That Day, recapped

ConvergeSouth 2005 was held at NC A&T this past weekend, beginning on Friday.
We have a very tight security schema on our network, including Cisco EAP WLAN.

This is no hot spot, and to get on, one needs to update drivers nearly all the time and an account with strong passwords must be provided to the end user.

For those who expereince a mass influx of guests in tight environments, you can appreciate the neccesary inconvenience involved.

David Winer was one of many anonymous users requesting our WLAN service, and he sat down with one of our lady techs.

His rant begins with his strongly stated opinion that all WLANS should be wide open, a statement ignorant of the facts and dangers of security.

Our lady tech was severely upset with his belligerence - he was ranting at her. I told her too move on. He couldn't wait, and another tech assisted him, who he then ranted at. She asked me about why his machine was rebooting. Essentially, this was due to new Intel WLAN driver installs, but David was convinced, seemingly, of incompetence on the part of the tech, and then he started venting in my direction.

My response; 'Sir, do you keep your machine clean and up to date?'.

He detonated - "Do You Know Who I Am!".

Absolutely not.

And he kept ranting, and yelling, and just being decidely unco-operative.

Feeling my own anger rise, I left the scene.

Amazingly, I had several people who were there who have known him for awhile come to me to let me know who he was, and to further let me know that it was typical angry Dave acting out against someone who does not bow to him.

Ed Cone recommended me to search google for 'Wired Winder', and all my answers to who he was and is was found.

Later that day, I did make the effort to apologize for losing my cool, and he was unwilling to admit he was a dance partner in this issue. He did graciously accept my apology, and later I hade a couple of short conversations with him, and attended one of his conferences.

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1. As opposites attract, likes repel. We are very similarly viewed in issues of free speech and the Electronic Frontier.

2. People meet in various ways, including starting with conflict.

3. I prefer bridge building over busting, and I practiced that with Mr. Winer.

He is a very smart guy; no doubt. However, high intellect almost always partners with arrogant abuse of those the intelligent feel to be inferior. Read 'A Short History of Nearly Everything' to see how abusive and mean-spirited inovators can be.

And, that completes the 'Day I Met Dave Winer'.

The Day I met Dave Winer

"Do you know who I am?"

ConvergeSouth 2005, my first direct contact with the Blogging elite was not the best day. A difficult customer, I must say.

The encounter was based on Winer's need to get on AggieLAWN, the North Carolina A&T Cisco LEAP enabled network, and his stubborn reluctance to allow anyone to help him.

More later on the encounter with Winer Hell, but it was a good experience in the end. Great encouragement was found to proceed into my first blog publishing, and these words are my first in the 'blogsphere' or whatever the the buzzowrd is for online self-agrandizement journalism, spiced with bashing and hugging.