I took the site offline yesterday in solidarity with the Electronic Frontiers Foundation and other organizations to protest impending US congressional action on “copyright protection” bills.
As a published author I’m happy to have the government enforce copyright laws so that I get paid for my work. But the current proposals are heavy-handed attempts by the entertainment industry to stack the deck in their favor. I’m tired of this. I want copyright protections to make sense both socially and technologically. I want due process when someone’s web site is threatened with closure.
We were out about town the night before elections and found this:
The location is both a church and a designated polling place for the next-day election.
A row of parked cars indicated a meeting in progress. When we wandered past later, the meeting had broken up. Cooler and wiser heads must have prevailed, since the sign had disappeared.
Continue reading 'Election Eve Schenanigans'»
About ten years ago I discovered that I couldn’t use more than one HP product on my computer at a time. I had an HP printer and I’d bought an HP scanner. But the driver software couldn’t co-exist on the same computer. At least, HP declared they couldn’t, and they didn’t care.
They still don’t care about customers, except as a revenue stream. This is again clearly highlighted by their plan to send spam to newer HP printers (Computerworld). They’ve outfitted the new printers with Internet connections, presumably to provide automatic support and updates. They’re also planning to use the link to automatically print advertisements on these printers.
As noted in Slashdot, they send the ads, collect the income, and we pay for the paper and ink.
Continue reading 'Yet another reason to shun HP products'»
There’s an article in Atlantic about the decline in the news industry and the rise of Google, news and all. The article, like most Big Media coverage of the topic, focus on the risk to Big Media news operations, like offices in Kabul or investigative pieces on government waste and coverups.
When I look at Google News, what I most often see are 1,200 copies of locally-published articles that are in fact Associated Press stories. These are classic “straight news” reports: announcements by officials describing crimes, legislation, accidents, celebrity activities, and so on. It is in fact rare for Google News, or any other news source, to produce the sort of in-depth reporting that might vie for a Pulitzer.
Yes, the traditional funding sources of such things are drying up. Yes, they play an essential role in self-government. But somehow we’ll find a way to pay for these things. Maybe Google will trip over a new business model as they blunder about, or maybe someone else will.
Continue reading 'Saving the News'»
Slashdot pointed me at a fascinating article on the deforestation of the planet: Peak Wood: Nature Does Impose Limits | Miller-McCune Online.
I hadn’t appreciated the role of forests in causing relocation of native American settlements on the US east coast. Or the role of wood fires in making traditional Christian teachings of Hell sound like nonsense (where would they get enough trees to keep everyone in Hell burning forever?).
My daughter in law, with her recent graduate degree in environmental policy, may already be aware of this sad story. The rest of us should read it, too.
Continue reading 'The Peak of Woods: a Foretaste of the Oil Peak?'»
Fox News quoted its darling, Sarah Palin, who claims that Rand Paul is getting the same treatment she did. That’s nonsense. Rand Paul is being criticized for honestly voicing the logical implications of libertarian beliefs. Sarah Palin was criticized for her lack of any accomplishment beyond a mean sort of glibness.
At least Paul understands what he believes, whether the rest of us agree with him or not.
Joan Walsh of Salon made an apt observation today, when commenting on Rush Limbaugh, who is currently hospitalized. She thinks it’s impolitic to hit Rush on this, even though he’s never shied away from hitting others when (literally) down:
“There’s no liberal Rush Limbaugh, because most liberals don’t have a taste for cruelty as entertainment or political sport.”
I think she’s right, though such high-mindedness does pose a challenge for progressive and/or liberal people. I think that good causes can be promoted with humor and the sharp side of the tongue. Florida Rep. Alan Grayson gave a great example when he argued that opposition to health care reform was “pro death.”
I hope that some day soon our own humorist-turned-Senator Al Franken can find his voice.
Continue reading 'Fighting the Good Fight'»
My secret vice is that I read adolescent fiction on my smart phone. This awful habit started years ago. I have the collected works of Louisa May Alcott and Lucy Maud Montgomery and I pore over them when stuck in line or waiting for food at a cafe.
Now I find that Bear is likewise reading reading Eight Cousins on her smart phone.
This is particularly interesting because the womens’ roles in Alcott’s fiction tend to be super-traditional, while Bear’s politics are “progressive” to put it mildly. I generally agree with both Bear’s attitude on womens’ rights and her attitude towards Alcott: who cares if her female characters are so traditional!
I think we both appreciate Alcott’s underlying themes: the pursuit of moral ideals over superficial values (despite the difference in moral values) and the fundamental rights of women to self-determination (despite the different view of womens’ roles). Alcott portrays “strong minded” women as positive role models despite the negative reactions of conventionally attractive male characters.
Continue reading 'Reading Alcott'»
The Obama administration has taken a whole series of steps towards a sane defense policy. This is diametrically opposed to a foolish and expensive policy that believes any defense action or spending is good, especially if it looks aggressive.
So now we’ve eliminated a few hundred billion of spending on missile defense shields that don’t work. There’s a reason we called ballistic missile defense “Star Wars” back in the 1980s: it’s never been more than science fiction. At least Newsweek is getting it right – it may look good on a TV news graphic, but that’s not the same as working in the Real World.
Continue reading 'What? A Sane Defense Policy?'»
During the recount of Minnesota’s US Senate race, both campaign committees contacted our daughter about her absentee ballot. It turns out that her ballot had been rejected because “the signatures didn’t match.”
This is one of those arbitrary ballot challenges that can probably apply to anyone. It makes me wonder if absentee ballots are a wasted effort for activist college students. A knowledgeable campaign worker may know of her political leanings and disputed the signatures on that basis.
How do we prevent such things from happening? Is this an authentication problem? How arbitrary are the challenges made against absentee ballots?
Continue reading 'Making Absentee Ballots Work'»
Comments (0) 
Themocracy