A Random Pattern

Can you trust your computer? – GNU Project – Free Software Foundation (FSF)

With all the hoopla, excitement, and general craziness among bloggers, it’s time to slow down and process some of the frenzied news from the last year. With that time to think, there are some serious questions that need to be asked amongst the digerati. Here’s a starting point for a few posts on various aspects of control, specifically related to the “brave new digital world”.

Keep in mind, for my more geeky readers, that it is a new world, and it’s really still in it’s toddler years, if not infancy. There are many battles to be fought, and many lines to be drawn. Unfortunately due to the raw power and nearly unlimited reach provided by the internet, this is one baby that’s growing up more quickly than it can learn the value of the guidelines successful societies have followed for hundreds of years….

While the referenced article is more than a little old (at least in internet time), it takes on a chilling new gravitas against the sordid story of Sony. How the Sony situation is handled, and how we respond to other attempts to cross reasonable lines of behavior, will determine what our tomorrows hold.

Technology and the new class divide | Perspectives | CNET News.com: “The truth is that the promise of a digital utopia where all are more or less equal has not yet come to pass. More broadly, income disparities in the United States are greater than they have been in 30 years, and some suggest that income inequality is growing to levels not seen since the 1880s. Recent studies have also suggested that social mobility is stagnating and possibly even reversing. That means very few people are moving out of the class they were born into. Despite all our technology gains, it appears that class gaps are widening. Could it be that technology is actually exacerbating the class divide rather than helping to address it?

In an era when 60 percent of all jobs now require good fundamental technology skills and technology has become a quality of life indicator, tech elites have noticeable advantages. They’re able to demand higher paying jobs, communicate better and faster, and save time and money by handling routine tasks (like paying bills and accessing health information) online instead of in person.”

Right now there is a brewing battle between pipeline owners and corps such as Google. Web2.0 companies like the current democratization of the web, where all citizens are (at least somewhat) equal. But the pipeline owners are seeing dollar signs through a different vision of the future – a future where the speed of a particular site might depend on how much that site was willing to pay to the pipeline owner. I can see this leading to an even bigger class divide, voiding the promise of technology.

Chronicles of Narnia

I’m actually worried that the movie won’t have a strong enough Christian/religious theme.Now, I’m an athiest, brought up Quaker, with little interest in spreading Christianity or anything.But I read the books before I could understand the whole Christian allegory thing. I loved them. I reread them later, understood, and felt betrayed. Then I matured enough to where I could read them a third time and not take it so hard. And I realize that the whole feel of the stories, the idea that they had weight and importance and weren’t just some guys who had beef with each other, that came straight out of the religious treatment of the characters.If Aslan isn’t God, and the White Witch is just some woman who wants to rule this place, the story becomes a cheesy special-effects battle movie. Yay, Dungeons and Dragons. If they can try to instill some kind of reverence and awe, and a feeling that these people are taking part in a larger struggle, that what is happening matters, I think the story can carry itself a lot better.If you can get over the fact that it’s about Christianity, of course.I never saw The Passion, and I don’t think it’s a great idea for a movie, and so forth. But think how much more pointless a film it would be if the guy who was being tortured and suffering wasn’t Jesus. (via www.slashdot.com comments )

Now that’s some insightful commentary. There is definitely room for a valid discussion on how well the movie was done, or how well the movie followed or didn’t follow the book. But arguing about the religious overtones or symbolism is really kind of silly.

Jim Collins.com | Library Rochelle spoke to me repeatedly about the idea of “making your life a creative work of art.” A great piece of art is composed not just of what is in the final piece, but equally important, what is not. It is the discipline to discard what does not fit — to cut out what might have already cost days or even years of effort — that distinguishes the truly exceptional artist and marks the ideal piece of work, be it a symphony, a novel, a painting, a company or, most important of all, a life.

Hmmmm…