] -- from his ultraliberal politics ("I think that America
] collectively as a nation has its priorities so screwed
] up," he says adamantly

[ He may be ultraliberal, but how does that quote indicate such? Stupid reporters.

What little there is about the record in this article indicates that *gasp* he's not easy to pigeonhole.

For a short but legitimate review, check out pitchfork [http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/record-reviews/m/moby/hotel.shtml]. They panned it with a 2.4 / 10, which is pretty low even for them :

"Mellencamp isn't a bad point of reference, come to think of it. Hotel strikes the same mood of one-way-street sloganeering, although it's aimed at a sort of coastal blue-state weekend mysticism rather than a Midwest red, farm, etc. And strangely, the author of Buddhism for Dummies anthem 'We Are All Made of Stars' now apparently thinks we are all on about a first-grade level of comprehension. Songs tip off impending choruses like a bad poker player leaning back in his chair when he's got a big hand. Imagery is simple, familiar, and recycled-- rain is used twice, first on 'Raining Again' and reprised on 'Love Should'. And Moby spends a lot of time repeating trite phrases, such as "look at us, we're beautiful." (Twenty-two times in, duh, 'Beautiful'-- counting is less painful than listening.)"

Ouch. -k]

CNN.com - Moby pushes his art into new realm - Mar 29, 2005

] Known as a rectangular projection, this map is one way of
] looking at the spherical Earth as a flat map. Both the
] size of continents and their shape get distorted as you
] move away from the equator. Compare this with a Mercator
] projection, which greatly distorts sizes in favor of
] keeping the shapes correct, or a Peters projection which
] distorts shapes but gives a true indication of relative
] size.
]
] Also available is a semi-realistic view of dawn and dusk
] from far above the Earth, a look at the moon, and
] information about how this works.

On the same vein as the "world at night" photos, here are some cool maps the whole earth's surface.

[ Neat... and check out the different projections too... -k]

World Sunlight Map

"I would welcome voluntary actions by the industry to address both indecency and gratuitous violence, but they aren't stepping up to the plate, and that's why Congress cannot wait any longer to protect our communities and our families," Mr. Rockefeller said when he introduced the measure. "If the industry won't protect our children from gratuitous violence and indecency, then we must act."

[ Hey Rockefeller, how 'bout a "Be A Competent Fucking Parent Act". Protect our children by censoring as much as possible? I guess naive and uneducated is the way to build a strong future for America. -k]

Under New Chief, FCC Considers Widening Its Reach

] Paul Hester, former drummer for Split Enz and co-founder
] of Crowded House, is dead after hanging himself in a park
] in Melbourne, Australia. He was 46.

[ Balls. -k]

Crowded House drummer Paul Hester commits suicide - Reality TV World - News, information, episode summaries, message boards, chat and games for unscripted television programs

] Sony said Monday that a court has upheld an earlier
] ruling by a California jury and ordered the company to
] halt sales of its PlayStation videogame console.
]
]
] The intellectual property lawsuit brought by Immersion
] Corp. covers technology used to make a controller to
] vibrate during game play, which Immersion claims Sony
] copied without permission.

[ wow. -k]

BetaNews | Sony Ordered to Stop PlayStation Sales

] Badly-executed logo for a pediatric center in Virginia.

[Yowza! The designer was either a jerk, or so mentally chaste that they never noticed the connotation. Fucking dolts. -k]

Boing Boing: Pediatric center's bad logo

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TOM!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DECIUS

] zipdecode
]
]
] This project began a very short sketch (a few hours) that
] I created because I was curious about how the numbering
] works for zip codes in the states.
]
]
] This version adds several features over the original,
] including zoom, some new colors (thanks to Eugene Kuo for
] suggestions), and a better zip code database (because of
] all the people who emailed and were sad that they
] couldn't find themselves).
]

k-rad

[ I'm not sure it has a use, but it's damn cool with the zooming and the realtime... the one feature I'd add is the ability to click the dots and see where that is, or else toggle on and off place names at the highest zoom level... -k]

zipdecode | ben fry

] (Researcher Daniel Riskin) placed each bat inside a cage
] about the size of an elongated shoe box with a customized
] treadmill as the floor. At first, the bats strolled
] along. When Riskin sped up the treadmill to more than 0.5
] meter per second, he was startled to find that bats
] started bounding, pushing off with their powerful
] forearms. The maximum speed clocked was 1.2 m/s.

[ They look like really weird frogs... -k]

Boing Boing: Running vampire bat

] President George W. Bush, in fact, signed a law as
] Governor George W. Bush, the Texas Futile Care Act, which
] contradicts the one he rushed back to Washington from
] vacation to sign. That law allows a hospital to decide
] when to pull the plug. Just last week, against the wishes
] of his mother, a 5-month-old baby with a fatal genetic
] disorder was disconnected from life support and died in
] Houston.

I can understand the Schiavo case. There are two sides, both intimately involved, both family and they are at odds. The courts chose to side with the husband and let her die. The Texas Futile Care Act however really does amount to not just state sponsored euthanasia, it is state MANDATED euthanasia. This I don't understand at all. Hospitals are allowed to terminate patients over the objections of ALL the related parties??? Want to see something god is really going to be pissed about? And why aren't all these nutjobs down protesting every one of these cases in Texas?

Bush vs Bush or Spy vs Spy