At last they’ve found life after evolution: “Entrants for this year’s Aventis Prize,
the world’s most important science
book award, have departed from the
usual formula…” Telegraph UK
Author Archives: FmH
Carnegie Mellon University engineers are working on the next-generation pogo stick; and Pogo is working on a 240 g. full-color touchscreen device smaller than a 3″x5″ card with full PIM, MP3 player, GSM and GPRS integrated phone, SMS text messaging, email, and HTML and flash web browsing. 
Medical eyes glaze over Web hypnosis: ‘Medical authorities have denounced as “highly inappropriate” and “grossly negligent” a
plan by celebrity hypnotist Martin St James to offer his services over the Internet…
From June 22, at a monthly cost of $US25, Internet users will be able to log on and
self-hypnotise themselves to stop smoking or relieve stress. Mr St James, who says he helped cure himself from cancer and chronic fatigue syndrome
with self-hypnosis, will also offer free services, including suicide counselling.’ [Not only inappropriate and negligent; what happens if the user’s computer crashes or they lose their ‘net connection before they bring themselves out of trance (grin)?]
R.I.P. Francisco Varela (1946-2001) . John Brockman describes him on The Edge:
‘Francisco, an experimental and theoretical biologist, studied what he termed “emergent selves” or “virtual identities.” His was an immanent view of reality, based on metaphors derived from self-organization and Buddhist-inspired epistemology rather than on those derived from engineering and information science. He presented a challenge to the traditional AI view that the world exists independently of the organism, whose task is to make an accurate model of that world — to “consult” before acting. His nonrepresentationalist world — or perhaps “world-as-experienced” — has no independent existence but is itself a product of interactions between organisms and environment. He first became known for his theory of autopoiesis (“self production”), which is concerned with the active self-maintenance of living systems whose identities remain constant while their components continually change. Varela is tough to categorize. He was a neuroscientist who became an immunologist. He was well informed about cognitive science and was a radical critic of it, because he was a believer in “emergence” — not the vitalist idea promulgated in the 1920s (that of a magical property that emerges inexplicably from lower mechanical operations) but the idea that the whole appears as a result of the dynamics of its component parts. He thought that classic computationalist cognitive science is too simplemindedly mechanistic. He was knowledgeable and romantic at the same time.’
Bush Speak: An Interview with Mark Crispin Miller, the author of The Bush Dyslexicon: The
Saying of President Dubya. ‘(Miller) sees more in these verbal tics and grammatical bungles than just plain idiocy. In fact, the professor of media ecology at New
York University credits Bush for speaking a language television producers and talk show hosts can understand: one of superfice and shallowness, of one-liners and aw-
shucks answers. As Miller argues in his introduction:
“[T]his book is meant to shed some light on the propaganda of our time. The Dyslexicon attempts to give the lie to that enormous wave of
propaganda — a joint production of the GOP and the major media — whereby George W. Bush was forced on us as President, then, after his inauguration, hailed nearly
universally for his amazing charm, his democratic ease, his rare ability to be all things to all Americans, and so on. Our experience of this transparent coup has been
disorienting from the start.” ‘AlterNet
OxyCon Game: Anatomy of a Media-made Drug Scare. The author contends that the sensationalistic media coverage is untrue and irredeemably besmirches the image of a drug acknowledged as a major breakthrough in the treatment of debilitating pain. He says that “experts” deny that abuse of the drug outpaces growth in legitimate prescribed usage and that its illegal use is only a problem where “the usual street drugs” are not available. Well, I’m sorry, but this is typical muckraking journalism, and it’s confused and inaccurate. As someone observing from the front lines of the treatment of substance abuse, I can assure you how prevalent abuse of OxyContin has become in the past eighteen to twenty four months… among prescribed users who are better at scamming doctors to get it than doctors are in recognizing a con or saying no when they recognize it. The “dual diagnosis” patients we see with substance abuse and personality disorders or mood disorders, to listen to them, have the worst migraine headaches imaginable, or the most persistent lower back pain after their wokplace injury or motor vehicle accident, or insist they need their Oxy for dental pain or the dull, subjective ache of fibromyalgia, with a frequency far in excess of epidemiological data on the co-occurrence of these conditions.
Ridiculing concern by likening it to the ’30’s film Reefer Madness, as is done here, is the worst sort of ignorant yellow journalism.While War on Drugs hysteria may fuel publicity about the latest drug menace, that doesn’t mean there is not an epidemic of abuse. And you can expect one any time there’s a major therapeutic advance in pain management. AlterNet
So What Else is New? Bush brother blamed for unfair election: ‘Thousands of black electors in Florida were disenfranchised in last November’s election by an electoral system tainted by “injustice, ineptitude and inefficiency” a leaked report by the US civil rights commission says.
It accuses Governor Jeb Bush, the president’s brother, and his secretary of state, Katherine Harris, of “gross dereliction” of duty, saying they “chose to ignore mounting evidence” of the problems. ‘ The Guardian
Does the Constitution protect the right to talk
about how to foil copyright protection? Princeton computer scientist Edward Felton broke the music industry’s SDMI copy protection as a mathematical exercise but was scared off from publishing his results by threat of a lawsuit from the music industry. Nevertheless, bootleg copies of his, quite technical, paper are all over the ‘net. Now, with Electronic Frontier Foundation legal assistance, he’s suing the RIAA and the U.S. Justice Dept. for the right to publish, hoping to invalidate the “anti-circumvention” clause of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. Salon
R.I.P. John Platt, unassuming British rock critic and cultural historian of the late ’60’s. New York Press
I wrote awhile ago about the Java toaster which gets a weather forecast off the net and burns the appropriate symbol into your morning toast. Here are the photos. The Register
Archaeologists Home In on Body Ornament Origins. The origins of human self-adornment have been shrouded in a veil of mystery. A new report finds archaeological evidence of widespread, persistent and standardized use of body ornamentation more than 40,000 years ago, emerging more or less simultaneously in Europe, Asia and Africa. It is suggested that, with burgeoning human numbers, the frequency of encounters with outsiders grew sufficiently to make it useful “to convey to strangers aspects of social identity, such as group
membership, gender, age and marital status.” Scientific American
“My hypothesis is that the genome is an internal expression of the ecosystem in which it lives.” Philosophical tract questions wisdom of genetic modification: ‘The relationship between the genetic material of living things and the ecosystems in which they live is
deep and changeable, says Arjun Makhijani, president of the Institute for Energy and Environmental
Research in Takoma Park, Maryland. In an essay that is being embraced as an important philosophical
advance by some environmentalists, Makhijani argues that tinkering with genes may upset the
environment in much more complicated and far-reaching ways than have been considered.’ BioMedNet
Researchers find many parents have ‘fever phobia’. “Despite the knowledge that childhood fever is a natural
body defense and not a disease, many parents continue to have a
”fever phobia” that leads to overtreatment and misconceptions,
according to a study published yesterday.” Boston Globe
The Botany of Desire: How Grasses Use People to Fight Trees New York Times
Toward True Security, a report issued jointly by the Federation of American Scientists, the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Natural Resources Defense Council, blasts the National Missile Defense intentions of the Shrub administration as destabilizing, rather than enhancing, nuclear security. Here’s the Washington Post‘s coverage of the report. To claim that the most immediate nuclear threat is from so-called “rogue states” is preposterous. The twin threats of further nuclear proliferation and an accidental Russian attack from a failure of its aging command-and-control and early-warning systems are far more dangerous. Even apart from NMD, the U.S.’s maintenance of a large nuclear arsenal on hairtrigger alert is an outmoded cold war posture that could lead to accidental nuclear war in the face of such a threat. The FAS report was written by a 16-expert panel including former weapons designers and disarmament negotiators. In addition to giving up on NMD, they suggest a nuclear posture declaring our weapons to be deterrent only; decrying rapid-launch options, scrapping pre-set targeting plans, unilaterally reducing the size of our arsenal and retiring all tactical (battlefield) nuclear weapons, “dismantling them in a transparent manner.” We should commit not to resume nuclear testing and affirm a commitment to eventual disarmament. We should convince Russia to follow suit.
Sorry to be so shrill. I cover disarmament issues so often in FmH, as passé as they may seem, because of the extent to which I think we have to awaken from a deluded dream if we do not recognize the threat under which we still live and the insanity of the current administration’s enhancement of our jeopardy. Sorry, it’s abstract, but think about it.
Baby’s sex not linked to shape of mother: “The widely held belief that a woman’s body shape can influence the sex
of her children has been undermined by a new study.
Folklore has it that a curvy “hour glass” body-shape is supposed to
produce girls and a more androgynous shape, boys. Evolutionary
biologists thought this was because a a less curvy body is supposed to have
higher levels of the male sex hormone testosterone, which favours more
male conceptions.” Telegraph
Celebrate Remote Control Anniversary! “Tomorrow (June 7) is an important day
for couch potatoes: It’s the 45th anniversary of the marketing of the first TV
remote control.” Remember the 1956 Zenith Space Commander?
Phil Agre of the Red Rock Eaters mailing list, who is a nut for cheap writing implements, pointed me to this Washington Post blink about the banning of gel pens around the country.
Landmark Ruling Secures Native Land Rights: “On May 12th, 2001, the High Court in Sarawak, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo, issued an extraordinary ruling that could have
sweeping consequences for indigenous land rights. After two years of litigation, the court upheld the customary rights of the Iban village
Rumah Nor, finding the Borneo Paper and Pulp company did not have the right to destroy Rumah Nor’s rainforest.” [via Utne Reader]
Aroma Therapy: In The Military, It’s Known As ‘Nonlethal Weapons Development’. Cognitive scientists research enhancing offensive odors in the interest of national security. Amusing mini-history of the ‘stink bomb’ included.
Least Common Denominator Dep’t.: Moviegoers confused: ‘Preview audiences who’ve watched
Steven Spielberg’s new movie, A.I., are having some problems with the
film’s title.
The initials “A.I.” stand for “artificial intelligence,” but exit polls suggest
many people think the title of the movie is “A-1” — just like the steak sauce.
New York gossip reporter Baird Jones claims the name confusion is so
serious that studio executives are considering putting the words “artificial
intelligence” in parenthesis after the title — a prospect that Spielberg is
furious over.’ [I could understand being confused going into the film, but coming out??!!]
The Intelligence Online news service’s list of “sites chosen by our journalists”: a rich set of links to intelligence services, foreign government sites, sites about business intelligence, computer security, infowar, terrorism, nonproliferation, money laundering, Muslim fundamentalism, etc.
A reader asks:
“I’ve been reading fmh for over a year now (I think; it’s so hard to keep “track), and love it. One thing has puzzled me, though: why do you call it “‘blinking’ and not ‘linking’?”
My reply:
I explained that once way back at the beginning. Just as a ‘blog’ is a ‘weblog’, a ‘blink’ is a ‘weblink’ . A friend suggested that there ought to be a special term for it and I ran with it. To take the wordplay further, just as ‘we_blog’, ‘we_blink’. I have yet to see it picked up by anyone else, though, so maybe I should give it a rest…
The Media Theory Site. “Social theory for fans of popular culture. Popular culture for fans of social theory.”
Time to Beta Test the New Wetware: an interview with Paul D. Miller, a.k.a. DJ Spooky. “Basically, as an artist, my work is an
investigation into how culture gets made. I guess you could say its process
oriented… That doesn’t mean I’m going to sit down everyday and write “cultural
crit” stuff. Folks who I like to call “low level cultural bureaucrats” do that… it’s a
false and ultimately sterile way to try to beat culture into some kind of formula
that they then try to stamp their name on to make some kind of “career” and it’s
a modus operandi that disgusts me….” frontwheeldrive
Humble Pie: “As Bush dusts off the Reagan cowboy hat, there’s a growing consensus among even our
historical allies that America’s leadership role is neither inevitable nor advisable. If the
president doesn’t tread more carefully, he’ll find himself inflaming old animosities and, worse,
instigating new ones. It’s one thing to antagonize potential enemies–but do we really want to
antagonize our friends?” The American Prospect
California’s Progressive Mosaic: “Does California’s shift leftward signal
progressive change nationally?
California is more than just the Democrats’ electoral anchor, however. Increasingly, a number
of its cities are coming to look like Justice Louis Brandeis’s “laboratories of
democracy”–enacting minimum wage, health care, and worker-rights ordinances that would
normally be the responsibility of the federal government (if only the feds could be interested in
the conditions of working-class life). In city after city, a civic left has emerged in California,
with the state’s new-model labor movement–the most dynamic in the country–at its core.” The American Prospect
We’re Just Dying to Work with You: “(M)any of the greatest (deceased)
actors in history are as busy as ever, toiling overtime, doing
everything from celebrity endorsements to cameo film roles.
Humphrey Bogart, Clark Gable, Marlene Dietrich, James
Cagney: all are proving veritable cash cows for their respective
estates, digitally reanimated for a whole new audience. And,
with the Screen Actors Guild strike threatening to paralyse
Hollywood, this year could be boom time for dead thesps.” Sunday Times of London
Thinking ‘drains the brain’. Too much thinking can be exhausting; the effect is more pronounced in seniors. Research demonstrates glucose drain from key brain areas with concentration. BBC
Mothers’ hormones determine tomboys. Ananova
Customized Computer Case Modifications: windows, blowholes, neon lighting and strobes, custom colors…
India to Levitate Flying Car: “An Indian boffin appears to have got the jump on his US counterparts
with a 12-rotor jambusting flying car.
Engineer Rakesh Goel expects the vehicle will be in production by
2004. He claims it is safer than a helicopter and ideal in crowded
cities.
Mr Goel does seem, however, to have overlooked the
consequences of giving the subcontinent’s legendary drivers access
to something which, in addition to left, right, forwards and
backwards, can also go up and down.” The Register
Israeli Survives Two Disasters: “Eli Yadid is the luckiest guy in Israel. Or perhaps the unluckiest.
When a building floor collapsed in Jerusalem, killing 23, Yadid was standing just beyond the killing
zone. When a suicide bomber blew himself up in from of a Tel Aviv disco, killing 20 Israelis and
himself, Yadid was just arriving.” He also survived a terrorist attack on his school when he was 16. AP
Johnny Paul Penry’s Texas death sentence overturned by Supreme Court. Penry is the severely retarded confessed murderer whose first death sentence appeal in 1989 was upheld by the Supreme Court in a precedent-setting decision in which they found capital punishment of the retarded to be constitutional but ruled that juries must be properly instructed in how to weigh the defendant’s mental retardation as a mitigating factor in sentencing. The Court at that time sent the case back to Texas for a new trial, and Texas still didn’t manage to get it right; the current Court ruling upholds Penry’s lawyers’ contention that the instructions to the jury in the second trial were no better than the first. This may all be a moot point, because the Supreme Court has pending before it another case, from North Carolina, in which it has agreed to reconsider the more basic question it rejected in the 1989 Penry case — whether execution of the mentally retarded fundamentally violates the Eighth Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. Dallas Morning News
R.I.P. Anthony Quinn, who died of respiratory failure in a Boston hospital Sunday at age 86.
Patience, a Password Led to Standoff’s End. “With visits and food, authorities earned trust of Idaho siblings. Tales of
neglect and filthy environment emerge.” LA Times
The Reviewer Who Wasn’t There Sony Pictures, Columbia’s parent, was forced to admit last week that David Manning, a reviewer whose glowing comments about even the most lame Columbia films, is a fake dreamed up by the studio’s advertising department.
The real question is why Sony had to conceive the counterfeit critic to begin with, given the world of movie junkets, where normal reporting standards don’t apply.
Reading the glowing newspaper-ad recommendations for even the lamest movie, you might wonder if those quoted critics are real. Unlike Manning, they are. Many are habitués of the junket circuit, an all-expenses-paid gravy train where the studios give journalists free rooms and meals at posh hotels and the reporters return the favor with puffy celebrity profiles and enthusiastic review blurbs. Sometimes studio executives will suggest what kind of quotes they need, and even shape the reviews to suit the studio’s goals. If a studio wants its movie pegged as “This year’s ‘Alien’,” the reviewer delivers precisely that. No one complains, and bad movies end up with great quotes. The junket troops are a mostly anonymous crowd working for obscure outlets like Wireless Magazine and Inside Reel, which helps explain why nobody—even people within Sony and Revolution—noticed that Manning was a sham. MSNBC
“Contacting the Congress is a very up-to-date database of congressional contact information for the 107th Congress. As of June 1,
2001 there are 509 email addresses (of which 201 are Web-based email homepages), and 535 WWW homepages known for
the 540 members of the 107th Congress. More traditional ground mail addresses are available for all Congressmembers.
Contacting the Congress has received many emails recently reporting that email addressed to Congressmembers is
bouncing back. It appears now that a recent study has confirmed what has been long suspected, Capitol Hill is ill-equipped for
email (the study refered to in the article is available online). This, combined with recent stories on problems with the Senate Email
Servers suggests that if your message is really important you should consider sending it via fax or phone (numbers
available here). It also suggests you should only mail your members of Congress, since spamming everyone in Congress just
contributes to this problem.”
My representative is one of the 31 who does not receive correspondence via an email address…
All-You-Can-Eat Economy is Making the World Sick, says the venerable Worldwatch Institute: “We’re eating more meat, drinking more coffee, popping more pills, driving further and getting fatter. Around the world we are consuming more than
ever before: but more than one billion people still don’t have access to safe water; natural disasters are taking a worsening toll; and we have yet to
vanquish some of the world’s biggest killers-diarrhea, malaria and AIDS-reports a new publication by the Worldwatch Institute, Vital Signs 2001: The
Trends That are Shaping Our Future.”
From Neat Net Tricks:
CONFIRM.TO. There is a little-known feature that hides an HTML tag
which in turn triggers a relay system to post a read receipt to the
sender. The tag is planted in Outlook Express 4.x and Netscape Messenger
4.0 or later (and possibly any email software that supports HTML message
browsing). The message can be sent on any email software by placing
“confirm.to” in an address as: “anyuser@sample.com.confirm.to” (without
the quotes). When addressed this way, an email relay system intercepts
the mail, plants the tag in the message, and then delivers it to the
recipient to which it is addressed. When the recipient displays the
message online, the html tag triggers the relay system to send a read
receipt to the sender. No software or download is required for this to
work. The relay is performed by Postel Services. The first 30 such
relays per month are free and no sign-up is required. Greater usage is
available for less than 2 cents per receipt by setting up an account at
their site, http://www.postel.co.kr .
Discovery of ‘tidal giant’–a new Egyptian dinosaur–reported in Science. ‘The partial skeleton of a massive sauropod dinosaur, unearthed at an Egyptian site that its discoverers call “dinosaur heaven,” makes its
debut in the 1 June issue of the international journal Science. Dubbed Paralititan stromeri, the dinosaur is one of the largest ever discovered
from the Cretaceous period (about 146 to 65 million years ago) in Africa, and may be the second most massive dinosaur ever found.’ EurekAlert!
The Irony Scare: “how did a literary device become a public enemy?” The New Republic
The left should love globalisation: ‘Opponents of globalisation may have finally met their
match. The challenge comes not from the sharp suits of the
World Trade Organisation, the International Monetary
Fund, the World Bank, or even from Clare Short, but from a
middle-aged academic who is no stranger to direct-action
techniques. He is the man accused of leading the Italian
revolutionary left in the 1970s: Antonio Negri. Thirty-odd
years after he achieved notoriety in the student revolts of
1968, his new book, Empire (published by Harvard
University Press), has been hailed as “a communist manifesto
for our times”. It is a riposte both to the Jeremiahs on the
left who see globalisation as an unalloyed evil and to the
fatalists of the right who see it as a fait accompli that we
are powerless to change.’ New Statesman
A dermatologist writes: “(The skin disease) Tinea imbricata has an ornate appearance, but its precise distribution has been poorly defined
Clinical diagnosis based on appearance of their diseased skin is that Gungan inhabitants of the planet Naboo are infected with tinea
imbricata.
Indirect evidence suggests that Gungans have had contact with human populations who have this fungal infection
The occurrence of tinea imbricata in Gungans may help answer questions about extraterrestrial interventions in human affairs. ” British Medical Journal
A banner day for neo-Nazis: “Hatewatch, the website that monitored the proliferation
of hate sites on the internet, closed last month claiming that it
had outlived its usefulness. … (But) hate groups are increasingly turning to
newsgroups and email.” Salon
“Maybe what depresses human beings is not the great roar and thrust of history, but the very opposite: its absence.” A generation without a cause: “This week, I’ve come across at least three references in the news to increased levels of depression and anxiety in young
adults. To wit: It is being reported the level of depression and other psychiatric disorders has risen in every group of 18- to
24-year-old Americans — one generation to the next — since the Second World War.
I expect you’ll be hearing more about this as two new books make the rounds. Quarterlife Crisis: The Unique Challenges of Life
in Your Twenties by New York journalists Alexandra Robbins and Abby Wilner, describes the aimlessness and anxiety of this
generation of college graduates. The Myth of Maturity, an excellent book by Cambridge sociologist Terri Apter, approaches the
same subject from a more scholarly vantage point, arguing on the basis of careful study that young adults are remaining caught
in a twilight of adolescence, unable to transform their relationships into marriages and their jobs into careers.” The National Post
The sizzling sleepers of summer: “As the mainstream press promotes The Mummy Returns, Pearl Harbor and the other vacuous, shrieking offspring from its
news-tainment corporate parents, a more skeptical part of the audience has quietly been taking in more adventurous sorts of films. Below, Salon’s
critics take a look (in some cases a second look) at the season’s most compelling, if less hyped, films…”
The Pursuit of Happiness: “Lithium helped Fiona Campbell cope with her
childhood traumas, but she says, the drug brings its
own problems.” The problems are worse, or at least the price less worth paying, if as with this author the lithium recipient does not have frank bipolar (manic depressive) illness. The Guardian
Review of Warrior Lovers: erotic fiction, evolution and female sexuality: “Did Starsky have a thing for Hutch? Was Kirk in love with Spock? What if Bodie got it on with Doyle? These
unlikely plots are standard in a cult literary phenomenon known as ‘slash literature’: a genre of romance fiction
that pairs heterosexual characters from television and film in fantasy romantic relationships. (The term ‘slash’
refers to the punctuation mark — Starsky/Hutch — that unites the lovers.)
In Warrior Lovers, Catherine Salmon, an evolutionary psychologist and slash author, and Donald Symons, a
world expert on the evolution of sexuality, place ‘slash’ in the context of our evolved sexual psychology… Sticking close to the science, Catherine and Donald argue that slash provides a unique insight into human
sexuality. By comparing slash with mainstream romance, they reveal the essential ingredients of women’s
sexual fantasies. The ideal is a relationship in which the man does not lose interest as the woman’s looks
fade. Instead the relationship is a lifelong, shared adventure with a committed equal, based not on ephemeral
lust, but on enduring loyalty and trust.” AlphaGalileo
Today’s Astronomy Picture of the Day points to a mind-boggling cosmological event clear across the universe. “Last March, telescopic instruments in Earth and space tracked a tremendous explosion that occurred across the universe. A nearly
unprecedented symphony of international observations began abruptly on 2000 March 1 when Earth-orbiting RXTE, Sun-orbiting Ulysses, and
asteroid-orbiting NEAR all detected a 10-second burst of high-frequency gamma radiation. … Major telescopes across the globe soon began playing along as GRB 000301C came into view, detailing unusual behavior. The Hubble
Space Telescope captured the above image and was the first to obtain an accurate distance to the explosion, placing it near redshift 2, most of the way
across the visible universe… Even today, no one is sure what type of explosion
this was. Unusual features of the light curve are still being studied, and no host galaxy appears near the position of this explosion.”
David Anderson at Metaforage wrote me that a source of his at NASA says the explosion has finally been identified. It was Trent Lott’s reaction to the news that Jim Jeffords was leaving the G.O.P.
The NPR show Marketplace has generated a simple weekly rating of our collective, subjective economic experience by polling “people-components” in various regions and endeavors. This week’s R.E.A.L. Index is 7 on a scale of 1-10.
The Boston Globe resident hi-tech weblogger DC Denison writes about the hippest hangout in my hometown; I’d never heard of it:
“The Rack, that upscale pool hall/celebrity jock hang-out next to Faneuil
Hall Marketplace, is not where I’d normally look for the latest in wireless
technology. But now that I’m here, at 7 p.m. on a weeknight, the idea is
starting to make more sense.This place is an epicenter of electronic cacophony and techno tack (stuff
that you can do technologically, but probably shouldn’t). Sports highlights
are looping on video screens, a closed-circuit TV is pumping out an
in-house channel, a Fox TV sports kiosk is waiting to capture “fan
comments,” an Internet web cam is scanning the premises, and off in a
corner a band is covering Jimmy Buffett tunes. Oh yeah, and many of the
black-clad denizens have cellphones pressed very tightly to their heads,
trying to communicate over the din. This place is electro-diversion,
short-attention-span heaven (or hell depending on your view on info
overload.)
His point in blinking to The Rack is to talk about its innovative use of handhelds:
But wait, there’s more! Last week the club shoe-horned in a fleet of small
electronic gadgets: Touchpak hand-held wireless entertainment units,
which are intended to divert and entertain customers while they are waiting
for tables: pool or dining. I picked one up from a hostess just inside the
door.A Touchpak turns out to be a standard PDA, a Compaq iPaq, customized
and loaded up with news, sports, movie clips, shopping sites, and tiny
little ads. Here’s where it intersects with Rack-land: it alerts you when
your table is ready. So it’s a beefier version of the pagers many
restaurants use.And here’s the tech angle: Touchpak uses wireless LAN technology,
which means there’s now an antenna on the roof of The Rack that allows
the restaurant to communicate with the devices in a confined area
(basically the restaurant and the outdoor patio). Because it’s a closed
system, the bandwidth can be much higher, allowing the streaming of
movie trailers, for example.For ten minutes or so, I impersonated an anxious patron waiting for a table
and used my unit to navigated between Reuters news, sports, and The
Rack’s menu (eventually The Rack hopes to allow patrons to order from
these units). It was mildly diverting, another option piled on to The Rack’s
squawking collection of electronic boxes.Note to the criminally minded: The Rack feels reasonably protected from
your larcenous inclinations. First, patrons are asked to leave a credit card
or driver’s license as a kind of deposit. Second, a tracking device sounds
an alarm, and notifies security, when a device gets too close to an exit.
Third, Touchpak is working on a system that will permanently disable
these devices when they are outside the network.”
The Rack’s site has a webcam where the curious can remotely check out the ambience during open hours. [The closest I’m ever likely to get to such a with-it place…]
How do you stack up against Nielsen’s stats on average activity by a web user in April 2001?
Popular Thyroid Drug Faces Deadline. In bizarre FDA news, the manufacturer of the drug Synthroid, which has been used for at least 35 years to treat hypothyroidism, has to file a new drug application and provide proof of efficacy and safety because its active ingredient levothyroxine has never been formally approved for use. AP
New Study Sees U.S. AIDS Rates Jump. On the twentieth anniversary of the Centers for Disease Control’s recognition of the new epidemic, a new government survey suggests that a new generation of gay men numbed by incessant AIDS warnings are contracting it “at alarming rates”. AP
Turn Buried Bodies Into Organic Soil – Scientist. “A Swedish scientist investigating the most
environmentally friendly form of burial has found a way of quickly
recycling corpses into soil enricher, the Swedish daily Svenska
Dagbladet reported on Friday.
The new green method, approved by the Church of Sweden, turns
the human body into organic matter in a few weeks compared with
coffin burial, in which the body takes between 50 and 60 years to
decompose.
It was developed by biologist Susanne Wiigh-Masak, who found that
cremation emits poisonous gases with unknown effects, making it even
less eco-friendly than conventional burial.
In the new green method, the body is immersed in a bath of liquid
nitrogen, producing up to 65 pounds of pure organic matter, which is
put into a thin, easily degradable coffin.
This is then buried near the ground surface and enriches the soil in the
same way as autumn leaves.”
“I bequeathed myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles….”
– Walt Whitman (Leaves of Grass)
Is Astrology Sociology? 63-year-old French astrology columnist and astrologer to French president Mitterrand has just earned a PhD in sociology at the Sorbonne after successfully defending her controversial 900-page dissertation “The Epistemological Situation of Astrology in
Relation to the Ambivalent Fascination/Rejection of Postmodern Societies”. The news has set off a front-page storm of protest in France between academics concerned about shoddy scholarship and those who feel a maverick discipline is being scapegoated, “… between the followers of Émile Durkheim and followers of Weber. Or, to put it
another way, between positivists who rely on quantitative techniques and
objective measures when assessing social life and phenomenologists who attach
greater importance to subjective experience and emotion. ” New York Times
Scientists View New Wave of Cancer Drugs; “long-awaited payoff from decades of research into the molecular biology of cancer.” New York Times
Happy birthday, Johnny Weissmuller (06/02/04-01/22/84)
Bizarre Versions of How Nepal Royals Died: “Though the streets of Kathmandu were mostly calm, there were
occasional protests against official explanations for the massacre, first
blamed on the crown prince himself and then on an automatic
weapon exploding by accident.
‘According to the information received by us, they were injured
when an automatic weapon suddenly exploded,’ state radio
announced Sunday…. The radio announcement replaced an earlier explanation given by
officials that Crown Prince Dipendra had shot his parents and then
himself in what media reports described as a row over his choice of
bride.
The 29-year-old prince, declared king by the Himalayan country’s
privy council Saturday, was still critically ill on Sunday, the radio said.
His uncle, Prince Gyandendra, named regent since the new king was
in a coma, also issued a statement suggesting the massacre was the
result of an automatic weapon going off by accident. He was out of
town at the time of the killings.” Reuters
To the citizens of the United States:
In the light of your failure to elect a President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The Rt. Hon. Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.
A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Then look up “aluminium” . Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up “vocabulary”.
Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as “like” and “you know” is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up “interspersed” .2. There is no such thing as “US English” . We will let Microsoft know on your behalf.
3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn’t that hard.
4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys.
5. You should relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen, but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.
6. You should stop playing American football. There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American football is not a very good game.
The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays American” football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football.
Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game.Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US rugby sevens side by 2005.
7. You should declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. The 98.85% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your borders should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys. Merde is French for “shit”.
8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 8th will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called Indecisive Day.
9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.
10. Please tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us crazy.
Thank you for your cooperation.
To the citizens of the United States:
In the light of your failure to elect a President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The Rt. Hon. Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.
A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Then look up “aluminium” . Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up “vocabulary”.
Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as “like” and “you know” is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up “interspersed” .2. There is no such thing as “US English” . We will let Microsoft know on your behalf.
3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn’t that hard.
4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys.
5. You should relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen, but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.
6. You should stop playing American football. There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American football is not a very good game.
The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays American” football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football.
Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game.Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US rugby sevens side by 2005.
7. You should declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. The 98.85% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your borders should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys. Merde is French for “shit”.
8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 8th will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called Indecisive Day.
9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.
10. Please tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us crazy.
Thank you for your cooperation.
To the citizens of the United States:
In the light of your failure to elect a President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The Rt. Hon. Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.
A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Then look up “aluminium” . Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up “vocabulary”.
Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as “like” and “you know” is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up “interspersed” .2. There is no such thing as “US English” . We will let Microsoft know on your behalf.
3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn’t that hard.
4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys.
5. You should relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen, but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.
6. You should stop playing American football. There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American football is not a very good game.
The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays American” football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football.
Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game.Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US rugby sevens side by 2005.
7. You should declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. The 98.85% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your borders should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys. Merde is French for “shit”.
8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 8th will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called Indecisive Day.
9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.
10. Please tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us crazy.
Thank you for your cooperation.
The 13 Scariest White Guys in America. Don Hazen: ” The bully is back in American politics. Intimidation, dismissal of
majority opinion, denial of scientific facts and aggressive scapegoating —
these tactics have once again taken center stage. Blatant propaganda
feeds fear and distrust, and the powerful and the privileged wallow in
the spoils.” AlterNet
To the citizens of the United States:
In the light of your failure to elect a President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The Rt. Hon. Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.
A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Then look up “aluminium” . Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up “vocabulary”.
Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as “like” and “you know” is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up “interspersed” .2. There is no such thing as “US English” . We will let Microsoft know on your behalf.
3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn’t that hard.
4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys.
5. You should relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen, but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.
6. You should stop playing American football. There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American football is not a very good game.
The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays American” football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football.
Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game.Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US rugby sevens side by 2005.
7. You should declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. The 98.85% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your borders should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys. Merde is French for “shit”.
8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 8th will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called Indecisive Day.
9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.
10. Please tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us crazy.
Thank you for your cooperation.
“Girl pressures. Mafia beefs. High blood pressure. A difficult boss. Listen to what’s bugging two real-life New York gangsters in these secret FBI wiretaps. The ‘Frank & Fritzy Show’ is the inaugural series on The Wiretap Network, with a new episode every week. Great solution for your end-of-season Sopranos jones.
Bad Heir Day. In a New York Times op-ed piece, Paul Krugman calls the Bush tax plan “bizarre”, “weird”, “a joke. But if the administration has its way, the joke is on
us. For the bill is absurd by design. The administration, knowing that its tax cut
wouldn’t fit into any responsible budget, pushed through a bill that contains the
things it wanted most — big tax cuts for the very, very rich — and used
whatever accounting gimmicks it could find to make the overall budget impact
seem smaller than it is. The idea is that when the absurdities become apparent —
when mobs of angry junior vice presidents from New Jersey start demonstrating
against the A.M.T., or when elderly multimillionaires develop a suspiciously high
rate of fatal accidents — Congress will always respond with further tax cuts. And
if the result of all those tax cuts is to prevent the government from ever providing
the things Mr. Bush promised during the campaign, like prescription drug
coverage under Medicare or increased aid to education — well, that was also
part of the plan.”
Many in G.O.P. Remain Bullish in Face of Senate Loss: “Confronting the loss of the first
all-Republican government in nearly 50
years, after a scant four months in power,
many conservatives profess to be
undaunted… Conservatives have concluded that it is Mr. Jeffords who is to blame for the
sudden Senate power shift, not them — an argument that Mr. Lott was more than
happy to embrace on his own behalf.” New York Times Mr. Lott even admits he included Jeffords in the ‘Singing Senators’ barbershop quartet to “keep (him) feeling like he was part of the family.” [the ingrate!] And Joe Conason: Ready for Slime Time:Critics Slander
Jeffords. “These conservatives, who in previous years have welcomed every Democratic
turncoat with glee and gloating, didn’t notice how ridiculous they sounded when
they suddenly began to wail about the treachery of the Jeffords move. Nor did they
seem to realize that by spraying him with venom, they might gradually push other
moderate Republicans toward a similar crisis… Mr. Jeffords was well aware that his decision would rupture old
friendships, as he regretfully predicted the other day. After observing how his
party’s enforcers treated the Clintons and anyone else who got in their way in
recent years, he may well have anticipated the treatment he’s getting now.” New York Observer Jeffords receives death threats after party switch, accompanied by plainclothes Capitol Police since his announcement. USAToday
And good ol’ Molly Ivins says in The Nation: “When Texas sent the nation Billy Bob Forehead for President, we did, in fact, try to
warn y’all about (Karl) Rove. He not only goes after Democrats, his record of attacking
Republicans who cross him is equally distinguished. Rumor and slur campaigns are
among his favorite methods. He started using dirty tricks when he was with the College
Republicans and has since been linked to the rumors that Ann Richards is a lesbian (a
perennial for any woman in politics), that John McCain is crazy as a result of his years in
prison camp and several other notable doozies. The campaign against McCain in South
Carolina during the primaries was a Rove classic. McCain was simultaneously rumored
to be gay and a tomcat who cheats on his wife, who in turn was rumored to be a drug
addict. The news that McCain has a black daughter (adopted from Bangladesh) was
spread judiciously under the radar of the national media. Anonymous leaflets put under
the windshield wipers of cars parked at white fundamentalist churches on Sunday are
good for this purpose, as are certain radio call-in shows.”
McCain is Considering Leaving the G.O.P. Trying to build a centrist wing of the Republicans, in a widening rift with the President’s faction, and privately meeting last weekend with at least three prominent Democrats about defecting. Washington Post
FTC’s guide to identity theft [PDF download; via Red Rock Eaters]
John Shirley: along came George W: “And when I was a kid, the movie The Fly, with Vincent Price, truly horrified
me. Especially the part where the little half-fly/half-man was caught in a
spider’s web screaming, “Help me, help meeeee!” as the spider crept closer.
Gave me nightmares. And—I admit it, me a horror writer—that’s why I never
saw the Cronenborg remake.” Spark Here’s John Shirley’s web site.
Clone Snafu Suspected: ” Scientists say they’ve found a reason why cloned animals sometimes drop dead or grow huge before
their time.
The paper, published in the June issue of Nature Genetics, suggests that “DNA imprinting” — a process
that the embryo’s genes go through in the early stages of sexual reproduction — goes haywire in cloned
animals.
One critic is giving the study the thumbs down, saying it was designed poorly and that it causes more
confusion than anything.” Wired
“A woman aged 62 has given birth to a
baby boy in France and may face court action for undergoing a
fertility treatment available in neighboring Italy and England but
banned under local laws.” Mother and child are doing well. Reuters
Winning entries in The Guardian‘s SMS (short messaging system) poetry contest.
Birds sing a new tune in wireless era: “Danish ornithologists say that birds, especially Starlings, have begun incorporating the sound
of a ringing cellular phone into their own songs. So far, reports of wireless warbling have been
restricted to Copenhagen, where birds seem to favor Nokia’s classic ring tone.” CNet
Top 10s: The Guardian‘s omnibus collection of authors’ quirky lists of recommended books in various categories.
Japanese scientists report optical transistor. New Scientist
Stop demonizing cell phones! ‘A car swerves into your lane. When you see the driver is talking on a
cellular phone you shout, “Those #$@!&! things oughtta be banned!” But let’s not stop
there. If you look at what people do on cell phones, you’ll see that banning the phones is
only the beginning–there’s a lot more we should get rid of.’ ZDNet
Stones that could be Britain’s pyramids: ‘The history books tell us how the Romans brought civilisation to
the barbarians of Britain.
But yesterday an archaeologist turned that long-held belief
upside down by claiming that the ancient people of these
islands were far more advanced than any of the early
Mediterranean cultures…
“There was no great movement of peoples towards the Atlantic,
because they were already there,” he told the Hay-on-Wye book
festival yesterday. “Only recently have we begun to discover that
these people were far more advanced than those around the
Mediterranean. We have underestimated dramatically the
complexity of these people.” ‘ The Guardian
‘Defective brain’ causes impulsive acts. The BBC bills it this way: “Scientists at Cambridge University believe they
have discovered the part of the brain
associated with impulsive behaviour.” The nucleus accumbens doesn’t function properly, as evidenced on fMRI scans, in extremely impulsive people who “can’t help it.” Rats which underwent n. accumbens lesioning were unable to delay gratification. The BBC article concludes that this is evidence of a “strong biological and, therefore, genetic basis to impulsive behavior.” Extremely reductionistic and misleading reasoning. To start simple, biological does not equal genetically based. The rats’ injuries were biological but acquired, not inherited.Organic injury, especially to frontal lobe structures, often causes impulsivity; most neurobehavioral conditions causing dyscontrol are acquired but not inherited. ADHD may have a heritable component but it’s not clear if it is primarily an impulse disorder, or if it’s even one homogeneous disorder at all. I’ve been studying, treating and writing aabout adult ADHD for more than a decade and I don’t believe it is. Don’t get me started on the absurdities of the current ADHD bandwagon fad!
Doubtlessly it is not a single small structure but the concerted action of many frontal structures that helps us with being planful, maintaining set, inhibiting urges, and deferring gratification, all parts of the complex human capacity for “impulse control.”
Are readers aware that clicking on the 
icon at the end of any post can start a fertile, intelligent, enlivening and enlightening discussion on that post on the FmH mailing list?
The intolerable truth of genetic inequality: “In free Western democracies today there
are certain ideas which are so explosive that
even to acknowledge their existence
publicly is to incur the most savage penalty
from the reigning liberal establishment. You
will be labelled a bigot, a racist, a sexist, a
fascist or in some way be demonised as
intolerant. Henceforth you will have no credibility. Nothing you say will be listened
to.
You will cease to exist in current debate, except in the ridiculed fringe. Your
persecutors will be the people who most preach tolerance. Yet they are the most
intolerant of all.
In a way that is what happened to American social scientist Charles Murray after
he wrote his controversial 1994 book which linked race and IQ, The Bell Curve:
Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life. Sydney Morning Herald
“A British eating disorder organisation was today warning women
about the dangers of visiting pro-anorexia Websites and chatrooms. These corners of cyberspace are filled with people who are aware
that they have eating disorders, but see it as a positive way to live
their lives.
Many refer to themselves as ‘pro-Anna’, and swap tips on how to
starve themselves and how to hide the obsession from others.
The sites and chatrooms are often littered with pictures of terrifyingly
skinny women.
They also include photos of celebs such as Ally McBeal star Calista
Flockhart and model Kate Moss.” The Register
“When we got the first shipment we
weren’t sure that it had arrived. The worker who unpacked it
said we’d got the packaging but not the things inside.” Invisible toy doll makes money out of thin air. “The US company behind action figure Invisible Jim says it
encourages children to use their imaginations and doesn’t
take up any space.” Ananova
‘What is 666: The Mark of the Beast? Can a Christian take the 666: The Mark of the Beast? Is “www” equal to “666” in Hebrew? Can someone “innocently” or “accidently” receive 666: the Mark of the Beast? What if I “innocently” take a debit card, credit card, a vaccine, smart-card, or
biochip and it turns out to be — 666: The Mark of the Beast? Is the biochip implant The Mark of the Beast? What about barcodes and 666: The Mark of the Beast? Do barcodes really have the number 666 “hidden” in them?’
Missing in Action: what happened to the men of the 364th? “The story, whispered around Centreville, Mississippi since World
War II, goes like this: Members of the 364th (Negro) Infantry
Regiment were killed at Camp Van Dorn to silence their
relentless–and sometimes violent–demands for equality in a
segregated Army. Some swear they witnessed the shoot-out or
events that led to a shoot-out or its aftermath. Some say the
casualties were many, others say just a few. Some testimony
claims to be first-hand, much is just hearsay.” In These Times [I certainly don’t know if this is true, but if you don’t think it’s plausible, that’s another story.]
Blogging as a Form of Journalism: “Weblogs offer a vital, creative outlet for alternative voices” USC Annenberg Online Journalism Review
“Once I noticed I was on fire, I decided to relax and enjoy the fall.” Matthew Rossi’s back, finally.
Stressed Out? Bad Knee? Try a Sip of These Juices As if you didn’t know it, the juice drinks with the herbal additives with which you’ll quench your thirst this summer come from the big beverage companies and are probably no healthier than Coke or Pepsi, except insofar as they inflate your self-righteousness when you drink them. And when pressed about the veracity of the health-promoting claims they make for them, the beverage companies say things like “We don’t claim that,
it’s just a playful theme.”
For all you pious vampire fans — recognize the actor? [via MetaScene]
I can’t believe it. I finally got one of those scam letters we’re always warned about!
Subject: Investment Pact
Greetings,
It is with strict confidence and trust that I wish to contact you seeking for your assistance to help
as regards an investment opportunity. I sincerely hope that this letter will not come as a surprise to
you, or cause you any embarrassment since we neither knew each other before, nor have had any
previous contact or correspondence. I would appreciate your benevolence in giving this matter the
much-needed attention as I am presently in a difficult situation and need your assistance and
guidance urgently.I am Mrs. Ndaye Banya, wife of Maj. Timothy Banya, the former commander and head of the
Secret Unit in charge of Diamond dealing for the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) of Sierra-
Leone. My husband was formerly working directly with the former Rebel Leader Mr. Foday
Sankoh who is presently in government custody. The government intends trying Mr. Sankoh for
illegal diamond dealing and especially for the killing of 21 people during a public demonstration
outside his home in May last year which subsequently lead to this arrest. As the situation is, my
husband is very much likely to be prosecuted alongside for activities in the diamond mining.The RUF is now headed by Gen. Issa Sesay who is determined in bringing peace to Sierra Leone,
he signed a cease-fire agreement with the government on Friday 10th Nov., 2000 and instructed
that peace must returned to our fatherland after nine-years conflict, pledging to allow U.N. troops
unhindered access throughout Sierra-Leone. My fear is that the government will try Mr. Sankoh
and that my husband may also be prosecuted alongside and our assets may be confiscated. Also all
accounts abroad and locally traceable to our name and families may also be frozen given the
circumstances.In view of this development, I was initially trapped with about US$20,000,000.00 (Twenty Million
United States Dollars) that is in cash in boxed containers. Through the assistance of my proxy in
collaboration with a set of Diplomats, I was able to move to this consignment out of Sierra Leone
to a Security Firm in a neighboring West African country. The money is kept and lodged in a
security vault under the auspices of the Security in a crate marked antique. For the time being it is
safe and content undisclosed.All I want you to do is to receive the said amount in your name and invest it on my behalf while
maintaining my anonymity in whatever business endeavour you decide undertaking. My situation is
very desperate, as I cannot leave Sierra Leone because of the house arrest I am under.In the light of above, I am soliciting your assistance and partnership to move this money out of the
Security Firm as both of us can make a fortune. I would require your assistance in terms of logistics
and materials to enhance the movement of the consignment from the Firm in question. Therefore,
contact me immediately, if you are able and interested in assisting me in this endeavour preferably
using my alternative email address at ncbanyand@email.com, as soon as possible.Thanks for your anticipated understanding and assistance.
Yours faithfully,
MRS. N. BANYA
Email: ncbanyand@email.com
A Note:
Each generation must out of relative obscurity, discover its mission, fulfill it or betray it. (Frantz
Fanon)
I intend to send an encouraging reply; I’ll share any further correspondence from “her” with you. You could write her with excitement, saying you just heard about the fantastic investment opportunity she offered an acquaintance of yours and you wanted to get in on the action. I won’t mind that you violated her “strictest confidence”, honest.
Owning the Future: Looting the Library:
” As we plunge
into the digital realm, the nation’s 16,000 public libraries are
striving to uphold their tradition as protectors of public access to
new books and articles. But publishers, in an increasingly bald,
frontal assault on the library’s mission, have something very
different in mind: a pay-per-use model for information content
that will largely shut libraries out.The battle is being waged on many fronts, from legislative
initiatives and lawsuits to the publishing industry’s unilateral
pursuit of copy-protection technologies that will keep
users—including libraries—from sharing digital content.”
Pat Schroeder, in a former life a distinguished progressive Congressional representative from Colorado and now chief lobbyist for the publishing industry, “has been quoted as saying that
publishers have to ‘learn to push back’ against libraries, which
she portrays as an organized band of pirates!” Technology Review And: The science world is in revolt at power of the journal owners: “Scientists around the world are in revolt against moves by a
powerful group of private corporations to lock decades of publicly
funded western scientific research into expensive,
subscription-only electronic databases.” The Guardian
The Quest for Justice: Aryeh Neier’s essay reviews a number of books on war crimes tribunals, the truth-and-reconciliation commission model, and the modern problem of making a people think about their responsibility for the atrocities committed in their name. New York Review of Books
Corporate anthropology: Dirt-free research. I studied cultural anthropology as an undergraduate. Money wasn’t the reason I didn’t go into the field, but it could have been; job prospects in anthropology never extended far beyond the campus — except to things like an uneasy marriage to oil companies consulting on how to exploit indigenous people’s land rights in “culturally sensitive” ways. But now it appears anthropology has successfully, comfortably reinvented itself as a tool of the domestic corporate economy. CNN
A Brief History of SPAM®, and Spam: ‘In a policy statement on SPAM® and the Internet posted on its website, Hormel now
says that it “does not object” to use of the slang term “spam” to describe unsolicited
commercial e-mail.
Instead, the company asks only that people writing specifically about square, canned
pork follow a set of trademark guidelines.’ Wired
“You have to be courageous to publicly criticize the Church
of Scientology. The organization recently proved — again
— how far it will go to investigate, smear and intimidate
critics… Scientology claims that it has reformed
and says it should be treated like any
other church. But the Jesse Prince case
and others continue to set this church
apart.” St. Petersburg Times
