Okj sure- - the Be-In has always beena fun party.  But the idea was always to go beyind having funa nd create a mood for discourse, interaction and enlightenment.

I gave many a presentation at Be-Ins - including a live MediaBand gig at the Mariner's Hall one year.  Let's see that must have been '93 or '94.

Anyway - Bruce Eisner is helping to spread the meme and get folks contributing to the flow.  Discussions going on at the Be-In Tribe.

Bruce Eisner's Vision Thing
3 inbound blogs, 4 inbound links (Last updated 14 minutes ago)

13th Annual Digital Be-In Complete Info and Blogs Announced

My friend Michael Gosney sent me the following email announcing some blogs with ideas and information for the 13th Annual Digigal Be-In mentioned earlier in this weblog. Here is the email message with updated information:

Hi all -
We are working on blogging the Be-In...
Marc Canter has put up an initial piece at here.
Also, we have started
Be-In Now – news and notes on the ever-evolving Digital Be-In

Goz – notes on the new edge

We would greatly appreciate your interaction here... Let’s get the ideas circulating!
Info on Digital Be-In 13 is below, also at http://www.be-in.com
many thanks,
Michael
Below is a press release with more information that I just received.

Verbum is pleased to announce...

DIGITAL BE-IN 13!
San Francisco's original socially conscious cyberculture happening!
(((((((The Transparent Network)))))))

The Be-In returns in its 13th incarnation, for the first time on Memorial Day weekend. Staged at the Be-In's home venue, the SOMARTS cultural center, this one-of-a-kind Gathering of the Tribes will feature speakers, exhibits, art installations, live music and a late night DJ dance party.

May 29, 2004
SOMARTS
934 Brannan St, San Francisco, CA
7PM-4AM
21+ w/ID
http://www.be-in.com

We got wristbands too.

And a large trade show booth.  And a cigar party.

And ads in Hollywood Reporter.

:-)

Ship Yer Code!.

Marc's Voice: "Ross is shipping like the exact same week as we are."

Maybe, maybe not! ;) Of course,  May 10 through May 14 *is* First Annual Ship Yer Code! Week. The festivities kick off with a pancake breakfast at the Creative Commons first thing Monday morning. Stay tuned for more infromation about the rockin' schedule we have lined up!!

Note: Tickets are available on a first come, first serve basis at a Tower Records near you. Wristband policy in effect, attendee's *must* be shipping code next week!!

ObDisclaimer: Of course, I'm not publicly confirming nor denying that Tucows is shipping anything next week. You'll have to wait for the press release that's allegedly coming out in order to get the real scoop on the rumors that Marc is spreading about Blogware.

This is really important!  It seems that Microsoft is NOT going to support Rendezvous.  Fucking assholes.

Here's Jon's post....

UPnP, Web services, and Rendezvous. A few of us InfoWorlders spoke yesterday with one of Microsoft's Indigo architects, John Shewchuk. In the course of our conversation, Shewchuk mentioned the recent WinHEC announcement about device support for Web services protocols, reported in InfoWorld on May 5:

Microsoft Corp., Intel Corp., Lexmark International Inc. and Ricoh Co. Ltd. on Tuesday detailed new Web services technology designed to make it easier for users to connect devices such as printers, digital cameras and digital music players over a network. The companies at Microsoft's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) officially announced a Devices Profile for Web services, which describes how devices should use Web services protocols. The announcement builds on WS-Discovery, a Web services specification that Microsoft, Intel, Canon Inc. and BEA Systems Inc. introduced in February. WS-Discovery describes a way for devices to find and connect to Web services. [InfoWorld.com: Web services find way to devices]

So here I was - flew all the way up to Seattle to hear Clay again and god dammit - the only time I could talk to him was on the bus or during dinner!  I actually really like listening to Clay - while other social scientists seem to use the term "well the thing about it is" - so much, that it occludes their message.

Dave brings up a lot of good points below, but before I launch into a support of 'new kinds of conferences' meme again I'd like to also say that the echo chamber is getting kind of cliquish - if you ask me.  The same dam speakers at every conference means there's no reason for me to go.

It would be nice to have new kinds of conferences, that formerly continued the debate beyond the meatspace event and back-channel IRC gossiping.

Kevin and SuperNova should have a persistent, decentralization meme location, while emergent democracy, Free Music or Technorati data mining might work as well.

But the real issue that Dave brings up below has more to do with politics and the entrance fees to these conferences - than anything else.  I'd love to make it to all the conferences in the Bay Area - as I can sleep at home and drive there.

But there's no way in hell I'm gonna pay (I don't have a job that wil pay for it) and there's no way I'm getting on a plane to listen to Clay again.  Unless we can discuss in public his issues.  I'm just not much of a "sit in my chair and be nice" kind of guy.  If I got something to say (like Dave Winer) I say it.

At least my Opera training comes in handy once in a while.

So here's Dave's post.......

Sponsors, speakers, panels, audience.

Supernova and the recently announced Web 2.0 conference are throwbacks to the priorities of old conferences, of the eighties and nineties: sponsors, speakers, panels, audience.

Execs from high tech companies pay sponsorship fees, not disclosed, and guarantee that the content is paid advertising and that nothing real is said on stage. If you don't pay the sponsorship fee, you don't get a speaking slot. If you offend a sponsor, you don't get invited back.

These conferences are all spin, and empty bluster.

The organization of the conferences, with speakers and panels, guarantees that the audience falls asleep or is frustrated, waiting to make their point until they get to ask questions at the end of the session. Questions. What a silly concept. Look in the room. It's pretty likely the people who know the most are in the "audience."

By the end of the day people are in the hallway or outside, talking to each other, and when that gets boring, talking on cell phones.

Now that they have WiFi, at least there's an outlet for the audience's ideas, their blogs.

But as we learned at BloggerCon II, it's totally possible to do a conference without sponsors, without speakers, panels, without an audience. In this model, the rooms are full to capacity and even though there's WiFi, there was hardly any time to post to blogs. You can steal the design for this conference. And if you do, sign me up, I want to be there.

If you really want to get the most out of people's time, switch models. You don't need the money from the sponsors, and you don't need speakers, and you surely don't need an audience.

ScottGant writes "Wired has this story about Steven Dunifer and his four-day Radio Summer Camps sponsored by Free Radio Berkeley that offers how-tos for building transmitters and antennas, along with advice on handling any FCC agents that might come knocking. Imagine this: A thousand little stations send radio programming across cities and towns from senior centers, dorm rooms and attics. The understaffed FCC would be powerless to shut them down. Audiences would have substantive content choices. No one would tune into Top-40 radio. And the media moguls would slink back into their caves. The FCC and Big Radio are obviously paying attention to the microbroadcasters -- it was pressure from independent broadcasters that forced the FCC to grant a limited number of low-power, or LPFM, radio licenses to community organizations, a decision that the NAB resisted. Are these Pirates or Patriots?"

[unmediated]

I'd like to see this go WAY beyond just audio Radio.  Buty we gotta start somewhere.  Right on brothers!

Mason Hale, Chief Technologist at Frog Design, has started a blog. I can't wait to read more. Frog Design is a very respected design house. Here's more about Mason.

[Scobleizer: Microsoft Geek Blogger]

Hey I know that guy!

So I've been beating on Michael Gosney and the folks running the Digital Be-In this year to start using the transparent network (which is the theme of this year's event.).  They've set up web sites before, but never actually USED the transparent network that they're talking about.  At least MY definiton of what the transparent network is (a decentralized, distributed end-to-end NEA web.)

They clearly have had their own networks, their own cliques, their own set of friends that they use to promote their events, but I was really hoping that THIS year we'd use the technology that we all love so much to communicate and interact leading up to the event - to build the buzz virtually.

One of the fun things about a term like 'transparent network' - is that there are so many defintions of what it is.  So an obvious activity surrounding this year's event - could and should be in the discussion of just what IS a transparent network. Or what IS the network itself.

And since this year's theme is the transparent network - I thought it would be apropos for us all to eat our own dogfood and bring their discussion into the blgosphere.

As soon as I heard the topic of this year's Be-In - I knew it would be ripe for debate - as there clearly are many different defintions and interpretations of the term - transparent network.  I doubt that even David Weinberger and Doc could even agree on ONE definition.

So when I heard that BOTH the Creative Commons and EFF were speaking, in addition to Baba Ram Dass, Wavy Gravey, R.U. Sirius and me - well then (I thought) now we're cooking!

Be Here Now was an important link and seminal work in my transition into a thinking person - as it challenged every norm I had up until then, on what a book was - and how ideas were communicated.  It was around this time in my life (age 15) that I also has an epiphany of why we're all here - to repropagate the race of course.

That's why I have 5 kids so far.  Giving life to life is what it's all about.

And how those lives then express themselves.

Anyway if you want to join in the discussion of what the transparent network IS, how it will EVOLVE and just how many different ways can we slice the same term - come on in.  We're using a Tribe Tribe, a couple of blogs and ...... [ insert your own contribution here.]

Set a spell, take your shoes off.

Diagram of how it fits.

Anyway, enough rambling. Marc wanted a diagram for how pDNS fits in with everything else.. I took the word "fits" literally and create this following puzzle-piece diagram ;)



To explain:

pDNS totally depends on the parser, pa needs pDNS for doing lookups in a logical way that is not as screwy and intensive as rdql as we are looking for large scale in this project.

Anyway, any questions.. drop em.. or any suggestions..

Incentives for online software: the 7 pieces social software must have .... This is an excellent read as I think about Drupal's role within social software... After years of study, I found this blog from Matt Webb most interesting, and actually very accurate. Enjoy reading. [drupal.org - community plumbing]

This is an excellent read as I think about Drupal's role within social software... After years of study, I found this blog from Matt Webb most interesting, and actually very accurate. Enjoy reading.

From the blog:

"We need mechanisms in the online software to bring in a similar incentive structure to the offline world. The single most useful piece of thinking I've been using is Stewart Butterfield's March 2003 post on the devices in social software, mechanisms successful pieces of social software tend to have.

Identity
Presence
Relationships
Conversations
Groups
Reputation
Sharing
I'll describe each of these, as I see them, critiquing AOL Instant Messanger (just as an exmaple), and then describe how we put them into use.

Identity | Your identity is shown by a screenname, which remains persistent through time. There are incentives not to change this, like having your list of friends stored on the server and only accessible through your screenname. This acts as a pressure to not change identity. Having a persistent identity is more important than having one brought in from the physical world.


Presence | Presence is awareness of sharing the same space, and this is implemented as seeing when your friends are online, or busy. AIM isn't particularly good at group presence and visibility of communication, although other chat systems (such as IRC and early Talkers) use the concept of "rooms" and whispers.

Relationships | AIM lets you add people as buddies. From that moment, their presence is visible on your screen. This is a relationship, you're allowed them to have an effect on your environment. Not terribly nuanced however.

Conversations | Conversations are implemented as synchronous messaging. There's a difference between messaging and conversations. Messaging is just an exchange of text with no obligation, but conversations have their own presence and want to be continued. AIM does this by having a window for a conversation. It's difficult to drift out of it, it hangs there, requesting you continue. Contrast this with email which often is just messaging, and conversations die easily.

Groups | AIM isn't great at groups. Although you can have group chats, the group is transient. People have more loyalty to a group when there's some kind of joining step, when they've made some investment in it. Entering a window just doesn't do that, and there's no property of the group that exists outside the individual user's accounts.

Reputation | Reputation is used more in systems which allow meeting new individuals. AIM's simple version of this is "warning". Any user may "warn" any other user. A users total "warn" level (a figure up to 100) is shown to everyone they communicate with. Unfortunately, it's not a trustworthy reputation system, and reputation is notoriously difficult -- but humans are great at dealing with it themselves, given certain affordances: persistence identities, and being able to discuss those identities with other people. AIM's simplistic relationship system makes reputation not so important though.

Sharing | People like to share. With AIM, sharing is often as simple as giving a friend a link to follow. Other systems, such as Flikr, are about sharing photographs. These act as small transactions that build genuine group feeling."

Curious what our Drupal development community thinks about these 7 components (as pivotal/needed) to the Drupal project. Thoughts/discussion? Thanks. [MapTheWay]

Here we go!

Reunions In The Air.

So yesterday I told you about American Airlines’ shameless play to connect our familial dots and then fly us all to our family reunions.

Well today Classmates.com gets into the act of bringing our academic families back together with Reunion Center 2.0—offering online ticket sales for school, work, and military reunions. According to the press release we can utilize Classmates.com Reunion Center to:

    — Sell tickets online for all reunion events and collect payment from attendees via Visa, MasterCard or check.
    — Post reunion information and photos to share with their class.
    — Increase reunion awareness by leveraging Classmates.com’s listing of more than 38 million school alumni.
    — Send email invitations, updates and reminders to the reunion class, even if they are not yet members of Classmates.com.
    — Show class members a current RSVP list of reunion attendees.
    — Find lost alumni and enable class members to stay in touch.
    — Create class message boards to share reunion ideas and memories.
    — Get ideas from thousands of other reunion planners.

All for a modest processing fee. Have you been to a High School Reunion lately?

The transition of Userland continues.

I go back with Peter Winer almost as far back as Dave.

Clearly this is a company like no other.