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December 13, 2005
The Internet is Dead: Long Live the Internet!
I know I've started a bit of a shitstorm with my optimistic posts. I really do understand, and feel the pain you might be feeling with the current state of the world. I'm not afraid to tell you that I have had many restless nights and stressful, and even tear-filled moments, at how despairing it can become. But I am at a point now, that optimism is the most productive and healthy option. So be good to yourself and give it a whirl. As Chris Arkenberg once told me, we really are in the final war between the forces of history that have kept humanity down throughout the ages, and the forces of liberation that are finally breaking free. This war is not about weapons of mass destruction or political will, it's a war of thoughts and ideas - yours, mine, everyones. As long as people continue to believe them, things won't change. So here's letting you in on a little secret - they can't win if you don't believe them. For example, they can't maintain martial law, so all they can hope to do is keep in you line with fear and lies.
So listen up, this time, we the people, are finally going to win. It will not be some stale victory, but a lasting and permanent one. One thing is for sure, we will be very damn grateful once we are there. The only sad truth I can say is as MCP2012 mentioned in a recent comment, the transition from now to then, could very well cost lives, many, many lives. But here is some more good news that I came across today that continues to give me hope that things are moving our way.
xMax sparks low power wireless revolution :
This new wireless technology is totally disruptive. To understand just how revolutionary this technology is, and will be around the world, consider how bad the current internet is going to be if Doc Searle's greatest worries come to pass. He believes, and rightfully so, that the telcos and cable companies, who own almost all the internet pipes in the US, are attempting as we speak to control everything that flows through them. What this means for you and me, is no more free and democratic internet. If they have their way, the internet will become a top-down pyramid of locked DRM content from them to you the paying schmuck and criminal they think you are. If they manage to get their way, say goodbye to everything you ever loved about the internet and its liberating power.
But there are many things that will never allow this draconian, dark age future to come to pass. The first is the nature of capital itself which will continue to reward ANYONE who trys to create something better. If the telco's want to lock it down, first hundreds, then thousands of smaller companies will come into play to make a new internet, Google has already bought up thousands of miles of "dark fiber" for reasons unknown. But if their recent actions are any indication, they could very well be positioning themselves to become the savior of the US internet in the advent of a telco lockdown. They are already offering free Wi-fi in several places. Unfortunately Google has already used their muscle power in equally un-free-market ways. For example, they had the city of Mountain View give them a monopoly on free wi-fi access. Totally bullshit, but that's the story. But alas, that brings us to another more promising possibility:
xMax technology can change everything all over again. It gives the power of the network to everyone. It will allow anyone with $100 to set up their own very long range (up to 20 miles) wireless ISP. And because the power is so low, it falls outside the range of FCC regulation. Of course, they could try to regulate it, but then they open up a pandora's box of major public backlashes, not to mention that to regulate low power wireless like xMax, means that now wireless airplanes, remote controls, and garage doors now fall into this regulatory scheme as well. Not to mention the already pervasive wi-fi that is already out there.
With a technology like xMax saturating the marketplace, you're looking at the ability of every computer becoming a node on the network. This type of network is also know as a mesh-network. With every computer equipped with one of these xMax transcievers, what are the telco's going to do? At this point, it will become completely obvious, even to your average consumer just how unfriendly and downright customer hostile the telco's are. Who needs cell phones, cable TV and commercial Clear Channel radio, when everyone can download, transmit and communicate anyway they want, whatever they want, wherever they want, whenever they want from small, cheap and out of control, very powerful, long range xMax-like devices?
And even if the worst case scenario comes to pass, and the Telco's manage to lock the internet down in the US, what about the rest of the world? All it takes is a small conglomerate of free networks somewhere to give them a strong competivie edge over those parts that lock it down, that in the information economy, those maintaining those lockdowns will do sp at their own peril. Capital favors liberty.
Links:
Posted by paul at December 13, 2005 01:15 AMThis is excellent news. We're sure to see a myriad embedded devices captialize on this technology. If it's as low power as they claim, it should easily run off solar power all day and the watch battery all night... basically meaning you could run one longer than the hardware itself could hold up to the elements. Single-cycle modulation appears to be the answer to the mesh hive networks future.
http://81.168.51.180/mediawiki/index.php/Hive_Blob
peace,
core
I believe you're right, Paul -- we are nearing the breaking point, where either the common WE of the people will have to take up the reins, or we will all perish in the meltdown of coporate-sponsored Fundamentalisms and Psychofascisms. Ecumenical salvation or universal extinction -- those are the only two options. And strangely enough, the outcome of it all is a matter of faith, or trust. To which the ultimate question is: Do you trust your own will to happiness, or not?
I pray that we answer in the affirmative.
Posted by: Upwinger at December 15, 2005 05:23 AM
Indeed, Paul hits it dead on. This is the revolution, and I hope I am a useful revolutionary.
The essential point can be clearly demonstrated by history. The internet specifically is merely the latest of a long progression. If the pattern of history holds true, then yes -- the internet is doomed to become assimilated and thereby destroyed as a disruptive tech. I argue that it's halfway to assimilation right now.
However, it will be replaced by something else, and something that is even more powerful, even more free, and better. And yes, that something else will eventually be assimilated and replaced by yet another something.
The key is to avoid becoming emotionally invested in the mechanism -- the internet, for example -- and keep your eye on the effect -- free (in every sense of the word) global (in every sense of the word) communications (in every sense of the word).
Although I think we are sitting on a cusp, one of those moments in history that will be looked back on as a key point, I don't think it's black and white. This can be viewed as a struggle of good vs evil, but it isn't one that will result in a clear victory for all time by any side. We're about to change battlefields, but the battle is eternal.
Posted by: JohnFen at December 15, 2005 10:33 AMI know this is diverging from the original subject a bit, but I want to go on record as believing that the 'battle' is NOT eternal. There has to be a (relative) end to duality and duplicity such as is currently tearing the ecosphere and psychosphere to pieces, or else we shall not make the next bar on the evolutionary latter. There will always be challenges, and rewarding ones at that -- and it shall always remain an uphill climb. But without an essential (dare I say, spiritual) Unity at the fore of the upcoming human endeavor, I fear that the schizoid fascisms of current world regimes may leave both body and soul Im not pessimistic about the near or far future, but I want to be clear about the seriousness of the goal, and the seriousness of a much needed optimism at the forefront of any philosophy that chooses to chart a winning course to tomorrow. Thank you, once again Paul, for being an important part of such an uplifting cosmology.
Happy Christmannukwanza
Posted by: Upwinger at December 15, 2005 08:00 PMWell, I should clarify a bit, because I sense we're talking on different levels of abstraction.
What I mean is that, as long as there are humans there will always be greed, corruption and selfishness. The current battlefields -- the environment, etc. -- will not likely always be where the battle is. Battles are won and the war changes venue.
And all in all, from a historical standpoint, good does prevail over evil in the long run. It's usually in a "two steps forward, one step back" kind of way (as Upwinger says, an uphill climb), but the overall trend is a very encouraging one indeed.
I guess all I'm saying is that enlightenment isn't a goal you can achieve (individually or as a species), it (like education) is a process that should never end.
Posted by: JohnFen at December 15, 2005 09:24 PMBlessin's all,
Sorry to interrupt this fine discussion. JohnFen, it seems that the never ending process, which you've described as enlightenment, is more aptly described as Samsara. According to Buddhist dogma, the causes of chronic human disease are greed, anger and ignorance. From this perspective it seems feasible, as Upwinger suggests as to whether one trusts one's own will to happiness, that in fact we do have the power to choose poisonous thoughts, words and actions, or to transmute these into positive energies.
In other news, everywhere I turn to read about xMax I find the words fraud and snake oil. What a bummer. I was really excited at the claims. I still remain optimistic. If the hype is all smoke and mirrors then it's the highest profile fraud scheme I've ever witnessed. Only time will tell. Of course, whether xMax violates Shannon's theorem (which their FAQ denies) or not doesn't detract from Paul's primary insights. Terrence McKenna has said that “the primary insight that has been secured here at the end of the 20th century... is to have understood finally that information is primary... the implication for the digerati, is that reality can therefore be hacked.”
This has become somewhat of a mantra for me this last year. I've been trying to develop a hacker wargame which combines elements of consciousness, mysticism and the spirit of free information. During the process I've reached several conclusions. One that really seems to resonate with Paul's blog is that information is by nature free-flowing, accessible, and boundless. Like a mountain stream which reaches a beaver's damn during the dry season may simply back up and slowly trickle around the edges. Inevitably, however, the rains will pour and this river of information will burst through or flow around any obstacle impeding its path. This is excellent news!
Looking back at the trend, as JohnFen points out, we could look back from cave painting and petroglyph to clay tablets to skins leaping forward to the printing press, radio, television, and soon some sort of information space which transcends all boundaries. I have some strange gut feelings about all of this though. What happens when information becomes more available, redundant, and at ever decreasing latencies? Are we swirling around the rim of a whirlpool which is going to suck us through into the macrosphere of a new paradigm? Or do we still have a long ways yet to go?
Maybe what JohnFen has been hinting at is true: this is yet still Samsara, the endless struggle. Perhaps Enlightenment is the only way to survive the impending singularity... or maybe I've read one too many suttas for my own good and am presently trapped in a strange reality tunnel.
So much for 6am ramblings... ;-)
peace, metta,
core
I am hopeful that 'greed, corruption and selfishness' are actually reptillian and simian traits, soon to atrophy, with more purely human traits coming to the fore. I don't think many of us have yet seen an authentic human -- the truly human has yet to push up out of the evolutionary chrysalis.
I agree with you, JohnFen, that enlightenment is an unending process. It is coincident with the gradual unfoldment of the Cosmos. Our viewpoints are not that dissimilar after all.
Peace to all
Posted by: Upwinger at December 16, 2005 06:15 AMas far as personal networks and influence levels for organizing people, the xMax demonstrate that potential. but - before we worry about organizing people, perhaps organizing ourselves as individuals is in order. there is so much cognitive dissonance that it is difficult to think. cutting through the b.s. requires a broad knowledge base and right now, all of us in this country are working with the same manipulated tools that may or may not be technically correct. How long has the lying been going on before we recognized that it was pervasive?
but Paul is onto something, and the positive approach is welcome and totally acceptible. It may take a bit of a while for some of us curmudgeons to convert over, but normal vincent peale defined the field nicely in a Previous Hi. There is a dude named Jeff in Oregon spreading positive thoughts to 'warriors' - i don't know where he is going with it - but he is nearly at his magic number of a thousand.
i will cross-post this post at the zone. welcome fellow bard
I'm interested in the interest in the sub-microwave spectrum (interested in interest, how about that!). To me it seems intuitively a more bilogically friendly technology, and so much closer to what I would like to see in a possibility for a self-organising and evolving network..
just a thought.
Posted by: sixnon at December 18, 2005 05:21 PMThere'll be push to control this tech, too, of course--probably under some terrorism-related pretext, but it hopefully won't succeed. These little islands of communication can, I should hope, link their msgs & communiques, just as drums used to be employed to relay msgs & info over great distances. This will be considered "underground", illegitimate, suspicious, etc., by the major media. We can only hope (but the hope, fortunately, isn't especially unreasonable) that the general public, if and to the extent this tech comes into widespread, "popular" (= "populist") use, will see thru the authoritarian pretextual bullshit, and continue to use this tech, and to combine with other liberatory tech as/when they come about. The transition period--the next 10-15 yrs or so--**may** become frought with peril as the power/wealth-elites try to hold onto and consolidate power, and impose what is nothing less than a hi-tech feudalism on the rest of us. Which is precisely why everyone in the transhumanist community--especially already-respected persons like Ray (Kurzweil), Hans (Moravec) Eric (Drexler) and many others need to also be conistently beating the drums of liberalism and the rule of law, civil liberties, **sousveillance**, and transparency/accountibility on the part of government agencies/bureaucracies. I hope we can avoid violence and oppression--there's a good chance that we can. But, as I continue to say (not at all intending to be a Cassandra...), be prepared for some political nastiness over the next 5-10 years. Marshall Brain's stuff on "Robotic Nation" sees both great liberatory potential, yet also much potential for mischief and nastiness as well. Paul's posts, however--and THANK YOU, again, dear Paul--remind us that the (trans)human drive for freedom, liberation, & self-actualization is NOW in full-play, and that genie cannot and shall not be procrusteanly shove back into a dank cell (if you'll allow the mix of metphors...). These technologies will be used to spread the word that there ARE alternatives to any proposed authoritarian bullshit, that there are liberatory and wealth-for-everyone, positive-sum paths that are available, and will continue to become available.
SPREAD THE WORD... in any way(s) you can: SPREAD THE WORD about the **positive**, ultra-decentralized, technological ultra-sophisticated future that is racing pell-mell... superexponentially to meet us...
And Happy Holidays to all...! ;) (wink)
Posted by: MCP2012 at December 18, 2005 07:16 PM