Accept no substitutes

Author: Paul (Page 27 of 146)

DJ Spooky – artifacts, pics, vids, audios, etc

There are more than a few artifacts of Paul Miller’s aka DJ Spooky’s visit to Chapel Hill and Duke:

350 Years Later – No One Dare Name It

Best American Erotic Poems: 1800 – Present is out (as it should be) just in time for Valentine’s Day. One poem, a translation of a 14th Century Welsh poem, is mentioned by Gwyn Williams in his 1953 “An Introduction to Welsh Poetry: From the Beginnings to the 16th Century” thusly:

If some of the poems attributed to Dafydd [ap Gwilym] in the manuscripts are really his, then his expression of erotic experience went far beyond our present limits of printability. I find no difficulty in believing him capable of indecency, though the style of some of these poems seems to indicate 15th century composition,for the re is nothing very nasty about them, only a bolder extension of the happy paganism we see in Dafydd’s indubitable work, an extension within the limit of taste of that age, and unhappily, beyond the limit of ours. It is the task of scholarship unhampered by nonconformist prejudice to estimate the authenticity of these poems whilst we hope for the advent of a cleaner social conscience to allow them to be made available to the general reader.

And so 350 years or so after Dafydd’s poem was set in ink, we see that it cannot be named in a book review as Marcy Smith writes in today’s News and Observer Book Pages (thanks Marcy BTW):

[An interlude for the under-18-year-olds reading this column: Hey, isn’t that your cell phone ringing?]

Find more perilous pleasures in “The Best American Erotic Poems from 1800 to the Present” edited by David Lehman (Scribner, 336 pages). Erotic love letters abound, from Walt Whitman’s exuberant “I Sing the Body Electric” to Emily Dickinson’s “Wild Nights! Wild Nights!” up to “Letter to My Love” by the youthful Heather Christle. In between you’ll find a love note by Chapel Hill’s own Paul Jones: “To [Mr. Happy]” — do read it, but note that you may have trouble meeting his eye at a cocktail party afterward.

[OK, you can call the kids back.]

Year of the Earth Mouse

Lobsang Wangyal
Just somehow got a minimally addressed package from Tibetan (in exile) Lobsang Wangyal. It was addressed to my University address but ended up in my home carport. There is something charmed there for sure. Adding to the charm is that the package arrived on the Tibetan New Year aka Losar.

Inside the package were stickers advertising the Tibetan Olympics to be held May 15 – 25, 2008 in Dharmasala, India and two wonderful 13 month calendars for 2008 and the Year of the Earth Mouse filled with photographs by Lobsang and marked with important dates.

Thanks for the gifts and for making sure I recall, and recall fondly, my own trip to Dharmasala, Lobsang.

DJ Spooky love in NandO blogs, DTH interview etc

Spooky with Penguins
DJ Spooky, seen above with penguins, will be here at UNC on Friday afternoon and at Duke on Saturday night. David Menconi of the News and Observer treats us to some current and vintage Spooky links and interviews at his blog here. I did a little interview with Kevin Turner of the Daily Tar Heel this morning that will run on Friday. More press as it happens.

Remember the UNC event, DJ Spooky on Rhythm Science, is FREE on Friday February 8 at 3 pm in the Great Hall of the Student Union. Facebook event here.

TODAY at 3 – Cliff Missen of Widernet.org

Cliff Missen
Who: Cliff Missen
What: eGranary: bringing the Net to places wires and wireless won’t reach
When: Monday, February 4, 3:00pm – 5:00pm
Where: Pleasants Family Room, Wilson Library, UNC – Chapel Hill
Facebook event:
Hosts: ibiblio and INTRAHealth

THE WIDERNET PROJECT

Launched in 2000, the WiderNet Project, a service program based at the University of Iowa School of Library and Information Science, is improving digital communications in developing countries.

The project trains computer technicians and coaches decision-makers at universities in the developing world, providing on-site hands-on training, cutting-edge research on information technology issues facing the developing world, and donating new and refurbished computer equipment to partner universities. Over 3,600 technicians, decision makers, and librarians have been through our training programs across Africa.

The WiderNet Project also provides millions of digital educational resources to those without adequate Internet connectivity via the innovative eGranary Digital Library.

More information about the project can be found here

Weekend Roundup: Poetry, Blogs, Hawthorne, Homelessness

ibiblio links show up in the darnest places. This weekend in the Salem (Mass) Gazette and the associated site, Wicked Local. In an article, “Recalling Smith and Walker” author and preservationist John Goff points us to the Nathaniel Hawthorne story, set in Salem, “Grandfather’s Chair: A History for Youth” Yes the story is on ibiblio in the Eldritch (yes Eric Eldred’s Eldrich Press as in the Supreme Court case) site.

Jeffery Beam and Josh Hockensmith began what will be an irregular reading series in Chatham County at Josh’s house this Saturday. It’s always a pleasure to hear Jeffery, who began his presentation by singing a Neil Young song and then took us back into time to some of the first of his published poems some I heard almost 30 years ago. Josh’s poems were varied in style including his personal poetic movement Velocityism and poems as questions (influenced nicely by Pablo Neruda’s Book of Questions).

Sally explained Orange County’s 10 Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness at our church this morning. She of course emphasized the humanity of the project, but also presented evidence of considerable economic benefits resulting from the plan.

Met with the BlogTogether brain trust to talk about the possible follow ups to the Science Blogging Conference. The conference was much loved despite the light dust of snow in the afternoon. Yes we have other ideas in the cooker.

Local CEOs who blog
made the News and Observer today. Included in the sample entries are iContact’s Ryan Allis and CED’s Monica Doss. Monica has a great story of sharing the wonderful It’s Carrboro video with Richard Florida.

Florida’s reaction according to Doss: He was — to put it mildly — awestruck: “In a word it is amazing. It is exactly the message our communities need to send, not to just to each other but to the world.”

The opposite of Happiness Studies

My ex-hometown, long exed, made the Forbes list. The list of most miserable places to live. Why? Fast growth coupled with fast unemployment and accelerating violent crime:

The biggest surprise on our list is Charlotte, N.C., which is ranked ninth. Charlotte has undergone tremendous economic growth the past decade, while the population has soared 32%. But the current picture isn’t as bright. Employment growth has not kept up with population growth, meaning unemployment rates are up more than 50% compared with 10 years ago. Charlotte scored in the bottom half of all six categories we examined. It scored the worst on violent crime, ranking 140th.

Places more miserable than Charlotte: Detriot, MI, Stockton, CA, Flint, MI, NYC and LA. All with high violent crime and high unemployment.

PJ on P2P on CBC

Search Engine logo
Just back from the WUNC studios where I taped an interview with Jesse Brown and Andrew Parker of Canadian Broadcasting Radio One’s Search Engine show

The talk was about HR4137 aka the College Opportunity and Accessibility Act, p2p sharing on campuses and the recent revelations that the numbers used by the MPAA to argue their case about campus file sharing is off by at least 300%! And BTW the data and methodology for their study are *still* not open for review.

Want legal file sharing of legal materials? Visit ibiblio’s bittorrent site and get, among other things, the Congressional Record.

Data Privacy in Transatlantic Prespective

live blog/twitter

Today: Data Privacy in Transatlantic Prespective for Data Privacy Day 08

at Duke Law for data privacy confab. Bout half Europeans. US privacy is about limiting gubernint

duke net lets you see all the mac addresses for all duke guests in the room. So much for privacy at the privacy confab

Howard Beales formerly FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection talks about unencrypted wireless while I am handed MAC addresses by Dukenet

in Europe this is Data Protection Day; in US this is Data Privacy Day – why? Stefano Rodotà explains

citing European Dream http://tinyurl.com/2zf2zs ” How Europe’s Vision of the Future Is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream”

Europeans are not drunk on the free market; American privacy law is mostly against the gubermint but changing.

European approach seen, by them, as human rights agenda

COuncil of Europe’s Internet Bill of Rights

next up Peter Hustinx, European Data Protection Supervisor of the European Union

1/28/81??? was european data protect acts. US didn’t sign

Again the Human Rights perspective in Europe is emphasised.

3 deficitcies in original. def of privacy is unclear. again only against gubermint/public interference. negative approach rather than struct

Euro Charter of Fundamental Rights – Privacy and Data Protection are separate but closely related

about independent agencies — outside of gubermint but in Italy directly elected. how to avoid over politicalization of such agencies?

Kathryn Ratte, Attorney, US Federal Trade Commission on Notice and Consent policy. means you get to read the unreadable

on unfair practices. the key is injury. injury that cannot be easily avoided

behaviorable advertising == tracking you online so’s you can get targeted adverts. FTC wants industry self-regulation by disclosure

Annie Anton of NCSU’s Privacy Place. Can software extract policies and put them to effect

2002 survey instrument to find what people say they want in privacy and that was actually in policies

guess what they didn’t align

annie’s hang out and publications to which she is refering http://theprivacyplace.org/

Anton does have great war stories about trying to get access to policies on privacy issues. Europeans are harder to read tho

Fred Cate, Director of the Center for Applied Cybersecurity Research next

Cate notices that how people *say* they care about privacy has almost no effect on their behavior!

people all ignore consent and notice. hippa for example. want surgery? you sign

notice and choice is intellectually dishonest says Cate

what is your choice once you have notice?

Peter Swire: opt-out vs opt-in for third party uses doesn’t work. there are instead 5 categories. Fulfillment. Internal operations. Anti-fraud. Public priority. Marketing (most controversial). looking for substantive rules rather than millions of contracts.

??s P3P policy enacted anywhere asks Andrew Chin of UNC Law. Anton answers: no one have accepted and implemented really. insight: companies have no reason to implement P3P unless they are required to do so.

Cate picks up on browser protection. and ignoring the customized security settings. bad security interfaces means bad compliances. everyone keeps the default. under Vista,IE comes with a higher security setting.

Anton: says that P3P policy interpretation is non-consistent. (as well as inconsistent)

from the audience. p3p was good only for cookies and stopped there. flash cookies are immune for example.

Mike Hubble of Womble Carlyle. What are actual data protections in practice? (part of the issue here is that policy and compliance are nowhere well reviewed).

Swire sees this as can you buy insurance for your data protection.

Giovanni Buttarelli says europeans work on that and let businesses be responsible for implementing

Cate says that audits and standards in advance and liability afters. Focus on end results. Not PR and policy.

Kathryn Ratte says FTC looks at security that way

audience: like swire’s 5 approaches. but how to implement that? and who? FTC? public sector? tell us more about how it might work? (Swedish guy asking)

Swire: commercial data is overseen by FTC, a independent agency in all respects, so they should and do have authority except banks. they do have medical. now about public sector: swire says see his writing. senate has something in place but the executive branch has provided no budget or appointments.

anti-fraud is protected. as is all except marketing which does have some regulations.

Swire: practices in US and in Europe are similar regardless of policy and law.

more from audience on marketing. who wants it? recommender systems like netflix, amazon etc.

Buttarelli on new telephone books. 27 million Italians were asked it they wanted their mail, sms, email and phone should be listed. 5 million answered the inquiry. most agreed to have it all listed.

Cate differentiates between disclosure vs poorly targeted adverts (like spam). He loves his personal preferences at eBay, amazon etc

Swire doesn’t want heavily personalized info just out there because the info can be had by say local law enforcement.

Anton on Catalog choice by mail. She unsubscribed to many but not Anne Taylor (thanks for sharing ;->).

audience: she reads all notices. like opting IN rather than OUT. likes the 5 categories. but says that notice and consent has not gotten a fair shake. success of do not call as an example.

anton: clicking as opt in sux

cate: no one reads notices. response rate for opting in and opting out is tiny and identical. basically always fails. default will always be the rule.

audience (anton student): Cate said transparency is better than notice. but transparent to who? how to make that via software? Cate says it’s law not software that will work here. when you roll out the system, you need to be clear on collection, storage, third party etc. one problem in the notice world is that having the FTC use your notice against you creates overprotection and opacity. more on transparency.

Weekend Roundup

Brian reports that there is an ongoing discussion on Open Science in regards to the proposed UNC Innovation Center at Orange Politics.

Bora sends good reads on Science Blogging. One that should be included for sure is the Open Laboratory 2007 – The best of science writing on blogs.

Tola reports that his company Sonecast has permission to do a “sonecast” of the upcoming DJ Spooky performance. Sample “sonecast” site here.

Sally reports briefly on our preview of the documentary on writer Elizabeth Spencer and on an upcoming showing of “Durham: a Self-portrait.” Both by Steve Channing.

I recommend a stop by Tyndall Galleries to see the Wayne Trapp and Mary-Ann Prack show. It particularly delightful to see a lot of Prack’s sculptures together in one place.

Bob’s revelation

At the North Carolina Technology Association, Bob Young, the speaker and old friend, tricked us a shift from talking about his tech companies, Red Hat and Lulu, to his Canadian Football team, the Hamilton Tiger Cats. It may shock you to know that running a football team, Canadian or American, is quite different from running a tech company. Okay, you realized that. But how is it different?

According to Bob, tech is largely undefined and changing. What was a wise choice yesterday isn’t such a winner today. Every day there is a new set of rules. This is an area where originality rather than mastery is the more important. The facile original will take the day so you need to be careful to build a team of folks that are young and original or at least act young and are original to be a success. Independence in act and in thought is highly valued.

But in football, at least in Canadian as described by Bob, the rules haven’t changed in over 100 years. The plays are well known and tried and true. And they are not likely to change very much. In this case there is little room for originality. You need to be able instead to execute with the least possible flaws. Mastery is far more important than originality.

I wonder if this is only part of the insight that can be had into the two cultures. A broader vision might be like Jane Jacobs‘ two Moral Syndromes — Guardian and Commercial — in Systems of Survival.

Note the terms, mastery and originality, are from Roger Martin’s Opposable Mind and not directly from Bob’s talk.

Carrboro’s Best Eateries Threatened

Yikes! The Carrboro Taco Trucks received letters saying that they were in zoning violation and would be charged $250 just to appeal, says Carrboro Citizen.

But the Trucks do have their defenders including Mayor Mark Chilton, Alderman Jacquie Gist and long time Carrboro businessman Cliff Collins.

[…]

Board of Aldermen member Jacquie Gist said she was unhappy to see the action taken on the basis of an anonymous complaint, saying it makes it hard to understand why the complaint was filed and what its motivation was.

“I am very worried by the real possibility that hard working entrepreneurs who are adding to our community could be put out of business and have their livelihood threatened. It is un-American and certainly un-Carrboro. If Carrboro can not offer a welcoming home to immigrants trying to achieve the American Dream then maybe I don’t know Carrboro as well as I think I do,” she wrote in an email response to The Citizen, adding that she had confidence that the town would find a workable solution.

Cliff Collins, owner of Cliff’s Meat Market, said he would likely file an appeal if necessary to keep the trucks in operation.

“I guess I understand both sides,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt anybody’s business. But I really think these trucks are an asset to our downtown.”

Collins said the trucks operate mainly at night and stay open later than most food establishments, adding to the vitality of the nightlife.

[…]

Also at Orange Politics here.

BBC legal snips hit MySpace; The Doctor glimpsed somewhat

First, Torchwood became available from Netflix today, but as you might guess “very long wait” is the message in my queue. And the Doctor, we get him like Torchwood a year after airing. This is what caused the American Revolution. Last time the Brits sold us stale, year old, overpriced, overtaxed tea. My ancestors in Edenton were the first to protest followed by a less gentile response up in Boston.

But there is hope even if that hope comes in snips (at the moment I’m promised).

From a friend:

Tomorrow morning we are officially announcing that MySpace has inked its first global network deal-a worldwide content partnership with the BBC.

Under the partnership, the best BBC video content will be made available online globally via MySpaceTV. MySpace users will be able to visit and subscribe to the BBC Worldwide’s MySpaceTV video channel in order to view, embed and virally share BBC content across the MySpace community.

Now the press release:

BBC WORLDWIDE SIGNS WORLD’S FIRST GLOBAL NETWORK DEAL WITH MYSPACETV

The Mighty Boosh, Robin Hood, Top Gear Comes to the Global Social Networking Platform

LONDON and LOS ANGELES—January 24, 2008—BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the BBC and MySpace, the world’s largest social networking platform, today announced the launch of a ground-breaking partnership to bring new and archived short form BBC content to MySpaceTV. The announcement marks the first global agreement of this type between MySpaceTV and a major broadcaster.

Under the partnership, the best BBC video content will be made available online globally via MySpaceTV, the social networking site’s popular new video platform. MySpace users will be able to visit and subscribe to the BBC Worldwide’s MySpaceTV video channel in order to view, embed and virally share BBC content across the MySpace community.

Under the deal, current and archived video content from BBC Worldwide programmes will be available on MySpaceTV including some classic moments in TV: Robbie Williams and Russell Crowe being interviewed by Parkinson, Jeremy Clarkson and his team on Top Gear and some breathtaking clips from David Attenborough’s natural history series. Also available will be some gripping moments from classic series such as Doctor Who, Robin Hood and Torchwood in addition to some hilarious sketches from The Catherine Tate show, Red Dwarf and The Mighty Boosh.

Simon Danker, Director, Digital Media, BBC Worldwide, said: “MySpace is recognised as the largest social networking site and this partnership continues our strategy of putting BBC content right at the heart of where audiences spend their time and watch video online. The breadth of content we bring to this deal means that MySpace users will easily be able to find a favourite clip to put on their profiles and share with their friends, whether that is a Top Gear stunt or something a bit different from The Mighty Boosh. With the global nature of the deal, this is a great opportunity to put the best shows from the BBC in front of new audiences.”

BBC Worldwide content will be immediately available across MySpaceTV’s 27 international territories and nearly 110 million global active users. Localized versions of MySpaceTV are available in seven different languages across the UK, Japan, Australia, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Mexico, Canada, Netherlands, New Zealand, Latin America, Switzerland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, and Austria.

The deal represents a further move by BBC Worldwide, the BBC’s commercial arm, to broaden the reach of its content to new channels and outlets, to engage with audiences around the world and to promote content which will be available on Kangaroo[1] in the UK and BBC Worldwide’s commercial media player internationally.

“Shows like Top Gear and Doctor Who are enormous hits whether you live near the white cliffs of Dover or in Dover, Delaware,” said Jeff Berman, EVP of Marketing and Content for MySpace. “This is MySpace TV’s first global network deal and it reflects a fast-approaching Internet future defined by co-operation between corporations and the portability of content across new and traditional networks.”

Today’s announcement comes on the heels of explosive video growth driven by dozens of industry content partnerships and user interface changes. MySpaceTV is an integrated component of the company’s worldwide community and content platform, continuing the evolution of the company’s video offering by aggregating the best elements of video and empowering MySpace users to view, create, and share videos in new ways throughout the community.

BBC content will be available to view from 24th January 2008. [actually you can see it now– pj]

Doctor Who: A Wound in Time

Add to My Profile | More Videos

Data Privacy in Transatlantic Perspective: Conflict or Cooperation?

Data Privacy Day
Monday January 28 at Duke Law. “Data Privacy in Transatlantic Perspective: Conflict or Cooperation?”, some very heavy hitters from both sides of the Atlantic get into European and American approaches and solutions in regards to data privacy.

Sponsored by:
Duke University Center for European Studies
Duke University School of Law
Center for International & Comparative Law

In today’s world, the right to privacy has come under immense pressure. Thanks to the terrific capabilities of modern technology, electronic data on our personal lives is gathered, stored, and shared on a scale that was unimaginable even a decade ago. The imperatives of national security have led governments across the world to call for more personal data to be collected directly by public authorities or to be siphoned from private corporations engaged in data processing for their own business purposes.

Notwithstanding these developments both European and American law is designed to safeguard privacy. To be sure, the law of privacy in the United States and Europe can differ dramatically. Yet both communities seek to protect their members from intrusive observation by others. Without such safeguards, individual autonomy and liberal democracy are unthinkable.

This day-long conference will bring together leading legal scholars, privacy professionals, and government officials from Europe and the United States to discuss the future of data privacy in light of these new realties. What are the differences in the legal safeguards for data privacy in the United States and Europe? How successful have the two systems been in mediating between legitimate demands for personal data and the right to privacy? What are the prospects for transatlantic cooperation on data privacy? And, ultimately, will the liberal commitment to privacy survive the radical technical and political transformations occurring in contemporary society?

Borscht Mexicalli

I had to admit my culinary crime against Russian food to Alex Tropsha when I ran into him at the Weave yesterday. I took borscht the famous beet and cabbage cream soup South of the Border with some good results. The sweetness of the beets, the heat of the serraño peppers, a slight tang of lime and some chorizo made for a lovely fuschia colored soup which I accented with blue corn tortilla chips. Yummmm.

I started with a “Mexican Beet and Cabbage soup” from Epicurious and subbed serraño for jalapeño. Added some Mexican chorizo (before and after the blending as some in my family like to taste a chunk or two of meat now and then even in soups). To keep with the winter vegetable feel, I also added a few carrots. Some borscht recipes call for parsnips, potatoes, and vinegar. I passed on all of that.

Can be served hot or cold. Or poured on the streets to prevent icing!

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