Posted on May 31, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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Noble words that, if truly implemented, take Britain down a path to open governmnet and citizen scrutiny. But only if “transparency” actually means “open data”. We don’t need summaries, PDF, printouts and other indigestible publication. We need the data in machine-readable, current form so that citizens can process the data and discover the real-time truth about the country. It’s great that there’s an advisory board (can I join it or is it a closed club?) but there also needs to be an ombudsman with power to fix problems. My summary: fantastic news if it’s true, but Tory opposition to the Digital Economy Act wasn’t and I won’t believe this until I see it either.
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“There are real privacy issues to be faced in the data collected by web companies. But they are part of a far bigger picture of how the world is changing. We need thoughtful understanding of what the real risks are, not finger pointing by the media (and even more frighteningly, by members of Congress) at companies that are easy targets because they make good political theater.” — Or as Scot NcNealy put it much more concisely, “You have no privacy – get over it.”
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“Creativity is akin to insanity, say scientists who have been studying how the mind works. ” – It’s all on a continuous scale, just like other important factors in our psychology.
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Filed under: Links | Comments Off on ☞ Transparency, Privacy and Genius
Posted on May 29, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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What does open source have to do with open data? This extremely insightful move by the SEC demonstrates that the syntax of open data is not enough to provide transparency. We also need an implementation of the semantics of that syntax, provided openly, freely and as the basis for reimplementation, so that we can understand what we are being shown.
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This long and detailed analysis is well worth the read to see just how low the US delegation at ACTA will sink to hide the fact that they are a tool of the US media industry. There’s enough data available in public to make it impossible for people like this to get away with lies and extreme spin. I hope they see the coverage and realize no-one is fooled.
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“However, Google, for all its open source credibility, should be expected to work with, not around, established open source processes. If the process is broken, help fix it, not make it worse.”
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Filed under: Links | Comments Off on ☞ Transparency and Good Will
Posted on May 27, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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This FAQ/debate article with an anonymous BCS spokesbeing make it clear what the issue at the BCS is all about, both directly and through tone.
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This EFF campaign makes a great point: that ACTA is ironically a counterfeit itself, since it is not mainly about the counterfeiting of goods but has been hijacked as a back-door method to impose controls on the internet that have failed to be imposed by transparent and democratic methods. The campaign is very much focussed on the US but the message seems one worth transplanting elsewhere.
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Filed under: Links | Tagged: ACTA, BCS | Comments Off on ☞ Getting The Point
Posted on May 26, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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The British Computer Society is in the process of being transformed into The Chartered Institute of IT. This is the wrong direction – it’s becoming a club for the Pointy Haired Boss instead of an association to support Dilbert and Alice. The consequence? It’s full of talk of outsourcing real computer jobs abroad and wants to serve the people who are doing it. It failed to take any public leadership position over the Digital Economy Bill and rejects attempts to embrace open source. It has no connection to the interests of actual computer professionals any more. For me (a Fellow, for now) it has come to symbolise all that’s worst in British IT.
The last-ditch battle to wrest the BCS away from the budget-and-management apparatchiks is coming, because an Emergency General Meeting has been called for July 1st. I just hope there are enough real computer professionals still involved to rescue it; my experience of the current leadership suggests it’s too late.
[Also in this thread: this post, BCS Faces No-Confidence Vote Crisis, BCS Leadership Targets Member Rights, BCS Rebels Finally Get A Voice]
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Filed under: Links | Tagged: BCS, UK | 17 Comments »
Posted on May 25, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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Carlo demonstrates that On2 must clearly have analysed the patent context for VP8 since so many of the “sub-optimal choices” called out by H.264 partisans reflect avoidance of patented ideas. This lends weight to Google’s confidence over WebM, as well as highlighting the way software patents hinder innovation (although I recently heard an advocate declare they stimulate innovation by forcing this sort of working-around; ridiculous!)
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Thus making the reason WebM is a Good Thing as plain as the nose on your face, just as long as MPEG-LA can be totally shut out of taxing it.
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If you wondered why end users, and not just developers, need protection from MPEG-LA’s patent pool, read this and discover that your publication of H.264 video on your web site might mean you owe MPEG-LA $100,000. We really do need an alternative, safe patent pool with a $0 charge for those promoting freedom instead of fees.
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So Sun’s secrets were gifted to an insider trader as pillow talk? Great, that makes it so much better. Can’t say I instantly feel “Moffat is the least culpable person charged” on that basis.
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Filed under: Links | Tagged: WebM | 4 Comments »
Posted on May 24, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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Just because Microsoft is busily embracing open source, that doesn’t mean they have any interest in software freedom, as Andy Oliver points out.
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Excellent and balanced set of proposals from Michael Geist for copyright reform in Canada – well worth reading in full to see what’s possible. Sadly, all the signs are that Canada will adopt reform that ignores balance and citizen rights in favour of copyright owners. As I will keep saying, copyright is a social contract granting temporary monopoly in exchange for surrender of the work to the public commons – sadly government and copyright owners alike have forgotten this and insist on ever-broadening control with ever-diminishing surrender to the commons.
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Another story of music industry greed, excess and inflexibility that actually harms musicians. When will it end?
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Filed under: Links | Comments Off on ☞ The Power of Pedantry
Posted on May 24, 2010 by Simon Phipps
The announcement last week at Google IO of the creation of the WebM project and the release of the VP8 codec was a positive and welcome development, finally offering an alternative to the royalty-liable H.264 and to Theora. WebM arises from Google’s purchase of ON2 last year and had been widely anticipated. Google did their homework, securing endorsements from competing browser vendors Opera and Mozilla and even from Adobe (possibly in exchange for Google’s endorsement of Flash on their TV platform) and, weakly, from Microsoft. The parade is now in full swing, and we can expect many more announcements of support like the one from the Miro Project. Only Apple was painfully absent, pushing the Google-Apple tension further into the spotlight.
There was still more homework to do, though. Once all the hoopla had died down, it became clear there are some serious questions that need considering. Read about them on my ComputerWorldUK blog.
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Filed under: Links | Tagged: ComputerWorldUK, WebM | 1 Comment »
Posted on May 23, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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$3 million extra in licensing costs that clearly no-one had budgeted for, and lock-in that means there’s no alternative but to pay up and then cut staff to make up the budget difference. Had they used open source software, CSIRO would be free to cut their subscriptions and handle the support and downtime risk internally while they rebalanced.
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Looks like the pressure is on…
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Finding the Apache community too stifling, the iBatis project has moved lock, stock, barrel and all committers to a new home. The power of open source is in the ability to fork when genuinely necessary.
- Freedom To Leave
I just added my 2006 essay on substitutibility and the freedom to leave to the selection on this web site.
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Filed under: Links | Comments Off on ☞ Needing The Freedom To Leave
Posted on May 22, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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I’ve lost count of how many people sent me today’s XKCD, complete with a bearded figure advocating use of open document formats…
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New survey by Info-Tech Research Group seems pretty obvious if you have used both. OpenOffice.org is an office productivity suite, Google Docs is a collaboration system.
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Filed under: Links | Comments Off on ☞ Told You So
Posted on May 21, 2010 by Simon Phipps
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Filed under: Links | Comments Off on Waiting 7 Years For A Tip…
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