If you spend any time on the Internet sending e-mail or browsing the Web, then you use domain name servers without even realizing it. Domain name servers, or DNS, are an incredibly important but completely hidden part of the Internet, and they are fascinating! The DNS system forms one of the largest and most active distributed databases on the planet. Without DNS, the Internet would shut down very quickly.

In this edition of HowStuffWorks, we will take a look at the DNS system so you can understand how it works and appreciate its amazing capabilities.

DNS for Dummies

Howstuffworks

It is important to note that the absence of a two-way conversation in American television also means that there is no "meritocracy of ideas" on television. To the extent that there is a "marketplace" of any kind for ideas on television, it is a rigged market, an oligopoly, with imposing barriers to entry that exclude the average citizen. The German philosopher, Jurgen Habermas, describes what has happened as "the refeudalization of the public sphere." That may sound like gobbledygook, but it's a phrase that packs a lot of meaning. The feudal system which thrived before the printing press democratized knowledge and made the idea of America thinkable, was a system in which wealth and power were intimately intertwined, and where knowledge played no mediating role whatsoever. The great mass of the people were ignorant. And their powerlessness was born of their ignorance.

Good read. Only... I wish it could be packed into a 5 second blurb, so it might actually have some effect.

You know what Google Ads put up for this article? 'Pet Cremation Services.'

Pet Cremation Services.

Al Gore tells it like it is

When people ask me why I blog, the answer is that it helps me organize my thoughts, memorialize them, work them out.

In short, to discover what I think.

The Big Picture: Why Write ?

The two-sentence statement from the IRA, announcing that it had disposed of its arms, ended with an enigma: Who exactly is P O'Neill of the Irish Republican Publicity Bureau, Dublin, the name that appears at the end of IRA statements?

Given the well-documented history of the Irish republican movement's leadership during the past 30 years, P O'Neill is probably nobody but a committee, perhaps the so-called "Army Council" of seven leading republicans.

But the use of the name on scores of IRA public statements, which have sought to justify the movement's armed conflict, poses a question: just how does a supposedly secret organisation communicate with the outside world?

BBC NEWS | Magazine | So who is P O'Neill?

Catonic wrote:

seriouslyuguys wrote:

Rattle wrote:
In the most recent blow against evil pornography, the feds have pointed the chilling effects laser at SuicideGirls, forcing them to take down a number of photo-sets and individual photos.

It doesn't look like the Feds actually DID anything. They are pre-emptively taking photosets down in order to stave off prosecution. But the fundies have already won. If I were running SG I'd stand my ground and fight rather then wimping out like this.

Sounds like Prior Restraint to me.

I was refered to a piece about the owner of Suicide Girls by the Sensual Liberation Army site in which although looking superficially alternative the Suicide Girls site owner is in person quite right wing so perhaps he is only out to make money rather than a member of the libertarian right.
Surely attempts to stop this sort of consensual material will continue and needs perhaps to go to court to reaffirm 1st Ammendment rights. The argument about community standards is strange. Surely the 1st ammendment is to protect minority voices against majoritarianism. The question arises, if the shape of the Supreme Court changes because liberals on the Court retire or die, will a real threat to 1st ammendment rights occur.

RE: Justice Department in War Against Porn, chilling effects hit SuicideGirls

Simon Wiesenthal, the renowned Nazi-hunter, who died in Vienna on Tuesday, has been buried in Israel.

Shalom

BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Wiesenthal honoured at graveside

Decius wrote:

the cry I do not have an idealogy (i was taught by my left wing teachers) is the cry of a person so immersed in what Gramsci called hegemony that their idealogy is held entirely unconsciously.

That perspective is a bit circular. I'm not talking about hegemony. I'm talking about people who conciously choose to evaluate what they think about an issue based on their favorite philosophy as opposed to considering the effect that they wish to acheive and asking how they might acheive it. An example would be Catholics opposing sexual education in Africa on purely idealogical grounds in spite of the fact that distributing condoms will in fact lead to a healthier society there and in no way limits their ability to advocate abstinance. They justify their policies based on philosophy rather then strategy.

I think we agree but are arguing at cross purposes. By idealogy I mean the consistent or not set of ideas and beliefs used to make judgements. What you refer to I would simply call dogma.

RE: Francis Fukuyama: The acceptable face of the neo-cons? | Al-Ahram Weekly | Profile

noteworthy wrote:

if there is a big opening up in the Egyptian political system and it looks like the banned Muslim Brotherhood could capitalise on such moves to come to power -- the same concerns Hamas in the Gaza Strip -- would the US be happy with the outcome, would it want, for instance, Hamas to be the dominant political force?:

this is an important point,I think, democracy in the Middle East may not conform with the United States best short term political interests however if such forces come to power democratically they will have to learn to accomdate ( a process Iran is currently going through although of course it is only partially democratic but certainly more so than Kuwait or Saudi Arabia) they must learn to live in the wider global civil community.

"America has never created democracy abroad. People who live in a society that want it have created democracy. The US can't simply decide it wants to democratise this part of the world, it has to build on internal discourse that is pushing in that direction.

"There is," Fukuyama insists, "no single global strategy that works in terms of democratic openness. Sometimes it happens from the bottom up and sometimes it happens from the up down, and to be successful it usually has to work in both ways. There has to be elite that wants change, though that desire can be supported and driven by popular participation. For example in Chile, the Philippines and Korea it required pressure on leaders on top to open up their systems and those pressures couldn't have come only from civil society. In Ukraine and Georgia on the other hand there was obviously a big push from below -- pressure in both directions is necessary. There is not one single strategy that produces democratic transition."

thats great
we need to encourage civic society
unlike Fukuyama I believe we need an International Criminal Court which by its very existance instills the values of human rights and the notion of the rule of law

Fukuyama is, after all, on record -- in an interview with this paper last year -- as arguing that the Muslim world is long overdue the kind of reformation spearheaded by Martin Luther in Europe. Is it possible a more liberal Middle East could arise from such a process, and where would that leave civil society?

i understand the argument in that medieval Catholic power models were fundamentally dictatorial and Protestantism arguably led to the English Civil War, John Locke and thence liberal political theory and over time liberal democracy but a lot of blood was spilled note the 30 years war in Germany as example 1.

noteworthy said

He holds out hope that Arab governments can improve without becoming fully democratic

surely the point is that a civic society can grow and mature
the US wasn't the democracy we know ... [ Read More (0.2k in body) ]

RE: Francis Fukuyama: The acceptable face of the neo-cons? | Al-Ahram Weekly | Profile

The other day I had a chance to flip through a friend's copy of Kurt Vonnegut's new book. Its one of those rare volumes that you can flip to just about any page and find at least one great truth present that makes you laugh out loud.

Its clearly targeted to a younger crowd. This is a perfect book to give to a teenager. MemeStreams user Opheria put together this selection of quotes:

“I think that novels that leave out technology misrepresent life as badly as Victorians misrepresent life by leaving out sex.”

“One of the most impressive ways to tell your war story is to refuse to tell it.”

“If you want to really hurt your parents, and you don’t have the nerve to be gay, the least you can do is go into the arts.”

“I don’t know about you, but I practice a disorganized religion. We call ourselves ‘Our Lady of Perpetual Astonishment.’”

“The last thing I ever wanted was to be alive when the three most powerful people on the whole planet would be named Bush, Dick and Colon.”

“We are all addicts of fossil fuels in a state of denial. And like so many addicts about to face cold turkey, our leaders are now committing violent crimes to get what little is left of what we’re hooked on.”

“We are here on Earth to fart around. Don’t let anybody tell you any different.”

“Bill Gates says, ‘Wait till you can see what your computer can become.’ But it is you who should be doing the becoming, not the damn fool computer.”

“The only proof he needed for the existence of God was music.”

“…I don’t think people give a damn whether the planet goes on or not. It seems to me as if everyone is living as members of Alcoholics Anonymous do, day by day.”

“…do you know why I think George W. Bush is so pissed off at Arabs? They brought us Algebra.”

“If you actually are an educated, thinking person, you will not be welcome in Washington, D.C.”

“Life is no way to treat an animal, not even a mouse.”

“Our President is a Christian? So was Adolf Hitler.”

“Doesn’t anything socialistic make you want to throw up? Like great public schools or health insurance for all?”
“I have one reality show that would make your hair stand on end: C-Students from Yale.”

“Only nut cases want to be president. This was true even in high school. Only clearly disturbed people ran for class president.”

“What is it, what can it possibly be about blow jobs and golf?”

“…it is time we thanked God that we are in a country where even the poor people are overweight. But the Bush diet could change that.”

“The good Earth - we could have saved it, but we were too damn cheap and lazy.”

“Rules only take us so far, even good rules.”

Amazon | A Man Without A Country - Kurt Vonnegut

janelane wrote:
In my "Engineering Design" class, we have to figure out what the world of 2020 will be like.
-janelane, obliged
decius wrote
government structure: This is a US centric response: I don't see many structural changes occuring in a 15 year timespan,

I don't see any structural changes to be likely since the constitution is designed to make fundamental change incredibly difficult however if the religious right has its way and Roe v Wade is overturned because Bush or a successor packs the Supreme Court then we almost move into Margaret Attwood The Handmaid's Tale territory. I see an even greater clash between the urban progressive elements and the fundamentalists. There does not seem much room for political compromise between the creationist, pro-life, anti-gay forces and liberal rainbow coalition eco-friendly pro-choice pro-diversity forces.

The EU could spin apart. The problems faced by various governments to ratify a constitution and may prove a landmark. It has in many ways a top down project imposed by a political elite. It has a fundamental logic ecomonically and politically but medium term there are huge hurdles. The Rupert Murdoch press and the political elite fudging the democratic imperitive of handing real power over to the directly elected body rather than the council of ministers and second hand failed politicians becoming Commissioners ( the senior EU bureaucrats ).

One of the major questions is China. A nuclear power, a dictatorship. Will the economic leap forward spread to other areas of China? Will economic liberty lead to increased calls to loosen the grip of the party, what will happen when the last of the old guard who marched on the Long March are dead? The political role of the Chinese Army is as ever key.

War, poverty, debt, diease in the developing world. HIV is devastating a generation in Africa. Dictators have saddled much of the developing world with huge debt and much of the planet is riven by violent political struggle of which Al-Qaeda is a religious veil for a deeper political and economic struggle. Choosing the World Trade Center was not a random act, it was a political focus which to them incapsulated "the enemy". Whether the divisions will increase between rich and poor I think depends on perspective. Internally to countries I think divisions will increase, as manual and low skill jobs are outsourced across borders. Jobs will continue to flow abroad but this will in turn enfranchise people in India, China and potentially Africa and continue the disenfranchisement of elements in the "West". Flint Michigan will only get back on its feet through education, which means sending its children into the military so they can go to college.
The US regained a lot of perceived ecomonic power through information technology. Where was America in the 70s and 80s? Brewing a technological revolution produced by the capit... [ Read More (0.3k in body) ]

RE: The Year 2020