Category: tech
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Pulling back the tattered ethical rags of the sharing economy
Mike Bulajewski has written a lengthy reflection on ethical consumerism singling out the “sharing economy.” His premise: We’re led to believe that as consumers and suppliers for these services, we’re supporting ethical values of kindness, community-building and trust between strangers; living more sustainably by sharing unused property; building community wealth; reducing the power of centralized…
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Long Morozov
The New Left Review has an excellent in depth interview with Evgeny Morozov called Socialize The Data Centres! Too bad that was the headline they went with, because his argument is more subtle than that, and the article contains so much more. For example, we learn about Morozov’s upbringing in Belarus and his early intellectual…
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Computing in North Korea
There has been a wave of information about the computing environment and networking capabilities of North Korea coming out in the past week. Vice reported on the the release of a torrent of RedStar OS, a North Korean fork of Fedora. Combined with heightened interest over the purported Sony hack, there have been a lot…
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“Political platforms: A list of technology platforms and the political ideologies they are associated with.”
[This is an imaginary appendix for my imaginary dissertation I will write someday.]
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Disruptive politics
As Silicon Valley becomes the economic and cultural center of the US (and everywhere else, considering how “software is eating the world”) it is only natural that it will seek to become a political center. Hiring lobbyists — like Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Uber (and Netflix in Canada) have — is just the first step. In…
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Podcast devolution
This is my current roster of podcasts. It has been pared down severely from what it was a few years ago. It is a mix of Canadian news, tech law and philosophy, actual philosophy, movies and pop culture. I highly recommend them all. With all the talk about a podcasting renaissance recently, I thought I…
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Tech and social control — an OKDG After Action
@sundaysociology and @chadkoh deep in discussion. Photo by @scdaustin How does technology influence the social and political lives of humans? That was the central topic of discussion during the second half of last night’s OKDG event. I sat down with UBCO Professor of Sociology Christopher Schneider to talk about technology and social control. My purpose…
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Embracing the Z-axis — OKDG after action report
“Technology changes society” is a truism but it is always worth asking “how?” At last night’s talk to the Okanagan Developer Group I used my trip to MakerHaus last February as a jumping off point to explore this question in light of recent advancements in the Maker Movement. Photos c/o @jvdwdesigns and @gunsinger. Yes, that…
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Negative 3D — A technical review of The Hobbit
I finally saw The Hobbit in 3D HFR. The experience overall was a good one. Watching the regular 24fps previews and then the actual film was like night and day. You could tell right when the Newline Cinema logo floated onto the screen that this would be different. I would recommend reading Kevin Kelly’s explanation…
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Instantbight.com: Interview with Chad Kohalyk…
Check out the smoking desktop he designed! See my interview of instantbight.com Instantbight.com: Interview with Chad Kohalyk…