Morozov is tapping into a current of thought that is becoming increasingly popular. It's the same sentiment that has triggered a backlash against TED talks - a backlash against attractively packaged memes that are being sold using slick conference talks or other forms of effective marketing. This sentiment is partly driven by a skepticism about what is really being marketed. Is it the idea or is it really personal influence, consulting careers and book sales?
It's easy to apply this type of skepticism to O'Reilly media which promotes endless ideas such as 'Big Data' rebranding old technology and approaches as new, invalidating any previous concerns with data privacy and the like. I think we as an industry take the memes too seriously and with too little critical thought.
I agree TED is a bit of a nexus for it. In my circles I see a sort of backlash (or maybe, better, buyer's remorse) directed at TED being fairly broad, hitting many people who wouldn't read more than a few sentences of Morozov. But then Morozov thrusts a dagger into that wound for a subset of people. For people who never liked any of that stuff and just think society is going downhill with all this technological nonsense, Morozov has less appeal, because you've already got Nicholas Carr and many other people for that angle.
You mention ideas vs. packaging/motives, but I think I've gotten more skeptical about the style of idea as well. Skepticism of the marketing/book/speaking-tour angle probably plays a role in that, but the ideas increasingly seem sort of fluffy. I like to think TED was better back when I was more positive on it, but I've re-watched a few older talks I recall liking, and they seem to have aged poorly, at least for me. I don't have anything against popularizing science, but I can't find much in the TED archives anymore that reminds me of what I think of as good popularized science, up to the gold standard of a Carl Sagan. It more often reminds me of motivational speakers and self-help gurus, the kinds of ideas you see on a CNN segment or something: new science says [amazing revelation that will change your life]. The Onion parody floating around [1] caricatures some of the rhetorical style pretty well. The style somehow seemed fresh at the time, but looking back on older TED talks now, they seem not all that different from stuff I was already familiar with earlier, a certain genre of lightly science-flavored "idea" stuff that's existed since at least the '70s. Maybe with better production values— some of the '70s stuff seems a lot more embarrassing even now.
That's a really interesting point, I hadn't considered that before now. There are a couple that I still really like, but I also think many of them legitimately were more interesting than they would be now - not because their information is dated, but maybe just because people have more connected knowledge bases now...?
It's a sad day. I came across a passage recently from The Tao of Programming which reminded me of Dennis Ritchie.
"The programmers of old were mysterious and profound. We cannot fathom their thoughts, so all we do is describe their appearance.
Aware, like a fox crossing the water. Alert, like a general on the battlefield. Kind, like a hostess greeting her guests. Simple, like uncarved blocks of wood. Opaque, like black pools in darkened caves.
Who can tell the secrets of their hearts and minds?
The programmers like D Rithchie and his generation are like the philosophers of ancient greece, they are profound, mystical, and have a large effect on our present.
It's worth remembering that even Stallman himself admits he is mildly autistic. Autism is often characterized by black and white thinking and lack of empathy towards others - both of which are displayed to excess in his comment.
From end-note 2. "Stallman considers himself afflicted, to some degree, by autism: a condition that, he says, makes it difficult for him to interact with people."
Some of these conversations strike me as a very Western view-point of religion, God and theism/atheism.
Religions like Buddhism, Jainism, Advaita Vedanta, Taoism and many eastern 'mystical' traditions don't actually talk about creator deities and the other meta-physics to which these scientists are non-believers.
> Who is the greatest contemporary philosopher that comes to mind?
That is a question that is as difficult to answer as "Who is the greatest contemporary scientist?"
Some candidates are Slavoj Žižek, Peter Singer, Annette Baier, Alastair Hannay, Daniel Dennett, John Searle, Simon Blackburn, Thomas Nagel, Leo Zaibert. The are also many famous philosophers are partly academics in specialist fields, eg. Richard Dawkins, Umberto Eco, Noam Chomsky, Steven Pinker, George Dyson and many more.
> Who is the greatest contemporary philosopher that comes to mind?
In fact, this is not a relevant question, it's the same like we'd be asking "who's the tallest philosopher?" or "who's the most handsome?". Heraclitus or Epicurus or Thomas Aquinas are as relevant to us, people of this day and age, as are the philosophers that by chance happen to live in the same time with us. I don't know who said it first (Hegel, I think), but I think that the history of philosophy is the same thing as philosophy itself, there's no linear progress from the pre-Socratics to the post-Marxists.
I assume since no-one has mentioned Google+ in connection with Google App Engine, that is not built on top of it.
Sure Google+ probably shares infrastructure with GAE, but you would think that if Google were really serious about GAE they would use it for their own external products. It sends a mixed message to the market when they tell app developers to use a technology for mission critical apps that they are not using themselves.
One of the cool things about using a functional language for web development is the potential to use continuation-passing style (CPS) to make http look like a stateful protocol, which makes implementing chains of user interactions a lot simpler.
I know Clojure doesn't support first-class continuations, but does anyone know whether is it possible to use Clojure Noir to program in this style?
You can easily transfer your H1-B to another company (the one you hold equity in), it is not a big deal. What you can't do is work for both companies at the same time.
You can hold H-1B status with two companies and get paid by both as long as you work the minimum number of hours stated on the H-1B application for each company. So you may end up working about 70-80 hours per week.
The problem is that when applying for, or even transferring, an H-1B the petitioning employer has to show revenue or existing capital and they also ask you if you have any ownership in the company. I am not sure what the impact of putting 'yes' in the ownership column would mean; likely a request for evidence.
Consult a good lawyer to guesstimate your chance of getting an H1 sponsored by your new company. If the odds are good (ideally, preexisting success cases) I would apply for a whole new H1 (not a transfer). If for some reason you do not get it, you are not out of status. If you do get it, turn in your resignation at the existing place. Make sure you work for the required number of hours for both parties during your transition period (2 weeks or whatever).
You can transfer it to the company, but if the Feds find out that you own significant equity in that company - they take that as an indication that you are intending to be an 'immigrant' on a non-immigrant visa, which violates the intent and spirit of the visa.
So, sure, you may be able to do it and not get caught. But if you do, you just got a one-way ticket home.
That's right, but your co-founder(s) can sponsor you, and indeed you them. Provided that you could in theory be fired (a three person board for example) then you can be classed as an employee for the purposes of the H1-B.
Very interesting! I'm up for H1B renewal in 2012, it might make sense for me to wait for that to get processed and then I can move the sponsorship from my current company to the startup.
Yes you can but you will need to get your H1-B transferred to the new company.
Non US-citizens can hold equity in C-Corps (not S-Corps), but that by itself does not allow you to live or work in the US. You would need to you get your H1-B transferred to the new company, but this is not a particularly difficult process.
It's easy to apply this type of skepticism to O'Reilly media which promotes endless ideas such as 'Big Data' rebranding old technology and approaches as new, invalidating any previous concerns with data privacy and the like. I think we as an industry take the memes too seriously and with too little critical thought.