Digital Impulses

Canada Fulbright Chair Lecture Series: John Gilmore & John Perry Barlow

USC Annenberg
School for Communication
Center for Public Diplomacy
3502 Watt Way, Los Angeles, CA 90089
Room 207
Google Map

Tuesday, November 14, 2006
1850 Hrs

John Perry Barlow & John Gilmore on the continuing erosion of Civil Liberties

Between them, Gilmore and Barlow co-founded EFF, Greenpeace and Earth First; co-developed the compiler that runs almost all the code you've ever used; wrote the Declaration of Independence of Cyberspace; founded the first great dial-up ISP and invented the alt. hierarchy; wrote the Grateful Dead's best lyrics and much more -- Gilmore philanthropic work includes relief for victims of Guantanamo Bay, lawsuits against the Attorney General over the right to fly anonymously, and much more.

1849: Cory Doctorow, John Perry Barlow and John Gilmore just walked into the room.  I am amazed at how completely unassuming these guys are.  They look like anyone else sitting here in this room.

1900: John Perry Barlow has launched into a background talk on the beginings of the EFF.

1940: John Gilmore has just explained how he made a pile of money by creating a set of tools and giving them away, charging large companies on a support package for these tools lik the gnu compiler, etc.  His company was sold to Red Hat in 1999 for 675 millon dollars.

2000: John Gilmore has just stated that all commercial / consumer printers embed a series of dots in any image that is printed by the engine in that printer that can be used to tie that print-out to the  serial # of the printer that printed it.

So, when you buy a printer or copier anywhere they really would prefer that you pay for it with a credit card so that they can trace the sale of the printer or copier to you directly via the CC transaction.

Here are a few images of the event:

John Gilmore on the left and John Perry Barlow on the right:
   

John Perry Barlow & Cory Doctorow:


Cory Doctorow:

This room is PACKED like I have never seen it before.  They are bringing in extra chairs as I type this.  I am very glad I got here 90 minutes early. 

It's a little surreal to be sitting directly across from John Gilmore and John Perry Barlow, true living legends of the computer industry... 

John Perry Barlow is wearing an Osama bin Laden t-shirt that says "He's still free.  How about you?"

I am really enjoying these talks, and seeing as to how Cory is scheduled to be the Fullbright Chair at USC until July of 2007, here's hoping he keeps inviting interesting people from around the Tech industry to come and speak at USC.  I will be at each one, time permitting.

If you are in the Los Angeles area, drop by USC when one of these talks are scheduled. Highly recommended.

Canada Fulbright Chair Speaker Series: Cory Doctorow

USC
Annenberg School Center for Public Diplomacy
Room 207
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
1837 Hrs

I am sitting at USC in the Annenberg School for Communication waiting for the talk by Cory Doctorow to begin at 1900 hours.

Because the original speaker slated for this evening had to cancel and subsequently Cory did not promote this event, only 4 people showed up aside from myself and so we had the whole room to ourselves and got to listen to Cory give a really interesting talk on the evils of DRM, Intellectual Property rights, his work with WIPO  Copyrights, Trademarks and how all of this affects the developing world.

As usual, Cory was at his articulate best, riffing on a wide-ranging palate of topics and kept me engaged from beginning to end.  I attempted to record the talk via Audacity on my IBM Thinkpad T60 but the integrated speaker was much to weak to pick up Cory's un-amplified voice from across the room.

So, that part of the evening didn't work out so well.

I am really enjoying these talks, and seeing as to how Cory is scheduled to be the Fullbright Chair at USC until July of 2007, here's hoping he keeps inviting interesting people from around the Tech industry to come and speak at USC.  I will be at each one, time permitting. 

If you are in the Los Angeles area, drop by USC when one of these talks are scheduled.  Highly recommended.