Sunbeams illuminating a coastal forest in Port Orford, Oregon

Chuggnutt!

Category: Online

  • Going mainstream

    National Security AgencyShould it bother me that the National Security Agency has a website? Or even stranger, that it has a special website just for kids?

    I mean, we’re talking about a government agency that was once so secretive that “NSA” was supposed to stand for “No Such Agency.” Weird.

    Hmmmm… even weirder, I just noticed that the NSA website is running—of all things—Cold Fusion, and according to Netcraft, it’s actually sitting on Windows Server 2003 and IIS 6.0. What the hell? One of the premier spook agencies of the United States and they’re running Cold Fusion on Windows???

    To further enhance the cognitive dissonance experience, check out question number 16 from the FAQ:

    I’ve seen NSA/CSS in movies and on TV. Do you assassinate people? Do you secretly perform experiments on us?

    Because we work with highly sensitive information, we are frequently the subject of speculation – and highly imaginative and creative fictitious pieces in the media. However, it is important to distinguish fact from fiction. The fact is that the Executive Order 12333 (EO 12333) strictly prohibits any intelligence agency from conducting these unethical activities, and we strictly abide by that Order.

  • Morse code wins!

    I thought this was funny: Morse code trumps SMS in head-to-head speed texting combat.

    93-year-old telegraph operator Gordon Hill delivered a resounding ass-whoopin’ to his rival, 13-year-old Brittany Devlin, using Morse Code.

    Man, there’s retro, and there’s retro.

  • Vermont Country Store

    A follow-up to my Scrapple post the other day: that post was inspired by a catalog for the Vermont Country Store (“Purveyors of the Practical & Hard-To-Find”) that inexplicably appeared on the desk of a co-worker last week. It’s a neat store, and I like the website; they sell all sorts of quality, unusual, nostalgic, and/or useful things like this Uncle Sam Bank (I had one of those!) or this Vacuum Coffee Maker or, yes, a Can of Scrapple.

  • Bend Bulletin article: Tech Town

    The Bend Bulletin (our local newspaper) has an interesting article online today: Tech Town, a profile of the local computer/tech industry and how it’s pulling “young, technically savvy people” to the area.

    The conventional wisdom is that Bend is a great place to retire, but increasingly it is a great place for young, technically savvy people to live and work, too.

    Bend officials envision an industrial park and university campus at the north end of town. The so-called Juniper Ridge project could become the cornerstone of an invigorated regional economy based on science, engineering and innovation.

    If those companies materialize as planned, they will bring even more skilled workers to the region, workers like Marshall Simmonds, Morgan O’Neal and [Chris] Reese.

    All three pointed to the character of Bend and outdoor recreation as drawing and keeping them here. That foundation, they said, makes the region ripe for new technology companies that will need to attract talented young workers.

    The three people they profile are Chris Reese, technical director for Sony Bend (whom I’ve blogged about before); Morgan O’Neal (“a throwback to some of the early entrepreneurs of computing and the Internet. He has little formal training in technology”—is the Bulletin trying to be complimentary here? jeez), web developer with my old employer, Alpine Internet; and Marshall Simmonds, vice president of Enterprise Search Marketing for The New York Times Company by way of About.com. That’s a pretty diverse group, considering.

    Still, it’s not entirely news that Bend is a high-tech region; technology is one of the industries that’s been growing like a weed for at least a decade (along with tourism) since the older industries like logging have been waning. Even so, this part is intriguing:

    City officials and local business leaders for the last few years talked about bringing more high-tech companies to the community. Most recently, the city has been eyeing the Juniper Ridge project as a potential home for such businesses.

    The first phase of Juniper Ridge development is already in the works, the city having annexed 500 acres it owns on the northeast edge of town. The city will select a master developer for the project, but the council is working with the region’s legislative delegation in Salem to site a four-year university there that can complement a contemplated high-tech industrial park.

    Almost sounds like the play Klamath Falls made for high tech (“Silicon Basin,” anyone?)—the difference being, of course, that Bend is already supporting a viable tech industry. But what’s this about a university? Ah, I see from this Bend.com press release that it appears to be for OSU-Cascades and possibly Cascades Academy of Central Oregon. Interesting.

  • Historic photos of Pacific City

    While researching something about Pacific City, Oregon, I came across the Pacific City Oregon Visitor’s Guide which has some links to a bunch of extremely neat historical photographs. I like Pacific City quite a lot, not just because of the Pelican Pub & Brewery, but also because it’s the quintessential small Oregon coast town (like Bandon, another town I really like). And the Dory boats are cool.

    Links to Pacific City history, historic photos, more photos, and historic Dory photos.

  • Brandon Bird Paintings

    My brother finds the best links. Check out artist Brandon Bird, who produces unique and totally random (in a wacked-out way) art work; I particularly like his paintings page. You have to click through and view them. That’s an order.

    I rather like the painting of Christopher Walken building Optimus Prime in the garage, I mean that’s just weird. Or the one named “Two Warriors Come Out of the Sky”, that one has to be seen to be believed.

  • New Bend.com

    I’ve noticed over the past few days that Bend.com finally has that new design Barney was talking about back around the end of the year. Overall, I think it looks 1000% better than before, albeit not quite perfect (the RSS feed appears to be broken, no user comments at the bottom of the articles…).

    However. Since Barney left, I think they are in serious need of an editor; I did a screen grab of the Press Release headlines, because something went horribly awry:

    Innapropriate press release headline found on Bend.com

    There is just so much wrong with that headline, it’s not even funny.

    Well, it’s a little funny. :)

  • Sklar on Google Toolbar

    David Sklar, a PHP programmer/author I respect, has a post on his blog on the Google Toolbar controversy. Sklar joins the voices of reason on this, few and far between though we may be. It’s a good post, worth the read, but I think his opening and closing sentences are the kickers:

    Why do folks who want the freedom to remix content as they see fit get their digital dander up when other people remix their own content? …

    The most important issue is recognizing that we all have to give up the control over our content that many of us demand of Big Media Corporations.

    That’s the key, I think; of all those crying foul over the Toolbar, almost every single one that I’ve read is entirely hypocritical in that they don’t want the Toolbar to change their content even though they themselves engage in exactly this same thing with other people’s content.

  • Google’s AutoLink

    Lots of invective and rhetoric being written about Google‘s new Toolbar functionality, AutoLink. Originally I probably wasn’t going to write anything about it, it’s really such a non-issue, but I’m growing irritated by the number of bloggers—mostly A-listers—who are speaking out against it. I’m not irritated as a knee-jerk reaction in defense of Google, but because most of what I’m reading is just plain wrong.

    Quick background: Google’s new Toolbar (which is in beta, only runs on Internet Explorer for Windows and which you have to knowingly install to use) has a new function called “AutoLink” which, when manually invoked, searches for certain types of text on a web page and will automagically turn them into links, if there weren’t any links there already. The type of text it search for seems to be:

    • Addresses. These will create links to Google Maps.
    • ISBN numbers. These will create links to the product-specific page on Amazon.
    • Shipping tracking numbers.
    • Vehicle ID numbers (VINs).

    Right off, I have to say I agree 100% with what Cory Doctorow wrote about this on Boing Boing:

    It’s not a service I’d use, but I believe that it’s the kind of service that is vital to the Web’s health. The ability of end-users to avail themselves of tools that decomopose and reassemble web-pages to their tastes is an issue like inlining, framing, and linking: it’s a matter of letting users innovate at the edge.

    I think I should be able to use a proxy that reformats my browsing sessions for viewing on a mobile phone; I think I should be able to use a proxy that finds every ISBN and links it to a comparison-shopping-engine’s best price for that book across ten vendors. I think I should be able to use a proxy that auto-links every proper noun to the corresponding Wikipedia entry.

    And so on — it’s my screen, and I should be able to control it; companies like Google and individuals should be able to provide tools and services to let me control it.

    Of all the sites I read, I think this was the lone voice of reason on the topic. Instead, you have people like Robert Scoble and Dave Winer calling this “evil” and a “slippery slope” that will lead to the end of the web as we know it and mass censorship by Google.

    I’m not kidding. This is what Winer wrote:

    And if links are changeable, is text subject to change as well? Might Google correct our spelling? Or might they correct our thinking? Where is the line?…

    What’s next? Could they link it to Gmail, and where ever the name of a Gmail user appears in a page, change it to a mailto link so you can send them mail? If you’re in the widget business, might they change the links to your widgets to links to your competitors’ widgets? (Aren’t they already doing that to Barnes and Noble?) Would they add discussion software so that any Internet user can mark up your page with their comments, no matter how inane or immature?…

    The AutoLink feature is the first step down a treacherous slope, that could spell the end of the Web as a publishing environment with integrity, and an environment where commerce can take place.

    What’s funny is that email programs already autolink email addresses and web addresses—often wrong, I might add—in messages I get. And—get this—on any blog with comment functionality on it (like mine), users can already mark up that page with their comments.

    (A note on the Barnes and Noble reference, though—yes, AutoLink does link a plain ISBN on Barnes and Noble’s site to Amazon. I confirmed it myself. Personally, I find it rather amusing; I know B&N will successfully lobby to get this fixed, so I’m not worried about it.)

    And here’s some of what Scoble’s written:

    I believe that anything that changes the linking behavior of the Web is evil. Anything that changes my content is evil. Particularly anything that messes with the integrity of the link system. And I do see this as a slippery slope….

    The fundamental building block of the Web is linking. Linking is MY EDITORIAL CONTENT….

    My editorial is sacrosanct. Linking is editorial.

    Ironically, Scoble runs a linkblog where he reposts other authors’ blog entries, with his name highlighted, and adds a “Related” and “Comments” link to other people’s writing even as he writes the above.

    It’s even more ironic that people like these guys who are all about innovation and are outspoken user advocates would come off like this. I see a “slippery slope” all right, but it’s going the other way.

    How? Well, AutoLink is basically simplifying this process:

    1. Highlighting a piece of text on a web page (like an address).
    2. Opening a new browser window, going to Google (or MapQuest or Amazon, etc.).
    3. Pasting that copied text into the search box, and clicking the search button.
    4. Done.

    No one should object to doing this, right? Well, the way I’m reading many of these arguments, pretty soon they will be. There’s the slippery slope, pretty soon the “content producers” are going to object because you might be using their text to search somewhere else on the web. So, let’s ban copying text from the browser. But wait, someone could just retype the text in without copying-and-pasting. Better take away the users’ keyboards so they don’t infringe on your content.

    See? It’s a fun game.

    The arguments almost all object to a third-party tool changing the content of their web pages by adding links. Okay, but what about the many pre-existing toolbars, plugins, extensions, and browsers themselves that already do this? Hell, the ability to do this is even built into the browser—you can turn off images, JavaScript, and stylesheets, and I guarantee doing that will alter the content of many, many sites—I’ve developed sites myself that depend on JavaScript and/or images, so I’m not exaggerating. This is a ridiculous argument.

    In fact, the only good argument I’ve seen comes from Rogers Cadenhead: the copyright issue. By essentially altering a work (a web page, in this case) that is copyrighted for public consumption, the AutoLink feature may be in fact violating the copyright of that page. That’s a reasonable, intelligent argument and is something that should be addressed.

    Until then, jeez. C’mon people, like Cory said, it’s healthy for the web. It’s innovation. Instead of whining about it, why not be productive? I’ve seen suggestions for an opt-out feature on web pages, that’s a good start; make it a META tag.

    Or what about this? Make the toolbar smart enough to not change copyrighted pages, only those that are using an appropriate Creative Commons license, or are public domain. How would it know? META tags, again; Creative Commons licenses already embed RDF inside the content, so it’s not a stretch.

    In fact, this is a good incentive to do something I’ve been meaning to do for awhile: convert my blogs over to Creative Commons copyrights. I personally have no qualms about toolbars or other software altering my content for a particular user’s display, so I’ll make it totally legal for them to do so. Within the week.

    In the meantime, everyone complaining—take a breath and get over yourselves.

  • Wikipedia’s unusual articles

    One of my new favorite Wikipedia pages is the Unusual articles list. You gotta love that. Where else could you learn about such things as Heribert Illig, a German historian crank who claims the Dark Ages didn’t exist and the years 614 to 911 AD are invented? Or that some guy legally changed his name to Optimus Prime, after the Transformers character? Or that the smallest park in the world is in Portland, Oregon?