SILICON SOAPWARE wafting your way along the slipstreams of the Info Highway from Bubbles = Tom Digby = bubbles@well.sf.ca.us http://www.well.com/~bubbles/ Issue #74 New Moon of January 24, 2001 Contents copyright 2001 by Thomas G. Digby, with a liberal definition of "fair use". In other words, feel free to quote excerpts elsewhere (with proper attribution), post the entire zine (verbatim, including this notice) on other boards that don't charge specifically for reading the zine, link my Web page, and so on, but if something from here forms a substantial part of something you make money from, it's only fair that I get a cut of the profits. Silicon Soapware is available via email with or without reader feedback. Details of how to sign up are at the end. ********************* Earlier this week an acquaintance described how a dot-com company next door to where he worked had shut down. There's been a lot of that going around lately. And even before the stock market crunch quite a few Silicon Valley startups, perhaps even the majority, ended up turning into shutdowns. So one might say that Silicon Valley, like Hollywood, is built on dreams and disappointment. But there are differences. The broken dreams in Hollywood are more individual, while those in Silicon Valley are more group-oriented. In Hollywood a person dreams of becoming a star, while in Silicon Valley a group of people will dream of their company becoming a big success. Also, the personal consequences of failure are different. In Hollywood failure of one's dream can leave one in relative poverty, stuck in some menial job: In the words of a well-known song, "All the stars who never were are parking cars and pumping gas". In Silicon Valley, on the other hand, one can have a rewarding career working for one company after another, even if none of the companies are successful. Being part of a failing company at the actual time of shutdown can be emotionally traumatic, but overall the work is pretty good as jobs go and is often actually fun if you like working with high technology. Another difference: Anyone can go to Hollywood with dreams of stardom, while only those who are proficient at programming computers or have other high-tech job skills dream of hitting it big in Silicon Valley. That may be why a greater portion of Silicon Valley dreamers enjoy at least partial success, and Silicon Valley doesn't have Hollywood's reputation as a place of broken dreams. ********************* Something reminded me of the question of what to say to animals other than cats to shoo them away. By analogy with "scat", does one say things like "scow" and "skangaroo"? And what of animals whose names start with something other than the "k" sound? There seem to be at least two possible rules, both equivalent for "k" animal names but not for others: Do you change the initial consonant (or consonant cluster) to "sc" ("sciraffe"), or do you just add an initial "s"? This latter works for things like unicorns and oxen and horses and pandas, but in other cases it makes a rather unpronounceable consonant cluster. I've heard there's precedent in some other language for sticking an initial "s" on words to negate them. Is that relevant here? ********************* A few days ago as I was taking a shower, somebody in another apartment was also using water, causing frequent temperature changes that I had to keep adjusting for. I got to thinking that a millionaire would have servants to keep the shower temperature adjusted for him. Or better yet, perhaps some sort of self-regulating valve that would respond with less lag than a human. But what if the person using the shower were doing something immoral, like sexual stuff with an unauthorized partner? In some societies a servant would see the higher moral duty and turn the water cold to put an end to the hanky-panky. A thermostat, on the other hand, wouldn't care, but would just mindlessly go on keeping the water temperature pleasant. Maybe some cultures would require artificial intelligence in things like shower temperature thermostats for that reason? Such a culture might decree that if a tool looks like it might be capable of judging its user's actions, then it must indeed do so. Of course some tools, such as knives, are so simple that practically no one would expect them to judge the morals of their users. Thus no-frills knives would probably still be OK. Other tools, such as computer networking systems, might be complex enough that they could be set up to make moral judgments, and in that case the law would require that feature. In the case of the shower temperature regulator, there's no way for a casual observer to see what's inside the wall. Maybe it's just a valve with some kind of thermal actuator on it. Or maybe it's a complex computer with hidden video cameras to see who's in the shower and what they're doing. Since it would seem possible to have a system capable of sensing and judging the actions of the people in the shower, the law would require that capability. Our culture currently isn't like that. But it might be interesting, in a science-fictional sense, to think about one that is. ********************* At last almost all agree that we're officially in the 21st Century. But it still doesn't feel as momentous as the digit rollover last year. And there's another thing: Over the last week or two I've noticed that I fairly often write "00" instead of "01" for the year on checks and such, but as I recall I hardly ever (if at all) wrote "99" for "00" this time last year. Is that because of all the hoopla over 2000 and the relative anticlimax of 2001, "official" new century or no? ********************* I somehow got to thinking about that science fiction story about someone who invented perfect "rhodomagnetic" robots that ended up taking away humankind's sense of purpose, because they solved all problems and didn't let people take risks. I got to wondering what if they were developed independently in several alternate timelines, and ended up with several different policies? One might partially withdraw to leave their organic companions with problems to solve, while another might take the opposite approach of turning them into trees or something so they would be content to sit there and be pampered all day without feeling any need to have a purpose or solve problems. Maybe in the latter case they wouldn't even have brains or minds at all. That way they couldn't be discontented. I think the original story ended with the original inventor getting a lobotomy, which is sort of a step in that direction. This might be worth thinking about some more. ********************* There's been speculation about some new technology code-named "Ginger". Some of the hype about replanning cities around it has led some to think that it might be something like cold fusion. But other evidence indicates that it may just be a personal scooter. It may well be a breakthrough in scooter technology that will attract millions of new riders and thus drastically change the urban traffic mix, but those sources think it's still basically just a scooter. But a scooter isn't as comfortable in inclement weather as a car or bus or train is. And it isn't the armor against criminals that a car is. That reminds me of the question about the amount of energy devoted to crime. How much extra energy and material is spent because of fear of crime? I'm thinking of people driving instead of walking, leaving security lights on all night, and so on. Anybody have any figures? ********************* One person at work quit a few days ago. When the conversation turned to what he would be doing next, someone suggested that he might become an exotic dancer, whereupon someone else commented that it looked like he had the build for it. That seemed to make him uncomfortable. That in turn led me to thoughts of perceived harassment, and whether the eventual outcome will be general rules against bringing any of your personal life into the workplace. No matter what your interests and religious beliefs and politics are, they will sooner or later make somebody else uncomfortable. So will we eventually be forbidden to mention any non-work subjects while at work? ********************* Thought while spraying shower cleaner in the bathroom after reading the label on the bottle: In states that still use the gas chamber for executions, do the pellets have a label that says "Avoid breathing vapor (unless you are the condemned)"? ********************* There's a site (http://www.slowwave.com/) that publishes dreams people send in. In this week's dream most of the teachers at the dreamer's school are ducks passing as human. Only the dreamer knows the truth, and she's afraid to blab for fear of getting thrown into the lake or something. That got me to wondering what the point was. If they look and act and talk like humans, in what sense are they really ducks? DNA? Something more subtle? Some religions believe that certain items can be one thing (such as part of a deity) while appearing to be something quite different (such as food) as far as any possible physical test is concerned. Is that how these schoolteachers are ducks? And if these "ducks" are successfully passing as human, why should it matter that they're actually ducks? Are they going to teach innocent human children to quack and lay eggs and fly south for the winter, and otherwise twist their loyalties away from humankind? It reminds me of the general attitude about Communists back in the 1950's, except that as far as I know there's no Evil Empire of ducks bent on taking us over. ********************* Something strange happened this morning. As I was walking across a parking lot a man asked if my socks were support hose. They weren't. I said so, and he went on his way. So now I'm wondering why he asked me that question. Had it been a survey I think he would have stated that fact, and would have had a clipboard or handheld computer or something similar with which to record the data. Was it some kind of performance art thing, or perhaps a psychology experiment, to stop random strangers and ask some weirdly personal question to see how they react? Or maybe he had some kind of sexual fetish for socks? I've heard of such centered on shoes. But if it's sexual, wouldn't the Internet be a better place than supermarket parking lots to seek out potential partners? Maybe I should have asked him why he was asking, but it didn't occur to me at the time. ********************* The Edge Near the highway's end is a motel-- Small, quiet, half-empty. There is no flow of travelers to points beyond pausing for the night As there are no points beyond To pause on the way to. This is the edge of the world. People do come, but not many: There are rumors that looking too closely or too long Can drive you mad, Or worse, that people may think you mad When you are not. So the tourist families that come to snap pictures of their children Standing next to the big sign near the edge ("But not too close!") And buy picture postcards showing the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria Falling through endless sky Are few. Most of the trade is "regulars" returning again and again-- Some in groups, Some meeting friends here, Some alone. The Edge somehow goes with aloneness And one's own thoughts. Indeed, no two see it alike, And like one's thoughts, It is never the same twice. For the motel this is a problem. Everyone who goes to the edge extends it: An inch here, a foot there, two feet somewhere else. So in a few years The motel will have to move Or lose its claim to fame And be just another motel. Thomas G. Digby written 2245 hr 4/08/75 entered 2345 hr 2/08/92 ********************* HOW TO GET SILICON SOAPWARE EMAILED TO YOU If you're getting it via email and the headers show the originating site as "lists.best.com" you're getting the list version, and anything you send to DigbyZine@lists.best.com will be posted. That's the one you want if you like conversation. There's usually a burst of activity after each issue, dying down to almost nothing in between. But any post can spark a new flurry. If there's no mention of "lists.best.com" in the headers, you're getting the BCC version. That's the one for those who want just Silicon Soapware with no banter. The content is the same for both. To get on or off the conversation-list version send email to DigbyZine-request@lists.best.com with the word "subscribe" (to get on the list) or "unsubscribe" (to get off) in the body, but nothing else (except maybe your signature if that's automatic). 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