Weekly Wrap 278: Reducing the pain, increasing the pace

Waratah in bloom at Bunjaree Cottages: click to embiggenMy week of Monday 28 September to Sunday 4 October 2015 was another pain-ridden ocean of chaos, but nevertheless there were a few solid achievements.

I launched Send Stilgherrian to Ruxcon 2015, a Pozible crowdfunding campaign with an obvious aim. As I write this, it’s already reached 29% of its initial target, which is promising.

On the health front, the broken tooth was repaired again. As for my shoulder, the X-rays and ultrasound imagery taken last week showed no permanent damage or signs of specific problems. It’s “just” strained muscles and tendons, and all that’s needed is rest. It does seem to be getting better, albeit very slowly.

Articles

Podcasts

I got most of an episode of The 9pm Edict recorded, but was too tired to complete it on Sunday night. Stand by.

Media Appearances

  • On Wednesday, I spoke about Facebook hoaxes on ABC 105.7 Darwin, but I didn’t record it.
  • Also on Wednesday, I spoke about Bitcoin and tractor square dancing on ABC 774 Melbourne and stations around Victoria, but I didn’t record that either.
  • On Thursday, I spoke about my crowdfunding efforts on ABC Radio National’s Media Report.

5at5

There were no editions of 5at5 at all, and that’s terrible. Why not subscribe so you’ll get all the future ones?

Geekery

Having migrated the final batch of a long-standing client’s websites to new virtualised infrastructure, I finally shut down my remaining hard-iron Linux server, a leased machine somewhere in a rack in San Francisco. Typing halt for the last time also ended my business relationship with ServePath, which later became GoGrid, and which was recently acquired by and absorbed into Datapipe. I’ll miss the excellent support their engineers have provided over the years.

Meanwhile, I’ve picked up a quick little job: building what is in essence a paywall for the website of the literary magazine Meanjin, so they can start selling digital subscriptions.

Corporate Largesse

None.

The Week Ahead

Once more, most of this week is over. It’s already the end of Thursday! But there’s still plenty of things to do…

On Friday, it’s the long train commute to Sydney for a lunchtime briefing on smart cities and the Internet of Things with Alcatel-Lucent’s expert on such things, Marc Jadoul. I’ll knock off some errands while I’m down there, and certain SEKRIT planning on the train.

On the weekend — note that I’m not predicting a specific day for each item — I’ll finish that episode of The 9pm Edict, finish the video of my UTS lecture, do some audio equipment tests, and do the preparatory work for Meanjin.

Further Ahead

The week beginning Monday 12 October will be a hectic one. Monday is the calm before the storm, when I’ll collect my thoughts and prepare myself.

On Tuesday, I fly to Melbourne, sneaking in a quick work session at Meanjin in the afternoon, before a reception kicks off the Australian Information Security Association (AISA) National Conference. I’m covering that for ZDNet, as well as recording material for my own Corrupted Nerds podcast. My thanks got to security vendor Tanium for covering my costs.

On Friday, I’ll be writing for ZDNet before flying back to Sydney. Some time on the weekend, I’ll produce another episode of The 9pm Edict.

The week starting… no, I’ll tell you about that next time.

[Photo: Waratah in bloom at Bunjaree Cottages, photographed on 8 October 2015. This waratah flower is slightly past its peak, but the intensity of its colour still manages to dominate the camera’s sensors.]

Talking crowdfunding journalism on ABC’s Media Report

The 9pm Edict's Public House Forum panel: click for podcast web pageABC logoIf you’ve been following me for a while, you’ll know that I’ve used crowdfunding, as we must call it these days, to help finance my personal media projects. This has once more come to the attention of ABC Radio National’s Media Report — probably because I emailed them.

Here’s how the website introduces the item Crowdfunding journalism, an interview with me which was first broadcast on Thursday evening.

Stilgherrian, a freelance journalist and commentator on internet issues, has crowdfunded his own podcast.

The 9pm Edict is made with the help of donations from what amounts to his fan base.

Richard Aedy asked him about the sustainability of fan-funded journalism.

The audio is of course ©2015 Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and it’s being served here directly from the ABC website.

I’m amused to see The 9pm Edict referred to as “journalism”, but perhaps Aedy is also thinking back to my first crowdfunding project, when I used the Pozible campaign Stilgherrian > Breakpoint+Ruxcon to fund journalism. That was two years ago, and that scored a Media Report story too.

But since then two Pozible campaigns, The 9 O’Clock Resurrection of April 2014 and The 9pm Urgent Hardware Refresh just two months ago, have been about The 9pm Edict. The first raised just over $1000 to kick off the return of the Edict, and as I wrote recently, that’s now settled down to generating a base revenue of around $700 per month. The second raised more than $7200 to replace a dying computer and upgrade my audio recording equipment.

I always enjoy being interviewed by Aedy, because he has such a broad view of the media landscape in Australia, indeed worldwide, and he’s such a gentleman. They’re always thoughtful questions, and I find myself revisiting some of my own thoughts about what I do.

This post cannot end without reminding you that I have a fourth Pozible campaign running right now, Send Stilgherrian to Ruxcon 2015. You have until 2230 AEDT on 15 October to make a contribution.

[Photo: Recording The 9pm Edict’s Public House Forum using equipment financed through crowdfunding. Photo by James Turner.]

Launching “Send Stilgherrian to Ruxcon 2015”

I’m re-launching Corrupted Nerds, my podcast about “information, power, security and all the cybers in a global internet revolution that’s changing… everything.”

And to kick things off, today I launched a crowdfunding campaign to take the podcast to Ruxcon 2015, one of Australia’s key information security conferences, which is being held in Melbourne on 24–25 October 2015.

[Update 16 October 2015: The campaign closed last night, and was successfully funded. Thank you.]

Screenshot of completed Pozible campaign: click for campaign web page

There’s plenty of information on the Pozible campaign page. I should mention, though, that the initial $2000 target just gets me to Melbourne and puts a roof over my head. We need to go beyond that to fund some production.

If there’s something you think should be explained better, or if you have a suggestion, please let me know.

Bonus link: Today, ABC Radio National’s Media Report broadcast an interview with me about my crowdfunding work, Crowdfunding journalism.

Weekly Wrap 277: Pain, pain reduction, fire, and teeth

Sydney Central station on fireMy week of Monday 21 to Sunday 27 September continued to be painful. Literally. In pain. Again. Which rather detracted from the joy of being in Sydney. And then Central station caught fire, and my front tooth broke again.

I did get some productive work done, as listed below, but if you’ll allow me to have a personal whinge for a moment…

The shoulder pain I mentioned last week hasn’t been fading, so I saw a doctor. His referral for imagery, both ultrasound and X-ray, has a clinical note written on it: “??rotator cuff tear ??bursistis”. This does not sound wonderful. I’ll know more next week.

And the broken front-tooth filling that was repaired a few weeks back? Yes, it broke again today. I’m rather stressed by this right now, because I know it will now need a more expensive repair option, and this sort of unexpected expense at the end of the month is, well, difficult to deal with.

Articles

Both of the ZDNet columns that I wrote this week were reflections on the Malcolm Turnbull-led Australian government. Yes, the regime change was yet another significant force that shaped my week.

Podcasts

None, but a new episode of The 9pm Edict is expected to appear very, very soon. I’m also thinking of ways to resurrect Corrupted Nerds.

Media Appearances

None. Well, that’s not quite true. On Wednesday, I was interviewed by ABC Radio National’s Media Report about my crowdfunding efforts, and that will be heard this coming Thursday 1 October at 1730, Friday 2 October at 0530, and on the program website.

I also stumbled across Matthew da Silva’s profile of me from earlier this month. People you should know … Stilgherrian. Why anyone would start a new series of blog posts with me is anyone’s guess.

5at5

The were four editions of 5at5, on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Why not subscribe so you’ll get all the future ones?

Geekery

I usually don’t mention the geekery that I do for the clients of my legacy business Prussia.Net and elsewhere. However, this week I’ve been migrating a client’s internet presence to new infrastructure, some 13 domains in all, and I’ve also been planning out some future work.

Corporate Largesse

  • On Thursday evening, Sapphire Communications introduced us to some of their clients over drinks at Gowings Bar and Grill.

The Week Ahead

I’ll be in Sydney for another week, it seems. It’ll be a busy one, at least to begin with. And it’ll also continue to be painful, at least to begin with. Sigh. This entire section was rewritten on Monday evening to reflect a rapidly-changing reality, and again on Thursday morning.

On Monday, I was approved to start on a SEKRIT project. I also went to the dentist in the early afternoon to re-do the tooth fix. The rest of the day was a write-off, because the codeine for my shoulder pain played very well with the Ativan for reducing the anxiety of having things in my mouth. I found writing to be a bit difficult after that.

On Tuesday, I’ll be writing a column for ZDNet, discussing another SEKRIT project, and tackling finishing an episode of The 9pm Edict podcast, projects. Tuesday was overrun by pain, some in the form of email, some in the form of neural signals.

On Wednesday morning, I’m shutting down that Prussia.Net client’s old server and tidying things up. In the afternoon, I’m getting the medical imagery done. At 1650 AEST, I’m doing a spot on ABC 105.7 Darwin. Then at 1930 AEST, I’ll be talking about various tech things on ABC 774 Melbourne and local stations around Victoria.

Thursday is 1 October. A new quarter, bringing with it a certain amount of adminstrivia. I’ll also visit the new VMware Briefing Centre in Sydney. I should write something for ZDNet in there too. In the morning, I’ll be working on plans for two trips to Melbourne later in the month. Then at 1500 I’ll re-visit the doctor to look at the medical imagery and decide what happens next.

Friday is bound to be about tying up the week’s loose ends before the long weekend, with the Labour Day public holiday on Monday 5 October. Nothing specific has been planned for that yet. Needless to say, I am stressed by the chaos levels.

Update 1 October: Edited to reflect the much-changed plan for the week.

[Photo: Sydney Central station on fire, photographed on 26 September 2015. This photo was also used by Radio New Zealand in their story Fire at Sydney’s Central Station extinguished.]

“Corrupted Nerds” on the future of media

Corrupted Nerds 11 cover image: click for podcast pageIt was my very great pleasure to meet Bob Garfield the other day — former advertising man, veteran journalist and media commentator, and co-presenter on NPR’s On the Media and Slate’s Lexicon Valley.

We managed to find time for a coffee and a conversation, and the result forms the latest Corrupted Nerds podcast.

“For 300-plus years, it was great for the audience, they got free and subsidised content. It was great for advertisers ’cos they got audience. And it was great for media, ’cos they got filthy stinking rich,” Garfield said. But now, things are bleak. “Unless you are in gambling, search or porn, there’s just no money to be made.”

Garfield explains why, basically, we’re all fucked.

Subscribe to all Corrupted Nerds podcasts via RSS, iTunes and SoundCloud.

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