User-Generated Content Licensing

Groundspeak, Inc., the company behind geocaching.com, a popular geocaching website, has added a click-thru license agreement that a paying user of their site must agree to before accessing the "pocket query" feature of the website.

IMPORTANT--READ CAREFULLY BEFORE DOWNLOADING THE ONLINE DATA

GROUNDSPEAK, INC. D/B/A GEOCACHING.COM (GROUNDSPEAK), IS WILLING TO LICENSE THE REQUESTED DATA TO YOU ONLY UPON THE CONDITION THAT YOU ACCEPT THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CONTAINED IN THIS LICENSE AGREEMENT. PLEASE READ THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS CAREFULLY BEFORE CLICKING THE ‘I ACCEPT’ BUTTON AND THEREAFTER DOWNLOADING THE ONLINE DATA. BY DOWNLOADING THE ONLINE DATA, YOU ARE INDICATING YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THE GROUNDSPEAK DATA LICENSE AGREEMENT. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS AS STATED, THEN GROUNDSPEAK IS UNWILLING TO LICENSE THE DATA TO YOU.

GROUNDSPEAK DATA LICENSE AGREEMENT


This is a license agreement, and not an agreement for sale, between the end user (Licensee) and GROUNDSPEAK, Inc. (GROUNDSPEAK), a Washington corporation, with its principal place of business at 2127 5th Avenue, Seattle, WA, 98121, USA. This GROUNDSPEAK Data License Agreement (Agreement) gives Licensee certain limited rights to use the Data and Related Materials. All rights not specifically granted in this Agreement are reserved to GROUNDSPEAK.

Reservation of Ownership and Grant of License: GROUNDSPEAK and its licensor(s) retain exclusive ownership of the copy of the Data and Related Materials licensed under this Agreement and, hereby, grant to Licensee a personal, nonexclusive, nontransferable license to use the Data and Related Materials based on the terms and conditions of this Agreement. Licensee agrees to use reasonable effort to protect the Data and Related Materials from unauthorized use, reproduction, distribution, or publication.

Proprietary Rights and Copyright: Licensee acknowledges that the Data and Related Materials contain proprietary and confidential property of GROUNDSPEAK and its licensor(s). The Data and Related Materials are owned by GROUNDSPEAK and its licensor(s) and are protected by United States copyright laws and applicable international copyright treaties and/or conventions.

Permitted Uses:
• Licensee may install the Data or portions of the Data onto a global positioning system unit ["GPS"] for Licensee's own internal use.
• Licensee may make only one (1) copy of the original Data for archival purposes unless the right to make additional copies is granted to Licensee in writing by GROUNDSPEAK.
• Licensee may modify the Data and merge other data sets with the Data for Licensee's own internal use. The portions of the Data merged with other data sets will continue to be subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement.
• Licensee may use, copy, alter, modify, merge, reproduce, and/or create derivative works of the on-line textual content [including the about geocaching content, links content and cache hiding tutorial] for Licensee's own internal use. The portions of the on-line documentation merged with other software, data, hard copy, and/or digital materials shall continue to be subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement and shall provide the following copyright attribution notice acknowledging GROUNDSPEAK's proprietary rights in the on-line documentation: "Portions of this document include intellectual property of GROUNDSPEAK and are used herein by permission. Copyright © 2006 GROUNDSPEAK, Inc. All Rights Reserved."
Uses Not Permitted:
• Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement to any third party whatsoever.
• Licensee shall not reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the GROUNDSPEAK-compatible data format(s) in an attempt to duplicate the proprietary and copyright-protected GROUNDSPEAK data model(s) and/or export format(s).
• Licensee shall not remarket, resell, and/or redistribute the Data or any derived portion(s) of the Data in its digital form to any third party whatsoever.
• Licensee shall not remove or obscure any GROUNDSPEAK and/or licensor(s) copyright, proprietary, or trademark notices.
Redistribution Rights for Derived Digital Data Sets: At GROUNDSPEAK's sole option, GROUNDSPEAK may grant a separate sublicense agreement, on a royalty fee basis, with Licensees who wish to obtain redistribution rights for derived or other value-added digital data sets in GROUNDSPEAK-compatible data format(s). Please address your written proposals to Attn.: GROUNDSPEAK Data Manager, GROUNDSPEAK, Inc., 2127 5th Avenue, Seattle, WA, 98121 USA.

Term: The license granted by this Agreement shall commence upon Licensee's receipt of the Data and Related Materials and shall continue until such time that (1) Licensee elects to discontinue use of the Data and Related Materials and terminates the Agreement or (2) GROUNDSPEAK terminates for Licensee's material breach of this Agreement. Upon termination of this Agreement in either instance, Licensee shall then return to GROUNDSPEAK the Data and Related Materials. The parties hereby agree that all provisions that operate to protect the rights of GROUNDSPEAK and its licensor(s) shall remain in force should breach occur.

No Warranty: The Data are not warranted and Licensee expressly acknowledges that the Data contain some nonconformities, defects, or errors. GROUNDSPEAK does not warrant that the Data will meet Licensee's needs or expectations, that the use of the Data will be uninterrupted, or that all nonconformities, defects, or errors can or will be corrected. GROUNDSPEAK is not inviting reliance on these data, and Licensee should always verify actual data.

THE DATA AND RELATED MATERIALS CONTAINED THEREIN ARE PROVIDED "AS IS," WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

Exclusive Remedy and Limitation of Liability: The GROUNDSPEAK and/or licensor(s) entire liability and Licensee's exclusive remedy shall be to terminate the Agreement upon Licensee returning the Data and Related Materials to GROUNDSPEAK with a copy of Licensee's invoice/receipt and GROUNDSPEAK returning any license fees paid to Licensee.

IN NO EVENT SHALL GROUNDSPEAK AND/OR ITS LICENSOR(S) BE LIABLE FOR COSTS OF PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES, LOST PROFITS, LOST SALES OR BUSINESS EXPENDITURES, INVESTMENTS, OR COMMITMENTS IN CONNECTION WITH ANY BUSINESS, LOSS OF ANY GOODWILL, OR FOR ANY INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF THIS AGREEMENT OR USE OF THE DATA AND RELATED MATERIALS, HOWEVER CAUSED, ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, AND WHETHER OR NOT GROUNDSPEAK AND/OR ITS LICENSOR(S) HAVE BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. THESE LIMITATIONS SHALL APPLY NOTWITHSTANDING ANY FAILURE OF ESSENTIAL PURPOSE OF ANY EXCLUSIVE REMEDY.

No Implied Waivers: No failure or delay by GROUNDSPEAK and/or its licensor(s) in enforcing any right or remedy under this Agreement shall be construed as a waiver of any future or other exercise of such right or remedy by GROUNDSPEAK and/or its licensor(s).

Export Regulation: Licensee acknowledges that this Agreement and the performance thereof are subject to compliance with any and all applicable United States laws, regulations, or orders relating to the export of data thereto. Licensee agrees to comply with all laws, regulations, and orders of the United States in regard to any export of such Technical Data. Licensee agrees not to disclose or re-export any Technical Data received under this Agreement in or to any countries for which the United States Government requires an export license or other supporting documentation at the time of export or transfer, unless Licensee has obtained prior written authorization from GROUNDSPEAK and the U.S. Office of Export Control.

Severability: If any provision(s) of this Agreement shall be held to be invalid, illegal, or unenforceable by a court or other tribunal of competent jurisdiction, the validity, legality, and enforceability of the remaining provisions shall not in any way be affected or impaired thereby.

Governing Law: This Agreement, entered into in King County shall be construed and enforced in accordance with and be governed by the laws of the United States of America and the State of Washington without reference to conflict of laws principles. The parties hereby consent to the personal jurisdiction of the courts of this County and waive their rights to change venue.

Entire Agreement: The parties agree that this constitutes the sole and entire agreement of the parties as to the matter set forth herein and supersedes any previous agreements, understandings, and arrangements between the parties relating hereto.

What I find most interesting about this whole agreement is that the waypoint data is user-submitted content. In fact, the Geocaching.com Site Terms of Use Agreement states under
3. License to Use Site; Restrictions

The Site and all content available on the Site are protected by applicable intellectual property laws, and are for personal and noncommercial use. All rights not expressly granted in this Agreement are reserved by Groundspeak or by the respective owners of the intellectual property rights. All materials available on or through the Site, other than Third Party Submissions (collectively, the "Site Materials") are the property of Groundspeak or of its licensors and are protected by copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property laws. Groundspeak reserves the right to impose additional terms and conditions upon Your use and viewing of particular Site Materials, and any such terms and conditions may be posted on the Site in connection with those Site Materials. You may not reproduce or retransmit the Site Materials, in whole or in part, in any manner, without the prior written consent of the owner of such materials, except as follows: You may make a single copy of the Site Materials solely for Your personal, noncommercial use, but such copying must be consistent with any applicable additional terms and conditions and You must preserve any copyright, trademark, or other notices contained in or associated with such Site Materials. You may not distribute such copies to others, whether or not in electronic form and whether or not for a charge or other consideration, without prior written consent of the owner of such materials. If you have any questions, contact us at contact@groundspeak.com.

and, under section

6. License to Use Submissions:

All comments, articles, tutorials, screenshots, pictures, graphics, tools, downloads, and all other materials submitted to Groundspeak in connection with the Site or available through the Site (collectively, "Submissions") remain the property and copyright of the original author. If You submit Submissions to Groundspeak, You must adhere to any applicable submission guidelines that may be posted from time to time on the Site. By submitting any Submission to Groundspeak, You grant Groundspeak a worldwide, non-exclusive, transferable, perpetual, irrevocable, fully-paid royalty-free license and right to use, reproduce, distribute, import, broadcast, transmit, modify and create derivative works of, license, offer to sell, and sell, rent, lease or lend copies of, publicly display and publicly perform that Submission for any purpose and without restriction or obligation to You

Color me confused. The information I submit to the site remains my property, but in using a feature of their site, the exported data becomes their property? How's that again? (emphasis in preceding paragraphs mine).

Time to Build a Moat? No.

On Thursday morning I got a call from my wife telling me that our house alarm had gone off and that she was en route to see what had happened. I left the office and showed up a short while later where I met her and 3 police officers, one of whom was already dusting for prints. From what we can reconstruct, it looks like would-be burglar(s)

• attempted to twist the lock off of my garage-side gate, then
• walked around to the other side of the house and popped the electric meter off, shutting off the electricity, then
• climbed our 8' privacy fence,
  
• looked around and decided the best method of break-in would be to break out a pane in the living room window,
• picked up a large metal shepherd's hook we use for hanging plants and broke the window pane, reached in, opened the window hasp and opened the window, and then
• fled the scene in confusion as the alarm sounded.

A couple of years ago we decided to add a cell phone-based backup to our alarm system, owing to reports that burglars were shutting house electric services to prevent alarms from sounding. Needless to say, our decision just paid for itself. In the for-what-its-worth category, Ellendale Electric installed and monitors our alarm service.

Over the last few years the Memphis Police department has taken a few knocks, but I'll say this: they have always responded quickly whenever I've called, and they have always been courteous and professional. The fact that my wife works with many of them on a daily basis might have something to do with it, but I don't think you learn to be good at your job in 5 minutes, so I'm inclined to believe that every one of the local guys in blue that I've dealt with are simply good officers, and that I'm certainly getting my tax dollars worth.

A short while after the officers finished most of their work, a revenue protection officer from MLG&W showed up to investigate the meter. He restored service and placed a heavy duty security collar around the meter, showing me how substantially stronger the newer style collars are than the old models. He also ordered a replacement meter just in case our old one was damaged by the burglar.

A couple of hours later a glazier came by from Joyner Glass to replace the broken windowpane.

All in all our experience has been about as good as you can expect. Since then I've been thinking about two questions:

• Why did we get broken into?, and
• What can we do to try to prevent being broken into?

As for the first, the MLG&W RP officer gave me as good an explanation as any when he said, "Your house looks like it has stuff." While we are working on changing that (see last post), I don't think the burglars intended to steal our books - even my signed, uncorrected proof of Milosz' The Unattainable Earth isn't that valuable and would be difficult to sell/pawn. I imagine they were intending to take our electronics and that they would have been sadly disappointed to learn that we do not have a giant flat-screen TV in our living room, nor do we have game consoles, or even a surround-sound stereo system of recent vintage. We have an 'L' grand piano - not exactly pawnable. We have a few of computers; it might be funny to see them react to Linux on my desktop, and even funnier to see them fire up my old Nec APC IV, though pound-for-pound it simple wouldn't be worth the hernia of getting it down the stairs.

I've decided upon 3 courses of action to try to prevent a future re-occurrence. First, I'm contacting my alarm company to get some stickers and signs, with the intention of making sure that potential burglars know the house is alarmed. Obviously this time that didn't prevent an effort, but this time we were dealing with a repeat-offenders - in effect, professional thieves - and I want to persuade lesser theives to move along. Second, I'm posting flyers in my neighbors' door-handles letting them know what happened and to be on the lookout for anything suspicious in our neighborhood. Third, I'm talking to the folks at work: you'd be amazed at the highly inventive suggestions you get from a bunch of enigineers who are handed a problem. Cameras? Easy. Wireless cameras? Easy. Wireless cameras that automatically email me alerts when they sense motion? Better. Machine-gun turrets that automatically shoot intruders? Okay, I probably won't go for the last one.

The other question I've been asking myself is why someone wanted to steal in the first place. I've never viewed thieves as particularly stupid, but I have always assumed they are lazy. Implicit in that reasoning, I suppose, is that thieves have a choice: they could be law-abiding citizens who work, or they could be lazy good-for-nothings who would rather steal. Our last would-be burglar turned out to be a crack addict who was stealing to support his drug habit; the blood he left at the scene matched a DNA sample taken when he was processed for a later crime, and that additional charge increased his jail time. All of that to say: I wonder what his actual choices were regarding stealing and working, really. Now at this point this may be starting to sound like an apologia for thieves, but that's not my intent. I do hope I'm never in a situation where stealing starts to look like an attractive alternative to being a responsible, productive citizen, though. Thieves are still lazy and irresponsible in my book, but they may be desperate, too. Getting arrested is a kind of treatment, because it takes them out of that immediate situation of desperation. It may not be preferable to them, but that's not really what's important. What is important is that they see and live an immediate consequence of their decisions, so they can re-evaluate how they can live.

Some folks have asked me when I'm going to sell my house and move. I'm not, certainly not yet. My wife deals with criminals of all kinds every day, so I have a fair appreciation, probably a better understanding than 95% of you, as to the level and type of crime in this city. [ I'll add that it is the rare, rare exception when the local media accurately quotes my wife regarding criminal cases, and that their coverage of cases she is involved in seems to be more ratings-driven than anything else. ] Like the thieves, we have made a decision and that decision is based on us having more reasons to stay than leave.

On the keeping of books

My wife and I recently had to purchase a new furnace for the house. This meant getting in the attic, which ordinarily wouldn't be a problem since we have walk-in access to it, save for one thing: my wife and I are packrats. My wife reminds me from time to time that it is a good thing that we are both packrats, contrary to what playwrights might tell you. All this to say that our attic needed a little organizing before the HVAC folks could safely move about the cabin. It wasn't a lot of fun, not only because of all the lifting and moving of boxes. I think the fundamental problem for any packrat is simply getting past the paralysis of knowing what to throw away. Call it "letting go" if it makes you feel better, but the problem remains.

The good news is that, having moved past the attic (not that we're done with it, but baby steps, baby steps), we're now actually considering other parts of the house, including our biggest accumulation: books. A couple of weeks ago I donated seven boxes of books to the library. (They accept donations at the main branch; I don't know about other branches.) Now I know what you're saying: seven boxes? big deal! Here's the deal: these were just the boxes in my garage, where they have been stored since we moved into the house... in 1999. Since then we've donated another 8 or so boxes, and I already have another 3 -5 boxes lined up. You're probably saying, "Ummm, you're donating to the library..... why not borrow from the library, too, and save yourself the trouble?" Well, first things first, as we still have the equivalent of 8 bookcases left to go. It's still a troublesome task. I look at a book and ask myself, "Am I ever going to read this book again?" I think my biggest problem is simply that I lie to myself and say, "Sure, I'll read it again." Another problem, though, is that, at least with respect to books, I am sentimental. When I look at a book, I don't just see the text; I usually remember when I bought it, where, and why. I remember reading it. You would think something so special would invoke a desire to share it with the world, but til now it's been harder than I thought it would be.

Right now I don't have a goal in mind, so I don't know when I'll be finished. Maybe I'll be done when I just can't get rid of any of the books I have left. I already know I have a few I'll keep, certainly more for the memories they invoke than the certainty that I will read them again:

• a couple of books inscribed by friends,
• a set of Tom Apostol's Calculus Volumes signed by Paul Erdos,
• a book autographed by an author friend,
• A signed uncorrected proof of Unattainable Earth by Czeslaw Milosz, and an autographed copy of his The Captive Mind.

For now, back to the shelves.

Wondering why IE is now crashing whenever I visit the Google Calendar webpage.

Mic check..... one TWO.... one TWO.... CHECK CHECK.

Bad Pilgrims

Rebekah Scott writes wonderful stories about living on the Camino Frances and the joys of rustic home ownership in Spain. (She's on my 'always' read list.) She recently wrote a post titled American Idiot that prompted me to comment on her blog, but rather than waste too much of her space I figured I use more of my own.
(And, no, I have no idea whether she's a big Green Day fan or not.)

Her post is about her encounter with an 'ugly American'. Don't know what that means?

I met a particularly nasty character today in Sahagún, holding forth at the Bar Deportivo before an audience of four or five other pilgrims, apparently English-speakers. This guy speaks no other language, he said: "and why should I have to?" He griped about the French, Germans, Spaniards, and other "foreigners" he´s encountering on his hike, and wondered why they don´t just pave the entire camino trail. And then he started into politics...

Now, Rebekah goes on to describe more boorish behavior, mainly of a political bent, but that's not what I want to talk about here, so if you're interested, read her post. I'll wait.

What her post did for me is to remind me of two events that occurred when my wife and I walked our little bit of the Camino Frances in 2004, and our own encounters with 'ugly pilgrims'. As I mentioned in my comment on her site, my wife and I encountered only one other American (Jim, who worked for the CDC in Atlanta) our entire trip. Maybe that's a blessing - at the time I was all for some experience that would push my wife and I into alien, uncomfortable territory. [ Careful what you wish for. ]

The first encounter was this: we had stopped for the day in Ventas de Naron,
where we met Manuel and Reme, good friends we would walk with for the rest of our journey. When the albergue opened, we climbed up the stairs and claimed a couple of the 22 beds and walked next door for a meal. Upon our returned we noticed that most if not all of the beds appeared taken.
So there we were, sitting on our beds, unpacking, chatting, and tending to the wounds of the day when we heard a tremendous commotion downstairs, so much so that Manuel and I decided it was worth checking the situation out. [ I suppose guys are guys anywhere and anytime. ] That was when first saw the pilgrim who became known to all of us as 'the angry German woman.'

Why was she angry? Well, she wanted a bed. Actually, she wanted two beds, one for herself and one for her husband. Her husband who was sick. Her husband, who would soon be arriving in a taxi.

Now, I can only tell you my opinion on these matters, so I'll tell you this: the Camino is not a hike, it is a Pilgrimage. If you want to know the difference, that's a whole 'nother conversation and far better explained by others, but certainly intent has a lot to do with it. And albergues do not exist for hikers or tourists; they exist for pilgrims. What's a pilgrim? Well, read some Cousineau and get back to me when you have an answer. In the meantime, there's a few specifics that are observed on the Camino, and one of the big no-no's is that you arrive at an albergue under your own power - walking, running, even riding a bike (though walkers might be given first dibs). Horseback? Maybe. Taxi.... in a word, NO.

"But," I hear you say, "the husband was sick." Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. I saw people dropped off by taxi on the outskirts of town so that they could stroll in and claim a cheap room. So what's the big deal? Nothing, really, except for a place to stay for the night for someone else who might have been walking all day. Was the German woman telling the truth? I honestly don't know. I do know she seemed to protest a bit too much, and she sure was awfully loud about it. I have heard it said that hospitalieros develop a strong intuition about genuine pilgrims vs. tourist pretenders, and maybe the German woman was setting off all sorts of mental alarms. When the husband arrived he didn't look that sick, but I'm no doctor. And maybe yelling is an obnoxious way of getting what you want from people, but maybe yelling is a disparate way of getting something you badly need, too.

Oh, in case you're wondering: the German woman and her husband ended up staying. They complained loudly the whole time.

At this point you may be asking: Is this an ugly German story? No, her nationality isn't my point.


My second story: a day or two later my wife and I stopped, mid-morning, at a sort of cafe on the road. We grabbed a couple of coffees and sat at an outside table and watched the pilgrim traffic walk by, when I spied a fellow walk around the bend with a Purdue tee shirt on. Maybe it was the appearance of something so incongruously familiar, but I couldn't help but yell out, "Hey Purdue!" to the man, who looked at me strangely, then looked down at his shirt, smiled, and waved. And so he stopped, too, grabbed a coffee, came outside and sat next to me. We talked for a moment, quickly establishing that the tee-shirt was the gift of a son or daughter-in-law, that he was a Spaniard and I an American, and that I was James and he was Jamie, so, as he said, "We are the same." Then another man, also a Spaniard sat down next to Jamie, we exchanged our 'Buenos dias', and then they struck up a conversation.

I do not know Spanish. Some might argue that I do not know English, either, but I certainly know very little Spanish. That said, I'm no dummy and 4+ solid years of Latin help me find my way through all sorts of things. So I eavesdropped very intently, and I caught a few things in their words: English. American. Something about not speaking Spanish.

I quickly became upset: here was a fellow I'd just met and befriended and now he was trashing ignorant Americans right next to me! I looked at my wife, suggested we finish our coffees and shove off, and we did so in quick order. But Jamie did the same and so there we were, walking beside this man who was complaining about us moments before. And then something wonderful happened: Jamie made a wrong turn. Or, I should say, he didn't make the right turn. He strode on ahead into what appeared to be a farmer's field, whereas I looked to my right, caught glimpse of splash of yellow paint, and stopped. I will admit that I hesitated, but I called out to Jamie and said, "Jamie.... the road is here." I had to repeat myself, but he came back, looked up, laughed, and said, "You're right! Thanks!" And so we started walking side-by-side again, and since I couldn't take it any more, I asked him, "Jamie.... I have to ask you a question.... back up the road, you talked to the man next to you, and it sounded to me as though you were complaining about Americans, and so I have to ask what you were talking about." And he told me, "No, that's not what we said. What we said was how nice it was to have an American try to say a little Spanish, because the British come over here and live and many of them do not speak any Spanish, and they all live together and try to stay the same, and after twenty years all they know how to do is order a beer."


Now, this story isn't about how this made me feel better, though it did, nor is it about ugly British pilgrims or ex-pats, either.


About once a month my wife and I talk about what it means to be a pilgrim. While we don't agree on several things, we do agree about intention being very important, perhaps the most important thing. "The journey is more important than the destination" may be a worn-out cliche, but for me the most profound moments of the road were in the most mundane places. The main thing the conversation with my wife continues to reinforce is that notion that everyone's pilgrimage is intensely personal and unique. I wish that everyone had the wonderful experience I did. I wish that everyone encountered the generous, kind, and wise pilgrims I did. The truth of the matter is that 100,000+ pilgrims walk the road, all for their own reasons, some joyfully but some painfully, too. This is the lesson I learned on the road: to get past my desire for other pilgrims to think and believe and act the way I do and instead to try to understand why it is that they are the way they are, especially when I see something I don't like. There is always a story, and many times it isn't the one I think it is.

So, Ugly Americans/Germans/French/British/whatever? Heck yes. Ugly because they are continually obnoxious? Sure. Ugly because they are scared and far from home? That, too. Lonely, depressed, and the thousand other reasons people choose to walk hundreds of miles, especially if they've crossed an ocean first? Yes. For some folks, the right moment may not have arrived yet. For some it may never come. I continue to remain hopeful.

Geogames

Coin gift from Jeremy Irish
Originally uploaded by jbgreer

Many local readers of this blog know that I'm a geocacher, albeit a methodical (read: slow) one. Still, I try to pick up a few caches when I can, so when I registered for the recent Where 2.0 conference in Burlingame, CA, I setup a few pocket queries on the Geocaching.com site around the areas of my visit. Five days away from home, and I only managed 4 finds: one in downtown Sonoma and a few near the hotel. That said, I was pleased to see that Jeremy Irish, head of Groundspeak, the folks behind the Geocaching.com (and Waymarking.com, and Wherigo.com) sites was speaking at the conference.

Since some of you may ask: no, Jeremy didn't speak about geocaching per se, though he did chide the crowd of geofolk who don't cache ("If you're not a geocacher..... SHAME ON YOU.") Instead, he spoke about the lessons that Groundspeak has learned in working with the geocaching community, especially as applied to other GPS and geospatial games. I thought it particularly telling that he cautioned against games that relied on a very accurate sense of location and that he described both positive and negative aspects of incenting players into the mania that plagues many players.

After his talk, I stopped by and identified myself as a geocacher and thanked him for his talk. I'd brought along a couple of old geocoins, intending to place them in a nearly travel bug motel. Instead, I offered him one of my coins as a gift. Imagine my surprise when he said, "Oh.... wait a minute", fumbled into his bag, and produced a similar gift of his own: a "Groundspeak Lackeys: 2007" coin that they had minted for employees, with iconic caricatures of all the staff.

Several of the other attendees and presenters were focused on geogames. Some were interested in them as educational devices, while others seemed to be promoting them as fun (and hopefully lucrative) ways of enjoying space. Either way, I think the explosion in location-aware devices will continue to stoke the creative fires of many. Here's hoping for their continued success.

The Five Questions

I once read that the easiest way to make money on the internet was to implement all of the standard *ix services like mail, telnet, ftp, finger, and wall, but to make them run in a browser. We've pretty much done that. Here's another take. In grade school I recall being taught that it was important to answer five questions in a piece of writing: Who, What, When, Where, and How.

The Who question is being answered by all of the social networking services, though they have yet to be truly unified.

The What question is being answered by search.

The When question is being answered by blogging and public messaging.

The Where question is being answered by online mapping services.

The How question is being answered by blogs and DIY communities.


So the question is: is there a better way to answer any of these questions?

Losing a little faith in humanity

Friday was not a good day.

On Friday my wife and I switched vehicles. She took my truck so that she could drop it off at a repair shop near her workplace; my truck was badly in need of a near pair of front tires. [ That's what putting off buying a new vehicle for 2 years will get you.... ] In turn I drove her vehicle to my workplace. She got the better end of the deal.

My commute route varies according to

1. day of the week,
2. time of day,
3. direction of travel,
4. sound, and
5. which intersections/streets the city chooses to render completely useless for extended periods of time.

The Monday drive home means taking the 385 Pkwy - I-240 W - I-240N and then home. Other days driving home means taking the Ridgeway exit off 385 and driving through town. Driving to the office might mean taking Walnut Grove to White Station to Poplar to the loop, or Sam Cooper to the loop. The sound of a train horn in the morning definitely means the latter. The construction at Perkins and Walnut Grove means avoiding it entirely.

So, this past Friday morning was a Sam Cooper to I-240 kinda day, which was fine until I hit the loop and realized that traffic was at a near standstill. I got a couple of lucky breaks and managed to shift over a couple of lanes, nicely positioning myself to avoid local traffic turning off onto Walnut Grove and Poplar. There I sat, parked, for at intents and purposes. Unfortunately, the driver of a small tan car wasn't that observant.

"Whoa!" That's what I yelled when I was struck on the rear passenger side of the vehicle. Maybe it's better that I didn't see it coming such that I didn't tense up. I looked up to see a small car making a severe course correction into the lane to my right, and then I saw them make another couple of quick adjustments and pull onto the shoulder of the road. I recovered and did the same, pulling in behind the driver. I stopped the car, turned it off, pulled out my phone, and began calling the police. Actually, I called 411 and had them transfer me to the police. Why not 911? Well, since I've been bombarded with TV commercials telling me to avoid using 911 for non-emergencies, I figured I was doing the right thing. Turns out I was not doing the right thing: the police told me to hang up and call 911. So I hung up and then realized I wasn't really aware of the situation yet. By this time the other driver had exited her vehicle and had walked around her car and then mine. She mumbled an apology and I asked her if she was okay, which, thankfully, she was. I called my wife and told her what had happened, and then I called 911.

And that's when the driver of the other car, a young black woman, about 5'1" or so, wearing scrubs and a white with pink and yellow pattern top got in her car while I wasn't looking, and drove off. No name, no license, no information.

Just so you know: leaving the scene of an accident is against the law in Tennessee.

I talked to the police, anyway, and they sent an officer who got to scene very quickly and took a report, and I have uninsured motorist coverage, so it's all good I suppose. It was when I got in my car and started driving off that I looked up and saw the Baptist Hospital sign that a few things clicked into place. 7:40 AM. Scrubs. Hospital. So, I figure there's a nurse at Baptist who ran into my car and then drove off to work. She drives a tan car. Her car is damaged on the front driver-side of the vehicle and may show signs of red paint.

Was she going to miss something important at work? Maybe. Was she uninsured, like ~40% of Memphis motorists? (that's an old figure, but still). Was she impaired? She was definitely groggy, especially for someone who had just hit another vehicle and should have been high on an adrenaline rush at the least. I can't say.

This is the second time I have been struck while not moving. The first time I was hit by someone pulling into an adjacent turn lane. It was dark. I got out and met a nice, older lady who admitted fairly quickly that she didn't have insurance, but that she wanted to pay to fix my vehicle. I took a look at her car, then at her, thought to myself, "she needs the money worse than I do", and told her no thanks. The damage was minor - heck, it added character to the truck.

Why the difference this time? Part of it is the vehicle. My wife keeps telling me that it wasn't my fault, but I still look at it as me causing damage to her favorite car that she wants to drive until it falls apart. Part of it I suppose it's because she didn't do what she should have done, really, and she got away with it. I do have a judgmental streak. Part of it is simple anger at myself for not doing some simple things, like immediately asking the other driver for her insurance card and taking a picture of her license plate with my cell phone. But part of it is that she didn't do what I wanted her to do. Yes, an accident is bad, but there's a breadth of ways they can be handled that can make all the difference, too, and I've seen that.

Did I expect some sort of karmic reward for my earlier gesture? No, but I sure wouldn't have minded if things turned out that way. Come Monday I'll be looking at the morning traffic a little more closely, but I'm wondering what I will do if I spot that driver. Part of me wants to stop her and pick up right where she left, with me calling the cops and seeing things handled properly. Part of me says, "Let it go." Part of me hopes that I don't see her, but that she sees me - often - and regrets driving off.

Brother Ed

Brother Ed
Originally uploaded by jbgreer

That's a picture of Ed and I taken by my wife this past Saturday in our driveway.

Ed and I met during our undergraduate days at university. I say 'met', though I know that at first I had heard quite a bit about him (and maybe vice versa) before actually meeting him in person, so in some respects he was my first virtual friend before the current internet craze.

During those early college years, Ed and I hung around similar circles, linked by a few common friends and an even more common quest to obtain access to various computers and use even more computing time. There was a small cadre of what amounted to independent contractors on campus, and we had a sort of gentleman's agreement not to poach each others plum positions, but not to be too greedy, either. Suffice it to say that Ed and I enjoyed our fair share of work in nearly every lab of importance at the time. Later during graduate school, one of those labs would become our home-away-from-home - sometimes quite literally if the weather grew too hot for an apartment we shared a half a block from campus.

Now, at the time Ed and I belonged, perhaps unconsciously, to that long-haired hacker-ish tradition of guys who wore fairly impressive beards. [ I did have someone once describe my school id photo as looking as though "I had come down from the hills to axe-murder my momma." ] So, imagine if you will, two fairly ursine fellows walking the breadth of the city, my 1973 Buick LeSabre being an expensive beast to feed at the time, We ate together, lived together, worked together, in short, spent pretty much every waking moment of our grad school existence together. I count it as a treasured complement that Ed later admitted that he didn't think he could put up with anyone else for that long.

And, so, Ed and I would would walk into one of our old haunts and, inevitably, sooner or later someone would turn and ask, "Say.... are you two guys brothers?" We even had someone ask if we were twins, which I thought was too funny since, as many readers know, I am a twin... just not to Ed. At first we were shocked at the suggestion, then amused, then almost expectant.

Well, time does go by, and grad school (the first time) has long since past, and I got married and even took to shaving most years, usually in the Spring but recently in the Fall. Ed I have now known each other over 20 years, making him one of my longest tenured friends. I grew up with 3 sisters, and Ed has become over the years the closest thing I'll probably ever have to a brother, which is what I call him and he calls me, though he has some to spare.

This past Saturday Ed and I bailed on a planned geocaching trip due to rain and decided to run a few errands instead. We were standing in line waiting to checkout when the man in front of us picked up his bags, turned, and said, "Are you guys brothers?" I said no and grinned, turned to Ed and said, "That hasn't happened in a long time." It's the truth, but it isn't, you see. Yes we are.

Old blogs, time

Some folks know that I post in a few places. One of those is my first blog, run on a site that created several years ago to host files for some friends and I. I didn't post there too frequently, either, except for one brief period before and during the Camino Frances pilgrimage. I've decided for various reasons to shutdown that blog, but I also decided copy over some of those old posts if only to give me yet another reason to think about the Camino.

Imagine my surprise when I started copying the posts and realized that my first direct Camino post was exactly 4 years ago today.

2008 Oxford Sacred Harp Sing

2008 Oxford Sacred Harp Sing
Originally uploaded by jbgreer

This reason I had plenty to be happy about. For one thing my wife celebrated our 12th wedding anniversary on Saturday. We originally had more elaborate plans for an out-of-town getaway, but the Memphis weather (it snowed on Friday) and other factors convinced us to stay in town and simply enjoy the day together. On Sunday we got up early, especially if you adjust for that morning's daylight savings adjustment, and drove down to Oxford, MS, home to a well-organized Sacred Harp singings that has been going on for 28 years now. This was our second year to attend.

As for Sacred Harp: suffice it to say that it is a singing tradition that comes from early 19th century efforts to teach singing, but it appears to have continued as a way of preserving a tradition and providing an excuse for communities to gather together. The name Sacred Harp comes from one of the principal song books. There are other texts as well, but most (all?) share a common characteristic in that the music is engraved using a shape note system in which different relative pitches are assigned different shapes, hence the name.

The singing itself it difficult to describe. It is not refined chorale singing; it's more like a raw, powerful expression of joy, faith, and sometimes sorrow. I've read a description where a fellow said that he would travel 1000 miles to sing Sacred Harp but wouldn't cross the street to hear it. A review for
"Awake, My Soul: The Story of the Sacred Harp" quotes a reviewer at the Washington City Paper as saying, "Get enough people singing weird harmonies at the top of their voices and you start feeling a little sorry for the devil." I don't know how the Oxford sing compares to other smaller, rural singings, but I know that the energy in the air is palpable, and standing in the hollow square leading a song feels like home to me.

Rafting the New River

Rafting the New River
Originally uploaded by jbgreer

This is one of my favorite pictures. Like all good pictures, there is a story behind it:

As I was finishing up my undergraduate degree I started working in the experimental psychology department in preparation for my next degree (or so I thought, but that's another story). That, in turn, put me in touch with many of the pych grad student population including a woman who befriended me, Marie L. Unfortunately for me, Marie ended up changing schools and moving to Louisville, KY fairly soon thereafter. So either in the 80's or very early 90's (my memory is a bit fuzzy as to exactly when) I took a Greyhound bus to visit her.

I don't recall much of the bus trip - the great Mackheath/Greer trip to Oregon stands out as a better travel adventure (another time, another tale), but I do recall that she picked me up at the bus station, took me by her place, and then announced that we were going to help a friend of her's move. Riiiiight. It wasn't so bad as it sounds, really, as the two friends were going on a trip with us. In fact, there were six people involved, so the moving was easy, and shortly afterwards we jumped into two cars and drove to a campsite near the New River in West Virginia.

After resting a bit, we made our way over to some outfitter company, got our life jackets, helmets, and paddles, and then hopped aboard the raft you see in the picture. The fella in back was our guide; I think his name was Mike.
The woman next in line is Janine R., who, as I recall it, later moved to NY state. That's me in the camo shirt with mountain man beard in full effect. Of the two next people, the one further away is Marie, who was wearing an actual wetsuit. (Marie was the kind of person who always prepared). Sadly, I can't recall the names of the others, though I think the other womans' nickname was Nee-nee?

That day was filled with fun. We rowed and learned our paces and then were fed a picnic lunch. Afterwards we rafted a rapids-filled section of the river, including a couple of class Vs. That night we had a huge party around a campfire with other rafters.

Principles of Operating Systems

Okay, y'all need to run out and buy Principles of Operating Systems: Design and Application by Brian Stuart, but not a) not just because I work with him or b) because I'm listed in the acknowledgment section. Really. (See, it really does matter if you provide editorial advice to textbook authors.... if only to increase the likelihood of your name appearing in print.) No, you should buy the book because I say so. You got a problem with that?