Watching this youtube video with my new boss this morning, I had a lovely realization about language and censorship.

In the same way that Victorians covered "chair legs" because "legs" were considered unchaste, we now hear the censor beep as "fuck". It's not the word that's bad, it's the meaning sometimes placed in it, which has now translated to a computerized tone. What about warning beeps on equipment you have? Notification beeps? How will we indicate this in the future? I'm reminded of Zoe Keating talking on Radio Lab about trying to figure out ways of making musical notation for tumping on the back of her cello.

So on that note, a TED talk from Steven Pinker about how language indicates how our brains work.

How does one encourage an agenda of action in others?

On that question, I'm pleased to announce the Meet-and-Greet for Jigsaw Renaissance, the maker space I've been helping to create over the past several months, occurs on September 5th from 12-2 at the Tower Room of 1415 2nd Ave. I do hope you'll all come out.

(Please do answer the question whether or not you can attend. Just two things in the same post)

I'm presenting an Ignite tonight at the King Cat Theater. Show starts at 7:30, I go on in the second track (starts at 9:30). Will be talking about Jigsaw Renaissance, the maker space I've had the honor to participate in set-up for. Please do come out.

I only started reading scifi about 7 years ago - not that long, if you think about how long the majority of my social groups have been reading it. I used to be a fantasy kid. Yup. And while I've been into the social aspects of the Internet since I was in middle school, the actual workings of computers and how we use them never occurred to me as something worth studying. I learned BASIC in elementary school, along with the typing space-shooter game (some of you will know what I'm talking about), was smothering my modem in high school to log into mIRC past my curfew, and understood the workings of Microsoft Office to the point of being the dorm compound expert (half a page short with an established font size? Character spacing! Need to build a schedule in Excel? Page-long IF-THEN statements!). But it never struck me that it was worth being passionate about, it was simply a very established aspect of my life. It was when I left the bubble of my astounding nuclear family that I realized the rest of the world didn't look at the Future as something to always be working towards, to always be excited about.

That's part of why I realized my Future was so neat. I want everything to be accessible. I want everyone to participate. And that sort of joy is infectious. I started running with the geek circles. (In small-town Indiana, there are no weird-subgroups, only one group of Weird, because there aren't enough of you to factionize.) I started talking to people about their Futures. And I started to be told that a lot of the ideas I had were also represented in scifi literature. What part of my idea process has to do with these scifi stories being so a part of the folklore of my social groups that of course I think of them too? What part of these ideas is just essential to the current course of humanity? Can ideas be archetypal as well, or only personality? I want to know where I could go if I read all these stories, if my starting point is an already thought-out idea rather than the fragments bouncing around the social psyche?
I wonder which of the ideas I come up with have to do with scifi stories being such a part of the folklore of the groups I run in, and which occur to me because it's a part of my structure. I wonder what I could come up with if I used those stories as springboards, took the ideas offered and ran with them instead of having to come up with them on my own.

Really, I just need about 12 more hours in each day, so I could actually get something close to the amount done that I'd like. Including reading. Maybe I just need to finally break down and get an audible account. But then I can't take notes. I need more technology! Minute marks in a story do not translate yet to page numbers. Someday. I'll wait, albeit impatiently.

I want to hear from you. What did you think of the Relevance Challenge?

Did it change the way you posted? How you viewed other people's posts?

I'll admit: I was not perfect. I never am. But while the challenge stopped me from making some inane comments, it also impeded me from interacting with others in the way I usually do. I think I'll likely keep the idea for blog posts, but not for instant areas like Twitter and FaceBook status. While I think some filtering definitely needs to take place, a lot of people I've talked to about the idea hint that it might be better to lead by example instead of ranting at people. So I guess this is where I refer back to my Twitter chart.

It is now possible to post without an LJ account. Apologies.

I want my Future back.

I want the Web 2.0 I was promised, a user-backed web in which we are the machine. I etched that message into my skin¹, I believe in it so much. We get to work together to decide where we go.

And we fucked it up.

We can't shut up about our cats and what we ate today^1.5 and what we saw on YouTube. We quote what we read instead of what we think.

I'm not saying there isn't a place for cats and food and YouTube. What I'm saying is that should be the break from the rule. I miss brilliant points from people because I don't have the time to filter out their signal from all their noise. And often people are just passing along an idea instead of building on it. Sure, over the course of time we gain some new facets to an idea, but if you think about the vast number of people which had contact with that, it could have grown so much more. Some ideas are put incredibly well and we should stick with that², but so much more could be done if people *interacted* with an idea, and were not afraid to voice that opinion, instead of just passing around the shiny object. Say something relevant, for fuck's sake.

So what's relevant? When I said "Based on discussion last night, a Twitter experiment: if it doesn't provide relevant information to others, don't say it." on Twitter April 14th, I got a number of responses. Most were concurrence, but nearly as many were "define relevance." Here's an example from the discussion³ which spawned the original Twitter post:

Say I'm throwing a dinner party. A number of scattered individuals know to head over to my house when I indicate I'm starting to cook. Due to timing, I don't type out an individual message to each, nor am able to sort through a contact book for a group text, to let them know to start their trek. I then might Twitter "I'm in my kitchen."
Or if I've been working on renovating a new home, the progress of which has been followed by a number of my internet contacts, none of which I have personal information for. When I'm done with the finishing touches on the kitchen sink, I might Twitter "I'm in my kitchen."
Both provide relevant information in these contexts.
But if I'm standing in my kitchen in my socks and am bored and so Twitter "I'm in my kitchen." I am just adding to an already high-traffic area of information, and should probably have my technology taken away from me until I know what is relevant and what is not.⁴

We are responsible for what we say. We should not have to dumb things down in order to have it be accessible when stumbled upon in the mess of "Can you hear me now? Good." If you're having a conversation with someone, why aren't you having it *with them*? Why are you doing it across Facebook walls, across Twitter, across publicly viewable forums? Are you scared that if you actually give someone a direct message they won't be so nice? That they might say no to hanging out, but if you ask when everyone can look, they aren't going to shame you in a public space? Or do you want to prove that you talk to neat people, that you have neat ideas too?⁵

Grow some balls⁶. Talk to people like they're people, not like it's just an exchange of petty ideas over the ethers or that having certain friends is a credential.

If you choose to say things to the public sphere which matter⁷, the responses people have to you will be more thought-out. And the people who follow it will be challenged to learn⁸, to spawn new ideas with which to join the discussion.

In short, have private conversations in private. Think before you speak and type. Take responsibility to add value to the existing conversations, and to start new ones. We are the machine. We work together. Don't spin in place without giving some assistance to the guy next to you. Because the two of you working together means all the other people around you can work that much better. Lubricate, damn it, lubricate! We can steer in any direction, we can have anarchists and communists and feminists and Christians and all sorts of people having dialogue so long as they remember there is a whole, and to give *something* back.

Thank you. Feedback is welcome and encouraged. Play devil's advocate or downright disagree with me. I want to hear it. Chew your brain food and then tell me what you make of it.



1. video, tattoo
1.5. I love blogs that tell me how to cook food. But I don't care if you had German for lunch unless we're hanging out later.
2. I won an improv round of Forensics once by saying in response to a quote, "it's a quote because of how well it's put. I can't say it any better."
3. Focus group on Information Diets, Self Control, and Attention. It will be up by week's end on st.imul.us
4. Twitter Shitter!
5. Of *course* there are exceptions to this. If you have something terribly clever to say to a posed question, go for it. But don't do the "@name doing better?" "@OP nah" WTF, guys.
6. I recognize the valuation of courage as a male trait with this comment, but I choose the vulgarity and accessibility of this idea over something more pompous. Also, I'm tired. And here's a Google Image Search because it's funny.
7. Bullshit and Snark amongst friends is not only allowable, but is also essential.
8. Which is not to say you should have elitist conversations in which you block out potential participants. Accessibility with challenge is key.

Side note: yes, I know there are people who are just connected to their friends and don't interact with the rest of the world. It's closed communication for them, not broadcast. And while I understand that, I also feel that is what mailing lists are for. Then again, that's the beauty of Twitter: it's opt-in. There is no spam, because you just have to quit following the person who is spamming.

Been reading a lot lately about incorporating technology into our persons. And no longer just in niche blogs or hard-to-reach places of the internet, although it's still definitely there as well. But also on NPR, and the New York Times. It's becoming more difficult to ignore. People are starting to pay attention to this Change.

Some things that have caught my eye, which have been closer to the mainstream:
Eye-Borg
Man lost eye. Man wants to replace eye with wireless camera. The technology exists, it's just a point of hacking it to suit him. From an article in my po-dunk hometown newspaper, "The closer I get to putting this camera eye in, the more freaked out people are about me," adding people aren't sure they want to hang around someone who might be filming them at any time. Which brings me to this discussion on WhiteChapel about surveillance, and the difference between monitoring each other and "The Man" (aka Little Brother) and being monitored (aka Big Brother).

We've also got this amazing TED talk by Aimee Mullins, about how her prosthetic legs give her superpowers. Something that used to be a disability by default is now a potential for advancing, for becoming more. She has legs that don't even look like legs, per se.

Which reminds me that another H discussion group is happening on the 27th on Cheating: why we think advancement is unfair, why we constrain ourselves and others socially from doing it, etc. The audio and links from past discussions are, as always, at st.imul.us, and you can now subscribe to the podcast on iTunes.

On related notes: Genderfork has even talked a bit about customizing your Self:
"We are approaching a time when we can customize ourselves to suit who we want to be, who we need to be, and who we know we really are. When the software can be rewritten, the hardware can be upgraded, and we can live any and all of our dreams. And that is a wonderful thing."

All of which I'd like to tie together with a quote from this article: "...there are implicit pitfalls in this rapidly growing virtual arena, particularly for those for whom social skills have not caught up with, say, their computational skills"


Discuss. I'll respond with more thought in the comments, but back to work with me for now.

So the reason I was squeeing was this: we have to *think* less and less about *how* we're conveying a message, and so can concentrate more on the message itself. I view all technology as a change in the way we communicate (communication being the giving and receiving of information, not talking about our feelings, though it can be that too). And this thing with gtalk/chat and SMS means that 1) the Net aspect of the interNet is gaining more strings, and those are more fluid or more transparent, depending on the terms you want to use. 2) this means that our identities are not so easy to compartmentalize because there's so much cross-referencing and cross-posting that it becomes more and more difficult to keep things apart. 3) our web is more stable because it's more based on Real People, it has more connection points, etc

I have attached the diagram I drew in a fit of glee. Please let me know if it doesn't make sense.



I love the cross-medium stuff as well. As someone who can't understand things said on a phone well (connected to my dyslexia is audio processing disorder), but who would much rather speak my lengthy pontifications than type or write them, cross-medium stuff is essential. Eventually I hope to receive my information in short form, click to longer form, and respond verbally. Shouldn't be that difficult, right? But right now I have to employ a slew of services (nearly all are pay-per use right now) to even get remotely close to this. I can have my voicemail transcribed and sent to my e-mail (otherwise I'd never get to it), but text to audio is mostly limited to the Deaf Community and their loved ones.

So basically what I'm going for here is another step towards a different sort of virtual reality. One where we don't have a net any longer, but a sort of blanket (but probably more haphazard in weaving styles). It doesn't matter where or how you access data in order to send or receive, but however you want to communicate, it will be available. Instantly. And that's just fucking cool. Smothered in an invisible blanket of communication.

Oh! Another neat thing about the whole gtalk/SMS thing is that it switches back and forth between the two without any difficulty (just a change in the icon) - so if you send something to the GSMS (just for naming sake), if they're online, it comes up in GChat; if they're offline it sends to their phone, etc. It's amazing. It's increasing the redundancy within the program so we don't have to sort through it ourselves. Remember when I said a point of my Future would be when my computer knows I'm close enough to see Twhil and quit sending Twits to my phone? Yeah. This is that. So is using BlueProximity.

Zomg, gchat now does SMS as well.

FUTURE.

Will pontificate here soon. Life's been... rough.

What is Transhumanism?

It’s a lot of different things. People like to talk about the Singularity, about Uploading, about flying cars and cyborgs and directly jacking into the Internet.

It’s to be more than human. To go beyond.

But what is it to be human?

We’ve been asking ourselves that question for a very long time. And I don’t know that there’s one answer, besides 42. Or even many answers, each one different for every person at every point in their life.

So why run a Transhumanist discussion group, if I don’t think there’s a solid definition to what Transhumanism even is?

The world is changing. We’ve always flown by the seat of our pants, chosen the best option available based on the information we have. And it’s worked. But every decision we make determines what we’ll be able to do in the future. And now, when we have so much information available to us, how we consume it and how we use it determine the systems we build. We're creating our Future. It's important for people to realize the impact they have and to make informed decisions about what they do instead of just using the newest, shiniest thing.

To me, a Transhumanist is someone who consciously builds the Future.