Slashdot | Campaign Financing Cyber Loophole

Read the summary and then the discussion and marvel at the ability of a highly intelligent community to remain politically marginalized through procedural ignorance.

Not that I blame them.

There's a level of basic education about how our election process works that's pretty fundimental to understanding politics today. This is never something that was covered in a civics class (if those are still taught anywhere anymore) but it's just as vital if you want to be a meaningful participant.

Slashdot | Campaign Financing Cyber Loophole

Read the summary and then the discussion and marvel at the ability of a highly intelligent community to remain politically marginalized through procedural ignorance.

Not that I blame them.

There's a level of basic education about how our election process works that's pretty fundimental to understanding politics today. This is never something that was covered in a civics class (if those are still taught anywhere anymore) but it's just as vital if you want to be a meaningful participant.

Markos, always on the edge.

FWIW, I'm planning to do the same for most of my projects ongoing. While taxonomy (top-down categorization through hierarchy) is still really useful for putting some structure around your data, in terms of allowing people to find relevant content quickly and/or to effectively contextualize information, folksonomy (bottom up categorization through tagging) offers a great deal more performance.

I'm going to be driving across the country in a few days. It should take a week. What should I be listening to? I'm particularly interested in getting some good audiobooks and/or podcasts.

Anyone actually listening to any of this crap? Tips?

Anyone who's nerdy and wants to get work, learn Drupal real quick. Everyone I know (including me) needs more help to handle the workload that's out there. Seriously. There are plenty of organizations who'll pay you to work on open-source software because all they care about are results, not owning a piece of code.

Spent last night playing videogames (X-men Saga, Gamecube) with Cian and Abe and Jesse with Cian's special lady Ashley spectating, complaining that it was too easy for us, that she wanted to see us die. Good times. I haven't done anything like that in a while. Cian and Ashley have a really good thing going.

Now I'm up in Portland, getting music from Tommy for the drive east. In a minute we'll go see Todd Snider and then party for John Henry's birthday. I'm looking forward to it.

Spent last night playing videogames (X-men Saga, Gamecube) with Cian and Abe and Jesse with Cian's special lady Ashley spectating, complaining that it was too easy for us, that she wanted to see us die. Good times. I haven't done anything like that in a while. Cian and Ashley have a really good thing going.

Now I'm up in Portland, getting music from Tommy for the drive east. In a minute we'll go see Todd Snider and then party for John Henry's birthday. I'm looking forward to it.

My sister got a job working for Code Pink down in LA. See, she's going to leapfrog me on the revolution tip too. I fucking knew it.

Congratz, Brie!

I like to think that the work I did in 03/04 in some way had it's Genesis in the spirit of Brooklyn of that time. It was a good place to live post-9/11 for the intersection of a lot of smart artists, law-students and b-schoolers who were all waking up to the fact that their individual career tracks might need to be a bit more widely focused as it seemed the world was not, in fact, going to take care of itself. I don't know if that spirit still reigns, but the buzz on the Left coast is that Philly is the New Brooklyn.

What if you could do the following:

• Take the central organizing principle of MFA of bridging political activism, civic participation and cultural cool.
• Implement it on the ground through one of the few indipendent production groups that's been able to prosper in the fact of Clear Channel's aggressive colonization of the club-level music scene
• Employ the Tank's theory of creating all-day venues that build social capital while performing the usual task of having a show at night.
• Staff it up with some of the better young organizers on the East coast, and situate it in a centrally-located ballroom/restaurant that can seat as many as 900 people in Phillidelphia?

I think you'd have something pretty bad ass. At the very least you'd have a 21st-Century union hall. It's blowing in the wind. If anyone with juice still reads this old blog, I strongly suggest -- even more strongly than I suggest you watch Primer -- you get in touch with the right people and do what you need to do to let this happen. Today. Contact me if you're not already aware of who that is.

I like to think that the work I did in 03/04 in some way had it's Genesis in the spirit of Brooklyn of that time. It was a good place to live post-9/11 for the intersection of a lot of smart artists, law-students and b-schoolers who were all waking up to the fact that their individual career tracks might need to be a bit more widely focused as it seemed the world was not, in fact, going to take care of itself. I don't know if that spirit still reigns, but the buzz on the Left coast is that Philly is the New Brooklyn.

What if you could do the following:

• Take the central organizing principle of MFA of bridging political activism, civic participation and cultural cool.
• Implement it on the ground through one of the few indipendent production groups that's been able to prosper in the fact of Clear Channel's aggressive colonization of the club-level music scene
• Employ the Tank's theory of creating all-day venues that build social capital while performing the usual task of having a show at night.
• Staff it up with some of the better young organizers on the East coast, and situate it in a centrally-located ballroom/restaurant that can seat as many as 900 people in Phillidelphia?

I think you'd have something pretty bad ass. At the very least you'd have a 21st-Century union hall. It's blowing in the wind. If anyone with juice still reads this old blog, I strongly suggest -- even more strongly than I suggest you watch Primer -- you get in touch with the right people and do what you need to do to let this happen. Today. Contact me if you're not already aware of who that is.