Right now I'm reading Linked: The New Science of Social Networks by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi. It's cracking good stuff. Reminds me of some of the things I was writing in my little handmade journal this past spring, thinking about how people's media/news/information network informs their political awareness and general personhood. One thing the book has not addressed in all it's talk of egalitarianism and so forth is reciprocity in linkage. That is to say, in reality, all links are not equal: some are one-way streets, others are bi-directional. In most human relationships, it's a balance between the two. A real solid scientific analysis of interpersonal links would have to view them as vectors, but I'd settle for something that could take into account binary (one-way/two-way) directionality.

A few examples; someone who works a room, gladhanding with a message can make contact with 100 people. But that will be 100 one-way links unless this person happens to actually absorb something from someone else in the process of all the palm-pressing. The likelyhood that this person actually absorbs as much as they put out from all 100 of the people in the room is close to nil. Consumers purchasing the same products are all on the recieving end of a link. Web sites linking to internet "hubs" like Yahoo or Amazon are on the giving end. Thinking politically, it's not hard to see how television news and talk radio are largely uni-directional links; the proportion of viewers watching the show to viewer emails displayed on Wolf Blitzer must run into the 5th order of magnitude.

It would seem that egalitarianism and democracy in networks is contingent on some critical mass of bi-directional linkage. For all these reasons and more, I like our chances with the net. It's becoming more diverse and hard to define out here, in spite of all the commercial encroachment. Participation is on the rise. While there are still "hubs" and "connectors" and mega-popular power-law sites, there's also a lot of actual community forming out here as well; dense and lively clusters of voices which both individually and collectively represent a vibrant society.

Just so you know, I'm feeling a bit better now. I needed a juicebox and possibly a nap -- that'll have to wait -- but things are looking less disasterous now. Second wind and all. I mean, if reading this doesn't give you a little chuckle, then what can? Oh, Ari... bet he's counting the days until retirement.

If you're up for a little paranoia indulgence, there's this bit of sad news: one of the marines who participated in the operation to retrieve Pvt. Jessica Lynch died in an auto accident today. No explanation yet, just drove off the road en route to his girlfriend's. Supposed to propose to her real soon it says. Tragic stuff, and pretty coincidental too, considerinng the dodgy details around the "resuce operation/movie" and Pvt. Lynch's being sequestered in a military hospital under armed guard.

I'm not saying I believe the military killed him because the whole Iraq war farce is coming apart at the seams, but the thought did cross my mind. Too much X-Files when I was growing up probably. Maybe he just let the car drift: I've read before that many car "accidents" are really suicides, but that after the fact its almost impossible to tell. Some kid in my high school went out like that. The official story was accident, but everyone knew. Perhaps Josh Daniel Speer was wracked with guilt or shame or something else just eating him up inside, couldn't keep it together. War breaks people. Maybe it really was just an accident. Too bad this poor kid is dead in any case.

As you may have noticed, there's now a whole new look to outlandishjosh.com. I've tried for a little more simplicity and bit off many design tennants from movable type. Let me know what you think!

I'll take a bit for things to percolate into the interior of the site, but it'll happen in good time. I have wild tales and (thanks to Sister Brie) a bunch of decent pictures from the 4th of July festivities. I also got a chance to interview my Air Force friend, and I'll be posting something from that conversation pretty soon.

J-mo tells me the NYC fireworks display(s) are officially being called, "The Lights Of Freedom." Don't quite know what to make of that, but my favorite freedom verbage so far has been Luke's idea that we re-coin booze as "freedom fuel." I'm off to a rockin' BBQ/Kegger/Concert. Should be fun. I'm taking on the task of setting up the wrastlin'; hoping to get some money riding on these annual friendly contests. I'll let you know how it turns out.