A Kludge in the Works

Until further notice

2009-10-06T11:38:00.000-07:00

I'm done with blogger. Until I have the specifics worked out, at which point I'll drop all the information here, enjoy the Uglistick:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e32gWJt7XDo

2009-09-14T13:44:00.000-07:00

Blog spot seems to be shitting itself, again. Will be moving the blog soonish- as in whenever I get regular internet access (sometime in the next two weeks). Any recommendations/preferences on where to move it?

Parenthood

2009-09-09T08:32:00.000-07:00

It is noting special to be a parent or have a kid. Any retard with working sex organs can reproduce. Parenting isn't about knocking someone up, it's about actually being there and raising the children. It's not about forcing the offspring into rigid modes of dogmatic acceptance, either. It's more about gardening.

Good parents aren't those that indoctrinate their children into being mindless clones imitating mommy/daddy. Good parents guide, direct, and nurture growth. They don't force it into a singular expression. It's the difference between bonsai and bell peppers.

Bonsai are constantly clipped, modified, formed, and manipulated until they become the desired shape. Bell peppers are planted, given water, weeded, stressed at certain points to provide varieties of color, texture, and taste. As should be apparent, it's a thin line- sometimes- between the one and the other.

Shitting out a kid, abandoning it, but paying lipservice to your own parentalship, that's certainly not parenting.

Drugs are Kewl!

2009-09-05T09:53:00.000-07:00

Last month disappeared into the Hellishness of the Great White North that is Indiana- the high one day in AUGUST was only 60-something. But, more on that will have to wait. Especially since I'm not done up here, yet.

However, drugs have been much on my mind lately. And today, Warren Ellis has pointed me at an article about the way the Ancient Greeks and Romans looked at/used psychoactive drugs.

Sure, it makes sense that the Greeks and Romans used psychoactives. Fits right into the conceptions I was taught of self-indulgent orgies, vomitariums, et cetera. No problems with all that; but the person writing the article makes a lot of common, and stupid, assertions about drug use in general.

"[...]cannabis can alter your perception of reality, not just your mood.

Reports of psychoactive drug experiences tend to support the idea that the user can become aware of multiple levels of reality all present simultaneously that are far more complex and yet more harmonious and unified than normal experience permits her to perceive. All sorts of understandings are possible, based on the particular mind and the particular drug[...]"

Bullshit.

Those "higher levels" only existed from the time the drug's chemicals invade the brain meats to the time they are flushed out of those same brain meats. Subjective PSYCHOlogical ACTIVity in the head of a person on psychoactive drugs is not what I'd call supporting tendency in "reports". Without the drugs no one ever experiences those higher levels (excluding such abnormal phenomenon as Left Temporal Lobe Epilepsy, and similar events). If no one had ever taken the drugs we wouldn't talk about these "altered states". The drugs create the effects, they don't grant access to otherwise unattainable levels of existence. Anyone who would contend otherwise should feel free to take some objective, rigorous, experimental sensor readings to indicate the existence of these other "planes". fMRI wouldn't qualify- blood flow to certain areas of the brain would, indeed, (seem to) indicate higher levels of activity in those areas, which would be exactly what we expect due to the cognitive skewing of the psychoactive drug(s).

Guess what: Reality is Real. Bullshit some assholes believe because it seemed real when they were trippin' off acid (when they knew they shouldn't have kicked it with them spider monkeys) is bullshit. Drugs aren't bad, per se; and that's an argument for a different time. My point is that drugs aren't some aid to the mystical. The mystical is bullshit, emergent effects from the psychoactive response in the brain- not real. Anyone who goes all misty/starry eyed when talking about the vast levels of consciousness accessible through the gateway of little chemical packages is fooling themselves. Which is probably pretty easy since their little drug-friends have probably rotted holes in the bits they're trying to think with.

Power

2009-07-31T06:02:00.001-07:00

Power Outages suck.

12 Hours of same is even more suck.

Back now, for the day, at least.

Back

2009-07-30T00:45:00.000-07:00

Sorted.

So, let's begin:

Slashdot pointed me to:

An Article by David Pogue:

15-SECOND INSTRUCTIONS This one makes me crazy. When I call to leave you a voicemail message, the first thing I hear, before I’m allowed to hear the beep, is 15 seconds of instructions. “To page this person, press 5.” Page this person!? Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize this was 1980! “When you have finished recording, you may hang up.” Oh, really!? So glad you mentioned that! I would have stayed on the line forever!

And then when I call in for messages, I’m held up for 15 more seconds. “To listen to your messages, press 1.” Why else would I be calling!?

(Yes, there are key-presses that can bypass the instructions. But they’re different for each carrier. When you call someone, you’re supposed to know which carrier that person uses and which key to press? Sure.)

Is this really so evil? Is 15 seconds here and there that big a deal? Well, Verizon has 70 million customers. If each customer leaves one message and checks voicemail once a day, Verizon rakes in — are you sitting down? — $850 million a year. That’s right: $850 million, just from making us sit through those 15-second airtime-eating instructions.

Update

2009-07-05T08:52:00.000-07:00

Still no fix on the computer front, yet. Should have it resolved by August- I hope.

So... Yeah...

Computer Troubles And More!

2009-06-17T17:35:00.000-07:00

I've been having computer troubles since a little over a week ago. Catastrophic failure has been averted; but I'm not sure for how long. So, in case there's a long pause here while I scrounge and scrimp and build a new frankensteinian internet terminal, I'll ramble on about my weekend at Bonaroo '09 after the fold...

Yes, yes, I went to Bonaroo. {see here, and here for generic details} We paid for the cheap-o regular tickets- roughly $270-ish after all the fees, etc. Four days of Primitive Camping, with porta-potties and a half mile walk into the center festival area. We- I went with my sister, her "wife", and some hippies- arrived Thursday night and stayed through Monday morning. It was... interesting. A bit disappointing- okay A LOT of a bit- but also vaguely cool and fun in ways that probably had more to do with the people I was with than the location.

Sunday, while firmly entrenched beneath a tarp for further protection from the sun, I wrote a little piece about the profound problems I kept running into face-first.

-------------

Ah, Bonaroo. The heat, the mud, the stench of burning skunk, and human shit. The scantily clad women and men, the burning red glare of sunburned flesh, and the rage inducing sight of morning joggers hoofing it around the 700 acres of tents and RVs. The three women wearing only paint on their exposed chest-icles. The copious amounts of frat boys sheathed in greek letters, false bravado, and beer pong tables.

I'm forced to contemplate the dried on mud, the ants, and especially the faux hippies. Do they know they're faking it? Does everyone else? What happens at the instant they become authentic, when faking it has become making it? Do they notice? Or does it take such a profound naivety and refusal to acknowledge reality, that they will have long before convinced themselves that THEY are the real deal- while everyone else is just a hippie hater?

Afterall, they will have, naturally, gravitated to the external reinforcement of other wanna-bes. The profound stupidity of the ones who try so hard to be free, counter-cultural, and relevant while miming slogans and ideals invented decades ago, buying fake authentic organic free-range cotton blended skirts at L. L. Bean, and spending daddy's money on drugs of varying quality and quantity, goes unnoticed by those guilty of perpetrating. Instead, they see their own ideas reflected in perfect detail by a hundred thousand others and bask in their own original brilliance, convinced of their ability to effect the change that hasn't happened during the nearly fifty years of peace, love, and funky munkeys. I'm my own bi-sexual, independent, free, and proactive vector for a beter world- making a change by singing along to Ani Difranco's cover of a hundred year old Union Hymn, thirty miles north of, virtually union free, Alabama.

Hand in hand with the huge recycling, composting, and conservation intitiatives among thirty thousand gas guzzling behemoths- not a Prius in sight- and enough poly-plastics to choke every dolphin, manatee, and whale that has (or will) ever lived.

But that Grateful Dead sticker/flag/t-shirt on the car/RV/100% water resistant, non-biodegradable tent makes them a rebel- just like everyone else...

Maybe I'm being too harsh.

There are ALL kinds, and it takes them all, right?

'Cause when I think huge hippie hug music fest, I think the Neo-Conservative HEART of the bible Belt in Southernmost Tennessee. Because the many hundreds of porta-potties- serviced and chemically cleaned three times daily- and the nigh $300 cheap tickets beam wavey gravey straight into MY brains. I mean, where else would one fo to watch Bruce Springsteen and Snoop Dog and Nine Inch Nails but a peace, love, and happiness festival sponsered by FUSE, Butterfinger, and Xbox 360? Now with free, seven dollar, showers! And a tent to recharge your cellphone while you check your email and update your twitter. New Media makes you edgy, hip, and culturally relevant! (This message brought to you by Vitamin Water PLUS by Coca Cola...)

Then again, four days of primitive camping with the sounds of generators- for the RVs, the lights, pavillions, and occasional camper- that does take a certain amount of comitment. Hence the ubiquitous smell of dank stanky 'anky... or is that human shit? Best not to think about it, like that mud in front of the porta-'lets that sucked your inorganic, petroleum based, flip-flop off your foot and squished up past the blisters on your toes.

Groovy.

You tool.

----------

Having said that, it wasn't all bad. It's an interesting experience, and if you're an upwardly mobile recent college graduate, or a frat boy, or attracted to either of those, you'll probably love it (assuming you can stand the opressive heat of the southern summer). But the line-ups are kinda stupid, and the hour to hour and a half sets that stagger means there will be many times where you watch one show for thirty minutes, catch the last thirty of another, and the final thirty of a third before waiting an hour or three for the next set. Just check to make sure you have ample amounts of portable shade, sunblock, hydration (and electrolytes), and resolve. Ensuring that you give a crap about the line-up, optional...

But don't expect it to be anything like what the advertising material claims. (Maybe if you fork out the $700 for the cheapest VIP tickets... maybe...)

2009-06-06T12:40:00.000-07:00

From BoingBoing:

I love this guys lectures. I watched both of his on primate sexuality, and highly recommend them. (They are linked towards the bottom of the Boing Boing article, linked above.)

Warren Ellis

2009-06-05T00:26:00.000-07:00

Seriously one of the best authors of entertaining, often thought provoking, word pictures today. Warren Ellis' third column for Wired UK is online, and it's a great read:

"UK booksellers are not yet reduced to the condition of their American cousins, who have gone beyond firing staff and are now using their bodies for food and heat. They fear the Kindle like it was the breath of the devil’s cock on their shoulder – despite the fact that Mr Bezos’s clever little board has probably not sold a million units yet. Because, as any American bookseller will shriek at you while gouging their own forearms open with Stanley knives, only 34 Americans actually buy and read books. As far as they’re concerned, the Kindle emerged directly from Satan’s mangina and will doom them all.

We have no such fear here in Britain. Here, the threat to reading comes only from our education system – and the fact that most children are born to 15-year-old foetal-alcohol-syndrome cases."

(first seen at WarrenEllis.com)

-or-

Displayed to EVERYONE...

Hidden, except for interested readers.

200

2009-06-05T00:22:00.000-07:00

Arbitrary title of convenience; also: true.

Which reminds me... Who was it that first noted it was "Harry Potter and the Adjective Noun"?

-or-

Displayed to EVERYONE...

Hidden, except for interested readers.

Bill, Killed.

2009-06-05T00:18:00.000-07:00

David Carradine Died. Looks to be suicide.

The Body Politik

2009-06-04T05:01:00.000-07:00

I'd like to have my own country, somewhere. Not a super power, per se; but a big chunk o land where I could rule as the benevolent dictator. I assume this is something of a common fantasy. And fantasy it is, because I'd want it to be America; but right... and Ruled Solely by ME.

A perfect place I could escape to every 4-8 years when the others take back over.

In a fantasy world, where everyone would instantly recognize and worship my obvious brilliance.

But, eventually, I'd never come back. I mean a lot of the time, my side is just as stupid as theirs.

But at least it'd be a constant 76 degrees, night and day, on my utopian isle of MINE-ness...

The Daily Show

2009-06-03T22:13:00.000-07:00

Bob Woodward was on Monday.

Douche.

l2 not be a fear mongering idiot.

Sotomayor (OVER 9000 DAYS AND PARTS!!!1)

2009-06-03T10:17:00.000-07:00

I'm putting this here as much for me, as I want to read these, but have other things- currently. I'll make some comments on them, later...

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/06/high-court-nominee-adopts-riaa-stance/
High-Court Nominee Mirrors Industry Copyright Stance — Update

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/29/1822251&tid=123
Supreme Court Nominee Sotomayor's Cyberlaw Record

Tomorrow

2009-06-03T08:59:00.000-07:00

20 years, tomorrow- June 4th. 1989. I was 8.

20 years since students tried to take what was, in this country is considered inalienably, theirs. And a lot of them got shot for it.

20 years, since protesters around China stood in defiance for what was only being paid lip service, The People. 20 years since people had to keep quiet or disappear. 20 years. And the youngest don't even know. "Lot of people in the streets then, I hear." 20 years since hard choices, and blood won the expansion of the cage.

4 essays: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/31/opinion/31tiananmen.html?_r=1

Even twenty years ago it took blood sacrifices to force the hand of The Powerful. If they can't remember it there, we should do them the honor of remembering it here.

News flash

2009-06-02T10:00:00.000-07:00

Good News:
I finished a story whose ending has been troubling me for months. The key? "If you're stuck on a scene, the problem is in the scene before it." That was and wasn't the case; but it helped me figure out the solution.

Bad News:
Probably not going to post anything else today; and more stuff to get done tomorrow means the same for then, too. We'll see.

Sotomayor, Day Two, (pt I)

2009-05-29T12:09:00.000-07:00

Student versus Douchebags.
Doninger v Neihoff
http://www.citmedialaw.org/sites/citmedialaw.org/files/2008-05-29-Doninger%20Second%20Circuit%20Opinion.pdf

"Avery Doninger (“Avery”), was disqualified from running for Senior Class Secretary after she posted a vulgar and misleading message about the supposed cancellation of an upcoming school event on an independently operated, publicly accessible web log (or “blog”)."

and

"Because Avery’s blog post created a foreseeable risk of substantial disruption at LMHS, we conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion."

The characterization of the "vulgar and misleading" bothers me, as does the "foreseeable risk of substantial disruption".

But:

"Doninger, alleging principally a violation of her daughter’s First Amendment rights, moved for a preliminary injunction voiding the election for Senior Class Secretary and ordering the school either to hold a new election in which Avery would be allowed to participate or to grant Avery the same title, honors, and obligations as the student elected to the position, including the privilege of speaking as a class officer at graduation. The district court denied the motion, concluding that Doninger had failed to show a sufficient likelihood of success on the merits."

{Which may seem a little flaky asking the court to do that, but it's later revealed that as a write-in candidate Avery still won, even without campaigning or having her name on the ballot.}

Additional Info:
Student council had rescheduled Jamfest- a battle of the bands- twice. On the new date, the teacher- who was to run lighting and sound- was unavailable. Administrators wanted it moved to the cafeteria or the date changed. Student Council said the cafeteria would require acoustic instruments and problems for the bands who would need to change their sets. Student Council also worried that changing the date would cause bands to drop out of the competition.

Avery, and three other Student Council members, got on one of their father's email accounts, and informed the broader community "to the Jamfest situation and enlisting help in persuading school officials to let Jamfest take place in the auditorium as scheduled. The four students met at the school’s computer lab that morning and accessed one of their fathers’ email account. They drafted a message to be sent to a large number of email addresses in the account’s address book, as well as to additional names that Avery provided. The message stated, in substance, that the administration had decided that the Student Council could not hold Jamfest in the auditorium because Miller was unavailable. It requested recipients to contact Paula Schwartz, the district superintendent, to urge that Jamfest be held as scheduled, as well as to forward the email “to as many people as you can.” All four students signed their names and sent the email. The message was sent out again later that morning to correct an error in the telephone number for Schwartz’s office."

The Principal was mad. Avery says the principal told her she was very upset and that Jamfest would be cancelled. The principal says that's not true. The principal was upset the student council didn't come to her or the superintendent first. "[The Principal] testified that class officers are expected to work cooperatively with their faculty advisor and with the administration in carrying out Student Council objectives. They are charged, in addition, with “demonstrat[ing] qualities of good citizenship at all times.”" District Court found for the Principal, on what was/wasn't said. Avery and Principal Niehoff, according to the principal, decided a corrective email would be sent out that night.

"That night, however, Avery posted a message on her publicly accessible blog, which was hosted by livejournal.com, a website unaffiliated with LMHS"

"jamfest is cancelled due to douchebags in central office. here is an
email that we sent to a ton of people and asked them to forward to
everyone in their address book to help get support for jamfest.
basically, because we sent it out, Paula Schwartz is getting a TON of
phone calls and emails and such. we have so much support and we
really appriciate it. however, she got pissed off and decided to just
cancel the whole thing all together. anddd so basically we aren’t
going to have it at all, but in the slightest chance we do it is going to
be after the talent show on may 18th. andd..here is the letter we sent
out to parents."

She posted the original letter, then:

"And here is a letter my mom sent to Paula [Schwartz] and cc’d
Karissa [Niehoff] to get an idea of what to write if you want to write
something or call her to piss her off more. im down.—"

"Avery testified before the district court that “im down” meant that she approved of the idea of others contacting Schwartz to “piss her off more.” She stated that the purpose of posting the blog entry was “to encourage more people than the existing e-mail already encouraged to contact the administration” about Jamfest. The district court concluded that the content of the message itself suggested that her purpose was “to encourage her fellow students to read and respond to the blog.” Id. at 206. The district court also noted that “[s]everal LMHS students posted comments to the blog, including one in which the author referred to Ms. Schwartz as a ‘dirty whore.’” Id. at 206-07."

There was a meeting. Jamfest was rescheduled. Avery says they didn't mention the propriety of mass emails to criticize the administration.

"According to the district court, however, Schwartz and Niehoff “at the very least, made clear to the students that appealing directly to the public was not an appropriate means of resolving complaints the students had regarding school administrators’ decisions.” Id. at 207. The district court also found that, as a result of the Jamfest controversy, both Schwartz and Niehoff were forced to miss or arrived late to several school-related activities scheduled for April 24 and April 25."

[ASIDE] Are you noticing a pattern, here? Anytime the kid disagrees with the "adults" the kid is wrong.... I wish I could see the actual court records to discover why that was. I'm not sure there are many kids who could, or would, lie under oath on the stand at a District Court. After all, according to the Army, 85% of people break- are unable/unwilling to resist telling the truth- on direct questioning. Anyway... [/aside]

The superintendent's adult sun used a search engine and found the blog post a few days later. The superintendent showed the principal, who researched Conn. education law, and the school's policies. The principal decided that due to the "vulgar" and "inaccurate" information in the post, and due to Avery not taking her counsel on how to appropriately deal with addressing issues of concern, "Niehoff concluded that Avery’s conduct had failed to display the civility and good citizenship expected of class officers." "Niehoff decided that Avery should be prohibited from running for Senior Class Secretary. Because Avery had Advanced Placement exams at that time, however, Niehoff chose not to confront her immediately."

A few weeks later, Avery goes to accept her nomination as Senior Class Secretary. Niehoff hands her a print out of the blog post. Demands a written apology tot h superintendent, that Avery show the post to her mother, and that Avery withdraw her nomination. Avery complies with the first two portions. Niehoff withholds Avery's administrative endorsement, "which effectively prohibited her from running for Senior Class Secretary, though Avery was permitted to retain her positions as representative on the Student Council and as Junior Class Secretary."

Niehoff says her decision was based on:
"(1) Avery’s failure to accept her counsel “regarding the proper means of expressing disagreement with administration policy and seeking to resolve those disagreements”; (2) the vulgar language and inaccurate information included in the post; and (3) its encouragement of others to contact the central office “to piss [Schwartz] off more,” which Niehoff did not consider appropriate behavior for a class officer"

"Even though she was not permitted to be on the ballot or to campaign, Avery received a plurality of the votes for Senior Class Secretary as a write-in candidate. The school did not permit her to take office, however, and the second-place candidate became class secretary for the Class of 2008."

Avery's mom sued.

"Schwartz and Niehoff removed the action to the District of Connecticut. Doninger filed a motion for a preliminary injunction. The district court developed the facts outlined here from exhibits, affidavits, deposition testimony, and the hearing testimony of ten live witnesses, including students, faculty, administrators, and parents. The district court concluded that a preliminary injunction was not warranted because Doninger did not show a sufficient likelihood of success on the merits. This appeal followed."

Discussion:

The court agrees that there's been harm to Avery's First Amendment Rights; but the second part of the question is whether Avery's mom's suit has "demonstrated a clear or substantial likelihood of success on the merits."

"The Supreme Court has yet to speak on the scope of a school’s authority to regulate expression that, like Avery’s, does not occur on school grounds or at a school-sponsored event. We have determined, however, that a student may be disciplined for expressive conduct, even conduct occurring off school grounds, when this conduct “would foreseeably create a risk of substantial disruption within the school environment,” at least when it was similarly foreseeable that the off-
12 campus expression might also reach campus. Wisniewski v. Bd. of Educ., 494 F.3d 34, 40 (2d Cir. 2007), cert. denied, 128 S. Ct. — (2008).[size=85]1[/size]"

[size=85]1[/size] The Wisniewski panel divided on the question whether it was necessary in that case to show that it was reasonably foreseeable that the expression at issue would reach school property. Two panel members concluded that the undisputed fact that it did so “pretermit[ted] any inquiry as to this aspect of reasonable foreseeability.” 494 F.3d at 39.

"[A]s Judge Newman accurately observed some years ago, “territoriality is not necessarily a useful concept in determining the limit of [school administrators’] authority.” [Thomas v Board of Education]. True enough in 1979, this observation is even more apt today, when students both on and off campus routinely participate in school affairs, as well as in other expressive activity unrelated to the school community, via blog postings, instant messaging, and other forms of electronic communication."

The court says, essentially, that the blog post [i]could[/i] make its way onto school grounds- which would mean the case falls under Bethel Sch. Dist. No. 403 v. Fraser, 478 U.S. 675, 682 (1986) {or Fraser} which says that a student's offensive, vulgar, speech is not protected while on school grounds, even if that speech would be protected for an adult. It says that, in fact, since other students posted comments on Avery's blog, this is extremely likely.

The court says that the materials [i]could[/i] cause a disruption- and that the materials did, by making two people late to a couple meetings.

Therefore, as established in previous case law (from the 60s, 70s, and 80s) Avery's First Amendment rights don't protect her because this was all a school matter, under school jurisdiction and territoriality, effectively.

"[The case] bears similarity to Lowery v. Euverard, which involved a group of high school football players who were removed from the team after signing a petition expressing their hatred of the coach and their desire not to play for him. The players lodged a First Amendment claim and the Sixth Circuit determined that the relevant question under Tinker was whether it was reasonable for school officials “to forecast that the petition would disrupt the team” — meaning that the petition might foreseeably frustrate efforts to teach the values of sportsmanship and team cohesiveness through participation in sport as an extracurricular activity. Lowery, 497 F.3d at 593, 596. The court noted that the players had not been suspended from school or even prevented from further criticizing the coach: “[T]hey are free to continue their campaign to have Euverard fired. What they are not free to do is continue to play football for him while actively working to undermine his authority.” Id. at 600 (emphases omitted). The court held that there had been no First Amendment violation."

Also, because there's no evidence that any of the other Student Council members wrote a blog post, or a similar kind of message, like Avery; Avery has no standing under equal protection for her mom's class-of-one claim.

Finally:
"We are sympathetic to [Avery's] disappointment at being disqualified from running for Senior Class Secretary and acknowledge her belief that in this case, “the punishment did not fit the crime.” Doninger, 514 F. Supp. 2d at 202 (internal quotation marks omitted). We are not called upon, however, to decide whether the school officials in this case exercised their discretion wisely. Local school authorities have the difficult task of teaching “the shared values of a civilized social order” — values that include our veneration of free expression and civility, the importance we place on the right of dissent and on proper respect for authority. Fraser, 478 U.S. at 683. Educators will inevitably make mistakes in carrying out this delicate responsibility. Nevertheless, as the Supreme Court cautioned years ago, “[t]he system of public education that has evolved in this Nation relies necessarily upon the discretion and judgment of school administrators and school board members,” and we are not authorized to intervene absent “violations of specific constitutional guarantees.” Wood v. Strickland, 420 U.S. 308, 326 (1975). The judgment of the district court is therefore affirmed."

My Conclusion:
Sotomayor didn't write the opinion, so bare that in mind. The finale seems to articulate things rather concretely.

HOWEVER, The usage of prior case law was spurious. In twenty-thirty years all that shit, and this case, will be superseded by a new generation of federal judges who will have grown up with modern technology. The internet is NOT the school. And just because my friends and me talk online, doe NOT make it inherently public communication. Those are OLD concept that do not address modern technological realities of the internet. It's the SCHOOL's responsibility to block access to sites like livejournal. Not the student's responsibility to confer with School Administrators and DISTRICT COURT JUDGES before posting their thoughts on their blog.

The person who found the blog was actively searching for it or something very similar. It takes some understanding of how search engines work, and crawl sites like livejournal, to really grasp this. This is part of the reason I'd like to see transcripts of the case. To figure out EXACTLY what this adult son of the superintendent was looking for, and why.

Also, my anecdotal experiences with fucked up school principals lead me to think that the Administrators are bullshitters- with the authority of their titles- saying "oh, she's just a kid, of COURSE I didn't say THAT! She only took it that way!" But it's also true that one person can say one thing and another can hear something completely different.

In the end, I think it's the Judges inability to really comprehend that The internet is not the same as a 'zine or a pamphlet. This case SHOULD have provided precedence protecting the rights of students to post private thoughts of their blogs, and email their friends. If Avery had been on a conference call with a bunch of her friends, and said even worse things, we'd never have known it and she wouldn't have had to correct it, and she'd have graduated as her Senior Class Secretary. But, instead, READING and WRITING got the STUDENT in trouble. Good Job, assholes. Way to be full of fetid fail...

Great News!

2009-05-29T00:10:00.000-07:00

(via /.)
"Showing a new-found resolve to crack down on self-serving edits, Wikipedia has banned contributions from all IP addresses owned or operated by the Church of Scientology."

Fall TV, so far...

2009-05-28T13:11:00.000-07:00

http://ausiellofiles.ew.com/2009/04/fall-tv-cheat-s.html

The gist is, I hate so much of what was a "sure thing" that I'm questioning a bunch of things about my future prospects. And hoping it's you that are stupid, not me. ;-)

To be honest, I also hated almost everything that got canceled, too. I think it's a choice between shit, utter shit, and Are You Fucking Serious? on television, anymore.

This

2009-05-28T11:15:00.000-07:00

http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1910892

and

http://www.critical-hits.com/2009/05/18/the-contrary-opinion-jj-abrams-star-trek-with-spoilers/

Yep.

Collins and the NIH

2009-05-28T09:54:00.000-07:00

Francis Collins, of the Human Genome Project, is the rumored Obama appointee to head the NIH, the National Institutes of Health.

After the last eight years of science-bashing religionistas, do we really need more people who can't separate their personal superstition from science?

Pharyngula says No:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/05/dis-appointment.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/05/holier_than_thou.php

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/05/more_on_what_we_can_expect_fro.php

I agree.

{BTW: Blogger is annoying....}

Sotomayor, Day One, (pt V)

2009-05-27T13:37:00.000-07:00

In conclusion, I find that I'm wary of her opinions on copyright; but hopeful they have changed. I'd like more information on her opinions of the constitutionality of RFRA, which she avoided. And I want more info on her opinions of rights to privacy. Also, some clarity on those FOIA requests she denied saying she didn't want to “unreasonably hamper agencies in their decision-making.”

All of these things will, surely, be discussed to death and back, and be brought up in the confirmation hearings. But she'll be able to avoid most of the hot-button issues. It will be informative to see which questions she avoids, and which she answers.

I think she'll be a good moderate on the courts. I'm still not sure how I feel about moderates on the SCUSA, though.

Sotomayor (pt IV)

2009-05-27T12:57:00.000-07:00

Hankins vs Lyght
I like to call this one Old Dude vs Methodists. It's the case of a minister suing the church because they fired him. He had refused to take mandatory retirement at the age of 70- a church policy.

The district court dismissed the claim; on appeal, the Second Circuit reversed, holding that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which - subject to certain exceptions - prohibits the government from substantially burdening the exercise of religion, had effectively amended the ADEA by providing a defense for ADEA violations.

http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/judge-sotomayors-appellate-opinions-in-civil-cases/

The crux of Sotomayor's dissenting opinion seems to be:
+ Both parties waived RFRA in letter briefs.
+ "The Court found RFRA's protections 'so out of proportion to a supposed remedial or preventive object that [the statute] cannot be understood as responsice to, or designed to prevent, unconstitutional behavior.'"
+ Even if RFRA wasn't waived, it doesn't apply to a dispute between two private parties. and "Two provisions of the statute implicitly limit its application to disputes in which the government is a party."
+ And that ADEA couldn't apply to a member of the clergy v the church because that is a matter of internal religious governance, and requires too much interaction between the state and the religion. She cites several cases making it clear that this is only the case due to the position of the person being forced to retire. In her own words "Here... the dispute is between a minister with primarily religious duties and a church that no longer wishes him to serve as pastor of a congregation." + Also "[M]y conclusion is substantially the same as that of other Circuits: courts may not adjudicate employment discrimination lawsuits brought by clergy members challenging a religious body's refusal to select or retain them as spiritual leaders."

If you've read all this and plan on listening to the confirmation hearings, do yourself a favor- as this one is almost sure to come up- learn about the Catholic Bishop rule.

Sotomayor (pt III)

2009-05-27T12:13:00.000-07:00

Great Resource:
http://documents.nytimes.com/selected-cases-of-judge-sonia-sotomayor/page/83#p=169

Sotomayor (pt II)

2009-05-27T10:35:00.001-07:00

Copyright:
Castle Rock Entertainment Inc. v. Carol Publishing Group

I'm thinking since this ruled in favor of the copyright holder, we'll be hearing a lot about it.

The complaint:
Carol Publishing Group published a book called The Seinfeld Aptitude Test, or The SAT. At first, NBC liked it and nothing happened. Later, Castle Rock asked them to stop. They didn't, so Castle Rock took 'em to court.

Essentially the court said "The Copyright Act of 1976 ("Copyright Act"), 17 U.S.C. §§ 101-803, grants copyright owners a bundle of exclusive rights, including the rights to "reproduce the copyrighted work in copies" and "to prepare derivative works based upon the copyrighted work."" And that the Carol Publishing Group had produced a derivative work, since there were so many usages of the fictional "facts" relating to the show.

Seems fair. The book was just a regurgitation of trivia from the episodes. No one would doubt that selling a ticket to a live play of an episode, where everything is done, and said, exactly the same, is not fair use. That's how the court ruled. The book took away the copyright holder's rights to the derivative market. If the book had, instead, been transformative- taking that trivia and making something else out of it- there may have been a case for fair use.

EDITED to add:
Also, looking at New York Times Co. v. Tasini she doesn't seem aware that there's a difference between print publication and electronic publication. As this has been an issue of dissent lately- re: The Writers' Strike, et al- I'd hesitate to harp on it. Especially in light of the fact that the SCUSA has already reversed Sotomayor's finding.

Sotomayor (pt I)

2009-05-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

I've seen a lot of back and forth on Sotomayor. Let me state that at the outset, I'm a bit worried. She'll be an ideal Souter replacement- centrist (hopefully leftist). She was appointed by Bush1, Clinton, and on the short list of Bush2 appointees. And everyone is arguing back and forth over everything, already...

So, screw it, I'm going to take a look for myself.

First, to clarify my starting position:

She's kinda a non-entity, most people seem to agree that she's never really made any big precedence forming cases. Which, apparently, isn't unusual for an Appellate Court Justice. She is, almost certainly, a centrist. Souter is also a centrist, though he's considered part of the liberal wing. I'm very interested in her confirmation hearings, and I'm not very hopeful. (She's Catholic- the sixth on the current court- the Bushes loved her, and she ruled for the Church in Methodist v Old Dude.)

Today's (first?) review:
Centers for Reproductive Law and Policy v Bush (2002)

They dismissed the case, but for different reasons than it was originally dismissed. There's precedence in her reasoning. Here are the important bits:

On 1st Amendment:
+ "The crux of plaintiffs' First Amendment claim is their contention that the restrictions chill foreign NGOs from collaborating with domestic NGOs like CRLP because such collaboration may be viewed as promoting abortion and thus would jeopardize the foreign NGOs' receipt of U.S. government funds. Plaintiffs argue that such collaboration is essential to their ability to carry out their mission as advocates of reproductive rights and that depriving them of this ability violates their freedom of speech and association."
+ "In reaching its conclusion, the court relied heavily on our analysis in [Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc. v. Agency for Inter-national Development]."
+"Our outcome on the merits is thus "foreordained" by Planned Parenthood. Under the Norton/Airec/i exception acknowledged in Steel Co., we need not reach the academic question of Article III standing in this case."

{Which is them saying, essentially, "we can bypass the hard question of jurisdiction because there's already precedence on the merits, and we reject the merits, just as we did in Planned Parenthood."}

On Due Process:
+ "Because Planned Parenthood did not address due process claims brought by domestic NGOs in this context, we address the due process claim separately and dismiss it on the alternative ground of prudential standing."
+ "Plaintiffs' claims do not fall within the "zone of interests" protected by the Due Process Clause. "
+ "It is not the plaintiffs, however, who are allegedly left uncertain of their rights by unconstitutionally vague language in a government provision; it is the foreign NGOs who are allegedly left in this position. Plaintiffs' harm is derivative of this due process-type harm, and their alleged injury (albeit an unactionable one) concerns First Amendment interests. Plaintiffs' allegation, simply put, is that the vague language of the Standard Clause causes the foreign NGOs to be overly cautious in avoiding interaction with plaintiffs, which in turn harms plaintiffs' speech and association interests. On appeal, plaintiffs expressly acknowledge that "[t]his vagueness claim is premised on the [restrictions'] chilling effect on protected speech and association." As plaintiffs do not assert a harm to their own interest in receiving due process of law, this is precisely the sort of claim that the prudential standing doctrine is designed to foreclose. Plaintiffs cannot make their First Amendment claims actionable merely by attaching them to a third party's due process interests. See Haitian Refugee Ctr. v. Gracey, 809 F.2d 794, 809 (D.C.Cir. 1987) (explaining that because due process rights "do not protect a relationship" between a third party and a litigant, a plaintiff "could never have standing to challenge a statute solely on the ground that it failed to provide due process to third parties not before the court")."

{The Plaintiff is saying "our rights are harmed because of ambiguity causing foreign NGOs to not interact with us." The court says "Too bad. You can bring suit over your rights, but you can't bring suit over someone else's rights. Therefore you don't have 'prudential standing' under Due Process."}

On Equal Protection:
+ "Plaintiffs argue that the district court failed to undertake a separate analysis of their Article III standing to bring an equal protection claim. Because we agree with plaintiffs that the case law regarding constitutional standing for equal protection claims is distinct, and because Planned Parenthood does not foreclose this claim on the merits, we address the question of Article III standing with respect to this claim."
+ "Because this classification "neither proceeds along suspect lines nor infringes fundamental constitutional rights," it must "be upheld against equal protection challenge if there is any reasonable state of facts that could provide a rational basis for the classification.""
+ "The Supreme Court has made clear that: the government is free to favor the anti-abortion position over the pro-choice position, and can do so with public funds."

{Essentially, the Court said: "You have standing, here; but because The SCUSA has said this behavior of favoritism is okay, precedence says we have to dismiss this claim because you have no merit."}

My Conclusion:
Doesn't tell us much. The Plaintiff was doomed from the get go because of how similar their case was to one brought by Planned Parenthood, to the same Court, in 1998 (4 years earlier). The precedence is from how standings and merits questions were resolved- which disagreed with why the case was dismissed; but not the dismissal. In other words, it's very appellate-like. I will say she did seem to consider the case and not just trumpet the governmental position over or above the plaintiff. In my opinion, that's a good thing.

Ethanol is worse than Gasoline

2009-05-26T10:48:00.000-07:00

Like "Clean Coal", Ethanol as "'GREEN' alternative energy" is fictitious bullshit dreamed up by- surprise surprise- people who stand to gain lots and lots of money from its use. Ethanol is crap. It raises the price of food. It causes more smog than gasoline. It destroys engines to the tune of ~$1000/repair. And it does nothing to curtail our use of crude oil to manufacture all sorts of things.

Environmentalism is Big Business, easily co-opted for it's popularity, and just as suspect as the corporations it so often opposes. Spend some time, and read the following article. The article indicates we need some perspective, better studies, and less Ethanol.

(via /.)
(Article: The Great Ethanol Scam, by Ed Wallace)
(snippets after the fold)

First, the primary job of the Environmental Protection Agency is, dare it be said, to protect our environment. Yet using ethanol actually creates more smog than using regular gas, and the EPA's own attorneys had to admit that fact in front of the justices presiding over the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in 1995 (API v. EPA).

Second, truly independent studies on ethanol, such as those written by Tad Patzek of Berkeley and David Pimentel of Cornell, show that ethanol is a net energy loser. Other studies suggest there is a small net energy gain from it.

Third, all fuels laced with ethanol reduce the vehicle's fuel efficiency, and the E85 blend drops gas mileage between 30% and 40%, depending on whether you use the EPA's fuel mileage standards (fueleconomy.gov) or those of the Dept. of Energy.

Fourth, forget what biofuels have done to the price of foodstuffs worldwide over the past three years; the science seems to suggest that using ethanol increases global warming emissions over the use of straight gasoline.

...

On Jan. 16 of this year, Lexus ordered a massive recall of certain 2006 to 2008 models, including the GS Series, IS and LS sedans. According to the recall notice, the problem is that "Ethanol fuels with low moisture content will corrode the internal surface of the fuel rails." In layman's terms, ethanol causes pinpoint leaks in the fuel system; when leaking fuel catches your engine on fire, that's an exciting way to have your insurance company buy your Lexus. Using ethanol will cost Toyota (TM) untold millions.

...

Though the media is ignoring it, one can easily find many stories on BMW (BMWG.DE) blogs relating similar problems with fuel systems damaged by the use of ethanol. Certainly that was the case with Christi Jordan and her 2007 Mini. For weeks it was difficult to start; Moritz BMW in Arlington, Tex., inspected it and found severe carbon buildup inside the engine. On her second trip to the mechanics they decided to test the ethanol content of Christi's fuel and found it was much higher than the federally mandated limit of 10%. This time the fuel pump had been destroyed by the ethanol. The repair bill came to $1,200: As in all cases where vehicles are damaged by ethanol, legally the factory warranty no longer applied.

Some Lite Reading

2009-05-26T09:20:00.000-07:00

Over at the Guardian, there is an article up about a recent "psychic" preliminary test for the JREF's Million Dollar Challenge. If you've never read about this before, or even if you have; do yourself a favor and go read it. The Update at the bottom of the article should be enlightening. Also, check out the review at Bad Astronomy (linked below) by JREF President Dr. Phil Plait.

Scientists put psychic's paranormal claims to the test by Chris French

The JREF challenge can be traced back to 1964 when arch-sceptic, magician and debunker Randi offered $1,000 of his own money to anyone who could prove a paranormal claim under controlled conditions. Other donors quickly came forward to support Randi's efforts and the total prize available has stood at $1m for many years now. Despite the fact that the world is full of people claiming to possess abilities that defy conventional scientific understanding, only a minuscule proportion of them ever put themselves forward for the challenge. A minuscule proportion of a very large number still amounts to several hundred applicants, of course, but this does raise the question of why the vast majority of psychic claimants shun the challenge altogether. One commonly cited reason is that the challenge is fixed by Randi in such a way that no one would ever be able to claim the prize. True believers in the paranormal often have a deep mistrust of Randi and, indeed, he has been likened to Satan himself on more than one occasion.

...

The first volunteer did not choose the reading that had been produced for her. Neither did the second. Or the third. By chance alone, the most likely outcome was for one hit out of ten.

(first seen at BA)

Veterans and Service-people

2009-05-25T08:01:00.000-07:00

Thank You.

Bernard, John, Kenny, Jackie, Arthur, Nemiah, Scully, Toby, and all the rest.

Those who never made it back, or who have since died, are in our thoughts.

I owe each of you, at least, a beer.

Comments

2009-05-20T08:54:00.000-07:00

Blogspot has, once again, failed miserably. I just got a comment for moderation. It was originally posted almost a week ago. Hopefully this is a one time glitch; if you're having trouble with comments here, feel free to email me, and we'll see what we can figure out:
tom (period) d (period) hand (symbol) gmail (dot) com

GLEE

2009-05-20T08:46:00.000-07:00

The pilot of GLEE- a new high school comedy/drama focusing on, well, The Glee Club- is up on Hulu. It's good stuff.

It's got the kind of subtle comedy that makes you smile, so you can take the cheesy-ness. And it's not your momma's after-school-special extra cheesy, it's the kind you'd see in a Broadway play: half-sarcastic. In fact, it reminded me a lot of the plays I've read and seen.

There's drama, and some obvious hooks for future drama; but the acting is superb. It's just the first episode, so we'll see how they go and where they throw their emphasis. I recommend watching it, it's a little over 43 minutes you'll be happy you spent.

If you liked any recent adaptation of a musical to the big screen, you'll enjoy this show. If you like sarcasm, you'll find plenty there. And if you "Can't stop the feelin'", well... just watch.

Star Trek: The College Years

2009-05-18T08:03:00.000-07:00

Watched it yesterday. Go see it, you'll probably like it.

(spoiler laden review below the fold)
(if you're viewing this on the Facebook feed, try checking in at my actual blog: http://tomhand.blogspot.com , where there are no formatting SNAFU's to overcome- like the lack of an actual fold)

Some Thoughts:
Jar Jar Binks cum Scotty (the cute little rock guy) is for merchandising purposes- look at JJ Abrams, he does/understands marketing very well.

The time travel alternate universes is old old hat. It goes something like: At every decision there are, at least, two choices. You pick one and that becomes your universe. A different version of you picks a different option and that becomes a different universe. Now, to add some Micheal Chricton from Timeline, you can't actually TIME TRAVEL, but you can move to other, slower, universes that are very similar to your own (most of the choices have been the same, or all have been the same, so far). But that may be nit picky. They may posit actual time travel, but that the act creates the new universe, or any act done outside your natural timeline creates a new Alternate Reality.

Star Trek has already shown the alternate Realities, where they meet their EvilTwins(tm)- they did this a couple times in DS9 and once or more in TNG, but I could be wrong about the latter.

What pissed me off was:
The Blatant use of Time Travel as easy to use plot point. Others have already commented on this, so I'm just agreeing. "Why make it good, when we can make it EASY?"

The Internal Inconsistency: Red Matter makes a black hole- everyone travels safely back in time, no problems. Lots of Red Matter makes a big black hole (maybe)- with a visible accretion disk that's about the same size as the original hole (and by "about" I mean, I didn't notice any difference), yet this one destroys your dumb ass. Stupid.

Scene first, someone gets sucked out into space and there's no sound. Not five minutes later a shuttle craft buzzes the camera and we hear it whistle-puttering past. Stupid. Then there was the blatant stealing of cinematography- on the free fall to the drill platform- from Firefly: silent, off kilter, shakily acquired, zoomed in on.

Summation: I succeeded a little too well at psyching myself down about this movie. But worse, I was right: they did it the easy, commercial way, rather than spending their massive budget on something other than pretty-ness. The reboot of Star Trek will be profitable; but it won't be satisfying. What make me think so? THEY MISSED THE DAMN POINT! Spock is talking about "faith" and they're all talking about "destiny". To start with, this is just weasel words to absolve the individual from responsibility for their own actions. To finish, the episode they seem to be referencing is from TOS. SPock is told by Kirk to fly the shuttle craft in a way that is not logical, because MAYBE- if their faith in their crewmates is justified- the Enterprise will be able to save them (if not, they die for sure). So Spock does it, and they get saved and everyone dies from the cute sugary plot-like thing they've just swallowed, right? WRONG. The point was Spock was an absolutist: logic was ALWAYS the answer. The point was that absolutism eventually fails, and is just as short-sighted as anything else, when done fanatically. But Mr's Abrams, Orci, and Kurtzman don't want deeper meanings, or science, to get in the way of selling their fucking movie. So, expect horoscopes in the next one, or Feng Shoe-y , or goddamn chiropractors and homeopaths....

Cool

2009-05-16T10:03:00.000-07:00

Of course, you're all Doctor Who fans. And you like really cool things- like Tesla Coils being used as instruments... so:
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/02/20/tesla-coils-sing-the.html

craptastic

2009-05-13T07:27:00.000-07:00

Which is diametrically opposite of mantastic, just so you know...

"There is more than one of everything..."

"This truck was never made..."

And the FBI agent who hasn't watched enough Law and Order to know that "Was it a mask, or bandages?" is a leading question...

Craptastical.

UPDATE: COMPLETE, UNADULTERATED, HACKERY! Fucking douche bag, un-talented, commercialists. Dickwaded cockfingering turdshits.
Fucking Sans-tastical.

Things

2009-05-11T17:41:00.000-07:00

1) First, I see on WarrenEllis.com that Diamond has changed some metrics and a good number of comic books and their creators aren't gonna qualify to get DISTRIBUTED. This is not good news. Imagine if they'd done this when no one really knew Brian Wood, or any number of others. We could be without DMZ, Watchmen, and Transmetropolitan. If that's not scary, your head isn't on straight. The reverse may be true, though; this might be a victory for Print On Demand (POD). We can only hope. What it definitely does, and I hope I'm proven wrong on this, is make it that much more difficult to get new works out to enough people for newer works to be made and experience to be gained.

2) Went to the Sports Page, off South Parkway, and saw The Ugli Stick on Saturday (click the link, and listen to some of their stuff, it's all great). You really want to go see them, because in a few years it's gonna cost you your left testicle- a price you'll gladly pay by then. Better even than their skills as artists of the musical sort, they're all great guys. It's hard to describe their style. Suffice it to say, they take bits and pieces from every genre, combine 'em, force willing supplicants to snort 'em, and gently ape-fuck awesomeness out for your amusement. While Quintin shoots bass groves at you all night long, and your girlfriend fantasizes about Eric. Then Dale Jr opens up his pipes or bounces his fingers along the neck and you start wondering why people with so much talent aren't all fronting their own bands. Tim... he drums. I suspect the earphones he's wearing are repeating "Don't smile, they'll know!" When you catch your toes tappin' and your head noddin', don't look Tim in the eyes, lest he steal and consume your sweet sweet thinky-bits. (Thanks Yvonne, it really was a great show.) They'll be back in H-vegas on June 12, at the Sports Page.

3) Also, yesterday I hit a link to 13 mysteries in science. It was from New Scientist, I think, and written in 2005. It's a damn shame they lied about half of them- if not more- making unrepeatable results in one lab into a scientific mystery isn't exactly being factual. If you happen upon the link, do yourself a favor and ignore it. The three or five interesting mysteries aren't worth the bullshit.

Great News, Again!

2009-05-08T03:47:00.000-07:00

NASA announced Thursday an $18.69 billion budget for fiscal year 2010 to advance Earth science, complete the International Space Station, explore the solar system and conduct aeronautics research. The budget request represents an increase of $903.6 million, or 5 percent, above funding provided in the fiscal year 2009 Omnibus Appropriations Act. All totaled, an additional $2 billion has been added to NASA's 2009 and 2010 budgets under the Obama administration.

read on at:
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/may/HQ_09-102_FY2010Budget.html

Ah. ha. ha.

2009-05-07T04:31:00.000-07:00

First seen on BadAstronomy

Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film As 'Fun, Watchable'

Funny, True. But still..

I can haz baby star lazers?

2009-05-04T23:39:00.000-07:00

(from wired.com)

Three previous laser fusion systems have been built in the past 35 years at Livermore Lab, none of which produced enough energy to reach fusion. The first, Janus, went online in 1974. It created 10 joules of energy. The next experiment, in 1977, was a laser system known as Shiva, which achieved 10,000 joules.

Finally, in 1984, a project named Nova produced 30,000 joules, and it was the first time its creators actually believed there was a chance of fusion. This newest system by the NIF team is expected to create 1.8 million joules of ultraviolet energy, which scientists hypothesize will create a baby star in Livermore with positive power output.

read more at:
http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2009/05/gallery_nif

{By the by: I want like 8 of these for my birthday!}

Story Time

2009-05-04T10:41:00.000-07:00

The Community That Works Together

We always lived out in the country. The main road that runs on one side of the neighborhood was somewhat heavily trafficked- enough so that back in the days of letting your dogs roam freely, the gauge of how good your pet was depended on whether they got hit by a semi at night. But our streets were calm, except for when the latest wave of teenagers got drivers' licenses and would barrel down them at a neck-breaking forty miles per hour.

I remember the house getting built, and when I was 9 they finally paved the road- though, it's never had lines on it. We had fields behind our house, and beyond them the river. We'd fish and swim everyday during the summer, in what we later discovered to be the most agriculturally polluted river in the state.

Half the thick clumps of "virgin" forest we gallavanted through as youths have been destroyed. Modest suburban homes, with manicured lawns replaced the random, wild, leaf covered places of yesterday. That was called progress, or so they told me.

What I know is, everyone knew everyone when I was a kid. All day, during the summer, children on bikes would ride unmolested on the road ways; but they spent most of their time in the woods. We visited The River, or The Monkey Vine Jungle, or The Dam. We saw snakes, and fish, raccoons, opossums, deer, birds, and all manner of insects. We recognized a few dozen species of plants, malignant and benign.

And then the fields got sold, too.

All the other fields within a twenty miles had been sold and turned into housing divisions. People grew up and moved away, wistful for the past and resentful of the future. Nothing happened to the fields. New families moved in, with dogs in fences, and children who stayed inside- or no children at all. Dogs got shot if they roamed free- or put in the pound. The old families tried to contain their resentment; and fences blocked new explorers from Th Monkey Vine Jungle. Nothing happened to the fields.

At the same time the resentments were fading, and new friendships were in the wind, something else changed. The old mill, hidden in the woods beside The Dam, was torn down to the foundations. Marks were put on trees, and the shape of the land was changed. There were whispers of development. New friendships formed over resentment at the intrusion, and respect for natural beauty. We became a new community, forged from our mutual hate of future degradations. The fields were being replaced with a Water Treatment plant.

We wrote the newspaper; but there were more people nearby, but not in the neighborhood, who wanted it. People who didn't know, and therefor didn't care, about our hidden wonders wanted more more-ness. New families meant more infrastructure; and we were opposed to progress, or so they told me.

We railed and cried. We spoke out and spoke up. We protested, and sometimes- in the depth of night- we sabotaged. Little hindrances, nothing substantial, but it caused delays. Eventually, we were at our wits ends; and some hung their heads, steamrolled into the future. It was ironic, and the way of things; but it was also profoundly sad.

Until we found help. Not from those nearby, who could come down and see our hidden beauties, our River and our Dam. But from a group of people with money- a group not like us in their wealth- from across the world: California. They sent in scientists, and used the law against the lawmakers. The environmental impact study halted the earth movers, the concrete pourers, and progress.

We put on a bake sale. We held a golf tournament. We did odd jobs, and we started a foundation for the preservation of Rural Life and Natural Beauty. The environmental impact was significant enough to warrant a government funded study; and we had more time. We held a block party, and invited the entire county. We barbequed, we held fundraisers, we washed cars, and we developed plans. In three years we had made money, and we bought our fields back.

There was a three day celebration, with guided nature tours. The kids rode their four wheelers, and the grown-ups smiled constantly. We were victorious! The underdogs had won! The county built their plant somewhere else; none of us knew where. We were the modern progressives, turning our fields into a community owned garden, park, and nature preserve; or so they told me.

We couldn't grow that, because it negatively affected those others. The lack of rotation meant weaker yields over the years. Dogs had to be on leashes, and our insurance wouldn't let anyone too near The Dam, and certainly not in The River. Our property values soared. The neighborhood bought better, bigger cars, and put up fences. Horses were only allowed on the trails, specifically marked, made for them; and the same for the four wheelers. Hunting was prohibited, but we put in a shooting range where the mill once stood. A picnic area and campsite were installed soon after- no more primitive camping for us!

The new kids grew up, and went off to college. The single family suburban homes were too empty, and too much to take care of; but they sold for twice the price they had been built. The lure of money, and the lack of family, tore people away. They were too old to walk all the trails, to take advantage of the vast natural splendors. New families moved in, and the progress we had fought continued unabated in new forms.

There's a clubhouse where we once grew vegetables. The River was shored up, and the old flood plains are cabins. It's three thousand a year for a family to have full access to the grounds; and that's a deal compared to what families outside the neighborhood pay! My nephew's kids enjoy the pool.

I had to put an eight-foot privacy fence around my yard because I refused to follow the homeowners' associations lawn grooming bylaws. If you put your hand up- and no one has a fire going in any of the cabins, and the people at the shooting range aren't shooting too often- and you cover the land so you only see the tops of the hills in the distance, the autumn sunsets still look the same.

I watch those magnificent paintings in the sky. I tore down the old house years ago, and built one that would last more than a couple decades. My porch is perfect for such viewings, and my privacy fence means I don't have to hold up my hand. I think back to playing in the woods, climbing the trees where houses now stand. I remember my first kiss, playful and inquisitive in woods that were replaced by the Clubhouse parking lot. And I remember our battle against progress, when I was so worried about the contamination to our well- which I had to abandon when they shored up the river.

We were poor when we built the old house, and all the time I was growing up; or so they told me. I had a bicycle and a BB gun, and all the woods in the world to explore; I thought I was rich. If I wait three more years before I finally move away from this place where, they tell me, I grew up; I'll be rich. Whoever moves in after me can live their lives behind my privacy fence; and if they pay their dues, they can walk in wonder, staring at the manicured nature I helped protect from progress.

(c) 2009 Tom Hand

Funny Commercials

2009-05-01T13:43:00.000-07:00

These Hulu commercials are funny as hell:

"And you're not soup, yet."

(P.S. My brains last, Dennis SAID!)

Ted Talks- Shadow Cities

2009-05-01T13:39:00.000-07:00

TED Talks are interesting things. I've probably watched 50 or more in the last year or so.

Today, I watched this one, by Robert Neuwirth, about "Shadow Cities". It's very neat, lots of pictures of squatter villages, lots of information about squatter villages around the world: Rio, Turkey, Kenya, etc. Only about 14-15 min, definitely worth watching.

He has some statistics in there:
* Today 1 in 6 people, on the planet, are squatters (about a billion people worldwide).
* By 2030, 1 in four people. (2 billion squatters of roughly 8 billion people total)
* By 2050, "better than" 1 in 3 people. (3 billion squatters out of almost 9 billion people total)

Those numbers aren't just interesting because of their predictions of squatting/squatters; but for their predictions of the worldwide population.

FAIL!

2009-04-29T18:57:00.000-07:00

They should just change the show to FAIL- or better yet, EPIC FAIL. The cardinal rule of Vampire fiction: you don't use Bella Lugosi's Dead (especially, a shitty version of it). Otherwise you violate the Laws on Pretension Prevention, a little known subsection of the Geneva Convention.

Also, knew it was the girl as soon as she was on screen.

The Un-Kosher Flu

2009-04-29T18:15:00.000-07:00

First off, fuck the pork industry for getting upset that "swine" flu might cause their sales to drop: Everyone they should be concerned about feeding already knows you don't get the H1N1 flu from bacon, you get it from Mexicans- and apparently a couple kids at Heritage Middle School in Madison, Alabama.

Second off, fuck the pork industry for being justifiably concerned people might think they can get ManBearPig Flu from bacon. But more importantly:

FUCK ALL THESE IDIOTS.

So far, there is no indication that Swine Flu is worse than regular seasonal flu.

From the CDC:

Yesterday, CDC issued new interim guidance for clinicians on how to care for children and pregnant women who may be infected with this virus. Young children and pregnant women are two groups of people who are at high risk of serious complications from seasonal influenza.

(emphasis mine)

How serious is swine flu infection?
Like seasonal flu, swine flu in humans can vary in severity from mild to severe. Between 2005 until January 2009, 12 human cases of swine flu were detected in the U.S. with no deaths occurring. However, swine flu infection can be serious. In September 1988, a previously healthy 32-year-old pregnant woman in Wisconsin was hospitalized for pneumonia after being infected with swine flu and died 8 days later. A swine flu outbreak in Fort Dix, New Jersey occurred in 1976 that caused more than 200 cases with serious illness in several people and one death.

In other words, it's not actually all that bad. Stop freaking out; or bury yourself in your flupocalypse bunker and throw away the key.

I'm not lucky enough that this will kill all of you.

-You Loving Kludge

P.S. Warren Ellis knew about all this since, at least, last Friday.

But Religion Did SOME Good Things!

2009-04-28T15:10:00.000-07:00

To which I say: "Fuck You."

If the argument that religion has done some good things for some people seems even the least bit compelling, you should consider the other side of that coin: the horrible fucking shit it has done to so many.

In Topeka, Kansas there sits a church. The Westboro Baptist Church. Home of people I have long considered evil pieces of shit, but now wonder if they aren't actually terrified slaves.

Read the speech that Nate Phelps gave at the American Atheists' Convention in Atlanta a few weeks ago. (April 2009)

Then go read his article about giving the before and after the speech and the crowd response.

In the end, religion doesn't do anything for people that it doesn't equally undo with "interest".

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I hate J J Abrams

2009-04-28T13:32:00.000-07:00

Well, 9 times out of 10, anyway. I liked Transformers, but I hated Lost, Alias, and Fringe.

Remember my accurate predictions about Watchmen, right before I saw it? Star Trek gets the same treatment after the fold...

If you're interested in a no spoilers (so long as you've seen the trailers) story about the people who made Star Trek- which opens on May 8th- go read this NY Times.com article. (thanks Tom)

If not, I'm going to quote from it anyway, to illustrate my thoughts that the Star Trek movie isn't going to be nearly as good as so many people are saying/wanting/needing it is/to be.

First, it's J J Abrams, director of Mission Impossible: III (I will give him it was better than John Wu's; but that's like being less retarded than the most retarded retard) along with other shitty shit shitshit.

There's a LOT of qualifying in the article. They are desperately trying to ensure fans that their beloved show/series/movies/franchise isn't being ass-raped by drunken clowns:

For the “Trek” faithful there are plenty of nods to past television episodes and movies, familiar catchphrases and Kirk’s notorious solution to a supposedly unwinnable mission simulation. But there is also a conscious effort to inscribe this “Trek” in the storytelling traditions popularized by Joseph Campbell, in which heroes must suffer loss and abandonment before they rise to the occasion.

[...]

Though their revisions may be contentious, the filmmakers said they were necessary; the “Star Trek” empire entrusted to them has been in dire straits.

The one that swayed me the most was:

Mr. Abrams said that throughout the production process Mr. Orci and Mr. Lindelof, both acolytes of “Trek” history, were there to keep an eye on him. The filmmakers also received the blessing of Leonard Nimoy, who created the role of Spock and agreed to reprise the character in the film as a wizened old man.

“Any fan who would think that it’s not ‘Trek’ has to say that to Leonard Nimoy’s face,” Mr. Orci said. “Don’t talk to me, talk to Spock.”

But then I remembered Nimoy really hated being identified as Spock for years. Sure, he's accpeted it all now; but my impression of Nimoy is that he's a pompous jackass. Really, only Gene Roddenberry's opinion would sway me. Not his wife's, and certainly not Rick Berman's opinion. But Mr Roddenberry is dead, so: Fuck You, Abrams, no swaying for you!

That's not all, but it is a large portion, of the qualifying. However, that's as much as I care to share. (Read more qualification at the link already provided.) In general, that level of "But it won't suck because..." in an article sets off my Suck-o-Meter alarms, big time! If it didn't suck, would you really need to tell me it didn't suck that much? "The lady doth protest too much, methinks" {Hamlet, Act 3, scene 2; I looked it up to make sure I wrote it correctly.}

Now, here's why I think the movie is going to blow:

Mr. Abrams and his partners are guys with mainstream pop-culture aspirations; their forte is taking on genres with finite but dedicated fan bases — science fiction, fantasy and horror — and making them accessible to wider audiences. And what they had in mind for their “Star Trek” movie is a film that is consistent with 43 years of series history but not beholden to it.

Re-parse that into non-marketing-ese:

Mr. Abrams and his partners are people who want to make lots of money and have lots of people like them; thy are exceptional at taking sub-culture and bleaching it, dumbing it down, and scrubbing away it's filthy underground musk until it's stupid enough for any idiot to get moist over all the pretty people and colors/explosions. And what they had in mind for their "Star Trek" movie is a film that is not beholden to 43 years of series history, the intentions of Gene Rodenberry, or anything that won't increase their profits- principles, for instance.

A couple self-explanatory bits:
This:

there is also a conscious effort to inscribe this “Trek” in the storytelling traditions popularized by Joseph Campbell, in which heroes must suffer loss and abandonment before they rise to the occasion.

This:

Perhaps more audaciously, this “Star Trek” also has a time-travel story line that essentially gives those on its creative team license to amend internal “Trek” history as they need to, and they aren’t timid about exercising it. (For example the villains of the movie are Romulans, even though the Enterprise’s first encounter with this alien race occurs in a well-known original “Trek” episode.)

Though their revisions may be contentious, the filmmakers said they were necessary

And:

Despite their collective reverence for “Star Trek” — and “Star Wars,” and Indiana Jones, and X-Men, and other cultural artifacts of their awkward adolescence — none of them are total “Trek” completists (not even Mr. Orci, who once owned a telephone shaped like the Enterprise). They say that makes them the ideal candidates to upgrade Gene Roddenberry’s creation for 21st-century audiences.

Before having been associated with a movie he hopes will attract all the fans, plus the not-fans:

ENGAGE J. J. Abrams in conversation for even a few minutes and he will gladly confess the role that “Star Trek” played in his cultural coming of age. “I was not a fan,” he said recently.

And After:

“I now consider myself a Trekkie,” he declared, “which I literally could not have ever imagined saying to anyone.”

“which I literally could not have ever imagined saying to anyone."

Mr. Abrams said his responsibility was not to the “Trek” loyalists, but “to create a movie that would be for moviegoers who love an adventure, and movies that are funny and scary and exciting — not ‘Star Trek’ fans, necessarily, but not to exclude them either.”

I'm fucking glad we're not gonna get excluded! Especially since we're the after thought, and not the focus! Yay!

What remains to be seen is whether the patient, thoughtful and deeply philosophical tradition of “Star Trek” is compatible with a “Star Trek” movie that is variously flashy, frenetic, dirty, slapsticky and sufficiently steeped in popular culture to accommodate both the Beastie Boys song “Sabotage” and a cameo by Tyler Perry.

Look, there's an ass ton more of this crap over there, go read it. But I want to end with one more:

“We’ve become so familiar with the idea of space travel because of so many movies and TV shows that it’s lost its adventure and its possibility, its sense of wonder,” Mr. Abrams said. “Forty-three years ago it was not a boring idea.”

Let's take this out of marketing-ese again:

"The whole concept of Star Trek was how cool Space Travel was. It's not anymore, so we're gonna dump what I see as the main concept. Ha ha, fanboys, fuck me? FUCK YOU!"

Okay, so that last bit may not have actually been in there; but my translator assures me she doesn't want to be beaten with the rubber hose, and her work tends to be pretty damn accurate.

He doesn't get what Star Trek was about. It wasn't about Joseph Cambell and SPACE TRAVEL!; those were tricks to discuss things. That's when Star Trek is at it's best, when it's speculative fiction- when it's using these future star ships, technologies, and aliens to explore contemporary things (like race) in a way that people won't just close down and vigorously ignore. Putting it in the future with aliens makes it easier for people to think about. Instead of shutting down, they think; and Star Trek blossoms.

And we know Abrams is going to throw in some pandering god references. But look back at Star Trek: it was the most relevant and exciting in TOS (the Original Series) when Roddenberry made it rational and secular. It was worst in DS9 (Deep Space 9) and Voyager, where they were constantly dealing with god and their personal spiritualities. Except they weren't issues, except as things characters refused to give up.

So, no philosophy, no social commentary, no strict science-based rationality (even from Spock); but up the pretty visuals. Down on space travel, up on time travel; down on Trek canon, up on new, easy to grasp Campbell-ian backgrounds/plots.

It's going to be pretty and very very stupid- like Jenny McCarthy, but pretty.

Choice: Vaccinate or Murder

2009-04-26T11:11:00.000-07:00

It really is that simple. Vaccinate yourself, and your children, or you could murder someone.

Bad Astronomer and President of the JREF, Dr. Phil Plait, has a post up on his blog about a recent Australian News story. A 4 week old girl died of Whooping cough in a region of Australia where only 1 in 3 children are vaccinated. The girl, who would normally be protected by herd immunity until she could receive the vaccination herself, was 1 of 3 children in a month with such severe whooping cough that she had to be air lifted to another hospital- she was the only one of the three who died.

Whooping Cough isn't Ebola, it doesn't kill every person who gets it; it's not even Marburg. But Whooping Cough can kill, and those deaths are entirely preventable. The anti-vaxxers- those people opposed to all or some vaccinations- are killing children with ignorance, stupidity, and fear mongering. Notice, in the video below, how the anti-vaxxer Meryl Dorey claims that whooping cough and measles don't kill people, and cause Autism. Except the whole thing is about how whooping cough killed that poor baby, and as the Doctor points out there are absolutely no links between vaccination and autism. (Measles can kill)(Autism rates have spiked due to an expanded understanding and definition of Autism; and better, more intensive, efforts to identify people with it.) (And let's not even get started on how horri-bad Polio is!)

Read the original article, by the Bad Astronomer Phil Plait, at his blog Bad Astronomy, and/or watch the video below. Then share this story with anyone you know who thinks vaccinations are optional.

For further, informed, reading about Vaccinations, I recommend the Science Based Medicine Blog. It's written by doctors, and contains this funny little concept I like to call: science. This link takes you to all their posts on Vaccines.

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Your TV Shows

2009-04-22T13:22:00.000-07:00

A while ago I talked about Fringe. I mentioned that The Psychic Olivia was a dropped plot point. It's been 3 episodes, and they've picked it back up- just like I mentioned they'd done before. And they invented a whole new bucket of bullshit for the viewer to choke down, thinly disguised as "creepy" and "dramatic".

What I'd like to add is two points:

First, in the big mystery of episode 17, the viewer easily makes the connections about 3-5 minutes before the characters in the show make them- which is stupid and bad writing, in my opinion. It's one thing to let the viewer in on it from the jump; or to let the viewer make the connection a few seconds before the characters. It's an entirely other matter for the characters to have no clue, get one more piece of information and then magically jump to the same conclusion the viewers- who haven't been made aware of anything other than what the characters know- have already surmised.

Second, the ending of episode 17 means one of two (I'll include a third just to cover my ass) things. Either, the good Crazy Doctor has had his memory messed with (which I think they've alluded to, and suggested he might have done it to himself); or the writers seriously think anyone is buying their tacked on bullshit. That second possibility isn't quite as remote as it may first seem. It could be the writers going "Oh, hey! Great idea, what if we add in all this stuff to kinda tie things in and make it creepy and mysterious?" And no one catching how/that it makes earlier episodes inconsistent. Or it could be there's an actual meta-plot and it's that ridiculous.

SOUTHLAND, Part II

2009-04-18T01:27:00.000-07:00

Watched Southland, episode 2, today. There's not much to say, that I haven't already said. It's crap, recycled at best. Bleeping curse words to add edginess, a cop who "[thinks she] made a mistake" with her own kid and baby-daddy putting it all on the line for an imperfect family, nice guy cops trying to do the right thing while the system- uncaring- refuses. Probably won't watch the third episode, but we'll see- certainly don't expect it to be any better.

Polls are for lulz

2009-04-17T20:56:00.000-07:00

Go read this article on why you should never trust anything that allows anonymous internet voting- like ratings of music or videos- and how /b/ made marblecake also the game the most influential 21 people on Time.com.

Suicide is Painless

2009-04-16T12:40:00.000-07:00

That's the title of the opening theme for MASH, written by Johnny Mandel with lyrics by (the then 14) Mike Altman. It comes from the Movie. Painless Pole- a dentist- declares his intention to commit suicide. They have a mock funeral, and the song is sung in the background. "Suicide is Painless, it brings on many changes, and I can take or leave it if I please."

Suicide has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. My grandpa's brother killed himself in Texas during his twenties. Another of his brothers killed himself after getting some bad medical news- he was in his eighties. I remember being young, and vaguely understanding why a relative was sitting on a different couch with their wrists covered.

"Through early morning fog I see visions of the things to be, the pains that are withheld for me. I realize and I can see..."

When I was in High School, I was on a drug called Accutane for acne. Though it's unclear if Accutane actually causes suicidal/clinical depressions, my own experience seems to indicate that it does. I took aspirins- and a lucky thing, too; that quantity of Tylenol would have killed me.

I remember thinking about my grandpa, my dog, and how the deaths of my dad (when I was 12), and my grandpa (when I was 7), had hurt terribly. Children shouldn't have to deal with death. In my mind, it all seemed very unfair. I was 15 and stupid; and that fucked up sense of entitlement meant a trip to the ER, a drink of Charcoal, and a night in the Pediatric ICU.

"The only way to win is cheat, And lay it down before I'm beat, and to another give my seat- for that's the only painless feat."

I had terrible migraines while on Accutane. Full blown grand mal brain seizures, or so it felt. Everything would get fuzzy and weird. My vision would tunnel, until I could barely see anything- everything coated in dense gray static. Then the headache, the nausea, the sensitivity to light, sound, movement, and tastes. I learned quickly to expect the night of vomiting.

I've never had migraines, except during the time I took Accutane; but even then they were uncommon. I had one within a few months of when I stopped taking it. The migraines say to me that the drugs screwed with my brain chemistry. I firmly believe that Accutane took me from depressed to suicidal- it's something I have to believe, for my own sake.

"A brave man once requested me to answer questions that are key, is it to be or not to be; and I replied 'oh why ask me?'"

I've heard lots about Samurai, and Ancient Romans/Greeks/Egyptians. People always bring up the Burning Monk (or some other "heroic" suicide or attempt), or the terminally ill. I always consider what these things imply, and what they mean to me and in my view.

In societies with strictly regimented honor codes- like the Samurai- there are always "suicide clauses." I see them as pressure release valves for the people who can't cut it, or who are too dangerous. In the South of Modern America there can be some strict social mores; but I wouldn't call them strictly regimented. The pressure release valve here is discretion- "out of sight, out of mind"- or moving somewhere else (Key West, Miami, New Orleans, San Fran, New York, LA, etc etc). Committing suicide to get away from them would be something like killing a cockroach with a howitzer.

As for "Heroic Suicides", I see that as pretentious grand standing at best, and ill conceived stupidity, motivated by anger, more often. Regardless, it's the biggest oxymoron I've ever encountered. In the case of the Burning Monk, he was making a point, and he made it big- but he never made another one. I wonder how many others thought they were doing the same, but no one remembers today.

The terminally ill have a right to decide they want to die with dignity, instead of suffering through months of agony in a hospital bed. That doesn't excuse selfish, otherwise healthy, thirty/twenty somethings or teenagers from trying to take what they see as "the easy way" out. Cowardice is cowardice, shameful and repugnant- especially when it's stupid. A terminally ill cancer patient may find asphyxiation less unpleasant than slowly dying as their insides rot; but to think that suicide is actually "painless" or "easy" is nothing more than stupid: death hurts.

"The sword of time will pierce our skins. It doesn't hurt when it begins; But as it works its way on in, The pain grows stronger...watch it grin"

Suicide is many things. What it always is, what it can't not be, is selfish. Ignoring the emotional pain death inflicts on the survivors goes beyond stupid and uncaring. It implies the statement: "My current pain is worse than anyone else's pain, for the rest of their life, at the loss of me." It's one thing for someone dying of Huntington's Disease to talk about their choice with friends and family, come to an understanding that there is nothing else they can do continue living without suffering terribly, and then take some poison. It's another to hunker alone, unthinking, drowning in self pity, and try to swallow a bullet.

Consider my death.

There are people I know who would forget me within a year or two. There are a few who would still think about me 5 or 10 years down the road. Maybe even one or two people I'm not related to who would remember me as long as they live. My family would never forget. Many of them would blame themselves, increasing their stress levels- rightly or wrongly. My four year old nephew would experience the death of his favorite uncle. I know what growing up with an intimate knowledge of death is like, I'd rather he didn't. I think it would drive my sisters apart, but it might bring them closer together- which might be worse. My mother would freak out. I'd hate to think how my grandma would react.

But I wouldn't care- hard to do that, dead.

Except whatever else I think, I'd like to be remembered fondly, instead of with pity. I really hate pity.

Instead of taking the coward's escape, I can get away for a while, reading a book or watching a television show (even one I hate). I can go fly a kite or hunt for worms with my nephew. I can go online and read something funny, or watch beautiful people do beautifully disgusting things to each other. I can listen to a comedian, or go hangout with friends (or just in a public place).

And if that doesn't work, I could call:
The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 1-800-273-TALK (8255)
The National Suicide Prevention Hopeline 1-800-SUICIDE (784-2433)

Fuck going out easy, anyway; I'd rather do it the hard way and laugh at everyone else when I finish regardless.

Your TV Shows

2009-04-16T08:24:00.000-07:00

Fringe is such a stupid show. There is nothing redeeming about it. It's not sci-fi, because science fiction would imply some sort of actual science. It's more like modern fantasy- wild conjectures with very loose, very badly strung together, science facts used to, I guess, try and explain things.

They take it right up to the edge, and let the viewer make the conclusions. The acting is good, sometimes, but mostly it's too "serious" to actually be serious. They're not trying to be as campy as they are. It's got all the great hallmarks of horror/thriller sci-fi, and I think that's why I watch it.

I wouldn't recommend anyone else attempt it. Fringe is truly crap-tastic. But years of less than B slasher flicks, zombie fests, and monster movies keep me viewing. Just like all those horrible examples of "entertainment" (read: train wrecks), the creators obvious intend one reaction, and miserably fail.

If they accepted that despite their big budgets, their great special effects, and their sleek look/marketing, they were just shitty camp horror, it would suck even more. But throwing the lady with the robotic arm in with the mad (read: crazy) scientist who was researching every single bit of the latest and greatest in cutting edge science, 30 years ago, doesn't make it sci-fi.

What irks me is, if someone tried to write this shit, they'd be laughed at. Not because it's stupid, which it is, not because it's childish and predictable, which it is; but because it glories in the dumbest, worst, most throw together hodge-podge of "plots" that ever got rejected- and it does it without the slightest bit of irony.

There's talent in the pool that creates each episode; but it still can't overcome being absolute shit.

Plot points that were about to happen, then completely dropped, ignored, and never mentioned again:

* The Psychic Olivia. Episode 14 revealed Olivia was a powerful psychic able to control electronic devices. Then there was a long break, and in two episodes it has never been mentioned again. Instead there's the romantic angle of who is Peter romantically interested in: Olivia or her sister? Hint: It will be Olivia, as was thoroughly demonstrated in episode 14. (That is, assuming consistency is in anyway important to the writers- a big assumption that has no evidence to support it in the 16 episodes so far.)

* The Cyborg Lady. Sure, she's been in other episodes, and has shown disturbing interest in Olivia- which we can assume has something to do with her Psychic abilities. But there's been no more about cybernetics, and we've gone two episodes without hide nor hair of her or her ominous megacorp.

* The Hairless Man. He's a gimmick ("See him in every episode!"), a shitty Where's Waldo where the camera tends to settle on the hidden person, to underline that he's "secret" or "important" or just because this is a prime example of stupidity and hodge-podge. More importantly, though he is in episode 14, and in a VERY unsurprising role, all the geniuses and investigators, who have all discussed/encountered him before never ONCE mention him when they meet a kid who is also hairless and "important". They've shot their wad with him, in a way, having had a full episode devoted to him; but that's bad planning, in my opinion, and so I consider him a dropped plot point.

* The Roguish Villian. Charming, star of City of Lost Children, and with an English accent, he was prominent in the episodes leading up to the break. Since then? Not even a mention of an off-camera hunt for him.

And that's the thing, innit:

1) No one is surprised, in the least bit, when they somehow try to tie a plot point back to something else- inventing a bunch of information that must be shoveled at the viewer like so much thought manure. Some of these plots are being PURPOSEFULLY ignored, at the moment, because hiding the obvious 4 episodes down the line makes it "smart", "savy", or in some other way, not obvious. (Uhm.... Hint: No it doesn't.)

2) All it would take, to force Olivia and Walter out of their Mary Sue status, and make the whole fucking show about a million times better, is to insert some throw-away lines about off-camera investigations. And guess what that would do? Allow the production staff to make web-based games, or text stories, or just blogs, for viewers (I hesitate to think anyone would actually be a "fan" of this drivel) to go exploring. In other words, it would allow them to move into the digital, interactive, internet age. (And you just KNOW the kind of people who like this shit are the weirdo internet conspiracy kooks who all think it's a fucking documentary- and all fo whom are avid members of ONLINE communities.)

Sense some hostility on my end? You might be a psychic- [insert irony here]- or it might be that I'm jealous people can write such sub-puerile bullshit and make a hella good living off it.

UPDATE: MEALWORMS ARE MEALWORMS, PUSHING THEM UP FROM A "CORPSE" AND CALLING THEM "MONSTER LARVAE" DOESN'T MAKE THEM NOT-MEALWORMS! (Technically, Mealworm Beetle Larvae.) Stupid, over-done, unsurprising, and shit-tastic. With as big a budget as they must have, you'd think they could use something other than standard horror staples as larvae for their "monster". Not to mention how stupid the whole concept is, scientifically speaking.

All I have to say

2009-04-15T08:16:00.000-07:00

Watch the first episode of Season 5 on Hulu.

Your TV Shows

2009-04-12T20:03:00.000-07:00

Dear Mr. Television Writer,

Waiting three episodes, or thirty, doesn't make the obvious any less so.

Jealously,
-Me

The New Dick-shun-ary

2009-04-10T06:40:00.000-07:00

Weekend - (n) (1) the time when real life always conspires to keep you from enjoying the only two-four days you're not supposed to be working. (2) when most accidental babies are made. (3) Usually the two days in the week when the most stuff, and the least productivity, happen.

26 Seconds

2009-04-07T01:33:00.001-07:00

Cool:

(And something we should all have known, understanding fluids and densities and buoyancy, but probably hadn't put together)

(Spotted over at BoingBoing)

NoGodTube

2009-04-07T01:18:00.000-07:00

In response to GodTube, and problems with YouTube (votebotting, flagbotting, etc) resulting in harassment and banning (with subsequent reinstatement), there is now NoGodTube.

[Personally, I would suggest atheists, agnostics, and others interested in using the site, also put their videos on YouTube, but encourage linking and embedding to NoGodTube. This way, we still have a voice in how the YouTube community continues to evolve, and we also have a place where our videos will be easy to find and available to anyone interested.]

So, in honor of the new site, I give you the following discussion between Blair Scott and Leonard Adams, recorded in February of 2008, about Black Atheists.

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Parts 2 and 3 (along with the URLs to all three) are below the fold...

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http://nogodtube.com/play.php?vid=128
http://nogodtube.com/play.php?vid=130
http://nogodtube.com/play.php?vid=131

Very interesting talk. Blair is a lot of things- Director, Founder, User of Shitty English Accents- leave him some comments, reviews, and feedback.

YouTube and the JREF

2009-04-05T01:36:00.000-07:00

If you haven't seen it elsewhere:

I don't agree, fully, with Randi; but I think the problems are with the DCMA, and YouTube's policies because of it.

UPDATE:
This, from /., seems to illustrate my point very well. It also suggests, to me, that everyone who wrote to YouTube saying they demanded an explanation and an apology was right to do so- it keeps them on their toes and, hopefully, squeamish about the policy so that they might change it if the legal situation ever changes.

Great News!

2009-04-04T22:03:00.000-07:00

From Bad Astronomy:

"Wow, I get wrapped up in my own personal world for a coupla days, and find out I almost missed this: the Iowa Supreme Court said that banning gay people from getting married is unconstitutional."

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Dollhouse

2009-04-04T21:12:00.000-07:00

If you had the ability to erase a persona, then with the clean slate, add whatever persona you could design- and you'd shown you could design almost anything- who would you not design?

Topher? Designed. The Watchers? Designed.

If it was me, everyone working at the dollhouse would be designed. Everyone would be wiped, at some point. There'd be wheels within wheels within wheels, as Frank Herbert might say.

Open Minded?

2009-04-03T07:11:00.002-07:00

Blair posted this on the NAFA Forums

SOUTHLAND

2009-04-03T02:23:00.000-07:00

There's a new show coming out, in a week, on NBC. It's nothing new: cop drama, following various police officers operating various cases. Quick to start, then develops, camera quality goes back and forth between faux COPS and production grade. Sound effects are crap- witness the first shooting, where the guns all sound like something less than caps.

Anyway, the pilot is up on Hulu, a week before it airs on TV. Because an obvious ploy for no reason is as good as a ploy with a reason, I guess. (I suppose it's to get word of mouth spurred.)

Nothing unique about it. Multiple arcs, from episodic to multi-show: something to get new viewers and keep the old ones. A mix of personal and professional, with emphasis (understand it's only the first show) on the professional. A great ensemble cast, and a heavy smell of money, so expect to be hearing raves about it soon.

Seriously, nothing unique about it. A mix of things from a hundred cop drama TV Shows and Movies, already out there- the rich-boy rookie with the hardass vet partner (overcompensating for being gay), the empathetic black female detective (taking care of her elderly sick mother) with the not quite as good younger white male partner, the "Gang life is stupid, pointless, and harmful" angle (complete with "community testimony" and "community fear"), the misogynist with a female partner, the cop on his first marriage that's about to die surrounded by hardened divorcees...

Absolutely nothing to set it apart. It reinforces the idea that stereotypes and cliches are okay, so long as they're not negative. It's crap, throwaway, dressed-up reruns with better production values. If you've been hankering for a fix since NYPD Blue dropped off, you'll probably like this. If you're a fan of the cop drama genre, you'll probably like this. If you like anything that's good and interesting, and have a memory like a goldfish (so you don't place all the old tired bullshit), you'll probably like this. Otherwise, leave it to the fans, the idiots, and the young. (caveat: For now)

A Load of Honor

2009-04-02T04:06:00.000-07:00

Honor is such crap.

Honor doesn't work unless everyone follows the same "code".
Examples:
Person A believes it's not honorable to kill.
Person B believes it is honorable to kill those who don't think it's honorable to kill.

Person B kills Person A. From a game perspective, who "won" there, for all sets of "won" that include "continued to live"?

More real-life example:
Person A believes it is not honorable to steal.
Person B doesn't consider stealing to effect honor in any way.

Person B steals Person A's Thing.

Who "won"? Hint: It's not Person A.

For all sets of providing reasons to support an argument where one person suggests "honor" as a reason, that person is a fool. A self-righteous fool, at that.

It's April Fools Day

2009-04-01T13:36:00.000-07:00

And if you're expecting a joke, here, you're a fool.

2009-03-31T04:39:00.000-07:00

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/03/30/dramatic-readings-of.html

Hate and the Art of Oppression

2009-03-27T12:22:00.000-07:00

I learned hate. When I was a child, my mother always commented on how sweet I was; nothing unique about it, most mothers think their children are sweet- most children are, in my experience. In school, I was poor, geeky, gangly, unpopular, quiet, smart, and generally an outsider. The other children saw to it that I became intimately aware of my differences, my flaws, and my shortcomings. I was given to the wolves, and the wolves taught me rage, injustice, pain, and disgust.

This is not a unique story. Lord of the Flies, and countless other stories, songs, movies, books, and lessons, have taught us all that these are not instructions unknown to previous generations. If nothing else, we share with all other humans our indoctrination in violence and hate at the hands of one another.

Something about us seeks to defeat the different, conquer the unknown, whether it be by naming it, or killing it. There are lectures by Prof. Robert Sapolsky on the neurobiology of primate sexuality, where he talks about Composite faces. It turns out that the more individuals used to make a composite face, the more attractive the face is rated during testing. Sapolsky says we seek out others that are not so similar to us that they might be family, but not so different that they are of a different species. Our most basic instincts- to mate- are wired for "normal", "average", "sameness", why should anyone be surprised most aspects of our culture mimic that compulsive yearning?

Atheists scare people. They are seen as immoral, untrustworthy, degenerate, different, and unknowable. The majority of people in the world profess some religion- even some people that call themselves "Atheists" still speak of spirituality. The scared, mistrustful, masses react with aggression to those they see as fundamentally opposed to their "way of life".

Atheists make up as much as 12, or even 15, percent of the population (depending on how you define it and which surveys {like this or this} you look at). We are a part of this country, and we are not to be feared. Anyone who knows 10 people knows someone who would describe themselves as non-religious- whether they use a term like "Atheist", "Agnostic", "Secular", or something else.

Hate is a dangerous thing. It can be useful, spurring someone to do more than they might otherwise. Unfortunately, that can mean the difference between failure and accomplishment, or arguing and killing. Fear, biology, and tradition tell us to fear the invaders from over the hill- after all, they are who will come in the night to steal our mothers, daughters, fathers, sons, mules, and food. This fear, often without any conscious effort, easily turns into hate; hate we pass on to our children, who pass it on to their peers.

In 1984, the year Dan White was released from prison, there was a documentary about Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to hold an elected position in the United States. That Documentary, The Times of Harvey Milk is current up at HULU. It is a staggering example of what can happen when people come together, despite their differences, and the tragedy one hateful person can inflict upon a community. It is a lesson, and a warning.

For Atheists out there, pay close attention to the speech Harvey Milk is giving after Proposition 6 is voted down (at roughly 47 minutes in).

[For those who couldn't hear it, what Jerry Brown says to President Carter is "Reagan already endorsed it, so I think it's safe."]

"A lot of people joined us and rejected Proposition 6, and now we owe them something. We owe them to continue the education campaign that took place. We must destroy the myths once and for all, shatter them. We must continue to speak out. And, most importantly, most importantly, every gay person MUST come out!
"As difficult as it is, you must tell your immediate family. You must tell your relatives. You must tell your friends- if indeed they are your friends. You must tell your neighbors. You must tell the people you work with. You must tell the people in the stores you shop in.
"And, once they realize that we are- indeed- their children, that we are- indeed- everywhere; Every Myth, Every Lie, Every Innuendo, will be destroyed once and for all. And once, once, you do, you will feel so much better!"

For Atheists and the non-religious, replace "gay"- in that speech- with the word you use to describe yourself.

Don't let the cycle continue, don't allow the fear and the hate to thrive- like they so readily do, in the darkness of secrecy: stand up and be counted. Singly we are but one or two, here or there; Together we are everyone, United we are everywhere.

I am a brother, an uncle, a son, an aspiring writer, and a person. My Name is Thomas Delaney Hand, I am an Atheist and a Skeptic.

Do Me A Favor

2009-03-27T09:54:00.000-07:00

If you're tired of my rabid pro-Antitheist views (especially if you or someone you know is a creationist) take a look at this:

It's by a christian for christians.

Then go read the article where I first saw it: Bad Astronomy Blog

Cancelled TV Shows

2009-03-24T19:06:00.000-07:00

I watch a bunch of old canceled dramas, cause they're on Hulu, and because you never know- Firefly was canceled, and it was awesome. Currently, I'm watching New Amsterdam. The second episode, I figured out whodunit in about 4 minutes.

The premise is John Amsterdam was ensorcelled in the 1600s to live until he found his true love and his soul joined with hers, at which point he would become mortal again. Obviously, he's only just now found her, and he's a detective in the NYPD. Yeah, seemed like a shitty romantic action movie plot to me, too; especially when his true love turns out to be a down-and-out-on-love separated ER Doc.

I'm on episode 4. They're talking to a rape victim who escaped before she was killed. It's about as convincing as Santa Claus. And the FEMALE DETECTIVE, when the rape victim says "and then he did it" says "He penetrated you." Not a question, a statement. She had to spell it out to the victim at the hospital! So not a minute later the victim says "I kneed him in his... you-know." Does the Female Detective, whom we know to be concerned she understands the victim correctly given the earlier statement, spell out that the "you-know" is a PENIS? Nope.

So glad this show got canceled, I hope whoever wrote that scene died after a long and excruciating bout of dick cancer.

(I told my sister about it, she asked if they were going to use that bit to illustrate something. I said they wouldn't. They didn't.)

Skepticism, Atheism, and New Keyboards

2009-03-24T14:50:00.000-07:00

Giving the new keyboard a whirl- let's hope the old keyboard was the problem, and not the port...

In a recent episode of HOUSE, a patient says "If there's no reason for all the bad things that have happened to me, this isn't a world I want to live in." House calls her an "idiot", which is right and wrong.

The episode deals with the Death Cat phenomenon. The episode does a good-ish job of explaining the "phenomenon"- the explanation being the cat seeking warmth. I'd like to extend this a bit.

DEATH CAT is a common happening, look online and you'll run into a psychic cat who can predict death. The problems with this reasoning are many. One, everyone dies, so anyone the cat lays down next to will die, eventually. Second, it's usually at a nursing home, a leper colony, or somewhere else where the likelihood of dying is vastly greater than normal- meaning the likelihood of randomly "predicting" deaths will be higher, too. Third, confirmation bias rears its ugly head- who remember everyone the cat lays down next to? So, the cat lays down to poor old Mrs Murphy and she dies three days leter, it's spooky. The cat then lays near old Werner Von Bruneiner, and he dies a week later. The cat next lies near Peggy for a night, and Penny for a night, and Gladus for a night, and nothing happens- but Peggy dies three years later, and Penny four and a half years later, and Gladus dies a decade later (because they're fucking old and decrepit enough to be in a Nursing Home!). Those three are non-events, when six months later, the cat lays next to Jonas McGrery and he dies the next day, everyone remembers Werner and Mrs Murphy; but they forget about Peggy and Penny. Or when the cat has a night by Mr. Davidson, and then he dies 3 months later, they remember the night the DEATH CAT slept with him. These aren't "predictions" they're coincidences, and the logical fallacy is confusing chronology (the order of events) with causality (how events influence one another).

Causality and chronology are different, somewhat obviously. The cat lays down next to the Elderly, then (on an ambiguous time line) the Elderly die, and it's less obvious for some people. Just because someone spilled salt (a widely used seasoning, used billions of times a day by people around the world) today, doesn't mean that's what caused them to break a finger the next day. What about the other hundreds of millions who didn't break finger, or the tens of millions that nothing very bad happened to, after they spilled salt? The fact is that bad things happen, and there are a lot of seconds in the day, and a lot of people in the world, for bad things to happen to for no reason. House says, about the cat, it's not really a phenomenon as there are millions of nursing homes, and tens of millions of cats at nursing homes, and it's no wonder that one of them coincidentally sleeps next to a couple of people who die.

Same goes for all superstitions- or other supernatural reasons (i.e. God, Satan, prayer)- for why good/bad things happen. The math is pretty convincing:

More than 6 BILLION (6,000,000,000) people on the planet, at the moment.
86,400 seconds in one 24 hour period (somewhat less than an actual day, astronomically speaking; but still)

That means, there are (# of People TIMES # of possible seconds for something to go bad) 518,400,000,000,000 chances for something to happen to any one person any one second, each day. (518.4 TRILLION)

If there's a 0.000000001 (that's one billionth) chance that something "unimaginably" horrible happens to any one person, any one second. (This would be extremely rarely bad: 1 in 1 billion chance.)

Which would mean, it could happen 518,400 times EVERY DAY.

Half a million horribly unimaginable events Every Day.

That's completely ignoring intelligent motivators- people wearing seatbelts, people using condoms, people generally doing things to consciously avoid horribly bad accidents; and the people actively trying to force unimaginably bad events onto someone else, by shooting them, for example.

Still, the sheer numbers are staggering. Even if it must take a full minute, there are 8.6 trillion chances; an hour makes it 144 billion; a day makes it 6 billion...

In other words, for an event that takes a whole 24 hours, if it's a 1 in 1 billion event, it happens 6 times every day, on average.

Whether that's a lot or a little would seem to be an extension of "the glass half full" debate.

House was wrong on one point, the girl isn't an idiot. She's stupid. Willfully, or perhaps even unintentionally, incapable of understanding- House gives her multiple examples and explanations throughout the show, which she then dismisses with some hokey bullshit.

I believe House is wrong on another point- he gives her shit, provides facts to refute her bullshit, and then makes his point, at which time she essentially says "but I still believe" and he just looks at her mysteriously and leaves. Why not say "So, what you're saying is 'Despite your facts and proof, I refuse to acknowledge reality?' Okay, that's fine, stupid. I refuse to believe you're sick, despite all the evidence to the contrary." Obviously that fucks up the narrative, a little, but he doesn't even begin the rebuttal, he lets her slide, giving her the last word. Which is chicken-shit true-believer pandering by another name, in my view.

Finally, I'd like to address her actual statement...

Uhm, holy fucking cock-smack by the penis of a million foot tall Zeus, Batman!?

It would be astounding if it was just a bit of "poetic" dialog on a TV show I watch. It's fucking unbelievably retarded, and scary, that I've heard people say that before. It's worse that they were proud of saying it!

How narcissistic do you have to be to refuse to live in a word that isn't about you? How selfish to need all of reality to be focused on you!

And don't give me that shit about "I don't think it's about me, I think it's about all of us!" or the more science-fictiony "I think it's about all conscious living beings" or the even more hippy "I think it's about all living things". That's not altruistic sentiment, because by being about a group (life, or conscious living things, or us) the speaker is a part of, it's about the speaker.

I swear these people don't go back and think about things even AFTER they spew them out of their pecker checkers! ("Mmmm, mmm, this one tastes fine!" for anyone lacking the proper mental visual.)

It's bad enough not to THINK BEFORE SPEAKING; how much worse is it to not think even AFTER speaking?

The people who say that kind of shit aren't serene peaceful supplicants, yearning for truth. They're arrogant fucking whores, demanding reality conform to their wishes. They're spoiled brats who never really understood that "Life isn't fair", and they are not princes/ses. These are people who don't fundamentally understand the difference between make-believe and reality. The exact same kind of people who strap bombs to their chests for some arbitrary number of sexually inexperienced children to molest in their fantasy cloud palaces.

I advocate not letting these people get away with feeling good about themselves. I advocate sticking it to them, and forcing people to deal with reality, not their misguided and warped perception of it. I advocate ridicule of anyone who refuses to acknowledge objective evidence and rigorous proof. I advocate scorning those who are too intellectually lazy, and/or dishonest, to try understanding the crap they are spewing.

There's a reason "god is in the gaps" and it ain't 'cause he makes sense...

Culture for the Masstards

2009-03-21T01:17:00.000-07:00

On this addition of the attempt to bring us all to the same baseline, Abbot and Costello. (A treat to make up for an all-text CftM earlier this week).

According to the Wiki-goodness:
Abbot (the tall skinny straight man) and Costello (the shorter plumper laugh getter) came out of burlesque*. Each had spent many years in comedy before they met. They first worked together in 1935, when other performers in the show- including Abbott's wife- advised a permanent pairing. In 1938 the appeared on Radio, the next a month their most popular sketch, "Who's on First?", debuted for a national radio audience.

In 1941, their second movie, Buck Privates, made them stars. In 1942, Abbott and Costello were the top box office draw with a reported take of $10 million. They would remain a top ten box office attraction until 1952.

All the classics:

And for those that just wanna see it: (from the above)

* Burlesque was a humorous theatrical entertainment involving parody and sometimes grotesque exaggeration. Prior to Burlesque becoming associated with striptease, it was a form of musical and theatrical parody in which an opera or piece of classical theatre is adapted in a broad, often risqué style very different from that for which it was originally known

Quote

2009-03-20T05:02:00.000-07:00

Again, just a quote I want to keep somewhere searchable, not one I agree with per se.

one of my professors once said, "Any God who can be killed ought to be killed." To which I would add, any faith that can be undermined should be undermined. A God or a faith that needs you or me to prop it up has already died long ago. You do not need to defend a living God. Only dead gods seem to require that.
– John Shelby Spong

Before the Music Dies

2009-03-19T05:16:00.000-07:00

I just finished watching the documentary BEFORE THE MUSIC DIES, on Hulu. It's a look at the state of the "Music Industry" circa 2005/6. As always, there are some points I disagree with; but overall it's an excellent film. Go watch it.

Some points/thoughts I had while watching:

Watch this movie, Before the Music Dies, and watch how people curse. Cursing is normal and natural. Restriction of cursing is understandable, I suppose, but absolute prohibition of it is stupid.

Radio is about percentages: if you retain 51% of the population, you're a winner. As you make a profit, you can lose that percentage. It's the dollars, stupid.

Brendan Marsalis makes the point that Coltrane and others came out and were hated for 5 yrs. Today, you don't have 5 years for your sound to catch on, gain fans, and become something-through the radio markets and "traditional" Record Company Route. "If it's really new, the people won't like it because they won't know what it is."

First half is "Why is it shitty, right now?" Second is, "Why it doesn't have to be, and how it isn't."

Here's the sad fact: Radio, that industry the record execs once loved for getting their content out to the masses, taught us all that music was free. The consumer knows why ads are there; but ads are an annoyance, not a means of funding the radio station. Sure, we all know the deal; but it takes thought to connect from These Annoying Ass Ads to "Oh, that annoyance is okay, because without it, we wouldn't have the radio." In fact, that's not the case, exactly; look at Public Radio, after all. That instruction "Radio is Free (ish)" became music is free, and with the availability of easy copying it became downloading/sharing without guilt.

How is this for a business model? Instead of a million people out there trying to get famous, get rich, and "be somebody" (whatever that means); artists being concerned with being artists. Musicians focused on making music; and when the record company comes and says "Hey, we can do something for you," saying "You can have this album, and distribute it, and do your thing, and leave us the hell alone." Basically, forcing the record company to accept your terms, and not vice versa. It takes a hell of a will to do; and I'm not saying it's the smartest move- but it's the way to remain "pure", "true", "uncorrupted" while still taking every authentic advantage that comes along.

"There are three types of artist. The first is the one who hurts to do what they do. ... The second is the type who tries to be like the first. The third type is one who does whatever they're told." -Erykha Badu

"I don't think that we need to panic; I just think we need to teach our children well." -Dave Mathhews

"It's important to sound like You, to feel like You, to be like You." -Erykha Badu

2009-03-18T03:30:00.000-07:00

Fuck.

Now, I don't think it's some coordinated movement against Climate Change Activists; but local police getting scared by the big smelly hippies? That seems plausible- after all, you never know how many of them have drugs, or gay porn.

(UPDATE/Clarity: I do imagine they may have been scared of some sort of eco-terrorism, and being spurred to ensure it didn't happen by wealthy business people. I still don't think it was a conspiracy; merely stupid.)

Quotes

2009-03-18T02:48:00.000-07:00

I need a place I can put quotes, for quick retrieval. I don't necessarily believe these quotes; but they interest me in some way. In other words, ignore this, it's just a brain dump.

from here.

"The real rulers in Washington are invisible, and exercise power from behind the scenes."
- Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter, 1952

"Since I entered politics, I have chiefly had men's views confided to me privately. Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the Field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it."
- Woodrow Wilson, The New Freedom (1913)

"Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day."
- Theodore Roosevelt

"A power has risen up in the government greater than the people themselves, consisting of many and various powerful interests, combined in one mass, and held together by the cohesive power of the vast surplus in banks."
- John C. Calhoun, Vice President of the United States

"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies...The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the Government, to whom it properly belongs."
- Thomas Jefferson

"If the people only understood the rank injustice of our Money and Banking system, there would be a revolution before morning."
- Andrew Jackson

"There is an evil which ought to be guarded against in the indefinite accumulation of property from the capacity of holding it in perpetuity by…corporations. The power of all corporations ought to be limited in this respect. The growing wealth acquired by them never fails to be a source of abuses."
- James Madison

"In this point of the case the question is distinctly presented whether the people of the United States are to govern through representatives chosen by their unbiased suffrages or whether the money and power of a great corporation are to be secretly exerted to influence their judgment and control their decisions."
- Andrew Jackson

"I am more than ever convinced of the dangers to which the free and unbiased exercise of political opinion -- the only sure foundation and safeguard of republican government -- would be exposed by any further increase of the already overgrown influence of corporate authorities."
- Martin Van Buren, Eighth President of the United States

"As we view the achievements of aggregated capital, we discover the existence of trusts, combinations, and monopolies, while the citizen is struggling far in the rear or is trampled to death beneath an iron heel. Corporations, which should be the carefully restrained creatures of the law and the servants of the people, are fast becoming the people's masters."
- Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24th President of the United States

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted."
- Dwight D. Eisenhower

"There exists a shadowy Government with its own Air Force, its own Navy, its own fundraising mechanism, and the ability to pursue its own ideas of national interest, free from all checks and balances, and free from the law itself."
- Senator Daniel K. Inouye

"You don’t have a clue of what’s going on in the government, and neither do the American people. If they did, there would be a revolution in this country.”
- Texas governor and quintessential political insider John Connally

The Worst Since the Great?

2009-03-18T02:40:00.000-07:00

(How the World Almost Came to an End at 2pm on September 18, 2008)

Culture for the Masstards

2009-03-18T00:24:00.000-07:00

In an on-going attempt to get everyone on the same baseline, I bring you another in the series:

This time, a double-header: Blogs vs Forums and Idiot vs Stupid. We'll look at them in reverse order. (A warning: kinda long)

Idiot vs Stupid

An idiot is someone who is ignorant or unskilled in knowledge. Stupid is the active inability to understand, comprehend, or apply knowledge/understanding/comprehension.

Everyone is an idiot, someway, somehow, somewhere, somewhen. It's impossible to not be an idiot, and to communicate. Idiot is derogatory in our society; and it should be used with an understanding of that, lest the user be stupid or an Idiot.

Stupid is more equivalent to "Retarded" that idea of non-politically correct inability via deficiency- though, technically "stupid" makes no effort to determine why the person is stupid; but merely that the person is such.

See the difference? Good. If not, well...

Blogs vs Forums
Both are full of people spouting their particular brand of bullshit. Both often feature controversial topics. Both tend to be more full of opinions than facts. Both require login (some do allow anonymous posting) and tag comments/posts with a name/userID/what-have-you. Yet, there are differences.

A Forum is a group effort. There are group-blogs, but it is not, necessarily the same thing. In many ways, the difference is akin to the difference between "religion" and "cult". Those links don't do it justice, so I'll provide an example: Some people say that Mormonism is a cult, some say it's a religion. The fact is it's whatever the speaker wants it to be- it fits both definitions. There is a side of this argument that speaks to the idea "common usage", that if the majority of people say Mormonism (to continue the example) is a cult then it is a cult, if they say religion it is such.

The problems with that are "Who counts?" Literally, who counts up the people and takes their official opinion on the matter. Also, who should be counted, should Mormons get to effect the common usage of their beliefs as religion or cult? (How many cults are happy being called cults, and don't maintain that they are actually religions?)

This same sort of thing can apply to Forums vs Blogs- especially when we only look at the mechanism each use for displaying/disseminating their content. The software is VERY similar- if not outright the same (look to those websites that are essentially a piece of forum software that contains ways of handling front pages, blogs, news, forums, among other things). Yet, there do exist some differences.

Blogs are always a hierarchical setting. Forums can be, and may appear to be even when they aren't; but blogs are always hierarchical. Blogs say: there are posters and there are commenters, one creates topics and performs maintenance and administration, one can only comment on posted topics. Forums say: There are administrators and there are non-administrators, one is capable of actually performing maintenance and administrative functions, both can post new topics and post comments about created topics. Though there is a lingo (i.e. "OP" = "original poster") and some mutual conceptions (i.e."First Post/Reply!", "First Page!") to Forums, there is no significant* functional distinction between the post creator and the people who post replies. On (most) forums, everyone is equal; on Blogs the bloggers may be equal, but the commenters are not equal to the bloggers.

Look at it this way:
Genius and Genius#2 are on a forum, arguing. Neither is an administrator. Genius cannot edit/delete posts made by Genius#2, and vice versa. The administrators can, of course; but on good (read: professional) forums the reasons such a thing might happen are posted, reviewable, and often subject to appeal.

Genius and Genius#2 are on a blog, arguing. Genius is the blogger, Genius#2 is a commenter. Genius#2 cannot go open a new topic to discuss Genius or some aspect of the argument. Additionally, Genius can disemvowel or delete Genius#2's comments/posts. If it's Genius's Blog, the rules don't have to be posted, and Genius is the final arbitrator of what is okay, and what isn't.

So, here's the difference:
Forums are a group effort to talk and discuss things amongst the group. A Blog is a way of disseminating information (often opinion), and though discussions can happen, that is secondary to the fundamental nature of simply "putting it out there".

Either can fulfill the role of the other, of course. If a website could be either, try looking to see how the website refers to itself. Remember, this is a guideline, nothing is ever 100% cut and dried, especially on the internet.

* There can be a distinction, like the ability to add a "formal" poll to the topic; but that's not exactly significant.
------------------
To end, allow me to address the elephant in the room.

Yes, this is in lieu of explanations. Yes, this is my way of warning people (see link above) who may not already know: This is MY Blog, MY Opinion, MY Rules- and not a democracy/fair/etc.

I wiki, you wiki, we all wiki on the wiki-goodness!

2009-03-15T07:55:00.001-07:00

Get on the internets and you'll see some genius post a link to wikipedia.org. Not long after, Genius #2 will disagree with something int he wikipedia article and call all of wikipedia into question.

Let's use a real world example:
Genius: "A wikipedia article on expertise says it takes 10 years or 10,000 hours to become an expert."
Genius #2: "Yeah right. You know anyone can edit wikipedia, right? It's all crap."

Often that last sentence is implied, rather than stated.

But does Genius #2 have a point?

The quick answer is "Almost; but not really; but it depends on the article." ("Quick" not "simple", the simple answer is: "not really".)

The definitive study for the reliability of wikipedia is... three guesses, and the first two don't count... that's right: wi ki pedia.

And if you read all those articles, you can go home now; I won't say anything you can't find there. Except: The argument that "anyone can edit wikipedia" is, essentially, an ad hominem attack on a webpage. It's spurious, bullshit, not-logical, some might say "stupid". I'd say "stupid"; but I'm an asshole.

Wikipedia has its faults. Jello Biafra's page and the Dead Kennedys page are prime examples of this. Look at the history and discussion tabs for each of those. At one point, Jello fans and Jello haters were waging wiki war. Edits were made on both pages- and others- with each side trying to slant the articles toward their viewpoint. Jello's fans were saying "Jello is awesome", Jello's detractors were saying "Jello is a fuckhead." At one point Jello's page became locked, due to the- essentially- vandalism being wrought on it. This had many sources/causes; but came down to stances on Dead Kennedys material and who said/did what to who about what. Each side sought to interpret the facts in a way that made their side seem the only logical side. It got bad.

However, note a couple of things: When this happened, the community responded by locking out edits to keep the bullshit out of the article. Note also that we can go look and see when/where/what was changed and sometimes even why it was changed. To put it another way, for every asshole who wants to vandalize wikipedia, there is an asshole who wants wikipedia to be prestine and accurate and full of TRUTH.

Lastly, James Randi, during the Amazing Show with James Randi and at other times, has said that, on occasion, someone will intentionally put blatantly false information into his wikipedia article. He then tells about how swiftly such information is discovered, removed (or removed to the talk page), and generally dealt with. Anecdotal, sure; but this isn't supposed to be definitive, it's supposed to be further evidence of how wikipedia can- and does- regulate itself.

In the end, wikipedia has its problems, but so does Britannica. If you're looking for information about people- especially little known or controversial figures- be careful. If you're looking up long established scientific principles, you're probably okay. Wikipedia is full of citations, use them to check facts. In the end, wikipedia may not be the most accurate encyclopedia in the world; but it's better than citing this livejournal post a friend of a friend once read.

And if you encounter Genius #2, feel free to give them the link to wikipedia's article on wikipedia's reliability, criticism, or simply itself. They deserve it for being a jelly-brained half-wit. ;-)

Mish Mash Makes Music

2009-03-12T22:42:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I wonder if we'll be creative enough to find the solutions needed for survival in the future. And sometimes, I think we'll be alright:

(First seen/heard at BoingBoing)

(There are 7, in all.)

$100 Million in Diamonds?

2009-03-12T11:32:00.000-07:00

Notarbartolo's specialty was charm. Acting the part of the jolly jeweler, he was invited into offices, workshops, and even vault rooms to inspect merchandise. He would buy a few stones and then, a week or a month later, steal the target's entire stock in the middle of the night.

Antwerp provided a wealth of opportunity and a good place to fence hot property. A diamond necklace stolen in Italy could be dismantled and its individual gems sold for cash in Antwerp. He came to town about twice a month, stayed a few days at a small apartment near the Diamond District, then drove home to his wife and kids in the foothills of the Alps.

When he had stolen goods to sell, he dealt with only a few trusted buyers. Now, as he finished his espresso, one of them—a Jewish dealer—came in and sat down to chat.

"Actually, I want to talk to you about something a little unusual," the dealer said casually. "Maybe we could walk a little?"

They headed out, and once they were clear of the district, the dealer picked up the conversation. His tone had changed however. The casualness was gone.

"I'd like to hire you for a robbery," he said. "A big robbery."

read the whole thing at Wired.com

Why Twitter Tweets?

2009-03-12T10:32:00.000-07:00

Go here: http://twitter.com/Nancy_A?page=2

Scroll down to:

Possible debris hit may force evacuation of ISS. http://tinyurl.com/bmovl5 Watching NASA tv now to get the latest,but only Russian audio now

Ignore time stamps, read through it.

That's right, the ISS almost got killed today- supposedly by a piece of the satellite that got 'splodo a not-long-while back.

(First seen at: Bad Astronomy)

Throwaways

2009-03-12T08:30:00.000-07:00

Throwaways are quickie ideas that might be of interest to others. Detailed fully in 6 Questions (Who, What, When, Where, Why, How, and Else) with no more than 2 Sentence Answers.

Who? Any Major Network, scripted TV show in primetime.
What? A web-exclusive episode, of the same quality and length as the regular show.
When? To be made available online during an off week- like when the Oscars cuts into the regularly scheduled broadcast.
Where? Hulu, or wherever the hell else the parent company wants to make it available.
Why? FOX has a lot of good shows- like HOUSE- and too many off weeks where they're showing stupid crap no one cares about: like the World Series (no, not the poker one).
How? Reduce costs around set, and from the special effects department/budget; and film it a little at a time during filming for other episodes. Same quality and length; but it can be assumed only fans are watching it, so it might delve further into the characters for no reason other than to explore them.
Else? The Internet is gonna steal your broadcast audience anyway; but this will train them to go to the site YOU, the creators and controllers, choose. It's like a gift to fans from the entire cast and crew; and should help foster loyalty- plus it's "interactive" because it's online where they can post comments.

Legend of the Seeker

2009-03-12T08:09:00.000-07:00

I spout a lot of HATE- exclusively the all-caps yelling, spittle flying, envisioning entrails, kind- here. I especially seem to hate all recent entertainment, and anything that hasn't been canceled. For instance, I hate everything Lord of the Rings; and I was particularly unimpressed with WATCHMEN; but I loved Firefly.

Today, I bring you something different. A new, currently on-going, series. It's not my normal bag of tea- it's fantasy- but Legend of the Seeker is definitely worth watching on HULU.

It's really not as unexpected a development as I first thought. The production team is very similar to Xena: Idiot Hooker, and Hercules: Gaying Up Mythical Assholes. I liked both of those, for the most part. I particularly started to hate Xena when they started into the Christianity thing. Though neither was MUST SEE TV, for me.

LEGEND OF THE SEEKER isn't the newest Raimi brother mythical half comedy with over-the-top tongue-in-cheek, especially in the effects department. Instead it's a drama: serious, honest, and never silly. The effects are there to add to the realism, convince the viewer to suspend their disbelief, and immerse themselves in the world. There are humorous aspects to situations or characters; but these are not the silly stupidity of Xena and Hercules followed by a knowing wink, these are the characters being fully fleshed out, and human.

The acting is superb, the storylines are brilliant, and Terry Goodkind is gonna earn himself a big mess of new fans. The series is based on Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth novels. Of course there's some controversy from him and his fanbase; but I haven't read the books, and I didn't come to the series because of him or his reputation. I may go back and read the source materials; a trip into a genre I've never been overly impressed with.

I actually came to the series despite many misgivings. My sister told me about it; and I had caught up on all the other shows I watch online. Bored, with no emails or forum posts or any other means of distraction, I figured I'd watch the first episode. I almost didn't, when I saw that the first two episodes are combined into an hour and a half for Hulu; but the boredom forced my hand. I'm glad it did.

And, if you needed another reason, (and to piss off a particular person) the lead actress- Bridget Regan- is H-O-T.

I have no idea what channel the show is on, or when. I watched the first 13/14 episodes online; and I'll continue to watch it that way. I use Hulu for convenience, the link was above the cut.

Prisoner's Dilemma

2009-03-10T05:25:00.000-07:00

In the iterated Prisoner's Dilemma the optimal strategy, under certain circumstances, is Tit for Tat.

The idea is, you can only every cooperate with someone, or defect from them. If you start with cooperation, and they defect, you defect until after they cooperate. If they're using- essentially- the same strategy, you'll never cooperate again. It's slightly more complex than that; go read the articles and see.

Every choice can be broken into some number of Prisoner's Dilemmas.

This never published, and I just went a cleaning- and found it- so if it seems out of context: it is.

Free Inch Nails

2009-03-10T05:09:00.000-07:00

NIN is giving away it's newest album completely free in a variety of formats; and all they want, in return, is your email address.

http://dl.nin.com/theslip/signup

I Watched the Watchmen.

2009-03-09T00:15:00.000-07:00

Remember when you read Watchmen, and you sat it down, and you had that feeling? That weirdly warm belly feeling like "I just learned something" mixed with "Now, THAT was an adventure!"? The movie has lots of stuff in it, and it's missing some stuff; but the thing it's missing the most is that. It's like watching cynical, worn-out, world-weary, professionals in a play they hate, but once loved.

Read the book; forget about the movie.

Watch More Men?

2009-03-07T15:46:00.001-08:00

The more I read about the WATCHMEN movie, the more I'm not interested in actually seeing it. Don't get me wrong, I will because I'm that kinda guy; but if I really had a choice, I doubt I'd go of my own volition.

Wired has two reviews up, one by a newcomer to Watchmen the other by a hardcore fanboy. The Newcomer gives it 6/10, the fanboy 7/10.

Both reviews mention the plots and the differences between the movie and the comic; though the fanboy's goes further into detail. And that detail reveals why I'm sure I won't like the movie. Ignoring the changed ending, they fucked with Rorschach, Ozymandias, and the whole principle of the book.

So it's a different medium, yeah? And there should be changes, yeah? And why did they get the funding to make this movie, huh? The source material was badass. So if you've taken the idea of the original, fucked it in the asshole, and then barely laid the original framework over the retard baby that's ass birthed as a result; have you made a new thing, or something based on something else?

Fight Club was an awesome movie. Even Chuck P, supposedly, said it was better than the book- in fact, I think, he said it was just as good, and that if you'd seen the movie first the book didn't compare. It took the original ideas, kept them, and then changed the ending almost completely. Yet it was a perfect adaptation- the same and not quite the same.

Watchmen, The Movie... They should've just changed the name and called it "inspired by".

Watch Men?

2009-03-06T22:33:00.000-08:00

Here's my prediction- and I haven't seen the movie, I've only seen the trailers and the clip they showed on the Daily Show last night (currently watching it on Hulu)- Watchmen blows.

Why?

Because they removed the premise of the novel, and made it into an Anti-Bush-like government movie.

Fucking idiots. Here's hoping they all develop testicle cancer.

I'm gonna try and go see it Sunday, I'll post if I'm wrong.

The Economist says "Make it Legal"

2009-03-06T14:04:00.000-08:00

(First found at Boing Boing)

The Economist is saying:

Next week ministers from around the world gather in Vienna to set international drug policy for the next decade. Like first-world-war generals, many will claim that all that is needed is more of the same. In fact the war on drugs has been a disaster, creating failed states in the developing world even as addiction has flourished in the rich world. By any sensible measure, this 100-year struggle has been illiberal, murderous and pointless. That is why The Economist continues to believe that the least bad policy is to legalise drugs.

“Least bad” does not mean good. Legalisation, though clearly better for producer countries, would bring (different) risks to consumer countries. As we outline below, many vulnerable drug-takers would suffer. But in our view, more would gain.

Here's why I doubt we'll be dropping this particular prohibition...

Look at the Kennedy legacy.

A single generation after prohibition and we had a political dynasty that was/is, arguably, the most powerful in America ever, but certainly within the 20th century.

And it was all built on the backbones of a fortune made in illegal alcohol sales.

The Kennedys made their money during prohibition; and when prohibition ended, they couldn't keep making money running booze. That's when they moved into politics.

BoingBoing seems to agree, to some respect:

But it won't happen, because the criminals don't want it, law enforcement doesn't want it, and the prison systems ... don't want it.

Ze Germans

2009-03-05T14:56:00.000-08:00

... are smarter than us:

(url: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cgJgnG9YzY&eurl=http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/&feature=player_embedded)

Is Alochol Bad for Women?

2009-03-05T14:21:00.000-08:00

According to Charlie Stross:

[A] lot of headlines and newspaper column-inches were devoted to the shocking findings of a recent survey of women's health that apparently indicated that drinking any alcohol at all correlated with an elevated risk of cancer:

Even small amounts of alcohol increase a woman's risk of cancer" (The Guardian)"

"Drink a day increases cancer risk" (The BBC)

"Even a little alcohol ups cancer risk in women" (Reuters)

Daily drink for middle-age women cancer risk (Washington Post, syndicated)

But were those reports accurate?

Stross says no, and provides some proofs. He goes on to sum up the abstract- which appears to be the only portion of the actual study the reporters looked at:

"Alcohol is evil. We know this because it is True. And it's especially bad for women because, well, women shouldn't drink. If you run a study to confirm this belief and the facts don't back you up, the facts are wrong. So tell the public the Truth (alcohol is always evil) and bury the facts; the press won't be able to tell the difference because they're (a) lazy (or overworked, take your pick) and (b) statistically innumerate."

There is a general sentiment, among many people, to accept what one group says or another. I'm choosing to accept what Charlie Stross and Sandy Szwarc have to say. Why? Read Stross's post, and the article at Junkfood Science. The numbers tell a different story than what some are reporting, and the paper's authors are trying to say. How could that be?

(from Junkfood Science, linked and cited in Charlie Stross' post)

“[Moderate drinking] is a level of consumption that generally has been found in scientific studies to be associated with a relatively low risk of harms,” said Robert Brewer of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.* “But low risk does not mean no risk.”

* The newspaper failed to disclose that Dr. Brewer is manager and director of the Alcohol Team at the CDC; serves as Principal Investigator for Alcohol-Related Disease Impact software, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; and has authored numerous publications on alcohol and alcohol-related health effects.

Drink. It's good for you- if you're a woman and have no more than 2 drinks every day.

Story Time

2009-03-05T12:20:00.000-08:00

"John Jacob Johnson, III was born on a farm in rural Alabama to Mitsy McCallister Johnson and John Jacob Johnson, Jr. He played football for Southern Redneck High School, and went to the University of Alabama on an athletics scholarship. Alas, he suffered a tragic, career ending, ankle sprain in his junior year.

"Forced to face the heartbreaking reality of working for a living, he switched his major from Athletics to Business. He threw himself into the books, trying desperately to earn himself a way off the farm in little Hickrape, Alabama. He got a part-time job, as an 'errand boy' for a local law firm. Undaunted by the proposition of blowing old conservative fruits for $3 a trick, he graduated Cum Laude and immediately applied to Law School. His impressive ability to suck a golf ball through a three foot section of garden hose impressed the registrars, and earned him one of the few coveted spots.

"It was there he met his wife Milley, whom he would marry and later kill- getting away with it because of his connections and experience as a trial judge. So thoroughly did he plan and perpetrate the murder, that he wasn't even a suspect. He used the 'grief' of the 'tragedy' as a springboard into a federal judiciary seat. Still willing to slurp down as many hot loads as it would take, 'Big Gay Jay'- as he was called behind his back- quickly climbed the federal ladder.

"None were surprised when the latest President gave Judge Johnson the nod for the Ultimate Bench. His confirmation hearings went through without a hitch- after all, Big Gay Jay personally knew the taste and proclivity of many a sitting Senator. So it was that three months ago, Judge Johnson, chin unusually dry, became Supreme Court Justice Johnson."

"Thank You for the history lesson, you plastic surgery enhanced sack of vacuousness, laugh vacantly while I glare at you in contempt."

Ah hahahahahah

"Good. We go now, to Justice Johnson's first news conference, a rarity for seated Supreme Court Justices."

"Yes, thank you all for coming- but, then, the huge erection erasing power of a name with a title as earth shatteringly huge as mine is hard to resist, isn't it? As you know, I'm Justice John Jacob Johnson, III; and I am the most junior member of the Supreme Court of the United States of America. I've called you all here today to lay out some basic facts, you sniveling retards. Pay attention, or I will use every ounce of my not-insignificant power to utterly fuck this Union, harder than any man since the current President's predecessor!

"You smug motherfuckers keep tossing around some drivel so often, I've found myself using it, and that is un-fucking-acceptable. The particular term I'm here to address is 'Activist Judges'. Since more than half of you are unable to find your assholes with both hands if you're given an eight finger head-start; I'm going to explain this to you again, in language a half retarded spider monkey could understand. Take notes.

"There are THREE branches to the Federal Government. The Executive, which executes the Laws; the Legislative, which makes the Laws; and the Judicial which ensures that the laws are- you know- legal. There are checks and balances placed between the branches, so that no one of them can become all-powerful and thereby negate either- or both- of the others.

"One of these checks and balances is the ability of the Executive to command the Armed Forces. One check is the requirements upon the Legislative should it seek to change the fundamental documents governing our federal government- like the Constitution of the United States of America. A different check is the Executives ability to appoint the members of the federal Judiciary. Another check is the ability for the Judiciary to deem a law unconstitutional, which would require the constitution be amended before such a law could be considered legal in the United States of America.

"This last, is pretty much what 99% of the time of the Supreme Court of the United States of America is consumed by: the legality of laws, their interpretations, and usage. In other words, activism. That's right, the Supreme Court (of the United States of America) is designed to be the Nine most activist judges in the land. In fact, almost all Federal Judges are, by design, ACTIVIST JUDGES, you brainless bags of syphilitic shit!

"Why? Because we make sure that the Executive- especially in its capacity as a police force- doesn't overstep the bounds, intents, or capabilities outlined in the laws the Legislature passes. That's why we're here. Guilt and Innocence are matters for juries to decide; judges make sure everything is legal.

"Thus endeth the lesson. But I will now answer one further question. A question that many of you have been wondering as you stare at me, red faced, ranting, with foamy spit spraying from my lips: Why are you doing this? I'll tell you why.

"Not only am I offended by how stupid and sheep like you idiot sons of bitches out there in the electorate are; but I am indescribably contemptuous of the manipulative fucks you domitable assholes allow to fill your heads with the rancid cow shit, you fucking douchebags are all too happy to spew at one another. I am a Supreme Court Justice. This post is for Life. That makes me gangsta. Know what a REAL gangsta does when he's given a podium, an audience, and the ability to speak? Rewind this tape.

"Peace, bitches!"

It is many weeks later before the Governor Goat Fucking scandal of Delaware replaces Justice Johnson's exit from the stage on the Mainstream News Networks. He throws the microphone down, and turns to march off, confident in the knowledge that no more dicks shall intrude upon the sanctity of his oral cavity, unless he so wants it. Some terse words are exchanged with a cameraman blocking the way, as the judge tries to exit. The sixty-three year old man, dressed in the robes of his office, throws a beautiful front kick into the waiting nutsack of the cameraman. This causes the man to fall over, grab his bleeding sack, and drop his camera; allowing the judge the room he needs to clear the stage. As the judge walks away, the camera picks up two distinct sounds accompanied by two distinct images. The first, the plaintive moans of the cameraman, his face twisted in ball busted pain. The second, the judge saying, "This is MY house, motherfucker!" and whistling as he walks away, his robes parting just enough for the entire world to get a small glimpse of sixty-three-year-old-ass-cheek.

----
The Civics Lesson, for kids! (c) Thomas Hand 5 March 2009

MurdocSpace

2009-03-02T20:32:00.000-08:00

For the last year, maybe 18 months, I've been dealing with MySpace telling me I'm- and treating me like- a spambot. Links are blocked, messages are blocked. I must enter Captcha at too many turns- like when I send a reply message.

The worst part? I have no recourse but to take it... except canceling the account. That's not an alternative, for me, because of who I have contact with there and no where else. So, I removed my formatting, turned the profile to FRIENDS ONLY, and will be adding no new content there. In other words, I'm using it as a very shitty email drop.

Has anyone else run into these issues?

NEVER Talk to the Cops.

2009-03-02T13:22:00.000-08:00

This goes along with my post a day or so ago.

Found At:
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/03/02/15yearold-girl-beate.html

Notice the loving way he throws her down by her hair, punches her in the head and then picks her up by the hair? Aren't cops lovable?

"Aww, wook at da' wittle po-po. Who's the cutest wittle coppie woppie in all the land? It's you! Oh yes it is!"

So You Say You Want a Revolution?

2009-03-02T09:08:00.000-08:00

I've had an idea kicking around my cranial-meat for a while.

SYSYWAR ("Sissy War") will be an irregular introduction to gadgets. The point being as much to discuss new technological innovation you can hold in your hand and throw at bastards; as to discuss the meaning behind the technologies and how it works. (For long time readers, think "Culture for the Masstards" for techies.)

Today's installment, Radio Free Radio!

The idea was first massively advertised by the satellite radio stations. Essentially, it's "take everything you love about radio, subtract everything you hate, and CRANK IT UP TO 11!" The really nice thing? If you're willing to spend some initial time at it, it works (and your time spent tends to decrease the longer you participate).

The sites, and there are others; but these are the type I'd send my mom to- because I wouldn't be worried about her getting spyware and viruses from just going there:
(In no particular order)
Pandora
Jango
Slacker Radio

To give you an easy example, we'll take Jango. At the main page, I put "Nine Inch Nails". The program assumes I want to listen to NIN and similar bands. So, skipping ahead I get "Cherub Rock" from the Smashing Pumpkins, "Intermission" from Tool, "Opus Dei" from Laibach, and "Fell on Black Days" by Soundgarden. Additionally, it recommends other bands I might want to add to my new "station". Marilyn Manson, KMFDM, Tool, Smashing Pumpkins, A Perfect Circle, and Nirvana are its suggestions. Not bad, right? Confused on why? Essentially, the station is only playing tracks similar to NIN, I can add other bands to refine the sound I'm looking for- General 90s: Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins; Industrial: KMFDM, Gothic: Marilyn Manson, A Perfect Circle; Metal(ish): Tool, KMFDM.

Pandora, as it loads, tells you that it's a means of placing the Music Genome Project into users' hands. The idea is the same for all of them. Add Groups you like, rate individual songs/groups and an algorithm sorts all listed tracks on the server sending you ones that are similar. It's radio, if radio didn't suck, and wasn't actually being pumped out of Durham, NC instead of down the block.

The real difference between the services is how customizable they are, and the extra features. Jango focuses on social networking, almost, and allows a general choice of "Popular Tracks, Happy Medium, or Wide Variety" for how obscure the track list should go. Pandora has more information about the bands and songs, will tell you WHY a song/band was selected, and a detailed list of what choices you've made for your station. Slacker allows more general customization- like obscurity, and era, for instance- and Slacker also has the slab of tech we're about to discuss. All have links to lyrics or artist info or to buy tracks. And all have the ability to create a station and share it with friends. Wil Wheaton has shared a station on Slacker Radio he created based on Bauhaus and similar bands, take a look/listen.

SLAB'O'TECH

The gadget to bring this technology out of your computer- should you be so inclined is the new Slacker G2 Personal Radio Player. Basically, it connects with Slacker radio when it finds a WiFi source and gets new music based on your previous tinkerings; but otherwise operates exactly like the website. So, going for a run/walk/jog/ride? Don't want to take along a laptop with an air card? Problem solved. (Wil Wheaton's review, which inspired this post.)

WHY THIS IS GOOD
I love radio because it exposes me to music I wouldn't normally hear if I was stuck with my playlist in [Preferred Mediaplayer] on Shuffle and Repeat All. Yet, I hate listening to radio- except for NPR News- because they play CRAP with a capital "UTTER-FUCKING-BULLSHIT-ASS-DRIPPINGS-RECTAL-PROLAPSE"! I can't stand 99% of what's on the radio stations available in my area. I want punk and metal stations, for instance, which we don't have at all. Now I can create them; and all of these services are free, or have very good free versions.

WHY THIS IS NEW
Technically, it's not; and I'm not concerned with that, too much. SYSYWAR, like CftM, is also about collating information and putting it into a place you can easily reference or send your friends. Now you have a post you can send your friends to, when they ask you what bands they should look into when they only like Echo and the Bunnymen, Leadbelly, and Snoop Dog. (Hint: Send them Here)

The G2, however, is fairly recent, so there's that.

Angel of Death?

2009-03-02T08:36:00.001-08:00

Remember Zoe Bell? Yeah, that Zoe Bell.

Ed Brubaker has created a TV series for the net, starring Zoe Bell as the assassin Eve.

Go watch it.

Has Capitalism REALLY Hit the Fan?

2009-03-01T22:37:00.000-08:00

Capitalism Hits the Fan: A Marxian View from UVC-TV 19 on Vimeo.

Analysis follows:

In short, the first 15-22min are instructive, the last bits are interesting; but fundamentally flawed.

In the comments- at vimeo- on this video, you can see a number of ideas discussed. Some (most? I didn't read more than the first handful) are marxist/socialist, some are capitalist (including the linked PDF from the Chicago Federal Reserve Bank's Letter from March 1997), some are anti-corporate, yadda yadda yadda. The thing that unites them is they each represent a fascinating singular viewpoint, and none of them do more than superficially present a straw man of any other views. But that's the comments (which we'll come back to), now for the video...

Are his facts accurate? Yes. He never claims they are more than generalizations- which they appear to be on closer inspection. For 150 years productivity, profit and wages rose each year. Was it always at the same rate? Probably not. Was it 1975 when wages started their stagnate/downward trend? Looking at the PDF linked above, it was 1972 when real hourly wages peaked. They explain the numbers they use:

"It is obtained by deflating the average hour earnings figure that the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) obtains every month from its Current Employment Survey (CES) of establishments by the BLS’s Consumer Price Index for Urban Consumers (CPIU)."

That seems a reasonable way of deriving the numbers; and the Newsletter continues with an analysis of why it's not if you care for that. (I'll dig deeper into that PDF in a moment).

Generally, Professor Rick Wolff's facts and analysis of the 150 years from 1820-1970 is correct- as you'd probably expect from someone at the Department of Economics at the University of Massachusetts - Amherst. His assertion that this isn't a financial crisis is emotionally/politically motivated. This crisis may have resulted from many things- in fact, I think it's safe to say that it did- but to compare it to the body isn't very valid. Everything in life, today, is far more entwined than it was 100 years ago. 100 years ago a mechanics wasn't expected to understand basic nutrition, basic finance, basic law (and basic copyright law), basic electronics, and various other basics essential to navigating life in the modern era. That's not to say such understanding wouldn't help a mechanic 100 years ago, it's to say that they weren't expected by their society to know those things.

Today, the RIAA will crucify your grandmother if her granddaughter doesn't understand that torrenting music is illegal (basic copyright law). The MPAA will attempt to crucify anyone who doesn't adhere to the warnings they put on all VHS tapes and DVDs- on the DVDs you can't even skip their warning (even the one written in a language you don't understand). No more pensions, IRAs, 401(k)s, etc etc (basic- maybe even moderate- finance). A mechanic can get sued if he allows a customer to drive a car out of his shop- even if he fixed the one piece he was asked to fix (basic law). Undernourish your kids and see what DHS says (basic nutrition). Setup the router so you can safely navigate the internet for entertainment, education, and porn (technically entertainment; but SO much more, really); set up the flat screen 1080i television, the MP3 streaming wifi enabled home stereo and entertainment system, the cable box DVR, the DVD/Blu-ray player, etc (basic electronics).

Just because we're that entwined, doesn't mean this didn't start in the Financial sector. If we had done things differently, we MIGHT not have seen this crash happen, or spread as far as it did. That's a maybe; not a definite. If we had done things differently- say a dictatorial political system with a communist market- we may have been Russia in the early 1990s.

His fact that the American working class was the only one that could have been leveraged was new to me; and fit many things I had heard and read. For many years I wanted to move to the UK and live there awhile. I knew most people there rented- though I still don't know why exactly, tax law seems to have some effect on it. I knew that is the commonly accepted de facto living arrangement in Europe and Developed Asia: renting over buying.

His facts are solid, if general, and his ideas are fairly valid. Despite the fact that this started in the Financial sector, it's spread to many- if not all- sectors and is resulting in massive job losses. It's a world disaster/crisis/whatever.

His plan is interesting. Read the comments to see where it falls short from the marxist/socialist mindset. He's detailed cooperatives, not communists; but ignoring jargon and revolutions, it's an interesting idea. I doubt, as one commentor said, that workers already have the power. How can you "refuse low wages" when you're too broke to provide yourself food, water, and shelter? How can you refuse "higher prices" when it's milk, eggs, flour, rice, water, and shelter whose prices are increasing?

A digression on worker's power...

When I lived in Birmingham, I stayed at an Apartment for two years. When I got in, the price for that place was $675 a month (2 bed room, 1 bath, with water, sewer, and garbage included). When I left it was $725. When I left, the rented that apartment- to whoever moved in after me- for $750 + $30 for the included. The apartment wasn't in a bad neighborhood- though a prostitute did try to pick me up in the parking lot once, and many of the immigrants had their apartments invaded. (I was walking the dog one morning, barely awake, when I brushed through a piece of fishing line. It tripped a very loud, and annoying, alarm; designed to wake the families before thieves could make off with their kids' bikes or break down their doors). It was in Homewood, on Valley Ave, right off Green Springs. And the only place cheaper- on that road- was about $50-$60 cheaper a month, but about three-four times less safe. Imagine trying to walk to work from further away. I originally moved there from a place near Cahaba Heights that was 2 Bedrooms, 2 Baths, for $715 (garbage and sewer included). They arbitrarily raised rent rates every year- the longer the buildings stand the less is actually needed for the owners to turn a profit, until they're so old they should be torn down. Moving further away might have resulted in less rent; but more travel time to work, more gas in general travel, and basically less net gain.

Workers at the lowest end of the spectrum don't have much power. Look at who pays the most in taxes. Don't you think it's highly likely they're the same people spending the money on most non-essential (i.e. non-grocery, non-gas) supplies? They have the power, and they're not the middle class, they're the upper middle class and higher. This is where the ideals of a consumerist, materialistic, greed based value system fucks us. Plus advertising. In America, Taco Bell during the early to mid 1990s had a 59c, 79c, 99c menu. Wonder why they don't now? Because if you price something too low it's perceived value is always lower than it's price. Take the same item, price it at $1.09- instead of 79c- and its value seems greater, though the only thing that has changed is the price point. This works ont he psyche of people invested int he rat race, and who have won. People struggling to get by don't give a shit if it tastes a little funny and is half broken, if it's cheap and plentiful (and won't give them cancer today) it's gonna have to be good enough.

Back to his models...

Look at those silicon valley start-ups. As one commentator noted, venture capitalists supplied many of them with enough money to actually get the product out there. Then the VC's would, usually, own the largest portion of the company (compared to any other single investor, at least). Even if the VC's were bought out- control reverting to the workers- how did those companies end up? Oracle. Compaq. Google. Go look up which ones are publicly traded, and which ones make their Board of Directors public. Go see who is on those boards. Who is the CEO- and where did that person come from? It's not a pretty picture for the idea of cooperatives. Which might be a fault of the capitalist market, and the fallible human's need to indulge their greed; but if it is, we'd have to change the entire system before the cooperatives we were changing the system for could actually work in the long-term.

Lastly, the commentors. As I have said, I didn't read many of them. Comments can be useful; but they can also be rather useless. Most don't fully consider the ideas purported by others- even when they directly address those others. I did, however, go look at the Fed of Chicago's newsletter.

Let's be clear, I thought it would be the pro-capitalism view, and it is. It is also 12 years dated- which is significant in light of the last six months to a year. I didn't manage to make it through more than the first page.

There are, however, major methodological problems with using the average hourly earnings series to gauge long-term trends in wage rates. First, they cover only wage and salary compensation. Fringe benefits and contributions for social insurance programs, important parts of workers’ total compensation, are left out.

Because these components of compensation have been increasing more rapidly than wages and salaries over most of the period covered by figure 1, average hourly earnings understate compensation growth. The earnings data are also limited to production and nonsupervisory workers. The nearly 20% of workers excluded from the average are more likely to be highly skilled and highly paid. Because such workers have experienced more rapid wage growth since the early 1970s, their exclusion imparts another downward bias to the measured rate of average wage growth. Finally, though it covers a large fraction of employment, the CES is subject to substantial biases in sample selection; for example, it excludes workers at newly opened establishments.

In other words, because CEOs don't get covered- and their wages and benefits have grown vastly- the figure is inaccurate. My general refutation is: FUCK YOU!

Also, it doesn't cover NEW companies. Yet, it will soon; but more importantly: where do you think the new companies get their data for salaries from? Cause I'm betting established companies.

Fringe benefits are good; but they're also a crock of shit. In the 1950s you got a pension. Today, you get far less money, devoted to matching your 401(k) or IRA contributions. They have their benefits over the old style pensions- but mostly for upper middle class and above. Many people feel the "choices" and "freedom" of IRAs and 401(k)s are worth it; but I contest those "freedoms" and "choices" blow when compared to a pension for 90% of people. Health insurance could be worse if employers didn't help; but it's still ridiculous- even for Hospital employees. Why? Because of businesses we like to call the Insurance Companies (who are highly unregulated, and about the worst of the worst when it comes to greedy corporate fucks). Go look at what some sites that show median salary, and see how much higher they rate things like retirement packages and health care.

Don't get me wrong, Health coverage is even more expensive- a lot of the time- if the employer doesn't help with it; but it's not exactly like a benefit when a large chunk of salary gets pulled out of each check. What's the term for something that's not a benefit, but not a disadvantage, either? That's how I see health care compensation at most companies.

Do I have a solution?
Nope. But I'm not a professional economist, either. I think Professor Wolff makes some interesting points; but I also think he can (literally) afford to view things the way he does. I also think he knows quite a bit about what he's glossing over. All in all, it's definitely a must see lecture, because it illustrates an alternative viewpoint and sparks discussions. His solutions are maybe a little better- because of who they benefit- than most of the ones I hear currently; but they're also less likely. We're a hierarchical society, trying to disrupt the hierarchy isn't a small thing- and despite the benefit 99% of people will resist that change.

Of course, it'd be easier to substantially change if we could get those 99% to actually think about what/how/why the system is/does/causes the things/ways/beliefs it is/does/causes.

NEVER EVER EVER Talk to the Cops.

2009-03-01T21:15:00.000-08:00

I have a lot of friends who get into trouble. I get into trouble, too. Being as close to 7' as 6', and loud, and an asshole (read: blunt and intentionally tactless) I'm easily visible, and likely to be remembered. Unfortunately- as so many people have told me- I remind everyone of someone.

Enter the police. I remember one go-getter putting me in the back of a hot patrol car, while he tried to be super cop and get me to confess. The only problem: neither of us knew what the fuck I was supposed to be confessing. He had caught me buying smokes- I was 17- but there was an APB (maybe a "warrant", maybe just an "Action Alert", who knows what they really call 'em) for me for questioning.

Fortunately, for me, I liked to read these old hacker journals. Kult of the Dead Kow- still around, in a way, but they dropped the K's- 2400, etc etc. One of the issues I had discussed the case of a hacker. It was written, in a very compelling way, as a first-person account of his arrest, and how that later helped convict him of a lesser crime. The article was intended as advice for how to deal with the cops. Essentially, it said "Don't EVER EVER talk to cops. There is no 'off the record;' they can lie to you. Cops DO NOT have the authority to make a 'deal'."

Turns out, those 'zines I was reading 3-4 years after they had first been published, were right.

(After the cut, 2 videos- each about 22 minutes- the first being a criminal defense attorney and law school professor. The second being a cop, who affirms everything the professor says, and gives the cop's-eye version of why.)

Prof. James Duane of the Regent University School of Law:

Officer George Bruch of the Virginia Beach Police Department

l2 RPG, nubz0r.

2009-02-26T12:48:00.000-08:00

So, a friend asked me "How do these 'RPGs' work, exactly?"

Of course, I over did it:

Here's an example of how a Tabletop, or Paper and Dice, Roleplaying Game works. This example is geared towards people who have never played a Paper and Dice RPG before, and the "VERY IMPORTANT" examples afterward are geared towards the White Wolf gaming systems. Feel free to link back to this page.

Tom, the utterly awesome and badass and generally great person that he is, has invited Dick and Harry, the near mongoloid simpletons that they are, to participate in a roleplaying game. A date, time, and place is agreed to; and they meet. Tired of playing futuristic space marines fighting aliens, and tolkeen-esque elves trying to save their world from Hitler-esque douchebaggery, they've decided to play a detective/mystery game set in Huntsville Alabama in the modern day.

Tom, Dick, and Harry sit around a dining room table, gaming books- and computers- assorted around them for easy reference. After all, it's easy to remember where the rules are, than the rules themselves. The game has started. Tom is the Game Master (GM).

Dick and Harry have previously made characters according to the rules- which differ from game system to game system. Dick is playing a Hard-nosed private investigator named Dick Tracy. Harry is playing Dick's long-time best friend, and professional magician, Harry Who. If the game was a play, these characters would be the parts played by the actors Dick and Harry.

Tom: "Dick, you've gotten a frantic voice message from a contact who has frequently helped you on cases in the past. He sounds anxious. The message says, 'Dick? Dick? Shit! Voicemail. Look, Dick, remember how I did you that solid a bit ago? I need a favor, and I need it now-like. Meet me at midnight in the rear of the alley behind McLeary's.'"

Dick: "What does my character know about this contact that I don't?"

Tom: "The incident he's referring to was a case you worked about six months back. It had hit a dead end and you were worried that it was going to languish and end up unsolved. Fortunately, this contact- we'll call him Bill- pulled some strings and got you the information that solved the case. It was a clutch rescue, and netted you some much needed cash. Generally, the guy's an excellent source of information, and he's never lied to you- a rarity in itself, among contacts. In other words, he's good people. If you want to know more, you're going to have to make some rolls."

[Tom and Dick look at Dick's character sheet. They decide that Dick's character isn't just trying to remember his dealings with Bill; but trying to figure out some things that might not have been obvious. Now that they have decided on some rolls Dick can make, Dick picks up the appropriate dice and makes the rolls. Tom interprets the rolls into actual information.]

Tom: "Well, you've known the guy for a few years, and he's always reliable- the type that won't jerk you around for a handout if he doesn't actually have information- which is unlike most of your other contacts. The only real problem is, he has a thing for cloak and dagger stuff- preferring to meet in alleys and use dead drops, instead of just calling you when he's alone. He really hates phones and voicemail. But he's never steered you wrong in all the time you've known him."

Dick: "Alright, well this sounds serious, and the guy's 'on the level' so I'll give Harry a call and go meet him."

Tom: "Gotcha. Harry, your ol' buddy Dick, the Dick, Tracy gives you a ring."

Harry: "Hello?"
Dick: "Yo, Hair, how's the magic business?"
Harry: "Good. What's up?"
Dick: [Explains the situation] "So, you wanna come along? Might lead to some fun."
Harry: "Sure, sure; I'll meet you there- I got a gig I'm about to do. Will I need anything?"
Dick: "Just your sparkling personality."
Harry: "Cool, see ya there."
Dick: "Oh, and Harry?"
Harry: "Yeah?"
Dick: "You might wanna ACTUALLY get a sparkling personality..."
Harry: "Dick."

Tom: "Nice. So, your show it great, as always, Harry, and you both arrive at McLeary's a few minutes before midnight. Though your characters have known each other since childhood, this is the first time we've played these characters. Go ahead and describe yourselves to each other."

Dick: "Remember Warren Beatty in the Dick Tracey movie? I'm him, but more Same Spade- no yellow, all browns, with a voice like Humphrey Bogart."
Harry: "I look like Harry Houdini."

Tom: "Right, so you're at McLeary's and you walk around back. The Alley buts up against an apartment building. McLeary's is a popular greasy spoon, run by a crotchety old bastard- but the food is good, and you've been going there since you were kids.
"The Alley is disgusting. Rubbish lines both sides, and the dumpsters- halfway down- are overflowing with week old trash. It smells putrid, and the humid air of the southern summer doesn't help. You're not surprised that it's dark- the old man who owns McLeary's is cheap. Whatever lights might be down there are either off or burned out. You hear the distinct sound of rats and other vermin crawling through garbage, and the thought of actually seeing what's there is slightly less appealing that traversing the dark, dank, corridor. What do you do?"

Harry: "I turn to Dick. 'Do we have to meet this bag of fuck down there?'"
Dick: "'Fraid so. What's the matter, scared of the dark?"
Harry: "No, it's just..."
Dick: "What?"
Harry: "These shoes are expensive!"
Dick: [laughing]"Oh, get to steppin' you prissy bitch!"
Harry: "Alright, alright! But if my shoes get stained, you're buying me new ones!"
Dick: "Fine, whatever, let's just go meet Bill."

Tom: "Oh, ho! We're gonna let the fates decide this. Dick, grab a ten-sided dice. Harry, grab one, too. Dick, your dice is the tens place; Harry your dice is the ones. If it's low, Harry needs new shoes, if it's high, Dick is off the hook. Roll 'em!"

[Dick's roll places them in the: singles, teens, twenties, thirties, all the way up to nineties. Harry's roll puts the polish on the number. If Dick rolls a 4, they're going to roll between 40 and 49- depending on Harry's rolls. The Dick rolls a 10 on a ten-sided dice (also called a "d10"). If Harry rolls a ten as well, that would mean they have rolled a 100 (00). Otherwise they have rolled a 01,02,03,04,05,06,07,08, or 09. Harry rolls a 5.]

Tom: "Uh-oh, Dick- looks like you've just bought little Miss Priss some new dancin' shoes!"

Dick: "Stupid metrosexuals..."
Harry: "Don't hate the playa, hate how you rolled!"

Tom: "Now I need you both to roll your Perception!"

[In the system they are playing, Perception is a roll that players make to see what, if anything their characters might notice beyond the general description of the scene the GM has given. A Perception roll is based on some of the stats recorded on the character sheets, and both Dick and Harry tally up how many dice they need to roll. In some systems, only one die might be rolled for a Perception roll. Usually, in those systems, the character sheet will record what type of dice (six-sided (d6), eight-sided (d8), ten-sided (d10), twelve-sided (d12), twenty-sided (d20), etc) needs to be rolled. Sometimes, there might even be a bonus- either to how many dice should be rolled, or to the number(s) rolled. All of that information is found on the character sheet, and GMs will help players who don't know where such things are located- a very frequent occurrence, even with experienced players.]

[Dick rolls his dice, Harry rolls his. Tom interprets the rolls into actual information.]

Tom: "Harry, you rolled bad and don't see anything, still too focused on whatever it was you just stepped in. You can feel some wetness in your shoe- which means Dick is buying you new ones!"

Harry: "Aw, motherfucker! I just stepped in something! Fuck! I hope you have good credit, asshole, we're going shopping tomorrow!"

Tom: "Dick, you notice a glinting on the ground, and a familiar smell. You follow the glint of moonlight, and sure enough it's as you expected. Bill's dead, and the glint is his pooling blood. His body lies on the rubbish against the apartment building. Before you can say anything, you hear Harry step in the blood, and start cursing."

Dick: "Watch out, there's...! Nevermind."
Harry: "There's what? What were you gonna say? And where's this Bill dude?"
Dick: "Bill's right there. (I point to the partially concealed body) And that's his blood you're wearing on your high-heels."
Harry: "Aw, fuck!"

------------------------------------------------------
End of Example.

Some notes you should be aware of: (Ignore any of it, if it doesn't make sense)
* Not everyone says "I" when referring to their character. Some people say "My character goes and looks at Bill's body." Some might say their character's name: "Amy goes and looks at Bill's body." Some people use combination of any of those approaches. It's just however the player feels comfortable.
* There's a concept of "Player Knowledge vs Character Knowledge". Player knowledge is what the Player knows. Character knowledge is what the character knows. As the player, you might know calculus; but if your character is a medieval knight, it probably has no idea about anything beyond basic mathematics. If your character is that knight, it knows things about chivalry, and the rules, rights, etiquette, expectations, and constraints of being a medieval knight. Things the player might not know. The GM is there to help fill in the gaps from a Character's Knowledge to yours, while it's your job to have fun you should refrain from having your medieval knight glibly go drive the automobile that just appeared from the future. in fact, your knight shouldn't have any concept of what he's seeing. This is a fact that crops up in almost every game; and something to keep in mind, but not something to be overly concerned with (that's the GM's job).
* Different systems use different mechanics. Let's take something similar: Throwing a stone at someone, to hurt them. In two different systems, you might roll based on your Athletics skill level. In the first, that might be 1d20 (one twenty-sided dice [Yes it can be either "dice" or "die" in this context]) plus some bonus based on how many levels of the skill Athletics you have. In the other, that might be a number of dice based on the combination of your dexterity and athletics- both attributes recorded on your character sheet. Additionally, determining if that roll has hit your opponent is different depending on the system. These rules can get rather arcane and complex. It's not the job of the players to know how to do any of this- though that tends to help speed up game play- it's the job of the GM. And the GM may be called somethign different in different systems. In RIFTS and GURPS, the GM is called a GM. In D&D the GM is a "DM" for Dungeon Master. In the World of Darkness games, the GM is an ST, or Story Teller. These mechanics are different because they are copyrighted- like software code- by the company that made them.

VERY IMPORTANT:
It may sound complex, but it's very very very easy to actually play, under the right circumstances.
For Instance: I might show you a White Wolf character sheet that has the following look:
STRENGTH * * *
DEXTERITY * * * * *
ATHLETICS * * * * *
You don't necessarily know what "Dexterity" means- in the context of the game, or what those asterisks represent. If you've been sat down and helped to make a character, you should have been told what each thing meant; but let's assume you've forgotten because of the sheer amount of information thrown at you (a very common occurrence with new players). So, I might say "Roll to hit with your rocks" and other players might grab some dice, roll them, and say "I got 6 successes!"

That sounds insane. How can you succeed at one task multiple times? Were they throwing multiple rocks? How did they know what to roll? And generally, "WTF?".

This is where knowing the rules speeds up the game. In White Wolf, the game is setup in such a way that to do something, you usually take an Attribute and an Ability, add them together, apply any bonuses or penalties to that number, and roll that many ten-sided dice. Each dice is a Failure, a Botch, or a Success, as determined by a difficulty set by the ST (ST, or Story Teller, is what White Wolf calls their Game Masters). But all of that is something that may still sound arcane.

Think about it this way: You have a certain chance to hit someone with a rock. They have a certain chance to dodge a potential hit, or even dodge into what would have been a miss. You make one roll to see if you CAN hit them. They make a different roll to see if they CAN dodge it. If you have more dice that say you CAN hit them, than they have dice that say they CAN dodge, you hit. If they beat you, they dodge.

Here's how it would look:

"Roll to hit!"

You roll to hit by rolling a number of dice equal to your DEXTERITY plus your ATHLETICS, a total of10 ten-sided dice (10d10). The ST didn't call out a difficulty, so it's assumed you have a 40% chance to hit on each of your dice. This means, a roll of 7,8,9, or 10 on a d10 is a Success. A roll of 2,3,4,5, or 6 is a Failure, and a 1 is always a Botch. Each Botch negates a Success.

You roll your 10d10 and the dice show: 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 9, 2, 3, 10, 10.

That's 1 Botch, 4 Failures, and 5 Successes.

The Rules also say that any dice that rolls a 10 may be counted as a Success and rolled again, to try and garner more Successes. You rolled 2 10s, but you also rolled a Botch. Botches negate Successes, and they take away 10s before the take away other Successes. So, your Botch kills one 10, leaving you a 10 to "reroll".

You roll a 1. Normally, this would be a Botch; however, when re-rolling, Botches only count as Failures.

So, you rolled 1 Botch, 5 Failures and 5 Successes. The Failures don't mean anything, but the Botch kills one Success, so your total is "4 Successes".

Your target gets a chance to dodge, using different Attributes and Abilities, bonuses and penalties, etc etc. But the basics of this is: if your target gets more successes to dodge than you get to hit, they have successfully dodged your attack.

What would normally happen, with a player unfamiliar with how the system works, is the following:
Player:"I want to hit that bitch with a bottle!"
ST:"Okay, Roll to Hit!"
Player:"Uhm.... say what?"
ST:"What's your Dexterity?"
Player:"Uhm, a bunch of asterisks."
ST:"How many asterisks/dots/pips/slash marks/whatevers?"
Player:"5"
ST:"How many asterisks for Athletics?"
Player:"5"
ST:"Roll 10 dice"
[Player rolls]
Player:"Now what?"
ST:"How many dice are a 7 or higher?"
Player:"5"
ST:"How many are 10s?"
Player:"2"
ST:"Did you roll any ones?"
Player:"Yeah, one."
ST:"Okay, that cancels out on of your tens. I need you to roll one more die."
Player:"It's a one."
ST:"Doesn't matter, this time. So, that's 4 Successes. Cool, your target only rolled 3 Successes to dodge."

This stuff is only hard when no one has played it before. But playing with even one experienced person makes it very very simple. After you've gone through that same conversation four, or OVER 9000!, times people tend to grasp it, and by the fifth time they only ask to confirm things. By the millionth time, the ST says "roll to hit" and they do everything themselves, replying with their successes.

RPGs

2009-02-19T21:09:00.000-08:00

I've been playing Tabletop, or Paper and Dice, Roleplaying Games for something like 16 years now. I enjoy them, and I'll probably be one of those guys still playing into my fifties and later. Maybe.

A handful of years ago I stumbled upon the idea of Virtual Table Tops, a way of doing Paper and Dice games online. OPEN RPG was the program I had encountered, and the implementation was buggy, but workable. Recently, I've found something better.

Enter RPTOOLS, and their suite of programs, specifically MAPTOOLS*.

It's simple, except that it's built from the ground up. Essentially, it's a chat client, with a layerable drawing feature, some RPG specific add-ons, and it's free. But it's better than that.

You can set visibile distances, lighting, obstructions, etc etc etc. It's really bad ass how feature rich this thing is, especially since it's FREE! The only thing that sucks is the lack of in-suit voice/data.

Want to send the PDF scan of the map from your sourcebook, instead of meticulously copying it? Gonna have to hit up some email addys. Wanna talk, and save the typing for dice rolls? Better get something like Ventrillo, a program VERY familiar to online PC Gamers.

But, really, those are VERY VERY minor problems- Ventrillo is free and can handle a normal group inside the limits of it's free, local host, server.

Want some numbers?

Documentation: 95% - video tutorials, awesome macro documentation, and an active Forums. Would be 100% with a document accompanying; but still, almost perfect. The video tutorials are AMAZING!

Features: 85% - I discussed the reasons why above. Some adventures require long descriptions of events/speeches. Having to type that is bad; but since you're building the maps beforehand, take a minute and write it all out in NOTEPAD, for easy cut and paste blocking. I just wish there was some player status implementaion, a la MMORPGs. AFK, and ReadyCheck, would make this 87%-90%.

Functionality: 88% - There are still bugs/issues. Most of these are simply annoying. I put it below 90% as a caution to people expecting perfection.

Other Problems: I've discussed them above. The only other one is if you're running a significantly older/underpowered machine. Space for storing all the gigabytes of graphics you'd want can be a problem. And if you're not a texture/3d/etc graphics modeler, you're gonna have some trouble gathering all the modern models you might want. But a little imagination and effort can overcome most of that. (For instance, I wanted a BBQ grill for a back patio. No such luck, and I got tired trying to search for one. Instead, I used a dark 55gal barrel, added two small pipes for smoke chimneys, and voila! Similar problem with sinks; so I used an image for an old washbasin. Ever seen those modern sinks that look like big bowls on top of a counter? That's what these look like. Good enough for me.) Top-down view only; but remember, if you were drawing out your game maps by hand, that's how they'd be, too.

Overall - 95% (Averages to 89.3, so 5.7% was added because it's COMPLETELY FREE, and OPEN SOURCE!) This is truly amazing. If you've moved away, but wanna still game with the same ol' assholes; if you're too poor/busy to drive an hour for the weekly game night; or if you're just more comfortable using computers rather than ACTUALLY being face-to-face with other humans, this is exactly what you're looking for.

As Tabletop RPGS are orders of greatness above the old Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books, this is that far beyond Forum post games, or trying to run a real game in a chat room.

*(Launching will cause the program to be installed and then run, downloading isn't significantly different for getting to know the program).

2009-02-18T13:47:00.000-08:00

It was said when Richard Burris (D-Il) first accepted Blagojevich's nomination that he had nothing to lose. Turns out, that's not the case. He's being investigated by Illinois for perjury, and by the Senate Ethics Committee.

He lied about raising funds for Balgojevich. Flat out lied. Because he wanted his one, last, shot at being somebody in politics. How desperate do you have to be, to make a national fuss about getting your Senate seat, while lying about how you got the appointment?

Sad.