What does the term ‘beta’ mean in social software? It’s become an ongoing joke since Friendster is *still* in beta. From my, admittedly limited, experience in software dev, alpha releases were almost always internal, hugely buggy releases. Betas were distributed to a small, reliable group of people meant to give constructive feedback. Of course things are buggy in alpha/beta, but rarely is any software project ever truly complete. Bugs are always found and new versions are released.

The weird thing about social software is that systems are distributed publicly as beta. Thousands (if not millions) of users appear on beta systems. Most of them are not trying to give feedback, but they do push the social and technological limits of the technology. Lessons are to be learned. Of course, lessons are to be learned in software ALWAYS, regardless of the labels.

I find it quite disconcerting that people want to label their distributions “beta” for over a year because it hasn’t been perfected, because new versions are coming out. This, to me, seems like an abuse of the term beta. New versions always come out. Is beta simply an excuse?

What does beta mean in the context of social software? Should we forgive technological imperfections? What about social consequences? What about apparent design decisions that seem to persist?

[This message is in part in response to this rant on why we should be lenient on Orkut because of its alpha status.]

I am really uncomfortable with public distributions of software being labeled as beta (or alpha), particularly when the population joining it is not aware of it being truly an alpha/beta. For example, would it be OK to completely scrap the data inputted because it is an alpha/beta? Are structures really going to change that much when it is in the hands of the public?

Genevieve Bell is one of my favorite researchers. Today, she spoke at Stanford and you can listen to her talk.

In June of 2002, Malaysian newsstands carried the latest issue of “Mobile Stuff” — a magazine geared toward Malaysia” growing population of mobile phone subscribers. On the cover, two young Malay men in clothing that suggests more LA hood and less KL suburbs, hold out their mobile phones to the camera beneath the banner headline “Real Men Use SMS.” Six months later, billboards in Shanghai carried the image of a woman’s shapely calves and ankles, bound with black patent leather ankle straps; positioned beneath one strap is her mobile phone. Beyond their utility as a technology of information exchange, mobile phones it appears have inserted themselves into the cultural fabric of societies across the world. Using comparative cases from Asia, this talk explores how mobile phones, and their various accoutrements, have become key symbolic markers of identities. I argue that mobile phones, rather than facilitating an idealized universal communication, actually contribute to the re-inscription of local particularity and cultural difference as dimensions of a larger political economy of value. Making sense of the different ways that cell phones are articulating with daily life provides an important perspective on the ways in which cultural patterns affect technology use.

V-Day is going to do a San Francisco Premier screening of “Until the Violence Stops” on January 28th. This is a benefit screening of the film that premiered at Sundance. If you believe in ending violence against women, this is a good way to help out. Attend the screening, support women and help raise money to end violence worldwide.

TICKETS AVAILABLE BY CALLING THE BRAVA THEATRE – 415-647-2822

When i was 14, i learned what it meant to be deceived by someone i loved. I saw lie after lie unfold in front of me in complete horror. It clicked and, since then, lying is about the biggest sin you can commit in a personal relationship with me. I’ve always told friends and lovers that i can get over cheating/chaos/anything, but i can’t get over lying, so just don’t magnify stupidity with cruelty.

Deception has so many levels. All too often, people lie to themselves, convince themselves of their lies and by the time they lie to you, they genuinely don’t believe it’s a lie. (Anyone see the State of the Union?) It’s all a matter of perspective, right? I’m certainly not innocent of this.

But there’s something so painfully demoralizing about feeling enthusiasm fade to exhaustion as the pieces of an intricate web of deception through avoiding the truth unfold. It’s not as cruel as an intentional lie, but it’s impossible to feel any form of trust or respect at the other end. ::sigh::

Sometimes, i amaze myself. When i saw that BoingBoing was nominated for a Bloggie, i scanned the list. I didn’t even think to look for any of the blogs that i’m involved with. Later, i was talking with Cory and he made some remark about how we’re up in the same category. I looked puzzled and he informed me that misbehaving was up for a Bloggie.

How funny. It never even dawned on me that our venture into hellish conversations around gender & tech would be recognized, but i have to admit that it brings me great joy. So, if you support us, please go and vote!

Ooh… pretty. music plasma.

Of course, not entirely sure how it’s working, but it is pretty.

I’m still shocked that so many people read my musings here. I also know that most people who read this don’t post. Yet, if you keep coming back, you must be interested in some cross-section of the topics that interest me. So, now i have a question for you…

What books have changed your perspective on the world? What books do you think EVERYONE must read?

And, more importantly, for those of you who see holes in my arguments, what would you recommend to fill them?

It was 1996 when my friends and i started getting attacked online for being queer. Before that, in our niche of the cyberworld, we were invisible to everyone but ourselves. It was a public space, welcoming to all queer folks. It was a safe space by the virtue of shared values, ideas and the underlying goal of supporting one another. There were no walls; it was safe through underlying social norms. But it was destroyed because rigid barriers are necessary to keeping hate outside.

We eventually escaped to the eGroups of the world before fading into oblivion. In 2001, i popped into various queer communities, talking to youth about their experiences online. They recalled stories that horrified me. Stories of older men preying on them, stories of the Christian right telling them that they were going to hell. Always on the search for safe space, these kids didn’t have what i valued so much about the online world in high school: inadvertent safe space, simply by being, sharing, supporting. Even in gay.com, they felt afraid. This saddened me.

I’m in awe of the networks of queer LJs that i see. I know that i don’t see all because much of what is shared is for friends-only, but it gives me great joy to realize that kids are finding new ways to construct semi-public safe space and support one another through the process of grappling with one’s identity. Yet, i know that what i see is only a limited segment of the digital queer youth. I wonder how kids feel about coming out online now, how they find that safe space, how they create friend groups out of nothing. It was so much easier in the 90s. All you needed was access to IRC, Usenet or BBSs. Of course, only a fraction of kids were online then.

When we started getting attacked, i felt the need to defend us, to maintain the safe space. But online, speaking to your attackers is like speaking to a blank wall. You can’t possibly defend yourself because they’re against you at their very core. Topics like queer identity and abortion will never go anywhere online. People aren’t willing to hear one another. Eventually, i gave up, exhausted, saddened, depressed. Since then, i haven’t engaged in debates online; i’ve only lurked. When i wrote to a mailing list, it was almost always neutral material: information about an event, a reference, whatever.

And then, my journals became blogs and read by an audience that i don’t know. And i got invited to help out with other blogs. Suddenly, i had to address a flurry of email and comments about what i wrote. Most of it was curious, supportive. But then again, it was rather unbiased. Yet, every time i write anything with an opinion on it, or truly want to work out a dilemma, i get attacked or the ideas do. I can take it far more when the ideas are attacked, but i truly hate the anonymous emails telling me that i’m a terrible person.

I continue to be reminded that blogging is not a safe space for me. There’s no common understanding, common ground. Even when i build up the gall to post what’s on my mind, i’m deconstructed based on what’s not said. My blog is not an academic paper. I’m not reflexively positioning myself every time i post. I’m not fleshing out all of that which i feel should be assumed simply because this is MY blog, MY post. I take a lot for granted and i only wish that people would realize that these posts are constructed in the context of me. I’m not trying to be a journalist; i’m not trying to address an unknown population from an unknown position. I’m trying to share my thoughts, ideas, life from my perspective.

While i may feel attacked here, in my own digital home, i feel outright demolished at misbehaving. Unlike many group blogs, this one has an identity. It’s a blog about women and tech. It’s a blog by women involved in tech. It’s a blog by thinking women who think, say, and create far more than a few posts a month on the site. There is an unspoken context. These are things that i take for granted. I try to keep posts short, but in doing so, i fail to lay out the framework and thus i’m attacked both for what i say and what i don’t say. Instead of creative suggestions, “perhaps you forgot this,” i usually see you’re wrong/foolish/inappropriate. Sometimes i wonder if we created misbehaving as a tool to increase our masochistic lashings. It’s certainly not a forum for interesting conversation in a safe space.

One thing that we’re missing as disconnected souls reading each other’s words is a shared social structure where we can intuitively understand when to critique and when to support. The blog world too easily lends itself to a forum for attacking each other, purportedly to critique ideas. How often are anonymous critiques truly constructive? How easy is it to tear apart someone you don’t know? Stanley Milgram learned that ages ago… if you feel like your responsibility is to critique, you can do so infinitely, regardless of how another might feel. And the further removed you are from witnessing the horrific reactions, the more you can continue on. Sometimes, i think we’re all a bit sadistic.

But it truly saddens me that blogs aren’t safe space. They don’t sit in a context; they don’t have a set of shared norms. And sometimes, it’s just simply not fun to constantly fight for the right to speak from your own perspective. It’s in moments like this where i remember why some people have no desire to speak up, no desire to fight. I remember asking my mum why she didn’t run for office; she laughed and reminded me that not just anyone is willing to be put through the ringer for the chance to spend every day being hated.

I continue to reconsider whether or not i should blog, or if i should only post uncontroversial material. While i’ve met some amazing people this way, i’ve also seen the increase in my insecurity about sharing what i know. Yet, often, my attackers are anonymous and i should know not to take them seriously. I can intellectually tell myself that it is foolish to let them affect me, but anonymous attackers hurt my soul even more so than actual people. With actual people, i can have a conversation, attempt reason, understand where they’re coming from. Anonymous attacks are just there, unable to be addressed personally, unable to find resolution in me. I will never forget the girl who asked me why i blogged, why i wanted to be a public target? I still can’t answer her.

“why can’t all decent men and women
call themselves feminists?
out of respect
for those who fought for this” – Ani DiFranco

I’ve been trying to wrap my head around the umbrella term “blog” – quite unsuccessfully at times. Who blogs? How do you categorize blogs? Why should you categorize them? For example, bloggers may see LJ folks as part of the blogging world, but not all LJ folks would agree. How do we address this?

Well, Liz and i were lamenting. Bless her for a good idea. As much as this conversation can go round-and-round online, it’d be most interesting to have a good RL conversation about the topic.

Plot 1: Bring the interested Etech folks together to have an interesting conversation. Although i realize that this will be dominated by a particular kind of blogger, hopefully we can get folks thinking outside of the box for a bit.

Plot 2: Hold a workshop at a conference where we can attract a more diverse segment of bloggers/journalers.

Plot 3: Do a bit of ethnography as necessary

Plot 4: Publish our findings.

So, if you’re interested in this conversation, come join us at ETech!

On the visualization thread, i was psyched to see “Social Circles” – a tool to watch mailing lists. I’m just a bit wary of how it is set up, given that it asks you for a mailing list to watch. I’m also a bit weirded out that i can see the converation patterns of other people in other mailing lists. I think that it is a bad bad bad idea to assume that all mailing lists are meant to be public.