archives

Consider This

PDF: PRODUCT EVOLUTION AND “STANDARDS SWARMS”

Historically, products came first, and standards second. But with technology cycles becoming shorter and the technologies themselves converging, if the chicken were to wait for the egg, it wouldn’t have time to hatch.

A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD

What do sports and standard setting have in common? Much more than you would think.

PDF: THE WIKIPEDIA AND THE DEATH OF ARCHAEOLOGY

Archaeologists try to extrapolate the past by inferring a lost world from the scraps its inhabitants left behind.  In the future, Wikipediologists will be able to learn more about today than perhaps we know about ourselves.  Assuming that someone volunteers to archive it on a regular basis…like, maybe, Google?

SOVEREIGNTY, WORLD TRADE AND HUMAN RIGHTS

The enactment of international laws permitting the effective enforcement of human rights creates tension between the sovereign rights of individual nations and the values of humanity as a whole. Why are nations more willing to yield power to facilitate trade than to ensure the rights of their own citizens?

LIVIN’ THE WIFI LIFESTYLE: THE IPOD BOWS TO THE ROUTER

Would it surprise you to learn that 8 out of 10 Americans would give up their iPod before they would sacrifice their WiFi router? It shouldn’t. The iPod/iTunes system is proprietary and limited to what Apple wants to give you. But the WiFi standard is open, and is being implemented everywhere, by everyone, and on every device imaginable. The result? We expect Internet access everywhere, all the time – and we’d even give up our iPods to have it.

#40: EVOLUTION, STANDARDS, AND OPEN SOURCE

Has evolution programmed us to be born as Republicans and Democrats? If so, we are the product of the earliest, if arguably (in this regard) not the most appealing, open source project.

PDF: THE MINNESOTA OPEN FORMATS BILL: BANDWAGON OR BABEL?

It is no surprise that Minnesota, a “blue state” like Massachusetts and heir to the political traditions of the Prairie Populists, should be the next state to see an open formats bill introduced. In this case, the devil is not in the details, but in the definition of an “open standard.”

PDF: WHERE (IF ANYWHERE) ARE THE BOUNDARIES OF THE OPEN SOURCE CONCEPT?

The open source software development concept can seem radical and revolutionary – until one compares it to familiar processes such as academic scholarship, legislation and the court system, each of which creates intellectual property, makes it available to all for free, and encourages reuse and further innovation. Its therefore not surprising that “open IPR” concepts are spreading to areas beyond software.