There’s nothing wrong with this codebase that a time machine and an automatic weapon wouldn’t fix.
[I know the feeling. Feel free to substitute for the “codebase” and your weapon of choice.]
It should be obvious that one conclusion respects people and one doesn’t. It should also be obvious that the first conclusion is correct and the second is incorrect, cynical, and low.
I can’t prove that good software respects people, but I can look at good software and show how it respects people. I can look at bad software and show how it doesn’t respect people.
“Gamification” treats people like children — children who need to be manipulated, who need to be tricked into doing what’s good for them.
And it makes bad software.
[Just because something feels like a game doesn’t mean that you should make it more like a game.]
Source: inessential.com
Carmaker Volkswagen (VOWG_p.DE) has agreed to deactivate e-mails on German staff Blackberry devices out of office hours to give them a break.
Under an agreement with labour representatives, staff at Europe’s biggest automaker will receive e-mails via Blackberry from half an hour before they start work until half an hour after they finish, and will be in blackout-mode the rest of the time, a spokesman for VW said.
The new email regime applies to staff covered by collective bargaining so it would seem board level executives will still be slaves to their Blackberries.
Very few companies have taken such drastic measures to force workers towards a better work-life balance.
[What’s interesting to me is the need to enforce this… that said, I can appreciate that many folks don’t understand and don’t respect the notion of “after hours”.]
If this becomes law, it’s a short stretch from SOPA to NODA (No Online Dissent Anywhere) and if you think I’m a nutcase for saying so, I’d like to remind everybody what happened just over a year ago, when US politicians were tripping over themselves to shut down wikileaks (a royal fiasco in which this company was embroiled) and to this day, they have not been charged with a crime anywhere.
Many of the “dirty tricks” employed against Wikileaks would be enshrined on law under SOPA (and someday, NODA):
A requirement that service providers block access to offending domains, including that they stop resolving their DNS
Search engines to purge search results for offending domains
Payment processors to sever ties to offending domains
And they added an extra provision that it will be an offense to knowingly create a service or system to provide a workaround to a banned domain or host. So for example, they would no longer have to hassle Mozilla to remove that firefox plugin that let’s you reach ICE blocked websites, it would be illegal to make it or distribute it.[snip… emphasis below is mine -Ed.]
Already we get business from companies whose stated corporate IT policy is to not use US based servers to hold email or route web traffic. I’m not talking about torrent hosts, whistleblowers and fake Rolex vendors. We’re talking large enterprise entities whose legal departments find even the theoretical legal ability for Homeland Security to monitor their corporate communications simply intolerable.
[Land of the free eh? Don’t stand on the sidelines for this one. Disclosure: I use easydns to host domains.]
School is pre-digital. Elections. Most of what you do in your job. Even shopping. The vestiges of a reliance on geography, lack of information, poor interpersonal connections and group connection (all hallmarks of the pre-digital age) are everywhere.
Perhaps the most critical thing you can say of a typical institution: “That place is pre-digital.”
All a way of saying that this is just the beginning, the very beginning, of the transformation of our lives.
[This is exactly right. It is what I wrote earlier today.]
Source: Seth’s Blog
I made this video of Beth lying in bed using Brushes on her iPad to trace a cartoon character. I was struck by the level of sophistication in her interaction with the app and made this quick video. All the voiceover was added in post, except for the part where I help her with the brush sizing.
Beth is four years old. Four.
[This is what art class ought to look like in 2011. I wish my son’s did. Go check out the video on Frasier’s page.]
Source: Fraser Speirs
Some of you have this all wrong. This isn’t whether I can afford to buy Noah an iPad. My complaint is that educators aren’t changing the way they teach fundamental skills for a world that already operates differently. Never mind how it will operate 20 years from now when my kid is finishing up his basic education.
Here’s the official White House anti SOPA petition.
Joshua Kopstein:
When the security issue was brought up, Rep. Mel Watt of North Carolina seemed particularly comfortable about his own lack of understanding. Grinningly admitting “I’m not a nerd” before the committee, he nevertheless went on to dismiss without facts or justification the very evidence he didn’t understand and then downplay the need for a panel of experts. Rep. Maxine Waters of California followed up by saying that any discussion of security concerns is “wasting time” and that the bill should move forward without question, busted internets be damned.
Bipartisan willful ignorance.
[Well said. Here’s the link again: The official White House anti SOPA petition.]
Source: Daring Fireball
Four very important words: “What would happen if…”
They spark almost everything in design and creation.
Nobody who opposes Big Government and favors degregulation should favor the Stop Online Piracy Act, better known as SOPA, or H.R. 3261. It’s a big new can of worms that will cripple use of the Net, slow innovation on it, clog the courts with lawsuits, employ litigators in perpetuity and deliver copyright maximalists in the “content” business a hollow victory for the ages.
A few years back, a former government official confidentially issued a warning to a small group I was part of, which favored some kind of lawmaking around technology. While this isn’t a verbatim quote, it’s pretty close, because it has been burned in my mind ever since: “In the course of my work I have met with nearly every member of Congress. And I can tell you that, with only a handful of exceptions, there are two things none of them understand. One is economics and the other is technology. Now proceed.”
Know-nothing lawmakers are doing exactly that with SOPA. As Joshua Kopstein says, Dear Congress, It’s No Longer OK To Not Know How The Internet Works.
SOPA is a test for principle for members of Congress. If you wish to save the Internet, vote against it. If you wish to fight Big Government, vote against it. If you wish to protect friends in the “content” production and distribution business at extreme cost to every other business in the world, vote for it. If you care more about a few businesses you can name and nothing about all the rest of them — which will be whiplashed by the unintended consequences of a bill that limits what can be done on the Internet while not comprehending the Internet at all, vote for it.
[Go read the rest of Doc’s piece. And then get off your hands and get in touch with your congress people.]
Source: Doc Searls Weblog
If you get a knock on the door from someone who’s too small to put you out of business on a whim, don’t think about how small they are, think about how small you are. You’re much more likely to be able to trust someone who has to work with you rather than someone who doesn’t.
[This is awesome advice in general.]
Source: Scripting News
turnings :: daniel berlinger 