] Hey, George Soros! You're sending sackloads of cash to
] all sorts of groups dedicated to defeating President Bush
] this November. But by so ruthlessly exploiting one
] loophole in campaign-finance law”the one that allows
] unlimited donations to the political nonprofits known as
] 527 committees ”you're ignoring a different, equally
] large loophole. And it's one that affects a medium no one
] seems to be taking advantage of yet: the Internet.
]
] 1. The Internet is the only place where political parties can still
] spend soft money on the presidential election.
] 2. On the Internet, you can run things that look like TV ads.
] 3. There are fewer disclosure requirements.

McCain-Feingold's Internet Loophole

Check out the Interz0ne III presentations. Pretty good quality for a con video.

Interz0ne Presentation Video

] One of the nation's wealthiest towns will soon have
] cameras and computers running background checks on every
] car and driver that passes through.

The license plate takes another step closer to it's destiny.

newsobserver.com - Florida town to use surveillance cameras

] "Do you think Hong Kong was democratic under British
] rule?" Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing asked reporters in
] Shanghai today. "Did the British raise concerns about
] that? Did the Americans raise concerns? No. Why don't you
] take a look at this double standard?"
...
] Prominent executives have warned that elections could
] lead to the establishment of a welfare state, a concern
] also raised in the late 1940's.

The truth hurts. The U.S. agitated for democracy during the second world war, and then dropped it. It didn't become a popular idea again until it got close to hand-over time. The economic arguements being made by the executives here are despicable and regressive. Frankly, primitive.

The New York Times : China Condemns U.S. and Britain on Hong Kong Democracy

] The Cybercrime Convention does three major things:
]
] It includes a list of crimes that each member country
] must have on its books. The treaty requires
] criminalization of offenses such as hacking, the
] production, sale or distribution of hacking tools, and an
] expansion of criminal liability for intellectual property
] violations (Articles 2-11).
]
] It requires each participating nation to grant new powers
] of search and seizure to its law enforcement authorities.
] They include the power to force an Internet Service
] Provider (ISP) to preserve a citizens internet
] usage records or other data, and the power to monitor a
] citizens online activities in real time (Articles
] 16-22).
]
] It requires law enforcement in every participating
] country to assist police from other participating
] countries. US police would be required to cooperate
] mutual assistance requests from police in
] other participating nations to the widest extent
] possible (Articles 23-35).

The obvious intent of this treaty is good and it does some things that need to be done, however, the ACLU makes a compelling case that it is poorly crafted. The result would be worse then the disease.

In general, the problem with these UN treaties is that these are governments negotiating with eachother over their interests. Citizens, and their interests, are frequently not at the table.

American Civil Liberties Union : Seven Reasons the US Should Reject the International Cybercrime Treaty

] From her front porch, Alice Dembowski has watched her
] city change, one tidy house at a time.
]
] "Chinese, Polish, Bosnian, Polish, Bengali,"
] she recites, her finger moving down the block. "They
] were all Polish at one time."
]
] "I've made friends. I go to their weddings.
] (But) we're losing our tradition and I'm
] getting mad," Dembowski said. "If they're going to live in
] America, why can't they be more American?"
]
] Next month, Hamtramck will become one of the few cities
] in the United States where the Islamic call to prayer is
] broadcast onto public streets. The impact of that
] decision is reverberating across the nation.

That woman's statement is humerous in its obvious ignorance.

This is a 4 minute thing that they blast 5 times a day. There is a sample on this site. For the most part I think its cool. I wouldn't mind it especially in an urban area. But, of course, I mostly like it because its alien. Others will hate it for the same reason.

I think the critical question is, at dawn? If this thing is loud enough to wake people up its a no go. I strongly support your right to blast islamic rites (or heavy metal for that matter) as long as you're not interfering with other people's sleep.

Community standards must factor in here. Obviously I couldn't set up a heavy metal loud speaker that played megadeth for 4 minutes five times a day. The only way to draw the line between this and that is to ask what the community is comfortable with, regardless of what you think of the community's reasons for choosing to be comfortable or uncomfortable with it. I don't see any way around that conceptually.

In general I think its a good thing to promote the notion that in the west Islam is acceptable. In the East they might ask if other cultures are similarly accepted.

(Of course, there is always the story about the Orb concert where they took a record of this thing and cut it into their mix because they thought it sounded cool and ended up getting their show shut down because there were Islamic people in the audience who got offended...)

Cultures collide in diverse Hamtramck

] A militant group has threatened to kill three Italian
] hostages unless their countrymen demonstrate against the
] presence of Italian troops in Iraq, according to a video
] aired on an Arabic news channel.

This is about the dumbest thing that I've ever heard. It would be good for the blooper reel if it wasn't for the fact that people's lives are at stake. What is the point of a protest rally when it is held under duress? It means nothing and will have no political impact.

These guys are either dumb, or something got lost here in the translation (maybe intentionally).

The government certainly won't organize a protest. It will be interesting to see if protests occur. Its possible that some people won't get the memo that you don't comply with requests like this. Will the ensuing demonstation actually satisfy the kidnappers? Who knows?

A much more interesting strategy would have been to kidnap people during election time and then demand that people vote a particular way or you'll kill the hostages. Maybe this is a trial run for such an attack.

Usually they'd prevent such a message from getting to the media, but under these circumstances Al'J might run it and the domestic media wouldn't be able to keep it bottled up. You could also end run that by posting your demand broadly on the internet... Spam it...

The only way to manage a situation like that is to launch a strong multi-partisan domestic cultural response that the terrorist demands ought to be ignored by the voters and then hope people come through. Things could get really really ugly if one of the domestic parties tried to take advantage of the situation...

(U:) Probably the point of this is not to influence the west, but to demonstrate to gullible people in the middle east that they terrorists have influenced the west.

CNN.com - Protest 'or Italian hostages die' - Apr 26, 2004

This is random but entertaining. Literally. Comic frames and random punch lines are remixed. Its a little like looking for shapes in the clouds.

exhilarator

] SmarterChild, for those not in the know, is America
] Online's artificial intelligence program. That's right -
] an AOL IM AI.

Elonka says:

The IM-bot SmarterChild disappeared for awhile, but seems to be back now. I find it enormously useful, since it's a quick way to get word definitions, find out what movies are playing, check the weather in a city that I'm traveling to, look up an encyclopedia entry, check a stock quote, etc. etc., all in plain english queries, "What's the weather forecast for Butte, MT?" "What time is Hidalgo playing?" or "What time is Hidalgo playing at the St. Charles 18?"

Or, when I'm really bored (or just want to procrastinate), it's fun testing the limits of its conversational ability, like to ask it about its parents (which it does indeed respond to).

If you haven't checked this out this bot yet, I recommend it. Just open an IM window and send a message (any message, even just "hi!") to "SmarterChild", and watch the time-wasting begin. :)

Observational Humor - Conversations with SmarterChild

angus wrote:
] Even if you are not a fan you should checkout some of the
] stories and links on his web page. I think Howard is making up
] for lost time. He sat on this domain for many years with
] almost no content posted and now the site is suffering from
] information overload. You be the judge.

This bruhaha over Jackson's breast, in the context of recent consolidation of broadcast media, is entertaining enough to comment on, but not fundamental enough to be angry about, IMHO.

First, Jackson's "incident" was clearly a promotional stunt for her new album. It apparently didn't help much. Whatever.

Second, I really liked Stern's movie. I had such great hope for him. But my only access to him is his television show, and Stern's television show sucks. If you've seen one you've seen them all. Its Stern "convincing" some stripper to take her clothes off, but I don't even get to see her naked because his show has always been censored. Between my cable and internet access I've got much better porn at my fingertips if thats what I'm in for.

Frankly, I don't care about the consolidation of broadcast radio and television because I'm not listening and I'm not watching. I get my information from the internet. I never watch broadcast television unless its the super bowl or something. The stereo in my car doesn't work, and when I do fix it I'll probably get XM. I think XM is over-priced, but broadcast radio is so bad that its almost not worth the money to fix my stereo if thats what I'm going to be listening to.

Stern should be using his website and he should be on XM. I'm sure that people who work in the old broadcast world view these new media as ghettos for programming thats not popular enough to make it in the real world. That perception is wrong. There is a fundamental change occurring from an environment where we all accessed the common denominator to an evironment where no one accesses the common denominator because there is enough bandwidth available to provide each of us with something that really does interest us. This is the future. The broadcast world is a ghetto of programming that no body really likes but which appeals to the majority of us on some low level.

All these "community" groups who are pissed off that consolidation has pushed them off the air need to get their asses in gear and start using the internet. They'll have real power to communicate and organize online. Its completely stupid for them pawn after dead media. I agree with the conservative's push to get these people wired, even if they did do it for selfish financial reasons. These changes are inevitable anyway. Within my lifetime I think I'll see the broadcast radio and television spectrum reallocated for another purpose, and I'll celebrate the day.

RE: Howard Stern: A General in the Culture Wars?