NakedPenguins

Kenya to fight hate speech

2010-06-02T08:56:00.000-07:00

For any group of people that put a value on free speech, a powerful tool for progress, it will always be the things we don't want to hear and things that make us upset that need the most protection. Discouraging people from talking about how they feel, and going so far as to ensure what they have to say does nothing to eliminate the ideas and feelings that people have.

It is not a bad thing to imagine a world where everyone loves each other and can get along in peace, but hate speech is a symptom than a cause of a real problem. In medicine, a sick person can be running a fever, but putting them in cold water does not heal the sickness.

Some people will always find excuses to be violent, no matter how quickly the excuse of the day can be censored. If what you want is to discourage violence, property damage, and fear, educate people on the principle and value of the free expression of ideas. Free people from the fear of expressing their opinion, and free people from fear of the opinions of others that they may disagree with, albeit strongly.

This mutual respect for will be a necessary tool for peace. Let people know what is really intolerable and come down hard. Creating a gray area for non-violent hate mongers is corrosive to law and the civil society, and too often what can be considered 'hate speech' yesterday, today, or tomorrow changes with the political atmosphere.

I am not denying that there are real problems in Kenya, just saying that a cautious (not to imply slow), structured, pragmatic approach will be necessary to make real change.

Again,
1. Educate for speech tolerance and against violence.
2. As much as necessary, swat / riot teams PROTECT protesters / non-violent expressions of all people equally.
3. Quickly and aggressively (zip ties are good for this) break up physical confrontations and acts of violence.

Targeting the problem as directly and narrowly as possible prevents resources from being spread thin, and builds public confidence of governmental objectivity.

Please, do not make 'hate' the gray area of violence any more than you desire violence be the gray area of free expression.

Re: Sex Workers Rights Reform Challenges

2010-05-18T09:04:00.000-07:00

(in response to the linked article)

Another thing I would add is that while prostitution itself is a misdemeanor, efforts made by prostitutes to protect each other for safety falls within the scope of pimping, a felony. Lower personal risk means higher legal risk.

Not as a reason not to legalize, but a challenge in legalization that I see is in the area of contrast and parental rights / obligations. To my understanding only in recent years at the Bunny Ranch in Nevada girls may turn down offers by clients without penalty. Previously if a girl did not want to serve a client she would be held liable to the house for their share of lost profit. Not wanting to put girls into uncomfortable situations, girls are free to accept or decline offers as they please.

But what if this came down to a legal battle? In the exchange of most goods contract law can provide equitable relief on unique goods and services. How would the law remedy such a situation as in my experience every woman is unique in both beauty and talents.

Also, the US has unique anti-discrimination laws from other countries. If a girl does not want to be with men but only women, has issues with people of certain cultures, only want to be with older or younger clients, married or single clients? How do we address and remedy these civil rights issues when the law needs to be blind? Should sex workers get a special pass?

Also, would a sex worker that gets pregnant, despite all precautions, be entitled to the same child support as in other circumstances? Is it an assumption of the risk? Could abortion as an individual policy of a sex worker be advertised? Could it be legally enforceable? I would think that if it wasn't a legally enforceable provision of a contract (with advertisements being 'offers') then it could not legally be advertised, but it still makes the matter complicated. What risks would be assumed by the client and by employees?

I am not a fan of anti-bigamy laws for many of the same reasons listed above, and while I reject the common "ethical reasons" for a ban on bigamy, I see the greatest challenge being a legal one. As if family law is not complicated enough.

Finally, a major challenge I see is from liberal progressives that still hold egalitarianism as a social ideology and goal. I agree that many people get into prostitution because there are low financial and educational barriers to market. The most well educated and subsequently skilled sex works are always going to make the most money as in any business, but I am certain on the job training is always allowed. Not to mention that since sex work is typically commission based, brothels would need to be having exceptional difficulty with someone to turn them away. Most sex workers not bringing in good money get out of the business first. I believe all people pick goals based on their circumstances, but to an egalitarian opportunities that exist in nature for poor people are immoral and "unlovely". Thus, while people have sex for free, this punishment where appropriate to apply is seen as morally equitable.

Defeating socially conservative opposition to prostitution might very well be easier.

Recognizing that, sex workers rights is an issue that is exclusive to libertarians. "centrists" will go along with anything, but the further you get from the center either left or right I expect one to find a more difficult time getting actual support for any real reform. Even in this age of budget crisis, solutions, imo, have become even more aggressively partisan. This leads me to believe that an issue such as sex works rights that do not split on the political line, despite having very different reasons for supporting their position, I see it even less likely in this current environment that anything will change in the near future.

When would Slavery have ended without Lincoln?

2010-05-13T09:51:00.000-07:00

As to the call at the end of the [Mike Church Show] today, I appreciated the humility of the answer you gave. Slavery was on its way out in the western world, but as you said, it is all speculation as to how something might have turned out under circumstances that never took place.

Right now I am in the middle of reading "The Lincoln War Crimes Trial: A History Lesson" [1] on Lew Rockwell's web site. I look forward to pointing people to that article, but that is aside from the point.

As far as "what would have happened" I sometimes wonder how history would have been written had Adolf Hitler been more successful. Hopefully not in my opinion and understanding alone, many people were very concerned about the violence against many groups of people, but with the piles of propaganda produced by the state, the passive supporters of the Nazi regime accepted the belief that the parties ambitions had a moral imperative.

Similar to global warming, there was a belief that (rather than carbon dioxide) bad genetics was going to wipe out the human race if drastic measures were not taken to stop this downward spiral. If you believed this argument, what could possibly be more important than working together to combat this problem eventually by any means possible.

If people revered today the legacy of Adolf Hitler with the degree of revisionist history taught in our public schools and espoused by neo-cons about "Honest Abe", I expect that instead of the question "How would slavery have ended?", you would get callers asking how else the human race would have been saved.

And sadly [Mike Church] would have to give exactly the same answer: "I can't speculate about a history based on circumstances that never took place".

If I could speculate, slavery was on its way out as it was losing economic viability on its own as in the rest of the Western world. A spontaneous order would have been an economically strong south without slavery, and without the slaughter of a Civil War. The institution of slavery would have faded into the past and regarded with a disdain between the treatment of American Indians and Chinese railroad workers.

[1] http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/wilson2.html

Democrats vs. Republicans

2010-04-27T17:03:00.000-07:00

(Click above link above link for context)

And this isn't simply filled with hate?

What I make of this is that if I tell you I am a "Republican", then this is what you are going to assume about me and my beliefs and the only philosophical grounds I stand upon is racism, homophobia, and equally support any and all proposals by any person that has ever identified themselves as "Republican" or "Conservative".

And if I told you I have never listened to Rush Limbaugh, never watched Fox News, and was never a political fan of George Bush, I don't live in a Trailer Park, and I have never hit a woman could I guess that you would say that I am not really a Republican?

You want a real list of conservative values, why not ignore the BS on BOTH sides and get a better understanding of the argument, then try to look for people that stand on the principled ground from which good policy is going to come from.

Some sites that have attempted to delineate conservative values for conservatives to focus on and debate:
• http://www.thecontract.org/the-contract-from-america/
• http://oathkeepers.org/oath/2009/03/03/declaration-of-orders-we-will-not-obey/
• http://theamericanconservatives.org/cms/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=49&Itemid=62
• http://www.campaignforliberty.com/about.php
• http://www.gop.com/index.php/learn/what_we_believe/

And of course you have rating scales that measure how certain candidates stand up. By some measures I have seen, Jim DeMint has a good prospect among Republican members of Congress for being elected President in 2010
• http://www.ontheissues.org/senate/jim_demint.htm

On The Nolan Scale, I know where I agree and disagree with Jim DeMint. I believe his proposals for Health Care reform are among the very best that are comprehensive, but I do not agree with his positions on everything.

The Nolan Scale is very interesting in my opinion and is a good measure of political ideology, and I think a discussion over why one might be in a particular position pn the Nolan Scale (beyond, of course, just the issues at question in The World's Smallest Quiz) that could actually give people some insight into why two moral people that disagree with each other can still respect each other.

Of course there are other political spectrum theories. I was impressed with the Wikipedia article on the issue and was impressed by how similar and yet not so similar arguments over political spectrums were, and the quality with which they support their arguments, particularly in how some compare and contrast socialism and communism. More and more I have felt like each "side" has a very different perspective on the political spectrum itself and where other people lie :
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_spectrum

But if you would prefer baiting by which we take anecdotal evidence of wrongs or downright hypocrisy on one side and stereotype individuals that put themselves out as members of that party, don't be too shocked when those not intimidated by your remarks don't come running to vote democrat.

To be a Democrat you need to believe...

1. The Civil War was over the right to keep slaves.

2. People that support States Rights want to bring back slavery.

3. American Jurisprudence begins with Holmes and ends with Warren.

4. Economic Theory began with Adam Smith and ended with Keynes.

5. There are ten articles to the Constitution, beginning with Free Speech and the Separation of Church and State.

6. Democracy is the process by which we make our laws.

7. It is the job of the Supreme Court to interpret the Constitution.

8. Free Markets are great, but Congress needs to make sure everything is fair first.

9. The president is the leader of the nation.

10. Murder should not disqualify you from being a member of Congress as long as you are really sorry, or just too drunk to remember.

11. "This is a White Man's Government!" is the slogan of the Republican party.

12. If you went to college you are an authority on every subject, unless you are a Republican then you are an authority on no subject.

13. If you worship a big white man on a little black cloud you are crazy, but if you worship a little black man in a big white house you are enlightened.

14. #13 is proof that I am a racist.

15. #14 is proof that I am a racist.

16. People other than you or anyone you know that have a lot of money got that way because they are greedy and therefore can not be trusted to spend their money in personally or socially responsible ways.

17. People other than you or anyone you know that don't have a lot of money got that way because they are stupid and therefore can not be trusted to spend their money in personally or socially responsible ways.

18. In Brown vs. Board of Education the defense shared findings that Black students in segregated schools more greatly preferred playing with white dolls than those students in integrated schools.

19. Ernesto Miranda was set free because his constitutionally protected right against self incrimination had been violated.

20. The purpose of a corporation is to give people jobs.

21. People are elected to office because the average person is too ignorant and stupid to understand complicated issues like buying health insurance or healthy food, but also explains why republicans sometimes get elected.

22. People that believe in personal responsibility and getting things when earned have been brain washed by right wing extremists.

23. The Tea Party is the militant branch of the GOP, and every non-white is a token. All the white ones wish they were Timothy McVey, but gun control stops them from fulfilling the dream.

24. Eugenics isn't politically correct, but probably necessary because the world is over populated.

25. Al Gore

26. Immigration Laws are fine so long as they are not actually enforced.

27. The Lost Decade was due to a lack of government regulation, with bailouts and stimulus money that didn't come as big, as fast, or as often as they needed to be to combat the problem.

28. Any time Barack Obama makes a wish and it doesn't come true, a Republican did it.

Yay, now we both have lists. Want to discuss conservative principles, or what democrats believe?

In re Constitution

2010-04-05T15:27:00.000-07:00

The biggest different between VAT and Fair Tax is that a VAT would just be another turd on the pile of crap that is our tax code. The Fair Tax, AT LEAST, makes the number of people that would be potential criminals for trying to work and earn a living WAY down; Fair Tax repeals the income tax.

And as long as we are talking about sobering reality, I heard some unfortunate news that I can not dispute. The Constitution is dead... and as much as it is not dead it is simply meaningless. Thomas Woods and Kevin Gutzman make a strong argument that the Constitution was on its way out the door with the Wilson administration and the philosophy of Oliver Holmes. The Constitution today is like British nobility: It is an interesting piece of history and a symbol of our cultural heritage, but other than that it has absolutely no force of law. The Constitution was a contract between the states for mutual self interest for which the federal government is an agent, and anyone that believes that is utterly delusional. Today we have much more a democratic republic, not constitutional federalism.

Many people today, to me, seem to think that kings and dictators are bad because they are evil, greedy, and selfish rather than finding the philosophical superiority in self governance.

Today the freedom many people desire is the freedom from responsibility. It only further breaks my heart that these people get away with calling themselves "liberals", for which they are anything but.

Today we have a compassionate, but none the less absolute, tyranny. The fact that government does not exceed anything greater than its own desire for control is no limit at all. It just means they are nice... except when they are not. We also find it acceptable because remember the other problem with kings is that we didn't vote for them. If we could just vote for our king, then everything would be fine, right?

btw, this isn't blaming anyone in particular, just pointing out the end result.

So basically, there is no question of constitutionality because there is no Constitution.

I am curious what is going to be the result of the April 9th Article V summit in Washington DC. The hosts have some great suggestions, not to mention some good ideas from state legislatures on how states can protect themselves (for which naming would go beyond the scope of this comment).

But remember, any amendment will still only be a symbol on an already dead symbol. An amendment would only be a formality for the real process of fortification (protect citizens from being individually attacked by the fed; take a look at what Montana and Arizona are doing) and nullification (reject federal authority).

Anything less and all the amendments you pass are just make a bigger constitution to wipe your tears with.

On Capitalism & the Free Market

2010-04-04T20:03:00.000-07:00

I am no scholar on the issue, but a friend was telling me about the history of Sudan with the rise and fall of their socialist system through the 70's until the oil embargo. As a strong proponent of the free market and capitalism, but I think one of the ironic about human beings and what makes a free market system and capitalism is that people will work their ass off to be lazy. The thing is that once people get what they want, they stop wanting.

Leave people to their own dreams with delusions of great inventions and great societies free of responsibility. They are going to believe it in their hards and it will become a religion, and people will work till their hands bleed and keep going.

But as soon as you convince a person we already live in a perfect world, or be already got it figured out, or don't worry just HOPE because there is someone else assigned to the job; the lazy inside of us doesn't cheer (but maybe a little) but instead just says "ok, nevermind."

We don't need to encourage hardship to "watch the human spirit overcome great adversity" as I think many liberals believe what the free market is about, but leaving people alone, free to have wild delusions and make it a reality for them and anyone else that choose it for himself, or moves on to make his own dream.

I love my dreams, dreaming is one of the greatest experiences of life. There are so few things we can really have much power in this world. Why in the world would anyone want to pay (or vote) someone else to do that for me.

I can't imagine a more important purpose for our being here.

In response to "Universal Health Care is not Socialism"

2010-03-29T17:48:00.000-07:00

As with everything including socialism, it isn't an argument about whether or not it should be regulated or rationed or whatever but about WHO gets to regulate and ration. When things are not regulated they can get out of control when it is important. That does not provide any basis or argument for any particular person or group to step in and do the regulating.

Every moment of your life and all things around you are regulated in one manner or another. For example rainfall is heavily regulated by temperature, and how often I see my doctor is regulated by how well I am feeling and how much money I have. Whether or not a person opens a business is regulated by ... err.. you get the point.

Before trying to fix something and reaching for the biggest tool you can find, ask yourself this question: What is a government? Where does it come from? What can governments do? What can government NOT do? A really fun question is what are some good things governments can and can not do vs bad things governments can and can not do contrasted with should not and list why.

Sometimes I wish I could punch Thomas Hobbes in the face for not explaining his work to people that would wish to take his observations out of context and try to reason that they were laws of nature and society. His observation was that the mass majority will comply with ever increasing government because any single step towards greater control always seems less harmful than the idea of "returning to a state of nature", or no government. Further, people tend to look at government control as freedom from responsibility, which is generally true, and for the consumer relief from responsibility by government means it may or may not only be easier for them such that it is a win win situation. Health Care for example: the class of individuals needing medical care mutually exclusive of medical providers believes that either 1)they are going to get something for free, 2) nothing is going to change for them. This class so greatly out numbers health care providers that their opinion is irrelevant. Therefore, logically, median voter says government takeover of health care can be good thing. It would also baffle the mind of most people to understand why anyone could possibly oppose a perpetually more powerful government. Also, if you agree with Hobbes (which is so deeply rooted in modern western thought anyway) we "know" that government only gets larger because the only way for it to get smaller would be for a significant number of people so opposed to whatever the government is doing that they would be willing to do without it completely. Such a situation is SO rare, who cares, right? Next, once we have accepted that government is going to only get bigger, and just take the leap forward that since progress is directly correlated to the size of government therefore government tends towards improving society.

Yeah, so all your arguments about how if it is important then we need to create a government bureaucracy, or more so, you are going to keep sitting on your ass while someone else both creates and another becomes the victim of a government bureaucracy is no argument at all, just a shibboleth of your political ideology.

And can you please explain your signature? Is your argument: Socialism = bad, Universal Health Care = good, therefore Universal Health Care != Socialism? It is almost like you make an argument against socialism, but then don't ... therefore you are right. What?!? Back to the earlier check your reality and try again questions. What is a government? What is the general structure or philosophy behind a socialist ideology? Where when and how does it work and for what purpose? Where may or may not this ideology be incompatible with the theory of what a government can and can not be, and under what circumstances or steps might be taken to mitigate possible shortfalls of socialism?

So how about this:
Health Care is a good thing and universal elements of it are tried and true rules of the industry. We love, value and honor people that enter the profession when it is what they choose to do so freely with the time, intellect, and resources that they are given on earth, and despite however they may choose to organize, or whatever mistakes they may make, we will not inflict the will of the people upon them because universality of any particular system is no measure by which others may make judgments of them. Also, indirectly related, we believe that life is both not so important and yet too precious at the same time that our lives or anyone else's life would be better managed by another than the principle individual without their consent as aspects of socialist philosophy might have us believe.

So get over it.

Citizens United v. FEC

2010-03-25T14:44:00.001-07:00

(Note: Old article I had planned on posting 3/25, but I do not know why I did not get any further than saving it as a draft. Anyway, whatever I was planning on adding I may get around to at some later time.)

I greatly enjoyed reading your post to Alan Grayson's page on Citizen's United v. FEC. Having heard so much from different writers I am finally getting to reading the transcript. Your arguments had significantly greater depth than others that I have read. In particular, I was very disappointed by the reaction of Lawrence Lessig whom I expect you are familiar with.

So it seems that the general argument is that we don't want quid pro quo elections, and law has many restrictions. It seems to stand out from your post that you believe that corporations are inherently evil, but even aside from that the McCain Feingold Act was not only much more sweeping, but make special partisan exceptions.

The legal question to me seemed to be whether the government had been prudent in narrowly addressing a systemic problem, or just banged at it with a hammer until they felt better about the issue without really considering the possible adverse side affects.

Whether or not you may have been in the minority of people that may have been interested in this film this isn't even a question of what they said but at the heart of whether or not they had a right to say it. And as if Theador Oleson's request for an open mind to adverse side effects, such as his mention that 97% of corporations are "mom and pop stores", the argument that "well what we really mean are the big money corporations" is exactly the point he tries to make. Follow that up with Elena Kagan affirmation of the censorship of little American business people, but that the big foreign owned media corporations effectively do whatever they want. Kagan demonstrated that the law, if upheld, would give the government the power to censor any and all political speech not done on a soap box.

This case didn't come down to a proper application of a good rule but an attack against specific speech someone didn't like, never mind it was big money opposition. And as you point out, there is nothing the court can do not. Clinton still lost, but that does not address that a group of people (like them or not) intended to purposefully express themselves as a meaningful time and place and were not allowed to. The manner in which the individuals to that assembly carried far too much weight in a way that really wasn't appropriate.

Personally, I love this case because to me it is a reminder of the wisdom that a bad law is NOT better than the absence of a good law. I think it is the law that was so overreaching in an attempt to address a great fear that it missed completely. Blame Congress for that, not the supreme court.

Don't worry, I know I stand alone in this belief, but since you seem to be very well read on the issue, I would be interested in your opinion of those aspects.

Thanks in advance for taking the time to respond if you do. If you don't have time or what not, thanks again anyway for your article.

A longer rant

2010-03-24T16:22:00.000-07:00

@Esoteric0714 Sigh, I only have time to slap one libtard a day, so feel lucky. You say something, and someone else says "STFU", you are BOTH exercising freedom of speech. Also, I really recommend you not spending so much time getting your critical thinking skills from listening to Nancy Pelosi, one day stupid might hurt and you will be in trouble. The Constitutional Convention that created the Constitution NULLIFIED the Articles of Confederacy, and the reason for it was to throw out (nullify) the British national system the founders admired but recognized the need to be decentralize if once this republic was put into place were to not become what we had finally thrown off. The problem with the Articles of Confederation was its FAILURE to properly nullify British rule as seem when the British attacked New York.

Also, you talk about the founders of the confederacy vs. constitution as if they were different people from a different time. So for your own sake, please pick up a history book and read it.

Btw, I still don't understand how a person without education or any feeling for how the government is run with respect to their personal responsibility even bothers opening their mouth on the discussion of how that system might be transformed. Is it a principle of "the loudest hobo catches the most dole", or "The greater the kiss ass, the greater the mouth full"? Guess that is just one of life's mysteries. I guess Machiavelli's failure was just a fluke.

The Contract

2010-03-23T12:11:00.000-07:00

I am not sure if this is going to be expanded into a short story, but I would like to think that it will. This started as a Slashdot reply, and turned into something a bit more. I might like to keep this a secret, but it seems posts to this blog are pretty much a secret anyway, so who cares. Btw, this was a response to a statement made about the preamble to the constitution and the statement about "general welfare."

---

Even the most basic understanding of contracts modern or historical gives simple clarity. If I make an agreement with my neighbors for the purpose of landscaping in order to create a more perfect neighborhood and the general welfare of the street, to reduce cost, time, and effort to that need, we would need to specify what that means. For example, within the contract we specify that ABC Landscaping will be the agent to the contract, and they have the right to determine how many times a month on which days our lawns will be mowed, so long as they are specified in advance; the amount of water and fertilizer necessary to promote healthy growth. If ABC Landscaping informs us that the best lawn is one mowed every other day, that was left to their discretion because it is specified in the contract. If we think this is excessive, it is not a contract violation per se, but a fault of the parties. In such a case you would probably want to notify that even if it is in the best interest of the lawn that you really didn't want the lawns mowed 15 times a month. On the other hand, if ABC Landscaping installed fences and lawn gnomes in every yard and converted one persons lawn to be a community pool, they have clearly violated the contract no matter how much they may argue that it contributes to the general welfare of the neighborhood as specified in the preamble.

The situation we have is to imagine a neighborhood of renters where the contract is made between the landlords, ABC Landscaping is still the agent but the cost of the landscaping is not included in the rent. Further, ABC Landscaping can sue you if you do not pay them. The problem we have is that ABC Landscaping has decided to convert all our yards into a giant admission free amusement park. And as if the Landlord we almost never see not caring wasn't enough, any complaints about this possibly having gone a bit too far are met with the kids throwing a fit over loosing their free amusement park and redouble that with the Union of Amusement Park Ride Operators crying that you are trying to kill jobs and put people out on the street.

This really isn't what you bargained for, but you are providing jobs, and the teenagers are reasonably well behaved. It is a bit on the expensive side, but hell, you even enjoy the rides every so often.

Now ABC Landscaping puts on their thinking caps. There really isn't any room for any more rides, but still they would like to make the amusement park better. So they get the brilliant idea of adding concession stands with free food for anyone visiting the amusement park! Everyone is thrilled, right? And anyone that complains must want people to starve to death or at very least just be miserable, right? "Buy your own damn food!" How cold is that? What possible reason could people really have for not wanting free food when everyone can get some?

To be continued...

The democracy of open source

2010-03-22T16:05:00.001-07:00

My criticisms of democracy only go as far as to agree with what James Madison and H.L. Menkin said about democracy. To say that if you reject pure democracy then you must prefer an dictator and that all dictators are evil is just absurd. Some things just should not be a majority vote of anyone that has an opinion just as science does not become truth with consensus.

Open Source is a meritocracy where your voice is heard relative to your contribution and against the weight of the merit of your opposition. The best part is that nobody's basic necessities are dependent upon the success of the open source project but in very limited circumstances, and money is not the primary driving force behind decision making.

Open source community in general is good at keeping communication lines open and the pool of ideas is greatly valued. If democracy to you is where a lot of people are free to give input, fine, but I don't want to hear you complain when the idea board is flooded with "make it work better", and "this sucks, you should do it different."

In my humble opinion, "democracy" is a very poor word choices to describe the nature of the open source community, or even an individual project.

Microsoft listens and then does whatever people ask for. The Linux community listens to people, but then does it right. Maybe democracy is the best form of government / organization for many reasons, but that doesn't mean the shortcomings simply don't exist. What frequently impresses me the most about the open source community is the ability to gather such diverse input without blinding people from doing what they know is most practical in principle to the best of their knowledge. I see it as fundamentally more beautiful than democracy without loss of generality for its merits.

Freedom, to be discussed politely over coffee.

2010-03-22T11:19:00.001-07:00

The US Supreme Court has never been one much for challenging congress. I am sure the supreme court will find some argument why this this is not unconstitutional rather than face the wrath of both branches of government. What needs to happen for the first time in history (and is well on its way) is an Article V Section 2 convention that 1) Does what Arizona did, bar government control over health care, collect taxes or spend money on health care, and imprison any individual entering the state for such purpose as treason. 2) Repeal the 17th amendment; the constitution is a contract BETWEEN the states, and the Federal government is an agent to that contract. The federal government has no sovereignty than what the states choose to give. The parties to that contract need to be responsible for maintaining it. 3) Clarify the due process clause of the 14th amendment; The bill of rights are a clarification of what the states wanted to make clear that the Federal government had no right to touch with the limited power it was given. Any and all "rights" of the bill of rights desired of the citizens of a state should demand that they be incorporated into their own constitution as that is the only place in which individual protections from all government or other private individuals is meant to be. Again, Bill of Rights as Obama puts it is a list of negative liberties for the Fed as they rightfully should be, as they were intended. 4) Clarify the interstate commerce clause. The interstate commerce clause does not mean that the federal government has as it pleases the power to regulate any and all things that might possibly have an impact on the economy but instead, as it was intended, to ensure that conflicting state laws do not hinder business across state lines, in other words, minimalistically remove barriers to interstate commerce.

Thank goodness for the wisdom of George Mason that insisted on the last minute addition of Article V Section II that allows states to reign in the Fed with NO "approval" of Congress, the Supreme Court, and certainly not the president.

This is the last resort to save this country. The people that still think freedom is worth fighting for must be the ones that take the power back. The idea that the Federal government is going to reign itself because of some morally guiding light suddenly sparking in the minds of the supreme court justices that freedom be necessarily inflicted upon the American people like Health Care "Reform" is laughable. Such action could only be scorned because those apathetic individuals that believe fighting for freedom is someone else's job only see freedom as responsibility someone else may free them from.

Today is a dark day, but there is hope today will be a call for apathetic people to wake up and ask what America once was and do what is necessary to take it back.

48 hours of freedom

2010-03-19T12:58:00.000-07:00

Other than government regulations (Mostly state regulations) that have sold non competition agreements, individuals have (for another 48 hours) the right to pick a difference health provider and different ways of ensuring their health including but not limited to a comprehensive HMO or limiting themselves to catastrophic illness insurance and paying cash for everything else.

This is "the right of the people", aka the mob, again bringing the right change for everybody by finally voting in the right person to lead, versus ensuring individuals the freedom to make informed decisions that meet their needs.

The counter argument is that people are too stupid, and those not too stupid are too greedy to be trusted with such responsibility. Personally, I find such notion offensive and that while that philosophy may have dominated for a long time I believe we over came such "negativity" with the enlightenment, and for those that were paying attention, what was once the Great American Experiment proved otherwise.

I see the temptation, and I entertained it myself when I was younger, that government and most of peoples lives could be better managed by panels of experts, helping us with difficult decisions and help mitigate some of the greatest risks that too many people unnecessarily loose their lives over, simply because they did not understand the risks of their endeavors (Not purchasing insurance, saving for retirement, heating healthy, exercising regularly, etc.) Common sense drives us to this conclusion with so many examples of pain that might have been avoided with a little intervention. It is likely why it is not a new idea. Particularly in the last 100 years we have seen example after example of great leaders making promises that in the near future life would be fair and that all we need is to cooperate and give a little bit more. Dissenters are always marked as heartless and uncaring, that they do not know as much as the experts, or just too stupid to understand the bigger picture.

Community is a great thing, but that does not mean that it can be forced upon someone then used as an example of its own greatness.

We'll miss you America.

McCain v. Feingold

2010-01-26T18:58:00.000-08:00

I can't help but agree with the majority opinion, not to mention in the case the Attorney General made a good case for why by the letter of the law made virtually all public political speech illegal. McCain Feingold Act is a great example of crony Republican big government control that Democrats vehemently opposed until the Union exemption was put in place. The law was BAD and so was the sell out.

A corporation is only a group of people, and as people should have the right to peacefully assemble. Numbers have power which is why the right to peacefully assemble is opposed by oppressive government, and why it is a protected right in our constitution.

The only time corporations become corrupt institutions is when they are empowered by government to do so. Big corporations have the money and resources to find legal ways around such laws, not to mention it gives congress power to play favorites which is exactly how this case played out. Of all the groups that would be charged with violating McCain Feingold, is it a coincidence that speech that put a powerful political parties front runner in a negative light would conveniently tie the speech up in court just long enough?

Getting government out of business is the best way to keep business interests out of government any further than to respect the interests of any individual regardless of who they associate with and how.

Transparency in this case, as mentioned in the majority opinion, is going to be the key to fair elections. Let people know when information is put out with a political interest, at least in the case of public elections, that people know where that money comes from, and for the sake of privacy, allow <$100 monthly contributions be anonymous, and any amount greater to be in the best interest of the people to be disclosed.

Don't punish people for working together. This case can be no better example without loss of generality that McCain Feingold, while possibly well intended, failed to serve and in this case corrosive to its own purpose.

Pareto Optimum

2010-01-07T12:06:00.000-08:00

Was listening to the radio and reading some stuff they were making reference to and got me to thinking about random stuff. this is mostly stream of consciousness and has not been edited yet and being posted for whatever type of review it gets and will be changed in the future. Initially got off to a bad start imo. Rather than deleting those parts to omit them they are just not displayed using CSS. See source if for some bizarre reason you want to look at it. Anyway...

On a scale for issues to be from black and white to complex, and for a society to scale from homogeneous to diverse, what is the probability field for Strong Pareto Optimality to be met an ideal centrally planned republic following ideal policy of the Median Voter (as according to Median Voter Theory)?

If issue complexity and societal diversity can not be measured objectively then a range for central planning to determine the ideal application of Median Voter policy must be defined. Assuming ideal individuals, just as we are assuming ideal government (each being rational and all knowing), people should be left as freely as possible to make decisions for themselves being the most appropriate candidate to meet their needs.

Considering the set of needs of each individual as a point in the same field of issue complexity and person diversity with the point at which each individual is with regard to how well those needs are being met, necessary changes should be made in parallel. Considering the set of point pairs as necessary changes to maintain a Strong Pareto Optimum, it is efficient to apply similar transitions to any similar subset as to reduce the work in total necessary change. However, Republics given leaders that are members of the society in which they apply these transitions for, leaving the job to be done in parallel by the individuals is the shortest path to needs being met.

In the end this leaves a narrow scope for the most ideal national government to improve the lives of its citizenry through central economic planning. The scope for central economic planning should be limited inversely proportional to the diversity of the population as demonstrated. However, we can look further than the individual and a national policy. If a diverse citizenry chooses to seek like minded individuals, or diversity is a result of diverse regional environments then in the range of differences a tier of sets of sub regions of communities could be defined, and knowing that the individual is best left to make decisions concerning their needs as based on that level of diversity, so should the power be divided between those tiers.

This becomes more parent as one of the most important elements is introduced; people and governments are not all knowing or perfectly rational. In what ways do specific imperfections influence the necessity for a centrally planned economy or individual liberty in order to maintain a Strong Pareto Optimum?

Morgage means NOT owning your house

2010-01-07T10:01:00.000-08:00

Equity is just a very expensive savings account. You could rent wherever you like, even a house, and put the different between a mortgage and the rent into a savings account and the only difference is liability. You can walk away from a rental and keep a savings. The house could crash in value and you keep your savings and possibly lower your rent increasing the contribution to your savings. The reverse is true if the home increases in value. Homes and land do have real value and can be used to create wealth, but for the most part they are a greater liability, and when home / land values fluctuate so much based on prospective (what people think they are going to be valued at, and what people think other people think they are going to be valued at) makes a mortgage a special type of gamble, and of what we have seen recently in the US, an investment "gamble" similar to junk bonds. Personally, there are much safer investments with higher return and liquidity without the liability. Buy LAND with cash when it constitutes a CAPITAL INVESTMENT :)

Lord Monckton

2009-12-11T17:22:00.001-08:00

Love this guy and his many videos. The linked comment is far superior to the article he is responding to. The video is great and anyone that finds this to be damning evidence that he can't even debate a child clearly was unable to understand anything he was saying.

When I was in elementary school I was told by my teacher that if we didn't turn off the lights when we left the room that green house gases that reflected light away from the earth was going to cause the next ice age and everyone was going to freeze to death, but that it wasn't just us, we needed to tell everyone to turn off the lights and use less energy if we were to save the planet. It was scary, right up until I was told it was all still true, that the green house gases were making the planet hot, and we were all going to die because food would stop growing. The proof was that a glacier had broken somewhere and glaciers aren't supposed to break.

Why is it so "radical" or "extreme" to believe that we are all fine, the earth is fine, and people just need to calm the fuck down? Pollution is real and everyone can take responsibility for local pollution. But there is no global crisis that demands a world government to control the planets CO2 emissions. CO2? Really? There is more credibility to the Dihydrogen Monoxide crysis.

Pray for Obama

2009-12-11T15:30:00.000-08:00

To me, the most terrifying thing Obama ever said was that the founding fathers / Constitution lacked the insight to empower the President / Federal Government to bring peace and equality to the American people. He doesn't just lack an understanding of the principles of limited government, but seems to measure the greatness of a country by the size of its bureaucracy. This also seems to be his practice. Not that I would set him too far aside from some past presidents, but he really brings attention to it like never before.

You say that he would never be a Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, or Mao, but for what we can look back upon as having been so terrible, they were not so greatly criticized while in power. Most of them achieved the level of power they did because they were beloved by their people, devoted to their ideology. To my understanding, the principle of conservative values is government should only be powerful enough to enable people to take responsibility for their own lives and collectively for each individual to protect their own private property. People can be rational when it comes to decisions that will affect their own lives because they alone bare the responsibility. When others are granted the power to make decisions for other people and their lives, it is only well intended without consequences for the decision maker. None of those "monsters" of history would be who they were if not for the idealists that empowered and enabled them. So I don't think it is a question of whether or not Obama is any of those people so much as whether or not he is being enabled and empowered by an ideology only all too similar of a history we were asked to "never forget".

(note: I will post a link to the video when I find it)

Stealing great titles: War is Peace (Too bad the author couldn't steal something else better)

2009-12-07T13:41:00.001-08:00

I love crap like this about how our democracy is threatened by the free exercise of speech and the press. It is fun to compare pro censorship literature of the past 100 years to today and see how their tactics have improved, but always coming back to how people need to be protected from themselves, and from their own ignorance. The best part is that of course they are never talking about the reader; the reader is smart because they are reading their article. It is all those other people out there that don't read or can't understand the brilliance that is Lawrence M. Krauss that are the idiots out there we could help so much if they would just do what we say, and read what we write. After all, this is Scientific American.

My Health Care is fine. I like my doctor, and I don't think under any condition I will ever "like" hospitals (oh well). In my experience, government is just the biggest corporation around, and like many monopolies once powerful enough rarely needs to listen to the customer to keep conducting business as it pleases. Academia tells us that government is the voice of the people, but the reality of which person is being heard leaves a lot to be desired.

I think there is a lot that could be done to improve health care in the United States and the world for that matter. In my understanding of the bills as I have read them and listening to the range of opinions on specific issues, I do not like any of the proposals getting serious attention. I am very skeptical that this congress will be able to produce a decent bill. I would be more open minded if congress would at least begin by looking at some of the many social welfare programs and regulations concerning health care that have not been as effective as intended.

The fanaticism in this debate, as the author likes to put it, is the idea that something must hurriedly be passed, whatever it is. "Death Panel" is a buzz word no matter who says it that relates to actual fear (rational or otherwise) some can't easily dismiss, and controversies over how specific provisions of the various bill provisions will actually be interpreted and executed (no pun intended).

And if the scientific method as a whole is going to be brought into this debate, let us consider some principles of engineering. Great designs, in reality, are only as good as they can be explained. If a majority of people can not be more greatly persuaded by truth than by lies, maybe some of the burden lies on you to improve your documentation if not also the design itself. Blaming the reader, investor, or customer for simply not understanding your brilliance is a cop out. And if there really is an emergency, all the more reason for due diligence, not blind faith.

In response to some of the comments made by readers of the article:

"Where is the proof?"

I believe, at least, he is regurgitating quotes by right wing extremists have taken from Congressional Research Services Health Care Reform: An Introduction by Bob Lyke, April 2009 (http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/R40517_20090414.pdf), you know, the one and only AUTHORITY Congress uses to determine the cost and impact of bills. I would hope and am fairly certain that someone in congress uses other sources for information in the debate. But simply going by my understanding of the above article, if CRS says more people will be left without coverage, costs will go up, and there is no reason to believe quality will improve, should not we all just take them at their word? Despite the fact that I would agree with their position, I do not support centralization of information dispensation. It is worth pointing out, but no justification for censorship of less authoritative opposition.

Who to blame when you lose an argument you got to define?

2009-11-16T12:18:00.000-08:00

In response to rocknog on 11/09/2009

I don't understand why religion keeps being brought into the gay marriage debate. If marriage is a religious thing, then government shouldn't be involved in any marriage. I don't understand how opponents of gay marriage can get around that contradiction.

Maybe they oppose States hijacking marriage and despite the fact that it won't change, they don't want the state further redefining marriage while in their trust. Remember, if you oppose federal control (support state rights / 10 amendment), you are a racist, and if you support individuality, personal responsibility, or anything theoretically covered by the 9th amendment (and I say theory because as far as I know, nothing has ever been supported on 9th amendment ground), then you must be a devil worshiping anarchist.

I think marriage means too many different things to too many different people and that the only people that have much any understanding of what marriage means with regard to the "state definition" is divorce lawyers. I think there should be no such thing as marriage as defined by the state because it is a loaded word. I bet if they could only call it domestic partnership that more people would actually take the time to read the contract.

People tend to ignore conservative arguments against states hijacking things for their own purposes and are generally written off as paranoid wackos, but for once "gay marriage" turned a lot of heads. And as with all the other issues they try to get attention, things such as facts makes most peoples brains go numb such that the debate evolved into who could make the most emotionally compelling argument.

One side came forward with the beautiful and happy peace loving argument of "Hate is not a Family Value". Simple, and perfect... one might think, until one rebukes with "Your tax dollars are going to be spent to teach preschoolers about anal sex". Both have nothing to do with the law, but at the point that this hit, coming back with "Civil rights... something... I think" just couldn't work.

Once you pull a Godwin/Alinsky and you let it define the fight, you just can't ever go back to a rational argument, and further, you can't cry when your opponent ends up with the bigger, more impressive tower of bullshit.

So, three cheers for Big Government democracy? Where are all the gays thrilled that the system works? Hmm...

FMOSS (Free market open source software)

2009-10-27T14:25:00.000-07:00

With all the comments being fairly similar, going to present the other side as I see it.

Linux exists in a particular environment where INDIVIDUALS selfishly develop what THEY need for their own purposes. A person who needs a piece of software for their own purposes and successfully develops what they need has not only had their needs met, but also created intellectual wealth. The sharing of that wealth even by a single individual is positive.

The volume of wealth is so great, and the foundation so solid, that anyone with a computer and Internet access can take from the pool, ATTEMPT to improve on it, share their insight (whatever the form) and you get a positive sum of wealth.

This model, unlike any other, is INFINITELY scalable.

One problem may be approached by n people. The more people looking at the problem, the greater the chance of producing the ideal solution. Relatively no individual has the ability to STOP independent competitive solutions by any means than rationally demonstrating the superiority of their ideas.

There are "problems" with this model, but in my opinion, the nasty and poisonous perception of this model is that progress is zero-sum. I don't know if I could list in my lifetime how many ways anyone with that belief could be wrong, so let me make it very simple and clear.

WHAT I DO IN MY FREE TIME FOR MY OWN PURPOSE IS NONE OF YOUR F***ING BUSINESS any further than your freedom to do with and improve upon in your own way as you see fit what I choose to return to the community by either choice, or expected by the terms of the Gnu GPL.

You can not CONSCRIPT me into producing what YOU want, you can only enable me or discourage me to continue to contribute as I choose.

One of the articles criticisms, which seems to be a recurring themes of articles that like to tell people how they should be spending their time, is that of the number of distributions out there. Think about this: Why do people create distributions?

Is it because there are not enough of them? ... no

Is it because other distributions are going the wrong direction? ... maybe?

Is it because other distributions don't meet their needs? ... seems to be their perception at least

Is it because they feel like it?

BINGO!

Creating, maintaining, and promoting a particular distribution is a LOT of work (in my observation and from talking to people that have done it) But if you could make them not do what they want to do with their time, you really think they are going to magically do what you want instead?

What is amazing is that people left to their own devices (no pun intended) to do as they please, their minds begin to open to "what is possible in the spirit of playful cleverness".

Getting people to not do what you do not need doesn't make more for you. If you need more, there are three basic solutions: 1) wait and hope someone with with more initiative, motive, skill, etc 2) read a book and develop it yourself, or 3) Provide an incentive such as money to encourage someone with the skill to do it for you.

This is not an argument against team work, but just the same this article isn't an encouragement of team work either. Encouragement of teamwork involves 1) identifying a specific problem 2) defining the scope in which you wish to address that problem 3) outline a solution and develop a functional prototype that demonstrates why not only you have a good solution, but that your solution is better than other solutions (or non solutions) 4) Use your product from step 3 and actually demonstrate to people why they should expend their time and energy working on YOUR project, and technically 5) pick from those people you wish to bring onto the core of your team.

Final point: Teams and Communities do not exist for their own sake; they exist because it serves the voluntarily consenting members of them. If you want a centrally controlled, managed, and developed system that democratically considers the needs of everyone equally, such a project already exists. It is called Windows.

Cannonical / Mark Shuttlesworth provides something very specific: A platform and location for people to freely collaborate and exchange ideas while providing a face, in a sense, to a very distributed community. Thankfully, Mark has the wisdom to understand his role and learned the lessons of many other FlOSS projects come and gone and never abused his position of a role model to dictate how Linux should inspire anyone.

All projects stand on their merit alone, and as one hobby / amateur programmer, I hope I am not alone in hope that this state of anarchy never changes.

More fun with CSS and Javascript

2009-10-23T15:27:00.000-07:00

This one was just weird... whatever

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html>
  <head>
    <script type="text/javascript">
      function d2h(d){return d.toString(16);}
    </script>
  </head>
  <body>
    <script type="text/javascript">
    var x=0;
    var y=0;
    var z=0;
    var c=0;
    for (z=0; z<=300; z++)
    {
      if ((Math.floor(Math.random()*2)) == 0)
      {
      x=Math.floor(Math.random()*100 + Math.floor(Math.random()*1100));
      y=Math.floor(Math.random()*100 + Math.floor(Math.random()*2)*600);
      }
      else
      {
      x=Math.floor(Math.random()*100 + Math.floor(Math.random()*2)*1100);
      y=Math.floor(Math.random()*100 + Math.floor(Math.random()*600));
      }
      c=d2h(Math.floor(Math.random()*16777215))
      document.write("<p style=\"height:1; position:fixed; top:" + y + "px; left:" + x + "px; color:#" + c + "\">Happy Birthday!</p>");
      document.write("<p style=\"float:left; height:0px\">" + Math.random() + "</p>");
      document.write("<p style=\"float:right; height:0px\">" + Math.random() + "</p><br /><br />");
    }
    </script>
  </body>
</html>

My first javascript

2009-10-23T10:57:00.000-07:00

So evidently this is a bit too complicated for me to get into blogger in any kind of reasonable way. Layouts and all that stuff... blah! Anyway, if anyone wants to check it out, here it is:

granite.png
black.png


<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html>
 <head>
   <style type="text/css">
   img
   {
     float:left;
     height:20px;
     width:20px;
     margin:0px;
     padding-top:0px;
     padding-bottom:0px;
     padding-right:0px;
     padding-left:0px;
   }
   br
   {
     clear:both;
   }
   </style>
   <script type="text/javascript">
     var t=0;
     function mouseOver(imgID)
     {
       t+=1
       document.getElementById(imgID).src ="granite.png";
       var r=setTimeout(function(){document.getElementById(imgID).src ='black.png';},t); // Thank you Rogi!
     }
   </script>
 </head>
 <body>
   <script type="text/javascript">
     var c=0;
     for (c = 0; c <= 255; c++)
     { 
       if (c % 16 == 0)
       {
         document.write("<br />");
       }
       document.write("<img src=\"black.png\" id=\"" + c + "\" onmouseOver=\"mouseOver(" + c + ")\">");
     }
   </script>
   <br />
 </body>
</html>

Havn't we seen this before?

2009-10-21T18:06:00.000-07:00

Proof that government needs to get their stinkin' noses out of business. 1) AIDS medications are VERY expensive, so it makes sense to discriminate against pre-existing conditions, otherwise it is a service plan, not an insurance policy. Affordable service plans should be affordable, but they are still totally different. 2) She wasn't looking for an insurance policy to protect her against AIDS, which sadly she is at abnormally higher risk, but a health insurance policy for her general health and well-being in the future. 3) I would speculate that while she may still be concerned about the AIDS herself that she would be willing to buy a policy that excluded treatment coverage of AIDS if she contracted the disease, and of course subsequent harm that may be caused by the disease. If she is still HIV free in 3 years, have them take a look at her health and keep to their word of coverage without the exemption. You could probably get a bit of a cheaper rate considering you are not buying insurance against it, and they are happier to let you pay a little more when you do want the insurance again.

Now the million dollar question here is why hasn't this been thought of before? TRICK QUESTION! It has been and while the insurance companies would love to tailor your policies to exactly your needs, it is illegal. ILLEGAL! Not big bad insurance companies stopping you, but the law! Who writes the law? The government, sticking their noses in where they don't belong.

Why did the government do this? Well it was to protect people against the big evil insurance companies that were making it too complicated for people to understand what they were buying. So they made all health insurance virtually identical so people wouldn't get confused. For example, some people wanted catastrophic illness insurance, but then complained that it didn't cover antibiotics for ear infections. The really sad stories were those that bought health service plans like checkups, medication discounts, broken arm insurance, but NOT catastrophic illness insurance, and then got very sick. I remember a story of a guy that had a health service plan he bought for his whole family. After having paid premiums for him, his wife, and 12 year old daughter every month for over 12 years, his daughter was sadly diagnosed with brain cancer. The father was devastated when he "discovered" that the plan he had been paying into his daughters entire life wasn't going to help her when she was sick because as the insurance company said that while they were sorry about his daughters illness, brain cancer wasn't covered by the policy.

This story and many others like it were important anecdotes to support health care reform in the 80's. Insurance companies were demonized for selling predatory policies, and the government made insurance policies "regular", in addition to other regulations.

So maybe, like last time, instead of outlawing "confusing" policies, give people the resources necessary to make informed decisions, because no matter what the law is, if you are paying hundreds of dollars a month to someone, government, business, friend, whatever, and you don't know what it is really for, you are going to be totally screwed. And nobody loves to keep bigger secrets about how they do business for you a secret than government.

This article proves to me that government can't do anything right and need to get out of places they don't belong like economics. Actually, there are a few things the federal government might be able to do reasonably well. I think someone wrote them down once in a blog or something. Here's the link if interested: http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.overview.html

And just to note, making trade regular and regulating trade or planning the economy are NOT the same thing open to interpretation as one group of people see fit when it pleases them. If you don't like the constitution, repeal it... of wait, already being done. Never mind: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMe5dOgbu40

CSS sure is strange

2009-10-19T11:39:00.000-07:00

This is a test
This is a test
This is a test
This is a test
This is a test

So spending some time today checking out CSS, and evidently you can just add CSS styles to the header in the template if you edit the full template in html. Pretty cool. Wow, you sure can do some goofy stuff with CSS. :) However, the pages can not be previewed :(

Questionable motives?

2009-06-18T04:33:00.000-07:00

Found an awesome article I hope gets some attention. In the comments there is an argument that a better explanation for the boom in film production has been a reduction in cost (i'll assume due to digital editing and cheap high quality storage). Sent this letter and hope to hear back, but in the mean time if anyone else has some thoughts on the issue would love to hear them. Anyway... the letter:

You left a comment on the article "Harvard Study Finds Weaker Copyright Protection Has Benefited Society" that makes me more interested in where you were coming from. While I would agree that the cost of production has significantly dropped, I don't necessarily see where that means the author is incorrect. This article was a summary of a summary, and while I didn't look at the original article, let alone the data, I fel you are making quite a leap with your statement. Is there at least a reasonable argument that despite "massive piracy" that "harm" has NOT been inflicted considering that, as you state, growth in the film production market, even if not the film industry, has continued to grow as the cost of production has dropped? And considering the purpose of copyright law, and in particular the HUGE recent expansions to copyright law since WWII which imo were quite questionable in the first place, hasn't scientific progress and the digital age mostly advanced IN SPITE of many of those "protections" revealing that for the most part the law has been to revealed to have really caused more harm than "prevented"?

Despite the argument that the framers of the constitution couldn't have imagined a digital age, I DO think that they understood a thing about tyranny, censorship, and human progress if you look the history of human progress.

I would argue that it was book piracy, by way of the printing press was the most direct cause of the enlightenment. Why should bit torrent be any different?

Disney built its empire on piracy. Not to completely excuse that necessarily, but isn't hypocrisy just a tad ironic, if not at least questionable?

Anyway, you had an strong opinion, so I was curious about your thoughts on some other levels, if they are things you have thought about.

Hope to hear from you,
Keith

And responding to another comment...

@Misterbull.com

Your examples are "illegal" channels compared to traditional "all rights reserved" channels. If work is shared freely on those sites either hap-hazardly or more officially by affixing a Creative Commons licence to the work, then isn't that exactly a "weakening" of copyright law (at least in ways that big industry would have you believe) and piracy (again, as industry trys to convince us)?

Further, the great technologies, like the Internet itself, is dominatingly freely shared technology that was a collaborative effort where the creators knew that open access to information is the core of human progress, and that if what you are creating is what is most important, then sharing it freely is the best thing you can do for everybody; from tcp/ip to apache and Underwriter Laboratories and Open Group, these companies represent a core of all of the technology you argue are "other factors" that you attempt to use to explain away the contributions of a culture that rejects the ownership and monopolistic control of culture (pirates) when they are really one in the same. These big companies are more and more taking from the free culture pool, and because it has been allowed (particularly the way Berkeley has treated its patents), they have also become more successful.

And yet they still chant the same mantra that was rightfully rejected with the Statute of Anne. Current Copyright law was written by and for the purpose of supporting a particular type of distribution. Their past successes have granted them the kind of wealth that lets you buy the law that while being in conflict with the people and an abomination to the social contract means they have only bought themselves an extra decade or two as powerful lords have typically done.

The current copyright law is anti-artist, anti-consumer, and maybe worst of all, anti-culture. Anyone who SAYS otherwise either makes a lot of money through the exploitation of the current system, or really doesn't read much in the way of history after what is presented to them by The Ad Council.

On Polyamory

2009-06-17T23:35:00.000-07:00

I think all relationships are a challenge, but as a philosophy, the idea is that love is not divided between the people that you care about. I believe loving yourself is the first step in being a healthy person for someone else to love and if after that you can "be yourself" then every person you meet can be an opportunity to learn and grow.

Life is difficult enough with its natural challenges; unnatural barriers make it unnaturally more difficult. There are two very important things I get in my marriage that I could not get if we were monogamous. The first, the ability to trust another as you would trust yourself; I put this as a kind of 'rejection' of the golden rule. This is the real test of trust that requires complete honesty and no "fake" tests of faith, if you know what I mean.

The second is an ability to see myself more objectively in a relationship; only in multiple relationships can I see the difference between me and the relationship with another.

Ok, a third thing: When you meet somebody, they had a life before you. Hopefully if you have fallen in love with someone it is because of who they have been and all their experiences they have gathered in their lifetime before their life became intertwined with yours. While my wife and I would each say that we could not imagine our lives having not met, we still embrace that we are independently great people and love watching the other continue to grow and love right up until the time that we met. If all of that made us who we are today, perfect for each other, how could one try and say "stop being who you are, I like who you are right now"? I consider that such a discredit to our experience. I believe all my past relationships, good and bad, helped me become who I am today, and continuing that search for all the love the world has to offer can only teach me how to be a better partner for my wife, and anyone else who chooses to be a part of that. :)

Adding this cause I am sure some would find it controversial, and I am very curious what others may think. This was (as above) a comment left on a youtube video.

Relationships are a challenge, no matter what the philosophy. In the western world, there is an indoctrination leaning towards mono as much as there is towards being hetero.

What you end up with is not only an unhealthy conflict between personal philosophies regarding love, which can fail a relationship, but worse, an incompatibility in ability to communicate through it. Not to be elitist, but imho, gay and poly think more about why they are who they are for reasons 'normals' can't understand.

The Holy Trinity

2009-06-11T19:52:00.000-07:00

Trinitarians, the atheist beloved cousin:


<----------------------------------------------------------------------------------->
/| The Father is our ignorance once we have been humbled.                          |/
/|                                                                                 |/
/| The Son is our culture that teaches us by example and that we posses            |/
/| to give to freely.                                                              |/
/|                                                                                 |/
/| The Holy Spirit is the eternal material world we might ever hope to understand, |/
/| that we communicate with and shape in every action and thought of               |/
/| our limited existence.                                                          |/
<----------------------------------------------------------------------------------->

Quick, whose driving the bus?

2009-06-11T19:17:00.000-07:00

I blame the Republicrats. There, easy. Were going to hell and all we can do is argue about who is driving the bus. My non-partisan secular position is that the government is a business just like any other, always trying to sell you one thing or another. No surprise most people love their representative and loathe congress. What did you expect? The only thing that makes government different from any other business is that under the social contract we give the government the unlimited authorisation of violence in the course of its legal action. It is no wonder that as 'legal' has become an epistemological blur that that the governments morally justified monopolistic use of violence has just become a cost of getting the job done.

The most revealing is how easy it is to be accused of ideolatery to even attempt to reference the Constitution as a reason why congress shouldn't do something. People seem to think "Well, if it's a good idea, why shouldn't Congress have the power to make it happen?" Well, even throwing out the entire idea limited government proposed by the founders as having been too long ago to matter today, can't we see plenty of examples as necessary outside the US to see that only creates trouble?

If you think "Well, were better cause this is AMERICA!", then fine, but then why in such a freaking hurry to change it?

I am proud of Mr. Obama and his ambition for the nation, and his ability to get people to rally together for a cause, and to cross many political lines to get people to work together in new and creative ways. But without going into the specifics of the thing that he has said or done that I support or criticise, if there is anybody with the slightest bit of respect for him, you need to stand up and explain to him the half he has TOTALLY WRONG.

How's this? Does Michelle Obama look like a sheep that just lies there and says "yes sir", or more like the kind of woman willing to get into a good healthy adrenaline fueled debate with the man when they disagree? What do you think makes that relationship work?

I find it sickeningly ironic that in that respect conservatives have a better relationship with Obama than his own party. I guess it is just sad then that there is no real conservative party to represent the position,but I guess it just goes to show that great Americans will always be the individual.

Chinese Proverb on piracy?

2009-06-11T12:29:00.000-07:00

Got this in an email recently. I bet Thomas Jefferson would agree:

'When Someone shares something of value with you, and you benefit from it , you have a moral obligation to share it with others.'

Scary or funny?

2009-06-11T11:43:00.000-07:00

I don't know if this is scary or funny. As a soap opera, it would be pretty funny. If this was an episode of Law & Order, I would be laughing my ass off. They are talking about the US Dollar. To put 9 trillion dollars into perspective, in 2007 there were only $1.5 trillion in circulation. If you have any 'money' (aka federal reserve notes) in your wallet, pull them out and take a look at a few of them and think about what you are really holding there.

The one comfort is you don't need to worry about running away anywhere... cause there is nowhere to go. Maybe another comfort is that you arn't technically any more screwed than anyone else, so nothing to really worry about, right?

So either way, funny or scary, get in a good laugh while you can...

Why I think al a carte cable programming is a bad idea for everyone

2009-06-04T14:39:00.001-07:00

Note: this was a response to someone complaining about their $30/month cable bill.

While I can understand your argument in principle, I think you are overvaluing the royalties paid by the cable company to content providers as a portion of the cost to bring that content to you. For the most part the only cost to the cable company is channel integration. I would bet that maintenance of that database is nominal. Content providers make their money off of commercials, but after that, cable companies are pirates of that content. If I remember correctly, the settlement that came from those cases was that cable companies would be required to provide some number of public broadcasting channels for some number of stations they pirate. So after they have built this giant content pipe, they regulate who does and does not connect to their giant data stream in a very simple way, on or off, with very little exception. The exceptions are 1) content where per channel royalties exist (HBO, Cinemax, Encore, whatever), and 2) per program royalties channels(pay-per-view). I would expect that there is some speculation going on and the cable companies pay bulk block rates, bringing the channels cheaper to you (assuming you could even get them some other way) and likely making decent money on the side. BUT, the real business of the cable company is not the content, but the pipe. So cable companies pay for almost nothing but the initial infrastructure cost (plus the bureaucracy involved in that), then customer service, billing, and technicians and the such. One product and one price means low overhead and extremely competitive. One the cost of the infrastructure is paid off, then the money is REALLY good.

So what you pay now is a per month connection fee that for the most part is a portion of the cost to build the system that brings the content to you. Now al a carte is a request to take a very simple system and make it relatively very complicated. More equipment to control and regulate what each customer gets, these systems would of course be much more software based compared to the very dumb light switch service=on/off situation right now. The number of switches now is one per customer, based on did they pay the bill. You are proposing changing that to a number of switches equal to the number of possible customers multiplied by the number of possible channels they ever hope for the system to support (needs to be scalable). The handling of the switches would need to be related an exponentially more complicated billing system very likely bringing in security issues. Think Sigma6, in general, more things involved is always more thing to go wrong. No offense to anyone who works as a technician for a cable company, but at present it really doesn't take much of a rocket scientist to operate these networks, and even if you would disagree, you are talking about increasing the level of technical knowledge by a maintenance exponentially, meaning significantly more training, and significantly higher salaries.

So an exponentially more complicated system that personally I can only imagine would be exponentially more expensive to operate so they can more carefully micromanage their billing scheme based on something that doesn't even impact them. The only cost thing they really pay for and bill you for is infrastructure and maintenance! Why should they care at all which channels you watch? If anything, just for the sake of simplicity alone, they should just meter the time you spend watching tv per television. I think that would correlate much better than which stations you watch with regard to what costs are actually incurred by the cable company, and just embed that into the cost of the installation and you end of with a system that isn't any more expensive on the whole across the entire customer base.

Is $30 really so much? You think it would even be possible to design and implement a system where it would even be reasonable to bring you one channel for < $30/month? I would bet that an al a carte system would have a surcharge of at least $30/month before you even get any channels. The reality is that you would be paying more to get less; the necessary attraction for such a system would have to be exponential, and I would bet there are not even that many people out there that don't have cable to make offsetting the cost even feasible.

The best system to reduce the cost to the customer = ( total cost to design and build + per year cost of maintenance * number of years desired to break even) all divided by ( number of years desired to break even * anticipated number of customers ) + necessary dividends to attract the necessary number of investors. From there, once the infrastructure is paid for, the extra revenue can be used to expand into other markets. Now, dividends are going to be directly related to investor confidence which leaves customer price to be set by the price people are willing to pay that maximizes gross income, since the cost per customer is effectively negligible (this is also why they are pretty cool with letting you not pay your bill for awhile is they can keep billing you, and whatever maximizes gross income over time is their priority). This in turn tells the company the amount of time it will take for the cable company to break even. That number is directly related to risk because technology goes obsolete, and they need to cover that infrastructure cost first. So if time to break even comes out to 5 years, then likely they would say "Build it!", if it comes out to 50 years, they are likely going to say "lets do it somewhere else", cause more then likely they are investing their own money as well. Further, that time to break even will determine the exponential rate at which their market grows, and with that capital and dividends will rise over time.

Yeah, so in short, I don't think you are paying what you think you are paying, and al a carte programming is just a really bad idea for everybody.

copyright infringement is not theft

2009-06-04T10:41:00.000-07:00

The linked article is really awesome, and not wanting to loose track of it, posting it here. I think it has one of the most clear and concise explanations on the whole "infringement is theft" and how it is a very one sided argument by people that DO NOT PRODUCE, but instead an out dated rich group of middlemen trying to buy their relevancy back into a marketplace that DOES NOT WANT THEM!

Rosa Parks v. Random college student downloading bad movie

2009-05-22T16:37:00.000-07:00

Social Contract Theory, nearly as old as philosophy itself, is the view that persons' moral and/or political obligations are dependent upon a contract or agreement between them to form society. REF

Hobbes argues that we will do ANYTHING to avoid the State of Nature and will always, rationally, pick absolute authority.

This could not be told better, from the same article:

According to Locke, the State of Nature, the natural condition of mankind, is a state of perfect and complete liberty to conduct one's life as one best sees fit, free from the interference of others. This does not mean, however, that it is a state of license: one is not free to do anything at all one pleases, or even anything that one judges to be in one’s interest. The State of Nature, although a state wherein there is no civil authority or government to punish people for transgressions against laws, is not a state without morality. The State of Nature is pre-political, but it is not pre-moral. Persons are assumed to be equal to one another in such a state, and therefore equally capable of discovering and being bound by the Law of Nature. The Law of Nature, which is on Locke’s view the basis of all morality, and given to us by God, commands that we not harm others with regards to their "life, health, liberty, or possessions" (par. 6). Because we all belong equally to God, and because we cannot take away that which is rightfully His, we are prohibited from harming one another. So, the State of Nature is a state of liberty where persons are free to pursue their own interests and plans, free from interference, and, because of the Law of Nature and the restrictions that it imposes upon persons, it is relatively peaceful.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau:

Humans are essentially free, and were free in the State of Nature, but the ‘progress' of civilization has substituted subservience to others for that freedom, through dependence, economic and social inequalities, and the extent to which we judge ourselves through comparisons with others. Since a return to the State of Nature is neither feasible nor desirable, the purpose of politics is to restore freedom to us, thereby reconciling who we truly and essentially are with how we live together. So, this is the fundamental philosophical problem that The Social Contract seeks to address: how can we be free and live together? Or, put another way, how can we live together without succumbing to the force and coercion of others? We can do so, Rousseau maintains, by submitting our individual, particular wills to the collective or general will, created through agreement with other free and equal persons. Like Hobbes and Locke before him, and in contrast to the ancient philosophers, all men are made by nature to be equals, therefore no one has a natural right to govern others, and therefore the only justified authority is the authority that is generated out of agreements or covenants.

Thomas Jefferson in a letter to James Madison on Shay's Rebellion (a violent opposition by ~1200 farmers regarding free trade agreements with Spain on the Mississippi River. Farmers feared the agreement would affirm sovereignty of Spanish traders):

I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government. REF

In another letter criticizing the (not yet ratified) constitution:

I do not like... the omission of a bill of rights providing clearly and without the aid of sophisms for freedom of religion, freedom of the press, protection against standing armies, restriction against monopolies, the eternal and unremitting force of the habeas corpus laws, and trials by jury in all matters of fact triable by the laws of the land... The saying there shall be no monopolies lessens the incitements to ingenuity, which is spurred on by the hope of a monopoly for a limited time, as of 14 years; but the benefit even of limited monopolies is too doubtful to be opposed to that of their general suppression.REF

In another letter Jefferson states:

since there is no natural right to property in land, how much less is there a natural right to a property in ideas Specifically on the topic of copyright, just in case you didn't know, Madison said:With regard to monopolies they are justly classed among the greatest nuisances in government.

Jefferson, with good insight to the importance of the individual in an age of enlightenment, had many theories about appropriate copyright terms. If you are interested, check out more of the discussions between Jefferson and Madison; he actually makes arguments using actuarial tables (that personally, I don't think account for enough, but gives an idea of what he was thinking) of between 14 and 19 years. The following, unamended, continues to be in our constitution:

Article 1, Section 8:
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; ... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries. REF

The clause itself is clearly taken, as much policy was set at the time, from earlier century English common law, Statute of Anne, 1710:

An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by Vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or
Purchasers of such Copies, during the Times therein mentioned.

Whereas Printers, Booksellers, and other Persons, have of late frequently taken the Liberty of Printing, Reprinting, and Publishing, or causing to be Printed, Reprinted, and Published Books, and other Writings, without the Consent of the Authors or Proprietors of such Books and Writings, to their very great Detriment, and too often to the Ruin of them and their Families: For Preventing therefore such Practices for the future, and for the Encouragement of Learned Men to Compose and Write useful Books; May it please Your Majesty, that it may be Enacted, and be it Enacted by the Queens most Excellent Majesty, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons in this present Parliament Assembled, and by the Authority of the same, That from and after the [1710], the Author of any Book or Books already Printed ... shall have the sole Right and Liberty of Printing such Book and Books for the Term of [21] Years ... and no longer; and that the Author of any Book or Books already Composed and not Printed and Published, or that shall hereafter be Composed, and his Assignee, or Assigns, shall have the sole Liberty of Printing and Reprinting such Book and Books for [14 years].REF.

It took over 60 years for the courts to settle how to interpret Anne with regard to unpublished works. In Donaldson v. Beckett in 1774, court ruled that copyright for unpublished works would be perpetual, but null immediately following first publication. REF

You can see that the scope of copyright was such that it was agreement between book publishers and artists, exclusively. This philosophy, social contract, of ideas and artistry in relation to distribution rights continued with very little revision up until the end of WWII. For the history of influences and changes in the scope of copyright law from then to today in the United States, I would highly recommend the book Free Culture. For a more European view, and broader history of Copyright law back to the beginnings of the written word, I would highly recommend Steal This Film part II which covers in some great detail the violent persecution of Gutenberg and the publishers that followed him.

Short version each of those, people have always tried to control the spread of ideas, and copyright today is not what it was very recently.

Copyright of the past represented proper, social contract; copyright was an agreement between two groups of people that mutually benefit from each other, but could not agree, and such disagreement was causing harm to each.

Some would like to believe that the law is that which you can write on paper, in the same way people were convinced for a long time that the King was appointed by God. Violate the word of the paper, violate the law; violate the word of the King, you are violating God.

In a republic, we elect representatives to serve our best interests at our will, as our Declaration affirms. Through manipulation and corruption, our representatives have violated their oath of office to protect and serve the Constitution, what it represents, and what was intended by its authors. But these were not just documents that were revered, but the work of philosophers that were torn with the thought of leaving a nation that they loved dearly, that they regarded as the greatest nation on the earth, but did not love them in return with the same respect. They moved on to form their own government, under fear of death, and fear of a return to a natural state.

So our OP may not be a lawyer, publisher, artist, politician, author, inventor, lobbyist, or any other character we identify with on the battlefield of copyright reform.

But he is a human being. He is a human being. Maybe not one that revers the law, but enjoys a civilized society. He did not break the law because he has contempt for the ordered society, but because he knows by instinct that his natural right as a human being to learn has been violated; he has returned to his natural state because there is no social contract to guide him.

In his natural state, he pursued the culture that was right in front of him, sought to gather information that would serve him in whatever manner that information does.

The result? Many of the social contracts that he had made voluntarily, consensually, and in good faith are void. For words paid for to be written on paper without respect for the law that were not further respected by the OP, he would be denied the right to participate in civilized society; his school, his home. We will now deny him the right to be a civilized member of society.

By contrast, Rosa Parks rode the bus. The 'law' at the time said that if you want to ride the bus, you could sit where ever you wanted, unless you were non-white when a white person was on the bus. Then, white people could sit wherever they wanted, but non-whites had to sit in the back. Just as Homor Plessy had been paid by the then ACLU provide a test case to challenge the 'separate but equal' doctrine, so was Rosa Parks. In each case they LOST. Separate being inherently unequal was not brought forward and won until MUCH later in Brown v. Board of Education. The biggest difference here was that a young child is strongly influenced by the necessity to go to a very far school rather than one that is near, not because of their intelligence, but the color of their skin. This fight was WON. But back to 1955...

So the ACLU working with many others needed a way to get to the courts. Conspiring to make a point, on the designated day planned ahead of time, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white person after the bus driver asked her to move. She was arrested and made an example of by the ACLU. The courts did not favor with her, but it got enough peoples attention to do something else. The bus systems in Montgomery, despite being favorable to white passengers, was greatly dependent on the patronage of non-white passengers. Thus, the Montgomery Bus Boycotts began. Non-whites (and some whites as well) in a joint campaign with the ACLU and other civil liberties groups demonstrated the mutual benefit of a more proper social contract between non-whites and the society. Hobbes says that humans will do anything to avoid returning to their natural state, but personally, I see this as the free market being the true and righteous judge in this case: people had to pick between walking, or riding segregated buses by their rules, the buses (for sake of simplicity) can either meet the demands of non-whites by giving color-blind accommodations, or go on the assumption that they could continue to operate without the patronage of those that are boycotting figuring also they probably would not enjoy walking for so long. Well, the buses tried to operate for awhile, but were unable to continue and were forced to change. Shutting down the bus system was also an option, but not one whites willing to deal with.

So yeah, in so many words, they have a lot in common. Of course they are different, different people, different places, but the ground they share is strong. The OP may not be getting paid by the ACLU to make some kind of point, and didn't go into the situation to make some kind of big political scene with lawyers in tow.

Societies don't exist for their own sake. They are there to serve. If I buy a bus ticket, I don't care where I sit so long as it is in a seat. If the buses are so crowded that I do not get a seat, I am going to be pissed. Back to basics; for people to want to cooperate together as a team, each person much "bring something to the table". The butcher and the cowboy can work together for mutual benefit. The blacksmith and the miner can work together for mutual benefit. The farmer and the brewer are each better off forging a relationship with their neighbor in this respect. Get them all together for a party, who needs more than steak and beer, with the blacksmiths mug, and the miners coal for the barbecue, who could resist such a great evening after a glorious day of working in your trade so obviously appreciated by your community. Add to this situation the musician. All great parties recorded in history have had music. If this musician comes to the party, you will see me leap from my seat to bring that fellow a hot steak and a cold beer, and I know no friend that would not do the same.

But the man who would damn me for singing his song so shall be damned from ever sitting at my table.

Criticize me all you like for being untalented and tone deaf; music is not my labor.

If you don't want your work "pirated", that's easy. Keep it to your damned self. I stand by that position morally, justly, and in the right, even if it takes a little while for the "law" to catch up.

Oh, and one last thing; Fuck You Jack Valenti.

Liberal = anti-freedom

2009-05-08T12:23:00.000-07:00

Great article with no surprises. People want things to get better, but not every situation can be made better by giving up your freedom to choice and personal responsibility by creating some huge government monster to manage it for everybody.

People think that intrusive government meddling can be good if it is just regulated and regulated and regulated, but the problem is that it just can't work. Mommy and daddy government can't ever come up with good policies to create a perfect utopia. Anyway, just wanted to share more than rant. Enjoy.

Ayn Rand

2009-05-06T11:45:00.000-07:00

An argument I read today from ingrenyonchera on youtube:

I agree completely that this woman was too idealistic. While it's all well and good to defend the rights of an individual, a world where it's every man for himself would result in a collapse and reversal of everything we've built up over the years.

... I'm not saying what we have now is the perfect solution, but the way forward IS FORWARD, not backwards - and I meet too many philosophers (who mostly just uphold the views of other philosophers like this) who don't seem to understand this.

Your argument is that rational egoism fails because man is ultimately evil. So somehow that puts you in favor big government? Forgive me for not following your logic here.

If man is ultimately evil, then that only supports the argument that collectively working preserving individual liberty is the only purpose government can serve without being corrosive to its own objective.

The alternative is that people are good, and government is only as efficient as it can operate on a premise of perfect knowledge.

Big government can only be intentionally harmful, or deleteriously inefficient. Take your pick. This does not even begin to address the issue of corruption.

Ubuquity for Firefox

2009-04-16T12:12:00.000-07:00

Just how badly can an awkwardly phrased sentence be lost in translation?
きまり悪そうに言えばどれだけひどい文章の翻訳で失われるのですか？
ما ضاع في الترجمة من الجملة أن تكون أسوأ بكثير الحرج؟
Потерянные в переводе приговор будет гораздо хуже, смущение?
Perduts en la traducció de la frase seria molt menys compromès?
Tabt i oversættelsen af sanktionen ville være langt mindre engageret?
Perdu dans la traduction de la phrase sera beaucoup moins engagé?
אבד בתרגום המשפט יהיו הרבה פחות עסוקים?
Zapomenuté překlad hodnocení bude mnohem méně vytížených?
Forget the score will be much less busy? it

Simple phrases are simple to translate
単純なフレーズに簡単に翻訳している
من السهل ترجمة هذه العبارة البسيطة
Легко перевести эту простую фразу
קל לתרגם את זה פשוט ביטוי
Je snadné překládat jednoduché věty
Jest łatwa do przetłumaczenia proste zdanie
Ito ay madaling isalin ang isang simpleng pangungusap
It is easy to translate a simple sentence

Ok, I cheated, but Ubiquity for firefox is still really cool. Lots of cool tools to make for a powerful web experience. I'll write more about it later after I have played with it more.

Digital Literacy: Comparing iPhone and Desktop Linux adoption

2009-04-16T11:51:00.000-07:00

Apple selling many iPhone and grabbing a decent market chunk can't be used to show Linux has somehow failed. Apple convinced insecure and wannabe nerds (and some real nerds too) that a big shiny new gadget will make them look cool. The Linux Community is trying to convince people that enjoy finger painting and story-time that reading and writing are valuable skills that that can benefit you throughout your entire life.

I am sure this sounds like typical fanboyism, but have you ever listened to someones excuses for not wanting to learn to read, write, or learn basic algebra? It is the same excuses: It won't be relevant to the career I want, I get along just fine speaking, that's just for smart people. Well, how is it that Linux can be both demonized for being inferior AND only for the really smart computer genius type. Might it be worth a moment to try and see what they see? Honestly, that is what convinced me that despite the fact that it was HARD, and there were things I had to LEARN or even REMEMBER, it was about communicating, building, developing, and working together in a radically different way. I think it took me about a year to get comfortable with Linux, several more before I really began to see why it is used in all the places that it is, and why people feel so passionately about it.

Some people see a computer as a fancy typewriter for papers, a canvas for painting a picture, and an easier way to send letters and pictures than via snail mail. digital music is just another way to listen to music. For all those old things done in new ways, there is something uniquely special that can be expressed through a computer that isn't just a digital form of the same old thing in a different way. There is something uniquely powerful that enables people to fundamentally work different, and only Linux is where people can share instantly and unlimitedly the tools to express yourself and communicate with the world DIFFERENTLY.

Sure, Microsoft and Apple let you push the button, but just like reading and writing, no matter how good the story is told, don't think that is any kind of substitute. You just aren't talking about the same thing. It isn't digital literacy.

But don't worry, sure I am making a big deal out of nothing. You can already read and write, and computers are really just like books where it is easier to fix mistakes without wasting paper. There are nerds out there that take care of this stuff so that normal people can use them like books. Doubt learning how they work would ever be something worth anything to the 'normal' user.

I stopped paying attention when it went from "The year of Linux" to "The year of the Linux Desktop". Didn't anyone notice what happened in between? Further, The Year of the Linux Desktop was 2004 with the release of openSuse. The Year of Linux was 1997 with the Internet. If you care about being literate in a digital age, you know about Linux.

Wish I had made the effort to learn earlier, but guess just happy to be there. Having been there, there is just no way to explain to an adult illiterate person the value of learning how to read and write. I know it sounds elitist, but it really just struck me today how similar the arguments are. Think about it.

RPM v. DEB

2009-04-16T11:47:00.001-07:00

RPMs and DEBs are just different. While I am a fan of apt-get, they make a lot of assumptions and take away from a lot of the configurability that an rpm allows. Of course, the same old argument between Linuc and Windows in general, is that it is whether or not it is useful to the average individual to take the time to learn the difference, and as usual no, but just the same, that is no reason to take such configurability away. Most people never install anything ever, especially not system "stuff". So where is the line? Each to their own :)

I find it funny, and a little sad when I hear people trying to tell other people what to do or how to standardize Linux. If you make hardware and you would like your hardware to work with other peoples hardware, and both pieces of hardware are in development, then there is room to suggest a standard and find some way for your stuff to work together in the end. On the otherhand, if someone writes a great program, but only specifies dependencies in a README, but never bothers to package it, you have three(ish) basic options: 1) Deal with the fact that it isn't package and compile it yourself. 2) wait for someone to package it for your system, then install it, or 3) Package it yourself.

Not to make it out to be more work than it is, but packaging takes time and effort. From what I have seen, programmers are almost always a different group of people from package maintainers. Any project that packages its own software likely has the job of just package maintenance.

deb packages are also very configurable. I don't think there is anything they can't do. Technically, there is nothing in its design to stop someone from a deb package running the binary every time you install it and never actually installing anything. Just the same, debs can install repositories, it just isn't standard to do that. Personally, I think it is better to let people choose whether or not they want their installed third party software to be self maintaining along with the rest of the system. If there is a repo, make note of it on the website and in the documentation. All a deb has is metadata, install script, uninstall script, and files. This means debs can do anything scripts and files can do. :) as for what apt-get does is store the metadata such that it can know what script sets have already been run, and if others need to be run, etc. The limits comes down to what the package maintainer chooses to put in their install script.

rpms are easier to build and maintain. debs are much more of a pain in the ass. debs are convenient for the vast majority of users, and they are a lot of work. Would deb users like to see every project out there have a deb available? Of course! But at the sacrifice of development time, or your own? Even if debs were "always better in every way", you are only talking about an end product and not the time that went into putting it together.

So whenever I hear someone say "I wish there was a deb", I say "Your probably not alone, why don't you go do that! Never done package maintenance? Wonderful, here's the manual and if next week you are still confused, i'd be happy to walk you through it."

Linux is about personal responsibility that can ideally easily benefit everyone, imo. Not everyone can really handle that.

Morality and principles of capital punishment

2009-04-03T10:09:00.000-07:00

I have weighed all the difference evidence and such out there regarding the death penalty and such as I found it difficult to decide what to support and its relationship to my own philosophy. In the end, I think it is unjustifiably expensive, and horribly immoral, but not immoral for what I might call "the typical reasons". I think it is immoral that a person that was not a victim is the executioner, and the sterile atmosphere trying to make it appear so "humane" is just disgusting. The state has a compelling interest in justice because we pay them through taxes to be the benevolent and fair moderator, and if a person has possibly committed a crime that morally justifies death, the state should get to make the final decision, but them actually doing the killing is wrong.

I like what (I have been lead to believe is true) goes on in Japan. Honor killings. If you have been dishonored or wronged in such a way that means the criminal deserves death, they can issue you a permit, more or less, to hunt that person down and kill them. THAT is honorable. THAT is humane. THAT is moral. It isn't a "bad dog" that needs to be put down, this is a living human being that deserves to DIE! Let a man (or woman) in such a position face their death with some dignity, and the face of the person they wronged be it with a rope around their neck, or a knife swiftly jabbing into them. Let that face be the last thing they see before meeting their maker up close and personal. Not behind some sterile glass where the "victim" sits right along site the criminals lawyer. What a sick and pathetic situation for both parties.

Making the family responsible for the execution of an individual not only puts responsibility where it should lie and make them accountable for their accusations, but could also brig a type of closure better then some damn shrink is going to give them helping them "talk about their problem".

If you are morally object to killing the person yourself, or none of the members of the family will kill them, or possible closest friend (maybe put that in a will? In the event of my murder, I entrust the undersigned to avenge my death. Hmm...) then the person should get life imprisonment. Further, if the victim is against honor killing / death penalty or the such, then no revenge death can be granted.

Why is is that justifiable homicide can be a defense, but only after the fact? Premeditated justifiable homicide can only be committed by the state? That just doesn't seem right.

Free is hard whine

2009-04-02T13:03:00.000-07:00

Liberty and personal responsibility are strange beasts that in todays world of regulations and bailouts, such ideas are foreign at best.

On the Mac vs. Linux argument, a leaked presentation by Steve Ballmer showed that from their own internal research, Linux and pirated windows is what hits them the hardest. Just in desktop space alone, 1 of 4 copies of windows are pirated, and Linux on the desktop outnumbers mac by more than 2 to 1.

Linux is particularly strange because anything that could be called marketing just doesn't operate in the way we have been trained to look at it. Ubuntu and Linux in general make solid baby steps, and with regard to anything that is important to you, that is actively being developed, the speed of development is blindingly fast. How many times in alpha would you report a bug only to have the problem fixed and an update available within < 24 hours. Scary. But if you are just standing back waiting to see how it is going to look different, it is unlikely you will see much.

Microsoft taks about great this, and great that, and while I was reasonably happy with XP (till SP2), there really wasn't anything XP ever offered that couldn't be got from 98 and 2000. It was great they brought them together, and I am sure it was a lot of work, but even from 98/2000 to 7... has WHAT you do changed really changed so much? I see many changes in how things are done, but not what is done... at least in so far as what Microsoft actually does. For what I do, the tools provided for Linux, and particularly Ubuntu, let me do more things in more creative ways where the time saved due directly to the efforts of the developers is greatly appreciated. The more I get involved in development, the more I am amazed how many projects are one person in a MASSIVE bottom up structure. Put in a little effort, and it is easy to have a direct influence... assuming you can actually make a constructive contribution.

Windows does give a great amount of comfort and stability. If something doesn't work, there may be one thing to try, and after that, your done. Anything breaks, just reinstall. Very easy and simple. In Linux, one is always drowning in possibilities. If something doesn't work, there is unlimited number ways to go about resolving the issue, and if it is broken, you never really know if it will be fixed tomorrow, a year from now, or never. Some people just can't and don't want that type of close relationship with their computer.

Windows is like riding the bus, and Linux is like owning a car... in too many ways.

and imo, Mac is like the trolley at Disneyland.

Why Linux sucks?

2009-04-02T11:54:00.000-07:00

It is a strange world, I'll admit. One thing that I tell people looking at adoption is "get ready to relearn everything you thought you knew about your computer". I find your signature particularly ironic because I think Linux philosophy has many close parallels to the philosophy of conservatism and virtually immune to the damning effects of democracy.

One of the things that I feel has hurt Windows over the years is that Microsoft has lost touch with what works. Development is strongly driven by criticism, and what people want is what they will get. This is most apparent in Vista where their top down development model was strongly influenced by user feedback. It SEEMS like a great idea, and honestly it is almost difficult to understand why it failed so miserably.

This is where Linux takes almost the opposite approach, but 'approach' seems to imply a type of central control that does not exist, but looking past that; Linux is COMPLETELY decentralized. Not only is development bottom-up, but so is influence, criticism, standards, motivation, and anything that might be interpreted as 'marketing'. With the money being removed from the structure of Linux development, it is really one of the purest / idealistic forms of liberty to have ever existed. While today I don't think many fundamentally understand the difference between Liberty and Anarchy, I think many are dumbfounded that a pure merit based system that completely relies on personally responsibility could have accomplished anything. I consider myself a pretty hard core libertarian compared to some (but that may have something to do with living in California), but as I get more involved in Ubuntu development, I often don't understand why anything developed this way doesn't just cause all my hardware to burst into flames.

On the flip side, you can only get so far making people do things they don't want to do. In Linux, If I want something that doesn't exist, it is my personal responsibility to develop it or get it developed. Yelling at the computer and flaming message boards only gets you so far, and it should be of little surprise that no one is intimidated let alone motivated to rush out on their free time fix that issue for you. At the end of the day, someone must actually write the code, and do all the things that are involved in getting that code to you, and in by far MOST cases, writing a code patch and emailing it to you won't be good enough. You don't want me to code it; if you use Ubuntu, you want me to write a blue print, register the appropriate branch, put together a team, write the code, debug it, test it, share it, get it reviewed, revise it, propose for merge, voted on and approved, merge, package, and integrate into repository; and as if that wasn't good enough, you want it for your platform, back-ported, automatically updated on your system, and then maintained indefinitely. Sorry, but the only way I am doing that in my free time, for free, is that I really want it myself, and even then, if we disagree, if I am stuck doing all the work, I am going to implement and design parts however I feel like.

So while it may seem really rude or a brush off when people say "do it yourself", it isn't that they are heartless or lazy, I think they are really trying to save you some effort. If you consider the greatly consolidated steps mentioned above as 'X', and 'Y' as the amount of effort it may take to convince someone else to do the work, does it really need to be explained that 'X < X + Y', ALWAYS. The common defense is that 'X' is somehow less for a seasoned developer than for a novice / non-programmer. Sure, but why is that a problem for the developer? Further, which programmer specifically subsidize your ignorance? Are you asking me to do it? Hmm.. let me check my inbox... nope; let me check my launchpad account for new blueprints or teams I have been subscribed to... nope. *Whew* well that was a relief. You must have been talking about someone else.

If you don't want to develop, and you don't manage a team and pay for development, and you kinda just want it to work, people will be happy to let you know that a that level of influence, and that level of personal responsibility, that level of merit earns you "whatever exists". No one dictates these rules, it is just nature. Imagine being stranded on an island, whose responsibility is it that you survive? If ALL your faith is in the coast guard to come bail you out, you could put all your effort into waiting patiently, screaming at the sky, or setting the island ablaze to get their attention. Any of those things may very well be effective. In this brave new world we live in, you will likely be lucky enough to be picked up on a big brother satellite that will see your movement and come out to investigate what you are doing there before you even realize you aren't in Hawaii. But what if they DON'T rescue you? Is your last dying breath going to be made writing a letter to your senator via bottle, explaining your martyrism to poor naval patrol? And while after you are long dead and there is some boat out there named in your honor, maybe you could have taken a little effort to just see what kind of resources are available on the island that could be out to use to start a new life for yourself.

Yeah, personal responsibility is a bitch that way sometimes, huh?

The thing I find interesting is that all bureaucracy is optional. There are great standards, and the only punishment for not following them are completely intrinsic; rare are there real rules with real consequences compared to so many things are fake rules with fake consequences made up by people in the name of "the greater good". Sovereignty and liberty are strange creatures.

If all this seems somewhere between 'too much work' or 'fan boy drivel', and personal responsibility is unrealistic or just a buzz word, then it really doesn't matter what OS you pick and more than your vote actually means anything in an election. It will always come down to picking the lesser of two evils, and being upset either way.

And really, in such a case, I'll agree that Linux is likely your worst possible choice.

Interesting...

2009-03-19T12:05:00.001-07:00

Global warming hysteria finally cooling down

2009-03-12T08:25:00.000-07:00

The article linked above is really great. I listened to the global cooling debate and later the global warming debate to a point I finally had to look at what everyone was talking about. I looked into data on global temperatures and atmospheric changes and various theories and it seemed easy to see that for hundreds of years it has been understood that seasonal droughts and what was apparently a 28 year cycle of global warming and cooling was the direct cause of the electromagnetic cycle of the sun. The sun's plasma is a giant magnet that swirls and spins, twisting its magnetic field until it snaps, resetting things back to a more stable state, and the cycle repeats. The earliest evidence of this was shown in the relationship between drought seasons / global warming and sun spots. The fields "snapping" is seen in solar flares when the "magnetic pathways" (for lack of a better word) expand beyond the surface of the sun, and plasma following these pathways flare up, cool, and fall back to the sun leaving a dim mark we call a sun spot.

I have received some criticism for this belief, I think some believing I am uncaring to the earth. On the contrary, I think it is more harmful to spread lies about the way things work. I think we should be kind to the environment and stop polluting it as much as we are, but responding to bogus science about man made global warming with extreme measures to manipulate the political and economic environment can only do harm.

Note: Too see video of all presentations from the 2009 conference, click here.

2009-03-06T07:38:00.000-08:00

I was never really into music, until I got to middle school where you needed to know music to be cool. But listening to the radio didn't give me the right information, and the range of music just blew.

Then one day came Napster.

I started downloading everything, lyrics, album info and such and really got to get to know music, I was able to buy all the right stuff and amassed a good size collection (as much as one can at that age working odd jobs and saving lunch money)

I'd share the music with my friends, and tell them about artists I had heard, and get them to buy a copy too.

Then Metallica put out a really crappy CD. I loved their other stuff.. and I was pretty satisfied with the ones I already owned. Then THEY attacked Napster, and actually won. No surprise really, but I said **** them, and went back to listening to the radio for new music. Never bought another album again.

Today, what I see in person is in such conflict with these stupid cases. The Statute of Anne was much more sensible in so many ways. It makes sense it was written in our constitution that there needed to be limits on copyright in order to promote science and useful arts. I hang out with a log of musicians, and spend a lot of at open mics and drum circles. The music is about the music, and people live to share.

I used to copy music I liked, but I discovered I was wasting my time. Why should I promote the music written by people that don't even believe in music the way I do. Now, I use Jamendo, and when I meet an artist, and they tell me about their beliefs, I point them in the direction of creative commons.

I promote music by artists that love music the way I do. Same reason to use Linux; it is software for people that love computers, not people that found a way to make a buck at exploiting the stupidity of others. Linux is a community where everyone is given equal access to everything possible because that is the best way for new creativity to spawn, and in return the people that put in their time and effort "working for Linux" get what they want in return: Not the money to possibly afford the title of the day, but again, everything the community has to offer.

With Linux, the more I give, the more I learn, and the more I get in return.

I don't buy indy labels because I don't go to music stores. If I buy an album, I get the hand drawn, signed, one of a kind from the artist himself. One time I was listening to a guy on a street corner in Santa Cruz, California (BIG music / punk / hippy city) playing a Cello. I listened for about 2 hours, struck up a conversation with the guy, and ended up buying him a new set of strings. Still, the best concert I have ever heard.

I know it will never happen. Who ever is in power will always fight to keep the system the same because it worked for them. People will thrive in ANY environment because humans are amazing that way... but what I support is make it the best environment to promote culture, music, and education by making information distribution as awesome as possible with better Internet and better protocols like bit torrent. It is the library of the digital age.

After that, THEN let the scum of the earth come crawling out from under their rocks and find a way to exploit it and squeeze as many pennies out of the system as possible through market research and providing something unique.

You say people being able to give things away for free is communism. I say you got it all wrong. Sharing is at the heart of humanity. Communism is going to the government and making a law to put fake rules into place that allow you to control a system no matter how many people it hurts. Copyright is government trying to control the system.

Why do we still have libraries, and where did they come from? What are they for? Don't they just promote mass piracy? Were libraries only "acceptable" because they are hard to get to and inconvenient? Poor and low on money? Or were they meant to encourage thought and education for free to the best that the technology of the day could provide?

Well, today we have the Internet. It is revolutionizing the way people think and share. It is going to kill the library, but only because every adult and child in the world is going to have direct access the greatest library in history.

Do you think we could survive in such a world? Know what, I think we can. This is why Peter Sunde is a hero of the day. He is the great librarian of the 21st century, and we should give him praise for his vision, a vision I support with all my heart.

Long Live The Pirate Bay!

Why doesn't Microsoft have a site like ubuntuforums.org?

2009-03-02T22:33:00.000-08:00

It would never work, at least not exactly. Its a political thing. Basically, who wants to give their time and energy away for free to help with something Microsoft is paid to do? M$ makes money, while EVERYTHING that is Gnu/Linux is created for someone's personal use and given away for free that others that create will be willing to share in the same way. Additionally, if you make a good program for yourself and share it for free, there is a good chance people will repay you through contributions of bug fixes, additional features, or maybe a really big thank you.

When was the last time you think anyone took the time to write Bill Gates and say "Thank you Bill for making a really great operating system for my computer". Not likely, cause why bother, you got your OS, M$ got their money, no more reason to really talk to each other.

It is really interesting the relationship Sun Microsystems has with the OSS community. They give away a produce for free, and open the source. However, if you contribute, you can only make code suggestions, that may or may not go in, and Sun keeps total control. Lots of people use open office, but there is no real Open Office developer community because you can't really ever be part of a team. They are 'basic' open source, meeting the dictionary definition. They arn't putting their effort into community building. Ubuntu is quite the irony. Sun is open source and discourages community (passively) while Cannonical makes proprietary software (you can't get the code for the forums, or even help) but these closed tools are used to build community.

M$ having a site like this is like having a poetry jam where they charge admission: If you are going to read poetry, you want to get paid. But make it free and charge for drinks, but put in some comfy chairs, people will want to share for free just to be heard.

I love ubuntu. I do some programming, but nothing cool enough worth inclusion in Ubuntu. Maybe some day. I am AMAZED how much Gnu/Linux has become simply through a desire for nerds to share and help each other out. I WANT to be more a part of such a great community, but my experience and skill only put me at, hopefully, very knowledgeable user. So, I try and do support. I came on the forums for the first time in a long time and found I knew the answers to many of the questions people were asking. So I figured 'why not?'

Seriously, I get this whole, wonderfully incredible operating system and software that does everything I need that would otherwise cost tens of thousands of dollars in proprietary software, and it is all given away in hopes that people will want to get involved.

Me helping any way I can makes me feel a part of that; it is how I can pay for my Linux just the way it was meant to be.

So this is my way of giving back. If there was a site like this for Microsoft (actually, there is, sort of. it is called Microsoft Knowledge Base) I, for one, wouldn't bother. I'd say "Already paid for it, let someone else do it". Why would I want to give my time away for free? This isn't free, I get Linux!

Open Movie Editor

2009-03-02T10:10:00.000-08:00

Found a really awesome movie editor while looking through the ubuntu forums. As they put it:

a simple non-linear video editor
Open Movie Editor is designed to be a simple tool, that provides
basic movie making capabilities. It aims to be powerful enough
for the amateur movie artist, yet easy to use.

Very straight forward and easy to see what you are doing. the version released about a year ago allowed to you drag sound and video from your media directory to channels, split sound and video from files, and drag and drop images onto your time line. The latest version added a ton of transitions. Can even drag and drop svg titles.

And thanks to Fabrice Coutadeur, there are packages of the new version available for Ubuntu Hardy, intrepid, and jaunty for both 32 and 64 bit.

Highly recommended for video bloggers
https://launchpad.net/~fabricesp/+archive/ppa

The relationship of my two loves: Food and Linux

2009-02-27T11:36:00.000-08:00

I like being able to see how things work. Windows is much more "the magic box that does computy stuff", where as in linux, even if you don't understand it all, it is there for you to see. Immersion is great for learning, and Linux organizes things in a good way to learn anything and everything you want. Windows trains you to click the mouse when a window pops up.

BASH, as others mentioned, is a wonderfully powerful language that has completely changed the way I work with my computer since I made a complete switch years ago now.

But personally, I love and live Gnu/Linux for cultural reasons. Sure, it is more secure, faster for near all tasks, but would I switch from a community of people that believe that the purpose of information is for it to be shared to paying someone that believes I should be in jail if I try to understand how things work? Hmm... no, doesn't really appeal.

I guess I think of Windows as a restaurant with really good food, but really rude service, and while you are reasonably satisfied with your experience, you can't help but notice the health department makes an uncomfortably large number of visits. But if you are careful, and have a lot of money, some of the best chefs in town offer their dishes here exclusively.

Linux is more like a farmers market filled with chefs whose greatest joy in life is for you to share their food and ideas. There is no limit, and everyone welcome. You can have all the food you want for free, and there seems to be this kind of rule that if you bring food, you are supposed to tell people what you put into it. If you use other peoples ingredients or change someone else's dish, then you must tell people what you put in it, and where you got the recipe from.

So people ask where to eat. Well, I think we are all really used to and understand the restaurant model, and paying ala cart. We even got special toilet paper every time we get food poisoning. On the other hand, there is an orgy out in the wilderness where they hope you know how to cook so you can share and play, but even if you don't know how to cook, or even know what a frying pan is, your still welcome, just be mindful the conversation may just be a little different then what you are used to.

So know what? I don't really care if that other place got the latest iron chef. Its expensive, and he usually never shows up anyway. They keep changing everything around every time they move, and make you keep buying things you already paid for. Not to mention there is a door charge before you even get any food, but that is usually part of the package deal anyway.

So maybe sometimes the food gets better, or even really amazing on a rare occasion. Maybe the food gets cheaper every once in awhile. If you are really lucky, maybe they fired that waitress that kept spitting in the food. That's wonderful... but know what, while I thought I was initially tempted by the free food and dreams of being a chef, I've found something of a community.

But it is nice to know that in addition to the great community, the food is actually better, even if you can't get everything out there.

A comment on Ways Beyong Empiricism

2009-02-23T18:49:00.000-08:00

I see empiricism in a way as a clearly definable aspect of Rationalism. I do not believe any rationalist ascribes to pure empiricism any more than Cartesian philosophers ascribe solipsism. I think that is part of the beauty. I agree completely with your observation that all human truth is an merely an abstraction of truth even before we consider the implications and limits of language, but some abstraction results in group think, and other abstractions result in particle accelerators.

There is empirical evidence to show that empiricism is not a fundamentally complete construct for truth, but rationalism also says sometimes we just don't know. Rationalism is a powerful tool used recklessly with Occam's razor can cut up and justify any truth you like. In a way, it is still just a path. But, the difference from other philosophies like Christianity, rationalist, hopefully, reject any dogma, including science, for a pragmatism that says there are no limits to what we can discover.

When it comes to spiritual / supernatural beliefs, just try to keep it in perspective with what can really be known and how ideas can be communicated in absolute ways. Least for the sake of self evaluation and clear communication so you and others can really study it and improve. Keep in mind the potential of mathematics and study things that let you express yourself in challenging ways. With infinite knowledge out there, how can you know where you are going without really knowing where you are?

Idea #17763: Every program in Ubuntu is using different way of handling the same problem

2009-02-18T10:48:00.000-08:00

Sorry, I think this is a really bad idea. Programs have an individual way of working. One of many problems I find with KDE is that there is obviously a standard way of doing things that almost nobody follows; there are extra menu items in nearly every application that are unused, but there because it is part of some standard.

The place this should actually be added is to glib or qt; give developers a simple "Add default components and configuration" type thing to the library so that default items will perform default actions such as exit. There could even be a simple way to integrate a 'new' item subroutine.

Sound cool? Well guess what, it already exists! There are always new tools and hot plates and SDK IDE skeletons to make things easier on developers.

I think maybe rather than see something and assume that just because it is different that there must be something wrong with it because it is "inconsistent". Personally, I pick my applications based on the interface. There is variety.

This has been an age old war, and I guess it will never die, but FOREVER it has always been "Which is better, vi or emacs?". The different is the interface, but in this case, everything is the interface!

Rather than criticizing the devs in their UI design, maybe give then a little credit and assume for a moment they put a little time and effort into their work and things are designed with a purpose to work best for their application.

My solution: Tell your friend that because the software is community developed, not only do individuals have the freedom to develop independently, but there is no marketing department trying to make everything look the same for the sake of making everything look the same. It is just one of the quirks of the organic nature of Gnu/Linux et al. Improvements are always coming about, but just like nature, evolution needs diversity to progress. Gnu/Linux is always evolving and that is part of what makes it great, rather than feeling stuck looking at doing everything the Windows way, or the Apple way. If you have ever felt like that choice left you deciding the lesser of two evils, Linux can be a breath of fresh air.

A friend and I were discussing the issue with paradigm shifts: They are not all of the sudden, no matter how much the new ideas may have appeared to have reached critical mass in your mind. Even after profound paradigm shifts, we can continue to try to stuff new ideas into old boxes; compartmentalizing the new data in the old ways. Usually that just doesn't work.

In this case, for a new user, it is probably a good opportunity to remind them to pay attention to the application they are using, and don't just start clicking at the mouse and keyboard thinking all applications are the same, unless investigation is the purpose at that moment; there is always an appropriate time and place.

For the more adventurous types, qt and glib are reasonably straight forward at least with regard to changing the name of menu item names or hot keys in fully developed applications. While there is always more you can do knowing more, encourage them to be pragmatic about looking for the key piece of code they want to change, and worry less about the parts that don't necessarily make sense. It isn't as scary as it sounds, and interfaces is a fun simple place to start that requires almost no previous programming experience, just a bit of imagination.

A poem

2009-02-12T15:02:00.000-08:00

So I had expected this to be a poem about the word Ubuntu, my feelings on the monetary system, about copyright law, but somehow it turned into something else. Oh well.

I had an occasion to write a poem, and below is what I came up with.

They say ignorance is bliss, and it must be
because the more I read, and the more I learn
the more angry I feel I become.

I never cared about politics. I had long believed
it was only a place for hurt and disappointment
crooks and thieves with agendas we can't even begin
to comprehend.
But maybe the politics are simple, and where we see
conspiracy is just ignorance taking on a life of its own

Does one belief say worse about humanity than the other?

Last year I was inspired: I didn't feel so alone in my opinion
I thought I really had a chance to discover what the big deal was
and with such a leaning telling me things were going to go the right way
I knew I could be part of something good.

I spoke, I wrote, I rallied.
And I did so in places where I was not only going to be heard,
but could stir up some controversay, and hopefully made an impression
many people made an impression on me as well and helped me learn what we were really up against.

By election day I was calling around, and picked up friends to take to the polls,
many not knowing they could still vote on the provisional ballot.
Thrilled, pumped, and excited, I knew I had done some good.

Aparently I was not on the side of the majority.

How did it happen that the message of new trains and happy chickens
had made it into peoples hearts, but love between two people fell on deaf ears
even if for just a small majority of Californians. Further, alternatives
to an over crowded prison system filled with people that never should have been in there
in the first place isn't much of an issue for those of us on the outside.
I doubt the two minorities find much solice in their common defeat.

As I was struck later with the final numbers,
the realization that so many could be driven to the polls,
and driven there by fear and hate.
All I could do is cry and scream out in rage...

...but honestly I don't know if it was more from the blunt force of reality,
...or a fierce jealousy for the cynics that that already knew the truth.

Many gay and lesbian friends couldn't understand my response,
"havn't you been paying attention?" they would say.

"I thought I was"

Wikipedia Standards

2009-02-11T12:13:00.000-08:00

I take exception to the idea that only scholarly journals may be sources of information.

There, fixed it for you. I'd even agree in proportion to the triviality of such information. As far as "Only scholarly journals are primary sources", the only other type of primary source is direct observation and personal opinion, but they needed to be stated as such and kept in context. The easiest thing to do here is when it isn't a scholarly journal, cite in text the context of your supporting argument, like "Joe the Plummer, some idiot tax cheat with no license that calls himself a plummer that happened to be standing around near Barack Obama one day while the camera was on him says we need XYZ to fix the economy" is reasonable, but saying "some people believe we need XYZ to fix the economy", and your source is Joe the Plummer and you cite it hurts your integrity. There is a really important difference.

Though honestly, my BS alarm always goes off when I hear the phrase "scientists say" or "doctors agree" us often followed by a line of bullshit. Truth or not, it is the epitome of lazy "journalism". Just take a short line to explain who is saying it, and a rough idea of their credentials. Then, not only can the information be put in context, but when it is proven wrong it doesn't send creationists in a frenzy writing their local school board.

This way when people share interesting stuff they read, they can say "Hey, some doctor guy is looking into investigating a possible link between mercury and autism." rather than "Hey, did you know the reason your kid has autism is because of those vaccinations you gave him?" Not that people are going to stop being idiots and grossly exaggerate things out of context, but at least when someones BS alarm goes off, they can more easily hunt down the source and confirm some kind of validity.

I would hope that despite publications [that suck], we can have slightly higher expectations for something we are going to call an encyclopedia.

Security vs. Obscurity

2009-02-11T09:09:00.000-08:00

This was a great quote I had to share, if not at least write down for future reference.

If I take a letter, lock it in a safe, hide the safe somewhere in New York, then tell you to read the letter, that's not security. That's obscurity. On the other hand, if I take a letter and lock it in a safe, and then give you the safe along with the design specifications of the safe and a hundred identical safes with their combinations so that you and the world's best safecrackers can study the locking mechanism -and you still can't open the safe and read the letter - that's security.

Another element from other articles I have read is that security only exists in relationship over time. While the above example is true, it is not true with respect to reality... at least for an approach. There are always limits to security. Security can always be better, and all security can eventually be broken. So when designing a security system, how secure is not whether or not it can be broken, how secure is what is the minimum amount of time we can be reasonably assured the security is going to hold. Or further, how much effort would be necessary to break a system in relationship to cost and skill level of the cracker.

Maximize the cost and skill necessary to crack a safe, and you have a very secure safe. Minimize the investment of such a system and you have a very good safe.

From my understanding of today's computer security, some people stumble over vulnerabilities, and others hunt them out. If it is a problem with Microsoft software, the cracker / hacker can report the vulnerability and hope that Microsoft fixes it before anyone else that might not be so kind reports the issue. The person to discover the problem also gets no notoriety unless they publish a proof of concept, or no a full scale attack on a computer system. Frequently Microsoft will not fix issues until that point has been reached anyway. Why fix a problem unless that specific problem is going to hit your bottom line. Linux and BSD are different. Hacking and cracking are not only encouraged, but eluded to above, it is encouraged. If you find a vulnerability, write your proof of concept and, because you have the code, a possible fix to take care of the problem. If it is a design flaw, explain why the flaw exists. You get famous (within that circle) and the system gets better. Once the problem is fixed and a patch has been distributed, the proof of concept gets public release, and the nerds and geeks cheer and update their system, if it hadn't already done so automatically.

For hackers and crackers, operating systems are like puzzle books. Microsoft puts the same puzzles out there every time, and each time a puzzle is solved, they may or may not change the puzzle at their leisure if there is a chance so many puzzles are solved that it might become hard to keep selling the same book. Gnu/Linux/BSD on the other hand, is... harder. Every time a puzzle is solved, no one else is allowed to take a shot at it because whoever solved the puzzle and whoever wrote the puzzle work together as and with a community to make it harder.

Now consider this: these are the nerdiest people in the world offering hypothetically the most challenging puzzles in the world that have real life consequences... and they have been going at this for ~25 years. Security patches are frequent, but most often very obscure, unlikely circumstances that create hypothetical vulnerabilities often proofed in the most ideal of environments.

Not to discredit Microsoft for their desire to be secure, but there really isn't any money in fixing software that has already been sold. There is no community to improve the software because no one is allowed the source code that makes it easy to make the software, and further, even if someone were to get their hands on the code, or miraculously is able to write their own patch without knowing how it works, such activity is not only illegal, but there is virtually no process that allows for such fixes to be certified.

The last MAJOR bug for Gnu/Linux / BSD was in SSH where some .01% of computers were statistically likely share the same list of some 100,000 "random" keys due to a glitch in the standard distribution of key generation. WTF?? Are you joking? This is the most critical vulnerability discovered in years?!? Not to mention that the guy that even discovered the vulnerability had a fix submitted upstream within a day that pretty much fixed the problem world wide within maybe as long as 48 hours? Compare that to a Microsoft Exchange bug that allows an attacker to do anything they want after simply sending a cleverly malformed email.

Personally, if Microsoft says that if looking at the code would expose the software to an unlimited number of critical vulnerabilities compromising your network and all your data, that doesn't make me concerned about Gnu/Linux, that makes me concerned about Windows.

Like seriously, the code is that bad?

I'd tell customers with that concern that Gnu/Linux have been openly audited by the nerdiest geeks for roughly 25 years and worked together to develop the best security ever. Linux community says that open source is more secure; if Microsoft is saying that being able to see the source code exposes you to limitless vulnerabilities, maybe there should be some concern that the code to Windows has been leaked to the Internet for quite some time? Not to mention, didn't they recently change to some "shared-source" BS where you can look at the code, but it doesn't actually mean shit like with OpenOffice?

Anyone else having as much difficulty following Microsoft's supposed argument here, and how if true, just makes everything look worse for Microsoft?

Further, this article is a study of "Automatic Patch-Based Exploit Generation" where the simple process of Microsoft even attempting to fix the software is done so poorly that is ca be used to have quite the reverse intended affect.

A FIVE-STAGE MODEL OF THE MENTAL ACTIVITIES INVOLVED IN DIRECTED SKILL ACQUISITION

2009-02-10T23:51:00.000-08:00

I keep loosing this. I thought I had made reference to it in other articles, but evidently not. I don't know why or who dot the Dreyfus model wrong in terms of the names of the stages, but whatever the reason, here is the real study. And despite all the sites that want to sell you the article, they are archives of public domain. This study was government sponsored, and if you read the notes, this is public domain.

If you like to learn, or ever wanted to be really great at something, are a fan of the scientific method, or a militant atheist, you will LOVE this read. This is likely the best short read ever for me.

Enjoy!

Best Gun Control Legislation for Public Safety: 2nd Ammendment!

2009-02-10T14:32:00.000-08:00

This was a must share from a commenter, mitch77 ,on digg regarding the above poll.

OK only the occasional moron is suggesting that this does not apply to every citizen..
That is hopeful.
However it's important to understand why they were so adamant about this.

It's because the 2nd amend is the whole deal.
If we lose the right (power) to defend ourselves and the rest of the constitution
how long would we be able to keep any of it? The founders had this fact as their motivation.

A LITTLE GUN HISTORY (Death estimates are the lowest estimates - far from the highest)

In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million disarmed dissidents were rounded up and exterminated.

In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million disarmed Armenians were rounded up and exterminated.

Germany established gun control in 1938 and from 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million disarmed Jews and others were rounded up and exterminated.

China established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to 1952, 20 million disarmed political dissidents were rounded up and exterminated.

Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 disarmed Mayan Indians were rounded up and exterminated.

Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to 1979, 300,000 disarmed Christians were rounded up and exterminated.

Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975 to 1977, one million disarmed educated' people were rounded up and exterminated.

Defenseless people rounded up and exterminated in the 20th Century because of gun control: 56 million.

It has now been 12 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by their own government, a program costing Australia taxpayers more than $500 million dollars. The first year results are now in:

- Australia-wide, homicides are up 3.2 percent.

- Australia-wide, assaults are up 8.6 percent.

- Australia-wide, armed robberies are up 44 percent (yes, 44 percent)!

- In the state of Victoria alone, homicides with firearms are now up 300 percent. Note that while the law-abiding citizens turned them in, the criminals did not, and criminals still possess their guns!

- While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months, since criminals now are guaranteed that their prey is unarmed.

- There has also been a dramatic increase in break-ins and assaults of the ELDERLY. Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety has decreased, after such monumental effort and expense was expended in successfully ridding Australian society of guns. The Australian experience and the other historical facts above prove it.
You won't see this data on the US evening news, or hear politicians disseminating this information.
------------------------------------
MEANWHILE...every state (48) in the US that has passed "concealed carry" laws
has seen a clear reduction in violent crime rates. (the looser the law the more the reduction)
And virtually NONE of accompanying lawlessness predicted by the leftists who opposed the laws has been a problem.

"In a comprehensive study of all public multiple shooting incidents in America
between 1977 and 1999, economist/mathematicians John Lott and Bill Landes
found that the only public policy that reduced both the incidence and casualties
of such shootings were concealed-carry laws.

Not only are there 60 percent fewer gun massacres after states adopt concealed-carry laws,
but the death and injury rate of such rampages are reduced by 80 percent."

I actually can't imagine a coherent argument against this but I'm willing to listen...

Russia and a National OS. Just another bureaucratic mess?

2009-02-10T13:26:00.000-08:00

In response to this post on Slashdot regarding the Russian ideal to mandate everything:

Possibly similar to what I see in the United States. Schools force kids to read great books against their will, rather than ending up with well educated kids, just a lot of kids that really hate to read and will likely not pick up another book once they are out of school.

What is going to matter is implementation. With the reading example, it is intended that kids end up reading really good books, but it comes down to the teacher that often has the biggest influence on what a student ends up with, and how they appreciate it.

Standardization and organization for efficient use of resources to develop a base infrastructure, I believe, is one of the few legitimate purposes of government. Allow for free market competition, but standardize public education and government offices to use an open standards and basic system tools so everyone can play nice. This will expand opportunity for the private sector / free enterprise to build upon these tools. Both the public and the private sector can have influence on the future development and auditing of the tools so that bugs get fixed and if necessary, forks are made.

The problem you identify already exists with Windows. The difference with Linux is that open standards make it much less of a hack job to implement interoperability. Building tools on Windows has you at the mercy of the closed tools you use. If an API is buggy or needs to be changed in some way, you are not allowed to. A free base system gives people options and proprietary software developers on their toes.

If Russia is going to fork Fedora and say "screw it" to the GPL and close source it because they feel like it and make one system everyone will be taught, and stop developing it once it is "good enough", then it will be a disaster. I get the impression that is not their plan; honor the GPL, get help from Red Hat as necessary to train their own developers, become an equal partner with respect to the community and provide upstream contributions, keep the source open and available to the public. This will provide new opportunity in many ways for all people, not just Russia.

I understand where you are coming from, which what encouraged me to respond, but the Russians have never been so insidious or oppressive of its people as Microsoft has been to its user base, unless you think gallop polls are the heart of democracy and liberty... then who knows. A national OS based on Linux is like collecting taxes to build roads, not telling people where they have to drive. Private sector can have their tour buss and taxi cabs, but let that be far different than gated highways mandating police escort.

My feeling with regard to user apathy is to look at the above situation and think "who cares if I get where I need to go?", not to mention all the other great advantages of not having to do any work or remember how to get places.

It isn't the standardization that is the problem, so much as the centralized control of such standardization that creates problems. I am certain the Russian government is going to do a better job of oversight with regard to enabling the Russian people to get the most out of their computing experience than Microsoft.

I look forward to when the United States will consider catching up with the times, but I don't expect much from a country that still regards Ricardian Economics as God's Will... but that's another issue. :)

As far as any perceived irony of Russia and China embracing Linux:

Even worse case scenario, Russia and China want total control over their country, and where they may not be able to have control, the most important thing is to ensure that others DON'T have it. Software freedom will ensure that Microsoft isn't a dictator, and in "oppressive" countries like Russia or China, I am sure their leaders are the first and best to recognize a regime hell bent on global domination and control. Have it their way, they would take credit for giving Microsoft the idea in the first place.

Americans have been spewing their Liberty, Freedom, and Democracy rhetoric so long without any thought to the meaning, they wouldn't know a dictatorship if it kicked them in the face, stole their money and replaced it with "notes" depicting people that used to know what those terms meant.

Too subtle?

Woot to Russia. I look forward to seeing where this goes in many respects.

The American Monetary System - Part 2: comentary on the charts development

2009-02-06T08:35:00.000-08:00

As mentioned before, the poster started simple. The Black square, white square, and colored text in the box marked United States were all added afterwards, as well as the title. While each of those make the information more bias, I figured why not. However, I think they provide poor analysis of the more important part of what was being explained. There are also very obvious missing parts due to the necessity of sticking to the scope of the monetary system. Otherwise the chart would have completely lost any flow that it might have had. Even at present I think the black and white boxes are distracting from the important information and the part of the chart that actually had some flow. The text on the side seemed so small and dense compared to the large, clear parts of the graph that after putting in the black box, I felt compelled to completely pack the entire page full of text.

I think splitting up the info in several different ways could improve its impact / flow. For example, take all the text other than the labels and put them on another page. Another idea (and this is a great thing about SVG) is cover the flow of the chart through an ODF presentation.

The greatest problem I was trying to show (but don't point out directly) is the logistical end of this system. Sure, it is implied that these bankers are "evil and bad", but just objectively taking a step back, lets follow the chart.

1. Government / congress authorizes the treasury to issue Treasury Bonds to the Federal Reserve. Government can not issue money directly unless it is backed by gold or silver according to the Constitution. The question of being on the gold standard or not is whether or not the Treasury issues those bills. Not being on the Gold Standard, as we are right now, means Gold and Silver Certificates are not being issued as legal tender. The Federal Reserve Act (questionably) without violating the constitution allows the government to issue bonds. These bonds are used as collateral, and authorize so many dollars to go into circulation.

2. The money is given to the Federal Reserve to be deposited exclusively into accounts of the 12 Regional Banks.

3. The only legal tender for the United States is in these banks available as loans to Government, Private Corporations (including minor banks), and people, at interest.

4. When money is borrowed, money is created in two ways. Ignoring loan initiation fees, which could technically be a portion of the money borrowed in payment of the service of providing the loan, interest begins to accrue on a daily basis. The amount loaned (or "principle") + the Interest charged = more money created from nothing. This isn't more being printed, this is money that exists only as a matter of record, but still owed in paper. This is hypothetically part of the fundamental flaw. Oversimplifying it in terms of mathematical limits, if all the money is returned, how do you pay back the money that doesn't exist. Think of a credit card. If you owe $110, and you only pay back $100, what can happens? What does happen?

5. The last example isn't what seems to happen in reality, so instead lets say there are two borrowers. Two people want to start a business, so they go to the bank and each take out a loan of $100. To keep it simple, lets say that the interest in 1 year comes to $10 each. Each company pays its employees and can either spend their money on Company A, Company B, or save it. Assuming people spend all their money, lets say over the course of the year Company A was more successful than Company B. Company A doesn't want to keep paying interest, so they pay back the $110. This now leaves Company A with only profit that it can use to continue to pay its employees and operate a successful business. There is now $90 in the economy ($200 - $110). If people have no money because they always spend it, Company B has $90 - profit / holdings of Company A. This is why it is said that whatever money you have is someone's debt. With Company A's debt paid, how successful would Company B need to be in order to acquire the money necessary to pay off the $110 debt? With only $90 in the entire system, it is not possible; the company will fail to pay its loan with absolute certainty. Applying this situation to today, lets say Company A likes company B because unemployed people don't have money to spend, and the only people with money already work for Company A. Company A was most profitable getting money from the employees of Company A and Company B. Lets say Company A decides to bail out Company B for the sake of the economy. Company A takes out a loan for $110 and even rather than loaning it (which would be guaranteed income) it just gives it as a gift to stimulate the economy. Company A owes $121 ($110 + $11 interest), but $90 Company A has + $110 Company B has now makes $200 again. We are back where we started... except that in the beginning Company A + Company B owed $220, now Company A + Company B owe $110 (+$11 interest for an additional year) + $121 ($242) to keep the economy in equilibrium of $200. From here the cycle repeats itself.

Questions:
A) Does it matter how successful the companies are, proportionally, or otherwise?
No.
B) What happens if people save their money and don't spend it in the economy?
The cycle of moves faster. This is why it is said that people need to spend money to stimulate the economy. If companies don't get money, they can't pay employees, and work by those companies doesn't get done.

6. The fractional reserve. This is pretty clearly covered on the chart, but one issue: b can not ever be less than c. This relationship can be seen in the difference between the prime lending rate and the prime lending rate. I hope this argument is obvious.

In the next part, I hope to address what Ron Paul is talking about; how the collapse of the banking system will set people free is a good thing, and the effect of bankruptcy on the system.

The American Monetary System

2009-02-06T00:10:00.000-08:00

So I spent WAY too much time putting this together, but I am fairly happy with it. Looks great in Inkscape (original is SVG), but wouldn't export, and imported funny to Gimp. Oh well. Also, sadly, I have don't see any image hosting site that handles SVG. wtf? oh well.

I was inspired by Henry Fords quote, and it started with a simple explanation... but then I just kept adding stuff. I would love to blow this up as a poster and just put places. Maybe give one to my local Bank of America... or maybe just wear it in front of Bank of America. :)

Enjoy!

Text Editors - More people should know Lyx

2009-02-04T11:18:00.000-08:00

simple CL text editor : nano
advanced CL text editor : vi or emacs
simple text editor : gedit
basic text editor : abiword
basic online text editor : Google Documents
fancy text editor : OpenOffice Word Processor
fancy online text editor : ThinkFree.com
professional document processor : Lyx

Abiword is great for those that love or need low use of resources, don't like memorizing anything, and just want to start putting their ideas down. I am a fan of gedit, but it only handles plaintext. Google Documents has the same features as Abiword, but everything is stored online.

If you need images, fancy layouts, or tables; you are going to want OpenOffice. Much more resource heavy, but gives you all you could want and a bit more for those familiar with Ms Word 98 - 2003. ThinkFree.com has just about everything the average user would want to do, but missing some of the features of OpenOffice most people don't even know about.

A highly under rated application is Lyx. Ever notice that professionally published documents typically have a certain clean feeling that at first thought seem impossibly complicated to manage in a program like OpenOffice? that is because professional publishers use a language called TeX to do all the work for them. TeX is like a printing / layout programming language. TeX is difficult, but is made much easier with something called LaTeX, which basically adds macros for making common tasks simple rather than having to know every little detail of what you want to do. Lyx takes it to a whole new level with what they call a WYSIWYM word processor (What you see is what you mean). The annoying thing with fancy word processors is not making the layout, but going back and fixing or doing fine adjustments. Trying to get things lined up frequently requires fine motor skills with the mouse, and carefully eyeballing everything you do. Lyx makes it easy to create a layout, and allows you to see the straight forward LaTeX code that lets you know for certain things are the way you want. My favorite part is that layouts (like bibliography, glossary, index, table of contents) are all data driven. For example, with the built-in BibTeX, make a reference in text, and it automatically adds the entry into your bibliography. From the Gui, the data for that reference can be minimized. You can also use a reference in multiple places throughout a document, and LaTeX understands that you are citing the same reference and will only make one entry.

There can be a little bit of time to setup a new document, and the learning curve for everything can seem a bit high, but if you need to make professional looking documents for publication of more than ten pages, it is worth your time in the long run to learn it. Your 10 page documents will be easier to manage and tweak to look just the right way without the usual poke & hope that often fails. For large, fancy publications, Lyx enables you to do amazing things that would be otherwise impossibly difficult in an application like OpenOffice. Ever wonder how Dummies books are put together, or math textbooks? Think it would be impossible in word? Your right! They use LaTeX. Lyx makes LaTeX easy and familiar.

Problem with the real economy? There isn't one.

2009-02-03T11:13:00.000-08:00

I can not escape it. Of all the stories I hear about the troubled economy, I feel like the scope of the problem isn't being fully realized. The talk about bailouts, economic stimulus, and predatory lending, supply and demand, are just components of a very regulated system... well, except not regulated by the United States government, by the banks. The 12 banks. The 12 only significant banks. Sure, there are many banks that are allowed to play in the financial market, but they play at the will of the 12.

While I might love to go into many arguments that have been made and use them as sources to support my claims, I have not reached that point in my argument, however, here is a quick list of sources that I draw my beliefs from.

http://quotes.liberty-tree.ca/quotes_about/rothschild
http://www.prolognet.qc.ca/clyde/pres.htm
http://www.populistamerica.com/how_the_federal_reserve_runs_the_us___part_iii
http://www.john-f-kennedy.net/thefederalreserve.htm
http://www.sciforums.com/U-S-Presidential-Assassinations-t-82114.html
http://www.rense.com/general83/break.htm
http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/E/usbank/bankxx.htm
http://mises.org/story/3167

Let me issue and control a nation's money, and I care not who writes its laws ~Mayer Amschel Rothschild

and he succeeded.

Consider the way we perceive money. It is an important part of our society, but we give it value in a way that no commodity would ever receive. Gold does not yield the immediate exchange power we have given to our currency. The value is abstract, and I understand that. But consider the role money plays, and imagine a person or corporation that could operate freely outside the system.

The best analogy I can make is to virtual worlds. World of Warcraft has an economy. Gold plays a powerful role in acquiring items and potions and such. There is also the economy of gold sellers that making the farming of resources very difficult in some cases, but in turn lowering the price of those goods making it a buyers market. Large guilds and small guilds, big players and small players have large and small amounts of gold. This gold gives them power to play a role in the game.

Now consider a GM.

How wealthy is a GM?

A GM is a God in every possible meaning. How much money does God have. Gods' have no need for money because their power is divine. That which can only be manipulated by mortals through the flow of money is granted by these gods.

Well, I have talked about God in reality, and sorry, but there is obviously no God. The power that exists in World of Warcraft by GM's is the type of power Christians consider their God to posses. Personally, I've moved on. I am not going to waste my life waiting for something that isn't there, especially in the presence of such a rich beautiful environment around us to explore and learn about... but I digress.

Some people talk about the great power of the GM and the great things that they have. I am baffled by how 'impressed' some people are by this power when "HELLO!!! They are programmed that way!" Further, Blizzard would not benefit from destroying its own economy. It thrives off of subscriptions, and while they could possibly finance a great guild to become powerful beyond all measure... the power is only an illusion. If Blizzard decided it didn't want to do World of Warcraft anymore, no amount of game gold is going to have any influence on the future of the game.

In a very similar way, the Big 12 operate on the economy, media, and government with the same level of control Blizzard has over the distribution of game gold...

...but in not nearly a nice way.

Zeitgeist Part III covers the basics the best that got me into looking at this mess. The only thing that makes this entire monetary system even appear to work is that it is so greatly distributed, it is not apparent how insidious it is as a whole.

The federal reserve prints money
The money is deposited into 12 exclusive banks, and only these 12 banks.
The money is loaned out at interest to the government and the people / corporations.
ALL the money that exists is one big loan from these 12 banks + interest, so even if all the money in the entire world were to be returned to the banks, interest is still owed to the big 12.
The only way to pay off this interest is:

To print more money that is further borrowed and loaned at interest.
Liquidate the assets of the borrower.

One defense in the case of 5.1 is that the federal reserve can only issue money at the approval of the Treasury, but in the case of 5.2, the real value (as in real economy versus finance economy) of any default (which is inevitable when the amount of money owed is and always will be greater than all the money in the world) goes to the loan holder, any of the Big 12.

Sure, there are smaller banks. and those banks collect on defaulted loans, or even make their money on loans being paid back. It is even possible that the banks could be using only money from depositors and not borrowing the money from one of the Big 12, but even in that case, that money is SOMEONE'S debt owed SOMEWHERE.

What do you buy with that type of power, and in what cases do you use your influence of forgiveness to these loans to extend your power? Invest in real property, invest in big media. Only let the people live on YOUR land, using your money, and watching your news and media, and invest in politicians with nice happy ambitions that will bring about change, so long as it is within the system, and not OF the system.

We may have issued a Declaration of Independence, fought a war, and say we won because we have this constitution, a congress, and a president, and all these laws...

...but who cares. The only people that really cared were the British bankers. Only too shortly after the war was this country sold out. Only 2 of the 12 banks are domestically owned. Look for yourself which banks these are, and which family leads them, and tell me how much good it has ever done for the American people.

It is musical chairs in this monetary system, and we are arguing over their color and the softness of the seats. We argue over capitalism and communism, supply and demand, and we don't look at the big picture. THERE IS NO REAL ECONOMY when the system operates at the will of bankers, because there is no money, there is only debt.

Does it really take a logician to see this; to see the limit of this system of inflation and liquidation? Why are we working for these bankers? Why do we appoint them the gods of our economy and complain like as if it was anyone else's fault; we have appointed an evil God, or maybe we should have learned a lesson or two about humanity and the bestowing of absolute power to anyone.

It is well enough that the people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning. ~ Henry Ford

If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered. ~ Thomas Jefferson

We've done it. We have lost the revolutionary war.

The one nice thing? There is statistically NO chance that Obama would be assassinated. Every president that has ever been assassinated has been close to eliminating the central bank of the United States. Of the others whom have had attempts on their life, two-thirds of them argued against the central bank. So as I said, Obama is pretty safe.

Has he said anything about nationalized banking? Guess I'll need to check. If so, that will be the real threat: trying to give everyone the red pill and possibly displeasing our gods. The threat would never be over the color of his skin.

So consider this: Look at the power and control of the media. Control of the media is almost completely centralized. They have influenced copyright law and culture to devastating levels. All of this to ensure censorship of radical ideas like abolishing the federal reserve. The media can control much from its position... now consider on top of that the same families controlling the banks. Hypothetically, what would be the limits of control for 12 companies cooperating to ultimately control all the banks, the media, and using its wealth to purchase land effectively for free in the end (What useful labor has been produced by these banks that get free money to loan out at interest?)

The only hope I see in seeing anything resembling benevolence from these gods is: You play buy their rules. You play by their system. You obey their laws. You worry about whatever the news tells you to worry about. You pick a political party and when you are upset you write ~~their~~your congressmen. You can hold your signs (after you get your permit).

Just don't think for a second you could beat them, or that the world might be able to work in some different way.

I am not advocating violence, but I wish someone could please explain to me how this might end any other way. Of course there is one nice, easy, non-violent solution. Just keep playing along, and pretend like everything is fine. For real measure, just never get into debt, and never give anyone money you can't stand to loose. Oh, and of course it is important that you never stop working, because don't forget inflation takes money away from you no matter where you hide it. Of course there is hope that you die early.

Anyway, while I am certain that the gods' would not allow it, here is what I believe would be a superior monetary policy, both the necessary transition, and the self sustaining system that would follow. Keep in mind this is a work in progress, and this is my initial proposal:

1) Treasury takes over Federal Reserve and void all promissory notes / bonds issued to Federal Reserve.
2) Declare eminent domain over all bank debts and Federal Reserve notes (the money).
3) Outlaw usury (charging / earning interest). Allow only the issue of dividends / stocks.
4) Nationalize banking: Tellers would be public employees and ATM's would be a public service, giving people a safe place to keep their money.
5) Eliminate the IRS (part 2)
6) Pass the Fair Tax Act (part 2)
7) Draft a Federal Employment Act (part 3)

Looking at the evidence, the problem is not a lack of the gold standard. The gold standard is a way to control bankers, but fiat money can be self correcting without the wild swings of the whims of the bankers, particularly when you eliminate interest from the equation.

1) Government prints some fixed amount of money each year.
2) This fixed amount of money is the federal budget. This money can be spent on all the things necessary. Initially money can be given to state governments proportionately. All employees of the government would be paid in these dollars in the same fashion Lincoln paid soldiers of the Civil War (he printed his own money). Each year, this same amount of money would be printed. There would be no debt ever because the government isn't borrowing it or taxing it from other people that borrowed it. It would be merely a tool of the economy.
3) (part 2) Money enters the system through (sorry mises) the governments planning of what would be best for people to do in terms of useful labor. This would inspire people to acquire dollars in the same way they did before. The value of the dollar would be others incentive to produce goods and accept these dollars as payment. Once those privately produced goods were purchased, then the cycle is complete, the government is entitled to a tax. The fixed portion of the price of newly produced goods over time should reach an equilibrium of ( one trillion dollars + money in economy ) * .23 = one trillion dollars. Normal Free Trade should be able to operate at this point.
4) If a large volume of money is taken outside of the country, or if lots of money is saved, then an inflation does occur. If the money re-enters the market, taxes should bring the system back to equilibrium. This may sound very similar to what we have now, or at least theorized, but I disagree. The equation above has a set equilibrium based on the forces of supply and demand and the natural movement of the REAL economy. Right now we have a fake economy controlled by a finance economy that limits out over time to give everything to the bankers + infinite inflation of the dollar. That is NOT the same kind of equilibrium.
5) There should be a legal right to work. Virtually anyone can join the military and make money if necessary. Why not extend this to any useful labor. People don't need the threat of starvation and death of their family to be motivated to higher learning and career advancement. If there is anything people ever need, that is a job because assisting people with what they need IS useful labor as ascribed by Adam Smith. The goal isn't the money, the goal is useful labor. Government paying you just means they are the ones telling you what to do that is useful. Money is only the instrument. Again, those dollars are promises to stimulate the private sector. When those dollars are spent in the private sector, taxes take a portion and return it to the government. Useful labor by government stimulates the private sector in proportion to the tax rate.

Rothschild won his bet, control the money supply, control a nation. And sadly, if this is the only way it can be understood:

The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender
-- Proverbs 22:7

Our own government is a slave to the interests of bankers; it is no wonder the government is powerless to do much about the economy. Wealth comes from useful labor. For whatever role of leadership the government is meant to play, people are suffering and yet there is nothing useful for people to do? This has always baffled me on a very simplistic level, but after going through many of the sources above, it makes a lot more sense.

Let the bankers get / maintain their control, and we will always, as a whole, owe more to them than everything we have. It is the way the system was designed.

If you are content with the way things are because you as an individual is getting by, I can understand. Just be aware that what you are content with is the idea that every American patriot and revolutionary fought for nothing.

God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion.
The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is
wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts
they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions,
it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. ...
And what country can preserve its liberties, if it's rulers are not
warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of
resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as
to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost
in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from
time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
It is its natural manure.
~Thomas Jefferson

The answers are meaningless if we are asking the wrong questions about how things work.

Computers are useless. They can only give us answers. - Pablo Picasso

Answers to our present situation have been given by so many people over and over. It is time for some new questions, and begin to challenge the things we take for granted. I have generally been a big fan of small government, but looking at what appears to me as the real problem, our government is powerless. The government only appears powerful as attempts are made at eliminating privacy and other rights.

Power is the ability to get things done, not simply an ability to oppress. To trust the government may seem a dangerous thing to do, but I do believe they may have our best interests better than a bunch of foreign bankers. Hell, just look at what the domestic banks are doing.

Eliminate usury and give the power to the government to make interest and debt free direct investment and we will see a government with the power to do good, and beginnings of a real economy.

OS Discussion: What have people talked about by TLD

2009-02-02T13:35:00.000-08:00

I've talked about Google Trends before, and controversy keeps being brought up about Ubuntu v. Windows Vista, as well as other combinations. Today I wanted to take another approach. Not what people are looking for so much, but what has been said. I was inspired by an article on Slashdot about the Department of Defense setting up their own site like Sourceforge, which happens to reside at a .mil top level domain(TLD). So I thought, if .mil sites are heavily regulated and organized, what is the trend of references to various Operating Systems? Further, how closely does this relate to other 'special use' TLDs?

Because I really hate when people don't put the raw data or method for data collection with a study, here is the code I used. Sure, I could have done this by hand, but Linux, for me, is all about making things easier.

note: The reason for the sleep 1s; is because of this

echo "Search results for OS's by TLD\n\n"; for j in '+site%3A.edu' '+site%3A.gov' '+site%3A.mil' '+site%3A.org' '+site%3A.net' '+site%3A.com'; do echo -e "\nMatching terms for $j"; for i in 'Microsoft' 'Windows' '"Microsoft Windows"' 'IBM' 'Apple' 'Unix' 'Linux' '"Red Hat"' 'Solaris' 'AIX' 'Novell' '"Sun Microsystems"' 'OSX' 'Fedora' 'Suse' 'FreeBSD' 'NetBSD' 'OpenBSD' 'Ubuntu' '"Windows 3"' '"Windows 95"' '"Windows 98"' '"Windows NT"' '"Windows 2000"' '"Windows XP"' '"Windows Vista"' '"Windows 7"' '"Windows Server"'; do sleep 1s; echo -en "$i\t\t"; lynx "http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=$i$j&btnG=Search" -useragent="Mozilla/5.0 Lynx" -dump | grep Results | sed -e 's/^.* of about \([0-9,]*\)\ .*$/\1/' | head -n 1; done; done | tee TLDresults.txt

Should I have formatted it and saved it as a script? Probably, but that wasn't how it was done. :) I love the terminal. Ooh, and run at your own risk. I got multiple computers banned testing this script.

Anyway, here are the results I got (reformatted):

Company / OS	.edu	.gov	.mil	.org*	.net*	.com*
Microsoft	7420000	1320000	64700	64000	30100	548000
Windows	11000000	1620000	65900	171000	48500	893000
Microsoft Windows	596000	84600	5190	4650	3170	59100
IBM	6460000	1420000	21500	40400	5950	185000
Apple	1920000	606000	11500	40600	15200	318000
Unix	7350000	775000	10300	25100	12000	68400
Linux	2130000	693000	5450	104000	51600	254000
Red Hat	796000	201000	2620	3960	1660	17000
Solaris	612000	68700	2560	13400	2320	21600
AIX	328000	68100	2480	4790	1680	15100
Novell	144000	20600	1190	2170	1050	12200
Sun Microsystems	225000	29000	2240	4180	731	16600
OSX	885000	142000	7090	19300	7440	85500
Fedora	788000	21900	680	6810	3620	13800
Suse	283000	19200	359	4630	1880	9230
FreeBSD	356000	9770	177	10400	2420	9910
NetBSD	46500	2520	136	3270	321	1890
OpenBSD	28300	2450	102	2080	437	2430
Ubuntu	486000	29100	49	14200	9340	44100
Windows 3	57500	3410	271	108	165	2290
Windows 98	83800	16000	1260	2790	1440	46400
Windows 2000	231000	45700	3690	3660	1880	39100
Windows XP	1450000	51400	3450	12600	7590	144000
Windows NT	390000	39700	4010	4810	1700	22900
Windows Vista	296000	8880	905	5830	5440	117000
Windows 7	15500	1150	134	1440	3550	61700
Windows Server	54800	8130	1040	1890	1970	29900

(* thousands)

~~note: eek, formatting didn't come out as expected. Will fix soon.~~
update: ok, so my html sucks, but the table is easier to look at than before.

Unfortunately have run out of time make any remarks considering the trend, but I see some interesting relationships. Will comment further tomorrow.

Jurisprudence and Imaginary Property Law

2009-01-29T13:13:00.000-08:00

Just because the RIAA is able to buy its way into congress doesn't mean that the laws it writes are not subject to jurisprudence.

I believe in the rule of law and do not give 'god-like' status to the government in my mind, or in my obedience to it.

Truth is not a democracy.

The content industry has spread lies and fears based on dubious hypotheticals. Now that it turns out that either they were totally talking out their ass, or had an ulterior motive. This should challenge the system to change, as it is an obligation of politicians and people of a republic.

But given that these multi-billion dollar companies likely didn't get where they are by being stupid, looking at the "real" threat of of a healthy commons, and recognizing the roots of the constitution where it says, "Congress shall have the power to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries", and compare it to what is going on in our legal system today...

...there are people that are very angry. And they should be.

p.s. oh yeah, so don't be surprised if this means there are a few people out there tired of listening to your ramblings and ignoring them, no matter where you manage to get it written. While this may be of limited concern to the MPAA/RIAA's of the world, the government should be wise to the large and growing number of people that are willing to invalidate your laws for you; it is not a problem that is going to be solved through violence or incarceration. You can try, but you can't stop ideas: There will be reform, or there will be revolution.

Big Brain Academy

2009-01-26T14:01:00.000-08:00

It sounds like the conclusion of the study continues to confirm that using your brain is the best way to keep it sharp, be it playing Nintendo DS, being engaged in a classroom environment, sudodu, or any other pencil and paper puzzle or homework. I personally don't find any suggestion that Big Brain Academy isn't more than any other method to be more effective to be particularly significant. If it keeps up with other methods, then great, it lives up to its purpose. If children are more engaged, excited, inspired and encouraged to use their brain because of Big Brain Academy, not to mention the possibly more motivating competition through the social use of the game, then the game should be praised.

I would be most interested in feedback from these 10 year old about how they felt about being a part of the group they were in, what they thought of the other groups, level of perceived group cohesion, perceived positive and negative effects of competition, and if they would be inclined to encourage their parents to get them a copy, and if so, felt like it was something to become good to impress their friends.

There is no lack of material out there to stimulate ones brain (or things out there to bring it to a screeching halt for that matter). The challenge is getting kids to take pride in training their brains and feeling like pursuit of academics endeavors would enrich their lives.

Self motivated students will always thrive in rich environments and can pick tools for themselves be it Big Brain Academy or a good old fashioned textbook. For the less motivated student that is open minded but otherwise finds 'math' or solo puzzles boring them to sleep, Big Brain Academy brings new options to parents and students. The greatest thing I love about Big Brain Academy is that it is adaptive to any skill level or age, and anyone with the skill to hold the remote is going to be able to participate.

At very least, when was the last time parents got a fun, challenging brain game that was equally enjoyable for their child?

I played this game for the first time on New Years at an all adult party, and it was a lot of fun for everybody. I don't think a wild game of sudoku in any form would have been nearly as entertaining. From someone that has had no interest in buying a console since the 8 bit Nintendo, I am strongly considering getting a Wii just for this game.

I feel this 'scientist' took a too narrow and flawed approach in assessing this game, particularly with respect to how the game could likely have been improved. Even more reason why personal feedback from participants could have had the greatest value from this study.

Government Support for Propietary Solutions is Obsolete

2009-01-26T10:48:00.001-08:00

FutureGuy writes:

All I can tell Obama is the only reason "open source"/free software even exists is because that's one way to compete/gain market share from commertial companies like MS. MS in many ways is the main motivator for "open source"/free software. If you take companies like MS and Apple out of the picture the resources available to enhance and maintain open source software will dry up faster than dry ice under hot California sun.

That is amusing. MS operates in the finance economy where the value of the software is how much money can be made. OSS operates in the real economy outside the finance economy where improvements to software are intrinsic, and censorship isn't the root of its power (value isn't gained through scarcity). The argument comes from whether or not companies can profit from OSS. Of course they can, just not through the illusion of false scarcity. Con artists and middle men hate it when they are beaten out by real value. The only reason government should hate F/OSS is because it can't be taxed.

If what you want is better software / information technology, F/OSS is obviously the best choice, but software can be the means to the end of either profitability or better software. Profitability can mean more money to stay competitive, or better software can be produced that is more productive such that the software can be used to do better business.

As long as there is a need for better faster software to do things and look at problems in new ways, there will be money for programmers. Microsoft has contributed to the software industry as much as, and in the same way the RIAA has contributed to music culture. Great music has always come from the truest music lovers, and I am certain for as long as people could hear, there has always been value in music. Only since there has been money in heavily controlled mass distribution of information has a new type of criminal been imagined in order to ensure control and maintenance of a very profitable business.

The government and other users are not in this business. Just because of the present level of control by Microsoft, and possibly the long for people to get back in touch with culture could be difficult with companies like Microsoft and members of the RIAA and MPAA that have so much to gain from the commoditization of our culture is no reason to continue to support it.

If the best move for the government is for them to gain the most money through the largest bribes and handing out control to large companies that results in "standardization" through exclusive control, then sticking with Microsoft will be the sure way to go. If Obama wants to make a move for the people, encourage transparent culture where people participate in it, rather than just pay for it where a faith in humanity is what will be the most profitable (with regard to value and encouragement of useful labor) then the FIRST thing Obama can do is embrace open standards and free open source software.

bodycoach2 writes: When I refer to Open Source, I like to call it, "Open for Peer Review". Microsoft and Apple's (1/2 of Apple's, at least) code is NOT open to peer review. Take the cases of the Breathlizer tester machines. The software code on those are not open to peer review. We, the public, are not able to question our accuser (the software code)- a fundamental right in our justice system. I have no problem with proprietary software. But when government uses software, I prefer that the code be open to peer review. The Total Cost of Ownership is a topic that can change with each situation, each software package, even with each user. But not being able to review the code is something we cannot afford. xcal78 replies: Long as your footing the bill for all the extra costs incurred above what Windows would have costed(sic) the government go right ahead. I'm not interested in spending 2-3 times more for a new system just because. Open source is open your wallet. Research what's involved in a system switch of any kind. See if you can find a TCO vs ROI chart for an OS switch that proves you get a better TCO and when the ROI is from Windows to anything else. It doesn't exist so you'll be looking for a long time.

Cost of change? If you are totally dependent on Microsoft for training and maintenance of your business, then actually taking responsibility for your systems is going to be a big reality check, and just as you did with Microsoft, if you need someone else to make these changes for you, not only is there going to be a diminished benefit, but it is going to cost you. Low end MS tech support is very cheap; they are everywhere. Linux support... different. Not as many Linux people sitting around with nothing to do, AND with so much documentation for open source software also being free, and with so many forums, and advanced howto's for everything, anything left is going to require a guru. This is where there is big money. There is also money for large scale startup, which is more of less and should be an initial training (otrherwise what do you do if/when it breaks?)

The real problem and expense is an issue of management. Microsoft makes it as easy as possible for people to get locked in by the promise of doing all the work for you. With Linux, there is an expectation for people to take some initiative either by learning it yourself, or hiring someone to remember it all. Fortunately this is easy because for the most part, there is primary or third party documentation that is easy to follow and understand. But like with anything else, if you don't try, you are going to pay for it. Between all the people that read the documentation and made an effort and are seeking expert help for a few pieces, they are going to pay the same price for support per hour as you to be hand held through everything.

So average TCO is very misleading, and even median TCO makes some bad assumptions. How about look at the range of TCO and listen and take advice from those that were able to do successful implementations. Listen to what worked and didn't work. When you look for advice, do you want the average story, or the most common story? Of course not! You want to know cost / effort of what works + cost of worst possible scenario. Using this information, you can decide what resources are important to invest in to reduce business expenses. Microsoft, Apple, Red Hat, and Sun want to offer you total business solutions. The first two specialize in simplicity, but at the expense of flexibility and diversification among others. Within those two elements, OSS typically offers modularity, and for the greatly ambitious, well documented code that is easy to add onto, whereas Microsoft and Apple limit you to API's that can't be audited (for whatever that is worth).

A better government I thought Americans appreciated was the idea of participation by the people. Even if most people choose not to participate, the opportunity for all to become active political members has always had a high value. While well managed use of F/OSS has survived the FUD, even if t was more expensive, isn't there an obligation in the digital age to support transparent government through open standards? It is not impossibly expensive to enable our best and brightest to keep us aware of the way things are working, and allow any American to become one of those people?

There is no way this discussion would even be taking place if Microsoft were not an American company. Why? because there is no way we are going to give that away! Why should we take what should be given to the American people and give it exclusive to one very small American company. Sorry, but Microsoft is very small when you consider opening opportunity for all.

The only counter argument is "Just sell out because I don't care". Well, you know what? I don't buy that! The Internet is an example of what can be built on free open source software and open standards. ATM, token-ring, and mainframe systems are what came from proprietary software, which gave us great opportunities to get off the ground. TCP/IP packet switched networks were evolution and birth of digital freedom and ultimately the Internet.

Government is ready to move forward.

Roe v. Wade: Is a fetus a person?

2009-01-23T16:43:00.000-08:00

Row v. Wade was a case about a womans right to privacy. Since then the argument has been heated over the life of the potential child, and the potentially compelling public interests to over turn the case. A case may be making it to the Supreme Court soon to argue the personhood of the unborn child. This is one short perspective...

I am not going to rant on about this, but I was listening to this being argued on the radio (Make it Plain: Sirius Left 146) Do you think that a fetus is a person? is a viable argument?

So many aspects to this for so many reasons, but as I said, somewhere so much to say and too much to say, but I think I can cover my opinion of the issue and perspective simply:

All Life is sacred.
Every Female egg and every menstruation is a growing and developing life with full potential.
People need to be responsible in their sexual relationships for MANY reasons.
The law does not recognize a life as a person until it is an adult with the majority of normal capacity and 18 years old, or emancipated.
Pregnancy is a private matter that should be respected
The life of a baby has a compelling public interest once the child has been introduced to society as such, when it has been done so voluntarily. Given the right circumstances, compelling interest could exist before conception.
Compulsory maternity mandated by the state is rape under any circumstances, however given appropriate medical technology including safety and meeting appropriate conditions for compelling public interest, allow the pregnancy to be transfered. If by some means those conditions were met, and no harm would come of the mother, but the transfer was not entirely voluntarily, Neither biological parent would retain any rights or liability.
To deny a womans right to choose is to objectify life, not embrace it as sacred.

I realize I have left many points very vague, but I think I will cover them by reference, individually in separate articles as I already have much to do today.

For even simpler measure, I look forward to the Freedom of Choice Act being signed into law by Obama, representing progress and respect for life, and women.

Ah, the Evidence of FACT challenges. We will always love you!

2009-01-22T16:19:00.000-08:00

If you find this evidence compelling, countering the claims of Zeitgeist, part 1, another great site: The Flat Earth Society
Compare the number of users and active discussions going on @ The Flat Earth Society web site compared to Zeitgeist Challenge and compare who has made the better, more comprehensively rational argument for their belief. Personally, I could more easily believe that the perceived direction of the dimensional planes makes it appear that the world is round, but a simple Polar to Cartesian transformation (which is purely perceptual) shows a flat earth supporting all the claims of the Flat Earth Society. That would be my support.

The Bible, just like dinosaur bones, were put here to test our faith, and an attempt to hide the truth.

But it is fun to take on challenges, but why work so hard to win only $250 when you could win $7.5 Trillion just for proving evolution?

Or $100,000 offered to prove global warming

And if Zeitgeist part 2 was true, why wasn't this million dollar reward collected?

All this must prove is that Tom Cruz is our true Lord and Savior. Provide any evidence that I am wrong, and I will write your name on a $2 bill, wipe my ass with it, and flush it down the toilet. I have faith it will get to you.

Afterthought: Looking around some more, I came by this response to Zeitgeist, which personally only goes to show that at best, in the case of religion, both arguments are absurd. However, how about we just say that Zeitgeist was a complete satire with as much validity as The Da Vinci Code. Isn't the simple argument: They are all just stories with as much importance to your belief that you choose to give them. What's pragmatic; should you seek truth from one book or many?

Is the idea of attempting to seek truth beyond the bible just greedy, or an emergent truth just pessimistic? I'm happy believing Jack Black aka Jesus Christ in that there really isn't much of the Bible that is believed by anyone anymore, even though people keep saying they do, or use it as an excuse to justify ANYTHING that they feel like attributing to it.

And yet another note, Nature's Eternal Religion was recommended for those looking for more material along these lines. From what I have read so far, it is a book about the beauty of nature, and the disgusting politics of man. I am sure I will have more to say about it after I have finished reading it.

Final note? Something I couldn't help of thinking as I was driving home after reading browsing this site, the Rational Response Squad was this equation:

Astronomy + Literary Anthropomorphism+ Superstition + Rule #34 = Holy Bible

and possibly...

Holy Bible + Group Think + Democracy = Bat Shit Fucking Crazy Politicians Running This Country!!!

Do I even need to add greed into this?

Too Simple? Nah.

How do you call this a "study"?

2009-01-21T13:22:00.000-08:00

This article seemed interesting, until I realized there was absolutely no data, and technically, there weren't even any results. Just an unsupported opinion. I tried to keep an open mind to see where this opinion was coming from, and there really wasn't much of anything till I came past this little gem:

a good male is more willing to pay the cost of a long courtship to claim the prize of mating.

I thought prostitution was illegal. This sounds very demeaning to both genders. Though I know many treat sex as something a woman sacrifices for a man, can I just say "YUCK!". Women need to empower themselves by taking time to understand their sexuality (let alone men). It does not just come naturally with puberty or just waiting long enough. Take control, be pragmatic, and enjoy yourself, when the time feels right, without being pressured into doing anything you don't want to do, but keep an open mind.

What was their data anyway? Interviews with couples on their 50th anniversary asking how long they waited? People that divorced in less than a year? People that say "I'm sad", or "I'm happy". Was this only people in relationships, or people who were single? Were these people in clinics for nymphomania? I can find happy and miserable people in all kinds of relationships. What science or even matter for that matter are you trying to show? 1 day is short period of time?

Objectifying sexuality and particularly female sexuality this way I find offensive. However, for those of you that can't seem to learn from your mistakes (which sadly maybe the truth of this "study", though who could ever know without the data) then maybe you are better off waiting. I think if things don't click reasonably well on the first date, maybe you should think of cutting your losses. Learn to trust and improve your instincts, both the onces that say "this guy seems to be trying to hard" and the one that says "I bet this guy would be a great lay".

I just keep reading it and am just trying to think of this in anything but a sick and depraved way. "a good male is more willing to pay the cost of a long courtship to claim the prize of mating". While women can get a good vibe that says "let's take things slow", I certainly hope that NO woman ever buys into this misogynistic crap that a women are a commodity to be bought and sold.

Changing the price doesn't make you less of a whore. Try instead to THINK and be WISE about your CHOICES.

This is annoying...

2009-01-18T23:20:00.000-08:00

Ok, this is just an angry response, not a well thought out one, but I am going to leave it as is just the same.

fjpoblam writes:

Creative Commons and the Copyleft movement recognize that, in the web world, it is impossible (there are not enough human "enforcers") to guarantee protection of intellectual property published on the web. No can do. Period. The best an artist/programmer/creator can do is *ask* for credit and *ask* that, if the work is copied, it be passed along, freely, with no more restrictions than the artist/programmer/creator put on it. The artist/programmer/creator can further DEMAND that the artist/programmer/creator has ABSOLUTE right to diddle the original work and gain profit from it NO MATTER WHAT anyone does with the copies. (You can't copyright my stuff in such a way that keeps me from diddling it.)

Wow, you just don't get it.

Just because companies have found a way to profit off of free software does not mean that is what the free software revolution is about. Creative Commons and Gnu GPL are keeping companies like Disney, Microsoft, Sony, and these other douche bags from pirating our fucking culture, commoditizing, and selling it back to us. The financial institutions of this country have raped us, printing money and putting a price tag on everything to take it back at their leisure.

Creative commons and the GPL says you may steal everything else, but you are not stealing our thoughts, our beliefs, our culture. The purpose of life is to share information, and those that try to package it up and take it away from people are the real criminals of the world, and no matter what their talk, no matter what their lies or excuses, I will continue to tell them they can completely go FUCK themselves.

If you don't want it pirated, keep it in your fucking head. It is the last safe place, even if for only a little bit longer.

Ethics of Stem Cell Research

2009-01-18T17:04:00.000-08:00

To begin, from what I understand, stem cells are basically blank. Heart cells, nerve cells, liver cells, bone cells, skin cells or any thing that provides a function needs to be told what it is, and how to work. The DNA / nucleus is like a computer chip. Without software, or in the case of a cell RNA, is needed before it can do something or produce any useful work. They do not yet have a purpose. In the case of an embryo, the only job in the early stages is for it to simply make copies of itself. Once there is a large enough group of them, it can be time to start giving those cells any of a wide range of jobs, like become part of a heart, lungs, nerves, or whatever is needed. There cells work together dedicating their life to whatever job they are assigned. They live out a lifecycle like people, but much much shorter. A thing about heart cells though, once they are programmed, they can either do their job as a part of the heart, or divide to make new replacement heart cells. Because they are programmed with a particular code, what ever the job of the parent was, so will be the job of the children. Heart cells can not become lung cells, for example because they were not designed that way.

So here is where stem cells are totally unique. They have no job yet. They have not been told what their task will be that it will provide or that its children will provide in all future generations. Remember that once programmed, they can never be reprogrammed. They dedicate their life to their work.

Amazing things have been done with transplants and graphs. Hearts can be taken from one person that can no longer serve another's life, but can be given to another where both can continue to live. burn victims can have damaged skin removed, and other skin can take its place, and those cells continue to do their job.

If we define our life by who we are uniquely and our role in society by what we do in all aspects, it could be said that stem cells are not yet alive. They are the tools that are used to become life.

There are limits on what scientists can do with transplants. We do not worry that because, say, a liver played the role of cleaning a persons body that somehow the persons soul is going to be damaged by playing that same role in another body.

scientists want to extend that to a smaller level. While stem cells are the building blocks for life, they have not been told what to do yet. In nature, at some point in natural development, those cells will be given a job, and what scientists want to do is guide those cells to do what they do naturally. Instead of becoming an entire new life with enough time and programming, doctors can put those cells into a person with a spinal cord injury, and being near those cells, the stem cells will see "This person needs a section of their spinal cord". even if microscopic, the cells can communicate with each other, and the stem cells will know their purpose in life, and take on the role of being a part of that spinal cord.

Being totally unprogrammed, and being so small, stem cells can take on the tiniest of tasks as they were meant to, and with no prior knowledge, completely integrate itself into the hosts system without chance for rejection of complications due to conflicting programming.

Programmed cells can not be reprogrammed. If the stems cells were a life, or meant to be a baby, the kinds of issues that in adults that could be resolved though stem cell therapy would not work. If the cells were meant to become a new life, they would. Instead, in an adult with a disease or injury, the stem cells will want to help repair the damage and become a part of another life as nature intended.

This miracle of life that we have slowly come to understand is not simple. It isn't just a shot, or a bandaid any more than heart transplants, or skin graphs were just easy things. There is more that needs to be known, and this is why for real progress of medical science, we need to study these things, and understand how this works to provide the environment necessary for these stem cells to do what they do naturally.

In whatever respect stem cells could be considered to be alive, it is not like growing children to harvest hearts where a child is killed and their bodies discarded. Such a wretched disregard for life is and should be deplorable. In the case of stem cells, all the cells can be used in a manner already intended by nature. Even if a group of cells were divided, these cells can still do any job necessary. As we already see in nature, this can happen under normal circumstances to create identical twins. In whatever way we may see identical twins the same, they are not one life, they are individuals as complete as any other person. As we have recently discovered, the opposite can be true. In the case of fraternal twins, two eggs each separately fertilized can be joined together. If this is very late in development when these cells have start to become a complete person, there can be upsetting results, Siamese twins. In Siamese twins, two to be children mostly developed can combine at a stage to complete one part of the body together that is shared. Sometimes this may just be skin, and the twins are easily separated, and being disconnected, a normal healing process will begin to complete the missing parts individually; this is one of the many roles of programmed skin cells. Sadly in earlier development, children may join together to make one spinal column, at which point the pair would either live out life with a very difficult disability, one twin may be killed to save the life of the other, but more often than not, this will result in a still-birth, as the machine that is our bodies will either recognize the result and self terminate, or simply fail on its own.

Another type of twin though has been recently discovered, a Chimera. Like a Siamese twin, but where the combination is almost completely stem cells. In this case, the child will develop completely normal and healthy, just with 2 (or possibly more) sets of DNA. Because they were combined so early, there are no complications because there is so sense of identity by one to reject the other. Perfect symbioses.
but in the way stem cells work, some group may become bone marrow, while the others of the different DNA may become skin. This has brought a whole new complication to DNA testing, because while DNA testing of one tissue type may measure one way, a blood sample from the same person can come back as a mismatch. Checking the same person from different tissue samples was never considered, and in the case of, say, DNA evidence for a homicide or rape, a Chimera has a solid defense in our current system.

So what do we say of these different people, and types of twins; one where we see what we call "life" divided, and others where two lives may have been combined. What does it all mean? It means there is a lot about life and particularly stem cells that we do not understand in their role.

We do separate Siamese twins in hopes of providing a quality of life to individuals, and Chimeras can be totally normal and healthy. We do not accuse identical twins of only having half of a life, nor should we. It is an opportunity to understand what is revealing itself as an amazing process that is life.

Cells without a purpose in life can become any number of things as we have seen in nature in nearly infinite ways. Stem Cell research can take cells that want to provide for a life in a new way to improve the quality of life for many individuals that where either their stem cells or DNA might not have gotten things right the first time. Doctors will hopefully one day to correct such mistakes with Stem Cells doing just what nature intended.

To try and stop stem cell research because one can not open their mind to the multifaceted and nearly incomprehensible miracle of life beyond what we currently understand is brutally unethical. Please allow thinking to guide our progress, not ignorance.

Watch Obama Inauguration Here!

2009-01-17T15:22:00.000-08:00

This looks exciting. The publicity seems higher than ever for an inauguration. They even have memorabilia at 7-11. He sure has a good PR guy.

Side note, having greatly surpassed the old blog in size, I think it is fair to say Liberated really doesn't apply anymore, this simply is, NakedPenguins. :)

The more things change, the more things stay the same

2009-01-16T09:59:00.000-08:00

I think this is more a reflection of computer users, or even people, than Ubuntu users. People that know and understand Linux, use Linux. I have used a variety of distributions, but I am pretty happy with Ubuntu. I have used Ubuntu exclusively for only a few years now, but I can still see where I am far behind in my understanding of many things based on the forums I visit. Ubuntu irc had been a fun place I would go to get help, and often spend some time helping others. It was very civilized, though there were a lot of new people. Years later, now, it might be hard to distinguish from 4chan or Barrens chat. I don't go there any more AT ALL.

But honestly, I think this is just what happens when popularity increases with anything. I remember when the majority of people on the Internet (if you would really call it that) were between intelligent and highly intelligent individuals discussing a wide range of topic (though usually leaning towards the nerdy side) in a civilized manner.

Going from telnet to web browsing changed everything! The number of people online was approaching a million! The number of servers you could connect to or 'sites' you could now 'browse to' was skyrocketing! People starting making their own web sites and hosting forums at home, and there were just tons of people all excited to be involved in this new medium, despite the fact they had no idea what they were doing.

And then AOL came along, and Geocities. Soon everyone had a web page for their cat, and flame wars seemed to be the thing in every chat room. It was just like the parlor times a million! This was about the time I stopped going into chat rooms at all, because it was just intolerable.

But eventually we got slashdot, google, ebay, wikipedia, archieve.org, eff, findlaw, loc.gov, youtube, hulu, piratebay, thinkfree, change.gov and so many others both recently and over the years.

I miss the days when every person I knew that had a computer had taken it apart and put it back together many times, they all had some minimal programming skill, and nerdy groups of people would be going around to business or telling our non-nerd friends "you could do that so much better if you had a COMPUTER!", to which they would reply, "that stuff is for nerds, I am doing just fine with my typewriter". "There's nothing I can do with a computer I can't do on my typewriter", and "computers just make it more complicated and expensive".

There was no convincing them. You would try to explain, but they wouldn't listen.

Then one day they would come you you and be all like "Hey, guess what? I got one of those Pentium things! Isn't that cool!" and all you could do is smile and sigh. And after that, it was the endless phone calls for little things that you didn't mind, because it was exactly what you had been pushing for in the first place. But sometimes it made you wonder.

Soon, the round table discussions over new technologies in the library were replaced with sheep-dip seminars (thank you Andy Hunt), row after row of zombies watching someone explain what a mouse was for, and how to put things in the trash. Soon you had all these 'experts' saying that they knew more about computers than anyone because they had taken a class. Oh, the humanity...

So what a surprise that after all these years, we are still seeing the same type of revolution. Yes, I miss the 'Internet' when it was between 10,000 and 100,000 users, but those times are gone, and in the big picture, the new even more nerdy stuff is worth it.

They say that Linux userbase / marketshare (or whatever way Microsoft feels like measuring it one day to the next) is about 1%, but it is easy to see it is the top 1%. Maybe it is just me, but I don't see an even distribution be user base as a whole of computer experts between exclusive Linux users and exclusive Windows users. It is the same one percent 20+ years ago trying to get people to use computers because it was the future. That same group (albeit a new generation) are pushing Linux. The gurus are already Linux users. Who do you think you are recruiting? Ubuntu has made great ground in working its way down from that top one percent to possibly the next 1%. It is going to keep growing, and I can PROMISE you it is only going to get worse. If the goal is Linux adoption, then that is exactly what is going on, but why should the adoption on Linux be any different than the adoption of computers or the Internet was for the general population.

The newbie, beginner Linux user is going to use Ubuntu. It is the pretty flashy cool new thing. And as expected, they are going to flame the boards, and spend way too much time uploading their new theme of the hour to gnome-look.org. The old school Debian users are going to be like "What the hell have we done?", and the Gentoo users are going to be laughing their asses off saying "I told you so", and things will progress, change, adapt, and get better. Computers now do amazing things, and no longer are our libraries filled with people trying to get their Mouse Skills Certification. I swear the bottom 20% only changes as people die off.

The great thing is that Linux will never have to play to the lowest common denominator. Ubuntu may, and that will be its place. To me, Windows has played to the lowest common denominator consistently, and fighting through their sense of what intuition would be for someone that has never used a computer drives me completely nuts. I was discussing this with a friend who has also been studying the Dreyfus Model of Skill Acquisition (Anyone familiar with the Pragmatic Programmer series should be familiar), and we came to the same conclusion: If intuition is for experts, how do you create an intuitive interface for a novice?

The implications are nauseating.

This is a great reason for there to be many forks of projects any time it is deemed necessary, and distributions that can all be customized for computer users at any level of from novice to expert. That is part of the freedom I think we all hope for. It is also obvious to see that play out between Debian and Ubuntu users. Linux users may be the top 1%, and Ubuntu users make up the bottom 0.8% of that 1%.

So I can't help but point out that maybe the real fear shouldn't be for Microsoft, but for the Linux community, and to use everyones favorite cliche...

The Year of Linux is coming; brace yourself!

The Novice Computer User and the Pragmatic Learner

2009-01-15T11:29:00.001-08:00

Some people just need to see things a specific way, or they are totally lost. I know people that couldn't work an upside down door handle. Please never let that difficulty drive Linux development. Fortunately, Linux has always been about options. there may be a distribution out there that is for people that can't find their car if it is parked on the wrong side of the driveway (I think it was called SugarOS), but I believe it will be an evolutionary thing. Kids today are starting at very young ages with much better technology and are getting more intimate understandings. Kids are reaching competency and proficiency very quickly like kids do with anything they can actually get their hands on. Most adults if, say, they were pasty the age of 20 when they first got introduced to a computer, without much concerted effort, ever become more than very well trained novices. For anyone familiar with learning theory should understand that with that type of 'experience', it can't be adapted, no step or detail seems any more 'important' than any other in accomplishing a task, they don't see see the big picture, and the challenge in learning anything new is equal to the number of new steps to memorize. In what way is Linux ever going to be easy for these people to learn, and in another way, the kinds of challenges Linux can deal with, the tools are virtually worthless to a computer novice, those that don't see it holistically.

I think this explains why it is easy for little kids to use Ubuntu. The learning curve is great with just a few bumps, but while the system isn't designed to limit out at novice use, there are plenty of tools and methods to let novices work their way through the system doing basic tasks till they get a better understanding of all whats going on.

Tasks in Windows are just as simple in Linux for a novice, but the methods are different. The big difference between Linux and Windows, for me, is lifting that ceiling. If you begin to understand what all is going on or how things work, Linux gives you new and creative ways to do complex things in very simple, non-obvious ways. This is where I think people get intimidated. A novice watches a proficient Linux user do something seemingly "magical" and the novice begins to believe that is the way they need to do things. While maybe it should be the way to do things, that doesn't mean it is what they need to be doing right away. Linux is a world of possibilities: Be aware of where you are in your understanding with your computer and take appropriate steps to learn things in a way that is appropriate for your level. And if someone that helps you works their magic in ways that are beyond your level, don't worry, it probably took them some time to get to that level themselves.

However, if you really don't care to put in the mental effort to get past novice, I recommend getting a Macintosh. There are fancy expert features of OSX, but they are kept pretty hidden as so not to appear confusing.

It is a lot like a high performance car and their maintenance. Drive it hard, and it is going to need more work. If you need to hire a mechanic every few hundred miles, it is going to be very expensive unless you do your own mechanic work. Some people need to be rich, some people need to be mechanics, some people need to learn to drive carefully, and some people just need to buy slow cars.

Windows is like riding the short yellow school bus; it gets you where you need to go.

The challenge in picking an OS, for yourself or others

2009-01-15T10:19:00.000-08:00

Windows is adopted well enough that it is pretty easy in an environment with computers to find other people that have used windows before and can help. I remember decades ago when Windows 3.1 was the hot new thing. I didn't understand what the big deal was, classes on what a mouse was, and how to start applications like word. You would think that this basic knowledge would be adaptable, but it sadly that isn't the way people look at computers. I work at a school, and we had a 2 hour seminar to show people how to use the new photocopy machine. It was pretty fancy and could do cool stuff, but that wasn't what the class taught. It just had the very basics. I didn't get the trouble. We had other copy machines that worked in, what I thought, worked in the same basic way. Evidently not everyone saw it like that.

Linux is fine. People that are very productive on their windows machine and have explored the system past the basics I don't think would have any difficulty in learning a major distribution in a short period of time to get the basics down. But it does take effort. It is different and it will take the same kind of effort it took the first time when people were introduced to windows 3.1 or 95.

But for anyone that insists "But I don't want to learn anything, I just want to use it", get a mac. The important and good software is being ported to mac, and more companies are beginning to understand that it is possible to approach a project from a cross platform approach such that software never need be ported. This will mean hopefully soon, software will pretty much be platform independent, or that adding a platform will require negligible effort. With this in mind, the people that want to be able to mimic other people in what they do with the computer, get a mac. If you want a tool to express yourself without limits, get Linux. Between the two, where does that really leave Windows? I say "good riddance to bad rubbish".

Woman struggles with Ubuntu, online classes

2009-01-15T09:14:00.000-08:00

The issue is that Windows is easy to get started with, and there isn't a lot to learn. Simple GUIs for everything, and you wouldn't know about any advanced features unless you looked them up and knew what you were doing.

Linux is about productivity first. Linux is easy to use, but not completely obvious. With the power to begin any complicated task just a click or keyword away, it can feel like being dropped into an ocean and being asked to swim. The most extreme example of this type of design where productivity is valued over obviousness or 'intuitiveness' is Blender3D. Blender is a F***ING nightmare to figure a damn thing out. I used 3D studio max and poked around and was modeling simple buildings and funny creatures in a matter of hours. Blender I was just like WTF!?! and by the time I figured out how to draw a simple cube, I gave up. Last summer, I thought I would give it another go after watching Elephant Dreams. I figured, ok, of they can do this, I must be able to do better than a box. I thought: What would be the pragmatic way of going about this. Hmm.. Read the damn documentation maybe? The first thing the documentation covered was that the GUI ia intentionally designed a very particular way and they are NOT going to change it. While it requires a lot of memorization, once you 'get it', it will enable you to model faster than ever. Despite not knowing how to do anything, the GUI didn't seem so 'stupid' anymore. If every little detail was very well thought out, then I needed to give it a chance. I jumped on youtube and did a search for "Blender tutorial". MANY results. I picked a series and followed along. While the controls were not obvious in any way, they were easy to remember and simple to use. Every few videos or so, I would try to figure something out on my own, but usually with complete failure. But continuing with the videos, each 20 minute segment was showing me whole new aspects of what could be done. I got to give credit where credit is due. super3boy did a pretty good job. The videos were a bit on the crude side, and the examples were really simple and drawn out, but considering how effective he was in assisting me with my learning, it was perfect. I even showed a friend that had never even much used a computer but to check email, and within a week we were making beautiful scenes, fun simple games, and such. Water, fireworks, explosives taking out buildings, whatever came to mind could be put together right away as the thoughts unfolded. It wasn't like having to think of one part then work through it and then think about the next part after the first part was done.

Anyway, the point is, Linux can be over whelming. I know many people are interested in Linux, but watch people who are comfortable with it, and it all just looks like magic. I have been using Linux for several years now, and I still see people do clever things that appear "magical". Maybe that is why Macs are so popular. I don't think there is anything I have ever seen done on a mac that couldn't be copied by a monkey. Maybe that is the appeal. One simple way to do certain things that people want to do with their computer that make them look cool. But while mac is much like a "choose your own adventure" novel, Linux can feel like pencil and paper, but give it a little time and energy, it is more like Harold's Purple Crayon.

I can understand that some people just want the choose your own adventure. I get that. But Linux enables your computer to be a tool, and as with any complex piece of machinery, the novice needs a teacher. Just because its complex and there is much to learn doesn't mean there is anything wrong with the machine. It means people need help. This is why I feel the Linux community is so strong. It is necessary for people to share their knowledge. It requires upstream developers to hang out in their own irc channel. It requires LOTS of third party documentation to address all the various learning styles that may best help people learn.

My local library uses only Ubuntu. They also have free classes on getting started with Ubuntu. I think it is also a cultural thing, because I remember there being very similar classes at local libraries when Windows 3.1 was new. People had no idea what computers were going to be capable of, but saw the advantage of digital word processors over type writers for editing, and businesses were beginning to require basic computer skills for jobs. Linux is revolutionary, and as Microsoft has feared in their internal memos, FlOSS is completely revolutionizing the way people think about computers. The Internet in a very basic way operates around the government; it is not something you can put a wall around because it is designed to work, and circumvent censorship because objectively censorship is identified as a problem within the network and attempts to fix it. Software and just the exchange of ideas operates on a humanistic level above the monetary system where the sole objective of sharing ideas is to be a part of a community of ideas, not trying to scrape together bits of money here and there to get by. Sharing your ideas and having people listen around the world is like printing your own money with whatever value you desire... but guess that it a bit beyond the scope here.

Short of it? Non-computer people and people willing to change need mentors. Start a club. Have a few hours a week or each month where you can teach people about Linux, community center, library, school, whatever; if you believe Linux can really make for a better world. Microsoft will always bribe and pay people to do their dirty work, but a passionate Linux user over a paid Microsoft lacky should be able to win the debate. Each of us just need to make the effort. If you don't really want to leave the house, spend a little time in #ubuntu irc channel. Yes, there are some complete f***ing idiots in there that make you want to just bang your head against the wall till you can peacefully drown in your own blood, but they are making an effort, and if they are willing to be patient with you, maybe they deserve a bit of your time. Hasn't someone else ever done that for you?

In studying (the) apocalypse...

2009-01-14T16:00:00.000-08:00

If you have ever thought about THE APOCALYPSE, the wikipedia article is a MUST read. Evidently there is more to it than the end of the world. In Greek, it just means visions / information revealed to a person by God. More recently (last 1700-1800 years) apocalypses refers to the things Peter was told about in "The Apocalypses of Peter", or "Revelations of Peter" aka "The book of Revelations. But there are MANY books of revelations made to many people, and certainly not all about the end of the world.

If we are only talking about 'apocalypses', then there needs to be room to consider any number of issues. Personally, world destroyed by nuclear holocaust I don't find very delightful, not to mention not really a subject I think is very interesting, in so far as I might have influence or learn something from its study. However, in a broader sense, its relationship to "special" knowledge, like does God talk to people and tell them things that nobody else gets to know and we have to trust them, and about truth and stuff... much more interesting.

As for the broader topic, there is lots of great philosophers out there that discuss 'what is truth', and how do we believe things, and does 'God' talk to us, and what of visions that might make one think that they are directly communicating with 'God'.

Some insightful quotes from various Wikipedia articles:

"[Calvin] states that the whole sum of our wisdom consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves.[48] Calvin argues that the knowledge of God is not inherent in man nor can knowledge be discovered in observing this world. The only way to obtain it was to be taught through scripture." ~John Calvin

"[Thomas] Aquinas believed that truth is known through reason (natural revelation) and faith (supernatural revelation). Supernatural revelation has its origin in the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and is made available through the teaching of the prophets, summed up in Holy Scripture ... Natural revelation is the truth available to all people through their human nature; certain truths all men (and women)can attain from correct human reasoning." (Thomas Aquinas, Wikipedia)

"[Descartes] attempts to arrive at a fundamental set of principles that one can know as true without any doubt ... he rejects any ideas that can be doubted, and then reestablishes them in order to acquire a firm foundation for genuine knowledge... Initially, Descartes arrives at only a single principle: thought exists." (Rene Descartes, Wikipedia)

"Being a "Spinozist"... was the equivalent in his time of being called an atheist. Jacobi claimed that Spinoza's doctrine was pure materialism, because all Nature and God are said to be nothing but extended substance." (Spinoza, Wikipedia)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth also has LOTS on the study of the subject and many philosophers that talked about empirical and divine truth, and the difficulties of each.

If we want to take a closer look at apocalypse, or THE Apocalypse, why should we be interested in group think driven Bible lesson?

"[Sarah] Kierkegaard criticizes all systematic philosophies which attempt to know life or the truth of existence via theories and objective knowledge about reality. As Kierkegaard claims, human truth is something that is continually occurring, and a human being cannot find truth separate from the subjective experience of one's own existing, defined by the values and fundamental essence that consist of one's way of life." (Truth, Wikipedia)

This seems like a great argument against apocalypse. In my understanding, truth can only come from sharing and recycling such conclusions one draws themselves until a collective experience is able to project a closest possible approximation of the truth. However, group think and "tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions" (Confirmation bias) can still create mass falsehoods. This is why things must always be up for debate, and in relationship to the scientific method, must be testable such that a model is able to bring about information that wasn't otherwise known, continues to confirm a theory.

The idea of an Apocalypse attempts to completely circumvent such processes to assert truth that can only be confirmed by itself (See Immanuel Kant). No matter how scary such predictions may be (See Revelations of Peter) or consequences of denying such truth, to accept these as "Transcendent Truth" without further empirical analysis is reckless. You might as well give all your money to the next guy you see on tv that asks you too (Like the 700 Club).

There is an strange divide in what some accept as reasonable proof of historical events, and what we would accept today as new truth or better understanding. I will admit that it appears we are a bit more skeptical today than we have been in the past, or at least hope. Many people accept the revelations of Peter as fact, but I would find it very difficult to anyone would take seriously similar predictions if made today (not counting Global Warming), at least with respect to predictions of what "God" wants or will do in either the near or far future. Any such prediction would require some kind of outside confirmation.

It could be argued that people are enchanted with the idea of terrorism. Bush said God tells him to bring democracy to the rest of the world (at any cost), but is this the same kind of predictions made by Peter if we are to accept his 'visions' as truth? If Bush's visions are just a modernization of the same old 'story', shouldn't that give even greater reason for skepticism?

I mean, look what happened last time. Please, when are we going to expect a minimal amount of prudent skepticism of the past that we already expect today, and awknowledged WE HAVE CHANGED.

Guess it would need to be true first. :)

Maybe we don't build upon the past?

2009-01-14T10:02:00.000-08:00

SatanicPuppy writes this. Here is my closer look at that argument...

So you do not believe that software is evolutionary where the present is always taking the past and building upon it to create a future where some code grows and some code dies and in the end 'better' is emergent?

You are really going to argue that each person or company exists in a bubble and just writes whatever code is necessary to make / improve their project in such a way that beats out all the competition?

That's great! Must mean we only have a few more years until the software we need will all be written and we will be done. And developers can spend the rest of their days doing seminars showing new people how to use the software.

Yeah, come to think of it, this whole progress just building upon progress building upon progress just sounds like an endless cycle that just creates more and more work for people, like as if for every answer there were just three new questions. Yuck, who wants to live in a world like that?

I think the best part about your vision of the world is that once we have this whole 'science' thing done, technology will be the best, nobody will ever become obsolete because their knowledge will always be up to date because they will only learn the right thing the first time, and schools will save TONS of money because they will never need to replace their science textbooks ever again.

And since we know it is perfect, we can then convert all the religious people because it is unchanging, so they can count on it, and everyone will start calling it The New Holy Bible, and it will be easy to see who is defective and unfit for society: Those who disagree with it are heretics, because only people that understand that we now live in a perfect world are good.

I think we should just give the money all to Microsoft since they are the closest to creating the one true operating system. They must be, just look at their market share. I am sure their team of geniuses are pretty close to making the one perfect operating system for everybody that will never need to be upgraded again and finally everyone can be happy!

And then not long after that, think of how easy Google will have it when it can finally finish indexing the Internet. I am sure it just pisses them off all the time that while they are busy trying to organize the Internet people just keep adding stuff to it over and over and over again. How does that help anybody?

I'm going to write Lawrence Lessig right now expressing my frustration for him lying to me all these years, nonsense about "ideas building on ideas of others". What non-sense! Stuff like that is for Pirates, Communists, and kids who cheat in school. Thanks for setting things straight.

ZooLooK argues "Open Source is the ultimate in re-usable investments in the area of computer technology". The only way I would disagree is that people with the source need to be enabled to share contributions to the code, share improvements with each other in some way.

But dj245 disagrees arguing that anything the government invests in FlOSS wise will just be replaced; it doesn't represent a permanent infrastructure improvement. I couldn't disagree more. Here was my full response:

So what you are saying is that progress always builds on the past? Wow, think you have just made a great argument for FlOSS, because the more we can keep track of past accomplishments, the less likely we will find ourselves reinventing the wheel.

Honestly though, I am not sure if you are being serious or not. There are two things going on with the Kernel to my understanding in this context: Either new things come about, and support is added (old code doesn't change) or people examine the way something is done and find a way to improve upon it (old code still exists in that the improved version is a derivative. how do you make something better without something to start with?).

Another thing I think of is the collective work of the ancient Greeks. Are you going to say that all their math, science, architecture, technology and such were a waste of time because we have stuff that is so much better now? Are you joking? There are many ways that the money could be wasted, but most of that is a matter of poor oversight. I would expect it to go something like Google Summer of Code where money will be given to specific projects that have specific goals and a track record of success... versus these banks that seem to have a history of scams and failures. FlOSS is a real way to invest in the community rather than giving someone money to find a way to get money from others. Government grants for science, medicine and such are released as public domain... so unless these are 'works for hire' (which they usually are) they can legally be GPL despite all the "restrictions".

"Collecting information is only the first step towards knowledge, but sharing information is walking the path to civilization."

Thinking about it further, while roads, dams, rails, and other such infrastructure are vital, and which I have argued should be about the only legitimate purpose of a federal government, they are only snap shots; things like a dam, road, or rail represent where technology was at some point. Roads don't improve because they need to be standardized. same with rail or many other things. We are slowly phasing out copper telephone lines for fiber optic, but what a huge gap in technology. Also, all those things need to be maintained. We spend money on keeping things old because it is even more expensive to make it new. A dam for example if there is some kind of revolutionary advancement, replacing it or fitting it with the new technology is often prohibitively expensive.

Ok, so data storage isn't free either, but updating the information on a hard drive is nothing like having to tear down a power plant and put up a new one. Also, as much as we want to respect people for their contributions and let them make money with patents and such, real progress for civilization doesn't come until those patents or copyrights expire. Creating work toda and putting it into the public domain or share alike licenses like GPL, society advances TODAY, not 70 years after you die.

Room for infinite progress does not mean hopelessness. It is also not quixotic. Working together as humanity to advance ourselves agressivly and to the limits of societies collective mind is the greatest thing our species can ever hope for. As mentioned above, I think the Greeks saw this and understood it, judging from their philosophy, but looking at the way the internet has revolutionized the world, we can really see that nothing can hope to advance our civilization than to push sharing of any and all knowledge to every brain on this planet.

There were some interesting predictions made by the writters of Star Trek. Something Jonathan Archer, captain in Star Trek Enterprise was explaining to an alien at one point, humans were at war with each other, greedy and materialistic to the point of destroying themselves until one day they discovered they were not alone in the universe, and society took on a whole new purpose of working together for humanity.

I know the economy goes in cycles, but I do see people struggling in ways that I can not understand how are necessary for society to function. Unless we believe the Ricardian theory that if wages go up, that just means poor people will have more babies till they are poor again, we need to do something different. From what I have seen of numbers, one of the mai reasons people people have children when they can not afford to take catre of them is due to a sese of hopelessness, a hopelessness that leads them to believe that no legacy can be forged in their own lifetime, but maybe a child will have a better opportunity.

But we know that doesn't work either.

The good information is coveted and restricted though the filter of our monetary system, violating rules of supply and demand due to artificial supply restrictions. Meanwhile the only free access to information is crap that gets throwen in our face whether we like it or not. Advertisments EVERYWHERE like grafetti from television, billboards, windows, and buss stops to spam.

We surround ourselves with disgusting, worthless information, filling and overwhelming our brains with garbage. Some try to fight this brain littering, but for each thing that gets pushed away only creates a void for new crap to take its place.

It is because advertisers know we are hungry for information.

Information is like bacteria. There is good bacteria and bad bacteria. We have evolved from simple viruses to very complex machines. We depend on bacteria for many functions of our systems, even though many bad ones can compromise them just the same. But a system filled with good bacteria leaves to room for bad bacteria to take over. Encourage the free flow of good, useful information, and people will be drawn to it just because it is better. Google, wikipedia, firefox, have dominated because their core have been about encouraging people to express themselves freely. Youtube, MySpace, Facebook, and even Twitter are taking over as popular sources for primary information. Unlike television and movies, these services provide bidirection self-influencing communication.

I figure an argument of it is that from each side, the commercial side, and the commons have a symbiotic relationship, where the commons is the primary source, where the most elite groups are able to produce commercial products, but I am not so sure. I don't believe that the only balance for encouraging development of new ideas is artificial supply restrictions to meet some kind of fake supply and demand. Supply and demand works when different people can bring similar things to market. people compete for good fast cheap, and the best people will find the best value in driving the price up when they can best use those commodities and a balance is found.

But does it work to commoditize information in the same way? Sure, but to a limit.

This wasn't all building up to this conclusion, but a solution neeeds to be mentioned. If companies. people, or whatever can be allowed to artificially manipulate the market through 'limited' (not so limited) monopolies, they should have to pay for it proportionally to its value. Say, for each year after 7 years there should be a tax that goes to schools to create new competitive ideas, based on a percentage of gross profits produced over the lifetime of the work while in copyright, even if VERY small, but something to encouage people NOT using a copyright to transfer it into the public domain to become profitable again for the whole of humanity.

More games should be developed with cross-platform compatibility in mind

2009-01-13T20:39:00.000-08:00

The issue though is that overall, Linux doesn't NEED users in the way Microsoft NEEDS users. Sure, Linux community can be vocal and outspoken, but they are not the kind of people to bribe government officials or members of congress. Microsoft will always find ways to distort the numbers. Honestly, Linux is fine just the way it is, and I have seen a huge influx of non computer people looking for help with issues and bad blogs by people I am amazed have the capacity to even turn on a computer.

Even if Linux only has 1%, they have the top 1%. I don't know a developer or tech person that knows anything about how to work with windows that doesn't dual boot some flavor Linux.

The two things that are really measurable? Compare the number of books in book stores with anything of a computer / technology section and there are as many Linux only books as windows only books. The rest are cross platform with development books doing all their example work for a Linux machine / gcc.

Further, look at the Halloween documents. Microsoft is VERY aggressive about protecting its market share, and sees Linux as a huge threat where cheating and lies are their only defense. Admittedly DX10 is awesome, but the license fees to developers as well as Microsoft games, and OEM licensees come at a great discount if you are a Microsoft only developer / retailer.

Linux is everywhere and it dominates in the markets i has penetrated. The LAST place it has to touch is video editing (that is long off unless adobe ports premiere), and desktops. But so much of that is bulk purchases where the end user had no choice. Further, the teachers union has been a whore of Microsoft since Microsoft saw how successful Apple was with getting kids hooked early.

Another 'number' to check out. The profitable gamer right now on desktop computers are the MMO's. Look what what has stayed doing really well, and what good games completely tanked this year. Notice any pattern? The top games gave great Linux support.

While companies can have bad developers that can screw up any game, simply working from the ground up keeping in mind that your program needs cross platform support, it is EASY. You don't need to have two teams writing the whole thing from scratch separately. Windows is the dog in the cross platform battle. All you really need to do is use a cross compiler and debugger. It is not terribly difficult to write, compile, or debug / test for many platforms all on one machine, even without virtualization.

And finally, nothing gets tens of thousands of comments unless it is "stolen" sex tape. Video games as a whole just don't get that much attention from people for anything.

Also, there are quite a few really great games for Linux.. they just end up in repositories, not game stores, or play in web browsers(not a fan myself, but sadly they "make the charts")

This isn't a call for games for Linux, cause they are there. It is a call for MORE games from certain companies we would like to see set free from under the thumb of Microsoft like so many others have had the chance to experience.

What is humanity?

2009-01-13T13:26:00.000-08:00

Words are powerful.

We have this idea that things that are good should not be picked apart for the sake of it, as we no longer accept the practice of killing healthy human beings for the sake of getting a better understanding of humanity.

Dehumanization had always been necessary as a past practice in order to over come the mental barriers that naturally kept us from over coming those barriers, just as military are trained to dehumanize any enemy in the name of the greater good. That which is 'bad' can be justifiably destroyed.

But Kali (for lack of a better term) is about rebirth, not destroying ourselves just to see how much we can tolerate, or loosing the present in the name of the future. "We must be the change we want to see in the world", or we only loose ourselves, because the present we create IS the future.

So what of words? Words are powerful, but powerful as tools of communication. Words themselves are not sacred, but without a clear commutable understanding of what the words mean between two people, then the words have no value in communication as only rough shadows of ideas will be expressed in vague terms.

So while I have disagreed from a young time what some have said about 'God', I was generally for the happy thought of 'God' is good, 'God' is truth and love and all that stuff. What could be the harm in that? The thing is that while those terms are used to 'describe' God to help people understand 'His' nature have many 'theories'.

A great and inspirational book, "Pragmatic Thinking and Learning" by Andy Hunt, has a lot to say about the human brain and mind; we have the power to analyze it and retool it through concerted effort, but that moves a bit off the point. The thing that really struck me is that he opens with an introduction to The Dryfus Model of Skill Acquisition. Both that paper and Andy Hunt's book talk about the fallacies of the Scientific Method. In short, the Scientific Method can be used to prove Event Theories; theories that say "When you do this or this happens, then this other thing will happen". By contrast, a Construct Theory is a kind of guide or model. Construct Theories can be used by people with strong understanding of a subject to guide them towards better understanding, but they are NOT rigid sets of rules that help predict events. Construct Theories can not be proved by Scientific Method because there is no measurable level of success that results in hard fact. In a way, I have thought that the "Theory of the Scientific Method" is a Construct Theory for discovering facts. The Scientific method doesn't show you how to find new facts in the world, or build new technology, but a guide for hopefully acquiring a level of certainly in the discovery of facts through observation in the world.

So what definitive meaning is generally understood by people in when you use the word God, what typical assumptions are made in using the term about the person when referring to God, or a God or Gods, and what are the overall implications of the possibly variations between people, or most importantly, myself.

Short version of that, I agree with Dawkins. It is either a meaningless that conveys no knowledge, or has dangerous implications about our general perceptions and understanding of the world around us. I have also discussed this in great detail in previous articles. I do believe in free will, as much as it is obviously observable, but I do not claim to understand how it works within what seems to be a very controlled macro universe. Is there some relationship between the apparent randomness going on at the quantum level in matter, and the guts of the brain tha make up free will? Great question that I think we are very far from being able to answer. Whatever it is, I have no concerns about it being boring.

As far an an eternal soul? I don't get it. I can see why people might like to believe there is something eternal about all our experiences, thoughts, memories, and individuality, but beyond such a 'nice' idea, I see nothing to support such a conjecture. I do believe in the whole of humanity. I believe community is what immortalizes us, and makes our flesh and individuality steps in a greater experience that is all of us. Our individuality are like raindrops towards an ocean. Each rain drop is important as a member of the whole. By contrast, what is one rain drop that does not fall or become part of the ocean?

People wonder what happens to our 'unique spirit' after we die. Well, what would happen of your individual spirit if all the people in the world were dead or gone in some way such that you were all alone on the planet? What of your life if the planet was completely without life but yourself?

From what we know of the development and evolution of the planet, life is simply dependent life. Everything and all relationships within life are because of life. But even between life and death, we see a symbiotic relationship between living and non-living. It is all one big experience to understand, or just be what it is.

Drawing from Religulous, by Bill Mahr, what an irony it would be for mankind to have the power to end such a relationship through the use of nuclear weapons, but that is another topic.

God is a theistic belief for which I full heartedly reject as immature and closed minded. It implies many limits for which can not be proven, and rejects the idea of an emergent truth. I find such an idea to be so empty and sad, so very much not what I feel people had intended when this idea of a great creator with magical powers from an alternate dimension or sitting on a cloud is the reason why there are things in this world for which we do not yet understand.

I just don't need it, and it is hardly even a worthy philosophical supposition. I am ready for a philosophical debate that doesn't keep returning to this silly 'God' idea.

In the past, I have attempted begin from a direction of 'God is...', but as mentioned before, what I was attempting to convey was so far beyond the theistic understanding of a 'personal God', I came to the conclusion that for me to take that term and use it in such a different way should be mutually offensive. If there are true theists out there (I hate to say I know there are, I just can't quite wrap my head round it), for me to say that we believe in nearly the same thing but in a different way... is a joke. Also, to use the word I feel sets a certain tone, a predisposition in peoples mind that they understand what I am taking about. While I would hope that there is a general understanding, I would be most interested in really being able to discuss finer details with people rather than just sharing immeasurable context-free thoughts. How would you ever go about taking such things and assimilating what they have said into wisdom. Simply too much room for cognitive bias.

I have found ways of explaining my beliefs and understand of the world that isn't just God++, and really gets into details. Yay! It took some work, but I feel that taking the time to describe things in a way avoiding that G word has helped so much.

So now the problem. A word that keeps wanting to come into my mind to use in a way I think people will misconstrue is Spirituality.

Am I being too picky? Is this a meaningless word we throw around that has some general meaning that applies to all faiths, or is it a word that people will hear and know that it might be something specific and not necessarily what it means to them. Do most people understand it in Descartes terms; the mind that is not the brain?

I think the mind does exist completely within the brains physical world, but that our understanding of the physical world is still limited in that some respect. This idea of a soul I find to be the result of some kind of closure bias, a necessity to have an answer without respect for the validity. I feel there is plenty of 'evidence' to support a fundamental physical world. I think if Solipsism, or even some kind of collective Solipsism were truth, the world would not operate in the way that it does, but more like a dream. The 'reality' of dreams feels much more inline with solipsism. I find it hard to believe that all frustration with learning is a self inflicted part of the experience. While that frustration CAN be self inflicted, I don't think that is the ULTIMATE barrier to truth.

More simply, Science does work, and it is used to discover all kinds of new things all the time. Truth is NOT a democracy... not matter how much congress might think it is, but not to get off topic...

I don't want to say that I am not spiritual, but what does it really mean to be spiritual? If everyone is spiritual, or everyone sees themselves as spiritual, but not always others, than it is less than meaningless, that can really be harmful towards actually getting a better understanding of ones self, or others.

The thing is, I do believe that if for no other reason than to be negative, all people believe that they are spiritual, but not that everyone else is. I think this my strongest argument to 'reject' it.

But the word does have certain implications. Maybe the word spiritual holds special meaning like mathematics? that word has certain implications. I think many people think of being frustrated at school, but there is a bigger picture. Math isn't real in a physical sense, it is jusy a language for discussing things. Is spirituality the same kind of platform? A direction to take people in? Or does it always mean you believe in dualism, or some kind of spiritual realm that exists differently but over laps with our reality. I am not offended by the thought, just that if I am trying to explain something different, or in particular, that I don't believe in such a thing. I think there is an under estimated relationship between what is believed to be known and that which is not known, but not to imply that there is some alternate spiritual plane where specifically our consciousness goes or continues to exist when we die.

And yet I feel like an elitist to feel the need to make some kind of new word for my belief. Atheist seems to work pretty well, and other people that have identified to me as atheist tend to have similar beliefs, but it is a word theists are very uncomfortable with. I think there are still those that are non-theists that just really dislike the word atheist because all thei can think of is Godlessness, a lack of faith rather than faith in something else. (No, I don't think that makes atheism a religion)

I believe in ubuntu, a unique quality that comes about from people working together; I believe there is something to be embraced within the opportunity for people to work together and a community that is more than just many individuals. There is something special when people work together and what they create or contribute to the world community has benefits to people the creator never knew existed.

So is that Humanism? Rather than saying 'my spirituality says' , but say I believe it is pragmatic to assume value of human life before other judgments are made, and that such a believe or understanding will lead us to a better future? Then the details come after that, such as 'just war' theory, or 'should I punch this asshole in the face cause he pisses me off and I think it would make me feel better' theory.

Well, so far I have tried not to use the word spirituality or spiritual (stopped using the word spirit a LONG time ago to describe ANYTHING). It still catches me every one in awhile, but I fid the challenge encourages me to articulate myself better. However, for the same reason, I certaintly not going to go around saying I am not spiritual. Same implication.

Anyway, found a bunch of quotes on what I am much more interested in than all this God or spirituality talk. First a negative one.

Lawrence Lessig, someone I have repeatedly mentioned as an inspiration of mine, says this:
"Americans have been selling this view around the world: that progress comes from perfect protection of intellectual property."

Do they sell the idea? yes, but it is snake oil / TOTAL BULLSHIT!! I think we have tricked people into putting a false value on the scarcity of knowledge. Also, I think the artificial scarcity created when we hide information from people crates an illusion of progress, when in reality it is relative progress.

When we cripple other industries and countries from developing when we impose trade sanctions on those that "steal" our ideas, that doesn't mean we are suddenly progressing faster than we were before, just faster than everyone else.

Is that all Americans see as progress? Is the only measure of rogress how much better our progress is than anyone else? Sure, on a competitive level, but we actually go to great lengths to cripple world progress in order to sustain the illusion of progress s we can feel better about ourselves.

That is going too far.

I think the US Constitution is VERY clear about copyright, that it can and should only exist so far as "to promote the progress of science and the useful arts". Our congress today just doesn't "get it" as far as what that means. It is talking about ubuntu (not the OS, but the word). We need to find ways to get as much information to all people as best as possible for human kind to process it and assimilate it into wisdom to yet be shared again. Those that prioritize information and the progress of humanity over some convoluted rules regarding the monetary system are called Pirates and Thieves.

But people still do it when it is illegal. People go to prison for trying to share ideas with the rest of human kind because of some belief that some how the individual that made the contribution exists outside of the system and needs some kind of special recognition for their 'accomplishment'.

Thee just has to be something better that can be acknowledged in our law and taught to our children that can end this cultural war.

Here are some other quotes I love:

Collecting information is only the first step toward knowledge, but sharing information is the first step toward civilization.
~Nelson Mendala (I think. If anyone actually knows the root of this quote with some kind of source to show, I would be very happy. The quote is in the linked video in the title. I am not sure who the guy saying this is supposed to be. Maybe Cesar Chavez?)

It is largely because civilization enables us constantly to profit from knowledge which we individually do not possess and because each individual's use of his particular knowledge may serve to assist others unknown to him in achieving their ends that men as members of civilized society can pursue their individual ends so much more successfully than they could alone.
~F. A. Hayek

“In formal logic, a contradiction is the signal of a defeat, but in the evolution of real knowledge it marks the first step in progress towards a victory.”

“The major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur.”

~Alfred Whitehead

The two operations of our understanding, intuition and deduction, on which alone we have said we must rely in the acquisition of knowledge.
~Rene Descartes

Looking at Windows 7

2009-01-13T11:28:00.000-08:00

In response to this post:

Agreed (Vista is great if you have the equivalent of a $2000 computer less than a year old). If you got all this fancy hardware, I would hope that you were planning to use it for something. I was fortunate enough to build a pretty fancy machine for myself a bit more than a year ago ( X2 6400+ Black, 4gb ram, 8800gtx, and some other fun hardware ) and I run Ubuntu on it exclusively. It works for me.

I don't see what Vista has to offer that I couldn't get from XP if I wanted to use some piece of software that works best in Windows. Vista has nothing to offer, especially at the price. It is nice to hear that 7 has done a lot of back end clean up work, and if it out performs XP, then awesome, but that really doesn't offer an incentive to switch.

The one application that I find no reasonable alternative for is Adobe Premiere, but all that tells me is that there is an incentive to get a Mac.

Ok, you say Windows 7 != Vista, but Vista == Windows && Windows 7 == Windows, so there many similarities, and some differences. Rather than having an endless list of specifics, how much different is it compared to other possible juxtapositions? Are there more differences between 7 and Vista as there are between Ubuntu 8.10 and 8.04? 7.10? Debian? Fedora? Gentoo? Are there as many differences between 7 and Vista as there are differences between Linux Kernel 2.6.27 and 2.6.20? 2.6.16? 2.4.37? Is 7 as different from Vista as Mac OSX 10.5 and 10.4? 10.3? FreeBSD 7.1? FreeBSD 6.4?

Sorry, but by no measure is 7 a significant leap from Vista. XP was a brilliant merge of Windows 98 and NT 4 as much as Ubuntu was a leap from Debian, OSX was a leap from FreeBSD taking many design principles from OS9.

7 appears to have some significant progress from the original release of XP, but with respect to how long that has been, what has Apple done in the same period of time? Solaris? AIX? Linux? I think the only systems with less progress in that period of time has been OS/2, BeOS, and Debian GNU/HURD.

It is nice they are fixing the Vista problems. It is nice they are removing the bloatware, feature creep and all that jazz, and really taking a closer look at some of the performance issues that may only have been possible to see with a large user base like it has now.

Improvements in back-end performance, AWESOME! Screw the advertising, some of the best empirical data for comparison is the SDK release notes, which is the only think you can really look at after Microsoft's GUIs for everything. This is the only measure I can see as useful for judging what we are really going to see in Windows 7.

If so, what does that say? Some XP people may finally be willing to switch assuming money is not a factor once real software comes out for 7 that will not as well to a significant (even if only perceived) degree over XP. Vista people will be vilified, and thrilled about the new version that "met their attention". If they bought Vista, they will buy 7. Windows 7 user base will certainly pass up Vista long before XP (if that isn't blatantly obvious). The Windows dynasty will continue to live on for awhile longer.

So I think this brings us back to the original statement: Windows 7 != Vista? No. It is Vista done right and is the little step whose name was changed because the marketing department said so.

If 7 is somehow different than Vista after all the above named things, tell me how it is going to attract the Mac OSX user, the Ubuntu user, the Gentoo user, The Solaris User, the *BSD user, the AIX user. By portion, more users of any of those respective systems will upgrade, and if they dual boot, it will be with a Mac. Windows 7 will hope to hold its own users for a bit longer.

On another note, The real back end changed to Vista became a part of XP SP3. While it may be unlikely Windows 7 will be XP SP4, I am sure it will be Vista SP2.

Want to pay for the name change? Be the first one to have it on your system? Patronize Microsoft for their continued support of your favorite OS? Go ahead. It isn't new, its just Windows, sending that collection plate for another round.

But why should you care? You LOVE Windows!

Anti-smoking ads make me want to smoke

2009-01-09T14:20:00.000-08:00

Sabre24q7 writes:

How can someone be "proud" that they smoke lol.
A.) Smoking tastes nasty and leaves mouth dry.
B.) It's extremley bad for your health in many ways.
C.) Waste of money.

I dont see one positive thing about smoking, and if someone says it makes me look "cool" i will smack you.

a) depending on why you smoke, the taste can vary. Some people are poor, cheap, and addicted. They eat things like spam with mustard on white break and smoke the cheapest off brand. For me, smoking is like whiskey and chocolate. You can either get the cheap stuff that fucks you up, and the chocolate that will burn ulcers in your mouth it is so nasty, or you can pay $300 a bottle, drink rarely, import fine chocolates from Switzerland and make a fine evening of it.

If I can't get good the good stuff, I won't have any of it. Good tobacco should not leave your mouth dry. Like good anything, the entire experience is pleasant. I'll admit I sometimes have 2 cigarettes in a day, but nicotine affects me strongly. More than that takes away from the experience.

b) so is stress. Nicotine is a poison to your nervous system. How? it blocks your body's ability to metabolize the hormones that make you feel stressed. Just because it is a form os self medication doesn't mean that it is completely meritless. For me, I can work harder and focus on all kinds of straining mental activities without worry of overload, because if it becomes too much for me, I always know I can take a smoke break. Of course there are other ways to manage that, and there are good ways to keep your stress low, such as staying well hydrated, and good night sleep in addition to regular exercise and healthy diet. I don't think I care if I am just lying to myself, but with any medication, there is moderation. If smoking is the ONLY way for you to relax EVER, and so you smoke a pack a day or more, you should consider therapy, or at least some Tai Chi.

c) This I think is a bit bogus, unless you can't afford it. I go through about a pack a week. Sometimes if I need to relax and I am going to be at home, I get a pint of Ben & Jerry's and put on a good movie. In my area, a pack is about the same price as a pint, and I will tell you right now that pack last a LOT longer than that pint.

Many things cost money, and everything costs time. There are responsible and irresponsible smokers and non-smokers. I will admit that I find it dumbfounding that I smoke EVERY DAY. There are few things I do nearly every day: Go to work, eat, sleep, fuck, check news / email, and smoke. Smoking is the only thing on the list of things I do almost daily that pale in terms of necessity. I know how I think about smoking that it is an addiction, and I don't think I would mind being a non-smoker if I didn't have friends that smoked. However, not to say that I like all smokers, just that there is a personality trait I have noticed in people that I enjoy that tends to be mostly in smokers that I prefer.

I think it is a little bit of a taunting death thing, fuck you to authority (in a non-criminal way), and a moment you remind yourself to take everyday just for yourself when you know that the only thing you need to do is kick back, relax, and puff that cigarette. And it is an even more pleasant experience to share with a friend.

Experiences can be cool, particularly when everyone is in sync with a moment, but just like rule #34, for anything that has ever been done, there will always be someone that can look like a complete idiot doing it. Smoking is not intrinsically cool, but I don't think there is anything that is.

Except vagina. Vagina is cool.

MMO failures of 2008

2009-01-08T09:25:00.000-08:00

Ok, MAYBE this is just coincidence, or I have the relationship backwards, but PotBS SHOULD have slaughterd EVE. LotRO is also amazingly successful despite the fact it is a very poorly designed wow with all the drawbacks of DAoC and EQ. Hmm... What do WoW, Eve, and LotRO all have in common that those 4 games COMPLETELY lacked? ready for this? LINUX SUPPORT!!! Yeah, I said it. I played Pirates and loved it, but restarting the computer (let alone having to have a whole other OS installed just to play 1 game) was stupid. Not to mention the LONG patch times. Everyone in pirates was like "wow, this is just like Eve". I ended getting Eve, and while it is not nearly as fun, it doesn't require turning my entire computer into a console. Lord of the Rings is OK, and again, I don't have to choose between a game and having a computer. I stopped playing WoW shortly after Burning Crusade launch for a number of reasons, but Wrath of the Lich King has brought all new fun to the game. So maybe it is just me, but the 3 commercial pay by the month MMOs that are doing really well have full Linux support. Are there issues? Sure! but there are windows issues too. I know Linux gamers are HUNGRY and rumors by many that they would buy ANY descent game just to show their support. Maybe the user base is as small as M$ would like to try and make it out to be, but the user base is pretty dedicated. And while I said my observation may be total coincidence, nothing in that review even eluded to "failed because they over extended themselves to try and support too many OSs".

Old news

2008-12-21T17:26:00.000-08:00

Quite some time ago I was reading an article online that ticked me off. In an effort to express my agrivation, I wrote my own article reporting on it the way that I do.

Palo Alto Daily News
Thursday, December 14, 2006
Page 17

Niggers Trade Genitals for Crack, Scientists' Get Good Laugh

By Lauren Neergard

Associated Press

In a recent dual study on poverty on Africa, scientists offer impoverished natives $5 (a large amount of money in many areas) in return for their genitals. Many of the Jungle Bunnies claimed they had sick and or starving parents, mothers, children and other family members that they would do anything to relieve their suffering. One participant of the study claimed, “Sex isn’t even that great with all the dirt and disease plaguing the area. Without food, water, or medicine there isn’t much of a life. There are more important issues here than temporary physical pleasure that must be considered.” Many other participants had similar responses, among 3,000 from South Africa, 2,784 Kisumu, Kenya, and 4,996 from Rakai, Uganda.

Another doctor from the National Institute of Nap Prevention argued how simple the procedure was, “I doubt many had any idea what was going on… I don’t speak gibberish, but I think quite a few thought they were getting hair cuts or some kind of welfare.” The doctor snickers a bit before giving a hearty laugh before returning to a patient having a Kermit the Frog toy placed in his rectum as a practical joke.

Despite the many testimonies, a concurrent study immediately outside the clinic where scientists posed as drug dealers allowing participants to trade their $5 crack cocaine. “It was the funniest thing, these stupid niggers were essentially selling their genitals for crack” noted Dr. Anthony Fauci Director of the International Ku Klux Klan. On the other hand Dr. Kevin DeCock made the important point “It’s not a magic bullet, but a potentially important intervention against future generations of Coons that are ruining the economy in a time of growing global commerce.”

Studies like this are proving to not just be helpful to the local communities by preventing these animals from breeding, but after the niggers are busted for possession of crack cocaine by our own police department, we loose no money or crack, and have a large storage of large black cock that can be bleached and given to underprivileged white men in America for increasing profits. With growing success, similar studies plan to take place in China to help curb the Chink epidemic. While there were plans to bring this cure to Jerusalem, Jews claim they have been doing this for thousands of years to their poor people claiming Abraham, a popular cultural icon, started the trend to prevent jock itch from sand. "No Jock, No itch", so goes the saying.

In related news, study in America reveals molestation by priests not so bad, but builds character. Church attendance soars as government supports practice with these new findings, and Circumcised girls make better mothers, fewer sluts. Final statistics to be reported later this week.

The Year of Linux

2008-12-18T11:58:00.000-08:00

I find it hard to believe that you have spent more than a few months with Linux to not find many things radically different. A PART of Linux that tries to make itself compatible with people is give them ways to use their old knowledge to do the same old tasks on Linux that they did on windows. To say that Linux is only playing a catch up game tells me you should probably stick with Windows. IMO, I think Macs take the most common thing people want to do and put it into a one-click application. What you can do is REALLY awsome. Just check out youtube to see what people have done with iMovie. In business, the best thing you can do is take one thing and do it REALLY WELL. Try to expand too much, and you will just be beaten out by a large number of specialists. Linux doesn't NEED to attract or prove anything to anybody. It is awesome that people are starting companies and making big money off of Linux directly or indirectly, but that is not the core of what Linux has ever been about, at least for Linus Torvalds as I understand from a number of interviews I have read.

One thing to love and hate about design principles in Linux / FOSS is that it is based on creating the most productive software, not necessarily the most easy to understand or get started with software. Blender I think is the best example of this. There is a LOT to learn before you can do much of ANYTHING in blender. It is confusing and every button and modifier key does something different. The interface is ... well atrocious in many ways. Until you "get it". Once you painfully climb that seemingly never ending vertical learning curve, you are FREE. Forget the mouse and just imagine what you want to see and type it out in a few bizarre incantations on your keyboard. IF you can remember all the crazy commands, Blender is FAST. If you can't remember, or simple don't like working that way, then Blender is not for you. What will not happen is Blender changing its interface to attract a greater number of people. Take it or leave it.

There is also the issue that at the heart, Linux is Free. Many great Windows apps are developed under Linux, or for Linux, then easily ported to Windows. Write an app for Windows, and it works on Windows. Write an app for Linux, and it will work on anything with a microprocessor with the right simple planning or forethought.

My killer, can not live without, Linux application is BASH. I get strange problems in my head where I want to look something up in a way that a regular search engine simply won't do. or some stat problem I want to double check via brute force (cause why not, it is another way to confirm an answer), a method that can not always be done mentally. This is where I jump on the computer, and in a few strange incantations in a terminal, I have just what I wanted.

Yes, we can do that too will always be a catchup came cause who knows what Microsoft will convince people they need next. That can't ever change unless Microsoft stops being main stream. This will be a cultural change. Linux is about the bringing the power of the computer to the users fingertips. Windows is more about meeting the needs of "Ohh, Internet, I want to do that!". We are just in a time where there are still so many people in that latter category. Linux is just a kernel, but it is also just a tool. There will always be new things added to Linux that people need for themselves that others will join in and contribute to, but gearing itself towards "sacrifice anything and everything to get the maximum number of people to use it" will, I pray, NEVER be the heart of Linux.

Specialist circumstances need specialized software. Web Server, embedded systems, data centers. Linux provides the tweakability to do killer things REALLY well. You just can't do that in Windows, certainly not in the way that a trained Linux specialist can really make things work.

The Year of Linux was 1996.

Just read the Halloween Documents to confirm that BY MICROSOFT! At this point in time Microsoft identified Linux as an undefeatable adversary due to the NATURE of its distributed and community development in addition to the well made tools available for the system. It was an expert system for expert people that Microsoft would never be able to get rid of in any legal or moral way. Linux took over in the above named markets and have never fell.

The one thing that was argued was that Linux could never be a viable Desktop solution. Microsoft has powerful ground here, but OpenSuse introduced a great desktop system that showed that the FOSS community could reach out beyond people that could make contributions. That was in 2004.

So with those milestones long behind us, what do you want? What is this Year of Linux? Mass use? Well, the Internet is built on Linux / BSD, so everyone that uses the Internet is using Linux, strictly speaking. The LAST place for Linux to have a "take over" is on those nodes, the workstations, the home computer, something the complete novice can "do the Internet on". So at LEAST call that the Year of the Linux Desktop.

Microsoft has a plan to stay in business. It is called FUD. Microsoft is in large part successful for the same reason 23% of Texans think Obama is Muslim. In this case, it doesn't matter. I have Linux, and Linux does everything I need. I discourage many people from using Linux because Linux will present their computer to them as a tool to extend their mind and express themselves in new, powerful ways that may have been previously unimaginable. Most people DON'T WANT THAT. I'd argue that it is because most people don't understand that it is a possibility. As I said before, they just want to do the Internet and the email. For them the computer does things (hopefully) that you tell it to do. It is not an extension of their mind, not in the way that an ">expert would harness their computer skills.

People won't change, but society will change as new generations of computer users are born into it. As this takes place, as it obviously has been, the software will be there, and it will be Linux.

By this measure, the Year of Linux will be when general education teachers in public schools assign FOSS development as a part of every regular class. When C (or whatever language of your choice it) will be considered as equally important to teach along side English.

This is realistic, but no less than 30 years away because most teachers over 30 these days hardly know how to turn their computer on. It will take the children born in the last 10 years that grew up in todays technologies to be the majority of teachers in schools and administers on the Board of Education.

So to see that end, all we need to do is keep doing what we are doing now. It will always be transitional. Microsoft will always make Linux out to be insignificant. The only difference in the future will be the number of people still listening.

What do you listen to?

If programming languages were religions

2008-12-17T08:58:00.000-08:00

According to this, most of them are. I feel privileged to have some familiarity with all of them. I was presently amused that Scheme wasn't significant to even make it on the list.

And I'd argue, reading through the comments:

Assembly is Atheism... followers believe that whatever you do, there is only the reality on the chip. You shouldn't need intermediary or 'fake' rules to deal with the reality right in front of you, but they can be useful for guidance so long as you don't believe them. They believe if you can handle it, you are enlightened, but understand a human need for simplicity. Try to argue with them though, and you'll get an earful.

and responding to / completing an anonymous post:

"JavaScript is the Jedi religion. Those who master it can do anything." But sadly has a poor basis in reality, and it's application seems to create many problems that were never intended or hardly anticipated by its creator. It lives in a box, but for some reason its followers keep putting it in places it never should have gone. There is also create controversy that a sequel would kill the last bit of dignity that might remain.

however, reading further, I think I like this one for Javascript even better

JavaScript is Alcholism - the more you do it, the more it rots your brain as you realize that functions are objects, your prototypes are polluting namespaces, and you just can't seem to get any closure.

And this one for assembly was amusing, as long as I had my own. I'll had his others because they are reasonably clever:

BASIC = Agnosticism. Everyone starts out here, unless firmly indoctrinated in another religion from birth. It isn't very useful, except to say that you believe in something, but it certainly isn't going to claim miracles or such.

FORTRAN = Druidism. It's been around since ancient times, and it's arcane syntax and rituals are confusing to anyone. Few practice it today (except in secret), and only a few locations still hold meaning for those of the sect.

Assembler = Deism. The assembler was created, and has been running ever since. The machine is perfect. We don't know who wrote the machine, but it IS written, and whoever did write it is not paying attention anymore.....but that is okay since the machine is perfect, and can do anything within the constraints of this reality.

The bias in many of the comments is almost as funny as the article.

FOSS business model for movies and games

2008-12-03T13:41:00.000-08:00

tepples writes:

Movies are not FOSS, remembering that the last 'S' means software.
I mentioned movies because video games combine aspects of movies with aspects of non-game software. How does the purpose of free software as you describe it (to be productive) mesh with the purpose of video games?
Movies make more sense under a CC license if you want it to be that type of free, but that is something else entirely.
Can you think of any way that an organization could make money producing CC licensed movies?

This is actually a problem in a way for people that want FOSS to meet all their needs. The product needs to have intrinsic value to the person producing it. If 10 big companies need fancy expensive accounting software and are tired of poorly performing, slowly adapting, or whatever be wrong with some company that provides proprietary accounting software, there is motivation for those companies to work together to produce a FOSS solution. Also, if one company starts an FOSS project alone, there is hope that other people will join in to help improve the product, but it still never becomes the principle of the business. The threat is if the lost efficiency in producing the product in house (in theory big software companies could hire better programmers and are more in the business of hiring programmers) is greater than the total ownership cost of the proprietary solution + business lost from use of a product that does not meet your needs over time.

So this is the problem with Linux Gaming. There is little intrinsic value in producing a game. If, what you want is a great game to play with other people, again, where commercial games are not meeting your needs, then an FOSS product makes sense. Making accounting software to do good accounting makes sense. Making a video game to be able to play a video game doesn't have the same return on investment.

The most common example of an FOSS game as a business looking to make money is game engine and 3d video accelerator cards. Neither company is a "gaming" company, but they are trying to make a product profiting off of the gaming industry. Highly specialized cards having features that are not implemented in games. Look at the recent development in hardware accelerated physics. If you think you have a hardware feature or API that could make games a lot better, you need to demonstrate that to software developers and to customers to get them to produce for your card, and make the product of value to the consumer. So make an FOSS game. This is where proprietary would be VERY BAD. YOU know your product and what it can do, so YOU should be the one making sure that the real value of your card is demonstrated in the game. Are you really going to let some other company do that for you? I hope not! Further, you may only have time to demonstrate how great games made on your system COULD be without really making the game some all time best seller. But remember, that is not your business, your business is the card. Making the game open source gives other people the opportunity, if they like it, to build upon it and make it great. Any improvement, hack, fork, or just sharing of the product IS your objective and can only improve sales... assuming the card is actually worth buying and not vaporware. Your hardware is going to need to perform to be viable long term, but if you can build a community around your products, you will be golden.

Another example, World of Warcraft. They don't sell a piece of software, they sell an entire lifestyle and gaming solution :) Bit torrent drives their updates. Blizzard is invested in making bit torrent better. LUA is probably the best example, it drives the way people interact with the game. It lets you play the game you want to play it so long as it doesn't interfere with Blizzard's ends. Some work was necessary to ensure that the system could not be exploited, but it is perfectly reasonable to believe that one could have an entirely open source client (Like SecondLife, something with an open source client)... but Blizzard wants to protect certain parts of the experience. The server software is not given to the customer, so it is proprietary as much as any changes IBM makes to their own version of Red Hat, but I can assure you Blizzard doesn't host their games on Windows Servers :) However, if the source was leaked, or even given away or sold, Blizzard is successful because it provides an entire gaming experience. New content frequently comes out, the servers are very fast when you consider the number of players per server and such. It would be very expensive and difficult for someone to even grab a fraction of Blizzard's market share even if you had all the same equipment and their software, because there is so much more to WoW then selling a box. The best anyone can do is try to get copies of their content as fast as possible and hope people will want to play on your private server. The benefit is in managing a private server with your own rules and / or friends, but financial gain is unlikely unless you can provide something competitively different from Blizzard, and why should Blizzard care, they got their own thing that seems to work pretty well for them. By all right, the leak of the source code probably helped them cause it got people addicted, and then wanting more of a whole experience, better servers, more players and such.

As far as movies in games, again, is the game your product, or is the movie your product. CC the movies, and you will see people advertising your game everywhere for you as they add their personal touch. Fan art is one of the best things you can have that makes a community. Fans that don't share are not a community.

As for movies all by themselves, I am sure you can think of similar examples as above, but with movies you have boxed information. If we want to sell an experience or a service, what goes with movies that will make money with the distribution of the product without relying on a direct relationship between the number of times the movie is watched, and how much money you make? Well, with an CC-BY-NC-SA license ( I know technically NC isn't a Free Culture approved license, but bear with me ) Movies can be licensed to theaters. In the US, I think this would require much nicer theaters. I hear this is how things work in China. Either a producer pays to get the movie in the theater and gets a cut, or makes money licensing the movie to the theater. However, your movie has to be good enough that after it has been reviewed and watched by people all over the Internet that there is a motivation for people to come and watch it on the big screen, or whatever environment some venue provides. Of course that makes your business reliant in part on theaters providing a quality venue. The same is true for musicians. It is hard to make all your money off of concerts if there is no decent place to play.

Tell me what you think. These are the kinds of things I think of that would make piracy a joke and allow the benefits of information sharing to only empower the entire human race. I have been considering working on a business to provide consulting business on how they can be successful with open source models as part of their company considering if I am as critical as I have expressed of this article, I should really put my money where my mouth is. In such a model, I see free books, and very expensive on site consulting. No matter how good any book might possibly be, competitive edge is all about fine tuning your business to be ahead of the competition. The better the book and the better it works, the more I see such companies wanting to invest in some one on one help. And anyone wanting to steal this idea could only warm up the market place for such a service to be viable. :)

Did that more or less answer the question?

The Obvious Perspective

2008-12-03T10:18:00.000-08:00

This is something I think we fail at. We can judge or rationalize peoples arguments, but really knowing someones perspective is tough. I was thinking about this with respect to meta-cognition, thinking about how to think about something. But what about thinking about how another person thinks about how they can think about how they would think about a problem? I think this the most coveted skill in teaching.

So thinking about that this morning, I came up with this problem that is puzzling, but amusing it its simple solution. With any such problem it is about perspective.

Which of these sequences is not like the other?

a) 1243
b) 2314
c) 2341
d) 3421
e) 4132

Hint #0: (The pattern between the four other numbers should be easily describable in one common word that would logically reveal the answer to a reasonably clever person.)

Hint #1: ( Each block is a sequence of digits, not a 4 digit number. )

If nobody comes up with a solution by the end of the day, I will post a hint.

The FOSS business Model

2008-12-03T00:59:00.000-08:00

There are many objectives and purposes of FOSS, while boxware has only the purpose of selling units. That is tough to compete with because boxware, from an investor perspective (person investing in the company selling it, not the ones buying it) it is successful when they sell so many units, and fail if they sell too few. Very straight forward.

FOSS in every way is more complicated. Investors of Red Hat want to see subscriptions sold, but that also depends on who you would call an investor. Many people profit from Red Hat's work, and any FOSS progress is perpetual. Red Hat will always live on in a way because of its nature. People can always expand and support Linux no matter what happens, By contrast, whatever way it could happen, if Microsoft one day went belly up, EVERY investor, stock holders and users are totally burned.

So another contrast. The purpose of Windows is for the software to be sold. The purpose of Linux / FOSS is to be productive. FOSS doesn't need to be profitable by the box as much as it needs to be useful, and proprietary software doesn't need to be as useful or productive AS MUCH as it needs to sell box units.

When we are talking about a movie company, there are two routes to go. Movies are not FOSS, remembering that the last 'S' means software. Movies make more sense under a CC license if you want it to be that type of free, but that is something else entirely. FOSS v. proprietary for a movie studio is the argument of whether or not the company is going to use make all their own software (very impractical, they are not a software company), or pay someone to give them the software they need. On a larger scale, individual companies can make their own software (again, makes no sense cause not a software company) or movie studios as a whole can pay one big company to provide for all their needs. In a way this can make a lot of sense, but has certain limitations when it is proprietary.

The FOSS solution says use this open model, build upon it as you need, BUT if you share that code or want to sell it, you need to "share-alike". This means that movie studios can meet their own individual specialized needs, and have the benefits of a community that is 'invested' in having quality software. There is also the motivation and hope that if you choose to share parts / tools that are good for you, others will build upon it and improve upon it making it the best software possible.

So if 100 movie studios work together sharing their best in-house tools for making quality movies, then many things happens. You have great software everyone can use. The software is superior than what any one company could develop. The tools are more flexible than could have been possible by one company, and profitability will come down to the ability for companies to utilize that software to make a good movie. Software engineers got paid for their work, the software is very valuable, but 'worthless' as a stand alone package. So now the questionable investment is whether or not it is going to be worth your money to invest in someone looking to make money contributing to such a project that is not directly involved in the movie production itself. Red Hat is such a company (for another industry, of course), but when such business models 'fail', the ability to quantify the failure financially for that company is 'simple' (sort of) but not for the software as a whole, something MUCH more complicated.

But again, the only thing special here is that when proprietary boxware fails, it fails for EVERYBODY and entirely. FOSS just can't be judged the same way, even if it is something very difficult for people design a business model around.

And I'll just say it now before anyone needs to point it out, I do casually program and use Linux but I am not a software engineer, and certainly not involved in the industry beyond consumer and fan. This is just my observation and opinion as an outsider with a strong belief (even if a naive one) in FOSS.

Note: As usual this was an inspired post as linked above. The original article regarding the subject matter came from here.

Afterthought from reading this post:

What good does FOSS adoption mean if there's no money exchanging hands?

Cause sometimes software is made to be used. One way you could measure FOSS profitability (albeit unfairly) would be to add up the profits of all companies invested in FOSS, like IBM, Sun, Pixar, HP to name a few. These companies don't ONLY use FOSS, and they don't give away all their software secrets, but they ARE big investors in FOSS, and FOSS is a big part of what they use to be profitable while contributing to it.

So maybe FOSS profitability is a lot like the restaurant business; Never trust a skinny chef :)

And why not one more. This post kinda pissed me off.

One thing i think we will see FOSS project's movng away from is giving away the software. if you GPL something, it doesn't mean you have to give it away, it just means who ever you sell it to gets the source code along with the program.I could for example write some software, sell it to others and then give them access to the source where only paid customers could make commits and see the source. source is only required if you distribute something....

I have said this so many places, but I think it needs to be said again given your post. I don't think you GET free software. I know this is separate from the article, but you fail to see the primary goal of free software and why it works. Sharing code makes better software. THAT'S IT! It was never about making profit directly off the software. Profit is made from productive USE of the software. What people want to try to do is take this great, powerful, and successful thing Linux and make profit off of it directly, like business people have tried to do with everything forever! Free software is just really hard because its nature. And as many commented, and my interpretation of what you said, people are not going to turn free software into proprietary software. Hmm... I take that back, noone is going to turn GPL software into proprietary software. DAMNIT, technically, you are right, it is called Mac OSX. Personally, and let people flame me for saying this, exactly the fears you are expressing that will be the death of FOSS are exactly what has happened to BSD. This is why I think the BSD Free model is going out because people are recognizing that for free to stay free comes at the price of making sure it stays that way. That is what GPL is all about. Torvalds disdain for GPLv3 I think reveals some reveals a lot about how the classical belief in free software is dead as people are forced to take harder and harder lines on free v. proprietary, where before it was just about free, and not necessarily what happened to it.