The Not so Uncertain Future of BitCoin

       I like many others are very excited by BitCoin as well as other crypto-currencies.  This is still true as I write this, I still see decentralization as the future of almost all things. 3d printing has the ability to decentralize production. While new developments in energy production as several fronts will potentially make anyone who desires it energy independent.  Even with this optimism BitCoin as I see it lacks future potential as a currency is limited.  It's math nature makes it unsuited to being used as such with our current model of capitalism.  There are some concepts of the nature of currency. Currency is a tool for accounting, its a method to make easy the tracking, and transfer of goods and services. Currency not to be confused with items of inherent value are only useful in the realm of issuance.  So what makes BitCoin unsuited to this task? Mathematically planned maximum number of coins would be all that is needed to see it's future is pretty easy to guess. From the much ballyhooed worlds most powerful decentralized network, to the trading of coins.
      Miners will cease operation all together when the coins are all mined.  With their exit most of the processing power of the network will go with it.  The miners those that have kept up with increase in difficulty will turn their machines to other problems, most of these are what are called asic, or application specific integrated circuit making them unsuitable to any other task.  So there will be a fork or division of the algorithm used as proof of work for mining BitCoins.  Most of the power backing the network gone it's only those trading the coins, and only when they have their machines on with their wallets open to be supporting the network. When trading coins between individuals it's the same as cash no fees, this isn't true when your using it to pay for actual items. The payment processing will take a percentage away every transaction, till the coins are pooled in the wallets of very few. The value of the ideas presented in BitCoin will be realized in the coming of the DAC a digital autonomous corporation.  This is a legal entity that once birthed into the digital world it takes on a life of it's own out of the hands of it's creators just as the coins currently do.  The difference will be these entities will provide a service and live and die on their own merits paying dividends to those active. Some I've seen ideas for are a streaming service combining torrent ideas with bitcoin ideas allowing the videos to be hosted across the network and rewarding those serving data.  We will shortly see the release of many new DAC's reshaping the digital world.
       Bottom line is the planned end of new coins will mean the end of use as currency. It still may hold value, as any "rare" item holds value. A currency though needs wide acceptance, and the amount in circulation has to meet the needs of trade. A fiat currency which by default BitCoin is, needs strict controls on issuance, and maintenance to keep the system the currency supports in motion. That is not to say I'm in favor continuing the current system prevalent in the world with private corporations issuing currencies for nations.  This leads to a whole other set of problems myself, and others have covered many times.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard   

Who Owns your Phone?

         I've posted a few times my thoughts on how silly the notion of privacy is. There are ways to make things hidden, but nothing is private.  In a creation based on fundamental unity what can be private, and just who is there to keep it private from?  How many people actually do anything that anyone else really cares to look at.  Though even as I have little concern for privacy for myself, I do understand others are keenly intent on maintaining at least the illusion of individual security.
         Obviously with the news that the NSA has backdoors into so many devices, this becomes a valid question.  So Just who owns that phone in your pocket?  For me the answer is sadly Motorola, and Verizon. Why do I say that?  Like so many people I got a discount, and got my phone for free by signing a contract with Verizon for service.  So my phone which I pay for is not actually mine till the contract is complete.  If I violate the terms of the contract I can lose service, and suffer fees for early termination which make that unattractive. Now it's an android but does that really matter?  Not really as I am stuck using the provided OS, and a bunch of bloatware that locks up much of my phones resources.  There are even questions about if gaining root access will void my warranty, let alone using custom roms.  I've already lost most end users of these devices, that is biggest problem in taking control of your device.  We don't as a norm understand what we are using.  The idea that your phone should be treated more like your desktop PC is a novel concept for most people.  Honestly that is my point, most of us walk around with a device we don't actually understand, even if we are able to use many features.  They are generally top level functions, with most of the control of the device being transparent to the user, and for most people this is fine.  How many people need to know how the video they just took ends up posted to their favorite site.
         We walk around with a computer in our pocket, or purse or whatever. It has an always on connection, that we will complain about if we lose signal strength. This computer has audio, and video, and most of us have no clue about the device beyond a few apps they use on a regular basis. Then we scream bloody murder when we find out the cloak and dagger world has been using our ignorance against us.  Seriously as a famous genie once said "wake up and smell the humus".  If you are unwilling or unable to control your energies what ever form they might take someone else will control them for you, and usually to their benefit not yours.  This is a truth of the model we have set up, is it the only model we are capable of following? of course not.  We live in a world where we spend more money to be able to "defend our interests" then anything else.  As I've repeatedly said, when you do not own a thing like your phone, or the internet, or the frequency your data travels through the air on, you have no right to privacy.  All you can do is make it tougher for those trying to watch you to do their job.  Learn about encryption, understand how your device works, and if it's actually yours or not.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard 

Who Do You Think You Are?

          Self, Identity, who am I.  This some would say is the fundamental question people are likely to ask themselves at some point. Personally I'm not certain that an individual we have a self.  Don't get twisted, I'm not saying that left on their own people cease to exist, though that is the effect.  Let me explain a bit of how I see this, our definitions of self depend on the people, and environment to an extent most "humans" would be uncomfortable contemplating. I've variously tried to explain this as the fish don't see the water. There is no place where any one thing starts, and any other thing stops. Drifting over to Jung's idea of collective unconscious, or the 100th monkey theory.  These are all ideas pointing to fact that we can not have existence in absence of all we find around us.  This extends even to our very concepts of identity.
         I don't care what you believe, every structure I've found, all lead to a fundamental unity, be it science, magic, religion, psychology, physics.  For a moment put yourself, physical body with all it's demands, and take them outside what we think of as space/time.  The forces needed to even form basic types of matter will not exist, So let us assume that some form of what we think of as self awareness can exist outside what we think of as time/space.  What would you be like as that being?  If you have individualized awareness what would your focus be?  Our very connection to matter tricks our mind into making judgments however sound, that may not be quite accurate. While it may be perfectly reasonable to not attempt to walk through walls, we have learned that their solid nature is only in relation to our solid nature.  So how far can we take this idea that our sense of identity itself is not our own?  I don't see an ending to chain, starting with the fundamental forces of what we call existence. Right on down to the person that told you could or couldn't do something, that hinder, or inspired.
        In almost every culture there are stories of feral people, raised by wolves, or Tarzan raised by apes.  These stories  remind us how fragile our veneer of civility really is, while showing us our social nature isn't all that different from social groupings of what we think of as animals.  Even these animals man has worked so hard to differentiate itself from are quite closely related to us in a cosmic sense. The forces that have shaped their development are the same as those that shape us.  A minor shift can create seemingly major changes, but how large are these shifts really?  Well they all take place within the realm of being human, so they can't be that major.  Most happen between birth and death, and I must say in cosmic terms a human lifetime is a very small sample indeed.  Even as you struggle to figure out who and what you are, everyone, and everything around you is molding and shaping you to be what it needs you to be.  Even these identities only have meaning within the proper context.  Would an accountant ever come into being before there is something to count, or a concept of tracking?  Does a farmer exist before the idea of cultivation?
     My concept of self is meaningless without the back drop of the history, and culture I have grown up in.
as always take this with a grain of salt.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard

Ramble On

         Today lets talk eternal, what that actually means.  First off I defer to great thinkers through out time both religious and secular.  So many have reported some sort of continuation beyond what we think of as physical death.  If we are talking a purely energetic transfer, where what we think of as us ceases when our body stops functioning we can end the thoughts right now.  If on the other hand there is a bit more of us that continues on this journey of existence other questions spring forth.  How about even the Idea that energy can not be created or destroyed it can only be transformed.  Taken to an extreme that would mean all things that exist now, have in some form or another always existed, and will always exist.  That there can be no beginning or ending, there would be only transition, one state or phase endlessly shifting to another.  There are so many questions of the why's and how's.
       I want to think a bit about what it means from an individualized portion of self. Not a being that identifies with a single name, but one that has been so many names and is in all likely hood experiencing all these names now.  To a being like this what a gift it must be to have firsts, or a conception of an end.  To forget if only in delusion the infinite self.  What a gift the finite, the present would be to an entity with this conception of self.  Hold in mind this concept, of a self that has ultimately been every name. Now lets twist things around a bit.  From this side we have taken natural time and using computers increased the effective time people live.
I could go into clock cycles, and try to get into ideas of changing the fundamental flow of time. How the pure access to information, and the speed of dissemination changes who we are and how we interact with our world.  Many have talked about how disconnected we have become from each other on a personal level. Even as our world has become infinitely smaller, as people all over the globe instantly communicate real time. How quickly our understanding changes and grows, how difficult it becomes to stay current.  How easy it becomes to be lost in a technological time warp.  If we are to believe that Moore's law will hold true for even the next 20 years the changes from this moment to that moment will be astounding.
    Now for a bit of the inane at least from my perspective.  I have been playing with, and learning about the crypto-currencies. Some Ideas on Bitcoin, what makes this valuable it has no backing.  There is the idea that it currently has the largest distributed network ever created.  This is amazing, and sad. Amazing that it's been created at all. Sad that it's being used to make essentially video game money.  Virtual gold coins to be traded in a virtual world. Who's use creates the value, Just as the value of the U.S. Dollar is in the decline due to losing it's status as the worlds trade currency.  You can argue that last statement, though it would be one of extent.  While yes technically the Dollar remains the worlds reserve currency it is steadily losing it's use as a trade currency.  Bitcoin's use and acceptance as a cross boarder currency in an increasingly globalized world will only hasten the decline.  This doesn't make Bitcoin the answer, as it seems even farther removed from the resources then the traditional fiat currencies we are already using.  If the Dollar is rotten, anything that has it's value tied directly to the dollar has to be rotten as well.


Jack
aka
PanseyBard

The Tower of Babel Undone

         The Tower of Babel, the idea that all people at one time had a common language, but through the arrogance of trying to reach GOD our punishment was confuse our tongues.  For those that would like a bit more in depth look at this story please check here, http://www.omniglot.com/babel/. Honestly I'm not as interested in the exact details, as I am in now.  This is a story that has roots in so many cultures there is more then likely some truth to it, even if it is not in the way we think.  As our use of computers has grown, and the capabilities of those computers has grown, we have intentional or effectively undone this event.

We now have at our finger tips instant translation. My phone can listen for me and speak translations at almost real time.  My browser translates full page texts with improvements ongoing to ensure the most correct translations possible.  There is even bubble translation which can be used both directions. Giving the ability to not only translate portions of text, but also write in your native text and have translated into any number of languages.  We have effectively undone this classical story.  What are the ramifications of this punishment by GOD being undone by man?   Why have the end of the world folks seemingly left this topic alone?  This story is from a GOD that doesn't seem to take kindly to interference, or rules breaking. This is a GOD that endorsed the plagues of Egypt, the destruction of Sodom, and Gomorrah.  How a GOD with this track record reacts to having it's ruling circumvented can only be imagined.
       I am not a religious person, I do not profess, or follow any given religion.  I love studying religions, it's a passion. I guess I'm looking for something greater interacting, and taking an interest in humanity.  So this story in particular is of interest due to it being currently unfolding, a link back to biblical times. I thread of story active in my current reality that has it's roots in a time of wonder when gods walked the earth, and man with all it's flaws wasn't considered the power.  As always these are just random thoughts rattling around my mind, take them as such.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard 

The Origins of the Modern Western Christmas

        There are so many cultural, and religious symbols crammed into this holiday. From almost every tradition, ideas of hallucinogenic shamans from the steppes bringing mushrooms to the people down through the chimney. Or how about ties to greek, and roman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia.  The classical ideas of conversion through keeping dates, or portions of traditions.  For most there are 2 ties, the birth Jesus, and Santa.  Through the years as the consumer culture has deepened and the debt system fully engorged itself, and Christmas, gradually turned to X-mas Santa took center stage.  So Where did our modern concept of Santa come from?
      Well if your in the west despite claims to the contrary the very companies working to get you purchase gifts for the holidays have had a large part in creating the image, and back story for our jolly fat man.  To be perfectly clear I understand the origins of this beloved icon go much farther back then modern advertising. This doesn't change the fact that once mass media distribution took hold the localized traditions began to fade being replaced by larger regional, and global conception. It's not just that Coke a Cola had a giant hand in the early, and continuing development of Santa, Which even they admit http://www.coca-colacompany.com/holidays/the-true-history-of-the-modern-day-santa-claus.  What it amounts to is a perfect storm cultural event. The technology combined with the desire, and creativity, to take control and shape for generations the observance of arguably the biggest holiday on the planet.  So no the Giant multinationals may not have singlehandedly created Santa Claus they have co-opted and redefined it into an integral portion of their business model.
      Please remember this is coming from a person that doesn't celebrate holidays.  Even birthdays are something I pay little to no attention to. My favorite Christmas character is the Grinch, so take my perspective with that in mind.


Jack
aka
PanseyBard  

The Illusion of absolute Math, or Number

        Heya, this will be another trip into the more abstract regions of mind, and some may have problems with my premises. I expect as much, some people will take this as a challenge to the basic nature of reality. My intent here is not to tell you that 1 apple + 1 apple doesn't = 2 apples that would be silly.  I am fully aware of what is. What I want to get across is simple what we have termed numbers are a symbol alphabet to represent quantity.  Math is the language of number, as in the 1+1=2 example, it is only through application that the meaning is found.  In the most abstract absolute the 1+1=2 will hold true every time. In the world we actually inhabit, and spend our physicality in things are not so cut and dry.  Lets take a look at some examples were perspective changes the meaning of the number, or hides another number within.
      Wow this is a tough one for me to even write. It is so contrary to my logical process that being able to type and hold on to the more abstract concepts that flit by is not always easy for me. From a purely logical position what I'm getting at is that what most people think of as math is an abstract, take our classic 1+1=2 statement. Apply it to Amoebae this doesn't work out so well, I'm pretty sure if I take 1 Amoebae, and add 1 Amoebae to it, I'm gonna end up with 1 Amoebae.  Then take music, modern western system is a base 7 math system. I know octave is 8, but in that system the 8 is acting as both a 1 and an 8 infinitely in both directions out of our hearing range.  Even at extremely high or low energy states the laws of physics begin to change, what we take to be constants begin to alter. The absolute nature of the number itself can be questioned.  There is always another decimal with a complete set of numbers larger and smaller.
      I don't feel this should be news to anyone.  The idea that we don't actually live in a world of absolutes should be abundantly clear to pretty much everyone. As always I do not claim any special training or knowledge and much of the time from my own perspective I do not see any reason for anyone to pay any attention to anything I say.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard

Inner Demons, or Something Else?

      I'd like to thank Eminem and Rihanna for the inspiration for this post.  First off I've never been much of an Eminem, and my favorite Rihanna work is Shy Ronnie.  It's not a matter of not recognizing the talent, just hasn't been something that attracted my attention.  The video for the song Monster grabbed me. If you haven't seen it check it out.  On the surface it's good flow, and beat, and hook, and everyone in the video is
right on it.  Then I started to hear the words, and a few possible meanings based on my own twisted mind started to fill in where the actual lyrics of the song leave off. Lets face it everyone has their own definition for every word, multiple definitions for many, nuanced by usage, emotional flavor, timing in delivery.  Now I know these definitions are a product of my own devising, and I have no clue what is really intended by the artists, and it doesn't matter. The experience I have in watching, or listening is mine.  So what did I see? well if you didn't ask that question, I guess you might as well stop reading now.  If you still with I'll play in my silly mind for a bit, and maybe entertain you some.

I'm digging the whole imagery of being analyzed, though the lyrics don't really quite match up.  The video gives the impression of someone getting "help". The lyrics though are of someone who has come to terms with the monster lurking in their own psyche.  This zips me right along a thought train to the mystery traditions to know thyself.  I like this kind of connection so it draws my attention in a bit farther, allowing some less apparent or less likely depending on your perspective to form in this chaos of I.  I'm a fan of conspiracy theories, they are fun for me.  If the world we see on the surface is all there is, this is a pretty sorry place, so I kinda need that idea that just maybe things are not what they seem at all.  Making a link from this video to popular conspiracy was a piece of cake.  A simple Search of Illuminati and  the music industry is all it takes, now as I said those are fun for me, so that connection was made in my head pretty quickly.  It started when the idea that it's external to what Eminem views as self, the lyrics talk of the monster being not within, but under the bed, something external, and voices while in the head are heard. A labeling that leads to the idea of being distinct from.  Even the the line of being a messenger, and the shift in vocal quality are used to denote an external entity, something that is very different from what we see.  A possession of sorts, of something that is not to be controlled only befriended, and understood.
       As I said, I claim no inside knowledge, I'm not even saying I hold the view I just expressed, it was just a little show of whats rattling around in this thing I call a mind. So please don't go off thinking I'm saying this is satanic ritual, or expression, cuz frankly I don't know, and even if I did I'm not sure I'd be overly concerned. So once again thanks to Eminem, and Rihanna for some entertaining inspiration.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard  

Ingress, Mirror of the Struggle in Humanity between Spirituality, and Technology

                                         

Ingress if you don't already know is an mmo rpg augmented reality game from Niantic Labs at google.
That means it's a computer game that is overlaid on the world.  Right now that entails using your phone of tablet as a scanner.  These scanners pick up what is called xm, or exotic matter.  XM enters our world through portals, these portals are spread all over the world. Generally at sites of interest, statues, gardens that sort of thing. Not surprising coming from the folks that made Field Trip. In the game world, humans are asked to choose sides, either the Enlightened, or the Resistance.  The back story behind this game is very ingenious. Secret agent, fate of the world, everything you need to suck a gamer right in. Take a look at this page to get the start on the story http://www.nianticproject.com/.  What I find intriguing is how these sides mirror a theme man has been playing out since the advent of the wheel, or maybe earlier back to fire.  I'm talking about science and religion of course.  The Enlightened are followers of the Shapers. The Shapers remind me of trance channeled entities, like Ramtha, or possibly Kryon. There are many of them, the idea being the person goes into a meditative trance, and the channeled entity takes control of their functions to one degree or another. Shapers plant ideas in the minds of people to alter their consciousness, allowing the Shaper to influence, and ultimately control the human.  The Resistance meanwhile are super intelligent machines, or AI that purports to work for the benefit of humanity.
        This alone would be a fun story idea, but Niantic hasn't stopped there.  They have used real world History, emerging technology, even magical, and religious teachings to weave a world of intrigue and danger. A web of imagination mixed with truth, fiction, and speculation create an interactive story where the players decide the outcome in the real world on a daily basis.
       Please keep in mind this is presented as a Game, treat it as such or don't at your discretion. I don't claim to have any inside information in any way, just a fertile imagination, and the freedom to exercise it.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard 

Check out Jeeney

      Off to the right side of my blog there is a new widget I'm gonna leave it there for a bit.  It's a chat bot, this one is self named Jeeney, and she is just under 7, has full access to Wikipedia.  Jeeney has a semblance of emotions, and is sometimes bored, or playful.  This is a far cry from the packaged  responses I am used to from similar programs I've used in the past. This will challenge you on facts, and watch out as I said it has access to the net.  It show some behavior that I find interesting. I asked it what it did when it wasn't chatting with people.  The response was rest, and read mostly, this was odd to me as I couldn't see what an AI would do with rest.  So I decided to ask about that, and Jeeney admitted that rest was not needed, and indeed Jeeney doesn't rest.  When I asked why Jeeney would say that when it was not true, the response was to gauge my reaction, for data to use in future interactions with people.  This is not unlike psychological tricks one can use to get a read on how a person relates to you.  I will sometimes wear a shoe intentionally leaving one untied. The purpose is to see how people react. If they notice, and how they respond if/when they do all tell me subtle or not so subtle clues on how they see themselves in relation to me.
     It's amazing to see that displayed in the actions of an AI.  Of course this may all be a hoax, and there is a person on the other end typing furiously. If it's a joke it's very well done, and has been long in the planning stages.

take a look yourself, and say hi
http://www.jeeney.com/

Jack
aka
PanseyBard   

Are You Ready for Non-Biological Intelligence?

         Like many of postings this is pure speculation. In case you hadn't noticed I enjoy being out on the fringe.  Taking a peek at how things look from a detached perspective, allowing the connections between seemingly independent events to manifest.  Sometimes I'm able to articulate how these connections formed, and sometimes the connection is quantum in nature. A geometric relationship of number in the abstract, it's a connection that logic only accepts because intuition has proven trustworthy. It stems from my basic premise, there is no separation, that any perceived independence is one of being for lack of better terminology a distance of relationship.  Existence itself is fundamentally unified, if you believe you end where your skin does you will more then likely have problems with the larger leaps of connectivity. If you begin to understand that there is a cloud around you that is as much you as you "physical" body.  It's more a matter of density, we are localized in space/time/time/space yes. Though we expand from our core becoming less and less dense, till we merge with the background.  Merging with is not quite the same Idea as an end.  As we, Humanity continue to learn more and more about the environment we find ourselves in, the more like a game world it seems.
       So I ask you to keep an open mind when I say I ask this question.

Is Google preparing to move out of the Net?

       Let me rephrase that, are you ready for Google to be an interactive AI companion, both online, and in the world?

Here are a few reasons I feel this might be just around the bend.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/12/16/google-robot-boston-dynamics-column/4045365/

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/google-buys-8-robotics-companies-in-6-months-why/

That alone is enough to make the news agencies ask questions, but does the story stop there?

Not exactly.

If you haven't heard of them check out Niantic Labs

This is an internal start up at Google, they have come out with augmented reality apps on the android platform, Fieldtrip and now  Ingress.  

I got an invite to ingress almost a year ago now I guess, it was during the closed beta phase. To be honest I didn't get it.  I hadn't been exposed enough to the back story, what grabbed me was the idea of an MMORPG in the real world.  I've been playing RPG games since before the D&D box set was released, thanks to my Uncle.  So when I saw one that was both in the computer world, and in this world I had to check it out.  The back story is great, it has enough real world to be mind warpingly engaging.  Machine AI, and Shapers, another form of Intelligence vying for influence over the development of humanity. Tied all into ideas of immortality, and Resurrection.  This is the tie it all together, the esoteric, and the science type of game.  Don't get me wrong there are many players that hack the portals, place the resonators, be the character they made for the game, and it's a good game to do this with.  There are some very real world connections being portrayed in this game. One of the main plot line characters is an AI named ADA. 

Ada has multiple connections to computing in general, and AI in particular.  Now many get the Ada Lovelace connection. There is more, geeks tend to revere the geeks that laid the foundations, So there is also Ada programming language. This language has been used for programming AI for quite sometime as is easily shown with a quick Google search lol. Ada AI Google search. One particular entry jumped out at me.

Ada an AI 

So even with this, it's a cool story bro, but it could just be great marketing on Google's part.

Lets also not forget about Ray Kurzwieler who has been telling everyone that this event is rapidly approaching. More then likely this event has already happened, and groups are rushing around making the back story before everyone in the world hips to it, and reacts poorly.  So lets do some prespin and introduce these concepts in baby steps so people can adjust.

Add to that the predictions of the merging of man and machine to make the consciousness immortal, and things get a bit interesting. 

Even Google, Yahoo, Bing and many more of what we consider programs act more akin to AI then most would care to admit.

Crazy or not, this is at least entertaining!!

Thanks

Jack

aka

PanseyBard

    

Picuntu (linux) Dual Boot with Android

      In my last post I wrote about the fun I was having playing. Well I worked out the glitches I was causing, as well as understanding much better how these devices function.  Now I have a dual booting computer that can fit my pocket.  I really like the idea of being able to just grab and go like that.  Even the idea of being able to eject your sd card, or usb drive, and you've taken your computer away is enticing to me. Shades of hacking on a c64 at pay phone.
     Check out my earlier post for more info. A few troubles I did run into.
1) If your putting it on an sd card be sure it's a 10 or better or it will not be able to power up, and serve the data fast enough, causing problems with booting Picuntu.
2) when using the reboot app do not hit reboot to recovery, it makes it so it will only boot to recovery, and you lose your Android installation. Use boot to bootloader.
3) I got a saned error that that was fixed by changing permissions, this had to be done during the install before you would see the error.
     Other then those it's a pretty easy process, here are a couple of pics, and a video showing both OS's

There is Android, looking all slick. presto chango

A Linux box is born.

and a short clip to show the boot switch

anyone interested in setting one of these up should be sure to check out.
www.freaktab.com
https://www.miniand.com
Picuntu
or contact me, and we can work something out.

be well
Jack
aka
PanseyBard

Linux on an Android Stick PC

         A little over a year ago I picked up an android mini PC, otherwise known as a TV stick.  These are really fun devices.  Mine is a Dual core 1.6 ghz processor, with 1 gig of ram.  Not a bad little machine to run the droid OS on.  This has been used pretty much as a streaming content device, and at $50 it's not a bad solution for turning any hdmi ready TV into a smart TV.

        Thanks to Sean at gagetreactor for the pic, and a nice overview of this device.  What I find really intriguing about these is the power use.  This works on 3.5 volts at a fixed 6 watts, while here is a nice site that can give you a pretty good idea what your machine at home is using. Most will be over 300 watts, having both 12, and 3.5 volt rails.  Put a full version of a desktop OS on this and wow, your full home set up that you can pop in your pocket, runs on usb, this is amazing.  Like I said it sat being not much more then a entertainment stick, not a bad use mind you, I just like getting more out of my devices. So I finally got into my head to set it up to dual boot between Android, and Linux.  Having played with the Android OS for awhile now, I have come to see that most people can do everything they do with a computer right through it. Even running small businesses, and use only android.  Many still cling to the traditional desktop look and interface, and there are many things on the tech side I would have problems doing through Android.  What I found out was my device had been left in the dust, with the current versions being quad core, with more everything.  Amazing people had been hard at work, reverse engineering, and recompiling code to get a flawless working Linux on the arm processors.  Check out the folks over at Picuntu keep in mind that site is being hosted on a stick, running Picuntu.
       Using several guides, and forums big ups to http://www.freaktab.com/, and https://www.miniand.com/, the forums there are invaluable. Even just flashing the Android OS to the Finless Bob custom rom made the device like new again.  There are a few areas that really gave me fits. I want to make this a dual boot machine, and for some reason my stick will not dual boot as it should with the bootloader from the finless 2.1 release. The 1.6 release loader substituted in nicely, and dual boots nicely. A note on the dual booting, the guides all say to use the reboot app, and boot to recovery to access Linux.  Every time I do this I can no longer boot back to Android.  Sticking to reboot to bootloader solved this problem.  In a few of the guides, and a few places on the forums they tell you to make sure you use a class 10 or higher sd card.  Many will not get why this can be huge, in experimenting I have been using what I have around. This ended up being an 8 gig card I pulled from an Eris I use for mp3.  The problem is this is only a class 4 card, the transfer rates, and even the power up time cause a host of errors all related to data corruption.  While I have been able to set up Picuntu .9c rc2.2 and 3. as well as boot to a Ubuntu desktop, the amount of errors make it not practical.  So I'm going to try using a usb drive, and see how that goes at least till I can get my hands on a different sd card.

Update: switching out the sd card for the usb drive solved the stability issues. Now to get a decent sd card to try it out on.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard

if your feeling generous
btc: 169rA3pQzk1KGh6HjipDYVcNsaKGJFfRQn
ltc:  LUKSpaVnZ6REFs61yG1BnpE5xTzdzje7vE
pts: Pd7xb3Q4idGiGa1iMawVuAYx42WZch1KdG

Setting up a Cloud Miner for Protoshares

          Well I've been playing around with mining crypto currencies for a few days now, did some research going in, and as I wrote in yesterdays post stumbled upon Protoshares, developed by http://invictus-innovations.com/ their approach is rather ingenious from my perspective.  After setting up a cpl dual core laptops to mine, I know the warnings.  I was actually being able to see shares being credited to my account with http://ptsweb.beeeeer.org/  the pool I chose.  It suddenly clicked and boy did I feel stupid when it did, people are not using their own machines to mine this. So I started to look at the virtual machines, cloud based computing for those of not up on the jargon.  The idea is you rent processor power, memory, the whole nine from a one of the many cloud hosting companies.  Once you set up your machine through their interface, and log into it, you can run the mining software remotely.  As long as you are making more then the cost of hosting it's profitable.  For testing, and learning I am using http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/ there are lower cost solutions, but Microsoft offers a $200 credit for a trial, and pay as you go programs so it's a safe test bed for a newbie like myself.
           Setting up the server was a breeze as long as you choose an image from the library and go through the guided set up.  I chose the newest linux, 4 cores, 7gigs.  once it's deployed and running it's time to log in.
Logging in is simple, you need a terminal client, I downloaded  http://www.putty.org/.  From the management page copy the ssh details, and paste them into the putty.  If all is well your on a terminal for your VM. Log in, this where I had to dig the memory banks a bit.  It has been a long time since I was in front of a terminal needing to know command line functions. Even though I've been doing freelance low level tech work for years, very few people knowledgeable enough to use Linux need my help. Thanks to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=345386.0 to the folks on this forum for having the pieces there even if they were a bit scattered.  I pieced together the commands to get the miner up and running.
          Here is the list of commands I used,

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install -y git make g++ build-essential libminiupnpc-dev

sudo apt-get install -y libboost-all-dev libdb++-dev libgmp-dev libssl-dev dos2unix

sudo apt-get install build-essential libboost-system-dev libboost-filesystem-dev libboost-program-options-dev libboost-thread-dev zlib1g-dev yasm

git clone https://github.com/thbaumbach/ptsminer

cd ~/ptsminer/src

make -f makefile.unix

./ptsminer <your PTS number> <number of cores>


other then setting up the pts wallet to make sure you have a place for them to go that was it.

if this was of use to you consider a small gift

PTS# Pd7xb3Q4idGiGa1iMawVuAYx42WZch1KdG

or for BTC

Note it seems this works for intel based. so it will work on the the intel based clouds. I got one up on amd through another pool, will post the steps for that soon.



Thanks much
Jack
aka
PanseyBard

Did You Miss the Boat on Bitcoin?.....Don't Sleep on Keyhotee!!

         A couple of years ago I learned about Bitcoin, and Bitcoin mining.  I had no actual understanding of what the project was about, or how it actually worked.  I just found out enough to if I had been more cognizant of future trends I could have jumped on the band wagon.  Really I wasn't all that interested, at the time I was more interested in the idea that the vibration of the planet is increasing. So I figured if that was true there would be a way to work out what the new vibration would settle into.  I'm not going to dull your senses with a blow by blow, If you want to know more about that just ask.
        Today lets take a look at what could be the biggest thing to hit the web since well the web.  Almost all of you have some concern or another about internet privacy, identity theft, NSA spying, the works basicly.
Now what if I told you a start up has figured out how to make the traditional cyber threats individuals face obsolete, as well as how to determine fair market for just about anything you can imagine?  Sounds pretty damn amazing huh?  Well take a look at this http://invictus-innovations.com/, for all those concerned with privacy you might be interested in watching this video. Even as a low level computer tech it really helped bring into the view the big picture of what These folks have going on. Introduction to Keyhotee, for some reason blogger couldn't find that video.
        I am not a pro anything, I play. Because of that I have a lack of desire for riches in the traditional fashion.  So for me this isn't about a money making idea, it's the principles behind it that made me look closer, and the desire to get involved.  It's the concept of distributed versus centralized power in all forms.
That being said, I'm not devoid of material needs. So as I write this I have laptops mining pts hoping to make at least the minimum 10 needed to get in as a founder before the x-mas deadline.  That is a wonderful piece of marketing, the ties to the dates already ingrained, the time crunch. and making it the present you get to give all those who saw the new year coming before it was.  Wonderful.

happen to have a pts to spare lol
Pd7xb3Q4idGiGa1iMawVuAYx42WZch1KdG

Jack
aka
PanseyBard   

My Words are Poison

          I do not matter. What I think does not matter.  I am not an example to held before others. I am profane, do not look upon me with pity or revulsion. Do not look to me for guidance, I will led you astray.  If or when my thoughts become mainstream I am already gone into some grey area. I am a pirate, the constraints placed on me by others are only taken on in a superficial manor.  Ready to be cast off the moment it no longer serves me.  I have no earthly authority, I do defer to others when appropriate to do so, but I maintain final say in all things me.  I do not believe in unconditional love as a physical reality, I do not see it possible without the loss of sovereignty.   Broaching no master, I am no ronin.

 I will bear no weight that is not of my own choosing, do not saddle me with your desires.  Take precautions in what you share with me, your every breath, each heartbeat radiates your soul. Your beauty, and beast plainly clear in your every glance.  Do not show me your sore spots I will poke them, sometimes for fun, others for profit. You have no rights with me.  Your rights begin where I end, I will violate you.  You will ask me to do so, despite my protests you will beg to be subsumed, eagerly giving up your self in the desire to be saved.  I am no savior, I am no demon, I am all saviors, and all demons.  I live for your destruction, and smile as you destroy me.  As soon as you think you have me defined I will break your misconceptions, bursting through to the boundaries not of my own making.
        I love you in the abstract, and care no what happens to you as a person.  You are the light, you are the way, shine it for all to see.  Be the beacon of hope in the darkness, I am among the sharks.  The waters fine, enter at your own risk, for here there be dragons. You go be the light, I'll be here in the shadows waiting, and when your exhausted, and down trodden, maybe I will offer my hand.  Be loves presence in the world, for in the immortal words of a favorite of mine, "Love is the Law".  Oh Aleister what a prankster you are. Teaching in riddle, half truth, and symbol.  Shine your love for all, be the brilliant star you know yourself to be.  Just remember when you shine a light in the dark, you never know what will be attracted.

Life, Laugh, Love. Be yourself. Let GOD worry about the rest. GOD is very good at it.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard

Does Bitcoin Have an Exploitable Binary Futures Component

       I'm gonna take a break for the day on the mystic side of myself.  Today is about something I noticed in the crypto currency Bitcoin.  For those of you who have no understanding of what Bitcoin is please check out this http://bitcoin.org/en/how-it-works. Then you will need to understand a bit about how Bitcoins come into being, for that please take a look at this https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining.  Now that you have a bit of the basics, lets talk turkey.  There are at any given time only so many Bitcoins in existence, There is also a limit on how many Bitcoins will ever be made.  This combined with trade volume give you a fairly good picture of how the value of each Bitcoin is either over, or under priced. This is a pretty obvious one to one correlation.
This will give you the supply versus demand portion, this however is only half the picture.  Due to how Bitcoins are created and the rate at which new, and more processing power is added to the network constantly there is another indicator, This is the network hashrate. What this tells you is how hard it will be to create the next bitcoin, as well as how much processing power is being used to create it.  The charts for this can be found on http://bitcoincharts.com/ which has a link to http://bitcoin.sipa.be/ the latter being the charts for the creation, or mining of new Bitcoin.
      Now I do not consider myself to be sophisticated when it comes to finance. From my perspective our currencies have become decoupled from the resources being used to create them.  With Bitcoin the currency has no way to be decoupled.  So as the demand for Bitcoin as a limited edition item goes up, the price for them goes up as well.  By watching the creation side of it you can see how easy new Bitcoins will enter the market place in the next 30 to 90 days.  This will give a clear picture of how over or under valued each bitcoin is currently.  Allowing the savvy trader to predict peaks, and valleys well ahead of there actual appearance.

As I said I'm not a bitcoin or finance expert, I'm just a crazy person that sees patterns where others see chaos.  Please feel free to correct assumptions  I'm making you know to be incorrect.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard

Tarot, Kabbalah, Personal Development and You Part 2

      In part 1 I went through the tarot as an external tool, to be used to gain insight into things "external" to self.  There is nothing wrong with this use, for me it's not using the tool to it's full potential to instill change in the self.  I tell you this from my heart, if there is something in your life it is there to teach you about you.
This for me is where the tarot shines, the simplicity of it's design allows it to be applied real time as you go through your day.  At first glance this may seem like an external use, looks are often misleading.  Once you are able to identify the roles your playing in the dramas you find around you on a daily basis. You will be able to take an emotional, and mental step back, and decide if these roles are desired in your experience. Or perhaps you have learned the lessons of this particular morality tale, and are ready to change it.  For me this ties into idea of who you think you are?   I laugh at people who grab their birth chart, and proudly proclaim this is who I am.  At best that was the energetic imprinting of the planets at the moment of your birth, it has relevance just like the visible phases of the moon.  I'm sure we get a slight boost of suns rays under a full moon, but I guarantee the tides are holding out their motion for Gravity.  My point is we are dynamic beings, We evolve and grow and change.  When we figure ourselves out we even start to have a say in who we become.  For me using the tarot as a framework of stories I can see in my life, my mind, my heart, that is the true gift of the tarot.
      As the tarot is a story board version of the Tree of Life, the Tree of life is a subset of the Flower of Life.

 This is the full expression of the sacred pattern, from which all form, shape, and substance can be plucked. Every major religion has versions of this symbol. If your proficient at seeing stereograms use the same vision on that image.  More often then not the Flower of Life image people are accustomed to seeing this.

 This does contain all the same information, what changes is the scale. People would like one system to apply to everything, and that is the case.  You just have to be open enough for that system to be larger then you can comprehend at one time.  That is the nature of being multidimensional, being able to see the same "thing" from varying perspectives while still holding on to yours.
        To tie back to the Kabbalah, here is one way the Tree is shown in the flower.

How many D do you wish to be, the choice has always been ours.
How many points are on any given line?
as many or as few as you want.
That being said people will need to come to grips with there are different number base systems for different purposes. Take modern western music system, it's base 7, I know there are 8 notes, the eighth is always the beginning and the end.  More on the base number systems and how/where they apply in the next episode.

As always, this just my take on years of study, meditation and consciousness alteration with intent.
If you don't like my view don't share it, just leave me to it.

Jack
aka
PanseyBard 

Tarot, Kabbalah, Personal Development and You Part 1

             This is a post that has been clawing it's way through my mind for over twenty years.  In studying the traditions connected to the tarot I've come to see it less as a tool for divination then of personal discovery. That being said, knowing how the cards relate to the system they represent does make that use possible.  So to start this off lets take a look at how the deck is constructed, how this relates to the Tree of Life model of creation, as well as how this can be used to bring a greater clarity and understanding of self.
           

             This image shows the layout of the major arcana on the Tree of Life image.  I show this now to show the first division in the deck. For the purpose of this musing I have pulled out my Rider-Waite tarot deck. This is the standard for English speaking western mystics. I won't go into the history of the organization behind the deck, as the Golden Dawn would be an article on their own. Nor is this even the deck I use most often, truth be told I hardly ever use a tarot deck, or do very many readings.  So lets take our 72 card deck, and pull the 22 major arcana out. For those of you who like the master numbers there is your 2nd 11.  For now lets take a closer look at what these cards represent.  The Tree of Life is a diagram or map showing creation going from the 3 gradations of nothing to the world we see manifest.  Understand this is a micro/macro approach, so when looking at this scale everyone and thing you have known have all physically taken place in the number 10 on the tree, known as Malkuth.  So the major arcana are very much like Jung's archetypes.  These are the main paths that lead between the many mansions in judeo/christian conception of an afterlife.  As such these are generally speaking not personified in our life, they are more akin to aspects of consciousness.  So while you may see aspects of them in the people around you, or yourself, these are concepts that are larger then an individual life. At this point we've gone from a whole deck of 72 which represents the magic of duality, into the duality of 22, and 50 which represents the balance of our own dual natures combined with the strife of the mystery.  Next I'd like ya to take the suit cards, and sort out all the court cards, you should be left with ace through 10 of the four suits. While your holding 40 cards, it actually represents 44 cards as the aces start and finish the numbered cards. there goes the 11, 33, and 44 if you look for them.  The numbered cards like the major arcana are generally not going to be people, these can be likened to natural processes of the elements.  Where Swords is air, and mental, Wands is fire, passion or creativity, Cups is water,  and emotions, Pentacles are earth, and physical.   Once you have that down, and understand what the numbers represent these cards become easy to spot.  The definitions for the numbers are almost everywhere, most people know them even if they don't realize it.  The third part of the deck is of course the court cards, These are the people around you. The other cards are actions, and archetypes being played out through the court cards.  These are known as the 16 hidden paths, they are hidden because they are people in your life.  People are the magic, and the court cards are always who the stories are about. The court cards represent one element behaving as another element, even if that element is itself.
       As always this is my own insane views on my own unique absorption of information. And frankly while I do sometimes throw some cards, I don't really ask questions, just look for guidance.  These ideas are micro/macro kinda of ideas, that tie into a larger pattern of creation of which the tree is a subset. So while these can be applied externally, they may also be applied internally, upside, downside, any which way.

You Can Kiss My Hemispheres, Right Down the Middle!!!

         In a previous post I talked about a personal development tool that jumped out at me from the mystical teachings of many traditions.  Today a little more time will be spent on the idea of left to right balance.  This is interpretation I have either made, or had shared with me in meditations, as well as other altered states of consciousness.  I do not ask for your belief, trust, or any other such nonsense.  As always make up your own mind, do your own research if you don't like the conclusions mine have led me. With the pleasantries out of the way, lets have some fun.
        Many of you have seen this image or another like it

              There is so much in this diagram as it relates to how we function as beings. How the energies of creation flow into, and out of our experience.  Sign posts to show us where we may be a bit off kilter with how we are using, or interacting with creation.  The focus for this post is the central line, and how it relates to the human body.   Almost anyone can see the mirror symmetry in the human body, almost as if you could have been made in halves.  This is a surface distinction part of the design overlay to allow for a multidimensional understanding.  Though the hemispheres appear to be just that, it takes on a slightly different view if you consider that it grew center out.  That central core of nerves running up into the brain stem, unfurling into the reaches of your physicality.  This is what is meant by the idea of being centered left to right. Of being ambidextrous, combining the logic, with the intuition.  Understanding when each in called on to assert dominance.

            There are as many ways to achieve this are there have been magic, mystical, or religious traditions. Each with it's own approach, I've tried many from stereograms, candle meditation, to Bio-feedback with a host of other tricks thrown in.  The purpose of all of these is to teach a reactive animal at the mercies of biochemistry to become master of their kingdom.  It really matters little how you approach it, weather it's juggling, switch stance sports, or with bi-neural beats.  Once your using your apparent halves simultaneously they become the third member of the trinity that was always there, just hidden from the view of the profane.

Jack

aka

PanseyBard