At the time, the entire world was focused on all the ways those behind-the-scenes heroes help. From oil-drillers lending their expertise to how to go get them, to manufacturers of the capsule that brought them out, to iPods sent down fully loaded with Elvis and lots more…even to the psychologists helping them deal with the effects of long-term entrapment. NASA was even called it for its experience in helping crew members deal with long periods of isolation while in outer space.

At least those were the official stories.

Later, after the men were saved, we learned how those official strategies and tools were hacked.

Drugs were smuggled down to them in letters from wives, girlfriends (sometimes both), and friends.

Porn was also smuggled down to them because officials were not dealing with their “greatest need” after air, food and water.

Yes, the official channels of tools, support, discipline and structure were absolutely necessary.

But so were the underground channels…the hacks. Those 33 men made sure to workaround the system to get their needs met.

Maybe there’s something we can all learn from these heroes?

image: astantin.com

The Magna Carta is arguably one of the most significant documents in history in establishing obligations and freedoms between those in power and the populous. A century and a half after William the Conqueror centralized and organized power in England the monarchy had grown so powerful that the land-owners revolted. In 1215, their Magna Carta laid the foundation for many future bills of rights, constitutions, and limitations and responsibilities for those in power.

I have also had the opportunity to view one of the original copies, made in 1297, in Australia’s Parliament House. Given the significance of this document, I assumed I would encounter crowds of people and armed guards. Instead, I saw it by myself in a hallway viewing area that seemed more fit for a high school science project, which was right next to a coat check room, with a hurricane sound in the background from one of those industrial blowers because there was a leak in the ceiling a few feet from the document and the carpet was soaked.

Expect that kind of Magna Carta-ish experience when discussing how corporate senior executives will need to transition from today’s approaches to business to infrastructures that are as user(worker)-centered as they are corporate-centered. Important and meaningful conversations, but also pedestrian, messy, noisy, and not a lot of reverence. Within those noisy discussions are certain to be pearls of wisdom — hard-won advice from your fellow hackers on how to bring about much-needed changes.

Bring on the noise!

SIDE TRIP
About The Magna Carta
> The Magna Carta, meaning Great Charter, is not just one document. It is a number of them, from different dates, all referred to under the same collective name
> Publication has its origins in a dispute between King John and English barons, and it went some way towards limiting the king’s authority
> The first document was sealed – not signed – in 1215 by King John at Runnymede. The final one was issued in 1300
> 17 versions survive from the 13th Century
> The charter guaranteed basic freedoms and property rights to “free men”
> The Magna Carta was re-negotiated on four occasions within the first decade of its existence, as both the king and England’s earls, bishops and barons all attempted to redefine its terms

It’s a good example of how hackers can bring something new to the table – by providing close and careful examination of what’s actually happening, instead of what people are running around screaming about, they can help us rationally construct an argument about what we can do.

It flies in the face of modern marketing, media, and news reporting, but it’s pretty damn useful. :)

It’s not really a suprise – imagine staying home on a day off and getting a bunch of projects you’d been looking forward to finishing cleared off your plate. Can you see freaking out if you spent the whole day at it, or would you go to bed that evening with a big smile on your face?

If you’re looking for even more of an excuse, compare that against the fact that people sleeping < 6 hours a night are 12% more likely to experience premature death. It’s probably worth noting that skipping the commute will help buy you more time in bed. ;)

But the point that is perhaps understated is that Square can rock an entire industry segment. That’s the power of startups, and of hacking existing systems. It’s why the hackers’ mindset is such a powerful thing – and such an essential tool for innovation.

There are plenty of examples of market-changers like Square (Facebook.com, anyone?). What’ll be next, and why aren’t you building it now?

The plot is being led by British solicitor Peter Cathcart and involves Washington political lobbyists and fake blogs and Twitter accounts filled with content by PR agencies. What’s interesting about this is that they’re utilizing all the same techniques and technologies large companies are, but to a decidedly political end.

Perhaps even more importantly, they’re using political lobbying and marketing to force a coup, rather than the more traditional use of physical violence. That’s certainly cheaper (if you measure lives as infinitely valuable) than the alternatives, and (despite its inauthenticity) more laudable.

Unfortunately, more than 31,000 alarms in Southern California are now being investigated for being missed. The consequences for this are severe – parole administrators started the investigation the day after it was discovered that lax GPS supervision of paroled sex offender John Albert Gardner III allowed him to kill two San Diego County teenagers.

But here’s the most interesting bit – officials say the backlog of alerts grew because they lacked the software to create a report of unresolved cases. What’s more, it turns out that the system generated a the same kind of alert for any event – whether a GPS unit was low on batteries or in the middle of a schoolyard. This resulted in a massive overflow of alerts to officers who had no capacity to handle them.

It’s a pretty classic case of mismanaged technology, with tragic consequences. The hacker approach would have been to try it out in small cases, gather feedback, and tweak it until it worked. But the state of CA instead invested massive spending in a one-time expense – and then expected a miracle.

Hackers know – and love – that solutions don’t exist in a vacuum. They need to be evolved over time to fulfill the needs of an environment. Technology isn’t always the answer, but in this case at least, it could have been a much better part of the solution.

This is extremely damaging for innovation, because it means that anything I can abstractly imagine, I can patent (as long as I can demonstrate it well enough for an under-educated patent examiner). There are companies that do nothing BUT create patents, some so they can license them to developers who can actually run with them, and some solely to provide them with ammo for profitable lawsuits.

Either way, it’s lose-lose for society. If we are forced to claim other kinds of return for our inventions – such as social or reputational – we will continue to innovate along those lines. Slamming that door shut in favor of limited economic returns, and returns which favor large companies exclusively, hurts us all.

Simply put, rather than acknowledge that their ability to keep people from freely trading music is beyond recovery, a major record label is stealing software designed to stop people from stealing software, and using it to stop people from stealing their own.

If that isn’t evidence of a breakdown in consumer trust – and an ability to innovate – I don’t know what is. I’m not saying that swapping copies of music you didn’t pay for is right, but I’ll happily contend that stealing software to defend your position against stealing certainly is.