Lakeland this morning, Freehouse tonight

Nice day today. Not a lot of people in Spiritwood today but we had a great time together. That was cool. Worship was good. I was so into it, when it was time for me to preach, I was suprised by it. Drove home today through Glaslyn, North Battleford, and then home. Added about half an hour to the trip but it was a nice distraction and the most important part of the trip was a stop at Cochin Lake for some ice cream. Tonight we are hanging out with the Worship Freehouse folks.

The blood of Willi Plett covers all

Leighton has some nice things to say about me on his blog. I thought I would point out that I am reading a lot of Yoder and I do have a a great deal of respect for Anabaptists. That being said, for all of our differences, we have the one thing that can unify humanity. Willi Plett and the Calgary Flames.

Plans for Labour Day Weekend

Finish covering in the bottom of our deck
Touching up some spots on the top of the deck
Sitting on the deck
Drinking cool glasses of water on the deck
Listening to Play by Great Big Sea and Moby (two separate albums) done
Taking Mark to the Park on Saturday (done), Sunday, and Monday
Finish reading Erwin McManus' new book, Uprising
Figuring out how to add a recommended book section to the site that doesn't feel cheesy (done) and code it
Play Frisbee with Wendy
Hang out at the Black Duck
See Mars

Time Machine Spam

Wired magazine tracks down the guy who is sending out the spam looking for the time machine. I remember reading it and laughing at it because I thought some spammer was just being a smart aleck. Sadly he is someone who is struggling with reality

"I expected him to tell me at that point that it was all a joke, and he'd give me the punch line," said Hill. Instead, Hill began to worry that White was "a person challenged by reality and as such deserves our sympathy and support."

Hill's hunch, it turns out, was correct. An investigation has revealed that the time-travel spammer is dead serious about his quest for technology that can rewind time.

A trail of Internet clues has fingered Robert "Robby" Todino as the source of the time-travel messages. In a telephone interview last week, the 22-year-old Woburn, Massachusetts, resident admitted that he has sent nearly 100 million of the bizarre messages since November 2001.

"It almost feels worthless now because the people who are monitoring my every move always seem to win. But it's the only form of communication I have right now," Todino said.

His father, Robert Todino Sr., worries that malicious users have preyed on Robby's "psychological problems" and bilked him out of money.

"What bothers me is that some people are trying to sell him equipment and take advantage of him," said Todino Sr. "He's invested a lot of money into it and has been hurt by it."

But Robby insists that he is "perfectly mentally stable," and that the time-travel technology he seeks is out there somewhere.

"A lot of people will say the stuff I talk about is crazy and out of this world. But I know for a fact that it is true and does exist. Untrained minds may disagree with me, but they don't have access to the sources that I do," he said.

Yeah it is kind of sad.

Soularize 2003

The new site for Soularize 2003 is now online. October 8-10 in Boston, Mass. In case you missed it. The site is a PrairieFusion design.

Link

TheOoze Blogdirectory

TheOoze.com has launched it's own blog directory. If you think your blog would be a good fit for TheOoze's readers, head on over today and submit your blog.

Why are the Spammers sending out SoBig.F virus?

Lockergnome has a theory and it isn't good.

I observed back on Tuesday that my Symantec SMTP gateway was stopping SoBig.F subject lines coming from spammers (i.e., blocked via DNSBL) at over 3 times the rate that I was seeing them from Joe user types. Further, I noticed that they were sending even more SoBig.F emails than they were spam. So, why would spammers who make their living be generating emails allow their servers to be compromised? They didn't. They are doing this on purpose and I have a theory for this. I call it my echo theory.

Say that, as a spammer, you know one or more of the addresses in your database is to a spam trap - but you don't know which one. You generate LOTS of SoBig.F emails on purpose, using your database for the forged-from addresses. Now, JoeUser has his server or client antivirus filter setup to send a reply when it encounters a virus (which is a very BAD thing, after Klez taught us about the virtues of forged addresses).

Dutifully, JoeUser's email server or client automatically sends a helpful note off to "SpamTrap," informing them that they are infected. Often these replies even extol how much smarter they are than "SpamTrap" because they caught it, but "SpamTrap" did not. Heck, let's even send an email to the postmaster at SpamBait's ISP, telling him / her how much better the BrandX filter is that JoeUser is using... but I digress.

The email server at SpamBait's ISP sees an email to SpamTrap and says "Ah hah, JoeUser's ISP must obviously be a spammer, so load his IP address into our DNSBL servers."

JoeUser now sends a legitimate email to me SmartUser at IuseDNSBL.com and it, of course, bounces. JoeUser now calls me and asks why he was blacklisted. After some diligent effort on my part, I find that DNSBL.SpamBait.com is saying half of my customers and suppliers are spammers. I have a business to run, so I turn off DNSBL on my gateway and - lo and behold - all of the spammers emails that were being blocked due to DNSBL are no allowed to come though. That is my echo theory. That is why spammers are using half their bandwidth to send SoBig.F

I don't even like to think about this. Spammers are the scum of the matrix.

Auntie's digital revelation

More on the Beeb's decision to release their programming archives

The BBC doesn't have the rights to all of its material. Some of the BBC's broadcasts have copyrights owned by others, who'd be rather less keen to see their intellectual property spread around the net. Actors have contracts that specify residuals - payments that kick in each time a programme is shown. But there is a stash of material that currently does not earn the BBC a penny, and for which it owns exclusive rights. What's more, it's been listed in every Royal Charter that it has a requirement to present this material to the world.

Last Sunday, Greg Dyke changed that. He revealed that the BBC is planning to digitise and offer for download, for free, as much of its back catalogue of programmes that it can legally do, from the earliest radio reels to nature documentaries to educational programmes. Anyone will be allowed to re-use, re-edit and mix this material with their own, provided it's for non-commercial use.

The project is called the BBC Creative Archive. It draws some of its inspiration from Lawrence Lessig's Creative Commons project, a US legal project that provides artists with boilerplate contracts that allow their works to be shared more easily on the net, rather than tied up in copyright restrictions that make copying their work illegal.

To fulfill Dyke's vision - where, as he describes, children can download BBC material to include in their own presentations for free - the BBC's work will have to be largely free from copyright controls.

And if the BBC takes this route, it will have the biggest, most responsive file-distribution on the planet to help shift this treasure trove of material: the file-sharing networks.

Presenting its archive material without restrictions would allow the BBC to occupy a niche that no other commercial company would dare to assume. It would allow them to tap a vast distribution system that no other company feels confident enough to use. It would serve a public good, in refilling the public domain diminished by companies attempting to restrict their customers' use of their works.

And it would be the BBC as it was always supposed to be. BBC material is supposed to be free to use and download. After all, you've already paid for it. It belongs to you, to do with as you wish.

The Road Test

Andrew Jones has posted a review in Christianity Today regarding a couple of contemporary worship guides

To be honest, I don't expect a great deal of success. Redman's book appears to be about singing in church. It is written with papal nicety, in seminary prose, possibly too delicate to handle the demands of post-charismatic, post-Reformation worship. And yet it promises to be a "travel guide that points out the issues to encounter along the journey." But can it appreciate the intricacies of a nonlinear worship journey that avoids a pre-determined outcome? Let's wait and see.

Wuthnow's book takes a more scholarly approach, leaning on its backbone of research, a 400-strong choir of statistic-singing voices, each one a compelling argument that creativity is a significant part of American spirituality. Yet on first impression, it appears old school, snobbish and hierarchical, a book for high church people who drive Oldsmobiles. The churches used as examples tend to be large, at least 30 years old, and nothing at all like the organic churches being started by the starving artists and 20-something church planters in some of our road-tests. Still, I have an open mind. And a heavy suitcase.

After taking the books around the world, here were his finding

The Sabitage event was the ultimate trial. Unfair, perhaps, since these books deal more with fixed-space worship than worship-on-the-move (labyrinths, stations, etc.), and stage-led rather than hands-on experiences. Very few books would speak intelligently here. Alternative Worship (Jonny Baker and Doug Gay) comes the closest. Or perhaps The Prodigal Project (Mark Pierson et al.).

Redman's book fared surprisingly well with the new media. He restates the postmodern discussion, synthesizing the usual suspects, though in a manner more predictable than prophetic. He also tackles the "rave mass," the bricolage of video technology, and assures us that the new does not supersede the old but "new media often transform older forms and lead to new forms and hybrids." Well said!

Wuthnow's book, as I feared, was frowning at the wild antics of these new-media artists. They had broken all hierarchies of "high" and "low," art for galleries and crafts for the studio, house for living and church for worshipping. Concepts of layering, threading, mixing, and looping were hinted at by Redman but ignored by Wuthnow, who treats new media as old media with electricity. No DJS here.

Still, Wuthnow's book was not dumbfounded. It addressed the potential of the imagination, the use of body movement, and gender involvement, and acknowledged installation artist Meredith Monk, whose legacy is felt strongly at this event. Wuthnow's account of a woman using art as a healing language to plum the depths of her own mysterious spirituality, and as a means of expressing that to the world, was highly descriptive of what Sabitage was about.

This is the big surprise of All in Sync. It is a wealth of information, born of modern research, hemmed in by a traditional framework, and yet it is also a book of passion, opening the heart of creativity, releasing worship out of its small ecclesial bowl and into the ocean of creative possibilities. And it has the numbers to prove it.

Flying along

Here are some real examples that have been heard or reported:

On landing, the stewardess said, "Please be sure to take all of your belongings. If you're going to leave anything, please make sure it's something we'd like to have."

"Thank you for flying Delta Business Express. We hope you enjoyed giving us the business as much as we enjoyed taking you for a ride."

As the plane landed and was coming to a stop at Ronald Reagan, a lone voice came over the loudspeaker: "Whoa, big fella.WHOA!"

From a Southwest Airlines employee: "Welcome aboard Southwest Flight 245 to Tampa. To operate your seat belt, insert the metal tab into the buckle, and pull tight. It works just like every other seat belt; and, if you don't know how to operate one, you probably shouldn't be out in public unsupervised.

In the event of a sudden loss of cabin pressure,masks will descend from the ceiling. Stop screaming, grab the mask, and pull it over your face. If you have a small child traveling with you, secure your mask before assisting with theirs. If you are traveling with more than one small child, pick your favorite.

Weather at our destination is 50 degrees with some broken clouds, but we'll try to have them fixed before we arrive. Thank you,and remember, nobody loves you, or your money, more than Southwest Airlines."

"Your seat cushions can be used for flotation; and, in the event of an emergency water landing, please paddle to shore and take them with our compliments."

"Should the cabin lose pressure, oxygen masks are in the overhead area. Please place The bag over your own mouth and nose before assisting children... or other adults acting like children."

"As you exit the plane, make sure to gather all of your belongings. Anything left behind will be distributed evenly among the flight attendants. Please do not leave children or spouses."

And from the pilot during his welcome message:"Delta airlines is pleased to have some of the best flight attendants in the industry. Unfortunately, none of them are on this flight!"

Heard on Southwest Airlines just after a very hard landing in Salt Lake City: The flight attendant came on the intercom and said, "That was quite a bump, and I know what y'all are thinking. I'm here to tell you it wasn't the airline's fault, it wasn't the pilot's fault, it wasn't the flight attendant's fault ... it was the asphalt."

Overheard on an American Airlines flight into Amarillo, Texas, on a particularly windy and bumpy day: During the final approach, the Captain was really having to fight it. After an extremely hard landing, the Flight Attendant said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to Amarillo. Please remain in your seats with your seat belts fastened while the Captain taxis what's left of our airplane to the gate!"

Another flight attendant's comment on a less than perfect landing: "We ask you to please remain seated as Captain Kangaroo bounces us to the terminal."

An airline pilot wrote that on this particular flight he had hammered his ship into the runway really hard. The airline had a policy which required the first officer to stand at the door while the Passengers exited, smile, and give them a "Thanks for flying our airline." He said that, in light of his bad landing, he had a hard time looking the passengers in the eye, thinking that someone would have a smart comment. Finally everyone had gotten off except for a little old lady walking with a cane.She said, "Sir, do you mind if I ask you a question?" "Why, no, Ma'am," said the pilot. "What is it?" The little old lady said, "Did we land, or were we shot down?"

After a real crusher of a landing in Phoenix, the Flight Attendant came on with, "Ladies and Gentlemen, please remain in your seats until Capt. Crash and the Crew have brought the aircraft to a screeching halt against the gate. And, once the tire smoke has cleared and the warning bells are silenced, we'll open the door and you can pick your way through the wreckage to the terminal."

Part of a flight attendant's arrival announcement:"We'd like to thank you folks for flying with us today. And, the next time you get the insane urge to go blasting through the skies in a pressurized metal tube, we hope you'll think of US Airways."

Doh!

I missed my chance to see Mars tonight. I am fascinated with astronomy but can't pic anything out of the sky to save my life. I had the chance to join Bob Johnson at a friends place to check out the red planet but Wendy is working (double doh!). I don't have a telescope but I think I would enjoy one. I should join the astonomy club this year. I think I would enjoy some star gazing.

Joe Myers on community

Joe Myers is coming out this fall with a book called "The Language of Belonging". I haven't read it yet (it isn't out) but I am going to take some time to read it as soon as I get it. I have talked to Joe before and he really knows what he is talking about. Here is a post from his blog on small groups.

Today, I learned of a friend who was asked to leave their post at a church. He was called to lead the small group ministry. My friend has wonderful pastoral competencies but, he is definitely not an “A” type personality.

Unfortunately, when he accepted this post he agreed to develop a plan where “people would be in intentional community through small groups” and “60-80% of the congregation would be involved.”

This kind of brainwashing propaganda from the small group movement makes me ill! Okay, now that I’ve got that out of my system…

I have found from extensive observations, interviews, and research that these statements are fine except for…

1. Community is not experienced mostly through intentionality. Community spontaneously emerges from environmental influences

2. Small groups are not the way a majority of belonging and community is experienced in a person’s life. Most of these experiences are in public and social environments.

3. It is unrealistic and unhealthy to expect 60-80% involvement in your congregation’s small group program. This usually results in a dependant-codependent relationship with your congregation. Anything over 30-35% is a little suspect.

4. Who are we to assume we need this much “intentional” control over someone’s life? Most do well to find significant community and belonging in their life outside of your congregation. Why invite them into an incestuous relationship where they are not in contact with others on a journey to find God?

People are desperately longing to belong. However, they want to belong to a healthy community in a healthy way. People are looking for real friends and family not the romanticized version of what those family and friends look like and act like. They are looking for a real home not a congregations 1950’s view of what this means.

It is time we put away our narrow definitions of belonging and community and seek to see how people want to connect and find ways to help them there.

Don't Try This At Home

A little known fact is that one time I broke an entire package of Exlax up into a big bowl of Rocky Road Ice Cream and gave it to my dad. It didn't kill him but it gave him some time to think over his philosophy of parenting.

Really Stupid Exposes of Christian Music

I am not a great fan of the Christian music scene but I never knew these folks still existed. It is quite funny. I never could take these kind of people seriously. They attack everyone, even Billy Graham is exposed. A lot of hatred on these sights. I wonder what drives it.

Fighting back

I HATE SPAM has a built in feature that allows you to send a complaint to the spammers ISP (heh, heh, heh) and to the SEC and some other agencies that deal with fraud (like the FDA). I am liking the program more each day. It is now catching about 95% of my spam. It needs to get to about 98% before I will buy it but it is getting there.

From Alan Creech's "emergency blog". This was said by Dallas Willard

Big question - the most important for a leader is this: "Does the gospel I preach have the natural tendency to produce disciples, or only consumers of religious goods and services?"

The Baghdad Girl Blog

Doc Searls pointed me to this blog, another Baghdad blogger who is talking about life in Baghdad. Not exactly the way CNN reports it...

The Myth: Iraqis, prior to occupation, lived in little beige tents set up on the sides of little dirt roads all over Baghdad. The men and boys would ride to school on their camels, donkeys and goats. These schools were larger versions of the home units and for every 100 students, there was one turban-wearing teacher who taught the boys rudimentary math (to count the flock) and reading. Girls and women sat at home, in black burkas, making bread and taking care of 10-12 children.
The Truth: Iraqis lived in houses with running water and electricity. Thousands of them own computers. Millions own VCRs and VCDs. Iraq has sophisticated bridges, recreational centers, clubs, restaurants, shops, universities, schools, etc. Iraqis love fast cars (especially German cars) and the Tigris is full of little motor boats that are used for everything from fishing to water-skiing.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that most people choose to ignore the little prefix 're' in the words 'rebuild? and 'reconstruct'. For your information, 're' is of Latin origin and generally means 'again' or 'anew'.
In other words — there was something there in the first place. We have hundreds of bridges. We have one of the most sophisticated network of highways in the region: you can get from Busrah, in the south, to Mosul, in the north, without once having to travel upon those little, dusty, dirt roads they show you on Fox News. We had a communications system so advanced, it took the Coalition of the Willing 3 rounds of bombing, on 3 separate nights, to damage the Ma'moun Communications Tower and silence our telephones.
Yesterday, I read how it was going to take up to $90 billion to rebuild Iraq. Bremer was shooting out numbers about how much it was going to cost to replace buildings and bridges and electricity, etc.
Listen to this little anecdote. One of my cousins works in a prominent engineering company in Baghdad — we'll call the company H. This company is well-known for designing and building bridges all over Iraq. My cousin, a structural engineer, is a bridge freak. He spends hours talking about pillars and trusses and steel structures to anyone who'll listen.
As May was drawing to a close, his manager told him that someone from the CPA wanted the company to estimate the building costs of replacing the New Diyala Bridge on the South East end of Baghdad. He got his team together, they went out and assessed the damage, decided it wasn?t too extensive, but it would be costly. They did the necessary tests and analyses (mumblings about soil composition and water depth, expansion joints and girders) and came up with a number they tentatively put forward- $300,000. This included new plans and designs, raw materials (quite cheap in Iraq), labor, contractors, travel expenses, etc.
Let's pretend my cousin is a dolt. Let's pretend he hasn?t been working with bridges for over 17 years. Let's pretend he didn?t work on replacing at least 20 of the 133 bridges damaged during the first Gulf War. Let's pretend he?s wrong and the cost of rebuilding this bridge is four times the number they estimated- let?s pretend it will actually cost $1,200,000. Let's just use our imagination.
A week later, the New Diyala Bridge contract was given to an American company. This particular company estimated the cost of rebuilding the bridge would be around- brace yourselves- $50,000,000 !!
Something you should know about Iraq: we have over 130,000 engineers. More than half of these engineers are structural engineers and architects. Thousands of them were trained outside of Iraq in Germany, Japan, America, Britain and other countries. Thousands of others worked with some of the foreign companies that built various bridges, buildings and highways in Iraq. The majority of them are more than proficient — some of them are brilliant.
Iraqi engineers had to rebuild Iraq after the first Gulf War in 1991 when the 'Coalition of the Willing' was composed of over 30 countries actively participating in bombing Baghdad beyond recognition. They had to cope with rebuilding bridges and buildings that were originally built by foreign companies, they had to get around a lack of raw materials that we used to import from abroad, they had to work around a vicious blockade designed to damage whatever infrastructure was left after the war... they truly had to rebuild Iraq. And everything had to be made sturdy, because, well, we were always under the threat of war.
Over a hundred of the 133 bridges were rebuilt, hundreds of buildings and factories were replaced, communications towers were rebuilt, new bridges were added, electrical power grids were replaced... things were functioning. Everything wasn?t perfect — but we were working on it.
And Iraqis aren't easy to please. Buildings cannot just be made functionary. They have to have artistic touches — a carved pillar, an intricately designed dome, something unique... not necessarily classy or subtle, but different. You can see it all over Baghdad — fashionable homes with plate glass windows, next to classic old 'Baghdadi' buildings, gaudy restaurants standing next to classy little cafes... mosques with domes so colorful and detailed they look like glamorous Faberge eggs... all done by Iraqis.

Salam Pax's house was raided by the American forces this week as well. At least he kept his sense of humor.

Financial scandals test trust in churches

No kidding. According to this article churches need to clean up their act.

Link

God's Dog Grooming

via CBS News

Across town, it's the same idea but different clientele: Christian dog grooming. There are bible references on the walls, but the dogs don't seem to mind, and the owners aren't complaining, either.

Rachele Karpiuk said she feels more secure at the Christian dog salon because of better services and a financial trust with the owner.

"I know she's not going to take me for a ride or overcharge me or be cruel to my animals," Karpiuk explained.

And that kind of reputation can be money in the bank. Christian business owners are experiencing new popularity in non-traditional fields.

There's a Christian-based theme park in Orlando with shows and theme park food. Plus, there is "The Lord's Gymnasium," which is filled with statues.

"So many people are looking and going back to the religions, especially since 9-11," Lord's Gym owner Patricia Steppans said. "9-11 was a really big boost for Christian type businesses."

And because life needs a little laughter, nightclubs like the Improv now feature Christian comedy nights.

Yeah, how do you follow that story up.

Link

jordoncooper.com/Hockey Pundits Fantasy Hockey League

After last years Hockey Pundits Fantasy Hockey League fun, we are bringing it back this year. Here is the signup information. We have room for 19 more teams. Last year's league filled up fast so sign up asap! From Yahoo! Sports

You have been invited to join Hockey Pundits's Custom League in Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Hockey.
In order to join, just go to http://hockey.fantasysports.yahoo.com/hockey, click the Sign Up Now! button and choose to Join a Custom League. Then, when prompted, enter the following information...
League ID#: 11517
Password: garybettman
We will send you a confirmation with further details once you have completed the registration process.

Attacking Kenny G.

Pat Methany on Kenny G.

I first heard him a number of years ago playing as a sideman with Jeff Lorber when they opened a concert for my band. My impression was that he was someone who had spent a fair amount of time listening to the more pop oriented sax players of that time, like Grover Washington or David Sanborn, but was not really an advanced player, even in that style. He had major rhythmic problems and his harmonic and melodic vocabulary was extremely limited, mostly to pentatonic based and blues-lick derived patterns, and he basically exhibited only a rudimentary understanding of how to function as a professional soloist in an ensemble - Lorber was basically playing him off the bandstand in terms of actual music.

But he did show a knack for connecting to the basest impulses of the large crowd by deploying his two or three most effective licks (holding long notes and playing fast runs - never mind that there were lots of harmonic clams in them) at the key moments to elicit a powerful crowd reaction (over and over again). The other main thing I noticed was that he also, as he does to this day, played horribly out of tune - consistently sharp.

Of course, I am aware of what he has played since, the success it has had, and the controversy that has surrounded him among musicians and serious listeners. This controversy seems to be largely fueled by the fact that he sells an enormous amount of records while not being anywhere near a really great player in relation to the standards that have been set on his instrument over the past sixty or seventy years. And honestly, there is no small amount of envy involved from musicians who see one of their fellow players doing so well financially, especially when so many of them who are far superior as improvisors and musicians in general have trouble just making a living. There must be hundreds, if not thousands of sax players around the world who are simply better improvising musicians than Kenny G on his chosen instruments. It would really surprise me if even he disagreed with that statement.

He goes on to trash Kenny G pretty hard. I never knew G was sharp. How embarrasing if it is true. That being said, I think all internal trashing, legit or not, seems really petty and catty to outsiders. I don't know what the blogging equivelent of this kind of discussion would be. Maybe this:

That Glenn Reynolds, he uses Verdana 10pt consistently when we all know that Arial 10pt is the way to go.
-or-
I can't believe that Hockey Pundits is so constantly pro-Canadian in their views on hockey.
-or-
Did you hear that the reason Jordon links to Wendy's weblog is that they are married? How pathetic is that.

Saskatoon to Host 2006 Vanier Cup

The first time Canada's National Football Title Game to be played outdoors.

Ev Vs. The Alpine Slide

The Alpine Slide won

Books that don't matter...

I have been reviewing "Books that Matter" for TheOoze. Anyone want to help me create a list of books that don't really matter at all. If you have any suggestions, post them in the message boards here (free registration required -- I know that is lame but...)

The Calgary Stampeders

The thing I hate the most about the three ring circus that has become the franchise formerly known as the Calgary Stampeders is that it is going to take such a long time to clean up. This was one of the Canadian Football League's crown jewel franchises. Previous ownership and management really partnered with not only Calgary Stampeder fans but the entire City of Calgary to build a franchise that the entire city could be proud of. They took it from a seriously troubled franchise in the late 1980's and completely transformed it. The former owner, Sig Gutsche was a charismatic but left the football side in the very capable hands of Wally Buono and Stan Schwartz. When the new owner bought the franchise (with his son the quarterback), he forced Buono to resign and has fired the very respected Stan Schwartz and has brought in (wait for it), his teams kicker, Mark McLoughlin to run the football side of the team. I am sure McLoughlin is a very smart person (for a placekicker) but he has no experience, has limited ties to the Calgary business community, and has never run a professional football team before. Hopefully they bail out and local owners can come in time to save this sorry franchise.

I am a Roughrider fan but no one likes to see a proud franchise and a great rival go down like this. My earliest football memories were watching a really bad Calgary team play at McMahon Stadium in the early 1980's. Unless the California based owners sell or head back south, there won't be a team to go watch there in a couple of years.

When Anil Dash isn't taking on big water, he is exposing the history of the FBI

This is kind of cool. (via Anil Dash). For us Canadian readers, here is the history of the R.C.M.P. For any Brits out there, here is the history of the London police force and Scotland Yard.

Unspoken Groups by David Weinberger

From David Weinberger talk at O’Reilly Emerging Technology Conference (April 26, ’03 in Santa Clara)

If social software has been around for as long as software has been, why is it becoming a buzzword only now? Is it because consultants see a new wave to ride? Sure, that’s a part of it. But since most social software is relatively simple and inexpensive, this doesn’t promise the big consulting bucks that, say, knowledge management did.

Even if consultants get rich off of social software, that’s not why the rest of us are excited about it. That’s not why it was the undercurrent of conversation at the recent O’Reilly Emerging Technology Conference. It’s not why some of the people I respect the most have been drawn towards this "new" software as engineers and as customers. Social software is sending some of the old energy through us again.

Good. Frankly, we’re a dispirited clan that could use a lift.

But, perhaps that isn’t a sufficient explanation either. Companies that have been burned by groupware and stymied by knowledge management systems are beginning to explore emergent social software. This tells us not only that they’re looking for something simpler, but that perhaps they’re willing to make the most basic trade as corporations, the trade we made when we first got on the Net as individuals: trust for hope.

Five years ago, the idea that idea of putting up a page that anyone can edit would have been laughed at. What’s to stop vandals wiping out a week’s work with a Control-A Delete? But now wikis look like they make sense.

Five years ago, it was obvious beyond question that groups need to be pre-structured if the team is to "hit the ground running." Now, we have learned — perhaps — that many groups organize themselves best by letting the right structure emerge over time.

Such beliefs deliver trust and get hope in return.

But I want to go further. If such a change is occurring — I say if — then it, too, is emerging from a greater, implicit whole. And here’s where I place my own hope. Could it be that the this turning of the greatest of the beasts of structure, corporations, could betoken an even more significant change? Could we at last be turning from the great lie of the Age of Computers, that the world is binary? Could we be ready to embrace the most obvious of facts: The earth is continuous, with every edge imposed? The world is ambiguous, with every thought, perception and feeling just a surface of an unspoken depth?

We can hope. Can’t we? Please?

via Bob Carlton

He was a what?

Ryan Hale has a frightening story about being ripped off by a fraud artist who was posing as an architect.

As if Big Tobacco Wasn't Enough. Anil Dash goes after Big Bottled Water

Read his essay here. Basically he makes the point that bottled water isn't as pure as regular tap water.

New Anti-Spam Software

Okay, the Spam Pal experiment wasn't working out to well for me. I liked that it was free but it only got around 90% of my e-mail spam a day. Not quite good enough and was flagging a lot of false positives. I probably could have tweaked it a bit but it wasn't getting the job done and I don't really like Blacklist generated spam filters. Leighton suggested trying again with a new address but jordon AT jordoncooper.com seemed a little flat to me. Plus all my other addresses are coop AT. I tried to download McAfee's product yesterday but it would hang on download. After checking some review sites, I saw some good stuff about I HATE SPAM so I decided to try it out. So far it is working okay. I am only a day into my trial and will post the results. I like CloudMark's SpamNet better but it is $4 USD a month and over a year that is around $70. Seem a little expensive to me.

I'll yet you know how I HATE SPAM works out for me.

New Next-Wave coming

Hey, just a head's up on the new Next-Wave redesign that is coming out. Alan Creech did the design and it looks amazing and Jason Evans is the new editor-in-chief. Doesn't look like Jayson Blair is writing for them so that's always a good sign too. I won't spill the beans on the Next-Wave development site but I will say I am really excited about it's launch.

Not everyone appreciates the BBC like I do

The Conservative Party of England wants to shut down its website among other things. Their assesment is flawed as private sites have not been able to do what the BBC and to a lesser extent the Guardian have done and they is keep archives online and available for free. Canada.com and Canoe both have horrible link rot and take away from their value of those who actually use the net (I have a feeling not a lot of Conservative MP's are familiar with it)

Great White Sharks breaching

These are some terrifying pictures.

Great White Sharks have undoubtedly breached for centuries but at certain localities it happens more often than at others. One such area is Seal Island False Bay, South Africa. Here Great White Sharks use the breach as the final effort that often culminates in a successful predation. When these great white sharks breach the person fortunate enough to see such a spectacle is left with an indelible memory. Please view our pics below"

Blogrolling.com Comes to an End... for now.

I turned off new user sign-ups today. The server is getting the snot kicked out of it and I don't have the time and energy to keep dealing with the growing user base so I don't know if I'll ever be allowing new users again. Sorry. I just don't want the service to be crippled for paying members since 95% of the traffic and overhead comes from free accounts. The database problems seem to be somewhat stable at this point but any more growth and it's going to implode so there it is.

Light polution

This NASA image shows the impact of light polution today. This is amazing.

This article goes out to my friends at Lakeview Church

who had an unbacked up hard drive on their server that went down and took all the staffs data with it. Better late than never.

[Listening to: Sunday Processional - Various Artists - (3:43)]

This isn't good

David Weinberger tells us

A friend in Belmont (MA) was among a group of neighbors whose laptops were stolen from their homes. It seems the thieves used RF detection equipment to scan the neighborhood, finding homes with wireless hubs. They targeted those homes & stole the laptops.

[Listening to: Christe Redemptor - Various Artists - (2:29)]

BBC Free Journalism Training Materials

Speaking of free education, the BBC has offered some free classes online for journalism. Three cheers for the BBC. Very cool stuff.

Photos of 737 after assault by hail storm

This Easyjet 737 HB-III departed Aug,15 at 09:50 from Geneva, and flew 10 minutes later into a Thunderstorm. They returned to Geneva for an emergency landing. No one was hurt.

Complaining along

I find myself using the net now to thank people for exceptional customer service. I just sent an e-mail of to Zellers thanking them for some super polite employees I have run into lately. At the same time I just sent off an e-mail complaining to Safeway about the constantly stale bakery products I get from the store that Wendy works at and also the store down the street from me. It is a double edged sword.

Zellers has blown me away lately. 20+ years of bad experiences looking for stuff, understaffed, and often uncooperative employees and all of a sudden, these people are doing everything they can to do their job and seem to be really enjoying working there. I don't know what they did but it seems to have worked.

UPDATE: Heh, you aren't going to believe this but apprently Zeller's anti spam software is blocking e-mail from their comments section of their website. Oops.

Yahoo! to Purchase PrairieFusion?

Slashdot/ Sven Lathams reports today that Yahoo! is set to launch into blogging based on the blog service it appears to be running in Korea (but no one is sure as its in Korean except the logo: Yahoo Korea Blog) ignores the recent history of Yahoo! and its hunger for acquisitions when it misses the boat on major new trends on the internet (which it usually does).

Sources inside Yahoo! have told the Blog Herald that the company is already in talks with a number of Blogging firms, looking for the right acquisition vehicle to integrate into the Yahoo! stable of sites. Yahoo! is also concerned with the widening scope of the Google stable the recent purchase of Pyra Labs by Google Inc.


Although Yahoo! did not respond to our request to confirm the rumours, the Blog Herald believes that it is not a matter of if Yahoo! will purchase a blogging firm, but when, which one and at what price.

Names such as Xanga and TypePad are possibilities, with Six Aparts new TypePad service, although in early days, seeking widespread critical acclaim and increasing market share at the cost of its competitors strongly. Live Journal, although "Open Source" could also provide opportunities for Yahoo! with a very large user database.

This isn't good

Most CD-R's are completely unreadable in less then 20 months

The tests showed that a number of CD-Rs had become completely unreadable while others could only be read back partially. Data that was recorded 20 months ago had become unreadable. These included discs of well known and lesser known manufacturers.

It is presumed that CD-Rs are good for at least 10 years. Some manufacturers even claim that their CD-Rs will last up to a century. From our tests it's concluded however that there is a lot of junk on the market. We came across CD-Rs that should never have been released to the market. It's completely unacceptable that CD-Rs become unusable in less than two years.

This is not good. I take around 3000 digital pictures a year. Any idea on what CD-R's are good to use?

MIT Everyware

Every lecture, every handout, every quiz. All online. For free. Meet the global geeks getting an MIT education, open source-style.

Lam Vi Quoc negotiates his scooter through Ho Chi Minh City's relentless stream of pedal traffic and hangs a right down a crowded alley. He climbs the steep wooden stairs of the tiny house he shares with nine family members, passing by his mother, who is stooped on the floor of the second level preparing lunch. He ascends another set of even steeper steps to the third level and settles on a stool at a small desk, pushing aside the rolled-up mat he sleeps on with one of his brothers. To the smell of a chicken roasting on a grill in the alley and the clang of the next-door neighbor's metalworking operation, Lam turns on his Pentium 4 PC, and soon the screen displays Lecture 2 of Laboratory in Software Engineering, a course taught each semester on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "Here," he says, pointing at the screen. "This is where I got the idea to use decoupling as a way of integrating two programs."

In a huge brick house that Evan Hoff shares with three other guys in Nashville, the 20-year-old brings up the MIT Web site and connects to the same material Lam is studying halfway around the world. "This is the lecture on data abstraction," Hoff explains. "I went over this in community college, but that class only took it so far. This teaches you about the three different specification conditions, the things you put in documentation to let future programmers know how to use it. In community college we covered only two of them."

When MIT announced to the world in April 2001 that it would be posting the content of some 2,000 classes on the Web, it hoped the program - dubbed OpenCourseWare - would spur a worldwide movement among educators to share knowledge and improve teaching methods. No institution of higher learning had ever proposed anything as revolutionary, or as daunting. MIT would make everything, from video lectures and class notes to tests and course outlines, available to any joker with a browser. The academic world was shocked by MIT's audacity - and skeptical of the experiment. At a time when most enterprises were racing to profit from the Internet and universities were peddling every conceivable variant of distance learning, here was the pinnacle of technology and science education ready to give it away. Not the degrees, which now cost about $41,000 a year, but the content. No registration required.

Why aren't churches, denominations and seminaries doing this? With many ISP's offering a gigabyte of space for $9 a month. Space is not the problem. With content management systems (like, ahem, PrairieFusion's) out there and affordable, lack of technology isn't the problem. It is a closed door mindset that is keeping this stuff from people who really want to learn.

Lessig on the extremists in power

Larry Lessig is enraged over the ignorance that caused this story

According to the Post, Lois Boland, director of international relations for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, said "that open-source software runs counter to the mission of WIPO, which is to promote intellectual-property rights." As she is quoted as saying, "To hold a meeting which has as its purpose to disclaim or waive such rights seems to us to be contrary to the goals of WIPO."
If Lois Boland said this, then she should be asked to resign. The level of ignorance built into that statement is astonishing, and the idea that a government official of her level would be so ignorant is an embarrassment. First, and most obviously, open-source software is based in intellectual-property rights. It can’t exist (and free software can’t have its effect) without it. Second, the goal of WIPO, and the goal of any government, should be to promote the right balance of intellectual-property rights, not simply to promote intellectual property rights. And finally, if an intellectual property right holder wants to “disclaim” or “waive” her rights, what business is it of WIPOs? Why should WIPO oppose a copyright or patent rights holder’s choice to do with his or her rights what he or she wants?
These points are basic. They should be fundamental. That someone who doesn’t understand them is at a high level of this government just shows how extreme IP policy in America has become.

Today

Goofing off with Wendy and Mark

Burning Man Never Get's Old

Burning Man, which begins today in the Nevada desert. About 30,000 are expected to attend.

"The important thing about Burning Man is that it is the most experiential phenomenon I can think of," says [Electronic Frontier Foundation co-founder John Perry Barlow, who has been making the yearly pilgrimage since 1997]. "It can't be turned into data in any useful way. You can't informatize it by blogging it, filming it or taking pictures of it, because so much of it can't be translated into information."
Burning Man volunteer Jim Graham isn't fazed when he hears the event derided by some as "Girls Gone Wild" with extra helpings of sand and drugs. "Any time someone makes that kind of generalization, I say 'Yeah! It's exactly like that,' and smile. In the beginning, I came for the spectacle. Now, I come back for the opportunity to interact with so many people who possess such mind-boggling creativity."

Sometimes first-time attendees get a little too mind-boggled. "One crew from Israel last year wanted to do a 24-hour falafel camp," Graham recalls. "I said, 'Guys, maybe you should just do it around dinnertime.' They became such a hit, they were all wiped out by the third day. It's still a temporary city of 30,000 in the middle of nowhere, so there are practical considerations. Bikes get stolen, people get in fights over how loud the trance music is, someone still has to coordinate port-a-potties. But it's like nothing else."

via Boing Boing

What Happened?

A couple of you e-mailed and asked what is up with my site. Long story that started last night while fooling around with the sites search engine. I was noticing some orphan files all over the place. Plus a great deal of consternatio