The netizen's duty as cybrarian

The netizen's civic duty is to contribute to the information stored on the Internet. Preferably with accurate, relevant, and generally high quality content.

In order to contribute information constructively, one needs to find the relevant online systems that will store this new information. That is, online systems that accept submissions from arbitrary users as part of its main data - the equivalent of "crowdsourced" systems.

Can we open source the whole economy? This book claims to show how!

Now that's a book I want to read:

Christian Siefkes.
From Exchange to Contributions: Generalizing Peer Production into the Physical World.

Takeouts from "Moon" - Duncan Jones 2009

"Moon" at IMDB

  • When faced with a situation of which we can predict the outcomes with any degree of certainty, we make a conscious choice to act in a certain way to attain the desired outcome, having assessed the effort needed for it. That is the fundamental act of will. Some outcomes do not require a lot of will power (i.e., energy furnished per unit time) while others do.
  • Rhythm in music represents our interpretation of the various natural cycles.

Takeouts from "The Man Who Hated Women" - Niels Arden Oplev 2009

"Män som hatar kvinnor" at IMDB.

  • Spoken languages have common root words that are pronounced differently. Shared words have been introduced at various times and places in human history. Tracing back the farthest will yield the first word that was uttered, the root of language.
  • There are two orthogonal views of reality: The one concerned with the present instant, where we try to build a comprehensive and consistent snapshot of the moment, with all its details.

Gravebook

People die. When netizens or their relatives die, it is natural to want to preserve their memory, just like we do in physical life. So far, I have mostly seen Facebook groups that are dedicated to the memory of the departed, usually created by a friend of theirs. This space allows for people who knew the deceased to stop by and leave a comment. But as the Internet gets older, and generations of netizens come and go, it will be necessary to build a better infrastructure for Web cemeteries.

The artist vs. the record label

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One of the sad facts of the music industry that, effectively, the record label has become the enemy of the artist.

The music industry has been functioning because the audience are willing to pay artists to play music for them. We want to hear good music. So the fundamental ingredient of the music industry is the artist, not the record label. The label is a management institution that exists to support the artist in reaching his audience, to free up the artist's time and mind to focus on the truly creative task.

Nature is not perfect

One sobering thought concerning our physical world is that despite its grandiose infinity, it is palpably not perfect. Nature, the active agent of the physical world, produces specimens that are not, with all their wonderful design, flawless. Rather, individual cells at all scales deteriorate and die. Humans are all born with defects and accumulate more during their lifetime. Clearly, one can imagine a state of affairs that is more agreeable although we are unable to come up with a consistent logical recipe for it.

Questions I'd like to ask music copyright holders

  1. If I own a physical copy of the album (BluRay, DVD, CD, tape, LP), does that entitle me to freely download or stream the same album?
  2. If I purchase or am entitled to a digital copy of the album, can I lend it to my friends? my wife? my daughter?
  3. Can I store my legal digital copy on a streaming server for me to enjoy anywhere I go?

Affirmative answers to these questions would open up new ways of distributing music content that no one seems to be contemplating today.

The Butlerian Jihad

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The real world works according to its own logic, which we understand at least in part. We program computers to simulate this logic that we observe.

As such, instead of interacting with the real world directly, we now interact with software that, supposedly, has a relation to reality.

What is the point of dealing with software as a intermediary between us and reality?

Openness versus privacy

Here are some questions I often wonder about concerning issues of online openness versus privacy:

  • As a netizen, do I have the right to retrieve my own information from any Web application where I deposited it?
  • Do I have the right to completely erase my own information from any Web application?
  • Can I receive proof that the totality of information referring to me is actually accessible to me?
  • Can I examine the physical tables of those Web applications to ensure that my information is not at risk?
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