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Anthem

November 18 2009

One of my favorite novels has long been Anthem by Ayn Rand; indeed it was the first public-domain text that I posted at the Monadnock Press website. Unfortunately, the Project Gutenberg etexts of Anthem contain numerous errors, only some of which are corrected in other online versions such as that… read more

Current Readings

November 16 2009

Here’s what I’m reading right now: J.J. Gibson, The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception Alexandra Horowitz, Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know William B. Irvine, A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy Martha Nussbaum, The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics… read more

Music Shortlist

November 09 2009

Periodically I like to make short lists of books and recordings that I would not want to do without. It helps to focus the mind. Lately I’ve been thinking about the 25 albums (not individual songs or pieces) that I would want on a desert island. Here’s the current list,… read more

Okonomiyaki

November 09 2009

Last night I got my first taste of the local specialty in Hiroshima: okonomiyaki. (Did I mention that I’m in Japan right now? :) The best I can describe it is that it’s kind of like a noodle frittata or cabbage-stuffed pancake. You sit down at this huge griddle and… read more

XMPP Is Not Bloated

November 08 2009

I’m getting a bit tired of all the unsupported allegations from people like Anil Dash and Adam Fisk that XMPP is bloated or impossible to deploy. Now maybe I’m just a bit snarky at the moment because it’s 5:30 AM where I am in Hiroshima Japan and I got 3… read more

RhymBox Dispute Resolved

November 03 2009

Back in 2004, a controversy erupted in the XMPP developer community regarding the RhymBox instant messaging client. Through a series of unfortunate misunderstandings, the parties to an agreement regarding further development of that client went their separate ways in a rather public fashion, resulting in a cloud over the RhymBox… read more

Small Books

October 24 2009

I’m really starting to like small books. Yes, I recently wrote a book that’s 320 pages long, but in my own reading I’ve taken to books of under 200 (and preferably 100) pages. Oxford’s series of Very Short Introductions is a good example. Another might be the original 1855, 92-page… read more

Financial Thinking

October 14 2009

As mentioned, I’ve been reading intensively about personal finance since early May. While that doesn’t make me an expert (far from it!), I have drawn a number of tentative conclusions: When it comes to money, no one has your best interests at heart. Financial advisers, bankers, brokers, mutual fund managers,… read more

FTC v Blogosphere

October 08 2009

An instant classic from Perry de Havilland: The notion that the US blogosphere is going to allow the US state to require it to register certain content is something that has me wondering if some cunning conspiracy was not at work by a shadowy cabal of Good Guys (who inexplicably… read more

Keyboarding

October 05 2009

It seems that every six months or so I have a relapse into wrist problems caused by too much keyboarding (the last time was back in April). To help remedy the problem this time I’m going to work offline more (editing on paper with a red pen), take more keyboard… read more

William Safire

September 28 2009

The great language maven William Safire died today. Despite the fact that he called himself a libertarian conservative, I never read much of his political commentary, preferring instead his writings on what Mencken called the American language. Indeed, as previously mentioned, a letter that I wrote to him circa 1982… read more

Alicia De Larrocha

September 28 2009

I heard today that Alicia De Larrocha, one of my favorite pianists, has died. I listen regularly to her recordings of Isaac Albéniz and Enrique Granados, whose music I adore. One of my prize CDs is her long-out-of-print recording of the Seis piezas sobre cantos populares españoles and Escenas románticas,… read more

Systemics

September 21 2009

We can have no better illustration of the deeply systemic nature of America’s continued and inexorable fall from Constitutional innocence than the nearly immediate capture of Barack Obama, supposed agent of change, by the powers-that-be (I do say supposed, because I never possessed a whit of confidence that he would… read more

The XMPP Council

September 10 2009

As just posted to the members@xmpp.org discussion list, I have decided not to stand for election to the XMPP Council this year. Although I have served on the Council for many years, I think it is time for me to open up a place on the Council for some of… read more

ACTive Architectures

September 01 2009

The term REST is often used to describe the architecture of the World Wide Web, following chapter 5 of Roy Fielding’s dissertation. Because this architectural style has a catchy name, it tends to receive quite a bit of attention. Indeed, some people seem to think that REST is the only… read more