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Fedora Weekly News Issue 117
Welcome to Fedora Weekly News Issue 117 for the week of January 21st 2008. http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FWN/Issue117
In Announcement, we have "And the F9 codename winner is...", "FUDCon F9 Survey available" and "Fedora Unity releases updated Fedora 7 Re-Spins".
In Planet Fedora, we have "Summer coding project ideas for Fedora", "Red Hat, rocking hard", "The name game" and "My big announcement".
To join or give us your feedback, please visit http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/NewsProject/Join.
In this section, we cover announcements from Fedora Project.
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
And the F9 codename winner is...
JoshBoyer announces in fedora-announce-list[1] ,
"Fedora 9 (Sulphur)
Try as they might, the Bathysphere lobbyists failed in their quest to have the little round ships be the moniker for Fedora 9. Instead, by a narrow margin, the community has chosen Sulphur to be the codename for Fedora 9."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2008-January/msg00012.html
FUDCon F9 Survey available
PaulFrields announces in fedora-announce-list[1] ,
"The Fedora marketing team has posted a survey regarding FUDCon F9, held January 11-13, 2008 in Raleigh, NC. All community members are invited to participate, whether you attended or not. We expect to use these surveys in the future for additional FUDCon events, to make sure that the events are delivering as much value as possible to attendees and observers. The URL for the survey is: http://www.keysurvey.com/survey/185839/207c/"
"ERRATUM: The survey ends at 10pm EST on 07 Feb 2008 (0300 UTC 08 Feb 2008). Thank you for participating!"
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2008-January/msg00009.html
Fedora Unity releases updated Fedora 7 Re-Spins
JeroenVanMeeuwen announces in fedora-announce-list[1] ,
"The Fedora Unity Project is proud to announce the release of new ISO Re-Spins (DVD and CD Sets) of Fedora 7. These Re-Spin ISOs are based on Fedora 7 and all updates released as of January 18th, 2008. The ISO images are available for i386, x86_64 and PPC architectures via jigdo starting Thursday, January 24th, 2008. We have included CD Image sets for those in the Fedora community that do not have DVD drives or burners available."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2008-January/msg00007.html
Planet Fedora
In this section, we cover a highlight of Planet Fedora - an aggregation of blogs from world wide Fedora contributors.
Contributing Writers: ThomasChung
Summer coding project ideas for Fedora
KarstenWade points out in his blog[1] ,
"Summer in the Northern Hemisphere has been very busy the last few years since Google introduced its Summer of Code project. Folks are beginning to include the Southern Hemisphere. The Summer of Content from OLPC already plans to cover both Summers with two project rounds per year. Summer is a traditional time for students to take a break from studies, and the Summer project ideas build upon an existing history of programming interns from universities and colleges earning experience and compensation."
[1] http://iquaid.org/2008/01/27/summer-coding-project-ideas-for-fedora/
Red Hat, rocking hard
DavidNielsen points out in his blog[1] ,
"Forbes reports the 25 fastest growing Tech companies, our friends at Red Hat comes in at 11th. Many congratulations to Red Hat on the fine result."
[1] http://lovesunix.net/blog/?p=232
The name game
JoshBoyer points out in his blog[1] ,
"The timing was totally different this time around so that the Art team could have more time to create artwork for the release. Also, there's no real reason to keep it secret until the last minute. We tried this for this release to see if it made a difference anywhere. If it doesn't produce something that most people view as good we can always change back."
[1] http://jwboyer.livejournal.com/20716.html
My big announcement
TomCallaway points out in his blog[1] ,
"I've known about this for some time, as have a lot of people, but it hasn't been publicly announced anywhere yet. The paperwork went through earlier this week, so it is official now: I'm now the Fedora Engineering Manager inside Red Hat."
"Also, this means that February 2008 is going to be a busy month for me. Right now, I'm planning to attend SCALE 6X[2] and FOSDEM '08[3] , with Capricon 28 (not a Linux event) shoved in the middle."
[1] http://spot.livejournal.com/287187.html
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraEvents/SCALE/SCALE6X
[3] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraEvents/FOSDEM/FOSDEM2008
In this section, we cover Fedora Marketing Project.
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
FUDCon video: New face of Fedora
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list[1] ,
"One of the major announcements at the recent FUDCon was the changeover in Fedora Project leadership. Max Spevack, the outgoing project manager, sat down with incoming Fedora chief Paul Frields (a familiar face to magazine readers, as he's a popular contributor). Couldn't make the conference? Catch up now instead."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2008-January/msg00253.html
Linux Format Interviews Jack Aboutboul
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list[1] ,
"Fedora's dedication to opening everything is not just for hackers – it has a wider importance in that our approach is an agent for social change"
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2008-January/msg00210.html
Max Spevack talks to Linux.com
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list[1] ,
"We caught up with Max at FUDCon. He told us how much he has enjoyed being the Fedora project leader for the past two years, and why this is a good time to hand the reins to someone else. Max will still be working for Red Hat, and even though he will no longer be head Fedora honcho, he'll still be involved with the project. But that's enough from us. Let Max tell it in his own words."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2008-January/msg00209.html
Spinning a Fedora Linux Live CD
RahulSundaram reports in fedora-marketing-list[1] ,
"The Fedora project has added a powerful tool to its Linux distribution to build your own live CD. With a single livecd-creator command and a kickstart file listing the software you want, you can create a desktop, gaming, or Web server to run live on most PCs. This article gives details of how to do that."
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-marketing-list/2008-January/msg00194.html
In this section, we cover Fedora Ambassadors Project.
Contributing Writer: JeffreyTadlock
Ambassador Needed for Florida Linux Show
A post the Fedora-Announce-List[1] was made asking for a Fedora Booth presence at the Florida Linux Show on February 11th, 2008. If there are any Ambassadors in the region, please check the Help Wanted: Events page [2] and add your name to the event.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-announce-list/2008-January/msg00011.html
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/HelpWanted/Events
Ambassador Needed for Linux Fest Northwest
JesseKeating posted to the Ambassador's list [1] looking for Ambassadors to help staff a Fedora booth at Linux Fest Northwest. The event has been added to the Help Wanted: Events page [2] . If you can help, please add your name to the event.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-ambassadors-list/2008-January/msg00204.html
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/HelpWanted/Events
FAmSCo Summary
The Fedora Ambassador Steering Committee held its first meeting since the initial meeting to elect a chairman of the committee. The following highlights some of FAmSCo's discussion on mailing lists and from that meeting.
- In efforts to help keep fellow Ambassadors informed as to what FAmSCo is doing the committee will be communicating summaries of activites through the Fedora News project.
- FAmSCo meetings have moved to the public #fedora-meeting channel. FAmSCo will be meeting every two weeks on Monday's at 20:00 UTC, with the next meeting being 2008-02-04. The Meetings page [1] will contain summaries of past meetings.
- FAmSCo is discussing going back through the Ambassador Verification list [2] and following up with any Ambassadors who have not signed the CLA and offering to help with the process or removed the name from the list if needed.
- FAmSCo is also discussing a better way to receive feedback from Ambassadors regarding events, Ambassador operations and more. Early discussions mention the possibility of a web form to simply using an email alias.
[1] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/SteeringCommittee/Meetings
[2] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Ambassadors/MembershipService/Verification
In this section, we cover the problems/solutions, people/personalities, and ups/downs of the endless discussions on Fedora Developments.
Contributing Writer: OisinFeeley
YUM Proxy Cache Safety, Storage Backend
This week's Intensely Detailed Thread Prize has been awarded to the exchange started[1] by WarrenTogami concerning the best manner in which YUM and HTTP mirrors can handle proxy caches. Warren had received some interesting feedback from a squid[2] developer, HenrikNordström and explained several ways in which caching proxies could cause YUM metadata to fall out of sync with the actual upstream RPM packages. The main conclusion seemed to be that it would be best to make the filenames of the repodata contain distinguishing information. Warren proposed several other ways relying on HTTP response headers as potential alternate solutions, including the use of ETags[2] .
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02361.html
[2] http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod/core.html#fileetag
Warren's specific suggestion that the repodata filenames be modified to include timestamps was tempered by his worry that older clients unable to handle the renaming would hamper migration, but JesseKeating[3] and ChuckAnderson[4] did some testing and found that YUM was able to handle the situation as far back as "FC5, yum-2.6.1-0.fc5, ftp and http baseurls".
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02362.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02371.html
JamesAntill threw an exception[5] when NicolasMailhot commented "I made the same analysis several months ago when I setup my own local mod_proxy cache. I'm glad to see Warren is getting through better than me at the time." James counterposed the relative success resulting from the method of flaming the "stupid yum developers" on @fedora-devel versus discussion on the IRC channels #yum, #yum-devel and the subsequent opening of bug reports and development. Nicolas responded that this was an example of shooting the messenger and that the problem had been reported many times. James' response was to cite[6] possible shortage of resources and to point out that SethVidal is usually very responsive when approached through the method which James had described.
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02451.html
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02459.html
A very long and interesting sub-thread was opened[7] by LesMikesell who was interested in the divergent question of how it would be possible to change YUM so that non-cooperating users in the same netblock would be served files from the same local cache.
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02364.html
There seemed to be general agreement that the transition to versioned filenames of repodata could work. AlanCox noted[8] that keeping two versions of the most up-to-date repodata, one with the newer filenaming scheme would cover the case of older, incompatible clients and new clients. JamesAntill suggested[9] that SHA1 sums be used instead of timestamps and that YUM would need to be modified to clean up metadata in /var/cache/yum. He also suggested that Warren should discuss the issue on #yum.
[8] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02390.html
[9] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02397.html
Disable SELinux To Use Revisor
A problem with running SELinux while attempting to run the FedoraUnity Project's revisor tool[1] , for creating re-spins of Fedora, was brought[2] to the attention of the list by ValentTurkovic. Valent posted screenshots of AVC denials and suggested that the respective programming teams should sort out the problem.
[1] http://revisor.fedoraunity.org/
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02094.html
JohnDennis suggested that the actual alert could be saved from setroubleshoot and could then be entered into bugzilla instead of using a screenshot, but Valent responded[3] that the developers should just try and compose a respin with revisor and that this was typical of a pattern in Fedora: "looks like nobody actually does testing of these new features." A quick clarification was issued[4] by JefSpaleta to the effect that revisor was not used internally by the Fedora Project. CaseyDahlin pointed out that the ability to respin Fedora easily was being advertised and people expected it to work, to which JesseKeating responded[5] that '"We" cannot help what some other parts of the project choose to tout (:'
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02099.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02131.html
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02134.html
The core of the problem was outlined[6] by JefSpaleta when he explained that SELinux interacting with any chroot-like apparatus was a problem, and re-emphasized that Valent's apparent belief that Fedora release-engineering would have seen the problems was incorrect as revisor was not used internally. Jef also argued that while re-spin generation tools should issue alerts that SELinux should be disabled, they should not automatically disable SELinux. JesseKeating deepened[7] the explanation with the information that "installing a new policy in the chroot will actually cause that policy to activate on the running kernel and then you have policy that doesn't match labels, watch the fun!" and suggested that SELinux should be disabled entirely or at least put in permissive mode before trying to use chroot-dependent tools such as revisor, pungi or livecd-creator[8] .
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02135.html
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02117.html
[8] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraLiveCD/LiveCDHowTo
Valent returned to the attack (see FWN#116 "AVC:Denied {trolling} For PID=666 Comm={SELinuxRemove}"[9] ) on SELinux leading JohnDennis to remind[10] him that he was free to disable it whenever he liked but that the goal of the Fedora Project was to "smooth out the bumps rather than disabling the technology." A brief response from Valent led DanWalsh to explain[11] the problem further and this resulted in opening up the thread to interesting, problem-solving contributions. Dan's take was that the chroot and the host both use the same kernel, so the loading of new SELinux policies _within_ the chroot actually affects the host kernel. Dan wondered whether the solution could be virtual machines, or getting the chroot to run a separate kernel, or tricking SELinux within a chroot into doing nothing. As part of the brainstorming TillMaas suggested[12] that separate xattr namespaces could be part of the solution. JamesMorris took up[13] the virtual machine idea and wondered if lguest would be suitable due to being scriptable and booting nearly instantaneously and DanielBerrange added[14] the suggestion that LVM snapshots would provide disposable disk-images which could be booted as guests.
[9] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FWN/Issue116#head-9c5db4e29943d9f156002b24d7b01a6b2b0542cb
[10] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02136.html
[11] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02415.html
[12] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02429.html
[14] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02477.html
JesseKeating played the role of realist and asked[15] for them to "get back to me when it works on x86_64, ppc, ppc64, ia64, s390, s390x, sparc, sparc64, arm, alpha..." DouglasMcClendon mentioned his qfakeroot scripts again and an interesting exchange occurred[16] which explored the speed of qemu, the flakiness of kqemu and the non-availability of qemu for PPC and an acknowledgment[17] that Douglas' qkfakeroot is "pretty cool" in its ability to eschew root privileges even if it takes too long to be used as a standard compose tool by Fedora release-engineering.
[15] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02480.html
[16] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02494.html
[17] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02499.html
Two separate threads later resulted from this and are covered in this same FWN#117 as "What Is A Fedora Developer?" and "SELinux And Chroot".
Long-term Support Release
The issue of whether it was possible to have a "long term support" release of Fedora was floated[1] by DavidMansfield. David's courteous post recognized that this might be mistaken for flame-bait and acknowledged that teampower might be a constraint. David explained[2] that the absence of many tools such as gnumeric and git and some of the "cool" tools from the livna and rpmforge repositories from CentOS/RHEL was a problem for him.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02191.html
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02195.html
CaseyDahlin was the first of many to suggest[3] that David should take a look at the EPEL repositories. HorstvonBrand added[4] that the purpose of Fedora was to make obtaining freely distributable software easy and that this ruled out some of the programs in livna and rpmforge.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02196.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02279.html
AndrewFarris recalled[5] the now defunct FedoraLegacy project and a sub-thread exploring the problems of trying to maintain a long-term release evolved including a discussion of whether RHEL in conjunction with the EPEL repository was in effect "Fedora LTS".
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02204.html
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02308.html
JefSpaleta welcomed[7] the idea of a "Fedora LTS" but cautioned that the idea seems to originate in Canonical's specific business model and that it is hard to see where this fits in to the Fedora space. His post was very encouraging but challenged proponents to expand upon a potential business plan.
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02212.html
Discussion of whether FedoraLegacy actually failed, whether failure is actually beneficial and what was learned took up the remainder of the thread[8] .
[8] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02392.html
F9 Alpha Spinning
Some figures for the sizes of ISOs for Fedora 9 Alpha spin were posted[1] by LukeMacken. Included was a diff between the F8-Live-i686 and F9-Alpha-Live-i686 Desktop spins.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02574.html
Suggestions were made[2] by HansdeGoede to reduce the size of the ISOs a little including splitting up gnome-games and perhaps removing httpd from the LiveCD. LubomirKundrak suggested that httpd was there because of WebDAV file sharing[3] .
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02615.html
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02619.html
RahulSundaram wanted[4] to make sure that the latest content was going into the Games LiveCD and offered to keep it updated in livecd-tools. This led BillNottingham to query whether keeping the contributed spin configs in livecd-tools itself and ColinWalters suggested[5] keeping them in the same CVS directory as comps.
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02629.html
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02641.html
SzabolcsSzakacsits took pains to emphasize[6] that the apparent growth of ntfs-3g did not take into account that ntfs-3g changes had enabled the removal of fuse and a consequent overall decrease of 109MB. KevinKofler did not approve of some of the changes as he claimed that they essentially created a static copy of fuse into ntfs-3g.
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02677.html
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02689.html
SELinux And Chroot
As a result of the discussions over how to improve the interaction between chroots and SELinux JamesMorris created a bugzilla[1] entry and requested that concerned parties add requirements. He noted[2] that a related issue under discussion was the distribution of policy when the host and target have differing policies.
[1] https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=430075
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02403.html
Fedora 9 For Asus Eeepc
The lucky OrionPoplawski had been playing around with a new toy in the form of the ultra-portable Asus Eee PC and reported[1] that he had encountered issues with the ethernet adapter (Attansic Tech L2 100Mbit), the wireless adapter (Atheros AR5007EG) and the Flash RAM harddrive.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02645.html
ColinWalters suggested that as Orion wanted to minimize writes to the flash drive (as there are a limited number) it would make sense to make the filesystem read-only, in effect creating a "Live OS" on it with the exception of /home which would be stored on an SD card.
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02646.html
The use of jffs2 was recommended[3] by JohnPalmieri on the basis of its use in the OLPC. John added that modern flash used "randomized writes" (presumably wear-leveling) and thus was less likely to see the problems encountered with journal writing in ext3 filesystems or FAT on the older hardware. He suggested also eliminating any /swap partition and looking out for a new FS which was reputed to be better for large flash drives. Some doubt was cast on this by JonathanUnderwood as apparently the drives do not appear as flash to the OS.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02649.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02653.html
JoshBoyer and RubenKerkhof suggested that the logfs and ubifs filesystems might be what John was thinking about. Josh thought that the wear-leveling was done by a controller and not the actual flash chip.
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02660.html
BIND: Less Restrictive Modes And Policy
An announcement of a major revision of BIND file modes was made[1] by AdamTkac. Adam proposed that only /etc/rndc.key and /var/log/named.log should be restricted to the root user and that other binaries should be readable by non-root users. He also proposed that the /var/named/* subtree would be writable by named. Adam sought objections.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/thread.html#02499
SteveGrubb wondered[2] which other users would be expected to share a DNS server and pointed out that it was "a high value target for hackers".
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02019.html
EnricoScholz suggested[3] that only the slaves/ and data/ directories had to be writable, but that pz/ and other parts of the chrooted filesystem used by named had to be read-only. AndrewFarris wondered why and ManuelWolfshant recalled[4] BIND's past history of providing a remote root. He also stated a preference for the general principle of granting the minimal rights necessary. After Enrico confirmed this AdamTkac explained[5] that /var/named was supposed to be writable by design.
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02073.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02080.html
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02127.html
A later comment mentioned[6] that there was a problem with coredumps and in discussion with ChuckAnderson Adam cited a bugzilla entry which documents the problem.
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02123.html
What Is A Fedora Developer?
Several hours after the extensive discussions[1] of the need to disable SELinux while using chroot-dependent compose tools ValentTurkovic initiated[2] another thread about using revisor in which he asked for guidance as to whether he was encountering bugs or making usage errors.
[1] FWN#117 "Disable SELinux To Use Revisor"
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02156.html
This thread had the potential to turn sour shortly after Valent was advised[3] [4] by several people that the FedoraUnity project were the experts on revisor and Valent responded[5] by echoing the comment made[6] (and answered!) previously in the earlier thread in which he had been involved. Namely he claimed that "I thought since I'm using a really loudly advertised fedora feature, and config files which all of them are provided from fedora and not some 3rd party that this is the correct list."
[3] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02160.html
[4] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02163.html
[5] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02166.html
[6] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02133.html
JesseKeating responded[7] calmly with the question "You are aware that the vast majority of software in Fedora is developed and discussed at their respective upstream locations, right?" JefSpaleta produced[8] one of his typically insightful explicatory posts in which he drew a distinction between upstream developers who contribute to Fedora and "Fedora developers" who produce infrastructure which allows the Fedora Project to be a conduit between users and upstream projects.
[7] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02167.html
[8] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-devel-list/2008-January/msg02165.html
In FWN#114 "SELinux Rants"[1] we mentioned that the copying of directories using tar should be done with the "--xattrs" option in order to preserve the context labels. DavidHighley subsequently contacted us to report that he had experienced problems using this method. David later helpfully reported that tar-1.17-5.fc8, which is available as an update appears to fix[2] the apparently broken storage of SELinux and extended attributes which David was reporting. Thanks to David for the follow-up on this issue.
[1] http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FWN/Issue114#head-9aa83fad0c280fb44728ecae1f51900c5f9a014a
[2] https://admin.fedoraproject.org/updates/F8/FEDORA-2007-4400
Advisory Board
In this section, we cover discussion in Fedora Advisory Board.
Contributing Writer: MichaelLarabel
Requests To The Fedora Board
RahulSundaram has made five requests on the fedora-advisory-board list[1] . These requests come down to logistics with such appeals as posting an agenda prior to each meeting, posting the meeting minutes more promptly, and differing opinions on community board member nominees. The message with responses can be read on the mailing list[2] .
[1] https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-advisory-board
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-advisory-board/2008-January/msg00252.html
Fedora 7 Unity Re-Spin
For those not yet ready to upgrade to Fedora 8, the Fedora Unity[1] project has released updated spins of Fedora 7. These new ISOs contain all of the Fedora 7 updates as of January 18. The announcement and download links can be found on the fedora-advisory-board list[2] .
[2] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-advisory-board/2008-January/msg00245.html
In this section, we cover the Fedora Documentation Project.
Contributing Writer: JohnBabich
Works in Progress
Work continues on the Desktop User Guide (DUG) and the Administration Guide (AG). The goal is to include both guides in the official Fedora 9 release.
Release Notes Summary
KarstenWade proposed a canonical release summary [1] .
"We can use clever ...Include... statements that draw only specific parts, so each 'mirror' of the canonical summary can show the most appropriate fragment.
Anyone interested in doing this work? It involves:
- Working out a single canonical location from amongst the several Releases / # / Release Summary, Docs / Beats / Over View, Press release needs (more lightweight), etc.
- Define a format for that page so that it can be fragmented (if needed)
for different summaries
- Write up a process for jamming all that together
- Publicize/evangelize"
JonathanRoberts agreed [2] and cited the KDE Project as doing an excellent job in this regard.
RahulSundaram [3] concluded: "As the person behind both of these documents, let me note that release notes overview was meant to be more technical while the release summary was born out of an earlier effort to do press releases via the community. Also due to general lack of contributions (even though Jonathan Roberts and others did help for Fedora 8), the time taken to write a proper release summary was almost an entire night last time and that too way later than the release notes string freeze.
We need to decide whether the overview in release notes can be the kind of content that release summary currently is. If that is preferred, let me know and I will do that from Fedora 9 onwards. I wouldn't mind more people helping out either."
[1] http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-docs-list/2008-January/msg00185.html
[2] http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-docs-list/2008-January/msg00187.html
[3] http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-docs-list/2008-January/msg00207.html
In this section, we cover the Fedora Infrastructure Project.
Contributing Writer: HuzaifaSidhpurwala
Continuing issues with xen
MikeMcGrath reports [1] ,
xen1 started exhibiting these issues when we moved from FC6 to RHEL5 GA. It was assumed to be hardware issue because of how sporatic the issues were and because we actually do have RHEL5 on other xen hosts. The iscsi issue may or may not be a red herring but some of the reports listed in the ticket suggests a kernel / poweredge bug that we may be hitting. We had moved all non-redundant guests off of xen1 onto the more stable xen2 box. After upgrading xen2 to RHEL5 we started seeing the same problems with it. There's a few things we can try, Mike will be doing so on xen1 with proxy4 as our test host since its competely redundant and has, in the past, crashed that box. In the future though they should all be in similar specs (1U box, 8 core 16-32G memory)
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-infrastructure-list/2008-January/msg00093.html
Some Network issues affecting fedora servers
MikeMcGrath reports [1] ,
Seems a link between AT&T and level3 was down. Mike was monitoring the situation but there's little we can do about it right now. The link came back after some time.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-infrastructure-list/2008-January/msg00105.html
Security Week
In this section, we highlight the security stories from the week in Fedora.
Contributing Writer: JoshBressers
Enterprise-grade Linux: Five network security FOSS apps
iTWire has a story detailing five open source security applications:
As more security applications are gobbled up by large firms, open source projects gain a unique advantage. Anytime an organization needs to make money, they are willing to draw a gray line with respect to their ethics. As most open source projects don't rely on corporate funding, they can be more strict with respect to what they call malware. It is quite likely that as the volume of malware increases, this advantage will become more clear.
Growing virus production taxes security firms
The Register points out the current problem with growing malware trends:
The rate at which malware is growing is quite alarming. If this trend continues it will become impossible for anti virus firms to keep ahead of the wave. The current attitude toward malware is to take a very reactive approach. Most groups don't focus on stopping the cause of problems, but rather treating the symptoms. While there is certainly a great deal of money to be made in treating symptoms, the well is going to dry up eventually.
Security Advisories
In this section, we cover Security Advisories from fedora-package-announce.
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
Fedora 8 Security Advisories
- xorg-x11-server-22.214.171.124-39.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00641.html
- libXfont-1.3.1-2.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00674.html
- hsqldb-22.214.171.124-1jpp.5.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00678.html
- mantis-1.1.1-1.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00734.html
- clamav-0.92-6.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00740.html
- bind-9.5.0-23.b1.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00781.html
- xorg-x11-server-22.214.171.124-40.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00811.html
- kernel-126.96.36.199-107.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00828.html
- pulseaudio-0.9.8-5.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00852.html
- icu-3.8-5.fc8 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00896.html
Fedora 7 Security Advisories
- clamav-0.92-6.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00644.html
- mantis-1.1.1-1.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00676.html
- xorg-x11-server-126.96.36.199-15.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00704.html
- hsqldb-184.108.40.206-1jpp.5.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00753.html
- boost-1.33.1-15.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00760.html
- libXfont-1.2.9-3.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00771.html
- bind-9.4.2-3.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00782.html
- xorg-x11-server-188.8.131.52-16.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00841.html
- pulseaudio-0.9.6-2.fc7.1 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00869.html
- icu-3.6-20.fc7 - https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-package-announce/2008-January/msg00921.html
Events and Meetings
In this section, we cover event reports and meeting summaries from various Projects and SIGs.
Contributing Writer: ThomasChung
Fedora Board Meeting Minutes 2008-01-22
Fedora Ambassadors Steering Committee Meeting 2008-01-21
Fedora Documentation Steering Committee (Log) 2008-01-22
Fedora Engineering Steering Committee Meeting 2008-01-24
Fedora Infrastructure Meeting (Log) 2008-01-24
Fedora Release Engineering Meeting 2008-01-21
Fedora Testing (BugZappers) Meeting 2008-01-02
Fedora SIG EPEL Meeting Week 04/2008
Fedora SIG KDE Meeting Week 04/2008
Ask Fedora
In this section, we answer general questions from Fedora community. Send your questions to askfedora AT fedoraproject.org and Fedora News Team will bring you answers from the Fedora Developers and Contributors to selected number of questions every week as part of our weekly news report. Please indicate if you do not wish your name and/or email address to be published.
Contributing Writer: RahulSundaram
Fedora on Older Hardware
Robert Myers <firstname.lastname@example.com>: In the development of Fedora 9, is there any work being done to improve it's performance on older hardware? If so, will the performance increases be noticeable on, say, a 450mhz Pentium III with 256 megabytes of RAM?
The major features for Fedora 9 are listed at http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/9/FeatureList. While there isn't any special focus in Fedora 9 to make it work on older hardware, we typically inherit a number of performance improvements from the upstream projects that we integrate, including many key projects where Fedora developers are major contributors. As an exmaple, OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) project is based on Fedora, and since OLPC is a resource constrained environment, our participation results in improvements that make it easier and more efficient to run on older hardware.
To add to that, there are a couple of Fedora spins developed currently that target older hardware or low resource systems in which you might be interested.
- http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ChristophWickert/FedoraLite
- http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/RahulSundaram/XfceLive
OEM Installation
Shannon Mendenhall <email@example.com:I was wondering when or if you are going to include a OEM install in your next version (fedora 9). I was hoping so it would make it easier for OEM builders to leave the client to set up there time zone, user name, password, ect... thanks, I look forward to hearing your reply. ---
Actually, we've had this feature since the first version of Fedora. Refer to
Also, Fedora provides a number of sophisticated and easy to use tools to make further customizations. Take a look at
Compiling Kernel
Sd <email@example.com>: How I can compile your kernel? Where I got kernel-source?
An easy question, thanks to the nice documentation at http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Docs/CustomKernel. Note that this is already referenced from the release notes at
Bluetooth and Multimedia Keys
Zlatko (Email withheld on request)
First of all, I would like to thank You for Fedora 8. I'm using Fedora since first edition, and now, I can say that Fedora is highly improved, and can be used almost for everything. I'm using Fedora on my laptop exclusively for business purposes, and also I'm using Fedora on my desktop computer at my home for watching TV, watching DVD, playing various games, Internet surfing, and so on, and everything is working OK. But, there is a slight problem in using fedora on my laptop. So, on to the problem... :-)
My integrated bluetooth wont work, unless I do the following:
1. I start laptop with Windows Vista 2. I restart from Vista to Fedora
Each time I do this, bluetooth works fine. But, if I turn off computer, and start it again directly to Fedora, bluetooth wont work, and system wont recognize any bluetooth device. I have described this problem on Fedora forum, also, but nobody answered my question so far, even I have posted that post month ago. Here is the link to that post: http://forums.fedoraforum.org/forum/showthread.php?t=172988
And also, if I may ask, is there a plan to support so-called "Fn" functions? For example, on my Toshiba Satellite P200-10C, when I press "Fn + F8" I should be able to activate/deactivate wireless/bluetooth, but instead, nothing happens. I surely hope that You will consider these questions, and help small users such as I am... :-)
Thanks in advance...
Another user asks a similar question
Yuan Yijun <firstname.lastname@example.com>: I use a Dell 640m which have some external "multimedia button" to control music volume. And I used to close the lid while playing some background music. When the lid is closed, these buttons are not functional at all, so I cannot mute it without open the lid && login (because of gnome-screensaver). How to make them work? Thanks!
The bluetooth issue as well as multimedia keys not working on your laptops out of the box appear to be bugs/enhancement requests that can reported directly to http://bugzilla.redhat.com. We are continuously enhancing Fedora to support components like Bluetooth and multimedia keys to work better, and we appreciate your feedback. Use the following references:
- http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/BugsAndFeatureRequests
- http://people.freedesktop.org/~hughsient/quirk/
Prayer Time for Fedora
Riam budhi <firstname.lastname@example.com>: I wanted to ask you, where is I can download prayer time ( I am muslim)?
Unfortunately, this software isn't available in the Fedora repository yet and I couldn't locate any good alternatives. This is now a opportunity for you to be a contributor to Fedora and maintain the software in the Fedora repository. Refer to


text:
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The ordinance claimed to be violated was section 66 of the Revised Ordinances of the City of Boston (1893), and reads as follows:
The proceedings were removed to the superior court of the county of Suffolk, where the accused renewed a motion which he had interposed in the municipal court to quash the complaint. The grounds assigned in support of this motion were seven in number, and, among other objections, it was substantially asserted that the ordinance violated rights alleged to be secured to the accused by the constitution of the state, and by the fourteenth amendment to the constitution of the United States. The motion to quash being overruled, and an exception noted, the accused was tried before the court and a jury.
At the trial the government put in evidence the ordinance heretofore referred to, and called the attention of the court to suctions 35 and 39 of chapter 448 of the acts passed by the legislature of Massachusetts in the year 1854, which sections are as follows:
In behalf of the accused, 11 instructions were requested to be given to the jury, all of which were refused, and exceptions were reserved to such refusal. But one of these requested instructions set up alleged rights under the constitution of the United States, as follows:
There was a verdict of guilty. The exceptions taken during the trial were certified to the supreme judicial court of the commonwealth, where they were overruled. 162 Mass. 510, 39 N. E. 113. The superior court sentenced Davis to pay a fine and the costs of the prosecution, and the cause was brought here for review. [167 U.S. 43, 46] James F. Pickering, for plaintiff in error.
Hosea M. Knowlton, for defendant in error.
Mr. Justice WHITE, after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court.
In the brief of counsel for plaintiff in error, many presumed errors are elaborately discussed, all of which, when analyzed, rest on the assumption that there was a right in the plaintiff in error to use the common of the city of Boston free from legislative or municipal control or regulation. It is argued that:
The record, however, contains no evidence showing the manner in which the ordinance in question had been previously enforced, nor does it include any proof whatever as to the nature of the ownership in the common from which it can be deduced that the plaintiff in error had any particular right to use the common apart from the general enjoyment, which he was entitled, as a citizen, to avail himself of along with others, and to the extent only which the law permitted. On the contrary, the legislative act and the ordinance passed in pursuance thereof, previously set out in the statement of facts, show an assumption by the state of control over the common in question. Indeed, the supreme judicial court, in affirming the conviction, placed its conclusion upon the express ground that the common was absolutely under the control of the legislature, which, in the exercise of its [167 U.S. 43, 47] discretion, could limit the use to the extent deemed by it advisable, and could and did delegate to the municipality the power to assert such authority. The court said:
It is therefore conclusively determined there was no right in the plaintiff in error to use the common except in such mode and subject to such regulations as the legislature, in its wisdom may have deemed proper to prescribe. The fourteenth amendment to the constitution of the United States does not destroy the power of the states to enact police regulations as to the subjects within their control (Barbier v. Connolly, 113 U.S. 27, 31 , 5 S. Sup. Ct. 357; Railway Co. v. Beckwith, 129 U.S. 26, 29 , 9 S. Sup. Ct. 207; Giozza v. Tiernan, 148 U.S. 657 , 13 Sup. Ct. 721; Jones v. Brim, 165 U.S. 182 , 17 Sup. Ct. 282), and does not have the effect of creating a particular and personal right in the [167 U.S. 43, 48] citizen to use public property in defiance of the constitution and laws of the state.
The assertion that, although it be conceded that the power existed in the state or municipality to absolutely control the use of the common, the particular ordinance in question is nevertheless void, because arbitrary and unreasonable, in that it vests in the mayor the power to determine when he will grant a permit, in truth, while admitting on the one hand the power to control, on the other denies its existence. The right to absolutely exclude all right to use necessarily includes the authority to determine under what circumstances such use may be availed of, as the greater power contains the lesser. The finding of the court of last resort of the state of Massachusetts, being that no particular right was possessed by the plaintiff in error to the use of the common, is in reason, therefore, conclusive of the controversy which the record presents, enrirely aside from the fact that the power conferred upon the chief executive officer of the city of Boston by the ordinance in question may be fairly claimed to be a mere administrative function vested in the mayor in order to effectuate the purpose for which the common was maintained and by which its use was regulated. In re Kollock, 165 U.S. 526, 536 , 537 S., 17 Sup. Ct. 444. The plaintiff in error cannot avail himself of the right granted by the state, and yet obtain exemption from the lawful regulations to which this right on his part was subjected by law.
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Citation: 167 U.S. 43
Docket No: No. 229
Decided: May 10, 1897
Court: United States Supreme Court
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subset: commoncrawl


text:
Where In the World Is Jesse Jackson Jr.? [UPDATE]
Seriously, do you know? He's been missing since June. We mentioned last week that he's probably in rehab (also that he's a callow scion who owes everything to the circumstances of his birth, something a lot of you disagreed with!), but that his staff and family are still resolutely refusing to tell his constituents what's going on. His father vigorously denied a report that he'd attempted suicide, insisting that he's just "regaining his strength." An anonymous friend told a Chicago radio station that "he doesn't get a lot of sleep and he has sleep disorders." What do you think? Drugs? Suicide? Chronic illness he wants to keep secret?
Update: NBC News' Andrew Mitchell is now reporting that he's at an Arizona rehab facility "suffering from alcoholism and addiction."
NBC's Andrea Mitchell: Rep Jesse Jackson Jr is in a rehab facility in AZ suffering from alcoholism and addiction
— Jesse Rodriguez (@JesseRodriguez) July 11, 2012
[Image by Jim Cooke]


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Charlie Sheen Wants to Create 'Porn Family'
Charlie Sheen wants to be the patriarch of a HUGE "porn family" -- composed of his favorite adult stars -- and he wants them all to live in a mansion down the street from his own house ... TMZ has learned.
Sources connected to Charlie tell us ... during the infancy stages of Sheen's most recent bender Tuesday night, the actor brought his realtor and some of his XXX lady friends to dinner with his neighbor George Santo Pietro -- Vanna White's ex-husband.
We're told the meal was served in the wine cellar at George's home -- located just two miles from Sheen's place -- and Charlie drank ... A LOT.
During the boozefest, Charlie agreed to rent out George's giant estate for four months -- at the rate of $250k per month -- while George goes away on an upcoming trip to Thailand.
And why does Sheen need an extra mansion? Charlie explained that he wants to start a "porn family" -- and he wants the "actresses" to all live in the same house. One big, smutty family.
The next morning, Sheen's people found out about the deal and were "furious" -- and immediately put a stop to the plans.


text: Back Iron and Total Iron-Binding Capacity Do these tests have other names? Iron (Fe), serum iron, TIBC What are these tests? The serum iron test measure the amount of iron in your blood. The total iron-binding capacity (TIBC) test looks at how well the iron moves through your body. Iron is an important mineral that your body needs to stay healthy. Your body uses iron to make hemoglobin, the protein in your red blood cells that carries oxygen throughout your body. If you don't have enough iron, you may not have enough hemoglobin. This condition is called iron deficiency anemia. Iron in your body is carried, or bound, mainly to a protein made by your liver called transferrin. The TIBC test is based on certain proteins, including transferrin, found in the blood. Your transferrin levels are almost always measured along with iron and TIBC. Why do I need these tests? You may need these tests if your doctor thinks your iron level is too low or too high. Not having enough iron in your diet is the most common cause of anemia and the most common type of diet deficiency in the U.S. Your doctor may do this test to look at your diet, nutrition, liver, or other conditions that cause iron to be low, such as increased blood loss or pregnancy. Symptoms of iron deficiency include: Being tired and feeling weak Getting frequent infections Feeling cold all the time Having swelling in the tongue Struggling to keep up at school or work In children, having delayed mental development Symptoms of too much iron can include: Feeling tired and weak Joint pain Abdominal pain What other tests might I have along with these tests? Iron, TIBC, and transferrin blood tests are almost always done together. Other blood tests that may also be done include measuring your hemoglobin; your percent of red blood cells, or hematocrit; and all the cells in your blood, called a complete blood count. What do my test results mean? Many things may affect your lab test results. These include the method each lab uses to do the test. Even if your test results are different from the normal value, you may not have a problem. To learn what the results mean for you, talk with your health care provider. Normal results of iron testing may be different for men, women, and children. Iron and TIBC are measured in micrograms per deciliter (mcg/dL). Normal results for iron are: 65 to 175 mcg/dL for men 50 to 170 mcg/dL for women 50 to 120 mcg/dL for children Normal results for TIBC are 250 to 450 mcg/dL for men and women. Some common conditions that may cause the amount of iron in your blood to be too low include: Iron deficiency anemia Other types of anemia Blood loss over time Long-standing infections or diseases Last three months of pregnancy Some common conditions that may cause the amount of iron in your blood to be too high include: Conditions that cause red blood cells to die, called hemolytic anemia Iron or lead poisoning Iron overload, such as from hemochromatosis Many blood transfusions Liver damage Your doctor will look at your iron level in conjunction with the TIBC, transferrin, and possibly other tests to better understand what the results mean. How are these tests done? The test requires a blood sample, which is drawn through a needle from a vein in your arm. Do these tests pose any risks? Taking a blood sample with a needle carries risks that include bleeding, infection, bruising, or feeling dizzy. When the needle pricks your arm, you may feel a slight stinging sensation or pain. Afterward, the site may be slightly sore. What might affect my test results? Many medications can affect the results of these blood tests. Some common drugs that may affect your results include alcohol, birth control pills, antibiotics, aspirin, estrogen, and testosterone. Women who are having their menstrual period may have decreased iron. How do I get ready for these tests? You may be asked to have these blood tests in the morning after fasting overnight. Normally, iron levels are closest to normal in the morning and get lower as the day goes on. Be sure your doctor knows about all medicines, herbs, vitamins, and supplements you are taking. This includes medicines that don't need a prescription and any illicit drugs you may use.


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Court prep: 2011 Wimbledon 7th seed Serena Williams will defend her singles title in the Nike Smash Lawn Dress. Note the preppy obsidian navy trim around the collar and faux low back (covered with performance-enhancing mesh) of this empire-waisted piece; and the single lines down the center of the front/back of the dress — just enough to cut up all the white and keep her out of wardrobe distractions. Also note that they opted for godets instead of pleats in the skirt. Shoes are the Air Max Mirabella 3.
Buy: Nike Smash Lawn Dress, $85, TW.
More photos: Detail shots of the dress and shoes after the cut…
(images courtesy of Nike)


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Iron Man 3
It's not looking so hot for Tony Stark in the first trailer for Iron Man 3. The formerly cocky mega-genius is feeling haunted by his own mortality and beset by nightmares — and that's before the Mandarin strikes. This is some of the same footage we saw at San Diego Comic Con last summer, but the melancholy tone is definitely new.
Meet Microsoft's New Surface Laptops
[via Apple Trailers.]


text:
15: The Seal of the Wisdom of Prophethood
in the Word of 'Isa (Jesus)
He was manifested from the water of Maryam
and the breath of Jibril in the form of man existing from clay.
The spirit was in an essence purified of nature
which it called prison.
For that reason, the spirit stayed in it
for more a thousand years in the designation of time. (1)
A spirit from Allah, no other.
For that reason, he revived the dead and formed the bird from clay.
Since his relation with his Lord is proven,
by it he has effective action in both the higher and lower worlds.
Allah purified his body, and made his spirit pure,
and He made him a model of taking-form.
Know that among the special qualities of the spirits (arwah) is whenever they touch anything life flows into it. This is why the Samiri (2) seized a handful of dust from the track of the messenger, who was Jibril, and he is the Spirit. The Samiri had knowledge of this matter. When he recognised that it was Jibril, he knew that life would flow into whatever he had walked on, so he took a handful of dust (3) from the track of the messenger or he filled his hand or the ends of his fingers, (4) and threw it into the Calf. The Calf made a noise like the sound of a cow mooing. If it had been in another form, the name of that form's sound would have been ascribed to it - as grumbling to the camel, baa-ing to rams, bleating to sheep, and voice or articulation and speech to man. That power from the life which flows in things is called lâhût. The nâsût is the locus on which the spirit is based. The nâsût may be called a spirit by what is based on it.
When the Trusty Ruh, who is Jibril, presented himself to Maryam, peace be upon her, in the form of a "handsome, well-built man", (5) she imagined that he was a man wishing to have intercourse with her. She took refuge with Allah from him with all her being, with the whole of her existence, that Allah might save her from him since she knew that that was among the things which are not permitted. She was given a complete presence with Allah, and it is the meaning-without-form spirit. If Jibril had breathed into her at that moment in this state, 'Isa would have been born in such a manner that no one could tolerate him due to the harshness of his nature which was the state of his mother.
When he said to her, "I am only your Lord's messenger of your Lord so that He can give you a pure boy," she relaxed from that contraction (qabd) and her breast expanded. It was at that time that Jibril breathed 'Isa into her. Jibril conveyed the word of Allah to Maryam as the Messenger coveyed the word of Allah to his community. 'Isa was "His word that He cast into Maryam, and a Spirit from Him." (6) Then appetite filled Maryam. The body of 'Isa was created from the actual water of Maryam and from the imaginary water of Jibril which was infused in the moisture of that breath, since the breath of the living is moist because of the water content in it. So the body of 'Isa is from imaginary water and real water. He emerged in the form of a man in respect to his mother and inasmuch as Jibril had appeared in the form of a man, since taking-form only occurs in the human species according to the normal principle.
'Isa brought the dead to life because he is the Divine Spirit, and bringing to life belongs to Allah. The breath which 'Isa has is like the breath which Jibril has. The word belongs to Allah. The bringing the dead to life by 'Isa is an actual revival inasmuch as it was manifested from his breath as he was manifested from the form of his mother. His bringing to life is also imagined to be from him, but it actually belongs to Allah. He joined the two by the reality on which he is based even as we said that he is created from imaginary water and actual water. Bringing-to-life is ascribed to him by means of actualisation in one aspect, and by imagination in another aspect. In respect to actualisation, it is said of him that he brings the dead to life. In respect to imagination (tawahhum), it is said that he breathes into it and it becomes a bird by the leave of Allah. (7) The agent is in the prepositional phrase "by Allah's permission", even though He did not breathe into it. It is also possible that the agent is the one who breathes into it. It became a bird as regards physical form. In the same way, 'Isa healed the blind and the lepers.
All was ascribed to 'Isa as being "by Allah's permission." (8) "Permission" (idhn) is an indirect expression, as in His words, "By My permission" (9) and "by the permission of Allah". If the prepositional phrase is connected to breathing, the breather has leave in the breathing, and so it is a bird by the leave of Allah. If the breather breathed not by leave, then the taking form of the bird as a bird is not by the leave of Allah. The agent in that is then the verb "it becomes (yakûn)." If there had not been something real and something imaginary in the matter, then these forms would not have accepted these two aspects. Rather, it has these two aspects because the constitution of 'Isa accords that. 'Isa showed humility to the extent that he prescribed that his community "pay the jizya (10) tax with their their hands in a state of willing submission," (11) and that if one of them were slapped on the cheek, he should offer the other cheek to the one who slapped him, and not rise up against him nor seek revenge. This came from his from his mother's side. Since the woman is lower, she has humility because she is subject to the man legally and physically. The power to bring to life and heal that he had came to him the side of the breath of Jibril in the form of a man. 'Isa brought the dead to life by the form of man. If Jibril had not come in the form of man, but in another of the elemental forms of phenomenal beings from the animals, plants or minerals, 'Isa would not have been able to bring the dead to life without taking on that form for that moment and appearing in it. If Jibril had come in a luminous form beyond the elements and natural humours, since luminosity is part of his nature, 'Isa would not have been able to bring the dead to life unless he appeared in that form of non-elemental light, while still maintaining the human form in respect of his mother.
When he brought the dead to life, it was said that it was him and not him. The onlookers fell into bewilderment (hayra) just as the man of intellect becomes bewildered in his logical reflection when he sees an individual human being bringing the dead to life, as that is one of the divine qualities - bringing to life with speech, not mere bringing with animation. (12) The beholder is bewildered because he sees the form of a man who possesses a divine effect. That led some of them to speak of that as "incarnation" and say that 'Isa was Allah since it was by Him that 'Isa brought the dead to life. Thus they are charged with disbelief (kufr) which is the veil because they veil Allah, who brings the dead to life, by the human form of 'Isa. Allah said, "They are unbelievers who say, 'Allah is the Messiah, the son of Maryam.'" (13) They fell into both error and disbelief at the end of all they said, not because they say that he is Allah nor by calling him the son of Maryam. But they made the attribution that Allah, insofar as He brought the dead to life, was contained in the human form of the nasut which is called the son of Maryam. There is no doubt that 'Isa was the son of Maryam. The hearer imagines that they have attributed divinity to the form, and so they make divinity the same as the form. That is not what they do. Rather, they make divine He-ness the subject in the human form which is the son of Maryam. They should differentiate between the form of 'Isa and the divine principle because they have made the form the same as the principle. Jibril was in the form of man who did not breathe and then he breathed. One differentiates between the form and the breath, and the breath from the form. The form existed without the breath - thus the breath is not part of its essential definition. For that reason, differences occurred among the people of different [Christian] parties regarding 'Isa and what he was. Whoever looks at him in respect to his mortal human form, says that he is the son of Maryam. Whoever looks at him in respect to his mortal representational form relates him to Jibril. Whoever looks at him in respect to what was manifested from him of bringing the dead to life, relates him to Allah by the quality of the spirit, and says that he is the Spirit of Allah, (14) that is, by Him life was manifested in whomever received his breath. Sometimes Allah is imagined to be the passive principle in 'Isa, and sometimes the angel is imagined in him, and sometimes mortal humanity is imagined in him. So the conception of everyone is based on what predominates that person. 'Isa is the Word of Allah, (15) the Spirit of Allah, (16) and the slave of Allah. (17) That is something which no one else has in the sensory form. Indeed, each person is attached to his father of form, not to the One who breathed his spirit into the human form. When Allah fashioned the human body as He said, "When I have shaped him," (15:29;38:72) then He breathed into Him, that was from His spirit. Thus in its being and source, the spirit is ascribed to Allah. That is not the case with 'Isa. The shaping of his body and mortal form is implied in the breath of the spirit. Others, as we mentioned, are not like that.
All existent things are the words of Allah which are inexhaustible (18) because they are from "kun" and "kun" is the word of Allah. Is the word ascribed to Him according to what He really is? His what-ness is not known. Or is it that Allah descends to the form of the one who says, "kun", and so the word "kun" is the reality of that form to which he descended or in which He is manifest? Some of the gnostics take one side and some take the other side, and some of them are bewildered in the business and do not know. This is a question which can only be recognised by taste (dhawq), as was the case with Abu Yazid al-Bistami when he breathed into the ant which he had killed and it returned to life. He knew in that action by Whom he had breathed, and that was an 'Isawian witnessing. As for the revival of meaning by knowledge, that is the divine life, essential, eternal, sublime, and luminous, about which Allah said, "Is someone who was dead and whom We brought to life, supplying him with a light by which to walk among the people..." (6:123) Whoever gives life to a dead soul by the life of knowledge in a particular problem connected to knowledge of Allah, has brought him to life by it, and it is "a light for him by which he walks among the people, i.e. among his likes in form.
Were it not for Him and not for us,
that which is would not have been.
I worship Him in truth,
and Allah is our Master.
I am his source so know!
If you said, "man,"
Then do not be veiled by "man".
He has given you a proof.
So be Allah and be creation,
and you will be merciful by Allah.
Feed His creation through Him,
and you will be spirit and sweet scent.
We give Him what appeared by Him in us,
and He gave to us.
The command is apportioned between Him and us.
My heart was given life by the One who knew it
when He gave us sensory life.
At that time (before time),
we were beings, sources and times in Him.
That did not endure in us, but that gave us life.
Part of what proves what we mentioned concerning the breath (nafkh) of the spirit with the elemental form is that Allah has described Himself by the "breath of the All-Merciful". Everyone described by an attribute must follow the attribute and all that attribute demands of him. You realise that breath is necessary for the one who breathes. For that reason, the divine breath accepts the forms of the universe. It is like the primordial substance, (19) which is not other than the source of nature.
The elements are one of the forms of nature, and what is above the elements and what issues from them are also part of the forms of nature. They are sublime spirits going right up to the seven heavens. As for the spirits of the seven heavens and their sources, they are elemental, so they issue from the vapour of the elements. The angels from every heaven are from the elements, so they are made from the elements, and there are no beings of nature above them. For this reason, Allah described them with dispute, (20) i.e. the Highest Assembly, because nature has polarisation. Polarisation is that which is in the Divine Names, and they are ascriptions given by the "breath of the All-Merciful." Do you not see how the Essence is not subject to this principle, and that it is independent of the worlds? This is why the world appeared in the form of the One who brought it into being, and it is not other than the divine breath.
The divine breath ascends by what it has of heat, and descends by what it has of humidity and cold, and fixes itself and solidifies by what it has of dryness. Thus precipitation comes from cold and humidity. Do you not see that when the doctor wants to give someone a remedy, he looks at his water (urine) in a long-necked bottle? If he sees precipitation, he knows that the digestion is complete. He gives the remedy to speed progress. The precipitation is produced by his natural coldness and humidity.
Then Allah kneaded the clay of this human person with "His two hands." These are opposite to each other. Even though each of these two hands may be a right hand, the distinction between them is not hidden. They are only two in themselves - two hands because He only causes effects in nature according to what is in conformity with it. Nature consists of opposites, so He said "two hands". Then He brought man into existence with two hands, and called him man (bashar). (21) This refers to the direct contact (mubashara) of the two hands as befits the the Divine Presence. That arises from His concern for this human species. Then Allah said to the one who refused to prostrate himself before Adam, "What prevented you prostrating to what I created with My Own Hands? Were you overcome with arrogance (towards the one who is your like, made of the elements) or are you one of the exalted?" (38:75) meaning those who are above the elements. "You are not like that."
By the exalted, (22) He means those who, by their essence, are above being elemental by their luminous constitution, even though they are part of nature. Man is only better than the other species by virtue of his being made of clay (bashar). He is the best species of all that was created from the elements by direct contact with the two hands. So in rank, man is above the terrestial and celestial angels, although the lofty angels are better than the human species according to a divine text. (23)
If anyone wishes to recognise the divine breath (nafas), let him recognise the universe, because "whoever knows himself knows his Lord" (24) who is manifest in him. The universe was manifested in the breath of the Merciful which Allah breathed from the Divine Names. They brought the manifestation of their effects into existence from the non-manifestation of their effects. He was generous to Himself by what He brought into existence in Himself. The first effect of the breath took place in that Presence. Then the command continued to descend (25) by breathing out from the universal to the last of what Allah brought into existence.
All is contained in the source of the breath,
like light is contained in the essence of darkness
at the end of the night before daylight.
Knowledge comes by proof at the end of the day
for the one who is sleepy.
He sees what I have said as a dream which indicates the breath,
And it gives him relief from every grief.
In the recitation of the Qur'an, it is, "He frowned." (26)
He has given a tajalli of Himself
to the one who came to fetch a firebrand. (27)
So Musa saw Him as a fire, while He is a light
for kings and seekers.
If you have recognise what I said,
then know that you are in a state of grief. (28)
If Musa had sought something else
(other than the brand),
he still would have seen Him in that,
and not the opposite.
When Allah establishes this 'Isawian word in the Station (29) so that we would know and he would be known, 'Isa will be asked about what was ascribed to him and whether or not it was true, even though Allah already knew whether or not that matter had taken place. Allah will say to him, "Did you say to people: 'Take me and my mother as gods, besides Allah'?" (30)
Adab demands a response to the one asking the question because when He gave him a tajalli in this station and form, wisdom necessitated the response in separation by the source of gatheredness. So he put disconnection first and said, "Glory be to You!" using the kaf (pronoun of the second person singular) which defines who is indicated by encounter and speech. "It is not mine," inasmuch as I belong to myself rather than You, (31) "to say what I have no right to," that is, what my he-ness rather than my essence necessitates. "If indeed I said it, You know it," because You are the Speaker, and whoever says something knows what he has said. You are the tongue by which I speak, as the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, reported to us in a divine transmission in which Allah said, "I am his tongue by which he speaks." He made His He-ness the same as the tongue of the speaker, but ascribed the speech to His slave.
Then the man of right action completed his response by saying, "You know what is in my self," and the speaker is Allah, "and I do not know what is in it," so this is in knowledge of the he-ness of 'Isa in respect of His He-ness, not in respect of the fact that 'Isa speaks and has an effect. "It is You", so He brought distinction and support to confirm the proof and dependence on Him, since Allah only knows the Unseen. So He separated and gathered, unified and made many, made wide and narrow.
To end his reply, 'Isa said, "I said to them nothing but what You ordered me to say." He negated to begin with, (32) alluding to the fact the he has no existence. The statement required adab with the questioner. If he had not acted thus, he would have been described as lacking knowledge of the realities, but he certainly was not like that! Thus he said, "only what You ordered me," and it is You are the One who speaks on my tongue, and You are my tongue. Observe this divine polarity of the spirit! What is finer and more subtle than this!
'Isa said that he said, "Worship Allah." So he used the name of Allah because slaves differ in forms of worship and Shari'a. So he did not specify one name rather than another name. Instead he used the name which joins all of them. Then he went on, "my Lord and your Lord." It is known that His relationship to one existent being by lordship (rubûbiya) is not the same as His relationship with another existent being. That is why he made a distinction when he said, "my Lord and your Lord," by two references one to the speaker and one to the one addressed. He said, "nothing but what You ordered me," and thus he affirmed that he is one who is commanded. The quality of being commanded is not other than slavedom, since one is only commanded when obedience is expected of one, even if one does not comply.
Since the command descends according to ranks, all that appears in a certain rank is coloured with what the reality of that rank gives it. The rank of the one commanded has a principle which appears in everyone who is commanded. The rank of the commander has a principle which appears in every command. Allah said, "Establish the prayer." He is the commander and the one who is subject to the obligation is the commanded. The slave says, "Forgive me!" so he commands and Allah is the commanded. What Allah demands of His slave by His command is the same as what the slave demands of Allah by his command. This is why every supplication is answered, and it must be answered, even if the answer is delayed, just as some who are under obligation delay the prayer. Whoever who is obligated to perform the prayer and does not pray it at its proper time, delays obedience and prays it at another time when he is able to perform it. There must be an answer, if only by intention.
Then he said, "I was a witness against them (and he did not say over himself with them as when he said, 'my Lord and your Lord') as long as I remained among them" because the Prophets are witnesses over their communities as long as they are in them. "But when You took me (i.e. raised me) back to You," and You veiled them from me and me from them, "You were the One Watching over them," no longer in my substance, but in their substance, since You are their eye which necessitates observation.
He wanted to make a distinction between him and his Lord so that it would be known that he was a slave and that Allah is Allah and He is his Lord. He referred to himself as a witness (shahid) and he referred to Allah as the Watcher (raqib). He mentioned "them" before himself when he said, "I was a witness against them as long as I remained among them," (33) preferring them in priority and with adab. He put "them" after Allah in relationship to Him when he said, "You were the One Watching over them" because of what the Lord merits in priority of rank.
Then know that Allah has the name the Watcher (Raqib) which 'Isa applied to Him, and He is the Witness in His words, "a witness against them," and "You are Witness of all things." (5:117) He referred to all things and "thing" is the most indefinite of things. He used the name, "The Witness," and Allah is the Witness over every witnessed thing according to what the reality of that witnessed things demands. He indicated that Allah was the Witness over the people of 'Isa when he said, "I was a witness against them as long as I remained among them." This is the witnessing of Allah in the substance of 'Isa, as it is confirmed that Allah is his tongue, hearing and sight.
Then he said something which is both 'Isawian and Muhammadan. As for its being 'Isawian, that is the speech of 'Isa by the transmission of Allah from him in His Book. As for its being Muhammadan, it happened that Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, stood in one place for an entire night reciting it without turning to anything else until dawn broke. It is, "If You punish them, they are Your slaves. If You forgive them, You are the Almighty, the All-Wise." (34) "They" is the pronoun of those who are absent as "he" is the pronoun of someone who is absent. as He said, "they are those who disbelieve," with the pronoun of those who are not present. Absence is their veil to what is meant by the witnessed one who is present. He said, "If you punish them," with the pronoun of the absent, and that absence is the source of the veil which hides them from the Real.
The Prophet mentioned them to Allah before the time when they are present (35) so that when the actual time came when they were present, the leaven would already have acted on the dough, and the dough might have had time to become equal to the leaven. (36)
Then by "they are Your slaves," he singled out the unity (tawhid) on which they are based. There is no submissiveness greater than the submissiveness of slaves because they have no freedom of action with themselves. They act according to what their master wishes of them when he has no partner in them. He said, "Your slaves," and singled out what was meant of the punishment which is their humiliation. There are none more lowly than them since they are slaves. Thus their essence necessitates that they be lowly, so You do not degrade them, for You do not degrade them with anything more lowly than the fact that they are slaves.
"If You forgive them," if You veil them from the punishment which they deserve because of their opposition if You put forgiveness on them, You veil them from the punishment and protect them from it, "You are the Almighty," the Protector, the Guardian. When Allah gives this name ('aziz) to one of His slaves, then Allah is called the Exalter (Mu'izz). This name is given to him by the 'Aziz, so he has strong protection from the revenge and punishment which the Avenger and Punisher desire for him. He also used distinction and dependence to confirm the proof, and so the ayat is the same sort of His words, "You are the Knower of the Unseen Worlds," and "You are the Watcher over them," and "You are the Almighty, the All-Wise." (37)
The question from the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and his supplication to his Lord in which he repeated the phrase for the entire night until dawn was a request for the answer. If he had heard the answer in the first questioning, he would not have repeated it. Allah showed him the judgements in detail by which they deserved punishment. As each instance was presented to him and specified, the Prophet said to Him, "If You punish them, they are Your slaves, and if You forgive them, You are the Almighty, the All-Wise." If he had seen in what was presented to him anything which would make it necessary that Allah had already decided and that His presence must be preferred, he would have invoked Allah against them rather than for them. So what they deserved is changed by what this ayat accords of submission to Allah and exposing themselves to His pardon.
The Prophet related that when Allah loves the voice of His slave when he makes supplication to Him, He delays the answer to his supplication so that the slave will repeat the supplication. This comes from His love for the slave, not because He has turned away from him. For that reason, the Prophet mentioned the name of the Wise, and the Wise is the one who puts everything in its proper place, and who does not turn away from the qualities which their realities necessitate and demand; so the Wise is the One who knows the order of things. When the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, kept repeating this ayat, he was in possession of a great knowledge from Allah. If anyone recites it, let him recite it in that manner. (38) Otherwise, it is better that he remain silent. When Allah lets the slave articulate any request, He does so when He wants to answer it and grant his need. Let no one be slow in whatever has been guaranteed to him, but let him persevere as the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, perserved with this ayat in all his states, so that he either hears with His ear, or with hearing, whichever you like. How else will Allah make you hear the answer? If He permits the question on your tongue, He will let you hear the answer with your ear. If He permits the meaning to you, He will let you hear the answer by your hearing.
Notes to Chapter 15:
1. As he was born more than five centuries before the Prophet Muhammad, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and is still alive, waiting to descend.
2. The story is found is the Qur'an 20:75-95, where as-Samiri convinces the tribe of Israel to cast their ornaments into the fire out of which he brought the figure of a Calf which lowed, and which they worshipped. He told Musa, "I beheld what they did not behold, and I seized a handful of dust from the messenger's track and cast it into the thing."
3. With dad, qabda.
4. With sad, qabsa.
5. Qur'an 19:17.
6. Qur'an 4:171, "The Messiah, 'Isa son of Maryam, was only the Messenger of Allah and His Word, which He cast into Maryam, and a Spirit from Him."
7. Qur'an 3:49; 5:110.
8.Qur'an 3:49.
9.Qur'an 5:110.
10. The tax paid by the People of the Book to the Muslim State.
11.Qur'an 9:29.
12. i.e. the dead person can speak and answer him. This not simply causing the dead limbs to move of their own accord.
13. Qur'an 5:17, 5:72.
14. Ruh Allah.
15. See Qur'an 3:45, 4:171.
16. Qur'an 14:171.
17. Qur'an 19:30.
18. See Qur'an 18:109, "Say: 'If all the sea was ink to write down the Words of my Lord, it would run out long before the Words of my Lord ran out,' even if We were to bring the same amount of ink again."
19. Al-jawhar al-hayulani.
20. Qur'an 38:69, "I had no knowledge of the Highest Assembly when they disputed." It can also mean mutual rivalry.
21. Qur'an 15:28, "I am creating a mortal (bashar)."
22. "The exalted" are the angels who wander in love and those who are near, like Jibril and the angels of the Throne.
23. "Or are you one of the exalted?" 38:75.
24. As the Prophet said.
25. See Qur'an 65:12, "It is Allah who created the seven heavens and of earth their like, the Command descending down through all of them."
26. Sura 80.
27. Musa in Qur'an 20:10; 27:7. Refers to empirical knowledge, but he found unveiling in the form of the Burning Bush.
28. By standing behind the veil or seeking other-than-Him.
29. On the Last Day.
30. Qur'an 5:116.
31. To slaveness rather than lordship.
32. (ma qulta = I did not say).
33. Literally in the Arabic, "I was against them a witness."
34. This is the end of what 'Isa said in this verse.
35. On the Day of Gathering.
36. According to the commentator, the leaven is the predisposition for the arrival in the presence of Allah. The dough is the clay of his substance.
37. All used in this verse.
38. i.e. with knowledge, weeping, and maintaining adab


text:
"Little Joe never once gave it away
Everybody had to pay and pay"
— Lou Reed, Walk on the Wild Side
The consensus seems to be that social networks have a monetization problem. On this topic, both the leading technology industry blogs and the world's top news organizations agree. The problem is not that these sites have no revenue. I "guesstimate" that MySpace and Facebook have annual revenue run-rates of approximately $650mm and $450mm respectively – highly reputable numbers. The perceived problem relates directly to revenue per user or page view, as these are two of the most heavily trafficked sites on the Internet. As a comparison, other companies with similar usage, like Yahoo, are doing $7.2B in annual revenues. When reporting earnings from Q4 of 2007, Google also opined on the difficulty in monetizing social networking sites. Sergey Brin noted, "I don't think we have the killer best way to monetize social networks yet."
There is ample historical data that proves web sites like these are inherently difficult to monetize. Most other online communication products have had similar struggles. Two great examples of this: the many leading players in the Instant Messaging (IM) space (AIM, ICQ, Yahoo Messenger) and the leading free email sites (Hotmail, Yahoo Mail). These products/sites have always had some of the lowest eCPMs on the Internet. Many speculate that this is because the user is so heavily engaged in using the product (i.e. communicating) that they are unlikely to be distracted by or engaged in an advertising message. Another corollary to this point is that other Internet properties offer more direct purchasing intent based on the way they aggregate users. Example here include TheKnot for brides, TripAdvisor for travelers, and even Google, where the search query highly delineates the direct intent of the user, allowing the advertiser to find users already in the purchasing funnel. All of these properties have incredibly high eCPMs.
Despite this conundrum, there is a solution. Luckily for these U.S. based companies, a Chinese company named TenCent has already paved the way by identifying the optimal way to monetize this type of product. For those that don't know, TenCent is the owner of the leading IM franchise in China – a product known affectionately as "QQ". TenCent was founded in 1998, has 355 million users, US$1.2B in annual revenues, and a US$11.2B market capitalization. The stock chart for the past 5 years is included in the adjacent graphic. The two primary drivers of revenue for TenCent are digital items and casual game packages and upgrades. Advertising, which doesn't work well on U.S. products like IM, doesn't work well in China either. Advertising revenues for TenCent represent only 12% of total revenues. Recently, I asked a leading Internet analyst which company in China is best positioned above all others? He quickly replied "TenCent".
The spreadsheet below tries to highlight the monetization differences between TenCent, Facebook, and MySpace. For each we have taken our best guess at monthly unique users, monthly page views, monthly revenues, and advertising as a percentage of revenue. For TenCent, these numbers are published. For MySpace and Facebook we used the best information we could find and/or infer. We then calculated effective CPM (eCPM), revenue/user, and advertising revenue per user. Lastly, we show these same numbers for TenCent with a cost of living adjustment. In China the cell-phone ARPU (average revenue per user) is about 1/5th of that here in the U.S., so adjusting these numbers up by 5X gives you a much better number for comparing directly with the U.S. properties.
The takeaways are quite straightforward. The amount of advertising revenue on an adjusted basis at TenCent ($2.08) is quite similar to Facebook ($2.44) and MySpace ($5.85) (some may wonder why MySpace ad revenue per user is higher than Facebook – many believe they are more aggressive with ad placement and insertion). The key difference in this comparison is obviously the revenue TenCent generates with business models that are largely absent on both Facebook and MySpace — digital items and casual game revenue. For every $2 of adjusted advertising revenue TenCent has per user per year, they generate $17 in other revenue streams. Benchmark Capital has invested in two private companies in the social/virtual world space – SecondLife and Gaia Online. In both cases, the company revenues are significant, and in both cases advertising is not the leading business model.
More supportive data comes from the three leading social network players in Japan. Believe or not, all three companies are already public and trade on different segments of the Tokyo Stock Exchange. You will see in the same spreadsheet that Mixi, DENA (Mobage-town), and GREE have market capitalizations of US$511MM, US$1.5B, and US$1.1B respectively, and are all very profitable. DENA and GREE, which interestingly are more popular on mobile than on the PC, have invested heavily in these two magic business models (casual games and digital items) and have revenues per user that dwarf that of Facebook or Myspace (DENA is 10X Facebook on this metric!). As a result, these companies sport market capitalizations per user of over $100. Here is the big punch line: Mixi is the actual leader in the market in terms of users, is the clear leader on the PC, is the company that most resembles U.S.-based social networks, and has remained focused on advertising as its core revenue steam. Not surprisingly, their revenues per user are a fraction of DENA and GREE, as is their market capitalization.
At a recent public investor conference in San Francisco, Alexander Tamas, an executive associated with the leading free email service in Russia (Mail.ru), noted that his company felt that the U.S. companies have little understanding on how to monetize a product like Mail.ru, and that they were taking their clues from TenCent in China. Most of the public market investors in the audience, who have witnessed TenCent, DENA, and GREE's remarkable success, nodded in agreement. Gaia also presented at this conference and the crowd was standing-room only. The questions from the audience made it even more apparent that the buy-side investors have a strong appreciation for the digital item business model.
It is peculiar to have a situation where the NY-centric public market investors are more open minded to a new business model prior to the entrepreneurial executives on the west coast, but that is clearly the case here. It is not hard to see why investors like this model. When Pony Ma, the founder of TenCent, first described the digital item model to me five years ago I was blown away. He was selling virtual clothes and accessories for digital avatars that represented his users online. Think about it; this is a beautifully high gross margin business with very low marginal costs. He even told me he thought digital shirts should deteriorate over time like real ones. Pure genius.
It is my perception that most U.S. executives have trouble conceiving and believing in the digital item model. For starters, they simply think it's strange. "Why would someone buy clothes for their virtual avatar? That's weird." What they fail to realize is that U.S. consumers pay for "virtual" things all the time. In the attached picture you see a pair of expensive Chanel sunglasses that retail for $329. If you removed the Chanel logo from them, and offered them for $50 cheaper, you could not sell a pair. Not one. Why? People are buying an image that they want to project about themselves. Without the logo, they fail to make that statement. The same is true for watches, clothes, cars, sodas, beers, cell phones, and many more items. People care greatly about how they are perceived, and are willing to part with big bucks to achieve it. Digital items are merely the same phenomenon online.
Another reason that digital items are a great monetization model for a social network is congruence of fit with the core activity of the site. We already discussed how for TheKnot, the decision to come to the site is very consistent with identifying exactly "who" the advertiser is trying to reach and at "what time". For social networking sites, one of the key "experiences" of users is self-expression. Think about it: is the Facebook news feed more about the reader or the poster? Isn't someone's MySpace page all about self-expression? If people are there to represent and express themselves, shouldn't you build a business model that charges for the ability to better differentiate oneself? Shouldn't you also charge for ego-gratification on a sliding scale (the bigger the ego, the more the charge)?
These same executives like to believe that digital items are distinctly an Asian phenomenon – a convenient theory will prove to be a dangerous rationalization over time. Here are some numbers from a U.S. corporation. As I mentioned we are investors in LindenLab and their leading vitual world, SecondLife. In SecondLife, the users are the ones that get to sell digital goods (rather than the company as in TenCent's case). Linden makes its money providing the platform services underneath this powerful economy. At this moment in time, the economy inside of SecondLife – the amount of digital goods and services – sold each year between SecondLife users, is over a US$450mm annual run rate. Of this, developers are realizing over $100MM in real profits extracted from Linden's in-world to real-world currency exchange. And keep in mind that SecondLife has much fewer users than either Facebook or MySpace.
Another interesting data point exists in the Facebook and MySpace application developer programs. Best I can tell, the startups that are generating the most revenue on top of either platform are either selling digital items/avatars, or providing casual game packages — the exact two business models that are the drivers at TenCent, DENA, and GREE. This is hardly a coincidence.
Despite these arguments and the fact that others have also been arguing this same point, it would be surprising if either MySpace or Facebook move in this direction. First, they would need to have executive buy-in, which is not obvious at this point. Second, they would need to hire people with experience in executing against this model. Like any other endeavor in life, there are right ways and wrong ways to exploit these models, and there are already many experts in the field of digital items and casual games. Lastly, they would need to prioritize this direction over other programs. Currently, MySpace seems extremely focused on music, and Facebook on user-based communications.
The good news is that if they ever get around to deploying these models, they will not have trouble convincing Wall Street it's a good idea – Wall Street is already there.
More Information:
Wikipedia on TenCent
TenCent IR About Page
TenCent IR Investor Intro
Stock Information and Company Financials on Mixi
Stock Information and Company Financials on DENA
Stock Information and Company Financials on GREE
In addition to these, most of the large US investment banks are covering TenCent, DENA, and GREE with English based research. If you have a relationship with one of these banks, you can likely ask for their reports.


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It started with off-grid locations, places where electricity was either carried in or generated on-site. Then it beat expensive diesel generators. In 2010, unsubsidized solar electricity could best on-grid retail electricity prices of major utilities in Hawaii. In the next decade, residents in metropolitan areas representing 100 million people will watch the biggest solar barrier yet – economics – fall by the wayside.
But cost isn't the only barrier to solar, and U.S. states should carefully consider the lessons learned in Hawaii as solar creeps toward cost parity with the grid.
For one, utilities adhere to archaic limits on local power generation that can severely curtail the expansion of residential and commercial rooftop solar power. For another, local permit authorities can be overwhelmed when cost-effective solar means that as many has half of local building permit applications are for solar installations. And costly electrical upgrades and grid interconnection studies can add thousands to the cost of solar arrays.
Then there are the 3 out of 4 residential and commercial buildings that aren't suitable for solar because of the orientation or shading or because the occupant is a renter, but who could "go solar" by sharing in a community project.
And of course there's the political backlash if the existing incentives for solar don't scale back commensurate with the falling cost of solar, leaving taxpayers holding the bag.
This short presentation outlines the challenges and solutions from Hawaii (and the full details can be found in the report here):
This post originally appeared on ILSR's Energy Self-Reliant States blog.
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