The arrival of another new year is a time for contemplation.

Or so i’ve always been told. And some, only partially conscious part of my mind, want to take this opportunity to brood, not on that which passed, for that is not my nature, but instead on that which is expected.

2004, from this vantage point, is but a notion of events yet to come, but the notion and the expectations it brings is slowly crystalising in my mind. And it’s an exciting picture being formed. 2004 has the potenital, to be the most exciting year of my career yet. OK, if you really think about it, that goes for every other year as well, but nevertheless, this one feels different.

2004 will be the year where the funding we secured late last year from the Open Society Institute, will result in an actual project. The first time, since I un-rooted myself from the ‘traditional’ private sector in early 2001 that I have a crystal-clear and funded project I can call my own (well it’s ours in fact, but it is also mine). 2004 will see the birth of a danish NGO uniquely focused around our passion for open technology in development. 2004 will see me travel more than any year before it (at least to more countries) and 2004 will give me a chance to speak at the incredibly sexy and geeky Emerging Technologies Conference, in San Diego in early February.

With a march trip to Namibia to facilitate at AfricaSource (arranged by our friends and colleagues at Tactical Technology, and planned trips to 3-5 other countries to get our own wireless roadshow off the ground, 2004 will be a heavy travel year. And with my new-found (thankyou WSIS) contacts at IDRC, InfoDev, danida, Growth Africa and throughout the community, 2004 will also be make or break for my passion to be a part of the community enterprise to improve the use of ICT’s in the developing world.

And in my heart I believe it will be make!

Salute 2004

In the continuing saga of my left knee…

this wednesday i spent the day at my local hospital for arthroscopic surgery in the left knee. the same left knee that i had cruciate ligament reconstruction in about 4 years ago.
This time it’s the meniscus. Well, last time it was the meniscus too, but that was overshadowed by the torn ligament. Anyway, to make a long story short, I now have 3 tiny ‘arrows’ stuck in my meniscus, which means wearing a brace, and not bending the knee for 5 weeks. It’s been 3 days and it’s already starting to annoy me that i can’t reach my toes, can’t put on my sock without help, and am prevented from using my normal mode of trannsportation, my bicycle.

on the other hand, i get to spend inordinate amounts of time lying in a deckchair in fron of the tv, or with my laptop in hand.

All i really hope is that these 5 weeks don’t end up being in vain, that the knee really heals so i can get back to playing a bit of friendly basketball.

Hi,

I did some minor revamping here at multiplicity. Mostly concerned with changing the categories.

I wanted to put more focus on Free Software (Open Source) and Open Spectrum wireless as my career gradually takes me further and further into that sphere.

You can see the new category split in the right bar, and as usual you can filter the contents of the site there as well.

All my personal, political, scathing rants and funny links have been moved to the Mixed Bag category, while alll my accounts from travelling and volunteering, including Ghana and Armenia, have been gathered in the Travel category.

New categories include:
* Gadgets for all those insane links to Palm Tungsten C related gadgetry or other toys that I can’t help noting.
* The Whole Wide Web for observations of a more general character about RSS syndication, Semantic web babble, search engines etc.

That leaves practically 3 categories for what I would call my professional interests:
* Wireless and Open Spectrum
* Free Software and Localization
* ict4dev

I hope this makes it easier to follow the angles that interest you. I know it’ll make it easier for me to place each entry in a relevant category.

As always, there are separate rss feeds for each category as well.

I just got the strangest letter today.

In a very cordial tone, my friendly neighbourhood
tax-authority has decided to inform me that my private expenses for the years 2001 and 2002 are unacceptable.

You heard me. unacceptable. And that’s their choice of words.

According to them, after paying my taxes I’ve had only 30.000 kroner
in 2001 and -30.000 kroner in 2002 left to spend (that’s about USD 5000), which, of course, is completely unacceptable.

Once again they confirm that being an impoverished slob is illegal in Denmark,
unless you don’t actually work, and hence get your money from the
government, in which case being poor is perfectly acceptable
behaviour.

The tax authorities have now charged me with not having enough money,
punishable, I believe, by being relieved of even more of my money, and
my task in that respect is to show up with shitloads of documentation
for every dime I spent since early 2001 (the first 3 months of which I
spent in Ghana as an impoverished volunteer).
Continue reading →

Ethan Zuckerman’s Weblog : Antiquated, illiterate, destructive and indefensible

Ethan, vey eloquently, puts into words something that has been on my mind for years now. The dire effect of western agricultural subsidies, on the fate of the developing world. I won’t bore you with my rendering of the issue, just read Ethan’s instead.

Suffice it to say that this is bad in so many ways, it makes me sad

It gets truly surreal once you look at the cows. European Union dairy subsidies average out to $913 per cow per year. That’s almost twice the income of the average person in sub-Saharan Africa: $490 per year. Now, the EU doesn’t just help cows – they also give to international development. In fact, they give $8 per African person per year, slightly less than 1% of what they spend on their livestock.

I think i tore my cruciate ligament on tuesday. Again.
At least i think i heard that snapping sound, like one of those wide rubber bands, gone slightly soft under the influence of sun and time.

Ofcourse it wasn’t really my cruciate ligament at all. Just a piece of my thigh, held in place with a couple of screws through the bones.
It must be almost 5 years ago that they put that in, and everything was pretty good. The replacement ligament was always too long, and therefore not really a good replacement. But given the circumstances my knee was at least playing in the same league as ‘normal’. Until last tuesday that is.
Continue reading →

When you look out the window and see an unjust world,
When you look in your heart and see the strength to improve it,
What is left to you but the choice between cynicism and idealism?

I choose to believe in life because the alternative is unbearable!

speech accent archive

This site examines the accented speech of speakers from many different language backgrounds reading the same sample paragraph. Currently, we have obtained 264 speech samples.

[via BoingBoing]

If you visit my front-page, and have a look at the category list on the right hand side you’ll notice 2 new categories.

Handhelds, is about my new Palm Tungsten C, and my experiences with handheld computers in and off the wireless networks that I work with. Look here for news related to voice over wifi on my palm, or on how I get annoyed with the service and problems that come with most commercial wireless ISP’s etc.

Open Systems is about Open Source, Open Tech, Open Spectrum and generally the idea that technology innovation gains from sharing. I sepnd more and more time thinking about, and working with issues that revolve around Open Source/Free Software, as well as ideas on Open Spectrum for wireless systems, so I though it deserved a category of its own.

This also means that Disruptive Tech will be more about wireless technology, and other issues related to that.

If you’ve set filters on my page using the cookie-based system in the right column, remember to consider adding the 2 new sections to your customized output.

cheers