Category: Social Impact

One more example of Sturgeon's Law – Perseus study on weblogs

Everyone seems to be getting their shorts in a knot over the recent Perseus study on weblogs. Among comments I’ve seen in my aggregator are those from:

MarketingWonk
Many to Many
Mathemagenic
The Register (Andrew Orlowski in one of his usual blogs are stupid rants; what is his problem?)
Scripting News

So, where’s the news here?

This is a perfect application of Sturgeon’s Law – “90% of everything is crud.” I suppose it sells papers and marketing studies to focus on failure, but the important message is that the failure has to occur if you want to see the successes. The more experiments you can run and the easier it is to run an experiment, the more likely you are to see successful results.

The latest round of games in the instant messaging arena

Yahoo IM stupidity. Yesterday, I noticed that Yahoo! IM was refusing my connection through Fire, the multi-protocol IM client I run on OS X. It seems Yahoo has decided to stop providing access to non-Yahoo client software. CNET says this affects Cerulean Studios… [RatcliffeBlog – Mitch Thinking Out Loud]

Yahoo and Trillian aren’t playing nicely here, so my pain level has risen. I think Mitch is right to compare this to the phone company’s efforts in the 1960s to keep foreign devices off of their networks.

I’m wondering how to account for the rash of clueless behavior we see of late. The people at Yahoo (or the RIAA for that matter) aren’t stupid. So why do they do things that look so stupid from my perspective?

I have two hypotheses.

Hypothesis one is that modern training in marketing succeeds in conditioning marketing types that markets consist of statistical abstractions that have no connection to the living, breathing human beings they interact with on a daily basis.

Hypothesis two is that training in strategy ignores any notion of dynamic change or any notion that people outside the organization might behave in ways inconsistent with the assumptions in the strategic plan.

Copyright cops in the NYTimes

“You Coulld Be Next”. A Cartoon in the NYTimes?

“On copyright – the Copyright Cops – outlining many of the favorite examples of just how pervasive copyright (and copyright infringement) has become in modern life.” [Furdlog]

And make sure you’re reading Furdlog daily because Frank is doing a fantastic job covering filesharing and copyright issues.

[The Shifted Librarian]

Ridicule may be the most effective tool available to address copyright in its current incarnation. And listen to Jenny; Furdlog should be in your aggregator.

MP3s Are Not the Devil – Orson Scott Card on copyright

Orson Scott Card weighs in on copyright from the perspective of record companies vs. those who actually create something:

So it’s pretty hilarious to hear record company executives and movie studio executives get all righteous about copyright. They’ve been manipulating copyright laws for years, and all the manipulations were designed to steal everything they could from the actual creators of the work.

Thanks to Slashdot for the pointer.

Lessig petition on reclaiming the public domain

reclaiming the public domain. We have launched a petition to build support for the Public Domain Enhancement Act. That act would require American copyright holders to pay $1 fifty years after a work was published. If they pay the $1, the copyright continues. If they don’t, the work passes into the public domain. Historical estimates would suggest 98% of works would pass into the pubilc domain after 50 years. The Act would do a great deal to reclaim a public domain. This proposal has received a great deal of support. It is now facing some important lobbyists’ opposition. We need a public way to begin to demonstrate who the lobbyists don’t speak for. This is the first step. If you are an ally in at least this cause, please sign the petition. Please blog it, please email it, please spam it, please buy billboards about it — please do whatever you can. And most importantly, please help us explain its importance. There is a chance to do something significant here. But it will take a clearer, simpler voice than mine. [Lessig Blog]

The pendulum has swung too far in the direction of control over intellectual property rights. This is one sensible thing you can do to help push it back in the direction of balance between public and private interests.

Hacking the Xbox

A (dangerous) primer on hardware hacking. Andrew “bunnie” Huang, whose presentation on hardware hacking at ETCON last month was nothing shy of brilliant, is selling his book, “Hacking the Xbox” online for $24.95 (pre-order now and get it for $19.99!). This, after his publisher backed out of the deal for fear of the DMCA.

This hands-on guide to hacking was cancelled by the original publisher, Wiley, out of fear of DMCA-related lawsuits. Now, “Hacking the Xbox” is brought to you directly by the author, a hacker named “bunnie”. The book begins with a few step-by-step tutorials on hardware modifications that teaches basic hacking techniques as well as essential reverse engineering skills. The book progresses into a discussion of the Xbox security mechanisms and other advanced hacking topics, with an emphasis on educating the readers on the important subjects of computer security and reverse engineering. Hacking the Xbox includes numerous practical guides, such as where to get hacking gear, soldering techniques, debugging tips and an Xbox hardware reference guide.

“Hacking the Xbox” confronts the social and political issues facing today’s hacker. The book introduces readers to the humans behind the hacks through several interviews with master hackers.

“Hacking the Xbox” looks forward and discusses the impact of today’s legal challenges on legitimate reverse engineering activities. The book includes a chapter written by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) about the rights and responsibilities of hackers, and concludes by discussing the latest trends and vulnerabilities in secure PC platforms.

Link Discuss (Thanks, Chris!) [Boing Boing Blog]

Something to order and put in my to read/to learn pile. Taking things apart is still one of the absolute best ways to learn anything. I’m right there with Ed Felten on the importance to intelligent tinkering as one of the fundamental engines of innovation that has driven our economy over time. Dumb ideas like the DMCA are the predictable but ultimately doomed, IMHO, efforts to preserve the status quo for those who once innovated but now prefer to clip coupons and litgate.

Protect and Exercise your freedom to read

American Civil Liberties Union : Support the Freedom to Read! .

With the passage of the USA Patriot Act, the FBI gained the power to search your library and book-buying records without probable cause of any crime or intent to commit a crime. Furthermore, librarians and others who are required to turn over records are not allowed to say that the search has occurred or that records were given to the government.

This means that average Americans could have their privacy violated wholesale without justification or proper judicial oversight. Questions from Members of Congress to the Department of Justice about the use of this power have gone unanswered or have received a superficial response.

In response to these un-American and dangerous powers, Rep. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) has proposed the “Freedom to Read Protection Act” (HR. 1157). This act would restrict the key provision of the USA PATRIOT Act — by exempting libraries and bookstores from the laws that allow the FBI to conduct these searches of personal records.

Take Action! Urge your Representatives to support the Freedom to Read Protection Act! [Privacy Digest]

Supporting the Freedom to Read Protection Act is a good idea but here’s something else you might want to think about doing as well. Radically diversify your reading choices. Order something at the opposite end of the political spectrum from your usual fare. Check out something at Loompanics or Paladin Press, or ChristianBook.com. Create patterns in your data that don’t add up and can’t be categorized.

There are two desirable features to this strategy. First, if enough of us do it, we can overwhelm these silly systems with white noise in the data. Second, if we actually start to read and think about viewpoints that radically differ from our own, we might actually start to get smarter as individuals and as a society. There isn’t much point to protecting our freedom to read if we don’t bother to exercise it in the first place.