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How about a bullet train?

I've just propagated the meme here.

I've been reading about decentralized news for quite awhile now and have been waiting for some real, concrete results/products to be released. As such, here are some of my Mozilla bookmarks from my Decentralized News folder. Please enjoy!

Scripting News
... Call us cockroaches if you want, I'm sure IBM thought Apple, Microsoft and Intel
were cute and dirty too, but distributed and decentralized news is rapidly ...
scriptingnews.userland.com/backIssues/2002/02/15 - 25k - Dec. 9, 2002 - Cached

Research News: TVC Alert, 31 May 2002
... Before summarizing software available for reading RSS/XML news feeds (end of article),
the author opines about the value of decentralized news or information ...
www.virtualchase.com/tvcalert/may02/31may02.html - 38k - Cached

Hoosier Review
... used to their privileges as brokers of information in a top-down world, threatened
by the rise of new, bizarre, egalitarian and decentralized news sources? ...
www.hoosierreview.com/musgrave10.html - 12k - Cached

Netizens Info
... Non-electronic Reference Sources. Bellovin, Steve M. and Mark Horton, USENET
- A Distributed Decentralized News System, an unpublished manuscript, 1985. ...
www.columbia.edu/~hauben/CMC/netizen_thoughts.ht ml - 11k - Cached

www.columbia.edu/~hauben/CS/netizen_thoughts.txt
... and future of the data highway Non-electronic Reference Sources Bellovin, Steve
M. and Mark Horton, USENET - A Distributed Decentralized News System, an ...
8k - Cached
[ More results from www.columbia.edu ]

MetaLog
... just recycled news from major outlets. But what the weblogs did do
was provide a decentralized news source. At a time when all of ...
www.larkfarm.com/metalog.asp - 18k - Dec. 9, 2002 -

Michael Barone
... years ago. That's how it's bound to be in a country with increasingly
decentralized news media and a fragmented electorate. The ...
www.jewishworldreview.com/michael/barone100300.a sp - 17k - Dec. 9, 2002 - Cached

SubIntSoc.net: The Suboctagon Report - The Center Cannot Hold, ...
... Another example: personal video cameras. People on the streets with cameras formed
a decentralized news-gathering system that the TV networks couldn't match. ...
subintsoc.net/suboctagon_20011121.php - 39k - Dec. 9, 2002 - Cached

Wired Online: Brain Tennis
... Or will the many-to-many nature of the Net lead to self-correcting, decentralized
news media that nobody owns and everybody contributes to? ...
hotwired.lycos.com/braintennis/96/23/index2a.htm l - 11k -

Is the Florida Unified Ballistic Railway (FUBAR).

It borrows its propulsion system from Jules Verne. Let's just say it takes the idea of a "bullet" train quite literally. :)

Note the "artist's conception" pic, with the sign that says "WARNING: EXTREME DANGER - STAY BACK 1000 METERS."

I'm serious! Cybercafes are sprouting up in Lagos and other African cities, and guess who one of their main customer bases is? Yes, the African money transfer scammers.

THe free market at work, I guess.

I'm in the process of setting up a political blog on SubIntSoc.net that uses b2. It's open source and totally customizable. The Cafelog forums contains scripts for dozens of cool hacks created by users.

Ultimately, "blogging" software is usable for all sorts of purposes. Heck, people use Slashcode for blogging. A "blog" is just a threaded, sequenced posting and/or discussion program. Not all are about people's belly button lint, or whatever.

and they have a funny series of e-mails exchanged with a nigerian money transfer guy...

Oddly enough, they also have a great article on the history of calculator watches.

And it's updated every week (1 or 2 new stories).

One the funniest features: Create Your Own Terror Warning.

The Subversive Intellectual Society runs an interesting site. It's not really a mock news site, but it contains a lot of satire, mostly about government, corporate and technology subjects. They pose as some kind of underground political group, and claim that their web site is hosted on a hacked DARPA server.

Right now they are chronicling a fictitious candidate's race to become "Dictator" of Florida.

The Subversive Intellectual Society runs an interesting site. It's not really a mock news site, but it contains a lot of satire, mostly about government, corporate and technology subjects. They pose as some kind of underground political group, and claim that their web site is hosted on a hacked DARPA server.

Right now they are chronicling a fictitious candidate's race to become "Dictator" of Florida.

...thanks to a top secret DARPA project, unknown till now.

Here's a look at what they've picked up recently in the Oval Office...

;)

...thanks to a top secret DARPA project, unknown till now.

Here's a look at what it's been recording recently in the Oval Office...

;)

At least according to "Harry Covert":

File #2: A Martian Chronicle

This guy ties together two interesting ideas: the fact that humans appear to have evolved through an "aquatic ape" stage, and the particular gravitational conditions of Mars.

We should also note the recently discovered vast amounts of water on Mars.

Someone's already got their fingers in the cookie jar.

P.S. I realize this is a joke. No flames, please.

Check it out:

subintsoc.net

It's comical to see how various groups are attempting to use the DMCA,
as well as traditional IP law, against each other, in a vain effort to control
the ideas they call "their" "intellectual property." As Benjamin Franklin said,
when someone else uses your idea, you are not diminished... you still "possess"
it as much as you ever did.

For example, see this humorous(?) dispute between a small web site and someone
claiming to represent Wired Magazine, in which everything from the DMCA,
to copyright and patent law, to the GPL(!), is invoked to assert one side
or the other's IP claims:

http://subintsoc.net/blowback_200203.php#wired2

Just goes to show how asinine these sorts of things can get.

These are the same folks responsible for the great Create Your Own Terror Warning page...

ANd they claim to be having a legal dispute with Wired magazine.

True or not, it's very entertaining.

These are the same folks responsible for the great Create Your Own Terror Warning page...

ANd they claim to be having a legal dispute with Wired magazine.

True or not, it's very entertaining.

The resourceful team at the Subversive Intellectual Society managed to dig up a whole series of confidential letters sent to people like David Koresh, Ted Kaczynski, Elian Gonzalez, and others, by various government agencies.

Maybe they'll dig up Senator "SSSCA" Hollings' tax returns next. Or his CD or video purchases...I'd love to see those...

;)

The resourceful team at the Subversive Intellectual Society managed to dig up a whole series of confidential letters sent to people like David Koresh, Ted Kaczynski, Elian Gonzalez, and others, by various government agencies.

Maybe they'll dig up Senator "SSSCA" Hollings' tax returns next. Or his CD or video purchases...I'd love to see those...

;)

This comes on the heels of dozens of other mergers since the 1996 Telecom Deregulation Act. While I agree that Napster is not terribly relevant these days, it does look like the media titans are gradually getting more savvy about the Internet. Will they buy up the current crop of music-trading networks next?

Michael Powell of the FCC is actually actively lobbying to tear down the rules against greater concentration of media mergers. And of course the RIAA and the companies that are buying up all the radio stations (Clear Channel, Infiniti, etc.) are helping to shut down webcasting. Pretty soon the media landscape could look something like this...

And issue your own customized terrorism warning!

See my posts near the top of this topic (about how I've spent a lot of time on my personal web project during my 8 mos. unemployed).

I've battled the blues almost every day of this depressing time. It didn't help that my city (New York) was ATTACKED and virtually shut down during the month of September. Also, my grandfather died right after I was laid off, my wife and I had to move to a lower-rent apartment, I injured myself during the move, and one of our pets contracted a life-threatening illness. Of course I have nothing to complain about compared to the people I know who lost someone in the World Trade Center. But this whole city has been a really rough place for the last several months.

Working on Subintsoc.net and other non-paying web projects (such as MiamiStories.com) during times that I couldn't get paying work has really helped preserve my morale and sanity, as well as honing my skills and adding to my resume.

It sucks not to be able to do what you're good at, and what you used to get paid well for. Sometimes doing it for free, and hopefully providing some entertainment to the world in the bargain, is a good way to go.

See my posts near the top of this topic (about how I've spent a lot of time on my personal web project during my 8 mos. unemployed).

I've battled the blues almost every day of this depressing time. It didn't help that my city (New York) was ATTACKED and virtually shut down during the month of September. Also, my grandfather died right after I was laid off, my wife and I had to move to a lower-rent apartment, I injured myself during the move, and one of our pets contracted a life-threatening illness. Of course I have nothing to complain about compared to the people I know who lost someone in the World Trade Center. But this whole city has been a really rough place for the last several months.

Working on Subintsoc.net and other non-paying web projects (such as MiamiStories.com) during times that I couldn't get paying work has really helped preserve my morale and sanity, as well as honing my skills and adding to my resume.

It sucks not to be able to do what you're good at, and what you used to get paid well for. Sometimes doing it for free, and hopefully providing some entertainment to the world in the bargain, is a good way to go.

I've been (mostly) unemployed in NYC for almost 8 months now. I've spent much of that time on a new web project:

http://subintsoc.net

If someone actually buys the t-shirt we've got for sale on the site, the Dept. of Labor could come after me for making money while collecting unemployment benefits. Then again, technically, it's not a dot-com...it's a dot-net. So maybe Microsoft will come after me instead...

If you visit, try the new do-it-yourself Terror Warning Generator!

And remember, Cogito Ergo Rebello...

I've been (mostly) unemployed in NYC for almost 8 months now. I've spent much of that time on a new web project:

http://subintsoc.net

If someone actually buys the t-shirt we've got for sale on the site, the Dept. of Labor could come after me for making money while collecting unemployment benefits. Then again, technically, it's not a dot-com...it's a dot-net. So maybe Microsoft will come after me instead...

If you visit, try the new do-it-yourself Terror Warning Generator!

And remember, Cogito Ergo Rebello...

...or at least that's what this site claims.

It's an analog audio monitoring system put together in the early 70s, and hooked up to an early, experimental signal processing and digitizing program.

This was a DARPA - Secret Service project, and apparently the software is still kicking around. Amazing what those paleo-geeks from the age of ARPAnet were capable of...

...for the moment.

Of course, Tom Ridge could still make it happen as a Homeland Insecurity measure.

...is that those who make them secret often won't even divulge what it is they've made secret. This is a major problem in a democratic society. In the US we are still dealing with decades of Cold-War-era documents that are difficult to get at. The Freedom of Information Act provides some help, but if you don't know a secret exists, how can you file a request to have it released to you? Also, the gov. is increasingly putting people on trial with secret evidence, that even the defendant and/or their attorney cannot see. This is the sort of thing this country was founded in reaction against.

I sympathize with our Aussie friends on this. At least the USA doesn't have this sort of regime on the Internet (yet).

Speaking of government secrets: ever wonder what the true story is about Bush and the "pretzel?"

...these DVDs, including the 10 mins. of cut footage!

Also, if he'd only lived to see the leader of the free world being assaulted by a pretzel! How pathetic and bizarre, yet hilarious...it would appeal to his twisted, brilliant sense of humor.

Of course, Adams would have known that there is more to the story than meets the eye...

Now if only Tom Ridge could figure out which end is up...

And Bush would come clean about the "pretzel" incident.

Now if only Tom Ridge could figure out which end is up...

And Bush would come clean about the "pretzel" incident.