From Poynter.org, ‘I see dead people’: a compilation of resources for journalists, useful for the rest of us too, to help figure out whether a given celebrity is already dead or still alive . Avoid making the ‘Abe Vigoda gaffe’. And also from Poynter, I was entertained by these tips for ‘fair and accurate’ reporting on the clergy abuse scandal. Pointers include: avoiding blaming sexual abuse on clerical celibacy; not forgetting the poor wrongly acused priests when tallying the victims of the scandal; keeping in mind that some sexual sins are worse than others; recognizing that the Catholic Church is vulnerable to scapegoating; trying to broaden coverage of Church affairs to get beyond the abuse issue to some of its other involvements; and understanding that the Church is not monolithic and contains a spectrum of opinion and behavior. Pardon my heresy, the (self-professed) Catholic reporter who wrote this article is not exactly a poster child for impartiality; he sounds more like he works for the Vatican’s public relations office…

Forthcoming film of a Philip K. Dick short story is “…like the antidote to Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter,” says director.

From the diary of dan sandler, via randomWalks: ‘Now that iPod users have figured out how to use the iPod to store contacts, Apple has added the same functionality with updated iPod software.

There’s a clue, however, that the iPod team may not be terribly happy about having to cram this quite tangential feature into their svelte product. Take a look at the name in that screenshot: Alan Smithee. Where have you heard that name before? Yes, it’s the name used by disgruntled film directors to distance themselves from projects over which they have “lost creative control” to the studio.’

Here‘s the IMdb bio of Alan Smithee, and a list of 47 films he directed.

James Lileks creates the Orphanage of Cast-Off Mascots:

“The following page are filled with cast-off mascots – humanoid creatures who once served as advertising emmisaries in newspapers and magazines. Most of these products are dead, leaving their mascots orphaned; in many cases, the mascots were cast off to satiate the public’s taste for something new. None of them were particularly sucessful, or even well-loved. It’s hard to love the frightening face of Pepeco Pete, or want to be embraced by the razor-blade arms of Pal, the Shaving Boy. But they tried hard, day in, day out.

Most of them labored in the food-ad pages of the newspaper. In Minneapolis, the Thursday paper had all the coupons and ads – page after page of tiny ads, each with its own tagline or mascot. On a good fat day the paper might teem with three dozen of these happy folk. Imagine the nervous thrill of a Wednesday night in the mascot world, as they prepared for their one big shot, their weekly attempt to snare the wandering eye to their master’s products. Their payment? Nothing. Not even the promise of some ink the next week. Only the newspaper’s habit of microfilming every page kept them from vanishing altogether. That’s where I found them. Every day I crank up the microfilm machine, and release a few more from darkness.

Now it’s your turn to help. I’m calling on the citizens of the Web to adopt a cast-off mascot and affix him to your own page.”

“Britain is a nation of cyber snoopers. Almost nine in ten (87 per cent) of UK workers have surreptitiously read a boss’s private email on at least one occasion. That’s according to a survey of 200 professionals, sponsored by security firm Indicii Salus, which found that the vast majority of snoopers were motivated by curiosity rather than though of personal gain in accessing their boss’s email.” The Register

Finding Pay Dirt in Scannable Driver’s Licenses — another outrage. I wonder if you get to patronize the business if you insist on being ‘carded’ in the old way, with a visual inspection of the data on the front of the card instead of letting it be swiped in. I object to this for the same reason I don’t use the preferred-customer discount cards at grocery stores and drugstores unless they will agree to issue me one under a pseudonym. If swiping in the driver’s license gets to be a more widespread practice, what would be the downside to taking a penknife [or, as a reader suggested, a strong magnet, although the visible defacement of the card serves a civil disobedience purpose… –FmH] to the magnetic strip on the rear to prevent its data being readily harvested in the swipe?

The Selling of 9-11: ‘It has been six months since 9-11 and already we have had a formal anniversary. Stilted moments of silence, child poets, giant laser beams, and solemn speeches brought out the ghosts that have yet to be put to rest and never will, so long as there is a profit to be made on their continued haunting. HBO, Showtime, and FX have all announced plans to produce TV movies about the events, but on March 10th, CBS took the lead with a commercial-free special, 9/11. An important documentary to some and exploitative reality programming to others, the nearly uninterrupted two-hour broadcast of footage shot inside the World Trade Center provided an insider’s view of the results of the terrorist attacks. Gaining an estimated third of the American viewing population, 9/11 was profitable, but at the expense of many of the victims’ families who felt the timing was inappropriate. Although they publicly voiced their concern, it did not change the network’s decision to air the program.” AlterNet

Bush Acts to Drop Core Privacy Rule on Medical Data: This is an outrage. Read the proposal, formulate your own opinion and find a way to act during the thirty-day period for public comments. While the dysadministration says its concern is for patient care, it seems to me this move has a multifold motive, and none of them are for the good of the patient.

First, it is consistent with Shrub’s ideological battle against privacy as an end in itself. By basing his decision on worst-case scenarios in which upholding privacy rights could have an adverse impact on quality or rapidity of care, he says civil rights are only useful if they are means to an end. Calling his position ‘common sense’ implies that consumer advocates’ principles are nonsense. Second, he continues to dismantle Clinton achievements on principle as an ideological slap in the face to constituents of the Democratic administration. Thirdly, this is another giveaway to big business — in this case, the healthcare industry — at the expense of the rest of us, allowing insurance companies less fettered access to patient information for purposes not of patient care but reimbursement — to improve their cash flow. Finally, it clearly is an ideological tool to further his anti-abortion and pro-family fundamentalist agenda.

Believe me, patient care would not be significantly compromised by patients having to sign another form; there are already massive paperwork transactions involved in any healthcare encounter, and one more consent form will be dealt with as automatically as the rest. From the inside, I can tell you that healthcare facilities have easily taken in stride preparing for the Clinton privacy provisions, and efficient policies and procedures for complying are in place. But the potential for misuse of patents’ medical data if it is not strictly protected are rampant. NY Times