On hiatus

This weblog is going on hiatus for at least next one month.

My work life has been getting rather precarious. It doesn't take much time to put together the posts. I also enjoy the diversion a great deal. But lately, I haven't had the mindset to focus on it. I need to sort out my job scene before I can do good work here. I may post something now and then. But I feel vaguely guilty about people coming here expecting to find something posted with the same frequency as earlier and being disappointed. So I wanted to let you know that posting is going to be light to non existent till at least the second week of August.

Hasta la vista.

John Gilmore's little interview in Salon about the machinations inside ICANN has created quite a stir. Dave Farber posted the article in his 'Interesting People' mailing list and Declan Mccullagh posted it in Politech. Now ICANN lawyer Joe Sims has sent a response which can be read here.

Gilmore is one of the original cyberpunks. There is some highly educated paranoia in that interiew. If you can ignore that, he raised some good points. There is also some corroboration here of his comments about the pressures that were brought on John Postel (one of the seminal figures of Internet):

"From your editor and from Jon's friend and thesis advisor. It is unreasonable for someone with independent means like Gilmore to say "Jon didn't have the spine..." His University, his organization ISI made noattempt to help him. What was said to him was a threat to end his career (which he loved) and no one with the resources and connections (both of which USC and ISI had) defended him. Jon had no resources except his love for the net.".

I would still like to believe that his accusations against Vint Cerf are untrue.

Dan Gillmor is weblogging his classnotes from the Internet law course that he is taking in Harvard Law school. It is an interesting read.

I tend to avoid commenting on op-eds written on hot button issues. They are usually written by fundamentalists of one hue or other. I am uncomfortable around fundamentalists of any kind.

But 'Charlie's ghost' is a poingnant story. I too think that "As a matter of law and politics, ...this (abortion) is not a decision I would entrust to courts and legislatures". But some of the issues that Bill Keller raised in that article are disturbing. As he mentioned "The ideologues on both sides, those who view abortion as an absolute wrong and those who view it as an inalienable right, too often treat these decisions as if they were clear-cut and pain-free." This week's 'Economist' noted that in China, the male female ratio is getting badly skewed. Given the choice of one kid, most parents are choosing to wait for a boy. I had read in 'Times of India' (quite some time back) that in Mumbai some of the more affluent families (those who have access) are quietly aborting the girl fetuses in their families.