Okay, the title's a little off, but it felt clevered. Sam Peterson, an evidently upstanding citizen of Sparta, Michigan, was charged with a felony for using a coffee shop's open WiFi connection without going into the shop. It wasn't a problem for the owner of the shop, but police and local prosecutors figured there had to be something wrong with it, and sure enough, they found a law that seemed to make it illegal. [Link]

Evidently the U.S. has been granting patents or trademarks on various yoga practices or postures. [Link] Via Souljerky, which has a bunch more links.

Fed up with the pervasive, remarkably obvious corruption of the Bush regime and the promise of more politics-as-usual from the slate of presidential candidates offered so far by major parties, netizens are flocking to former Libertarian (and current Republican), Texas' Ron Paul. His stock rose after his recent performance in the Republican debate, where he argued that terrorism is a response to intrusive U.S. foreign policy. (A quote from the debate: "We overthrew the Iranian government in 1953 and their taking the hostages was the reaction. This dynamic persists and we ignore it at our risk. They’re not attacking us because we’re rich and free, they’re attacking us because we’re over there.") [Link] [Link to Ron Paul's Wikipedia entry] [Link to Salon article]

David Weinberger has written a book about metadata, called Everything Is Miscellaneous: The Power of the New Digital Disorder, and if you're thinking metadata's a dull subject, guess again. In fact, this is the most important book I've read in years, and one of the best at getting at what's really as we move online and digitize everything we know. David's written about the changing architecture of knowledge as a third order of organization emerges. The first order is physical (how you stack books on a shelf or arrange silverware in a drawer); the second is physical or analog metadata, like the cards in a card catalog or the entries in a ledger. The third order is electronic metadata, and what's significant about it is ... sufficiently complex that he's written a book about it. The third order is characterized by folksonomy or tagging, where you can create multiple categories for any one item, creating many classification schemes and many ways to order the same reality. From the book...

For example, the digital order ignores the paper order’s requirement that labels be smaller than the things they’re labeling. An online “catalog card” listing a book for sale can contain–or link to–as much information as the seller wants, including user ratings, the author’s biography, and the full text of reviews. You can even let users search for a book by typing in any phrase they remember from it–“What’s the title of that detective novel where someone was described as having a face like a fist?”–which is like using the entire contents of the book as a label. That makes no sense when all that information has to be stored as atoms in the physical world but perfect sense when it’s available as bits and bytes in the digital realm.

I'm leading a conversation with David at the Inkwell conference on the WELL, and we're about halfway through the two-week discussion. If you want to comment or ask a question but you're not a member of the WELL, you can email inkwell at well com and one of the forum hosts will post your words. Meanwhile I suggest that you buy the book if you're interested in the changing architecture of knowledge.

Metadata is, of course, information about information. Back in the day, it was easier to know which was the data and which was the meta. The book on the shelf was data (purists may disagree with me) and the catalog card was metadata. In fact, this corresponds to the first two "orders of order" my book postulates. In the first order, you organize the things themselves: The books on the shelves, the bolts in the bins, the cans in the larder. In the second order, you physically separate the metadata from the things, you generally reduce the metadata to what fits on a card or label, and you organize them: The library's card
catalog, the map of the items in the warehouse. In the second order, you frequently can manage multiple sorts (subject, author, title), whereas the first order requires you to put each thing in one and only one spot, because that's atoms are mean that way.

In the third order, the content and the metadata are all digital. We can now organize free of the constraints of the physical. The old principles of organization are ill-suited to this new environment, so we have to invent new ones...which is what my book is about.

Now, metadata gets mushy in the third order because when both the content of (say) a book is on line, we can use that content as
metadata. So, we can ask "What was that tragedy Shakespeare wrote in 1599?" using the author, genre and year as metadata, or we can ask, "When did Shakespeare write the play that has the line about someone having 'smote the sledded Polacks'?" The content becomes metadata. So the difference becomes operational: Metadata is what we know and data is what we're looking for.

This makes metadata squishier as a concept, but it makes our species smarter. Everything that is linked to anything else becomes a lever by which we can pry up new knowledge.

Photo by Jon L.

This photosynth demo is very cool... "We can do things with the social environment, taking data from everybody, from the entire collective memory visually of what the Earth looks like, and link all those photos together, and they become something emergent that's greater than the sum of the parts... this is something that grows in complexity as people use it... their own photos... become enriched with all that [everybody else's] metadata..." Thanks to David Weinberger for the "miscellaneous" pointer!

1. TEMPERANCE. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
2. SILENCE. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
3. ORDER. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
4. RESOLUTION. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5. FRUGALITY. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
6. INDUSTRY. Lose no time; be always employ'd in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. SINCERITY. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. JUSTICE. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. MODERATION. Avoid extreams; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. CLEANLINESS. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths, or habitation.
11. TRANQUILLITY. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. CHASTITY. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dulness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
13. HUMILITY. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

Tom Atlee has published an interesting piece called "Story Fields - the Narrative Shape of Our Lives." Looking at stories, he sees "that there are huge constellations of them that reinforce each other. Each of these groupings paints a particular whole picture of how life is or should be. These story-pictures seem to have a lot of power over people." He goes on to discuss how we weave our perception of reality from stories, myths, and symbols. To reshape reality, we have to reshape the narrative. [Link] Of course, this isn't new thinking, but Tom's articulation is always interesting and compellling:

... we can apply the principle of justice mechanically, as a computer would, weighing out pros and cons. But the approach is cold; we can't bring real justice to life that way. If we want to live a principle, we need to translate it into story form. Our efforts to live by the principle of justice draw us into fables, history, role models and other story phenomena -- the story of Solomon deciding who is the real mother of the baby, the image of Gandhi fasting until the Hindus and Muslims stop fighting, the role model of Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat in the front of the bus. Then, in our own lives, we play out our own small versions of these stories. Research into the cognitive processes of moral deliberation shows how heavily we rely on stories and mental scenario-building to put our moral principles into practice. Jesus, Christian missionaries, Jewish prophets, Buddha, and hundreds of zen masters and meditation teachers have spoken in parables to weave their principles into the living story-fabric of their audiences' minds.

At the societal level, a story field can seem almost synonymous with culture. Actually it is the narrative dimension of culture.

Wirless Communications Association International (WCA) has created "the authoritative go-to resource for comments by – and comparisons between – top U.S. policymakers regarding the pace and benefits of broadband deployments." [Link]

(Thanks to David Armistead for the pointer!)

We don't get out much, but we made a point of catching the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club at La Zona Rosa last night. Marsha wasn't quite sure why I'd picked this particular band to draw us out of our lair, but as we staggered away from the band's phenomenal marathon three-hour-plus set, a third of which was encore, I asked her if she got the point. "You didn't know they were going to be that great," she said... and I had to admit it. Who could've known? The BMRC simply took over the house and blew the roof off, and they were treated to the typical Austin-audience enthusiasm... I figured they weren't accustomed to the raving fan attitude the found at La Zona, where everybody knew their songs, even their more obscure first couple of albums. After they played a couple of songs for the encore, they realized they couldn't stop, so Robert Been would lean. exhausted, bemused, on the speaker after each song and ask the frenzied audience what's next... Heard live, the music was explosive and tight, busy with creative licks and chops and hooks; at one point Marsha said it reminded her of sixties psychedelica, but to the band's sound was mature, i.e. their own despite the obvious influence of bands like Jesus and Mary Chain. (Photo above is a promo from the BRMC web site, and not from last night's show... however I notice the band's web site has a space for fans to upload photos from each show. Here's Austin's.)

I want to see the new Fantastic Four film (Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer), if only because the Silver Surfer was my favorite Marvel character, the tragic, detached herald of worldy doom... so I'm reading reviews this morning. Manohla Dargis in the NY Times refers to the film as an "amalgam of recycled ideas, dead air, dumb quips, casual sexism and pseudoscientific mumbo jumbo." She says it like it's a bad thing – but that's an apt description of any Marvel comic. The One Who Matters, fanman Harry Knowles, loved the film against his own expectation, and writes "...what we have are scenes of the Fantastic Four being… well the Fantastic Four. Entertaining crowds, Reed and Sue are trying to get married, but something is always complicating that process. (I know the feeling) - Johnny wants to throw Reed a bachelor party. It’s appropriately goofy, but dammit… it’s the exact sort of hammy thing that Stan Lee would have done." Now there is a review I can trust!

Mark posts the above photo he got from somebody who'd owned a cardboard rocket ship. Back in the 50s I drove my parents nuts begging for one of those; they never gave it, but I finally got a loaner. It was almost as great as mom's vacuum cleaner (which had a down side – you couldn't get inside – and an upside – it made the right kind of noise). I remember sitting inside the borrowed rocket, wearing my Superman suit, absolutely invincible.

The New York Times says that consumers are "internet fatigued," and as a result, ecommerce sales are slowing down. I'm betting the paper's headline interpretation ("some buyers grow web-weary") is only a small part of the story, and the Times mentions opinions more diverse than the headline suggests. I'd be interested in hearing whether credit card sales are down overall as consumers react to the unethical practices of credit card companies, who are finding any excuse to boost rates and lock consumers into spiraling debt. Online purchases are usually if not always by credit card; sane consumers have torn up their cards and are doing whatever they can to extricate themselves from the clutches of usurious corporations. [Link]

Bob Frankston has a good point: "Putting so much effort into issues like Network Neutrality and Broadband deployment diverts us from recognizing that the Internet has nothing to do with telecom except insofar as we let telecom control our connectivity." [Link]

...our home networking keeps improving because we have no reason limit it. Perhaps this is the biggest misconception driving policy – the assumption we need to incent people to do better. In reality as long as we don’t discourage it there are too many ways to make improvements – it’s more about removing impediments (that’s the point of antitrust). Home networks are still clunky but if you remember back just ten years ago things have improved a lot.

Evidently you're not allowed to take photos in Silver Spring, Maryland. I shot the above photo from my Silver Spring hotel room in 2006 - I guess I broke the law, and got away with it?

Several vids on Youtube from the great Black Rebel Motorcycle Club performance we caught at La Zona Rosa a week ago...

In 1994 I helped Bruce Sterling release his book The Hacker Crackdown: Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier online as plain text "literary freeware," ultimately distributed far and wide. The book was inspired by the response to the Secret Service raid at Steve Jackson Games. Steve sued the Secret Service, won the lawsuit, and became a poster boy for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), and instigator of EFF-Austin, which was originally supposed to be an EFF chapter. Bruce heard about the raid within hours, when Steve appeared on SMOF-BBS (where Mike Godwin and I also hung out) and let everybody know what little he knew at the time. His book includes an authoritative account of the raid and "offers a unique and colorful portrait of the nature of 'cyberspace' in the early 1990s, and the nature of "computer crime" at that time." (From Wikipedia.) Now Cory Doctorow's podcasting a reading of the book.

A team of Italian scientists think they've discovered the impact crater from the Tunguska object (probably an asteroid or comet that struck Siberia in 1908). Lack of a crater has always been a bit of a mystery, given the power of the blast. The Italians suspect Lake Cheko, five miles from the probable epicenter. [Link]

Dick Cheney claims that the Vice President's office is not "an entity within the executive branch," so Rahm Emanuel (D-IL) will introduce an amendment to the the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill to cut funding for Cheney's office. [Link]

At a press briefing yesterday, White House Deputy Press Secretary Dana Perino said that Cheney's assertion that he operates outside of the executive branch of government was "an interesting constitutional question that people can debate" and a "non-issue."

On Thursday, Emanuel suggested that if Cheney feels his office is not part of the executive branch "he should return the salary the American taxpayers have been paying him since January 2001, and move out of the home for which they are footing the bill."

Jette's coordinating an Alamo Downtown (aka original Alamo) blogathon for draft house fans (which I could see stats on how many Alamo Drafthouse regulars are bloggers, bet it would be an impressive percentage). The idea here is to blog your memories of the Alamo, which will close its doors in a couple of days (as it moves to the former Ritz Theatre). [Link]

Lauren Weinstein posts about a Google page called "An explanation of our search results." Says Weinstein, "In the normal course of searching on Google you'd only find it if you followed an unusual "sponsored link" -- sponsored by Google itself -- above the regular search results for a single, very ancient word." The term is "Jew," and the Google page acknowedges that its search algorithms produce "results that [are] very disturbing" when it's entered as a search term, as opposed to "Judaism," "Jewish" or "Jewish people," which produce "informative and relevant" results. The Google team says

The beliefs and preferences of those who work at Google, as well as the opinions of the general public, do not determine or impact our search results. Individual citizens and public interest groups do periodically urge us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Although Google reserves the right to address such requests individually, Google views the comprehensiveness of our search results as an extremely important priority. Accordingly, we do not remove a page from our search results simply because its content is unpopular or because we receive complaints concerning it. We will, however, remove pages from our results if we believe the page (or its site) violates our Webmaster Guidelines, if we believe we are required to do so by law, or at the request of the webmaster who is responsible for the page.

We apologize for the upsetting nature of the experience you had using Google and appreciate your taking the time to inform us about it.

Weinstein makes a good point about the value of this page:

...it might be wise to muse more on that Google page noted above. For it tells us very plainly that among major search engines, Google understands that Search Results Matter. They matter now to everyone who uses the Web, and even to people who don't have Internet access at all -- but whose lives are impacted by the Web nonetheless. And that's the entire population of the planet.

The Web, after all, isn't really computers and routers, fiber and spinning disk arrays, databases and blogs. The Web is people. Our job now is to find the path toward helping make sure that the power of Web search enhances people's lives while not incidentally creating asymmetric opportunities for seriously damaging innocent lives in the process.

Taylor Willingham asked me to live blog the PBS All-American Presidential Forum last night. Some people were live blogging from the event, but we were blogging from Austin, where I was at the Carver Library blogging along with Mike Aaron and Tom Moran. I noticed that my friend Liza Sabater was blogging on the scene in DC; when I pinged her she pointed me to a chat room at her site, Culture Kitchen... so I bilocated. All the live bloggers on the scene and in Austin posted to an aggregate page set up by the Media Bloggers Association. I posted quite a bit before the debate, during an hour-long local discussion at the Carver library, where mostly black participants were talking about race and society. The consensus seemed to be that presidential candidates had been ignoring race until last night's forum, where it was a prominent subject.

My posts are pretty buried at the Media Bloggers site, but you can find them more easily at Extreme Democracy. The early posts were mostly transcriptions of the local conversation. (I was all typed out by the time the forum/debate started.) The group at Carver was lively, intelligent, and often very funny... I'm not sure I captured all that, but it was a great discussion... the televised forum was less compelling.

Photo taken at Carver last night by Mike Aaron. I'm the guy by the screen, wearing a purple tshirt.