PageSourceSearch

https://idallen.com/

html idallen.com collected 2026-10-02 05:02:02 UTC 67,553 bytes, 1,447 lines download raw bytes

1<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC
2  "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
3    "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
4<html lang="en">
5<head>
6    <link rel="shortcut icon" href="/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon">
7    <link rel="stylesheet" href="ianstyles001.css" type="text/css">
8    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
9    <meta name="Author" content="[email protected] (Ian! D. Allen)">
10    <title>Ian! D. Allen - Personal Home Page</title>
11</head>
12
13<body>
14<table summary="Two-column page layout table">
15<tbody>
16<tr>
17    <th class="topleftblock">
18	<img alt="DR LINUX Ontario car license plate"
19	src="images/drlinux.jpg" height="78" width="116">
20    </th>
21    <td class="toprightblock">
22	<h1 style="float: left">
23	    Ian! D. Allen
24	    &nbsp;
25	    <a href="http://www.gc.ca/main_e.html"><img src="canflag.png" alt="Canadian Flag" height="26" width="50"></a>
26	    <br>
27    Personal Home Page</h1>
28	<span class="updated">
29	    Updated:
30	    
31	    2023-11-16 23:17 EST
32	</span>
33    </td>
34</tr>
35<tr>
36    <td class="leftblock">
37	<ul class="leftlist">
38	<li class="leftbottom">
39	<a href="resume/">R&#233;sum&#233;</a>
40	</li>
41	<li class="leftbottom">
42	<a href="teaching">Teaching</a>
43	</li>
44	<li class="leftbottom">
45	<a href="http://contactimprov.ca/">Contact Improv</a>
46	</li>
47	<li class="leftbottom">
48	<a href="http://someassemblyrequired.ca/">Theatre Improv</a>
49	</li>
50	<li class="leftbottom">
51	<a href="http://www.facebook.com/people/Ian_D_Allen/122608521">Facebook</a>
52	</li>
53	<li class="leftbottom">
54	<a href="ncf/">old Free-Net web</a>
55	</li>
56	<li class="leftbottom">
57	<a href="sympatico/">old Sympatico web</a>
58	</li>
59	<li class="leftbottom">
60	<a href="topposting.html">Top Posting</a>
61	</li>
62	<li class="leftbottom">
63	<a href="command_line_vs_gui.txt">Command Line vs.
64	<acronym title="Graphical User Interface">GUI</acronym></a>
65	</li>
66	<li class="leftbottom">
67	<a href="openformats.html">Open Formats (HTML)</a>
68	</li>
69	<li class="leftbottom">
70	<a href="openformats.txt">Open Formats (text)</a>
71	</li>
72	<li class="leftbottom">
73	<a href="ncf/english.html">Pronouncing English</a>
74	</li>
75	</ul>
76	<hr>
77	<span class="jumpdown">Jump down to:</span>
78	<ul class="jumpdownlist">
79	<li class="jumpdownli">
80	<a href="#contact">Contact Improv Dance</a>
81	</li>
82	<li class="jumpdownli">
83	<a href="#desktop">Home Office Desktop</a>
84	</li>
85	<li class="jumpdownli">
86	<a href="#snippets">Quotations and Snippets</a>
87	</li>
88	</ul>
89    </td>
90
91    <td class="rightblock">
92    <img style="float:right; margin-left:1em; margin-bottom:1em; border-radius: 25%; border: 0.5em solid red;" src="images/ian_chertsey_2010.jpg" width="285" height="429" alt="Photo of Ian! D. Allen by Justin Burr">
93
94    <h2>Places Lived</h2>
95    <div class="indent">
96    <p>Hello, I'm Ian Allen, Ian D. Allen, and often Ian! Allen or Ian!
97    D. Allen too. (All those combinations are for the search engines.)
98    </p>
99    <p>
100    I was born in Ottawa [Canada] and have lived in Deep River
101    [Ontario], Pointe Claire [Quebec], St.Lucia [West Indies], Toronto
102    [Ontario], Hillsburgh (The Everdale Place School Community) [Ontario],
103    and Waterloo [Ontario].
104    </p>
105    <p>I now live in Ottawa [Ontario] since 1992.
106    </p>
107    </div>
108
109<!-- Stack Echange, Mastodon, Tip Jar Block -->
110<div align="center" style="width: 40%; padding: 0.5em; margin: 0.5em ; border: 0.5em double green ; border-radius: 10%">
111<p>
112<a href="http://stackexchange.com/users/2025988">
113<img src="http://stackexchange.com/users/flair/2025988.png" width="208" height="58" alt="profile for Ian D. Allen on Stack Exchange, a network of free, community-driven Q&amp;A sites" title="profile for Ian D. Allen on Stack Exchange, a network of free, community-driven Q&amp;A sites">
114</a>
115</p>
116<p>
117<a rel="me" href="https://mastodon.sdf.org/@idallen">
118<img style="width: 50%" alt="Mastodon" src="images/mastodon-wordmark-black-text.svg">
119</a>
120<br>
121<b><tt>@[email protected]</tt></b>
122</p>
123<p>
124IDAllen Tip Jar:
125<script type="application/javascript" src="https://liberapay.com/idallen/widgets/button.js"></script>
125
126<noscript><div><a href="https://liberapay.com/idallen/donate"><img alt="Donate using Liberapay" src="https://liberapay.com/assets/widgets/donate.svg"></a></div></noscript>
127</p>
128</div>
129
130    <h2>Teaching</h2>
131    <div class="indent">
132	<p>
133	I was employed full-time as a Professor of Information and
134	Communications technologies (ICT) at
135	<a href="http://www.algonquincollege.com/">Algonquin College</a>
136	in Ottawa from December 1996 through June 2019.
137	I had to resign from teaching on June 30, 2019 because I was
138	being forced to teach night courses that conflicted with my
139	personal life.
140	</p>
141	<p>The web pages for my College teaching course notes are on both
142	<a href="http://teaching.idallen.com/"><strong>teaching.idallen.com</strong></a>
143	and
144	<a href="http://teaching.idallen.org/"><strong>teaching.idallen.org</strong></a>.</p>
145<!-- UNUSED
146    <p>I also maintain backup copies of my teaching web site.
147    Don't use <a href="backup.html">the backup site</a>. Use the above
148    links instead.</p>
149UNUSED -->
150    </div>
151
152<!-- UNUSED
153<h2>Search this Site (badly)</h2>
154<div class="indent">
155
156This is a terrible search engine.  It doesn't find short words or
157numbers.  Use it if you find it useful.
158<p>
159<form action="/cgi-sys/entropysearch.cgi" target=searchwindow>
160Search Query <input type="text" name="query" value="">
161<input type="hidden" name="user" value="idallen">
162<input type="hidden" name="basehref" value="http://idallen.com">
163<input type="hidden" name="template" value="default">
164<input type="submit" value="Search">
165</form>
166</p>
167</div>
168UNUSED -->
169
170<h2>Dance and Movement</h2>
171    <div class="indent">
172<p>
173I'm a big fan of ecstatic dance, 5 Rhythms dance, and other barefoot boogies,
174<a href="#contact">contact improvisation dance</a>,
175and
176<a href="http://www.facebook.com/CreativeDanceandMovementOttawaGatineau">Creative Dance and Movement Events</a> in general.
177</p>
178<p>
179Poet TS Eliot reads from <a href="https://www.themarginalian.org/2015/11/18/t-s-eliot-reads-burnt-norton/"><i>Burnt Norton</i></a> (from "Four Quartets").
180Excerpt:
181</p>
182<blockquote>
183    <pre>
184     At the still point of the turning world.
185     Neither flesh or fleshless;
186     Neither from nor towards;
187     at the still point, there the dance is,
188     But neither arrest nor movement.
189     And do not call it fixity,
190     Where past and future are gathered.
191     Neither movement from nor towards,
192     Neither ascent nor decline.
193     Except for the point, the still point,
194     There would be no dance,
195     and there is only the dance.
196     I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where.
197     And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time.
198    </pre>
199</blockquote>
200    </div>
201
202<!-- UNUSED
203Here's a calendar of various Creative Dance and Movement Events in my world:
204<a href="http://sites.google.com/site/creativedanceottawa/">Creative Dance and Movement Events</a> in general.
205<iframe src="http://www.google.com/calendar/embed?src=rqohq0213uhhviv0gmkjlsc62k%40group.calendar.google.com&ctz=America/New_York" style="border: 0" width="800" height="600" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"></iframe>
206UNUSED -->
207
208<h2>USENET Postings (back to 1981)</h2>
209<div class="indent">
210<p>I've posted to Usenet News Groups since they first appeared at
211the University of Waterloo in the early 1980's. My userid
212<strong><tt>idallen</tt></strong> was unique on USENET up until 1995. The
213links below show you all my USENET postings and some other stuff (post 1995)
214that isn't me.
215</p>
216</div>
217<ul>
218<!--
219<li><a href="http://groups.google.com/groups?as_oq=idallen&amp;as_drrb=b&amp;as_mind=1&amp;as_minm=1&amp;as_miny=1981&amp;as_maxd=1&amp;as_maxm=1&amp;as_maxy=1995&amp;as_scoring=d&amp;filter=0">
220idallen USENET postings 1981 - 1994</a>.</li>
221<li><a href="http://groups.google.com/groups?as_oq=%22idallen@cgl%22%20%22idallen@math%22%20%22idallen@idallen%22%20%22idallen@freenet%22&amp;as_drrb=b&amp;as_mind=1&amp;as_minm=1&amp;as_miny=1995&amp;as_maxd=31&amp;as_maxm=12&amp;as_maxy=2008&amp;as_scoring=d&amp;filter=0">
222<li><a href="http://groups.google.com/groups/search?q=idallen&amp;qt_s=Search&amp;as_drrb=b&amp;as_mind=1&amp;as_minm=1&amp;as_miny=1981&amp;as_maxd=1&amp;as_maxm=1&amp;as_maxy=1995">
223idallen USENET postings 1981 - 1994</a>.</li>
224<li><a href="http://groups.google.com/groups/search?q=idallen@cgl+OR+idallen@idallen+OR+idallen@freenet+OR+idallen@ncf+OR+idallen@math&amp;qt_s=Search&amp;as_drrb=b&amp;as_mind=1&amp;as_minm=1&amp;as_miny=1995&amp;as_maxd=31&amp;as_maxm=12&amp;as_maxy=2008">
225idallen USENET postings 1995 to present</a>.</li>
226-->
227<li><a href="http://groups.google.com/forum/#!search/idallen|sort:relevance">
228idallen USENET postings 1981 - present</a>.</li>
229</ul>
230
231<h2>Links</h2>
232<ul>
233    <li>Contact Ian!: <a href="mailto:[email protected]?subject=from_idallen_web">[email protected]</a></li>
234    <li>Ian!s Resume: <a href="resume/">r&#233;sum&#233;</a></li>
235<li>Some of Ian!s <a href="oclug/">Unix/Linux talks</a></li>
236<li>Ottawa Contact Improvisation Dance has <a href="http://contactimprov.ca/on/ottawa/">drop-in class/jam nights</a>.</li>
237<li>Ottawa Theatre Improv drop-in workshops are at <a href="http://someassemblyrequired.ca/">SomeAssemblyRequired.ca</a>.</li>
238<li>My Ottawa FreeNet home page is closed; but, you can see what it <a href="ncf/">used to contain</a>.</li>
239<li>My Sympatico home page is closed; but, you can see what it <a href="sympatico/">used to contain</a>.</li>
240<li>Weather in Ottawa, CANADA: <a href="http://www.weatheroffice.gc.ca/city/pages/on-118_metric_e.html">official</a>
241and <a href="http://ottawa.weatherstats.ca/">summary</a></li>
242<li><a href="http://www.worldofends.com/">What the Internet Is and
243How to Stop Mistaking It for Something Else</a></li>
244<li><a href="http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/">How big
245brother and big media can put the Internet genie back in the
246bottle</a></li>
247<li>The <a href="http://www.indiangeek.net/wp-content/uploads/Programmer%20competency%20matrix.htm">Programmer Competency Matrix</a> and an <a href="programmer_competency_matrix.html">Alternate (old) Copy</a>
248</li>
249<li><a href="http://xkcd.com/">XKCD - A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language</a></li>
250<li><a href="fans.html">How NOT to use fans to cool a room</a></li>
251</ul>
252</td>
253</tr>
254</tbody>
255</table>
256
257<div><a name="contact"></a></div>
258<h2>Contact Improvisation Dance</h2>
259<div class="indent">
260<p>
261   Discover  and  practice  the  science  and  playground that is 
262<a href="http://contactimprov.ca/">Contact Improvisation</a>.
263   Strengthen  your  body, open your mind and awaken your
264   instincts.   Explore sensory and physical experiments of shared touch,
265   weight,  gravity and momentum and expand into three-dimensional space,
266   spontaneous  composition,  trust and risk.   Engage in scores and open
267   dancing  and  experience  serious  play  -  matching wits and methods,
268   sharing  common  ground  and  sudden miracles - by surrendering to and
269   shaping  the  dance  in the moment.  Be ready for joint creations with
270   formal  and  open  structures and games, scores and scenarios ranging from
271   the whimsical to poetic, cooperative to aggressive, simple to complex.
272   (Knee pads are recommended.)
273</p>
274</div>
275
276<div><a name="consensus"></a></div>
277<h2>Formal Consensus: Values-based Decision Making</h2>
278<div class="indent">
279<ul>
280<li>
281<a href="http://www.consensus.net/">Values-based Consensus Home Page</a></li>
282<li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJMOx8KK_fM">OPN Interview with CT Butler, Author and Activist, on Values Based Decision Making</a>
283</li>
284</ul>
285</div>
286
287<div><a name="desktop"></a></div>
288<h2>Home Office Desktop</h2>
289<div class="indent">
290<img alt="Ian!s office" width="400" height="300" src="images/desk_sml.jpg">
291<p>
292This is where I work, at home.
293&nbsp;
294[<a href="images/desk_med.jpg">800x600 [229 KB]</a>]
295&nbsp;
296[<a href="images/desk_big.jpg">2815x2112 [2.5 MB]</a>}
297</p>
298<p>
299I'm a Unix/Linux system administrator ("sysadmin").
300I'm a big fan of <a href="http://xkcd.com/"><em>xkcd.com</em></a>
301<br>
302<a href="http://xkcd.com/">
303<img alt="Sysadmin Comic from XKCD" width="638" height="247"
304  src="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/devotion_to_duty.png">
305</a>
306</p>
307</div>
308
309<div><a name="snippets"></a></div>
310<h2>Quotations and Snippets</h2>
311<div class="indent">
312<p>
313    <b>Principles only mean something if you stick by them when they
314    are inconvenient.</b> -- "Laine Hanson" (played by Joan Allen)
315    from the movie "The Contender"
316</p>
317
318<p>
319"It takes two people to make a relationship difficult, but it
320takes only one person to make a relationship better."       
321- Harville Hendrix - http://www.harvillehendrix.com/watch.html
322</p>
323
324<p>
325For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.
326--&nbsp;H.L.&nbsp;Mencken
327</p>
328
329<p>
330"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary
331depends upon his not understanding it!" - Upton Sinclair (1935)
332</p>
333
334<p>
335"How can I tell you what I think until I've heard what I say?"
336</p>
337
338<p>
339The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to
340change; the realist adjusts the sails. - William Arthur Ward
341</p>
342
343<p>
344The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him...
345The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All
346progress depends on the unreasonable man. - George Bernard Shaw
347</p>
348
349<p>
350Issues with nuclear power are similar to GMO's. The problem isn't the
351science, but the inability of our governance structures to manage the
352complexities and the risks when mismanaged. After watching the C-11
353committee hearings my belief in the ability of our governments to make
354sane decisions about technology is even lower than it was before, and
355I've always been an opponent of nuclear power and GMO's for governance
356reasons. The lack of basic science and technology literacy in government
357is extreme: I think they believe Harry Potter was a documentary.
358- Russel McOrmond, http://www.digital-copyright.ca/node/5449
359</p>
360
361<p>
362The situation is quite likely urgent.  We may be near a tipping point.
363In a complex system, the only way to identify a tipping point is from
364the other side.  The only thing we know for certain is that the longer
365we wait the more likely we are to pass one.  If we continue operating
366according to our sabre-tooth-tiger reflex, where we need to see the
367danger big, violent, and immediate, before we react, we may be doomed,
368because at that point in a complex system when the danger is big,
369violent, and immediate, probably no action would be sufficient.
370<br>
371--&nbsp;Greg&nbsp;Craven (wonderingmind42)
372<br>
373<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twRbGD4zq0s">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twRbGD4zq0s</a>
374<!-- UNUSED
375<br>
376<a href="http://manpollo.org/">http://manpollo.org/</a>
377<br>
378<a href="http://gregcraven.org/">http://gregcraven.org/</a>
379UNUSED -->
380</p>
381
382<p>
383[On dismantling the national child care programme:]
384Giving a family money (tax credits) isn't the same as building social
385infrastructure.  We improve roads; we don't give people tax credits to
386allow them to buy thicker and thicker tires.  -Ian!
387</p>
388
389<p>
390"The main thing to understand about systemic racism is that trying
391to assign individual fault and guilt misses the point. Saying that a
392problem is systemic means that it doesn’t reduce to good guys and bad
393guys. Something in the structure of institutions pits well-meaning people
394against each other, and there’s no way to resolve the issue without
395hurting somebody.  [...]  That conflict is entirely artificial: [...]
396Things just wound up that way. And while we could go round and round
397about the intentions of the people who started it all, that’s just
398a distraction, because they’re dead. We’re not a jury discussing
399their punishment; we’re heirs trying to sort out their legacy.  [...]
400The point isn’t to assess blame or demand that people feel guilty or
401apologize. The point is to make the injustice stop. Change the structure
402of things so that well-meaning people are no longer drafted into an
403artificial conflict."
404--&nbsp;https://weeklysift.com/2021/07/26/the-cleveland-indians-guardians-a-teachable-moment/
405</p>
406
407<p>
408What Charles Darwin taught us about human origins is fully accepted in the
409conveniently compartmentalised science of biology; but, the implications
410for human history, modern society, economics, etc. we are not facing up
411to: the fact that they are all deeply rooted in our primitive, animal
412nature, which is incapable of understanding or adapting to the need
413for limits, so vital for achieving sustainability on our finite and
414vulnerable planet.
415--&nbsp;http://www.spaceship-earth.org/PoS/Plundering_of_a_planet.htm
416</p>
417
418<p>
419In the modern world it is perfectly normal for lots of people to make
420extensive use of a car and fly off on holiday once or twice a year. Our
421biological programming and social conditioning thus respond by telling
422us that it must be okay for us to do so as well. On the other hand, our
423recently acquired, more enlightened, human nature (e.g. our intellect,
424in its literal sense) tells us that what may be of little consequence
425for our planet when just a few (million) people do it, is likely to have
426catastrophic consequences if 100's or 1000's of millions of people do
427the same thing.
428
429In the past, playing safe for the best chances of survival, meant
430following the norm and doing what most other people did. But that has
431now changed. In the modern world, such behaviour has become a threat to
432our survival.
433--&nbsp;http://www.spaceship-earth.org/PoS/Uncommon_sense.htm
434</p>
435
436<p>
437It is in the nature of living things to overrun their habitats unless
438checked, possession of a forebrain and opposable thumbs does not
439exempt humans from this. If anything it means that the "check" will
440come very late and harshly, and that our collective response will c
440ome
441too late when alternatives are few.
442--&nbsp;Paul&nbsp;Vixie,
443http://fm.vix.com/terra/climate/iberian-drought-2005.html
444</p>
445
446<p>
447Technical workers are problem solvers; so, don't become a problem.
448If management policies or rules are perceived by technical workers
449as a hurdle to getting work done, they will come up with creative
450ways to work around the "management problem".
451--&nbsp;Advice from eWeek to managers of technical staff in early 2006.
452</p>
453
454<p>
455It is less useful to think of the child is an immature adult than it
456is to think of the adult as an atrophied child - Keith Johnstone 
457</p>
458
459<p>
460Being chronologically challenged, I have been in this game for too long,
461written too many briefs, and been on too many delegations to Ottawa to
462address various Commons committees to be sanguine about saying, "The
463poor dears need some more knowledge. If they only knew what I know,
464the world would be a better place to live."
465One begins most of these civic journeys with the idea that those in
466power are well-intentioned but ill-informed, and I am sorry to say
467that many of us ended up by saying that those in power are very
468well-informed but ill-intentioned.
469They (the politicians) have no intention of doing what I might
470consider the right and appropriate thing.
471--&nbsp;Professor Emeritus Ursula Franklin, University of Toronto,
472quoted in CCPA Monitor, March 1997.
473http://wsp.bctf.ca/bctfnews/archive/1996-97/1997-06-18.html
474</p>
475
476<p>
477There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."
478-- Isaac Asimov
479http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/456687-there-is-a-cult-of-ignorance-in-the-united-states
480</p>
481
482<p>
483In the way that scepicism is sometimes applied to issues of public concern, there is a tendency to belittle, to condescend, to ignore the fact that, deluded or not, supporters of superstition and pseudoscience are human beings with real feelings, who, like sceptics, are trying to figure out how the world works and what our role in it might be. Their motives are in many cases consonant with science. If their culture has not given them all the tools they need to pursue this great quest, let us temper our criticism with kindness. None of us comes fully equipped.
484-- Carl Sagan http://metousiosis.com/2012/11/17/carl-sagan-quote-5/
485</p>
486
487<p>
488The skillful ability to move is at the very core of what it is to be a
489conscious perceiving agent.  [...]  The capacity to move and the capacity
490to see are interwoven.  [...]  The world comes into focus as a kind of
491dynamic of trying to make sense of it.  [...]  The way I think about
492what human consciousness is, in a way, it's dance.
493--&nbsp;Alva&nbsp;Noë
494<br>
495http://seedsfestival.ning.com/video/video/show?id=2217980%3AVideo%3A75
496</p>
497
498<p>
499From my ongoing inquiry into what's needed in order to cultivate clear
500boundaries, I've developed a workshop called "101 Ways to Say No to
501Contact Improvisation." The premise of the workshop is that until a
502person has the confidence and ability to say no to something, he or she
503won't have the trust and capacity to fully say yes to it. In the
504workshop, we explore physical and verbal skills to say no to dances, to
505touch, to being lifted, to weight exchange, to momentum, to manipulation.
506--&nbsp;Martin Keogh,
507http://www.martinkeogh.com/resources/101WaystoSayNotoContactImprovisation.html
508</p>
509
510<p>
511[2m30s] "I wrote an internal appreciation about that computer [the
512Apple Lisa] in which I said this is a catastrophe.  This is the end of
513language in relation to computers.  This is the implementation of the
514"cave man" interface: you point, and you grunt.  And if we reduce the
515interaction between human beings and computers to pointing and grunting,
516then we miss the role of language in the evolution of human mind and
517human consciousness.  Language is what makes our brains bigger.  If we
518don't use languages to relate to computers, neither their brains nor
519our brains will grow in the way that they are supposed to grow."
520--&nbsp;
520Eben Moglen, Free Software Foundation: www.fsf.org,
521http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKxzK9xtSXM
522</p>
523
524<p>
525Our future ability to communicate freely depends on keeping our
526words in public and open standard formats that are not controlled
527by who can afford to buy the licenses to read them. Do not send me
528any Microsoft Word documents; they are <a href="openformats.txt">too
529expensive</a> to read.  -Ian!
530</p>
531
532<p>
533People think that stealing Microsoft software only hurts Microsoft;
534they're wrong.
535Alas, people aren't going to realize the proprietary bind they've gotten
536themselves into and switch to using free and open-source software until
537they stop stealing all that Microsoft software.  -Ian!
538</p>
539
540<p>
541The difference between free and freedom:
542</p>
543<blockquote>
544<p>
545Whenever I hear people discussing GNU/Linux's prospects for becoming more
546popular, I'm reminded of a comment by Tommy Douglas, the social democrat
547who became a hero for introducing universal health care into Canada. If
548he could press a button and gain a million voters who did not understand
549his policies, he said, then he would not press that button. He meant that
550he was not in politics simply to be elected, but to gain supporters for
551his ideals -- and that he was determined not to lose sight of his long
552term goals while purs[u]ing short term ones.
553</p>
554<p>
555The comment resonates for me because, increasingly, in the rush for
556market share, many people seem to lose sight of the fact that the goal
557of GNU/Linux and free software is not popularity in itself, but the wide
558acceptance of a set of ideals.
559</p>
560<p>
561At its most basic, free software is about helping users gain control of
562their computers so that they can participate unhindered in the digital
563conversations of the networks and the Internet. It's about installing
564software freely, rather than being dictated to by the manufacturer. It's
565about using your computer the way that you want, instead of ceding control
566to lock-down devices installed by software vendors without permission
567on your machine.
568--&nbsp;Bruce Byfield,
569http://www.datamation.com/osrc/article.php/3733286/GNULinux-World-Domination-for-the-Wrong-Reasons.htm
570</p>
571</blockquote>
572
573<p>
574Free and Open Source Software [FOSS] is about making good quality
575software, software that can *DO*
576things. If you want to use it, you're expected to invest time in
577learning how to use it. It was created and given to you, free of
578charge, by people who invested a lot of their own time in it for no
579personal gain. The least you could do to repay their contribution is
580invest a little time of your own before you complain that it doesn't
581work like the parallel Windows software.
582--&nbsp;Dominic Humphries, http://linux.oneandoneis2.org/LNW.htm
583</p>
584
585<p>
586That's actually what's most exciting to me--that, because of the nature
587of these open-source projects, other people can learn from all of the
588things that we're learning here.
589
590In a commercial environment, you usually have proprietary software, it
591is closed source. People see the output, but they don't get to see the
592process. At Mozilla--let's say, Firefox--you can see both the output
593and all the steps that went into it. 
594--&nbsp;Window Snyder,
595http://news.com.com/2008-7355_3-6117896.html
596</p>
597
598<p>
599I think it's important to always carry enough technology to restart
600civilization, should it be necessary.
601--&nbsp;Mark W. Tilden,
602http://www.you-review.net/features/interviews/mark-tilden/1/
603</p>
604
605<p>
606One of the biggest changes in
607politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal.
608It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the
609oval office and in Congress. For the first time in our history,
610ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in Washington. Theology
611asserts propositions that cannot be proven true; ideologues hold
612stoutly to a world view despite being contradicted by what is
613generally accepted as reality. When ideology and theology couple,
614their offspring are not always bad but they are always blind.
615--&nbsp;Bill Moyers,
616http://www.tompaine.com/articles/the_delusional_is_no_longer_marginal.php
617</p>
618
619<p>
620The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth
621of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic
622State itself. That in its essence, is Fascism - ownership of
623government by an individual, by a group, or by any controlling private power.
624--&nbsp;Franklin D. Roosevelt, Message proposing the "Standard Oil"
625Monopoly Investigation, 1938
626</p>
627
628<p>
629One of the things I routinely tell people is that if it's in the news,
630don't worry about it.  By definition, "news" means that it hardly ever
631happens.  If a risk is in the news, then it's probably not worth
632worrying about.  When something is no longer reported -- automobile
633deaths, domestic violence -- when it's so common that it's not news,
634then you should start worrying.  [...]
635(More people are killed every year by pigs than by sharks, which shows
636you how good we are at evaluating risk.)
637--&nbsp;Bruce Schneier,
638http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-0505.html
639</p>
640
641<p>
642The hacker ethic that played such a large part in advancing
643computer science, building gcc, building Linux, indeed building the
644world's computer systems and engineering the biggest peaceful
645economic boom in history, is more than just a thirst for knowledge
646about computers. It's the obsessive belief that knowledge exists to
647be shared, that helping someone by making their computer run better
648(or their air conditioner) is one of life's joys, and that the
649rules that prevent sharing and helping exist to be broken. [...]
650The hero is the one who knows how to fix things, and fixes them --
651despite not being "authorized." The evil is the paperwork we
652construct around ourselves, the forms and regulations that take the
653place of people freely helping each other. -- Jamie (of "Jamie and
654Emmett"), http://slashdot.org/features/00/04/22/0940241.shtml
655</p>
656
657<p>
658The basic difference is this: hackers build things, crackers break them. --
659http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html
660</p>
661
662<p>
663The greater good of our society and our need to educate our
664populous for the benefit of all outweighs the narrow rights of the
665author to get paid in the short term. &nbsp;
666Our society and culture is the infrastructure that facilitates the
667creation of artistic works and therefore we reinvest a small
668portion of these works in the education of our authors so that we
669may have even more and better artistic works in the future.
670--&nbsp;John Lange
671</p>
672
673<p>
674Overprotecting intellectual property is as harmful as underprotecting
675it. Culture is impossible without a rich public domain. Nothing today,
676likely nothing since we tamed fire, is genuinely new: Culture, like
677science and technology, grows by accretion, each new creator building
678on the works of those who came before. Overprotection stifles the
679very creative forces it's supposed to nurture.
680--&nbsp;http://wikiquote.org/wiki/Alex_Kozinski
681</p>
682
683<p>
684The proper balance [in copyright] lies not only in recognizing the
685creator's rights but in giving due weight to their limited nature...
686excessive control by holders of copyrights and other forms of
687intellectual property may unduly limit the ability of the public domain
688to incorporate and embellish creative innovation in the long-term
689interests of society as a whole...
690--&nbsp;Supreme Court of Canada, Théberge v Galerie d'Art du
691PetitChamplain inc (2002) 210 DLR (4th) 385 (SCC) at para 30.
692</p>
693
694<p>
695If you own a house, it's yours until you sell it. But if you
696have a neat idea, or write a fine book, it's yours for only a
697limited period, after which it enters the public domain, where
698everyone can have free and equal access to it. Theoretically, a
699copyright should last just long enough to give people an incentive
700to create and innovate. -- James Surowiecki,
701http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?020121ta_talk_surowiecki
702</p>
703
704<p>
705There's no intrinsic reason why someone should continue to get
706paid for something long, long after the labor they expended on it is
707complete. Architects don't get paid every time someone steps into
708one of their buildings. They're paid to design the building, and
709that's that. The ostensible reason we have patent and copyright
710law is, as the US Constitution says, "to promote the Progress of
711Science and useful Arts." But travesties like the Digital
712Millennium Copyright Act don't promote the progress of science;
713they actively discourage it. So do software and biotechnology patents.
714The patent system was intended to allow inventors to profit for a
715limited time on particular inventions, not to allow huge technology
716companies to put a stranglehold on innovation by patenting every tiny
717advance they make.
718--&nbsp;"The End Of Copyright", Ernest Adams,
719http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20051128/adams_01.shtml
720</p>
721
722<p>
723Viewing creative works as property, however, leads to the presumption
724that they can and should be owned and controlled forever. But as we
725have seen, this is not what the Copyright Clause of the Constitution
726envisions, nor is it consistent with a free society.
727--&nbsp;"The progress of science and useful arts:
728why copyright today threatens intellectual freedom",
729The Free Expression Policy Project,
730http://www.fepproject.org/policyreports/copyright2dintro.html
731</p>
732
733<p>
734The primary rationale for Intellectual Property protection is, first and
735foremost, to promote societal development by encouraging technological
736innovation. The legal monopoly granted to IP owners is an exceptional
737departure from the general principle of competitive markets as the best
738guarantee for securing the interest of society. The rationale for the
739exception is not that extraction of monopoly profits by the innovator
740is, of and in itself, good for society and so needs to be promoted.
741Rather, that properly controlled, such a monopoly, by providing an
742incentive for innovation, might produce sufficient benefits for society
743to compensate for the immediate loss to consumers as a result of the
744existence of a monopoly market instead of a competitive market. Monopoly
745rights, then, granted to IP holders is a special incentive that needs to
746be carefully calibrated by each country, in the light of its own
747circumstances, taking into account the overall costs and benefits of
748such protection.
749--&nbsp;Statement by India at the Inter-Sessional Intergovernmental Meeting on
750a Development Agenda For <acronym title="World Intellectual Property
751Organization">WIPO</acronym>, April 11-13, 2005,
752http://www.digital-copyright.ca/discuss/4756
753</p>
754
755<p>
756Creativity and Innovation always builds on the past.
757The past always tries to control the creativity that builds upon it.
758Free societies enable the future by limiting this power of the past.
759Ours is less and less a free society.
760--&nbsp;Lawrence Lessig,
761http://www.oreillynet.com/lpt/a/2641
762</p>
763
764<p>The U.S. is rapidly on the path to becoming the world's leading
765privacy rogue nation. - Joel Reidenberg
766(http://news.com.com/2100-1023-253826.html)</p>
767
768<p>The problem with privacy is that nobody cares about their
769privacy until after it's been violated. Only when Bill Gates
770discovered that his e-mail could be searched for a message about
771cutting off "Netscape's Air Supply" did he realize the danger in
772logging it. Many people only realize the danger in their records
773when they enter a lawsuit, or a custody battle. They all thought it
774would never happen to them. -- Brad Templeton,
775http://www.templetons.com/brad/gmail.html
776</p>
777
778<p>But, it is no less true that individuals are not free and are
779robbed of dignity if they must go through life knowing that third
780parties, and particularly agents of the state, may at any given
781time be looking over their shoulders monitoring, recording,
782cross-referencing, analyzing and possibly misconstruing everywhere
783they go, everything they do, every human contact, every
784transaction, every communication. &nbsp;
785That is why the fundamental human right of privacy is enshrined
786right alongside the right to be free from racial discrimination in
787the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Privacy is, in the
788resounding words of that distinguished resident of New Brunswick,
789retired Supreme Court Justice G&#233;rard Laforest, "at the heart
790of liberty in the modern state". -- Privacy Commissioner of
791Canada
792</p>
793
794<p>In May 2004, a parliamentary committee recommended changes to
795Canadian copyright law modeled in part on controversial features of
796an American law known as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The
797committee characterized these changes as "responsive to the needs
798of all Canadians". &nbsp;
799The truth is that these proposed changes would drain millions of
800dollars from Canada's provincial education systems, threaten
801national security research and personal privacy, harm Canadian
802culture by enlarging the billion dollar Canadian culture deficit,
803and put Canadian business at a competitive disadvantage.
804http://www.cippic.ca/en/projects-cases/copyright-law-reform/truth.html</p>
805
806<p>A few years back Harold Evans of the London Sunday Times,
807observed that the challenge facing American newspapers "is not to
808stay in business -- it is to stay in journalism." As corporations'
809authoritarian, profit-driven consciousness comes to dominate both
810media and governance, you can expect a lot more serial celebrity
811scandals and even less news on the way things work or anything that
812really counts. -- W. David Kubiak,
813http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0312/S00040.htm
814(See https://medium.com/de-correspondent/optimizing-journalism-for-trust-1c67e81c123 for the same quote.)</p>
815
816<p>
817We have grave concerns about the potential use of <acronym title="Digital Rights Management">DRM</acronym>s by rightholders to
818override existing copyright exceptions," its statement said.
819In the long term, the restrictions would not expire when a work went
820out of copyright, it said, and it may be impossible to trace the
821rights holders by that time.
822"It is probable that no key would still exist to unlock the DRMs,"
823Laca said. "For libraries this is serious."
824"This will fundamentally threaten the longstanding and accepted
825concepts of fair dealing and library privilege and undermine, or even
826prevent, legitimate public good access."
827--&nbsp;http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4675280.stm
828</p>
829
830<p>
831The difference between protecting your Privacy and Digital Rights Management (DRM):
832</p>
833<blockquote>
834<p>
835Privacy: In privacy scenarios there are three types of people: (1) a sender,
836(2) a receiver, and (3) an attacker.
837For example: you want to send your credit-card to an
838online store; an attacker wants to capture the number. Your personal security
839here concerns itself with protecting the integrity and secrecy of a
840message (your number) in transit.
841That act of personal privacy and security makes no attempt to restrict the
842disposition of your credit-card number after it is safely received by the
843store; it merely wants to secure the number in transit to the store by
844protecting it from attackers.
845</p>
846<p>
847Use-restriction (DRM): In DRM use-restriction scenarios, there are only
848two types of people: (1) a sender and (2) a receiver/attacker.
849Remarkably, <em>the receiver is also presumed to be an attacker
850    who is trying to misuse the message</em>.
851In effect, in DRM scenarios, there are only senders and attackers;
852the concept of a friendly "receiver" does not exist.
853I transmit a song to you so that you can listen to it, but I must
854stop you from copying the song, or perhaps stop you from listening to it
855more than you've paid for, or perhaps I must tell your computer to delete
856the song after your license expires.
857To be effective, this kind of DRM use-restriction <em>requires</em> that
858the equipment used to send, carry, and receive the song be totally under
859the sender's control so that the sender can fully control what you can do
860with the senders's song.
861Your computer that receives the sender's DRM content is no longer your
862computer, since for DRM to be effective the computer has to obey the
863sender's commands, not your commands.
864(If you could make your computer ignore the sender's commands, the DRM
865would not be effective.)
866</p>
867<p>
868Understood this way, DRM use-restriction and your personal privacy are
869completely antithetical.
870A computer that is capable of being remotely controlled by a third party
871who is adversarial to its owner is a computer that is capable of
872betraying its owner's personal privacy in numerous ways without the
873owner's consent or knowledge.
874The only way you can protect your privacy is if you control your own computer.
875If you control your computer, DRM can't work.
876</p>
877<p>
878A computer that can <em>never</em> be used to override its owner's wishes
879is by definition a computer that is better at protecting its owner's privacy.
880DRM requires you to give up control of your computer.
881As is often the case in security, increasing the security on one axis
882weakens the security on another.
883</p>
884<p>
885--&nbsp;original idea by Cory Doctorow (modified from original by Ian!)
886</p>
887</blockquote>
888
889
890<p>
891[...] religions are owned; thoughts are owned.
892If everything can be tracked, someone will want to find a way
893to bill for it.
894--&nbsp;Karl Schroeder speaking about his novel "Permanence"
895</p>
896
897<p>
898Should the government be suing Microsoft for violating antitrust laws?
899Perhaps. But doesn't it seem kind of odd for government lawyers to be
900typing Microsoft Word documents about how bad Microsoft is? If the
901federales were serious about increasing competition in the world of
902software it would be much more effective simply to convert government
903operations to open-source software. 
904--&nbsp;http://philip.greenspun.com/humor/bill-gates.html
905</p>
906
907<p>
908Here's what Bill Gates told Microsoft employees in 1991:
909</p>
910<blockquote>
911<p>
912    "If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of
913    today's ideas were invented and had taken out patents, the industry
914    would be at a complete standstill today...A future start-up with no
915    patents of its own will be forced to pay whatever price the giants
916    choose to impose."
917</p>
918</blockquote>
919<p>
920Mr. Gates' secret is out now--he too was a "communist;" he, too,
921recognized that software patents were harmful--until Microsoft became one
922of these giants. Now Microsoft aims to use software patents to impose
923whatever price it chooses on you and me. And if we object, Mr. Gates will
924call us "communists." 
925--&nbsp;Richard Stallman, http://news.com.com/2010-1071-5576230.html
926</p>
927
928<p>
929[E]ven if we pretended that Technical Protection Measures could
930work, we would have to acknowledge that they would be designed to
931enforce the wishes of the privilege holders, not the law. --
932Matthew Skala, http://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/lawpoli/copyright/consultations/otcpymtg.php</p>
933
934<p>One of the criteria of beauty is brevity. Bugs increase more
935than linearly with the size of a program. So, a shorter program
936will also have the very practical benefit of having fewer bugs. --
937Paul Graham,
938http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2004/05/27/paul_graham_interview.html</p>
939
940<p>Having software be Open Source or not is not a technology
941choice, but a methodology choice around the creation of policy. An
942analogy would be to requiring that construction workers [abandon]
943building and safety codes, or suggesting that Government Access to
944Information laws are costly and thus should be abolished. Rational
945people do not suggest that it would be a good decision to save
946money and ignore these codes and critical governance accountability
947measures, but that is the essence what Steve Ballmer is asking
948people to do with software/policy decisions. -- Russell McOrmond
949http://lists.canopener.ca/pipermail/discuss/2004-February/001389.html</p>
950<p>The old Internet had one level, that of human beings, and they
951posted what interested them. Contemporary Internet users may find
952this hard to believe; but, most of the content was free, and
953everyone had something to offer (there were no pure consumers).
954<br>
955--&nbsp;
955Paul Lutus http://www.arachnoid.com/freeware/index.html
956</p>
957
958<p>
959Also, I have dumped Windows and now use Linux exclusively. I got tired
960of being inexorably drawn toward the police-state mentality that Bill
961Gates seems to prefer. Imagine buying a pizza, taking it home, and then
962discovering you have to call the pizza parlor for permission to eat it.
963Then imagine having to call the pizza place again, the next day, in
964order to be allowed to give the leftovers to your cat.  You may object
965to this comparison - after all, Windows isn't a pizza. I agree. A
966pizza is worth more and lasts longer without collapsing.
967<br>
968--&nbsp;Paul Lutus http://www.arachnoid.com/generalfaq/
969</p>
970
971<div class="indent">
972<p>
973The likely path of the Internet is one which finds it more stable but
974less interesting. Its financial transactions will be more trustworthy
975while its range of users' business models will narrow. Its attached
976consumer hardware will be easier to understand and use for purposes
977preconceived by its manufacturers, while being newly off-limits to
978amateur tinkering. Had such a state of affairs evolved by the Internet's
979twenty-fifth anniversary in 1994, it is plausible that many of its
980central uses of today would never have developed, because the software
981that underlies those uses would have been deprived of a platform through
982which to be readily distributed to and accepted by a mass market.
983<br>
984[...]
985<br>
986What is being built as a gated community -- offering safety and stability
987to its residents, and a predictable landlord to whom to complain when
988something goes wrong -- is in fact a prison, one whose confinement is less
989than obvious, since what it blocks is generativity -- the ability to have
990a shot at affecting the future without a regulating party's permission
991or consultation. It blocks the potential for transformative uses yet to
992be invented, a potential that is likely not in the minds of consumers
993when they buy their PCs -- but that they can cherish nonetheless should
994they have a chance to experience it as it unfolds. The network engineers
995will still be able to enjoy generative computing on platforms that do
996not run these operating systems. But the rest of the public will no
997longer automatically be brought along for the ride.
998<br>
999[...]
1000<br>
1001Such systemic barriers are deeply offensive to the values of Internet
1002designers, and they represent a drastic transformation of today's Net
1003from an engine of innovation to little more than interactive cable
1004television.
1005<br>
1006--&nbsp;Jonathan L. Zittrain, The Future of the Internet - and How to Stop It
1007</p>
1008</div>
1009<p>
1010There will come a time when there is nobody left who will sign
1011up for the proposition that yes, indeed, I wanted people not to be
1012able to understand, learn, fix, improve or share the technology
1013that manned their lives because it was making me rich to keep them
1014unfree. Soon, and I do mean soon, the number of people willing to
1015admit "Yes, I sold the privilege of human communications to people
1016by the sip rather than acknowledging their right to be in touch
1017with one another, and it made me money, and I will grow rich," will
1018go down.
1019--&nbsp;Eben Moglen, Free Software Foundation: www.fsf.org
1020</p>
1021<p>
1022We believe we can build better products collaborating with our
1023customers than we can hoarding technology from our customers.
1024Imagine buying a car where the hood was locked shut and you allowed
1025the dealer that you bought it from to retain the only key to the
1026hood of the car. Every other industry in a free market democracy
1027works the way open source does. It's only the software industry
1028that has this really weird, binary-only proprietary model. If you
1029don't have source code, and you don't have a license that allows
1030you to make changes to it, you have handed control of your
1031technological infrastructure either for your organization or for
1032your society to the developer of that software. - Bob Young,
1033co-founder of Red Hat Linux</p>
1034<p>Christian Einfeldt recounts, "One of the most moving interviews
1035among the hundred or so interviews that we have done so far for the
1036Digital Tipping Point film came from Brazilian Culture Minister
1037Gilberto Gil. He was describing what open source software meant to
1038him. He paused for a moment, spread his arms wide, and said with a
1039big smile on his face, "It's walking toward freedom, freedom of
1040use, freedom of speech, freedom of relationship... I think that's
1041what it's about." -
1042http://www.openoffice.org/editorial/year_four.html
1043</p>
1044<p>
1045As a proponent of open-source software, I am 100 percent and more in
1046favour of commercial software vendors clamping down on software pirates
1047with the full rigour of the law. Why should honest open-source developers
1048face cut-price competition because Microsoft is too lazy to pursue
1049pirates? In particular, I think it is complely disgraceful and unethical
1050than Microsoft turns a blind eye to software piracy throughout the third
1051world. This only encourages people to become addicted to software they
1052can never afford to buy, and discourages them from using open-source
1053software which is completely and permanently affordable.
1054- http://www.mealldubh.org/
1055</p>
1056<p>
1057"Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place.
1058Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are,
1059by definition, not smart enough to debug it." - Brian W. Kernighan
1060</p>
1061<p>
1062On protest:</p>
1063<div class="indent">
1064<p>A year or two after emigrating, she happened to be in Paris on
1065the anniversary of the Russian invasion of her country
1066(Czechoslovakia). A protest march had been scheduled, and she felt
1067driven to take part. Fists raised high, the young Frenchmen shouted
1068out slogans condemning Soviet imperialism. She liked the slogans,
1069but to her surprise she found herself unable to shout along with
1070them. She lasted only a few minutes in the parade.</p>
1071<p>When she told her French friends about it, they were amazed.
1072``You mean you don't want to fight the occupation of your
1073country?'' She would have liked to tell them that behind Communism,
1074Fascism, behind all occupations and invasions lurks a more basic,
1075pervasive evil and that the image of that evil was a parade of
1076people marching with raised fists and shouting identical syllables
1077in unison. But she knew she would never be able to make them
1078understand. Embarrassed, she changed the subject. -- Milan Kundera,
1079The Unbearable Lightness of Being -
1080http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/show/146529</p>
1081</div>
1082<p>Quotation from a commentator on CNN: "The United Nations
1083peacekeeping force could hamper the war effort."</p>
1084<p>It isn't always obvious what the final destination is. If we
1085send a message to a light to turn on, is the operation complete
1086when the switch is thrown, when the light itself glows or when (and
1087if) the room is sufficiently bright. There is no one right answer,
1088and a network that imposes one will only frustrate innovation.
1089-Bob&nbsp;Frankston
1090http://www.frankston.com/public/essays/IPAnIntroduction.asp</p>
1091<p>On the flight to Las Vegas I saw a TechTV show in which a lucky
1092winner's house got a digital makeover that consisted of putting
1093flat panel TVs everywhere. The technology may be digital but it is
1094not empowering -- the TV broadcasters are still in total control of
1095what is available to watch and the consumer is just that -- a
1096consumer. [...] There is no sharp distinction between components
1097and "solutions" -- it depends on how I use it though some are
1098easier to build on than others. The key is having an interface that
1099allows me to write my own software. [...] Companies steeped in a
1100tradition of providing complete solutions find it hard to even
1101grasp the concept of innovation at the edges. Digital systems have
1102changed the rules because it is becoming increasingly feasible for
1103people to do things themselves. -Bob&nbsp;Frankston
1104http://www.frankston.com/public/writing.asp?name=attheedge</p>
1105<p>All of these stories are about attempts to prevent users (that
1106is, all of us) from getting access to connectivity and from being
1107able to add value. That's a very big story but as long as the
1108reporting is so clueless and focused on consequences rather than
1109what is really going on it will be hard for us to make informed
1110decisions. -Bob&nbsp;Frankston
1111http://www.satn.org/archive/2004_02_22_archive.html#107756804659206421</p>
1112<p>Richard told a wonderful story to Allision the other day, one
1113about how we live. I have an apartment. Tracey does. Peter has our
1114house with various creatures living with him. Richard has an
1115apartment. Various other friends live in various other places. But
1116we all have email accounts in shared places. When I wake up, I flip
1117on the computer system, grab a cup of instant and a shower, and
1118when I arrive back at the terminal, there are some telnet sessions
1119running, Eudora kicked in, and email pouring onto the screen. I
1120instantly say morning to whoever is awake already, although Peter
1121and Tracey keep different hours. Richard wakes up an hour or two
1122after me, and logs on. We chat a bit, ask about the other's welfare
1123and breakfast state. Richard's story was that we all live in a
1124virtually shared huge old house, with many bedrooms all over the
1125place, and a central kitchen and living room. Each bedroom is an
1126apartment, the central areas connected by Internet tech. We each
1127sit with our own cats, our own loved ones, our own furniture, and
1128our own thoughts, and share them every morning and throughout the
1129day. - Carolyn Burke -
1130http://carolyn.org/Page23.html or
1131http://web.archive.org/web/20011020073622/carolyn.org/Page23.html</p>
1132<p>[...] in that 30 years, we saw a 40% decrease in the length of
1133Time Magazine cover stories and a 25% decrease in the New York
1134Times opinion pieces. So here we have a world that is more complex,
1135requiring the management of more information, more subtle
1136decision-making, and yet we are providing less opportunities for
1137people to express complex ideas about those problems. - Thomas
1138Homer-Dixon</p>
1139<p>As a cryptography and computer security expert, I have never
1140understood the current fuss about the open source software
1141movement. In the cryptography world, we consider open source
1142necessary for good security; we have for decades. Public security
1143is always more secure than proprietary security. It's true for
1144cryptographic algorithms, security protocols, and security source
1145code. For us, open source isn't just a business model; it's smart
1146engineering practice. -Bruce Schneier
1147http://www.counterpane.com/crypto-gram-9909.html</p>
1148<p>Commercial success isn't measured by whether you *like* the
1149product; it's measured by whether you *buy* the product. It's
1150difficult for users of commercial software to click on anything
1151that isn't there to make the parent company more money. Things are
1152in Linux because people *like* them there. -Ian!</p>
1153<p>Next time your boss comes to you and asks "Can't you just...?"
1154Stop. Think about what he just asked. Your boss is managing
1155complexity and he doesn't even know it, and he's just described the
1156interface he wants. Before you dismiss him as asking for the
1157impossible, at least consider whether or not you could arrange
1158things so that it looks like you're doing the really simple thing
1159he's asking for, rather than making it obvious to all your users
1160that you're doing the really complex thing that you have to do to
1161achieve what he asked for. You know that's what you're doing, but
1162you don't have to share your pain with people who don't know or
1163care about the underlying complexity. - Piers Cawley
1164http://pc1.bofhadsl.ftech.co.uk:8080/archives/000009.html</p>
1165<p>Do the <acronym title="Digital Millenium Copyright Act">DMCA</acronym> et. al. really retard the 'bad guys'? After all, the
1166DMCA is just a law, and the bad guys, by definition, are not law
1167followers. They could care less. But it does impact the 'good
1168guys', particularly those doing security research [...] "Rain
1169Forest Puppy" http://www.wiretrip.net/rfp/txt/evolution.txt</p>
1170<p>A popular response is: "If you have nothing to hide, you have
1171nothing to fear." [...] The truth is that we all do have something
1172to hide, not because it's criminal or even shameful, but simply
1173because it's private. - Privacy Commissioner of Canada.</p>
1174<p>I've always been a believer in antitrust. It's the concentration
1175of power that bothers me, not whether it's "for profit" or "for
1176government." [...] And I just knew that if I lived in California I
1177would stay there and not travel and not see the rest of the world;
1178whereas in New York I was always flying to California, but I was
1179still taking the subway in the morning, encountering homeless
1180people on the street, dealing with just much more of reality than
1181you have in California. You live a really privileged life out here.
1182You created all of this without the government and there's very
1183much a sense of "Well gee, why can't everybody just be like us?" -
1184Esther Dyson</p>
1185<p>On risque de pleurer un peu si l'on s'est laisse' apprivoiser. -
1186A.deS.E.</p>
1187<p>The better you do your job, the less people will notice you. -
1188Tom Reingold</p>
1189<p>The trouble with doing something right the first time is that
1190nobody appreciates how difficult it was. - anon</p>
1191<p>Most people, if they counted how many people swam across the
1192river, would never think about building bridges. - Ronald
1193Altman</p>
1194<p>Why should we limit computers to the lies people tell them
1195through keyboards? - Bill Gosper, <acronym title="Massachusetts
1196Institute of Technology">MIT</acronym> <acronym title="Artificial
1197Intelligence">AI</acronym> Lab</p>
1198<p>Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his
1199judgement, and he betrays, instead of serves you, if he sacrifices
1200it to your opinion. -- Edmund Burke, Speech to the electors of
1201Bristol. 3 Nov. 1774</p>
1202<p>There is simply no way that a bunch of people in Redmond or
1203anybody in Silicon Valley here can anticipate the needs of anybody
1204who is remotely interesting, and that includes most children and
1205some adults. - Alan Kay
1206</p>
1207<p>
1208Community is enhanced by a common listening experience. When listening
1209to the live Hober stream, you are sharing a global experience, rather
1210than being shunted into single-faceted canned programs.
1211--&nbsp;http://hober.com/
1212</p>
1213<p>
1214[...] When people are firmly rooted in their community, they
1215must pay attention to what the community thinks of them; but when
1216they can easily pull up stakes, they only need to look out for
1217themselves. [...] there is something wrong with making the survival
1218of the fittest the guiding principle of a civilized society. [...]
1219success is an inadequate basis for holding a belief because being
1220successful is not identical with being right. [...] Conflicting
1221views and interests will produce an open society only if there are
1222institutions dedicated to the common good, allowing people with
1223different views and interests to live together in peace. [...] -
1224George Soros www.soros.org/personal.html</p>
1225<p>This is a crucial slip. In referring to the service economy, Cox
1226violates the Wired principle that everyone in the Information Age
1227will be a Web jock. Instead, most of us will work in Wal Mart
1228(which now employs a population as large as South Dakota's), or at
1229Starbuck's, pouring coffee for the Information Elite. There, the
1230defining skill will be sucking up. - Jedediah S. Purdy, Harvard
1231Perspective</p>
1232
1233<p>Lars Osberg, an economist at Dalhousie University in Halifax,
1234has come up with a graphic way to illustrate the size of this army
1235of unemployed Canadians and the enormous waste of its idleness.
1236Let's suppose that the army was put to work building something
1237highly labour-intensive - something like, say, the great pyramids
1238of ancient Egypt - using the exact same primitive technology that
1239was available back in the 26th century B.C. Osberg calculates
1240unemployed Canadians could have built no fewer than seven pyramids
1241since 1990 and be well on their way to completing their eighth.
1242--&nbsp;Linda McQuaig, "The Cult of Impotence: Selling the Myth of Powerlessness
1243in the Global Economy"</p>
1244
1245<p>The idea that the poor - and the rich - will always be with us
1246is not new. But never before has the split been so unambiguous, so
1247unequivocal. The reason is simple. The rich - who happen also to be
1248the most politically powerful - no longer need the poor. They do
1249not need the poor for the salvation of their souls - which they do
1250not believe they have and which at any rate they would not consider
1251worthy of care. Nor do the rich need the poor for staying rich or
1252getting richer - in fact they reckon they would be better off if
1253the poor weren't there at all, making claims on their riches.
1254&nbsp; The poor are not a reserve army of labour which needs to be
1255groomed back into wealth-production. Neither are they consumers who
1256must be tempted and cajoled into "giving the lead to economic
1257recovery". Whichever way you look at it, the poor are of no use.
1258This is a real novelty in a world undergoing perhaps the deepest
1259transformation in the long history of humankind.
1260--&nbsp;Zygmunt Bauman, Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Leeds University
1261</p>
1262
1263<p>
1264When I tried to smile at the deformed man near the beach, my stomach
1265churned uncomfortably. It made me remember the time when I was a 9
1266years old, visiting family in New York, and being overcome with sadness
1267by streets overflowing with homeless people (before Rudy Giuliani
1268shipped them all upstate.) I tried to put on a kind face for the badly
1269deformed man but, it still brought into sharp focus the thin line between
1270vacationing in the third world and taking part in what Sierra's father
1271calls the "pornography of poverty."
1272--&nbsp;Doug Karr, http://www.livingroomwar.blogspot.com/
1273</p>
1274
1275<p>The US government, and no doubt governments all over the world,
1276will use the climate of war as an excuse to curtail civil
1277liberties, deny free speech, lay off workers, harass ethnic and
1278religious minorities, cut back on public spending and divert huge
1279amounts of money to the defence industry. To what purpose?
1280President Bush can no more "rid the world of evil-doers" than he
1281can stock it with saints. It's absurd for the US government to even
1282toy with the notion that it can stamp out terrorism with more
1283violence and oppression. Terrorism is the symptom, not the disease.
1284Terrorism has no country. It's transnational, as global an
1285enterprise as Coke or Pepsi or Nike. At the first sign of trouble,
1286terrorists can pull up stakes and move their "factories" from
1287country to country in search of a better deal. Just like the
1288multi-nationals. - &#169; Arundhati Roy 2001 -
1289http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4266289,00.html</p>
1290<p>Terror is in the human heart. We must remove this terror from
1291the heart. Destroying the human heart, both physically and
1292psychologically, is what we must absolutely avoid. The root of
1293terrorism should be identified, so that it can be removed. The root
1294of terrorism is misunderstanding, intolerance, hatred, revenge and
1295hopelessness. This root cannot be located by the military. Bombs
1296and missiles cannot reach it, let alone destroy it. Only with the
1297practice of looking deeply can our insight reveal and identify this
1298root. Only with the practice of deep listening and compassion can
1299it be transformed and removed. - Thich Nhat Hanh, November 2002 -
1300http://www.wagingpeace.org/articles/2002/11/00_hanh_strike.htm</p>
1301<p>"The secret of life," declared sculptor Henry Moore to poet
1302Donald Hall, "is to have a task, something you devote your entire
1303life to, something you bring everything to, every minute of the day
1304for your whole life. And the most important thing is -- it must be
1305something you cannot possibly do."
1306- https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/148751-the-secret-of-life-is-to-have-a-task-something
1307</p>
1308<p>What we wanted to preserve was just not a good environment in
1309which to do programming, but a system around which a fellowship
1310could form. - Dennis Ritchie (co-originator of the Unix operating
1311system)</p>
1312<p>Laws are the spider's webs which, if anything small falls into
1313them they ensnare it, but large things break through and escape.
1314--Solon, statesman (c.638-c558 <acronym title="Before Christian Era">BCE</acronym>)</p>
1315<p>Think of the Linux community as a niche economy isolated by its
1316beliefs. Kind of like the Amish, except that our religion requires
1317us to use _higher_ technology than everyone else. -- Donald B.
1318Marti Jr.</p>
1319<p>In 1954, when Jonas Salk developed a polio vaccine, he never for
1320a moment considered the idea of pursuing individual ownership
1321rights to the discovery. Nor did Salk imagine the idea of licensing
1322the vaccine in an effort to personally control the direction of
1323future research in the field. In fact, Salk's funder, the March of
1324Dimes, prohibited patenting or the receipt of royalties on the
1325results of its research projects. When Edward R. Murrow, the
1326renowned television commentator of the day, asked, "Who will
1327control the new pharmaceutical?" Salk replied that, naturally, the
1328discovery belonged to the public. "There is no patent," he said.
1329"Could you patent the sun?" -- "Trouble on the Endless Frontier" by
1330Seth Shulman http://www.publicknowledge.org/</p>
1331<p>People understand instinctively that the best way for computer
1332programs to communicate with each other is for each of them to
1333be strict in what they emit, and liberal in what they accept. The
1334odd thing is that people themselves are not willing to be strict in
1335how they speak and liberal in how they listen. -- Larry Wall,
1336http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/larry.html
1337</p>
1338<p>
1339In short, I was trying real hard not to look like a complete idiot and
1340I probably spent a few hours penning that first tentative question. As
1341luck would have it, the responses I got back were polite and helpful.
1342I was even more surprised when one of my early questions was answered
1343by one of the developers. Here's me, an absolute nobody, who has
1344probably asked a very basic question and someone famous (in this
1345project anyways) took the time to point me in the right direction.
1346Looking back, I'm sure that's the moment where a part of my brain said
1347"this is where you belong".
1348--&nbsp;Dru Lavigne,
1349http://blogs.ittoolbox.com/unix/bsd/archives/006968.asp
1350</p>
1351<p>
1352When people pay $70 to a company for cable TV,
1353everyone says the users are paying for "content".
1354When people pay $70 to a company for Internet,
1355everyone says the users are getting Internet content "for free"
1356and aren't willing to pay for content.
1357The company has to pay for TV programming that it offers to its customers,
1358but it doesn't pay anything for the Internet content it offers.
1359Perhaps the ISPs should be sending some of that $70 to all the 
1360"free" Internet content producers!
1361- paraphrased from Tim O'Reilly
1362"The Clothesline Paradox and the Sharing Economy"
1363at OSCON 2012 
1364http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kbcgmf6eDKU
1365</p>
1366<p>
1367The Internet *is* diverse; unless, you're exclusively a
1368Microsoft user. Windows users are locked into a Microsoft view of
1369the world where everyone clicks on the same menus, and the menus
1370contain only the things that Microsoft puts there. It's hard for
1371Windows users to click on things whose purpose isn't to make
1372Microsoft more money. -Ian!
1373</p>
1374
1375<p>Home is a place where you are without having to justify why
1376you're there. -Ian!</p>
1377
1378<p>
1379Why I use Linux, and some of my Linux <a href="linux_like.txt">background</a> .
1380</p>
1381
1382<p>Web hosting under Free / Open Source software: Linux/Apache</p>
1383</div>
1384
1385<hr>
1386
1387  <p style="font-style: italic; font-size: 80%">
1388    Web hosting under Free / Open Source software: GNU/Linux/Apache/PHP.
1389    Webmaster: <a href="http://idallen.com/">Ian! D. Allen</a>
1390    &nbsp; Updated:
1391		
1392		2023-11-16 23:17 EST[-0500]
1393  <br>
1394  <a href="http://www.catb.org/hacker-emblem/">
1395    <img class="middle" src="glider.png"
1396    alt="Hacker Ideals Emblem" height="55" width="55"></a>
1397    <em>The <a href="http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/H/hacker.html">real
1398    definition of Hacker</a></em>
1399  <br>
1400  <a href="http://www.fsf.org/register_form?referrer=9625"><img
1401      class="middle"
1402    src="images/fsf9625.png" alt="[FSF Associate Member]"
1403    width="88" height="31">
1404    <em>Support Free Software GNU/Linux</em>
1405  </a>
1406  <br>
1407  <a href="https://freedns.afraid.org/"><img
1408      class="middle"
1409    src="https://freedns.afraid.org/images/powerani.gif" alt="FreeBSD Daemon Logo">
1410    <em>Support Free DNS</em>
1411  </a>
1412  <br>
1413  <!-- Creative Commons License -->
1414  <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">
1415      <img alt="Creative Commons License"
1416      class="middle"
1417      src="images/somerights.png" height="31" width="88"></a>
1418  This work is licensed under a
1419  <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">Creative Commons
1420  License</a>.
1421  <!-- /Creative Commons License -->
1422  <!--
1423<rdf:RDF xmlns="http://web.resource.org/cc/"
1424    xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
1425    xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#">
1426<Work rdf:about="http://contactimprov.ca web pages">
1427<license rdf:resource="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">
1428</Work>
1429</rdf:RDF>
1430-->
1431  <br>
1432  <a href="http://www.anybrowser.org/campaign/">
1433  <img src="images/anybrowser3.png"
1434      class="middle"
1435  alt="Any Browser logo" height="31" width="88"></a>
1436  Online materials should be viewable in
1437  <a href="http://www.anybrowser.org/campaign/">any browser</a>.
1438  <br>
1439  <a href="http://www.arachnoid.com/freezone/">
1440    <img class="middle" src="images/freezone1.jpg"
1441    alt="Internet Free Zone Level 1 logo" height="40" width="440"></a>
1442    Support <a href="http://www.arachnoid.com/freezone/">free and
1443	non-commercial</a> Internet.
1444</p>
1445
1446</body>
1447</html>

Line numbers count LF bytes from the start of the resource, as the search results do. Vendor segments are library code the classifier recognised; they are stored but not indexed. Bytes are shown as Latin1 characters, one per byte.