Hi Sudoroomies!
We've been planning some cool bio meetups for Counter Culture Labs, and
lots of people were excited about doing one on brewing
kombucha<http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-Make-a-Big-Batch-of-Kombucha/>.
I figured it would be great to do this at sudoroom, and make a joint
sudo/CCL party/workshop out of it!
Do any of you have a nice healthy kombucha "mother" at the moment? We want
to do some microbiology experiments on the culture in the future, so it
should be a natural one that has been propagated for a long time, not
something started from a store-bought bottle (those typically use a single
strain, rather than the complex mixture of bacteria and yeasts you find in
a real kombucha mother).
We have a slot in our meetup calendar penciled in for a kombucha meeting
for the week after next (next week is
bioinformatics<http://www.meetup.com/Counter-Culture-Labs/events/129899352/>!)
I figure that may leave us just enough time to brew a big batch in advance
of the meetup, so we'd have enough kombucha for tasting, and enough mother
to hand out to anyone who wants to participate and brew their own batch!
So... let me know if (a) you have a kombucha mother we can use, (b) would
be interested in brewing up a big batch in advance of the meetup, and/or
(c) would be interested in helping to lead the meetup the week after next
(exact date to be decided)! I can definitely help out with (b) and (c).
Heck, we could even try brewing some mate kombucha...
Patrik
hi everyone,
you are once again invited to come do things with the awesome sudo kids
tuesday from 6ish to 8:30ish. want to do a group activity? teach really
brilliant kids something awesome? build a thing with them? help them build
a thing? we've done calligraphy, clay, mate-brewing, piano, radio, and
more. kids have expressed an interest in 3d printing and making videos. if
you want to do either of those things with us (whether tomorrow or sometime
in the future), or have an idea for another thing you'd like to do, be in
touch!
additionally, ray and i have started working on concrete goals and desired
outcomes for the sudo kids program. we are doing this because a hackerspace
without kids is like a diy electronics project without a blinky light -
extremely sad. kids are natural hackers and if our role is to provide the
physical and community infrastructure to encourage people to keep building
and making and learning and exploring things forever, then kids are
naturally part of that equation :) additionally, having activities for kids
is a proven strategy to expanding our community. yes, we are operating from
the principle that if you hook a kid on a thing, that you will eventually
have an opportunity to speak with their parent. the good news is that we
are not selling stuff but selling the idea of making stuff and being in a
community of makers. finally, if you've never done stuff with kids before,
you may find the experience to be really different than what you'd expect
(i know i have). i continue to be extremely impressed and more or less
constantly verklempt at the insight and intelligence of the children we
work with.
so, if you want to help coordinate activities and be a part of the cool
sudo kids organizing/future direction/expanding the program crew, (or are
just interested in learning more about what "helping coordinate sudo kids"
involves - it's not a lot), be in touch via email or just come on a tuesday
night.
- marina
Approval for citywide surveillance now scheduled for July 30.
> The Domain Awareness Center began as a federal grant for port security, but has expanded to include more of Oakland.
> http://oaklandlocal.com/2013/07/a-proposed-citywide-surveillance-center-in-…
>
> The approval of $2 million in federal funding for a citywide surveillance center in Oakland was postponed to July 30 as opposition to the controversial proposal slowly gains public awareness and criticism.
>
> The agenda item first presented in an Oakland City Council Public Safety Committee received little vetting by the some council members when it was heard July 9. It also attracted no public comment that night. However, in the past week the issue has gathered energy as some city advocates question the proposal, they say, may further infringe on their privacy, in addition, to it lacking any guidelines for its use and possible expansion.
>
> At Tuesday’s Oakland City Council meeting, the director of the city’s emergency services, Renee Domingo, said no standard operating procedures currently exist for how the system known as the Domain Awareness Center (DAC) will be employed, if approved by the council. In addition, the city and port are in the process of studying various public records and data retention requirements in relation to the DAC, said Domingo. Later, she added there is doubt whether the DAC will function as a center for data storage since the feeds it will pull in already come from sources with their own retention rules.
>
> The DAC was first approved by the City Council in July 2010 following the allocation of federal stimulus dollars for security at the Port of Oakland. The $2 million outlay before the council this month represents phase two of the program which, according to a city staff report, has ballooned from covering the port to other parts of the city, including street cameras and various other locations, including schools and the Coliseum. Approval would also allow the city and port to seek out other agencies to provide additional video feeds to the DAC, including the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and Caltrans, among others. During the Public Safety Committee meeting last week, staff also indicated plans to partner with other statewide and federal authorities for inclusion in Oakland’s DAC.
>
> Privacy advocates say the DAC’s ability to become a clearinghouse for numerous video feeds from a panoply of government agencies, along with a torrent of data sources, including information and statistics from law enforcement, sets a dangerous precedent in a city beset with a police department, which in the past, has routinely infringed on citizen rights and has paid millions in settlements for their actions.
>
> “[There are] huge opportunities for abuse here, too,” Oakland resident Joshua Daniels said Tuesday night. “We’re talking about giving a surveillance system for the entire city over to, perhaps, the most abusive police force in the country.”
>
> Gwen Winter, another Oakland resident speaking during public comment said, “This has nothing to do with crime. This has nothing to do with terrorism. What you want to do is watch what all the people are doing so they won’t organize.”
>
> Following revelations brought on by Edward Snowden over the federal government’s ability to spy on Americans, Sandy Sanders urged for the council to maintain a delineation between the city’s data and other agencies. “Our data is our data and your data is your data and those should be separate. Do your job in government and protect us.”
>
> A few public speakers took fault with Councilman Dan Kalb’s comments in committee last week when he concluded his statements on the DAC by saying, “sounds good to me.” In response to the public outcry Tuesday night, Kalb said, “This is not a fault or a criticism, but I’ll only say, I wish all the people who were here today were at the public safety committee a week ago. It would have been more helpful.”
>
> The City Council may have been caught flat-footed by the amount of criticism against the DAC Tuesday night. Councilman Larry Reid moved to delay the item to July 30. Councilmember Lynette Gibson McElhaney, who sits on the Public Safety Committee, agreed. Reid asked staff for additional research on the proposal before adding, “Given that we can’t even get our freaking phones working for our police officer…and now we want to add this additional technology when there’s only two to three years for maintenance?” He also criticized the public safety committee for not properly vetting the item.
>
> Councilmember Desley Brooks said the item should have never been placed on Tuesday’s consent calendar. “It was only supposed to go on the consent calendar if it wasn’t controversial and clearly there are people who have a different opinion.
>
>
hi everyone,
you may have heard of "today i learned," our wildly successful
co-learning-teaching one-off workshops that take place every saturday:
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Today_I_Learned
since the launch of TIL in January we've held over 20 workshops on topics
that range from jewelry-making to today's statistics with doodles. many
thanks to everyone who has facilitated a workshop, attended a workshop,
suggested a workshop, promoted a workshop, and workshopped a workshop.
i've mostly been taking the lead on keeping the schedule filled up,
encouraging people to do sessions, and promoting the TILs, but i need help!
we are not doing as well as we could be on really fulfilling the potential
of the TILs. unfortunately i don't have the time to really give this
project the love it deserves.
here are some of the tasks that we need help with to really have the TILs
fulfill the original intended function: providing an easy way for new
people to show up and participate in sudo room (while also sharing our
knowledge with each other and improve our teaching techniques):
- keeping the schedule filled up & encouraging sudoers and others to
facilitate sessions
- ideally we'd have at least a month ahead booked up so that we can
prepare detailed schedules for distribution to local schools,
after school
clubs, etc.
- promoting events
- at the moment, we barely provide a week's notice for upcoming TILs.
this is not enough lead time and as a result, they are often not as well
attended as they could be.
- promotions currently really only happen to channels that are likely
to reach people who already know about us: via email lists, twitter, fb,
and our blog. creativity in promotion (with different kinds of
promotional
activities for different TILs)
- currently, i mainly promote the events with little participation on
the part of the facilitator or larger sudo community. if we'd like to
distribute responsibility for the promotion, it would be helpful
to have a
"how to promote your workshop" guide and provide other mechanisms to help
make it easier to promote (blog post templates, flyer templates, etc.)
- documentation
- we should have been taking video of every workshop and putting it
online. we have not done this. this would be a huge improvement.
who's in? XD
- marina
hi everyone,
a few of us have been working on getting the radio up and running with lots
of great programming all the time. we need help!
do you want to be a part of coordinating the radio? here are the kinds of
things that need to be done:
- recruiting dj's
- training dj's
- coordinating scheduling
let's spread the work around so that we can give the radio the love it
deserves!
- marina
This may prove to be interesting, although its just a blogging class now.
http://info.bayareanewsgroup.com/communitymedialab
*The Oakland Tribune Media Lab*
1970 Broadway, Suite 100
Oakland, CA 94612
Most likely there are many issues close to Sudo that might be helped here :)
-Dude
Dear All,
Please feel free to sign up for the free Bioinformatics class that Ron will
be running at Sudo room on the 28th of July!
http://www.meetup.com/Counter-Culture-Labs/events/129899352/
The intersection of biology and computer science is showing tremendous
potential. Literally thousands of data sources great and small are publicly
available now. Come and enjoy a low key introduction to all the ‘omes’ –
genomes, transcriptomes, proteomes, methylomes, metabolomes, etc. We’ll
play with some of the more useful data sources, tools and biological
pathways. No biology training is necessary – the talk will be accessible to
anyone.
Programming skills are useful, but not necessary. Tools: If you have a
laptop, please bring it. We will try to look at data in the class and
preview a couple of tools. Cygwin on windows machines, OsX or linux are
useful here, but we can go over these at the time if needed. We will be
open to designing a project for anyone who wants to go deeper and get more
experience with Bioinformatics.
Ron Shigeta PhD Trained in biophysics and structural biology has been doing
bioinformatics for 12 years in bay area biotech. My current interests are
pharma pipeline tools, machine learning, and synthetic biology.
All the best,
Ryan
--
Ryan Bethencourt
Tel: (415) 825 2705
ryan.bethencourt(a)gmail.com
www.bamh1.comwww.linkedin.com/in/bethencourtwww.logos-press.com/books/biotechnology_business_development.php
Come out for a fun night of PRISM & Privacy & Pizza at the New Parkway
Theater in downtown Oakland.
Wednesday, July 31 - a free evening panel and film screening about the
past present and future of privacy and national security, and the
historical importance of whistle-blowers.
The thought-provoking panel discussion will be followed by a screening of *The
Most Dangerous Man In America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers*,
which received an Academy Award nomination for best documentary feature.
Panel discussion featuring:
· Cindy Cohn, Legal Director, Electronic Frontier Foundation
· Judith Ehrlich, Director, Writer, Producer, *The Most Dangerous Man in
America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers*
· Nicole A. Ozer, Technology and Civil Liberties Policy Director, ACLU
of Northern California
· Moderated by Declan McCullagh, Chief Political Correspondent, Senior
Writer, CNET
When: July 31st, 2013 - 5:30 PM - 8:30 PM. Doors open at 5:30 for mixing,
mingling and purchasing food and drinks, panel begins at 6:15 PM and will
be followed by the film screening at 7 PM.
Where: The New Parkway Theater, 474 24th Street Oakland, CA (just a couple
blocks from BART)
RSVP at http://www.acslaw.org/BayAreaGovernmentSecrecryFilmScreeningRSVP
Admission to this event is free, but space is limited and RSVP is required.
*The Most Dangerous Man in America* is the true story of what happens when
a former Pentagon insider, Daniel Ellsberg, armed only with his conscience,
steadfast determination and a file cabinet full of classified documents,
decides to challenge an "Imperial" Presidency -- answerable to neither
Congress, the press nor the people -- in order to help end the Vietnam War.
Presented by the Bay Area Lawyer Chapter of the American Constitution
Society, American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, BORDC, and
Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Hi Folks,
Last night went pretty well overall despite not getting my beer machine operational due to disappointing answers to such questions as "how many power cords into power strips into power cords can I connect?" and the ever popular "will the plumbing leak where you least expect it?" We did have some newbies there working on a robotics project for a school assignment and let me tell you, there's something about the smell of burning servos that just can't be beat. Overall their objective is to use machine vision as a feedback for actuators, seems pretty cool. Rabbit and I put together some power hardware to map 4D visualizations to some addressable LED strips for a burning man project. We did a little probing of the door raspi but couldn't get a rise out of the relevant GPIO pin so I defer to the original system designers, but volunteer to fabricate a plug-in circuit board to streamline the component layout. Also got some soldering assistance from one of the sudo kids who gravitated toward the table full of wires.
This final point lead me to an idea - I'd like to incorporate a sudokids robotics event once a month. Open to any and all ideas as to how this would play out, but at minimum we could have them build and compete remote controlled rovers, in both co-op and free for all modes of course. Let me know if you have any ideas for kid-friendly microcontroller projects. I'd like to develop this idea and start mid-september.
Happy Hacking,
hol