cat -v harmful stuff

New Management Considered Harmful

A little over a year ago, we lost Uriel.

Some time before that, he had made arrangements to turn over his online accounts (and domains) to me in the event that he was no longer able to manage them himself. I acceded to this, reluctantly, knowing that I would never be able to live up to the standard of discernment and involvement he brought to all of his projects. In fact, I have largely abandoned cat-v’s presence on social networks. A significant amount of this garbage is not even accessible to me from my 9front system. I’ve found it impossible to make time to sift and evaluate the endless geyser of nonsense that sprays perpetually into the computing world.

I’m not Uriel.

During the last year the cat-v.org sites have survived mainly in maintenance mode. I moved everything off of Linux and onto 9front (performance has taken a noticeable hit, which is why you sometimes find it necessary to access these pages through archive.org). At the same time, cat-v.org’s truly punishing amount of traffic and the corresponding system load has resulted in numerous and significant bug fixes to the 9front fork of Plan 9 from Bell Labs. It’s likely that no other Plan 9 installation has ever endured this level of sustained abuse. In this way – and I must say, continuing in the fine tradition of cat-v.org, itself – the blight of the web has actually contributed positively to the improvement of software not just intended to perpetuate the existence of the web. Thank you, Uriel.

The future of cat-v.org is open to interpretation. I believe that Uriel hoped I would continue to develop some sections of these sites. In the last year I’ve added only a couple of documents (some recently discovered) that I think fit well in the sections where they were added. I’ve abandoned topics such as golang, where my ignorance is eclipsed only by my lack of interest.

I intend for all the sites to remain permanently available. Some of them may continue to be updated over time, but it is not my intention to radically alter what is already there. I met Uriel because of these sites, and it is my hope that they can continue to enlighten others, just as they once caused me to reconsider my own opinions about computing. (That was an exciting, frustrating, ultimately life-changing week of reading.)

So. Complaints to /dev/null. Contributions may be submitted to the cat-v mailing list, where they will be considered and discussed. I can’t promise you that you’ll like my attitude, and I can’t promise you that I will want to hear whatever it is you have to say. That, friends, is life. Those of us who elect to keep living will find a way to move forward.

And finally, please stop e-mailing me about your fucking golang libraries.

Uriel, thank you, and save me from your fans.

sl