Several friends have been pointing me at del.icio.us for quite a while now, which has led me to give some thought to folksonomies.
I'm reminded of a talk at the Web2.0 conference in which Google was demonstrating a research project that performs auto-categorization of search results. The thrust was that when you do a search, rather than just return a flat list of links, Google would examine the context of the search terms within the resulting pages in order to ascertain the category of use. That is, "bismuth" can be a metal or a ship. So Google would return "metal" and "ship" from your search of "bismuth", and you could select the category you meant to get a more precise result.
Folksonomies (aka del.icio.us) are really interesting from the point of view of enabling an architecture of participation around categorization, but will result in a somewhat colloquial categorization on which subsequent viewers can't truly depend. At best. I mean, if we listen to George Carlin ("Toledo Window Box"), we might imagine some folks will tag with "bush", some with "hemp", some with "boo", some with "smoke", some with "weed", some with "guage", some with "grass", some with "tea", some with ... you get the idea. We wind up with a number of variously disjoint islands referring to the same concept. And because the terms are colloquial, what I mean by 'tea' won't be the same as what you mean by 'tea', and you will undoubtably be surprised and amused when you visit some places I've tagged thus.
A folksonomie isn't - can't be - very authoritative. This is probably what Blaise Cronin was referring to: "Undoubtedly, these are the same individuals who believe that the free-for-all, communitarian approach of Wikipedia is the way forward. Librarians, of course, know better." Free-for-all classification is, one suspects, precisely the problem the Dewey Decimal Classification System was designed to address.
All this sets up something of a competition between Google category extraction and del.icio.us. It'll be fun to watch it play out.
Thursday, July 7, 2005
Tuesday, July 5, 2005
DIY magazines
Blaise Cronin* seems confused.
Though he admits
He closes with:
He's missed making his point apparently by being too concerned with the supply side and not the consumption. He should be talking about the ability of information consumers to create their own magazines.
Many have commented on self-publishing as a democratizer (yup, I'm bastardizing the language again). Blogs, mp3, and other technical advances are reducing the cost of publishing to the point where we mere individuals can publish without the permission of some cigar-smoking executive someplace. It is a great liberator, but it leaves us with the million-monkeys problem. A million monkeys will no doubt produce Shakespeare, but the trick becomes to find the Shakespeare in the volume of material produced.
Librarians, publishers and record companies are filters of information. They choose and organize information to make it more accessible. Because they all try to serve a broad audience, they create filters that aim for a certain breadth. In principle anyway, but more on that in a moment. Without librarians and editors, we use aggregators and Favorites that we set up ourselves to gather information we may want to read.
In effect, we create our own magazine-analogues. DIY magazines.
The challenge in self-selecting content for our private magazines (that is, setting up our own aggregators) is that we can narrowly focus our attention on points of view that we appreciate. How many of us want to read authors we disagree with? With mass-market magazines we can choose to not read an article after seeing the title, or perhaps a call-out box of some sort. We get part of the message anyway, or at least know the message exists.
DIY magazines are our own filters of what content to even become aware of. This can increase the divide between different ideological groups as those groups only read those who think as they do and fail to pull any balancing points of view into their own magazine. Rather than finding common ground, they propel their opinions to extremes by never reading contrary voices. Little groups become their own apparent majorities (at least to themselves) as "everyone says" whatever they want to hear.
Not that there are that many contrary voices anymore anyway. Media consolidation has left us with a few companies (editors in fact), all with similar goals and ideals, controlling our information channels. Read or listen to media outlets around the world (or even just Britain) and you hear many interesting stories about America that somehow American media singularly (pun intended) fail to present. Thank [insert politically correct deity here] for self-publishing.
BTW, Cronin is Indiana University Dean and Rudy Professor of Information Science. I'd be far more impressed if he used this pulpit (well, Chair) to discuss media consolidation vs issues of choice and democracy in a self-publishing world. That is, how to create something better using new technologies, rather than dismiss that which is new out of hand.
PS. Here are a few interesting books in this area. If you look at Breaking The News, be sure to check out the review by Barron Laycock. As I was writing today, I encountered the following quote that provides interesting colour for my point above, from a review of Rich Media, Poor Democracy (emphasis mine):
Lately, I’ve been wandering around Blogland, and I’m struck by the narcissism and banality of so many personal blogs, of which, if the statistics are to believed, there are millions. ... One wonders for whom these hapless souls blog.
Though he admits
Blogs can keep stories alive, bring them to the surface and propel them into the media mainstream. Take note: a new communicative dynamic is at work in the public sphere.
He closes with:
Undoubtedly, these are the same individuals who believe that the free-for-all, communitarian approach of Wikipedia is the way forward. Librarians, of course, know better.
Many have commented on self-publishing as a democratizer (yup, I'm bastardizing the language again). Blogs, mp3, and other technical advances are reducing the cost of publishing to the point where we mere individuals can publish without the permission of some cigar-smoking executive someplace. It is a great liberator, but it leaves us with the million-monkeys problem. A million monkeys will no doubt produce Shakespeare, but the trick becomes to find the Shakespeare in the volume of material produced.
Librarians, publishers and record companies are filters of information. They choose and organize information to make it more accessible. Because they all try to serve a broad audience, they create filters that aim for a certain breadth. In principle anyway, but more on that in a moment. Without librarians and editors, we use aggregators and Favorites that we set up ourselves to gather information we may want to read.
In effect, we create our own magazine-analogues. DIY magazines.
The challenge in self-selecting content for our private magazines (that is, setting up our own aggregators) is that we can narrowly focus our attention on points of view that we appreciate. How many of us want to read authors we disagree with? With mass-market magazines we can choose to not read an article after seeing the title, or perhaps a call-out box of some sort. We get part of the message anyway, or at least know the message exists.
DIY magazines are our own filters of what content to even become aware of. This can increase the divide between different ideological groups as those groups only read those who think as they do and fail to pull any balancing points of view into their own magazine. Rather than finding common ground, they propel their opinions to extremes by never reading contrary voices. Little groups become their own apparent majorities (at least to themselves) as "everyone says" whatever they want to hear.
Not that there are that many contrary voices anymore anyway. Media consolidation has left us with a few companies (editors in fact), all with similar goals and ideals, controlling our information channels. Read or listen to media outlets around the world (or even just Britain) and you hear many interesting stories about America that somehow American media singularly (pun intended) fail to present. Thank [insert politically correct deity here] for self-publishing.
BTW, Cronin is Indiana University Dean and Rudy Professor of Information Science. I'd be far more impressed if he used this pulpit (well, Chair) to discuss media consolidation vs issues of choice and democracy in a self-publishing world. That is, how to create something better using new technologies, rather than dismiss that which is new out of hand.
PS. Here are a few interesting books in this area. If you look at Breaking The News, be sure to check out the review by Barron Laycock. As I was writing today, I encountered the following quote that provides interesting colour for my point above, from a review of Rich Media, Poor Democracy (emphasis mine):
If your politics lie anywhere to the right of Ralph Nader's, in other words, don't come to this book looking for validation. But for a stimulating, nuanced, and rigorously researched presentation of the case for overhauling the current media regime, look no further.
  |   |   |
Friday, May 27, 2005
Development as passion, not obligation
Quote: Open source as a business model is inherently flawed and cannot support the development of truly innovative software.
Larry McVoy went on to say "It costs a huge amount of money to develop a single innovative software product. You have to have a business model that will let you recoup those costs."
I think he's forgetting passion.
You can employ me, and I write what you want. And you can employ others to integrate what I wrote, and still others to test what I wrote and others integrated. And because you've now employed a small army, you need to charge a lot, which leads to outside sales people and whole slew of related expenses.
Or you can find someone who is really intrigued by a problem and wants to write something on his own time, and fiddle, and try different approaches, see what works well. Someone for whom solving the problem is a passion, not just a job.
As a bonus, consider: the product I write as an employee doesn't carry my name. But the work I do for passion, it is my visible resume. It creates my reputation in the community of my friends, peers, and now with ZoomInfo, prospective employers. Guess which one I truly care about.
In a proprietary world, it may well cost a huge amount of money to develop a single innovative software product. But in open source, I think it costs far less. Open source benefits from a saying that was common 15 years ago when I was coding full time: Any good developer throws out at least half a dozen innovations before lunch.
Larry McVoy went on to say "It costs a huge amount of money to develop a single innovative software product. You have to have a business model that will let you recoup those costs."
I think he's forgetting passion.
You can employ me, and I write what you want. And you can employ others to integrate what I wrote, and still others to test what I wrote and others integrated. And because you've now employed a small army, you need to charge a lot, which leads to outside sales people and whole slew of related expenses.
Or you can find someone who is really intrigued by a problem and wants to write something on his own time, and fiddle, and try different approaches, see what works well. Someone for whom solving the problem is a passion, not just a job.
As a bonus, consider: the product I write as an employee doesn't carry my name. But the work I do for passion, it is my visible resume. It creates my reputation in the community of my friends, peers, and now with ZoomInfo, prospective employers. Guess which one I truly care about.
In a proprietary world, it may well cost a huge amount of money to develop a single innovative software product. But in open source, I think it costs far less. Open source benefits from a saying that was common 15 years ago when I was coding full time: Any good developer throws out at least half a dozen innovations before lunch.
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Reverend's Finger - an open source source brew
I've been meaning to post this for a while, ever since winning a homebrew competition last fall.
Reverend's Finger
Recipe for 5 US gallons. All temperatures degrees F
3/4 lb British Crystal 77
1/4 lb Belgian Special B
mashed in at 150 for 40 minutes
165 10 minutes
heated to 175, removed and rinsed grains
added 6 lb amber liquid malt extract
Bittering: 2 oz EK Golding 5.5% (boiled 65 min)
Flavour: 1/2 oz Fuggles 4% (15 min)
1/4 tsp irish moss (10 min)
Aroma: 1/2 oz Fuggles 4% (1 min)
WPL007 Dry English Ale yeast
Fermented at 68 for a few weeks, crash cooled to 34 for another couple of weeks
Kegged and aged under 9 lbs C02 for 2 months or so (fresh beer be damned)
[Comments from my previous blog]
Reverend's Finger
Recipe for 5 US gallons. All temperatures degrees F
3/4 lb British Crystal 77
1/4 lb Belgian Special B
mashed in at 150 for 40 minutes
165 10 minutes
heated to 175, removed and rinsed grains
added 6 lb amber liquid malt extract
Bittering: 2 oz EK Golding 5.5% (boiled 65 min)
Flavour: 1/2 oz Fuggles 4% (15 min)
1/4 tsp irish moss (10 min)
Aroma: 1/2 oz Fuggles 4% (1 min)
WPL007 Dry English Ale yeast
Fermented at 68 for a few weeks, crash cooled to 34 for another couple of weeks
Kegged and aged under 9 lbs C02 for 2 months or so (fresh beer be damned)
[Comments from my previous blog]
1. tianye left...
Friday, 1 September 2006 1:49 am
hello 2. glen martin left...
Saturday, 24 April 2010 12:29 pm :: http://blog.glen-martin.com/
A drunk at a bar had a conversation with me once that went just like that comment. "Hello ...." and then nothing. Thanks for the very topical comment. Free beer doesn't hurt
I agree that open source is free as in freedom, not free beer. But free beer is good too, so SpikeSource is having an open house this Friday March 18 at 4pm in our Redwood City office.
If you've ever wondered what we're about, this is a great opportunity to catch us all live. We'll be happy to talk about open source testing, our Spike Asset Manager open source inventory tool, give a preview of some upcoming projects, or anything else that's interesting in the open source world these days. I'm interested to hear what you're doing with open source, including what projects or components you're using together.
We're hiring too. You may know a bunch of folks who already work here, such as Kim Polese, Murugan Pal, Alan Williamson and Calvin Austin. Tim O’Reilly, Brian Behlendorf and Mitchell Baker are on the advisory board. Doc Searls is involved too. We're building a great team, and need some more great developers. And a few more 'overhead' as well.
So if you're in the area, feel free to drop by for an open source brew. If you might come, try to drop me a quick note at <defunct>. I promise I won't use your email for any other purpose - I care about privacy, and I suspect you do too. I'm just thinking headcount and supplies.
SpikeSource Open House, Friday Mar 18 4pm
SpikeSource, Inc.
<defunct>
If you've ever wondered what we're about, this is a great opportunity to catch us all live. We'll be happy to talk about open source testing, our Spike Asset Manager open source inventory tool, give a preview of some upcoming projects, or anything else that's interesting in the open source world these days. I'm interested to hear what you're doing with open source, including what projects or components you're using together.
We're hiring too. You may know a bunch of folks who already work here, such as Kim Polese, Murugan Pal, Alan Williamson and Calvin Austin. Tim O’Reilly, Brian Behlendorf and Mitchell Baker are on the advisory board. Doc Searls is involved too. We're building a great team, and need some more great developers. And a few more 'overhead' as well.
So if you're in the area, feel free to drop by for an open source brew. If you might come, try to drop me a quick note at <defunct>. I promise I won't use your email for any other purpose - I care about privacy, and I suspect you do too. I'm just thinking headcount and supplies.
SpikeSource Open House, Friday Mar 18 4pm
SpikeSource, Inc.
<defunct>
1. a reader left...
Gord
Tuesday, 15 March 2005 8:53 pm
Free beer, and I'm too far away. Damn! Well, have one for me... ;) Gord
Saturday, January 29, 2005
Nerd God
In case it wasn't apparent to anyone, I'm a nerd. This was officially cemented by an official nerd score, see the bottom of the gutter of this page. For the record, I answered all the questions on the test absolutely truthfully.
This all came about because a friend posted his nerd score and amusing logo to his personal mailing list.
Now, many have known or suspected my nerdiness over the years. I was nicknamed 'Syntax warrior' in high school. For fun, I used to wire-wrap simple little electronics projects (like video cards and SBCs) at home. I have 4 computers in my home office, each running different operating systems, and switch cards etc so often that right now only one has a complete case. The vast majority of my TV viewing involves a hdtv card feeding MythTV on a Debian distro, displayed on the 3rd monitor on my desk. And depite being clearly in Marketing these days, I've programmed in 4 languages within the past month.
The only saving grace in my life: my partner ranked in the 35th percentile on nerdiness.
This all came about because a friend posted his nerd score and amusing logo to his personal mailing list.
Now, many have known or suspected my nerdiness over the years. I was nicknamed 'Syntax warrior' in high school. For fun, I used to wire-wrap simple little electronics projects (like video cards and SBCs) at home. I have 4 computers in my home office, each running different operating systems, and switch cards etc so often that right now only one has a complete case. The vast majority of my TV viewing involves a hdtv card feeding MythTV on a Debian distro, displayed on the 3rd monitor on my desk. And depite being clearly in Marketing these days, I've programmed in 4 languages within the past month.
The only saving grace in my life: my partner ranked in the 35th percentile on nerdiness.
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
In war, are there terrorists?
Interesting report of an Italian case in which terrorism charges were dropped because the alleged acts existed within a context of war. The men were accused of recruiting suicide bombers etc to go to Iraq, seemingly after hostilities had broken out in that country.
Unpalatable as this ruling may seem, taking into account the outrage by Italian politicians who see this potentially gutting anti-terrorism laws put in place after Sept 11 2001, and in no way defending terrorism, this legal position seems thoughtful. I mean, bombing bridges, factories, and flying a plane into the Pentagon may be thought of as terrorist attacks under normal circumstances, but during a war a clandestine infiltration of enemy territory to destroy war capacity is if not respected (by the victim) it is at least more common tactic. In fact, clandestine missions (performed by our side) enjoy respect and pride in popular culture.
The true irony would be if the declaration of a War on Terror, so useful in galvanizing American popular opinion in favor of military action against those (arguably) uninvolved in Sept 11, were to result in unsuccessful prosecution of those captured because a war permits different standards of behaviour.
Unpalatable as this ruling may seem, taking into account the outrage by Italian politicians who see this potentially gutting anti-terrorism laws put in place after Sept 11 2001, and in no way defending terrorism, this legal position seems thoughtful. I mean, bombing bridges, factories, and flying a plane into the Pentagon may be thought of as terrorist attacks under normal circumstances, but during a war a clandestine infiltration of enemy territory to destroy war capacity is if not respected (by the victim) it is at least more common tactic. In fact, clandestine missions (performed by our side) enjoy respect and pride in popular culture.
The true irony would be if the declaration of a War on Terror, so useful in galvanizing American popular opinion in favor of military action against those (arguably) uninvolved in Sept 11, were to result in unsuccessful prosecution of those captured because a war permits different standards of behaviour.
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