Posted 09:41 by Mark Federman permanent link
Anarchic Collaborative Space

Another one from Sean. Just Letters is not only a fascinating study in anarchic collaborative space; it's also fun. Observing several distinct categories of behaviour provides an interesting insight into the quest for identity in a sea of anonymity. Did I mention it's also fun?
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Posted 18:00 by Mark Federman permanent link
On Administrative Dynamics

I came across this item while doing some reading and research. It's from a letter written by Marshall McLuhan to Jim Davey, then Program Secretary in the Office of Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, March 2, 1970.

In a word, any conventional bureaucracy becomes a police state when speeded up by a new technology such as telephone or telex [or, of course, Internet - MF.] Just as Machiavelli could regard the state as a work of art as soon as the medieval order had been scrapped by the new speed-up of Gutenberg technology, so our political structures become "works of art" as they are scrapped by new technology. - Letters of Marshall McLuhan, p. 401

This was written about five years before McLuhan began to coalesce and articulate what would become his Laws of Media. However, he already had the notion that a medium in obsolescence, that is, a current medium that loses is dominant power of unseen influence in our affairs, takes on an aesthetic aspect and becomes art. His observation that bureaucracy becomes "art" in its obsolescence, suggests (according to the laws of media) a simultaneous reversal from an enabling business structure to an oppressive one - the metaphor of the police state. It is interesting to note that our electronic business world does enable managers to keep closer tabs on the types of workers whose time doing "work" was relatively invisible to managers before we became pervasively wired (and now, "wirelessed.")

There is hope, however. Reversal says that when pushed beyond the limit of its potential, a medium will reverse what were its original characteristics. Internet-enabled work environments, when pushed far enough, should reverse the "police state" mentality to one of human - read worker - emanicipation.
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Posted 13:03 by Mark Federman permanent link
I Like You.

I really like you!
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Posted 13:51 by Mark Federman permanent link
Rammstein's Feuer Frei - The Movie

This is very cool, in both senses of the word. (Thanks, Sean!)
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Posted 11:09 by Mark Federman permanent link
Digital Future Series @ Library of Congress

McLuhan Program Director, Derrick de Kerckhove, now holds the Papamarkou Chair in Education and Technology at the John W. Kluge Centre at the Library of Congress. He is hosting a series of colloquia through the year that are being broadcast and webcast by C-SPAN. On Monday, David Weinberger was the featured speaker, talking about the nature of knowledge, blogging and the change in our conception of authority. The talk is available as a video feed, courtesy of C-SPAN and the Library of Congress, and is well worth watching. Among many things, David talks about the obsolescence of the traditional, literate, Aristotelian taxonomy upon which we have based our modern organization of knowledge, and the value of multi-subjectivity that spans multiple human contexts, thus enabling an authority of authenticity that exceeds the authority of officially legitimated expertise.
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Posted 18:56 by Mark Federman permanent link
Primer, The Movie

Several of us had the distinct pleasure of being invited to an advance screening of a new movie, Primer. To say that it won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival, is inadequate to describe how great this mind-bending film is. Telling you that three of us sat for an hour (the whole film is 80 minutes) afterward trying to puzzle through its paradoxes, gives you some idea of the richness of this... what to call it? Low-tech, sci-fi intellectual thriller? Whatever...

The premise is that a small group of men, tinkering with a devise that is supposed to create anti-gravity, find a weird side effect. Of course, as we know from McLuhan thinking, "the side effects are the main effects." The film soon starts dealing with issues of causality, temporality and determinism in a fashion that will have you wishing that you were taking notes.

Primer is one of those films that requires multiple viewings to figure it out, and has the potential to engender a huge cult following, not to mention the subject matter of both film studies and philosophy classes. Highly recommended!

Primer opens in Toronto November 26.
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Posted 16:33 by Mark Federman permanent link
The True North Strong and Not So Free

Two disturbing items reported at BoingBoing recently, both involving issues of controlling the flow of so-called intellectual property, even when what would otherwise be flowing is supposed to be permitted to flow! One is systemic, and speaks to the relative lack of knowledge of Canadian legislators - a situation that is not unique to Canada. The other appears to be egregious and deceitful behaviour on the part of a Canadian ISP, if the reports are indeed true.

According to this BoingBoing post,

Canada Heritage is now recommending an Internet "levy" that will go to a collecting society, on a grounds that everything on the Internet is copyrighted by someone, and the collecting society will gather money for them in exchange for your use of their material.

The problem here isn't really the levy -- blanket license fees, including levies, are actually not a bad way of solving some copyright problems -- but what you get in exchange for it. The levy here would cover all Internet users, including institutions that have the right to re-use work without permission or payment (like schools and libraries), and it won't confer any substantial rights upon you.

The other problem is, of course, that an increasing amount of Internet material is born digital, not associated with any of the major publishing or distribution licensing groups, and may well be licensed by the creator for sharing on the 'net. Besides, how can this "levy" be collected from, and distributed to, people who are outside of Canada?

That the good folks at Heritage Canada are even considering the misguided - and self-serving - logic of the lobbyists demonstrates that they are not sufficiently knowledgeable about the subject matter to even be allowed to deal with the issue. Hopefully, Parliamentarians will pay attention to the petition that is now circulating, that asks them to listen to a wide variety of views, including those of people who are more aware of the important consequences of legislation now in committee. There is a copy of the petition at the McLuhan Coach House, if you happen to be in downtown Toronto and want to add your signature.

The second item has to do with a story that one of Western Canada's ISP's is allegedly blocking packets from certain protocols - certain file-sharing protocols - in order to limit users' ability to share files. Here's what BoingBoing says:

When customers of Canada's Shaw Cable high-speed Internet service noticed that their filesharing activity had slowed down dramatically, they didn't know what to make of it. Calling the ISP didn't help: Shaw's tech support people swore that they were delivering all the packets they received from their customers, just as you'd expect. ... So the Shaw customers went to DSL Reports, a community site for posting about DSL and other high-speed providers, and they found that they were not alone and not imagining things. Lots of Shaw customers were getting really crummy performance out of their Internet connections. ... Then someone claiming to be a Shaw insider posted an explanation: Shaw had secretly installed a packet-filter on its network that was using hidden rules to silently discard some of its customers' packets. And they'd instructed their tech people to lie about it when customers called in and asked.

What added veracity to the allegations was the "cease and desist" letter that Shaw's lawyers apparently sent to DSL Reports. (Haven't companies learned by now that the fastest way to lend credence to an allegation is to send a chill letter in response to the allegation. It's a reputation economy, boys and girls!) Blocking copyrighted files is one thing - a dangerous precedent for the ISPs, to be sure, since it then removes them de facto from the realm of common carrier, and instantly makes them liable for content - but blocking protocols is quite another.

The thinking - and I use that term loosely - that led to such a decision is yet another indication of how technological means are being used to ultimately stifle the mechanisms that have led to the wealth of creativity that we are now experiencing. By embedding prevention mechanisms that have the effect of turning our tools of ubiquitous connectivity into merely another (pay-per-view) broadcast medium, we effectively stop the progress and evolution of new cultural forms. That many of these new forms threaten entrenched, vested business interests is not new. That government regulations are created specifically in favour of these vested interests is also not new. That millions of people around the world are critically aware of these issues IS new, historically speaking, and that potentially makes all the difference in the world.

If you are a Shaw customer, confront their management with the allegations and demand to know the truth on the protocol-blocking allegations. If you are a Canadian resident, sign the digital copyright petition. And if you are reading this post from elsewhere in the world, ensure your respective legislators understand that the future of ideas, innovation and culture are at stake.
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Posted 10:17 by Mark Federman permanent link
Prague: Robot, Golem and Other Meta-Issues

Next Monday, November 15, beginning at 18:30, the McLuhan Program hosts Michael Bielicky, who will present Prague: Robot, Golem and Other Meta-Issues.

Michael is a world-renown multi-media artist and designer from the Czech Republic, the place many consider the home of modern multi-media. He will share a kaleidoscopic introduction to the Czech prehistory of multimedia with some visual examples, and current projects, with a conversation about new media forms in post-communist Eastern Europe.

Michael is the co-founder, and a professor, of New Media Arts at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague, co-founder of The Institute of Unstable Thoughts in Kiev, Ukraine, and an adviser for the creation of the first New Media Art Department in North Thailand at the Chaingmai University. Some of his more recent projects can be found here, and you can play with a wonderful graphical "toy" to which he contributed, Puppet Tool.

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Posted 09:30 by Mark Federman permanent link
Can You Legislate Against Obsolescence?

Or, let me put it another way. Had the legislators of the time mandated that all automobiles made required a holder for the proverbial buggy whip, would that have preserved the buggy whip industry? Then why do legislators - and Parliamentarians of Canada who are being tutored by your American friends, I'm talking to you - believe that by aligning our copyright laws with those down south, our recording and movie industries will be better off.

Cory Doctorow has a great discussion on aspects of this topic that I won't repeat here. (Go read Cory's commentary that concludes with

If Canada wants to "solve" the problems of the Internet, it should be looking to find "Internet-native" solutions. Canada's Internet laws should treat copying as a feature, not a bug. It should empirically evaluate which sectors are negatively impacted by file-sharing (mounting evidence suggests that almost none of the entertainment industry's woes can be blamed on the net) and then solve those industries' problems with blanket licenses and other tools that don't seek to regulate copying, something that's impossible to do without breaking the Internet.

When something is obsolesced, it is obsolesced until it is retrieved in a new form by a new medium some time in the future. The aluminum-disk-covered-with-plastic industry is one such example that is trying to hold onto its market dominance by fiat, when new forces have pushed it aside. It's not clear to me that they have actually noticed what's really going on. Certainly, all the lawsuits launched against its customers won't help the recording industry a bit if they cannot entice new artists to subscribe to their business model, one, ironically, that seems to defy current audience tastes. And now, artist-control and wide distribution have a powerful ally.

The Internet Archive has offered to host audio and video files that are Creative Commons licensed, effectively providing artists with almost unlimited bandwidth. Now, The Publisher has arrived, "a desktop, drag-and-drop application that licenses audio and video files, and sends them to the Internet Archive for free hosting. When you're done uploading, the application gives you a URL where others can download the file. ... Also note that aside from being downloadable from Internet Archive, these tagged MP3s can flow on to P2P networks, and be identified as Creative Commons licensed." More information is here.

Originally, there were significant technical barriers that stood between a musician and her or his audience. Recording, publishing, distribution and airplay were all insurmountable challenges. Economical home studios, and electronic composition and synth music overcame the first problem. Peer-to-peer networks are taking care of the airplay issue. Now, publishing and distribution are being handled, so long as the musician is prepared to embrace the ethos of intellectual property under conditions of instantaneous communication. Such acceleration forces the old characteristics into reversal: From exclusive copyright, to creator-controlled Creative Commons, in an environment where reputation is mapped to currency.
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Posted 14:16 by Mark Federman permanent link
Four More Years - And then the Aftermath

Dan Gillmor says it, so I don't have to. The fear of what lies ahead for America during the next term of the Bush administration, that is. Fifty-one percent - a clear, if slim majority - of American voters not only want more Bush, they want a strong shift towards the radical right and Christian fundamentalism, as demonstrated by the gains in the House of Representatives and the Senate. As I have said for a very long time now, The Unites States of America is effectively - that is, by virtue of the effects that emerge - a fundamentalist Christian theocracy. It is simultaneously engaged in two brutal wars, one against "Global Terrists," and one against secularism. Truly frightening stuff.

Equally frightening will be the response of the rest of the world, that had begun a process of isolating the United States for its unilateralism, and perceived expansionist and imperialist aspirations. Also, expect to see even more reversals than we experienced over the past four years. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? The pursuit of life and liberty alone will be the challenge for most, I think.

But on the bright side, think of all the material Jon Stewart will have.
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