] The "billboard in your home" metaphor you used is totally
] inappropriate. There are no flashing colors, no obtrusive
] interruptions. If you'd seen the system, there's no way
] you could have made a statement like that.

A better "billboard in your home" metaphor is advertising on television, and junk mail. The concerns about Gmail are not addressed correctly here on either front.

[ I think this whole issue is being blown way out of reasonable proportion. I've got zero problem with gmail as originally envisioned. That being said, I wasn't gonna use it for anything particularly important either, so having it give targeted ads on the random chatter from my grandparents isn't really a concern. I think the concept they're pushing is very intriguing and I'd like to see it in action... on my own test set.

I'm certainly not one to dismiss privacy issues, but I pretty much assumed right off that they were gonna be needing to digest my messages in order to do the things they said. I'd never in a million years do this with mail i want to keep private. I don't have any critically private shit go to my hotmail account either.

Speaking of which, aren't the blinking, flashing, "DATE THIS HOT CHICK, YOU PATHETIC LOSER" ads on hotmail about a thousand times worse than the unobtrusive ads i saw on the gmail screens? -k]

Powazek: Just a Thought: Dear Senator

] The Alternative Minimum Tax is becoming a miserable
] annual tradition for a growing group of prosperous
] taxpayers.

[ The title of the article is pretty sensational, and the conclusion it makes, that inaction on AMT is politcally motivated, is questionable, so I'll happily dismiss those points.

That being said, the actual information about the AMT and it's questionable, and increasing, application to the middle class is pretty interesting... I want to know more. I'm certainly not affected (I don't have shit to write off), but may be someday.

I wonder if anyone here on Memestreams has had experience w/ the AMT or has some knowledge to drop on us? -k]

Bush's Secret Tax on Democrats - How the Alternative Minimum Tax has become a Republican weapon. By Daniel Gross

] I sniped at the NYT's Adam Nagourney last night, but this
] very day he achieves a significant breakthrough,
] pioneering a solution to a problem that has plagued
] American journalism for decades. The dilemma is this:
] What do you do when you have a strong opinion about your
] subject? You can't just say what you think--not within
] the strictures of "objective" reporting, anyway.
]
]
] The traditional response to find someone--an "expert"--to
] spout what you think back to you. Then you can quote this
] expert, citing their expert credentials (while ignoring
] other experts you disagree with).

[ This struck me today, particularly in the context of everyone's new obsession with poliblogs. I think I've said before that one of the main draws that blogs have is that they are subjective -- completely, unabashedly, and by design.

The people who run them and post on them have obvious agendas and far from undermining their utility, it makes it easier to sort through the nonsense. It undermines the notion of absolute "expertise" which, as the above indicates, can be, and is, manipulated by the reporters of "trusted" news sources.

An article on Memestreams a few months back talked about how the lack of implicit credibility or authority on the web will increasingly force people to view almost everything through a lens of skepticism, forcing them to look for corroboration or refutation, on their own.

I could probably say a fair bit about the self-reinforcing that goes on throughout the blogs... there are lots of circular references and cross-citations among blogs of similar bent. But the balance still favors them in my opinion. All in all, I think people will continue to move towards news sources which don't publicly deny their opinions under a pre-supposed veil of objectivity while conveying their very real, and quite legitimate, attitudes through indirect means. If you can't be objective, then just be honest. -k]

Don't Editorialize. Clymerize! - Nagourney's breakthrough. By Mickey Kaus

] She cites another example. In September 2002, The Onion
] ran a piece called, "Al-Qaida Allegedly Engaging in
] Telemarketing." The piece told of the terrorist
] organization's nefarious plan to raise funds through
] various phone scams. It also showed screenshots of a
] videotape the CIA had uncovered in which al-Qaida's
] second in command, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, is seen with a
] headset, presumably tricking an unsuspecting victim.
]
] Thus, upon seeing the story, the Branch County sheriff's
] department in Coldwater, Michigan, which had been
] investigating telemarketing scams targeting the elderly,
] issued an urgent press release.
]
] "In the course of this investigation, it was learned that
] this is going on throughout the United States, and some
] of these telemarketing programs are believed to be
] operated by al-Qaida," the release stated. "The CIA has
] announced that they acquired a videotape showing al-Qaida
] members making phone solicitations for vacation home
] rentals, long-distance telephone service, magazine
] subscriptions and other products."

[ Wow, man. I mean, journalism? Hello? -k]

Wired News: Onion Taken Seriously, Film at 11

] To Bush, credibility means that you keep saying today
] what you said yesterday, and that you do today what you
] promised yesterday. "A free Iraq will confirm to a
] watching world that America's word, once given, can be
] relied upon," he argued Tuesday night. When the situation
] is clear and requires pure courage, this steadfastness is
] Bush's most useful trait. But when the situation is
] unclear, Bush's notion of credibility turns out to be
] dangerously unhinged. The only words and deeds that have
] to match are his. No correspondence to reality is
] required. Bush can say today what he said yesterday, and
] do today what he promised yesterday, even if nothing he
] believes about the rest of the world is true.

Fantastic commentary on the seperation of Pres. Bush from reality as noted in his *incredible* press conference yesterday. And yes, I am using incredible by its other meaning-- not credible.

[ interesting... -k]

Trust, Don't Verify - Bush's incredible definition of credibility. By William Saletan

] First off, Kushner has erected a straw man. No one is
] claiming that the White House should have "foreseen what
] would happen" on September 11. But many do argue that,
] having received the August 6 memo, the administration
] should have reacted more aggressively. Kushner doesn't
] have to agree, but he can't dismiss that argument out of
] hand.

[ This is basically my feeling too. No one with any sense thinks that the PDB is damning evidence that the administration absolutely could have prevented 9/11. What it is, though, is another sign that the attention being given to terrorism and homeland security was not as high a priority as the administration has been claiming. And it also tends to undermine the statement that they lacked evidence that Al Qaeda was planning an attack within the US.

Probably the attacks were still not preventable in that time frame. Probably the FBI / CIA / etc. did and do have systemic problems and suffer from lack of communication, but I'd feel a lot better if it seemed like the administration had acknowledged the threats, the internal problems, and been working to resolve them. At this point, I basically don't see that this was the case. -k]

CJR Campaign Desk: Archives

] With government funding and access to a large swath of
] radio spectrum, four RFID developers are starting work on
] a new generation of RFID products aimed at bringing
] greater safety and new wireless applications to U.S.
] roads.

[ Domino motherfuckers! I've been predicting this one for a while now... lots of potential, both good and ill, with this kinda tech. We're truly not too far from car-to-car comms, automated crash avoidance, network blackbox reporting, emergency services overrides/lockdowns, etc. Gonna be very interesting to watch how this evolves. -k]

RFID Journal - Automotive RFID Gets Rolling

] The findings, he said, also suggest that this difference
] does not lie in the overdevelopment of a specific
] mathematical region of the brain. Rather, it seems
] related to an ability to use more of the resources the
] brain has available.

[ Huh. Sure wish there was more to the article... but it's an interesting result. -k]

Vital Signs: Mental Abilities: Peering Into a Math Whiz's Brain

] Victoria's Secret is dropping its nationally televised
] fashion show this year, at least partly because of
] criticism following Janet Jackson's breast-baring faux
] pas at the Super Bowl.

Terrible business decision.

[ Agreed. Also lame. God forbid we should see some lingere on TV. Our kids will be corrupted forever. Really, titties are dirty and foul. Dirty, filthy titty, as David Cross might say. -k]

Victoria's Secret to drop TV fashion show

I think Virgil showed this to me a while back, and I ran across it today. A nifty way to explore physics

[ Very cool... makes some of the connections more clear and at least offers a fairly complete introduction to physics. Though, I agree with Neoteric that it would be nice to see a few problem sets. The math doesn't always make sense until applied.

In my case, it almost never made sense until applied, and a decent portion of it was still a mystery after that. Physics is hard... let's go shopping.

Still and all this is good and more of this kind of thing will only enrich the web, and those who use it. -k]

Hyper Physics