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Today the Seattle Police Department harbor unit held an open house to welcome the public to see their new 45' response boat, Patrol 9.

"Giving away sacks of gold so you can divest from Goldman Sachs!"

…yells Circus, a member of the group #MicCheckWallStreet.

I've seen some footage and photos of protesters attacking press in Seattle on May Day. It's bullshit. And dumb. Even if you're a well read, thoughtful window breaker that has a really good reason for wanting to smash capitalism. Attacking the press at a public rally with thousands of people because they are recording you is pointless. Everyone has a camera phone. You can't stop the coverage. If you want privacy, try doing something away from a thousand people with iPhones.

I'm excited. Really excited. I think my coworkers are more excited than I am. This is going to be big. Or small. It's going to be something.

This was originally posted on the Occupy Seattle Blog.

Recently I read a blog post on Modeled Behavior about a piece written by Edmund Phelps on Keynes vs. Hayek. One interesting quote pointed out on the post was:

"What now do we do? With some luck, the economy will
“recover” through a return of investment activity to sustainable

Representative McDermott,

I am a voter in the 7th congressional district and live in Seattle.

I've read that CISPA is nearing a vote in congress. This is yet another attempt to impose a regime of monitoring and surveillance more appropriate for red china than the US.

We don't need more laws allowing the communications of US citizens to be intercepted by third parties. Computer security threats are not a problem to be solved by reading all our e-mail. They are a problem with software development or deployment.

photography by Alex Garland

Today about 12 protesters from the group "MicCheckWallStreet" protested the actions of big banks, including Bank of America, in front of a Bank of America in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle. From their website:

As it stands today the western way of life is a threat to millions (optimistically), or perhaps billions (pessimistically), of people, within many of our lifetimes.

This threat isn't that we will run out of resources and approach a malthusian economy where population growth matches or surpasses economic growth. The threat is that world GDP growth will continue to track the output of greenhouse gases, that the process of globalization will bring millions out of dire poverty, and that the combination will cause massive global climate change.

If you want to change the world you need ideas, information, and networks of people receptive to your ideas. Technology can give you reach (of everyone else on the Internet), but as of today it cannot help with interpersonal or ideological conflicts, make a poorly worded argument strong or make people cooperate. Social systems can help if you're working with people that are cooperative and share similar goals, technology can at best help determine and implement them.