Friday, June 29
OJR Tools of the Trade: Content Management for the Masses "Content Management for the Masses
You don't have to be rich to run a stalwart news site"
You don't have to be rich to run a stalwart news site"
Thursday, June 28
Solar Cooking Plans Solar Cooking Plans
I started making a solar cooker once but got busy and never finished it, but some of these look so simple that not even I could screw it up.
I started making a solar cooker once but got busy and never finished it, but some of these look so simple that not even I could screw it up.
Friday, June 15
XML.com: Three Myths of XML [Jun. 13, 2001] The third is that technology, including XML, is more determinative of social relations and institutions than they are of it.
Thursday, June 7
"We have to realize that each advance in typifying and standardizing things also implies a tradeoff. When we first reach forward and grasp things, we only see the benefits of our standardization, only the positive side of greater clarity and utility. it is difficult to accept the paradox that not matter how alluring, every gain in fixed intelligibility brings with it a corresponding loss of vivacity. Because we are finite, every gain we make also implies a lost possibility. The loss is especially devastating to those living in the technological world, for here they enjoy everything conveniently at their disposal -- everything that is, except the playful process of discovery itself"
(Michael Heim, on the Black experience in cyberspace)
Wow. I want to write like that.
(Michael Heim, on the Black experience in cyberspace)
Wow. I want to write like that.
Monday, June 4
"Information doesn't want to be free. Information wants to be valuable." I first heard this gem from Larry Wall, creator of the Perl programming language. Like many other open-source software authors, from Linus Torvalds, creator of Linux, to Tim Berners-Lee and his spiritual descendants at the Apache web server project, Larry discovered that one way to make his information (i.e., his software) more valuable was to make it free. Larry was thus able to increase its utility not only for himself (because others who took it up made changes and enhancements that he could use), but for everyone else who uses it, because as software becomes more ubiquitous it can be taken for granted as a foundation for further work. The Internet (based on freely available software including TCP/IP, BIND, Apache, Sendmail and so on) demonstrates clearly just how much value can be created by the distribution of freely available software.
Nonetheless, it is also clear that others, Bill Gates being the paramount example, have found that the best way to make their information valuable is to restrict access to it. No-one can question that Microsoft has created enormous value for itself and its shareholders, and even its critics should admit that Microsoft has been a key enabler of the ubiquitous personal computing on which so much of our modern business world depends.
What many people fail to realize is that both Larry Wall and Bill Gates have a great deal in common: as the crea
Nonetheless, it is also clear that others, Bill Gates being the paramount example, have found that the best way to make their information valuable is to restrict access to it. No-one can question that Microsoft has created enormous value for itself and its shareholders, and even its critics should admit that Microsoft has been a key enabler of the ubiquitous personal computing on which so much of our modern business world depends.
What many people fail to realize is that both Larry Wall and Bill Gates have a great deal in common: as the crea
Consecration: A Law We Can Live With Consecration: A Law We Can Live With
Orson Scott Card at his snotty best!
Orson Scott Card at his snotty best!
Saturday, June 2
Friday, June 1
