People

When I read and reviewed Who Controls the Internet?: Illusions of a Borderless World, the filtering and/or censorship of content by nations became more apparent - particularly China. in the post 'Internet filtering is growing by the minute around the World': conversation with Robert Faris of ONI Initiative, a discussion with Robert Faris, Research Fellow of Open Net Initiative (ONI), seems to indicate that the growth of filtration/censorship continues:

...Rob shared some interesting and intriguing outcomes of this research as well as some research ideas to pursue in future. He thinks that the outcomes of ONI research is showing that the filtering is growing by the minute around the World. There are more and more country that are filtering the Internet and the scope of what they filter is growing all the time. Trying to guess what the causes could be, he identified few that are seem to be common all across the research work. Example: to protect our children from harmful content, national security interest, social norms and trying to prevent highly offensive materials from being out there, preventing copyright infringement etc. But interestingly as the research shows, once you put up the infrastructure for filtering the Internet and not only the technical infrastructure but also the administrative, political and social infrastructure- it is very easy to add other things to the list... { Read more }

While I was out and about yesterday I saw yesterday's Trinidad Express - an article called 'Murder Rap' caught my eye since it mentioned YouTube... but, as I have come to expect of journalism in Trinidad and Tobago, it did not actually have a link to the video.

Heaven forbid there be a web reference.

This morning I decided to go look for it and... couldn't find it. It isn't that I didn't look hard. Maybe all the UWI videos were a little distracting - but I didn't find the video. I found the following video by searching for 'Murder Rap Trinidad':

And that video, or course, doesn't link to the original video...

What is interesting is that the video was found in the first place. As far as I know and can tell, the video doesn't exist: no one has provided a link to see the video itself. I'm not saying that I don't believe the media - but come on: quoting sources in modern times includes something called web links. Get into the new millenium.

What is also interesting is the outcry on this. There are a million and one songs being played in automobiles that say much the same thing - why is this one so special? Maybe it's the culture that is being exported through Web 2.0 that is being analyzed? { Read more }

When Richard Jobity pointed me at How I got a Windows Vista refund from HP, I was not only happy to see that Hewlett-Packard had refunded the person who did not want to accept the Windows Vista End User License Agreement (EULA), I was impressed with the fact that the fellow had gotten his money back. While I am known for supporting Free Software and Open Source, that isn't really what pleased me. What pleased me is that someone took the path least traveled. It also pleased me that he is running Drupal.

Here's the thing: When you get a laptop, either you accept Microsoft's EULA - or not. Most people don't bother with even trying to say 'no' when the EULA pops up on the screen, they simply click through and say yes. Why? It is simply the easier thing to do; you can accept the EULA or just toss Linux on the machine. What you can't reasonably do is choose not to accept the EULA and get a refund for the software on the laptop. One person got a refund from Hewlett Packard because of persistence. They stayed on top of it, they did not budge.

Question: If you sell a product that has a precondition of use in accepting the license of a software package, but you do not have other options available to users who choose not to accept the license, is this really a choice?

This is apparently what Hewlett-Packard, as well as other computer manufacturers do. Leave all the Free Software/Open Source stuff on the side: They sell a product that asks a user if they will accept a software license after the product is purchased. That doesn't seem fair, it doesn't seem right and it most certainly doesn't seem like they care about their customers as much as Microsoft's EULA. Granted, they may be shooting products out with a shotgun for the masses, but if you offer a choice it should be legitimate. { Read more }

After reading Web 2.0: A Strategy Guide: Business thinking and strategies behind successful Web 2.0 implementations, as well as reviewing the book, I've been considering a lot of things. Mix in a dash of Andy Oram's The Behavior Gap: Three Persistent Problems for Internet Technologies and my reaction. Squeeze some more efficiency for users in. Add an economy for users of Social Networks. Remember the Cluetrain Manifesto, and that 'markets are discussions'.

It seems to me that a large portion of what will be Web 3.0 will stand a lot of what caused success in Web 2.0 on it's head - inverting it so that the users gain some dominance. After all, without users, Web 2.0 would not exist - and while it is all well and good to make money while providing a service - the question is how much the users will tolerate. Just as there was a tipping point for success, there may well be a tipping point for failure. Alienate your community and you alienate your business base - keep your community happy and it will stay consistent and grow.

One of the problems with Web 2.0 has been, and continues to be, that it is focused on how very few people or legal entities make money providing services to many people. At some point, the majority of people who are interested in such things may well figure out that Web 2.0 is only about them as much as they allow themselves to be. Somewhere along the line, people may figure out that they are financial pink bunnies to the remote controlled social network - that they are only benefiting casually while others literally cash in on what the masses do. It is no different from traditional business in a sense; in this way social networking businesses are not too different from McDonalds. Lots of people eat at McDonalds (ask any dietician), but few people work there. Even fewer people gain the ability to improve their own positions through working at McDonalds.

It is a little reminiscent of Levitt & Dubner's observation in Freakonomics about crack dealers in the 1980s averaging $3.30 an hour. { Read more }

Between meetings, I ended up passing Gulf City in La Romain, Trinidad this morning - at 10:24 a.m. I decided to pull in for a late breakfast and early lunch.

I ordered 2 bacon and egg sandwiches on white - and when it came time to dressing them, I was given the options of things to put on them. I asked for lettuce, tomato, onion and green pepper.

'No green pepper'.
'What do you mean no green pepper? I'll pay extra to get them if I have to.'
'We can't put green peppers on this sandwich. It's the rules.'
'Well, that's a silly rule.'

At this point, an elderly gentleman on my right decided to instruct me in the rules and regulations of Subway, but I had no time for him and indicated as much to him with my hand (no, nothing rude) and continued the conversation a bit, noting that the gentleman ahead as well as the lady ahead of him were paying attention and showing some consensus on the Green Pepper Dilemma.

'You know, it really is a silly rule. I'll fill out one of those comment cards about the Green Pepper thing. As simple as it is, I just really want green peppers this morning and I find it depressing that I can't have them...'

And the lady behind the counter, having more customer service ability than the rules she is forced to work by, put a few slices of green pepper on my sandwiches. 'I wouldn't want you depressed this morning'. Bless her heart for being smarter than the rules.

That, you see, is customer service. And in the comment card, I put a 6 for customer service (on a scale of 1-5) and wrote that not allowing green peppers on breakfast sandwiches is downright silly.

Silly rule. Great customer service. Maybe some of that customer service will leak over to the rules at Subway. At least in South Trinidad, I can get real pork products - unlike Chaguanas areas, where pork is forbidden.

In my morning reading, I came across the term peerocy which appears to be new. Given the context in Viacom Versus Google: Coming of Age of the "Viderate" Generation, I immediately thought 'Fair Use':

And just what did Judge Stanton opine? While he declined Viacom's request for YouTube's proprietary code, he ordered Google to provide Viacom with userIDs and IP addresses (for unregistered users) as well as three terabytes of video, so that the latter might ascertain if copyrighted videos enjoy the brunt of YouTube's traffic. The Judge's perspective, particularly his viewing any privacy concerns as merely "speculative," has already been met with hostility. Here's the ruling in its entirety.

While the Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF) has spoken to the legal consequences of the opinion (agreeing with Google that the decision violates the Bork-driven Video Privacy Act of 1988), Rasiej adopts a broader view. Responding to whether or not there's a zero-sum relationship between piracy and privacy, Rasiej won't take the bait. "One person's piracy," he counters, "is another's 'peerocy'" (referring to any peer-to-peer sharing where value is believed to be inherent in the sharing).

As Rasiej sees it, "as the technological revolution continues to advance, we're witnessing a massive clash of norms and behaviors that have yet to be established. The value of information, then, is open to debate and may be worth more in an open network, than in a protected one. People are discovering new ways of creating value by sharing as opposed to holding information back." Noting pragmatically that owners do what they can to preserve their business model Rasiej argues for innovation not only of new models, paradigms, and opportunities, but also recognition of competitive necessities.

The newly coined 'peerocy', it seems, recognizes an inherent value in Fair Use - though it does so as a play on 'piracy', a commonly accepted slang for copyright infringement. Despite the root, the fact that someone has recognized the inherent value in sharing in coining such a word demonstrates that at least one person has a clue when it comes to these things. { Read more }

I ran across the phrase, 'Building a More Strategic, Collaborative And Sustainable Movement' in my email a few moments ago, and at first read came up with Building a More Strategic, Collaborative And Sustainable Bowel Movement.

And I wonder who comes up with these things. But let's strategically analyze the significance of the accidental metaphor for social interaction. After all, there is waste. Let us address the waste, which we will officially call Predictably Ostentatious Objects (POO) where objects transcend the tangible and include anything that is referenced as a noun. For example, a meme.

In the context of the Internet, POO comes along and clogs up blogs, aggregators and even email. It has been known to crossover to books, newspapers, magazines and even bathroom walls - and vice versa. POO, as they say, happens. So now we need to address a More Strategic, Collaborative and Sustainable Movement for handling POO - like peristalsis.

POO starts somewhere and gets spread around. Some people sniff it cautiously, others feel it for intellectual texture, still others roll it on their tongues, and still others step in it accidentally. However POO is handled, in a collective way the world digests it in it's many forms. Someone, somewhere, rolls the POO into a nice and neat bolus that begins rolling around. It gets around to just about everyone, even in passing - the spread of POO is more and more noteworthy as more marketers than content creators participate. We get new and improved POO, which is neither. We get more efficient POO. We even get more efficient POOing. But what we don't have is a direct method of dealing with this POO other than ignoring it. In many ways, POO is dealt with like that bad smell in the elevator:

"It smells really bad! Come smell!"

No, thank you. I believe you. I believe it smells bad. { Read more }

One thing that has bothered me for years in Trinidad and Tobago is the inability of people to remove their own garbage from the tables at fast food outlets. It simply amazes me on one hand, as the garbage cans [rubbish bins] are located strategically in most places where, on the way out, you can simply toss the garbage into a hungry receptacle.

Is it really that hard?

The message it sends is kind of interesting. Let's say you walk into a fast food outlet, get your food and wish to sit down. At the busiest times, this means that the tables in Trinidad and Tobago are either occupied or are full of someone else's rubbish. No one likes to sit at a dirty table, even the people who leave their garbage behind, but there it is. Where this attitude comes from, the root, is not clear. But walk into any fast food restaurant in Trinidad and Tobago, and there it is.

In reading the tables of rubbish, here's what I came up with: Trinbagonians simply don't care about how they leave something behind. They don't feel any responsibility for what they leave behind, they do not feel accountable for their actions and will happily leave it for someone else to deal with. Yet, when abroad, they do not maintain this culture. Odd.

The state of the country seems to bear me out.