connecting*the*dots

Eastward (pg. 16)

[…]

Along the Leestown Road, near an old whitewashed springhouse made useless by a water-district pipeline, I stopped to eat lunch. Downstream from the spring where butter once got cooled, under peeling sycamores, the clear rill washed around clumps of new watercress. I pulled makings for a sandwich from my haversack: Muenster cheese, a collup of hard salami, sourdough bread, horseradish. I cut a sprig of watercress and laid on it, then ate slowly, letting the gurgle in the water and the gutteral trilling of red-winged blackbirds do the talking. A noisy, whizzing gnat that couldn’t decide whether to eat on my sandwich or ear joined me.

Had I gone looking for some particular place rather than any place, I’d never have found this spring under the sycamores. Since leaving home, I felt for the first time at rest. Sitting full in the moment, I practiced on the god-awful difficulty of just paying attention. It’s a contention of Heat Moon’s — believing as he does any traveler who misses the journey misses about all he’s going to get — that a man becomes his attentions. His observations and curiosity, they make and remake him.

Etymology: curious, related to cure, once meant “carefully observant.” Maybe a tonic of curiosity would counter my numbing sense that life inevitably creeps toward the absurd. Absurd, by the way, derives from a Latin word meaning “deaf, dulled.” Maybe the road could provide a therapy through the observation of the ordinary and obvious, a means whereby the outer eye open an inner one. STOP, LOOK, LISTEN, the old railroad crossing sign warned. Whitman calls it “the profound lesson of reception.”

New ways of seeing can disclose new things: the radio telescope revealed quasars and pulsars, and the scanning electron microscope showed the whiskers of the dust mite. But turn the question around: Do new things make for new ways of seeing?

John has topped himself with this shot. Check out the entire set.

I got into NYC late last night and just checked my news aggregator. What a great surprise. Best wishes to the Carroll family and a thank you to the men who ultimately decided to do the right thing and set her free.

Now, someone find them and hold them accountable for murdering Allan Enwiyah, Jill’s translator.

You gotta love the Aunt Jemima bottle as Ann. More can art over here.

Terry Heaton
Telcos buying legislation to screw you and me

[…]

Meanwhile, there’s a House hearing tomorrow on a new bill that gives the Telcos what they want and will alter the way the internet is used by allowing them to divide bandwidth into a haves and have-nots system. By refusing to spell out net neutrality, this bill gives that authority to, of all people, the FCC and sticks a screw you finger in the eyes of small businesses and entrepreneurs in the U.S.

Declan McCullagh writes for CNet News:

“A November draft of Barton’s (Republican Joe Barton of Texas) bill (click here for PDF) explicitly said broadband providers “may not block, or unreasonably impair or interfere with” Internet access. The final version (PDF), on the other hand, simply gives the Federal Communications Commission the authority to set rules and publish violations.”

Barton released the text of the bill (the Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act) Monday and scheduled a hearing for tomorrow. A vote could come as early as next week. Why the hurry? Because that’s the way flimflammery works.

Despite all the nice rhetoric about the Telcos needing to recoup their costs, the reality is that this legislation has been bought and paid for by Telco profits, and the only thing it guarantees is the furtherance of that. Call or email your Representatives and tell them you want net neutrality spelled out in the bill.

If you care about this and other internet freedom issues, I’d advise you to use this as a reason to pop on over to EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) and become a member supporter.

UPDATE: Kevin Marks has written a smart post on the Telcos trying to force their obsolete dedicated pipes model on an already supportive network model.

Within hours of posting my need for pro-bono legal assistance in setting up The People, Yes! as a non-profit organization, Liza Sabater got the word out at culturekitchen and Sue Polinsky — local blogger, tech genius and contributer to everything non-profit — pointed me to David Kyger at the local law firm, Smith Moore LLP.

Today, I’m very grateful to be able to announce that David and Jordan Nance have taken my project under their legal wings.

Thank you, gentlemen.

Artist: Lou Reed
Song: Magic And Loss

==========

When you pass through the fire, you pass through humble
you pass through a maze of self doubt
When you pass through humble, the lights can blind you
some people never figure that out

You pass through arrogance, you pass through hurt
you pass through an ever present past
And it’s best not to wait for luck to save you
pass through the fire to the light

Pass through the fire to the light
pass through the fire to the light
It’s best not to wait for luck to save you
pass through the fire to the light

As you pass through the fire, your right hand waving
there are things you have to throw out
That caustic dread inside your head
will never help you out

You have to be very strong, ’cause you’ll start from zero
over and over again
And as the smoke clears there’s an all consuming fire
lying straight ahead

Lying straight ahead
lying straight ahead
As the smoke clears there’s an all consuming fire
lying straight ahead

They say no one person can do it all
but you want to in your head
But you can’t be Shakespeare and you can’t be Joyce
so what is left instead

You’re stuck with yourself and a rage that can hurt you
you have to start at the beginning again
And just this moment this wonderful fire
started up again

When you pass through humble, when you pass through sickly
when you pass through I’m better than you all
When you pass through anger and self deprecation
and have the strength to acknowledge it all

When the past makes you laugh and you can savor the magic
that let you survive your own war
You find that that fire is passion
and there’s a door up ahead not a wall

As you pass through fire as you pass through fire
trying to remember its name
When you pass through fire licking at your lips
you cannot remain the same

And if the building’s burning move towards that door
but don’t put the flames out
There’s a bit of magic in everything
and then some loss to even things out

Some loss to even things out
some loss to even things out
There’s a bit of magic in everything
and then some loss to even things out

Jeff Jarvis

BULLSHIT!

[…]

Pulling back from the political absurd to the culturally sublime, it is also utterly ridiculous that the FCC contends it is enforcing community standards when it says that the nation as a whole finds bullshit to be among of the most offensive words in the language. Show me the man or woman — or, yes, child on a playground — who has not said “bullshit.� Show me one, and you will have found me a liar. Go to Google and you will find 30 million uses of bullshit. Bullshit is part of our language, part of our culture, part of our politics, part of our democracy. Those are not our community standards the FCC is enforcing. They are enforcing the fetish of the so-called Parents Television Council and their ilk. By stretching to make shit not merely indecent but now profane and by stretching again to include the s-word variants in that ruling — thus specifically encompassing bullshit — the FCC far overextended not only its dubious authority but also common sense. Gotcha again.

So let’s say the FCC reconsiders its foolish ways and decides that bullshit is, indeed, political speech and thus protected beyond even its reach. This, too, illustrates the absurdity of all this. What happens when that protestor yells the next time that Bush’s war is the byproduct of a rat or a monkey or an owl? Does the FCC has to decide which animals’ shit is protected? That is the level of absurdity we have reached here.

At the Foursquare conference recently, I questioned FCC Chairman Kevin Martin, saying that in the room we were hearing CEOs of major worldwide corporations calling on the FCC to pay attention to the urgent business of preparing our telecommunications infrastructure to protect us in case of disaster or attack and also the vital necessity to catch up to Korea and even France in broadband to protect our industry and our future. Yet, I complained, he was wasting his time instead, on farts.

And bullshit.

[…]

Unbelievable. Read the entire article, it’s spot on.

I need a few hours of consulting to help get thepeopleyes.org set up as a non-profit. If there are any lawyers out there with non-profit experience, and are willing to donate a little time and/or a few emails, I’d really appreciate it. Please comment here or get in touch with me at spcoon~at~seancoon~dot~org

(I’ll also gladly take advice from people with experience in non-profits)

UPDATE: I just spoke with a law firm here in Greensboro that might be able to assist me — pro-bono — on this project. Once our relationship is official, I’ll post the name of the firm and the gentleman who gave his valuable time on the phone today. Thanks for the tip, Sue!

Nicholas Carr:
“…The whole reason businesses exist is to control forces that are hard to control.”
(hey Nicholas, try keeping the comment permalinks active so next time I can properly attribute your quote)

Busting out the HOWTO Corporate Blog post over a whole bunch of nothing…

UPDATE: I’m putting where my money where my mouth is and picking up the X-Box 360. I’ve been a PS2 guy forever, with more than 25 games and waiting patiently for the PS3, but you know what? Sony’s DRM / Rootkit stupidity compared to Scoble’s integrity has proved to be the tipping point for me.

And I’m Mac addict! (read = Microsoft hater)

C’mon Locutus, quantify this decision with a corporate metric.

I met John Ford at the Greensboro Web Design Meetup he was running last month. Over the following week, we traded emails and eventually decided to share portfolio and application ideas over a six-pack in my home office. After going through some work and chatting up each of our killer app ideas, we ended up discussing how we make software, going back and forth between Getting Real and Cooper’s Goal Directed methodology.

As John was about to go on a month long trip to Asia and Australia, I gave him my copy of The Inmates are Running the Asylum to enjoy on the trip, but under one condition: he had to take a few pictures of it at various exotic locals on his trip.

C’mon John, one more!

More than a half-million people protested horrible Republican Immigration bills in L.A and across the country, but since 1998 more than 3000 people have died in the desert heat while trying get to a job mowing your lawn, watching your kids and rebuilding our communities.

How do we thank them?

Tony Herrera
“U.S. to Illegal Immigrants: Drop Dead.”

As Spring arrives and the days become warmer my mind begins to focus on Summer. I think of Summer and the promise of scorching 100+ degree days in our deserts of Arizona. While the heat begins to rise in our deserts our Congress is involved in its own intense and heated debate over illegal immigration. No matter what position one might take on the issue of illegal immigration the fact remains that this year over 300 men, women and children will die as they make a desperate attempt to illegally enter our country.

During the period of 1998-2004 over 3000 deaths were recorded in the surrounding desert areas of Tucson, Arizona. The deaths are a result of a shift in migration patterns by illegal immigrants as they sought alternative routes due to an increased border patrol presence and fences built on the border between San Diego and Tijuana. The beefed up Border Patrol presence and fencing resulted in the smugglers and immigrants moving further inland to desolate areas in their effort to reach the U.S. undetected.

The majority of the immigrant smuggling trade is now transacted in the Naco, Arizona and Naco, Sonora, Mexico region. It is no small secret that the Mexican town of Naco functions mostly as launching point from which Mexican and Central American immigrants attempt their perilous journey into the United States. The deaths have continued for the past 10 years and they have attracted the attention of various groups such as No More Deaths an organization that has openly provided humanitarian aide despite the risk of arrest and fines for their actions. A list of some of the dead is provided here.

As the Senate prepares to tackle the most sweeping immigration reforms in years, a top Democrat has vowed to do everything in his power, including filibuster, to thwart Republican Majority Leader Bill Frist’s proposed overhaul. Minority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat, has stated that he would “use every procedural means at my disposal” to prevent Frist from bypassing the Judiciary Committee. Majority Leader Frist has made clear the Senate will take up his proposal next week in the event the 18-member committee fails to complete a broader bill.

Whether or not Congress can agree on a comprehensive immigration bill remains to be seen. In the meantime a bill approving a new 700 mile long fence on the Mexican border with Arizona has been passed. The bill will force employers to check the Social Security numbers of new hires against a national database. The bill also contains all sorts of punitive measures - such as making it a felony for illegal immigrants to be here and making it a felony for anyone who knowingly helps an illegal immigrant.

Twenty years after passing the most sweeping immigration reform our leadership in Congress now fails to reach common ground on immigration reform and has enacted potentially dangerous and regressive immigration policies.

In California issue of illegal immigration has been a hotly contested debate especially since then Gov. Davis granting Illegal Immigrants Drivers Licenses. The much touted accomplishment of Sen. Gil Cedillo were short lived as Gov. Schwarznegger citing Homeland Security issues forced the Assembly to cave and grant a repeal of the same law.

As we continue this contentious debate angry voices will rise from both sides, as surely as the heat in the Arizona desert. Indeed protest and demonstrations are already being scheduled in major cities including Los Angeles, San Diego, Chicago, Denver, Milwaukee, New York, Philadelphia, San Antonio, Las Cruces, New Mexico, and Tucson, Arizona.

The images to come will likely be seized upon by our mainstream media and used to boost ratings but will fail to provide any real contribution towards healthy dialogue that could contribute towards resolving the issue of illegal immigration. The images that our mainstream media is likely to provide will be those of groups engaged in heated exchange of words - such as inviduals from the Minuteman Project and Immigration Watchdog locked in angry shouting matches with pro immigration groups the likes of NCLR and MALDEF.

As insults get traded and angry voices rise during our Nations debate on illegal immigration, the death toll will also rise in the sorching heat of the Arizona desert.

Something has to give.

Jesus’ General hit his stride a long time ago, but he’s in the zone this week. If you don’t know the General by now, well, you’re going to hell.

Repent sinners.

Some of the General’s recent classics:

• My response to the vile bastards who are trying to destroy America by destroying me
• Red State Jesus
• Three Years

The Consumerist
Ma Bell To Shut Down New Orleans WiFi

One of the surprising acts of compassion and competency that came out of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina was that the city began providing a free WiFi service to business owners and residents whose phone service had been wiped out. The 512 kbps service allowed many business owners to begin struggling back to their feet and corporate sponsors like Yahoo and Google were in discussion to expand the service in the coming months.

Well, no longer. Telecommunication lobbyists from Bell South have put the lean on New Orleans, demanding that the free service be outlawed. Apparently, it violates a law that prevents the public sector from competing with the telecommunication sector. By law, then, cities can provide no more than a 128 kbps service to citizens.

“The vendors, the BellSouths of this world, are not only going to force us back, making our existing Wi-Fi illegal, but also they want to close a loophole for emergencies so that we would not do this again,� says Greg Meffert, New Orleans’ chief information officer. But Greg’s no lily-livered pansy. “If I have to go to jail, I guess I will,� he said. “If they really want to play that game, I guess they are right. But we simply cannot turn off these few lifelines we have to our city and businesses.�

[…]

More sources

• FactoryCity - BellSouth to New Orleans: Let Them Eat Cake
• Sploid - Telecoms out to kill NOLA’s free WiFi
• WebProNews - Telecoms Better Keep An Eye On The Big Easy
• Red Herring - WiFi Fight Brews In Big Easy

(via missrogue)

I had planned on writing a long review of V and linking over to current memes that voice a similar “power to the people” message, but there’s no need.

The people are on it.