Update to last night's post

Apparently, when you block a post from a third-party application in Facebook, you're then given the option of blocking all subsequent posts. That raises the comfort level a bit, as the application continues its lumbering waddle into platform-hood.

Facebook giveth and Facebook taketh away

It's clear that Google+ has changed a bit, simply because Facebook has adapted by allowing its users to, erm, "curate" their audience. Meaning that previously, anything you posted was either public or to your circle, whereas now you can cherry-pick who can read your comments, links, etc. So that rant about your work life goes only to your friends; your parents know nothing about your revelries, etc. Kudos also for the feature that requires your approval before you can be officially tagged by someone else in a photo.

Given how social media has largely made us the curators of our personal brands, such tools seem obvious from the perspective of the rear-view mirror.

But tonight I noticed that, while options for controlling output has been made more granular, options for input have quietly been retired. Notably the "Block all" options for either people or applications. All that's left are "Block this post" and "Report post or spam." Without digging, I'm not even sure what that latter is supposed to mean. I'll guess I'll find out when the next Yelp check-in spam hits my news stream. In the meantime, I find the "trade-off" interesting: My gut feeling is this signals a tighter integration between who you know and where they're spending their money. All of course, to entice you--and your wallet--to follow.

Which only reinforces the maxim that if you can't tell what's being sold, you're what's for sale.

Frivolous Friday, 08.26.2011: The Geek Workout

During the last few weeks, I've rationalized not going to the gym with the argument that packing boxes, schlepping them, wrestling a carpet cleaner and mopping both walls (for painting) and floors (for the usual reasons) was plenty of strength-training, thank you very much.

But as much as certain muscle-factions might have protested, that's exercise I prefer to the hothouse flower kind that treadmills and free-weights provide. At least there's something to occupy the mind. Even if it's only speculating on how inbred the spider population must become over the cold months when I haven't the heart to evict them. (Charlotte's Web in First Grade, read by a student teacher I absolutely adored, you understand...)

But I had a minor epiphany today after a bit of email back-and-forth Dennis & I had over the work to be done over the weekend.

Dennis:

Unless you had other plans in the works, I am planning on getting out into the detached garage and doing some cleaning. I would like to get the bee equipment and such organized and moved out to the storage shed, the small table saw ready for sale and just get the garage capable of being walked through without injuring oneself.

Now, if you want to understand the garage, what you need to know is that it has already sent Dennis to the emergency room, from whence he emerged, sporting a look that only Boris Karloff could love. (Thankfully, the forehead scar is as distant a memory as the piranha scar from his late teens. And, no, I am not making that up.)

You also have to understand that the garage is, in fact, a mess. So, being the perennial wisenheimer, I snarked back:

What?! Ruin all the "Indiana Jones and the Man-cave of Doom" fun of venturing into the garage?--are you *cracked*, man?!?!?! (Although I will confess to a certain morbid curiosity to know now many dessicated, cobweb-covered corpses you'll find felled by diving pipe-wrenches, bifurcated by Beverly-shears, flattened by giant rolling tool-cases, etc. But, then, I'm kinda sick that way...) ;-P ;-P

Awhile later, though, I realized that, Indiana Jones--despite the buffed physique and fast-twitch reflexes of a jungle cat, was actually a nerd in his own way. You don't get the "Dr." in front of your name without some of that in your mental make-up. And, seriously, how many dudes do you know could ID a 12th century inscription while being chased by a secret brotherhood through the underground crypts of Venice with a lovely blonde at their side? Yeah, exactly.

But running for your life (being from giant rolling stones or the flunkies of rival archaeologists) beats the living tar out of trying to follow the plot (minus sound) of Mad Men on the gym television.

Lamentably--at least for present purposes--occultist Nazis and Soviets are considerably harder to come by these days. And, because Mom did her darnedest to raise a post-racial daughter, I'll pass on the hordes of aboriginals from the 2nd & 4th movies, thanks. (Dear Mr. Spielberg: Congratulations on making Rudyard Kipling's ghost blush, you pandering twit.)

Training to become a Jedi Knight would be an excellent way for a geek to blow off steam after a day at the office. After all, you're going to be a force (Force?) for good, and that's one heck of a motivation. (And I imagine the bennies in the Old Republic were pretty good, before Supreme Chancellor Palpatine--a.k.a. Darth Walker--busted the Jedi union and outsourced state security to scabs.) But, there's the celibacy requirement, and I wouldn't trade Dennis for even a rainbow lightsabre, so that's a deal-breaker right there. Not to mention that being able to levitate things with my will would ultimately be counter productive for any fitness regimen.

I suppose there's the holodeck of Star Trek: The Next Generation--basically a Wii on steroids. The fringe benefit is that it AI will do everything physically possible to avoid harming you. (Unless you're as disaster-prone as Lt. Barclay, of course.) I mean, your exercise routine not only monitors your biofeedback, but it also has a plot! (If you ever thought the ST:TNG universe laughably short on chunky folks like your faithful blogger, boy, were you being unimaginative my friend!) It's the perfect workout. Now all I need to do is write code day and night and save enough money to have myself cryogenically frozen until the latter 24th century. No sweat.

Except that maybe that plan is what my favorite History prof. meant by "too clever by half." Drat.

Okay. So maybe something a little closer in space-time would be more practical. Something with motivation and mentoring. The major drawback to hoping that I'm an immortal born to duel my peers for the dubious "prize" (of what I can only assume is bragging rights) is that I first have to verify that I'm immortal. That seems...shall we say...statistically non-viable at best. So I think I'll give that a miss, if it's all the same to everybody. Cato has no doubt retired by now--and in any case, we'd both be uninsurable inside of a month. So that's likewise a bust for keeping me on my toes.

And, lamentably, I've probably missed some sort of age cut-off for the job of "Slayer." Pity. I'm more of a night owl anyway. And I can't say as I'd complain about having a trainer (a.k.a. "Watcher") with a gorgeous British accent and a thing for ancient books. Who nags you to train with cross-bows! But as extracurricular activities go, it's probably not something you want on your resume. (Although, statistically, skinny chicks earn more, so at least there's an upside.) Plus, I just pulled up Google Maps and typed in "Hellmouth," with no exact matches. Which tells me that the job market for Vampire Slayers has pretty much dried up since Buffy hung up her cross and stakes. I suppose any blood-sucking demons left are too busy reinventing themselves as sparkly heart-throbs or nostalgically crashing cosplay parties to hire themselves out as personal trainers.

All of which, of course, means that I have no choice but to find a new video podcast (my carefully-rationed supply of Wine Library TV running critically low) and again take my place in the shadow of The Buffed Ones. If only there were an elliptical machine for the mind...

Why "internet time" doesn't matter so much anymore

Back in the summer of the post-dot-com-bubble-pop (a.k.a. 2001), fellow tech. writer--let's call her "A"--and I drove from Rochester, MN to the Minneapolis Convention Center for a tech. expo. She was looking for work--and tchotchkes. Whereas I'd talked my first line supervisor into letting me put 8 hours into this junket on the pretext of research, specifically the question, "What does the internet mean to your business?"

Let's face it, that particular tech. expo. was already showing the effects of the post-bubble hangover. The convention center had had to fill the space by booking a manufacturing-related expo. at the same time, discreetly partitioning them with blue curtains. As it turns out, the best answer to that question came from the manufacturing side. A micro-manufacturer of industrial tools related the story of how a customer in desperate need of a replacement for broken equipment had emailed the CAD drawings to them. After taking a look a the drawings, the manufacturer called the customer--a few hours' drive away--and said, "Send your truck now. We'll have it ready for you by the time you get here."

Naturally, at the time I was all drop-jawed about the competitive advantage that "internet time" provided. (Dennis, being a manufacturing engineer at the time, was trained in a world where dead-tree prints would have to be shipped, then re-drawn by one of the manufacturer's techs, and only then could the actual business of "manufacturing" begin. Even at dail-up speeds, receiving a digital file that could be directly imported made for blazing turnaround times.) Even today, I caught myself annoyed with Canon for only just drop-shipping yesterday a part that I ordered (gasp!) all the way back on Saturday. (The horror...)

Now, in many, many parts of the world, such digitization and delivery capabilities are positively banal. And, to me, that's a good thing. I was reminded of that tonight when I pulled a non-bill, non mass-mail envelope out of the stack. A small business' company envelope, obviously, with the city/state/zip line nearly running off the Avery label. The one-page form-letter offered the services of a (relatively) local moving storage company. Short, sweet, who-we-are-and-what-we-can-offer-you. (No physical signature above the printed one, which would scandalize Mom--old-school enough to hold each sheet of bond paper to the light to verify that the watermark was correctly aligned. But it was obviously proofread for grammar and spelling, which (sadly) pretty much puts it ahead in the game.)

The backstory is that Dennis & I just put our home up for sale, so it's pretty obvious that the MLS listing prompted the contact. And good on them for showing some hustle. In the end, it doesn't matter that property listings no longer have to wait for the classified. Nor even that reverse lookups (of addresses or phone numbers to people) are stupid-simple (if you don't mind popup ads and enough cookies to choke a certain fuzzy blue Sesame Street character). But it's the first moving-related offer I've seen since a bare-bones listing went live nearly two weeks ago.

And I can't help but notice that, in both cases, neither firm could be described as a "technology" company. Speaking for myself, I think we programmer/technology types sometimes take technology for its own sake a little too seriously. For the manufacturing and moving company, it's not All About how quickly they can access information; it's about how capable they are of doing something constructive with it. Dunno about anybody else, but I can't help but be a little humbled by that.

Danegeld 2.0 *

Earlier this week, I was wickedly amused to read that the makers of the Abercrombie & Fitch line of clothing were offering to pay the cast of MTV's Jersey Shore to refrain from wearing their togs, citing concerns about their brand's image. (Cue Billy Joel: "Where have you been hidin' out lately, honey? You can't dress trashy 'till you spend a lotta money.") I was further amused when one of my classmates from Programmer's School picked up on that, offering to do the same for a substantially reduced price. And then, tonight, a librarian friend was having a Facebook conniption about Kourtney Kardashian's "librarian" get-up, which was also worth an evil laugh.

One of the downsides of the democratization in time-wasting brought to us by the internet is that celebrity can simultaneously more far-flung and more fleeting than ever before. But for the enterprising (but otherwise talent-free) flash-in-the-pan, this opens up all manner of opportunity. The obvious examples:

• Trust fund do-nothings (think Paris Hilton as well as the afore-mentioned Kardashians)
• Washed-up tween-idols (e.g. Britney Spears, The Biebs 5 years hence)
• Serial rehabbers (i.e. Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan)

Any of such otherwise useless members of society can thus fund plastic surgery or maybe a beach house--or at least the next bail--by being bought off by brands afraid of offending their more mainstream retailers. Yep, I can't help but think that Abercrombie & Fitch let the proverbial genie out of the bottle here.

Granted, such tactics won't be 100% successful. Some companies, after all, deliberately court controversy for an "edgy" image. (Look no further than the in-your-face product placements for VirginMobile, PlentyOfFish.com and Polaroid) in Lady Gaga's Telephone (NSFW version)).

But such failure is all part of my cunning plan. See, I figure I can eventually graduate to video blogging. In my "office" cleverly disguised as a spare bedroom...complete with full menagerie of stuffed animals. The current wardrobe--A green men's T-shirt and blue-striped white boxer shorts--will more than suffice. As will the humidity-frizzed hair. And the make-up that hasn't been re-touched since early afternoon.

With such anti-hipster cred. at my fingertips, I should really learn how to use it responsibly. Yeah. Nice image you go goin' there, Apple. It'd be an awful shame if I were to, say, "accidentally" flash your latest product around in front of my webcam... Ohai, Coca-Cola...oh, I'm sorry: Did I leave that can out in plain sight? My bad. Here, let me tuck it back into one of a dozen cases under the spare bed. Yes, that spare bed--the one with the wrinkled Martha Stewart bedspread, and the "Euro-shams" that look like a deflated meringue, what with the way I just wadded the pillows into them and all...

You get the idea:

Step 1: Videoblogging stardom
Step 2: Blatant extortion
Step 3: Profit!

Eh. I can think of worse ways to feather the nest. And at least I'm finally getting some mileage from the un-coolness that I've been building up since grade school...

- - - - -

* Historical note: Protection rackets go by many names--most notably the Orwellian "War on Terror" in our day and age--but few were ever so successful or wide-ranging as the Danegeld. Wagnerian/Victorian horned-helmet idiocies aside, the Vikings were a remarkable people in many ways, with a presence ranging from Constantinople (where they formed the bodyguard of the Byzantine Emperor) to Eastern Canada (L'Anse Aux Meadows in the province of Newfoundland-Labrador). And they were apparently skilled enough with...errr..."international brand recognition" to be able to extort tribute from points as distant as Saxon/Norman England, Christian Spain and western Russia. And it is in honor of the, um, "business acumen" of my husband's ancestors that this post is titled.

Free for the giving

There's a phenomenon known as the Tragedy of the Commons," which--in the proverbial nutshell--says that if there exists a limited source of something valuable that is available for free (or next to nothing), sooner or later some jackhole will take more than her/his fair share. This emboldens other jackholes to do the same, until the thing of value is gone and/or damaged. Not surprisingly, it boils down to the whole "socialize the costs and privatize the profits" deal that passes for capitalism these days.

But it only occurred to me (as I started gnawing my way through Chris Anderson's The Long Tail) that there is a flip-side--we might even call it the triumph of the commons. As computing and networking costs have dropped so sharply, coupled with the democratization of the tools for photography, artwork, publishing, A/V production, marketing, etc., it throws open the doors for all manner of contribution. Motivations may differ: Exhibitionism, generosity, experimentation, reputation-building, Quixotic windmill-tilting, whatever.

Not too surprisingly, Wikipedia seems to be most often cited as the poster-child for that sort of thing. The (donation-supported) hosting costs are a laughable fraction of the actual value. For that matter, I wouldn't be surprised if its hosting is pure LAMP stack--i.e. completely open-source (and thus the work of committed volunteers). In other words, the cost of the world's encyclopedia comes down to hardware, electricity, backups...and salaries/bennies for the redoubtable SysAdmins who shepherd them. Plus whatever the bean-counters and suits feel the need to skim off the top, of course--but that goes without saying. Even with that, it's cheap at thrice the price.

Ditto for the bloggers, scraping by on Google ads--or something less reputable--who are showing the world that a professionally-groomed face and opinionated mouth are not unique qualifications for political commentary. And the musicians who decide to let their audience, rather than the RIAA suits, dictate when and where their music will be heard.

The point is that, even as a few self-involved morons are Why We Can't Have Nice Things, a relative handful are the reason we can. Overall, I'd say that's a pretty amazing flip-side. And it would be a waste to overly lament the former, when the latter don't see half the kudos they deserve.

No posting this week

It's already clear that this week is booked, inside work and out, so I figured it's be a little less lame to get the heads-up out before the last minute.

Have a productive week and fantastic weekend, all!

Frivolous Friday, 08.05.2011: Computer Camp

Don't ask me why, but last night I realized that thirty years ago, Mom sent me off to computer camp, offered by the local University. A magical place of wonder and discovery in the camaradarie of fellow fledgling geeks. Where, even with all the excitement and exercise of the day, there was still plenty of energy left for a good sing-along by the light of our laptops' monitors. No doubt anyone who remembers computer camp remembers standard fare like:

On top of the LAMP stack,
And hosted domain,
I wrote my first web app,
But deployed it in vain.

I thought that my code had
Refused to compile--
I'd forgotten to roll my
own .ini file . . . (1)

No? Hmmm...maybe that one was just a regional variation. What about:

Once a web designer camped in a coffee-shop
Surfing the Eight-oh-two-eleven-g,
And he raised a round of funding and chatted the barista up:
You'll come and found the next Twitter with me! . . . (2)

Still no? Well, then, perhaps your crowd was musically talented enough for rounds like:

Linux kernel (Linux kernel)
Beta-trial! (Beta trial!)
Check it out from GitHub: (Check it out from GitHub:)
make-compile! (make-compile!) (3)

Or, maybe it was your first time at computer camp and you didn't know any of the songs. And it didn't matter so much, because somehow you found yourself sitting so to the dreamy-eyed guy whose hand had brushed yours as you both reached for the same cafetaria tray at lunch and then blushed. Then, IM-ing under the cover of the music, you learned that you shared the same preference for strongly-typed languages and ANSI-style indentation. And, suddenly, the concept of "pair programming" didn't seem like such a bad idea to a lone coder...

- - - - -

Lovely memories. Certainly more charming than the reality of computer camp circa 1981, what with the "terminals" being large, noisy typewriters with greenbar paper feed--i.e. no such thing as a monitor except for the one immediately commandeered by the fastest kid through the door. It's just as well that Mom doesn't know I blog, or I would sorely disappoint her now with the knowledge that, after awhile, I grew bored and sneaked off to the University Library instead. Thus dropping into more of a Liberal Arts vortex and setting back my programming career by about, oh, a dozen or so years.

But, although life comes equipped with a rear-view mirror (which should be used), it alas does not have a gear for "reverse." Yet--to extend the metaphor--making so much as a lane change might have meant never knowing some of the dearest people I know now. Something I wouldn't trade for all the money in Silicon Valley.

- - - - -

(1) Sung to the tune of "On Top of Old Smokey"
(2) Sung to the tune of "Waltzing Matilda"
(3) Sung to the tune of "Frere Jacques"

Another yardstick of "progress"

At Dennis' family reunion, one of our newest Kewpie-doll cousins--at least twice removed--was running about the jungle of adult legs, Mamma's cellphone in hand. Mamma, understandably enough, was in hot pursuit of her--or, perhaps more aptly, the phone.

I leaned close to Dennis and observed (sotto vocce, of course) that the little blonde cutie-pie will probably grow up in a world that can't wrap its brain around a phone that doesn't have pictures and interactive icons and text.

As the festivities were winding down, I stepped into a conversation Dennis was having with the youngest of his Dad's brothers, now pushing 80. (But, being a farmer, he'll "retire" work-boots first, naturally.) Uncle C. doesn't quite fit the stereotype of the old-school Wisconsin farmer in a number of ways. Or, on second thought, maybe he does. Because he--from my limited acquaintance, anyway--adapts with a speed and readiness that's instructive for the likes of me. And he groks the fact that the internet--for all the garbage it contains--puts a stupefying amount of knowledge literally at your fingertips.

But Uncle C. also shared a glimpse into his Depression-era sensibilities...a world largely defined by what one couldn't afford. He, for instance, didn't know what a sundae was until his older brother--flush with the cash of his WWII Army paycheck--treated him to the choice between that and the equally mysterious "malt."

Which is about when the epiphany hit and I realized that, for all the noise that each generation makes about the thing it can count as bedrock certainties, an equally powerful touchstone is the thing that it doesn't know. And, before anyone thinks to trivialize telephones and ice cream treats, I will note that my own mother grew up in the shadow of polio (before the vaccine became commonplace). Not to mention what a mind-blowing luxury of clean, safe drinking water is in some corners of a planet three-quarters covered by sea water.

There's a reason that I never, ever feel superior to my predecessors regarding the things that they had to know to survive. You can make all the ballyhoo you want about the information that's available online today vs. what was painstakingly copied to papyrus or vellum centuries ago. The things that no one except the most pedantic would even think of uploading--much more taking for granted--are, to my mind, somewhat more telling than the "gee-whiz" navel-gazing to which tech paparazzi seem to be so prone.