kiva.org - microfinancing through the web!
May 5th, 2009 by Niels Christian
Now you can microfinance people who needs it. Listen to Bill Clinton enthusiastically endorsing this project!
Tags: Bill Clinton, kiva.org, microfinance
Open Source in China, wall art
April 3rd, 2009 by Niels Christian
Ubuntu logo, the China way (another take on China-Africa relations! :))
Tags: art, China, image, open source, ubuntu
Dont ‘normalize’ Christiania, ‘normalize’ Copenhagen
March 6th, 2009 by Niels Christian
(OPEN LETTER TO THE CITY HALL OF COPENHAGEN)
Dear City Hall
I am kind of baffled by the whole government idea about “normalizing Christiania“.
Of course crime should not be apart of the daily life on Christiania, crack, herion and other hard drugs should not be sold freely, that is a no-brainer. But I am wondering what long term effect the idea of mixing private property in Freetown Christiania, which the government seem to plan for. What will it do to the alternative culture, that has been part of Copenhagen and Denmark since 1971?
Instead of “normalizing” Christiania, what we should be doing is to learn from the culture of Christiania - apparently known as ‘normalizing’ - so: Don’t normalize Christiania, but normalize Copenhagen.
I went for a walk a blue-skyed and sunny morning the other day. I came across this recycle station, which was happy colored in red, green and blue. The message this recycle station is sending is a ‘proudness of recycling’. Not an opposing message of hiding the recycle station in dark green monotonious colors. It might not be a conciuos decision, but it is a product of the underlaying culture of Christiania.
Don’t normalize Christiania, normalize Copenhagen.
Another example is the great vastness of different resident architecture. This picture is showing just one of many different houses. No elitist architect has put a dominating building of glass, which has no relation to the people living there. Instead people are building according to the ideas of their own grass-roots. This building is both of old and new, brick and wood. A lot of postmodern interpretation can be put into this house. Again, it might not be a conscious decision, but it is a product of the underlaying culture of Christiania.
Don’t normalize Christiania, normalize Copenhagen.
I believe City Hall already has commented positively on the development plan for Freetown Christiania, that Christiania proposed as an answer in the on going dispute of “normalizing” Christiania: “The plan has received positive attention from the municipality of Copenhagen and the Agenda 21 Society for its sustainability goals and democratic process” (source). Again, a product of the underlaying culture of Christiania.
The point I am trying to get at, is that the alternative culture, that exists in the phenomena ‘Freetown Christiania’, is giving a whole lot to the Danish culture in general. So we shouldn’t try to “normalize” Christiania, but rather “normalize” Copenhagen after the grass-root visions of Freetown Christiania.
Most sincerely
Yours truly
Tags: Christiania, democratic, Freetown Christiania, grass root, housing, normalizing
WP-theme commemorating Freetown Christiania
March 5th, 2009 by Niels Christian
I have put this Wordpress theme together on the base of the k2-theme.
Nice to have in the theme library if one should suddenly feel the urge to commemorate Freetown Christiania.
Any comments or suggestions can be put as comments below.
Tags: Christiania, Commemorating, Freetown Christiania, theme, wordpress
Standard Deeming? a NetNeutrality issue.
February 11th, 2009 by Niels Christian
This is from savetheinternet.com, a website agitating for net neutrality. While it can be beneficial for the traffic all together to divide between critically time-dependent (livestreams, skype) and not so critically time-dependent (emails) the situation is that ISPs are making the decisions about what to divide in which category. This post by Tim Karr claims that these ‘deemers’ are the problem, cause they are not acting according to the users whishes. Should there be a standard for the deeming?
The Rise of the Deemers
Who decides what’s more sensitive and less sensitive on the Internet? Apparently, the deemers do.And that’s the problem.
The lesson we learned from Comcast’s misadventures in network management is to be skeptical of any practice that comes between users and the Internet – even if it’s deemed appropriate by those standing behind the curtain.
And while Cox has called its gatekeeper intentions sound, its Web site gives little indication about how these practices will affect Internet users. Nor does it indicate that they plan to comply with the FCC’s Internet Policy Statement, which helps guarantee that control of your Internet experience ultimately resides with you – the user.
Tags: FCC, internet, ISP, Net-Neutrality, regulation, telecom
Two Gallants - Despite What You Have Been Told
January 13th, 2009 by Niels Christian
Tags: Music, Two Gallants
The Black Keys - Just got to be
January 7th, 2009 by Niels Christian
Still in love:
This is how it is, my trinity: The White Stripes are God, they define the shit for the masses, Rose Hill Drive are Jesus, cleancut juvenile and pure bluesrock, The Black Keys are The Holy Spirit: mystic, transcendental voice, raw undefined garage bluesrock, with a little bit of punk drums on the first album.
Tags: Just got to be, Music, The Black Keys
Avalanche in Ferne area - Local News will rule!
December 30th, 2008 by Niels Christian
Avalanche
As seen on dr.dk Update (Danish news update on the internet) six guys are killed in an avalanche in Fernie Canada.
This is of course already old news, when I look up “local news, Fernie” on Google and find http://www.thefreepress.ca, local news from Fernie since 1898 (today as well online :).
The local news are much more updated and detailed about the situation, My What?, Where?, Who? and What Now? is answered much more qualified. Now, I would not have known this without dr.dk Update (because my NewsFeedNetwork is old-fashioned?), but as I am interested in the news (I myself has spent time in the backcountry to the Fernie area, not on a snowmobile but on Volkl Gotama) I needed more background and detailed info, which I found on thefreepress.ca (following quote only for the ones who are interested in what to do when the avalanche hit your friends (or recognize the risk)):
“Sgt Tim Shields said they were initially riding in two groups when part of a group of seven snowmobilers was buried by the first avalanche.
He added: “A second group of four snowmobilers heard yelling from the area and came to the aid of members from the first group who were in the process of digging out their fellow riders.
“The newly formed group was able to locate one rider, but as they were digging him out at a depth of about three meters a second avalanche came down and buried the entire group. All of them were wearing avalanche beacons.” Two men managed to dig themselves out of the snow within 20 minutes, and they located a third man in the next 20 minutes by using their avalanche beacons.
They were located in a large bowl with massive cornices ready to come down and, after assessing the snow layers around them realizing they were at risk of getting caught in further snow slides they began to walk out of the area.”
The local news rule, it took me 2 minutes to find the source and it had better information: background details, more updated (”Seventh body found by search and rescue”). It should be a part of the journalistic role to provide the more detailed sources and link to the content. Enable the user to obtain individualized knowledge on their own! That is what the reader/viewer/user wants: individualized, actively accesed news and information.
Journalist, show me your sources!
Tags: Avalanche, Fernie, journalism, local, news
Awesome doc on copyright and the mixing culture
October 31st, 2008 by Niels Christian
original site: http://www.goodcopybadcopy.net/
Tags: copyright, culture, good copy bad copy, mixing, Music
The public service purposes online and as open source
October 24th, 2008 by Niels Christian
Tony Scott is spilling his knowledge on this topic. Working for BBC he is developing bbc.co.uk/music/beta, where they make good use of “semantically meaningful links”, which make other BBC sites more valuable, but this also goes for the global network, thus the public value is regarding society at large:
By joining BBC data, in this fashion, with the rest of the web the Network Effect is magnified yet further. That does benefit to the BBC, but it also benefits the web at large and that is important. The BBC has a role that transcends its business needs - it can help create public value around its content for others to benefit from (assuming, of course, there remains one, non-discriminatory, free and open internet).
His co-worker Nick Reynolds takes it a bit further and spurs a debate on the BBCs six goals, when he aligns them with the power of the (semantic) link:
In the old world of television the “mixed schedule” was one of the ways the BBC delivered its public purposes. The thinking went (and I summarise crudely) “If we put Panorama next to Eastenders then some people might watch both”.
I don’t think the mixed schedule is dead. But in an on demand world where people can just watch Eastenders whenever or wherever they like it’s clear the BBC needs some new methods of bringing people wonderful things they didn’t know they liked or needed.
And on the internet the method is clearly the link.
(…)
Let’s take a look at a couple of those public purposes again:
“Sustaining citizenship and civil society“
(How does citizenship get encouraged - surely by sharing? A citizen has a stake, a link to other citizens?)
“Bringing the UK to the world and the world to the UK“
(Sounds like linking to me)
It might become intangible, but the direction seems somehow valid.
On public service media supporting/benefiting of open source communities Jemima Kiss writes on BBC and their possibilities of open source activities). BBCs has done this with Dirac.
The strategic choice is much aligned with the one of Googles and their new open source browser Chrome. On this page of their explanation of why it is open source change “internet” to “society”. Why open source? Cause competition is good!
Tags: BBC, link, Nick Reynolds, online, open source, public service media, semantic-web, Tony Scott
