Stand Your Ground laws are at least *supposed* to be about defense of life, not property, as I understand them. Cyberattacks are mostly not life-threatening.

Pancake game sub for Captcha looks culture-biased.

I take it that you have never jumped out of an airplane or willfully engaged in an action that requires physical chutzpah and an acceptance of imminent physical danger as part of your work environment.

Failure in these instances could result in injury or possibly death, and it is only natural in these situations that such a weight of failure should weigh heavily on the performer of those actions.

Chances are that you would not be able to step up and engage in these sorts of actions if you aren’t, “feeling your oats”

Your examples were all predicated on a comfortable and very-forgiving work environment (and as such, I’m not sure you can fully dodge the socio-economic angle), which is itself an element of your own self-identified “community of skill”.

I have my own thoughts on the maintenance and joining of “communities of skill”, apprenticeships and the like which I will eventually blog (I’m not asking for a plug or read), and I will spare saying anything more on it here.

Good Show. I found it thought provoking.

I’m currently training to be a tradesman. Those of us who are in the trades have a much different take on “new” (internet related and “virtual”) technology. So what for you may be a matter of affection, is to those of us entering the trades at times conflicting with our livelyhoods.

So college educated though I may be, my 4 year degree, and my skills with “knowledge work”, research, and baseline proficiency with technology seemingly aren’t enough. It’s easy to calls us “Luddites”, after all that revolt was about jobs; yet, that in itself isn’t the issue.

In our own way we are engaging in what I thought all this “new” technology would be best at, dialogue. However, as both of us can attest this isn’t happening on a wider scale. The fact it hasn’t has and always has been my primary concern.

Both “tech” websites and “activist” organizations set up what are essentially broadcast channels and not are not intended to be outlets for civic engagement and dialogue (I’ve aready described what comes of attempting to do so on such sites, either the site owners suppress dissenting voices, or the chorus of “likers” might drum you out with shame or snark).

And in-so-far as they aren’t outlets for “common” dialogue these groups don’t have to write up an immediate response to dialogue in a bill (even if that is supposed to be what the internet is for). However, it is fairly easy to rebuff disagreeable language with an article or text (newspaper style, a day later) explaining why you disagree with it (Many such online orginzations simply put up “articles” that call for people to wholeheartedly accept their point of view and as such are devoid of explination (or even linkage to such explination!)).

To my mind, the EFF is to the Government what I am to your site similar. So as “Joe tradesman” it baffles me when those “defending technology” don’t use it in the manner they themselves endorse, for active dialogue. Rather they chose to revert to the old forms of politics (to which they are opposed) that are either pseudo-lobbiest, or simple opposition and poltical-base building. (To be fair the EFF does at least do Legal briefs, but the internet is supposed to be their bread and butter!)

(This dissonance is my source and motivation for examining the conflicting philosophies and seeking resolution of those conflicts that continue unaddressed despite the technology itself.)

So there-in is my critique of modern activists, and I do not intend this as any sort of personal attack, as I said earlier you are one of the few willing to engage in meaningful dialogue even as it puts great strain on yourself.

So I apologize if this has taxed your patience, bur rest assured that I do gain a great amount of value out of our interactions; however, it seems that the reciprical may not be true and for that I am sorry.

I would like to see your work and podcast contine.

I apologize for not addressing what was clearly the more important question to you.

I don’t really have a good answers as to why people get defensive of the things for which they have affection. Perhaps it is the urge to simplify arguments by trying to frame them in stark, polar terms. It takes time and cognitive cycles to contemplate, engage with, and respond to more nuanced approaches, such as the questions you routinely ask. I hope you understand that I side with you that these issues are almost always complex. As your reaction clearly indicates, you oppose the bill (I didn’t mean to imply otherwise) but have good questions about how we are reacting to it and trying to address the questions and criticisms raised (I *tried* to give you credit for the quality of your question.) That is an admittedly complex view that perhaps runs afoul of the mental shortcut I am trying to describe. Perhaps resources on cognitive science and psychology may be more helpful here.

As far why hackers in particular are fond of EFF, I think there are some pretty simple explanations. In the historical vein, Bruce Sterling’s Hacker Crackdown offers ample evidence. For more contemporary reasons, the fact that they specifically focus on issues near and dear to hackers is clearly part of it. There is also their firsthand participation in hacker events, fund raising at events like Defcon, Shmoocon, etc.

I clearly need to update the intro to my podcast and the language on the web site. I am more than a citizen these days, working as I do now in public policy after years of volunteering and as an individual, online activist.

By way of explaining my defense of EFF and how they operate, I am not shy about the fact I am a long time sustaining donor. Working for a nonprofit, now, collaborating with other nonprofits, I am accruing experience on how each such organization choses to prioritize and utilize its limited, limited resources.

However you so quckly and unequvically jump to the conclusion that I am a supporter of the legislation. I am not, and I have never made any such claim.

I am not sure where you got that fact from other then perhaps to guess that very act of me questioning the methods of an orginization and group that you support somehow makes me a party to those you oppose. What conclusions am I supposed to draw here?

I think you, as other activists in the online world, are deeply confused by me and my position in American Life and politics. I am just a citizen who is naturally skeptical of ALL poltical players, and I don’t want to go down that road as to who is in fact the more correct poltically.

With that said I’m not sure how to respond to you as you have assumed that I am a supporter of the bill, and thus apparently the rest of my concerns (mostly the philosphical ones) need not be addressed.

I sense that I might be on your last nerves and if I am I wish that you would let me know, so that I can reassess my own engagement with you.

You voice a poltical interest and I am simply a citizen doing my due dilligence. Now as I have asked you before, if you don’t want me questioning or bothering you, then all you have to do is tell me and I will leave you be.

I hate to be so frank, but do you grasp where I am coming from?

The challenge to the reasonable request you are making is timing. The bill could go to a floor vote as early as next week. There isn’t a lot of time to pressure its sponsors to hear amendments, an avenue that was in fact explored but ultimately failed with SOPA and PIPA.

I do share your concerns that too often putting out very general calls for opposing new legislation invites eventual skepticism from the wider audience of online users to which these appeals are targeted. That doesn’t mean that there are not valid problems with CISPA.

I would suggest that in addition to asking good, critical questions about how EFF is acting to oppose a problematic bill, you also pose your thoughts as a more general question: if the outcome is so valid (which is highly debatable for CISPA) then why don’t the sponsors allow more time for debate, relying on the strength of their arguments rather than a rush to enact a problematic bill?

The willingness to compromise you ask for requires time and opportunity provided by the sponsors to be seen as worth pursuing by hackers and other concerned netizens. EFF is not in a position to directly propose amendments, either. Doing so usually requires an ally within Congress, something we are lacking as those that opposed SOPA and PIPA and worked to make room for debate and deliberation have been convinced by the vague threats and poor reasoning around security risks motivating this bill. (Bruce Schneier’s books and blog are excellent, accessible resources on how we make poor decisions when it comes to risk.)

If you are not already, I suggest you read Mike Masnick’s coverage of the questions around CISPA as being a bit more thoughtful. In his most recent post, he does give credit to the sponsors for considering amendments but correctly points out that they are not receptive to those suggested by the public, only technology companies.

You know I push for details whenever their is seemingly overt political positioning, and in a way this is also an outsiders view of the hacktivist community, that you can take as an honest opinon, or you may reject outright the choice is yours and of no concequence to me.

In a democracy, commenting and improving legislation is a must, and to this end I think the hacktivst community/ EFF have outright opposed one too many items to such a degree that I now question whether the EFF or the hacker community even understands or grasps the concept of democratic compromise.

I am reading that many people oppose the bill due to its “broad language”. Which that is fine, however, it is a bit duplicitious to oppose a bill that has “too broad language.”

After all, if a bill’s language is “too broad” then why not an offer more narrow language? Where’s the compromise? Where’s the willingness to acknowledge that that bill was crafted for a reason, and that reason is a valid one? (or as I suspect this is a broader unaddressed philosophical divde, despite my own limited efforts)

Unfortunately, this does not seem to be the EFF’s idea, regardless of the finer points of contention they simply want to oppose the bill, and crowdsource their own opposition.

At what point will the EFF and by extension the hacker community come to the realization that, if they want to contribute to the laws of the larger society, then, they must engage with issues that they have traditionally opposed outright?

Hacktivists love to point to the mess of the legislature yet they also, like many other poltical groups in this day and age, fail to soften their own poltical hard-line (us vs them) approch.

I’ve have tried my best (and suffered the consequences (social beratings/ snarkings/ bannings etc)) to makes these realities known to those in said communites, yet as is apparent by the unwillingness of such groups like the EFF to either offer alternatives or to speak to compromise I think that we are about to go through another one of these round-about vapid politicking, and dialogue will fail to open yet agian.

Really, who cares who “wins” either way the community has lost an opportunity to make a reasonable and lasting contribution through actual engagement with the language of that issue.

Then again god-forbid anyone one the internet for disagreeing with the EFF.

OK, I’m ready for the snark filled diatribes against my person for, “not getting it.” In the end it doesn’t matter, I’ve had my say and I can only hope that I won’t get banned or blocked for mentioning here.

For all of the music except the track I use for the Inner Chapters, I created it from royalty free loops and include it in the license for each episode. There is a production page on this site with more details. The production page also has the artist and track name for the Inner Chapters’ music and while at one time it was available under a by-sa music sharing license, the artist has since changed the license. I sought and received explicit permission from the artist to use the track for this purpose so I cannot say it is available under a general license any more.

Thanks for clarifying. Thankfully I chose mostly to use the behavior to which the saying relates, just was curious about the origins of the phrase as it was not obvious. Good to know and helps make better sense of how the saying came into more common usage.

The important quality for whether something can be copyrighted or not is whether it’s a creative work. It’s the person who did the creative work that holds the copyright. In the case of Electric Sheep or Wikipedia, there are a huge number of copyright holders, all of whom have agreed to license their work in a specific way:

‘By clicking the “Save Page” button, you agree to the Terms of Use, and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license.’

As for Wolfram Alpha, who is doing the creative work? The people who made the database, or the user who’s entering unique input and getting a unique output?

You can’t copyright information, only creative work. Regardless of what they claim, using Wolfram Alpha’s data for other purposes is still 100% legal. All they can copyright is the creative *presentation* of that data on the page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural

This may be complicated by Terms of Use, though. I don’t know if violating a user agreement is illegal, though. Not sure how that contract law aspect of things works.

The point relating to “increaseing citizen engagement” seems oddly moot. If anything the internet as a whole has increased civic engagement, albiet poltical civic engagement, to a massive and unrelenting degree.

This is generally the space I find myself trying to write in my own work. The problem isn’t the “engagement”, it is the fact that the very act of “engagement” itself does not entail agreement wether on local or national issues. I think our engagements speak to this dynamic, now imagine such engagements with a strict transparent procedure and multipule parties. Given the trouble we seem to have in communicating I can’t imagine what it would be like for a society inside oa similar system.

The gist of it being that “social” technology (i.e. multi-user webspace instead of peer-to-peer connection, like a phone or telegraph) hasn’t been around that long, and there isn’t so much hacking to be done as there is tweaking of social expectations. Which frankly given the rapid accendency of modern computation is simply going to take time…

just my 2 cents…

P.S (COPYFIGHT LOL)

The problem with these in general is that there is an incremental drain in the form of digging into LVM/RAID/etc. and virtualization. The tools for both are getting easier but it is still a non-zero cost. It also requires forethought, like my simpler take of having a backup/restore plan.

More specifically, though, I’d be incredibly hesitant to virtualize my critical path system since the key piece is my audio toolchain. It was hard enough to sort out the drivers, modules and configs on a bare metal OS. I have *no* idea how any of this would translate, if at all, to a VM. Worse, even with a kernel compartment approach, I fear that the effect would be on the latency of my tool chain. There is more than just the processor involved here.

For folks not doing media production or something else so hardware dependent, I think your suggestions are excellent assuming the hardware resources sufficient to the task of running a VM at good enough speed.

Personally I think you should have returned your defective unit immediately.

I love my Archos 43 for streaming media over my LAN which it does very well. My only complaint is that Archos charges you extra for the Cinema: MPEG-2 media and AC3 sound plug-ins. It does surf the net reasonably well but I do have to wear reading glasses to read some things.

While this is definitely not an Ipod, it does things the Ipod can’t even dream of doing and has one tremendous bonus – NO iTunes

I love my Archos 43 that I just bought a second new one on eBay for 1/2 what I paid a year ago for the original. While the battery is great, I always want to have one fully charged as I use mine every day.

Good luck

I know you were focused on geek fatigue in this episode, but you did focus a lot on system upgrades. It seems to me that there is an 800 lb elephant in the room that you forgot to mention: virtualization.

In brief, virtualization allows you to run one operating system inside another, giving it access to some subset of the overall shared hardware on a single machine. I run Virtual PC “way back when” on my G4 & G5 macs and today I run Virtual Box, VM Ware, and Parallels Desktop on my Core i7 based Mac.

Many of the geek fatigue issues resulting from system upgrades with Linux could be contained and their effects on your critical path could be eliminated if you utilized some method of virtualization. Simply put, if you virtualize your critical path system, you could make an exact copy of it, and run it at the same time as you are running your operational system. On one copy you could keep performing your critical path work (podcasting, paying bills, playing angry birds, etc). On the other, you could begin down the path of upgrading various parts of your Linux OS, all the while taking notes. Then you could stop at any point you started to feel fatigue and set that virtual machine (VM) aside.

Should you wreck the viability of a VM you could simply trash it and re-clone your operational VM. This would save you quite a bunch of time trying to get the trashed system operational again and thereby alleviate the source of some major geek fatigue.

I understand that newer hardware virtualizes better than older hardware, but if I remember correctly, you have a dual G5 system. I expect you should be able to dedicate one entire processor to your operational VM while sharing the other with the host operating system and your experimental VM.

This would work even better for someone running one of the newer Core i3, i5, or i7 processors. These machines can deliver 2, 4, or 8 very capable real or virtual processor cores for not a lot of money. Over a year ago I helped spec out a new desktop machine for a customer. We paid extra for a hefty graphics card. The systems had 8 GB of RAM, 500 GB HDD, and a 2.4 GHz Core i7 processor with 4 physical and 8 virtual CPU cores. The total cost of each machine was around $1300.

A quick look at the Dell Small Business website (the cheapest way to buy a Dell) shows an i7 equipped machine available for only $750.

I understand some people don’t have the resources for newer machines like these, but even an older Core 2 Duo, dual core CPU machine should provide sufficient power to make virtualization a real option for people with even older hardware.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on how virtualization might help to constrain or even eliminate some geek fatigue.

Sincerely,
Paul Fischer
Host, The Balticon Podcast

Did you enable raw1394 in the Ubuntu Studio control center? Are you in the audio and any other appropriate groups to access the raw 1394 device? Did you logout and back in for any group changes to take effect?

Error (configrom.cpp)[ 150] initialize: Could not parse config rom of node 0 on port 0

Not sure what it means. I know the mixer runs on firmware version 2.0, but I’m not sure if those things are related.

Could be a version problem, after all I most likely checked out a different version of ffado than you did. Mine says: 2.999.0-2073M

Any idea how I might fix this? Thanks a lot in advance.

cu
Roman