I’m here in Salt Lake City, learning about how the U.S. military — and its contractors — do software.
My network access is sporadic so I’m a little behind the curve.
But I note a handful of things:
Mitch Kapor’s reflections on the Internet-driven Korean election.
“More than 70% of people would reveal their computer password in exchange for a bar of chocolate, a survey has found.” (Via Slashdot)
At dinner last night I discovered that there is good beer in Utah.
Public Knowledge has a fundraiser planned for next Wednesday, April 21. More details here. The group is celebrating those technology companies who have taken a stand against the Broadcast Flag, publicizing the FCC’s upcoming proceedings that will set rules for software-defined radio, and generally throwing a party.
I’d be there myself but will be traveling next week — I’m off Monday to the Systems and Software Technology Conference, a conclave about military software development, to learn more about that part of the programming universe.
I can’t make it to the second Bloggercon on April 17 at Harvard, but it looks likely to be a fascinating program with great people. I look forward to following the proceedings from a distance.
Rob Glaser of Real Networks, Lisa Gansky of Ofoto and Shane Robison of HP are talking about “user-generated content” here at PC Forum, in a panel moderated by Hank Barry of Napster fame. There’s lots of talk about monetizing content and tools and rights (including some slaps at Steve Jobs for keeping ITunes and the IPod a closed system), but I think they’re all missing the point. Newsweek’s Steven Levy asked, “Are we going to enter a renaissance of alternatives to the media with homegrown stuff, or is it going to be more of an ‘American Idol’ kind of thing?” He didn’t get much of an answer.
Glaser talked about a “shortage of narrative storytelling skills” and a “dearth of creative talent” when it comes to users creating longer-form video content. Technically, perhaps he’s right. But so what? “User-generated content” isn’t about creating some sort of big farm team for the pros. The long-term value of “user-generated content” isn’t in the businesses — not necessarily those on this panel –that no doubt will figure out how ways to generate revenue from it. The value is to individuals, and society, in the sheer number of previously silent voices that will sound, in the previously unheard stories that will be told, to whatever size audience. We’re slowly but steadily increasing the breadth of human experience and expression that is recorded and available to others. Next to that sort of social good, somehow the implementation details of different business models seem trivial.
(These issues have been hashed out for years at the Digital Storytelling Festival.)
I’m much too exhausted to offer a full account, but Neal Stephenson just spoke for an hour or so here at PC Forum — and said that, since he’s now finished work on the Baroque Cycle (the next volume is out April 13), he thinks he may turn his attention to an update of his amazing essay on computer operating systems, “In the Beginning Was the Command Line.”
There’s good blogging on PC Forum from David Weinberger, Brian Dear, Bret Fausett, and I’m sure others. Socialtext has created an “eventspace” Web site / wiki for the conference.
I got into Phoenix for PC Forum very late last night, missing the Sunday afternoon festivities and panels. But there’s plenty to talk about from today. The WiFi here is great, but the combination of a shortage of AC outlets and my own desire to pay attention to the speakers rather than on posting means that I don’t think I’ll be doing too much live-from-the-conference blogging. Look instead for more of a roundup report later this week. Unless I change my mind or some time for writing opens up in the schedule!
Next week I’m heading out for Esther Dyson’s legendary PC Forum conference (March 21-23), to hear people like Google’s Eric Schmidt, Neal Stephenson, AOL’s Jonathan Miller, Steven Johnson and many more.
I interviewed Dyson back in 1997, on the threshold of Internet-investment mania. A lot of people were saying a lot of silly things in those days; a surprisingly high percentage of Dyson’s observations remain not only unembarrassing but actually relevant:
| The point I’m trying to make is not that intellectual property is valueless, but that the price of copies is going down dramatically, so you need to think of other ways to exploit the content. And a creator is now in a much better position than a publisher. |
At that moment, Napster had yet to begin haunting music execs’ dreams, Salon’s first story on the MP3 revolution was still three months in the future, and blogs were a concept waiting for software to make real.
So I talked to Dyson again yesterday to preview this year’s conference. I’d just read the 70-page “documentation” — a special edition of Dyson’s “Release 1.0” newsletter in which Dyson personally interviews each of the speakers at her conference. You don’t often find that level of focus and attention at tech conferences, where routine pitches and boilerplate Powerpoint presentations are the norm.
I asked Dyson how the ebb and flow of the tech industry’s fortunes over the last half-decade have made themselves felt at PC Forums past: “There were a few years when it was all business models and eyeballs.” Then the wheel of the tech-industry cycle turned downward. “Last year, it was, ‘you gotta have faith and it’s coming back.’ This year, people are ready to get excited again.”
Does she see any signs of boom-era insanity creeping back into the conversation? Not yet, for the most part. “I think people are getting a little overexcited about Google — which is certainly deserving of love, but it’s human, too. I want people to get excited without losing their heads — rational exuberance.”
Depending on the vagaries of Wi-fi and Radio Userland, I’ll be filing from Scottsdale early next week.
My column about today’s now-concluded Digital Democracy Teach-in is now
online here.
Well, Joe Trippi just spoke for an hour here at the “Digital Democracy
Teach-in”… I’m not going to blog blow-by-blow here (e-mail-to-blog is
pretty funky right now anyway), so I can actually pay attention to the live
event, but I’ll be filing an in-depth column tonight on the event.
Beginning Monday I’ll be at the O’Reilly Emerging Tech Conference in San Diego. I’ll be filing a report for Salon on the Digital Democracy Teach-in there, and blogging, too (assuming my desktop box that runs Radio doesn’t miss me and decide to crash in my absence).
