Posts from — June 2003

SOFTWARE ECONOMICS. Fresh off the controversy over Orrin Hatch's failure to register software, we have an interesting post from Kevin on the problems of open source software:… [OUTSIDE THE BELTWAY]

This is an interesting post and set of comments, but I think some of the comments are somewhat biased. Such is life, I'm just happy that people discuss such things in public.

A TOY (paper) ROBOT!!!!!. Roll Fold your own giant paper robots! Many delightful designs, including the Whale-Copter(?), the Kanga-Bot, and a suprisingly familiar little guy. Hours of fun, at least until you pass out from blood loss following massive paper cuts. (Link courtesy Pixelsurgeon by way of Veer.) [MetaFilter]

origami and robots, that's two tastes that go great together!

Web as Exhibitions. WebExhibits is like buttah. Parts of WebExhibits have been linked to before. But the place itself is about much more than time and art, with an incredible library of high quality links that one can get pleasurably lost in for quite a while. [MetaFilter]

sharing the wealth with this one, if you haven't clicked here and surfed a while, you are missing out.

We have to fight for our right to party.. The Right to Party. “This time, for real, I‰??m calling for the establishment of a Party Party, or, at the very least, for a Party Party attitude. I‰??m issuing a call to arms for those of us always in need of, as the great Jeff Spicoli once said, tasty waves and a cool buzz.” Hedonists and libertines, unite! [MetaFilter]

This says something about the nature of freedom and privacy, I think. To me it indicates that people see that both are necessary for the enjoyment of life.

Favorite island in the South Pacific? Place to stop in Europe?.

Let's see whether the blog works in reverse…

At the end of July I must give a talk in Sydney, Australia.  The plan is to fly west around the world.  It would be possible to stop somewhere in the South Pacific, perhaps most easily in Fiji.  On the way back I am planning to stop in Western Australia and then St. Petersburg, Russia.

The questions:

1) best place to stop in the South Pacific for a few days?  Is there a great place to sit in a hotel and snorkel from the beach in Fiji?

2) interesting place to stop in mid-August between Perth, Australia and Russia?

Constraints:  (a) I have an Israeli stamp in my U.S. passport from my recent trip to Tel Aviv and therefore would be denied entry to almost any Muslim country; (b) I want to take reasonably direct flights (and therefore Africa seems to be out of the question; you can't get there except by connecting through Europe or Dubai (which might be a problem with that Israeli passport stamp)).

Please put your suggestions in the comments or email if you prefer.

Thanks!

[Philip Greenspun Weblog]
stop in bombay

it is a nice stop, and don't assume that you would be denied entrance based on an isreali stamp… though you very well might…

GVU – Global Virtual University. Quote: “The Global Virtual University (GVU) is an online university for sustainable development, and has a particular objective to meet the educational needs of the developing world. The agreement to start the university was officially signed in September 2002 at the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, where the Norwegian Government, the United Nations University (UNU) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) pledged their support and partnership.” [Serious Instructional Technology]

well, this is good news, there have been groups interested in this for some time, now that we have it, the question is, what will it really do?

Lisbeth is a Ph.D!. My long-time cool colleague, Lisbeth Klastrup has succesfully defended her Ph.D. dissertation on virtual worlds today in Copenhagen!
Congratulations, Doctor Klastrup!!!

(My own dissertation is due October 1st, btw.) [The Ludologist]

Congrat's to Lisbeth, Wooo Hooo! the newest Dr. Klastrup has a position at itu.dk which is awesome!

Communication & Collaboration Convergence.

Uh oh, there's that word again.  Convergence.  The solution to all our problems.

Siemens has released OpenScape, which integrates phone, voice mail, e-mail, text messaging, calendaring, instant messaging, and conferencing services. Its all centered on IM to synchronize use of different modes of communication, with a SIP server (Session Initiation Protocol) for telephony integration.  OpenScape 1.0, however, requires Microsoft's forthcoming Windows Server 2003 and Greenwich collaboration server. Its the latest in a long line of communication and collaboration solutions to leverage Outlook as a platform.  And its estimated to cost as much as $400 per seat.

This may just be unified messaging redux, but Mike from Techdirt is right that it has potential as a productivity tool if its simple enough for people to use.  People use many modes of communication.  Optimize only a one or two and you may make communication in its entirety even more sub-optimal. 

[Corante: Social Software]

Wow, 400 per seat is a bit outrageous for something you could probably put together out of a set of linux hacks. It was just the other day when i was helping a colleague using freebsd set up an audio system on a standard serial port to answer phone and the like. in short, with a little innovation and some language recognition, you shoudl be able to 'hack' a product like this together from free software.

Blog -> BBS: WebDawn reverses the pattern. Another fusion of the patterns of weblogs and BBSes, this time in reverse. Mark Carey has created a new view of his Web Dawn weblog, reconfigured in BBS format:

Forum View provides an alternative view to the blog, giving a more accurate view of the conversations taking place. With the more recently active conversations listed on top, you can quickly get a sense of which entries have generated discussion – without scrolling to the bottom of each entry to see the number of comments.

Here's the forum view itself. [Corante: Social Software]
interesting hmmm, might be something to this….

Lesbian Park Rangers. There's a new elite force protecting the wilderness in Canada; a duo whose love of the bush has become more than a vocation, it has become a calling. This is the story of some rangers who, unlike Mounties, aren't interested in getting their man. Meet the Lesbian Park Rangers. [MetaFilter]

this is an intereting art project…. the whole identity vs institution thing is usually underplayed