Fish Out of Order, Daily Edition

I've been thinking a little further since my last post on the subject of open and closed systems, and I realised I forgot to mention the largest problem of all with closed formats - preservation of data.

The recent deaths of some well-known writers who published large swathes of material online has lead many to think about what will happen to the data they place on the internet after their death. Domains expire, databases are purged. Books can be destroyed by catastrophe or malice, but data can be destroyed simply by not paying attention to it.

Documents that ran on the oldest computers will not be readable by their modern counterparts unless you convert them to an open format which can be used as a master down the road, allowing important online publications and other digital information to be accessible centuries later.

So what if we lose a blog or two? So what if an informative amateur astronomy website dies from lack of funding? So what if government records kept digitally are lost at some point - we get a clean slate, right?

You know, I'm half inclined to agree. I just love getting rid of things. My parents were hoarders, a side-effect of being raised shortly after two world wars, but I become more and more of a minimalist every day.

And there's a lot of data the world won't miss. But there needs to be ways to save the important stuff. And it's not always easy to judge what is important stuff and what isn't.

Our National Archives has a nifty little tool called Xena aimed at preserving documents. They have been working industriously on keeping our country's data stored in ways that wil lbe useful to us in the future.

Do I think the iPad is going to destroy history as we know it? Of course not. This discussion began because of the talk about the iPad after its press day yesterday, but it's not about the iPad anymore.

Many old NES games from the 80s are now playable on the console giant's latest console, because they kept their old game development files and were able to convert them to a format playable on their new system, re-selling them to customers. But smaller game companies who don't have the resources of Nintendo to do those things with their own products - particularly seeing the companies who made the products might not even exist anymore - may never re-release their games for new systems.

No, that isn't a devastating thing. It's a little sad, but it won't dramatically alter the path humanity takes towards a Bright New Future and a New Tomorrow. But the relaity is that we are moving more and more towards content produced by individuals and smaller organisations who will rise and fall like the tides over our digital landscape. They will leave, and unlike Marcus Aurellius' diary, their words may become unretrievable centuries down the track.

Yes. This is quite the tangent. Tangents are delicious, especially when you pick them fresh from the tree.

My response to an article about walled-garden systems (I love this analogy).

Yes. You're right. A system under the control of a single entity can produce some amazing results and make things far more convenient for consumers. I say this because I am a console gamer.

Games consoles have always been designed as closed systems. The games that appear on them are designed to run on exactly that system, with exactly those specifications. The distinction between console and computer is a little hazier than it used to be, but for the most part they remain closed systems. And they work wonderfully. Switch it on, level up, switch it off. Done. Lovely.

And playing games consoles did make me want to grow up to be a games developer, so it's certainly true that you don't need an open system to be inspired. I was writing my own text-adventures on our DOS machine within a year or two of beginning my console-playing life, and I absolutely loved nutting out why something wasn't working, and understanding the root reasons why things behaved as they did.

So I agree. Walled gardens are lovely.

But I still prefer oceans.

If I buy a pot-plant for my walled garden - actually, let's make it a Golden Wattle bonsai, I've always wanted one of those - and manage not to kill it, it will slowly grow and look stunning in my little walled garden.

Then I get a new job in a distant city, and need to move house. I try to take my beautiful Golden Wattle mini-tree of awesomeness with me, but I can't. It's perfectly self-contained, and it will thrive in the new environment as well as the old one - in fact, my new place has a larger garden and a nice shaded space that will be perfect for the tree - but I can't take it with me. I'm not allowed. I purchased it for this garden, and I can't take it with me elsewhere if I decide to move.

To me it feels like the Walled Gardens article is attacking the least significant part of the argument against closed systems. I think that the key concerns supporters of open systems have are not that they cannot modify them and tinker at will. It's that You Can't Take It With You. That's the fear of the closed system.

It's the problem the Kindle has, and why I'm planning on buying a BeBook later in the year. It's why I never used iTunes until they removed the DRM protection on music files.

If someone builds a better garden, I want to visit it. But closed formats mean I have to buy all my plants all over again. This has been a woe of console gamers for years - once their old 1980s NES dies, that’s it for their old cartridges.

I would love to read Fray magazine on something like an iPad. But if one day a competitor creates an eMaxiPad that is more powerful, elegant, and can read any non-proprietary format - I won't be able to take my earlier copies of the magazine with me.

Unless… unless someone implements a separate  system which tracks and tallies all your purchases across all mediums, and therefore authorises you to download copies of something you already paid for so that it can be played across a different machine.

Another solution that requires less collaboration of closed-system companies would be to have the individual vendors to store your purchases of their products, and then give you a license to download whatever version of their product will run on your machine of choice forever. That way I could download a different closed or open format of the same magazine rather than losing my ability to read it once the hardware changes.

That would make things much simpler.

I love oceans. I love the network of rivers that lead to estuaries feeding them. Water, free to evaporate, condense, and rain down on any point in the world. Including my beautifully designed walled garden.

Lately, mostly via Twitter, I’ve been noticing an awful lot of negative comments directed at cross-dressers. All of them focus on the dehumanising aspect. “I saw this thing...”

People with so many little tracks and turns and loose bolts in their brains that they rattle when they think.

I like weathered people. People who creak and groan but, year after year, learn the patterns of the world and how to work through them.

There are people I know who possess endless positivity, endless forgiveness, endless flattery, and listening to them makes my brain evaporate. I just can't connect with them.

Perpetual moaners aren't my bag either. To me they're the same thing as those continuously knitting silver linings out of shrouds. Both ring on an inherent dishonesty to me. I can't relate to it. I can't believe it.

But if you've lost a button in the wash, or got stretched out of shape, but you know what, you don't even care, you just adapt to it and make it a part of your life? You have my deepest respect. You have your virtues and your quaint habits and your downright annoying tendencies and you're content to show them to the world? I am doing my best to follow after you.

Wear your heart on your sleeve, your spleen in your hair, your bladder in your coffee. Let it all out. Be yourself. You don't have to love everything, or everyone. And the world isn't against you, either.

Unless you're Bob. Nobody likes you, Bob*.

* Bob, I don't mean you. I mean that other Bob. You know, the one no-one likes. Man that guy is a jerk. Apologies for any confusion.