barcamp

raise your hand if you don’t kinda have a crush on Penelope Trunk? No? Yes? Okay, maybe it was just me.

Just because she said the words “blow job” to you while maintaining eye contact?

bonus points for nearly starting a libertarian/liberal argument riot;

Where the hell was I for that one?! I would have thrown DOWN!

Just because she said the words “blow job” to you while maintaining eye contact?

Heh – if that’s all it took, I’d have a lot more crushes. Okay, maybe not. No, because I actually thought what she has to say is pretty interesting. I think she underestimates the stranglehold corporate america has on most people, though. I think she misconstrued some of my comments as an attack on what she has to say, rather than an attempt to point out how freaking hard it is to escape corporate america..

Where the hell was I for that one?! I would have thrown DOWN!

My friend Paul Van Hoesen gave a presentation about his new org ctechnology, and their efforts to a) point out what a huge disconnect there is for internet access between rural/urban areas, different ethnic communities, etc, and b) guide community/government leaders in fixing it. It was a fairly interesting talk – anyways, of course such a talk inevitably led to “should the government be doing this?”

There was really no time to Go There, given the time constraints, but even if it had, I would have probably stayed on the sidelines, smugly content in my knowledge that we’re pretty fucked either way, since the telcos and the government have been working hand in hand since the beginning, but anyhow.

Who knew that the transmission of ones and zeros can evoke such passion? I’ll sell tickets next time…

The last round with the state education contract shows what happens when the gov’t and a carrier push the envelope on having it their way - 87% of the school districts check out of the state network, at their own expense, leaving AT&T with nearly zilch. When it comes to the ‘net, the Wisdom of the Crowd has an amazing way of flowing around all the B.S. and moving on to what really works. The places I’m visiting and the people I’m meeting lately are 3 steps down on Maslow’s Theory of Digital Needs and really don’t give a damn about self-actualizing, esoteric debates about “broadband” - they just know the train has left and their kids are not on it.