Sky's Blog

I wrote yesterday about the potential for the Internet to become fragmented and subdivided so that it would be many separate internets rather than a vehicle for open international communication. Traditionally this kind of subdivision is called balkanization, though I called it cantonization because of the current example of the great Chinese firewall [China’s Golden Shield]. What you see as the Internet when you log on in many countries around the world is only a portion of what you’ll see from other locations. There are some other important issues related to this fragmentation of the net. (continue reading…)

So the “solution” to providing uncensored Chinese-language search, at least right now (beginning 22 March, 2010), is to have Chinese citizens use google.com.hk (hk==Hong Kong) rather than mainland-based google.cn. I guess it’s a breakthrough idea to do this, since under Hong Kong law, the uncensored search is legal, but of course the arguments going on these days about restrictive access to the Internet have to do with nations trying to restrict the access of their citizens based on physical location. And the location of a server is important because the local authorities can come in and physically shut you down.

But the great firewall is already blocking Google.com.hk content, as would be expected. (continue reading…)

Have you ever noticed that sometimes when you are described as a geek it’s not exactly a compliment? (I always mean it as a compliment, comeon!) That’s because people don’t fully understand the words nerd, dork, dweeb and geek. Here’s the explanation as a cool Venn diagram.

Thanks to Xeni at BoingBoing for pointing it out. And click the diagram to see how the terms relate.

Also see Traveling Geeks. Not Traveling Dweebs, Traveling Nerds or Traveling Dorks.

And here’s an interesting bestiary of geekdom, listing many different types of geeks. I know a few who fall into some, but not all, of the categories.

Here’s a novel way of looking at how we (maybe) fit into the future of publishing—Dorling Kindersley Books did a video about The Future of Publishing, initially for internal consumption, but later on they released it on YouTube. As Cory Doctorow said when blogging it in BoingBoing.net^[1] “Watch it at least halfway through…” and you’ll see a change in  attitude. (continue reading…)