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Category: thesis

07/03/06 02:25 - ID#32680

Mob-ility

I am sick today. I got a sore throat over the weekend and it hurt so much today that I have a pounding headache. I would honestly rather be at work programming instead of sitting here thinking I should be working on the written portion of my final thesis for grad school. I know this is a recurring story but it depresses me on so many levels. The worst of which is how I failed to arrive at my goal or how Buffalo failed me. The rest of this post is not so boring I swear.

I started reading some more of Howard Rheingold, "Smart mobs" in which he talks about mobile communities that have formed around the world and the effects they have on society. Lots of concentration is on mobile networks that help users share real time information. An example was a group of people in Scandanavia that all scammed the subway (I am not promoting this) by having a cell phone network that would alert the users where the train conductors were. When you saw one, you would send a message with the location of the conductor which would then be sent to the other users.

There are hundreds of examples in his book. One of the most famous mobile socialo networking groups is called upoc - it lets you create a mobierl social network that works similar to the tarin conductor example above. One of their most famous is a celebrity stalker mobiel network in NYC which send all the user sthe locations of NYC celebrites when other movbile users send those lcoations to the list. Exmaple, you see julia roberts at a restaurent and send a message everyone else gets it and rushes to her. Freaky and scary - i think.

The one thing I have hated about living in Buffalo is the lack of public willing to accept mobile internet. I really don't understand it at all. I provides the benefits of instant information access with benefits of social networks. Something as simple as being able to look up a recipe at the grocery store, or to record an event as it is happening.

Being horrified that I was a super failure by not being able to create a mobile network I decided to check out upoc communities that were centered around buffalo. There were not very many and the ones that were had few users and even fewer messages. The largest group was of course one that sent messages about the bufflao bills.

Even crazier is that there was a mobile user group for upstate NY - yes - all of upstate - Syracuse, Buffalo, Rochester, Utica, etc. It had only 44 users across hundreds of miles and these were the messages:
    
Jun 05 10:11PM     
Fr: cliffr39
dude chill out with the whorin 4 times in 3 hours is aggressive
Jun 05 10:05PM     
Fr: Supermanmax
Any cute white single moms here?
Jun 05 10:04PM     
Fr: Supermanmax
Any cute white single moms here?
Jun 05 7:49PM     
Fr: Supermanmax
Any cute white single moms under 30 here?
Jun 05 7:48PM     
Fr: Supermanmax
Any cute white single moms under 30 here?
Jun 04 4:05PM     
Fr: Supermanmax
Any cute single white moms under 30 here?
Jun 03 9:28PM     
Fr: Supermanmax
Any single white mom here in her 20s?

So maybe Buffalo just isn't ready for something like this. But why? That is a question I really just cannot answer. I really wanted to build a mobile empire, a temporary reality layered on top of the city, in which people shared their lives and and radically changed each others perception of local community. Instead we have a journaling community which shares many of the same benefits in terms of building community but has gotten all of these people stuck at their computer screens.

Although, the average user of estrip.org has not reached the level of mobility/portability that I desire, it has laid the foundation for a community which continues to grow and adopt new technologies as they become available and afforable - ultimately helping to make these technologies socially acceptable in a mobile technology unsavy town.

Ironically, I made plans from my phone in the chat to meet (e:joshua) and (e:libertad) right after this. Maybe it does work, but I am th emobile link, lol.

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Category: thesis

07/19/05 01:36 - ID#32110

Writing the Thesis!

I was writing my thesis for a change when I looked up toot in the thesaurus. It turned out to not be the word I was looking for.

toot - 1. a bout of heavy drinking 2. to inhale an illegal drug, especially cocaine
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Category: thesis

07/12/05 04:59 - ID#32089

Heat Wave

Can anyone else work when it is 92 degrees out and you thought it was bad in DC (e:southernyankee)

I am supposed to be writing my thesis today but all I can think about is developing new web applications and moving the server. Unfortunately, moving the server is far more complicated than I thought and I am not so sure if I want to do it anymore. It means I would have to get rid of vonage, cancel adelphia, and order a verizon phone line. Then I could apply for DSL but they can't promise any speed until after I have a phone line, but I don't really want the phone line if the DSL isn't going to be fast enough. I really need a solution now I am tired of uploading.

I guess when I look back on this time period I am either going to be really happy about what I accomplished or really hate myself for letting it control my life. (e:shawnr) got me to look around the web some more at what is going on and I still feel like a country mouse developer in the land of the city mice with my stupid VPS.
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Category: thesis

07/12/05 08:51 - ID#32087

Silly Thesis Paul is for Programming

If programming and designing the site and developing the community was like eating a large delicious meal, then writing the thesis feels like the disgusting burp that leads to a little vomit after you eat too much. There is too much to talk about and not enough interest on my part about talking about it. I might need some of you to fill out a survey so that I have some more background information on why you use the site, etc.

I can't wait till this process is over. I have another 40 days to make it happen. I just have nothing to offer over what the sociologists have already said three million times. Maybe I will have some sort of inspiration. What really kills me is that I spent $70,000 to feel this crappy.
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