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I don’t believe in the concept of treason.

The term has been flung around so often to describe anything, anyone or any action that may be a threat to, or enemy of the state, to/of those who are in power, and to/of those who are vying for political power.

Republicans use the “treason” word against Pelosi, Democrats use it against Bush/Cheney/Rove/etc. It’s all about slinging mud on an individual because he or she doesn’t toe a party line.

I’m rather tired of the belief that someone can pose that much of a threat to the population that he/she should be dragged to court as a criminal. I thought we were out of the Cold War?

Handhelds in Japan and Handhelds in America: function and form

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I just read this post. And this one. And this one.

What they all have in common, besides their concern over Apple’s handhelds and the Japanese computer culture, is their mention of how the handhelds in Japan have magnitudes of hardware features that aren’t even heard of in other parts of the world, including the U.S.

One of the most recent (prototype) devices to be created in Japan is the Wellness Navigator, which is a mobile phone that can also give health checks and results of calorie and alcohol intake (using a breathalyzer).

However, while the mobile phones in Japan can double as charge cards, fingerprint scanners and door keys (among other things), they are noted for their lagging interfaces in comparison to the Western-made mobiles like the products of Apple, Nokia and Motorola.

So is it true? Have things come so full circle that the hardware products in America that are improved in their function by magnitudes in Japan’s factories now have to find improvement in their GUI accessibility in….America?

And furthermore, Garmin is coming out with the nuvifone, a phone with a multitouch keyboard (like the iPhone/iTouch) and built-in GPS navigation. So we in the West could see some more of the mobile functionality that is already commonplace in Japan within the next 5 years or so.

It will be interesting to see exactly how many ways the handheld can be applied, as it is no longer just a phone, just a media player or just a GPS device.

In fact, I’m very certain that it will get very heated when phones in the U.S. will serve as replacements for charge/credit/debit cards, transport tokens and movie/theme park/museum tickets. Oh, and this will be over Wi-Fi connections, not over spotty cellular data networks.

Politics and security scares will be involved in this development, as card makers and ticket makers will now have to compete with virtual card developers.

So yah, handhelds are bound to shake things up,

Me and the furry thing

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I’m doing my final paper in English 191 on the furry fandom and multimedia genre. I have to turn it in next week.

Seems appropriate, I suppose. Despite never having traveled to a convention and never maintaining any face-to-face relationships with any particular furry, I have been tied by interest to the furry genre since when I started to use the Internet on a frequent basis (2002). Furthermore, I have been a “fan” of the “funny animal” genre for much longer, even though I never understood why.

What’s wierd, however, is that I STILL don’t know why I have taken such a longtime interest in the furry/funny animal genre.

So I ask myself….is it because of some unnatural, sexually-attractive undercurrent that draws my face to a furry/funny animal picture like a mouth-hooked fish to a boat?

I mean, most assuredly, I remember when I was actually afraid of a guy who talked like a woman (two of them were in the church). Years later, I find my own sexual attitudes becoming far more ambiguous than what they once were, and I’m far less certain about my own sexual affinities.

But again, I’m not an outgoing individual, so I’m not into sex.

So what is it? If it’s not a sexual attraction, what is it?

Why am I so obsessed with anything furry-related?

Why have I been so interested in it for so long?

Is this a fad, a phase, or a nagging disease?

Dogs in my dreams.

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I’ve been having wierd dreams for the last two months.

They involve dogs.

Dogs that run up to me, jump at me and bite at me, only to bite/gnaw on my clasped hands. If I sleep long enough, the dogs calm down.

Every time I have a dream involving these dogs, something big is usually happening.

When I had a dream sometime early last week, it involved two German shepherds, one of whom bit at my hands and the other of which bit at my right torso; I woke up with a start. Not long afterward, I had this flu/sinusitis that hit me around Tuesday/Wednesday (February 26/27).

This Wednesday, I had a dream of a medium-sized dog with a bulldog’s face and pointy ears who bit at my hands, but then calmed down enough for me to put my hand out and let him lick it. I also saw a guy with a cut beard who was dressed like those who are into puppy play, among other things :-/.

I personally don’t know why I’ve been seeing different breeds of dogs in each dream that I’ve had for the last month or so. I can say that I’ve seen two German shepherds, a Doberman, somebody’s pit bull, and one other breed.

I think it may be related to this one weekend in January when this dog came into our front yard from down the street and wandered around in it while me and my nephew were raking up the leaves (yes, we have a “perennial,” the sheepdog of tree species). I remember when the daughter(?) of the owner came with her young sister to the front yard to try to bring him back home, even though the dog never came to them; oh, and when the dog became first frisky with a passerby’s German shepherd, then came back to attack the dog rather viciously.

It was rather interesting to see that while raking. So maybe the dreams that I’ve had ever since are related to that dog.

Might as well pick a dog as a totem animal, if I see one again in a dream.

On cloning: Is the individual self the final monopoly?

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I kinda find it hypocritical that those who espouse the “free information” slogan when it comes to discourse on intellectual property are also dead-set against the idea of RFID tags and other supposedly “privacy-endangering” technologies which are being produced for future commercial and non-commercial markets.

I mean sure, we’re talking about arms-oriented governments and money-oriented corporations who are pushing for these technologies, and its pretty scary to think that, within the next two decades, these technologies will become incorporated within both institutions as a means to “keep tabs” on their respective public.

But if we’re supposed to espouse the free sharing of information for everything else, shouldn’t we also freely share information about ourselves as well (its not like they’re holding back much on the social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook)?

In fact, if the sharing of personal information were to take a wiki form in the future, then should we be surprised if that information was used in, say, human cloning?

And how would human cloning – the creation of a multiple number of the same self – redefine our civilization? Or how will it redefine the way that governments and corporations relate to individuals?

It’s possible that multiple selves can be used to stock an entire bureaucracy, even though the selves may vary in personality, profession, mentality and/or wealth.

It’s also possible that a single face can be attached to many of the ills of a society, as has happened before with the attachment of social ills to ethnic groups and subcultures such as Jews or homosexuals. This could result in “facial violence.”

It’s even possible that the multiplication of faces through cloning could lead to the partial diffusion of ethnic or nationalist loyalties, as they would be supplanted by loyalties to the “self”, which would be effectively separated from the “individual.”

Indeed, it would complicate matters. But such possibilities are for the sci-fi writers to explore.

Related video:

Idea: Icons as typed symbols for programming on multitouch handhelds

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OK, as I’ve probably noted before, multitouch handhelds (or handhelds in general) aren’t built for serious text input. And I’ve written before that such limitations should not preclude the creation of programming environments from within the devices.

So since then, I’ve been thinking about what could be done for the creation of such environments which won’t require the serious text input that is common in older computing form factors (desktop, server, etc.). And I think I may have found another preliminary solution:

Replacement of text words with graphic symbols or icons.

This means that instead of typing text words by the letter or key in order to construct a single syntax, one could simply create a string of graphic symbols which are interpreted by the handheld to mean a string of words and text symbols.

Preferably, the symbols would be rendered in SVG so that they could contain the data that would be used by the runtime (the web browser?) for interpretation, while providing customization abilities to those who may want to create similar yet distinctive symbols in order to symbolize a level of critical intensity (say, a yellow star as opposed to a red star).

Such usage of SVG (or, if you prefer, PNG) icons as a replacement for text could also be enhanced (and, hopefully, understood) with animated icons and even sound-embedding in the icons.

Now…what applications could be created with this that isn’t already creatable with a desktop computer?

I’m still thinking about that…

Places and islands: the third social networking tier

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First you had profiles, then you had groups. Most social networks on the WWW are centered around these two components of the user experience. Multimedia posted through the user’s account are seen and reviewed by other users via their accounts, and the better, more pertinent ones are featured within multimedia “pools” maintained by groups, which are user-created, user-sustained mini-communities which are devoted to a particular subject or demographic.

However, the most bleeding-edge concept in social networking is the “place” or “island”, which are user- or group-created pseudogeographical positions which are fixed to a specific “area” of the world within the network.

As stated, these may be created by either single users or by whole groups, and could even serve more than one group during the lifetime of the “place”.

At current, the social network which has best incorporated the concept of “places”, and has probably marketed it to the furthest extents in recent years, is Second Life. The closest WWW-based equivalent to the social networking “place” is Wikipedia’s articles, which are designed to appeal to a specific subject within the online encyclopedia, but can be maintained and sustained by more than one group (or “WikiProject”) which all have vested interests in the contents thereof.

Thus, can the “places” idea be successfully brought to the WWW-based social networks of present? What kind of political arrangements could evolve out of the addition of a new tier to the social networking mores of MySpace, Tribe.net, Facebook or LiveJournal?

Finally, what technological advancements could accompany the development of “places” within these social networks? Could newer applications of the ubiquitous RSS feed (which is already used extensively for both personal and group productions) find a niche to fill in the “places” idea?

EDIT.

A few ideas for RSS updates+Places:

  • Events
  • Additions, edits and cleanups (for those who are interested in the construction and maintenance of the place)
    • New rooms
    • New exhibitions
  • Scheduled reboots? (Hopefully not; SL tends to have alot of those, and you can be logged out at any time without prior notice)

Second Life, first impressions

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I’ve been walking through Second Life for the last three weeks (my name is “Rayne Leominster”, if anyone cares to know).

At best, I’m rather dissatisfied with it. At worst, I find it pointless and annoyingly slow.

I’m dissatisfied with SL because I know that there’s much more that could possibly be done in it besides:

  • Dance in a club with no music
  • Change your avatar’s appearance every 5 minutes
  • Build structures that will likely serve no purpose

I don’t feel the vibe of P2P on here (there isn’t any), and I teleport to a number of places (often either threadbare or filled to the brim with avatars and user-created objects) for no reason except to move from where I’m currently situated, only to be disappointed when I arrive.

I’m especially annoyed by the prominence of money (also known as L$) in SL.

The graphics and network lag makes usage of the client horrendously choppy. The UI is crowded, constricting and half-responsive, even when you’re in a lag-free area (which is extremely rare to find).

So that’s my first impression of Second Life.

On desktop GUIs for multiple monitors

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OK, this one *will* be short.

I think that I’ve heard a criticism on Digg of the user interface of Mac OS X when it comes to multiple displays. In fact, I think that neither OS X nor Windows are built or created for the multiple-display interface.

For one, both interfaces possess “bars” which span the length of the screen: OS X has the “Apple menu“, while Windows has the “Taskbar.”

IMO, these items, by drawing the mouse icon to the area within the single screen, simply reinforce the single-screen metaphor, while providing no functional space or capacity to the next screen.

Another GUI element that discourages one from effectively using more than one display for a GUI is the application window. It, like the above menubars, spans the length of the screen and has to be dragged from one screen to another if it is being used in a multidisplay.

The fact that all of the visible contents of the application are inside of the window doesn’t help, either. Tabs within windows (especially in most modern web browsers), while allowing one to navigate more than one document without having to close the window, also reinforce the window’s single-purposed feel and look.

The dock might be an answer – maybe a top and bottom dock that don’t span the length of the screen and perform specific functions for the UI – but it is also a very old metaphor, dating from the late 1980’s.

Hopefully, a new GUI element will come in the future that will redefine how we view our user interfaces with an expansion of our displays.

On Kosovo, self-determination, and the deflation of nationhood

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This post will be short.

Kosovo, as I’m sure many of you who are reading this have heard, has declared independence from Serbia, as was expected since around 1999. The Serbs, both resident within Kosovo and resident within Serbia proper, are angry and protesting, while the ethnic Albanian majority of residents have celebrated the coming diplomatic recognition.

I may be a bit biased toward the pro-independence side, since political self-determination is something which I wholeheartedly support, wherever it may be. But I can also agree with the sentiment that Kosovo’s secession will set a precedent that could lead to an increase of the UN’s membership.

The biggest reason why I think that the Kosovo issue is overblown, however, is because of how most sovereign countries are now interdependent, to various degrees, upon each other.

The European Union, while not being the best example or model of the supranation, is probably the best example of this interdependence across borders. The EU’s member states are very wired for cross-border communication, very accessible for cross-border transportation, and very sensitive for cross-border socio-political developments. Thus, those who often cross borders as part of their occupation don’t have to worry that much about border guards or currency exchange rates.

Of course, this setting is not easily duplicable for other supranational organizations, such as the African Union, which spans the second largest continent on Earth, has its highest concentration of transport connectivity in the most southerly regions, and is far behind other regions in terms of communication infrastructure.

And of course, the EU is not a complete panacea for inter-member disputes. Farm subsidies have to be increased regularly in order to prop up competing agricultural markets, for example.

But overall, I doubt that the Serb minority has that much to fear from the Albanian majority. Besides, when the border guards are dismissed when both countries enter into the EU, I doubt that the nationhood of Kosovo or Serbia will matter that much in the greater scheme of things.