a plug for CrunchBang Linux
CrunchBang Linux is awesome!
I don’t typically blog about the day-to-day geekiness involved in maintaining our small fleet of computers, but I have to recommend this distribution. It’s been on my laptop for about 36 hours, and I absolutely love it.
Our current network consists of:
- My Asus EeePC 901. It’s running Ubuntu 8.04. We use it for Skype, occasional browsing/productivity, and as a portable machine.
- Erin’s Dell E6400. This is her primary machine, and it’s running Ubuntu 9.04. It usually lives in the bedroom, but has been known to move around the apartment.
- Erin’s ancient Dell 600m. It’s connected to the TV. It has no working screen, wireless card, battery, PC slot, or USB ports, so it’s not good for much else. It’s running Windows XP, as the S-Video out doesn’t work under Linux.
- My Dell E1505. This is my primary machine, and it lives on the desk, connected to a couple external drives. It’s on pretty much 24/7, and gets used for just about everything. It serves files to all the other machines and functions as a desktop. This is the computer that’s now running CrunchBang.
I recently installed Ubuntu 9.04 on my Dell, but I just wasn’t pleased. It felt bloated and slow. To be fair, this machine runs an FTP server, a Samba file server and a DAAP server in addition to the usual desktop apps including Firefox, Skype, and a busy bittorrent client. It’s about 4 years old, and it was feeling sluggish. I’ve been meaning to set up an internet jukebox of some sort, maybe Jinzora, but that means adding a webserver and database to the mix. It was time for a lighter-weight OS.
Enter Crunchbang Linux. It’s built from a minimal Ubuntu installation, but without all of the bulk of full-fledged Ubuntu. You still get apt for package management and the very robust Gnome network tools. It uses the Openbox window manager, which is amazingly fast and configurable. The rest of the installed applications are an excellent compromise between features and speed.
Installation was a breeze, and I haven’t had a single problem. Lately I’ve felt that Ubuntu is focusing more and more on eyecandy and flashy new features, and I’m just not that interested. I’m tired of spending hours trimming the fat from the distro. So far, crunchbang performs impressively. Memory and CPU usage are lower, and everything feels snappier.
This isn’t a distribution for everyone. It requires some comfort with the terminal and configuration files, but it’s surprisingly easy. If you’re looking for a lightweight alternative to Ubuntu, I highly recommend it.
And just to prove that lightweight doesn’t mean ugly, check out a couple screenshots:
Another newspaper post (with bad statistics!)
I thought this would make a good follow-up to my last newspaper post.
An interesting entry on the Nieman Jornalism Lab blog suggests that online newspaper readership is less significant than most people assume. Martin Langveld runs some back-of-the-envelope numbers to suggest that only 3% of reading occurs online.
Color me skeptical. First, I question some of his assumptions. He uses data suggesting that there are 116.8 million readers Monday-Saturday, and 134.1 million on Sunday. This assumes 2.1 readers per paper on weekdays, and almost 2.5 readers per paper on Sunday. I don’t know if I buy it. I’d like to know if that figure includes only home subscribers, or if it includes higher-volume subscribers like universities and hotels. I expect the number of readers/paper is lower in these settings, but that’s just my gut feeling.
Even if we accept these figures, Langveld makes an “educated guess” that each reader views 24 pages per day, which seems quite high. As far as I can tell, he has no basis for this guess. He also assumes that readers spend an average of 25 minutes with their papers Monday-Saturday, and 35 minutes on Sunday. Again, I’m guessing this figure is too high.
He goes on to argue that online advertising is overvalued, and that it’s not surprising that online revenue is less than 10% of total newspaper revenue.
His post was prompted by another writer who suggested that online metrics overstate the number of internet readers. This is probably true. A precursory glance at page views and unique visitors would likely indicate an inaccurately high rate of online readership. That doesn’t make Langveld’s statistics any more believable, however. When pressed, he states that halving the number of pages read or the amount of time spent would give online readership 7% of the page views, and 6% of the total viewing time. Langveld seems to assume this is an insignificant difference, but I disagree.
Surprisingly, I agree with one of his final points:
The fact remains, of course, that not only is online revenue alone insufficient to sustain news operations, but the print operations of our larger newspapers, having lost most monopoly pricing power, are not sustainable either, recession or no recession.
Neither online ad revenue nor print circulation will cover the cost of a traditional newsroom. As newspapers cut back on the “expensive” reporting in favor of cheaper content, I expect they’ll continue to lose readers. I don’t have data on the demographics of newspaper readers, but I’m certain that younger readers favor online content. I expect they’re more apt to use non-traditional news sources as well, rather than the big names in the newspaper business. It’s no surprise that the big picture is an ugly one for newspaper companies.
The question remains: How will journalism be funded in the 21st century? Maybe the traditional approach of ad revenue and subscriptions isn’t totally broken, but newsrooms would have to get a lot cheaper. Perhaps jettisoning the overhead of the print operations would help, but I don’t really know. I’m certainly no expert on the intricacies of the newspaper business. Anyone have any thoughts?
Bad news for the newspaper business (but don’t look so worried)
Newspapers are in serious trouble. This shouldn’t be a shocker to anyone, and the bad news just keeps coming. On Monday, March 16, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer announced that it was done publishing paper editions, shifting to internet-only content delievery. The New York Times covered the story here. In addition to shutting down the printing presses, the P-I news staff is being cut from 165 to 20. The site will consist of “mostly commentary, advice and links to other news sites, along with some original reporting.”
On March 23, the NYTimes reported that four newspapers in Michigan were ending daily publications. In Flint, Saginaw and Bay City, papers would be printed only three days per week. In Ann Arbor, publication will be cut to two days per week. The Ann Arbor News is laying off its entire staff of 272, and will re-form as two companies. One will release printed papers, while AnnArbor.com will provide web-based news. The site will provide “some original reporting, and an emphasis on reader input and community forums.” No word on how many people will be re-hired, but it will certainly be less than 272. (See the story here for more information.) The Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press are cutting home delivery to three days per week. Newspapers in Philadelphia and Minneapolis have declared bankruptcy.
If you’re a newspaper junkie, this sounds pretty crappy, but one person’s crappy is another’s revolution. Clay Shirky has written a fantastic essay on the problems facing the newspaper business. He writes that the digital revolution parallels another revolution, brought on by the printing press.
The Bible was translated into local languages; was this an educational boon or the work of the devil? Erotic novels appeared, prompting the same set of questions. Copies of Aristotle and Galen circulated widely, but direct encounter with the relevant texts revealed that the two sources clashed, tarnishing faith in the Ancients. As novelty spread, old institutions seemed exhausted while new ones seemed untrustworthy; as a result, people almost literally didn’t know what to think. If you can’t trust Aristotle, who can you trust?
and:
That is what real revolutions are like. The old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place.
That’s the real kicker. The newspaper business is broken, and we don’t have a replacement for it. Digital media has challenged every form of print, recorded or broadcast media, but newspapers are really getting the worst of it. At the very least, they’re getting it first. File-sharing has put serious pressure on the movie and music industries. Stop-gap measures like prosecution and digital sales aren’t really picking up the slack, but people still want recorded albums. They still want to watch movies. The physical medium and distribution method have changed, but the idea of an album or a movie has been (fairly) resilient. The same is true of books. The Amazon Kindle is making in-roads, but digital books haven’t really caught on. For most people, even the best e-readers don’t match the appeal of a “real” book.
Newspapers are a different story. Shirky says that the newspaper industry was fairly forward-thinking. They recognized the potential of computers and networks and attempted to plan for the future. The extent of the revolution wasn’t clear, however.
The curious thing about the various plans hatched in the ’90s is that they were, at base, all the same plan: “Here’s how we’re going to preserve the old forms of organization in a world of cheap perfect copies!” The details differed, but the core assumption behind all imagined outcomes (save the unthinkable one) was that the organizational form of the newspaper, as a general-purpose vehicle for publishing a variety of news and opinion, was basically sound, and only needed a digital facelift.
This isn’t panning out. Advertisements and circulation aren’t generating enough revenue to cover the costs of maintaining a newsroom and printing papers. And when a staff is cut from 165 to 20, it’s pretty clear that the end product won’t be the same. “Mostly commentary, advice and links to other news sites, along with some original reporting” is not a newspaper.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Shirky argues that journalism has become so entwined with the print media that we consider them one. But here’s the bottom line:
Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism.
This is an essential point to remember. We’ve come to think of the newspaper as a social institution. The newspaper isn’t the institution; the news is. We’re going through a chaotic time. New outlets are springing up, old outlets are appearing less relevant or less sustainable, and it’s impossible to predict how things will settle out. I’ll attempt one impossible prediction, however. The newspaper (as we know it) isn’t long for this world, and that’s not a bad thing.
As the venerable old mediums struggle, technology has drastically lowered the cost of media production, creating millions of new competitors. Again, this is an old story. Between YouTube videos, self-produced music, self-published books, blogs, podcasts, there is no shortage of diversions available to consumers. Did I mention it’s cheap? This blog is hosted for $5 per month, plus a few bucks to register the domain. I might not be as trustworthy as the New York Times, but I am certain that a new order will emerge. People still need journalism, and someone will provide it. There may just be a few (million) more contributors.
I don’t have any answers. As Shirkey says, this stuff is brand-new. Nobody can predict how this will shake out. People are quick to point out how technology threatens social institions. I don’t buy it. Art, music, literature, journalism…these things are institions, and they aren’t in any danger. The medium almost certainly will change, but the the medium is secondary to the true purpose. Just relax, and remember that you’re living in a revolution. It’s bound to be unnerving.
Successful Troubleshooting!
I just sorted out a very geeky problem I’ve been having, and I’m feeling pretty proud of myself. Prior to coming to Korea, I ordered myself an Asus EeePC 901. For the most part, it’s been a fantastic machine. My one complaint has been the wireless performance. It’s mostly OK at my apartment, but on the go it has a real hard time connecting to access points. If the signal strength is anything less than stellar, it’s just pretty flakey. It may be a linux-related driver issue; I’m not sure.
Regardless, I’d had enough, so I ordered an Intel 4965 AGN card prior to my parents’ visit. The original Ralink card used 2 antennas. The new Intel card had jacks for three. I’m pretty sure that three antennas are required for true 802.11N speed, but I haven’t done a lot of research on it. Something about MIMO (multiple input/multiple output) support. I thought 3 was probably better than 2, so I spent $5 and ordered one. I don’t use N networks now, but I figured I might in the future.
Ideally, I would have disassembled the machine and found a good location to stash the new antenna, but the wire was really short, and I didn’t want tear everything apart. I just stuck it under the (shielded) access panel. I knew this was a piss-poor location, but I figured that I wasn’t using wireless N anyways, so it probably didn’t matter.
I made this update right before going to Thailand. Everything seemed to be working well. The new card connected to networks faster than the stock card, battery life was better, and it seemed to do a better job with weak signals. I didn’t do a lot of testing, however.
I only used wireless a few times in Thailand, but things didn’t go well. The connection was laggy, and Skype had terrible delay or dropped calls. I blamed it lack of bandwidth, but the problems didn’t go away when I got home. Even on my (excellent) Korean connection, I had problems using Skype.
Tonight I tackled the problem. Ping showed terribly inconsistent latencies, and tons of duplicate packets. At first I blamed my crappy router, but my other laptop had no problems. Traceroute didn’t help narrow down the source of the problem.
I pulled the new wireless card and re-inserted the old card. Problem solved. This had me really frustrated, because the Intel card is pretty much brand new. I tried the Intel card again, but without the third antenna. Bingo! Low latencies and no dropped/duplicate packets.
I don’t know enough about the hardware or the wireless N specification to really understand this one, but it appears that the case shielding was messing up the third antenna, which caused the problems. I’ll watch it for a few days, but the problem seems resolved.
I love easy fixes. I suppose the moral is to do things right the first time, but methodical troubleshooting is critical when problems arise.
