The Others: Howard Zinn, moved by The New York Times’ monumental memento mori to the WTC victims, wonders if putting a human face on those who have died under our bombs might affect those Americans who declare their support for Dubya’s “war on terrorism”. The Nation

New Theories Dispute Existence of Black Holes — ‘Two U.S. scientists have questioned the existence of black holes and suggested, in their place, the existence of an exotic bubble of superdense matter, an object they call a gravastar. The two are pointing out that physicists have swept some “humiliating” problems with black holes under the carpet. By confronting these problems, they claim to have found an alternative fate for a collapsing star.’ Cosmiverse

What Is An “Unlawful Combatant,” And Why It Matters

‘According to Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, the Taliban and al Qaeda fighters currently being held captive at the United States Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are not prisoners of war, but “unlawful combatants.” What’s the difference?

The short answer is that a prisoner of war is entitled to the protections set forth in the 1949 Geneva Convention. In contrast, an unlawful combatant is a fighter who does not play by the accepted rules of war, and therefore does not qualify for the Convention’s protections.

Buried within that short answer, however, are a host of complexities and troubling implications.’ FindLaw [via dangerousmeta]

Taleban army rises again to face US

A renegade army of 5,000 Taleban soldiers with 450 tanks, armoured carriers and pick-up trucks is locked in a tense stand-off with American special forces in Afghanistan.

The troops fled Kandahar with their commander and more than 100 senior Taleban figures in December after reneging on a surrender agreement. They have regrouped among villages in the mountainous region of Ghazni province, northwest of Kandahar.

Amid growing concern that powerful pockets of resistance loyal to Osama bin Laden remain in Afghanistan, an American soldier was wounded in the foot and 15 Taleban and al-Qaeda guerrillas were killed yesterday in a gunfight north of Kandahar. The Times of London

Robert Fisk: “The man who would testify against Sharon is blown up. Was this another targeted killing?”

Why would anyone want to car-bomb the former Lebanese Phalangist militia leader and government minister Elie Hobeika in Beirut – less than two days after he agreed to give evidence against Mr Sharon in a Belgian court, which may try the Israeli leader for the murder of up to 1,700 Palestinian civilians in the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps in September, 1982?

Independent UK

The last gasp of celebrity culture? “The end of Talk magazine this week was big news–if you live within 75 miles of Times Square (OK, 10 miles), or in ZIP code 90210, northwest Washington and maybe Boston. This isn’t to say that the people who live in the rest of the U.S.’s 3.6 million square miles don’t care about celebrities and buzz and what’s up below East 14th Street. They’re just not preoccupied with, well, talking about it.” WSJ OpinionJournal

Simson Garfinkel: Message in a Bottleneck

Many people who have never tried wireless messaging think that it’s just another techno-gadget—a technology looking for a market. But as soon as they try it, most realize that it’s friendlier, faster, more reliable, less intrusive and generally a lot cheaper than making a cell-phone call. The big difference is synchronicity. With the phone, Beth and I both have to be present at the same instant. With messaging, I can send her a question when I want, and she can answer it on her own time—handy if she’s changing a diaper when I try to reach her (or doing something really important, like sleeping).

This combination of attributes has given rise in the United States to a dedicated, but perplexingly small, following for two-way wireless messaging systems. MIT Technology Review

Broadband Walks the Last Mile: “If you want fast access from home, your only hopes are cable-modem and DSL services. Or are they?” MIT Technology Review

How Amazon finally made a profit: ‘Seattle-based online retailer, one of the poster children of the Internet, surpassed even Wall Street’s expectations, recording a net profit — one without qualifications — for the first time in its six-year history. The news sent its stock up 24 percent yesterday to $12.60.’ Seattle Times

Unlocking door to homes of tomorrow

The latest round in the home entertainment wars was kicked off by Steve Perlman’s start-up company, Moxi Digital. At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas earlier this month, Moxi unveiled the Media Centre (MC): “a combination digital set-top box, video and music jukebox, media server, and internet gateway and firewall”, says the company. It will play your DVD movies, CDs and MP3 music files. It will record broadcast TV, just like a TiVo personal video recorder (PVR).

And licenses permitting, it will stream multimedia to any personal computer or TV set in your home. It is, according to Forrester Research’s principal media and entertainment analyst Josh Bernoff, “the first true entertainment gateway”. Guardian UK

Searchin’ for the Surfer’s Saint

A group of Vatican elders is angling to give the Internet a patron saint –­ a holy helper with a dedicated connection to the Divine.

The church’s leading candidate is a seventh-century Spanish encyclopedist, Saint Isidore of Seville (560-636). A theologian and a scholar, Isidore was best known for his massive, 20-volume Etymologiae, ­an attempt at compiling all the world’s knowledge, covering grammar, medicine, law, geography, agriculture, theology, cooking and all points between.

Wired

Palm to unveil wireless device. “According to the sources, the i705’s key feature will be always-on, secure wireless e-mail access through its Palm.net service. The service will also be able to notify subscribers when there is a new message in their in-box.

The i705 will cost $449 and will also come with a Secure Digital expansion card slot, 8MB of memory and a monochrome screen with a resolution of 160 pixels by 160 pixels.” CNet As a longtime Palm fan watching painfully as the company has floundered in its last several iterations, one can hope that they’ll get it right next time, can’t one?

Bluetooth for existing mobile phones: “Plantronics recently announced its M1500 Cordless Headset Solution with Bluetooth support at the Winter 2002 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), as the first solution that brings Bluetooth to those who already have mobile phones and would like to Bluetooth-enable them. The M1500 includes a cordless headset and a Bluetooth adapter that plugs directly into the headset jack of many popular mobile phones.” infoSync

Qaeda Moving Into Indonesia, Officials Fear — ‘For the last two years, Osama bin Laden has been working to establish a beachhead here in the world’s most-populous Muslim nation, say American and Asian officials. Members of his organization Al Qaeda have slipped in and out of the archipelago, bringing millions of dollars in cash for radical Islamic organizations, recruiting members, and providing military training, those officials say.’ NY Times

“Media Alliance is a 25-year-old nonprofit training and resource center for media workers, community organizations, and political activists. Our mission is excellence, ethics, diversity, and accountability in all aspects of the media in the interests of peace, justice, and social responsibility. MA offers a wide variety of services and support to its 3,000 members and groups affiliates, as well as to the general public. We publish MediaFile, the Bay Area’s media review, and People Behind the News, a comprehensive guide to media outlets and journalists throughout the Bay Area; and we train hundreds of community organizations and activists every year in media and computer skills and media advocacy techniques. We have also conducted analyses of media coverage of welfare legislation, affirmative action, and bilingual education and published the results of our analyses.”

Recent articles in MediaFile include:

• Terry Messman: Justice Journalism: journalist as agent of social change, from William Lloyd Garrison to Indymedia.
  

• Andrea Buffa: Watt’s Up? Behind the media’s coverage of the energy crisis.
  

• Jeremy Rifkin: Media Giants Lobby to Privatize Broadcast Spectrum

Great list of links to media-related resources online.

If their work is appealing to you, they’re appealing to you. “Though it is on the opposite coast from you, I thought you might be interested. Heard about Media Alliance via an SFGate article and was impressed with their history, etc. Unfortunately, they are having funding issues and I was dismayed to think another voice of dissent might be silenced,” writes an FmH reader.