Et seda diskussiooni käima lükata, kirjutasime paari õhtu ja ööga Marteni, Linnari ja Danieliga esimese mustandi kokku. Rõhk sai pandud inimesele, internetikasutajale ja väärtustele – meelega hoidusime tehnoloogiate, standardite, sideprotokollide ja juriidiliste krutskite mängutoomisest. Ja leppisime kokku, et hea neutraalne, kitsalt ACTA-väitlustest räsimata organisatsioon, keda me kõik usaldame seda diskussiooni ärgitama ja modereerima on mõttekoda PRAXIS.

Seega, palun tulge osalema: http://mottehommik.praxis.ee/internetivabaduse-teesid/

Kas need on meie õigused internetikasutajatena, mille kaitstuses kindlad olles oleksime me valmis selleks, et tulgu või veeuputus või allkirjastatagu ACTA?

Toivo Annus:
Mõni leimab internetis, mõni teine Riigikogu kõnepuldist. Mõnda like’vad maikades arvutinohikud, mõnda teist jälle sõbralikud vuntsidega rahvasaadikud. Igaühel oma meedium kus end koduselt tuntakse ja seda ei saa ju pahaks panna. Rohujuure tasemel lällamine ja meemide ehitamine väga midagi ei mõjuta, plakatitega meeleavaldused ei tundu ka optimaalseim viis elukorralduse suunamiseks. Küsimus ise pole triviaalne aga oma mugavustsoonis meemitamise ja “peame arutama” poliitudu vahele vahele tahaks näha päris inimeste – aga selliste vähe mõjukamate – seisukohti. Nt Jaan Tallinn Presidendi mõttekoja liige, Sten Tamkivi Peaministri ümarlaua külaline (?), @LinnarViik valitsuse nõunik (?), @OttPärna – AF juht, Andres Jõesaar Ringhäälingunõukogu liige, Andrei Korobeinik riigikogu liige – kui te täna peaksite ACTA osas ise hääletama, siis kas hääletaksite pigem poolt või vastu? Kas ja kuidas olete või kavatsete valitsust/ametnikke/seadusandjat olete selles osas nõustada?

Soovitan järgnenud vastuseid kõiki lugeda, aga kuna Toivo katsub seal edasisi arendusi vaos hoida, siis rist-postitan oma arvamuse (täiendatud ja linkidega varustatud kujul) ka siia. Juhul kui kellelgi tekib sellele mingeid täiendavaid küsimusi või mõtteid – laske aga tulla.

Kitsamalt ACTA osas võttis Andres Jõesaar sõnad üsna suust, nii ebamäärase ja mitmetitõlgendatava teksti puhul sõltub kõik paljudest pisikestest järgmistest (rakendus)otsustest, mitte niivõrd sellest, kas praegu see üldsõnaline tekst saab allkirjad või mitte. ACTA seatud raamides saab korda saata kuritegelikke lollusi, aga saab ka õlgu kehitada ja üsna nii edasi elada, nagu Eestis praegu.

Seda juttu, et me “ACTA pärast Eesti seadusi ei muuda” võtan demagoogilise pooltõena. Näiteks on minuteada justiitsministeeriumis töös uus autoriõiguste seadus. Ilmselt küll, et seda ei tehta “ACTA pärast”, aga paljugi, mis sinna kirja saab, saab olema konfliktne üsna samal maailmavaatelisel skaalal, mille üle praegu vaieldakse. Ja mis iganes järgmine seadus 5-10a jooksul selles valdkonnas veel muutub, vaatab muutja ikka üle õla ACTA poole tagasi, et sellega mitte vastuollu minna – nagu iga muu rahvusvahelise lepingu puhul, mida me sõlmime.

Nii et viimase nädala jooksul olen hoopis mõelnud, et äkki oleks konstruktiivne tõmmata fookus kitsalt, binaarselt “ACTA jah/ei” käralt nende teiste, Eesti internetikasutajate ja -arendajate elu otseselt puudutavate kohalike seaduste peale. Kuna kõik osapooled on oma deklaratsioonides ühel nõul, et internetivabadused on jube olulised, siis äkki vaataks üle, et hoopis need on selgelt ja kaasaegsele ühiskonnale sobilikult kirjas, ACTAst sõltumatult. Natuke on Infoühiskonna teenuste seaduses, osa hirme seotud ja Elektroonilise side seadusega, isegi Põhiseaduses (p 39, 43, 45 jne).

Aga asi ei ole ju masinates, teenustes, sides ja bittide kopeerimises. Äkki oleks aeg küps Interneti_kasutaja_ õiguste ja kohustuste seaduseks?

Mis ma ise selles suunas teinud olen / teen on peamiselt kahte liini pidi:

• ITL juhatuses ja liikmeskonnas on teema kuum ja sektori esindajatena küsitakse meie hinnanguid ja arvamusi erinevatest ministeeriumitest, kes seda paberit käsitlevad. (vt ka ITL presidendi Taavi Kotka vastus Toivole)
• President Ilvese nõunikuna olen tema õigusnõunikule Ylle Madise-le jõudumööda abiks presidendi seisukohtade kujundamisel sellel teemal.

Peaministri ettevõtjate ümarlauda on mind kunagi küll paar korda kutsutud, aga esiteks ei ole kuulnud, et ACTA teemal midagi sellist plaanis oleks ja teiseks on too formaat olnud… pigem loeng kui seminar.

Ahjaa, kui riigikokku kuuluks, siis hääletaks ACTAle vastu enne kui need ohustatud internetikasutajate õigused kohalikes seadustes selgelt kaitstud ei ole. Ja natuke selle pärast ka, et kõik need isiklikuks keeravad teerullimeetodid peaministrilt, ametnikelt ja autorikaitsjatelt on kodanikuna solvavad.

Ja nüüd siis paar päeva hiljem täienduseks veel mõned mõtted:

Eestil on neil teemadel maailmale anda

Tunnistan, et jäin oma esialgses ülaltoodud mõttekäigus asjatult liiga Eesti-keskseks, lugege palun kindlasti Linnari arvamuslugu tänases Postimehes, kus ta endale neid piire ei seadnud. ACTA ja selle poolt välja kraabitud pinnaalused pinged on universaalsed kogu Euroopa ja tegelikult kogu maailma jaoks, ja üsna unikaalselt ühes hoomatavas ajalises aknas. Oleme Eestile kogunud kahekümne aastaga piisavalt arenenud e-riigi usaldusväärsust, edulugusid, müüte ja mainet, et internetiajastu inimõiguste osas olla rahvusvaheliseks teenäitajaks, julgete ideede ja lahenduste välja pakkujaks. Meid kuulatakse rahvaarvu ja majandusliku võimu kohta ebaproportsionaalse tähelepanuga. Ja liidriks kipuvad saama ja jääma need, kes sellistena käituvad.

E-kodanike juhtimisest

Peaminister Ansipi kõrge kaarega käitumise kohta on siiani kõige ilusama paralleeli leidnud Krister Paris siin. Ootamatult (kas tõesti?) hakkab selguma, et e-valimistel oma e-riigi  etteotsa esindajaid valiv rahvas vajab sinna inimesi, kes ka ise satuvad vahest Twitterisse või Facebooki või tasuta wifi-levialasse Creative Commons litsentsiga fotosid sirvima või Soundcloudist konglomeraatide vahendamata heliloomingut kuulama. Selliseid juhte,  kellele ka isikliku kogemuse põhjal tundub, et vajadus trikitada VPN-ühenduste ja välispankade krediitkaartidega selleks, et legaalselt olla osa “Lääne kultuuriruumist” on üsna sama tõsine probleem nagu lennuühenduste vähesus, kui meie eesmärgiks on hoida siin maalapil elamas eestlasi-eurooplasi.

Andrus Ansip ei ole muidugi kaugeltki ainus “eelmise aja” mees, kellele need teemad täiesti läbi kogemata – aga paistab oma kõrgelt toolilt muidugi kaugemale ja on otsustanud oma ignorantsi hoopis alla joonida.

Kaitset vajavad autorid, mitte isehakanud esindajad

Kuigi ma ise hetkel ei investeeri aega pikematesse filosoofilistesse mõtisklustesse autoriõiguste olemuse üle muutuvas maailmas, ei tule see, mitte minu hoolimatusest või huvipuudusest, vaid sellest, et seda teevad praegu paljud minust targemad ja paremad kirjamehed. Viimati loetutest soovitan:

• Jaagup Irve Memokraadis: ACTA ja usaldus
• Rick Falkvinge: Keegi ei nõudnud külmikumaksu (Peeter Mõtskülaeestikeelses tõlkes)

Ma siiralt loodan, et kogu sellest trallist väljumisel võtab autorite võim dikteerida oma teoste tarbimise tingimusi oluliselt järele sellele, mida tehnoloogia tegelikult võimaldaks. Ja saab teistpidi oluliselt kärbitud läbipaistmatute vahendusorganisatsioonide õigustamatu kümnisevõtt.

Kalev Rattus on läinud sel nädalal juba nii kaugele, et on avalikult süüdistanud tema töömeetoditele selgelt vastanduvat ITLi lausa miljonite kroonide suuruses altkäemaksus koalitsiooniparteidele, et EAÜ lobistatud “tühja kasseti tasu” nimelist piraatlus-trahvi Eestis mistahes salvestusvõimalusega elektroonikaseadmele laiendada. USB-portidega teleka omanikuna tundub mulle absurdsena väide, et puhtalt see fakt teeb minust piraadi ja õigustab mõne protsendi koorimist mitte enam tühjalt salvestusmeedialt (0.20 EUR) vaid näiteks suvaliselt LED-paneelilt (2000 EUR).

ITL juhatuse liikmena kavatsen selle IT-sektorit koondava seltsi tegevusi terve mõistuse säilitamisel digitaalses maailmas seda jõulisemalt toetada, mida vähem Rattus oma jätkuvate solvangute eest vabandab.

Another absurd argument often brought is about the “thick skin” that those who speak in public should have anyway – why should the wussies then complain on a few comments? Just read a rant in Stephen Fry‘s autobiography that summarizes the answer so simply and beautifully:

…those who grow up these days to become trollers on internet sites and who specialize on posting barbarous, mean, abusive, look-at-me, listen-to-me anonymous comments on YouTube and BBC ‘Have Your Say’ pages and other websites and blogs foolish enough to allow space for their poison. Such swine specialize on second-guessing the motives of those who are brave enough to commit to the risk of making fools of themselves in public and they are a blight on the face of the earth. ‘Oh, but a thick skin is surely necessary for the acting profession. Actors and theatre people should get used to it.’ Well, if you want to be in a profession which accesses emotion and attempts to penetrate the mind and soul of a man, I should have thought what is more necessary is thin skin. Sensitivity.

- quote from The Fry Chronicles by Stephen Fry

I believe you can replace the exemplary profession of actors and theatre people here with anyone: a parliament member, policeman, business leader, cabinet minister, social scientist, investigative reporter, novelist, civil servant, software engineer, creative artist, entrepreneur or the mother of the year. We do not want any of those people disappear from the public space, shut up and encapsulate growing their shell concrete hard only to sit in a hole surrounded by a selected trustworthy few of their own kind to throw poisonous, life-defyingly sarcastic remarks back and forth to underline their hatred of the world outside.

We do want all our leaders, hierarchy- or opinion-wise, no we want _anyone_ who has something to contribute to the society out in the open, sharing, listening, sensing, learning, teaching, analyzing and understanding.

Here’s to 2012… with thinner skins around us.

Pretty much exactly 12 months ago I made my first angel investment ever in a company that makes physical things. My entire entrepreneurial career and the businesses I’ve supported on the side have always evolved around outcome you can not really touch: would it be software or consulting and services.

On this backdrop, the magic of turning ideas into physical objects has a special appeal for me. Estelon‘s flagship speakers weigh 85kg a piece yet are delicate enough to ship with a pair of white gloves for handlers. Their distinct shape is driven as much from physics as from visual aesthetics. And when they actually perform their primary function of music delivery it is as close as it gets to engineering creating pure emotion. The kind which both justifies and makes you forget the fair value on the price tag at the same time.

A few months before signing up for the seed round with fellow angel Jaakko Karo I was (only half-)joking to the founders that as I could not afford to buy their product I guess I have to invest the money in the company to ensure I eventually can become a client one day. Now, a year later, it amazing to look back at progress made already:

• Product development. The original XA model has been complemented with a smaller entry-range XCs, as well as a pimped up, diamond-tweeter equipped XA Diamond. Overall, an almost-full lineup of real speakers in real production.
• Reviews. A Google search for “Estelon speakers review” goes above 7000 mark already, featuring praising coverage from bloggers and forum goers to established magazines like ToneAudio, HomeTheater, Stereophile, RobbReport and others. And often the pro reviews of this class of equipment is preceeded by months of careful setup, burn-in and continuous listening – so expect more to be on the way.
• Awards. The XA and XA Diamond have brought home the CES Innovation Award, prestigious in consumer electronics, not once but twice now (2011, 2012) in High Performance Audio category. Bel Canto, MartinLogan, Lawrence Audio and other peers there don’t usually hang out that often with first-year startups, I think.
• Sales. You can today walk into a high-end audio shop, audition and buy a pair of Estelons in a growing list of countries in America, Europe and Asia. And the best part: not only you can, but people do.
• Making history. This summer, the Estelons were showcased at an exhibition at Estonian Museum of Applied Arts and Design. Another thing more common after 12 years, rather than 12 months in the market.

What for me has been just a year of light monthly involvement to date is of course a rise towards the highest peaks for Alfred Vassilkov after his first 25 years as a speaker designer and over 5 years of work on this particular concept. I feel privileged to be along on this journey now and am thrilled to see where Alfred, Alissa and the rest of the team will take us by same time in 2012. And which speakers I can enjoy at home then.

And for the ultrabrief context of what they are about:

The Singularity represents an “event horizon” in the predictability of human technological development past which present models of the future may cease to give reliable answers, following the creation of strong AI or the enhancement of human intelligence.

Since the flight back and on following business travel in Europe I’ve been taking 30 minutes here and an hour there with an intent to capture the thoughts the event sparked for me. Each time I’ve run into a writers block and failed to post.

When you walk into a room of 600 people passionately discussing some of the hairiest big problems and opportunities facing the humankind this century, from friendly artificial intelligence to mesh robotics or regenerative medicine (aka growing someone a new leg if they loose one), it can, frankly, feel like walking into the proceedings of a religious sect. Until you quickly realize that it is as atheist (and rationalist) as anything sect-like could potentially be, seeking to overcome biases, trusting scientific research and provable facts over emotions and beliefs.

And again, that single weekend left me with too many new open ends to think about and a sense that I should read a few hundred pages of existing thoughts before a single paragraph I could write in a blog post here could add anything new to the discussion. Instead, I know that I truly enjoyed the chats with all the really smart people I got to meet, from doctors to physicists, from computer scientists researching AIs to professional sports betters, hedge fund managers and venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and academics.

I’m quite sure I’ll be back at another summit for more stimulating conversations some next year. And I recommend you sneak some of the speech videos in your viewing list besides the TED ones you’ve made an occasional habit of.

For starters, here are two speeches from this year, each having their own approach to arguing how a person can go about picking which hard problems to solve in their life. These are agnostic to your field of activity – worth the time for entrepreneurs, academics of social/NGO folks alike. And even being a geek is not required for the most part.

Peter Thiel:

Jaan Tallinn:

And if you’re still after more, recommend clicking through:

• All past Singularity Summits
• LessWrong – a community refining the art of human rationality, see also the Sequences there
• Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford University
• The Thiel Foundation, especially my favourite: 20 Under 20 Fellowship

Besides a chance to sharpen your mind and spend time discussing their products with the cream of the crop of young European entrepreneurs, a good reason to show up was a recent invitation to join the newly formed Seedcamp Advisory Board, which got announced now. There is tons of action and tons of traction around the European startup scene and Seedcamp has earned quite a central role in this movement. I hope I can contribute to bridging that “center” with the Nordic corners of the continent, where there is tons of tech innovation action happening in my homely Baltic and Scandinavian countries – with the role model and community around Skype playing no small part.

And last, boy, did Estonia in particular rise to the spotlight this year. Out of the 20 finalists picked, 4 have strong Estonian roots: GrabCAD (a community for CAD engineers), Transferwise (Skype employee #1 Taavet reinventing currency exchange), Sportlyzer (Tõnis using the learnings from how much better than me he was in karate training in highschool towards online coaching for endurance sports) and Campalyst (a mixed Baltic social media ROI tracking team who got together at a Garage48 weekend just 6 months ago).

Have to say, the visibility of these teams already became a bit ridiculous at times: you had times where some other teams where apologizing for not being Estonian, you had some tongue-in-cheek slides plugged into pitches, and all of this followed with heavy twitter coverage tagged as #estonianmafia.

(As a sidenote, I am philosophically not fully bought into this hashtag. First, when building a company to change the world, your roots are something to be proud of, but not the main or only thing that should define you. Also, not only is it too easy to misspell (see #estionianmafia or #estonianmaffia), but it’s original connotations with ruthless, violent, non-ethical winning is an extreme opposite of what I actually see among these people… but hell, Dave McClure picked the tag! And maybe the startup movement can do flip version of what Coke did with Santa Claus and hijack the mafia-word completely from its previous bearers?).

By the time of announcing the winners today, the ratio of Estonian companies went up from 20% to 66%: GrabCAD and Transferwise were up there in respectable company of Vox.io (Slovenia).

A major step which will be remembered in defining what #estonianmafia is really made of then came from Hardi Meybaum, the CEO and Co-founder of GrabCAD. Accepting the 25,000 EUR grand prize he said that GrabCAD is already financed and building great companies is not just about what you are able to take. And with that, handed away the fresh stash of euros won to Farmeron from Croatia.

Thanks for making us proud.

Characteristically to being just in the middle of a 10-week intense effort of forming their products in such an early seed stage it is far too early to tell which one of them will actually fly as a company. It could be well just 1-2 companies and I have my hunches to which one(s), if any – won’t reveal that before their final pitches on August 10th though. Nevertheless that same hunch tells me that out of the people present the ratio of future success will be much higher, and even if their current concept fails they will find a new idea and potentially a differently formed team that will help them succeed in the future.

So in a way, it is back to that big discussion in May about what is the real role and goals of all these startup incubation/acceleration program formats out there. Even if they often don’t produce sustainable companies, they still do train better entrepreneurs.

On other random thoughts from these meetings and surrounding hallway chats:

• When thinking of new incubation and accelerator programs, the Baltic and Nordic countries need to start taking a seriously regional view. Besides the Garage48 event constantly on the road, there still is too much disjointed action in each country to create their own unique support systems. These efforts should be more synchronized, combined, consolidated, co-financed and co-marketed. Otherwise, as a random illustration, while Finnish Startup Sauna and Lithuanian StartupHighway compete head-on for the same short roster of potential participants, the best local startup teams apply to the Seedcamps, TechStars, Betaworks and Y!Combinators directly and flee Europe on day 2 of their existence. Which, as it has been proven many times, will more than likely to benefit their particular careers (which makes me happy for them!), but is not the dream scenario for our Nordic, or generally Europan economies in the long run.
• Another side-effect is that no single Top50 VC group in the world can today sanely pick if and which of these programs to support or even attend in Nordic-Baltic region – there are just becoming too many programs and impossible to distinguish from each-other. The result is that serious money stays home where they already have a natural dealflow. And our new companies need to follow them there.
• Unfinished idea to throw out there: what if all the major acceleration program attempts in the region put their backs together and pitched their co-operation to be branded by some major globally established incubator under a franchise? Think of Seedcamp Nordics, or TechStars Europe based in this area. That would help manage the expectations of both the investors and startups considering affiliations, pending of course the needed measures to keep the bar as high as the mothership has it. Discuss?
• Estonia is extremely lucky with the amount of two-way public dialog happening around technology entrepreneurship in the context of the country’s overall economic environment in the future. From our President, several cabinet ministers and MP-s to ranking officials in ministries and public agencies there are people who get and are able to discuss matters ranging from e-governance to funding and taxation issues of fragile early-stage ventures. Given how small even booming gaming software sector in Finland is compared to some traditional Finnish export industries, as well as the long-standing position of Nokia, they truly early guys claim they need to fight much more for attention.
• As the Aalto Venture Garage co-working space was under renovation (check out the fancy designs being implemented) we spent time in the neighboring Aalto Design Factory instead – I was very impressed by the overall feel of the distinctly Nordic yet unpretentious environment and took some photos too.
• Among the many startups hosted at the Design Factory, I met three that are in a more mature stage of launching their products. A few whose creations I would likely buy without much hesitation today:
• PowerKiss wireless mobile charging ring that doesn’t look like that massive brick you have to attach to your phone, sold at airport electronics shops (I forget the brand).
• Jalo Helsinki‘s Fly-shaped smoke detector / fire alarm. The end of the era of those ugly plastic round pucks the law requires you to stick in your ceiling in many countries.
• TribeSudios‘ Stagecraft seems to become a really interesting format shift in social gaming, or, as they put it, “what happens when real game designers take on social”. Even though I can’t remember when I played a non-mobile game last time, I am looking forward to understanding trendchanges in this form of entertainment better.

Thanks again for the invitation, guys.

[6/2/11 10:36:52] Martin Mets: Räägitakse, et Eestis on puudu juba 2000 IT-spetsialisti. Viimastel aastatel on vastuvõtt IT-erialadele natukene paranenud, kuid see võiks olla endiselt palju parem. Käisin just eile ITLi koolituuril Kehra gümnaasiumis ja seal räägiti kaasakiskuvalt, et palk on üle keskmise ja töö firmades (seal oli näiteks Webmedia) tore, mitmekülgne ja rutiinivaba, kuid õpilastes see erilist vaimustust ikkagi esile ei kutsunud. Mis peaks olema see präänik, mis tooks aina rohkem inimesi IT-erialasid õppima? Kas endiselt oleks vaja murda mingeid iganenud müüte? Mul on tunne, et siinkohal ei ole tegemist valdkonnaga, mis ise lihtsalt paika loksub…

ITL korraldatud koolikülastuste ja muul viisil noortelt kogutava tagasiside põhjal tundub, et põhjuseid, mis noori IT juurde jõudmast takistavad on mitmeid, ei oska ühtki neist esile tuua kui suurt ja peamist. IT valdkonnas kõva käpp olemiseks peab endale juba koolis alla laduma tugeva reaalainete põhja – on kindlasti neid, kelle jaoks matemaatika ja füüsika ongi rasked, aga samas võib paljude andekate jaoks olla sageli lihtsalt tüütu või igav see, kuidas neid aineid õpetatakse: kas kuivalt ja teoreetiliselt tahvli ees või läbi põnevate projektide nagu robootika või lihtsam tarkvaraarendus. “Raske õppustel, kerge lahingus” tarkust meenutades on oluline ka kohustuslik matemaatikaeksam: kui mõni andekas noor selle gümnaasiumi lõpus tegemata jätab, sulgeb see ta ees mitmeid ülikooliuksi, mis teda tegelikult hiljem huvitada võiksid.

Eesti üleminekuühiskonnas on olnud väga oluline ka küsimus, kas üks või teine erialavalik võimaldab majanduslikult “head elu”. Usun, et selles osas oleme nüüd üle perioodist, kus arvati, et vaid majandus- või juuraharidus seda suuta tagavad – väga hea programmeerija töö on ka väga hästi tasustatud võrreldes ka pankuri või advokaadiga.

Ja veel üks väärarvamus on see, et tehnoloogia on kuidagi humanitaaria vastand hariduses ja tööturul. Me soovime, et meil oleks rohkem insenere, aga lõpuks on näiteks edukas IT-tööstus suur tööandja ka disaineritele, lingvistidele, antropoloogidele, turundajatele jne. Oluline, et need eri distsipliinid oskaksid koos töötada ja selleks omavahel üksteise toimist paremini tunneksid.

[6/2/11 10:37:21] Martin Mets: Kurdetakse, et IT-erialadel on lõpetajaid vähe. Samas aga haaravad nad ise juba enamiku paljulubavaid üliõpilasi teiselt kursuselt enda juurde tööle, mistõttu jäävad paljudel õpingud lõpetamata. Mis võiks siin olla kuldne kesktee?

See on üks suur müüt, mida tuleb ikka ja jälle ümber lükata. Suurtel ja edukatel IT-firmadel puudub motivatsioon palgata teiselt kursuselt inimesi endale tööle. Osad neist, kes müüvad arendusteenust, müüvad tegelikult oma töötajate CV-sid ja seal on rahvusvahelises konkurentsis oluline näidata vähemalt magistrikraadi. Teistel on lihtsalt edust tulenevalt tehniliste probleemide keerukus nii suur, et nende lahendamine eeldab rohkem haridust.

Soliidsed IT-firmad palkavad tudengeid ehk osalise ajaga ja julgustavad neid igati kooli lõpetama, et võimaldada neile ka tulevikukarjääri. “Poolikuid” tudengeid satub ka mitte-IT-firmadesse IT-tugiisikuteks jm lihtsamatele töödele, sest need firmad ei suuda päris IT-firmadega tööpakkumistes hairtud spetsialistidele konkureerida. Statistika näitas, et paari aasta taguse majandusbuumi ajal läks suurem osa IT-alade väljalangejaid hoopis… kinnisvarasektorisse! Ja üks suur koolist langemise põhjus on koolide sõnul ka raskused õpingutes (jällegi – reaalainete põhi oli nõrk).

[6/2/11 10:38:56] Martin Mets: Kas Eestis antav IT-alane haridus vastav IT-firmade ootustele? Paljud arendajad ja start-upid räägivad, et neid erialasid või programeerimiskeeli, mida neil vaja oleks, Eestis ei õpetataki. Kui suur peaks olema IT-alane spetsialiseerumine väikeses Eestis, kas olekski vaja üksnes baasharidust, millele hiljem lisandub juba tööalane praktika ja täpsem spetsialiseerumine? Kas firmad ootavad pigem valmis spetsialisti või teadmistega inimest, keda nad saavad enda käe järgi vormida?

Sõltub rollist, loomulikult. Oluline on, et ülikoolist tulev noor oleks õppinud probleeme lahendama ja loominguliselt mõtlema – on ohtlik, kui teda on silmaklappidega treenitud kasutama vaid üht platvormi ja programmeerimiskeelt ja puudu on oskus valida ja vajadusel õppida juurde parimaid tööriistu vastavalt konkreetsele ülesandele. Arvutiteaduses on palju vundamenti laduvat teooriat, mis ei sõltu programmeerimiskeeltest – vajaduste analüüs, algoritmid, võrkude toimimine, andmebaasiteooriad, statistika ja andmeanalüüs. Sellele alusele saab siis laduda juurde teadmisi, mis tulenevad konkreetse tööandja ja tema projektide/toodete vajadustest. Insener areneb ja õpib kogu elu.

Teisalt on firmades rolle, kuhu palgatud töötaja peab olema juba saabudes oma nishshis oluliselt targem kui tööandja ja sealsed kolleegid – selle tarkuse allikaks eelduseks on näiteks doktorikraadini viinud akadeemiline uurimistöö.

[6/2/11 10:41:30] Martin Mets: ITLi tegevuskavas (2009-2011) on tööjõu ja hariduse valdkonnas kirjas eesmärk, et “tõstame Eesti IKT kõrghariduse kvaliteeti rahvusvaheliselt konkureerivale tasemele”. Milline on Eesti IT-hariduse tase praegu?

Mulle tundub, et baasdistsipliinides – matemaatika, füüsika, keemia, arvutiteadused – ei ole meil midagi häbeneda. Neis on korralikku taset ja pigem kuuleb ülikoolidelt muret oma jätkusuutlikkuse üle. Head õppejõud vananevad, konkursid nende kohtadele üliväikesed, doktorante on suhteliselt vähe ja seega pole igas valdkonnas näha, kust võiks tulla need uued Eesti professorid, kellele teatepulk üle anda.

Suur on arenguruum on aga eri distsipliinide koostöös. Taanis on üks uue põlvkonna ettevõtluskool, mis eeldab igalt oma lõpetajalt, et too on kooli jooksul edukalt läbi teinud mõne tudengiprojekti, mis a) kaasab tudengitest osalisi kolmnurga tehnoloogia-disain-äri igast nurgast ja b) see tiim viib projekti ellu üle vähemalt 6 ajavööndi, s.t ainult Euroopa-sisesest ei piisa.

Ma kardan, et Eestis pole ühtegi IT-tudengit, kes seda lõpetades öelda saaks. Aga kui ta näiteks Skype’i tööle satub, siis visatakse ta täpselt sellisesse vette, kus tuleb hakkama saada sadade eri valdkondade esindajatega üle 16 ajavööndi ja mitmekümne eri rahvuse – oleks ju loogiline, et kool teda selleks ette valmistab?

Just sellises interdistsiplinaarse ja üle riigipiiride mõtleva lähenemise juurutamises näen ma ka Eesti ülikoolide IKT programme koondava IT Akadeemia algatuse suurt potentsiaali ja võimalust.

Setting

For reasons beyond my control I was stuck at home for a few weeks in a state that allowed for little talk or work, but the more for light reading and writing and most of all – listening to music. While at it, I came to a conclusion that I’ve outgrown my good old Arcam AVR200, one of the most “musical” AV receivers in its class and at its time about 10 years ago. It’s the usual story of being too busy to sit down and just listen, and the limits of sleeping kids in the house set to the volume you used to operate on in college. My current setup has been quite fine for the quiet loungy backdrops for when you have some guests over, but just a bit too… bland when you really focus on it.

To make things even more complicated, my upgrade needs are somewhat “temporary” (as in those things that usually end up becoming permanent). After my awe over the sound of the Estelon speakers late last year (disclosure: followed by an investment into the company) it is only a question of time when I’ll make that upgrade step too, just not sure to which model yet. So for now I needed something to match my “temporary” Audes Maestro 145 floorstanders – a good price-performance bet any time, with capacity to fill the room (especially at the lower end), but definitely not the easiest to drive.

As a source I’ve effectively moved away from CD-s (played via Arcam DV88+ or even plain Sony BDP-S383) to Sonos ZP90 streaming either MP3 or ALAC files locally or live from Spotify or Rdio (when available). Everything is increasingly digital, with all the benefits and problems coming with it.

In this context, I set myself on quest to buy a good, musical stereo amp between 1000-2000 EUR, available in Estonia immediately for home audition or purchase.

Search

The second half of my artificial constraint effectively cuts off a number of brands that are just not stocked over here and all the thrills of shopping around places like eBay or PinkFishMedia. I felt it would be great to support the local HiFi enthusiasts scene a bit with a local purchase from a local shop. (Am thinking about sharing what I learned about the scene too in a separate post, if anyone sees any use of it). I intentionally didn’t limit myself to brand new gear only, quietly hoping that this set range could get me an even pre-power amp combo that way.

This is how the process worked:

• I decided to leave the tube amps out of this search even if I stumbled upon any that would work cost-wise. I am afraid they would prove a bit impractical in everyday family use in a normal living room even though I very much do like how some of them sound with analogue and digital sources alike. Peculiar designs, half-an-hour warm-up times, maintenance of tubes, hot parts that kids could find inappropriately interesting are some examples of issues that I decided not to tackle.
• I filtered out a number of mass producers from my selection: Denon, Onkyo, Marantz, Pioneer, Sony before I started and Harman-Kardon, NAD and Cambridge Audio as I read and thought  more. This is for a a few reasons:
  • You can logically expect more positive surprises from the lower end models of a generally high-end manufacturer than from the few isolated high-end models of a manufacturer 90% of whose effort goes into producing the cheapest multichannel receivers sold in supermarkets en masse. Audio equipment is a bit like musical instruments, smaller quantities, less automation and more expert engineer’s time and personal attention spent on each piece results in that little magic that make one violin sound better than the other.
  • Japanese electronics giants are leading the competition race of adding more and more adjacent features (digital enhancement and processing, more inputs of different kinds, etc), rather than iterating crazily on the core experience – amplification of music. As a result, they tend to end up sounding a bit dry, electric and sterile. I know this sort of generalization is unfair to some specific great-sounding models they produce, but these generally tend to be above my set price bracket.
• On the remaining subset of the market I did quite a number of hours of reading forum threads, magazine reviews and comparative tests, copying links and cut-outs to Evernote. You can’t and shouldn’t buy audio gear without listening, but having a general context of a market segment helps and particular reviews could point out benefits or concerns you might want to look to confirm when auditioning later. These are the sources I tend to pass through when doing basic research:
  • What HiFi – UK magazine with a structured database of lighter gear reviews, mostly from more mainstream-consumer end. Don’t rely on their 5-star ratings system blindly, but you can get some generic calibration done.
  • Stereophile – US magazine with very thorough reviews of a well-picked, mostly high-end equipment. With Forums.
  • SixMoons – thorough reviews of more obscure and higher-end gear hidden behind one of the most outdated and obscure user interfaces that made it over the 21st century line on the world wide web.
  • AVForums and AVSForum (talk about confusingly close brand names!) are usually too bottomless and varied in conversation quality to read thread-by-thread, but you will find popping up among google search results very often with valuable nuggets.
  • AudioReviews – a generic consumer review site with slightly structured user generated content. Quite randomly gives you good insight into comparison shopping and equipment matching.
• I emerged with a shortlist of amplifiers that fit my criteria and thus I wanted to hear:
  • Naim Nait 5i and Nait XS
  • Primare i30 or i32
  • Densen Beat B200 + B300/B305 (second-hand pre/poweramp sets)
  • (Peachtree iDecco, Roksan Kandy K2 and Cyrus 6XP had to drop as not being available in town)
• I sent out emails to 5-6 local HiFi vendors asking for audition availability of the above or their likely recommendations of something similar. Sat back.

Auditions

As I was not up for a caravan of first-round home auditions, I then had to drop by a few studios and knowingly leave some differences up to their cabling, room configuration and transports. I could listen to almost all of the amps driving Audes Credo Blues floorstanders at least, probably one of my most favourite speakers of all time that I have owned to date. They are easier to drive than my current Maestros, but I roughly know how much so.

And of course you just have to bring your own CDs with a few regular test tracks you know very well.

Naim

There is a healthy subculture (not to say a religion) of devoted Naim people out there. They cherish the unique PRaT (“Pace, Rythm and Timing”) characteristic of their gear and happily close an eye on some of the quirks of the series, such as their stubborn use of proprietary DIN connectors (mostly duplicated by more common RCAs) for chaining audio components and their upgrade options. These peculiarities and overall design aesthetics seem to convey the subtle message that you’d be best off with a Naim setup from playback device to speakers. Probably true both qualitatively for you and commercially for them.

However, based on my audition, a stand-alone Naim amp in an otherwise non-Naim setup would be a great addition to almost any sytem in this price range. Even the entry level, sub-1000EUR Nait 5i was able to reveal forgotten sounds from the familiar discs, keep the drums’ punching, mid-bass where it should be and not getting a single high note mudded into it. You could call the soundstage a bit narrow, but still make out the virtual positions of instruments in the air between speakers.

Where the 5i seriously lacks is sheer power. Driving the Blues speakers it started to really live only after cranked up at 80% of the volume – with Maestros that would be even worse.

• Verdict: If I had a pair of nice bookself speakers in a 15 sq. m. room to feed, I would have walked home with a Nait right then for the sound of it. Unfortunately it’s next bigger and but more powerful brother, Nait XS was sold out for the moment and thus I moved on.
  • (A friend invited me to a home listening of his Supernait (basically Nait XS with built in DAC, priced well higher as a result) and there is an XS coming in very soon, so I might come back and revise the opinion here.)

Densen

Theoretically the country of origin should not influence audio engineering that much, but it does. If not for the sound (and there are different schools), then definitely the minimalist looks and user interface of this Danish  manufacturer are as Scandinavian as pickled herring or cross-country skiing. The only thing neater than a box with a single button is a box with no buttons, right?

Sound-wise I was hoping to hear more of a difference from the only pre-power amp combo among the integrated amps auditioned. There was nothing really to complain about with vocals and acoustic guitars, but when you take the Densen B200 & B300 brothers to electronica they just act as if they have been recruited to military. Their answers are reserved, clear and accurate, but without spark, enthusiasm or excitement about what’s ahead. Plus, sheer power-wise these separates were in as much trouble feeding the Blues as the lowest end Nait… The preciseness of bass was there, but the presence not.

An experimental switch to an alternative power amp (Advance Acoustic MAA 406) improved things a bit, but not by an order of magnitude.

• Verdict: Precise, clear and detailed (maybe “nordic” as intended?) but notably less musical and inviting than Naim.

Primare

There is something interesting going on with this other Scandinavian’s integrated amps. I30 has been very highly regarded in its class for years, but it is just old. Components, technologies and competition move at their own pace and so Primare decided to go for a bigger revamp with I32. As a result, you get quite a few people discussing around the forums how it has become more digital, more compressed and controlled by sound – not necessarily all good things, despite of the added flair of onboard DAC upgrades and digital inputs.

I was lucky to find an “old” I30 still stocked and went in for the listen. Unfortunately this particular place had it paired with only Monitor Audio lineups of speakers – fine, but incomparable with my experience. Presuming Monitor Audios to be relatively neutral and transparent of speakers — hard for me to imagine how the I32 could go even more unpretentious than the I30 was. Easy listening but not much to remember and share.

As the guy running the place was more interested in pushing the sale and talking pricing rather than listening for a second about my setup and interest in comparative auditions, I just left.

• Verdict: Meh. Quite a “light Densen” based on the limited listen.

Accuphase

Next to the Naim and Densens there was an Accuphase E-213 hooked up – out of the set price constraint, but I decided to benchmark nevertheless. And glad I did, as this maker has a totally different approach to sound characteristics than the others in the bunch. The soundstage presented was much wider and more layered, pinpointing nuances (both subtle instruments as well as potential recording mistakes). There was enough power to go around for the Blues, and enough detail in both the bass drum and hithat.

Everything positive said, the overall sensation I was left with resembled listening to a live act in an open air concert through low fog of a summer night. You’re close, the music is there all right, but somehow you don’t get quite immersed to it.

• Verdict: out of the 2k EUR cap of this test, but worth a listen to calibrate what you really like.

Heed Audio

And finally on to a surprise. One of the emails I sent out came back saying: “haven’t got what you asked for, but you should listen to this before you decide”. And so I did: Heed Audio Obelisk Si + Obelisk X2 Power Supply.

It is basically a tiny (half-size) super minimalistic integrated amp, which optionally comes with another shoebox of a power supply you can plug in to separately feed the power amp stage. Two buttons, numbered inputs and a few LEDs, that’s it. And it is made by fellow Fenno-Ugric Hungarians improving upon an original British design.

What is not small or minimalistic is its sound. It has plenty of that infamous PRaT that, as it comes out, isn’t a Naim exclusive afterall. And at the same time, it somehow feels more open and intelligent, less obsessed with being “pratty”, but rather taking the time for every note to sound to it’s full length. It is fast and affirmative enough for a house track while letting me know for the first time how the nuances differ depending if a musician pushes or pulls his arm on a violin in Arvo Pärt’s Spiegel Im Spiegel. Frankly, I did not expect to get into this territory of audioholism in the harsh envelope I set myself.

There is a very well written full review of this pair you should read for more technical detail.

• Verdict: Imagine if a Nait had a baby with a tube amp. The resulting Obelisk sits in my audio rack as I write this and I don’t think it is going back to the studio.

Learnings

This post is not intended to sell you a piece of equipment, as usual, the hifi (and even mid-fi as this more realistically is) world is one of music, personal tastes, informed and emotional choices, matching pieces of electronic musical equipment with each other and to your listening environment. Yada-yada-yada. It is important to have fun in the process and I hope some of the thoughts and pointers above just expand your options.

As we recently discussed with a friend, the most fun part about buying audio gear is learning new things for yourself. My new takeaways from this few days session are:

• Audition with someone you get along with. Doesn’t matter if you actually know what you want to do – the owner of gear needs to come along with it. One manufacturer basically dropped from this selection for a salesman who was on a completely different wavelength.
• Set yourself hard price limits to stay sane. Agree with yourself what you can or want to spend and stick to it – auditions will become so much easier. There is always something a few hundred or thousand euros more that you can honestly say you understand and like even better – but it doesn’t matter.
• Watts really, really don’t matter. I knew that before of course, but hadn’t seen displayed so explicitly in the comparision of a 120W per channel Densen being easily outperformed by nominally 80W Heed when driving large 4Ohm speakers.
• Trying to characterize sound with words is hard, but fun. It is like describing the taste of wine. I’ve read many reviews, but never tried to write one – so here we go: check.

Thank you: HiFi Klubi, Hertsius, HiFi Studio, Henrik, Elite Audio, Alfred.

More than 30 years (an eternity!) have passed since the first word processor and email clients, but there are still new ones entering the market iterating further to remove “unnecessary obstacles” and to get out of the way from the user’s intent: to write stuff and send it away. (See: WriteRoom or Sparrow).

Almost every time I ask a stranger about what they like or dislike about Skype software, it goes something like this:

Well, I like how I simply click on my relative’s name and then just click the green button and then she appears on the entire screen and we can just talk for an hour. It is so cool, it feels like being in the same room! Last week I was talking to my grandma, who has been living in Australia for….

See what just happened there? From the second sentence in giving feedback on software, the software dissapeared. What remained was just the human experience, the long distance relationships and stories about people. The holy grail of great software: becoming invisible, transparent for the user.

Software that Wants to Get in Your Way

Now, on this backdrop, it seems that there still is a counter-current of software that does get in the way of the user intentionally. Note that I do not mean just badly designed software here or  some godawful legacy enterprise application built in COBOL and green-on-balck terminals, eating the productivity of whiteish-blue collar insurance clerks for breakfast, lunch and early dinner.

And generally, even technologically modern and well-designed corporate applications get some slack for getting in the way of their users. After all, every organization has the ways of working it wants it’s employees or partners to standardize on and behaviours it wants to bluntly enforce. It you need a certain doublechecking to happen for SOX compliance or your software development process requires every task to be estimated before entering a sprint backlog – it is probably one of the simplest and most effective ways to knowingly build a few obstacles, nags and annoyances into your enterprise software to enforce people to do the right thing. You know, a little extra checkbox here or mandatory form field there.

Where it gets interesting if  you look at consumer internet software and mobile apps that contain those obstacles in their user experience. There is no enterprise lock-in after an expensive purchase, there is no hierarchy with top-down pressure to use those apps, there are tons of cheap of free competitors to turn to instead. And still, for some weird reason, users love some apps that distract them on their purest way of doing something. In most cases – probably despite of the nags. But in a few elite winners – for the obstacles.

Let me give you a few examples:

• (UPDATE) Twitter‘s notorious 140-character limit. From one side it is a limit derived from SMS (160char minus room for @username), but on the other hand there are no such external limits on messages transported over internet. SMS compatibility could have been addressed by other means, such as truncation and thus this global limit on messages was a design choice by Twitter that has influenced their DNA massively.
• Path, a mobile photo sharing app which artificially limits max number of your contacts to 50. In the rat race between social networks for who gets to grow their users’  connection graphs the fastest, it was an eyebrow-raising move, but their users love them for the purity of sharing pictures with just their closest ones. And the pressure to think twice before accepting someone in.
• GMail has a few tongue-in-cheek dialogues built in that, if you look from the UX purists’ point of way, get right smack in the way of doing the core thing people come to a mail client for, sending a message:
  • GMail can actually stop you from sending a message at a weird hour unless you can solve a few math puzzles. So you can prove you’re sober enough before doing something you might regret later.
  • They also stop you with a warning dialogue when attempting to send a message without an attachment… when your message text refers to having one.

Call for Discussion

Firstly, I would love if you can think of additional examples and submit them in the comments!

For example, one immense area to think about is advertising inside web apps (not just content sites) and in mobile apps. Slapping a banner with animated penguins in front of the “OK” button user intended to press is bad for the experience. On the other hand, Google’s search users are known to confess that text ads often enhance their experience to find what they’re looking for. What makes advertising part of the experience?

Trying to generalize it seems that while a piece of software that in its entirety gets in a way of the user attempting to achieve their goals can not be considered a good user experience, carefully picking the moments to get in the way of the user on the feature level can actually be a good thing.

How to recognize the those moments? From the few examples above one might say that the motivation is to avoid something negative, to protect the user from acting silly (aka being human) – like confirming every incoming contact request as their “friend” to avoid insulting anyone. And it would be likely that there can be cases of positive motivation too – helping a user to achieve more than they expected.

What do you think?

UPDATE: Realized this could be a Quora question too and added it. So wherever you’d like to chip in.