2005 March Archive at Rik Abel

Archive for March, 2005

Metadating game

Published on March 31, 2005 in Social Networks. 0 Comments

So, as Stephen Downes noted last year in his article The Semantic Social Network, the technologies of content syndication (such as RSS feeds on blogs) and social networking (such as Friendster and Orkut, or - more recently ‘incidental’ social networking hit flickr and ‘mososos‘ like dodgeball) are merging. Interesting.

I know I’m far from the first to think this, but we now, us bloggers, have a good bit of metadata about ourselves readily available on the web. In my case, not just my blog (I’ve been googled a few times lately, which is nice/weird), but also my flickr photos, my del.icio.us links, my to-do lists (for a privleged inner circle - like my wife), what music I’m listening to (if my audioscrobbler account ever gets configured properly by me…). Anyone who was sufficiently bored could find out quite a lot about me and maybe get some sort of vaguely accurate idea of my ‘essence’ if they spent enough time reading my blog, seeing what I am linking to, what music I’m listening to, and so on.

This might be enough to make many people paranoid, but I am naive enough to enjoy all this transparency, and besides, if I *really* want to keep something secret, I just don’t put it on the web. But anyway, there’s all this metadata about me (my ‘personal info cloud‘, if you will) available for all and sundry to look at. And then I got thinking about how online dating works…

The reason for this is that I recently (well, last year) designed the front-end for dating/flirting website phlirtz.com. (Check it out!) It’s fairly close to the way that most people are doing dating sites - you describe yourself (maximum 4000 characters - no pressure), say what you are looking for, list your interests (favourite films, books etc), outline your lifestyle and appearance, upload a few photos which hopefully show you in a good light, and hope for the best. It’s better than the usual lonely hearts column since at least you get a whole web page to describe yourself, and people can see what you look like, and so on, but couldn’t we improve on it still further?

If you have a large amount of metadata about yourself online (and thanks to the explosion in popularity of blogs and services such as flickr this may not remain the preserve solely of geeks for much longer), then wouldn’t it be great if you were single and looking for a partner with similar interests, if they could access this info about you - if you permit such access. And wouldn’t it be *really* cool if you could make this information available out there in the real world? Where you actually walk right past people who might be your perfect partner, if only you knew it. How? You know, with smartphones and Bluetooth and free wifi and xml.

So, when you have one of those fleeting glances on the escalators in the tube and afterwards wonder what might have been, that need not be the end of it. If both parties were signed up to a mososo dating agency they could be transmitting their own personal data clouds and using pattern matching to highlight any likely matches that they come within bluetoothing distance of. (With Playtxt.net you can manually set your location postcode via SMS and will be informed if any other playtxters are in the area. That would work, too.) I think this is clearly the future of dating, as long as folks are comfortable about exposing themselves to strangers in such a way. I personally think that this is a good thing to do - I’m all for transparency (within reason), the dating game is a market - a meet market, and as we all know from Cluetrain, Markets are Conversations.

How exactly would it work? I imagine that you have some sort of checklist of interest, favourites etc, which can be syndicated through wireless (Bluetooth/WiFi) and some clever markup language like wltm.xml. Then some sort of pattern matching software on the users’ smartphones will notify both users when a potential target is in range, and allow them the ability to choose whether to ping the other to get more info. This would presumably include contact details, since potential datees on the escalator might not want to meet there and then, and a photo of the user so you can put a name to the alert. In essence, a more information-rich version of the lovegety idea.

So, if you are a Neutral Milk Hotel liking, nature-loving, Apple-using, vegetarian, karate-enjoying cat-hating singleton looking for someone with similar tastes and interests (long walks in the park, kicking cats’ arses…) metadating could be just what you need. Of course, it doesn’t need to be restricted to those seeking companionship and/or love/random sex with strangers. You could find out if anyone in your area fancies going to see a band you want to see that night, for example. The opportunities are literally limitless. I’m aware there may be some worrying Big Brother panopticon-type considerations, but I’ll let the tinfoil hat brigade worry about them.

[note: I hope to post more often on topics relating to social networks/network theory/small worlds/emergence/social software/mutual synergism/web of life/open source design/folksonomical zeitgeists and so on. I’ve avoided it thus far since I am far from expert in the field and don’t consider myself much of an essayist. But then I figured what the heck! I’m really interested in the stuff, and I can learn faster through interaction with others than just reading books in isolation. Hopefully you’ll find some ideas amusing or stimulating enough to comment, maybe even start a few conversations. Rather than just me banging on into the void…]

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two wheels good! singlespeed better! fixed gear bestest!

Published on March 31, 2005 in Cycling. 5 Comments

I have always loved cycling and bikes since I was a little kid and got my first, a red tricycle with solid tin front wheel and painted-on spokes effect. I loved that trike and rode it round and round the garden cackling manically, little feet a blur, occassionally garroting myself on a fallen clothes-line. There was a very direct connection between me and the bike - I pedaled forwards, it went forwards, pedal backwards and it went backwards, slow down or stop using your legs, no need for brakes!

Then I had a succession of increasingly sophisticated machines - the first two wheeler was fixed-gear and I got expert in running alongside and leaping aboard while somehow locating my feet onto the pedals and the end of windmilling cranks. That was a great bike, man. I mean, you could pedal it backwards. How cool is that?

But then, at some point, an invisible boundary was crossed - I got my first bike with a freewheel. From there it was a slippery slope to Sturmey Archer 3-Speed equipped Chopper clone (said gearstick placed with no apparent concern that it was highly likely to interface painfully with young boys’ nads in the event of inevtiable crashes. Duh.) Then I eventually got a mountain bike (a Specialized Rockhopper with lovely dark purple sparkly paintjob) with 21 gears and V-Brakes, etc. All of which seemed perfectly natural - you may as well use technology to let you ride where you wouldn’t otherwise be able to, right? Having loads of gears is cool! The more the better! And who wants to have to pedal all the time? Isn’t it nice to freewheel now and then? Well, maybe. Maybe not.

I’ve always sort of ‘put-up’ with derailleurs for their perceived advantages, but they never stay indexed properly for long, and because I’m lazy and inept I can’t be arsed to be tweaking them all the time, and to be honest, I don’t go mountain biking much these days, and I’ve started to really enjoy road riding, specifically through London. I only ever use about 3 different gears in London and I started to seriously question whether it was worth all the faff of having multiple gears. Plus my bike (a 2003 Kona LavaDome which I honestly DO love, really) and I just went through a winter in Toronto, and let me tell you, when it gets down to -35C your fancy-schmancy derailleurs aren’t going to work. Or, occassionally and alarmingly, your brakes. And then your bike sort of starts to randomly ping and squeak in alarming fashion. In fact, riding a bike in -35C is probably not sensible behaviour, but I’m English and I didn’t know any better. But I digress.

I noticed quite a single-speed culture in Toronto, particularly among the bike couriers, who must face particularly hardcore conditions in a Canadian winter. Most of them rode slicks, weirdly, given that all the roads are ice. Anyway, I’d started to think about ‘simplicity‘ as a powerful tool for increasing general levels of happiness, quite a lot, so these elegantly stripped down bikes have become something of an obsession. There, I said it, I’m in the grips of one of my occassional bike obsessions. Sorry dear.

Of course, now that my filter has been opened, I’m seeing singlespeed bikes everywhere on the streets of London. Looks like I’m late to the party. It seems there are legions of singlespeed enthusiasts, and even a fairly sizeable hardcore of ‘fixies’ - folks who ride fixed gear bikes (no freehweel!). Check out fixedgeargallery (I love the intarwebs) for literally thousands of photos of fixies’ beloved fixed gear bikes. And tell me that a lot of them ain’t durned purty!

And so but I’m basically totally obsessed with getting a singlespeed fixed gear bike. Just as soon as I can afford it (which may be a while…) I’d quite like a Condor Pista, in blue. But then again, maybe I really want a Surly Steamroller. Decisions, decisions…

So, whaddya think? Am I nuts? Are gears worth the hassle? Would you buy a singlespeed bike? (Think about the simplicity and lack of maintenance! Just get on and ride! A highly evolved machine with maybe just one (front) brake. Lightweight, sleek, beautiful. You know you want one…)

UPDATE: I *knew* my fresh meme sensors were twitching: Wired says fixed gear bikes an urban fixture. [Thanks, ChrisG!]

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We come in peace

Published on March 24, 2005 in moblog. 1 Comment

Klaatu!

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Simple Records

Published on March 24, 2005 in Music. 2 Comments

Following on from my earlier post on the topic of Simplicity and how it is generally a good thing, my friend Melissa at Fabric has launched a new record label called Simple Records. Lovely.

(I’ll be heading to Fabric this saturday to enjoy the mighty Akufen, who will doubtlessly deliver a killer set. How about a follow up to My Way this year, M. Leclair? Pretty please…)

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ourmedia host your media, for free!

Published on March 23, 2005 in Social Software, Web/Tech, grassroots and webactivism. 0 Comments

Ourmedia.org will host your media, providing free storage and free bandwidth for your videos, audio files, photos, text or software. Forever. No catches. I am SO there, particularly when I start videoblogging in earnest.

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Blogging Builds Big Brains Five Ways!

Published on March 23, 2005 in Blogs. 0 Comments

According to the Eide Neurolearning Blog, blogging is good for your brain in at least five ways: Brain Of The Blogger. To summarise, the authors found reasonable grounds for suggesting:

Blogs can promote critical and analytical thinking.
Blogging can be a powerful promoter of creative, intuitive, and associational thinking.
Blogs promote analogical thinking.
Blogging is a powerful medium for increasing access and exposure to quality information.
Blogging combines the best of solitary reflection and social interaction.

They conclude:

[I]t looks as if blogging will be very good for our brains. It holds
enormous potential in education, and it could take societal
communication and creative exchange onto a whole new level.

Sounds good to me. It’s all about the mutually-synergistic non-zero sum collaborative game-playing and emergence of a hyperconnected global consciouness (noosphere) on the way to our evolution as truly enlightened, spiritual beings, baby.

Sorry, I’ve been reading Techgnosis again…

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The Devil’s Playthings

Published on March 22, 2005 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

Idle Thumbs is a new (to me) gaming blog. Don’t call it "new games journalism" unless you want to be annihilated by a giant mecha-swan. After reading their review, I now want to play Katamari Damacy even more than I did. Which was a lot, already.

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BikeTree

Published on March 21, 2005 in Cycling, Design, Enviroment and Sustainability. 0 Comments

BikeTree is a brilliantly elegant, green solution to secure bike storage in urban cores. Simply swipe your smart card, insert your bike into the slot at the foot of the BikeTree and go ‘ooh!’ as it glides up the trunk to be securely stored in the transparent canopy, out of harm (and nasty bike thieves’) way. Naturally, the lifting mechanism is solar powered.) At the moment BikeTree is only installed in Geneva, Switzerland. It would be great to see such an elegant, clean, green innovation used in London. How about it, Ken?

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