] NASHVILLE, Tennessee (AP) -- Bloggers -- those
] Internet-based writers without rules -- are fighting back
] against criticism that their work is unreliable, libelous
] or just poorly done

The conference Decius and Rattle pimped Memestreams at is on CNN

Bloggers' conference emphasizes reporting

] You can now test the Linux operating system and desktop
] environment. It's as easy as ABC.
]
] Simply click on "Start Linux". In a separate window, a
] complete Linux system will start on your PC, without
] requiring an installation. In certain web browsers, like
] Firefox, a small program file needs to be downloaded and
] run. You will be using the KDE-Desktop 3.2 desktop
] environment, which is equipped with the latest versions
] of Open Source applications, like office package Open
] Office, web browser Firefox, image-editing suite GIMP,
] and many more.

Web-based Linux Demo

] "The broadcast flag regulations exceed the agency's
] delegated authority under the statute," a three-judge
] panel unanimously concluded. "The FCC has no authority to
] regulate consumer electronic devices that can be used for
] receipt of wire or radio communication when those devices
] are not engaged in the process of radio or wire
] transmission."

HELL YEAH!

Court yanks down FCC's broadcast flag

] Japanese Kids Say the Darndest Things
]
] These are things that kids have hit me with at some point
] in the classroom. Most are in English, or at least their
] best attempt. I swear I'm not making any of this up.
]
] During a quiz game, I asked "What's the name of the
] famous bridge in San Francisco?" They always guess
] "Rainbow Bridge" because that's the name of the famous
] bridge in Tokyo. Um, no. Not quite.
]
] One boy completely surprised me though. He slowly and
] timidly approached me, looked up, and hit me with his
] guess - "Gay Bridge."

The life and times of a black American teaching English in Japan. And yes, everyone keeps asking him if he has a big dick.

I Am a Japanese School Teacher

Fuck James Joyce and his stupid homoerotic clouds.

...

400 pages. 32 Hours

] The Mystery Pit of Oak Island

I first hear about the Oak Island Treasure after reading Douglas Preston Lincoln Child's "Riptide," a fiction work based on the it.

The Oak Island Mystery revolves around a 160'+ pit that appears to be man-made, on an island off the cost of Nova Scotia. It has a documented system of booby traps that have been tripped and flooded the original pit. Many people have died over the past 200 years trying to recover the "treasure."

"Riptide" itself is an excellent novel, involving priates, cryptography, and engineering. I highly recommend it.

Oak Island Mystery

] Wink is a Tutorial and Presentation creation software,
] primarily aimed at creating tutorials on how to use
] software (like a tutor for MS-Word/Excel etc). Using Wink
] you can capture screenshots, add explanations boxes,
] buttons, titles etc and generate a highly effective
] tutorial for your users.

Wink - [Homepage]

What do those icons do when you aren't around?

Icon War

This paragraph is from the Washington Times:

] The CIA's chief weapons inspector said he cannot rule out
] the possibility that Iraqi weapons of mass destruction
] were secretly shipped to Syria before the March 2003
] invasion, citing "sufficiently credible" evidence that
] WMDs may have been moved there.

Sounds like WMD probably went to Syria from Iraq...

This text is from the Washington Post:

] Although Syria helped Iraq evade U.N.-imposed sanctions
] by shipping military and other products across its borders,
] the investigators "found no senior policy, program, or
] intelligence officials who admitted any direct knowledge of
] such movement of WMD." Because of the insular nature of
] Saddam Hussein's government, however, the investigators were
] "unable to rule out unofficial movement of limited
] WMD-related materials."

Liberal Bias?

The Times doesn't respond to this quote:

] Iraq's ability to produce nuclear arms, which the
] administration asserted was a grave and gathering
] threat that required an immediate military response,
] had "progressively decayed" since 1991. Investigators
] found no evidence of "concerted efforts to restart the
] program."

But

] Hussein "retained the intent and capability and he
] intended to resume full-scale WMD efforts once the
] U.N. sanctions were lifted," Pentagon spokesman Bryan
] Whitman said yesterday. "Duelfer provides plenty of
] rationale for why this country went to war in Iraq."

Thats the key question isn't it?

The times says:

] Clearly, the media needs an object lesson in an old
] truth: Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Yeah, but is it ok to actually launch a war based on a total absence of evidence? Is a sentence like "Years later, there is still absolutely no evidence that the Bush administration's justification for the Iraq war was accurate." a reasonable enough headline for you? You really have no idea whether or not you were right. You've grabbed onto the tinyest thread left to uphold your position. This is the kind of crap I expect from silly online debates. This is not something that I want to hear coming out of the US Government.

There is absolutely no proof that bunny rabbits don't have tea on pluto. However, its extremely unlikely, and most people would tend to beleive that it isn't true. At what point to you admit that the idea that there was an imminent threat that Saddam would give WMD to a terrorist organization is extremely unlikely, and start asking objective questions about whether or not it actually made sense to re-elect a political team that sent thousands to their graves based on what was most likely a bad call? Oh no. We couldn't do that... That might involve voting for a (blech) liberal. Fuck Liberals. They suck. Conservatives rule!

Links:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2004-10-06-wmd_x.htm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A12115-2004Oct6.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/04/25/AR2005042501554.html
http://washingtontimes.com/national/20050427-121915-1667r.htm
http://washingtontimes.com/national/20050427-110457-2216r.htm

Liberal Bias or Crazy Moonies

] Collaborative Filtering Research Papers
] Summary: 48 abstracts with links to the full papers and
] reader comments.

Nice summary as I madly implement my last alogrithm

Collaborative Filtering Research Papers