Month: November 2014

So, some people might wonder what my involvement was with Anons because I have a chapter in my book dedicated to them.

Well, I always liked the idea of remaining anonymous. Personally, I think that is a great way to go. It has mystery around it. You know. I mean, who wrote it… anonymous. No credit. No arrogance. No money. It was anonymous.

I also like the idea of moving together without restraints. However, sometimes that can get.. out of control. I see that now.

I admit I had a lot of fun with Anonymous back in 2008. It was a great time. Yes, they did come to me for advice. Yes, I did my best to assist. I won’t lie. I also offered editing assistance to biella. That was before her writing days at Wired, when I could still reach her.

I’m kind of like a dark shadow in the Copyright/Linux/Hacker world. I never amounted to much but did a ton of work. No one really knows who I am but if you need help, I’m right there. My one friend of so many years said, “Why do you help? You should stop that.” I cannot. It is what makes me who I am. I am heated with passion to serve. It is a fault. I am not rich. I am not famous. I lead a simple life. In fact, I am amused sometimes at how people perceive me.

Success in terms of finances and fans might be nice, considering my friends/peers are now so high up the ladder, I cannot even reach them anymore. I think that is the most difficult part of not moving up as they did. I cannot just call or email them. It’s kind of hard for me in that sense. I feel cut off and disconnected.

As a copyright geek/activist, it is not easy to relate to other people. Sometimes, I feel so alone. With my friends/peers unreachable, it makes it even more difficult. I made a terrible mistake on one hand of trying to live a “normal” life. 8 years was a long time to be out of the game. When he found out what I had done with regards to activism and such he wanted to believe that was just in my past.

How can you bottle up such passion?
I was with him and there was none.

Anytime something happened, my passion wanted to explode with bursts of activism and protest.
When justice was not served, my blood boiled but then, was cooled by his icy stare.
Ultimately, the passion within prevailed and he was gone.

Could I go another year without allowing myself to be my true self out loud?
Could I go another year sitting in chat with Anons and skyping for lulz without waking him?
Could I go another month without talking to someone about copyright?
Could I spend one more night with my tear soaked pillow wishing I was brave enough to be me?

No. Not one more minute. Not one more second.

-me

Well, I started off going to this and the Installfest. The problem – I had forgotten the orange KitKats I promised my friend who attends the installfests. Well, I tried to find some at the store, but could not. Then, I turned it around to get the ones I left at home.
So, anyway, I ended up at the installfest. There was that jerk from Canonical – Ugh. Look, I don’t care if you know your shit but he doesn’t.
I understand a little more about why he does some of what he does.

1. Apparently, modules are loaded and people who don’t know shit tend to reinstall an entire distro hoping the module will load.

2. He’s an idiot that as one great man so eloquently put in a separate, different but similar way – I honestly don’t see how the Canonical employee ever survived to adulthood…

Honestly, this particular Canonical employee lacks basic social skills and is not skilled at all. I cannot stand him. He also could use serious orthodontic work.

Anyway, I drove around for a good half hour looking for parking less than 20 bills. Then, I apologized for not making it and had lunch with my daughter who lives down the street from the uni.

This was a bust. We ended up going to Social Box.. Bleh. This was a total disappointment. Not only did I have to hack our way into getting net the month before but this month, there wasn’t even a place to plug in. Seriously!

In the past, we always had a place to plug in and collaborate. This month, we left as soon as I arrived. That was a little awkward considering the LUG BDFL arrived just as we were heading out. There was at least 5 of us who left. I know more wanted to but we just didn’t care. No computers? No Internet? No happy hour? Wow.

Of course, it wasn’t the PLUG’s fault the format changed. That was totally not. It was just such a major disappointment from what it was. It was great before. Now, it SUCKS.

We are supposed to have the room tomorrow that we can actually plug in our computers and collaborate. Perhpas I can muddle through the menu – which includes (I do not lie) SMORES and $12 calamari. It was $4 at happy hour previously… Bummer!

Their calamari was amazing. Now, I guess I’ll find out.

So, this November – November 12, I did attend the Sunland LUG. There were a few more people this month than in past months. I did miss the October meeting and will miss the December meeting. In Dec., I am speaking to Colorado LUG about Free Culture. I am hoping to get the video equipment working so I can show them some exclusive video from the past. That’s me… a blast from the past.

I thoroughly enjoyed the LUG at Sunland.
The topic was basically what people would like to see and learn. It was great!

I hope to visit their LUG again sometime because I never leave there without feeling good and learning something. This is a great LUG!

They discussed shaving the time to 1.5 hours.
They discussed a lot of interesting topics.
I really liked the one guy who helped them with one command to recursively search. I think he is on the right track. If you teach them one command line command, maybe, eventually, the users will be more comfortable with command line.

I would be happy to demostrate Mint to the group. However, these are users more comfortable with desktop and not servers, with gui and not command line. I think it’s great to see the diversity of user experience.

From them, I begin to understand what users want. I begin to understand how the simplicity can be valued over options and complexity. It is a very awesome experience for me. Also, a couple of the guys are a HOOT!

So, I went to the West Side meeting at Gangplank in Avondale. As it turned out, one of the attendees did not realize there was a meeting just down the road – literally, from where he worked. I’m sure people might get some value from the PLUG.

It all depends on your work, your interests, your attitude and well, frankly – your age.
I find there is somewhat of a disconnect as far as diversity in the LUGs here.

So, Sunland LUG is in a 55+ community and the members are older.
PLUG consists of those in the mid 40s and over range.
MPGLUG does have a variety of ages and nationalities. For some reason, we seem to attract a lot of people from Pennsylvania in the East meeting.

Avondale Gangplank seemed like a good setting for this first meet and greet. There were some suggestions on the format and venue.

We are looking for something closer to Downtown and Avondale is a little far west.
We will look into that in the near future.

I had a great time. There were 3 really great guys who attended. We ended up chatting after for another hour or so. We talked about Hadoop and clusters. We discussed education. We talked about horsepower and cars.

All in all, it was nice to connect with some people on the west side and these meetings will continue as long as people keep attending!