A Reasoning Web?

In 1994 I presented a paper at the 2nd International WWW Conference in Chicago titled, “Publishing in the New Mass Medium: Creating Content on the Internet”. In a nutshell, I thought that the web would emerge as another mass medium along side radio, newspapers and television. I thought that this would be driven by what I called at the time “the economics of sponsorship”.

Though a bit broad and hard to find now, (I did come across some German language snippets of it recently), I think it shows that I had some idea as to what was about to happen with the explosion of the web.

I then did a poster session on the time sensitivity of web content at the Fourth Annual Conference, and with the subtlety of a carnival barker I extolled the importance of “Temporal Design”. The way we retrieve our news and information has changed, in how we retrieve it and how its delivery is structured. Think of the date sort on Google news or how online newspapers show their breaking stories off the home page and you get an idea of the effect. When I think about how poorly I described my ideas then, I suppose I could just as well been talking about time travel.

And for a really narrow topic, at the 1998 “W3C Workshop on Web Characterization” in Boston, I submitted a position paper on “Statistical Analysis and Reporting as Applied to Unique Characteristics of Streamed Media “.

Right now, I spend most of my time thinking about identity and public access to data and information about whoever you might choose to build a profile on. It is a subject I am happy to investigate and in which I am interested in pursuing as a topic to write about and explore.

But I am unsure as to what the next big change will be. If you follow evolution of the Internet and then the effect of the HTTP protocols introduction through Tim Berners-Lee’s World Wide Web project, the changes are significant and can be distinguished along a time line. The availability of broadband, the integration of databases, the delivery of rich media and a wide/deep access to search and information can be tracked along with the companies that have risen to prominence through business models leveraging their technological introduction.

Web pages are more likely to behave like user interfaces to applications than print.

So what will be the next significant and noticeable change to occur in how we do business, socialize, entertain ourselves and pursue knowledge and information? Am asking you. What?

Richard Waters in a piece for the Financial Times relates this idea; he is suggesting that computers that can reason are now in view. It is the neural network driven, natural language processing, image recognizing, expert systems enabled service that you can ask “Where should I go on holiday?” that will create the next big disruption.

But as he says later in this analysis “Standing in the way of this grand vision, however, are some very big obstacles. This is not just a matter of technology: at a deeper level, it touches on philosophical questions about the nature of language and meaning.”

After all, In 1950, British mathematician Alan Turing guessed that "thinking computers" would arrive by 2000.

It is a very interesting bit of writing which at least takes a stab at answering my earlier question.

It also states at one point that the movement already has a name: “Web 3.0”. I’ll save my reaction to that for another time.

Hotel Murano Art Featured in CNN Money

My wife spotted this article and photo piece on the Hotel Murano.

CNNMoney did the feature and had some nice comments about the city. It is one more bit of proof that Tacoma has accomplished a positive image throughout the US based on it's investment in arts, museums and tourism.

The article featured the following statement about our association with glass art.

Because Tacoma is at the center of U.S. glassmaking, Sondland, 50, and curator Tessa Papas filled the hotel with glass sculpture. There are 46 artists represented, from Seattle's Dale Chihuly to Greece's Costas Varotsos to Denmark's Vibeke Skov, whose glass Viking ships are seen here.

For those who may not have seen the article here it is.

UPDATE:
Kevin Freitas of www.kevinfreitas.net grabbed some early photos of Costas Varotsos' "Orizon" as it was revealed this morning. He has some great shots here.

Toe Tapping to the Music Also Happens On Stage

And now for something completely different. No, I am not talking about Spamalot, as the Pythonian phrase might suggest, but rather I mean something different in South Sound musical theater. “My One and Only” opened last weekend and continues with the second week of its run tomorrow at the Tacoma Musical Playhouse. It is a Tony winning Gershwin showcase from the 1980’s that originally starred Tommy Tune and Twiggy.

What makes it different is not the acting, comedy, musical numbers or costumes that you might find in any number of musicals around town. In fact, the boy meets girl, boy loses girl and then boy wins girl back story is fluffier than in many shows. And no, it is not the fabulous mustache that I wear.

It starts with the 17 piece live orchestra playing Gershwin. I could just sit backstage or sneak over to just behind the curtain and listen to these folks all day. The show could work as a stand alone concert based solely on George and Ira’s music played by these musicians.

But for uniqueness, based on its availability in the South Sound, the show is an amazing tap dance showcase. Vince Wingerter, as Captain Billy Buck Chandler, wears tap shoes in every scene he is in. That should say something right there. Jenny McMurry plays his love interest, Edythe Herbert, and the two have a wonderful dance number they perform from one scene, to scene change, to next scene that I marvel at from the wings every performance.

But, as it should be, the show stopper is the twelve minute long tap dance extravaganza (yes, I said extravaganza, though admittedly there are no fireworks, mini-tramps or animals) involving almost everyone in the cast, that is the finale of the show. Kudos to every parent who made the cast take lessons and Jon Douglas Rake for giving them a chance to show off what they have learned.

No I don’t tap dance, but everyone else does. They are a great cast and they get their due in a very positive review of the show from the Tacoma Weekly’s Krista Curry.

Thank you to Kat Dollarhide who provided me with a few photos from the show. Kat always does a great job of providing many photos of each show at the TMP.

The Anonymity Experiment - Catherine Price

Photo by Aaron Goodman

I often focus on privacy. The idea behind "Your Digital Double" is that so much information exists about you and is gathered every day that it can be argued the information aggregated will some day define you more than your real world interactions. It has been said that you are who you appear to be (dress for success, manners matter, word power...) but you also are who you appear to be from the data stored and analyzed about you.

In a interesting piece from the February issue of Popular Science, Catherine Price takes on the project of trying keep her every day life off that grid.

My daughter gave me the article to read, which I think is great because that means she is already giving the topic of privacy and identification consideration.

The article begins with a mention of David Holtzman's quest to see how much he could find out about himself form sources available "to any tenacious stalker". In the end, "he was able to discover so much about himself - from detailed financial information to the fact that he was circumcised" that the publisher wouldn't let him put it all in the book for privacy sake.

Throughout the piece, the author mentions the numerous ways we are tracked each day. GPS, RFID, Cookies and cell phones are all mentioned. Just as many of those topics have been mentioned within these posts over the last year.

Here are a small sampling:

Good to Go and Track You Down With (automatic toll booths)
Personal Info on Your Digital Double (Research on your own personal information)
i-SAFE From Harassment and Blackmail (Using Information Against You)
Privacy 101: If You Post It, It Can Be Seen (General Awareness of the Topic)

Check out the article.

Business Daily Paper Joins the Blogging Ranks

The Weekly Volcano has the Spew (and the Fort Lewis Ranger has the Blog-ah), the Tacoma Sun basically IS a blog that is also an online newspaper and The News Tribune uses a digital counter widget that updates every time a new blog is added. (I am kidding about the widget, but they do have a LOT of blogs).

And now, the Business Examiner has a blog as well.

Called the BE Daily Blog, it has been operating in Beta mode for a month now. In fact the first blog entry, “test blog entry”, from Jan 29th is still available in the archives.

But don't let the youthfulness of the blog fool you, the bloggers over at the Examiner have been busy over the last month posting about as many entries as I make in half a year. I stumbled across the blog while on the phone talking to BE Editor Steve Dunkelberger.

“You have a blog!” I exclaimed.

“Yes”, he answered me.

“Can I talk about it?” I asked.

“It’s in Beta, but yeah, go ahead. We are testing the comments feature right now.” he answered.

(Steve, you are a newspaper guy. Can I make up things that are close to what you said and still put quotes around them?)

((Second question. If I blog about your blog and it ends up on The Examiner's Blog Watch, which I noticed you are blogging on, will it create an endless loop of some sort.))

Any way, it is great to have another news based blog on the virtual block. Very cool. I look forward to reading the entries and hope that the BE Daily Blog joins the ranks of FeedTacoma blog feed sources for all things Tacoma.

As for what you can do?

Go take a look and make a comment on items of interest to you. At this time most of the comments there are either in some form of faux Latin or are similar to “this is how a comment would look."

Tacoma Goodwill and Online Sales

Bill Kaufmann visiting the Living and Working in a Virtual World class last week, and the discussion centered around e-commerce. Back in 1999 Bill founded ImprintSTORE.com and built out the business around both corporate logo specialty items (think golf balls, pens, tote bags), and the potential of e-commerce. In 2004 it merged with CorpLogoWare. CorpLogoWare also provides custom imprinted products for corporate events, promotions, gifts and work place apparel.

His experience in online commerce made for good conversation, but the bulk of the discussion centered on the topic of what takes up most of his time these days.

He is E-Commerce Manager for Tacoma Goodwill Industries and www.MyGoodwillStore.com.

Shopgoodwill.com is the first Internet auction site created, owned and operated by a nonprofit organization. It was created and is operated by Goodwill of Orange County (Santa Ana, CA), but Bill is responsible for the build out and success of the Tacoma Goodwill’s efforts.

As the site information provides, “In 2006, there were more than 600,000 unique items posted on the site from 73 Goodwills across the country. And Tacoma Goodwill finished first in total sales, items posted and items sold.”

The Tacoma stores total sales were second to an Oregon based store not long ago. This was partly because of a watercolor painting by Frank Weston Benson which sold at auction for $165,002 dollars. The painting was anonymously donated to the site, with bidding on the shopgoodwill.com website starting at $10, and increasing after the work was authenticated. So don't think small when thinking what might be for sale.

A team is in place that determines what goes on the online auction site and how many times it gets posted if it doesn't sell at first. For each item, there is a cost associated with photographing and describing the item, so it has to have an inherent starting value.

Bill likes to talk about the idea that sales and management of sales still goes on in a very traditional fashion behind the scenes. He refers to this as the Brick and Click of e-commerce.

It is also, according to Michelle Kaufmann (no relation to Bill) a very green thing to do.

I’ll mention one last note of interest, if you are looking to check the shopgoodwill site out. If you buy something online, they will deliver it to a Goodwill store near you, so you can simply pick it up as opposed to paying shipping charges. Not only is this more convenient, but it often means additional sales at the Goodwill store it was delivered to.

And that means additional support of their mission of changing lives by helping people with disabilities or disadvantages go to work.

Origami From Space

I had some fun teaching origami again last week. This time it was to kindergartners which means the ages ranged from 4 at the youngest and 6 at the oldest. It is actually a pretty good age to begin learning origami techniques and folds, as well as talk about geometric shapes.

Given their ages, it isn’t likely that they are going to be able to do anything too complex and by keeping the models relatively simple, you can also quickly run around the room to make certain everyone stays up to the latest fold.

Also helping was the use of the newest kind of overhead projector, which actually takes a video of your images and projects them on the wall. This way, as long as you stay within the red dots that light the flat surface you choose to set the projector on, everyone can watch as you demonstrate the actual folds. By placing the folding instructions next to you, they can also see how the real project relates to the diagramed one.

The kids at Crescent Heights Elementary were incredibly well behaved and remained interested and engaged for two full hours. Whew.

Simple models that are fun and very doable for kids of that age include the candy dish (that you test by putting candy in it) ((they love that)), the paper balloon (also known as the waterbomb) or any simple sound producing toy model. I have one that is a favorite of mine, and if I can find the diagram online will link to it.

Also on the origami front, I was tipped to this interesting news.

Some University of Tokyo researchers have teamed up with members of the Japan Origami Airplane Association and are hoping to develop a paper aircraft capable of surviving the flight to the Earth once launched from the International Space Station.

Pink Tentacle writes about it and there is a BBC video on it from TechLifeBlogged.

If they come up with a design and materials that work for them, they may want to also talk to Bigelow Aerospace. Bigelow has been busy launching privately funded inflatable space stations up into space for a few years now. It may be more cost effective to go through the ISS.

“Bigelow Aerospace is dedicated to developing next-generation crewed space complexes to revolutionize space commerce and open up the final frontier to all of humanity. At Bigelow Aerospace, we're building the future today!”

Happy folding.