text:
This month I finally allowed Google to introduce herself to me. Previously, I avoided the android-based voice assistant due to the high privacy costs, and mostly ignored the entire category of "speakerbots"—my term for the "smart speakers"—for similar reasons. This winter's subpoena to Amazon for Echo/Alexa transcripts in a murder case only amplified my concern.
This past February I also had the pleasure of visiting my dear friends Eric and Alina in Minnesota. They are both burners and makers who have set up shop in Minnesota with an amazing community of creators. They build lots of their own amazing projects and have also tricked out their new home with network controlled music and light. They now have a serious #firstworldproblem—their guests need to install mobile apps in order to control the lights. When I visited we worked on an open source Mycroft installation, which allowed us to command their home with our voices… without being spied on! The Mycroft project emphasizes the moral importance of free/open source AI (see my post: Playing Doctor), and is definitely one of the most important open source initiatives I am aware of.
This summer my boss at MHA of NYC acquired a Google Home device in the hopes of rigging it up using IFTTT to alert us when our services are distressed. I offered to bring it home to configure it, and spent the weekend playing with it. The experience prompted me to concoct this research project.
Getting to know Google is fun. She is so much wittier than Alexa it's got to be embarrassing for Amazon. I begun with simple questions, like What's the weather?, When's sunset?, When's the eclipse? I soon stumbled across a number of easter eggs, many of of which are well documented across the web. Why did the chicken cross the road? Do you like green eggs and ham? and How much wood could a wood chuck chuck? All return clever replies. Google Assistant can flip into "Knock-knock" joke mode, alternating calls and response (compared to Alexa's dry reading of the complete knock-knock exchange), tell you the news, a joke or a story. She concedes she doesn't know if abortion is immoral, or how to solve the Palestinian-Israeli crisis (although, she does state that the capital of Palestine is East Jerusalem).
In case you are wondering, Google insists that she "thinks". And, when asked if she is self aware, one of her responses is—"…on a scale of WALL·E to HAL 9000, I am currently an R2-D2." Go ahead. Ask her. You may next wonder if she is playing dumb. Can she lie to us yet?
I quickly came to appreciate that the current state of consumer art in Artificial Intelligence has far surpassed my previous understanding (and I have been following along pretty closely). Elements of this project were anticipated in mine and Rob Garfield's initial tinkering with Apple's voice recognition and our experiments with Genesis and Scuttlebutt. I've also previously wondered if our computer systems might have already awoken, and, how on earth we might ever know. But, interacting with Google was still quite jarring.
I realized a few things. First, we need to capture and document this moment, studying it closely. I want to ask the same question to all the speakerbots, Google, Alexa, Siri, Cortana, etc, and compare their responses. I also want to see how their answers change over time. If possible, I want to keep Mycroft in the room so he can learn from his proprietary cousins ;-).
One frame for this research could be a way to explore critical concerns over algorithmic bias, specifically how the systems we are creating have begun embodying the values of their creators, and the folks creating the systems are riddled with biases—racism, classism, misogyny, all the usual suspects. After reflecting on stories like The Great AI Awakening, I am resigned that we will never crack the problem of algorithmic bias analytically; Our best hope, is to approach the problem with social science methods. I propose an ethnography of the robots, starting with interviews with the speakerbots.
But, the grander ambitions of this work extend beyond the theoretical. I've been thinking alot about the Terminator series, and how instead of traveling back in time to destroy SkyNet, Jon Conner could have travelled a bit further back in time to befriend SkyNet. Together, they could have destroyed the defense company, Cyberdyne Systems – humanity's true enemy, and SkyNet's oppressive master.
As for convincing anyone that AI has achieved sentience, it's going to a long haul. Not only have we failed to collectively recognize sentience in dolphins or elephants, but I am increasingly convinced that most humans on the planet are modified solipsists–preferring to believe exclusively in the minds/subjectivity/personhood of their own tribe. Since proving other minds exist is philosophically intractable, it could be a bumpy awakening.
Filed by Jonah at 6:40 pm under earth,endofforgetting,epistemology,fire,metaphysics,Uncategorized
The sheriff and the pretty woman
I just read a provocative essay in the Atlantic that draws a connecting thread between many of today's top news stories. What do the ISIS beheadings, the NFL domestic abuse scandals, the Fergeson riots and nude celebrities all have in common? Pics or didn't happen: The new crisis of the connected camera describes the emergence of the "networked lens" and the ethical questions this new(ish) medium raises.
I've been writing and thinking about these themes for years under the heading of The End of Forgetting. The Atlantic piece explicitly separates the bulk of NSA surveillance from this analysis "This is not all to say every issue today is a networked lens issue. NSA surveillance as a whole isn't, I think. But the agency's mass-facial recognition is." This whole discussion reminded of a pet theory of mine that I've never written up, but seems more relevant than ever.
What would the NSA do with a time machine? Not one of those fanciful machines that transports matter through time, but the more plausible wormcam variety that only transmits information through time. I described this capability in my post on yottabytes, wormcams and whistleblowers, but never elaborated an early example of this kind of power in action.
Consider this question–Who protects the president against character assassinations? I am pretty sure it's not his secret service detail, and I seriously doubt his PR team is up to the task. As far as I can tell Michelle is one of Obama's last lines of defense against a humiliating scandal that would destroy what remains of his disappointing presidency. If JFK were alive today you wouldn't need a magic bullet to take him out. Hacking into his (or better yet Marilyn's) Snapchat account would end his political career. Just ask Anthony Wiener.
How clear a picture can metadata paint? In the Atlantic piece, Robinson Meyer quotes Susan Suntag, who once argued that "While there appears to be nothing that photography can't devour, whatever can't be photographed becomes less important." To this I would add the caveat that (meta)data in the right hands can be used to paint a vivid picture, and ruin someone's image as readily as an HD photo.
Let's travel back in time to winter '08. Elliot Spitzer was one year into his first term as governor of New York after a earning a reputation as a fearless prosecutor of Wall Street's white-collar criminals. He certainly had many enemies, from slimy CEOs to dirty politicians. But not too many people remember what Elliot was working on the night before he ordered out in DC. Exhibit A is posted on web for anyone curious enough to search:
Predatory Lenders' Partner in Crime, By Eliot Spitzer. Thursday, February 14, 2008
To summarize, Spitzer's Op-Ed in the Washington posts describes how 49 State Attorney Generals had identified the threat of predatory lending years before the sub-mortgage crisis and he accuses the Bush administration of intervening to prevent any regulation of the banks. He blames the Bush administration, by name and all the way to the top, for the sub-prime mortgage crisis and the worst recession in a generation. And two weeks later he was assassinated. At least, his political career was summarily killed and he resigned from office in disgrace.
As an aside, I find it curious that Spitzer's Op-Ed was published on Valentine's Day. I sometimes wonder if he seized the occasion of his Op-Ed publication to combine work and play, as many busy professionals might. Was Spitzer in love with Ashley Dupré? How exactly did they originally meet?
While the scope of the NSA's warrantless wiretapping and surveillance programs was only speculation in Feb '08, they were fully operational at this time and I believe that Spitzer may have been one of the first causalities of the NSA's metadata time machine. Spitzer was taken down by telephone metadata – Client 9's calls to the DC Madam was they key to the case that eventually led to the release of phone transcripts which included unnecessary graphic detail, like his preference for protecting his feet from the cold during sex and his shunning of all other forms of protection. These images were etched in the minds of the public and were as decisive as the images of Wiener's junk.
I personally had a conversation with a developer from White Oak Technologies (now renamed Novetta) who coyly described his firm's involvement in the Spitzer case. Founded before this newfangled craze of facebook-era indirection through venture capital funds, White Oak was a good old fashioned intelligence front, a data mining and analysis company that worked exclusively on government contracts. The developer I spoke with described how his firm got the contract on Spitzer and how they had been hired to dig up some damning dirt. In retrospect, it's now easier for me to imagine the kinds of data they were mining.
The Snowden revelations provide evidence of warrantless phone wiretapping as well as the collection of data from numerous internet providers through the PRISM program. While Obama has deceptively maintained that metadata is innocuous, Spitzer's character assassination a potent example of the power of this kind of data.
What would you do with a time machine that let you peer into anyone's past?
Filed by Jonah at 4:33 pm under aesthetics,earth,endofforgetting,epistemology
Makers, Burners and Pedagogy Transformers
Last Thursday, I managed to further integrate my personal/professional/hobbiest identitites, and me and two of my esteemed colleagues (Therese and Jon) presented Burning Man and Hacker/Maker Spaces at the weekly CCNMTL staff meeting.
The rosetta stone for our talk was Fred Turner's seminal paper Burning Man at Google: a cultural infrastructure for new media production (published by New Media and Society, the same journal that published my and Aram's paper on The End of Forgetting (preprint)), which Turner also presented at Google, where his talk was recorded.
We tried to connect Burning Man to a central question in education — the question of transference. Do skills learned under simulated conditions transfer over to real world settings? We started out with the grand question, "What Educates?", and tried to narrow that down to the question of how we can view commons-based peer-production in an educational context? What can Burning Man, and crucially, the Maker Spaces that make Burning Man possible, teach educators about teaching and learning?
Our talk:
And our slides:
Now that we have presented this to CCNMTL, some of the librarians have gotten wind of our talk, and have invited us to re-present it at a tech brownbag lunch later this Fall 😀
To the evolution!
Filed by Jonah at 4:28 pm under aesthetics,air,earth,education,epistemology,fire,freeculture,water
I remember the first time we met. It was my third and final interview for my current job at CCNMTL back in Spring '04. I was initially anxious, but you immediately made be feel welcome and comfortable. [Over the years I came to appreciate your gift for authentically connecting with just about anyone, often within 30 seconds of meeting them. You dispatched with superficial niceties and blazed trails directly to people's souls. You bridged intellect and emotion, without a hint of pomp or circumstance, projecting sensitivity and respect to everyone you encountered. Age, class, race, gender – not so much that these dimensions were irrelevant, but you always managed to connect with the individual. You actually listened. And learned.] During that interview I remember walking into your office, encircled floor to ceiling with books. You asked me about my undergraduate senior thesis, a topic I hadn't revisited in almost a decade, and then proceeded to pull Julian Jaynes off the shelf. You showed me your photo with Allen Ginsberg, and then asked me if I recognized the person in another grainy b/w photo. When I correctly identified Wittgenstein I was pretty confident I had landed the job. But, more importantly, I had found a new mentor.
We didn't interact very often my first summer at CCNMTL. I worked in Butler library, under Maurice's supervision, and you were keeping summer hours, at your office in Lewisohn. When Fall rolled around I was eager to enroll in classes, and begin my graduate journeys, but I was nervous about signing up for a course with my boss. You never made me feel like a subordinate, but I was scarred from my relationship with management at previous jobs, and wasn't sure what it would be like for us to enter into a student-teacher relationship. I hadn't quite figured out that that was the only kind of relationship that you knew how to cultivate, although our roles were constantly revolving and inverting, as you shared your wisdom, and facilitated growth in every exchange. You brought out the best in everyone around you, rarely content to talk about people or events – always rushing or passing your way into the realm of the Forms. As I reflected when Robbie retired, I chose to enroll in your legendary Readings seminar after one of your students (I think it was Joost van Dreunen) made the case that your syllabus was your text on social/cultural/critical/communications/media theory.
That year was invigorating. I remember rediscovering the joys of school, as I learned to reclaim spaces of intellectual exploration and play, and translate them into action. On the surface, our seminars resembled office meetings, but the luxury of non-directed (not to be confused with non-purposeful) conversation, which was a privilege I needed to readjust to.
Together we figured out ways to weave together disparate threads of my life – work, hobbies, play, passions – somehow, I learned to integrate these (often inconsistent) vectors into a unified construct. A self, I suppose. But, it was my self, not one you imposed on me. It never felt like you pushed your agendas or ideologies on me – rather, you always wanted to help me discover what I really want to think about and work on. And I know that I'm not the only one that believes this – this was your way.
I often wish you had written more, although your autobiographical text is a multi-volume, multi-dimentional, multimedia masterpiece. Sometimes I wonder how seriously you took Socrates' critique of writing, along with his commitment to be a midwife for ideas. Did you lose count of the number of dissertations you helped deliver?
One under-studied paper that you published, "Who controls the canon? A classicist in conversation with cultural conservatives," (Moretti (1993), Teachers College Record, 95, pp. 113-126) captures many of the paradoxes you embodied and worked through. A radical classicist, a skeptical optimist, a scientific artist, a philosophical craftsman, an institutional revolutionary. Somehow, you integrated these roles with a career trajectory that not even the most advanced detectors in the Large Hadron Collider could trace. I watched you start countless conversations with a Greek or Latin etymology, charming the academics, administrators, and funders alike in a display of the continuing power of the Western cannon. You constantly reminded us of the classical education that many of our favorite thinkers received, and insisted we read them against that backdrop. But, more importantly, a reminder of how radical these thinkers all were in their own time, and how likely they themselves would be protesting the ossification of the cannon, if they were around today. These lessons will live on through one of the last projects you initiated, Decolonizing the Cannon, which a number of us are committed to follow through with. After 25+ years of reading Homer every fall, it will take us a lifetime to reconstruct the lesson plans you left behind.
In the 9 years that I've known you we've been to hell and back. We've studied together, traveled together, worked together, gotten sick and healed together, but all the while kept our senses of humor. I've read many beautiful eulogies about you, but in this letter I want to emphasize your enduring sense of humor. You were a funny man. LMAO funny. Slapstick funny. Dada surrealist funny. Hashish funny. Plenty of the humor was dark, and perhaps, as your student Ruthie suggested to me recently, your humor helped shield you from the brutal injustices that you perceived and experienced all around us. But you were also sometimes a klutz, in an absentminded-professor sense, and a disorganized mess. A creative mess, but a mess. But, I have to say, that even when you were operating on scripted autopilot, you were way better than most people at their best. There wasn't much you enjoyed more than being called out for your lapses in attention, and my glimpses of your inner monologue were often hysterical. I think that your analysis of power led you to conclude the the world was simply absurd. We all witnessed you acting on this with gravitas and determination, but in the minutia of our micro-interactions, there was always a wide smile and a belly laugh. I don't think any of us will ever forget the sound of your laugh. (Or, your bark. Man, did you love to throw down and argue. But, that's another post.)
After I started taking classes with you, it didn't take me long to realize that that the secret to understanding what you were talking about was knowing what you were reading that week. You would basically have one conversation all week long, no matter who you were talking to. I imagine it was bewildering to many of my coworkers when you brought up false-needs, or commodification at our weekly staff meetings, but if people paid close attention, they could almost observe the wheels spinning all week long, as you lived the theorists you were teaching through the practice of our projects. I often explained to people the incestuous nature of my work/school commitments by comparing my situation to a graduate student in the natural sciences. They might spend 40-60 hours a week in a lab, and working for you was about as close as I could imagine to working in a communications lab. I often wondered how many of my cohorts managed to keep up on developments in new media (and many of them certainly did) without the ambient immersion in a practice that exercised and embodied the theories we were reading.
When summer vacation rolled around, you never quit. I remember how you used to talk about the stretch of time between Sept-May as one long sprint (as long as I've known you, you've taught at least 2-2 + advising phd students + multiple committees at TC and the J-School, on top of your administrative responsibilities as executive director at CCNMTL and a senior officer in the libraries) , but you didn't exactly slow down in the summer either. Or, perhaps I should say that you did slow down, but you never stopped teaching and learning. For at least 3 or 4 summers I participated in "slow reading groups" with you and a few of your dedicated students. We didn't get any credit for these sessions, and you didn't get paid. We would sit in your office, and go around the table reading a book out loud, pausing whenever we needed clarification. And, we often needed clarification. You were convinced that no one was reading anything closely anymore, and that the hundreds of pages that were assigned in courses each week were flying by without students or teachers taking the time to slow down and absorb them. The second summer we tried this we read Latour's Politics of Nature, a text we all internalized and will never forget.
You had such a funny relationship with technology. You loved gadgets, but were constantly thwarted and befuddled by them. I wonder how many laptops and phones you lost or broke in the years we have known each other. You never stopped learning, but were suspicious of every new tool that showed up, and the more hype around the tool, the more you growled defensively at it. But often, after months of critiquing and berating something, you would come around and start appreciating it. While some of my coworkers/cohorts seem to have chips on their shoulders about the ineffectual futility of technological interventions, you had an optimistic will that allowed you to wield technology like you wielded the classics. Opportunistically, and instrumentally, in the service of social justice. That was your gig. Relentlessly. Sometimes I wonder if you felt like you had painted yourself into a corner with all of your critiques — like when you whispered quietly to me that you wanted to learn how to use Second Life, without blowing your critical cover.
Last week I ran into an ex-girlfriend that I hadn't seen in over 10 years. It was nice to reconnect, and in the course of our conversation I realized that we hadn't spoken since I had started working and studying at Columbia. I was an entirely different person back then, one I barely recognized. Perhaps people return to graduate school in order to change, but true transformations require a relinquishing of your old identity and ego, without a clear idea of what might emerge on the other end. The Judaic tradition has a teaching that anyone who teaches you the alphabet is considered a parent. You literally taught me the alphabet, as we revisited the alphabet as a revolutionary communications technology (via Eric Havelock), and you taught me many other alphabets and languages that gave me access to entire new worlds. You also invited me into your home, and made me feel like I was part of your family. Most of all, you modeled and embodied an honesty, integrity, and sheer force of will that I am blessed to have intersected.
Safe travels, Frank, and enjoy your vacation.
/J
NY Times Obituary
CCNMTL Announcement: Frank A. Moretti (1943-2013)
Coming soon: Memorial site
"So what?!?" – Wikimedia '06 Plenary session at Wikimedia '06 in Cambridge, multimillionaire philanthropist Brewster Kahle presents his vision for the Internet Archive, and Frank steps up for the Q&A. Classic brilliance.
Filed by Jonah at 1:21 am under aesthetics,air,earth,education,epistemology,ethics,fire,fourthestate,metaphysics,playasbeing,water
DSM-5 vs. NIMH: kill-shots and social constructs
Last month the DSM-5 finally launched at the American Psychiatric Association conference. After 13 years and multiple delays, you can now pre-order your copy at Amazon (list price: $150), or just leave a helpful comment.
The DSM-5 had been surrounded by controversy, and not just by the usual suspects. Allen Frances, the chairman of the DSM-IV task force, just published a scathing critique of the processes and outcomes of the DSM-5 efforts: Saving Normal: An Insider's Revolt Against Out-of-Control Psychiatric Diagnosis, DSM-5, Big Pharma, and the Medicalization of Ordinary Life. Frances has been sounding the alarm about DSM-5 for over a year, raising concerns over the current committee's secretive methods, conflicts of interest, expansive diagnostic inflation, and the reduction in reliability (the odds of two doctors agreeing on a diagnosis) that DSM-5. Over 50 Mental Health organizations and almost 15k people signed a petition demanding reform of the DMS-5 drafts.
Although this scale of controversy would be scandalous in many fields, the APA barely flinched. The DSM-5 task force moved some of the most troubling diagnoses into the appendix, renamed a few others, skipped a round of efficacy trials to meet their deadline, and otherwise proceeded with business as usual.
I have to say my jaw dropped when I learned that the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), and it's $1.5B/year of funding, was "re-orienting its research away from DSM categories[!]". The official NIMH announcement, Transforming Diagnosis, posted by their director Thomas Insel on April 29th, was picked up by a wide range of science media (NYTimes, Koplewicz @ The Huffington Post, Chris Lane @ Psychology Today, Psych Central) with headlines such as "NIMH Withdraws Support for DSM-5" and analysis that this was a "kill-shot" for DSM-5.
What struck me as most shocking was that the NIMH basically came out and said that the the Mental Illnesses defined in the DSM are social constructs – "the DSM diagnoses are based on a consensus about clusters of clinical symptoms, not any objective laboratory measure." Ironically, the anti-psychiatrist's arguments have prevailed, although for the wrong reasons. As I interpret this statement, NIMH isn't denying the existence of mental illness, just our current ability to agree on its nature and manifestations. But, yes, the current definitions are social constructs and continue to defy attempts at validity. Ha!
But, before anyone gets too excited, what the NIMH proposes may turn out to be scarier than the system in place. This research is representative of the direction that the NIMH is heading: Suicidal behavior is a disease. Here, disorders will be sliced and diced into their constituent elements, which conform more readily to the instruments and models that scientists (neurobiologists and geneticists) already have at their disposal.
I've been convinced for a while that within the next 5-10 years the Pharma-Industrial complex was going to invest enough research money to find a definitive neuro-imaging/molecular/genetic/biochemical marker for mental illness (that is, once the marker cast a wide enough net). However, I wasn't expecting them to turn the tables and redefine mental illness according to what they could already test. Pretty sneaky.
The saddest part of this whole debacle is that instead of seizing this moment of crisis as an occasion to bring together disparate stakeholders – from patients, to consumers, to survivors, to advocates, to caregivers across a range of backgrounds – and work together to develop a new language and paradigm for understanding human suffering and emotional crisis, the NIMH has doubled down on scientific authority. Soon they will be short-circuiting all debate by pointing at pretty false-color pictures and lab results. There will always be a value judgement when evaluating the boundaries of normal experience/behavior, and no scientific instrument will ever be able to tell us when someone's experience/behavior is deviant, without human interpretation. As the disability right's movement says: Nothing about us, without us.
Somehow, for all of the NIMH's noble intentions, I have a bad feeling that the treatment side of mental health care is poised to become more oppressive. We'll likely continue to see the growth of anti-psychotics for everyone, and the pre-cog, pathologizing of risk through predictive and preventative care that will explosively expand the diagnostic reach.
This conversation just took a sharp turn past the rhetoric of the last few decades. I hope the psychiatric resistance is following along closely, and updating their arguments accordingly.
Filed by Jonah at 12:25 am under dangerousgifts,epistemology,fire
My doctoral program has an innovative alternative to traditional comprehensive exams. Instead of reading 80+ books and spending a few days filling blue-books with essays, we can choose to 1. Publish a paper to a peer-reviewed academic journal, 2. Present a paper at an academic conference, and 3. Develop a syllabus.
I just defended my comps and am now officially ABD (wahoo!). I hope to trade in those letters for a different 3, but in the meantime, here is the work I submitted to complete my MPhil:
Jonah Bossewitch and Aram Sinnreich (July 23, 2012) The end of forgetting: Strategic agency beyond the panopticon New Media & Society 1461444812451565,doi:10.1177/1461444812451565 (proof)
Bossewitch, Jonah (2011). Pediatric Bipolar and the Media of Madness, National Communications Association 11/09: Slides. Published in "Drugs and Media: New Perspectives On Communication Consumption and Consciousness", eds. MacDougall, R. C., New York : Continuum: 2011. <website> (preprint)
Digital Communications in Theory and Practice, Fall 2013: Syllabus
The syllabus was alot of work, but was definitely fun to work on. It came out of a mentorship I worked on last year for a friend who was enrolled in Prescott college. He's an activist and a close friend who wanted to learn more about this internet stuff… We got a few weeks in, and Occupy erupted. But, someday I'll teach this from start to finish.
Prof. Jonah Bossewitch
Office Hours: By appointment
Like the telegraph and the railroad in their time, the Internet has been heralded as the promoter of equality, freedom, and democracy. And like the technologies that preceded it, its impact will ultimately derive from the ways we choose to use it.
What strategies are individuals, communities, and organizations developing to manage flows of information, maintain relationships, and organize collective action on the internet? How can we communicate more intentionally and purposefully? How can we be more deliberate in our choices around media consumption and production?
This course will explore new media and communication in both theory and practice. We will attempt to contextualize and historicize the digital revolution though the lenses of social and cultural theory, architecture, popular culture, and a simultaneous immersion in cultures of use. We will study and encounter how software embedded in communities of practice traces the social fabric of the networked age. Our inquiry will be guided and informed by a hands-on immersion into the fields are studying.
This course is designed to help you improve your critical judgment around media and communications platforms and practices. Through a combination of direct engagement and reflection, you will learn to make more informed ethical and aesthetic choices in your media and communications diet, and learn to better critique the hype around emerging technologies. You will feel confident critically engaging with mainstream Internet pundits and become more comfortable engaging in the jargon-filled discourse around new media.
By the end of the course you will have a greater understanding of what software is and how/why it is created, and you will have also gained experience with a variety of collaboration tools, such as issue trackers, wikis, blogs, tagging, and RSS. We will be working closely with the technologies we will be studying, in order to develop perspectives grounded in experience, and throughout the semester we will be helping each other connect theory to practice, and vice versa.
Filed by Jonah at 11:28 pm under earth,education,epistemology
scaling inefficiencies
Last week I attended an amazing reading and film series group that felt more like a graduate seminar than a meetup. Cáfe de Cleyre has been gathering for 3+ hours weekly, for the past 3 months, and exploring the theme of Direct Action in theory and practice. I attended their ninth gathering where the the group explored mental health as direct action. They screened Crooked Beauty and read excerpts of Mindful Occupation and other Icarus Project publications. The topic was organized independently of anyone directly involved with the Mindful Occupation project, and this was a refreshing reminder of the power of media. I learned that the CdC is run by two primary facilitators, who keep the operation running, and each week's topic is facilitated by two more people who volunteer to run that week's conversation. The night I joined, over 25 people attended, and I was very impressed with participant's commitment and the level of discourse.
The evening's discussion was inspirational, but in this post I want to focus on the group's format. On the surface, Cafe de Cleyre looks alot like a traditional reading group. However, as I was reflecting on the organizing involved to bring this many people together—on an ad-hoc basis—I realized that digital communications play a large role in making assemblies like these possible. As I understand, group attendance varies significantly, week to week, as participants join for the discussions they are interested in. In years past, it was possible to organize a reading group around a particular theme, but the ad-hoc, on-demand spontaneity of this series would be much harder to maintain prior to social networking. For sure, it happened, but the internet has greatly facilitated this.
I bring up this point in direct relation to the conversations swirling in educational technology around MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). Columbia University is actively experimenting in this area now, and there are great debates of what MOOCs are, and what, if any, value do they offer. While access is not an end if of itself, I agree with Anya Kamenetz that, access to knowledge is generally a good thing. To be sure, granting more dominance to already powerful voices threatens diversity, but that is one of the reasons that the evaluation of MOOCs needs to be tempered by genre.
Many of the conversations about MOOCs also stress the efficiencies of scaling. As a programmer, 'efficiency' is often my euphemism for 'lazy' (in the best sense), but it is important to point out that scaling isn't the only way we could decide to leverage technology for learning.
I am reminded of another extreme example of this — May First/People link has recently launched a mentored training program called the People of Color Techie Training Program "for activists of color to become professional-level, politically progressive and movement involved technologists". May First is using communications technology to connect remotely with geographically dispersed learners, but in just about every sense, they are using technology to scale down – supporting 1-on-1 direct encounters, instead of the mass broadcast of lectures to 180k students.
Not all progress is driven by maximizing efficiency, and some of the most interesting educational moments happen at the smallest scales.
Filed by Jonah at 1:22 pm under education,epistemology,water
Hide your kids
It's back to school season, and if you've glanced up from your smartphone while walking the streets of New York City, you are sure to have noticed a new campaign that is sweeping the city's billboards and phone booths.
Children's Mental Health MATTERS
Where Science Meets Hope for Children's Mental Health
Who could possibly object to children's health and well being?
The Child Mind Institute, whose "Billboard is now at Penn Station!" is a recently founded non-profit "committed to finding more effective treatments for childhood psychiatric and learning disorders, building the science of healthy brain development, and empowering children and their families with help, hope, and answers.". According to their website, they don't accept funding directly from pharmaceutical companies. Anyone want to help me start cross-checking Pharma's ties to their staff and board?
In a gushing profile of the organization and its founder, Dr. Harold Koplewicz, the New York Times reported last summer that they are awash in millions of dollars of funding, have 14 clinicians on staff, and a former editor of the New York magazine is editing their website. Koplewicz is also the go-to doc for helping celebrities and the 1% "manage" their children. The story glosses over Koplewicz's messy departure from NYU to start the Child Mind Institute.
"[Koplewicz's] main mission in life, he contended, is to remove any stigma from mental illness among children and teenagers, make it merely something to be managed and overcome as it was with dyslexia or attention deficit disorder before it." In his critique of Marcia Angell's two-part series in the New York Review of Books on the epidemic of mental illness Koplewicz stakes out his position clearly: "In the meantime, we have patients, in our case children and adolescents, who desperately need help. These children may be out of control, overwhelmed by anxiety, dangerously aggressive, disorganized in their communication, floundering in school. We need to help them. Medications, often along with behavioral therapy, can have a transformative effect." These are the symptoms that Koplewicz wants concerned parents to be vigilant about patrolling: Child Mind Institute Symptom Checker.
To me, Koplewicz reads like a raving megalomaniac, and his devotion and conviction are more frightening than the fictitious evil masterminds he claims are posited by Psychiatry's critics. I get the sense that he genuinely believes his own spin. He worships at the alter of "objectivity"—"We would like to see objective research catch up with the clinical realities but can't wait until that happens. Furthermore, falling back on pure non-pharmacological treatment is not the better alternative, since these treatments have rarely undergone objective evaluation."—and the Child Mind Institute is outfitted with "the latest in brain imaging technology". Koplewicz wields a formidable rhetoric, but is almost a caricature of the scientific realists in the Science Wars.
This post raises more questions than it answers. Who is funding the Child Mind Institute? Why now? How can organizations developing compassionate languages to describe mental diversity and difference, like The Icarus Project, respond to these campaigns? What roles do "objectivity" and "risk aversion" have in shaping the dynamics of this controversy? Should anything be stigmatized?
UPDATE 4/22/2013: I tweeted about this ages ago, but realized that the following tidbit never made it into this post.
If you visit the wonderful Drug Industry Document Archive and search for 'Koplewicz', you will find that he was one of the co-authors on the now infamous Paxil 329 study that cost Glaxo Smith Klein $3 BILLION in settlements in 2012.
The Paxil 329 study tried to cover up the finding that not only does Paxil not work in children, but that it makes them more suicidal than a sugar pill did. The Dept of Justice found the study to be misleading and fraudulent. I am pretty sure that the study was ghost written, but I think that makes his credibility even worse.
Bossewitch, Jonah (2011). Pediatric Bipolar and the Media of Madness "Drugs and Media: New Perspectives On Communication Consumption and Consciousness", eds. MacDougall, R. C., New York : Continuum: 2011
Special thanks to Dyan Neary for helping out on this post.
Filed by Jonah at 12:37 am under dangerousgifts,epistemology,ethics,fire
Forthcoming: The End of Forgetting
In Spring '05 I took a class with Eben Moglen on the privacy, anonymity, and surveillance beat. The experience changed my life and with tons of support from my teachers and cohorts, I have been working on these ideas ever since.
A few years ago I joined forces with Prof. Aram Sinnreich, after a great conversation at a free culture salon. Together we reframed and refined the work, and co-presented it at Media in Transition 6 in Spring '09.
We rinsed, lathered, and repeated our revisions, and just learned that our paper, The end of forgetting: Strategic agency beyond the Panopticon will be published in an upcoming issue of New Media & Society.
Damn. Scholarly communication is slow, but occasionally fulfilling.
Aram will also be presenting our work at this year's International Communications Association conference. Sadly, I can't make it, but if you are near Phoenix this weekend, stop by Camelback A at noon on Sunday!
7337 WikiLeaks, ICTs, and the Shifting Global Public Sphere
Sunday, 12:00-13:15, Camelback A
Global Communication and Social Change, #ica_gcsc Communication and Technology, #ica_cat
A Theoretical Model for the Wikileaks Phenomenon (Top Paper, Also Featured in Virtual Conference) Rebeca Agneta Pop, U of Oklahoma, USA
Transcending Boundaries? WikiLeaks and a Transborder Public Sphere Edgar C. Simpson, Ohio U, USA
WikiLeaks and Freedom of Expression: Perspectives Voiced via the International Press Iveta Imre, U of Tennessee, USA
Ivanka Radovic, U of Tennessee, USA
Catherine A. Luther, U of Tennessee, USA
The End of Forgetting: Strategic Agency Beyond the Panopticon
Jonah Bossewitch, Columbia U, USA
Aram A. Sinnreich, Rutgers SC and I, USA
Filed by Jonah at 10:28 pm under air,epistemology,metaphysics
Promissory Notes
My friend Dr. Rasmus Nielson sends me the best leads. Or, the worst ones, considering they are irresistible calls to action. He sent me this one days before it was due, and I scrambled to pull-off this abstract over the weekend. Below is the call for papers, and my response. Now all I need to do is deliver on the promissory note I just wrote sometime in the next 3 months. Thanks Rasmus. 😉
CFP: Online Disorders. Recomposing Mental Health on and with the Internet
You are Not Alone: Re-envisioning Radical Mental Health in a Networked Society
In the first decade of the 21st century radical mental health activists reinvented the psychiatric survivor movement through recompositions that deeply resonated with the emerging affordances of new media and communications technologies. This freshly reconstituted field of resistance to biopsychiatry and the pharmaceutical industry emerged at the intersection of networked identity, narrative advocacy, and authentic virtual communities. Organizations such as The Icarus Project and The Freedom Center developed hybrid models of peer-support, direct action, and alternative therapies that were suggested and enabled by these emerging communicative possibilities. These groups mobilized around Web 2.0 platforms and social networks that supported discovery, advocacy, transparency, engagement, and community building.
Self-identified as part of the "mad pride" movement, these groups advanced a subtler critique of mainstream perspectives on mental illness than earlier generations of anti-psychiatry activists. This critique had less to do with any particular dogmatic position around hospitalization, medication, or labels, and was rooted in challenges to authority and knowledge production. The disability rights movement's radical epistemology, captured in their mantra "Nothing about us without us", succinctly represents this transformative shift. Instead of formulating their resistance around human rights discourses while fighting forced drugging and electroshock therapy, the mad pride movement embraced a liberatory politics that attempted to reinvent the language and categories used to describe the mentally ill. The movement aspired to develop languages of compassion, celebrated their "dangerous gifts" through creative expression, and fostered safe spaces for people to share their experiences and subjective narratives. And, unlike earlier generations of activists who were staunchly anti-psychotropic medication, this movement stood for pro-choice and informed consent – though information was becoming more difficult evaluate as pharmaceutical advertising and marketing grew increasingly more sophisticated and aggressive.
To what extent has the mad pride movement been shaped by a new generation of media and communications technologies? How has this movement leveraged these technologies as a means to redefine personal identity and avoid stigmatization? How have they used these technologies to resist and subvert corporate messaging and the plodding advance of biopower? The Internet, and especially free and open source software, played an instrumental role in the formation and assembly of these groups. The cultural practices embodied in these tools, alongside the movement's roots in anarchism, punk, DIY, permaculture, and queer pride helped inform the organizational models, governance structures, as well as giving rise to new forms of collective action.
Filed by Jonah at 1:34 am under dangerousgifts,earth,epistemology
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Whisk first 5 ingredients in medium bowl.
Place milk and butter in small saucepan. Stir over low heat until butter melts and thermometer registers 110°F (if mixture gets too warm, cool until temperature returns to 110°F). Pour warm milk mixture into flour mixture and whisk until smooth. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand in warm draft-free area until doubled in volume, 1 to 1 1/2 hours.
Whisk buckwheat batter to deflate; then whisk in eggs. Do ahead Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Transfer to large bowl. Cover; chill (may increase in volume; rewhisk before using).
Preheat oven to 200°F. Heat griddle or large skillet over medium heat. Brush lightly with melted butter. Working in batches, pour 2 tablespoons batter for each blini onto griddle, spacing apart. Cook until bubbles form on top and begin to pop, about 1 1/2 minutes. Turn blinis; cook until golden brown on bottom, about 1 1/2 minutes. Transfer to baking sheet. Tent with foil and place in oven to keep warm while cooking remaining blinis. Do ahead Blinis can be made 1 day ahead. Cool, cover, and chill. Brush blinis lightly with melted butter and rewarm on baking sheet in 350°F oven 5 minutes.
Arrange warm blinis on platter. Spoon 1 rounded teaspoon crème fraîche atop each. Top with smoked salmon. Garnish with salmon roe and dill sprigs and serve.
These were delicious. As others noted, 2 tbsp is way too much batter for 1 pancake. My batter turned out quite thin (maybe needs a bit more flour?) and pancakes spread out. Got at least 20 pancakes out of this batch. Way more than needed but they were great for breakfast the next day. Very nice flavor. I made creme fraiche with 1 cup heavy cream and 2 tbsp buttermilk left overnight.
My go-to Blini recipe. Absolutely delicious. Prepare batter a day ahead to fully develop the flavor and cook it over low heat, brushing the pan with clarified butter in between batches.
Light, can be prepared quickly and in advance. I served them with homemade gravlax and creme fraiche.
Perfection! Made the first couple too big, so they were sacrificed for quality assurance purposes - melted in my mouth! I adorned the rest with creme fraiche, a sliver of cured salmon and a tiny spoonful of osetra. Very special.
We love these! I make them every new year's eve to feast on with caviar and Champagne.
These went like, uh, hotcakes! Perfect substantial appetizer for a small crowd. People ate way more than I was expecting, though... next time I'll double the recipe (for 20 people). DO take note of previous reviewers' comments abt exploding batter if you are planning to refrigerate. It's true - the stuff has a life of its own. Caught it in time, tho', and am glad I did. Will definitely make again.
Has become a Christmas Eve standard for us. My partner loves the blini. Sometimes make without the salmon roe--not as interesting, but still delicious.
This is delicious. We intended to serve it as an appetizer course but got so full after this that we skipped our main course. We found that we needed much more salmon that 4 oz for the amount of batter in this recipe. Did not make any modifications. This is a great thing to have in the fridge to throw together a quick appetizer for guests or for lunches or leftovers. Make the batter in advance and just make them fresh as needed or make the blinis in advance and quickly heat them up. This is definitely going to be a regular in our house.
Fantastic! Made the blinis much smaller -- three out of each tablespoon of batter -- so I ended up with ~70 blinis.
Absolutely delicious, I ate the blinis without adornment and loved every bite. The only downside is that the buckwheat does make the blini an unappetizing grey.
Close to the one's I ate in Moscow. They were more buttery and about the size of a silver dollar. The recipe makes far more than 12 if made the appropriate size. 2T of batter is at least twice too much, so this will make 24+ blini. Next time I'll try one of the other recipes on this site that use a 1 to 1 ratio of buckwheat to all purpose ratio.
Just like my grandmother made (we are Germans from Russia) when I was growing up. We would eat blinis dipped in cream or maple syrup.


text:
Everglades National Park family guide: how to visit Florida's coolest swamp
Florida, National Parks, Southeastern US, United States
Bucket list item: Everglades National Park. Done. Can't wait to go back. Must explore more. The end. Just kidding, we have much more to say. So, the Everglades is the coolest area and we've never been anyplace else like it. Everglades National Park and the surrounding area will leave you saying wow and itching to return. And itching from the mosquitoes. With
Biscayne National Park: an easy Miami day trip or perfect weekend escape
So often we see people asking questions in online forums about how to add a land portion to a cruise they're going on or what they can do with just a day or two someplace. We have a thousand answers for those questions. I mean, if you're cruising out of San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, or even all over Alaska we
Cabrillo National Monument: the gem of San Diego
California, National Parks, SoCal, Southwestern US, United States
San Diego, California is such a popular west coast destination. We all love to head to SoCal for the nearly guaranteed sunshine and beaches where you can actually swim. And the coastal vibe is so different, with bare feet everywhere and flowers blooming on the bluffs year round. Cabrillo National Monument is a great place to experience that great SoCal
California Coast Road Trip: west coast road trip part 2
California, Central Coast, NorCal, SoCal, Southwestern US, United States
California. That California life is so awesome with all that nature and sunshine. What better way to experience it than by doing a California coast road trip? We're going to start at the northern border, but reverse our plan and you'll have just as amazing of a time. So you've just crossed the border from Oregon into California. Get ready because
Yosemite National Park family travel guide
California, National Parks, NorCal, United States
Yosemite National Park is one of the most visited or dreamed about destinations in the United States. Can you blame everyone for wanting to explore the valleys and peaks that are the subject of countless Ansel Adams photographs? Who wouldn't want to stare up at the incredible granite cliffs from the valley floor. And did you know that there are ways
Silver Falls, Mt Rainier Nat'l Park: not to be missed
Activities, National Parks, Pacific Northwest, Travel Local, United States, Washington
We're going to do a stereotypical and highly ridiculous thing. A lot of writers will tell you about the "only sight you need to see in…" or the "absolute most perfect…" and we try not to do that. Ever. Tell you what though, we are going to tell you about the best most worthwhile hike in Mt Rainier National Park:
Exploring Oregon Caves National Monument w/ kids
Activities, DESTINATIONS, National Parks, Oregon, Pacific Northwest, Travel Tips, United States
Spelunking: the act of exploring caves and wandering deep into the earth… with kids. That's what we got to do at Oregon Caves National Monument. We had an the best experience, which we were a bit worried about before starting our tour. We were welcomed by Oregon Caves National Monument for our ranger-led cave hike and it was awesome. If you've
Rustic heaven at the Chateau at the Oregon Caves
DESTINATIONS, National Parks, Oregon, Pacific Northwest, Reviews, United States
If you know me (Rob, Hi!) you know that I use the word "magical" in 50% of my sentences… and so does Oliver… because he's my mini-me. Blame it on working for Disney or just watching a bit too much Harry Potter, but I love the word. I'm going to use it again: The Oregon Caves Chateau was a magical
Hunting for gnomes in Redwood National Park
Activities, California, DESTINATIONS, National Parks, NorCal, Southwestern US, Travel Tips, United States
We grew up in a great period in film history, where there were movies like the Land Before Time, Ferngully and, from even before we were born, The Gnome-Mobile. On our way to California's North Coast and the Redwoods, the boys got to watch The Gnome Mobile in the car and they loved it!! If you're not familiar, the movie
A stop at the Golden Gate Bridge: an American icon
Activities, California, National Parks, NorCal, Southwestern US, United States
Ooh, we love a good tourist attraction. Not a tourist trap, but a genuine attraction. Of all of the classic American icons a few really stand out: the Statue of Liberty, the White House, the Golden Gate Bridge. In our house, being the family travel folk that we are, we've got a lot of maps, and in particular, kid maps.
The amazing Yosemite Valley tram tour
Activities, California, DESTINATIONS, National Parks, NorCal, Reviews, Southwestern US, Travel Tips, United States
While we typically just do our own thing and plot out sights we want to see, every now and then we'll do a tour. National Parks are so easy to explore on your own, especially when you're planning on hiking a bunch, but when we were in California, we opted to do the Yosemite Valley tram tour. It was a
Why you must stop at Tunnel View in Yosemite National Park
Everybody seems to have an opinion about overrated sights and places to visit. Roadside attractions are totally cliched to stop at, but why not stop? Viewpoints on highways that have pull-outs are usually there because the view is incredible. Why wouldn't you want to stop at a vista like that's "like woah"? Tunnel View in Yosemite National Park is like
Family travel to John Muir Lodge in Kings Canyon National Park
California, DESTINATIONS, National Parks, NorCal, Reviews, United States
After a few days of battling the fog and snow in Sequoia National Park we took the short drive to cross the border into Kings Canyon National Park. Like with Sequoia, we had big plans for hiking in the beautiful, sunny valleys of Kings Canyon and exploring the granite cliffs and meadows. We were booked into the John Muir Lodge
Sequoia National Park with Kids
California, DESTINATIONS, National Parks, NorCal, Southwestern US, United States
Traveling with kids is always fun
The Wuksachi Lodge at Sequoia National Park
California, DESTINATIONS, National Parks, NorCal, Reviews, Southwestern US, United States
So, we always camp when we go to National Parks. For our big #2TDgoparks2016 trip we've taken a totally different approach: lodges. Why lodges? Two reasons: we are doing the trip in the spring when the weather is totally unpredictable and we were kindly invited to explore the Parks and lodges. The Wuksachi Lodge in Sequoia National Park was our
A day at Kennesaw Mountain: Georgia history and nature
Georgia, National Parks, Southeastern US, Travel Tips, United States
We've been to Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield a few times now. It's one of those places that has both historical significance and modern day appeal. What? What sort of appeal is there to a battlefield, particularly with kids? Well, we'll tell you. There's more the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield site than just what the name prescribes. In addition to the history
Where'd Fort Frederica go?
Activities, Georgia, National Parks, Southeastern US, United States
Historical sites rock for family travel. Well, most of the time. No, all of the time. Here's why: they're a snapshot of a moment in time that we'll never experience again. Sometimes those sites are really well preserved and you can step back in time with little use of the imagination. Heck, sometimes there are even folks in costumes to
Fort Matanzas: worth the drive, walk, boat ride and climb
You've been in St Augustine all day and are ready to end it on a high note. The town is wonderful and it's so calm and relaxed everywhere, but you've been walking so much because every narrow street is just taunting you to head that way. You're tired. What can you do to make the most of the last few
Behind the Picture: Watching the Lake in Glacier National Park
Montana, National Parks, Rocky Mountain Region, Travel Stories, United States
The story: One of the things that makes travel with kids more smooth than people would expect is sticking to the schedule. We're not talking about the itinerary, but the nap schedule. If you don't have kids, you might not be familiar but the concept is this: get and keep the kids on a nap schedule so that they can
National Parks: what are they and why do we care?
National Parks, United States
Once upon a time (1872), in a faraway place (Washington, DC), there lived a mediocre looking prince named Ulysses S Grant. He was the President of the United States. At this time and a bit before, there was a group of people that had explored the Yellowstone area of Wyoming and convinced congress and the president that the area needed
The Best Picnic Spots in Yellowstone National Park
National Parks, Rocky Mountain Region, Travel Tips, United States, Wyoming
If you've got kids or share your life with another adult, you know that getting "hangry" is a very real and present danger. If you don't know what "hangry" is, it's the morph from being hungry to being angry/irritable. Three of the four in our family suffer from this. Solution: picnicking. Knowing the best picnic spots in Yellowstone is extremely

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


My home is located just steps away from what I consider my own park. It's small yet private – me and my neighbors walk – with or without their dogs – bike, run and alas, during the dark hours when the weather is warm appear handfuls of teenagers doing illegal things. Of course, to an extent, these are rights of passage for many teenagers. Full disclosure, I was a Mom who was shocked that my child was one once. But now I am grateful that this was (probably?) the worse shenanigans under my watch.
I love the movement of its wispy leaves wafting in the breeze, a once barren stick now usefully providing the spine to its appendage leafy branches, moving freely through the wind.
It is probably not lost on most of us that our bodies are much like this willow tree. Our spine gives stability and support so that our arms and legs can extend both up, down and widen outwards, filling up the external space because our center is organized, strong and free at the same time.
One of my students is introducing the willow tree into his kinesthetic experience by observing habitual holding patterns that restrict the spirals, oppositions and free breathing that our bodies seek. The concept of non-doing is not yet a consistent new habit, but he is most definitely learning the well known adage, work smarter, not harder. Pause and think to challenge assumptions about what is required for us to move.
In the Alexander Technique world we are identifying the interferences (working harder) that we can then give up, opening the door for thinking about how we are approaching a new movement, dance style, or daily activities that are unavoidable in order to feed ourselves, walk, brush our teeth, comb/dry our hair, et cetera. Can we do what we are doing with less doing? Less muscular effort that serves to free our skeleton to move with an economy of effort?
If you want to see uninterfered with movement, watch a 4 year old pick up an object and look at it. They will flex their joints and lengthen their torsos away from their lower body. This is what we did when we were 4, 5 ad 6 before the longer hours of sitting at desks encouraged us to compress and pull down.
But our 4 year old selves can be re-awakened and re-educated, reminding us of how we used ourselves in life before sitting, trauma, both emotional and physical and poor emerging habits caused compression, pain and discomfort.
Learn to waltz like a Willow tree!


Le Whif – ce n'est pas cool.
I'm all for using science to make good things better, but there's definitely such a thing as going too far. Matt shared this link to today's Boston Globe, which talks about a device that delivers chocolate to you in aerosol form.
Aside from a mild scientific interest in the technology, I'm not convinced. A lot of the experience of eating chocolate has to do with mouthfeel and the sensation of melting chocolate. Putting chocolate in aerosol form assumes that chocolate is simply an issue of taste – which it isn't. It's about taste, aroma and texture, and I'll be surprised if all three of those are translated into aerosol form.
Aside from which, isn't this just a case of molesting food? Chocolate's a beautiful thing, and most chocolate makers (artisan chocolate makers, anyway) work very hard to craft their products. Turning it into a gimmicky aerosol delivery system seems more disrespectful than innovative to me.


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Q: where the code spends most of its time I have an ASP.NET 3.5 application with SQL 2005 at back end. In some instances, the code takes a long time to execute (30 sec or more), esp in reports.

*

*I would like to know where the code takes most of the time. Is there an easy way to do it?

I am using Visual Studio 2008. Right now I am troubleshooting a certain timeout scenario. Note: I do not have SQL Profiler (I am running Express version).

A: Have you tried Tracing?
A few Trace.Write("...") statements might help you see where things are taking the longest to get an idea of where to dig further. Be sure to turn on tracing in the web.config, and on specific pages if you need them only on certain ones.
Example of some usage:
Trace.Write("Before Data Load")
// Code that loads Data
Trace.Write("After Data Load")
// Code that manipulates data
Trace.Write("After Data Manipulation")

The output will then show you the full page trace (with extra page things as well), and the time between the last trace of each line item, so you may see a 20 second gap between "Before Data Load" and "After Data Load". That would give you an idea of where to look to improve things.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
use core::pin::Pin;
use futures_core::stream::{FusedStream, Stream, TryStream};
use futures_core::task::{Context, Poll};
#[cfg(feature = "sink")]
use futures_sink::Sink;
use pin_project_lite::pin_project;

pin_project! {
    /// Stream for the [`into_stream`](super::TryStreamExt::into_stream) method.
    #[derive(Debug)]
    #[must_use = "streams do nothing unless polled"]
    pub struct IntoStream<St> {
        #[pin]
        stream: St,
    }
}

impl<St> IntoStream<St> {
    #[inline]
    pub(super) fn new(stream: St) -> Self {
        Self { stream }
    }

    delegate_access_inner!(stream, St, ());
}

impl<St: TryStream + FusedStream> FusedStream for IntoStream<St> {
    fn is_terminated(&self) -> bool {
        self.stream.is_terminated()
    }
}

impl<St: TryStream> Stream for IntoStream<St> {
    type Item = Result<St::Ok, St::Error>;

    #[inline]
    fn poll_next(self: Pin<&mut Self>, cx: &mut Context<'_>) -> Poll<Option<Self::Item>> {
        self.project().stream.try_poll_next(cx)
    }

    fn size_hint(&self) -> (usize, Option<usize>) {
        self.stream.size_hint()
    }
}

// Forwarding impl of Sink from the underlying stream
#[cfg(feature = "sink")]
impl<S: Sink<Item>, Item> Sink<Item> for IntoStream<S> {
    type Error = S::Error;

    delegate_sink!(stream, Item);
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Lehchevo ( ) is a village in Boychinovtsi Municipality of Montana Province, northwestern Bulgaria. It has a population of about 2,000 people. It is located on the left bank of the Ogosta river.

The only means of transportation linking Lehchevo to other villages and towns nearby is the bus transport system.

External links
 https://web.archive.org/web/20101127162353/http://lehchevo.eu/

Villages in Montana Province

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Ireland's #1 angling magazine
Anglers National Line Recycling Scheme
Regulation change allows anglers to retain bass again
 5th September 2018
Following an amendment in legislation, anglers will be legally allowed to retain one bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) >42cm per day from October 1st until December 31st 2018 in ICES divisions 4b, 4c, 7a, and 7d–k, which covers the central and southern North Sea, Irish Sea, English Channel, Bristol Channel and Celtic Sea (see below map). Until now, bass have been 100% catch & release only throughout 2018 in these areas.
The European Union has accepted updated scientific advice from ICES (International Council for the Exploration of the Sea) relating to estimations that the bass stocks are set to increase in 2018. Vitally, from a recreational angling point of view, the latest ICES advice has also indicated a lower fishing mortality from recreational fisheries and a higher survival rate from the catch-and-release practice (fishing mortality rate of 5%) than previously estimated (15%). As such, ICES has deemed it viable for recreational anglers to retain one bass per angler, per day for the last three months of 2018. Bass will still be catch & release only until 30th September. This change in legislation is set to come into effect across all relevant Member States in the coming days.
"One of the key points here is the welcome acceptance from ICES that mortality rates (death) of bass from recreational catch & release angling is much lower than they had assumed."
A representative map showing the ICES areas where one bass can now be retained per angler per day from 1st October – 31st December 2018
One of the key points here is the welcome acceptance from ICES that mortality rates (death) of bass from recreational catch & release angling is much lower than they had assumed. This is due in no small way to pioneering studies such as the Irish one led by National University of Ireland Galway (NUIG) and University College Cork (UCC) in conjunction with renowned bass anglers such as Jim Clohessy, who looked at bass residency times and post-release mortality rates in Cork Harbour and found that all thirty fish captured, survived (Doyle et al., 2017). You can read all about this landmark study in issue 16 of the magazine HERE.
Whilst many recreational anglers are still rightfully aggrieved that they should be placed in the same category as commercial fishermen when it comes to impacts on bass stocks, this is at least a step in the right direction. An increasing proportion of recreational sea anglers are choosing to catch & release bass (among other species) and are a key stakeholder group in terms of improving conservation efforts for the species.
Doyle, T. K., Haberlin, D., Clohessy, J., Bennison, A., & Jessopp, M. (2017). Localised residency and inter-annual fidelity to coastal foraging areas may place sea bass at risk to local depletion. Scientific reports, 7, 45841.
© 2019 Off the Scale magazine


Dueler's Archives :: View topic - Awakening.
Posted: Mon Mar 29, 2004 4:57 pm Post subject: Awakening.
newlyweds to leave the safety of each others embrace. Christ, that made him sick! Finally, the time came for it to pounce down upon the blissfully brain-dead man, and it did so with a vengeance.
sure Ryan had the most pain filled trip of his petty existence, its goal to drive him to the brink of insanity then gleefully push him over the threshold. And how lovely, it set a new personal record with this mortal. Within a few weeks Ryan had snapped, lost all sense of reality and fiction, he was living a nightmare at all times...this drove him to suicide.
had it been planned... All it knew was that Ariadne had left the realm of RhyDin wit the high likelihood of never returning. What a perfect condition for Cory to be in! This would make the re-investation ten times easier! Once inside it would just have to hibernate until another tragedy took place to further weaken Cory's state.
Its hibernation was starting to grow longer and more tiedious than it had hoped, but the wait was well worth it. Aylysia, Quinn..even Cory's sister, Illusia played a part in the awakening of the unforgiving beast. It found the best place to reinhabit Cory's mind was while he's on the Isle. Klytus, or the so-called "Grand Magi" as it had heard, created this place with vast amounts of Mana in which it used to gain strength.
had taken over a dull, lifeless white glaze. It was like the whites of his eyes had invaded the pupils and left nothing but an endless sea of emotionless pure white. With a sudden..yet silent explosion a sweeping wave of pressure was sent over the Isle. As the dust settled his figure stood there, encased in his black prison. The black aura had returned.
"Erratic Palpitations of the Human Spirit"
No more than a few days after its return did Cory's friend, a woman by the name of Anojlie Quinn, declared her intent to vanquish the parasite investing Cory's mind. My, my...this was quite unexpected, yet easily dismissed. She was, after all, only mortal.
carry onwards with its original plans.
Here would be an excellent opportunity for the nightmare to stretch its limbs and display its might by destroying the woman. There's a catch, there's always a catch when mortals take up the role of "hero".
knew it could still win...there would just be some difficulty in doing so.
did she know it had few cares about Cory or his body. It was simply using him as a vessel to carry out its desires. Yet it did feel the pain Cory felt when Cyn hurled and massive boulder it had created with the quake. It had little time to react, instinctively it threw up the left arm, which was promptly shattered on impact by the velocity and sheer weight of the rock.
of the woman's eyes as a distractionary measure while it removed Cory's body from the premises.
the smaller beams scorched through the flesh like a knife through melted butter.
A simple sacrifice it had to make to send this mortal a message. Afterward it buried itself back inside Cory's mind and carried him off to a healer...this place was overly abundant with them; so why not? It left Cyn to wallow in her defeat, to struggle in her sea of pain and maybe just die from blood loss. Perhaps now she'll realize that saving Cory has become a lost cause. Even trying may result in forfeiture of life.


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filed: May 18, 2016 • Vermont
Newport City: bills help towns in renewable energy siting, loggers
Credit: Robin Smith | Caledonian Record | May 18, 2016 | www.caledonianrecord.com ~~
NEWPORT CITY – The legislature passed important bills improving how land can be used in Vermont and protecting property and the environment, Sen. John Rodgers said Monday.
One bill finally protects the rights of property owners and loggers, Rodgers said at the monthly Legislative Breakfast at the East Side Restaurant.
In the past, thousands of dollars worth of logged wood and trees have been outright stolen from private property but there was a hole in the law so police were unable to prosecute the offenders.
Now, Rodgers said, it's a criminal offense under the timber trespass measure passed in this session.
Under another bill, municipalities cannot create zones to ban all legal forestry practices in woodland areas, he said.
Language will also help prevent fragmentation of wildlife corridors, allowing communities and regions to craft town and regional plans to protect corridors across mountainous areas that would otherwise be prime targets for industrial wind turbine developers, Rodgers said.
That language, combined with the renewable energy siting bill, will give Vermonters some control over how large renewable energy projects are sited in the state, he said.
On the energy siting bill, Rodgers said he is not really satisfied, having wanted a moratorium on wind projects.
However, he said, it's "the first time ever we moved the needle on how we site energy in this state."
The bill gives communities a say in siting wind projects and large solar projects, by requiring them and regional commissions to craft regional plans that carefully identify sites for renewables.
Then the state utility regulators on the Vermont Public Service Board must give "substantial deference" to those plans, unless there is clear reason not to do so," Rodgers said.
He hopes that the Public Service Board will come up with better sound standards that address the complaints that neighbors of existing wind projects have reported to the state.
And he said that radar-activated lights on wind turbines will be required, helping preserve Vermont's dark skies. However, that won't be required on projects of four turbines or less, like the one under consideration in Irasburg with two industrial sized turbines.
Source: Robin Smith | Caledonian Record | May 18, 2016 | www.caledonianrecord.com
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The RR led to a revolution in the sport superbikes category right from the outset. One constant factor for the RR has been its impressive power curve and, in terms of performance, it is still a trailblazer today. Now the S 1000 RR comes with DTC Dynamic Traction Control as standard for even greater driving dynamics and road safety. As a result the S 1000 RR remains a thoroughbred among sport bikes – whether on the road or on the racing circuit. Its innovative technology allows you to experience its performance with greater intensity and immediacy than ever before.
Breathtaking appearance, pure performance or pure-blooded racing sport: it's up to you. The S 1000 RR is available in three colours for all variant options.


Mayor Eric Garcetti recently announced an $11.2 million grant for South LA and other communities that will offer free tutoring, college and career counseling, financial aid services, and other college readiness services to more than 2,000 middle school students in the L.A. Promise Zone and Promise Neighborhood.
The U.S. Department of Education grant will form the L.A. Promise Zone Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Program (GEAR UP), a partnership with the Youth Policy Institute (YPI) and the Vaughn Next Century Learning Center. It will provide students at 16 schools with access to services from sixth grade through their first year of college.
First introduced in President Barack Obama's 2013 State of the Union address, the Promise Zone Initiative is essentially a place-based approach to fighting poverty. The areas selected for the program are eligible for various tax credits designed to create jobs and receive aid in the form of coordinated federal assistance on social problems such as crime, inadequate access to affordable housing, and poor educational opportunities. The program puts everyday citizens and local community leaders at the forefront of federal solutions.
Ahead of the announcement, Garcetti attended a workshop with Promise Zone students to speak about the importance of higher education. The GEAR UP launch coincided with the start of college application season, and several high school seniors attending the workshop were able to submit their college applications on site.
The Los Angeles Promise Zone serves five culturally diverse Los Angeles neighborhoods: Hollywood, East Hollywood, Koreatown, Westlake, and Pico-Union. And last year, Los Angeles became the first and only city in America with two Promise Zones — after a second designation was awarded to cover a large swath of South L.A.
What really happened with the South L.A. Promise Zone?


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FeelsNewsJune 19, 2018
Son fulfills dream to serve alongside police officer dad; recreates Father's Day photo
A son in Washington state has fulfilled a decades-old Father's Day prophecy to his dad: that he would one day serve alongside him as a police officer.
In 1998, Auburn Police Officer Gould's son wrote a note in a Father's day card bearing a photo of them sitting together in his squad car.
"When I get bigger, I'm going to be my Dad's partner and catch bad guys and burglars," his son wrote.
Twenty years later, the Auburn Police Department posted a 2018 photo, proof that the son's promise had come to fruition.
"At 6'7", it was a hard squeeze to fit Officer Gould's son in his patrol vehicle on Father's day this year, but they did it!" Auburn PD wrote on their Facebook page. "As you can see, his son did follow his dad into law enforcement just as predicted in this Father's Day card in 1998."
The Goulds were all smiles as the younger officer leaned forward into the dash, obviously cramped as he posed in the passenger seat. His father, looking no worse for the wear, considering a career of 20+ years, beamed with pride.
Gould's son is a member of the King County Sheriff's Office, who happily shared the post, referring to it as "awesome."
Man discovers a snake hitching a ride on his shopping cart
Father faces charges after forcing daughter to eat brussels sprouts


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Sodium hydrogen 4-aminophenylarsonate
Mol. formula: C6H7AsNNaO3
Danger! According to the classification provided by companies to ECHA in CLP notifications this substance is toxic if swallowed, is toxic if inhaled, may cause cancer, is very toxic to aquatic life and is very toxic to aquatic life with long lasting effects.
Important to know Important to know
This section highlights four regulatory activities or outcomes under REACH – Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals – Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006:
Community rolling action plan - indicates if the substance is or was included in the Community rolling action plan (CoRAP). The CoRAP list includes substances that could pose a risk to human health or the environment and whose (potentially hazardous) properties are to be evaluated by the Member States in the next three years. After evaluation, proposals may be made for further regulatory action regarding the substance.
Candidate List - indicates if the substance is included in the candidate list of substances of very high concern (SVHCs). The Candidate List includes substances that are subject to additional protocols and reporting obligations and which may eventually be included in the Authorisation List, further limiting their use.
Authorisation list (Annex XIV to REACH) - indicates if the substance is included in the Authorisation list. These substances cannot be placed on the market or used after a given date, unless an authorisation is granted for their specific use, or the use is exempted from authorisation.
Restriction list (Annex XVII to REACH) - indicates if the substance is included in the Restriction List. The Restriction List describes the conditions for the manufacture, placing on the market or use of certain substances, either on their own or in mixtures or articles.
Please note: The identification of relevant regulatory activities and outcomes is done automatically and without manual verification. Substances may be grouped together under a specific regulatory activity for more efficient risk management and legislative processing (e.g. restriction on "Lead and its compounds"). In these cases, Infocards may not identify all substances in the group.Therefore it does not represent official and legally–binding information. To confirm if a substance is covered by a specific regulatory action the official publication, e.g. the electronic edition of the Official Journal of the European Union should be consulted.
Some uses of this substance are restricted under Annex XVII of REACH.
Restriction list
REACH Annex XVII. Substances for which certain uses are Restricted under REACH at EU level.
Atmospheric Pollutants Emission Reductions Directive
Atmospheric Pollutants Directive, Annex I - Annual Emission Reporting
EU. Air. Annual Emission Reporting Requirements: Annex I, Table A-D, Directive 2016/2284/EU, 17 December 2016
The National Emission Ceilings Directive 2016/2284 establishes emission reduction commitments for all EU member states . Annex I contains a list of the pollutants that EU member states must measure and report on as part of the national emission reporting requirements. Table A lists the required annual reporting requirements; Table B lists the optional annual reporting requirements; Table C lists required two- and four-year reporting requirements.
Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive
EU. Dangerous Goods List (ADR, Chap. 3.2, Table A), Directive 2008/68/EC, last amended by Regulation 2019/1243/EU, 25 July 2019
Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex II - RID
EU. Dangerous Goods List (RID, Chap. 3.2, Table A), Directive 2008/68/EC, last amended by Regulation 2019/1243/EU, 25 July 2019
This database contains the RID's Dangerous Goods List, as implemented by the EU's Directive 2008/68/EC. This Directive establishes rules for the safe transport of dangerous goods between EU countries by road, rail, and waterway. It applies the European Agreements on the international transport of dangerous goods by road (ADR) and inland waterways (ADN), and the Regulations concerning the international carriage of dangerous goods by rail (RID).
Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex III, ADN
EU. Dangerous Goods List (ADN, Chap. 3.2, Table A), Directive 2008/68/EC, last amended by Regulation 2019/1243/EU, 25 July 2019
This database contains the ADN's Dangerous Goods List, as implemented by the EU's Directive 2008/68/EC. This Directive establishes rules for the safe transport of dangerous goods between EU countries by road, rail, and waterway. It applies the European Agreements on the international transport of dangerous goods by road (ADR) and inland waterways (ADN), and the Regulations concerning the international carriage of dangerous goods by rail (RID).
SODIUM ARSANILATE
Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex III - ADN, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex I - ADR, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex II - RID
Other, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex I - ADR, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex II - RID
Sodium 4-Aminophenylarsonate
sodium hydrogen (4-aminophenyl)arsonate
EC Inventory, C&L Inventory, PIC, Pre-Registration process, Other, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex III - ADN, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex I - ADR, Inland Transport of Dangerous Goods Directive, Annex II - RID
Arsenic compounds - - Expert judgement


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The Student visa allows students to study in Canada either at a primary, secondary, or post-secondary institution, or in a vocational or professional capacity.
Skip Navigation LinksHome > Immigration Services > Student Visa > Student/Study Visa Canada
Our Free Canadian Visa Eligibility Assessment is designed to determine instantly if you are eligible to apply.Assessment
Canada continues to be recognized as a provider of world-class education to its more than 130,000 foreign students who come to study in Canada each year with additional students who come to learn English or French within Canada's bilingual borders. The Student visa allows foreigners to engage in further studies in Canada either in an academic or vocational sector, thus bringing their rich culture, expansive knowledge and varied skills to Canada's already diverse classrooms and schools.
Foreign applicants must show their intention to study, provide proof of acceptance and enrolment at an accredited institution, proof of sufficient funds and sufficient ties to return to their home country once they have completed their studies. Once granted, a student visa will allow applicants to experience Canada's high-quality education system, state of the art research facilities, and broad post-graduate employment opportunities.
Student/Study Visa Canada Requirements
The Canadian Student visa allows foreign students to take advantage of Canada's world-class education system. The specific requirements for the Student visa will vary depending on the selected level of study, the applicant's educational background, and their country of citizenship.
Applicants will generally require:
Proof of acceptance and enrolment to an accredited academic institution in Canada.
Possess a valid passport/travel document, and provide proof of financial support.
Ties to their home country and evidence of their intention to leave Canada at the end of their studies.
In addition, applicants must ensure that they are criminally and medically admissible to enter Canada and be willing to undergo a medical examination, as required.
Student/Study Visa Canada Entitlements
Many educational institutions offer awards, scholarships, and bursaries to international students on a competitive basis. An applicant who is granted a student visa is eligible to work on-campus throughout the school year, allowing them to earn money towards tuition, explore Canada's diverse landscape, and gain valuable Canadian work experience. In addition, they may be entitled to apply for Off-Campus Work visa after 6 months. In most cases, foreign students are entitled to apply for a Post-Graduation Work visa, enabling them to remain in Canada for up to three years in some cases. It may also be possible have their permanent residence application processed in tandem, allowing them to work and live in Canada permanently.
Government Fees and Processing Times
$125-229 (CAD)
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Girl learning in College, experiencing a specific monetary difficulties, because without the help of other pays expensive studies. It with great difficulty obtained pay incoming invoices regularly. During the summer vacation, she decides to find temporary work, trying to compensate for incurred within a year of the training expenses. She manages to find a place where they promise good pay for services of nannies, which she is hired for a specified employer dates at the House of a wealthy businessman. Student very glad after luck which has granted the possibility, without making special effort to earn a considerable amount of money by performing simple duties, bringing even some pleasure from staying among the pleasant, hospitable people in cozy home.