Consilience

Dear Lazyweb,

I am looking for camera recommendations. My needs aren’t that great. I just want something relatively small, takes good pictures, and I can play with manual settings when I want. The relatively small part is because I want to be able to have this in my pocket and not look like I am hiding a melon. That means I’ll take it more places and thus (hopefully) take more pictures.

What do you use and why?

Thanks, Lazyweb.

Greg

It’s coming up, the Global Bug Jam.  Are you ready?

Have no fear, your friendly Michigan LoCo team will be hosting a GBJ event in Southeast Michigan where you can come learn the trade of triaging and have a great time doing so.  I know from experience that their Bug Jams are great events.  They even filled a room at Penguicon on the topic thanks to Wolfger.

Come one, come all to the Global Bug Jam, no experience required, only a desire to have fun and contribute.

The Important Information:

Where: Clinton Macomb Public Library (map)
When: 1pm to 6pm on Saturday August 9th
Who: The Michigan LoCo Team and You!

(See THIS PAGE for the latest information)

This just came across the email, courtesy of Nick Ellery:
——-
This week’s Hug Day will be focusing on Apt! There are currently about
127 New bug reports regarding Apt and we will be focusing on reducing
that number in addition to looking at some outstanding Incomplete and
Confirmed bugs.  We’ll do this by following up with reporters,
documenting test cases, and confirming bug reports.  The event
will be held in #ubuntu-bugs on Freenode. The list of targeted bugs
and tasks is posted at:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBugDay/20080724

Our goal is to deal with all of the bugs on that list.

So on 24 July 2008, in all timezones, we’ll be meeting in #ubuntu-bugs
on irc.freenode.net for another Ubuntu Hug Day.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBugDay
—–

So if you have some time and want to help out, come join us!

I know everyone reading this is thinking “you know, I sure would like to join some more IRC channels.”  We’ll here’s your chance!

The Free Software Foundation has just registered the channel #fsf-members on Freenode.  This channel is specifically for communication with other FSF associate members.  So come on in and hang out!  If you want to speak with a more general audience on FSF topics, #fsf is, and has been, available.

And as a teaser: if you are a FSF Associate Member, you can ask to get a FSF cloak on Freenode.  Just send your member number and registered IRC nick to campaigns@fsf.org

Hope to see a bunch of the Ubuntu people there!

That isn’t me talking, that is the Library of Congress.

The Library of Congress along with the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC), the Open Access to Knowledge (OAK) Law Project, and the SURFfoundation released a report (pdf) on Monday that basically states just that.

The stated purpose of the report is:

1. to review the current state of copyright and related laws and their impact on digital preservation;
2. to make recommendations for legislative reform and other solutions to ensure that libraries, archives and other preservation institutions can effectively preserve digital works and information in a manner consistent with international laws and norms of copyright and related rights; and
3. to make recommendations for further study or activities to advance the recommendations in the Report.

The key is number 2, “to make recommendations for legislative reform…”  From the release on digitalpreservation.gov:

As the laws of the countries discussed in the report demonstrate, in many cases exceptions and limitations do not accommodate the actions required for digital preservation.

Now, the recommendation doesn’t just simply state that anyone who wants to preserve information can do so.  So no, you won’t have the LOC on your side if you are sued for “preserving” media on your home machine which you do not have legal right to possess it.

From the report:

[These suggestions should] apply to all non-profit libraries, archives, museums and other institutions as may be authorized by national law (hereafter, “preservation institutions”) that are open to the public, provided they do not undertake these activities for any purpose of commercial advantage.

These institutions would be able to (1) reproduce as many copies as necessary for effective preservation, (2) transfer those copies to other formats as standards progress, (3) “communicate” those works within and between various preservation repositories to maintain redundancy.

Why did the Library of Congress et. al produce this report?  Because without some changes to the current status qua of copyright law libraries and archives will be unable to exercise one of their most important roles in our society: preservation.

[In the current US copyright system] there is no specific authorization for libraries and archives to make preservation copies of published works in their collections.

If you are at all interested in learning more about how copyright effects the preservation of our society’s knowledge, you should read the report.  Plus, for those of you who thought that librarians are just quiet subservient employees of the state that don’t speak up for our rights; think again.  Librarians are at the front of cultural freedom as any other group, if not more.

At least in the Open Source/Open Microblog world:

Kinda funny how my quotes is complaining about what a recent Bazaar udate did to my command prompt.  But, I stand by my statement: what it did is not cool at all.

Yesterday, a great project was publicly announced: Autonomo.us

Autonomous provides a framework to think about the world of Software As A Service. From the “Franklin Street Statement:”

We consider network services that are Free Software and which share Free Data as a good starting-point for ensuring users’ freedom. Although we have not yet formally defined what might constitute a ‘Free Service’, we do have suggestions that developers, service providers, and users should consider (ed: see statement for those suggestions).

Yes, it is a brain-child of some FSF people, so they of course support the AGPL. I have no problem with that because well, I support the AGPL.

Basically, it boils down to the word that I love; Freedom. My love for that word permeates to all of the projects on which I work: Open Source/Free Software, Creative Commons, Open Educational Resources, and Open Access Journals.

This statement outlines ideas which should be applied to Network Services such as online email service, microblogging services, wiki services, etc. Basically, you own your data and have access to the code which manipulates your data. So, Twitter is a Closed System; you own neither your data nor have access to the source. However, Identi.ca is an Open System; you own you data and you have access to the source[0].

This idea has been around for a long time. I know people who have not used any closed source online services (to the furthest extent they could). Many of us in the Open Source world, however, have areas which we could improve (how many developers do you know who have gmail accounts?).

This Franklin Street Statement allows us to have something we can reference as we improve our use of these services.

[0] You should follow me on identi.ca - http://identi.ca/greg

Hello all,

This is now the home for all things Greg.  I have a domain name now and a great person is hosting my activities here.

From now on you can find more about what I’m up to on this site (blog.grossmeier.net) and my homepage (empty for now) will be at grossmeier.net and I’ll have a wiki floating around somewhere (either wiki.grossmeier or just grossmeier.net).

If you have any suggestions on what wiki software to use I would greatly appreciate them.

I thought I would pass this along for those of you interested in the Free Culture side of things*.

My coworker, Fred Beneson, has just announced the CC Salon in NYC for July.  A CC Salon is to Free Culture what a LUG Meeting is to Free Software.  At this salon he has lined up some great looking presentations from Wikia Search and Livable Streets Network along with a performance by comedian Max Silvestri (of Gabe + Max’s Internet Thing).

If you are interested it will be taking place on Wednesday July 23rd at The Open Planning Project ( 349 W. 12th St. first floor).

There will also be some free (as in beer) beer sponsored by the Brooklyn Brewery.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to see other Freedom minded folks and have a good time!

You can RSVP on the Facebook event or emailing Fred at creativecommons.org (simply make that an email address).

*Full disclosure: I am employed by Creative Commons this summer

I just wanted to remind everyone that this Thursday is another Ubuntu Hug Day!

I know what you are thinking: “But Greg, isn’t that the day after your birthday and the day before your nation celebrates its independence?”

Why yes, you are right, what better way to celebrate getting older and wiser along with Freedom than by helping out with a great Open Source project! Here are the details:

Area of Focus: Xorg bugs

Goal: Get all the bugs on this list into a Triaged state.  There are lists of “New” bugs (untouched) and “Confirmed” bugs (need a bit more diagnostics before being Triaged).

But wait, there are more reasons to participate!  Coming up is the Global Bug Jam and you want to be all prepared for that right?  This is the perfect time to get some questions answers and general advice from the community of triaging experts.

If you have been triaging bugs for a while, an Ubuntu Hug Day is a perfect time to sing up for the Bug Control team.  And as always, be sure to get yourself on the stats page for 5-a-day!