Collected posts from the various blogs I’ve contributed to since 2002.
About our maps / The EveryBlock Blog On why EveryBlock chose to build their own maps rather than use one of the existing mapping providers (tags: everyblock localism mapping neogeography)
eMusic Selects Q&A: Breathe Owl Breathe - eMusic Spotlight emusic are profiling a Michigan band that is well worth a little of your time (tags: breatheowlbreathe emusic michigan music) Americans abroad are giving up citizenship for lower taxes - International Herald Tribune “other countries base taxation on residency, not citizenship” (tags: america citizenship nonresidency tax) Some thoughts on The Wire, season 5 (kottke.org) We’ve been following Season 5, and while it’s great I can’t help but agree that so far there’s too much to keep track of and not enough momentum. Still, there’s a long way to go… ...
I’ve found myself working in Python lately, both for a new project and while preparing a review of the Django book. Working in Ruby I’ve become used to relying on ActiveRecord whenever I need to talk to a database (whether inside Rails or not) and after a little time refamiliarising myself with MySQLdb I realised I was going to need a decent ORM for this project. As well as being road-tested and well documented, I was also looking for something that could either generate its models on the fly, or had a tool to generate them from an existing schema. ...
Two recent visits to the delightful cinemas at the Barbican deserve a mention here: The Diving Bell And The Butterfly has already been widely lauded, and thoroughly deserves it. Partially adapted from the Jean-Dominique “Jean-Do” Bauby’s autobiography of the same name, the film follows Jean-Do’s experience of living with the rare locked-in syndrome, the sudden onset of which leaves him only able to move one eyelid. Director Julian Schnabel has done a masterful job, using the camera initially to show us the world from Jean-Do’s restricted perspective but gradually opening up the viewer’s line-of-sight as his experiences unfold. His background as a painter clearly helps inform the visual pallete of the film, but he never quite drifts off into the impressionist self-indulgence that would have been so easy. The result is a story that is moving without being sentimental, and tinged with a deep sadness without being depressing. For me, it was one of those films that can serve as a reminder of the medium’s true capabilities. ...
brad’s life - A proposal: email to URL mapping Proposal for how to use an email address as an openid (tags: email identifier openid) Dawn of the digital natives - is reading declining? | Technology | The Guardian “If you believe a scary US report, reading is on the decline. But, says Steven Johnson, it completely fails to consider the amount that we do every day on our computers” (tags: literacy web) Adapting Ambitiously — err.the_blog ...
According to leaked documents obtained by The Times, the UK government is planning a green (discussion/consultation) paper proposing strong action against “illegal file-sharing.” According to the leaked documents they want ISPs to take the primary responsibility for monitoring usage and to ban any of their users who continually share copyrighted materials without permission. Whatever your position on copyright enforcement in a digital age, this is a ludicrous idea. Logistically such proposals will be almost impossible to enforce effectively. Setting aside the issue that many of us encrypt as much as possible of the data going out from our computers, it will effectively require ISPs to monitor all traffic going through their networks in a far more intrusive way than they currently do. ...
Six Apart - News and Events: The Social Graph API and Surprises “the fact that these relationships are being moved from “possible to find” to “easy to discover” means that we should be thinking of how this affects social behaviors in this new context.” (tags: api dataportability google privacy sixapart socialgraph socialnetworking) Where next for ICT Foresight? - Third Sector Foresight NCVO’s ICT Foresight reports have been interesting projects, so it’ll be interesting to see where they take it next. ...
The TH Interview: Andy Kunz on the importance of green transportation and trains as a solution to climate change and peak oil. Good ideas. High speed rail across the USA would be fantastic. Hopefully he’s right and current oil prices will finally push the authorities towards the needed investment… (tags: environment interview planning sustainability trains urbanism) What is this internet thing? at New Music Strategies Some reflections on recent cultural shifts and what it means for music, but at a more fundamental level than most posts on the topic. How is an internet-age song different from an electric-age song? ...
A couple of weeks ago I was fortunate to be able to attend the launch of Demos’ Everyday Democracy Index and pick up a copy of the associated 120-page pamphlet. The publication of the Index marks a helpful contribution to an important and fascinating series of conversations about the nature of democracy (in the sense of civic engagement and participatory decision making rather than a specific implementation), where it is most effective and how it can adapt to deal with societal trends and challenges. ...
Flickr: The MICROSOFT: KEEP YOUR EVlL GRUBBY HANDS OFF OF OUR FLICKR Pool Vendor generated angst, user generated dissent (tags: flickr microhoo microsoft photos protest yahoo) BlogFish: Review: Design Patterns in Ruby This book sounds like its worth some time (tags: book designpatterns ruby toread) Upgrading from the OpenID 1.x series library Instructions on switching from ruby-openid version 1 to ruby-openid version 2. Very handy (tags: documentation openid ruby ruby-openid upgrade)