Month: July 2002

Link from Blogger. The above is a chapter of a book from “blogroots” on the business potential of blogging or klogging. Includes quotes from interview with John Robb. (See earlier klogging threads.)

Blogroots are Meg Hourihan (megnut), Matt Haughey (wholelottanothing) , and Paul Bausch (onfocus). All part of the original team that created Blogger.

Need to investigate “trackback” from Moveable Type. Apparently creates a reverse link from a URL ? Pete Holiday is trialling a remote trackback suitable for non MT bloggers like me.

Common Dreams via Robot Wisdom. Another one spot on the mark. Interesting that the hand-wringing fall-out from 9/11/FBI, Enron / Andersens / WorldCom should spark this re-emergence of the blindingly obvious facts. If you insist on rational models (like accounting) you should not be surprised that the rationalisation of the irrational creates misinformation and misguided business decisions – this is the Galbraith / Argyris / DeLorean thread at work – I must sound like a cracked record.

Of course ! – “blindingly obvious” is a clue in itself – so blinding that ignorance of it looks like a deliberate conspiracy in hindsight ? – hadn’t spotted this angle before. Many a true word spoken in aphorisms. How can you not see the blindingly obvious ? is a non-sequitor. Standard metaphorical jargon is often closer to the truth than the reality for which it is a metaphor – another recurring theme.

Interesting corollary I’ve been meaning to follow-up – the article includes quotes concerning Adam Smith’s writing of “The Theory of Moral Sentiments.” before “The Wealth of Nations.”, that the order they were written is significant. Pirsig’s levels of values / Maslow’s hierarchy of needs all relevant here. I have a strong thread on “knowledge” being an emergent property of humans interacting and, in looking for the reverse relationship of what drives human nature / common sense / no-brainer actions to be the way they are, I have been drawn towards Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” analogy. Could there be more to this than analogy I wonder ?

Salon via Robot Wisdom. Another one to add to the thread, like the one on complexity of business solutions spotted earlier by Leon. Great work if you can get it. Business is so complex that systems are unlikely to model them very well, but being so complex, it’s unlikely anyone will notice that they don’t actually work. (Interesting that Jorn considers the claim “appalling” whereas it’s actually my starting point that this state of affairs exists.)

Thread on comp.ai.philosophy
Age old basic question but a long and interesting thread getting into many relevant subjects and a source of links. Entropy, complexity, micro / macro scales, quantum mechanics and much more.

Latest update from Tiscali. Their web server and ftp server migrations were
out of synch, and my account details are yet to be uploaded to the new ftp
server. That means the visible web pages are now over a month behind the
posted blog pages. Sounded like a firm promise this time – fingers crossed.
Updated 25th – ftp server still not accepting updates.

A promising feature from BloggerPro

Getting ready for new domain launch.

Simple ideas and proposed conventions for “text buttons” for linking html documents.