No Dreams in Digital

People speak in romantic tones about dreaming. Losing the ability to have dreams while sleeping is one of the trade offs of brain augmentation. The best time to back up the day’s data is at night when you’re asleep. Your subconscious is suppressed so synchronization can occur efficiently. So you could dream or learn something once and keep it forever.

Nowadays, if you want to dream after you’ve had the surgery, you have to go off-line when you sleep and that’s illegal. Besides being fined, you could lose some of the data you collected during the day. Depending on the job you have, that could a disciplinary offense.

I’m still paying off my cyberization loans, so I’m glad I got a descent I.T. gig. My parents got me augmented after high school, so of course college easier. Teach me once and I got it. I remember the ‘stock’ (un-augmented) students struggling in class, looking at me with envy. Some families abstain from augmenting their children for religious reasons.

The Anti-Facebookists or Christians look at me like Frankenstein. I’m not even a cyborg yet. The surgery just installed a stimulator for the brain to enhance its performance and recall. Other implant provides constant connection to EchoNet for data back up. If I get sick or damaged, my memories can be retrieved.

The stock kids used to tease me about the dreams they had the night before. They said I had to “turn myself off” a night. I would’ve resented it more, but I had so many benefits they didn’t. No exit exams, all A’s and guaranteed employment after graduation. I see why my parents got into so much debt to get me super-sized, so fuck the normals.

Five years after graduation, I was picked up by a data storage and recovery company. After some intense training, I was given a bank of whispers to support. Apparently I’m doing a pretty good job.

My apartment was near a budding arts district, which is to say close to the ‘hood. A place where artists and young entrepreneurs were rehabbing buildings once boarded up. When I wasn’t on-call, I’d hang out, read and slip overpriced coffee.

There was a buzzing in the base of my skull in these places, which meant folks has ad-hoc networks near by. One of the side effects of being connected to EchoNet all the time is sensitivity to data moving around at different frequencies. I can’t “see the data”, but I can feel it’s motion.

For fifty years it’s been illegal to be disconnected from EchoNet. Once you turn 18, you either have an selective service beacon, a EchoNet capable smartphone or have your brain augmented like me. Hanging around these underground nets might be a problem, but the Homeland Security doesn’t come down here much. Don’t see working CCTV cameras around here either, so I’ll risk it. There’s also rumors that folks go offline on a regular basis down here. I ask the brewista why folks risk a DHS visit for going dark illegally? 

“So we can dream.” One of the café regulars told me. He’s wearing shades sipping tea. “We can be free here. In that back room there is shielding from radio waves, so no EchoNet. Theres a few cots too. You can catch one or two dreams in the space of an hour. You should try it.”

He turned went into the dark room, still with shades on. I could see through doorway what looked like an opium den, but instead of smoking they were sleeping. I see now, all of these people had been augmented, but went offline to nap. Hmm, if you go dark (offline) for less than an hour, it gets reported as possible system failure. As long as you don’t do it every day, no flags get raised. These guys are having their cake and eating it too.

I turn my head as not to record (remember) any faces. It’s a pretty good life I have, but what’s this business of dreaming? I was taught it was a relic of the past like eating raw meat. But these people would risk jail time and possible data lost for something arbitrary as dreams...

Photo Caption: My New Balance 475's taken with my iPhone 4S w/Hipstamatic app (Loftus lens, Blanko Noir film)

copyright 2012 Johnathan Clifton Harding

Internet Exorcist

Chi Logger is malware that captures your keystrokes when you type and it remembers all your activities online. After some time, a profile is created and an open-source AI attached. Now, here’s where is gets scary. This virtual you comes alive duplicating all your behaviors online. This includes calling friends, online purchases and responding to your emails.

It's only when a client and this daemon cross paths by calling the same person or by the client checking credit card statements is the presence of the entity realized.

These daemons are children of the net; as such they store copies of themselves everywhere. Retail anti-malware products aren't capable of handling this kind of entity; you need a special kind of hacker - an exorcist.

One of our clients was a retired official from Department of Homeland Security. A daemon had been born and was surfing all the porn he used to, but was using his public login credentials, instead of the anonymous govt credentials he used while employed. Everything is logged on EchoNet, so DHS contacted him.

We took his case, after we confirm that he no longer surfed for free pornography, which is illegal. He had 13 terabytes of the stuff  on local storage, which is also illegal.

We tricked the daemon with a fake nude volley website. It downloaded pictures which had code in the headers triggering a suicide (or deletion) routine. After some weeks, the removal of the entity from the net was confirmed.

Our investigation revealed a possible link between creation of this daemon and the conviction of a member of Anonymous, the hacker activist group. We choose to withhold that information from the client.


photo credit: laptop on glass table, above photos. Taken with my iPhone 4S, Hipstamatic app (Jane lens, Pistil Film, Jolly Rainbo 2x Flash)

copyright 2012 Johnathan Clifton Harding

XBOX WON'T PLAY USED GAMES

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Sexy Chinese Nurse

There's an understanding unspoken, that the West is dying. That the BRIC countries: Brazil, Russia, India and China are emerging to take it's place in the sun.

The now senile United States, reaches out its boney fingers to the Pacific Rim, the Chinese nurse says "No, no Uncle Sam, it's time to take you medication." She gently removes his hand from her skirt and wheels us back into history.

The kids don't visit anymore. They spent all their time with their friends in cyberspace. With their long usernames and hip talk, always rebelling against their old man.

"That's the old way Dad, people don't think that way anymore."

They'll see, when they get responsibilities, they'll fall in line, do things the way I did it. That's just the way of the world.

But what if I'm wrong? What the West were wrong? Would hate the be forgotten, judged a failure by posterity. The history books we wrote these kids don't read. They read Zinn. They listen to Jon Stewart. They follow Muslims on Twitter. They live simply, refusing to buy bigger and better.

They have forgotten all the blood we spilled was for them. All the villages we've burned, all the icons we've killed, all the governments we've toppled was for them. How can they trust these muddy races? After all we've done. Surely they'll seek revenge. That's what we would do.

Good Ol' Days

“Sir, I know you worked hard for yours, but I’m out here.. If you have anything..” Sorry, I don’t have any cash. “Respect.” This young man in my neighborhood, his hair is freshly cut, but he’s begging at the Metro station and in front of the 7-11. This early 20 something has no other option but to beg? I know the economy is bad, especially for people without skills or business relationships, but..

How deep do I want to get into this. Not deep at all. I’ve got a friend who, at the time of this writing, is unemployed. He is one of the hardest working people I know. He’s held down three gigs for a period. He’s never asked for a cent. I’d give if asked, but..

Now I know the unemployed young man probably didn't get a quality education and my friend did. I would bet the young lion didn’t have the greatest support at home, my friend’s mother insisted her kids be productive. At the end of the day, I feel like shit sometimes that I can’t help either significantly, but..

Maybe this feeling of guilt is unwarranted. I’ve practically begged my supervisor to give my buddy some temp work and it happened. Don’t know if I impacted that decision. I know that I’ve given the young chap some dollars if I had it. Don’t know if more is expected of me by the divine in either case. If more is expected, just show me how to line that up with the kids and the parents. If everybody was doing this, the world would be better, but here’s a thought: what if the world is doing this already? Wall Street is looking out for it’s own, at Main Street’s expensive. That would be fucked up. Shark showing sharks love, seal looking out for seals..

Wonder if this equilibrium the extreme left and right seek is here, but they're just too close to recognize it. You don’ know you’re in the good ol’days til twenty years hence. The liberals have a young African American president, who came from a poor, activist household. The conservatives and business class has a president who signs their policies into law faithfully. Very little of this high drama is translating to Main Street, so it’s “Brother, can you spare a dime?”

I've said it before on my podcast Tricknowledgy on blogtalkradio.com, I feel like I'm playing musical chairs at work. Not at my work, but as a working American nationally. There are more and more folks out of work. Companies would rather hire someone whose already working. If they hire an unemployed person, they'll try to get them to take the lowest salary possible. Good for the company's profits, bad for the American economy. Less buying power, less retail, blah, blah..

If corporations are persons, they are some of the most unpatriotic sons of bitches ever. Forcing more productivity out of over worked employees, take more of their benefits, then pay bonuses to top management who invest their money out side the country. There has to be a structural shift in economic and politics in the West. It's not working for too many people.


photo: inside DC Metro car taken with iPhone 3Gs, Hipstamatic (Helga lens)

Float On...

How easy it is to take for granted things of beauty. Martin Luther King, Jr Day is a thing of beauty. The contrast of a country founded and developed on slavery, which celebrates a holiday to honor a descendant of those enslaved Africans.

A lot of work went into creating this day. There were years of grassroots support and political pressure before this holiday was reluctantly signed into law by a Republican president named Ronald Reagan in 1983. Some people still agonized over celebrating the life of an African American. It's easy to dismiss them. You don't live with them, don't fraternize with them... you probably work with them. So any stupid comments you hear slide off your back like water.

You figure these people are dumb, backward and willfully ignorant so fuck'em. As long as they don't make the laws you live by, they can talk shit all they want... but, wait. Politicians who think like them do make the laws you live by. There are people in Congress right now who didn't vote for the MLK holiday* and these people are still in Congress deciding domestic policy. No wonder the country is advancing so slowly.

This is not a hint that merely changing personnel in Congress will make MLK's dream of America come true. Barak Obama is a perfect example of that. Dr. King advocated for a change of values. Mr. Obama is a testament to the opportunity in America, but he supports the same values that is destroying this country: militarism, obscene consumption, and fierce individualism at the expense of the public's welfare.

The change in values starts with us and our families. Teach your kids, brothers and sister not to hate other people, not to think that war solves problems. You have to start with you. I have to start with me. We Us I have to change our values or like Dr. King said in his "Beyond Vietnam" speech, we'll be protesting forever.

Music is My Mistress, a book about Duke Ellington, he recalls his father advice "Be like a duck. On top you float along, but below you're paddling for all your worth.." We should agitate for change like that. Be smooth on the surface, but offline, aggressively educating ourselves, collaborating with others to make this country live up to the meaning of its creed. America is a thing of beauty at times, but it takes a lot of effort to get us there.

*Roll call for MLK holiday in 1979 http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=h1979-624
Photo: duck in pool near Natural Sculpture Garden in DC taken w/ iPhone 3Gs (Hipstamatic, John S lens)

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TOP FIVE trends in technology and US politics for 2012. We'll cover customer and enterprise technology trends. Political trends as well. We'll even predict the next President of the United States. Don't bet against us. This is a weekly politics and tech podcast. Saturdays 2PM - 2:30ish EST. Some.. Ok lots of profanity and profane ideas. Not for kids or ideologues.