Psyberspace

PETER MEYERS writes in the NYT, A Dispute Over Wireless Networks

Many Wi-Fi networks, intentionally or otherwise, allow passers-by to use the networks without any password. And there are tools that amplify the Wi-Fi radio signal, enabling it to be delivered over an even larger area, like a park.

Many broadband providers fear that every user of a free wireless network is one less paying customer. “Our goal is just to protect our customer base,” said Mr. Rosenblum, adding that Time Warner Cable currently had no plans to extend this enforcement campaign to other areas that it serves.

Maybe it is a fantasy and I just dont get the science, but I have a sense that companies are trying to bottle air and sell it, and stop anyone from breathing who does not pay up. Maybe there are some gadgets involved and some regulations required, but that is about it.

It is probably like music. Once there was a lot of cost in copying and distributing music. Now that is free but the old companies will not accept that. They want to make it scarce by technological and legal means. Now that is perverse use of tools (though probably familiar law.)

NoLogo Worthwhile site.
  
  
   
   

In a BBC News item Write here, right now Mark Ward writes, quoting Matt Jones:

The warchalks are intended to let people know about the open nodes that many people are happy for others to share.

Jones said he did not think there was much danger that it would be taken over by anyone malicious to post notice of corporate networks that are not doing enough to protect themselves.

“If someone is chalking it up they are doing something quite beneficial to the network operators by saying I have spotted this. Then they can decide to secure it or instigate a free wireless type scenario.”

This is an item that makes the whole thing easier to grasp if it is all a bit new – as it was for me. I’d love this – hope there are these hotspots wherever I go!

There is a problem with the lain item below, can’t edit it. Interesting stuff though – there is something very psyberspacy about it all. I want to explore it more. It is addressing the Matrix type stuff but perhaps in a more psychological way? I don’t get it yet. Is it written by Japanese? Is “psyche” a translation from the Japanese, or does it go back to the Greeks via the west?

Browsing this thoughtful, analytical site: zeligConf I found and liked this item from Aris Papathéodorou — Networks for technical/scientific knowledge exchange:

In concrete terms, this means that the productive cooperation practices, well tried in software, can and must be extended to other cognitive fields, and to other social subjects. Beyond the slogan, it is about inventing now social and material structures making possible an effective circulation of technical knowledge, of peculiar uses and practical innovations. It is about creating structures of public access to skills involved in a full use of the potentialities of free software and Internet, to give every user the possibility to access the “source code” of communication’s technosciences.

That this should be under threat, that it has become an issue to fight for is so sad. So much good will! So much knowledge and it is somehow being well repressed, almost without our realising it. We are creeping toward the world described in Richard Stallman’s short story: The Right to Read. (link to the Google cached version as I could not get to the GNU site’s version.)

I linked to this site ages ago too.

I did it, upgraded to Blogger Pro, I wanted to be able to make links to specific posts. Spell check etc. But now there is another damn learning curve – like how do I use the spell check?
Later: Ok, I can check the spelling! From the Blogger site, my old “Blog This!” does not show it – YET. Testing it now. Seems to work. I won’t be going on about it all, but one thing is really good, the small screen problem I had in Mozilla is fixed.
Still later… have been unable to publish (till now if this is through!).
Later… there were problems – promptly fixed by blogger – thanks Bill!

PC Magazine – WiFi explained
Broadband Block Party July 1, 2002 By Rob Flickenger (thanks Cory at BoingBoing)

Google alt.music.mp3 — This is the thread where streamer, p2p radio was announced. I have a sense of the importance of this sort of development and of people like this becoming heroes of a new era. That would be a victory for what is right.

Michelle Finley writes in Wired: Attention Editors: Deep Link Away

Hupp said deep linking is not illegal as long as it’s clear whom the linked page belongs to.

“Hyperlinking does not itself involve a violation of the Copyright Act,” Hupp said in his ruling. “There is no deception in what is happening. This is analogous to using a library’s card index to get reference to particular items, albeit faster and more efficiently.”

Website designer Laszlo Pataki cheers the judge’s decision but thinks that the case should have never gone to court.

“Why bring the lawyers in when there are simple technological fixes that could have solved the problem?” Pataki said. “For instance, Ticketmaster could have blocked all referrals from Tickets.com. That’s an easy thing to do, so I suspect that by taking the legal route TicketMaster wanted to either get publicity or squish Tickets.com.”

And here we are – in a deep link! I have deep linked into the print format of the item. And it seems right, feels right! There is no deception here, this is a story from Wired, click and it will take you to Wired. There are some issues here though.

• Identity and ownership
• Technological fixes

I hate that word “belongs to” in the quote above. I have just made a resolution to always do what I have done above, to add the authors name. Identity is important for both author and owner. WHO am I deep linking to? If that is obscured then it is plagerism. Law might say so but more than that, it is the ethos that counts. Ethos is more important than the law, because it must win out over bad laws. Ethos is free, laws belong to those who can pay lawyers.

Identity works the other way to. I link therefore I am. My links define me, I am not an island, I am a node in a larger net, and without the net “I” die. Weblogging has made that so clear. So do the best writers about the knowledge ecology, knowledge is a conversation, it always was.

Technological fixes; that scares me. Right there on the top of daypop today is an article by Robert X. Cringely, Bob writes:

This is NOT about making things better for the user. This is about removing the ability for the end user to make decisions about how his or her computer functions. It is an effort by Microsoft to take literal ownership of Internet technology, Microsoft’s “embrace and extend” strategy applied for the Nth time, though on a grander scale than we’ve ever seen before.

Technological “fixes” used by Palladium, and similar already being implemented by Microsoft in Windows Media Player “updates” (see Dittohead in BSDvault)

Maybe this is a case for stopping MS by law (what a joke), vigilance is needed and the ethos that we have a right to our personal space. It might initially be inconvenient, but not using Windows Media or Windows media player is an important start, a bit simpler than moving all the way to GNU/Linux, but a good step. Vigilance is not free, the price is effort, it means reading great efforts like TCPA / Palladium FAQ by Ross Anderson, who concludes:

No doubt Palladium will be bundled with new features so that the package as a whole appears to add value in the short term, but the long-term economic, social and legal implications require serious thought.