] Given the fact that the information in issue could almost
] certainly be found on the Internet, there is not a protectable
] privacy interest in addresses and telephone numbers.

(and social security numbers and other information...)

[Politech] Judge: Because of Internet, names and addresses in suit must be public [priv]

This is short and sweet.

Rumsfeld gets nailed.

Elonka wrote:
] ] For some little girls, it's a favorite doll; for others,
] ] it's a
] ] dress-up set. But when Elonka Dunin of St. Charles,
] ] Missouri,
] ] was little, her favorite toys were puzzles.

Wow! Kick Ass!

RE: Elonka in 'Woman's World' magazine

This week's Onion must-read.

Rumsfeld then declared the tournament open by symbolically shattering a block of obsidian with his prosthetic dragon's claw—the powerful weapon grafted onto his right wrist after 2003 champion Li severed his hand with manji butterfly swords.
..
"Man, they ain't seen unorthodox-but-effective until they seen me," said the languid Jack "Chocolate Lightning" Garrison, the two-time East Coast Freestyle Kung-Fu champion once described by SuckaPunch magazine as "six feet of stone-cold brotha and 10 inches of afro barely contained in a fly lemon-yellow jumpsuit."

Onion:Rumsfeld Hosts No-Holds-Barred Martial Arts Tournament

] There weren't a lot of hot babes with Commodore 64's in
] Toronto in the '80s.

The friendster keynote at SXSW.

Fast Company Now: Friendster Keynote

] "These people don't tune into today's radio channels
] which are aimed at a young audience. Our service allows
] them to discover their own music," Ashcroft said.
]
] Consumers can tailor the music stream by pressing a
] button on their phone to indicate they like or dislike a
] song.
]
] "It's self-learning. The channel will adapt over time,"
] Ashcroft said, adding wireless carriers are expected to
] charge a monthly fee of between 10 to 15 euros for the
] service.
]
] Sony's service, for which it has no name yet, will work
] on advanced multimedia handsets running on the Symbian
] software system, available on phones from Nokia, Siemens
] AG, Sony Ericsson, Sendo and others.

Sony to deliver collaborative filtered music over cellphones.

] I have always considered the profound distinction between
] ninjas and pirates to be an absolute one. One was either
] ninja or pirate - there were no inbetweens. One
] personality type was skilled and proficient, elegant and
] silent, contained and constrained, honourable and
] spiritual. The other type loud and flamboyant, gregarious
] and unrestrained, life-loving and vigorous, passionate
] and strong. I thought all people must pledge their
] allegiance, or be categorised accordingly.
]
] The other day at work, another binary pair was presented
] to me - a co-worker who doesn't declare people pirate or
] ninja, but instead elf or dwarf. For him, humanity falls
] into doers and thinkers - elves being elegant and
] timeless, conceptual and refined, abstract and beautiful
] while dwarves are practical and structural, hard-working
] and no-nonsense, down-to-earth smiths and makers.

plasticbag.org | weblog | From pirate dwarves to ninja elves...

] An Orwellian taint is emerging in the Bush
] administration's big victory last year in wringing the
] Medicare prescription drug subsidy from a balky Congress.
] The plan is being sold to the public through
] propagandistic ads disguised as TV news reports, and it
] turns out the government's top Medicare actuary was
] muzzled by superiors during the debate about the
] program's price tag.

This is probably a coincidence, but certainly the people who developed this PR campaign should not be working in the government.

Phony medicare news reports

] In June 2003, I wrote something about instant messaging
] that included the words "question" and "answerer". In
] November of that year, a young girl trying to finish her
] homework searched for "instant message question
] answerer", found the piece I had written, and IM'd me,
] looking for some answers.

Stupid People

] SB 500, the bill to require all electronic voting
] machines in Georgia to produce a permanent paper record,
] has passed out of the committee! To gain passage of
] SB-500 in this 2004 session, the bill now requires
] immediate action by the Senate Rules committee, the body
] responsible for putting legislation on the debate
] calendar for the Senate floor. Again, your calls and
] emails can tip the balance.

While this is exciting, I also have my misgivings. Clearly the electronic elections systems have security problems. We still aren't addressing them. We still aren't talking about auditing our policies and practices.

What we are doing instead is attaching a second system on to the side which offers paper ballots as a check.

I'm worried that what we've hatched here is a worst of both worlds solution where a logistically difficult, inaccurate, and insecure paper ballot system is tacked onto an insecure and failure prone electronic system which still has no transparency.

Security isn't about technology so much as its about how that technology is used. We're not even talking about addressing that.

This is a product of the fact that elections administrators have been almost totally unwilling to engage in a constructive dialog about these problems, preferring instead to play political spin zone with it and thereby eliminating any credibility they might have had.

While this is a political victory for those who are concerned about this problem, if you think its an ideal solution you've drunk the koolaid.

Blog for Democracy: SB-500 Update