Michael Geist
draws a contrast between 1997
and 2003 -- suggesting that Internet regulation, which used to
seem impossible, is proceeding apace.
In fact, a lot of changes in the Internet which previously seemed
impossible have come to pass or are coming to pass or might soon
come to pass if you're not careful.
I remember that, soon after I met Nick Moffitt, he made an allusion to the
Hunter S. Thompson line about "a high and beautiful wave". He predicted that
we would look back with some nostalgia and regret at that time (the years
immediately after 1997). Nick was talking about free software, not specifically
about free expression, but I still remember being concerned about the end of
that "high and beautiful wave". (If you've never read the passage,
do a Google
search.)
I'm still concerned.
I seem to be in
a song
about the DMCA. There are a lot of samples from a Free Dmitry protest, and I'm one of the samples!
My colleague Lee Tien is also sampled: "Between 1947 and 1975, the National
Security Agency intercepted every single overseas telegram...".
I was very startled, because I was told to listen to the song because Lee was in it, and then I heard
my own voice right at the end. I remember when I visited my father during the Free Dmitry campaign:
he told me later that he said goodbye to me, dropped me off at the airport, turned on NPR as he was
driving home, and heard me interviewed.
Martin Pool favorably reviews
a book by Eric Raymond called The Art of Unix Programming. I took a look,
and I think TAOUP is full of wonderful stuff. I would eagerly purchase a
copy if it came out in paper.
In general, it collects stuff that you have an intuition about after
working with Unix for a while, but might not have formalized anywhere.
And it's just plain fun and interesting (and doesn't claim that Unix got
everything right).
In other Martin news, I'm very pleased that
Martin
likes my code!
Here are two opposite sentiments which form an interesting pair:
Amicus Plato, magis amica veritas.
(This is given in several forms and attributed to several different people.
"Plato is [my] friend, but the truth is [my] better friend.")
Errare, mehercule, malo cum Platone quam cum istis vera sentire.
(This is definitely due to Cicero. "By Hercules [we might say 'by God'], I
would rather be wrong with Plato than be right [believe the truth] with
them..." Some translate: "I prefer to err with Plato...")
These two are
sometimes
contrasted, but I think not usually mentioned alongside one another.
The Illegal Art exhibit is really
great. I got to go with Aaron and Riana, and saw lots of people I knew,
and also attended part of the panel discussion.
The Illegal Art CD omits some works I might have included, but is
interesting; "Bittersweet Symphony" and "The Motorcade Sped On" were
my favorite tracks. The latter was moving to me even though Kennedy
died before I was born.
I also got the Illegal Art DVD, and got it autographed by Carrie
McLaren! (I gave her an autographed LNX-BBC in exchange.) I
haven't watched it yet, because I don't own a DVD player.
I'm going to go with my mom to the Illegal Art film exhibitions
later on this month. July is a whole month of illegal art for
those of us in the Bay Area, and my mom is coming to visit.
Apparently the City and County of San Francisco realizes what a bad idea
anticircumvention is. They posted this sign in many places around the
city:
![[NO 12:01A]](/images/no1201a.jpeg)
(Thanks to Cory for taking this
picture after I pointed this out to him.)
I received a note urging me to use the
robots.txt mechanism to prevent
Microsoft's search engine
from indexing my site. My response is that creating a search engine
is a virtuous and charitable thing, and an
ease to the people.
The impulse to decide which search engines are legitimate based on who
owns them seems to me less like an ordinary boycott and more like,
and closer to, a pattern of subdividing the net into small parts which
can't talk to each other. "A strange game -- the only way to win is not
to play."
Among those through whose hard-won precedent
We feel secure when we invent
Was Sony's lawyer, Dunlavey.
Timor mortis conturbat me.
Inside the park past which his streetcars run,
Since eighty-nine's quake basking in the sun,
A street sign honors Donald Chee:
Timor mortis conturbat me.
I took a vacation in Washington, D.C., which is incredibly hot and
humid. Sorry for the long gap in posts here; I'm back now.
[Main]
Contact: Seth David Schoen
