Two of our good friends here in Montreal are Kate and Morgan. She's a Ph.D. student in philosophy at Rutgers, working on her dissertation here, and he's a game designer. They're from Australia originally, and they just got married Down Under about 4 weeks ago. Her dad and stepmom live in North America, though, so they're thoughtfully holding a wedding party next weekend for Kate and Morgan's American friends and family at their home in Hudson (New York).
We've driven through the area a few times in the past, but we haven't really stopped for long. From what Kate says, Hudson's a pretty town and early October means lots of leaf-peeping opportunities. Not that Montreal's any slouch in that respect right now, but it will be nice to see other people's leaves, I guess. There's also a Firefighter Museum and a Shaker Museum.
I also just finished The Island at the Center of the World, a historical book about the 17th-century Dutch colony of New Netherlands (now New York). The main settlements were in the Hudson Valley between Manhattan and Albany (New York), so I'd like to find a nice one to stop at and look around.
The drive down is about 4-1/2 hours, and I think we'll be OK doing it in one hop, even with the baby strapped down in the back seat. We're heading out on Friday evening, spending Saturday checking out the sights, then parties on Sunday and Monday (a holiday, Columbus Day, in the US). Monday night Maj got us tickets to see Massive Attack here in Montreal, so we'll be zooming back up highway 87 Monday afternoon and if we can avoid problems at the border in Plattsburgh we'll be rockin' out (a bit) that evening.
tags: kate morgan wedding party hudson massive attack leaf peeping
Parallel distrihoozit
The discussions on the cc-licenses list over the last week have gotten increasingly heated. At heart is the very emotional issue of DRM (AKA TPM) technology, and to what extent its use is compatible with Open Source and Open Content.
It's been a real shame -- several pages-long posts that really try to hammer a point into the head of someone who's just not listening since they're busy writing their own 10-page-long email. It's become impossible to read and some wiser heads have asked for a cooling-off period. Thankfully so.
There is very little time left to continue this discussion. I really sincerely hope that people who are interested in seeing Commons licenses that are compatible with Debian and other Free Software pop in and say something to that effect. Cool heads who can state things in simple English are particularly welcome. The list allows posting to subscribers only -- kind of a damper on one-time posts -- but subscription only takes a second, and you can disable your subscription immediately after you're done.
tags: cc debian cc-licenses public review cc3.0
Busy Wednesday Ahead
2007 is going to be the year of wiki in Montreal. We're having two of the main wiki conferences -- RecentChangesCamp and Wikisym -- here in Montreal next year. And I guess it's time for the local wiki, open source, open content and "open other" community to start getting ready.
At least in the wiki world we're taking the first steps. Wednesday 4 October (uhh... I mean, Duodi 12 Vendémiaire) we're having Montreal Wiki Wednesday at 8655 rue St-Denis (metro Cremazie). Alain Desilets and Sunir Shah, who are both working on Wikisym, will be coming, as well as Anne Goldberg (principal organizer of RCC) and the inimitable Seb Paquet, who runs everything in this town. 15h-18h, fun times ahead.
tags: wiki wiki wednesday wikisym montreal rococo
CC Salon Montreal
But wait there's more! On top of WW, we're going to have a big Creative Commons Salon Montreal on Wednesday night, too. This will be the second time we've had a get-together in Montreal for CC so far, and I think it's going to be a good one. Maj and I are going to give an informal talk about Wikitravel and its CC license which has worked so well for us.
I'm really gung-ho on the CC Salon idea. It's a great way to engage the interesting, fun part of CC -- and it's all about the fun, right? CC Salon Montreal is happening 4 Oct at 18:30h at L'amère à boire, 2049 rue St. Denis (a mere 66-block walk from Wiki Wednesday!). Should be a good time.
(On top of all this, I'll probably stop at YULblog on the way home, just to make the Web maven's trifecta for the night.