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Kurt Vonnegut, one of my favourite authors and an ongoing inspiration for me to continue leading a virtuous life died last night. So it goes.
The man who spent the last few years of his life reasonably miserable, spurred only to write his last book out of 'contempt; for George Bush, joking about suing the cigarette company for failing to live up to its promise to kill him is not the man who will be remembered by me. I shall remember the first time I read Slaughterhouse 5 (Listen: Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time...), the incredible string of epiphanies that accompanied Breakfast of Champions and, my personal favourite, the undeniable warmth of Cats Cradle, with the wondrous religion of Bokonism it expounds.

Brillian video snagged from CrunchNotes. Makes me slightly worried and a bit like I may be missing a boat somewhere.

I think a lot of the predictions are a little far fetched towards the end; I'm always wary of discussing computational power and the brain, but the demographics are fairly enlightening.

This is lifted from my last piece on the oD blog, I'm afraid, but I hope my readers here enjoy it...
Over the past few months, Google has shown that it is finding it increasingly difficult to marry its 'don't be evil', college kids having fun in California image with an increasingly massive market valuation, influence and responsibility. Firstly, we had Brin and Page squabbling over the outfitting of a corporate jet (a Boeing 767, for the detail spotters out there), which they apparently requested be outfitted with hammocks, king-size beds and, one imagines, Bond-villian-esque shark tank bars, diamond chandeliers and the like. Of course, two wildly successful geeks indulging themselves in some fairly run of the mill excess is nothing to be too upset about but Google the company - as well as Google the search engine- have started to show some signs of creeping bureaucracy.Google's job application process has been much-vaunted for its ingeniousness, but it appears that for many talented engineers, they have finally crossed a line between pushing applicants, and pushing applicants away. Tales abound of ridiculous questions, interviews with inappropriate people and bizarre one-upmanship. And now, Google has gone (at least to my psychologists eyes), algorithm crazy, introducing massive profiling of their current employees to use to evaluate potential new employees. But then, when you have so many applicants that only 5% of randomly selected unsolicited applications even get read (this may be apocryphal), perhaps some sort of automated sorting is helpful. (Disclosure: I did apply to Google for a job. I didn't hear anything back, and I am a little bitter). I'm sure, however, it's all worth it for the Google canteen!

Becky Hogge giving out some props in her most recent New Statesman article for, ah, me. And productivity tips from the 'sysadmin'. I love that. I almost feel ready for 1337.

Finally, I am being given the due recognition for my name on google: as the attached screenshot shows, this site is now the top result for my name! Sucks to you, old lawyer dude!

I was in the Guardian on Saturday!. The dead-tree version had pictures. Expect a scan soon!

A few really good papers to read on online behaviour and participation. Nielsen pulls it all together, really; his discussion of users and lurkers is very enlightening. Basically, 1% of 'site users contribute 90% of the content, 9% contribute the rest and then 90% of your site members will actually just use the content. This is borne out by the way that, say, YouTube, Amazon and, yes, even openDemocracy are used. Go read.

Great news this morning from the BBC ; it appears that the Gower Report has recommended that copyright term for recorded work remain at the current length of 50 years, not be extended to 95 years. This is despite extensive lobbying behind the scenes from the major record industry players and high-profile artists, such as Cliff Richards.
Interestingly, however, the BBC appear to be the only people reporting this. Is it possible that someone from the Gowers report has leaked this information in order to hold the government to task when the full report comes out (we're expecting it Wednesday 6th December at 12.30)? At least that way, if the Government does turn round and support the lobbying of the large record labels, it will be clear that this is not what Gowers recommended, so there is a clear accountability issue. Certainly the wording of the article suggests that this is a preliminary announcement before the main report arrives, so let's hope that now the results of the inquiry have entered the public domain, there will be enough pressure on the government to act on these recommendations.

Quick post; check out BookMooch, the incredibly cool new book sharing service from the man behind Magnatune and, less fortunately, Lyris email software. This was presented at the MiniBar event in London on friday...more to come about this really cool event. Here's a post on oD that explains more.

Amazing...I love hot chicks who can skate! Thanks BoingBoing