Tuesday, April 30, 2002



New Dimensions World Broadcasting Network

[10:41 PM | wl | permalink

Saturday, April 27, 2002



Which children's storybook character are you? This is me! :)

this quiz was made by colleen

[3:45 AM | wl | permalink

Thursday, April 25, 2002



Myths Over Miami Miami New Times | miaminewtimes.com | News : Feature "Captured on South Beach, Satan later escaped. His demons and the horrible Bloody Mary are now killing people. God has fled. Avenging angels hide out in the Everglades. And other tales from children in Dade's homeless shelters." BY LYNDA EDWARDS

[11:19 AM | wl | permalink

Wednesday, April 24, 2002

Douglas Englebart


link

"Englebart's most famous invention is the computer mouse, also developed in the 1960s, but not used commercially until the 1980s. Like Vannevar Bush and J.C.R. Licklider, Englebart wanted to use technology to augment human intellect."

[12:49 PM | wl | permalink

Bootstrap Institute


link

"In the spirit of Engelbart's lifelong mode of working ever so fruitfully, keywords here remain pragmatic, experiential, evolutionary."

Linked to Englepart in the previous post as I had an inkling of the depth of his work - see the idea of open hypertext at work here, and the notion of augmenting intelligence. Of course it is patially implemented here too with the "permanent link" on each item. Blogs have that! Which is an easily overlooked factor in their value. Interesting site, on the edge. In the bootstrapping process does pragmatic come before soulful or is it the other way around? Anyway, experiential, evolutionary resonate well with me.

[11:52 AM | wl | permalink

Wordsworth, William. 1888. Complete Poetical Works. "... And I have felt A presence that disturbs me with the joy Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime Of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean and the living air, And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; A motion and a spirit, that impels All thinking things, all objects of all thought, And rolls through all things." Bartleby - a place I like to visit.

[2:30 AM | wl | permalink

Monday, April 22, 2002



Free Software Politics and Advocacy "I'm interested in linking the free software movement with the struggle for social justice and developing the synergies between them, and in connecting free software with freedom of information issues in other areas." YES There are good reasons for free software... free as in that it can freely flow through cyberspace and develop and grow as it moves without it becoming proprietory and closed source on the way. The GNU Licences can make it so.

• it can evolve more flexibly and be more functional - it develops according to USE value - it is better
• it can be available to more people - poorer people
• it prevents the alienation of the people creating the work from the ownership of it
• it's inner workings are visible, hence the learning is inherent in the product - the tools are at the same time educational tools and toys
• it is a model of how cooperation is possible and an inspiration for people working without the constraints of the profit motive
• anyone can re-build any program anyway they like and hence it enhances creativity
• it is an example of how technology changes the relations of production - and bodes well for the future of production

So much for the social and political... Psychologically... the virtual world, the mindspace, the context for the expression of out thoughts and feelings, the context for their *meaning*, feels and is different and better without a company brand name on it. Do we enter a Microsoft world - a Disney world - a neon lit suburbia - when we enter psyberspace - or can it be a national park? The commons? If we win this we will have different dreams and the anti-technology people will no-longer be right when they say there is no soul here. Yes, we do social/political things for psychological ends (alluding to)

[2:15 AM | wl | permalink

O'Reilly Network: Jeff Bezos' open letter on used book sales [April 21, 2002] YES

[1:22 AM | wl | permalink

Sunday, April 21, 2002



WTP - Ivan Illich Transcript van Illich with Jerry Brown We the People, KPFA - March 22, 1996 "Brown: This hour we have a very special privilege and opportunity. We have here in the studio in Los Angeles Ivan Illich and Carl Mitchum, two friends of mine who I hope you'll enjoy our conversation. Listen in. You'll find it instructive. Ivan Illich is the author of a book, very famous in the 1970s, called Deschooling Society, another book called Medical Nemesis. He's also the author of Celebration of Awareness, Tools for Conviviality, Gender, and now his most recent book called In the Vineyard of the Text, a commentary on a 12th century scholar and saint, Hugh of St. Victor. Along with us here in the studio is Carl Mitchum, a professor of humanities, presently Visiting Scholar at the Colorado School of Mines and on a more permanent basis a professor at Penn State where Ivan Illich and his friends and fellow scholars meet every year for a few months to study these ideas that over the next hour we're going to do our best to elucidate and share. Ivan, why don't we just start with the book that I first encountered when I became aware of you, and that is the book Deschooling. Can you reflect on what you were thinking about when you wrote it and how you might see that reality today because we're still struggling with schools in this society. There's still a dependency on professionals that seems to have control of how we learn or don't learn and I just have to wonder have we made any progress in creating the context where people get the sense that they are in charge of their own learning?" Interesting discussion. Does the world a context sensitive help? Not in schools which subvert that. Xenos - Zeus and hospitality? Acedia the inactivity which results from seeing how enormously difficult it is to do the right thing - is it a sin? There is also insight into the interface - the pupil of the eye which takes in with its psychopods the other person. But they do not really grasp the potential of the medium for - conviviality and friendhip.

[2:59 PM | wl | permalink

Saturday, April 20, 2002



GNU Free Documentation License

[2:46 PM | wl | permalink

Wednesday, April 17, 2002



Silicon Valley | 03/27/2002 | Journalistic Pivot Points Dan Gillmore writes: " Yesterday at PC Forum, I was part of a key moment in this evolution. "I was blogging a session on wireless technology, and wrote something about SkyPilot, one of the presenting companies. Duncan Davidson, SkyPilot's CEO, finished his presentation and sat on the podium, reading on his laptop, while other people talked. Then, in the Q&A, he corrected something I'd written in the blog. In other words, he'd caught this in near-real time and had better information (he should). I immediately posted another paragraph, which began, "I've been corrected...." Whoa. I'm still not entirely sure what happened. But I do know this. My journey in journalism hit a pivot in that moment. Maybe journalism itself hit a pivot point, as pretentious as that sounds." How interesting to hear this from one who was not only there but in it, doing it. This links in of cousre with an earlier post I made here from Esther Dyson The conversation continues... THE WI-FI PEANUT GALLERY All I know for sure is that I'm jazzed that it happened, and I'm going to think about it, hard.

[2:56 PM | wl | permalink

Tuesday, April 16, 2002



Look what the search engines found for me! Curriculum Vitae Walter Logeman "I did some primary school teaching in the sixties. In 1974 I founded ''Four Avenues" a state funded secondary school based on the principles of Ivan Illich. Taught in the school for four years." hehehe

[8:27 PM | wl | permalink

A PROFILE OF IVAN ILLICH "Illich's radical anarchist views first became widely known through a set of four books published during the early: Deschooling Society (1971), Tools for Conviviality (1973), Energy and Equity (1974) , and Medical Nemesis (1976). Tools is the most general statement of Illich's ideas. The other three volumes expand on examples sketched there in order to critique what he calls "radical monopolies" and "counter productivity" in the technologies of education, energy consumption, and medical treatment. This critique applies equally to both the so-called "developed" and the "developing" worlds, but in different ways to each." Illich came to mind during these last few months while I have been learning GNU/Linux (I hate being this purist using this name for it, but I think the underlying GNU ideas and WORK are vital The reason is that i have this memory from the seventies of Illich philosophy which advocated tools that people could fix. Car engines that one could get into, even valve radios because they were modular. Well, did it work for technology in the world of matter? Perhaps the success of the PC is an example. But in the world of software it is *imperative* to keep access open. When one person fixes something it can be available to all, instantly. Making that impossible is so wrong. It is worse than dumping food while people are starving... information is of a higher order and knowledge could lead to a better world. Dumbing down the world for profit - that is not only MS but all closed software projects. How can this be prevented? I'd like to revisit Illich on this...

[8:20 PM | wl | permalink

Design for Community: About Welcome to Design for Community! "If you're not sure what it is you're looking at, here's the basic idea: Design for Community is a book, an attitude, and, hopefully, a community." There is also a useful weblog to lint from here.

[7:29 PM | wl | permalink

Daypop - a current events/weblog/news search engine Search 7000 News Sites and Weblogs for Current Events and Breaking News

[7:06 PM | wl | permalink

Monday, April 15, 2002



Google Web APIs - Home Develop Your Own Applications Using Google It will be interesting to see what happens here. Any one seen an application? Dave Winer on the Google APIs

[10:35 PM | wl | permalink

Techne & Psyche Techne & Psyche perspectives on technoscience and the cultural psyche Dolores Brien's very psybernet related weblog. One I'll be watching a lot. Dolores has a real interest and insight into the psyche and the Net. See also: An interview with Stephen L. Talbott. The Machine in the Ghost.
Archetypes of the Internet by Dolores Brien.

[2:52 AM | wl | permalink

Internet Magazine - News/Advice/Reviews/ISPs/Hosting Kim Gilmour asks its busy 29-year-old co-founder and CEO Evan Williams about how weblogs have changed the Web

[2:13 AM | wl | permalink

EVHEAD What's this? "This is the personal web site of Evan Williams, president/CEO of Pyra Labs, the creators and operators of Blogger, a web application used to publish, among other things, sites like this (so, you see, this is work!). Here, I write about the Internet, business, blogs, San Francisco, my life, and various other things as they occur to me."

[1:20 AM | wl | permalink

Sunday, April 14, 2002



Writings Depth Charge by Jane R. McGoldrick This time about cliff Bostock.

[1:38 PM | wl | permalink

Psychotherapy: Why some people have abandoned it "So, in soulwork, our task is to imagine our way to truth, our calling in the world. The work does not require artistry, only the willingness to engage in the imaginal. The psyche naturally communicates metaphorically and in images (thus the work is often called "psychopoetics"). The imagination places us in the realm of "the invisibles," to use Hillman's term, or in mundus imaginalis, to use Henry Corbin's term. This is the place where our destiny reveals itself -- between the literal and the wholly imaginary. In this place, so unfamiliar to most people in our society -- and even scorned by much psychology -- life speaks clearly to us through the autonomous voice of personified soul." More Cliff Bostock.

[1:33 PM | wl | permalink

Writings Deiknymena: Erotic revelations in cyberspace by Cliff Bostock "But who is imagining in cyberspace?As we surf the Web an apparent random series of images begins to arise that at some level has coherence to the psyche (if we can presume some kind of coherence is necessary to maintain our attention). Any web surfer can verify that this "dialog" can go on for hours. The lived experience is not of incoherence and disassociation. It is instead of fascination and learning. One feels in contact ... but with what? This too is similar to accounts of the mystery cults. One is taken over by the experience - specifically by the "god" in the experience at the center of the cult. Despite the balkanization, the fragmentation into various cults with different contents, the shared experience in all of them is of being overtaken. The same is true in cyberspace. To put it in Marshall McLuhan's terms: We are re-tribalized (into newsgroups and chat rooms), but the particular content of the tribe doesn't matter so much. Why? Because the medium itself is the message. But, again, what is the fundamental quality of the medium - or, as the Greeks might put it, what is the god in the medium? Perhaps, as Ulansey seems to suggest, it is the collective psyche or anima mundi - the "megasynthesis" of matter and thought into a self-reflective colelctive envisioned by Teilhard de Chardin (1959)." The line "...what is the god in the medium?" interests me here. It is a project of mine - the archetypes of cyberspace.

[1:28 PM | wl | permalink

O'Reilly Network: Keeping Genome Data Open [Apr. 05, 2002] "Jim Kent was a graduate student in biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC), when he wrote the program that allowed the public human genome team to assemble its fragments just before Celera's private, commercial effort. His program ensured that the human genome data would remain in the public domain. Kent wrote the 10,000-line program in a month, because he didn't want to see the genome data locked up by commercial patents." A hero indeed! One of the spin-offs from now using GNU/Linux is that it is easier to see how locking away human knowledge for the benefit of the rich is just evil!

[1:09 PM | wl | permalink

Aldon Hynes' LiveJournal

[12:13 PM | wl | permalink

O'Reilly Network: Inventing the Future [Apr. 09, 2002] "Weblogs. These daily diaries of links and reflections on links are the new medium of communication for the technical elite. Replacing the high-cost, high-octane, venture-funded Web site with one that is intensely personal and built around the connectivity between people and ideas, they are creating a new set of synapses for the global brain. It's no accident that weblogs are increasingly turning up as the top hits on search engines, since they trade in the same currency as the best search engines--human intelligence, as reflected in who's already paying attention to what." "connectivity between people and ideas" - that is what I like about it.

[10:27 AM | wl | permalink

Saturday, April 13, 2002



Cliff Bostock - Writings Hillman Speaks: The topic is depression and the man is confounding by Cliff Bostock "This curious habit of exempting certain areas of inquiry from his own method of reversal permeated the weekend. While valorizing shattering, the suffering of depression, he seemed unwilling to look at what mania itself might be asking of value. To my own mind, mania, as a social descriptor, may be telling us we really do need to speed up our attention, that if we live on a dying planet, we need to begin merging our bodies with new forms of technology. It is in media - the internet, the cell phone, the television - that we see the most visible expressions of consciousness speeded to "manic" rates. There was just no opening in Hillman's (anti-technological, anti-speed) cosmology to discuss this in a serious way." "Indeed, the entire room seemed unwilling to go that way. One man spoke negatively of the way the "window to the world" has been replaced by "Windows '95." It is a great mystery to me how people in archetypal psychology offhandedly dismiss the idea that technology itself might be ensouled, that in a world on the apparent verge of environmental disaster, our survival might well depend on our capacity to take on new forms of embodiment. There has been a lot of (optimistic) writing in recent years about the internet as a group mind that may be the planet's salvation." A nice essay on depression from yr 2000. This is also a link which in turn links to a lot of writing by Cliff Bostock. Look for his article on Archetypes for example...

[1:11 AM | wl | permalink

Friday, April 12, 2002



The Internet Archive: Building an 'Internet Library' This is so good! I hope it can last - or will there be some sort of collective memory loss?

[7:29 PM | wl | permalink

Audio Online: UCB Speech Archives: Streamed Audio Files, Media Resources Center, UCB UC Berkeley Lectures and Events (including materials from the UCB Language Center Speech Archives) A great collection!

[2:50 PM | wl | permalink

Aldous Huxley - somaweb.org The hypnotic, intellectual, satirical, spiritual, and philosophical world of Aldous Huxley. Brave New World and other works - Extensive information, discussion forum

[1:47 PM | wl | permalink

Microsoft Has Shelved Its Internet 'Persona' Service By JOHN MARKOFF NY Times egistration req. Posting something likes this here makes me think: How is this part of exploring Psyberspace? Freud had the triad of Id, Ego and Superego. Jung also defined/discovered contours of the psyche, the collective unconscious, Self, Shadow, Anima and Animus and of course Persona. Just the connection with Jung's Persona means the item is of interest. But it goes deeper than that. Just as Persona is a way of describing the structure of the soul or at leasts its contours, .NET fits in somewhere as part of one of the the contours of psyberspace, which have not as far as I know been clearly named/discovered/created. The passport, virtual ID bots (like Persona) or whatever, present interesting questions: Who owns them and manages them? What will my persistent virtual ID contain - what happens when you finger me? How can that be done? How should it be done on the net? How does my virtual ID relate to me? Is a home page a virtual ID? And then I think: How does my persona relate to the real me?

[1:07 PM | wl | permalink

Thursday, April 11, 2002



Free as in Freedom Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software The whole of this book is online. amazon ""If anything deserves a reward, it is social contribution," Stallman wrote. "Creativity can be a social contribution, but only in so far [sic] as society is free to use the results. If programmers deserve to be rewarded for creating innovative programs, by the same token they deserve to be punished if they restrict the use of these programs." I like that line from Chapter 7. I think that reward could well come from taxes - more govt payment for free software. Edit: 20 April 2002 "I really admired the way Richard built up an entire political movement to address an issue of profound personal concern," Sarah said, explaining her attraction to Stallman. My wife immediately threw back the question: "What was the issue?" "Crushing loneliness." Fascinating comment... the idea we do political things for personal reasons. I buy it. I am glad RMS has such a psychologically minded friend - I hope it is working out for them. But there would be an interesting twist to entertain: He had to set up a life of crushing loneliness so that he could fulfil his destiny as a political leader.

[8:11 PM | wl | permalink

Wednesday, April 10, 2002



Mobilization for Global Justice I clicked on one of the bubbles in a futurefarmers animation and this is where it took me!

[10:36 PM | wl | permalink

Tuesday, April 09, 2002



Biographical Sketch of Richard A. Clarke Richard A. Clarke A Biographical Sketch

[6:23 PM | wl | permalink

BBC News | AMERICAS | US names cyber-terrorism czar "America built cyberspace, and now it must defend cyberspace," Mr Clarke said in accepting his new position." This is scary language - counter-terrorist measures are mostly scarier than anything terrorists get up to. Terrorism is scary, but that it may be not the real target here. It may be as in international politics, an excuse for extending superpower domination. The bit if foul jargon: cyber-terrorism does not bode well, despite some o the more reassuring words deeper into the article. In this time of doublespeak terrorist=friend may well be true. Will he promote secure operating systems or ban them? I have no idea. Perhaps he does know what is what, but then why all the hype?

[5:57 PM | wl | permalink

Sunday, April 07, 2002



A Beautiful Mind (2001) "Plot Outline: John Nash, diagnosed as paranoid-schizophrenic, goes on to win a Nobel Prize for work on game theory." Warning: Spoilers ahead: Of course I was entertained. That said, this is the second time in a short time I have seen such a form of inner aggression in the name of a psychological solution on the screen. Fight Club was the other movie - similar in concept. The characters in John Nash's psyche (as shown in the movie) had little connection with his own history and dynamics. In a way his isolation in the outside world spills into his inner life and in the name of sanity he treats his inner child, except for one parting moment, not unlike his own real son - with neglect. As a therapist I have worked with people with similar dynamics. It is almost a law of the inner world that these characters have good intentions poorly executed. Role reversal and re-education can make them effective players in the soul. So, I found it less than satisfying that these potentially interesting and rich aspects of the psyche - the best friend, the inner child, and the great protector were all dismissed as having no value. It is a folly to interpret the symbolic as literal. Are there hidden codes in magazines? Are they dangerous? Yes. The consumer society promoted in the magazines kills people. He was not so silly really! A case of category confusion. On the positive side, Nash's solution was far better than the one the psychiatric system was trying to impose. Still, I would have liked to have been his therapist!

[10:25 PM | wl | permalink

SELF Personal Non-Fiction "I write online and I write it in segments. I still believe that there is a new organization for the hypertext narrative. What do you I mean? "That you can enter this book from any chapter and it will be a new narrative."

[6:03 PM | wl | permalink

Psyche and Machine by Michael Grosso "Marshall McLuhan once remarked that the telephone may be likened to a form of telepathy. This comparison suggests an interesting question: What, if any, is the relationship between psyche and machine, between powers of the human soul and technology? At first glance, coupling the two seems an unpromising move." Found this while exploring the notion of an Inner Cyclopedia using search engines - found this with: automobile self dream psyche

[5:27 PM | wl | permalink

Doctor Hugo's Fuzzy Dreamz 00 || Museums of the Mind || I f this link works it goes to a really nice set of images - sperms seeking out an egg juxtaposed to a pen writing on paper... very dream-like!

[5:10 PM | wl | permalink

amsterdam.nettime.nl Mailing List Archives An excellent search engine of the whole mailing list.

[3:08 PM | wl | permalink

Walter's Weblog Discussion - Quick Topic Brand New on this Weblog Today I have always liked the simplicity of Quick Topic. There is now a link in every item here to a quick topic discussion. So far there is just one thread - and anything and everything goes in that. It is a sort of web forum, but you can sub to it via email! So have a go - click the discuss link below.

[2:58 PM | wl | permalink

Walter's Weblog Discussion - Quick Topic Brand New on this Weblog Today I have always liked the simplicity of Quick Topic. There is now a link in every item here to a quick topic discussion. So far there is just one thread - and anything and everything goes in that. It is a sort of web forum, but you can sub to it via email! So have a go - click the discuss link below.

[2:58 PM | wl | permalink

Review "Now lets talk about what I like in a web art piece. I enjoy the sites that have a noticeable narrative going on in them, they seem to have better direction and focus than a lot of the new sites I see out there. Many are too wide open, no focus, which leaves the viewer without direction, lost and aggravated. I don't mean so much direction and focus to the point the piece becomes too predictable and boring, I just mean it is nice to be taken on a journey and seeing inside the artist mind, not just left wondering around not knowing which way to turn, and in the net art space that is easy to do. Interactivity is nice, but too much irritates me, I want to be lured, driven through a piece. Imagery is also a must, words only reminds me I am reading a book. I want to be in a space I am unfamiliar with, but familiar with at the same time. Arguably creating something that hasn't been done before is impossible, but experiencing something I am somewhat familiar with is nice, as long as it is presented in a new or different way." I think of this site - Psybernet and how it has that focus - it is personal to me and about the psyche in cs. A good combo. Experiential... there is no objective view of the psyche in cs, and so as I am here writing I explore psyberspace, create it with annotations. I have not quite figgured out who wrote this review. matthewturlington?

[1:57 PM | wl | permalink

Net art - Doctor Hugo || Museums of the Mind || "In our minds we all have private museums, secret places for our most vivid memories, imagination and dreams."

[1:22 PM | wl | permalink

The Austin Chronicle Screens: Information Wants to Be Worthless "Net types like to catfight about whether blogging is the Way Forward or utter self-indulgence. Since it is almost certainly both at once, blogging is quite the hot topic. So there will be some bloggery debate, with scowling, and finger-wagging, and pepper-gassing. Yes, blogging has its limitations. There isn't much in the way of original content, for instance. Weblogging consists mostly of logging one's websurfing activities, then making sardonic comments about whatever you see. An activity one's admirers find hilarious. Yet admirers rarely pay for this. Except in their admiration." Little reflexive note here from Bruce Stirling whose article here is quite fun but what's his point? That its hard to make money out there when information wants to be free? How is that for a sardonic remark.

[1:17 PM | wl | permalink

Bio / Doctor Hugo "Since 1995, Doctor Hugo became one of the pioneers in Net.art. He participated in 1988 at the 'First International Symposium on Electronic Art' (FISEA) in Utrecht. He took part in various Net.art projects, including the ALT-X-site 'Being in Cyberspace' and 'Revelation' ISEA 2000, Paris. In the series 'Fuzzy Dreamz' (1998) he transforms his new media experiences into painting and vice versa. His works have been presented in major international exhibitions ranging from Antwerp, Brussels, Basel, Amsterdam, Paris, Barcelona and Chicago to the Biennale of Venice." His name popped up in Psyber-L discussion so I made this link... a "blog annotation" of the discussion. This is the sort of thing I imagine Esther Dyson is talking about happening in f2f conferences with wired people... doing it here makes a bit more sense for now.

[12:59 PM | wl | permalink

theSpleen - The Whitney & Net Art "...sitting just a few chairs over from Fry was Josh On, who was silent through most of the discussion, making occasional amusing remarks. Like Valence, On's They Rule engages in illustrating information, however They Rule takes on a proactive, political agenda by mapping the insular world of the wealthy elite. As On states: “They Rule is a political cartoon, a satire that turns data into information… Data should reveal things about people to people.” They Rule allows viewers/users to create “representations of data that are important and pertinent.” The site also invites the user to gather greater information on the distribution of capital from linked web sources."

[12:49 PM | wl | permalink

Saturday, April 06, 2002



GroupSense Online Groups Weblog

[10:11 PM | wl | permalink

Internet Groupware for Scientific Collaboration Internet Groupware for Scientific Collaboration by Jon Udell, http://udell.roninhouse.com/ An excellent article of what is *wrong* with emaiI - see the great example of idealised threading in the Zope group. Idealised. Yet that is what it could be like and IS like in newsgroups read in Agent - but who does that? I even switch on html occasionally these days. I buy food in plastic bags. I don't always bike everywhere.

[9:47 PM | wl | permalink

O'Reilly Network: Jon Udell: Instant Outlining, Instant Gratification [Apr. 01, 2002] "When I turned in the first draft of my book, my editor, Tim O'Reilly, said: "This is great, but you ask too much from people." And he was right. I was advocating not just a communication tool, but a way of using it to optimize collaboration. That meant asking people to narrate their work, but also to think carefully about the attention demands they placed on their coworkers, and to label, structure, and layer their communications accordingly. Most people didn't want to do these things, and most people still don't. "What does all this portend for instant outlining? There's reason to hope. It's been clear to me for a long while that the only thing that might displace email would be some kind of persistent IM. That's exactly what instant outlining is. If it catches on, and it's buzz-worthy enough to do that, we'll have a framework within which to innovate in ways that email never allowed." Interesting article - but I think that it still won't catch on... persistent internet messageing, nice idea but email remains king IMO. ANY method of collab requires either dumbing the tools right down and working ad hoc OR education in a series of rules and protocols OR human facilitation and email groups + the GroupSense approach to their design and facilitation is a real world solution combining what people know already and do now with gentle nudges to a saner world. Well managed email groups have benefits over the Outlined approach in Radio. Threaded email IS outlined. It is persistent (locally and/or on the web). It is instant when needed, asynch when needed, groups can be defined and structured as needed and you can filter out certain users if you need to! Why can't these guys use email + mailinglists? I am cross posting here - originally sent to Dan's Online Group Weblog.

[9:35 PM | wl | permalink

The conversation continues... THE WI-FI PEANUT GALLERY "... All this happened last month in Scottsdale, Ariz., and will be happening again and again as more conference venues get "wired" with wireless." "... What's going on here? "As always, the phenomenon is happening first in a reflexive way -- as you may expect, at conferences where the subject is computers. But such phenomena have a way of spreading." Esther Dyson is reporting on the PC forum - I think it is the first time i have read a report on the mooted shift happening - a room full of people f2f and online at the same time. The future is not being old & bloated & fed intraveinously while we are yourthful online. We will be fully physically alive, solitary or social and mixing the virtual into our actual with ease. And yes - it happens reflexively at techno events but will soon be ubiquitous.

[6:44 PM | wl | permalink

O'Reilly Network: iBooks Love Linux [Mar. 29, 2002] iBooks Love Linux by Edd Dumbill 03/29/2002 "It feels a bit like a homecoming. After years wandering in the cranky wilderness of mix-and-match PCs I'm working again on a computer that feels like it has a soul. The reason I feel like this? The other week I switched from an Intel-based laptop to an iBook." I have a Dell laptop running Mandrake - and while there is sometheing extra soulful about Debian on the iBook - I have a machine that has plenty of soul! 15" 1600x1200 playing K.D. Lang DVD while I work must be up there... or down pretty deep into soulful. The thing is that hardware aside, to be out of MS is bliss. I feels like being in a good restaurant after hanging out at Mc Donald's for years.

[5:40 PM | wl | permalink

Friday, April 05, 2002



They Rule Josh's project - you will need Flash 5.

[10:48 PM | wl | permalink

They Rule Josh's project - you will need Flash 5.

[10:48 PM | wl | permalink

E Y E B E A M | atelier SOCIAL NETWORK SOIREE: DISCUSSION, CHAMPAGNE, EXPERIMENT 'Eyebeam, the not-for-profit organization dedicated to art and technology, will host an interdisciplinary panel discussion entitled Social Network Soirée: Discussion, Champagne, Experiment. The event will take place on May 14, 2002 at 6:30pm in Eyebeam's space in Chelsea located at 540 West 21st Street, between 10th and 11th Aves. The discussion will address the social dynamics that drive fashion trends, enable salacious gossip, fuel Internet crazes and sustain corporate power structures. Each panelist will use social network analysis to explain a transformation in art, technology, or culture. A cocktail party will follow the discussion, where guests wear wireless badges called meme tags that track and analyze social interaction in real time. To participate in the experiment, guests will mingle, listen to freshly spun electronica, and sip complimentary mini-Moet champagne." I mention this cause it is interesting and also being the Josh On parent.

[5:41 PM | wl | permalink

Ducks on the Avon

Took this years ago - it was the first digital picture i ever took - and i stumbled across it while tidying up. I like it.

[12:54 AM | wl | permalink

Thursday, April 04, 2002



Anita Konkka Literary Web Site "Anita Konkka is a Finnish novel writer. She has published since 1970 eleven novels, essays, radio-plays, and a dream-book. She is a tireless scholar of love and love relationships, problematic ones, too. However, she doesn't portray her characters as enervated by love or otherwise with furrowed brow. In these Finnish latitudes she is able to write about love and its troublesome and unhappy aspects humorously and as though smiling, not derisively or with pity but friendly and understandingly." Nice to hear from you again Anita!

[3:19 PM | wl | permalink

The Community of Linux "Anyway, I wanted to come back to the idea of Linux. It is a careful phrase, 'the idea of Linux'. It occurred to me this morning, as I was reading the technology news and reflecting on the tasks of the day, (I'm not exactly sure how, but that is an interesting side question) that Linux and the whole Open Source movement isn't about the software. It is about community. The Community of Linux." This is from Aldon Hynes a regular on Psyber-L. I am looking forward to discussion on this whole topic. The idea of Linux to me is central to the psyche in cyberspace. Community is one reason for that, to be sure.

[3:16 PM | wl | permalink

Tuesday, April 02, 2002



DaveNet : In rebuttal to Glenn Davis "Davis says that the gee-whiz hello-world days of the Web are over. It's true it was fun (for a few minutes) to watch a fish tank on a webcam. But that was not the promise or purpose of the Web. Maybe he thought that's what it was. If so, he missed the point. It's about publishing without middlemen." Dave Winer also wrote something about Glen Davies... see my post below. Publishing without middlemen - reading without middlemen - can this happen? It is happening now - but new media wil not replace old, only transform it.

[10:57 PM | wl | permalink

Stupendous Links The Links of John Morgan A really nice page of links - backs up the notion "show me your links and i know who you are" - i have a sense i know John Morgan from links and nothjing else.

[1:21 PM | wl | permalink

Theories and Metphors of Cyberspace- Abstracts "Possible theme of a paper could be the -- Necessity and Metaphor. Contrary to popular belief 'we can not think what we like', words and metaphors have a power of their own" I wrote that a long time ago... it was an abstract for something I am still writing.

[1:16 PM | wl | permalink

Meet the Horses and Ponies: Thymie " I am called Thymie. I am the oldest, and the boss of the herd, yet the gentlest of everyone. I was born in 1984.I have had a successful, though short, trotting racing career as well. My racing name was Lotsa Time, and I am so gentle, and therapeutic that Kate spelled the Time part after a lovely herb to capture my healing essence." ~ Here is one of the pages from the site - which i have enjoyed making. The business is going well! We are loving the newness of our life - which is very different from how it was. The transitions have been hard.

[4:09 AM | wl | permalink

Psyber-L: A Psybernet Mailing List Psyber-L: Exploring Psyche in Cyberspace Mailing List "An online group for experiential learning about online depth interaction for people doing psychological work on the Internet. The group has been active (and inactive!) since 1993 and now has a life based on our history and sense of affiliation as well as the shared purposes. "The Psyber-L mailing list grew out of the need to learn more about and experience first hand the potential of the net, especially how online group interaction effects the psyche. "If you have an interest in the psyche online - please join!" ~~~ I have been completing the transition of this group from L-Soft to Yahoo. Bit sad about that as L-soft had a good feel to it and a better product, no ads etc. However Yahooo is easier and cheaper! I will be able to start writng there soon... life is getting back to normal after the huge upheval of stating the Mt. Lyford Horse Treks (see link coming up). How is it then that i have time for being here - but not there in the cty? Solitude, strange but true. But then why here at all? Here being in this blog? I am having a great time reviewing psybernet... tidying... shifting, it is helping me find myself. That sounds too grand. Helping a tiny bit in the big process. The list of links is really a nice mirror for me and goes well beyond this weblog: Old Links

[4:00 AM | wl | permalink

The Doc Searls Weblog : Easter Suday, March 31, 2002

[3:02 AM | wl | permalink

Monday, April 01, 2002

What was all that about?

I was wondering if the web is still interesting, after reading about Cool Site of the Day boredom (see link below). I searched Google on: "meaningful hidden sources" and picked the items of most interest to me. I can get engrossed in all of this and find it (synchronistically!) magical. Magic has been quite word lately as I read "True Names". But that is another story. Knowing the right word is to do magic. And that is what I'd say to Mr. Davies - what are you typing in your search engine?

[9:30 PM | wl | permalink

Catholic Enc. on Albertus
"Like his contemporary, Roger Bacon (1214-94), Albert was an indefatigable student of nature, and applied himself energetically to the experimental sciences with such remarkable success that he has been accused of neglecting the sacred sciences (Henry of Ghent, De scriptoribus ecclesiasticis, II, x). Indeed, many legends have been circulated which attribute to him the power of a magician or sorcerer. Dr. Sighart (Albertus Magnus) examined these legends, and endeavoured to sift the truth from false or exaggerated stories. Other biographers content themselves with noting the fact that Albert's proficiency in the physical sciences was the foundation on which the fables were constructed. The truth lies between the two extremes. Albert was assiduous in cultivating the natural sciences; he was an authority on physics, geography, astronomy, mineralogy, chemistry (alchimia), zoölogy, physiology, and even phrenology. On all these subjects his erudition was vast, and many of his observations are of permanent value. Humboldt pays a high tribute to his knowledge of physical geography (Cosmos, II, vi). Meyer writes (Gesch. der Botanik): "No botanist who lived before Albert can be compared with him, unless it be Theophrastus, with whom he was not acquainted; and after him none has painted nature in such living colours, or studied it so profoundly, until the time of Conrad, Gesner, and Cesalpini."

[9:15 PM | wl | permalink

Synchronicity The medieval "magician" Albertus Magnus wrote:

"A certain power to alter things indwells in the human soul and subordinates the other things to her, particularly when she is swept into a great excess of love of hate or the like. When therefore the [human soul] falls into a great excess of any passion, it can be proved by experiment that the [excess] binds things together [magically] and alters them in the way it wants. Whoever would learn the secret of doing and undoing these things must know that everyone can influence everything magically if [s/he] falls into a great excess."

[8:44 PM | wl | permalink

Mona Lisa
"Most probably it was Sigmund Freud's influential essay on Leonardo's homosexuality and Freud's consequential analysis of the Mona Lisa which was the direct or proximate impetus for Duchamp's image. But, whereas Duchamp seems to imply that the picture fuses artist and sitter, male and female, Freud suggests that the Mona Lisa (specifically her smile) is a manifestation of Leonardo's submerged memory of the birth mother from whom he was estranged at age four and who Freud theorizes expressed an unnatural affection toward her young son. In fact, Freud refutes the notion that there is a physiognomic similarity between the artist and the sitter, but goes on to suggest that the device of the smile was obviously so meaningful to the artist, using it frequently in his works of the time, it must have repressed significance. The person behind the Mona Lisa, Freud suggests, may have had such a smile, a smile that evoked long ago suppressed memories of his mother. Indeed, as Freud is quick to point out, this seems to have been a persistent theme: Vasari even noted that at the earliest age Leonardo was known for having created images of smiling women:

Let us leave the physiognomic riddle of Mona Lisa unsolved, and let us note the unequivocal fact that her smile fascinated the artist no less than all spectators for these 400 years. This captivating smile had thereafter returned in all of his pictures and in those of his pupils. As Leonardo's Mona Lisa was a portrait, we cannot assume that he has added to her face a trait of his own, so difficult to express, which she herself did not possess. It seems, we cannot help but believe, that he found this smile in his model and became so charmed by it that from now on he endowed it on all the free creations of his phantasy.

"(Sigmund Freud, Leonardo da Vinci: A study in psychosexuality. tr. A.A. Brill. New York, Vintage Books, [1955] Originally published by Freud in 1910, p. 79.)"

[8:35 PM | wl | permalink

Cool site man on NYT "He started Cool Site in 1994, after discovering the thrill of happening upon an especially interesting Web site and telling his friends what he had found. Within a year, more than 20,000 people a day were visiting the site, and Mr. Davis became a Web celebrity, giving interviews to online magazines and fending off gifts from Webmasters who were desperately seeking his recommendation of their sites. " "Today, Mr. Davis has not only kicked his Web habit but also almost completely given up the medium. The Cool Site of the Day still exists, but it is no longer run by Mr. Davis, who has also lost his enthusiasm for trolling for new pages."

[8:22 PM | wl | permalink

Kurzweil "A comprehensive archive of works written by Editor-in-Chief Raymond C. Kurzweil. Also, a directory of selected articles about Kurzweil or the Kurzweil companies." "After the Singularity: A Talk with Ray Kurzweil By Raymond Kurzweil John Brockman, editor of Edge.org, recently interviewed Ray Kurzweil on the Singularity and its ramifications. According to Ray, "We are entering a new era. I call it 'the Singularity.' It's a merger between human intelligence and machine intelligence that is going to create something bigger than itself. It's the cutting edge of evolution on our planet. One can make a strong case that it's actually the cutting edge of the evolution of intelligence in general, because there's no indication that it's occurred anywhere else. To me that is what human civilization is all about. It is part of our destiny and part of the destiny of evolution to continue to progress ever faster, and to grow the power of intelligence exponentially. To contemplate stopping that--to think human beings are fine the way they are--is a misplaced fond remembrance of what human beings used to be. What human beings are is a species that has undergone a cultural and technological evolution, and it's the nature of evolution that it accelerates, and that its powers grow exponentially, and that's what we're talking about. The next stage of this will be to amplify our own intellectual powers with the results of our technology." (Added March 27th 2002)" Plenty more there along those lines... The Singularity - interesting - originates with Vinge and links cyber c with the romantics?

[6:53 AM | wl | permalink

Eliza

[6:42 AM | wl | permalink

CyberPsychology "This page has links to a number of papers by Hugh Miller and Jill Arnold, of the Department of Social Sciences at Nottingham Trent University, about identity and Web pages. We've also included links to a number of other sites that we've found useful and interesting. We're keen to make contact with other people who are interested in this area, so feel free to email Hugh or Jill, especially if you're thinking of linking to this page or to any of our papers: we'd probably like to see your site. Jill has a questionnaire (and an opportunity to contact her for an interview) about identity and personal home pages." This is a site worth having as it identifies something very vital - web pages and identity. Vityual life does not require the paraphanalia of The Matrix, just the Net as we know it.

[5:35 AM | wl | permalink

Usenet post on psychodrama from 1996 I recall this discussion and found it again. Here is a nice post from Dimitra Barnard-Martinez (earthsea@accent.net) - It is amazing what is buried in the 20 years of usenet.

[2:53 AM | wl | permalink

Virtuality Theorists General Directories and Indexes of Sites. And I am there with a Psybernet link - among some interesting resources. Check this out for psyber stuff.

[12:05 AM | wl | permalink

Matthew Broersma doing an Eric Raymond interview. Centralization doesn't scale "If you want to go to a really fundamental analysis, what we're perpetually rediscovering on a scale of complexity is that centralization doesn't work. Centralization doesn't scale, and when you push any human endeavor to a certain threshold of complexity you rediscover that."

[12:02 AM | wl | permalink