12 DEC 2017 by ideonexus
The Consensus of Cyberspace
In the real world the empty page might scare the writer. as the blank screen might intimidate the programmer, but now individuals found themselves in the position of having to "boot up" an entire universe of meaning, without any easy reference to the constellation of familiar objects that tend to reinforce the tentative definitions obf newly ereated artifacts. Say, for example, one wished to create a chair in cyberspace, circa 1985. The most that can be said is that this "chair" won't look ve... 1 
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notes08 AUG 2013 by ideonexus
The Siren Server
A Siren Server, as I will refer to such a thing, is an elite computer, or coordinated collection of computers, on a network. It is characterized by narcissism, hyperamplified risk aversion, and extreme information asymmetry. It is the winner of an all-or-nothing contest, and it inflicts smaller all-or-nothing contests on those who interact with it. Siren Servers gather data from the network, often without having to pay for it. The data is analyzed using the most powerful available computers, ... 1 notes
notesWeb services that entice people to contribute to them, and whose contributions are then aggregated in various forms for the profit of the server owner.
22 FEB 2013 by ideonexus
William Gibson 1996 Observations of the WWW
In the age of wooden television, media were there to entertain, to sell an advertiser's product, perhaps to inform. Watching television, then, could indeed be considered a leisure activity. In our hypermediated age, we have come to suspect that watching television constitutes a species of work. Post-industrial creatures of an information economy, we increasingly sense that accessing media is what we do. We have become terminally self-conscious. There is no such thing as simple entertainment. ... 1 notes
notesWWW is emergent, we see consuming information as work, Beavis and Butthead are meta in that we are watching someone watching TV. Lots of good stuff here.
13 JAN 2011 by ideonexus
How Novel is the Internet?
Before the Web we were already used to sitting in front of electronic boxes for hour upon hour. The boxes have now changed, but they are still boxes. Of course the things we do on the Internet are different from those we did (and do) in front of the TV. But it’s important to remember that they are only different; they are not new. Think for a moment about what you do on the Internet. Not what you could do, but what you actually do. You email people you know. In an effort to broaden your hor... 1 notes
notesMarshal T. Poe makes a persuasive argument that, despite the tremendous possibilities it puts before us, we end up using the Internet to do the same old stuff we were doing before the Internet, only more conveniently.
03 JAN 2011 by ideonexus
ISPs Can Be Regulated Like Banks
The closest analogy to how ISPs operate on the Net is how banks operate on the terrestrial plane today. In most countries, banks are highly regulated, and they have a duty (in most countries) to know their customers. Although their primary mission is to serve their customers, to some extent they operate as (sometimes reluctant) arms of government. They are supposed to report not just illegal transaction, but also questionable ones--whenever someone shows up with more than $10,000 in cash, for... 1 notes
notesIn order to Bank in the United States, the company agrees to abide by certain rules and reporting practices, ISPs could be subjected to the same.
03 JAN 2011 by ideonexus
The Net is a Playground of Entropy
It may be fun to surf the Net and follow things randomly, but there's value in structure. The Net is a playground of entropy--the structurelessness that occurs when energy dissipates from a system. Yes, the Net also fosters self-organization, when individuals apply their energy, selectng and filtering information for others (aided by search and filtering tools). But there's rarely uch internal structure to what's selected; the structures created by links are usually webs of cross-references r... 1 notes
notesThe net is information entropy in the way things are associated, without strong semantic connections, but mere relations in links.
