Re: nettime Iraq: The Way Forward
In my original piece on Iraq, I tried to make the point that the main reason for US militarism is itself, it's ecnomic benefits(?) at home, and its effect in solidfying the country behind leaders and policies that otherwise would be more suspect. Justifications or rationalizations in terms of defending something or other have to be produced from time to time, but it is folly to take those at face value. Best, Michael On Jan 12, 2007, at 10:53 AM, A. G-C wrote: Sorry of my bad English ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Iraq: The Way Forward
Felix may well be right that cars lead to a reduction of communal life, and Venice (Italy) seems to an outsider to be a wonderful place. But: a) I hope we don't wait until the US is rebuilt car-free to pull out of Iraq; b) Venice is in fact becoming de-populated, with its natives moving to the car-unfree mainland; c) it is a complete mistake to think that Americans' access to oil depends on having troops in Iraq or anywhere in the middle east for that matter. On this last point, when Iran threw out the Shah and held the American embassy staff hostage, it continued to sell oil on the world market, like any other OPEC country. American petroleum companies and oil-field service companies such as Halliburton may have lost profits, but that hardly affected the supply of oil in the US. As it is, the invasion of Iraq has certainly not increased US oil supplies or lowered prices, but in fact done the opposite. The war is conceivably a war for oil-company profits (which have gone way up since it started) but not a war for oil itself. Best, Michael On Jan 10, 2007, at 6:18 PM, Benjamin Geer wrote: A comparison of car-centric Los Angeles with car-free Venice runs throughout the book. The author's web site provides a brief summary of the book: http://www.carfree.com/ I don't know whether the time is ripe for this idea in the US, but maybe September 11 and the Iraq war could be used to concentrate Americans' minds on an idea that would enable them to rebuild their communities while reducing their dependence on oil (and thus reducing their military presence in the Middle East). # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
nettime Iraq: The Way Forward
I have recently completed the following paper that I thought might be of interest to nettimers. Best, Michael --- Michael H. Goldhaber blog http://www.goldhaber.org Iraq: The Way Forward We have reached a crucial turning point in American history. The November elections and current polls have made clear that Americans have soured on the Iraq war, and want the troops to be withdrawn rapidly. One question now is how best to try to influence the new Congress to act successfully to help end, if not the complex of war, revenge and banditry now swirling through Iraq, then at least direct American participation. But that question cannot be tackled in isolation. Because the war and the war on terror in general have brought Americas reputation for competence, justice and humanity to a new low, through the debate on the war we have reached a rare teachable moment. The assumptions that that have surrounded Americas military posture ever since World War Two can now be brought into public question as never before. This opportunity is not to be missed. If it is the chances are that the failures in Iraq will be accounted for as mere errors in planning or execution. Pressure for further unwise and unwarranted military adventures will continue unabated. On the whole, Americans, and even most of their Congresspeople not to mention the President remain remarkably uninformed about the rest of the world. As a nation, our attention is focused inward, to an extent that most of the rest of the advanced world probably cannot match, if only because so much of their attention is focused on us. Even today, after nearly four years of war and occupation in Iraq, how many Americans can differentiate it from Iran? Most Congresspeople won that position after serving in state or local office hardly a route that rewards any special understanding of the rest of the world. Once they get to Washington, they find themselves overwhelmed by lobbyists and others who want to influence them in a particular parochial direction, not impart general global knowledge or wisdom. (Recently, the Congressional Quarterly journalist Jeff Stein interviewed Silvestre Reyes, the House Intelligence Committee chairman designate. Among other things, Reyes did not know which of al Qaeda and Hezbollah was Sunni, which Shiite. When pressed, he guessed wrong. This may not be the most important quiz question in the world, but it is rather germane to deciding how to handle some of the critical issues we face in Iraq and the Middle East in general. ) Still, while Congresspeople are more expert in domestic issues, that does not mean they are neutral when it comes to Defense Department appropriations and support of the military. Ever since World War IIs expenditures helped lift the country out of the Great Depression, and incidentally made the US by far the worlds dominant military and industrial power, keeping that supremacy has been tied to keeping domestic jobs and maintaining the economy. The very idea of national defense has lent some sense of unity to an otherwise possibly fractious country. A huge military has been taken to be a vital necessity as well as a source of pride, but what it is for is much less asked. There has to be some sort of default answer, of course; if we were apparently without enemies the giant force would eventually come to seem a senseless and unimportant use of substantial funds. In essence, every so often the Pentagons backers are faced with a situation of use it, or lose it. However, Americans general lack of curiosity about the world makes it easy to conjure up opponents, with only an occasional small war or military action needed to prove the point, couple with a much rarer fuller display of the militarys vaunted power. For most of the time since 1945, the Cold War against international Communism centered in Moscow neatly supplied the main bogeyman. But it has been fifteen years since the fall of the USSR. The supposed clash of civilizations with Islam came as a godsend to those many who have reasons to favor continued huge military investments. That led directly to the Iraq invasion. There was simply nowhere else that Americas huge military could with remote plausibility get any kind of a real workout. The visibility of Iraq debacle thus provides a huge and rare opportunity to challenge the countrys basic assumptions about the military. Already among the neo-cons, it is being bruited about that the war was fought with the wrong doctrine. Had we just used the right instruction book, we would have gotten the whole vast toy to work properly. In truth, the very idea that we should or can fight global jihad, or what the neo-cons are now beginning to style a global insurgency, needs to be debunked. The USs real power in the world has been economic
Re: nettime The hoopla over the US election and democracy
Ronda, You wrote; The primaries, similarly, only allow for voters to choose among candidates chosen by for them by the parties. I think that is an oversimplification. Generally, one has to meet some, admittedly often too onerous, requirement to run in a primary, but the parties as structures cannot limit who runs. I participated in a campaign this year to buck the Democratic Party's favorite in a Congressional district near here. We won by a sizable margin against the Party bigwigs' favored candidate. Our candidate has a good chance to defeat the incumbent Republican today. I am going off to help get out the vote shortly. Best, Michael # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Recent Gender Things on Nettyme digest [3x]
Dear nettimers, I think the following column , which appeared yesterday in nowhere more radical than the New York Times, illustrates why Kali Tal's response to Alan Sondheim deserved to be taken seriously, rather than responded to with the scorn it seems to have met, from Alan and some others. The column underlines that we do not live in a society where feminism has come close to triumphing. Best, Michael Why Aren't We Shocked? By Bob Herbert Published: October 16, 2006 (NYT) Who needs a brain when you have these?-- message on an Abercrombie Fitch T-shirt for young women In the recent shootings at an Amish schoolhouse in rural Pennsylvania and a large public high school in Colorado, the killers went out of their way to separate the girls from the boys, and then deliberately attacked only the girls. Ten girls were shot and five killed at the Amish school. One girl was killed and a number of others were molested in the Colorado attack. In the widespread coverage that followed these crimes, very little was made of the fact that only girls were targeted. Imagine if a gunman had gone into a school, separated the kids up on the basis of race or religion, and then shot only the black kids. Or only the white kids. Or only the Jews. There would have been thunderous outrage. The country would have first recoiled in horror, and then mobilized in an effort to eradicate that kind of murderous bigotry. There would have been calls for action and reflection. And the attack would have been seen for what it really was: a hate crime. None of that occurred because these were just girls, and we have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that violence against females is more or less to be expected. Stories about the rape, murder and mutilation of women and girls are staples of the news, as familiar to us as weather forecasts. The startling aspect of the Pennsylvania attack was that this terrible thing happened at a school in Amish country, not that it happened to girls. The disrespectful, degrading, contemptuous treatment of women is so pervasive and so mainstream that it has just about lost its ability to shock. Guys at sporting events and other public venues have shown no qualms about raising an insistent chant to nearby women to show their breasts. An ad for a major long-distance telephone carrier shows three apparently naked women holding a billing statement from a competitor. The text asks, When was the last time you got screwed? An ad for Clinique moisturizing lotion shows a woman's face with the lotion spattered across it to simulate the climactic shot of a porn video. We have a problem. Staggering amounts of violence are unleashed on women every day, and there is no escaping the fact that in the most sensational stories, large segments of the population are titillated by that violence. We've been watching the sexualized image of the murdered 6-year-old JonBenet Ramsey for 10 years. JonBenet is dead. Her mother is dead. And we're still watching the video of this poor child prancing in lipstick and high heels. What have we learned since then? That there's big money to be made from thongs, spandex tops and sexy makeovers for little girls. In a misogynistic culture, it's never too early to drill into the minds of girls that what really matters is their appearance and their ability to please men sexually. A girl or woman is sexually assaulted every couple of minutes or so in the U.S. The number of seriously battered wives and girlfriends is far beyond the ability of any agency to count. We're all implicated in this carnage because the relentless violence against women and girls is linked at its core to the wider society's casual willingness to dehumanize women and girls, to see them first and foremost as sexual vessels -- objects -- and never, ever as the equals of men. Once you dehumanize somebody, everything is possible, said Taina Bien-Aimé, executive director of the women's advocacy group Equality Now. That was never clearer than in some of the extreme forms of pornography that have spread like nuclear waste across mainstream America. Forget the embarrassed, inhibited raincoat crowd of the old days. Now Mr. Solid Citizen can come home, log on to this $7 billion mega-industry and get his kicks watching real women being beaten and sexually assaulted on Web sites with names like Ravished Bride and Rough Sex -- Where Whores Get Owned. Then, of course, there's gangsta rap, and the video games where the players themselves get to maul and molest women, the rise of pimp culture (the Academy Award-winning song this year was It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp), and on and on. You're deluded if you think this is all about fun and games. It's all part of a devastating continuum of misogyny that at its farthest extreme touches down in places like the one-room Amish
Re: nettime Beyond Oil, Lybia and the MIT
24 years ago, I testified before a US Congressional subcommittee consisting of Al Gore in favor of the US providing computers to the the third world. This was even before he invented the internet, though that was obviously coming. I still think it was a good idea. Why should only rich countries have such access? My firm belief is that, while many of these computers might be wasted, a significant subset will help third world people both define and solve problems in their own way, through contact with each other. but what is the story of Bauhaus chairs you allude to, Heiko? Best, Michael On Oct 11, 2006, at 2:19 AM, Heiko Recktenwald wrote: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/africa/11laptop.html? hpex=1160625600en=bc6ae2d6dab0ee0cei=5094partner=homepage As a little reading help, how fast will it go the way of Bauhaus chairs? H. Voila: October 11, 2006 U.S. Group Reaches Deal to Provide Laptops to All Libyan Schoolchildren By JOHN MARKOFF ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Disordered thinking through the origin of language (I'm in quotation)
Alan's account seems plausible, but still leaves question of where spoken language came from. My earlier thought has been that singing was the essential step. Different songs for different activities would then lead, implicitly and directly to verbs. My back is turned but I hear the eating song or the chipping song, or the running song and I know what that other is doing. Nouns arise as verbs that go with persons or things. Then why songs? they help keep group together, provide solidarity, help group members find each other and cooperate. Best, Michael On Sep 4, 2006, at 3:43 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote: (apologies for two posts in a row, but this has 'gone' somewhere of interest - Alan) Disordered thinking through the origin of language (I'm in quotation) - ... I know this sounds ridiculous - but I'm on to something. If ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Gates' Buffet, or Fail-Safe Philanthropy
On the contrary, it impresses a great many people. Presumably, that's the point of collecting so much money in the first place, if like Buffett you don't intend to leave it to your offspring. It would of course have been possible to run these businesses as non-profits, never collecting the billions to begin with. Best, Michael On Jul 3, 2006, at 9:25 AM, Nicholas Ruiz wrote: To transfer the money to his surrogate son impresses no one. # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime publication of Jyllands-Posten cartoons is not...
You are mistaken. It remains perfectly legal, courtesy of the US Supreme Court, to burn an American flag (if you own it) as a form of expression. It may not be advisable, because we have thugs here too, but most likely you would just be denounced. People get arrested for all sorts of legal things, but then, usually, they get let off without being convicted. You don't say what happened to your relatives. It is however illegal to sing in front of a foreign embassy in Washington DC. During the anti-apartheid protests, I was one of many arrested for that in front of the South African embassy. The DC government had already announced we were not going to be prosecuted, however. I was planning to plead innocent, on the much attested grounds that I can't sing. Best, Michael --- Michael H. Goldhaber [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Feb 16, 2006, at 10:01 AM, Jody Berland wrote: You can't burn an American flag, for instance, although you can make bikinis out of it. I have had relatives arrested for burning their own draft card. # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime New - Reviews of books I like:
Alan, your current list of books, as impressive as always contains a slight error. Edelman's theory of reentry had nothing to do with his Nobel Prize, of 1972, which was for the chemical composition of antibodies. His theories of consciousness came later. Best, Michael On Nov 18, 2005, at 10:02 PM, Alan Sondheim wrote: Gerald Edelman (whose theory of reentry among other things earned him the Nobel) mentioned both - James as a precursor and antidote to traditional AI or other hard-wiring approaches to the mind, and Darwin in relation to 'neural Darwinism,' competitions among groups of cells in development. # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Katrina: The Spectre of a Soviet-Style Crisis in the U.S.
Ricardo, If you want statistics, start with the state of education in this country compared with other industrialized countries or even China. Look at the growing general state of ignorance re news, the decreasing number of voters, growing income inequality, etc. You seem to think advances in logistics and supply-chain management operate independently of other societal factors, but the point is that they don't. Knowledge that used to remain in a community is now partly lost, and partly higher up the management chain. while there is real upward mobility for a small sub-set of people, our society is much less upwardly mobile as a whole than it used to be. Small business people replaced by Wal-Mart were not at the bottom or an organization, more likely they were at the top. They remained in the community; they often gained knowledge of the community, and though they never had much chance of becoming rich, they helped keep many a community together, serving a wide variety of integrative functions not served by Wal-Mart. Their few workers were often also there for life, and similarly were essential to the communities they served. If all you ever want is a standardized product that others want too, it will be at Wal-mart as long as they want to carry it, but if they don't, you won't find it anywhere in many communities. And if you want something different from what is standard, and everybody does at times, don't look to Wal_mart to carry it. (Wal-mart's censorship is well known). Further, if something is always on hand, it may never occur to you that someone somewhere produces it, that in some way natural resources are involved, and that you are part of a world larger and more complex than W-M seems to make it. Evidently, in W-M, there is no such thing as global warming, hurricanes, strikes, difference, a sense of place. A Brave New World without soma, even. In the red states of the country, where Wal-mart is strongest, young people also (coincidentally?) have the fewest options. There, men fighting, no-holds barred, in cages, is becoming a popular entertainment. It's also the zone where Meth use is on the rise. And the anti-abortion movement. Ask your friend in the field of domestic violence prevention what effect all that has. And while we are on the subject of violence, the only Wal-mart I've ever been in had guns prominently displayed, right in with the underwear and cantaloupes. I haven't checked, but I feel certain that Wal-mart supports Bush heavily; he is in line with its values. I am sure the Pentagon has excellent logistics and supply-chain management, which allowed it to attack Iraq without need and without one whit of understanding. Coincidence? I'd need to see the statistics to believe that. Best, Michael On Sep 17, 2005, at 12:56 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Michael, Thank you for the thoughtful response which I'm still having trouble entirely agreeing with. ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime A Progressive Response to Katrina
Thanks Eric, for these clarifications. I agree wholeheartedly that nettimers could make a real contribution to , and above all, that we progressives must put forth constructive and detailed proposals and plans now! Best, Michael # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
nettime A Progressive Response to Katrina
for this new reconstruction, to hold officials and corporations to a tighter accountability. We must seek out and propose capable new leaders for the parts of the endeavor we can already foresee. We must find ways to continue to be heard and to monitor progress. What must our immediate demands be? We can only arrive at that by swift networking to develop consensus, but the following seems a minimum we should aspire to * The poor must be rapidly and humanely compensated for their losses, receive adequate medical attention, and be reunited with their families and friends; * The levees must be restored much stronger, adequate for a much more intense hurricane; * All citizens of New Orleans and neighboring areas must be restored to their homes, with those of the poor adequately cleaned up, made safe and sanitary according to the occupants needs; * The damage must not be used as an excuse for re-development schemes that deprive previous residents of their homes; * The Mississippi must be ecologically restored in a more sustainable manner; * Emergency measures to equitably reduce oil and gas use must begin at once; * The US must at once sign onto and ratify the Kyoto accords, and immediately seek to go beyond them to start crash international programs of research into not only lowering carbon emissions but reversing current greenhouse effects; * Tax cuts for the rich must be rescinded at once to help pay for this and other measures. * FEMA and other federal agencies must be strengthened and made effective in fulfilling their intended missions, which must include detailed protection and evacuation plans that take into account the needs and limitations of all citizens; * Cronyism in government offices must be firmly opposed; * We must stop wasting our nation's and the world's resources on military adventures that cannot succeed; * Specifically, we should bring the troops home from Iraq at once. Michael H. Goldhaber Monday, September 5, 2005 # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Reducing military spending
Or just steals the US robots and reprograms them? Best, Michael On Feb 16, 2005, at 6:47 PM, Ivo Skoric wrote: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/16/technology/16robots.html?pagewanted= 1ei=5094en=527b7e950d00d351hpex=1108616400partner=homepage Pentagon says that an average soldier's upkeep, training, and retirement costs about $4 million. That's tax-payers money. If the soldier is replaced by a robot, that would cost only $230K per piece. And the cost of maintenance, of course, shich hopefully would be less than $4M. Although one never knows with new and untested technology. And where are they going to make them? In China? ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
nettime Oh! Freedom! (27 times) and al Qaeda
According to NPR, Pres. Bush said the word freedom 27 times in his 21-minute inaugural speech yesterday ? an excellent example of misleading framing (in the sense recently popularized by George Lakoff). Even worse, Bush spoke again of the 9/11 attack as being an attack on freedom. This is utterly absurd. What was attacked were two of the world's largest office buildings, both, incidentally, built by government, not free enterprise. (The Pentagon is obvious, and the WTC was built by the NY Port Authority.) We are usually told the fourth plane was to be aimed at the White House or the Capitol, but for all I know one of the huge office buildings in Washington could have been the target --or maybe another side of the Pentagon was. The previous major al Qaeda attacks were also on government office buildings, at the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. The other attacks were on US military targets. I don't know why bin Laden has it in for office buildings, but since he cut his teeth in the guerilla war against the soviets in Afghanistan, and since he has made it clear he believes he brought down the USSR through that, it's quite clear he has now focussed on the remaining western superpower. Would Bush say bin Laden attacked the USSR because of opposition to freedom? As for the office-building fetish, possibly bin Laden and his group did attack Soviet office buildings in Kabul or elsewhere in Afghanistan; maybe that even stuck in his mind as a source of success. Of course 9/11 was heinous, but it was an evil attack on office buildings, or perhaps on office workers, bureaucrats, or bureaucracy, not freedom. Let's reclaim that important fact. ( I have previously speculated that al Qaeda was interested in attacking the World Trade Center because they were confused by the name, and thought that, rather than being rented out with difficulty mainly as back offices for Wall Street, it was, indeed, the center of world trade. If so, this again shows that we should be careful what we name things.) Best, Michael # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime Questioning the Frame
I want to comment briefly on Coco Fusco's impassioned and cogent remarks on maps and war. I spent the year 1981 (the first year of the Reagan administration) hiding out in the bowels of the Library of Congress in Washington researching a book on the causes of war that I never wrote. One of my main conclusions was that modern wars are fought precisely because of maps. Modern states are defined in terms of their control of mapped territories. maps have a certain look in which it begins to seem plausible or necessary that some boundaries are wrong or artifiical, and so must be changed. For example, consider Northern Ireland. Because Ireland is a distinct island on the map, the map-reader's eye can easily conclude the whole island should be one color. (Only one island in the entire world has more than two different nation states on it: Borneo; only a handful have two; while tens of thousands of islands are within one state. Likewise, the map-reader's eye is unhappy with enclaves surrounded by other countries or the lack of clearly demarcated borders, or any territories that belong to no one. In principle one could imagine several countries interpenetrating or overlapping on the same space. Australian tribes, for instance, had overlapping home areas or areas through which they moved; modern mapped states cannot accommodate such ways of life. (The famous topological four-color mapping theorem would have made no sense in a world in which a single territory could have overlapping colors.) Obviously this thesis could be developed much, much further, but perhaps I've made the point: without maps, what would wars in the modern sense be? Where would they be fought? How would victory, or even partial victory be gauged? Why would they seem necessary? What would the defenders defend? So, while Coco is of course correct that the damage done by wars are done to real people on the real earth and not on maps, maps and the sense of necessity they seem to offer cannot be separated from modern wars. I say modern very deliberately. Pre-Modern wars were (or perhaps even are) different; they were not fought over maps. Post-Modern wars -- if acts of violence such as terrorism can be thought of as acts of war -- are also not about changing the color on maps, necessarily, but about the control of attention through other representations such as TV screens or websites. Or so I suspect. Best, Michael # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net
Re: nettime epistemological crisis for US tail-chasing politics
I'm not certain Breslin has all facts straight. The NY Times specifically claims to use random number generators to phone pollees, and if they really do, that should include cell phones. A different question is whether potential Kerry voters and potential Bush voters are equally likely to answer the phone, either because they don't want to be charged for a cell call while a pollster offers along list of questions, or because they screen calls or are out and about and available less, etc. The Gallup poll claims more Republicans than Democrats among its pollees, and that seems odd, quite possibly indicating a biased polling method. but Ted's remarks below seem valid. Best, Michael On Oct 1, 2004, at 8:40 AM, t byfield wrote: demolishing the received wisdom that landline-based polls continue to present anything more than the biases of a fading techno-social constellation. but, then again, it seems like pretty much the same could be said of the elections that the polls try to predict. cheers, t] http://www.newsday.com/news/columnists/ny- nybres163973220sep16,0,2532038,print.column ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime A 'licensing fee' for GNU/Linux?
A stupid question: what is FOSS? FSF? OSI? this reminds me of the horrible alphabet soup I used to encounter all the time when I worked in Washington. While it may be very convenient for writers to use initials, the practice very quickly renders conversation impenetrable to those who haven't been paying enough attention to recall all the abbreviations. I urge nettimers to take the time to spell out the meanings of abbreviations frequently, if not at least once per posting. Best, Michael --- Michael H. Goldhaber [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.well.com/user/mgoldh/ On Aug 11, 2004, at 4:45 PM, Novica Nakov wrote: In this sense, SW patents will not kill FOSS, but they will give large companies much more leaway in determining its future, substantially hollowing out the 'freedom' in free software. Or, in a highly unlikely scenario it can go the other way. If IBM holds on to its pledge [1] not to use patents against linux, and if other companies follow extending their good will to all software that is compliant with the FSF and OSI definition than everyone will develop FOSS simply to stay clear of patent trouble and we'll have all the freedom in the world. [1] http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-5296787.html And another link: http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-870390.html - Stallman's thoughts on software patents, 2 years old. # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime Michael Moore
Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911 and War in the Attention Era War is always a contest over something; for instance, under capitalism, it is often a contest over resources (including oil). In the attention economy, however, war is a contest over attention, and the ultimate winner is the one who is best able to use not only war but the images of war best to win attention. Thus, as I have described in a 2003 telepolis column, the Iraq war was the Bush administration's attempt to hold the attention it grabbed as a result of 9-11. As the war unfolded, at first this went well for the Bushies, what with embedded journalists, the quick march to Baghdad, the brilliant use of Pvt. Jessica Lynch, the pulling down of Saddam's statue, the playing card with the most-wanted Saddamists, Bush's aircraft-carrier landing and the like. But the images soon turned, what with the so-called insurgency, which was really just another stage of defensive moves by Saddamists combined with guerilla and terror tactics by other anti-occupation forces, the increasingly absurd hunt for =93WMD=94 then , more recently Abu Ghraib, the kidnappings and beheadings, which, sickening as they were, still captured attention for Abou Musa Zarqawi , or whoever was really behind them, the Falluja uprising, Muqtada al-Sadr, the 9-11 hearings, and so on. In the midst of all this, last Thanksgiving, Bush's attempt at new photo-op quickly fizzled when it turned out he was holding a cardboard turkey to serve the troops in the secured airport near Baghdad. Getting and holding attention is a matter, very often, of upstaging an acknowledged star by somehow getting into the frame, stealing the attention that goes to the star for oneself. In the most simplified terms, this now what Michael Moore has accomplished in and with his tremendously effective film. Though others have tried in the past to leverage Bush's image to the opposite effect, Moore has done this superbly, so much so that now, inevitably, as more and more people see the film, Bush himself, and the war, will become a reference to Michael Moore, and to the anti-war movement he supports. This took real artistry. Of course, critiques of the film and of Moore , from the silly right (including David Brooks in the NY Times) and the silly left abound, each trying to re-direct the attention Moore has garnered to him- or herself, but so clumsily, in the cases I have seen, that they mostly might as well be posing with their own cardboard turkeys. They accuse Moore of everything from blatant anti-Americanism to white nationalism to bad analysis, to an anti-Israeli position to ignoring Israel entirely (it is in fact not mentioned in the film). But all these attempts -- so far, anyway -- have been ludicrously crude, themselves weak caricatures of Moore's own somewhat crude but much more effective trademark tactic (especially in his earlier movies) of obnoxiously getting in the face of some important person he wants to make look stupid, and in doing so whose thunder (that is, received attention) he wants to steal. If Moore takes quotes from context for rhetorical purpose s -- and who doesn=92t, at times ---these would-be deflectors of his well-earned attention do so in spades, but without grasping how this tactic requires careful variation and iteration to be effective, so they end up simply making themselves look the same buffoons Moore is so good at skewering. Best, Michael # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime Re: Images and Official Language: The Gap or How notto Know
I remain chary of the word evil, especially as it has been so easily bandied about by Bush and company, but it's quite obvious that the adminstration remains far less moved by death and injury to others, whether American or foreign, than by the political opportunities of any situation, whether 9/11 or the chance to look strong by invading Iraq. And the fact that weaklings opposed the war plans only added to the appeal in the eyes of an administration that was as you say so blind to even the possibility of real suffering. Like Saddam, lullled into unreality in his hundred palaces, Bush and cronies seem trapped in , and hopefully by, their fictive world view. Unless, as I still fear, what we consider fiction the average American (or anyway too manyswing voters in swing states) will end up still taking as real come Novemeber. And even if that fear is not borne out, we have to wonder what Kerry takes as real. Michael Alan Sondheim wrote: But was it really a matter of 'spin'? It didn't look good right from the beginning to many people - don't forget we were coming down out of the Clinton era which was fairly prosperous. And 'spin' again seems too much of a singularity. ... # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime Re: Images and Official Language: The Gap or How not to Know
The Iraq war, I have thought all along, was begun by Bush as a matter of spin, chiefly to look good (ie.e. successful and tough) and manly. Iraq is far away, and still confused in the American mind not only with bin Laden but with Iran. Recall that the last real photo op was supposed to be Bush prancing in his flight suit. When that wasn't enough, we got Bush in Iraq with a cardboard turkey (not the best possible metaphor) and then a bedraggled, confused-looking Saddam, hardly the scowling villain Rove would have ordered. The Abu Ghraib images were unwelcome because unplanned, with low production values, etc. Had they been spun right, surely they would have been touted as showing the pluck and ingenuity of American GIs up against dastardly terror suspects. But it turns out the best spinners in the world can't spin an entire war and occupation of real people with real feelings and desires. They did come scarily close, however. Michael H. Goldhaber [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.well.com/user/mgoldh/ Alan Sondheim wrote: Returning briefly to Iraq, I think stating what the war is 'about' misses the point - that the word 'about' must be deconstructed, that there is no 'about' - which 'systemics' perhaps implies as well. The war is not 'about' Daddy nor 'about' oil nor 'about' jeffersonian democracy' nor 'about' Saddam nor 'about' torture etc. etc. It certainly isn't 'about' 9/11. One might say it is 'about' those who ordered the war and managed it, but this hits a psychoanalytical deadend. 'About' implies cause and effect and representation - this painting is 'about' the natural order of things, this war is 'about' oil. And such is a peculiarly occidental approach, I believe, this aboutness which insists on causation in relation to ethos, which insists on origin insead of, perhaps, taint. The war is unjustifiable, cruel, and in many ways 'about' America, in the sense of implication. America is responsible; reasoning and reasons are left in the shadows, and there are as many as there are shadows and they are as indistinct as shadows are. The darkness of the photographs throw a little light on the subjects: it's the captors who stand out, who make sure they are _named_ and _visible,_ while the prisoners are hidden, faceless bodies, hooded. Finally it might even be added that 'about' implies some justification, however minimal. If this is 'real'ly 'about' oil, perhaps the oil will save lives elsewhere, But there is none of this, no balance, no reason. Stare into the face of evil, and there's surprisingly little detail. Evil manages the news. - Alan http://www.asondheim.org/ http://www.asondheim.org/portal/.nikuko http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt Trace projects http://trace.ntu.ac.uk/writers/sondheim/index.htm finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
nettime The Dean campaign and the Internet
Nettimers: Howard Dean , by the current looks of things, has done something amazing in American political history . Without being President or Vice President he apparently has sewn up a major-party nomination before the start of the election year. Things could come unglued, and part of the earliness of his success may simply result from campaigning starting earlier and earlier in successive election cycles. Still, considering Dean's having come out of nowhere (well, Vermont) much of his success seems to be based on his highly sophisticated use of the Internet: as an organizing tool; for building support; as an extremely successful means of fundraising; and to hold his supporters together. Further, as the New York Times Magazine ( http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/07/magazine/07DEAN.html ) points out, his campaign has a sort of technological coordinator who has volunteers writing new kinds of software for new modes of Internet connection. This has apparently helped him develop a far more flexible, complete and complex organization in early primary states than any predecessor or competitor. For non-Americans, I should add that the primary system as it now exists is extremely weird, unrepresentative, and dominated by a handful of small states. It is generally thought that if one candidate wins both the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary, this candidate is essentially guaranteed nomination. However, a front-runner who somehow does not do as well as expected, especially in New Hampshire, can sometimes be viewed as the loser even if actually ahead in the vote there. The guess is though that Dean's support is so much stronger and deeper in both places than anyone else's that such a turn around is quite unlikely. He also seems to be ahead among Democrats in South Carolina, even topping the charismatic Senator Edwards from neighboring North Carolina. I bring all this up in the hopes that nettimers will discuss this model of politics via the Internet and what it might portend/teach. -- Best, Michael Michael H. Goldhaber # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime New Media Education and Its Discontent
Keith Hart wrote: It is these places [some universities] that are the guardians of intellectual lifeThey cannot teach the qualities that people need in politics and business. Nor can they teach culture and wisdom, any more than theologians teach holiness, or philosophers goodness or sociologists a blueprint for the future. They exist to cultivate the intellect. But let us recall that the student movement of the sixties, at least in the US used as its chief anti-text The Uses of the University by Clark Kerr , then President of the University of California system. He did not see the institution as primarily in aid of intellect but rather as a tool for numerous elements of society -- including government and business very prominently. The ensuing student revolt wound its way through campuses, but in reaction, university funds were cut, curricula were redesigned, campuses were redesigned so that protests more easily could be controlled, and even at public institutions tuition rose from nearly nothing to ever-larger figures. (Under Thatcher, it's my understanding that something similar was begun in the UK.) Some of the student demands, such as black studies and women's studies were met, but those elements of identity politics helped balkanize the student bodies so that efforts for common causes, including the intellect in some degree, were no longer likely to get off the ground. Meanwhile, the private elite schools used their greater resources as means to increase competition for places in them, so that only students who ceaselessly were in motion while they were in high school had much chance to get in (except for the few legacy students) . Their (the elite students') sense of self-worth and entitlement, and their ferocious work ethic continued and was nurtured in college. Doing rather than thinking has become the norm and is what is most valued among this elite. Michael H. Goldhaber # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime New Media Education and Its Discontent
Some of the items in this thread are quite disturbing, such as the thought that many people are insufficiently intelligent to go to university, but should rather go to polytechnics or the like: Public universities are packed with students who simply should not be in college. This policy that everyone's son or daughter should be able to go to college is ludicrous and devalues the degrees of those of us who belong, says David Patterson. It strikes me that much anti-intellectualism stems from many students' being led to expect from early on that they just can't cut it, that they are essentially unworthy, and that there is nothing they can do about it. At the same time, in our society, it is repeatedly claimed that education is the key to a good job and thereby a good life. Naturally this combination breeds resentment and resistance to being told either to read, write or think, in many cases, even though many who end up resisting formal thought are perfectly capable of thinking, and indeed, outside the academy often do it well. (Today, Gramsci's organic intellectuals of the working class might well be rap singers, e.g.) To pursue the discussion, a definition of intellectual might be worthwhile, so I will start with my own idiosyncratic attempt: an intellectual is a person who never gives up trying better to understand the world and her place in it, and continues to attempt to live according to that. This definition doesn't particularly favor the written word, nor scholarship, but it also cannot be satisfied with narrow expertise of any sort. It strikes me that the role of a teacher should be in part to help find ways to honor and encourage each student 's best forms of being an intellectual , in this sense, without necessarily using the label. Even better would be to help all the members of a class recognize each others' ways of being intellectuals. I am not saying that in my own teaching I do any of this very well. Michael H. Goldhaber # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime A Puff Piece on Wikipedia (Fwd)
Brian, the point of yours to which I was replying was not opposition to consensus, but rather the implication that to oppose one must have anonymity. That is not to suggest that current society is reasonable, liberal, democratic, desirable, un-opposable or necessarily irreplaceable. Kermit makes an important point in suggesting that Kelly is a Straussian, which to me makes Kelly's assertions and explanations highly suspect, reinforcing my previous doubts. Conservatives in the United States quite thoroughly dominate political discourse, yet are continually proclaiming that they are persecuted in the media, the academy and by the elite, which presumably justifies their conspiratorial and deceitful practices. Some leftists have at times done much the same, although in the US their claims of persecution have had a somewhat more solid foundation. Still, on either side, too readily donning this mantle of persecution and using it as an excuse for anonymity or for covering up one's real intent undermines any possibility of genuine democracy, and must lead to a general and debilitating distrust across the board. In a state of such distrust there can be no real consensus, assuredly, but at the same time honest dissent also becomes impossible. Derrida indicates that utterances without ambiguity and at least unconscious double agendas are not fully possible, but that is a quite different point, suggesting that discourse can only possibly be workable when every effort is made to reveal who one is and what one's interests are, as Kermit proposes we strive for. The more anonymous the voice, the less the possibility for such self revelation, and the more must be taken on faith. Reasonably, within the precarious limits of reason, but not contentedly, Michael H. Goldhaber Brian Holmes wrote: Similarly, Michael Goldhaber appears to me eminently reasonable, and perhaps lacking in historical imagination. Is a civilization like the current one replaceable? What could possibly motivate people to answer in the affirmative? Kermit Snelson's justifiable concern with the state of the Union, whether that lamentable state is attribuable to Leo Strauss or not, rather bears out the limits of Michael's reasonableness. For many years, worldly Americans have nodded their heads, quoted statistics, and pointed to demographic, economic, and psychosocial explanations that make the decay of our democracy appear quite plausible and normal. And look where that has got us. On a road which appears, in many ways, to defy reason. still waiting for a little less consensus, Brian Holmes # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED] # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime A Puff Piece on Wikipedia (Fwd)
If Locke, Voltaire, Diderot, Montesquieu, and D'Alembert were all in the habit of publishing anonymously, why is it their names are so familiar (and attached to their writings,usually) some 250 years later? Was anonymity merely a ploy, with clues provided somehow for true authorship? In the case of Voltaire, we know this was a 'pen-name.' Was it affixed to his work, and if not, what use would a pen-name have been? Michael H. Goldhaber Keith Hart wrote: I have been intrigued by this thread for the light it throws on the question of authorial anonymity. I have been reading a book by Christopher Kelly, Rousseau as Author: consecrating one's life to the truth (Chicago University Press, 2003), especially the hilarious first chapter, Responsible and irresponsible authors, with section titles including Naming names, Anonymity and responsibility, etc. It seems that Locke, ... -- - End forwarded message - # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
nettime blog blog failure
Well, nettimers, I wrote the following blog, but then I thought, you would probably be more interested in it than the average inhabitant of the blogsphere; so though it's own my new blog site ( http://blogs.salon.com/0002859/ ), why waste it? so here it is: Best, Michael Michael H. Goldhaber My very own Blog! Wow! Yesterday, at a party, I mentioned to a friend that I now have a blog, and she said Be careful! she then explained that as a therapist she hears her clients evidently being sucked into the Internet. I imagine this to be like one of those two-dimensional creatures in Edward Abbots Flatland disappearing as parts of them are sucked into the third dimension. (There another limb goes, into cyberspace). I reminded her that she was supposed to congratulate me on my blog, which, properly cued, she then did So here I am typing away for my legion of readers, though probably there aren't any. Still, like every other blogger I'm sure, I secretly imagine the entire planet eagerly sitting down to my latest addition with your morning coffee, tea, whiskey, water, alfalfa juice or whatever, far more interested in what I have to say than in your dull boring newspaper, or spouse or pet or child, or even your own blog, which you yourself could be writing between sips if you weren't so busy reading mine. When everyone on earth has finally seen the light and started a blog, then probably the average number of readers for each blog will approach the magic number zero (except for one's own re-readings, if any). But still, even if the hit counter shows you as you start your blog each day that no one has read your latest effort, it's difficult to feel, as you send your work out over the Internet to the blog server, that no one is ever going to read what you wrote. After all, one day, thr5ough some Google search or other, this blog might be discovered, and more and more people will link to it, so that even my past blogs will be read by many, preserved as they ought to be for eternity in cyberspace (the blogs, that is, not the people, but yet the people who blog will also be preserved to the extent they put themselves in their blogs) . Now one could just as well imagine writing things on scraps of paper and letting the wind carry them off, hoping someone somewhere will read them. Or perhaps one could tack the scraps up to telephone poles near crowded sidewalks. But the technology of the Internet offers a greater potential: we all know that some web sites do get millions of hits; why not this one? The result, writing a blog definitely presents the illusion that one has a substantial audience, say half the size of the largest potential audience, splitting the difference, that is, between what could be and what most likely is. Seems like a sound calculation, if you don't think about it too much. All this illustrates to me, vividly and firsthand, the phenomenon I call illusory attention. It occurs all over the place, in many forms in modern life. One of the purest cases is when you are watching someone speaking directly into the camera on television. She may seem to be speaking directly to you, even answering a question you have just silently put to her, but of course she is paying you as a person not the slightest real attention, since she doesn't know you exist. At the opposite, equally common extreme, perhaps, you are talking to your lover, right into her ear, perhaps, on some deeply intimate subject, while she is secretly thinking about renewing her car insurance, and you are none the wiser. To be sure, every human attempt at getting attention, whatever it may be, founders to some degree. No two people understand words in exactly the same way, or gestures or any other form of expression either, so we are never completely perfectly heard. Just as modern technology enables the illusory attention offered by a sympathetic-seeming talking head over TV, so the Internet, with its personal web sites, listservs, chat rooms, and now blogs , makes the illusion of one's outpourings reaching an audience seem far more real than tossing the scraps of paper (or just whispering) into the wind would lead to. And we do want attention. The knowledge that there is a huge audience out there apparently enhances the chances that someone who perfectly gets what I have to say -- yet without having thought of it yet yourself -- is reading this. You , perhaps. That prospect is so pleasing. Of course, though a close reader will see that I am very intimately revealing myself in the foregoing, this blog lacks the kind of personal revelation many blogs apparently have. (I really am not sure about this, since I have only ever read three or four blogs by anyone else. As with all of us, I suspect, writing my own blog seems so much more interesting, and in fact, carries for me a greater charge of illusory attention; which is another deeply personal admission, so there!). Freud spoke of the the train's carrying his child away
Re: nettime Iranonymity
Maybe the mullahs can get puppet dissidents to complain that porn sites are blocked, thus showing the US is not really willing to grant adult status to Iranians. Then if the sites are unblocked in reponse , perhaps that will distract dissidents from dissenting. It seems to work here. Best, Michael Michael H. Goldhaber Bruce Sterling wrote: *One wonders what the strategic Iranian infowar response to this should be. Maybe Americanonymity. -- bruces http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/32567.html A pact between the U.S. government and the electronic privacy company Anonymizer, Inc. is making the Internet a safer place for controversial websites and subversive opinions -- if you're Iranian. This month Anonymizer began providing Iranians with free access to a Web proxy service designed to circumvent their government's online censorship efforts. In May, government ministers issued a blacklist of 15,000 forbidden immoral websites that ISPs in the country must block -- reportedly a mix of adult sites and political news and information outlets. An estimated two million Iranians have Internet access. Dissident sites, religious sites, the L.L. Bean catalog -- we point them to the Voice of America site, but they can go anywhere, says Ken Berman, program manager for Internet anticensorship at the IBB, They're free explore the Internet in an unfettered fashion. Mostly unfettered. Like the Iranian filters, the U.S. service blocks porn sites -- There's a limit to what taxpayers should pay for, says Berman. But the United States' hope is that a freer flow of online information will improve America's image in the Arab world. The service is similar to one Anonymizer provided to Chinese citizens under a previous government contract that ran-out ended earlier this year. -- / # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
