The Tech of Burning Man (Slashdot article)

Lecter · Post by **Lecter** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 7:58 am

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/0 ... 133&tid=99

The main site ( http://marc.merlins.org/perso/bm/2005/ ) that contains over 1400 photos seems to have been slashdotted for the moment.

Mirror: http://marc.merlins.org.nyud.net:8090/perso/bm/2005/

Some of the comments in response to the article are rather ignorant. Feel free to correct them if you wish to set the tech nerds straight.

L

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 11:47 am

slashdot makes eplaya look downright hospitable. As a Linux chap, I've followed /. since inception, but never or almost never jump into the fray.
I don't like their post threading format where replies go one level under each other. There are some clever puppies on there nonetheless and they are at their best when arguing about the finer points of something technical.
The language or os flame wars are entertaining at times.

The Linux community shares one thing worth mentioning with BRC; it is the hybrid market/gift economy; one temporary and the other ongoing.

The host site of the article did get what is known as slashdotted. the mirror is worth a visit.

Lecter · Post by **Lecter** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 12:09 pm

I agree Ubu. Although I wouldn't limit the comparison to just Linux. I'd open it up to open source in general. Open source has the exact same spirit of the gift economy.

L

ZaphodBurner · Post by **ZaphodBurner** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 12:16 pm

Lecter wrote:
Some of the comments in response to the article are rather ignorant. Feel free to correct them if you wish to set the tech nerds straight.

L

Thank the gods for clueless idiots who've never been there and know all about it, like my coworkers last year who dismissed it as corporate hippiedom; it keeps them and any jackass who takes them seriously from going. They do us a favor.

Last year while riding away from Thunderdome I was nearly run over by flamethrower-wielding viking ship with a stripper pole for a mast. Those fucking HIPPIES!

-c
35,000 dirty, unwashed hippies is enough.

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 1:25 pm

correction noted, L!

If we wanted to get very slashdot about this we could start a discussion about free software versus open source!

Burning Man should be described as perrenial as well I suppose and not temporary....

Are you a Linux user?

Zburner: most of those slashdotters are kids and trolls just trying to poke fun. slashdot is a triage zone where quite a few terms such as troll have come into their own so in a sense it is a grandad to eplaya. The php communities are all over slashdot and got lots of street cred there, as php is an internet baby on steroids. (php is what the eplaya board is written in) php scares me, but it sure has a following.

Lecter · Post by **Lecter** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 3:55 pm

ZaphodBurner wrote:Thank the gods for clueless idiots

Indeed. But I believe that for every batch of clueless idiots, there may be a few people who are inspired to investigate further, and they may become a contributing/participating burner.

Then again, like Alice, I try to believe at least three impossible things each day.

Lecter

Lecter · Post by **Lecter** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 4:49 pm

ubu wrote:If we wanted to get very slashdot about this we could start a discussion about free software versus open source!

Free software? Free as in speech? Or as in beer? It's all g[r]eek, um, I mean GNU to me!

ubu wrote:Are you a Linux user?

I've dabbled. More of a FreeBSD fan (administered a FreeBSD server in the past, when I was a webmaster in the mid to late nineties). Now I just use Mac OS X and use Windows when I want to play games.

Every now and then I open up the Terminal in Mac OS X and VI around a text doc and reminisce.

Lecter

b00m3rang · Post by **b00m3rang** » Mon Sep 19, 2005 5:24 pm

Aah, FreeBSD. The vasty superior operating system, with the management issues. Oh where it could be today. I still prefer it to Linux as a server OS, also. Then again, working in a BSD shop with a bunch of FreeBSD contributors pobably didn't Linuxize my outlook any, either.

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 12:15 pm

Linux-schminux. all those names are just so much hype. the L distros are just an aggregate of conventions and a mess of free software. In that light the latest Linux distros are just the face of free software as it incorporates new and better ideas. Today's linux is not yesterday's linux and we have morphed and incorporated the best ideas from BSD, so that vasty, vasty stuff is well outdated by now.

Shall we start the eplaya emacs versus vi debate? just kidding.

When apple finally incorporates BSD fully as it seems to be (even as it charges for bug fixes, go figure) doing, those conventions will continue to spread.
It is a relief to be able to bring up a terminal on a Mac now. and the networking is so much better.

I did one Microsoft related project about a year ago, and it scared me so much, that I refuse to ever develop on or administer microsloth again. very, very frightening.

The free software networking tools are the most stable and easiest to use.
Solaris is terrible just because it does not have that toolset. The first thing peeps do when they fire up a solaris box is drop a bunch of gnu tools on it.

safetythird · Post by **safetythird** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 12:25 pm

What? No one pointing out that Linux is the bastard child of System V (Solaris nowadays) and BSD?

Gosh!!

S3

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 1:39 pm

well, of course it is. as solaris is a mix as well.

everybody keeps stealing ideas from everybody else. free software just makes that stealing easier and allows for massive peer review.

how did anyone do portforwarding and NAT without iptables? with stateless ipchains. so yesterday.

you a *nix user s3rd?

b00m3rang · Post by **b00m3rang** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 2:07 pm

ubu wrote:how did anyone do portforwarding and NAT without iptables? with stateless ipchains. so yesterday.

Using OpenBSD, pf, and nat... the way God intended.

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 2:24 pm

I must confess ignorance, though I approve of the invocation of god.

I just did a man pf on a fairly recent linux distro and no dice.

update-

aha. I see pf is a fairly recent addition to openbsd. and it looks like it is neck and neck with iptables for performance. It is hard to gauge because of the new changes in the latest distros of iptables and pf.

looks like another case of friendly competition.

so, boomerang, you using openbsd in production? must be even harder to get the pointy heads to approve openbsd than linux. ha. how is 64bit support?
you have something like kickstart or jumpstart for openbsd? and threading?

b00m3rang · Post by **b00m3rang** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 3:39 pm

ubu wrote:I just did a man pf on a fairly recent linux distro and no dice.

update-

aha. I see pf is a fairly recent addition to openbsd. and it looks like it is neck and neck with iptables for performance. It is hard to gauge because of the new changes in the latest distros of iptables and pf.

Hmmm, I think I built my firewall around '98, and it had pf. It's a P100, and I haven't had to do a damn thing to it since, except for modifying firewall rules occasionally. It just runs for years at a time with no problem.

ubu wrote:looks like another case of friendly competition.

so, boomerang, you using openbsd in production? must be even harder to get the pointy heads to approve openbsd than linux. ha. how is 64bit support?
you have something like kickstart or jumpstart for openbsd? and threading?

Yeah, it's definitely good to have alternatives. I've been using ipfw under FreeBSD most often lately (for server stuff, not for dedicated networking boxes).

I've used a lot of FreeBSD in production, but the OpenBSD has been mainly personal use.

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 4:53 pm

b00m3rang wrote: It just runs for years at a time with no problem.

That's what I like to hear!

I like the promiscuous bsd style license as well! If you want to build a business on top of bsd it is no problem, hence apple, etc.

and we joined eplaya on the same day i see...similar number of posts....

d6 · Post by d6 » Tue Sep 20, 2005 7:58 pm

feel free to send tech-noids to pictures of the robot, which we sent to BM to DESTROY ALL HUMANS!!!!
theres one from 2005 up on image gallery, and a few from 2004 -
or
www.robotronia.com/munzbot

i'm, ahem, "busy" and have not developed/uploaded any new images on the site.

ignorant humans...........

d6

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Wed Sep 21, 2005 9:22 am

love hotshot, d6, very fun to interact with!

care to unravel some of the tech secrets? bsd or linux? it is a telerobot for sure.
very nicely designed. the ladies love it. the sound and voice are also excellent. very well done.

safetythird · Post by **safetythird** » Wed Sep 21, 2005 10:36 am

ubu wrote: you a *nix user s3rd?

Yes, but I'm pretty old school. I run Solaris on Sparc and BSD on intel. For networking it's strictly IOS. I like to play to the strengths of whatever HW/OS combo I have to work with.

S3

(aka BOFH)

Lecter · Post by **Lecter** » Wed Sep 21, 2005 11:07 am

safetythird wrote:(aka BOFH)

Are you the BOFH?

If so, I really enjoy your stuff.

Lecter

d6 · Post by d6 » Thu Sep 22, 2005 9:36 am

Thanks ubu!
we very much appreciate the kind words -
should be @ decom if you'd like to get techy

pre-BM mayhem:
www.robotronia.com/press/AspenTimes.pdf

d6,

electronic usurper

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Thu Sep 22, 2005 10:16 am

You *know* I'll chat you up if I make it to decom! Thanks for the welcome.

Who is not blown away by your robot? It really does create an uncanny effect when it displays such apparent autonomy. the great joy of a well designed robot.

Reminds me of one of my favorite tropes from Daniel Dennet: something to the effect that artificial intelligence may indeed just be the mimicking of consciousness, and that that may just satisfy reaching the bar of consciousness, because we may just be mimicking consciousness ourselves.

I should try to distill that further. Did I pass the turing test? What if the judge of a turing test is itself a robot?

d6 · Post by d6 » Thu Sep 22, 2005 2:01 pm

I think youre onto something with that last sentence..........

d6

ubu · Post by **ubu** » Thu Sep 22, 2005 2:45 pm

you like that one? i kind of do too. It would be arrogance to say I stole it from myself. I'm the robot of that arrogance!

Thanks again, d6. I've got another good reason to go to decom....

The Tech of Burning Man (Slashdot article)

The Tech of Burning Man (Slashdot article)

Re: The Tech of Burning Man (Slashdot article)

Re: The Tech of Burning Man (Slashdot article)