My name is Michael Cardell Widerkrantz. People usually call me "MC".
Above you can see me in front of the CDC 6500 console at Seattle's Living Computers museum when I visited in 2017.
I live in Malmö in the south of Sweden with my wife Petra and our kid. My two grown kids Ludvig and Gabriel have moved out.
Too see what I've been up to lately, see my now page.
Since I work from Malmö and all my colleagues are elsewhere they mostly see me like this:
Or like this on Github:
-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-----
Version: 3.12
GCS/L/P d--@ s+:-- !a C++(++++) UBL++++$ P++$ L++$ E+++ W- N+++ o+
K++ w O- M V PS+++ PE Y++ PGP++ t 5 X+@ R@ !tv b+++ DI++ D--- G e++
h---- r+++ y?
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------
Explained and commented version.
I work as an applied researcher and programmer at Tillitis, a small company building security hardware. Tillitis spun off from Mullvad VPN in late 2022.
When my youngest was very young I was a stay-at-home dad for roughly two years. I believe this was very good for both of us.
Before that I worked as your regular C/Unix code monkey for many years. See résumé for the boring details.
I also maintain the servers for hack.org and some vanity domains hosted there.
I was born and grew up in the vicinity of Hudiksvall in the north of Sweden. I discovered computers and programming in 1981 but couldn't afford a computer of my own until 1985 when I bought a horrible Commodore Plus 4 for a bargain. Read more about current and previous computers.
I was bullied through primary school but somehow managed to survive. Computers, books and music helped. In upper secondary school I completed some courses ahead of time to get more time with computers. Like it says in the Kraftwerk song: "It's more fun to compute!"
More or less by chance I moved to Linköping in 1991, ostensibly to study at Linköping University (BA 1994), then discovered the Lysator Academic Computer Society, met my first wife Helena, had some kids, got my first real job and ended up spending a surprisingly long time there.
For a few years I lived in a large collective house complex in Linköping, Stolplyckan, then moved to a small intentional community, The T1 Collective. Later we formed The Area 41 Collective. Four adults, two kids, and 18 computers!
I lived for a year in Gothenburg 2001-2002, then back to Area 41.
In 2004 Petra, myself and the kids moved to Malmö in the south of Sweden, again more or less by chance.
Like Andrew Eldritch says, "Books are the best technology there is". We have at least eleven bookcases full of SF & F and arcana of everything from politics, medicine, history, linguistics, computer science to conspiracy theories and scientific scepticism, and all things in-between.
I listen to a lot of music. I'm fond of saying I'm an old punk that somehow discovered electronic music. I mostly listen to a lot of industrial, dark/cold wave, neofolk and other vaguely gothy stuff, but also a lot of classical music and, yes, some punk.
As you can probably guess, computers are one of my main interests. I'm especially interested in operating systems, network protocols and systems software but also minimalist user interface design and typesetting.
I have re-occuring episodes of retro-computing, where I typically read about or try out some more or less forgotten CPU architecture, operating system or programming language.
I probably spend too much time with my computers. I try to limit the tube time by not having a TV set and working part time (30 hour week), so I can spend time with my family, my books, my bikes, and my sword.
I practise in the German school of longsword fighting at MHFS since a few years. Still a noob at sparring but slowly learning. The pandemic didn't help, but I'm happy to have high ceilings in the flat and understanding neighbours in the cottage, so I could at least get some cutting practice.
I also train at a gym and bike everywhere on minimalist bicycles.
This is The Goth Bike, a 46:16 singlespeed I use in the city:
A long time ago I practised aikidō.
I'm very fond of downhill skiing both in and off piste. Not much of that here in southern Sweden, though, but I usually get about 20 days of skiing per season.
I have been practising zazen since 1988. This probably makes me a (rather secular) zen buddhist.
Until 1991 I was a member of the Northern Lights sangha in Hudiksvall, at the time loosely affiliated with the Diamond Sangha network of Robert Aitken roshi.
In 1991 I started and maintained the mailing list Universal Zendo until I left it in better hands in the mid-90s.
While being religious in a way (Buddhist, duh!), I also enjoy a healthy scientific scepticism. As a friend once said: “New age rhymes with sewage”.
After many years as an ovo-lacto vegetarian I started to follow a vegan lifestyle in 2004.
To quote the british Vegan Society:
Veganism is a way of living that seeks to exclude, as far as possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing and any other purpose.
This means I don't eat meat (including fish), dairy, eggs or anything that comes from animals or is harvested from animals. It also means I try to avoid the use of leather and other byproducts of slaughter or the keeping of animals.
I have put together some notes about a vegan lifestyle (in Swedish).
My political leanings are toward libertarian socialism or, if you like, classical European anarchism.
I have a history as a non-violent libertarian socialist activist beginning in a punk environment in the 1980s. One of the most notable achievements is co-founding the Spunk Library text archive in 1992.
As a pacifist and antimilitarist I was a conscientious objector when drafted into the Swedish armed forces. Looking back a few years later, I wrote an amusing text about it. In Swedish, I'm afraid.
Last updated: <2022-11-26 13:41:56 MET>