I had been cleaning up my old .plan files (well, they're not really UNIX .plan files, just some DOS-ASCII text files I stashed in My Documents whose extensions I changed from .txt to .plan), and I discovered in my blog topics section that on March 2004 I was planning on blogging about Indonesian Activist Munir's criticism of current President (at the time presidential candidate) Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. I like the way SBY runs our nation so far (if not perfectly), but it is imperative though to keep a level head.

If only I can remember what it is exactly that I was thinking about... perhaps its somewhat along the lines of disapproval of presidential candidates coming from the military... then perhaps I could link it to Munir's murder by arsenic poisoning in October September, and how slowly the investigation over his death has progressed (if at all).

But I feel this is not exactly the right time to put this up... his popularity is about to skydive just as he is about to cut gasoline subsidies (which is more enjoyed by the upper class and gasoline smugglers than the general public), which is a move I really-really dig. Subsidies are necessary, but they are like medicine. Depend on them too much and you get addicted and die; either due to withdrawal (from inadequate supply) or overdose (from too much). Proper medical procedure for medical drug treatment is application followed by gradual halting. You medical students can get the correct term for me :p

One thing though, this Munir thing the way I see it can be easily used as fuel by anti-SBY camps...

And I was actually planning to blog about... something else... wha...?

update: more from The Jakarta Post.

One of my favorite bloggers has not posted in a while. Some fans (to be more precise perhaps one particular fan) has decided to (presumably) declare that he "needs his fix," to which the blogger responds, "what fix, man?"

It got me thinking, perhaps its not Yohipup that did not get it, perhaps its us... We blog not for the audience, we blog for ourselves, that kinda thing...

just a thought...

...

Meanwhile in other news, Paris Hilton got hacked again. Remember to protect your privacy folks :)

• Jason Kottke of kottke.org decides to become a full-time professional blogger (via boing-boing)
• Some random guy freaks out over having created a penile culinari configuration (via kottke.org)
• An interesting essay entitled "The History of the Universe in 200 Words or Less" (also via kottke.org)
• A great corporate philosophy by Ludicorp, creator of Flickr (once again kottke.org)
• Still working on that honest thought. From Magnet. Which has uninstalled Firefox for whatever reason.
• A nice essay about giving the 'States a break
• A writing against hate (in Indonesian) (warning profanity)
• I'm looking for web hosting for my personal site. Planning to move my blog there, and create a portfolio. Thinking of rumahweb.com so far. Any suggestions ('Yed)?

update: Kottke has been featured in Wired

Ohhkay, in other news: I have finally implemented Haloscan Trackback and Comments in template, everything should be working fine now (I hope).

I was aiming for trackback only for a while, but I think Haloscan commenting might as well be implemented. I like Haloscan commenting better since it allows for html comment entries (so that you can put links, use html tag styles (like <em>, <I>, etc.) when commenting. I plan on phasing out Blogdrive commenting over time. I think. I would like to transfer all comments made before Haloscan implementation to Haloscan comments, but I might just forego all that...

One word of warning for Blogdrive users wanting to implement Haloscan trackback: do not use the code generated by Haloscan's code generator (the instruction you get at your Haloscan member page); instead use the code posted on this Haloscan forum thread (which is linked from the Haloscan code generator). If you don't do so, you'll wind up having a single trackback page for every single post. Read the thread for more details.

I'm still having problems sending trackback pings, though... to Ben Goodger's blog, specifically. That's the conversation thing about trackback, sending trackback pings to other blogs. If I can't ping other blogs then what's the point?

I'll get back to actual thoughts Really Reall Soon Now™,© &®. Honest.

Speaking of copyrights and honest thoughts, Lessig has given us another heads up for another great book. Released under a CC license, of course. Haven't begun reading it yet, though I've downloaded it...

addendum: BTW, if you read that book carefully, especially the first few pages, the term "Freedom of Expression" (used without permission) is officially a registered trademark of Kembrew McLeod.

And there's an interesting comment on the book posted at Copyfight

Okay, here's a funny one from MarkTaw (I blogged about his procrastination article a few posts back)...

"Why Your Pointy Haired Boss Is A Mathematical Certainty"

And Metafilter has some interesting comments on the article...

In other news, I will be removing and reimplementing my trackback in a few hours; I would kindly suggest nobody try to trackback me just yet (as if anybody has considered doing so at all; this blogging thing is really getting to my self-centered, egoistic side). The reason why is that in my opinion, in blogdrive blogs manual Haloscan trackback should be implemented individually in each blog post instead of in the template. More details soon™.

In a preliminary rush, I've managed to implement Haloscan trackback and commenting on my blog...

More information ASAP...

Real Soon Now™, Heh :p

By the way folks, one of my Best Buddy in the World™ has finally started blogging; check out D Pojok

I read a Wired article on the Firefox phenomenon a few days ago; it was on the February print edition. In it I read that several members of the Firefox developers were taking reflection time after the 1.0 release, having been 'elevated' to 'Code-Fu Master' statuses (and the job offers that come with said statuses). Mr. Goodger, having been offered several high-paying positions, had taken a long roadtrip from California to Colorado Silicon Valley to Seattle and back to reflect. Wired said that Ben had decided to stay with Mozilla.

As it turns out, confirmed by himself in his blog, as of January 10, 2005 Ben Goodger has actually decided to move to Google. Although his role in Google will remain as Firefox lead developer.

Well I say good for him. He gets to receive a better salary, and he continues to work for his original idealisms. I'd love to be in his shoes (provided they fit me, of course).

And of course I would also love to be able to do what he does for reflection time; [fanboy crap] Without NFSU-style driving, of course :p "Always wear seatbelts and obey the law," Brooke Burke sez :) I still like Mark Devellis better though, "When you feel the Need for Speed, go Underground" [/fanboy crap]

Well anywhoo, major respects for this Ben Goodger dude. I like the way he thinks; like this post he made commenting on open source GUI application UI toolkits, specifically a comparison between MS Visual C++ 6.0 and XCode. I agree with Ben that we should respect Microsoft for some of the good code that they have made. As has been noted everywhere, M$'s code quality has really suffered only as of late (as opposed to just plain usable in their heyday of Word 2.0 and Windows 3.1). Code bloat on most of M$'s latest products has been caused by their lapse in user experience quality control (and subsequent collapse of resolve due to massive criticism), which stems from their de-facto monopoly (no matter what M$ or the courts would say).

I'm not saying that we should replicate M$'s GUI practices (there are, of course, better ideas out there; kudos to freedesktop.org and openusability.org for their efforts), But that monopoly of theirs did not develop out of thin air with MS just sitting on their collective arse; their success stems straight from Sun-Tzu style marketing warfare. And hate hard-ball tactics however badly you want, fact still remains that a good campaign always depend on a solid product (notice I said solid, not necessarily good). If the product really sucks consumers will always see right through it the moment they made contact, but if it works then that's what they'll use. If you doubt that at all, then ask any ordinary computer user from the late eighties to compare Windows 3.1 and Motif; ask them which one the ordinary user can actually use.

Usability. By mere mortals. Computers are for everyone, you dorks! If you FOSS developers still say you want computers for everyone too, then I suggest taking a good, hard look at yourself in the mirror. If you then decide that computers are not for everyone then hey, more power to you! Just don't go around everywhere forcing everyone to belive that Open-source is the Future of Computing for Everyone™.

Which brings us back to Ben. Congratulations, sir, on your 'pay raise.' I love your work, I use it everyday, I know you didn't do it alone. Keep it up Man; I imagine that at least twenty million people hope you continue to do so :)

Firefox logo is © Jon Hicks,
and is a trademark of The Mozilla Foundation.

addendum:I tried to give Ben's post a trackback ping but I got spat with the message 'you are not allowed to send trackback pings,' and when I tried inserting a comment I get the message 'you are not allowed to post comments.' Needless to say I am annoyed. Like whatever.

written 20:46 2/7/2005

I've got Weezer in my earphones playing at almost maximum volume. My brother had just kicked a pile of shoes after coming home. My sister was at the PC at the time, trying to find out wether her university accepted her in or not. My mom was downstairs ironing clothes silently. I was in my room trying to write something inspirational on paper.

Life is pressure.
You flow. Or you drag others down with you.
Your brother. Sister. Mother.

Unless you live in a forest.
All alone.

I better send in my CV ASAP.
Like yesterday....

I hate being this weak.
I know I can stand up stronger to the world.
I know my brother's anger stems from his asking for help.
As my mother's tears.

I can help.
I can get a job.
I will stop wasting money.
I will not give up.

The workers are going home
The workers are going home
The workers are going home
Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!
- Weezer - My Name is Jonas

An interesting article on hacking the DMCA.

By Russ Nelson, the current President of the OSI (yes folks, Eric Raymond has stepped down, sorta).

PS.: sorry for not updating with anything significant; I think I'm gonna slow down my blogging...

Back in the early days of the graphical Web, during the early nineties, every personal website has links like these. A bit of community solidarity, supporting freedom, that kinda stuffs. Its kinda like putting bumper stickers on your own personal bit of the Web.

They don't include two notable cyber-movements though: free software and free culture. They get their own link sections.

The Classics

These cyber-activism links have been around since the '90s. In 'Net years that's about equivalent to Jurassic. But of course if the issues have been resolved they wouldn't be around anymore...

Newer Ones

Of course free thinking never rest, so people always come up with new things to complain about. Some of them are even valid complaints...

this article is part of the links section of fERDI:)'s mind-Dumpster.
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