"Michael Moore has known for a year that we will not distribute this movie, so this is not news." Yes, that is what I thought, too, except Disney kept sending us all that money to make the movie. Miramax said there was no problem. I got the idea that everything was fine.

"It is not in the best interests of our company to distribute a partisan political film that may offend some of our customers." Hmmm. Disney doesn't distribute work that has partisan politics? Disney distributes and syndicates the Sean Hannity radio show every day? I get to listen to Rush Limbaugh every day on Disney-owned WABC. I also seem to remember that Disney distributed a very partisan political movie during a Congressional election year, 1998—a film called The Big One… by, um… ME!

"Surprisingly, not only did we observe rescue of flower abortion but the kernels produced from pairs of flowers fused into a single normal-sized kernel that contained two embryos and a smaller endosperm," said Gallie. "Because it is the embryo that contains the majority of protein and oil, the presence of two embryos doubles their content in corn grain. The reduction in the size of the endosperm in the kernel, the tissue that contains most of the carbohydrate, means that the nutritional value of the grain has been improved considerably."

"I first knew that they were taking pictures when I saw that one of the computers had a picture of some prisoners as its desktop background. One of the prisoners had a black hood over his head and he was covered in cold water. I personally witnessed this event take place. The man was screaming, "I'm innocent!" until he got sick and his body got swollen from all the punishment," al Baz said. Cold water, solitary confinement, swollen bodies and constant psychological abuse are recurring images for the Al-Jazeera cameraman, who also credits his tormentors with ingenuity. "They had all different kinds of punishments and they changed them all the time. I begged them to interrogate me again so they would know that I was innocent, but they said no, that's it. All we know is that you're staying here."

Building your own station is also illegal. Dunifer advises his students to enlist the help of an attorney before hopping the airwaves. But he describes microbroadcasting as "electronic civil disobedience" rather than a typical criminal act.

"As far as I'm concerned, the real pirates are the NAB (National Association of Broadcasters) and their member stations," Dunifer said, referring to the powerful lobbying group. "They've stolen the airwaves with the full complicity of the FCC and Congress."

Someone calls technical support; wacky hijinx ensue.

1. Someone calls technical support for a magical item.
2. Someone calls technical support for a piece of advanced technology.
3. The title of the story is 1-800-SOMETHING-CUTE.

"Our current guidance assumes a continuation of the low-carb phenomenon that is affecting the industry," Livengood said. "Needless to say, we are disappointed that external forces have caused us to revise our first quarter and fiscal 2005 earnings guidance."

He has figured out that a lot of his patients (and their partners) spend a heck of a lot of time waiting around in his lobby. While pop-cult magazines and baby toys are still popular for minding the time, he realized there's an unlimited resource of entertainment he can make available with a simply $30 WiFI AP -- The Internet. Now I can work/surf/play online all I want while I wait for Tara to finish her appointment. There's even an abundance of power outlets near the seating area.

Anyway, I know I'm being nerdy, but I still think its pretty cool. If I decide at some point to consider switching doctors, I'll definitely inquire about wireless access in the waiting room.

Wearing sagging or baggy pants that expose your underwear or buttocks would make you a criminal under a bill approved by a House panel Thursday. "I don't relish the idea of seeing the beginning of people's pubic hair," Westwego City Councilman Glenn Green told the House Criminal Justice Committee on Thursday. "I don't relish seeing the beginning of the crease of people's buttocks. And I don't enjoy watching young men letting their sexual organs show through their red or black silk underwear," Green said.

AVN reports that "gigastar" (we love that term) Jenna Jameson is using her considerable talents and energy to fight an ongoing lawsuit against the adult industry by Acacia Research, who claims that porn sites which utilize streaming media technology are guilty of patent infringement. Quoth Ms. Jameson: "Acacia is making a blatant attempt to target the adult industry in its effort to extract unwarranted fees for alleged infringement of its patents ... If Acacia succeeds in intimidating adult site owners, they will move to mainstream sites and begin charging fees that will have to be passed on to everyone who uses the Internet." You can read more details on the case at the Internet Media Protective Association website; we really just wanted an excuse to post some pictures of Jenna we've had lying around in our bookmarks for a while.

I am a loyal Tivo user and Tivo did send out a message alert to users about the Friends episode. It was more along the lines of "if you manually extend the time of a recording, you may miss the beginning of the friends final episode." I find that Tivo is pretty good about catching unusual start times and other wonky tricks the networks play. The previous comment about HUT and ratings was right on the money...

Tech maven Meg Hourihan adds, "Even weirder is that I got a message on my Tivo warning me that the finale of Friends would have abnormal times. The message warned that if I wasn't just using the automatic "start on time" and "end on time" settings (i.e. I manually set the start time as 8 PM) that I might miss some. What makes things weirder and worse is that Tivo still didn't record the whole show! I made sure my settings were what the message instructed, and happened to watch the show live. Tivo kicked in to record at 8:59 PM (which is what it listed the start time as) but stopped at 9:59! According to the time on my digital cable box, the program didn't end until 10:03 PM. So if I hadn't watched it live, I would have missed the last four minutes. Seems like a major screw-up on Tivo's part, especially after sending out that message!"

Mindjack's Donald Melanson wonders, "This is just a thought, but since NBC was selling 30 second ad spots during the Friends finale for $2M (the same as the Superbowl) is it not possible that they were just trying to squeeze in a few more by starting the show a minute early and ending it a few minutes late? An extra four minutes of advertising would be an extra $16M for NBC."

BoingBoing reader Ran Li says, "I'd like to point out that this new NBC strategy is reminiscent of how Japan ended up with its crazy TV schedules. This is from the Japan SAQ:

Q. Have you ever noticed that Japanese TV shows start at odd times? One show starts at 6:58, another at 7:00, and another at 7:05. Why is that?
A. Until several years ago, most Japanese TV shows did start exactly on the hour, but because of the TV ratings war, some stations decided to get the jump on their competitors and start their programs a little earlier. The networks realised that because most programs ended a little before the hour, people would often start channel surfing, but they would be more likely to start watching a station that wasn't airing commercials at that time. Similarly, if a program runs until a little past the hour, viewers are more likely to watch the next program because they have missed the beginning of programs that have already started on other stations. Now that every station (except NHK) does it, there is nothing to be gained from starting programs earlier or later, and the stations have become trapped in a vicious circle where starting times are getting earlier and earlier.

BoingBoing reader Duane says, "This isn't really new...NBC has been doing it for weeks now, and Tivo sends out a message every time. The real killer is not wonking with the times -- it's simply providing bad times. Just because NBC puts into the guide that Friends would end at 9:59, that doesn't mean they can't run over to 10:01, which I believe it did last night. So even though I had 'manually record nbc from 8-10' I still almost missed the actual last scene. Had something else been in my todolist for 10, something on a different channel, I would not be writing you today because my wife would have killed me."

Matt Goyer says, "Don't worry -- if you missed the last 5 minutes of Friends, on May 11th you can buy the DVD from Amazon. Is setting the time a little later a way to get all those Tivo/DVR users to buy the DVD?"

For the record, my eligible works for this ballot are:

Best Novel: Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, Tor, January 2003

Best Short-Form Work: Nimby and the Dimension Hoppers, Asimov's, June 2003

Flowers From Alice, New Faces in Science Fiction (Mike Resnick, ed.), December, 2003
Printed Meat and Nattering Packages, Business 2.0, May 2003
Road Calls Me Dear, The Mammoth Book of Road Stories, January 2003

Nominations are due July 17th (my birthday!). Link

Pressing the L button for the 5th time (you'll hear 5 beeps) will put the Roomba in "bulldozer" mode, in other words it'll just roll forward no matter what, the sensors and bumpers and picking it up will not stop it. Be careful, don't let the Roomba damage you or itself.

pizza_party [-o|--onions] [-g|--green-peppers] [-m|--mushrooms] [-v|--olives] [-t|--tomatoes] [-h|--pineapple] [-x|--extra-cheese] [-d|--cheddar-cheese] [-p|--pepperoni] [-s|--sausage] [-w|--ham] [-b|--bacon] [-e|--ground-beef] [-c|--grilled-chicken] [-z|--anchovies] [-u|--extra-sauce] [-U|--user= username] [-P|--password= pasword] [-I|--input-file= input-file] [-V|--verbose] [-Q|--quiet] [-F|--force] [QUANTITY] [SIZE] [CRUST]

* Can order pizza with only a few keystrokes.
* Can save pizza preferences.
* Can use batch files for ordering many pizzas.
* Has easy to use flags for ordering different toppings.
* Runs on most UNIX-like operating systems.
* Supports most currently popular topings like "mushrooms", and "pepperoni"!
* Unattended / background operation.
* Pizza Party is distributed under the GNU General Public License.

[W]e go to a fancy, roped-off office on the first floor. There's a large desk, a book shelf, and a lot of pictures of boats on the wall.

"And this is L. Ron Hubbard's office."

"The actual office used by L. Ron Hubbard?" This is like being in Jesus' room.

"No. Each Scientology center has an office for L. Ron Hubbard, decorated in a way he would like it."

"Oh, so the office was used when he was visiting, ya?"

"No. He died before this hotel was refurbished."

Someone should mention to this lady that dead guys don't need offices. Especially an office built for a dead guy after the dead guy is dead.

David Maloney, a trucker from Aledo, Texas, is one who'll go the distance to reach a truck stop equipped with wireless Internet access.

"The only time I really get to use any kind of broadband is out here on the road," said Maloney, who recently stopped at a Flying J with Wi-Fi on his way from Virginia to Appleton, Wis. "That's the whole reason I came this far last night."

If you scroll through the press release, you come to a section which says that the gateway supports a CableHome 1.0 "for the ability to deliver secure, managed services from Comcast’s head-end network to the subscribers’ home network." Now there is a big problem with this thing - for instance, the Cablehome 1.0 standard allows cable operators to snoop around their home networks and learn things such as how many computers are attached to the gateway and what kind of traffic they are generating/receiving. (Beware Vonage fans, this could be used to detect your Vonage ATA as well.)

In case you were wondering, where’s the juice. Go to the Cable Labs website and read this document. Scroll down to Section 6.3.1 and read:

The goals for the CableHome Management Portal include:
* Enable viewing of LAN IP Device information obtained via the CableHome DHCP Portal (CDP)
* Enable viewing of the results of LAN IP Device performance monitoring done by the CableHome Test Portal (CTP)
* Provide the capability to disable LAN segments

cynartomachy -- bear-baiting using dogs

gigantomachy -- war of giants against the gods

pneumatomachy -- denial of the divinity of the Holy Ghost

NBC has scheduled the final broadcast of Friends to start tonight at 8.59 p.m. Why? To beat TiVo recording, obviously. I'm not sure if they don't want us to watch the penultimate episode of Survivor: All-Stars (confession: I'm addicted). But it's clear that starting it a minute early is intended to disrupt digital recording of shows that run 8:00 to 9:00 p.m. The fix is simple. On my ReplayTV, I just set a manual record from 9:00 to 10:00 for NBC (or I could set an 8:00 to 8:59 Survivors recording). But it's clear that this is a direct DVR pushback. But how does this help the network? I link to a post about Fear Factor in which the thread explores on a discussion board why Fear Factor was getting chopped or not recording.

UPDATE: BoingBoing reader Andrew Stern says,

"As a broadcasting student at SFSU, I suggest an alternate explanation for NBC starting Friends at 8:59PM." Starting the BIG (for NBC) Friends finale one minute early is more about ratings and shares/HUT's (households utilizing TVs) than screwing w/ TiVo users. NBC wants to ensure a very high Nielsen rating and this will be reflected in logbooks and PPM's if the show starts earlier. Just an opinion."

Update 2: The Tivo-b0rking just doesn't stop! More readers wrote in to complain about the oddly pegged end-time. Joe says, "Regarding the timing of the Friends finale -- even sneakier than the fact that it started at 8:59 was that (according to my atomic-synchronized watch) it ran until 10:03 or so. So people who Tivo'ed something other than ER at 10:00 missed the last few minutes of Friends."

Gene concurs, and adds, "Strange behavior, considering that NBC seems to partner with TiVo -- they broadcast the code at enables automatic recording of their shows, and they promote their programming on TiVo's showcase function."

Now, BoingBoing pal Jean-Luc sends us this "response logo" (shown at left) from a group of online freedom of speech advocates in France. The tagline? "Culture has no price / Don't buy any CDs." Weblogs throughout France are displaying the logo as a gesture of solidarity against the SNEP (Syndicat National de l'Edition Phonographique) anti-P2P campaign. "You sell us mediocre music at exorbitant prices," the banner exclaims in French, "Reduce the price of CDs, and start placing a higher priority on the quality of artists instead of the quantity of money you're cramming in your pockets." Sacre blog!
Link

There's a great online discussion salon going on concurrently, too, with Professor Shyam Sunder of the School of Management at Yale University, Chris Hoofnagle, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, Lee Tien, senior staff attorney at the EFF, and Dr. Daniel Engels of the MIT Auto-ID Labs.

Dubbed by one skeptical journalist as "Big Brother in small packages," RFID chips are tiny transponders that can be attached to almost any consumer good. While companies are set to use these radio frequency identification tags to track their merchandise from assembly line to warehouse to store shelf, privacy watchdogs suggest these same RFID tags could be used to keep tabs on consumers -- beyond the confines of a store or supermarket.

To use the service, you must download a browser toolbar. Then, when visiting an interesting site, you click on "Dude It" to automatically post a link to an existing blog or to a MyBlog page at the site. (You can also highlight pictures or text to go along with the link.) Comments can be added to the link, and you can also send the entire posting to friends by e-mail. In a way, the service has created the simplest blogging tool imaginable.

Thom Watson, a technology manager in Washington, is an experienced blogger who longed for a better way to keep track of notable sites. "I keep my blog mostly for personal thoughts," he said. "I wanted a really easy way to collect links by topic and comment on them."

Mr. Watson now maintains three MyBlog pages, on general topics, modern architecture and the Toyota Prius. Better yet, the service sends him suggestions on sites of potential interest based on similarities between his postings and those on other MyBlogs. There's even a social-networking aspect that links users based on their contact lists.

Fisherman and divers of Norway: If you happen to see a ten-foot long, robotic mini-submarine swimming off of your shores, please call the U.S. Navy. The service has been trying to find its mine-sweeping drone for a week, now, after the 'bot failed to return to its mother ship, the USS Swift.

The Swift has broken off its participation in a military exercise to look for the Battlespace Preparation Autonomous Underwater Vehicle, the AP reports.

"The ship has searched everywhere from the fjord leading into the southern town Kristiansand to deep ocean water some 30 kilometres out, where the waters can be as much as 580 metres deep," the wire service says. "Because the sub could surface just about anywhere along Norway's coast, [Norwegian military spokesman Cmdr. Thom] Knustad appealed on national radio for Norwegians to be on the lookout for the torpedo-shaped, yellowish-orange device with a propeller on one end. "

For many units serving in Iraq, digital cameras are pervasive and yet another example of how technology has transformed the way troops communicate with relatives back home. From Basra to Baghdad, they e-mail pictures home. Some soldiers, including those in the 372nd, even packed video cameras along with their rifles and Kevlar helmets.

Bill Lawson, whose nephew, Staff Sgt. Ivan L. "Chip" Frederick, is one of the soldiers charged in the incident, said that Frederick sent home pictures from Iraq on a few occasions. They were "just ordinary photos, like a tourist would take" and nothing showing prisoner abuse, he said.

"I would say that's something that's very common that's going on in Iraq because it's so convenient and easy to do," Lawson said of troops sending pictures home. He added that his nephew also mailed videocassettes "of him talking into a camcorder to [his wife] when he was going on his rounds."

But in the case of prisoner abuse, the ubiquity of digital cameras has created a far more combustible international scandal that would have been sparked only by the release of Taguba's searing written report. Since the "60 Minutes II" broadcast, pictures of abuse have been posted on the Internet and shown on television stations worldwide.

Assists the interrogation support program team lead to increase the effectiveness of dealing with Detainees, Persons of Interest, and Prisoners of War (POWs) that are in the custody of US/Coalition Forces in the CJTF 7 AOR, in terms of screening, interrogation, and debriefing of persons of intelligence value. Under minimal supervision, will assist the team lead in managing a multifaceted interrogation support cell consisting of database entry/intelligence research clerks, screeners, tactical/strategic interrogators, and intelligence analyst.

"To the country boys here, if you're a different nationality, a different race, you're sub-human. That's the way girls like Lynndie are raised.

"Tormenting Iraqis, in her mind, would be no different from shooting a turkey. Every season here you're hunting something. Over there, they're hunting Iraqis."

"(Isidro) Mejia, 39, was atop an unfinished home when he fell from the roof onto a co-worker who was using the nail gun, Los Angeles County sheriff's Deputy Mark Newlands said. The two men tried to grab each other to keep from falling, but both tumbled to the ground. At some point, the nail gun discharged and drove the nails into Mejia's head. 'They're extremely powerful," Newlands said. "They've got to drive through three-quarter-inch plywood.'"

"Sun City Girls traffic with bizarre miscegenations, self-indulgent trash, and hardcore mystic exotica. Their sometimes garish album covers attack the eye with devils, yonis, sacred transvestites, and nubile native jailbait. Lyrics, song and album titles -- 'Naga Smoke Signals,' 'The Genghis Necro-Nama-Khan,' 330,003 Crossdressers from Beyond the Rig Veda -- can sound like the spontaneous verse of young poetes maudites tanked up on National Geographic cheesecake and A Pictorial History of Magic and the Supernatural. This lurid romance with the Other fuels some of their most incandescent sounds as well, a music of transport that explores Middle Eastern, Southeast Asian, and South American atmospheres with a passion composed equally of informed pleasure and the heedless appropriation of the strange. Looking high and low, far and wide, the Sun City Girls have sought the wellsprings of the weird, of what H.P. Lovecraft called outsideness, and when they have found them, they have taken what they wanted."

"Back in the '70s, John Trubee (weirdo prankster) saw one of those ads that offers to assess your poetic talent and set your poems to music. So--testing limits--he wrote the most offensive thing he could think of, pushing all the buttons, and sent it off. The refrain was originally 'Stevie Wonder’s penis, is erect because he's blind.' The company wrote back and, of course, told him he had talent, and would set his song to music and press disks if he'd pay them a little. But, because they didn't want to get sued, they had to substitute 'a blind man' for Stevie. The record was pressed and it became a sort-of underground hit in LA. Funny also because Trubee's prank calls were supposed to be the inspiration for Matt Groening's use of them. They were friends!"

Working with Christopher Chabris at Harvard University, Simons came up with another demonstration that has now become a classic, based on a videotape of a handful of people playing basketball. They played the tape to subjects and asked them to count the passes made by one of the teams.

Around half failed to spot a woman dressed in a gorilla suit who walked slowly across the scene for nine seconds, even though this hairy interloper had passed between the players and stopped to face the camera and thump her chest.

However, if people were simply asked to view the tape, they noticed the gorilla easily. The effect is so striking that some of them refused to accept they were looking at the same tape and thought that it was a different version of the video, one edited to include the ape.

When I.R.C. started in the 1980's, it was best known as a way for serious computer professionals worldwide to communicate in real time. It is still possible - though sometimes a bit difficult - to find mature technical discussions among the tens of thousands of I.R.C. chat rooms, known as channels, operating at any one time. There are also respectable I.R.C. systems and channels - some operated by universities or Internet service providers - for gamers seeking opponents or those who want to talk about sports or hobbies.

Still, I.R.C. perhaps most closely resembles the cantina scene in "Star Wars'': a louche hangout of digital smugglers, pirates, curiosity seekers and the people who love them (or hunt them). There seem to be I.R.C. channels dedicated to every sexual fetish, and I.R.C. users speculate that terrorists also use the networks to communicate in relative obscurity. Yet I.R.C. has its advocates, who point to its legitimate uses.

Each second, a sensor in the heel can take up to 20,000 readings and the embedded electronic brain can make 10,000 calculations, directing a tiny electric motor to change the shoe. The goal is to make the shoe adjust to changing conditions and the runner's particular style while in use.

"What we have, basically, is the first footwear product that can change its characteristics in real time," said Mr. DiBenedetto, who led the group that created the shoe, of its ability to adapt its cushioning as the wearer runs.

The team shoots thousands of precise sequential images of the groove and then stitches the images together, measuring the shape of each undulation and calculating the route a stylus would take along the path.

"We grab the image and let the computer model what the stylus would have done if it had run through the surface," said Carl Haber, a senior scientist at the lab who led the research team in collaboration with Vitaliy Fadeyev, a postdoctoral researcher there.

You don't need a hardened computer, though breakdowns are frequent. I use an Apple iBook and took the precaution, during the invasion of Iraq, of covering the screen and keyboard in saran wrap, to keep out the sand. An item I didn't have, but dearly wished for, was night vision goggles. If you have to drive at night with the military in a warzone, as I and other non-embedded journalists did, you can't use any lights (you even have to tape over the red-light indicators on your dashboard). Driving without headlights in a desert behind a tank that doesn't have brakelights is an unpleasurable experience.

Rachel, who gives her age as "almost 23," is a recent transplant to San Francisco from Chicago. She is dressed in jeans, sneakers, a T-shirt, a zip-up hoodie and a belt decorated with pink flamingos and palm trees. She gamely tries to explain to the suits clustered around her exactly what it is that she does on the Internet.

The short answer: Um, everything.

A habitué of Craigslist, Rachel says she has used the Net to find a roommate, find her apartment in Hayes Valley, and find her part-time job. If she gets lost and doesn't have Net access, she'll call a friend who does and ask her to go to MapQuest and get directions. She pays all her bills online and reads the news on S.F. Gate and N.Y. Times.com, two sites she doesn't even bother to refer to by the names of the newspapers they represent. She's selling a car online right now.

Newitz was formerly Culture Editor at the San Francisco Bay Guardian. She has discussed the social impact of technology in Wired and Salon magazines, on CNN and NPR, as well as in her syndicated weekly column Techsploitation. As EFF's Media Coordinator/Policy Analyst, she will be handling media relations, as well as writing white papers, policy recommendations, and doing research. "I've always considered my writing to be a form of activism," she says, "so I'm pleased to join forces with an organization whose principles and dedication I've admired for many years."

Pozar is a longtime activist in the high tech community and has spent the past several years consulting as a network architect. One of the founders of Brightmail, an antispam company, he is also founder of Bay Area Research Wireless Network (BARWN) and co-founder of the Bay Area Wireless User Group (BAWUG). As Technical Director, he will manage new technical projects for EFF, as well as a team of analysts. "My goal in life is to foster the democratization of communication," he says, "and my work at EFF will help me continue the pursuit of that goal."

EFF asks the Commission to consider the question of enforcement separately from the question of functionality. The Commission should allow this proceeding, and others like it, to consider the question of the characteristics of the best possible design and operation of flexible radios without regard to enforcement questions. It should allow American technologists to build the devices that make most efficient use of spectrum and allow the greatest amount of speech over the public's airwaves.

As each new type of device and operational norm is approved, the Commission shoul dask, separately, how best to police the airwaves in light of the fact that the newly approved devices will soon proliferate. It must assume that Americans should and will acquire the best and most-capable radios possible and determine how to address the problems that may arise from this reality.

Further, the Commission should seek to backstop enforcement by hardening existing radio applications against harmful interference, spoofing and other attacks: for example,if air-traffic control signals carried cryptographically secured signatures, the risk of spoofed signals would be greatly reduced. Our government has already required that airlines install reinforced cockpit doors: reinforcing the cockpit radios is a logical next step.

*UNDERSTAND THEIR GENERATION OF THINKING. "*Everyone is doing it" or "rock stars and movie stars make too much money anyhow" or "the corporate entertainment scene is corrupt" is* *likely to be what you'll hear.* * You'll need to arm yourself with the counterarguments to these. Explain that most artists are not super wealthy and that they are leaving themselves open to doing something that is ethically wrong, could damage their computer and have legal consequences. *SET A GOOD EXAMPLE*. If you are currently using a peer-to-peer network to obtain digital music and movies, understand that your children will follow your lead. * *Let them see you buying your entertainment legally and they'll follow suit.

Enter the Born Bad CD series, from Australia. These (screamingly expensive, hard-to-find) discs consist of nothing but originals of songs that Cramps later covered, including classics like "The Crusher," "Goo-Goo Muck" and "Her Love Rubbed Off." I've put together a little Amazon list with the SKUs of the five discs in Amazon's catalogue. Link

SocialGrid has retained one of the top intellectual property law firms in America. Everything on this site is copyrighted and trademarked, including our search and coding system. Our patent application claims coverage on searches for all complex objects using Internet search engines. Our goal is to ensure a search system that will be free to our members and keep individuals and corporations from profiting by charging for searches. We will marginalize every profit margin. There is no money to made in creating another ID coding system. The world needs only one system. If necessary, we will give SocialGrid and the patent to Google to insure one standardized coding system. Any copycats and clones will have to answer to Google. Please be advised that any copyright, trademark, and patent infringement will result in legal action.

Update: The CBC page on this program has lots more info (Thanks, Simon!)

A two-year investigation by New York state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer's office found that many artists were not being paid royalties because record companies lost contact with the performers and had stopped making required payments.

Dear Queer, Gay, Bi-curious, or even Female Doctors, I would like to date you. I don't just want to date you for your sparkling personality and your good looks, but also because I am an accident-prone person with no basic health insurance. In exchange for you fixing me when I break, I will pretty much do anything: cook, clean, pet-sit...

* 9 Visitors Who Died at Disneyland
* 12 Strange Drugs, like carbogen, arsenic, and salamander brandy
* The CIA's 25 Tips for Interrogating a Prisoner
* 13 Nuclear Tests That Spread Radiation into Civilian Areas
* 63 Gay Animals
* 12 Things to do With Your Body After You're Dead
* 44 Substances That Soup up Your Brain
* 32 Famous People in Threesomes, including Lord Byron, Lenin, John Stuart Mill, Mary Shelley, and Picasso

Photo: 1974, Susan Meiselas, from the series "Carnival Strippers." Link

The new drinks contain the standard high-fructose corn syrup that sweetens regular soda but in smaller amounts. The corn syrup is supplemented with Splenda, a no-calorie, no-carbohydrate sweetener made from sugar.

The result is a soda with fewer calories than regular but more than no-cal. For instance, Pepsi says a 12-ounce can of Edge has 20 grams each of sugar and carbohydrates, and 70 calories, compared with regular's 41 grams each of sugar and carbohydrates, and 150 calories.

[P]ut the dish of marshmallows in the microwave and cook on low heat. Microwaves do not cook evenly and the marshmallows will begin to melt at the hottest spots in the microwave. (I leaned this from our Food Science teacher Anita Cornwall.) Heat the marshmallows until they begin to melt in four or five different spots. Remove the dish from the microwave and observe the melted spots. Take the ruler and measure the distance between the melted spots. You will find that one distance repeats over and over. This distance will correspond to half the wavelength of the microwave, about 6 cm. Now turn the oven around and look for a small sign that gives you the frequency of the microwave. Most commercial microwaves operate at 2450 MHz.

All you do now is multiply the frequency by the wavelength. The product is the speed of light.

Your post titled "Won't buy until they own up. Anyone else?" has been removed from Apple Discussions.

Mr. Moore's agent, Ari Emanuel, said Michael D. Eisner, Disney's chief executive, asked him last spring to pull out of the deal with Miramax. Mr. Emanuel said Mr. Eisner expressed particular concern that it would endanger tax breaks Disney receives for its theme park, hotels and other ventures in Florida, where Mr. Bush's brother, Jeb, is governor.

"Michael Eisner asked me not to sell this movie to Harvey Weinstein; that doesn't mean I listened to him," Mr. Emanuel said. "He definitely indicated there were tax incentives he was getting for the Disney corporation and that's why he didn't want me to sell it to Miramax. He didn't want a Disney company involved."

One of the scariest nightmares I've had in the past decade or so was about me being stuck in a Nethack dungeon. Everything was green on black (I'd been playing on a Facit VT100-clone) and in 7-bit ASCII. I distinctly remember being chased by a lower-case x, scared out of my wits and at the same time feeling ashamed of being such a wimp that a mere grid bug was a threat.

In addition to recording the drivers' licenses, telephone numbers, and addresses of customers who sell used games or consoles, some stores are routinely requiring thumbprints as well. Retailers are collecting the information under a law intended to regulate pawn shops and make it easy for law enforcement officials to track down thieves who fence stolen goods. A number of states have such laws, and Utah passed its own version just last month.

In California, the law has been on the books for more than a decade, but with the increased market for used games and DVDs, some retailers are taking a cautious approach and are collecting fingerprints just to make sure they don’t run afoul of local regulations.

"I don't embrace any belief systems. I'm a fuzzy believer. I might say that I 95% believe that humans will achieve a lifespan beyond the current biological limits; I 50% believe that this will work out well on a social-political level; I 95% believe that we will get really precise control over our minds and moods; I 60% believe that the future of most of humanity is pretty well fucked; I 10% believe that something very much like the singularity will actually occur; I 1% believe that it will happen in my lifetime."

This essay of mine argues that the correct way to evaluate security countermeasures is as consumers: is the security you're getting worth what you're giving up to get it.

From the essay: The invasion of Iraq, for example, is presented as an important move for national security. It may be true, but it's only half of the argument. Invading Iraq has cost the United States enormously. The monetary bill is more than $100 billion, and the cost is still rising. The cost in American lives is more than 600, and the number is still rising. The cost in world opinion is considerable. There's a question that needs to be addressed: "Was this the best way to spend all of that? As security consumers, did we get the most security we could have for that $100 billion, those lives, and those other things?"

"BitTorrent" servers and source sites, third-party copyrighted material, "warez" (including pirated software, ROMS, emulators, "phreaking", hacking, password cracking material - and links to the same), sites not in the English language, or IRC servers on our network. It is also forbidden to use our service as a "remote/off site back up" or a "filestore" solution. Accounts found hosting this material will be subject to immediate cancellation without refund. Easy Internet Solutions Ltd reserves the right to terminate accounts hosting material, which in its sole opinion, may be classed as "undesirable content" or which may pose a risk (of any sort) to either Easy Internet Solutions Ltd as a company, our network or servers or to a third party.

"A better understanding can benefit both technical leaders seeking productive directions for research and development, and policy makers aiming to make wise decisions."

The waitress interrupted, "You boys need anything?"

The old man grinned, his mouth full. He made a quick effort to swallow, but didn't hesitate to speak around the mess of potatoes that remained. "The name of the man that cooked my lunch, miss. This is heaven on a goddamn plate."

She returned a grin of her own. "His name's Merv, hon, and I'll be sure to pass that along. Now how 'bout a warm-up on your coffee?"

"I served with a commie sympathizer who went by the name of Merv. He had weak stomach, you know, loved to recite the poems he wrote about his wife. He got his head blown off in a French whorehouse."

729 : PAW, PAY, PAZ, RAW, RAY, SAW, SAX, SAY
76737 : PORES, POSER, POSES, ROPER, ROPES, ROSES, SORER, SORES
46637 : GONER, GOODS, GOOFS, HOMER, HOMES, HONER, HONES, HOODS, HOOFS, INNER
22737 : ACRES, BARDS, BARER, BARES, BASER, BASES, CAPER, CAPES, CARDS, CARES, CASES
7283 : PATE, PAVE, RATE, RAVE, SATE, SAUD, SAVE, SCUD
2273 : ACRE, BARD, BARE, BASE, CAPE, CARD, CARE, CASE

On the premise that graphic reproduction will eventually go the way of sound reproduction, i.e. it will become easy and cheap and available to all, the same is due to happen to literary copyright. It's a-coming, boys! You'd better get used to it!

...Yes, there is always going to be a living for writers. The consequence of the above is that a book, whether incarnated in ink and paper, laser disk, silicon, gallium arsenide, memory bubbles, or War and Peace encoded in DNA, will cost more than the blank on which it is inscribed, but not so much more that it would be worth your while to borrow a copy and duplicate it. Whatever deal authors and publishers make with one another will have to take cognisance of that. I expect authors will still be able to demand royalties. Whether an author will be able to become stinking rich, as a few now can, I don't know. What does it matter? It isn't necessary to the continuance of civilisation.

In the spirit of open media and participatory journalism, I'd like to use this wiki to publish drafts of each chapter in the book. I hope you'll participate in this effort by contributing feedback, edits, criticism, corrections, and additional anecdotes, either through the comments field below or by sending me email. Feel free to be as detailed as you like or to insert comments or questions. After all, you're the editor. (And remember, this is for a book manuscript, not a finished online document.) If you make a couple of helpful edits, I'll mention your name in the book's Acknowledgments (and buy you a drink next time we meet up).

...when it debuted on October 17, 1991, "Personal Technology" was an immediate hit. Mossberg's voice, amplified by the power of the Journal, resonated like no other. In 1992, he recommended America Online, an also-ran with only 200,000 subscribers, over Prodigy, the leader with 1.8 million subscribers and powerful backers, including Sears and IBM. "Prodigy tried to get me fired," he recalls. Mossberg's endorsement "really helped put AOL on the map," admits founder Steve Case. "It turbocharged our growth."

Mossberg's proudest moment came in 2001, when he objected to Smart Tags, a feature he tested in a beta version of Windows XP. Smart Tags could turn any word on a Web page into a link to a Microsoft property or sponsor's site without consent from the site's author.

The nose contains shelf-like structures called turbinates, which help trap particles entering the nasal passages. Material deposited in the nose is transported by ciliary action to the back of the throat in 10-15 minutes. Cold viruses are believed to be carried to the back of the throat where they are deposited in the area of the adenoid. The adenoid is a lymph gland structure that contains cells to which cold viruses attach.

Update: LA Observed has more info: Link.

Google intends to sell shares of itself through an auction in which Google stock is sold to those willing to pay the most per share.  This means, for example, that if only 20% of the bidders end up with Google stock, these 20% will consist of people who bid the most for Google.  Now, if you end up being one of these "lucky" 20% should you worry that the winner's curse has stricken you since you apparently valued the stock at an amount greater than what most investors believed Google to be worth?  

Rational investors will take the winner's curse into account when making a bid.  For example, assume that before the auction you think a share of Google is worth $100.  But you figure that if you end up being a winner in the auction it means that most investors think Google is worth less than $100.  So, the act of winning will cause you to think Google is worth only $80 a share.  You should, therefore, bid no higher than $80, an amount diminished by the winner's curse.

"Chillout is a state of mind. It's making space in your head to enjoy the setting and the sounds. It's a long drink on a long sunny day. It's a moment taken to appreciate the beauty of the simplest things. And it's even better with a decent soundtrack."

As Al Franken considers challenging Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., for re-election in 2008, the comedian and liberal radio host is looking to his hometown senator for advice: Hillary Rodham Clinton.

"I asked Hillary, 'Can you give me some suggestions about running for Senate in a state you haven't lived for in a while, or in your case, ever?' " Franken recalled, laughing heartily. "And she said, 'This will be a long conversation,' so we agreed to have a long conversation about it."

Doug Kaye: Now a recurring concept in your book is probably typified by this example: “A terrorist who wants to create havoc will not be deterred by airline security; he will simply switch to another attack and bomb a shopping mall.”

Bruce Schneier: This is, I think, really important.  I just did a hearing two days ago on Capitol Hill about CAPS II, about airline profiling, and one of the things I’m always struck with is how good we are at defending against what the terrorists did last year.  We’re spending a lot of money shoring up our airlines, we’re now talking about shoring up trains. And money that we spend that simply causes the bad guys to change their tactics is money wasted. 

You have a red and a blue door, and the terrorists go through the red door, and you say, “We must secure the red door,” so they go through the blue door the next time.  What did you actually buy? 

                          2003   2004 
                          -----  -----  
iraq.....................   480   2556
bin Laden................   233    355
enron....................    56     66
halliburton..............    12     28

Transferring your cell phone number is easy when you order from Amazon.com. You won't have to wait in line at a store while your number is transferred from your previous carrier to your new one. And, in some cases, you will be assigned a temporary phone number for your new phone so that you can use it until your transfer is completed (you can even forward your calls from your current phone to your new phone in the interim). Best of all, when you buy a cell phone from Amazon.com and transfer your number, you will still qualify for all of our great rebates and discounts.

We, the undersigned, demand that Apple Computers immediately acknowledge and address the manufacturing defect on the LCD screens of its Powerbook G4 laptops. The LCD screens of these laptops are susceptible to random “White Spots” appearing on the display. These spots are very distracting and are an obvious manufacturing defect.

Powerbook owners around the world have been complaining of this problem. Evidence of this can be seen on Apple’s own discussion group website located at http://discussions.info.apple.com and on various message board discussion groups on the Internet. Due to the extremely large number of Powerbook owners that have been sending their newly purchased laptops for repair under warranty, it is OBVIOUS that Apple is aware of this defect. However, most customers have been noticing this problem reoccur within hours or days of their Powerbook being repaired under warranty. This is completely unacceptable.

It's still under warranty, but that doesn't do me any good: There's no way I can part with my machine for 3-7 days while Apple fixes it. Normally, I own two PowerBooks, the current one and a slightly older one (so that I have a working unit during repairs), but when I moved to Europe, I divested myself of all but a single CPU, so now I'm pretty scr0d.

The scoop appears to be that Apple is replacing these lemons with the new 1.5GHz models (which may or may not have the same problem), but I doubt that they'll ship me the replacement, let me transfer my data and then send back the old 'un. I'm just going to have to work off the world's shittiest display until I can scrape up the dough to buy another machine. Bummer.

Recently it has worsened to the point where I took it in today to the Apple store in Old Orchard. The attending Genius immediately noticed the uneven illumination of my display and suggested that it be sent in to the depot for repair. He also mentioned that this was the first time he had ever seen or heard of this problem before, and that there are no reports in the knowledge base that described this issue. When I mentioned to him that he might take a look at this thread in the Apple Support discussions, he wanted no part of it. He said that he rarely reads these forums, and dismissed it as "Oh well, people posting to discussion groups are mostly complainers" (those were not his exact words, but it was implied). Then I told him that people are posting actual photos of this problem and that all of the symptoms look identical for each person, which could indicate a manufacturing defect. His response was that "for those people, I suppose perception is reality".

We will take four humvees on this trip, including a gun truck or technical with a mounted 240 SAW, squad assault weapon and about 20 marines carrying M-16 and M4 assault rifles. As the captain speaks, the marines pass out smoke grenades that could be used to obscure a disabled vehicle from enemy fire. They also pass out fragmentation grenades, olive green orbs with strips of red duct tape wrapped around the handles to keep them from exploding in case the pin is pulled inadvertently.

The captain (who doesn't wanted to be identified by name) reads off a checklist that covers everything from the military grid coordinates for our travel to recent intel on enemy forces in the area, radio frequencies and procedures if we come under attack. "I'm not reading this for my own amusement," he says gruffly, "if something happens to me or Gunny you want to know how to get back so you better be fucking writing it down."

SWG uses what is called a faucet-drain economy. You can visualize a spigot of cash coming into the game, a big ol' sink where the money sloshes around, and a set of drains where the money goes out the bottom. When money comes in from the faucet, it's actually being "minted" - it's being created by the game system. The sink is basically the whole game. It's the bank accounts, the player inventories, all the money that is used for trades and transactions among players, etc. When money goes out the bottom, it's deleted from the system, rather than circulating back to a central bank.

(Credits aren't the only thing that is generated, of course - a significant faucet into the game economy actually comes in the form of resource mining. Since the amount of money and the amount of resources coming into the game at a time both vary, you get small fluctuations in the price of resources as the value of both the resources and the currency changes. Plus, you also get different qualities of resources that affect the price. But we're not really talking about commodities pricing today, much as just about the value of a credit).

IBB's list includes "ass" (which inadvertently bans usembassy.state.gov), "breast" (breastcancer.com), "hot" (hotmail.com and hotels.com), "pic" (epic.noaa.gov) and "teen" (teens.drugabuse.gov).

When asked what impact free downloading on the Internet has had on their careers as musicians, 37% say free downloading has not really made a difference, 35% say it has helped and 8% say it has both helped and hurt their career. Only 5% say free downloading has exclusively hurt their career and 15% of the respondents say they don't know...

67% say artists should have complete control over material they copyright and they say copyright laws do a good job of protecting artists...

Some 60% of those in the sample say they do not think the Recording Industry Association of America's suits against online music swappers will benefit musicians and songwriters. Those who earn the majority of their income from music are more inclined than "starving musicians" to back the RIAA, but even those very committed musicians do not believe the RIAA campaign will help them. Some 42% of those who earn most of their income from their music do not think the RIAA legal efforts will help them, while 35% think those legal challenges will ultimately benefit them.

With all the talk on weird theme parks on Boing Boing lately, I thought readers might enjoy this New York Times article on a dinosaur theme park in Orlando Pensacola (thanks, Jim!) that is run by creationists.Apparenly, it explains that dinosaurs were created on "the 6th day" and the Grand Canyon is evidence of Noah's ark. Amazing quote: "There are a lot of creationists that are really smart and debate the intellectuals, but the kids are bored after five minutes," said Mr. Hovind, who looks boyish at 51 and talks fast. "You're missing 98 percent of the population if you only go the intellectual route." Intellectual route?

The short film backlon points to was sponsored by Charles H. Keating, Jr. (the same banker implicated in the savings-and-loan scandals) as part of his decades-long crusade against porn, and reminds us that "Pornography and 'fun' lead to illegitimate children and hefty financial burden on taxpayers." Almost as much of a burden as S&L bailouts! "Perversion for Profit" also exposes the secret ties between adult entertainment and "homosexuality, lesbianism, violent crime, the Communist conspiracy and Satan." Actually, I think there's at least one fetish website that combines all of those -- but that's another post.

While you're watching, check out the bodacious mid-century furniture on those babes. Is that an original Eames lounge chair she's vamping on? I think I need a cold shower.
Link

The Mars rover Opportunity has arrived at "Endurance Crater" revealing a variety of strata and rock formations and intriguing sand/salt formations at the bottom. At issue now is not whether Opportunity can roll in but whether she can climb back out for further investigations.

The Space.com bulletin boards are giddy at the possibility of investigating 'water seeps' One poster is reporting that a lead JPL scientists is predicting that Opportunity might last another six months. Another suggests that "the plan for Opprtunity is to head South/South West after it's done with Endurance Crater. The objective being the white area which would be an ideal area to look for fossils. If the rover can last as long as hoped though that puts some of the much larger craters within reach too!"

It takes less than a minute to go to the Breast Cancer site and click on 'fund free mammograms' (pink window in the middle). This doesn't cost you a thing. Their corporate sponsors/advertisers use the number of daily visits to donate mammograms in exchange for advertising.

One of the great things about America is that here, you're perfectly free to gouge your right eye out if the spirit moves you (IANAL, but I'm thinking there's probably some kind of religious freedom protection for faith-based body modification). And until what's left of our constitution is gouged out, everyone else is free to watch, read, or listen to all the smut they like in the privacy of their own laptops.
Link

- The activities that occurred at Abu Ghuraib prison are not to be compared to those of Saddam Hussein's rape rooms and torture chambers. After all, those were rape rooms and torture chambers. These were merely rooms in which rape occurred, and chambers in which individuals were tortured.

- In war, atrocities will happen, as dew on the grass in the morning, or flower blossoms in the spring. The dew gathers. The buds open. The atrocities bloom. It is all according to the mysterious, ever-unfolding cycle of life - a cycle too vast and complex for mere mortals to comprehend.

- These were isolated incidents, and the behavior of these prison guards should in no way reflect upon the military superiors who endorsed and promoted such behavior. This is because atrocities are supervenient on subordinates, but not on command structures. Those with greater learning will understand.

Fleece ferret hammock, golf balls, Kung-fu hamster.
Cheesecake, gas blower, belly button rings.
Barebone PC, donut maker, mouth guard.
Matrix sunglasses, cookie jar, stuffed monkey.
Zen alarm clock, hair bows.
Red dress, beef jerky, snake light.

"Another example of an Asian site featuring the torments of hell. It's not in a museum though, it's in a theme park in [Vietnam]. I mean, three words: Buddhist Theme Park! I was a little baffled by the concept myself but it was a lot of fun. Rides and stuff, plus this animatronic display of the [twelve] torments of hell for people who'd committed particular crimes. It was a little like Pirates of the Carribean, only incredibly lame, tech-wise. There was one specific punishment for gamblers, one for adulterers, another for drug-takers. It was kind of amusing how different members of the family I was with laughed nervously at different exhibits. If you're ever in Saigon, you have to visit, it's truly strange."

The park has a website where you can watch short MPEG movies of attractions, including the Hell exhibit. The whole park is surreal -- check out the wicked cool photos these gigantic swimming pools with faux-stone monuments of gods watching over. This one -- an old man with a waterfall beard -- is my favorite.
Link

Soon we were being deluged with dozens of e-mails a day, containing suggestions, citations, and questions about our work. Mail came from all over the world, and correspondents included several noted SF writers. It took months to fully catch up with the backlog (and the pace has reached more manageable levels). But the results have been spectacular. Some of the entries we have published from the project include Martian, meteor storm, mind-meld (from ‘Star Trek’), moon base, and multiverse, and out-of-sequence entries bot (a robot), filk (a type of song performed by SF fans), and Sturgeon's Law (‘90% of everything is crap’, formulated by writer Theodore Sturgeon)...

Science fiction has several advantages as a subject for this kind of investigation. The vocabulary is largely self-contained; SF terms tend to occur in SF and nowhere else, while, say, political language can be found anywhere and everywhere. The fans are particularly committed, often have linguistic interests, and are computer literate. They may also be more likely to be able to volunteer time than specialists in more academically oriented fields.