Monthly Archives: March 2015

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Orwellian doublethink of ‘open data’


When Closed is Open.

The Internet of Things is not about things, it’s about data.

 

Today, having tapped the arteries of data with their own services and via their open APIs, the data krakens now need the data in the harder to reach places: in peoples’ homes, on their persons, and even inside them. […]

 

via  The Orwellian doublethink of ‘open data’: when closed is open | Aral Balkan.

 

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Sleep-walkers in the midst of their good or evil fortune


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For life is at the start a chaos in which one is lost. The individual suspects this, but he is frightened of finding himself face to face with this terrible reality, and tries to cover it over with a curtain of fantasy, where everything is clear.
 
It does not worry him that his ideas are not true, he uses them as trenches for the defence of his existence, as scarecrows to frighten away reality.

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— Ortega E. Casset

The Revolt of the Masses, 1966

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Making better social media maps


OK

Location-based data from social media can be interesting to analyze and map, but there are a lot of inherent challenges with the data. The main one, which designers often ignore, is that it’s safe to make inferences straight from the tweets alone. That is, there’s an assumption that the data is representative of the real-life population when in fact there are a ton of social implications to consider.

via Making better social media maps | Flowing Data.

 

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Ritualistic vs Modern Machine Age


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The history of mankind divides into two great periods, one existed from time immemorial … and was characterized by the ritualist view of nature. The second began with the modern machine age. In both periods men wanted to control life and death, but in the first they had to rely on non-machine technology … by building a ritual altar and making that the locus of the transfer and renewal of lifepower.

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— Ernest Becker

Escape from Evil, 1975
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Claudette Colvin: 3/2/1955


 

Claudette Colvin
Claudette Colvin: Chicago Defender 3/26/1955

Girl, 15, Guilty In Bus Seat Case

Montgomery, Ala. — A 15-year-old girl who refused to move to the rear of the city bus was found guilty in Juvenile court here last Friday on charges of assault and battery, disorderly conduct and with violating a city ordinance which make its “unlawful for any passenger to refuse or fail to take those seats assigned to the race which it belongs.”

The girl, Claudette Colvin, was declared a ward of the state and placed on probation pending good behavior.