Here’s how I bought bitcoin, and what I spent it on.


TribalMixes is a “private torrent tracker” that’s been around since 2006. I joined in 2007.

It’s a contemporary analogue to the old scenes where folks would tape record radio broadcasts or live performances and then share them with each other. One big difference now is that the copies are all perfect, and way easier to share.

The way private torrent trackers work is that they enforce a ratio.

They know your IP address, and only permit people who are also registered and visiting their website to share the torrented files that they track. The website knows exactly how much data you’ve downloaded, and how much you’ve uploaded. In this case, the first has to be at least 0.4 of the second, or you’re cut off.

There’s an elaborate system of games (e.g. raffles) and gifts (free upload credit for visiting the site), and they also reward donations with upload credit.

At Durty Nelly‘s there’s a machine that looks like an ATM. It’s very easy to use.

  1. Open the bitcoin app you downloaded and hold it up to the window on the machine.
  2. Insert money into the machine.
  3. ??? wait ???
  4. Now you have bitcoin.

Penny Arcade explains it best.

Having donated my $5 to the site, it appears I have an invite to share. Hit me up in the comments if you’re interested in joining it. To see if it’s up your alley, here’s the last ten things to be posted there as I’m writing this:


Feel free to leave a tip.myBC

Stored Media / Sabbath


John and Marcia were very generous with their embarrassment of stored media riches. I gave them a copy of Neighborhood Rhythms, and they filled a paper shopping bag with some of John’s and his friends’ work from over the years — poets working in and around the Los Angeles from the 1960s onwards. I’m only now getting through it.

One of the works they gave me is a beautiful collection by a poet named William Pillin. I’m reproducing one of its poems, Sabbath, at the end of this post.

As we move away from stored media, will we also move away from the cull and share cycle that came along with them? Or is there a way to share the metadata of our digital files that does the same?

We can stick with DRM, but it would be nice to have a universal standard (don’t laugh) for a digital library. There’s no reason the metadata of the media we own have to be encrypted, even if some of the content does.

Not the prescribed movement of hands, not the ritual whispers out of antique books with broken bindings, not those you left me, people of blessed candles, but a certain music, a secret between us, so that even I, a pagan in Babylon, celebrate the Creation's completion. I can spare but a few hours for this evening's silence as I can't afford a whole day without labor; and the hymns I sing are alas, not Zemirot, the Sabbath hymns, but snatches of Handel, an Anglican rabbi; but I will praise the Indwelling Glory, putting, however briefly, my trials behind me, putting, however briefly, Egypt behind me. I will not stint, I will provide of the finest. The floors will be scrubbed, the furniture polished. With choice meat and hallot I will praise Thee, aye, with a double portion of manna, with broiled fish, with a goblet of brandy. Overlook therefore the profane, the informal. Send Shabbath Shalom, the peace of the evening, to us who are doing their ignorant best at this altar; son, wife and husband basking at twilight in the tender effulgence of grandmother's candles.

Google Instant Upload’s Nag:
“Make That Photo Public”


The successor function.
g + 1 = S(g)



Why you want to mess with my photos, Google?





Short answer:

you don’t.




