Understanding whose choice it is to adopt the new to preserve the ancient is not easy for a passing observer

i'm going to ground my thread on my recent African experiences by thinking about Africa as the dust-bin of the world and why the life-time of devices and environmental impacts should be something we consider in technology design. More generally, it has led me to think about two more fundamental things for design more generally

In Vanuatu it's common for people to travel home from work by out-rigger canoe. At various places along the coast, in close proximity to the nearby islands, you can see canoes drawn up on a beach during the day whilst their owners are at work, shopping or whatever. Some of the canoes are padlocked to mangrove roots. Quite an amusing sight - but not really. Once again, I'm just experiencing the discord between my view of nature and natural places and someone else's. It's common in the Sinai to see bundles of belongings, usually wrapped in a piece of cloth, left in the fork of an Acacia tree.

just sorting things out to go down to mt warning caldera for the weekend .. need to take my kid sister to some wilderness as she is finding it very bizarre that she cannot just walk out into it like she can in france ...

Another community mapping project

I came across this interesting discussion in a forum for a game (Crysis by In-Crysis) to be released in 2007 Q3. Gamers are keen to see effects of weather in games, if this is anything to go by. Read entry #16 and beyond, for example.

On further investigation, apart from the weather, there are a number of interactions with the environment, some of which are shown in this brief video I particluarly liked the difused light in some of the screenshots; it seems that they have an interesting engine.

Humankind's infrastructures have knowingly or unknowingly touched every part of this planet yet within our culture we refer to places as natural. i've been wondering what this delusion is about.

This was sparked by a conversation with truna - thanks, truna. I'm starting to think about what we mean by 'natural place'. If for a moment I take a dualist, Cartesian position, and say that by 'natural place' I mean that part of the world independent of humans, truna's question would be, "Are there any?" To which she would answer, "No." The whole earth has been tramped upon, even if no-one has visited. Witness the amount of plastics in beach sand and the oceans. There is nowhere where the effects of humans are not felt. An alternative would be to think of nature as a discursive concept.

Coming home, a grateful, long soft sigh. Despite thoroughly enjoying OzChi conference and catching up with colleagues; it meant a week in Sydney. Now back on my beach i am aware of my senses again.