So I recently wrote about the importance of crisis for sustaining an active ethical life. Since then, I have finished the section using a real life Debian example (many to choose from, thanks Debian!) but since it is too long to post here, I only want to provide a description of the paradox that crisis induces: a state of unity in disunity.

Below is a short description of the crisis I describe in the chapter (perhaps later I will tell the full strory here but for those Debian developers that read, they I am sure will know I am talking about the infamous Vancouver Prospectus). I have also included a *very* accurate and *scientific* figure of the emotional state of the crisis. Unlike sociologists, economists, and psychologists, anthropologists ar WIMPS, we just don’t exploit frequently enough the force of representational data like charts and pictures. I say we should. I say let’s assert our right to point to “figure 1″ and represent the social world we write in a glossy picture or a chart with lots of arrows of causation and attribution. Ok, let’s see how.

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….. I was awed by the cascade of responses that emerged from one email. Before addressing its content, it is first worth describing the emotive and social atmosphere of utter paradox that arose, in which synchronicity sat alongside unsettling discordance. The project was in one of the most pronounced moments of synchronicity that I had seen in a long time. Hundreds and hundreds of developers gave their due attention in the form of voluminous writings

Also on my academic blog DGI, I post it here. So my advisor wanted more instance of joking and boasting in code and here are some examples with some initial reflections on what is all means (mostly taken from my dissertation).

Sherry Turkle long ago wrote about hacking as “sports death.” Below, using the example of code, I would like to show how the boasting and taunting and disdain found in comment code performs as a jousting comepetition that acts like thier informal peer review process and it the basis by which they embody the role of expert hacker. My own brash language and snarky jokes will probably not remain in the final version, but it is the only way I get through writing my dissertation…

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If the subject of elitism erupts on mailing lists discussion over project organization, a form of stylized boasting, taunting, cajoling, and elistist disdain is often performed and at the level of code. Let me provide two examples. The first one is written in the style of an

So so so, I am nearing the deadline… It looks like the dissertation will be around 450 pages, minus appendix and works cited. It is a little monstrous so I am glad that I am finishing even if it feels like a premature birth. Better to give birth to a smaller dissertation than a tub-oh-lard. Right?

Speaking of anthropology, Kerimreports on all the anthroblogs and has updated them on a wiki magic…

So Boing Boing is reporting on what is being dramatically designated as Greatest Phone Message in the World. I too was there and did spill a laugh or two over that mermaid message. It made me really miss, however, the rolm phone which was our local internet, connecting the entire campus together.

There was nothing like coming home to a good audio message mixed in with all these friendly reminders and questions that are now passed on over email. Now I barely touch the phone and it has decidedly become about the worst way to reach me. I check the messages about every 10 days, the eluisve robotic man-voice saying “you have 53 messages….”

Alexander Knorr has pointed out, that even those on the “other side” also play and diz with their code.

I have also been meaning to link to his post which has some nice thought on fieldwork and its changing nature

Thanks Alex!

Today my advisor told me that I need more examples of hackers being playful and witty especially in the very acts of coding. Thanks to the efforts of my online IRC buddies we are starting to dig some good examples up.

Thanks Karl! :=)

;; if you look at this next function from far away, it resembles a
;; gun. But only with this comment above…
(defun bookmark-bmenu-check-position ()
;; Returns t if on a line with a bookmark.
;; Otherwise, repositions and returns t.
;; written by David Hughes
;; Mucho thanks, David! -karl
(cond ((< (count-lines (point-min) (point)) 2)
(goto-char (point-min))
(forward-line 2)
t)
((and (bolp) (eobp))
(beginning-of-line 0)
t)
(t
t)))

Now that the dissertation is almost done, I realize that a lot of it focuses on the experience of crisis and its relationship to the otherwise mundane processes of everyday life through which values are erected and solidified. My first chapter, for example looks at the DeCSS protests, examining how they allow for a moment of acute reflexivity in which incipient norms are solidified. Crisis is a moment in which certain cultural trends are sealed, a done deal, well at least until another crisis hits. Now I am on my last full chapter, which examines three ethical moments/forms of labor that unfold on the Debian project

I don’t consider myself overly interested in the politics, gender, and ethics of blogging but I do keep my eyes and ears perked for interesting happenings. Since I am going to be in CA this summer for a values in design workshop, I decided to register for the Blogher conference being held in San Jose July 30th. One aspect that I immediately liked about the conference is that there are very reasonable student rates…

Non-commerical Linux use on the rise:

New data released this week from research firm Evans Data shows that non-commercial Linux distribution use has passed the inflection point and is now more widely used by developers than commercial Linux distributions.

I saw this remarkable photo spread on Purselipsquarejaw and can not but help passing it along here.

These are the most striking photos I have seen about how bodies are literally made. A certain vision of self, physique, right, and wrong, culturally scuplted across time and space in the US through a dizzing range of everyday practices. This is visual ethnography at its finest, driving home how text, taken alone can be a medium of extreme poverty. While it is powerful and concise, and can be poetic and evocative, text alone is sometimes hard to capture the actual force and depth of what you are trying to capture.

Zonezero nicely theorizes the nature of digital photos and its implications for capturing a sense of reality in the making, a new type of the real.

I guess I am struggling with that right now with my dissertation, wrapping up two chapters that mean a lot to me for they touch upon many personal experiences. And by virtue of experiencing them, I know my representation is just a mere shadow of the actual events I witnessed.

Anyway, I better get back to that, shadow or not, its needs to be done, soon.:-)