] Microsoft Word documents are notorious for containing
] private information in file headers which people would
] sometimes rather not share. The British government of
] Tony Blair just learned this lesson the hard way.

Microsoft Word bytes Tony Blair in the butt

] "I would guess that you would then see stories about the
] family faced with economic ruin and the cost of having to
] hire defense counsel, settling for $10,000 or $20,000,
] and the money they were saving for Timmy's college
] education now has to go to Kid Rock," said Philip S.
] Corwin, a lobbyist in Washington for Sharman Networks,
] distributor of the Kazaa file-sharing software.
]
] "That's the kind of stuff that would scare a politician."

Labels May Face Risk in Piracy Suits

T-spigot now has CDs selling on Amazon. These are some friends of mine from the bay area. Frequently featured on somafm. The "Trip to Booker" track has samples Rattle gave them from a whacky indy film that our tivo grabbed one night. If you like the stuff on somafm, you should buy this CD.

Amazon.com: Music: Experiments in the Hypnotic Production of Crime

] Imagine sprinkling tiny sensors on road and fields for
] surveillance, putting them in buildings and bridges to
] monitor structural health, and installing them in
] industrial facilities to manage energy, inventory and
] manufacturing processes.That's the idea behind the
] emerging technology of wireless sensor networks (see
] "Casting the Wireless Sensor Net").

Sensors of the World, Unite!

] No. Placing your number on the National Do Not Call
] Registry will stop most, but not all, telemarketing
] calls. Some businesses are exempt from the national
] registry and still can call you even if you place your
] number on it. Exempt businesses include:
]
] * long-distance phone companies
] * airlines
] * banks and credit unions; and
] * the business of insurance, to the extent that it is
] regulated by state law.
]
] However, many telemarketing calls are placed by
] professional telemarketing companies, and even if the
] company whose goods or services are being sold is exempt,
] the telemarketing company may be covered.
]
] You may still receive calls from political organizations,
] charities, telephone surveyors or companies with which
] you have an existing business relationship.

Hrm. See, I got fairly excited about this thing... Then, after being woken up at 9 AM on Saturday Morning by the F.O.P., I decided to really look at it. Turns out, its basically useless. MOST of the telemarketing calls I receive are:

1. Surveys.
2. Charities.
3. Long Distance Services.
4. Credit Services.

All of these things are exempt. Thank you government, for yet again appearing to do something without doing anything at all.

National Do Not Call Registry: Not all its cracked up to be

This link is basically slashdotted right now... I don't think these people really understand exactly how much people do not like telemarketing... Anyway, hopefully it will clear up in a few hours and we can get registered...

National Do Not Call List Online

] Ex-Iraqi information minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf
] re-emerged on Arab television screens claiming the U.S.
] released him after questioning.

He lives!

CNN.com - 'Comical Ali' re-emerges on TV - Jun. 26, 2003

] In the age of the leak and the blog, of evidence
] extraction and link discovery, truths will either out or
] be outed, later if not sooner. This is something I would
] bring to the attention of every diplomat, politician and
] corporate leader: the future, eventually, will find you
] out. The future, wielding unimaginable tools of
] transparency, will have its way with you. In the end, you
] will be seen to have done that which you did.

A matter of fact observation about the future of privacy and the public mind made in the context of Orwell's birthday.

I used to beleive that by being able to communicate better we would understand more, and by understanding more, we would find peace with eachother.

But I increasingly find myself confronted with the fact that no matter how much cold, hard data you exchange people still see exactly what they want to see and people almost never change their minds about things that they care about. People have to learn to separate their sense of self worth from the accuracy of their beleifs, their cultural mythologies, etc... Technology is not going to solve that problem.

NY Times | The Road to Oceania

] Many of the more than 3,600 death row inmates nationwide,
] as well as defendants and offenders at other points in
] the capital punishment system, have not received the
] quality of legal representation that the severity and the
] finality of a death sentence demand.

Old news, but interesting... The ABA wants a moratorium on the death penalty, essentially because convictions in our legal system are more often a function of wealth rather then guilt.

American Bar Association on the Death Penalty

] Some top artists continue to resist authorizing the
] dismantling of their albums for Internet consumption as a
] la carte singles.

BILLBOARD: Artists opposed to online music stores