The Information Enlightenment

I’ve noticed an astonomical increase in the amount of spam comments that neeed filtering. It makes me wonder why russion prescription peddlers find my blog such an enticing venue to reach potential phish.

In real news, I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it here before but this is where I do much of my work: FOSS@RIT Campaign.

After 4 long years of dreaming a dream of running my own National Non-profit organization, it has come to fruition. CIVX.us is not only a FOSS@RIT Sponsored project, but it is now doing business as a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. All contributions are tax-deductible

Thank yous:

Eben Moglen – For taking me under his wing and giving me my foothold in NYC.
Ian Sullivan – For helping me all along the way, and supporting such a shoestring operation.
Jame Vasile – For being a general Opensource Rockstar and giving CIVX a shoutout in the NYC CIty Council Chambers.
Bob Leckie – For reminding me that not everyone is going to assume your intentions are noble, and giving me a place to call home when I felt the furthest from it.
Blair Horner – For showing me the ropes of legislative research, and all around mentoring me in the Game.
Russ Haven – For believing in me, and my canvassers, to a fault.
Abby Berner – WIthout whom I would not have made it through RIT.
Rebecca Housel – For being the first English Teacher in my life that recognized that I can write halfway decently.
Donna Brooks – For being the last English Techer I let tell me I couldn’t.
Jon Schull – For giving me a place to hang my hat, and officially give me a business card that says “Hacktivist”
Stephen Jacobs – For being the current Grey Beard Sensei in my life
Lewk Macken – Who’s name should have been at the top of this list.
Linji Mark – For her patience over the years, and watchful eye
Nathan Freitas – For giving me a chance to cast stones from inside of the glass house.
Andrew Hoppin – For giving me a seat at the big table.
Ben Yee – For rolling deep, and doing it big.
Noel Hidalgo – For giving me some kind of semblance of peace of mind when I wasn’t sure if the world was ready for Hacktivists like us.
Sean Sutton – For helping me hone my Politicking, and generally giving me hope when I was but a student, and nothing more.
Dr. Fornieri – For convincing me that us goombas are just born with it.
Dave Shein – For letting me show the next gen the ropes, and giving me a soapbox as well as a sandbox to prove myself again at RIT, but from the top-down this time around.
Karlie Robinson – For keeping ROC FOSS alive and well
Mel Chua – For showing me that “people our age run all this,” and the value of an 18 hour work day.
Justin Lewis – For being a leet muffukka
Taylor Rose – For giving me hope in the uninitiated
Fran Rogers – For teaching me to never sleep on M$ hackers again
Joe Grasso – For still being my top pick for “Corporate Minstrel,” and someone I would truly consider a “Gentleman in kind”
Muhree – For being my Island, my rock, my sanctuary.
The Wu Tang Clan – For teaching me the ways of the Witty Unpredictable. I will never reveal the Wu Tang Secret.

There are most certainly a whole whole whole bunch more people who deserve shout-outs, but those are the names off of the top of my head.

I recently landed a Google Fellowship to attend PDF2010, which is really exciting, and definitely the most Baller of the Poli/Tech conferences of the season. I’m so ready for a return trip to the Biggest of Apples

Life is pretty decent, barring the damage that one has to do to their credit to start a non-profit straight out of college, and not under the umbrella of independent wealth. I know my debtors keep an eye on this blog as well, so I guess you deserve a thank you too:

Debtors – Thanks for giving me another very large chip on my shoulder to use as ammunition to fight harder than ever to reconcile our finances, while making one hell of a good story.

There are so many communicados that require the utmost care and deliberateness and intentionality when crafted on my daily business. This place, is not where those utterances will get their spotlight. Here, I can say what I want, and what I want to say more than anything is Thank you to all of the people who believed in some long-haired, bearded, wide-eyed, idealistic, unreasonable, square peg in a world of very very round holes. The day is far from won, and all of this work, and time, and energy that went into making this happen, was really just getting us to the starting blocks… Now we race. To Pluto, and beyond!
–RemyD.