one small voice

stpeter's blog on jabber, technology, history, philosophy, et alia

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2005-10-28

Some Aphorisms

Short takes on standardization and such.

Recently I came up with a few aphorisms, most related to protocol standardization, so I figured I'd write them down here:

The law of standards (cf. Sowa): "Standardization efforts tend to succeed when they formalize simple, working technologies, but formal efforts at creating standards tend to result in complex, unworkable technologies."
Idea for a tagline: "We put the example in example.com!"
And a general observation: "It's much easier to question authority than it is to question your own assumptions."

Posted on 2005-10-28 at 14:33. File under technology.

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2005-10-26

Whither Liberty?

Toward a libertarian realism.

Tyler Cowen wonders what the future holds for those of a libertarian persuasion. Realism dictates that we recognize a simple fact: a libertarian world is not in the offing. Indeed, neither is a libertarian country or even a libertarian state. As I like to say, utopia is not an option. Unfortunately, there is a strong utopian stream among libertarians. Part of the reason is that most prominent libertarian thinkers have been philosophers, economists, and other cerebral types. For better or for worse, libertarianism -- the vision of a purely voluntary society -- is an ideology. Ideologists want to change the world and will not be satisfied until the world matches their vision (joke: "A libertarian is someone who lies awake at night worrying that somehow, somewhere, there are still a few miles of publicly owned sewer pipe").

While the ideology of libertarianism was a product of the deeply ideological twentieth century, that doesn't mean that the need for freedom is an artifact of ideology. Yet, although all human beings need liberty, the practice of liberty is a cultural phenomenon that has flourished only in certain times and places. Those who value freedom would do well to study its history. In particular, the modern concept and practice of a primarily (if not fully) voluntary society emerged in northwestern Europe, most sustainably in England and the places settled by the English (Canada, America, Australia, New Zealand, etc.). In other words, the Anglosphere.

It's important to have gadflies in any society, and libertarian ideologists can and do fulfill that role. Yet I think they undercut their effectiveness by not recognizing historical realities. A voluntary society is not some unnatural, pie-in-the-sky utopia -- it can be an organic extension of existing cultural traditions of individualism, common law, volunteerism, strong civic ties, high trust, pluralism, entrepreneurship, scientific investigation, technological innovation, private property, and intellectual freedom. The key, I think, is to evolve those traditions rather than attempting to foment some kind of utopian revolution. One aspect of evolving those traditions is strengthening ties between those areas of the world that have built on these predominantly English foundations. Another aspect is clearly understanding that this inheritance is not genetic but mimetic, not a matter of blood relations among people of English descent but a matter of ideas, laws, institutions, principles, and practices. Another aspect is leading by example -- forming schools, starting companies, creating new products, defining new technologies, defending privacy and property -- rather than attempting always to stand outside of society from a position of criticism rather than a practice of engagement. This does not mean "selling out", compromising one's principles, or giving up on the dream of a fully voluntary society. But it does mean doing the intellectual and practical work necessary to make a difference in this world, not sitting around and complaining.

Posted on 2005-10-26 at 21:22. File under politics.

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2005-10-24

CAcerting

New certificate.

For those who care, I just created a new CAcert certificate that includes my personal email address and revoked my old certificate that contains only my jabber.org email address, so if you sign/encrypt mail you may receive a notice about accepting the new cert...

Posted on 2005-10-24 at 17:09. File under technology.

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2005-10-19

Regionalism in the Rockies

Cultural regions in North America, part one.

While waiting for the thrice-annual meeting of the University Park Community Council to begin, I figured I'd do a little blogging...

I've been reading Cultural Regions of the United States, in which Raymond Gastil applies something like David Hackett Fischer's analysis of the founding American cultures to the various regions of the United States. The results are fascinating (see maps), and comport with my experience living and visiting around the country. For instance, his Rocky Mountain region is essentially most of Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana, with a few exceptions: far southern Colorado is part of his Interior Southwest cultural region, far eastern Colorado is part of his Central Midwest cultural region, far southwestern Wyoming is part of his Mormon cultural region, and a small strip of Idaho along the Montana border is part of the Rocky Mountain region (not the Mormon or Pacific Northwest regions). It would be interesting to extend his regional approach to Canada as well; for instance, most of Alberta, parts of western Saskatchewan, and parts of eastern British Columbia might also be considered part of the Rocky Mountain cultural region (as anecdotal evidence from just this week, western Canadian companies actively cooperate with companies in Colorado). It would also be interesting to see how this kind of regionalism aligns with the CommonCensus Map Project.

Note to self: I need to re-read The Nine Nations of North America and read All Over the Map: Rethinking American Regions as well as some of the books and articles referenced here.

Posted on 2005-10-19 at 18:58. File under society.

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2005-10-14

The XMPP Federation

Strengthening the Jabber network.

Michael Robertson of SIPphone (best known through their work on the Gizmo Project) has been pushing hard for IM federation, which has spurred me to follow up on some earlier thoughts and finally soft-launch what I'm somewhat grandiosely calling The XMPP Federation over at the xmpp.net domain (note: the site's not pretty yet, but we'll work on that soon). If you want your server listed, just go ahead and register. Oh, and if you can think of something fun and interesting to do with the Atom feed, feel free (it contains embedded geolocation information, so I have to think that Google Maps integration would not be that hard).

Posted on 2005-10-14 at 14:55. File under jabber.

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2005-10-13

Flunking the Test

Colorado gets an F on Referenda C and D.

The state of Colorado is asking for more money (technically, overriding the "Taxpayer's Bill of Rights" or TABOR, which specifies that state spending shall be limited to inflation plus population). Here's their argument (as presented in the voter blue book):

... the state experienced a recession during 2001 and the amount of money collected in 2002 was $7.8 billion, while inflation plus population growth would have allowed spending of $8.1 billion. The next year's limit grew from the $7.8 billion, not the $8.1 billion. This lowering of spending is known as the "ratchet-down" effect. The amount the state can spend under TABOR is now permanently below what it would be if no recession had occurred and spending had grown by inflation plus population each year.

Well, cry me a river. It turns out that the company I work for experienced a downturn right around the same time, about 40% of the employees were laid off, and the remaining employees took a pay cut to keep the company afloat (a much bigger pay cut than the state budget experienced, I might add). So my salary underwent that same "ratchet down" effect and the amount I'm paid is now permanently below what it would have been if no downturn had occurred. Yet if I presented the state's argument to my employer, they would (no doubt very nicely) tell me "tough luck". So I say tough luck to the state of Colorado. Spin off some marginal "product lines" (I can think of plenty) or tighten your belt a little further. Recessions happen, and you're going to have to deal with it rather than stamping your foot at economic reality. In other words, I'll be voting no on C and D, thank you very much.

Posted on 2005-10-13 at 18:03. File under politics.

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2005-10-12

Points on the Sphere

Anglosphere connections.

Kevin Phillips has likened the nations and regions of the Anglosphere to cousins. Yet, as in real life, those cousins don't necessarily know each other all that well. One possible way to improve connections between those cousins is through exchanges of people, as is familiar from institutions such as American Field Service (for students) and Sister Cities International. Yet, for instance, the "sister" cities of Denver, Colorado are Brest, France; Takayama, Japan; Nairobi, Kenya; Karmiel, Israel; Potenza, Italy; Cuernavaca, Mexico; Chennai, India; Kunming, China; Axum, Ethiopia; and Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Not an Anglosphere location among the bunch! So here's a proposal: let's get at least one Anglosphere town on the "sister city" list for every participating city in America.

Alternatively, towns with the same name could seek out connections among themselves or even hold reunions of a sort. Consider some town names from different regions of England:

There are Bristols in England, New Brunswick, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, and Vermont.
There are Cambridges in England, New Zealand, Jamaica, Idaho, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Maryland, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York, Ohio, and Vermont.
There are Newcastles in England, Australia, New Brunswick, Ontario, Ireland, South Africa, Delaware, Indiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Wyoming.
There are Richmonds in England, Australia, British Columbia, New Zealand, South Africa, Arizona, California, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Minnesota, Ohio, Texas, Utah, and Virginia.

Folks in these towns could hold a BristolFest or whatever every year, rotating among the towns with that name. It sounds like a good excuse to travel, see new places, make new friends, and experience the different flavors of Anglospheric culture.

(Cross-posted at Albion's Seedling.)

Posted on 2005-10-12 at 20:31. File under society.

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So What?

MSN, Yahoo, and interoperability.

Well, it seems that end users of MSN Messenger and Yahoo Messenger will soon be able IM with each other. Gosh, that's so '90s! Jeff Pulver explains:

As far as I can tell, the only possible reason Yahoo! and MSN got together to share their networks was to create a reason for the people who were once actively using their IM services, to come back. In the six years since AOL, Yahoo! and MSN were not allowing IM traffic from each other on their respective networks, the entire IM landscape has changed. These days it is the success of Skype attracting millions of active IMers away from the "traditional" IM networks of: AOL/MSN/Yahoo!/ICQ, coupled with Jabber's continued success in the Enterprise IM space and Google's recent entry into the consumer IM market space that collectively eroded the market share of active IM users away from the "traditional" IM players that finally gave a reason for some of the "traditional" IM competitors to find a way to work together.

Pulver ends thusly:

I look ahead to the time when we can all give out our IM-VoIP SIP and email URI, using a format similar to: firstname.lastname@example.com, which in the process eliminates the need to give someone a telephone number. The services (or should I say applications?) will use the SIMPLE/SIP standards to interwork, just as phone companies do today.

Not so fast, there, Jeff. Both the rapid growth of Jabber-based deployments in the enterprise IM space (especially the early adopters at the investment banks and U.S. government) and the release of Google Talk indicate the strength of XMPP as a key technology real-time communications, especially textual and data-heavy communications. (In fact, I received Jeff's blog entry from a PubSub.com keyword match delivered via the Mimir service, both of which use XMPP to push out RSS and Atom feeds in real time.) The SIMPLE extensions to SIP may be of interest to those who have the luxury of waiting, but those who need to build competitive advantage today rather than 5 years from now use Jabber/XMPP technologies to get the job done. (And I continue to doubt that there will be one ring to bind them all. People will have a mix of email addresses, xmpp addresses, skype addresses, sip addresses, and much else besides for a long time to come.)

That said, we see an emerging standards-based network of XMPP and SIP services. Google Talk does XMPP for IM and voice negotiation, and promises to add SIP support in the future. SIPphone does SIP for voice and now also XMPP for IM. Other large service providers (BellSouth, Orange, etc.) and enterprises (FedEx, EDS, etc.) have already deployed XMPP for IM and may deploy SIP-compatible XMPP extensions (or SIP itself) for call setup. One of the big questions is: what will Skype do? MSN, Yahoo, and AIM are legacy systems at this point. GoogleTalk, SIPphone, Skype, big ISPs and telephony providers, and major enterprises are where the action is. As I've argued before, it's in Yahoo's interest to go open and join the emerging standards-based network. Instead, they've chosen to get in bed with Microsoft. But don't think that this is the end of the story. Heck, for all I know they're going to use XMPP for their server-to-server connectivity... ;-)

Posted on 2005-10-12 at 14:29. File under jabber.

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2005-10-11

Cabot Day?

Celebrating the discovery of America.

Yesterday was Columbus Day, a source of much controversy (especially, it seems, in Denver). Jim Bennett explains why it would be better for North Americans to celebrate the voyages of the Italian John Cabot than those of his fellow countryman Christopher Columbus. From now on I'll be celebrating June 24 (the day Cabot landed somewhere in northeastern North America) rather than the second Monday in October.

Posted on 2005-10-11 at 12:11. File under society.

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Streaming XML With Jabber/XMPP

My IEEE article hits the newstands.

It seems that my previously mentioned article on "Streaming XML With Jabber/XMPP" is now available in Volume 9, Number 5 of IEEE Internet Computing. Unfortunately it's not online, so you'll need to buy a copy or visit your favorite library in order to read it.

Posted on 2005-10-11 at 10:13. File under jabber.

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2005-10-10

Snow Music

Duke Ellington, Johnny Hodges, and the white stuff.

On Saturday afternoon it was about 85 degrees in Denver. Then the temperature plummetted about 50 degrees in 36 hours or so. Since midnight last night it's been snowing (though without much accummulation, as you can imagine). I just started up one of my favorite recordings for snowy weather: Side by Side from Duke Ellington and Johnny Hodges. It's funny how certain kinds of music go with certain kinds of weather. Plus this is a great recording. I especially love the Duke's piano solo on "Stompy Jones" and the powerful, heavily chromatic chords he ends with. Bam!

Posted on 2005-10-10 at 14:47. File under music.

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Iconic

Keys, locks, and other security icons in Thunderbird 1.5 beta.

The other day I upgraded to Thunderbird 1.5 Beta 2 and I noticed that the nice message security icons (key if message signed, lock and key if message signed and encrypted) were missing. A post to the MozillaZine forums yielded the information that this is bug #308451 and that it will be fixed in 1.5 final.

Open source rocks, and the Mozilla projects rock especially hard. (Now if only someone would write a kick-ass Jabber client on the Mozilla platform....)

Posted on 2005-10-10 at 14:39. File under technology.

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2005-10-07

Exits and Trappings

Modernity, the West, and the Anglosphere.

Herewith a few additional observations on the Exit and the West. The exit to a modern industrial society occurred first in the West for a whole host of reasons that historians are still exploring. As I've discussed before, I think one of the keys was identified by Carroll Quigley in his description of the distinctively Western outlook (Weapons Systems and Political Stability, p. 1129):

The method of the West, even in religion, has been this: The truth unfolds in time by a cooperative process of discussion that creates a temporary consensus which we hope will form successive approximations growing closer and closer to the final truth, to be reached only in some final state of eternity.

Furthermore, the Exit occurred first in a specific region of Western civlization: England. Why? Here again the historians have been busy, led by Alan Macfarlane. It seems that England was in important ways more open, flexible, polycentric, pluralistic, trustful, individualistic, market-oriented (etc.) than the rest of the West around the time of the Exit (and indeed for centuries before). Observing these facts leads to the recognition of Anglosphere exceptionalism within the context of Western civilization.

As Western civilization has become ever more successful in solving the problems of existence, other cultures have attempted to emulate that success. The pattern is well described by Quigley (ibid., p. 166):

When a society finds a fruitful organization and outlook, other societies may copy its organization (although not its outlook), either in emulation or in self-defence against such a superior organization of human efforts represented by that superior system. When this occurs, numerous distinct societies over a wide area and over an extended period of time may seem to be moving, almost simultaneously, in meaningful and purposeful directions.

Naturally, few people in those cultures want to say that they are turning their backs on ages-old cultural traditions, so they claim to be advocates of (acceptable) "modernization" rather than (unacceptable) "Westernization". In Quigley's terms, they attempt to copy successful organizational features -- representative democracy, stock markets, research universities, and the like -- without copying the distinctive outlook of Western and Anglosophere societies. Yet a civilization is more than an outlook or a philosophy, it is a whole matrix of practices, attitudes, structures, and (in the broadest sense) technologies. As I've written before about modernization:

More than abstract philosophy or ideology, the West became such a powerful force in human history because of things like economic freedom, legal competition, choice in marriage, efficiency in timekeeping, eminently practical and often downright fun technologies (eyeglasses, guns, printing presses, washing machines, phonographs, telephones, computers, and who knows what next), forms of entertainment such as sports and theatre and movies and popular music, fast means of travel (including the invention of tourism), freedom first for slaves and then for women, and in general a culture that makes personal fulfillment not just a distant possibility but a lived reality for the vast majority of the people in Western countries (and a growing number elsewhere, whether you call it "modernization" or "Westernization").

The process of modernization is helped along by the many diasporas to Western nations, and especially to the Anglosphere, which for historical and cultural reasons is more open to immigration and assimilation than other parts of the West. Those who come from outside the Anglosphere to study or work for a while (or permanently to live) act as bridges to their home cultures, seeding them with aspects of the tacit knowledge built up over centuries within the Anglosphere -- knowledge about markets, society, volunteerism, trust, law, governance, consensus, cooperation, innovation, entrepreneurship, individualism, responsibility, and freedom. These all sound like big ideas, but they are just as much practices, behaviors, customs, and implicit attitudes that must be lived to be absorbed. Simply reading about them in a philosophy book or copying their outward forms is not enough, and results in a society that has the trappings of modernity but not its substance. Yet it is not the trappings that caused the Exit, but the underlying habits and practices and attitudes -- precisely what is hardest to impart. The implications for how the Anglosphere understands itself and interacts with other cultures are far-reaching.

(Cross-posted at Albion's Seedling.)

Posted on 2005-10-07 at 09:39. File under society.

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identity...