Despite the fact that I can’t understand a word anyone says, there is no denying the coolness that oozes from this film.
It’s a big … flying … car, but it is certainly no Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
My favourite piece of open source CMS software has added another significant scalp, with http://www.whitehouse.gov making the switch to Drupal.
The move has been orchestrated by Dries himself, through Aquia, along with some third party contractors based in the US. (More details and specifics are available via techPresident).
Much is being made of the Obama administration, or at least some aspect of it, making the “open source choice”. With a foot in each camp (both the closed and open source worlds), I have to wonder if the move is significant and, in a way, I hope it isn’t.
Much is being made of the choice as if it represents some fundamental decision by the US Government to chose open source for reasons other than it being the best technical solution. Dries has a great take on why this is the case, and I wish more of the news articles out there were picking up on these points.
As an advocate of Drupal, and of open source in general, it being chosen because it is the best solution is the only option that I can support … because it is the only option that takes open source forward.
Chose open source because it has a better cost/benefit balance, chose it because it is lower risk, more secure, or chose it because it fits your needs. But don’t chose it because it is open source, because that’s the same as choosing it because it is Microsoft or Google or Sony or any other brand name.
If we can make the playing field cost, risks, time, and function and eliminate the FUD peddled by others, then products and platforms like Drupal will be the best fit, will be selected, and the presence and market share of open source will improve.
But please, let’s not turn a victory dance into an awkward “Dad at a wedding” moment on the grave of some unknown closed source system. It is unbecoming of us all.
The first MWM Live was for someone who we honestly didn’t press-gang long in advance of the event. Probably the one person to play our “name a place, name a thing, name a person” game to get their story started too!
“OK”, said the landlord, “Here’s your uniform.” Carl looked sceptically at the bear skin hat and rusty old gas mask. The job hefting barrels at the Queen’s Head was supposed to be easy money, beer funds for his summer vacation. Gas masks and furry hats were not part of the plan.
“This.. is my uniform?”
“You’ll understand once you’re down there,” said the landlord, and opened up the trapdoor to the cellar. “Best get down there and get the lay of the land, son”
Tucking the hat and the gas mask under his arm, Carl climbed slowly down into the cellar. It was freezing cold, his breath clouding into vapour as his feet touched the stone floor. He felt the crunch of ice, and shivered.
“Put on the hat before you freeze to death,” shouted the landlord from the top of the ladder.
Carl did as he was told, and pressed on into the gloom of the cellar. With every step he took it got colder, and the air thickened with a smell that swiftly escalated into a stench that was almost unbearable. Carl strapped on the gas mask, grateful for the clean air.
He heard the trapdoor close behind him, extinguishing the light from above. In the distance, far further away than he thought the cellar should reach, he could see another tiny light.
A tiny light that was getting closer.
“Don’t run,” came a voice from the dark. “You’ll fall on the ice and break your neck.”
Out of the darkness, came the barrel-man. The legend of the Queen’s Head, the brewer of the infamous home brew. No more than three feet tall, wizened, and dressed in strips of leather and rags, the light that came closer came from a small lantern attached to his belt.
“Here,” he said, thrusting a rotting, dismembered human forearm at Carl. In the arm’s rotting hand was a key.
“Keep walking for about another hour, you’ll come to a door. Open it with this key, and bring out the barrels. The home brew should be ready.”
Carl felt the cold, dead flesh of the arm in his own hands.
“Why do I need the arm? Can’t I just take the key?” he asked.
“You see when you get there,” replied the barrel man. “New boy”
Written Sy Wyatt at the now infamous MWM Live! in Bristol, May 2009.
Pressure. Emmett had dealt with pressure his whole life. Pressure to deliver. Pressure to perform. Today, however, he was concerned entirely with the pressure on the outside of his deep sea exploration suit. The soft pinging in his ear told him he was safe, and still attached to the survey ship, thousands of feet above, by the umbilical.
“Can you see it, Emmett?”
“I’m pretty much on top of it. Another hundred or so feet and I’ll have contact.”
Emmett imagined the whoops and back-slapping going on on the ship. After months of searching, they had found her.
Emmett’s heavy boots hit the shell of the wreck. There was no give, ships like the Inca Queen were built to last, built to keep their cargo safe. Emmett couldn’t speculate what kind of ordnance could have sunk her.
“Can you see it? Emmett, can you see it?”
Emmett turned slowly, the high powered lights on the shoulders of his suit skimming along skin of the hulk. They reached a ragged gash, a hole punched in the side of the majestic Inca Queen. Inside, gleaming under the powerful spot lights, was her cargo. Untouched, perfect, preserved by intense pressure and cold of the Inca Queen’s deep grave.
Row after row of containers, their contents still a perfect, creamy white and, along the sides, a tell-tale flash of gold.
Emmett smiled. It would be biggest haul of his career.
“I have it. There’s at least eight thousand pints of gold top down here.”
Emmett flicked off the radio link before he was deafened by the cheers. Since the bovine flu epidemic, milk had become the most expensive commodity on the planet. The contents of The Inca Queen, once the star “milk float” of the global “Creamy Corporation”, was worth enough to make Emmett and his crew richer than God.
They know me so well! Murky Depths has picked up the SFX “Fanzine of the Month” gong for a 3rd time.
It wasn’t until I met up with Terry from Murky Depths this weekend that I found out that “The Escape Artist” was given a special mention.
