I really enjoyed the link from raph on taste and beauty. It ranks with other reading I've pulled from this site, namely Richard Gabriel's essay on Mob Software. I found the following quote particularly engaging:

In architecture and design, this principle means that a building or object should let you use it how you want: a good building, for example, will serve as a backdrop for whatever life people want to lead in it, instead of making them live as if they were executing a program written by the architect.

Wow; how true, and one of the driving forces behind my dig on available source code and a sharing community. Communities such as these allow the inhabitants to make their future on a shared canvas.

A friend recently had a "breaking through" point in her work. I can't help but think, wow, how amazing is it to be able to watch and share in that point? How often do we get to participate (whether through creation or observation) in someone's most creative driving endeavor and then get to savor the results, knowing the path that took us there all along? Awash in the possibilities that have in turn unfurled. The public source scene allows the same possibility: to partake or watch in something entirely creative, and to make the outcome more yours. It's those possibilities that make my life worth living.

Now it's time to water my plants.