This looks like fun. I'm not sure it's worthy of a Ph.D. thesis, though.

And so, who wins here? I'd say, Iran and Syria. Who loses? Israel and the US, because our "leadership" won't let either deal with the obvious repercussions.

As I've always thought, things are bound to get much worse before they get much better.

I really have to wonder at how gullible people must be to fall for such obvious attempts to do nothing but foment sectarian violence. It must be obvious to everyone by now that these attacks are meant specifically to push Iraq toward civil war, and for no other purpose. It's almost as if these people believe that a self-fulfilling prophecy, even fully identified, can't be altered.

Computer problems, and so light blogging today. Maybe some posts tonight if I can get everything resolved.

I'm not sure what Boing Boing means here by the title "Yahoo! blocks anti-censor, pro-human rghts move by sharehoders." It looks like the shareholders themselves simply voted against the measure. And, indeed, who is "Yahoo!" besides the shareholders?

I agree, although I feel this way about all social networking sites. Ultimately, I think they take too much time to maintain, and so unless one makes a career out of them, their attractiveness quickly pales the more of a time-suck that they become. I used LinkedIn, but primarily only to maintain contact with past coworkers--and, not even active contact, but just to know when they've switched jobs.

When I first saw the recent demos of the upcoming OS X upgrade from Apple, Leopard, I thought the same thing. Much of it just seems to be Vista with a little bit more development, and I'm sure that we'll see much of the same in future Vista updates. The Apple stuff is good, but it's not so far advanced over Vista that it offers a compelling reason to switch.

Of course, the fact that a Mac can run Windows (including Vista) has changed things considerably. My next PC will be a Mac, but I'll likely run OS X only as a novelty.

I've kept up with the healthcare industry for almost 20 years, since getting a job straight out of college where researching healthcare payment systems was a primary function. I noted then, and still believe, that government intervention is singularly responsible for the ever-increasing costs, and I remain amazed that our system continues to produce such quality care.

It started with the creation of Blue Cross/Blue Shield back in the 1930's, then continued with government-granted tax benefits for indemnity group health plans (which caused the disconnect we have today between the care that a person receives and how much he pays for it). Medicare has probably singled-handedly held back preventive medicine in this country, by spending hundreds of billions on highly interventionist care in the last few weeks of life, and the National Institutes of Health spends as much on basic research--without the cost-benefit justication that profits require--as the pharmaceutical industry. All of these governmental interventions, among others, have shaped the American healthcare system into the mess that it is today.

This essay by Dr. Onkar Gate of the Ayn Rand Institute just confirms my own beliefs. It's worth a read.

I'd probably do the same, if I had the money. Of course, I wouldn't have chosen an Airbus.

I've always found my Tablet PC to be a great tool, for a number of important functions. I've changed jobs recently, and so haven't had as many occasions to take handwritten notes, but that's the most obvious Tablet benefit. Other than that, there are times when even surfing the Web can be more comfortable on a Tablet in portrait mode.

Here's a story about a novelist who uses a Tablet PC in just about every meaningful way, it appears. If you have any interest whatsoever in the Tablet platform, this might tip you over the edge.

Notice the comments in this story about the WTC. The nutjobs are out in force.

If you'd like to weigh into the intellectual property debate, go here. My answers were the opposite of what I'm sure IPac is looking for, and the system crashed when I submitted them.

I'm sure it was a coincidence. Maybe you'll have better luck.

Digg Report: Today's #1 Digg, at a moderate 5568, is a rather inane bit of Anti-Americanism. Really, it's pretty crude. Judging from the comments, though, the Diggsters appear to like it.

I'm not sure I understand Mark Cuban's position in this post:

I recognize that it puts Google in a tough position. In fact, it could also be considered hypocritical on my part because I feel more comfortable with a user off the street buying and owning a DRM free copy of any or all of our movies or shows than I feel with Google holding DRM free copies of my content in order to protect it from pirated uploads. I dont have a good reason, but I don't trust Google with a copy of the worlds content any more than I would trust MicroSoft , IBM of the 1980s or any corporate SuperPower.

Whether or not a "user off the street" has any particular moral compunctions against sharing a file en masse is of course a crap shoot. The "corporate SuperPower"'s have very specific legal interests in recognizing and protecting copyright. They're the ones with the deepest pockets, and are far more likely to be (meaningfully) sued.

Cuban sometimes arrives at some odd positions...

To those Lefists who hold out some love for Communism... Idiotic comments aside.

I'm currently developing a new Web site, www.paperfreesmb.com that will provide on-going infomation, news, and support for small and medium business either looking to implementat a document management solution or expand an existing one.

If anyone can recommend a free content management system (Mamba, Drupal, etc.?) to use in building the site, I'd much appreciate any input. I'm not exactly sure where to start, but I want to develop a site similar to www.gottabemobile.com, www.tabletpcbuzz.com, and/or www.notebookreviews.com.

Thanks!

P.S. Don't go to www.paperfreesmb.com. There's nothing there yet!

Uh-oh! The Council for Foreign Relations has added a secret weapon in its quest for global domination. If you weren't scared before, you should be now.

Harry Binswanger presents an important argument for Objectivists who dislike libertarianism. It's specific to libertarian anarchy, but I believe libertarianism leads to anarchy inevitably and so it's a good refutation of libertarianism in general.

The gist? Libertarianism is a non-philosophical movement, and as such is prone to intrincism, mysticism, and a laundry list of unsupported and often contradictory positions.

Well, the last time I checked, the American economy's at about $13 Trillion GDP, the Russian economy not quite topping $1 billion. To me, that means Russia's still a pretty minor player in things economic, Putin's assertions otherwise notwithstanding.

More nyah nyah nyah from China.

Celebrity Report: A list of (alleged, until verified, I suppose) celebrity Republicans. It's not terribly important, since being Republican is no guarantee of rationality.

I have to say: I use a DVR in the bedroom, and a PVR (Snapstream Beyond TV, to be specific, and I highly recommend it) in the office. I rarely watch a show live, and I always skip through the commercials, and so I can understand CBS's position on ads and timeshiftng. In fact, this raises an interesting question: are some shows inherently more appealing to people who are more likely to timeshift, and if so, then are those shows necessarily harder to sell to advertisers? I wonder.

The bottom line, though, is that the networks need to develop different ways to monetize their broadcasts.

Hee hee. More Cox and Forkum.

Actually, I found the ending to the final episode of The Sopranos to be quite fitting. It was, after all, a show primarily about how "normal" people (read, neurotic, cynical, greedy) can find themselves conducting or condoning evil acts. The show ended by showing the Soprano family at their favorite diner, eating onion rings and fighting with such mundane aspects of existence as parallel parking.

There was no need to kill Tony off, or take him to jail. That was never the show's point.

And, one can then understand why Galloway was so against going into Iraq.

I've always liked this aspect of Lieberman.

Digg Report: Today's #1 Digg, at a brisk 4690 Diggs, is a link to a cutesy picture of Pluto and the other planets.

Bizarre.

Words don't mean much anymore, it would appear:

"Fighting between rival Palestinian militant groups, meanwhile, spread in the southern Gaza Strip, further weakening a shaky truce forged in the face of punishing Israeli air assaults."

I've always thought the word "truce" was synonymous with "no fighting."

This should get the Ron Paulies in an uproar. But beware: these are MORMONS!!!

Very nice.

If you care about global warming policies, this will be helpful come 2008.

Today's "duh!" moment.

A chapter that was removed from H.G. Wells' The Time Machine. As depressing as that novel is, this is even worse.

My wife just reminded me of a fortune cookie we received at lunch during our trip last year to find a place to live in California. We were moving from Chicago in about two weeks.

The fortune read: "You are heading for a land of sunshine."

And that's the definition of "coincidence."

The Diggsters show their compassion. Read the comments.

Funny, the underaged, hormone-driven dweebs that populate Digg were probably the first to download Paris Hilton's sex video. Now that she's in prison, however, they can't pile on enough.

Scrappleface on Paris Hilton. "What's bad for Paris Hilton is good for America."

It might seem like I'm picking on Techdirt, but I'm not, really. There's just a surplus of posts in my RSS reader, and I'm just now cleaning out my Techdirt folder. Nevertheless...

This post says "While we're generally suspicoius of vendor-funded surveys..." I wonder why. Are they equally suspicious of government-funded surveys, or NGO-sponsored surveys, or tech group-sponsored surveys? Most surveys are funded by some entitity with an agenda, whether it's obvious or not. It shows Techdirt's anti-business bias that they only mention vendors in this context.

The word "free" in "free trade" just throws some people, Techdirt among them. They simply can't understand that free markets require government protection of things like contracts, agreements and, yes, intellectual property. It would be fascinating to hear how trade could go on between nations without the protection of such things.

I suppose the Techdirt types imagine everyone will just play nicely, and share.

It's an open question as to whether our embassies should be promoting American culture. I don't really think that's a legitimate government responsibility. But the anti-American bile apparent in this Techdirt post is of more interest.

Techdirt often says it's not "political." Maybe, but it's certainly philosophical. And I used to think the site was about technology.

A particularly effective Cox and Forkum cartoon, courtesy of Little Green Footballs.

Update: The above LGF links might not work at the moment. They're apparently having some database problems.

Here's Boing Boing breaking trust with a film producer who's made their film available on YouTube. Boing Boing is recommending the use of the "Democracy Player" to pull the video off of YouTube for easier playing.

Perhaps the producer would have no problem with this, but it changes the game a bit. Rather than playing the film in the somewhat unwieldy and limited YouTube player, one can now play in a much more convenient player. Thus, one might be just that much less inclined to buy the "super high quality" formats available on the producer's site.

The film is an indy production called "Four Eyed Monsters," and I'm not a fan of indy films. But I am a fan of intellectual property and the creator's right to control it. Boing Boing, as usual, isn't.

This is pretty cool. Hum that unknown tune that's driving you crazy, and this site purports to tell you what song it's from.

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. Not only does Google maintain extensive information on our individual Internet activities, but it also has a tendency to be cavalier with intellectual property in general. The problem for the IT Left is that Google has long been their darling, acting as a foil against the company they really consider evil, Microsoft.

Will they accept privacy concerns with Google that they would accept from no other company? It remains to be seen which will take precedence, their hatred of Microsoft or their inherent dislike of business in general. I have no illusions, of course, that they'll be at all concerned about intellectual property.

Note that I'm not convinced that there are general "privacy" concerns in what Google is doing. Once my activities leave my computer, I'm not sure that they're any longer under my control. What happens on my computer should remain private, but that has as much to do with how I use my computer and what software I run.

If Google is going to dominate the world through sheer mastery of technology, then why does it need to engage in antitrust allegations against Microsoft?

I must admit, I do miss Chicago.

This is good advice. We have probably about 75% of our important documents scanned and saved in a variety of places, including on DVD in a fireproof safe. I like the idea of saving to online storage--not so much for the redundancy, but to make it readily available from any Internet-connected computer. Although I always dream of grabbing one of my notebooks in case of a fire or other disaster, it probably wouldn't happen.

I think I'd grab my kids first.

Some thoughts on terror and the Koran...

I love this: "pitting dog and cat lovers against animal rights activists."

Huh?

We used to call it "playing doctor." Seriously. Violence is one thing. Messing around is something we all did, or wanted to do, and is another thing completely. I think we're criminalizing what we once saw as mere curiosity.

This lays things on the line: vote Democrat to end the war. It'll be interesting to see how that theme plays out.

Wanna know which movie critics to trust? Go here.

Skull and Bones! Illuminati! Bilderbergers! Freemasons! Trilateral Commission! Priory of Sion! Reptilian Humanoids! Elders of Zion! Shadow Government! Council on Foreign Relations! New World Order! Military-Industrial Complex! The World Bank! Big Pharma! Big Oil! Big Banking!

It's amazing that anything gets done with so many competing interests.

A snowball in Hell? I'm not sure I remember a prominent UN figure, other than the US Ambassador, expressing support of Israel...

This is fascinating, if maybe a little depressingly predictable: a game called Bioshock that seems to incorporate Ayn Rand's philosophy in its background story. I'm guessing that it's hardly correct, although I'll reserve judgement given this review's use of such libels as the alleged "dog-eat-dog" aspect of Objectivism. I'm hoping that the game publisher knows Objectivism a little better than the reviewer, although I'm not that hopeful.

I'll likely buy and play the game, just to see what it's all about. Read the linked story if you have any interest in Ayn Rand and Objectivism.

Update: More here.

Is Putin crazy like a fox, or just plain crazy? I think the verdict's still out.

Nyah nyah nyah.

Very, very cool. With a name like "scramjet," it must be powerful.

If nuking Iran were on the Republican agenda, it would raise their stock quite a bit with me. Of course, Ron Paul is the only one who wouldn't.

Digg Report: Today's #1 Digg, at a 3929 Diggs, is about the world's biggest digger. It's a nice picture of a feat of mechanical engineering that I bet most Diggers can't really appreciate. Because, you know, it's like, physical.

Well, they should know...

Taking a former KGB agent at his word requires a bit of a leap of faith, or something like it. If true, though, this certainly wouldn't surprise me.

This should be required viewing for anyone who gives presentations.

I can't agree that the G8 Summit is just another "sales meeting." It's more so an opportunity for mixed-economy leaders to get together an figure out new ways to inject force into what should be free transactions between individuals, and to confiscate wealth for political purposes.

I'm a big fan of treaty organizations like NATO the provide for common defense among free nations (or, semi-free, of course, but that's beside the point). But I find the G8 to highlight the dangers of the mixed economy.

The reason we have safeguards against things like illegal search and seizure is because government is the greater threat against our freedoms, not individual criminals. By making such tactics in pursuing even legitimate convictions fruitless, in other words by throwing out cases where such tactics are used, government is less likely to use them for illegitimate purposes. Thus, we are safer from government intrusion.

That's why this kind of thing gets such scrutiny. I don't find it inappropriate, necessarily, but I do see how it stretches the bounds of acceptability.

From this MEMRI account, it appears that our journalistic openness provides great intelligence to the enemy. That might be one of the inherent weaknesses of a free society, or maybe it's just bad decision-making on the part of our mainstream media. Either way, it hurts us terribly in our efforts to enhance our security.

If one believes that Google's book-scanning project constitutes copyright infringement, then this guy was making a valid point. Boing Boing, of course, makes a whole host of assumptions, such as that the guy "misunderstands copyright," which is in the title but never supported in the story, and that Google's project is necessarily "laudable."

I hardly think it's a foregone conclusion that scanning books and placing their contents online is not copyright infringement. Personally, I wonder. And, such a project would require extreme methods of digital rights management (DRM) to avoid infringing, even if it's possible, while Boing Boing has historically been anti-DRM of any kind.

Digg Report: Today's #1 Digg, at 5418 Diggs, is about Paris Hilton's return to jail. The comments in this one are pretty harsh. I don't like her either, but then again, I don't really care.

I have some experience with this sort of thing at my son's after school program. The problem with the issue of porn and school computers is terribly exacerbated by misspelled Web sites, where a kid accidentally connects to a site that downloads all sorts of nasty stuff. I'm really not sure how any teacher could be prosecuted for this stuff.

All that this points out is that removing state sponsors of groups like al Qaida is the only way to make a meaningful impact on their activities.

A more rational treatment of intellectual property issues, which does tend to point out their complexity. This is from Edward Cline posting at the Rule of Reason blog.

Space-based energy? I like it. It does, though, walk that fine line as to what's legitimate for government. The Pentagon has to do things to maintain our military advantages, and so this might just be a necessary evil.

As much as I dislike Apple politically (or, maybe just Apple devotees), they do make some interesting stuff.

More from Boing Boing on stealing intellectual propert.

What exactly does it mean that Putin has agreed to put missile defense technology in Azerbaijan? Or, I should say, to suggest doing so, since I believe Azerbaijan is a sovereign nation. I haven't kept up on the whole former Soviet bloc nation thing, to know what the actual political relationship might be.

Some information on the Creation Museum, linked without comment.

Celebrity Report: I'm not surprised that Will Smith and Bruce Willis are friends, nor that Smith has doled out some good advice.

Here's Kasparov on Putin and Russia. As Ayn Rand said, evil requires the sanction of the good to prosper, and nowhere is that more clear than with Russia and the West.

A one-minute case against environmentalism.

Bill Gates has always been poor philosophically, but this is pretty disappointing even for him.

Digg Report: Today's #1 Digg, at a brisk 8203 Diggs, is a story about Paris Hilton's sudden release from prison. If the story is true, it would appear that the five days she spent behind bars (not three as indicated in the Digg headline) is typical for the crime. So, just the typical misleading Digg hyperbole.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

Those wacky ancient Peruvians!!!

I thought deja vu was caused by transitory timing glitches between each eye. I guess I was wrong, and this explanation makes more sense anyways. It's also sort of freaky.

While I'm a fierce proponent of intellectual property protections, both patents and copyrights, I do believe that advances in technology might require additional reform of the patent system. Amazon.com's "one-click" patent and, apparently, its cousin, seems to support this notion.

I'm not a patent law expert, though, and so I would rather err on the side of protecting intellectual property. The sooner such things get resolved, though, the better, I think.

Here's another chapter in the US government's on-going war against the evil corporation. In an age of increasing global competition, what we really need is for our government to do everything in its power to make the American economy less competitive.

The money sentence in this story: "There doesn't seem to be an easy way for the RIAA to monetize their problems." "Monetize" their "problems"? Is this a euphamism for "get paid for their products"?

Read the whole thing for the context.

This isn't such a new concept. I remember getting Atari fever back in the day, and Commodore 64osis, which was always quite painful.

While we were playing Space Invaders and Joust, our collectivist enemies were playing strangly nondescript games like "pass." Yes, that would be a driving game, which apparently was the most common video game of the Soviet Empire. Obviously, the proletariat was jonesing for the automobile, big time.

Update: Here's more information. Apparently, the Soviets were way ahead of us in the self-esteem movement--no high scores.

Freedom to steal intellectual property. Freedom to exploit children for sex.

The Pirate Bay. The darling cause of the IT Left.

I don't pretend to understand this quantum mechanics stuff. I also have an inherent distrust of it. I'm not sure how transmitting "information" across a distance can be the same thing as transmitting matter. I'm not sure anyone really does.

Well, this is good news, I supposed. I only wish Fox had listened to the browncoats, and resurrected Firefly.

Digg Report: Today's #1 Digg, at 5949 Diggs, is the worst sort of Digg misinformation. Here, Guiliani allegedly had some "journalist" arrested merely for asking a question. That's not how I see the video, and note that this was a private GOP event.

And, these were Truthers. Enough said, I think. Read the comments if you want a good laugh.

If you're so inclined, here's Scott Adams latest controversy honeypot. Chime in if you want to join the rabid pack.

Yegads. And this guy's running for President.

Ask.com has a new look. Check it out. It's a tad slower than Google, but it provides more compelling results in that they're also categorized. I can't say that the results are more pertinent; only additional testing will flesh that out one way or the other--and how has time for that?

This is a little techie, but I wonder: is Google just replaying the old "centralized vs. decentralized" game in a different way? After all, people wanted their own computers with their own applications and data for reasons. What makes the Web so different than the old legacy mainframes? And, once Google applications start running on the client, they're no different than Microsoft applications--and, they'll probably start being held to the same standard.

I think people accept Google's simplicity because it works for Web apps, and people appreciate their Web applications being quick and snappy. The same isn't true for client applications--people expect those to be robust and feature-rich. Sure, I might only typically use 1% of Microsoft Word's capabilities, but when I want that other 99%, I want it. I use Word because it has a very deep feature set, even if I don't use it most of the time.

The next few years should be interesting. I think some poeple are writing Microsoft off far too quickly.

I agree with most of this. When I write, I find myself using about 1% of Micrsoft Word's capabilities. I could probably write as well in Notepad--maybe better, because there are fewer distractions. I like technology, even complex technology, as long as it doesn't get in its own way.

This is as close to political as I've seen Dilbert get, and I even like it.

Would Boing Boing find a graphic novel about the Nazis "gripping, savage, and thoughtful," and in a good way? After all, the Nazi's were on the "Other Side" as well... Maybe the author will put out something on al Qaida next, perhaps showing the bliss experienced by the martyrs as the planes slammed into the buildings and they ascended in an instant to paradise.

This Boing Boing post contains a reference to likely the most popular error made about intellectual property and digital rights management (DRM): that DRM "(adds) restriction on what can be done with something (people have) paid for." A purchase is a two way transaction, between a purchaser and a seller. Both have terms that define the transaction. For example, in the case of media such as CD's and DVD's, the seller's terms are clearly laid out on the packaging: no unauthorized copies are to be made, which in practice means no copies, because none are authorized by the seller.

DRM actually only applies to materials sold in purely digital form (hence the name) and to which DRM has been attached. By definition, DRM can't hamper one's right to "do something" with what he's "purchased," because the DRMed product is specifically what was sold. Implicit in this sale (and, I'm sure, laid out clearly in the sales agreement with whatever online store sold the material) is the idea that the DRM will remain in place and will dictate the product's use. The purchasers right, if he doesn't like those terms, is to simply not purchase the product.

Only if one asserts that a sale is an open-ended transaction for the purchaser, with no rights allowed to the seller and with the right to do anything he wants allowed to the purchaser, can one make the claim that DRM somehow stops the purchaser from using a product appropriately. Instead, DRM actually defines quite cleary what the purchaser is buying: that is, a digital product with certain inherent restrictions.

The fact that DRM is circumvented does not mitigate its appropriateness. Many people know how to circumvent automobile security, but there are no calls claiming that the inability to protect an automobile from theft means that it should no longer be subject to protection. Rather, automobile manufacturers continue to develop new and better ways to protect them.

The same should be done with intellectual property. Some sellers have given up on DRM, and are selling unprotected materials. That's their right, of course. It's a great evil, however, that they do so primarily because they see no other choice.

Intellectual property protection remains a misunderstood and misconceived notion. I personally don't know a single soul who knows or cares about DRM; it's mainly a core group of Left-leaning, technologically savvy elites who make all the noise on the issue. Like the typical Leftist anti-globalization and anti-industrial (read, anti-capitalist) "rallies," the anti-DRM movement is not made up of typical people (i.e., you and me).