war

The Late Sinner

Well itâ??s as close to zero hour as we can get and finally I am crossing things off my horrible ToDo list. My excuse for pushing things in front of me last term was The Thesis (a pretty decent excuse). This term all my chickens have come home to roost. Too much, the list is too long. I shall drown in the pit of desperation (a.k.a. teaching) next term.

And I have not prepared enough.

Since the Swedes are a bunch of pessimistic Lutherans â?? which means no matter how good you are, you are going to hell anyway. Anyway, these morose flock have a saying: Late shall the sinner awake.

Well let me admit it. I am awake! My procrastination has reached the end of its tether. Nothing left to do now except work.

Or maybe procrastinate some more. LP sent me an excellent link to Tasty Research on the effectiveness of self-imposed deadlines on procrastination which cites Ariely & Wertenbroch (2002 PDF) on the reason why people procrastinate:

Why do people procrastinate? This is an effect psychologists attribute to â??hyperbolic time discountingâ??: the immediate rewards are disproportionally more compelling than the greater delayed costs. In other words, Procrastination itself is the reward

Isnâ??t doing research on procrastination an oxymoron? Should I look it up or just blog about it?

Posted on by mklang

Guilty Pleasures

During the thesis process I noticed a change in myself. I had less time and patience for many things I previously enjoyed. One such thing was fiction. So naturally I promised myself that I would return to such pleasures once the thesis was put to rest. But I have become largely a restless soul and I am finding fiction difficult to cope with. But this Christmas break a major exception has occurred.

The book I am reading is one that I have been saving for some time. But now I am happily reading Shalimar the Clown by Salman Rushdie. I have been hooked on Rushdie ever since I read his book The Satanic Verses. I did not â??getâ?? the reason for the chaos it created at my first reading. But was hooked by his use of images, stories and language. Already in the beginning you are met with a man (Gibreel) falling through the air after an airplane explosion:

Gibreel, the tuneless soloist, had been cavorting in moonlight as he sang his impromptu gazal, swimming in air, butterfly-stroke, breast-stroke, bunching himself into a ball, spreadeagling himself against the almost-infinity of the almost-dawn, adopting heraldic postures, rampant, couchant, pitting levity against gravity.

The Verses were followed (in order of reading â?? not writing) by his brilliant Midnightâ??s Children and in Grimus where I came across one quote that has never left me: A man is sane only to the extent that he subscribes to a previously-agreed construction of reality.

In The Moorâ??s Last sigh (what a name!) another great quote was:

By embracing the inescapable, I lost my fear of it. Iâ??ll tell you a secret about fear: its an absolutist. With fear, its all or nothing. Either, like any bullying tyrant, it rules your life with a stupid blinding omnipotence, or else you overthrow it, and its power vanishes like a puff of smoke. And another secret: the revolution against fear, the engendering of that tawdry despots fall, has more or less nothing to do with â??courageâ??. It is driven by something much more straightforward: the simple need to get on with your life.

I donâ??t get around to reading as much fiction as I would like but when I do Rushdie is among my most favourite.  So this Christmas I am thoroughly enjoying reading Rushdie â?? its well worth the guilt I am building up by not doing real work.

Posted on by mklang

The Darfur Wall

The tragic situation in Darfur has cost the lives of 400 000 people. In an attempt to raise money and awareness the Darfur Foundation have created a striking demonstration and collection method. They have created The Darfur Wall. This is 400,000 dark numbers spread over 40 pages. Each number represents one of the 400,000 people who have been killed in the Darfur genocide.

Each visitor can pick a number and, by donating one dollar, the number is lit up.

The founders carry the administrative costs so, aside from the Paypal fee, the money is divided equally between the four organizations supported by this foundation, allocated specifically to Darfur relief efforts.

Since the wall went up in November:

Numbers lit: 12270 of 400000
Total amount donated: $12,542
Number of donations: 848
Average donation: $14.79
Percent lit: 3.07%
Pages fully lit: 0 of 40

Posted on by mklang

Technology AS resistance

For a long time the dominant player in the personal computer market has been Microsoft. This has created a de facto standard among users who have come to expect and tolerate certain technological standards (and flaws) from their computers. One of the results of this dominance, among computer users, is the usersâ?? ability to praise diversity in principle but expect conformity from their computers.

If we all use the same tools we will produce the same limited range of products. Naturally there is a great variation within these products but still it is a freedom with limitations. One example of this is our perception of learning â?? at many (most?) universities today, when we say the word lecture most students and teachers think powerpoint. Therefore education becomes bullet-point lists. (more on powerpoint/eductation here: Do you hand out your handouts?).

But there is a technological resistance. Not to Microsoft. But a resistance to the current software ownership models which make it impossible (legally and sometimes technically) for users to

Run their software for any purpose
Study and adapt software to their needs
Redistribute, so others can be helped by such adaptions
Release improvements to the benefit of all

These four points are collectively known as the Four Freedoms and form the fundamental philosophy of the Free Software Foundation. The FSF works to provide software that fulfills such conditions.

Now many users argue that they are not competent to make changes to their software and therefore do not see the purpose of caring about such goals. This is a shortsighted outlook. The Four Freedoms grant others the ability to make changes. As non-techies all we have to do is reap the rewards of their labour. But without the freedom for them to make changes â?? we would have no rewards to reap.

Examples of Free Software are too numerous to list. But here are a few: Gnu/Linux operating system (comes in many different versions for example Ubuntu), Firefox (an internet browser), Thunderbird (an email client), GIMP (picture editing tool), Open Office (Office package with all you need), WordPress (the software that drives this blog) and much, much moreâ?¦

The software is free (fulfills the four freedoms) and is available at no cost. This is technology AS resistance.

Posted on by mklang

Torrent BBC

The BBC must be seen as being among the avant garde of television today. Not too long ago they opened up their archives under licenses similar to Creative Commons licenses (Look at the Creative Archive License Group). In doing this they were ahead of their time.

Now they have decided to make â??hundredsâ?? of episodes of BBC programmes via bittorrent.

By doing this the BBC once again show that they â??getâ?? technology. While in Sweden the term file-sharing is becoming synonymous with illegal action the BBCâ??s deal with Azareus shows that they can recognize a superior distribution system when they see one.

The new deal means that users of the software will be able to download high-quality versions of BBC programmes, including Red Dwarf, Doctor Who and the League of Gentleman. Classic series such as Fawlty Towers will also be available through a BBC “channel”. BBC News

Naturally the BBC is not into giving away these top titles (you didnâ??t think it would be that good â?? did you?) No, the titles will be protected by digital rights management software to prevent the programmes being traded illegally on the internet.

The BBC might carry the nickname Auntie Beeb but all I can say is that I wish my Swedish public service relatives were as creative.

(via Boing Boing)

Posted on by mklang

The Sting, or why suckers happily pay

Much of the visible focus of the Free Software vs Proprietary Software discussion revolves around products such as the browser, or the operating system. But what really gets me depressed is the fact that my own faculty has chosen to use proprietary software (the Norwegian Fronter) as their course management system. The best thing is that none of the teachers are particularly happy with this choice. But I doubt that anyone is ever happy about software.

But the fact that we have chosen proprietary software which we cannot develop (even if we wanted to) increases the sense of: â??No, no please let us pay for the privilege of being unhappy with software we cannot improve.â??

UPDATE: The system our faculty uses is the Open Source system called Fronter. The fact is that we have the legal technical ability to make changes to the system. The faculty have contributed in the past (Thank you, Aleksander!). The lack of understanding about this among the teachers (me included) can only be seen as a lack of internal communication.

Just to make sure that I maintain that unhappy feeling â?? UCLA have decided to rub salt into my wound. The UCLA have decided to adopt the Moodle as their sole course management system. Moodle is licensed under the GNU General Public License and is under active development in collaboration by universities all over the world.

Moodle is a course management system (CMS) – a free, Open Source software package designed using sound pedagogical principles, to help educators create effective online learning communities. You can download and use it on any computer you have handy (including webhosts), yet it can scale from a single-teacher site to a 50,000-student University.

If my own department is too dumb to see the merits of this argument then what hope is there for Free Software? People seem to want to be part of the P. T. Barnum worldview “There’s a sucker born every minute…and two to take ’em.” But why do I have to work with the ones who want to be conned and pay happily for the privilege?

The misleading title of this post may suggest that I have an answer to this question beyond human stupidity. But I don’t – or maybe I am just tired and cranky?

Posted on by mklang

Snow!

Another trip to Stockholm. This time to meet with people from UR (utbildningsradion) public service. It was a good meeting and an interesting discussion on how public service television in Sweden can use Creative Commons licensing. After the meeting I had some time to kill so I walked around Stockholm and it started to snow. Finally! So far December has been dismally warm and wet so a little snow makes it feel more like Christmas, even if we will not get a white Christmas in Göteborg.

So now that I have seen snow I feel more disposed to the season – which is good considering I shall be buying the tree tomorrow… Everything else is already all in place (almost). Christmas in Sweden is pretty traditional: tree, presents and too much food. I am looking forward to it.

Posted on by mklang

Bad Vista

The Free Software Foundation has launched a new campaign called BadVista (www.badvista.org). The campaign has two gaols (1) to expose the harms inflicted on computer users by the new Microsoft Windows Vista and (2) to promote free software alternatives that respect users’ security and privacy rights.

The part about Vista which bugs me is that Microsoft is attempting to sell this as something new. But from the users point of view there is nothing really new here. Vista is actually all about control: firstly, Microsoft’s control over users and secondly, the support department’s control over the customers/clients/users. For the cost at which Microsoft is selling it you would think that Vista would flop. But if you believe that you have forgotten about Microsoft’s tradition of marketing by FUD (playing on the Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt of the users).

FSF program administrator John Sullivan writes: “Vista is an upsell masquerading as an upgrade. It is an overall regression when you look at the most important aspect of owning and using a computer: your control over what it does. Obviously MS Windows is already proprietary and very restrictive, and well worth rejecting. But the new ‘features’ in Vista are a Trojan Horse to smuggle in even more restrictions. We’ll be focusing attention on detailing how they work, how to resist them, and why people should care.”

I think that the BadVista campaign will provide interesting reading… for those of you who want to catch up on Vista and its problems here are some related Vista articles

FIN24, Windows Vista: Fact or Fiction, 15 December 2006

eWeek, Vista, why bother?, 14 December 2006

CRN Test Center – CRN, 25 Shortcomings Of Vista , 4 December 2006

Posted on by mklang

Internet as Democracy

Among the many misconceptions about internet communication is the democratizing effect.

This myth begins with the idea of the marketplace of ideas. This is fundamentally an idea that as long as ideas are allowed to freely compete the best idea will emerge. This is a myth since it does not explain why bad ideas and regimes gain in power. If we add to this the techno-optimism of the early internet (which is still sometimes present) which put forward ideas such as John Gilmoreâ??s famous quote: â??The Net treats censorship as a defect and routes around it.â?? Similar sentiments were reflected in Yochai Benklerâ??s new book â??The Wealth of Networksâ?? (download as pdf here).

These sentiments are overly optimistic and mythical since the reality is far less utopian. It is important to understand the difference between the Internet and the World Wide Web.

Stated simply the Internet is all the hardware and cables which connects the world of computers. The Internet is the necessary technology on which different applications can be run. The World Wide Web (WWW) is one such application which is run on the Internet. eMail is another. Filesharing is another etc. You can have file-sharing without the WWW but you cannot have any of the applications without the Internet.

Since the Internet is based on physical cables and physical equipment. Technical, social, economic and legal pressure can ensure that regulation (both good and bad) can be applied to the Internet. Thus we can see that Internet censorship is a growing phenomena. Among those studying and reporting on this phenomena are the Reporters without Borders and the Open Net Initiative.

What their work clearly shows is that by using a mix of hi-tech and low-tech states are ensuring that the Internet is not an automatic democratizing tool.

Posted on by mklang

Monbiot on Torture

If my conscience were to have a name, then among the choices [for such a name] would be Monbiot. The author George Monbiot regularly publishes articles in The Guardian but even better he often (always?) posts these articles on his blog after a short while.

In his latest post â??The Darkest Corner of the Mindâ?? Monbiot writes about the effects of an innovative form of torture. The use of total sensory deprivation, in many cases, causes what Monbiot calls a social lobotomy. He describes it as the erasing of the human mind.

This â??newâ?? form of torture is practiced widely in larger American prisons and has found new practitioners among the interrogators employed in the war (another malapropism!) on terrorism.

Its chilling reading â?? it should be required reading.

Posted on by mklang