Re:Map to No where? I don't think so...
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A Map to Nowhere?
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Hah... if you think that sighting the coastline is the same as colonising a new continent then I've got hidden city to sell you. *FUNCTIONAL* genomics where you want to map out the pathway from genome to the protein sequencing to the biological pathways to the symptoms is not just a mere <A HREF="http://cbcg.lbl.gov/ssi-csb/Program.html">supercomputing crunching job</A>. We're talking Petaflops and petabytes here, not your average desktop word processor. <P>
Early research indicate that blind similarity comparison needs to be intelligently directled as the combinations can be daunting. This is the difference between random chess permutations and a quality alpha-beta pruning. To do the algorithms you need smart biostatisticians, bioinformaticists, cellular experts, and probably enough bureacratic gravy to keep NSF afloat for the next century or two.
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Now question... who would like to put some venture capital into this black hole?
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LL
As they say, TANSTAAFK and you have to be honest enough to yourself and any potential users. Be up-front and even transparent enough to put out to your users (and get them on your side) to show that your irreducible costs are $x/month and that *YOU* are currently acting as Santa Claus.
You're in a tactically unpalatable demographic as from the appearance of your site, it caters towards the pre-teen market which is notoriously short of change. However, I would suggest doing a little thinking inside the cube... what is it that you can offer them? And how can you use it to offset most of your costs (especially your stress levels). Again hypothetically speaking, if you don't have real-capital from a revenue stream you have to look at alternatives... in this case I would nominate *STREET CRED*. Kids (again assuming that is your target demographic) like boasting that they are better than x in something. How can x be achieved only from your site, and how can you convince another company that x is worth sponsoring. Again you have to think about your business model but I would suggest things like offering to act to 2nd tier games companies beta-testing programs (bounty scheme where they pay $xxx directly for each found bug), creating web-easter eggs to be sublicensed, web playback of advanced (you'd have to make an agreement with equivalent in Europe and Asia to spread the time-zone differential) playing techniques, offer to host chat rooms and provide sanitised market intelligence about future trends. This requires putting yourself into the shoes of a test-dreictor, coach, scout-master and what-else. It's also good to find yourself a niche that bigger companies find hard to duplicate as you are only a one-person band at this stage and it is too easy for the AOLers/MSNBC/Yahoos to muscle in on your customer base. Again, do yolur accounting sums and work out what meta-model you are trying to apply (resouce model, distribution model, service model, etc...).
OK let's look at it from 2 points of view, you (as person) and from the client. Basically in this day and age, you get paid either for your time (mythical 9-5), task ($$/page writing), your talent (what you know that others don't/can't), or your teleprescence (film-stars/Tiger Wood). So you ask to ask yourself, given that the computer is a tool, how does it enhance your performance?
The client's point of view is even more important as it defines what custom you take and what ones you would reject. Put yourself in their shoes, if they had to hire you as an employee, what skills would you bring to add value to what they do? How can you demonstrate that without your time/skills/knowledge/stellar personality etc, they would be worse off?
It is not easy as you ned to do some very careful critical thinking but once you've identified your role, you can then work out the business model (costs/value/risks/etc). For example, (hypothetically speaking) if you believe your skills are in programming/development with some judgement as technological consultant to these community groups, then you can market yourself as a fractional CTO. Ie if you have 20 organisations, ask that you expect to spend 1 day/fornight workly sole with their technological infostructure (information infrastucture) which would be equivalent to 5% of a CTO salary at market rates. You then have to pay the costs of the server and bandwidth against this income but then that's just a matter of accounting and tax deductions plus an incentive to keep the costs down.
The key point is to ask yourself what business you are in... and how will building your longterm reputation will bring you the outcome you desire.
Simplicity (TM) and interoperability are good but is that sufficient to convince the average person to substitute to change their ICQ/AIM/whather just for a slightly better interface? The mail system which is *THE* killer-app of the internet relied on divying up the system into 3 components
- mail transfer agent (MTA);
- mail delivery agent (MDA); and
- mail user agent (MUA).
Because the three components are somehwat independent and substitutable (e.g. sendmail/qmail, pine/elm/eudora) different palyers can upgrade without breaking some critical day-to-day use. Looking at the Jabber, it tries to be the polygot of IMs which while laudable, does make it a little unwieldly to offer alternatives and competition in the form of low barriers to entry tis'good (TM). For example, stuff like Elvin which is content-based messaging looks intriguing.
Perhaps some thought should be given to aligning the components in an analogous fashion. Has someone looked into comparison of the key attributes of the different IM system to see whether a similar structure could be nominated? For example, I would hazard
- message session agent - handshaking/setup
- message resolution agent - figuring out namespace conflicts
- message distribution agent - multicast/AIM/etc
- message client agent - the GUI thingy-a-bob
In fact spliting channels into a separate session control and others is what is suggested by BXXP framework.
Technically you can get more than a fraction back. For example, in Australia, you can get 125% deduction on R&D, even 175% if you undertake marginal increase above and beyond a rolling average. So in theory, if you wanted to set up a server in Australia dedicated to reverse-engineering closed software for "interoperability" reasons, then if you structured it properly, you'd get the government owning you a lot of money.
This is also given another name... tax rorting. Basically the tax system is not intended (or even designed) for encouraging innovation because the legal code from which it is derived is backwards looking. It cannot define what has yet to be invented. In the past some R&D syndicates (an older law) basically were side-marketed as tax-shelters which caused the closure of that scheme. I would like a citation but hearsay is that tax incentives are a negligible component in the innovation process. Marketing (identifying a need), availability of venture capital, and source of talent are ranked much higher. In addition, the government would refuse to deduct more than the matched income stream so effectively it is carried forward as an interest-free debt.
However, on reflection it would be a glorious legal hack to set up OpenSource servers in Australia to undertaken R&D projects in stuff like quantum computing or DNA computing (theory/code) and let the government handle the paperwork. Costs would be recovered by securitising the future tax windfall from any real discovery. ie discount the net 75% differential by the risk factor. ie supposing someone came up with a useful and aptentable application of quantum computing. Then you've suddenly recovered your sunk costs (basically server + mailing list + perhaps some prototypes). However, this is risky (about the same level as finding treasure ships but without the maps:-) ) so only the bold and brave need apply.
OK, the 70s'-80s have been basically moved the boundaries of computing-people relationship from 1-n to 1-1. This decade we are halfway through the shift from 1-1 to n-1 where we clients access multiple servers. This can be very broadly generalised as a shift away from single-user WIMP (Windows-Icon-Menu-Pointer) towards a multiuser LAMP (Linux-Apache-MySQL-Php/Perl) where the traditional model-view-controller paradigm now has multiple views and multiple inputs. Wheras the X event-loop dispatched the user actions, we now have the server serialising access and using the database to maintain a consistent state (baring a power failure or 5) to generate multi-media data-pages on the fly. This is good in the sense that software is now extended through time (think bookmarks) and space (the internet). It is novel to the mainstream because the traditional moving pictures (aka square-eye god of TV) was non-interactive (turn on / tune-out). Hence they can (gasp) click to delve further or (surprise) customise the appearance. This offers intriguing possilbities as we are not limited to keypress/mouse actions as event inputs but higher level functions like complete forms (basically what the fight about XML-schemas is about). Pretty basic stuff for anyone familiar with the guts of X but never before pushed into mainstream. If you model the bandwidth differential between a LAN and the real-world (TM), you can probably predict the type of network applications x years ago that will become somewhat popular next year.
Unfortunately what we are lacking is new courses/theory/tools on how to adapt applications for a n-1 computer-person relationship. Peer-2-peer is just an example of bad marketing of a really difficult concept. How do you get 2 or more machines into a consistent or synchronised state. This is the difference between having a dog on a lease and herding cats. Whatever solves this scalability issue is going to be create a whole new set of products/services (cough*.NET*cough). Why? Because traditionally data processing has been considered a pipeline process (following the manufacturing model) where it gets transformed from low-order to higher more structured order. Instead the network allows multiple pathways, multiple sourcing. This is illustrated by the fact that raw music (MP3s) might actually be more valuable (to someone like a DJ mixing/blending new tracks) than the finished packaged album (which is limited to only listen to). Allowing the consumer to gain access to the intermediate stages of production will be a long-term benefit but for now, it is anathema to vertically integrated businesses which is why they are being very careful with their EULA.
OK, let's look at the typical user's attention span. My guess is that you're looking at the meat-space interval between 0.1 sec and 5 minutes (roughly time for a human to respond to an event and the time it takes to go for a coffe break). Outside this response range you're look at either either direct embedded computer connect or distributed systems. So the performance requirements is that in ther period of 0.1 - 300 sec, you got a certain CPU (say 1 GHz) for software to do its thing. Now the human bandwidth is typing, reading, manu-vector (mouse/joystick), psycho-visual processing, listening, voice, kinesthetics/ haptics... if you look at the possiblie algorithms and the time-lines you note that it takes about 2 decades for CPU power to fully address each human IO mode. So 60-70s we had teletype + TERMCAP, 80-90s was pretty much the WIMP era, the next decades are probably going to be voice/sound combos (keep in mind the minimum 0.1 sec response requirement to signal feedback). I don't think we're going to see real VR in mainstream (ie the stage where your granny can use it) until maybe 2020+when the cost of development = the time for obsolescence (~ 5-6 years @ 2 CPU generations). Keep in mind the basic business model of the computer manufacturing buiness in that they need to recover plant costs before forcing an upgrade due to "lack" of parts. For the consumer to accept the disposable theory, it has to be within a certain price range ($1K-$5K / 5-6 years???). Now within this basic allocation, they need to divy up expenditure across hardware/software.
The point is that Moore's Law goes on quite happily but our human limitations (until someone hacks in a direct brain-connect) restricts the requirements cost-performance range of computer devices. The supply of software is limited by (IMHO) flawed IP laws fo it makes sense for a company to be vertically integrated and self-contain its sofware internally rather than specialising in specific functions. Hence the inability to scale software complexity since the average high-tech firm just has too many hungry mouths to feed (hey the MBA's need a salary to match their ego) for the market to sustain. Frankly given that the current usage of the information economy is entertainment, news sensationalism, peer communication, telepresence, and trailing far far behind education, it's hard to see killer CPU-intensive applications which absolutely requires denser forms of media.
The upside is that we're spared from 3D virtual spam for another 15 years.
This is one of my pet peeves so bear with me for a while. Non-experts routinely consider satellite drapped imagery etc as visualisations. Strictly speaking, data visualisation is *INSIGHT* not graphics. It comes down to how efficient is the enscapsulation of high level knowledge. Take for example, the difference between a sat-photo of a hurricane and a meteorological map. The first is visually rich (color-enchanged, digitally sharpened etc) but the 2nd is more useful as it codifies the fronts, pressure zones, wind direction etc. The processed information is specifically designed to remove clutter and enable an expert to quickly determine key features and artifacts. The same principle applies to GIS. People are not interested in pretty pickies, they are interested in teh rate of containmanation flow, the distribution of traffic density, the classification of vegetation regrowth, etc. GIS is an enabling technology and yes it does require lots of graphics processing but the real work is in preparing the data, not in the visualisation. Working with one Natural Resource Management group, they said that 80% of the work is in cleaning up the data. Visualisation is just a tool to help them accelerate the process of finding bad data.
As for the field of displaying quantitative information, the recommended books are Tufte . It is actually quite hard to create intuitively understood data visualisations because our eye-brain can only measure simple things like intensity, distance, etc. That's why things like pie charts where the angle is directly proportional to the propoertion works. All the other data visualisation techniques (parallel coordinates, tensors, etc) require a fair amount of training and patterning before you can pick up the meaning. A geologist (or related discpline) would be able to look at a contour map and be able to "see" in eir mind's eye the slope and elevation. Lesser mortals would probably require a pan of a 3D VRML model and even then have difficulty in recalling specific features. Adding extra layers or texture maps might be aesthetically pleasing (cough*QUAKE*cough) but doesn't really add any extra information.
After Columbus discovered the New World (americas) the then superpowers (Spain, Portugal) argued over how to divy up the goodies (tobacco, colonies, slaves, pagans for "conversion", etc). The religious authority Pope Alexandria VI mediated the dispute by defining the "Line of Demacation" [cite] where everying to the west of the parallel was claimed by Spain and everything East was allocated to Portugal. Of course, the entrepreneurs of Britain (aka pirates, heretics, and interlopers to the then ruling powers) ignored the treaty and eventually came to dominate America.
Lesson for today... just as in the past, the market gorillas (AOL-Time/MSNBC/Yahoo) are defining gated communities (cough*portals*cough) and declaring they "own" the customer (actually the life-time stream of transactions of which they hope to gain a not-so-insignificant slice) and will legislate/lobby/lock-out anyone who says otherwise. Reality of life... the world is not a closed domain and anyone who thinks that declaring a domainname/map/portal is then in the automatic position of granting titles (and not-so-coincidentally levying a tax) is going to be sadly mistaken. Yes, there is a vapor-rush as all the clueless dweebs (dot-cons) try to capture a slice of the perceived pie by staking out a trademark/site/authority. My observation is that people should think like privaters and ignore the silly rules when they make no logical, technical or practical sense. Domain names are *NOT* a scarce resource except for those with limited memories, afterall, if all non-persistent pages are generated by databases+scripts, does it really matter if you link to nfs://130.205.10.50/inode5397935#0x80.txt;uid=2314;access=456sdg rather than an easy to recall memnomic? Given a world of near infinite possiblities (noosphere), why should existing entities claim all the action?
However what is needed is recognition of the basic fact in that if you spend time, love and energy on a site (whether open-source or otherwise), it should be protected from misappropriation, misdirection or misuse (whoever writes the code/API/page gets to choose the license). Unfortunately, the juristidctions out there which are not under the thumb of big corporate lobbies interested in the status-quo yet are advanced enough to grant defensive legal protection/arbitration to entering new players not as yet established. There are some intriguing possiblities though, technically if you register a ship under a country and abide by those rules, you should be able to anchor offshore and provide a cache/proxy server that offers the services without being subject to silly restrictions (I believe some people are thinking of using this for the Dutch euthenasia law). Yes, the established commercial interests may consider this "piracy" but if you can demonstrate a need, and offer lower-cost alternatives (cough*Napster = not overpriced CDs*cough) then people will respond.
As someone once said, its easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission. There used to be several alternative root domains (AURSC?)... whatever happened to that concept? If you belive in something strongly enough and are wiling to stick to your priciples (RMS and GPL) then you will always find a way to ultimately voyage to a brave GNU world.
In marketspeak, its called "barriers to entry". Let's face it, if you want to get compensated for what you know (the basis of the knowledge economy) then it is in your best (OK selfish) interest to control/limit/milk the difference as much as possible. Doctors and Lawyers are perfect examples of this school of thought... guess how hard it is getting into a specialist medical college? Now with software, given that any concept (with proviso a Turing machine of adequate complexity and Turing strong language equivalent) then there is no barrier to entry... any idea can be reimplemented in a different language with a different twist partitioned across space/time. Even algorithms, given that you can transform certain problem classes into another (with some performacne penalty) then sooner or later, someone will find a non-patented algorithmic solution.
Patents had their roots in manufacturing processes for an industrial age economy (what the US was entering into after Independence). There it made sense to grant a long period of limited monopoly to reward the risks of experimenting with machinery. Nowadays we've got CAD/flexible manufacturing/24 hr design cycles, the rewards are disproportionate to the risks.
My gut feeling is that with something as mutable as software, that any period of monopoly should be no more than twice the period spent developing it instead of a fixed length. This will allow inventors to have some period of benefit, yet encourage them to keep the development period short (otherwise someone else would claim that problem space) and the end source could enter public domain sooner. Copyright (the distribution of implementation) is another problem. Marketing ideas / business plans are rather dubious products to protect as codification/automation of human practices is hardly an innovation (cough*Priceline*cough). Trade secret is more likely to be relevant as it affects execution rather than a saleable product in its own right. Given the failure of business models (cough*dotcon*cough), it seems that a MBA is the equivalent of a mental labotomy.
This is starting to get a little ridiculous. When they fenced off the public commons and called it capitalism, nobody in government objected. When they started gathering private consumption data and called it direct personal marketing, the mainstream press didn't raise a fuss. Now that they want to hold hostage our personal preferences and thoughts, the independent watchdogs are letting companies set the agenda without a comment. Is this how it is going to be, letting AOL/Time, Yahoo, MSNBC define the global rules of participation in a media rich economy? Is this going to be a world like the Prisoner when you wake up one day and find that you are no more than a number (<sarcasm> please take a ticket and join the queue for service rep but if you don't have any money/talent/influence forget about it as we'll deliberately ignore you til you go away</>). At least hackers have a choice, they have the talent and/or incentive to create their own little digital caves.
Why is this a fundamental concern? We are the sum of our thoughts, our desires, our memories. As we use electronic systems to craft our interactive environment, we define ourselves. Whever an EMACS macro set, custom shell resource scripts or personalised.Xdefaults, these represent a world that conforms. If the universe shifts (enw OS/window manager/etc) you can relocate. Pity the poor user who is not given a choice, either through ignorance, deliberate obscurity or forced "upgrades".
So what should be the principles of allowing an external third party have some control over our personal space? I would suggest at the minimum:
Transparency - any alterations in policies should be signalled and terms explained clearly. If there is to be retroactive alterations, at least state that up front instead of after the fact!
Reflectance - feedback mechanisms must adequately reflect the needs and expectations of the users. What are the dispute channels and resolution processes.
Op-out - there must be an clear exit choice such that you can transfer all user data with no discrimination or data corruption.
It is strange how software has shifted in the space of a decade from an ownership of the functionality to the suffurance to conformance to terms at convenience of the provider. The Prisoner might ahve full service in a model village, but what a mental limitation on eir horizon.
Trademark law is a classic case of cognitive over-cogestion... where there is no perceived contraints, in fact outright overusage due to the government's IP policies. Reality of life... the human memory is keyed to certain sounds and given that we tend to remember only a small number of short-term elements, there are a limited number of combos which are useful. Now the problem is that the whole essence of branding (cough*mindshare control*cough) is to get people to recall your product name as compared with the competitor's, you can see that this becomes very very messy. It is made even worse by the fact that most people don't give a damn about what goes on underneath the hood of a computer. As a professional term in the graphics industry of the computer software/hardware sector, it has a certain catchet but trying to extinguish or even deliberately persecute (cough*McD[a-z]**cough) the same usage outside that subdiscipline is really pushing the intent of the trademark law (either that of their lawyers are particularly stupid).
Software is not a good case where trademark works as there are inifinite combinations of software subsystems/components and if you name every single one it just becomes meaningless... who can remember all the different variants of the Intel chip line? Another particularly nasty social effect is that some symbols are sacred to certain groups (Muslum forbids the use of Koran script as it is considered blasphemous). There been some examples of corporations fencing off the social-symbol commons by trade-marking motifs from aboringinal tribes... effectively diluting and debasing their cultural capital. I believe (from hearsay) that Lucent got a lot of Budhists upset because their o-symbols was a close variant of one of their religious symbols (any citations on this?). The problem comes in that certain names/sounds/visual symbols have a certain meaning to certain groups and if it is hijacked by another, it is improper. Trademark law was suppose to help resolve it (in the commercial sphere) where a symbol (from guild times) meant a certain level of quality (intangible value apart from cost of material). This was to prevent counterfeiters from reducing the risk premium (excess over cost to account for past failed experiments). However, there is no way of managing this particular namespace as the communications realm is borderless. Hence the pollution from other noospheres where one set of prononents is looking for a set of symbols/shapes to descript their spin on a new concept. Globalisation is only making the matter worse because we now all share the same social sphere and corporations want to colonise new markets by dumping old ads (funny how the US got steel tarrifs but don't worry about pimping Hollywood crap). I really don't see any immediate solution to this problem except maybe gag the lawyers:-).
... precisely the same way that the US states are subserviant to the federal government. Each Australian State is effectively a sovereign entity (think of it as economic block) while the federal system tries to centralise certain activities (cough*taxes*cough). This creates some rather interesting political dynamics (e.g. vertical fiscal imbalances) in that States can ignore Federal laws (by passing their own variants) or create enough hue and cry that the federal government ends up back-pedelling. The good point is that there's diversity in the system, if you don't like laws in one state you can fairly easily relocate to another, or even Christmas Island which is a separate territory (which has fewer taxes). The downer is that some shanghinans get perpetuated, for example one premier (equivalent of US State Governor) in Queensland went straight to the Queen when trying the national hobby of rocking the boat.
What this means is that usually the government is too busy trying to sort out the mess in its own backyard to really bother the people that much (except for the recent introduction of GST which they've botched badly) so you can get away with some odd things. I believe someone mentioned that one of the world's biggest purchasers of SGI gear running a porn site is in Queensland which coincidenctally has one of the country's most conservative voters. Given the legal and economic stability and access to technology (some nice software hot spots around) it is not actually not a bad place to do IT work provided you focus on the export market and ignore the silly buggers down in the capital city.
... studies have shown that it is not any more effective (or cheaper) than campus-learning. Despite all the hyoe about CAI/CAL, passing on experience is inherently human intensive. Sure you can automate certian things via rote learning/flash but I don't see programs trying to pass across complex concepts or give suitable feedback such as praise. Many of the so-called educational sites are glorified publishers and it is debatable what long-term merit they have. ArsDigita has got some very very bright people, but it is too easy to underestimate the difficulty of teaching people. Formal courses are one factor, but unless you've been up at 3am trying to time a system call on an unloaded machine, you're missing out on the screening for passion (OK obsession) and sheer bloody-mindedness (OK nit-picking) for detail. Good software, like any well-engineered product takes time and teaching these tacit skills (vs merely technical stuff like languages) takes time and experience.
Also you need a fair amount of mathematical background (compsci is discrete maths for sakes) and you can't teach someone to be a professional racing driver if they don't have a clue in the first place of how to drive.
... that OpenGL/Direct3D unification promised by MS/SGI a couple of years ago? They were suppose to provide a common platform from low-high-end graphics. From hearsay, SGI supposedly delivered it to MS and considering their ex-CEO is now heading up MS internet strategy, they can't be ignorant of its presence. Or was it just another FUD to stonewall and hopefully sideshow the OpenGL standard? Given the rather anemic progress of 3D standards (cough*Web3D*cough) which is nothing more than tarted up VRML, I'm wondering what has happened.
If they're not going to use it at least SGI could OpenSource it to let some other people make use of it, if nothing more than exercise to critique the API.
How does one recognise self-independence or sovereignty? Our legal system does pose some administrative bottlenecks (e.g. citizenship and passports) but the systems are usually flexible enough to adapt (though not always painlessly or quickly). For example, the Mabo case which overturned the doctrine of Terra Nullus (the preassumption that Australia was *NOT* inhabitied at the time despite the presence of natives). All the property rights have derived from (OK nicking the place by teh British crown) this early premise and the recent overturn has meant a period of uncertainty as everything is renogotiated. If a superior civilisation did discover Earth, we might be in the position of trying to prove we actually deserve to cohabit this portion of the galaxy (which may prove bloody). As Napolean once said, God is on the side with the biggest guns. Legally, I suppose that the UN would try to ascertain the formal government structure and then organise some sort of protocol. The biggest problem here is whether any of our concepts of governance overlap? For example, supposing they come in and ask for our souls (or equivalent exotic) but we don't recognise the concept. This is much like asking the aborigines for spectrum rights 100 years ago. But once the xenolinguists figure out what conceptual basis of self-control exists, you can progressively match them up with human equivalents (e.g. refugee status) for which there are well established precedences. With formal recognition comes diplomatic rights (or at least the human equivalent). Great civilisations in the past managed to exchange people and even trade (Europe/China in Renaissance) but the evidence also exists that imposing a predetermined mindset can be harmful (e.g. Catholic conversion of the Americas). If you assume that the Prime Directive is a binding law then it is likely that it arose out of historical precedences on their side so again you'd be able to figure out the philosophy and draw upon human parallels.
An interesting question is can you figure out a culture's philosophy merely from a limited sample of their language? For example, if you make the assumption that since Vulcans have some telephathic ability, then the concept of lying might be foreign to them (cognitive dissonance). Their c'thia (truth) would be OK in the physical sciences (after all the laws of physics can't be broken) but would they understand commerce or the art of illusions/humor? Their Kh'askpetheya'th (definition of thought) would quite likely lead to different values reflected in the kro'el (way). Afterall c'thia (logic, reality-truth) is rooted in our perception of the world which is highly colored by social interaction.
BTW I recall there was a some mention of trying to simulate what the evolution of Vulcan would be based on biogeophysical developments (e.g. hotter sun, less water, etc) but is there any further work?
... is very difficult for information as it is neither rivalable nor excludable. Reading information does not deplete the source of information and you cannot prevent another person from using that information. Our traditional concept of common-law property has been built on these two assumptions, leading to the economics of scarcity and pricing accordingly. Given there is infinite information, artificial scarcity is a short-term illusion as sooner or later, a substitute comes up (e.g. opensource Linux for OS). Ultimately social probium (ie peer pressure) is the only solution for anti-social activities. Stealing data (unless a genuine trade secret), apart from the mebarassment factor, is rather self-defeating as a fair whack of it is useless (e.g. nobody worries about cron-logs). IF you make the assumption that traditional property rights are rather suspect, then the only thing you have left are people's time/space/convenience preference which you can charge for.
However, there are some new worries... identity theft is one, a good reputation (the only real currency in the hacker world) can be destroyed so easily. The relative anonymous nature of the internet is another (why do so many people choose handles?) gives rise to behaviour (e.g. written abuse that you wouldn't dare say to the same person face-to-face. However, they are not technical problems... most societies/groups/tribes evolve ettiquette as a means of smoothing interaction. Emoticons is one example in the current internet incarnation. I suspect there will be others (e.g. picons=personal icons). Another question is how do you define (and defend personal space), not merely from criminal but commercial intrusion. Have an ad pop up in the middle of sending virtual snuggles with your better half is not exactly a mood-enchancer. How does one set boundaries that everyone can recognise? The concept of justice... if someone transgresses, how can corrective behaviour be applied? Given that most people have actually a very small social circle, coming in contact with a mob of (perceived) social misfits is shock (and they probably think you're a uncool square). Gates communities are comforting precisely for the fact that they reinforce pre-existing biases (no matter how ill-concieved).
Just to let people understand the basic terminology, grok the EFF review of multimedia IP. Basically, there are 2 issues here, copyright and performance rights. The basic premise is that if a shop replaces a live band with a jukebox, then effectively that depresses the entire market for bands (with side effect of concentrating wealth into a smaller number of higher promoted groups). Thus if a publishing company suddenly uses material in a database or searchable distribution, should some of the additional revenue flow back to the authors? This is a complicated issue as all the profits are concentrated into whatever defines the value-add. If the value is in the database searching, then corporations have an interest in pushing the price of the contributing works down as far as possible. On the other hand, if it is a mere compilation/aggregation, then the authors naturally want to be compensated for their efforts being distributed via another channel. They'd naturally prefer new material (their creative talents) rather than rehash of old (prepaid works which are corporate assets).
Thus the debate is whether restructuring data is a "performance" and the stages of intermediate production. For example, in music, there is mechanical rights (access to raw material), synchronisation license (in conjunction with other media), public performance, excerption (embedding in other works). Abstract text data (and given XML, ultimately all data/schema can be represented in text)can be massaged in even more complication ways ranging from abstracts, quotations, reordered, structured, citations, mining, etc.
So who's right? Given the fact that Hollywood writers are striking (maybe the quality will go up when they import some Indian scriptwriters:-)), it shows that the issues are complicated and the power is on the side with the longest memory and biggest lawyers. Given that there's probably a backlog of (OK crappy but when did that stop Hollywood) scripts, it comes down who can blink first or is willing to eat. The traditional forms of dispute resolution (e.g. strikes) are less effectual in the case of mental activities as there are many substitutes.
The issue is a real conundrum. Publications gravitate towards the "star" system as the prospect of a few highly paid stars encourages a wide pool of low-level submissions creating a broad base but very narrow peak, effectively a trickle up effect as the interns are brow-beaten and compete among themselves (depressing their short-term value/cost) to subsidise the celebrities at the top. On the other hand studios hate the star system as they are dependent on limited resources (if they retire, switch employors, throw tantrum and quit) which is probably one reason why Disney views cartoons characters as inherently less risky (provide they can get their copyright control legally extended infinitely). This is one stituation where market forces are limited as despite logic, people can't resist the equivalent of a career lottery. If you accept that the media is driven by fads with a narrow window of earning opportunities (a la sport heros), then the loss of future revenue royalties is a significant factor. Think of the equivalent of contract professional programmer with highly specialised skills. If a company can distribute your ideas ad-infinum, then you are likely to be a very short-lived professional.
While the observation that corporations want to reduce contracts to employees and employees to slaves is probably unwarrented, ultimately increasing profits (which is what CEOs are promising Wall Street) have to come out of somewhere. If there is a fixed market (and it is defined by the total spare time people have for absorbing/reading material... (witness the moaning about pop-up ads while browsing) then the only source is to embrace, extend, then extinguish the source (ie promise great career, work them to death for creative sweat, then drop them before the real profits start coming in from mass market penetration and merchandising). Note that CEOs don't exactly offer to sacrifice their salaries when the market rejects the recycled sequels they foster. Alternatively dilute the offerings with only including a small gem among the general dross (Pokemon, single track/album) as they don't want to risk a "bad" selection (and you wonder why people are flocking to Napster).
In summary, the issues are complicated and it will take the wisdom of Solomon, the patience of Job and some serious head-knocking before people are happy. If you really want to make money, don't invest in the sharemarket but buy legal firms.
LL
Objoke... definition of lawyer... imagine cartoon with one person pulling on the head and another the tail... and the lawyer underneath milking the udder.
Everyone knows that if you go to college, you graduate and then get a job automatically
Some opinions differ. If one was really cynical, you might suspect that governments force people into schools/universities to get them off the official unemployment rolls and improve their administration's statistics. Given that computerisation is going to wipe many low-mid range white collar jobs out, things are going to get worse for the unskilled and general paper-pushers.
There's a reason why they call it work no matter how much the bosses try to dress it up.
The business model of ad-based web-sites is fundamentally flawed, whether passive or active in-your-face. Think of why we browse... we are activitely hunting for a specific (or fuzzy) piece of information. Any distractions, no matter how amusing initially, is a waste of time/energy. Just like email has become the defacto asynchronoous communications and SMS the instant pager and chat the social background noise, the web is the equivalent of scanning/comparison. This is distinct from window shopping or TV channel-shopping.
If you look at the porn sites, they accept that the feeder sites are there to filter and sort out the desires of human browsers and grant a finder's fee if that person converts to a full subscription-based site. This model has shown to work. Some catalogs which aim to build bulk purchases appear to work. Library based access fees also seem to work for large or unique archives (e.g. MedLine). Pay-per-page/view/download does not when the user has no idea of the end-quality unless there's a strong reputation behind it. Ad-backed sites at this stage do not appear to be relevant to consumers and are consequently discarded as noise unless pertinent to their immediate needs.
Sheesh... given all those epensive MBA's you'd think those guys and gals would have half a brain-cell to at least come up with an attractive alternative.
The assumption that citizens of 3rd world countries are willing to fork out $20 for a CD rather than pay for food/education is seriously flawed. Lumping in economic conduct (the rational decisions of household resource allocation) with the same seriousness as criminal cases merely shifts the burden (negative externalities) onto the public legal system and taking resources away from investigating less visible white collar crimes such as embezzelment of retiree's savings.
Copyright is a form of control (legal coercion) which if taken to extremes, means you are not allowed to communicate with your friends. Already we see NDAs, restrictive service agreements, and secrets creeping into mainstream activities. Commercial law that overrules the common law practices of accepted usage ignores the fact that business is only a means to achieve social outcomes and not just a scam to siphon money from silly sharemarket speculators.
The naive ignorance and general gullibility of the public never ceases to amaze me. Claiming that everyone who knows how to drive requires is also a mechanic does not compute. Very broadly speaking, there are 3 branches of mathematics which feed into computers
- statistical = accounting = infosys
- discrete = binary/automata = computer science
- continuous = scientific fields = computational science
Basically computers have matured to the stage where nowadays CSEE are nothing more than software engineering techniques, but the level varies according to the stage of hardware->firmware->software->wetware. (as Intel? CEO once said, hardware is nothing but frozen software). Computers are useful because they act as mental accelerators allowing you to do stuff overnight or in between coffee breaks or QUAKE sessions. But by itself, the theory is rooted in various branches of maths split into the business of computing (variations of the accounting equation), art of computing (Knuth/algorithms/etc) and the science of computing (complex systems/quantum effects/etc). For some strange reason fun and money seem to have an inverse relationship along this continuum.
For the average layperson who barely recognises how to access the internet (gee-whiz, moving text) the distinctions are superfluous but it doesn't help when the media confuses mathematics with their applications.
I would beg to differ. Capitalism (if you accept its broadest definition as trasmitting savings through space and time) is built upon private property rights and free markets which have two characteristics - exclusion (ie if I have it you don't) and rivalable (choice of alternatives with differing benefits). Certain services are neither and fall into the category of public goods. The classic example is a flood dam where everyone benefits from the reduction in risk irregardless of who pays.
Thus if you accept that a larger organisational unit such as a city council exists to reduce certain risks beyond the control of any individual business/individual, then some social tendencies are necessary. Just because people choose to share resources/expertise (cough*Linux*cough) without expectation of monetary reward does not make it communism. The centralised command and control mechanism of governance has been largely discredited as it is impossible for any central body to have the most relevant information. However, you note that there's only *one* tax department and *one* military. I'll leave it up to others to debate whether this is a good thing or not though. Where centralised authories get into trouble is the corruption of offices to confer private benefits (e.g. favorable land zoning) without due compensation to the afflicted.
The problem with pundits is that we view tommorrow's tech through the lens of yesterday's mental maps. When TV was first introduced, they had a presenter stand on front of camera to present information like a radio announcer. At the moment, the corporations are treating the web as a fancier TV with instant shopping. Until some creative souls experiment with new alternative interaction models that offer new capabilities, people will compare the potential gains (currently limited) against the hassles (downtime/spam/privacy loss) against a well-oiled media machine concerned about loss of advertising revenue. Unfortunately, experiments are not-costless (think opportunity costs or forgone choices) and the lack of mass audience network killer-apps (cough*hotmail*cough) creates lack of motivation to pay for so-so services.
The other big issue is that marketers consistently ignore the social context. Inventing a mousetrsp and expecting the world to beat a path to your door doesn't work anymore. A study notes that when someone did build a box-like "superior" mousetrap, they did not realise that a) because it was more expensive, housewives did not like throwing it away, and b) instead of getting hubby to chuck out the wooden springtrap + corpse, they had to check for the beast themselves (uck factor). In a similar vein, to expect everyone to access email via palms or browse TV through laptops ignores the very distinctive modes/times we use the devices (cellphones = instant/urgent, laptops for asynchronous email/worktray) and evenings for browsing for product comparisons. Trying to be everything for everyone while trying to grab real-estate in terms of attention without providing fair consideration/value in return is a recipe for disaster.
There are some social concerns about what does make money. Porn and betting are profit centres (which just shows that the stupidity tax works). Portals which rely on magnetic features such as hosting family photo albums cuts into the normal social capital (do people realise they are having their memories held hostage by a third-party?). Unfortunately with most new frontiers, the dom-name speculators, snakeoil spammers, IPO scamartists and bit hustlers have seized the opportunities ahead of the mainstream turning the internet a rather unsightly mental stripmall and driving all the researchers and tinkers to alternatives such as Internet2. As with most newsgroups as soon as the signal to noise ratio drops, the quality suffers and smart people disappear. Given this trend, the internet is likely to end up a set of disjoint private enclaves (subscribers) with a few massive public connexus (billboards) depending n your initial ISP's affiliation (cough*AOL/MSN*cough).
Would life have turned out differently? Probably not given that the media is currently structured to attract attention with its maniac-depreessive hysterical qualities. Unfortunately the only consistent money-spinners in a realm of solidified ideas tend to be either illegal, immoral or addictive (and if you don't think shooters like QUAKE don't fall into that category there's a portal I'd like to sell you). Will there be alternatives? Yes but they won't be obvious but the fun has always been in the striving to discover and improve oneself.
How about the word !dom (as the other half of freedom). The word free by itself does not convey the right semantic meaning. As ESR points out, there is a difference between libre and gratis. Essentially RMS says you can charge for it but it must not be controlled to the long-term detriment of the group as a whole. !dom can thus be seen mirror concept to free-!dom (or dual). For hackers who consider their work to be a form of art, this !dom concept also somewhat excludes their capture by corporations interested in fencing off the intellecual commons. Note that prime and dual has special meaning in mathematics but if you can prove certain transformations, they converge to the same value (or set of hyperplanes).
Slashdot Mirror
Hah ... if you think that sighting the coastline is the same as colonising a new continent then I've got hidden city to sell you. *FUNCTIONAL* genomics where you want to map out the pathway from genome to the protein sequencing to the biological pathways to the symptoms is not just a mere <A HREF="http://cbcg.lbl.gov/ssi-csb/Program.html"> ;supercomputing crunching job</A>. We're talking Petaflops and petabytes here, not your average desktop word processor. <P>
... who would like to put some venture capital into this black hole?
Early research indicate that blind similarity comparison needs to be intelligently directled as the combinations can be daunting. This is the difference between random chess permutations and a quality alpha-beta pruning. To do the algorithms you need smart biostatisticians, bioinformaticists, cellular experts, and probably enough bureacratic gravy to keep NSF afloat for the next century or two.
<P>
Now question
<P>
LL
As they say, TANSTAAFK and you have to be honest enough to yourself and any potential users. Be up-front and even transparent enough to put out to your users (and get them on your side) to show that your irreducible costs are $x/month and that *YOU* are currently acting as Santa Claus.
... what is it that you can offer them? And how can you use it to offset most of your costs (especially your stress levels). Again hypothetically speaking, if you don't have real-capital from a revenue stream you have to look at alternatives ... in this case I would nominate *STREET CRED*. Kids (again assuming that is your target demographic) like boasting that they are better than x in something. How can x be achieved only from your site, and how can you convince another company that x is worth sponsoring. Again you have to think about your business model but I would suggest things like offering to act to 2nd tier games companies beta-testing programs (bounty scheme where they pay $xxx directly for each found bug), creating web-easter eggs to be sublicensed, web playback of advanced (you'd have to make an agreement with equivalent in Europe and Asia to spread the time-zone differential) playing techniques, offer to host chat rooms and provide sanitised market intelligence about future trends. This requires putting yourself into the shoes of a test-dreictor, coach, scout-master and what-else. It's also good to find yourself a niche that bigger companies find hard to duplicate as you are only a one-person band at this stage and it is too easy for the AOLers/MSNBC/Yahoos to muscle in on your customer base. Again, do yolur accounting sums and work out what meta-model you are trying to apply (resouce model, distribution model, service model, etc ...).
...
You're in a tactically unpalatable demographic as from the appearance of your site, it caters towards the pre-teen market which is notoriously short of change. However, I would suggest doing a little thinking inside the cube
Best of luck
LL
OK let's look at it from 2 points of view, you (as person) and from the client. Basically in this day and age, you get paid either for your time (mythical 9-5), task ($$/page writing), your talent (what you know that others don't/can't), or your teleprescence (film-stars/Tiger Wood). So you ask to ask yourself, given that the computer is a tool, how does it enhance your performance?
... and how will building your longterm reputation will bring you the outcome you desire.
The client's point of view is even more important as it defines what custom you take and what ones you would reject. Put yourself in their shoes, if they had to hire you as an employee, what skills would you bring to add value to what they do? How can you demonstrate that without your time/skills/knowledge/stellar personality etc, they would be worse off?
It is not easy as you ned to do some very careful critical thinking but once you've identified your role, you can then work out the business model (costs/value/risks/etc). For example, (hypothetically speaking) if you believe your skills are in programming/development with some judgement as technological consultant to these community groups, then you can market yourself as a fractional CTO. Ie if you have 20 organisations, ask that you expect to spend 1 day/fornight workly sole with their technological infostructure (information infrastucture) which would be equivalent to 5% of a CTO salary at market rates. You then have to pay the costs of the server and bandwidth against this income but then that's just a matter of accounting and tax deductions plus an incentive to keep the costs down.
The key point is to ask yourself what business you are in
LL
- - mail transfer agent (MTA);
- - mail delivery agent (MDA); and
- - mail user agent (MUA).
Because the three components are somehwat independent and substitutable (e.g. sendmail/qmail, pine/elm/eudora) different palyers can upgrade without breaking some critical day-to-day use. Looking at the Jabber, it tries to be the polygot of IMs which while laudable, does make it a little unwieldly to offer alternatives and competition in the form of low barriers to entry tis'good (TM). For example, stuff like Elvin which is content-based messaging looks intriguing.Perhaps some thought should be given to aligning the components in an analogous fashion. Has someone looked into comparison of the key attributes of the different IM system to see whether a similar structure could be nominated? For example, I would hazard
In fact spliting channels into a separate session control and others is what is suggested by BXXP framework.
LL
However, on reflection it would be a glorious legal hack to set up OpenSource servers in Australia to undertaken R&D projects in stuff like quantum computing or DNA computing (theory/code) and let the government handle the paperwork. Costs would be recovered by securitising the future tax windfall from any real discovery. ie discount the net 75% differential by the risk factor. ie supposing someone came up with a useful and aptentable application of quantum computing. Then you've suddenly recovered your sunk costs (basically server + mailing list + perhaps some prototypes). However, this is risky (about the same level as finding treasure ships but without the maps :-) ) so only the bold and brave need apply.
LL
OK, the 70s'-80s have been basically moved the boundaries of computing-people relationship from 1-n to 1-1. This decade we are halfway through the shift from 1-1 to n-1 where we clients access multiple servers. This can be very broadly generalised as a shift away from single-user WIMP (Windows-Icon-Menu-Pointer) towards a multiuser LAMP (Linux-Apache-MySQL-Php/Perl) where the traditional model-view-controller paradigm now has multiple views and multiple inputs. Wheras the X event-loop dispatched the user actions, we now have the server serialising access and using the database to maintain a consistent state (baring a power failure or 5) to generate multi-media data-pages on the fly. This is good in the sense that software is now extended through time (think bookmarks) and space (the internet). It is novel to the mainstream because the traditional moving pictures (aka square-eye god of TV) was non-interactive (turn on / tune-out). Hence they can (gasp) click to delve further or (surprise) customise the appearance. This offers intriguing possilbities as we are not limited to keypress/mouse actions as event inputs but higher level functions like complete forms (basically what the fight about XML-schemas is about). Pretty basic stuff for anyone familiar with the guts of X but never before pushed into mainstream. If you model the bandwidth differential between a LAN and the real-world (TM), you can probably predict the type of network applications x years ago that will become somewhat popular next year.
Unfortunately what we are lacking is new courses/theory/tools on how to adapt applications for a n-1 computer-person relationship. Peer-2-peer is just an example of bad marketing of a really difficult concept. How do you get 2 or more machines into a consistent or synchronised state. This is the difference between having a dog on a lease and herding cats. Whatever solves this scalability issue is going to be create a whole new set of products/services (cough*.NET*cough). Why? Because traditionally data processing has been considered a pipeline process (following the manufacturing model) where it gets transformed from low-order to higher more structured order. Instead the network allows multiple pathways, multiple sourcing. This is illustrated by the fact that raw music (MP3s) might actually be more valuable (to someone like a DJ mixing/blending new tracks) than the finished packaged album (which is limited to only listen to). Allowing the consumer to gain access to the intermediate stages of production will be a long-term benefit but for now, it is anathema to vertically integrated businesses which is why they are being very careful with their EULA.
It is going to be an interesting decade ahead.
LL
OK, let's look at the typical user's attention span. My guess is that you're looking at the meat-space interval between 0.1 sec and 5 minutes (roughly time for a human to respond to an event and the time it takes to go for a coffe break). Outside this response range you're look at either either direct embedded computer connect or distributed systems. So the performance requirements is that in ther period of 0.1 - 300 sec, you got a certain CPU (say 1 GHz) for software to do its thing. Now the human bandwidth is typing, reading, manu-vector (mouse/joystick), psycho-visual processing, listening, voice, kinesthetics/ haptics ... if you look at the possiblie algorithms and the time-lines you note that it takes about 2 decades for CPU power to fully address each human IO mode. So 60-70s we had teletype + TERMCAP, 80-90s was pretty much the WIMP era, the next decades are probably going to be voice/sound combos (keep in mind the minimum 0.1 sec response requirement to signal feedback). I don't think we're going to see real VR in mainstream (ie the stage where your granny can use it) until maybe 2020+when the cost of development = the time for obsolescence (~ 5-6 years @ 2 CPU generations). Keep in mind the basic business model of the computer manufacturing buiness in that they need to recover plant costs before forcing an upgrade due to "lack" of parts. For the consumer to accept the disposable theory, it has to be within a certain price range ($1K-$5K / 5-6 years???). Now within this basic allocation, they need to divy up expenditure across hardware/software.
The point is that Moore's Law goes on quite happily but our human limitations (until someone hacks in a direct brain-connect) restricts the requirements cost-performance range of computer devices. The supply of software is limited by (IMHO) flawed IP laws fo it makes sense for a company to be vertically integrated and self-contain its sofware internally rather than specialising in specific functions. Hence the inability to scale software complexity since the average high-tech firm just has too many hungry mouths to feed (hey the MBA's need a salary to match their ego) for the market to sustain. Frankly given that the current usage of the information economy is entertainment, news sensationalism, peer communication, telepresence, and trailing far far behind education, it's hard to see killer CPU-intensive applications which absolutely requires denser forms of media.
The upside is that we're spared from 3D virtual spam for another 15 years.
LL
As for the field of displaying quantitative information, the recommended books are Tufte . It is actually quite hard to create intuitively understood data visualisations because our eye-brain can only measure simple things like intensity, distance, etc. That's why things like pie charts where the angle is directly proportional to the propoertion works. All the other data visualisation techniques (parallel coordinates, tensors, etc) require a fair amount of training and patterning before you can pick up the meaning. A geologist (or related discpline) would be able to look at a contour map and be able to "see" in eir mind's eye the slope and elevation. Lesser mortals would probably require a pan of a 3D VRML model and even then have difficulty in recalling specific features. Adding extra layers or texture maps might be aesthetically pleasing (cough*QUAKE*cough) but doesn't really add any extra information.
LL
Lesson for today ... just as in the past, the market gorillas (AOL-Time/MSNBC/Yahoo) are defining gated communities (cough*portals*cough) and declaring they "own" the customer (actually the life-time stream of transactions of which they hope to gain a not-so-insignificant slice) and will legislate/lobby/lock-out anyone who says otherwise. Reality of life ... the world is not a closed domain and anyone who thinks that declaring a domainname/map/portal is then in the automatic position of granting titles (and not-so-coincidentally levying a tax) is going to be sadly mistaken. Yes, there is a vapor-rush as all the clueless dweebs (dot-cons) try to capture a slice of the perceived pie by staking out a trademark/site/authority. My observation is that people should think like privaters and ignore the silly rules when they make no logical, technical or practical sense. Domain names are *NOT* a scarce resource except for those with limited memories, afterall, if all non-persistent pages are generated by databases+scripts, does it really matter if you link to nfs://130.205.10.50/inode5397935#0x80.txt;uid=2314 ;access=456sdg rather than an easy to recall memnomic? Given a world of near infinite possiblities (noosphere), why should existing entities claim all the action?
However what is needed is recognition of the basic fact in that if you spend time, love and energy on a site (whether open-source or otherwise), it should be protected from misappropriation, misdirection or misuse (whoever writes the code/API/page gets to choose the license). Unfortunately, the juristidctions out there which are not under the thumb of big corporate lobbies interested in the status-quo yet are advanced enough to grant defensive legal protection/arbitration to entering new players not as yet established. There are some intriguing possiblities though, technically if you register a ship under a country and abide by those rules, you should be able to anchor offshore and provide a cache/proxy server that offers the services without being subject to silly restrictions (I believe some people are thinking of using this for the Dutch euthenasia law). Yes, the established commercial interests may consider this "piracy" but if you can demonstrate a need, and offer lower-cost alternatives (cough*Napster = not overpriced CDs*cough) then people will respond.
As someone once said, its easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission. There used to be several alternative root domains (AURSC?) ... whatever happened to that concept? If you belive in something strongly enough and are wiling to stick to your priciples (RMS and GPL) then you will always find a way to ultimately voyage to a brave GNU world.
LL
In marketspeak, its called "barriers to entry". Let's face it, if you want to get compensated for what you know (the basis of the knowledge economy) then it is in your best (OK selfish) interest to control/limit/milk the difference as much as possible. Doctors and Lawyers are perfect examples of this school of thought ... guess how hard it is getting into a specialist medical college? Now with software, given that any concept (with proviso a Turing machine of adequate complexity and Turing strong language equivalent) then there is no barrier to entry ... any idea can be reimplemented in a different language with a different twist partitioned across space/time. Even algorithms, given that you can transform certain problem classes into another (with some performacne penalty) then sooner or later, someone will find a non-patented algorithmic solution.
Patents had their roots in manufacturing processes for an industrial age economy (what the US was entering into after Independence). There it made sense to grant a long period of limited monopoly to reward the risks of experimenting with machinery. Nowadays we've got CAD/flexible manufacturing/24 hr design cycles, the rewards are disproportionate to the risks.
My gut feeling is that with something as mutable as software, that any period of monopoly should be no more than twice the period spent developing it instead of a fixed length. This will allow inventors to have some period of benefit, yet encourage them to keep the development period short (otherwise someone else would claim that problem space) and the end source could enter public domain sooner. Copyright (the distribution of implementation) is another problem. Marketing ideas / business plans are rather dubious products to protect as codification/automation of human practices is hardly an innovation (cough*Priceline*cough). Trade secret is more likely to be relevant as it affects execution rather than a saleable product in its own right. Given the failure of business models (cough*dotcon*cough), it seems that a MBA is the equivalent of a mental labotomy.
LL
Prisoner within your own Mind ...
.Xdefaults, these represent a world that conforms. If the universe shifts (enw OS/window manager/etc) you can relocate. Pity the poor user who is not given a choice, either through ignorance, deliberate obscurity or forced "upgrades".
This is starting to get a little ridiculous. When they fenced off the public commons and called it capitalism, nobody in government objected. When they started gathering private consumption data and called it direct personal marketing, the mainstream press didn't raise a fuss. Now that they want to hold hostage our personal preferences and thoughts, the independent watchdogs are letting companies set the agenda without a comment. Is this how it is going to be, letting AOL/Time, Yahoo, MSNBC define the global rules of participation in a media rich economy? Is this going to be a world like the Prisoner when you wake up one day and find that you are no more than a number (<sarcasm> please take a ticket and join the queue for service rep but if you don't have any money/talent/influence forget about it as we'll deliberately ignore you til you go away</>). At least hackers have a choice, they have the talent and/or incentive to create their own little digital caves.
Why is this a fundamental concern? We are the sum of our thoughts, our desires, our memories. As we use electronic systems to craft our interactive environment, we define ourselves. Whever an EMACS macro set, custom shell resource scripts or personalised
So what should be the principles of allowing an external third party have some control over our personal space? I would suggest at the minimum:
Transparency - any alterations in policies should be signalled and terms explained clearly. If there is to be retroactive alterations, at least state that up front instead of after the fact!
Reflectance - feedback mechanisms must adequately reflect the needs and expectations of the users. What are the dispute channels and resolution processes.
Op-out - there must be an clear exit choice such that you can transfer all user data with no discrimination or data corruption.
It is strange how software has shifted in the space of a decade from an ownership of the functionality to the suffurance to conformance to terms at convenience of the provider. The Prisoner might ahve full service in a model village, but what a mental limitation on eir horizon.
LL
Trademark law is a classic case of cognitive over-cogestion ... where there is no perceived contraints, in fact outright overusage due to the government's IP policies. Reality of life ... the human memory is keyed to certain sounds and given that we tend to remember only a small number of short-term elements, there are a limited number of combos which are useful. Now the problem is that the whole essence of branding (cough*mindshare control*cough) is to get people to recall your product name as compared with the competitor's, you can see that this becomes very very messy. It is made even worse by the fact that most people don't give a damn about what goes on underneath the hood of a computer. As a professional term in the graphics industry of the computer software/hardware sector, it has a certain catchet but trying to extinguish or even deliberately persecute (cough*McD[a-z]**cough) the same usage outside that subdiscipline is really pushing the intent of the trademark law (either that of their lawyers are particularly stupid).
... who can remember all the different variants of the Intel chip line? Another particularly nasty social effect is that some symbols are sacred to certain groups (Muslum forbids the use of Koran script as it is considered blasphemous). There been some examples of corporations fencing off the social-symbol commons by trade-marking motifs from aboringinal tribes ... effectively diluting and debasing their cultural capital. I believe (from hearsay) that Lucent got a lot of Budhists upset because their o-symbols was a close variant of one of their religious symbols (any citations on this?). The problem comes in that certain names/sounds/visual symbols have a certain meaning to certain groups and if it is hijacked by another, it is improper. Trademark law was suppose to help resolve it (in the commercial sphere) where a symbol (from guild times) meant a certain level of quality (intangible value apart from cost of material). This was to prevent counterfeiters from reducing the risk premium (excess over cost to account for past failed experiments). However, there is no way of managing this particular namespace as the communications realm is borderless. Hence the pollution from other noospheres where one set of prononents is looking for a set of symbols/shapes to descript their spin on a new concept. Globalisation is only making the matter worse because we now all share the same social sphere and corporations want to colonise new markets by dumping old ads (funny how the US got steel tarrifs but don't worry about pimping Hollywood crap). I really don't see any immediate solution to this problem except maybe gag the lawyers :-).
Software is not a good case where trademark works as there are inifinite combinations of software subsystems/components and if you name every single one it just becomes meaningless
Technical hacks are no patch for social cracks.
LL
... precisely the same way that the US states are subserviant to the federal government. Each Australian State is effectively a sovereign entity (think of it as economic block) while the federal system tries to centralise certain activities (cough*taxes*cough). This creates some rather interesting political dynamics (e.g. vertical fiscal imbalances) in that States can ignore Federal laws (by passing their own variants) or create enough hue and cry that the federal government ends up back-pedelling. The good point is that there's diversity in the system, if you don't like laws in one state you can fairly easily relocate to another, or even Christmas Island which is a separate territory (which has fewer taxes). The downer is that some shanghinans get perpetuated, for example one premier (equivalent of US State Governor) in Queensland went straight to the Queen when trying the national hobby of rocking the boat.
What this means is that usually the government is too busy trying to sort out the mess in its own backyard to really bother the people that much (except for the recent introduction of GST which they've botched badly) so you can get away with some odd things. I believe someone mentioned that one of the world's biggest purchasers of SGI gear running a porn site is in Queensland which coincidenctally has one of the country's most conservative voters. Given the legal and economic stability and access to technology (some nice software hot spots around) it is not actually not a bad place to do IT work provided you focus on the export market and ignore the silly buggers down in the capital city.
LL
... studies have shown that it is not any more effective (or cheaper) than campus-learning. Despite all the hyoe about CAI/CAL, passing on experience is inherently human intensive. Sure you can automate certian things via rote learning/flash but I don't see programs trying to pass across complex concepts or give suitable feedback such as praise. Many of the so-called educational sites are glorified publishers and it is debatable what long-term merit they have. ArsDigita has got some very very bright people, but it is too easy to underestimate the difficulty of teaching people. Formal courses are one factor, but unless you've been up at 3am trying to time a system call on an unloaded machine, you're missing out on the screening for passion (OK obsession) and sheer bloody-mindedness (OK nit-picking) for detail. Good software, like any well-engineered product takes time and teaching these tacit skills (vs merely technical stuff like languages) takes time and experience.
Also you need a fair amount of mathematical background (compsci is discrete maths for sakes) and you can't teach someone to be a professional racing driver if they don't have a clue in the first place of how to drive.
LL
... that OpenGL/Direct3D unification promised by MS/SGI a couple of years ago? They were suppose to provide a common platform from low-high-end graphics. From hearsay, SGI supposedly delivered it to MS and considering their ex-CEO is now heading up MS internet strategy, they can't be ignorant of its presence. Or was it just another FUD to stonewall and hopefully sideshow the OpenGL standard? Given the rather anemic progress of 3D standards (cough*Web3D*cough) which is nothing more than tarted up VRML, I'm wondering what has happened.
If they're not going to use it at least SGI could OpenSource it to let some other people make use of it, if nothing more than exercise to critique the API.
LL
How does one recognise self-independence or sovereignty? Our legal system does pose some administrative bottlenecks (e.g. citizenship and passports) but the systems are usually flexible enough to adapt (though not always painlessly or quickly). For example, the Mabo case which overturned the doctrine of Terra Nullus (the preassumption that Australia was *NOT* inhabitied at the time despite the presence of natives). All the property rights have derived from (OK nicking the place by teh British crown) this early premise and the recent overturn has meant a period of uncertainty as everything is renogotiated. If a superior civilisation did discover Earth, we might be in the position of trying to prove we actually deserve to cohabit this portion of the galaxy (which may prove bloody). As Napolean once said, God is on the side with the biggest guns. Legally, I suppose that the UN would try to ascertain the formal government structure and then organise some sort of protocol. The biggest problem here is whether any of our concepts of governance overlap? For example, supposing they come in and ask for our souls (or equivalent exotic) but we don't recognise the concept. This is much like asking the aborigines for spectrum rights 100 years ago. But once the xenolinguists figure out what conceptual basis of self-control exists, you can progressively match them up with human equivalents (e.g. refugee status) for which there are well established precedences. With formal recognition comes diplomatic rights (or at least the human equivalent). Great civilisations in the past managed to exchange people and even trade (Europe/China in Renaissance) but the evidence also exists that imposing a predetermined mindset can be harmful (e.g. Catholic conversion of the Americas). If you assume that the Prime Directive is a binding law then it is likely that it arose out of historical precedences on their side so again you'd be able to figure out the philosophy and draw upon human parallels.
An interesting question is can you figure out a culture's philosophy merely from a limited sample of their language? For example, if you make the assumption that since Vulcans have some telephathic ability, then the concept of lying might be foreign to them (cognitive dissonance). Their c'thia (truth) would be OK in the physical sciences (after all the laws of physics can't be broken) but would they understand commerce or the art of illusions/humor? Their Kh'askpetheya'th (definition of thought) would quite likely lead to different values reflected in the kro'el (way). Afterall c'thia (logic, reality-truth) is rooted in our perception of the world which is highly colored by social interaction.
BTW I recall there was a some mention of trying to simulate what the evolution of Vulcan would be based on biogeophysical developments (e.g. hotter sun, less water, etc) but is there any further work?
LL
... is very difficult for information as it is neither rivalable nor excludable. Reading information does not deplete the source of information and you cannot prevent another person from using that information. Our traditional concept of common-law property has been built on these two assumptions, leading to the economics of scarcity and pricing accordingly. Given there is infinite information, artificial scarcity is a short-term illusion as sooner or later, a substitute comes up (e.g. opensource Linux for OS). Ultimately social probium (ie peer pressure) is the only solution for anti-social activities. Stealing data (unless a genuine trade secret), apart from the mebarassment factor, is rather self-defeating as a fair whack of it is useless (e.g. nobody worries about cron-logs). IF you make the assumption that traditional property rights are rather suspect, then the only thing you have left are people's time/space/convenience preference which you can charge for.
... identity theft is one, a good reputation (the only real currency in the hacker world) can be destroyed so easily. The relative anonymous nature of the internet is another (why do so many people choose handles?) gives rise to behaviour (e.g. written abuse that you wouldn't dare say to the same person face-to-face. However, they are not technical problems ... most societies/groups/tribes evolve ettiquette as a means of smoothing interaction. Emoticons is one example in the current internet incarnation. I suspect there will be others (e.g. picons=personal icons). Another question is how do you define (and defend personal space), not merely from criminal but commercial intrusion. Have an ad pop up in the middle of sending virtual snuggles with your better half is not exactly a mood-enchancer. How does one set boundaries that everyone can recognise? The concept of justice ... if someone transgresses, how can corrective behaviour be applied? Given that most people have actually a very small social circle, coming in contact with a mob of (perceived) social misfits is shock (and they probably think you're a uncool square). Gates communities are comforting precisely for the fact that they reinforce pre-existing biases (no matter how ill-concieved).
However, there are some new worries
Technical hacks are no solution to social cracks.
LL
Thus the debate is whether restructuring data is a "performance" and the stages of intermediate production. For example, in music, there is mechanical rights (access to raw material), synchronisation license (in conjunction with other media), public performance, excerption (embedding in other works). Abstract text data (and given XML, ultimately all data/schema can be represented in text)can be massaged in even more complication ways ranging from abstracts, quotations, reordered, structured, citations, mining, etc.
So who's right? Given the fact that Hollywood writers are striking (maybe the quality will go up when they import some Indian scriptwriters :-)), it shows that the issues are complicated and the power is on the side with the longest memory and biggest lawyers. Given that there's probably a backlog of (OK crappy but when did that stop Hollywood) scripts, it comes down who can blink first or is willing to eat. The traditional forms of dispute resolution (e.g. strikes) are less effectual in the case of mental activities as there are many substitutes.
The issue is a real conundrum. Publications gravitate towards the "star" system as the prospect of a few highly paid stars encourages a wide pool of low-level submissions creating a broad base but very narrow peak, effectively a trickle up effect as the interns are brow-beaten and compete among themselves (depressing their short-term value/cost) to subsidise the celebrities at the top. On the other hand studios hate the star system as they are dependent on limited resources (if they retire, switch employors, throw tantrum and quit) which is probably one reason why Disney views cartoons characters as inherently less risky (provide they can get their copyright control legally extended infinitely). This is one stituation where market forces are limited as despite logic, people can't resist the equivalent of a career lottery. If you accept that the media is driven by fads with a narrow window of earning opportunities (a la sport heros), then the loss of future revenue royalties is a significant factor. Think of the equivalent of contract professional programmer with highly specialised skills. If a company can distribute your ideas ad-infinum, then you are likely to be a very short-lived professional.
While the observation that corporations want to reduce contracts to employees and employees to slaves is probably unwarrented, ultimately increasing profits (which is what CEOs are promising Wall Street) have to come out of somewhere. If there is a fixed market (and it is defined by the total spare time people have for absorbing/reading material ... (witness the moaning about pop-up ads while browsing) then the only source is to embrace, extend, then extinguish the source (ie promise great career, work them to death for creative sweat, then drop them before the real profits start coming in from mass market penetration and merchandising). Note that CEOs don't exactly offer to sacrifice their salaries when the market rejects the recycled sequels they foster. Alternatively dilute the offerings with only including a small gem among the general dross (Pokemon, single track/album) as they don't want to risk a "bad" selection (and you wonder why people are flocking to Napster).
In summary, the issues are complicated and it will take the wisdom of Solomon, the patience of Job and some serious head-knocking before people are happy. If you really want to make money, don't invest in the sharemarket but buy legal firms.
LL
Objoke ... definition of lawyer ... imagine cartoon with one person pulling on the head and another the tail ... and the lawyer underneath milking the udder.
Some opinions differ. If one was really cynical, you might suspect that governments force people into schools/universities to get them off the official unemployment rolls and improve their administration's statistics. Given that computerisation is going to wipe many low-mid range white collar jobs out, things are going to get worse for the unskilled and general paper-pushers.
There's a reason why they call it work no matter how much the bosses try to dress it up.
LL
The business model of ad-based web-sites is fundamentally flawed, whether passive or active in-your-face. Think of why we browse ... we are activitely hunting for a specific (or fuzzy) piece of information. Any distractions, no matter how amusing initially, is a waste of time/energy. Just like email has become the defacto asynchronoous communications and SMS the instant pager and chat the social background noise, the web is the equivalent of scanning/comparison. This is distinct from window shopping or TV channel-shopping.
... given all those epensive MBA's you'd think those guys and gals would have half a brain-cell to at least come up with an attractive alternative.
If you look at the porn sites, they accept that the feeder sites are there to filter and sort out the desires of human browsers and grant a finder's fee if that person converts to a full subscription-based site. This model has shown to work. Some catalogs which aim to build bulk purchases appear to work. Library based access fees also seem to work for large or unique archives (e.g. MedLine). Pay-per-page/view/download does not when the user has no idea of the end-quality unless there's a strong reputation behind it. Ad-backed sites at this stage do not appear to be relevant to consumers and are consequently discarded as noise unless pertinent to their immediate needs.
Sheesh
LL
The assumption that citizens of 3rd world countries are willing to fork out $20 for a CD rather than pay for food/education is seriously flawed. Lumping in economic conduct (the rational decisions of household resource allocation) with the same seriousness as criminal cases merely shifts the burden (negative externalities) onto the public legal system and taking resources away from investigating less visible white collar crimes such as embezzelment of retiree's savings.
Copyright is a form of control (legal coercion) which if taken to extremes, means you are not allowed to communicate with your friends. Already we see NDAs, restrictive service agreements, and secrets creeping into mainstream activities. Commercial law that overrules the common law practices of accepted usage ignores the fact that business is only a means to achieve social outcomes and not just a scam to siphon money from silly sharemarket speculators.
LL
The naive ignorance and general gullibility of the public never ceases to amaze me. Claiming that everyone who knows how to drive requires is also a mechanic does not compute. Very broadly speaking, there are 3 branches of mathematics which feed into computers
- statistical = accounting = infosys
- discrete = binary/automata = computer science
- continuous = scientific fields = computational science
Basically computers have matured to the stage where nowadays CSEE are nothing more than software engineering techniques, but the level varies according to the stage of hardware->firmware->software->wetware. (as Intel? CEO once said, hardware is nothing but frozen software). Computers are useful because they act as mental accelerators allowing you to do stuff overnight or in between coffee breaks or QUAKE sessions. But by itself, the theory is rooted in various branches of maths split into the business of computing (variations of the accounting equation), art of computing (Knuth/algorithms/etc) and the science of computing (complex systems/quantum effects/etc). For some strange reason fun and money seem to have an inverse relationship along this continuum.
For the average layperson who barely recognises how to access the internet (gee-whiz, moving text) the distinctions are superfluous but it doesn't help when the media confuses mathematics with their applications.
LL
I would beg to differ. Capitalism (if you accept its broadest definition as trasmitting savings through space and time) is built upon private property rights and free markets which have two characteristics - exclusion (ie if I have it you don't) and rivalable (choice of alternatives with differing benefits). Certain services are neither and fall into the category of public goods. The classic example is a flood dam where everyone benefits from the reduction in risk irregardless of who pays.
Thus if you accept that a larger organisational unit such as a city council exists to reduce certain risks beyond the control of any individual business/individual, then some social tendencies are necessary. Just because people choose to share resources/expertise (cough*Linux*cough) without expectation of monetary reward does not make it communism. The centralised command and control mechanism of governance has been largely discredited as it is impossible for any central body to have the most relevant information. However, you note that there's only *one* tax department and *one* military. I'll leave it up to others to debate whether this is a good thing or not though. Where centralised authories get into trouble is the corruption of offices to confer private benefits (e.g. favorable land zoning) without due compensation to the afflicted.
LL
The problem with pundits is that we view tommorrow's tech through the lens of yesterday's mental maps. When TV was first introduced, they had a presenter stand on front of camera to present information like a radio announcer. At the moment, the corporations are treating the web as a fancier TV with instant shopping. Until some creative souls experiment with new alternative interaction models that offer new capabilities, people will compare the potential gains (currently limited) against the hassles (downtime/spam/privacy loss) against a well-oiled media machine concerned about loss of advertising revenue. Unfortunately, experiments are not-costless (think opportunity costs or forgone choices) and the lack of mass audience network killer-apps (cough*hotmail*cough) creates lack of motivation to pay for so-so services.
The other big issue is that marketers consistently ignore the social context. Inventing a mousetrsp and expecting the world to beat a path to your door doesn't work anymore. A study notes that when someone did build a box-like "superior" mousetrap, they did not realise that a) because it was more expensive, housewives did not like throwing it away, and b) instead of getting hubby to chuck out the wooden springtrap + corpse, they had to check for the beast themselves (uck factor). In a similar vein, to expect everyone to access email via palms or browse TV through laptops ignores the very distinctive modes/times we use the devices (cellphones = instant/urgent, laptops for asynchronous email/worktray) and evenings for browsing for product comparisons. Trying to be everything for everyone while trying to grab real-estate in terms of attention without providing fair consideration/value in return is a recipe for disaster.
There are some social concerns about what does make money. Porn and betting are profit centres (which just shows that the stupidity tax works). Portals which rely on magnetic features such as hosting family photo albums cuts into the normal social capital (do people realise they are having their memories held hostage by a third-party?). Unfortunately with most new frontiers, the dom-name speculators, snakeoil spammers, IPO scamartists and bit hustlers have seized the opportunities ahead of the mainstream turning the internet a rather unsightly mental stripmall and driving all the researchers and tinkers to alternatives such as Internet2. As with most newsgroups as soon as the signal to noise ratio drops, the quality suffers and smart people disappear. Given this trend, the internet is likely to end up a set of disjoint private enclaves (subscribers) with a few massive public connexus (billboards) depending n your initial ISP's affiliation (cough*AOL/MSN*cough).
Would life have turned out differently? Probably not given that the media is currently structured to attract attention with its maniac-depreessive hysterical qualities. Unfortunately the only consistent money-spinners in a realm of solidified ideas tend to be either illegal, immoral or addictive (and if you don't think shooters like QUAKE don't fall into that category there's a portal I'd like to sell you). Will there be alternatives? Yes but they won't be obvious but the fun has always been in the striving to discover and improve oneself.
LL
How about the word !dom (as the other half of freedom). The word free by itself does not convey the right semantic meaning. As ESR points out, there is a difference between libre and gratis. Essentially RMS says you can charge for it but it must not be controlled to the long-term detriment of the group as a whole. !dom can thus be seen mirror concept to free-!dom (or dual). For hackers who consider their work to be a form of art, this !dom concept also somewhat excludes their capture by corporations interested in fencing off the intellecual commons. Note that prime and dual has special meaning in mathematics but if you can prove certain transformations, they converge to the same value (or set of hyperplanes).
Just a thought,
LL