Monday, February 10, 2003

Permissions. It added tons of small scale permissions (like per-file read permissions) instead of wildcarding The new version fixes both of these problems. And it's GPLed. Now off to pick the right source repository... [Ockham's Flashlight] Hi Stu...one point here -- generating lots of small scale permissions is the point!  See erights.org.  But...if you know that substantially all of the permissions in a category are being used (like all of them), then I guess a wildcard is OK.  Wait -- it's not.  The reason is that in the future, you may be granting a permission, due to the wildcard, that you really didn't mean to. Stay small, stay granular. 10:49:55 PM

Clay Shirky Gets It. Dave Winer doesn't think so.  Are we on the same planet?  It is intuitively (and experientally) obvious that there are weblogs that get read a lot more than others.  This does have something to do with the content of those weblogs, but it also has a great deal to do with exposure through "top rank" lists and other mechanisms.  List ranking mechanisms tend to perpetuate the present, and as time goes by, make it more difficult for new information sources to gain any traction. Writing good things and getting referred can work, but generally fail to deliver much critical mass. Whether Dave wants to admit it or not, there is an A-list.  He's on it, for sure.  The very vast majority of us do operate at the departmental level.  All Shirky is saying is that a web log is not a great equalizer.  You can say whatever you want, but don't expect very many people to be aware of what you've said, or react to it in any way. I give up this text in an attempt to be disproven.  4:01:15 PM

Faith-based Budgeting. As I learn more of the "new" Bush budget, I realized that he has extended and imposed his doctrine of faith-based initiatives into the budget area.  The president appears to have a religious fervor and belief behind his economic policies -- complete faith that through some miracle the deficits that he, two years ago, predicted would never occur, will somehow disappear.  Imposing this kind of trust in a particular manifestation of the divine is precisely what this country's constitution is intended to avoid. 3:44:24 PM