digitalcommons

LionShare: academic P2P file sharing

LionShare is an effort to set up a peer-to-peer file sharing environment for educational institutions (presumably not any K-12 schools).It is based at Penn State and is meant to enable students and faculty there and at other schools to share "legal" files. The member sharing will not be anonymous. People outside of Penn State must register to download the software which will be released to the public on September 30, 2005.

Future Commons: Rudy Rucker

Yesterday, IFTF hosted another FutureCommons meeting in Palo Alto. This is a monthly event where my brain begins to work at more than 1000 RPM. Rudy Rucker, former SJSU Math professor and author of many science fiction works, came to talk about his new book on cellular automata, The Lifebox, the Seashell, and the Soul , a book that weighs in at 1 Kg. and which I had an easier time grasping with my hand than with my brain. The bumper sticker might be: "Reality is made up of a lot of little computations." From his web site: " I spent twenty years in the dark Satanic mills of Silicon Valley. I'm covered in a thick lint of bytes and computer code. And now I'm stepping into the light to tell you what I learned among the machines."

I had met Rucker at a Hacker's Conference 12 years ago. He and I are both from Louisville, Kentucky, and I remember his story about his early work teaching in a girls' school in Lynchburg, Virginia, where the dean cuationed him about his students, "There are two things you can't do. Don't screw them, and don't tell them there's no God."  As Rucker said to me yesterday, "Well, I didn't do one of them." His talk in a way bridged the gap between intelligent design and evolution. Before he came to IFTF he pulled out part of his book for a paper with some interesting ideas: "history of gnarl" and his web sites will take you deeper into his writings and knowledge.

I found myself in the position of someone who had heard of some of his references but knew nothing substantial about them. It was sort of like listening to a new form of music for the first time.  He has synthesized a lot of reading and works of others which buttressed his ideas about the universe.

He showed a number of open source programs  that generated some of these computational patterns and life forms. Particularly striking were the scrolling patterns that resembled, among other things in nature, coral patterns and malachite,  a semi-precious stone found near copper deposits.

After he finished, there were surprisingly few questions initially, but Jerry Michalski  led a discussion that was linked back to Rucker's talk. Jerry highlighted four or five books on 'the theory of everything' and asked who in the audience was familiar with each and could give a short summary.  Last month Howard Rheingold started what might become a tradition, the five minute university--short introductions to topics and ideas, and that's what Jerry was hoping for. The ensuing discussion was a mix of personal reflection, how the books affected a particular reader, and ideas about other books.  As a librarian, it was interesting to see how the discussion at the Institute for the Future was about books, though there were references continually to online resources, and Michalski frequently brought on screen his Brain (his web site leads to screen shots but the java applet did not seem to work) program that linked his own intellectual wanderings in a two dimensional space of ideas, people, wikipedia entries, and books.

Piracy: a new topic area

There are a series of events in August of next year here in San Jose, California. The International Society of Electronic Artists are having their annual meeting. There will be exhibits, films, concerts, performances as well as other groups convening.

I am trying to organize a session for a meeting for Pacific Rim communities that will parallel a number of municipal groups from around the Pacific meeting with counterparts in San Jose. My session is entitled: "Pirates of the Pacific Rim" and we will look at the diverse attitudes and activities of people and organizations toward theft-copying-sharing-fair use- distribution and sale of software, books, entertainment, and cultural artifacts of a local and national nature.

I have started a new category for this web log: piracy. There will be postings about this extreme form of knowledge sharing.

Documentaries and clearances

American documentary film producers have a difficult time clearing copyright on images, music, and other sound clips if they are reusing other media.  The Center for Social Media at American University is holding an invitation-only conference later this month to discuss the issues involved. "Fair Use and Free Speech: Beyond Untold Stories" takes place at Drexel Univeristy September 28.

However, they have also produced a report and short video with the help of the Rockefeller Foundation. "Untold Stories: Creative Consequences of the               Rights Clearance Culture for Documentary               Filmmakers" is accessible to all of us.  It shows the difficulties encountered in past productions as well as the conclusions about the effects on society.