And Thus The Identity Crackdown Begins...

FaceBook has launched a new service that ties commenting on other sites to your FaceBook account. So if a website turns it on, (and I think many will make it the default) most commenters will no longer be able to post with anything but their ACTUAL identity.

I have encouraged people to be themselves online for years. I knew that everyone running around pretending to be 20 different people and acting in a range of bad behavior from impolite to horrid, would not be tolerated for long. People were just loading up corporate cannons with reasons for a siege on anonymity. I also knew that when it DID start to change it would probably be at the hands of a big powerful entity. Back in the 90's I would have thought MS would be the one, then maybe Google... but of course the big winner of all our data now looks like it will be FaceBook, Google only WISHES you were building such a detailed profile into their database compared to what you shovel into FB each day.

I am of two minds, I look forward to a day when there is two thirds less crap polluting the web, but of course I don't want to tie all my opinions, thoughts, hopes and dreams back to a single (clearly untrustworthy) corporation. I just wish more people had decided to act civilized and not made such a service an easy sell.

The internet is the MOST public place you will ever make your voice heard. I believe that anything you post may someday be attached to your actual identity and viewed by anyone. I am a firm believer that de-anonymization tools will largely remove the illusion of anonymity in the near future. So its best to act the way you would in any very public place. Your home, work, or even a bar, all seem to be much more private places than any place you post online... but strangely, others seem to imagine the internet as the most private of places and assume everything they post under a pseudo identity would never be tracked back to them... even long before all the successful de-anonymization research, I just could not see that lasting.

In real life we feel pained and sometimes shamed for the stupid things we do and say, I causes us to examine ourselves and hopefully grow, mature, and respect others. Being held accountable for what you say is a fundamental part of being a person that exists in society. Bringing that accountability to the internet is long over due. We can't have a more meaningful dialog without looking each other in the eye.

How Do I Stop My Transformation?

Recently my 2 year old son has been taking a mouth full of whatever he is drinking and letting it run out of his mouth. This has been a HUGE problem and mess. So I decided to let him explore this and told him he could do it in the bathtub and his swimming pool when it was warmer. Wanting to keep my promise I took him to spit out water in the bath tub after lunch today… He was thrilled!

But then, like many of my plans to do something nice for him or to teach him something, it turned bad. He quickly went from being overjoyed to being outraged at me for not letting him turn on the faucet in the tub. He had a full-on melt down and there was little I could have done to prevent it (you have to know him). He wants to have things his way 100% of the time, He is stubborn, willful, strong as a baby OX, and he is not likely to give me a break or relax on ANY issue. It is very tiring to try so hard to please someone only to have them act like you are a monster.

Also this day, my wife had left a pie pad full of bird seed out on our deck table. He reached for it and I asked him to STOP! but he ignored me and poured it out onto our deck as I repeated the stop command 2-3 more times. I calmed myself and spent 30 minuets teaching him that the seed was for the birds and getting him to help me sweep up what we could so that the birds would have something to eat. He really seemed to "Get it" and seemed concerned for the birdies. I thought I had scored a big "daddy win".

Thirty minutes later he rushed over to the pie pan again and spilled it out before I could stop him then just acted like he could not hear me when I tried to talk to him about it and charged into the house with muddy boots making me leap up from my "gentle (down at his level) teaching guru position" and grab his arm like the "angry dad" I have never wanted to be.

Did I mention that he makes me tired and often frustrates my best efforts to be a "cool dad".

He also defeated the play yard keeping him out of my work area forcing me to consider moving my office behind closed (and locked) doors and making it so I can't work while I am with the rest of the family now. He had the run of the whole downstairs and I had just fenced off a small area… but thats not good enough, he has to have access to everything or he will hurt himself trying to get to it. This will also mean that I will have less time to work and will need to stay up later at night to keep my clients happy.

In addition to that, defeated a fence that I built to prevent him from crawling under our deck through a hole a tree and bush grow out of. He just kicked it apart ignoring me while I was asking him to stop. (it only took seconds) I now need a more sturdy solution, which is crazy because he will only be in danger of getting "stuck" under there for the next 6 months to a year. I think I may just toss some sand bags in the hole or something.

I think he is changing me. I am now a protector in a world that doesn't really respect protectors. A man forced to "set rules" for a lovable and irrepressible Dennis the menace. A squasher of freedom and joy. The "MAN", The foil of 75% of all sit-coms, a curmudgeon, an increasingly stoic pillar of authority, an out of touch fool to be gradually more and more despised over time... in a word, Father.

Crash Report

Adobe has detected that the application Photoshop has unexpectedly quit.

Problem description:

I deactivated a used font and switched to PS then slected the text to change the font to something else and PS crashed hard. I had been doing the same thing several times before but instinctivly changing the font first to a placeholder in PS before deactivating it, but I thought, "Thats silly its 2011 PS can handle such things in an elagant way by now"...

: )

But more importantly I have other problems with PS...
My first copy of PS came on floppy, I have owned PS for close to 2 decades and dutifully upgraded it over and over. As you look into this problem, Please also consider doing something about the fact that anyone with even a casual interest can acquire a cracked copy of PS, learn it, never purchase it, compete with a small business like mine by using it, and yet I see little benefit from my long time loyalty, sometimes paying three times the going rate of any functional PS replacement just to upgrade.

Speaking of those modestly priced PS replacements, most have come and gone over the years not because they were necessarily inferior (although admittedly not as feature rich) but they likely failed because adobe has such a lock on the category and sets the price purposely high completely aware that it will encourage piracy on the low end of users and thus making any such alternatives redundant to a "free" copy of PS acquired from an acquaintance or online. Adobe wins in the long run from lack of viable competition and selling expensive licenses to businesses that can easily afford them. Meanwhile, independent people like myself who want to own the tools they use find it increasing illogical to continue paying the somewhat outrageous upgrade fees and feel tempted to search for pro level alternatives.

When someone pays such a premium for a product (the most expensive piece of software many individuals will ever buy) it should come with an expectation of added value. In my oppinion you should have been tracking us long time users all along and finding ways to keep us happy, but something tells me you don't even know or care who we are. I certainly expect to have more value from my sizable expense over the years than the people that I believe you expect to steal (while inflating my price) the product. Largely my value using PS is the same as someone that never pays for it. None of which would be grating to me except for the fact that I strongly believe your company is aware of all this and that it is part of your business model.

I would guess that an honest internal breakdown of your customers would look something like this:
Corporate accounts: 90% of users purchase a license (actively enforced I would bet)

Medium sized: business 50%-60% of users purchase a license ( not worth enforcing, guilt driven I imagine)

Small business: maybe 25% of users purchase a license (a small percentage will pay even if the price is too high out of a sense of honestly. Being in this category makes me feel like you see us as "suckers")

Enthusiasts: 2% of users purchase a license (so many people "have" PS that it is dominant, and thats the way Adobe likes it. God forbid people refer to editing images as something other than "photoshoping".

Students: 30% of users purchase a license (hell even with healthy student discounts I doubt most non graphic design students purchase PS, but I bet a huge number of them have a copy).

So, every time Photoshop crashes and I lose even a few minutes of work these are the sort of things I think about. So thats the "bug" I would prefer your company address before anything else.

Proudly Owning Your Identity Seems To Be A Lost Concept

I recently read this article about unique internet ID's Americans.

I am not completely opposed to such a system but I wish wholeheartedly that the internet had evolved in such a way that made it feel less nessasary. For years I have argued that people needed to "be themselves" online and act the same way as you would in ANY public space. The alternative, I argued, would be that "the powers that be" (corporations and governments) would use the various forms of rampant bad behavior as an excuse to bring down the hammer on the open system we have enjoyed. The amusing thing is just how many people assume that because they use a "nick" (as we called them in the old days) that they would be forever separated from their actions online. I won't go into the detail, but I have always believed that data mining was too tempting to let much of ANY data that may be useful now or in the future vanish or ever really be erased. I assume that every digital bread crumb I have ever dropped is stored SOMEWHERE and that it is simply a matter of time before all that data is sold, traded, stolen, and eventually collected in one place to be de-anonymized with frighting accuracy.

Some reading on that...
wired

microsoft de-anonymize

Fear the ubercookies!

Geo location data in uploaded pictures is FUN!...

The bottom line is...
I believe that for the vast majority of users, being anonymous online is an illusion. I am not saying that rare people might be able to cover their tracks, but I would bet that many people that THINK they are good at it, are actually not that great. My guess is that a good, modern private investigator could pinpoint most online posters with some ease.

What is surprising to me is how different my feelings on this seem to be in comparison to so many people.

Reading the comments attached to that article are mind blowing...
"I have a right to anonymity. It's the same as the right to privacy."
" There's no F__KING way in hell that he or anyone else in the government is taking away my RIGHT to anonymity"
"Anonymity is what drives the internet."
"Just cause it's not in the Constitution doesn't mean it's not a right."
"Quit living by a piece of paper and make your own rights based on being a living, thinking, feeling human being with good sense!"

Yeah those last two get me. People are making up their own "rights" and treating them as if they were law. Now I agree that basic rights may go beyond everything we have thought to right down... but no way does going by mrfluffypants69 on a forum count as a basic human right. That is just a strange idea. Yes I am aware of the political uses of being anonymous, but I don't think that people reporting human rights violations from some hellish dictatorship consider it a "RIGHT". I think they are just glad that their oppressive governments have not yet found a way to stop it. Did a guy in the 60's broadcasting on a ham radio about how terrible things were in Eastern Crapistan see it as a right? No, I think he was just glad that he didn't get caught.

At what point did people feel it was a right to be anonymous online? Clearly it's a culture and society based thing that has shifted dramatically over the last couple of decades. Not many older people expect to be able to say any crazy or hurtful thing you want in a public place and get away with it.

Say for example you threatened to kill someone in an ad you took out in the news paper, The police would likely be at your door asking you a few questions regardless if you posted your name or not. (The paper would never print it in the first place but lets say it slipped by...) Our culture would never get mad at the newspaper or the cops for maintaining the right to expose a person who did such a thing was. I don't even think anyone taking out such an ad would expect to remain anonymous, unless they were kinda dull witted.

Do you have the right to shout whatever you want in a crowded park? If you said loudly that you thought some under age person was sexually attractive, or that you planed to do harm a specific person, or even property, would you not expect to face some reprisal?

Here is an experiment. Go about your daily routine one saturday. Go to the store, take the kids to a park, go see a movie, shop around at the mall for a while, hit a few bars if thats your thing... but do it all wearing a mask and REFUSE to take it off claiming its your right to be anonymous. THAT should be fun. Personally I don't see much difference

So even though we have clearly defined rules of civilized behavior, people ignore those rules online and expect impunity as if it were a RIGHT! In fact many people clearly state that they feel being anonymous online IS, without question, a right as if it was granted by some recent legislation or covered under some existing privacy law. *blink* *Blink* Is it me, or would privacy laws (if they applied at all) only make sense if you didn't POST the information in the first place. In other words you were the one that said or did the crazy thing online. You MADE it public! Perhaps I am naive about the law (It would not surprise me) but this seems to be common sense.

So... As I see it, you are linked to what you say and do by thousands and thousands of years of tradition and developing laws. Pretending you can be a virtual version of yourself and do whatever you want is just fantasy. The only reason that people have gotten away with it up to this point is that it wasn't cost effective to control it. Now that computing power is cheap enough, peoples behavior is altered beyond any hope of putting the genie back in the bottle by decades of false belief that they were "magically invisible", and databases are full to a point of glut from people believing they are not exposing themselves, its time to start locking down the system and cashing in. People will think they are having freedoms removed... no sorry I really don't think anyone in a position of power ever intended to let you keep those privileges.

I’m not a nerd. I used to be one...

Thats the opening statement in a recent essay by Patton Oswalt. My friend Rich pointed it out to me and that first line realy caught my attention because it was very close to something I have been saying for years.

In fact, I have been meaning to make a post about how I am an "Anti Geek", A selective geek that denies being a nerd/geek and since I don't refer to myself in those terms and don't embrace ALL geek touchstones. I am shunned by current geek culture. This essay gave me new insights into that phenomenon and I hope to make that post soon. But in the meantime, here are my thoughts on Mr. Oswalts article itself.

Wake Up, Geek Culture. Time to Die

I copied the text and listened to "Wake Up, Geek Culture. Time to Die" on my smartphone using a text to speech app I purchased for $2... (I think there is much to be said about THAT as it relates to the essay and I leave you to ponder the ramifications).

Many have been witness to my strong opinions about "geek culture" and how I have sought to avoid that label even though I love select things that are considered VERY geeky.

I agree with much of what he is saying, but believe he is glossing over a larger picture. Aspects of counter culture have ALWAYS been cherry picked by pop culture as they became "ripe"... Its just simply geek cultures turn. Its funny because he seems to set the dates for the beginning of the harvest a bit later than me. He blames the internet for the rapid acceleration, and I agree... But I would go much further back and say it really got rolling with the introduction of widely available cable television, home gaming, and home computing in general. As an example, I would most likely have complained about someone his age (he is only slightly younger than me) being the reason for good arcades closing because he was willing to sit at home and play sub standard home versions of the games! "Grumble Grumble! Spend a damn quarter ya cheapskate kid!" It's interesting, but because of big technology shifts, just those few birthdays probably mean that he and I had a vastly different teenage experience. In my oppinion, Geekdom was already on the upswing in popularity by the time he hit his teen years.

Also, later, but before the internet, publishing was in on the spread and dressing up of the techie underground to the mainstream. I was reader of Mondo 2000 (The Authoritative & Scholarly Journal of Cyberpunk Subculture) and during its run beginning in 1989, it could be found on many "fully stocked" magazine racks in pretty mainstream bookstores. It was freaky and tried hard to make things that had once been the realm of pure geeks, ultra fashionable. Look at these covers... http://www.mondo2000.net/ Notice anything? heh. Smart drugs, Hot scientists and Virtual reality where already on the lips of many "normal" people through the power of the hot chick on the magazine cover.

Of course, Geek culture is not the first counter culture to be "adopted" by the masses, but it may be the final one... there are few sub culture berries left to pick. Much like getting chosen for sports teams, seems like the geeks may have been picked last.

Convention for the horrifically yet proudly deformed

Now thats an unusual dream...

I was walking through a dark and stylish hotel filled with creatures that looked as if human skeletons had been resized and rearranged in every conceivable way, then organs replaced in them at whim and finally, skin tightly stretched over the results. All this with no regard for wether the resulting construct would constitute a viable living being. These convention goers were mostly nude and displaying themselves to each other with delight at their great diversity of form. The handful that had working genitalia were very proud of themselves and demanded a lot of attention. Some smaller participants were in ornate glass cabinets but it was clear that they were not prisoners, instead, it was for their protection as they needed a more pure environment to survive.

I wasn't fearful, just astounded. The setting was beautiful and richly ornate. None of the creatures seemed to be unhappy... But I DO recall that they had a little display, like a model of many identical six inch high beings doing some type of forced labor and the plaque beneath it read "Abused" I took it to be some sort of memorial to a less enlightened time when "normal" people had taken advantage of a population of them.

I am sure the dream means nothing other than that my "internal storyteller" is a creepy little fellow.

Sounds like my "external storyteller" should work that up into a short story someday...

Shaun The Sheep Is GREAT!

Oh wait now it sucks...

I have a 2 year old and I am building a library of quality entertainment for him on a server so that he won't be exposed to broadcast TV (and advertising) for a while. I was so happy discover that Shaun The Sheep had his own TV show and that it was so great! I started buying up episodes of season one and it is really stunning! Like mini episodes of Wallace and Gromit! They are subtle, funny and completely non verbal. The characters tell the story with hand gestures, eye rolls, and body language. One of the best shows I have come across for him yet!

So Last night when I found a new DVD that we did not have yet and I snagged it with glee. I popped it in today and I got my first taste of season 2. I will now stop collecting...

I am so disheartened. What happened?! Not only are the characters less endearing, but the color palate of the whole world is super saturated, the players express emotions with much more broad and clownish facial expressions, the once beautiful pastoral farm sets now lack detail (the junk heap that the sheep always pull resources from to build stuff is now less "junky" for example), even the grass looks bad! WHY would Aardman do this to such an amazing show?!

Cost I imagine played a big role. Lots of changes seem to involve not using clay but instead using what looks like foam rubber. I believe that the new lines around the mouths on the charters of The Farmer and Bitzer allow them to switch mouths instead of whole heads to speed animation. Still many of the other changes just confuse and sadden me. Constant "rasberry" blowing has replaced the eye roll, glower, and "sheepish look" that were more common in season one. I get the feeling that they were under pressure to make it more accessible to a larger audience (profitable) and in doing so they have crushed out much of the charm.

I think kids crave some realism, not everything needs to look like a candy wrapper. This new art direction is a mistake. One thing I noticed that most people may overlook is that the ever present poo adorning the fields of season one is now gone... I guess in this new reality Shaun and the other sheep have stopped going to the baaathroom. (sorry about that)

I am dying to know the behind the scenes story as to why this gem has become so... average. I am searching for an explanation.

I am sure Wallace and Gromit are safe from such de-evolution... so at least we will can look forward to future high quality shorts and movies involving those characters.