The old kingdom is a pattern of centralized information, command, and control. Businesses, governments, and even the very fabric of the web (more on this in a moment) are composed of gatekeepers and those seeking access. Our attention and labor has been aggregated, funneled and taxed by those in power for generations. The truth of this pattern is as old as civilization, as old as human culture. We are a society of unwitting drones.
Tag: web/tech
Communication is Free, Spam Filters Cost Money
The cost of exchanging a message is the time of its composition, and the attention of its recipient(s). Modern mobile devices are capable of sending and receiving information over ad hoc networks, and distributed software is capable of routing the data, therefore the cost of sending and receiving additional messages is near zero (power). The added value of a middle tier which merely bottlenecks connectivity is forced to zero.
Simons Mall Free WiFi Killed my Gmail Account
It was early in the morning as I walked the perimeter of the mall to avoid the remnants of the tropical storm that rolled through the north east this week. As usual I connected to the free WiFi graciously provided by Simons Mall, but there was one subtle difference. The log in screen had changed requesting my name and email address or cell phone number. Not quite awake I entered my actual email address and connected, completely unaware that I had just unleashed Lovecraftian horrors out of Pandora’s Box.
Hacking Education One Video at a Time
Although I’d heard of the Khan Academy before, at the time I chocked it up to one super motivated guy making videos. I never thought that perhaps the model Salman Khan was using could revitalize US education.
Moving to a Cloud of One (Company) is a Single Point Failure
Now while the following story by Dylan M. (@ThomasMonopoly) appears to have fabricated several facts (Matt Cutts shares some insight on HackerNews), it’s worth revisiting how many digital eggs you put into one basket. My issue is not with the veracity of the events, but in how plausible they are.
How much do you rely on someone else for your digital identity?
At 3am I rolled over in bed and had a passing thought:
What if my gmail account was permanently inaccessible?
Enough with the Dead End Apps
In the tech world there’s a surreal level of hype surrounding mobile and tablet applications. The source of the hype wave comes from users, developers, and even investors. But mobile is just one edge or surface of network applications, and it’s thin valued novelty will quickly wane. It’s frustrating to see the majority of developer creativity and energy going into dead end apps which pander to the lowest common denominator.
In the Age of Apps Embrace Digital Refunds
The concept of a refund goes far back in the history of bartering. The concept is simple enough, make a trade you’re not satisfied with and you can count on a full or partial refund. Untested or novel products experience greater liquidity when packaged with a reliable refund. There are variations on the refund such as try before you buy, but they offer the same promise.
Songify delights as a mobile app
Add…
- one part nonsense
- two parts mobile voice recorder and portable synthesizer
- a silly but popular vocal effect
- a handful of simple algorithms to sample and partition a recording
- one part mini game to blindly time your lyrics to the automated loops
- and a team sharp enough to recognize and build a micro business
Inconsistent Standards or When Feeds Fail
One of the biggest time sinks I encountered while hacking the CoffeeScript Tracker 0.0 was errors with response data. The CoffeeScript that hit dedicated APIs for the most part just worked, and the closer the interaction was to pure RESTful http the better. But problems arose when querying rss and atom feeds due to inconsistencies between the formats.