Here’s a link to an interesting topic: Race and IQ. I’m a fan of Gladwell and find his research to be thorough, provacative, and balanced.
http://gladwell.typepad.com/gladwellcom/2007/12/race-and-iq-con.html

Unless I’m really missing something, I miss the threads that happen before a show is recorded. I realize that inserting that conversation into the show had a lot to do with having a blogger-in-chief around, but I still really miss it.

Also, its time for a new suggest a show thread. The old one was from June. New thread for new life!

George

Radio Broadcasts would be great: I’ll listen on-line; but I think the radio broadcasts open the WEB interaction up to a much broader community.

Thank You!

Mynocturama- thanks for the Montaigne.

So this morning, I’m walking my dog in the woods (during the 1-week lull in hunting season) listening to the Bach installment and thinking to myself and missing the days when I used to sing it myself. Nothing is harder to sing than Bach when you’re learning it, and yet once you know it, nothing is more effortless. But what really struck me was hearing the voices in the rehearsal space–the intimacy of the small room. Most people hear that kind of music as finished product in a church or a big hall, and that’s kind of what OS is for me. It’s an intimate discussion of ideas that energize you to go out and do things that will play in a big room.

Blah, blah, blah. I’m so glad you’re back and hope that folks like “random knowledge” remain in their Jerry Bruckheimer/Morning Edition world and leave us roadkill to our happy little enlightened existence.

Isn’t it ironic that Chris must rely on the Watson Institute to nurture his new model where “casting where the new discourse of a global age is taking shape.” It is very revealing that Chris proudly states a few facts about Watson and this organization at Brown. He says that it was founded to address “the most urgent global risks of the time: nuclear hazards of the Cold War” by Watson who was “Jimmy Carter’s ambassador to Moscow”. To put this into perspective and give and little insight into who thinks that Open Source is worth nurturing it might be valuable to review a few facts. Watson was a visionary, in his time. While IBM was a de facto US Govt supported monopoly (much more so than Microsoft has ever been or will be) he was unceremoniously dumped when he and IBM’s old outdated business model almost led to it’s destruction. Then the original mission re: the Cold War was made meaningless by Jimmy Carter’s successors Ronald Regan and George HW Bush. The end of the USSR wasn’t due to Carter (and by extension Watson’s) ideas and actions to those diametrically opposite and the current success of IBM was due to Watson but to the fact that today’s IBM is totally different.

So, Watson and Carter were both great examples of “road kill” as history ran over their legacies yet it’s touted as success that Chris will shelter under those legacies in order to “move forward”. The phrase “It seems that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” is normally used when making a more direct statement about physical heritage but I think that it is appropriate here.

Lydon’s voice is clearly an intelligent one, and often interesting, but as a skeptic by inclination, I find this post to constitute more rhetorical self-cheer than a full explanation of what happened to ROS and its current state. Is Lydon, now a fellow at Watson, and using Brown’s facilities on the side, or does ROS as an entity itself have a formal home there – a concrete agreement with Brown that pays for the program? If so, did Brown pay off ROS debts, which clearly had mounted and were pushing it under? If not, what happened to those obligations? – a fair question to ask in light of the public’s money going to ROS indirectly (through the tax-exempt status of the Macarthur grant) and directly through donations.

What, also, is Lydon’s post-action analysis: why did ROS fail, as it clearly did, as a stand-alone effort, and how is this stint any different from several years back when he was a fellow at HLS?

In sum, the Radio portion of ROS seems now to be lacking, as does the Open Source aspect, as that, in significant part, suggests full disclosure. The apparent failure of the program, as opposed to Lydon individually, to find a sponsor, is telling. Boston and New England clearly have bright minds who are trying to build independent podcast programs, but perhaps with the logarithmically expanding media options on the WWW, the daily growing flood of options (i.e., competition) is too much for them to gain real traction. One cannot but admire Lydon’s effort in light of its apparent Sysiphean cast, but wonder, in that Lydon is a “visting fellow” – a term that suggests a time limit – what will happen a year from now . . ..

Put more abstractly, in closing: I find it somewhat puzzling that an individual who clearly has a mind that is very capable of – and likes to – challenge others’ rhetorically self-serving constructs, thereby often asking tough and thought-provoking questions, puts up postings about his own enterprise that do not evidence such a self-questioning dialogue.

Danny

Soooo…if you can recreate another hour-long show (even if it means combining two or more 15-25 minute interview segments – akin to your current podcasts), I’d like to think that KUOW might want to consider airing them at 9PM again. No, I can’t speak for them – I can speak only as one of their listeners. A listener who would prefer worldly, thoughtful, original programming rather than those locally produced reruns.

There’s really no substitute for the reach of an on-air presence. That ancient 20th century technology called ‘radio’ still out-performs webcasts, etc. in attracting an audience. And ROS was – and remains – simply PERFECT for Western Washington.
Good luck!

Looking forward to more rousing rambunctious conversation.

Lets go…there are important things going on. Lets find ‘em, talk about ‘em, and then see if we can shake up the system!

If Emerson were alive, would he say “we don’ need no stinkin radio station”? Would Ralph podcast sermons?

I’m sorry, but I feel diminished by your abandonmdent, for whatever good reasons, of radio. Without you in my kitchen in the evening, it will take more effort than I’m likely to be able to get together to absorb your episodes.

Please comment regularly on what your work and its impacts are like witohut an FM channel. Lack of a live broadcast will definitely impair my connection and put me at a greater distance from your wor. For how many others of us might this be true? You should worry about that.

>>>> Who’s minding the store? >>> How are we to mind the store? >> When you are driving your car at 100mph at a brick wall 1 mile away
and you have BRAKES but no steering wheel
YOU KNOW YOU ARE GOING TO STOP
AND YOU HAVE A CHOICE ABOUT HOW TO DO IT
>>> similarly, we are going to stop using oil (in the way we now use it)
and we have a choice about HOW and WHEN we stop.
By human decision we could begin to stop now, but if we leave it
to “human indecision” and “market forces”
then we may leave it too late,
because who knows how long it will take to implement
replacement infrastructure, cars, airplanes, military, ships
home heating (and maybe cooling), industrial uses,
plastics, fertilizer (if we really must continue with it)
pesticides (if we really must continue with them)
and OUR GREAT PLANNERS like GWB and his advisers show no
talent for being ahead of things.

World Population (or did I mention that?)
Goofy Political systems such as the USA’s where
its ALL market-driven
(i.e,, who can BUY the politicians DOES SO)
Nuclear Waste Storage or danger-reduction
Total human population
MAKING PEOPLE SEE CONNECTIONS BETWEEN PARTS OF THE WORLD SYSTEM

Cheers,

Peter Belmont

back shop? back shop!!! What about the unveiling of:

The Radio Open Source Institute for the Advancement of Emersonian Ideals

(sigh) Oh well! I do hope, however, we can revive the Emerson conversations; I was disappointed when they fizzled out. But like Potter said: “those dwindling few of us could not hold it up.” Zeke, I’d be up for connecting directly with others, however, if necessary. Meanwhile, I have 250 Emerson Dolls that I was going to hand out at the unveiling. You can pull a string and listen to pre-recorded messages: “Dude, A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds!” or “Does your heart vibrate to iron-strings?” Perhaps I can sell them on EBay