May 2006 Archives
Good read by Robert Young at GigaOm. He makes the usual good points about the paradigm shift from internet 1.0. He brings up the commodification of social creativity, given rise, or at least a better vehicle by first the digital publishing revolution, and further accelerated by recent technical innovation and social consideration as we adapt to the binary world.
Its good to see that some people are thinking critically about web 2.0 technologies, namely AJAX. ThinkVitamin throws up a good read on the pitfalls presented by irresponsible use of AJAX.
Authorities in Australia are considering an "email address for life" to bring email and snail-mail closer together. What a novel concept—I like it—though there are privacy considerations. Imagine a massive governmental mailbox, where every letter and package is open and available for deviants and government to see. Will we be seeing an e-version of those envelopes that supposedly prevent people from seeing the contents without opening? Oh yea, thats called encryption.
With all the new innovation in mobile tech, one would think the interfaces would be improved. There's a growing frustration with the ridiculous effort navigating a mobile device requires. There are a number of screens, with interaction paths that are really non-sensical—and these are on every single handset interface.
An article in Wired, titled Just Give Me a Simple Phone outlines some of the exasperation the regular consumer feels when confronted with the red-tape and electronic beurocracy of mobile phones.
Maps are good. Geocoding is good. Rss is good. Geo-rss affords so many possibilities—real-world application. The geocoder movement needs to become huge, geocode the hell out of everything.
I spoke to fellow Ta-Da-ist Nick Sears about the antiquated system of geo-coordinates. I think there needs to be another axis—for orientation. The coordinate system is for a flat plane, not a globe, and requires a compass for orientation. Whats up with that?
Apparently online journalists are protected under the First Amendment. Who would have thought?
Two items hitting the news-wires have piqued my interest...
EU to tax e-mail, text messages? This seems to still be under consideration. The SMS tax seems more than a little high, in my opinion.
Strict Net neutrality passes House Committe. This whole concept of strict net neutrality seems a lot of empty rhetoric. We all know the telcos want as much money as they can get, with as little service they offer—they are obviously dissapointed, and will undoubtedly lobby the hell out of this. There is little enough competition among the telecommunication providers, hence the need for such checks on their power.
Two positive articles, sans [my] tongue-in-cheek >>>
THIS is the stupidest thing I've heard all day (aside from a couple obnoxious RegEx related Perl errors). Whats the need? What ever happened to one internet... pervasive ubiquitous blanket whatever... Seems ripe for failure, though a decent amount of money (better spent on so many other related issues) will be wasted.
Last week, I finished 37signals' Getting Real. Great read (yea, Steven Jackson, I know, I know). By no means should all they throw out be taken as gospel, but really, a great read. They provide real insight on the development process: what helps, what works, what hurts, and what will cause the dreaded spiral into nothingness. I'm thinking of framing pg 69 for my wall—Be An Executioner—which lays out a comical albeit brilliant breakdown and formula for successful ideas and execution. Much wisdom is dropped on the topic of creative development, productivity, management, even post-development—something that really doesn't exist... Basically a tech-start-up cheat-sheet. Go buy/download it.
Also, their blog is great.
Cnet.com posted an article on the developing mobile web standards that... didn't really say much at all. Obviously, said standards will be based on DOM, CSS, Javascript, and HTML markup. Obviously, the accepted tools will be at the mercy of the developers, who will ultimately determine what is used. But more action is needed by the mobile providers, and handset manufacturers... and most of all the browser developers. Of course, the same issues now plaguing the web browsers will hinder development and content delivery on mobile devices.
For some reason, the URL www.streegiw.com used to point to my site - hyperradiant.net. Why? I have no clue. Cached search results still find it. But now the mirror has been broken. Guess thats what I get for google-ing my name.
Any thoughts?
Working on a mobile and web-based social/info app for white-water boaters on the Potomac River (MD, VA). Its pretty broken no, but should be functioning (at least in part) in the next couple weeks. Thoughts? Critique? All is welcome, no holds barred.
Is it just me, or is Technorati ultra-sluggish? Too much traffic on an infrastructure that just can't support? Come on guys...
And really, it could be a lot better.
Last night I went to a show. I can't remember the last time I saw live music, much less really fucking great live music. Wax Poetics hosted a show at SouthPaw (Park Slope represent-zent) featuring Bronx River Parkway (Truth and Soul Records).
The story behind my obsession with Bronx River Parkway and other revivalist funk groups is quirky. I was a pretty big record-head in the latter half of high-school and all through college. Junior year of college I came to NYC to visit some friends and get in some digging (rifling through dusty crates and crates of mildewed records searching for gems). On my second day, I decided to hit up TurntableLab, though with no idea where the store-front was located. So I did what I always do, walked around till something happened.
Well, around 1pm, I found myself nearing the East Village, and came upon a promising find (though not TurntableLab, by any means)—a clean, organized, pretentious looking shop. Now, I didn't expect to find any bargains, mis-shelved vinyl... But figured what the hell, and came in. Started picking through the stacks, found some great stuff—not too terribly high-priced, and started chatting up the guy behind the counter. Found out he had a huge stack of New York revivalist funk 45's behind the counter, those records they always advertised in the back of Big Daddy (RIP), and now, Wax Poetics. Great stuff, for the most part, really vibe-y and soulful, with brilliant drums. Had him play a couple dozen and picked out 8 or so to add to my purchase.
Those 7'inches turned out to be my favorite finds from the whole trip (although the Syl Johnson and Main Ingrediant lps still get constant rotation).
Well, I got back to Boston, and in making my usual rounds to the diggin spots, I started to find more of these 45's. Picked up a couple doubles, gave a couple away... Just really good music. Not super-rare, not something you would really play out, but great stuff to just chill with. And fun to mix.
But back to the original point, out of all those groups, Bronx River Parkway has to be one of my favorites. Stripped-down, gritty, latin-tinged funky-goodness. Phenomenal percussion, horns are always on-point, mellow keys, and heavy, just-sparse-enough bass. This aint an MP3 blog, or I'd post a couple tracks. But damn, it felt good to check out a show.
Three articles in the NYTimes struck my eye today:
Digital Media Brings Profits to TV Studios
Can TV's and PC's Live Together Happily Ever After?
More after this [PHP] programming break.
Great stuff seems to be going on over at the Berkman Center (Harvard—Cambridge, MA). Salutations to Shawn VanEvery. Good writing on conference events from Xin Roman, as well as great coverage overall on the event blog. Can't wait for more audio/video from this.
The nation is afire with talk of NSA wiretapping. This is a good thing. Not the blanket info and wiretapping (though I'll get to that later), but the talk. The ability to intercept communication and the actuality thereof has always been an issue within community. That being said, there has been a huge shift in what is considered private in the past few decades. Telecommunications provides for a sense of removal, an illusion of privacy never before felt. The feeling is akin to whispering in an empty room. But there are ghosts listening. The notion brings to mind legends of the spirit, hidden ethereal bodies ever present but untouchable. Perhaps we need new legends to update the old, to teach our children how to communicate effectively and take into account the oubliete of the ghost. This carries over through wiretapping, to extend to internet stalkers, a pan-all paradigm shift in the presence of transparent ubiquitous communication.
Now, the wiretapping. The government. Super-secret mega-scary ghosts sitting on your shoulder waiting for you to say "bomb", "heroin", "rape", "dissent"... The actual wiretapping doesn't scare me so much as the unchecked nature of it all, and the overall paranoid and/or uninformed response. Gathering information is great. I'm heavily biased towards grabbing everything, as might be gleaned from my previous ramblings. But the filtering is the kicker. How to filter out all the droves of information without infringing on privacy (albeit a privacy which really doesn't exist). Lawrence Lessig stresses the importance of transparency—the removal of the content to the subject—the human. I somewhat agree.
But how do the ghosts decide? Software? Is the impartial judge only reached through artificial intelligence and algorithmic filters? No, there will always be a human trainer. A man behind every byte. Scary?
Patents. Promoting innovation. Protecting intellectual property. No bright lines.
Tipped off to an interesting development re: patent research. The office is now promoting a system of peer review for new patents. This is pretty great, as there seem an aweful lot of ridiculous patents being registered as of late. Hopefully this will cut down on the garbage, pan-all, blanket patents mucking up the creative world.
Little Flash ad I did for Match Fine Print
You might have noticed a pretty big gap in posts that last week of April. This was due, of course, to the end of semester crazy-time at ITP, and the lack of all things relating to time, not final projects... Or something to that effect. In any case, finals went well, though nothing is really finished. Should be posting more about those aforementioned projects, as they are still very much in various stages of development. And dangit, they will be worked on, if I have to sacrifice sleep and free-time forever.
To all you fellow ITPers who had things in the show, great job. Great show. And to all the graduated second years, good luck; all will be missed.
