Today’s my birthday, it’s the longest birthday I’ve ever had, and one of the longest ones possible. My birthday will last 44 hours for me. I believe it’s possible to have a single calendar day last almost 48 hours.
I woke up in Aotearoa New Zealand, GMT+13, and am traveling to San Francisco GMT-8. Just after I take off from Auckland, the day will start in San Francisco.
I believe to maximize the length of an experienced calendar day you could travel from either Big Diomede Island in Russia to Little Diomede in Alaska, but neither island is inhabited so there’s no regular flights or ferry service. Samoa and American Samoa have the international dateline going between them and there are flights and ferry services between them. And the weather is more pleasant. So if you wanted a 48 hour day, you could start in Samoa, then close to midnight, hop on a plane and fly the few minutes to American Samoa. Geographically a ton of South Pacific islands are west of the international dateline but choose to use a TimeZone and date to the west of it so they can facilitate trade and cultural integration with the rest of Oceania.
Timezones are weird, really weird. Did you know there’s an open source flat file database which encodes all timezones that have ever existed? Including details on all changes to daylight saving time. It’s crazy, it’s own flat file format. The file is maintained and created by ICANN, the same weird international body that manages domain names and ip address allocation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tz_database
I find ICANN and its sister organization the IETF fascinating. They’re twin organizations, started as the internet emerged from a US government owned, university run network in to something all the rest of us are using. When ICANN was created, there was worry that the US government shouldn’t own and govern the internet for everybody. Many countries wanted to put internet governance under the UN, but there was a worry that if the UN controlled governance of the internet, then it wouldn’t keep it’s free wheeling ways, and would end up being a much more tightly regulated and censored place than it was through the 90’s or even as it is today.
So a totally new kind of organization was created, a multistakeholder international governmental body. ICANN’s mandate was strictly limited to issuing domain names and allocating IP addresses. The organization’s mandate would not extend to what people did with those domain names and ip addresses. Servers physically existed in sovereign countries, if you moved your data to a new country, then that government was now responsible. The sleight of hand was meant to let technologists play jurisdictional games, which is what made all sorts of things on the internet possible.
What does a multistakeholder governance model look like? Instead of the UN, where only nation states get a seat at the table, or a standards body run as a consortium of businesses where companies get a say in the rules, the ICANN process said that nations, companies, and civil society (NGO’s, social movements, religious institutions, etc…) are all co-equal in running the organization. ICANN is staffed mostly by diplomats. The meetings are held every 6 months in some random place in the world. ICANN collects a tax from domain name registrars, who then sell the ability to register domain names to registries. It’s this super weird, global government, which collects taxes, and has transparent public meetings. It is the opposite of what any conspiracy theorist thinks of when they hear global government. Anybody can show up and get a say, participate, but they keep everybody away by being very very very boring.
ICANN is run by an endless web of committees, it’s sister organization IEFT which defines internet standards is the most boring version of anarchism possible. The IETF moto is “We reject kings, presidents, and voting. We believe in rough consensus and running code.” In IETF meetings, you express your opinion about the discussion through humming! Yes HUMMING! It’s so weird, ICANN is an all encompassing global government which collects taxes (they call them fees) and its sister is this anti-authoritarian anarchist standards body.
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7282
Honestly, I think both organizations could be a model going forward for how we manage the world beyond and after the dominance of the nation state and corporations. They’re far from perfect, but they do kind of work. Really truly different kinds of was of organizing society. And the internet is as big and complicated thing as we’ve made as humans.
Anyway, all this is a weird round about way of saying, it’s my very very long birthday.
happy birthday rabble!
history lesson was good
well...colonising and stealing from most parts of the world - South East Asia, South America, Central America, Africa...can be a pretty profitable business I heard =)
how are the CIA, Biden, Hillary, DNC any better than Putin? peter the great, alexander, elizabeth petrovana - those are some powerful leaders who brought positive changes in Russia - can't be selective of names. lets not forget the no of countries that attacked russia, or for how long it has been embargoed or sanctions because of ideology. what do you expect Russia to say "opps sorry US, Nato, we will worship you now? " Well most countries did do that. Russia didn't
i think this is the problem. most people don't realise Russia has been oppressed for centuries. All they know is :
Russia = bad.
Putin = bad.
Russia history = communism = bad.
Russia Ukraine war, Russia = bad.
This is good. Everyone deserves a voice; ultimately, it's the people to decide. I'm surprised by the global panic over Putin's publicized interview. What's causing the fear?
The oppression against Russia is not just something that has been happening the past 100 years, or 2 centuries ago - its been several centuries way before communism was around even before the middle ages. European countries have always gang up against Russia - geopolitical competition, territorial disputes, ideological differences, and power struggles
Also, Russia was the strongest force in fighting against Hitler and the Nazis, and have been providing safe haven for the Jews for many centuries. Have we ever thanked them?
If you want to talk about systemic oppression, well hello there.
I am not a fan of communism from an economic standpoint and as charming as Putin can be (I have watched many of his other interviews over the years), I am not a fan the control and the oligarch practices.
BUT. It important to be fair to him and Russia to at least hear him out.
nostr:note1cxxkp8hh4lmfcfcrk9dwhdxhurtx2l7ttr3lqea4dpmpd0at3utsfcpyu2
❤️
I guess it's like what Satoshi says, you can't win everything - but you can achieve a significant milestone.
We cannot fight every battle for the people - it's impossible. Even if your heart breaks for them, it's impossible.
But we can help enable people to be problem solvers, to be independent, creative thinkers, innovators, to be economy savvy. It will arm them better in fighting their battles.
start somewhere! It will get there eventually
enabling people to enable their communities is key
Good morning nostr:npub1r0rs5q2gk0e3dk3nlc7gnu378ec6cnlenqp8a3cjhyzu6f8k5sgs4sq9ac! Oh that’s really sad to hear, I remember reading about Native Americans on how they can’t chop trees etc which is part of their culture and to some extent not being able to live off the grid because it’s meant to be preserved.
While some problems are out of their bandwidth, when it comes to innovations and problem solving - there are many problems of smaller scales that can be solved. And it can benefit them.
Sales of makers, crafts and artisanal can be one - and not just how they sell it but also how they brand it and package it with their heritage stories. I remember seeing a story from Costa Rica on how they built pottery through foot thumping for centuries and I'll buy the pots for the generational stories. And they partner with home designers for business and marketing.
Growth of services can be another - many smaller services like repair folks can tap into online portals that bridges needs and fixes.
There are various farm to table hypes - eg honeys with bees that only consume saps from macadamia trees etc and retailing specialty products that highlight traditional ingredients and recipes - with a modern twist of branding and marketing.
By tapping into these markets, Native American communities can not only preserve their cultural heritage but also generate income and economic opportunities.
The goal is to infuse and enable innovators from the community to solve their own community problems. Hyping up local innovation, entrepreneurs and successes can be quite the boost.
it’s a shift from this mindset of telling them they can’t do it to they can.
There is a beautiful story on Campo Benfeito in Portugal where 5 capuchinas women formed a cooperative to preserve local art and textile making which led to other perks like increased tourism. In Ghana, Kenya, Bangladesh micro financing tools has helped small innovators and entrepreneurs build their small businesses up. In West Africa, there is this stunning images of Shea Butter makers and how they transformed this tiny village into a tourist attraction (https://www.hamamat.com/the-meseum/)
I am working with a prof from MIT as a side gig focusing on the underserved community. He's been researching and working on uplifting these communities from within for the past 10 years (his book will be published soon). He’s tapped onto Africa, North and South Americas, Asia, South East Asia. This prof had his first degree even before I was born lol! It's been a great learning experience for me.
And while his work is not bitcoin or Nostr related, I see many ways Bitcoin and Nostr can be integrated.
I see Bitcoin as bridges with innovation that can be built upon, and I see Nostr as both a comms bridge and an empty canvas where many digital innovations can be created and it might be a step up towards both digitization and innovation. And as much as i trash on research papers, i had one published last year lol on digitalizing small businesses - or the lack thereof - and i think there are many opportunities - Its just about finding ways on unleashing creativity.
Just announced on the #TopBuilder2024 livestream (which you can watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SarZU3sm2g0) that I have been working with nostr:nprofile1qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnyv9kh2uewd9hj7qgnwaehxw309ac82unsd3jhqct89ejhxtcpr3mhxue69uhkx6rjd9ehgurfd3kzumn0wd68yvfwvdhk6tcqyqfz8haryafsvcqs3zrdkh2rgtfe0mplqqmzhpgptxfvk6amvs6cxtpwt2k to adapt Coracle to their new Phantom Power community platform for artists! Check out their new brand at https://phantompowermusic.io
i'm so excited for you!
Been reading a little bit on the Native Americans...
During the last Ice Age, indigenous people migrated from Northeast Asia and Southeast Asia to North America by crossing the Bering Land Bridge, which connected Asia and Alaska when sea levels were lower.
The indigenous tribes (before Europe colonization) were pretty fancy and sophisticated for their time with advanced agriculture, mound-buildings and other impressive architectures, and even urban centers. They had extensive trade networks.
Crossing the history of Iceland and Norway, there are stories on Norse expeditions and encounters with the tribes and skills exchanged on urbanization, trade, medicine and survival.
Late 15 century when Christopher Columbus (sponsored by the Spanish Crown) found America, everything changed. The Columbian Exchange brought new animals, plants, and along it came diseases that killed millions of natives who were not immune to it.
It is said that 90% of the indigenous people died (55 million) from smallpox, measles and influenza.
The colonization led to many conflicts and displacement of American Indian tribes from their land. In 1830, the Indian Removal Act forced the Cherokee tribes among many others to leave their lands in southeastern states to the Indian territory in present day Oklahoma. Famously known as the Trail of Tears thousands died from starvation, cold weather and sickness while forced to migrate on foot. It was one of the darkest chapters of American Native history.
There were many wars in the 19th century where the indigenous groups fought back for their sovereignty, land and resources (esp gold) against the US gov’t - some of the famous wars : the Wounded Knee Massacre, Red Cloud's War, Navajo Wars, Black Hawk War, and more . These conflicts often arose due to encroachment on indigenous lands, broken treaties, and attempts to forcibly remove native peoples from their territories.
4 centuries after colonization, in 1924, the Indian Citizenship Act granted U.S. citizenship to all Native Americans born in the country. Yet, discrimination and challenges persisted, including limited voting rights, unequal opportunities, and treaty violations. While the Act was a step forward, it didn't fully solve the systemic inequalities faced by Native American communities.
Fast forward to today, often what I see is this negative perception and prejudices towards the Indian communities as non-progressive, living on government handouts, drunkards and more.
When you think about it, tribes that were incredibly brilliant and happy, pre colonization - were ripped apart for centuries and even now - constantly reminded that they are not good enough. There’s Maria Tailchief, first US prima ballerina from the Osage tribe, Jim Thorpe, of the Sac and Fox tribe, which the King of Sweden considered the greatest athlete of all times, and many more successful American Indians yet the good stories are often forgotten.
There’s this idea by Albert Bandura (a Canadian American psychologist) on ‘self efficacy’ - which talks about how much one believes in their own capacity to achieve goals. If one has high self efficacy, then they have stronger belief in themselves which leads to stronger drive in achieving that goal.
Many underserved communities around the world have similar challenges of low confidence, low motivation and it becomes a negative cycle.
I’m sure we too have found ourselves stuck in this loop occasionally - after all we are only human - and we just have to find ways to come out of it - absorb anything positive, build ourselves up.
Often people might think handouts would work for underserved communities but I think what really works is finding ways to build up the community from within.
Empower them to help themselves. Give them tools that can help them identify and solve the problems that they face in their communities.
There are so many ways Bitcoin and Nostr can empower these communities. Even teaching financial literacy, economic empowerment, and self-sufficiency and enabling them to explore their creativity and innovation would be a pretty amazing step forward.
After all, entrepreneurship is about finding opportunities in the midst of problems.
no worries, saw your relay issues. i've been using nos.lol as its dependable, and primal's too. Been only on 2 relays for a long time now
maybe his next job can be a politician instead - seems fitting
Me: It would be an act of God if I won the prize for #TopBuilder2024
God: nostr:nprofile1qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnyv9kh2uewd9hj7qgnwaehxw309ac82unsd3jhqct89ejhxtcpr3mhxue69uhkx6rjd9ehgurfd3kzumn0wd68yvfwvdhk6tcqyqfz8haryafsvcqs3zrdkh2rgtfe0mplqqmzhpgptxfvk6amvs6cxtpwt2k wants to white label Coracle to introduce aspiring musicians to Nostr and Coracle
congratulations!!
Good book, came out 20 yrs ago and talks about how IMF, World Bank, modern banks, several powerful folks and more created extreme poverty of 3rd world countries - through various marketing gimmicks ie “sustainable development” in the 90s and even earlier. Gives a good idea on what WEF is up to. Also gives a good perspective on how dirty banks are.
would be good for Nostr to air this in case all centralised (aka gov't controlled) media bans it
What made you come to that realization ?
When I was young I had a friend who constantly complained and reacted angrily to any suggestions we offered when it came to solving problems. She just wanted attention. It was then when I told myself I would not help anyone who would not help themselves. Over the years I encountered many alike and that principle became a good filter.