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OpenBTS at Burning Man: Best Full Story

Advanced Cyber/IO, Autonomous Internet, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Historic Contributions, Mobile, Real Time, Tools
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Burning Man's open source cell phone system could help save the world

Solar-powered OpenBTS systems costs pennies a day and operates in the farthest outreaches of Earth.

By Julie Bort, Network World
August 30, 2010 02:47 PM ET

Today I bring you a story that has it all: a solar-powered, low-cost, open source cellular network that's revolutionizing coverage in underprivileged and off-grid spots. It uses VoIP yet works with existing cell phones. It has pedigreed founders. Best of all, it is part of the sex, drugs and art collectively known as Burning Man. Where do you want me to begin?

The Open Source Subnet
Cell towers that blend vs. those that offend

“We make GSM look like a wireless access point. We make it that simple,” describes one of the project's three founders, Glenn Edens.

The technology starts with the “they-said-it-couldn't-be-done” open source software, OpenBTS. OpenBTS is built on Linux and distributed via the AGPLv3 license. When used with a software-defined radio such as the Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP), it presents a GSM air interface (“Um”) to any standard GSM cell phone, with no modification whatsoever required of the phone. It uses open source Asterisk VoIP software as the PBX to connect calls, though it can be used with other soft switches, too. (More stats in a minute that I promise will blow away your inner network engineer.)

Direct to Source (If Still Up); Full Story Back-Up Copy Below This Line

Continue reading “OpenBTS at Burning Man: Best Full Story”

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OpenMoko, OpenBTS, Free Your Phone & Humanity

11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Autonomous Internet, Collaboration Zones, Communities of Practice, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, IO Technologies, Mobile
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Openmoko™ – Open. Mobile. Free.

Openmoko™ is a project dedicated to delivering mobile phones with an open source software stack. Openmoko was earlier more directly associated with Openmoko Inc, but is nowadays a gathering of people with the shared goal of “Free Your Phone”. Distributors are currently selling updated versions of the Openmoko Inc's phone released in 2008, Neo FreeRunner, to advanced users, while the software stack for FreeRunner and future free phones is being developed by the community.

Burning Man's open source cell phone system could help save the world

Solar-powered OpenBTS systems costs pennies a day and operates in the farthest outreaches of Earth.

By Julie Bort, Network World
August 30, 2010 02:47 PM ET

Today I bring you a story that has it all: a solar-powered, low-cost, open source cellular network that's revolutionizing coverage in underprivileged and off-grid spots. It uses VoIP yet works with existing cell phones. It has pedigreed founders. Best of all, it is part of the sex, drugs and art collectively known as Burning Man. Where do you want me to begin?

The Open Source Subnet
Cell towers that blend vs. those that offend

“We make GSM look like a wireless access point. We make it that simple,” describes one of the project's three founders, Glenn Edens.

Read rest of article….

Continue reading “OpenMoko, OpenBTS, Free Your Phone & Humanity”

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Rising Wisely — C-K Theory & Indian Brainpower

About the Idea, Advanced Cyber/IO
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Rising Wisely

This blog is focused on India’s development from the perspective of the Next Generation Infrastructure Lab at the Center for Study of Science, Technology and Policy (CSTEP), a Bangalore think tank launched in 2008. The bloggers are CSTEP’s researchers, its visiting students, and scholars. It is a collaborative, creative space to blog about the issues that we think about at CSTEP, including clean energy and climate change, transportation, infrastructure, information design, how to make technology and information more democratic, and ways technology can make democracy more participatory.

C-K Theory Explained

Breakthrough in theory of learning and innovation

Based on mathematics but also executable at multiple levels

Powerful framework, especially for engineers

Essence of the problem: what is creativity–RESISTENCE to past fixations

Provoke expansion in a step by step way, adding properties, studying attributes, rearranging both

Already existing knowledge does not lead to innovation in a natural way–innovation has to be forced by circumstance or process–this is a process that forces innovation.

C-K theory implements forcing as a process

Mixing attributes and properties from disparate objects (e.g. floating and flying) can force a new third way.

C stands for the Concept Space

K stands for the Knowledge Space

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EGYPT: CIA’s Last Stand? Mubarak as First Domino? Advice for the USG: BUTT OUT.

07 Other Atrocities, Advanced Cyber/IO, Collective Intelligence, Communities of Practice, Cultural Intelligence, Officers Call, Peace Intelligence, Real Time
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DefDog Recommends...

Suleiman: The CIA's man in Cairo

Suleiman, a friend to the US and reported torturer, has long been touted as a presidential successor.

. . . . . . .

In the mid-1990s, Suleiman worked closely with the Clinton administration in devising and implementing its rendition program; back then, rendition involved kidnapping suspected terrorists and transferring them to a third country for trial.

. . . . . . .

Under the Bush administration, in the context of “the global war on terror”, US renditions became “extraordinary”, meaning the objective of kidnapping and extra-legal transfer was no longer to bring a suspect to trial – but rather for interrogation to seek actionable intelligence. The extraordinary rendition program landed some people in CIA black sites – and others were turned over for torture-by-proxy to other regimes. Egypt figured large as a torture destination of choice, as did Suleiman as Egypt’s torturer-in-chief. At least one person extraordinarily rendered by the CIA to Egypt — Egyptian-born Australian citizen Mamdouh Habib — was reportedly tortured by Suleiman himself.

Read the entire article….

Phi Beta Iota: A great deal hinges on the next few days.  We are betting on the Egyptian people.  The USA should BUTT OUT.  Not only is the Administration completely ignorant of the dynamics in Egypt, where young people, old people, workers, and all other walks of life have “come out”–the Muslim Brotherhood has been SIDELINED–but anything the Administration says can and will be used against it and against the people of Egypt.  The USA is long overdue for getting back in touch with its core values, which should NOT include redition, torture, and dictator pals, all “in our name.”

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URGENT EVOKE: The End of Old Government

Advanced Cyber/IO, Augmented Reality, Budgets & Funding, Collective Intelligence, Collective Intelligence, Communities of Practice, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Earth Intelligence, Ethics, Geospatial, info-graphics/data-visualization, InfoOps (IO), International Aid, Key Players, Methods & Process, Mobile, Peace Intelligence, Policies, Real Time, Serious Games, Threats
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Four Rules of EVOKING

EVOKE is a ten-week crash course in changing the world.

It is free to play and open to anyone, anywhere.

The goal of the social network game is to help empower people all over the world to come up with creative solutions to our most urgent social problems.

VOKE was developed by the World Bank Institute, the learning and knowledge arm of the World Bank Group, and directed by alternate reality game master Jane McGonigal.

EVOKE is for all ages; recommended age 13 and up.

LEARN HOW TO PLAY: the Five Secrets of the EVOKE Network.

URGENT EVOKE Home Page

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How Military Spending Drains & Distorts Economy

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, Communities of Practice, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Officers Call
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Chuck Spinney Recommends...
When American Conservative Magazine and a senior Fellow of the Ludvig von Mises Institute collaborate to produce a dynamite article that builds on and reinforces the great work of my friend, the late Professor Seymour Melman of Columbia University, a card-carrying liberal, you know it is time to sit up and read it carefully.

Below is a an excellent article describing how the political economy of the Military – Industrial – Congressional Complex drains and distorts the civilian economy.  Melman did the path breaking research in the 1950s and 1960s and 1970s and his warnings about deindustrialization were prophetic.  No less an authority that William Anders, CEO of General Dynamics, confirmed Melman's warnings in spades, when Anders explained to a group of defense contractors in the 1991 why General Dynamics was not going to convert into civilian production after the cold war ended, because “most [weapons manufacturers] don’t bring a competitive ad-vantage to non-defense business,” … and … “Frankly, sword makers don’t make good and affordable plowshares.” [see The Domestic Roots of Perpetual War, pages 58-59 & footnotes 4 and 5.]

Chuck Spinney

Less Bang for the Buck

Military spending drains and distorts the civilian economy.

By Thomas E. Woods Jr.

American Conservative, 1 March 2011

Read full analytic piece….

Phi Beta Iota: Summing up, we have military spending distorting the economy, Wall Street defrauding the economy, and a mix of politicians completely out of touch with reality and pretending to be “governing.”  We can't make this stuff up.