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Category Archives: Geek stuff

State of the World 2023

Fierce Planet Posted on by

Happening now at The Well: a topic where Jon Lebkowsky, Bruce Sterling, and a very smart cast of dozens consider the state of the world as the new year dawns. So far it’s been a wide-ranging, global discussion about crypto, AI, climate change, health and COVID, and more. The entire topic is world-readable, though non-members can’t post directly but rather need to send questions or comments by email to the hosts. (Most of the Well is only open to members.) This is the 22nd iteration of this discussion, and earlier versions can also be found among the topics in the … Continue reading →

What have we done with the Internet?

Fierce Planet Posted on by

What it is, is up to us. — Howard Rheingold, author of The Virtual Community I think of myself as an OG Internet inhabitant, because I was one of the early commercial consumers who arrived online after NSFNet began to release control of the network to corporate actors. For me, that began in 1993. I had been hanging around bulletin board systems (BBSs) for a year or two, after peace activists I worked with started to use computers for communication and organizing. I ended up on a system I’d heard of some years before, The Well, created in 1985 and … Continue reading →

Rovers on Mars

Fierce Planet Posted on by

Tomorrow NASA will launch a new Rover to Mars, at 7 a.m. Eastern time. This one is named Perseverance, and it’s much like Curiosity, although it does have its own drone to fly around. The launch will stream live, if you’re up that early. I’m gonna try to be. I love the Rovers. I actually joined Twitter so that I could follow Spirit and Opportunity back in the day. And to remind you of the wonders of Mars, here’s a high-def video of all the things we’ve seen through the Rovers on our neighboring planet.

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Why?

Fierce Planet Posted on by

Why do you have to buy an iPhone 6 to get a working digital wallet? Think different daviddayen: Apple’s new payments system seems promising, but why is it limited only to the elite? The postal service can serve everyone, writes David Dayen

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Slowdown day

neil-gaiman:

staff:

Today’s the day. The day you help save the internet from being ruined.

Ready? 

Yes, you are, and we’re ready to help you.

(Long story short: The FCC is about to make a critical decision as to whether or not internet service providers have to treat all traffic equally. If they choose wrong, then the internet where anyone can start a website for any reason at all, the internet that’s been so momentous, funny, weird, and surprising—that internet could cease to exist. Here’s your chance to preserve a beautiful thing.)

PLEASE. 

Please do it. This one is important. You may not think YOU are important (you are, by the way) but if your representatives know that you care about how they vote, and if you call, and the person before you calls, and the person after you calls… then they vote to keep the internet the way it is. 

DOOOO ITTTTTTTT (said in the reassuring voice of the thing under your bed when you were tiny)

(Source: http://neil-gaiman.tumblr.com/)
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Slowdown Day

Fierce Planet Posted on by

mostlysignssomeportents: All across the Internet, websites and services are staging a mass denial of service attack on themselves, to show the world what the world would look like if Big Cable and AT&T solicit bribes to decide which websites you can reach quickly, and which ones are going to go in the Internet slow-lane. Read more…

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Geek Aid

Fierce Planet Posted on by

My friend Mike Knell of uffish.net is starting a new project he calls Geek Aid. He aims to get Geeks (web and IT workers, programmers, etc.) to donate one day’s pay per year to a charity fund, to be used for IT infrastructure, sustainability projects, and other things such as disaster relief for underdeveloped nations. That’s only two minutes worth of pay each day, he points out. It’s a worthy project, so please go read his description, and if you get a chance, pass the link around.

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Firefox

Fierce Planet Posted on by

If you’re not using Firefox 1.0 for your web browser, you really should be. And once you have it, look in the extensions section for Flash Block and Adblock. You’ll thank me forever.

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