Newspapers Taking Aim @ Google

Gotta love old media -- threatened by a changing economic landscape, they do what the threatened usually do -- they lash out first. This is starting to happen as Google News leaves beta and hits prime time. Google News provides an aggregating service, where they scan world of online media and provide a few lines of content to give a potential reader a sampling of what the article may entail. Then, they send content to the publisher. Sounds like a library to me. Sounds like a good deal for the newspapers too. They get more traffic to their site. This is no different than other aggregators -- or aggregating software that leverages RSS feeds. What these old media types are really pissed about is the fact that Google is making money. Of course they're making money! They've become the distributor! Old media however doesn't get left out, like they would have you believe. They get increased traffic.

Google should let those who wish to opt out, opt out. It should be a simple matter of telling webcrawlers not to follow the links into their sites. I'd love to see to who's the first to opt out.

Gimme Some Ganja, Man!

Researchers from the University of Saskatchewan have found that high doses of a synthetic cannabinoid, HU210, increased neurogenesis in the hippocampus of rats by about 40%. Nerve cells are constantly being produced in the hippocampus, a region of the brain associated with learning, memory, anxiety and depression. Recreational drugs, such as alcohol, nicotine and cocaine suppresses growth of new nerve cells -- but apparently, HU210 doesn't. The effect is reportedly akin to the way Prozac works. Before you decide to toke up however, you should know that HU210 is synthetic, and other studies have shown no neurogenesis from using 100% natural ganja.

Go figure. There is no justice in this world!

See more in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, published in Oct. 2005: Cannabinoids promote embryonic and adult hippocampus neurogenesis and produce anxiolytic- and antidepressant-like effects [PDF]

Republicans Unfit to Adopt

Bill Robinson has written a great opinion piece in the Huffington Post in response to Ohio State Republican Ron Hood's proposed law banning homosexuals from adopting children. In opposition to Hood's proposal, Ohio State Senator Robert Hagan has introduced his own proposal that would bar Republicans from adopting. Hagan sites research that shows that children raised by Republicans are more at risk for developing "emotional problems, social stigmas, inflated egos, and alarming lack of tolerance for others they deem different than themselves and an air of overconfidence to mask their insecurities." It's a hilarious read ... until you realize that while we're all laughing, Ohio will be enacting a law based on hatred for someone's sexual orientation.

Michael Wolf's China Suite

Check out Michael Wolf's China Suite -- photography from his travels in China. Wolf is a freelance photojournalist based out of Hong Kong, doing a lot of work in China. His work is featured predominantly in Stern magazine. Of his photography online, especially profound, is the series titled Architecture of Density, which explores housing development in Hong Kong. So many people, so little space. Makes me wonder where we're heading.

Gamma-Ray Burst Detected

Left, "before" image, from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Right, "after" image, from Swift's Ultraviolet/Optical Telescope. The pinpoint of light in the centre is the GRB, which outshines the entire host galaxy. Click image for the high resolution image [8.7MB tiff].

NASA's Swift telescope has detected a gamma-ray burst (GRB), a usual harbinger of a supernova, very close to our galaxy, in the constellation Aries. The GRB was detected on Feb. 18th, at 440 million light-years away, lasting 33-minutes -- quite the departure for GRBs, which are usually detected billions of light-years away, and lasting only seconds at most. Speculation is that the GRB may be a result of a very massive star collapsing into a black hole, then exploding.

NASA animation showing the collapsing star scenario that is the leading contender to explain gamma-ray bursts.

MPAA's Anti-Piracy Assault

The MPAA is making a major push to bring pirating sites down. They've launched an assault against P2P sites, across the spectrum -- bittorrent, edonkey and newsgroups. In the lawsuits filed, the MPAA is going after indexing sites -- sites that catalogue the files available on the different P2P networks. This is an escalation, and one has to wonder if the MPAA will succeed. Indexing sites serve the same function as search engines. They don't host the content -- they just make it easier to find the content. Even Google can be used to search for torrents if the filetype flag is used in a search.

This latest move is just another example of the MPAA's bullying tactic. The tactic has hardly worked in the past, and only serves to demonstrate the MPAA's ignorance of the technology it's fighting. Wake up people! There's billions to be made if you just get on the bandwagon and exploit the technology.

Women's Soccer a Toe-hold in Sudan

Even though conflict continues in Sudan, the shaky peace between the Islamist north and the Christian/Animist south has created fertile ground for women wishing to dust off the years of oppression under sharia. For the first time, six women's soccer teams are playing in a competition that they are hoping to grow to form a national competitive team. Islamic laws restrict women from participating in sports -- and even when they pushed those boundaries, the had to be covered from head to foot. Yet, with determination and perseverance, the women have risked it all to play. If only they can now get support from the country's football association.

This is yet another example of why Africa needs to be saved. Despite all the conflicts; the pandemics; the scourges that are attempting to rout life from the continent, life and human spirit flourishes. For these girls, and others like them, there is hope. We just need to help that hope.

Target Iraq

Iraq was a target of the Bush Administration since September 11, 2001, after the terrorist attacks in the US. New information, obtained by blogger, Thad Anderson, via the US freedom of information act, reveals that defence secretary Rumsfeld ordered a sweep for information linking the terrorists with Iraq -- and specifically, was looking for targets to strike within Iraq.

As the Guardian reports, Iraq has always been a target of the Bush Administration -- 9/11 simply provided the opportunity.

A Scanner Darkly

The latest Wired Magazine features a cover article on digital animation's taking of Hollywood, as exemplified by the latest Philip K. Dick's story to be adapted to the big screen: A Scanner Darkly. The movie utilizes an effect called rotoscoping, which employs software to digitally trace live-action footage. The results are stunning, and well suited to the story it tells.

The Meaning of Tingo

The Meaning of Tingo by Adam Jacot de Boinod is a book of words -- and also a book of the world. de Boinod developed an obsession for foreign languages, and has compiled a book on the linguistic quirks and differences of languages from around the world. The book, like its content, sounds like it would make an odd addition to most collections.

Some examples of what you'll find in the book:

• Kummerspeck -- A German term for the weight people gain from emotion-related overeating.
• Neko-neko -- The Indonesian word for someone with a novel idea that actually makes the situation worse.
• Olfrygt -- How the Danish describe the nagging fear of being unable to find a beer while out of town.
• Iktsuarpok -- The Inuit way of describing the act of repeatedly going outside to check if someone is coming.
• Dozvonit'sya -- The Russian expression for ringing a doorbell or calling a phone number over and over until you get an answer.
• Fucha -- Polish for using company resources for personal reasons.
• Xiaoxia -- What the Chinese call new Internet users. Literal translation: small lobsters.
• Plimpplamppletteren -- The Dutch word for skipping stones.
• Pana-po'o -- Hawaiian for scartching your head to remember something.
• Tingo -- Rapanui for a person who borrows items from a friend, one by one, until everything's gone.

Three Lectures by Hans Bethe

Theoretical physicist Hans Albrecht Bethe passed away last year, at the age of 98. In his career, he won the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the theory of stellar nucleosynthesis; and was the head of the Theoretical Division of the Los Alamos Laboratory during WWII, playing a key role in developing the nuclear bombs of the Trinity test and "Fat Man" weapon. He later went on to campaign against nuclear testing and the arms race.

In 1999, he delivered three lectures on quantum theory to his neighbours at the Kendal of Ithaca retirement community. The lectures are available online with accompanying slides.

Quantum computer solves problem, without running

If I had stayed in school, maybe I would understand this fully -- what I do understand however, is that quantum mechanics is really, really weird. Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have managed to combine quantum computation with quantum interrogation to produce a result from an algorithm, without ever running the algorithm. The researchers demonstrated what is known as counterfactual computation -- inferring information about an answer -- by exploiting the nature of quantum interrogation using a photon based quantum computer. What this result point to is the potential infer answers from an algorithm without ever executing the algorithm.

[Thanks for passing this along, Naj!]

Staying Awake

• Design Observer -- a blog about design and culture. Some interesting stuff!
• The Rising Stock of Black Directors -- 84% of the top 200 S&P companies have black directors on their boards -- and more companies actively seek black directors (and other ethnic minorities) because of the unique perspective the bring. I wonder what other ceilings the hunt for profits will break?
• Tesco: California Dreaming? -- retail continues to evolve, and the limits of the big boxes have probably been reached. Where's the next growth? Think small ...
• The Office Chart That Really Counts -- ever wondered about the informal interactions of employees at work? What would happen if an organization could really map the relationships formed from informal interactions? A wealth of social information would result -- which if used properly, could result in some really innovative ideas being realized. For more, see:
  • Knowing What We Know [PDF] -- Supporting Knowledge Creation and Sharing in Social Networks
  • Making Invisible Work Visible [PDF] -- Using Social Network Analysis to Support Strategic Collaboration
  • Six Myths About Informal Networks [PDF] ... And How To Overcome Them
  • Nurturing Interpersonal Trust in Knowledge-Sharing Networks [PDF]
• Even In Death, Gene O' Kelly Wanted To Succeed -- At 52-years of age, Gene O'Kelly was diagnosed with inoperable late-stage brain cancer. He had months to live. The then CEO of KPMG decided to take his death, and what was left of his life, into his hands. He managed his death with dignity and courage that most of us will wish we can do when our time comes. He wanted to succeed in his death, as he had in his life. In his last few months, he set about closing the relationships he had formed; and writing a book about his dying -- the last gift he wanted to give to his daughters. In his death, he leaves behind a lesson for all us still living -- balance. Unfortunately for O'Kelly, it was a lesson he learned when he had ran out of time.

Global Free Press

Just found this site. The Global Free Press is a "community supported, progressive audio, video & image archive." [Found via The Huffington Post's Contagious Festival, via Amal's World View.]

Seduction of the Innocent

Source: Superdickery.com

The above is a real panel from an early comicbook. It's amazing how time changes the interpretation and makes it hilarious!

Extraordinary Rendition: The Outsourcing of Torture

"Extraordinary rendition" -- what exactly does the term mean? I just came across the term in reference to Maher Arar, a Canadian of Syrian descent, who had the horrible luck to be greeted with the practice when he landed on US soil, coming back from a family vacation in Tunisia. He was accused by American officials of being a terrorist with affiliation to al-Qaeda. He was interrogated, then shackled and flown to Syria, where he spent 3-years being tortured in prison. The crime? "Extraordinary rendition" -- a practice that is illegal, and it nothing more than state sponsored torture and murder. Yet it is a practice that continues, and is legally accepted in the United States.

Must we become evil to fight evil?

From Wikipedia:

Extraordinary rendition refers to an American extra-judicial procedure, widely believed to be illegal, of sending criminal suspects, generally suspected terrorists or supporters of terrorist organisations, to countries other than the United States for imprisonment and interrogation. Critics have accused the CIA of rendering suspects to other countries in order to avoid US laws prescribing due process and prohibiting torture and have called this "torture by proxy" or "torture flights".

Media reports describe suspects being arrested, blindfolded, shackled, and sedated, and transported by private jet or other means to the destination country. The reports also say that the rendering countries have provided interrogators with lists of questions. Although Egypt has been the most common destination, suspected terrorists have been rendered to other countries, such as Jordan, Syria, Morocco, and Uzbekistan. According to former CIA agent Bob Baer, "If you want a serious interrogation, you send a prisoner to Jordan. If you want them to be tortured, you send them to Syria. If you want someone to disappear - never to see them again - you send them to Egypt."

In a number of cases, suspects to whom the procedure is believed to have been applied later appeared to be innocent.

Rendition is an extension of a long-standing policy of confining political prisoners to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, where they are beyond the jurisdiction of American courts.

The procedure allows American government agencies to interrogate and torture suspects without intervention by civil authorities, or protection of the law. The methods employed are illegal in both America and the host country. Therein lies the risks inherent with the procedure. The evidence obtained would be inadmissible in a court of law, and the procedures used to obtain it harms America's international reputation. There also exists the significant risk that the agencies and officials involved could be prosecuted for their criminal activities.

Creationists Lower Standards in Higher Education

Creationists are going to university now -- to take science, and are failing since they're arguing that Darwin got it wrong. Freshly brainwashed by religion, these students show up to British classes already knowing the scientific fact, that God created the world and people, as explained in the Bible and Qur'an. It's disturbing that students studying biology -- medicine -- don't believe evolution is real, because passages from the Bible and Qur'an tells them it God created everything.

There is no scientific evidence for it [Darwin's Origin of Species]. It's only a theory. Man is the wonder of God's creation. -- Muslim Medical Student.

This worrying trend has got the UK's Royal Society up in arms. They've decided not to sit back, but to confront the situation first-hand. Geneticist Steve Jones will be delivering a lecture on creationism and evolution at their next meeting -- and he's challenging proponents of creationism to debate the issue with him.

There is an insidious and growing problem. It's a step back from rationality. They (the creationists) don't have a problem with science, they have a problem with argument. And irrationality is a very infectious disease as we see from the United States. -- Steve Jones

The Ultimate MS Paint

Check out the ultimate MS Paint creation -- done by Stanley William Moore II. Quite impressive.

The Speed of Gravity

Here's an interesting read for budding theoretical physicists and others who don't get a headache when they find the words, relativity, causality, and gravitation, in long run-on sentences. Einstein's theory of general relativity doesn't support faster than light travel, but accounts for gravitational effects happening faster than light by viewing gravity as a geometric phenomena due to curvature of space-time. In this article, the author supposes that gravity is not just a geometric effect. Like the other forces, it would be mediated by radiation -- radiation that would travel faster than the speed of light -- greater than or equal to 2x10¹⁰c actually.

Subway Omnibus

• A Sotheby's For Inventors -- Ocean Tomo is looking to take advantage of your patents. The firm wants to be the auction house for patents. Many businesses with a wealth of dusty (and not so dusty) patents are going to Ocean Tomo looking for a sale. For once, market demand is driving the value of patents.
• Is Verizon a Network Hog? -- what's with the network-nazis lately? Verizon wants to prioritize traffic running over its network, giving itself 80% of the capacity for its own traffic -- everybody else, gets to fight over the remaining 20%. WTF?!
• Why The Economy Is a Lot Stronger Than You Think -- BusinessWeek's cover article declares that we're worrying too much about the economy. The traditional measures of an industrial economy doesn't necessarily apply in a knowledge-based economy. While that may shed a warm glow on economic thinking, it could also mean that today's (and tomorrow's) economy could be a lot more volatile than we may be comfortable with.
• The New Ethics Enforcers -- ah, how business has changed ...
• No Union, Please, We're Wal-Mart -- an excerpt from Anthony Bianco's The Bully of Bentonville. The story of how Wal-Mart left Jonquière after the Quebec government certified the store as only unionized Wal-Mart in North America.
• Creativity Loves Constraints -- a short article by Google's VP of Products and User Experience, Marissa Ann Mayer.

  Constraints shape and focus problems and provide clear challenges to overcome. Creativity thrives best when constrained. But constraints must be balanced with a healthy disregard for the impossible. Too many curbs can lead to pessimism and despair. Disregarding the bounds of what we know or accept gives rise to ideas that are non-obvious, unconventional, or unexplored. The creativity realized in this balance between constraint and disregard for the impossible is fueled by passion and leads to revolutionary change.

MSM Sellout to PR Firms

Paul Graham writes a great article about the role of PR Firms in the MSM. PR Firms feed the MSM information -- and what the MSM does with it? Just publishes it. Why? MSM is lazy. Bloggers on the other hand -- we don't want to be mouthpieces for anybody, and that is the challenge facing PR Firms. Just how do they crack that rather fickle group?

Sign O' The Times

Time, time -- Some say a man ain’t happy, truly -- Until a man truly dies

What world are we living in, when a politician can put a price tag on the life of someone? Yaqoob Qureshi, Indian minister of Minority Welfare in the state of Uttar Pradesh, has offered £6m to anyone who beheads one of the Danish cartoonists that drew the images of the prophet Muhammad. He also said that the killer would receive his weight in gold. I have to wonder how Muhammad feels about hits being ordered on his behalf. I also have to wonder if Qureshi has the money to fund such an offing -- and more importantly, is the Indian government going to do anything about him? Let's not forget that India wishes to obtain a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

Time, time -- But if a night falls and a bomb falls -- Will anybody see the dawn

Qureshi of course was probably just trying to up the ante on Imam Mohammed Yousaf Qureshi, who offered $25,000, a car and promised that a local jewellers would cough up $1M, in prize money to the killer of any of the Danish cartoonists. The Imam made the announcement in during prayer service in Peshawar, Pakistan. I wonder if the Danish cartoonists would offer to commit suicide for the money?

Time, time -- U turn on the telly and every other story -- Is tellin’ u somebody died

Meanwhile, protests continue around the world, by people who have never seen the cartoons. And people are dying. In Nigeria, Libya, Pakistan, ... and elsewhere around the world, the ignorant are falling -- not because of Danish cartoonists -- but because of failed leadership. The political and religious leaders are not leading. Instead of showing leadership, they are instead feeding the mob frenzy. It's a simple and effective tactic to maintain control. Feed the hysteria and distract the populace from the real problems of their everyday lives.

Time, time -- Sign o the times mess with your mind

Is the Muslim world capable of coexisting with the rest of the world? The rest of the world that is free? How will the rest of the world cope with the Muslim world? In the US, right-wing conservatism is on the rise. In Canada, we just elected Bush's lapdog. In Europe, countries are struggling with how to deal with the increasing immigrant population. More and more, leaders are being elected that carry an intolerant edge. The world seems to be moving to polar opposites. When will cooler heads prevail? Or will they be the first heads to roll?

One love! one heart! -- Let’s get together and feel all right.

Test 3

Blogger is still clobbering posts.

God Doesn't Exist

... but the dangerous combination of the stupid and religious, does -- and they've managed to claim more lives in the name of their absent gods than the gods themselves have. I'm now firmly on the opinion that true-believers are the ones placed here on Earth to bring about the Apocalypse.

I will now pick on the Islamic fanatics -- because, really, they're so easy to pick on. According to news reports, Iran is heading rapidly towards a confrontation with the rest of the world. At a conference in Tehran, titled, “Analysis of ways to act against the offensive of Global Blasphemy" -- an event to mark the anniversary of the Ayatollah Khomeini's call for the murder of Salman Rushdie -- Mohammad-Ali Samadi, spokesman for the Headquarters to Commemorate the Martyrs of the Global Islamic Movement, an Iranian government-orchestrated campaign to recruit suicide bombers, said that more that 52,000 “volunteers for martyrdom-seeking operations” have been registered by his organisation. I want to believe that this is just posturing, but it would hardly surprise me if this, and the associated numbers, aren't for real.

Such statements are made of course, with the express consent of the Iranian government -- and more importantly, the Iranian religious leaders. The collusion of the two have managed to put a stranglehold on independent and critical thinking in Iran. Those that can think for themselves, try to get the hell out of the country as quickly as they can while they still have their heads. It's a sad state for the Iranian people. They are being led astray and abused by their leaders. Iran, since the Islamic revolution, would make a great case study for an up-and-coming psychopath.

On a side note, here's a little biography on Iran's President, and Chief Terrorist, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. With people like that leading the nation, is there any doubt where they're heading?

Secrets from Google

The Silicon Valley Sleuth reports on a demonstration by McAfee's SVP, George Kurtz, at the RSA conference, on how much "goodies" are available online -- made easier to find by Google. The stupidest things that people leave lying around on their sites are passwords. johnny.ihackstuff.com for instance, posts some of these stupid finds. With a link from johnny.ihackstuff.com to a Google search for instance, I found a server.log file that gave me the following two incredibly stupid lines:

07-08-05 18:06:13,WARNING,Info,SERVER, admin account info: username: admin password: ie47ed 07-08-05 18:06:13,WARNING,Info,SERVER, superadmin account info: username: superadmin password: by63bs

Can security really be that lax?

[This was orginally posted 2/17/2006, then Blogger deleted it.]
[It was then reposted on 2/18/2006, then Blogger deleted it.]

Red State, Meet Police State

Boise Weekly is running an article on Dwight Scarbrough's encounter with officers from the US Homeland Security. Scarbrough, a federal employee, and veteran, was harassed by the officers because his vehicle is plastered by anti-war stickers and signs. What's the big deal? It seems very clear to me protesting the war in the US is not something that sits well with the government and law enforcement. What is happening to America the free? Especially disturbing is how the officers in question became very hard to track down after they visited Scarbrough at his workplace and harassed him. The Boise Weekly reporter had the most difficult time finding people who would first acknowledge that the incident occurred -- then, to comment on it. Scarbrough was accused of being in violation of some law that makes it illegal to have signage on a vehicle parked on federal property. Meanwhile however, there are other laws that specifically allow political statements to be made -- including the use of bumper stickers, on federal property. The whole episode is just plain disturbing.

Test 2

Will this post disappear? Will Test 1 disappear?

Test 1

Blogger has been giving problems of the last couple of days. Posts have been disappearing, and nothing new is making it on. Images have not been appearing. Here's hoping that this works!

Newly Forming Solar System Has Planets Running Backwards

NASA researchers, using the VLA radio telescope has discovered an astronomical shocker -- a solar system, some 500-light-years away, with two flat disks rotating rotating in opposite directions around a young star. Planets haven't formed from the disks as yet -- and probably won't for millions of years -- but when they do, the astronomers expect they will be orbiting their star in opposite directions. This is a first in solar system astronomy.

Slime Mould Robot

Researchers from the UK and Japan have successfully linked the Physarum polycephalum slime to a six-legged robot. Physarum polycephalum shies away from light, preferring moist, dark and humid places -- and that preference was used to direct the robot away from light sources. In the experiment, the slime was remotely linked to the robot. Light sensors on the robot relayed signals via a computer to the slime mounted on a circuit board. The circuit board detected the movement of the slime, trying to get away from the light, and relayed the slime's responses back to the robot -- which used the directive to move away from the light source.

Researchers expect that they will be able to have the slime on board the robot, and will then have to conquer the problem of feeding the slime. Once accomplished, autonomous slimeborgs will proliferate and take over the world! (Bwah-ha-ha-ha!)

Related: The researchers' findings -- Robot Control: From Silicon Circuitry to Cells.

Erosion of Fair Use

ars technica is reporting on the new offensive by the RIAA and pals to offend, misuse and with much prejudice, abuse, their customers. In a response to the US government's review of the effectiveness of the DMCA, the RIAA dunces have decided to go even more hardline than previous. They are now claiming that making backup copies and ripping CDs for MP3 players does not constitute fair use. Why? Cause you can buy another copy of the content silly!

Hate and Intolerance

The UK Telegraph has two opinion pieces that are a good read, concerning the latest incursion of Muslim society into our western-democractized-free-liberal-world. Specifically:

Nigel Farndale writes a piece that suggests that "sometimes a liberal democracy needs to show a little intolerance." He is of course referring to our need to show some courage in the face of the waves of "cartoon protests" happening around the world. This is not a time for us to show tolerance -- to show fear. The Muslim world has the right to be offended. No one argues that. That most of who are offended have no clue why they're offended, is another story. What they do with their anger however is very much a concern. They show no tolerance for our values. Their belief is absolute and leaves no room for ours. That level of intolerance should not be accepted.

Nonie Darwish also writes of a culture of hate that is fostered from childhood in the Muslim world -- hate for the West; hate for the Jews. Every problem of the Muslim world has a face and a name -- it is that of the infidel west and the Jews. The leaders of the Muslim world use their people. The Muslim people have little to no value to their leaders. They've been so indoctrinated into hate that any questioning of their leaders or beliefs inspires a violent reaction. How do they stop the hate? Darwish suggests that apologizing for the cartoons is not the solution. She's right. It's not. Her suggestion of having hope and tackling the root of the problem is empty however. I go right back to Nigel Farndale -- show some intolerance.

On a related note, check out Cox & Forkum's posts on the "cartoon jihad" and the support for free speech from Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Dutch Muslim politician.

Atomic Beauty

"Ever wondered what an atomic blast looks like before it obliterates everything around it? Before the smoke, the mushroom cloud, the devastation, it's really quite amazing to see the first few fractions of an atomic bomb upon detonation."

Photography by Harold Edgerton.

10 Best Sci-Fi Films (That Never Existed)

David Wong over at the Pointless Waste of Time has a great top 10 list -- Sci-Fi movies that never existed. Read his article for the details, but what made his top 10 are as follows, in reverse order:

• The "Real" Alien 3 -- the one where the aliens actually came to Earth. Think Alien (first movie) being crossed with Blade Runner.
• The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- no, not that one. The one that would be more like Shaun of the Dead.
• Star Wars Episode VII -- trying very hard to forget the last lame trilogy.
• Star Wars Episode VIII
• Star Wars Episode IX
• Doom -- that didn't suck.
• Starcraft -- yes, turn the strategy game into a kickass movie.
• Snow Crash -- an adaptation of Neal Stephenson's novel.
• The Matrix Prequel -- the story of the machine war, when the humans lost.
• The Matrix Sequel -- just one movie!

Check out the article -- it's an entertaining read for genre fans.

Oracle Buys Into Open Source

Larry's buying spree continues -- and this time, the one-stop software shop is looking to rival IBM as the benefactor of the open-source movement. (Yeah, I know, it's got a far ways to go -- but don't tell Larry or his ambition that.) Oracle is apparently in deep talks with JBoss, Zend (PHP) and Sleepycat Software. A successful acquisition of those firms would put Oracle in the position to shift its revenue model from licensing to subscriptions. Since open source software is free, Oracle would sell maintenance, support and consulting. Oracle already had a deep and wide customer base, so they're setting themselves up to capitalize on that base. In effect, Larry is continuing on his master plan to be the one-stop software shop for businesses.

Project IP

See what your browser reveals about you as you surf the internet: Project IP.

Doom the Movie

I recently saw Doom, starring the Rock. It's a movie trying to capitalize on the video game. I guess id wanted to make some more money off the franchise, and Hollywood, lacking any good ideas slapped something together. Put a big name action star, with lots of guns, monsters, special effects and Mars, and the result would be something called Total Recall -- I mean, Doom! While Total Recall had a story, Doom was totally lacking one. It's about a bunch of tough guys, testosterone seeping from their pores, sent to investigate what went wrong on a Martian colony. Apparently genetic engineering gone awry is the problem. The results: zombies (and innocent bystanders) getting shot.

It's no different from the video game. Which is the problem -- as it's no fun watching someone else play the game. If you lower your expectations, this is a passable action flick.

LMAO

Yes, sometimes I am curious as to why people get to my site. This morning though, I got this one that just made me lmao! Someone from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, went to Blogger Search and searched from "fuck my ass." (I removed the originating IP to protect the sinner.) When you search for those terms on Blogger Search, a page on my site is ranked number 2. Unfortunately, I don't think they found what they were looking for. Too funny! And then again, not too funny. Poor person would probably be flogged or killed if they got caught.

Patents Gone Wild

The US Patent Office is in need of a serious lobotomy. There was the JPEG patent claim that resulted in millions being paid out to Forgent. The latest claim comes from AT&T, covering core MPEG-4 technology. And in the last few weeks, RIM has been battling with NTP over patents that cover -- ridiculously -- where email is temporarily stored when a BlackBerry is outside coverage area. Thankfully, RIM seems to have developed a workaround that should allow it to continue doing business, while giving NTP the finger.

I have no love for patent speculating companies. They do nothing but sit like vultures waiting to deploy their army of hungry lawyers. The problem has gotten so bad in recent years, that now some of the silliest processes, concepts and technologies are being patented by large corporations. While some of those companies may be trying to curtail future patent suits by locking up generally understood concepts, the practice could prove potentially harmful for industry. For instance -- who's to say that the benevolent ideals of today won't turn nefarious under different management and circumstances in the future? And what if the license fees for some of the basic concepts prove unreachable for startups? Innovation and growth could be stymied.

The US Patent Office (and their ilk around the world) are in serious need of lobotomies. If only governments would develop the intestinal fortitude to stand up to business and lawyer interests, and instead focus on the economic viability of their nations.

Gmail for Your Domain

Google wants your email! They will configure, host and sell advertisements against your email! The plan is simple. Got a domain? They will provide Gmail for it. A limited beta is now running. Check it out. Soon, Google will take over the world. Join them! Google is inevitable!

Middle Managers May Be Useful ... After All

Rick Hackett of McMaster's DeGroote School of Business has recently published a study, suggesting that middle managers may be useful for more than just landfill after all. Hackett proclaims that middle managers serve a purpose in work life, by standing between the executive leadership and the workers that toil day-in and day-out to actually generate the company's profits. Middle managers represent the organization to the employees. They are the ones with the day-to-day interaction with staff -- and they play the pivotal role of translating and transmitting the warbles emanating from senior management. Middle managers are the ones that have a much more profound impact on employees. They're the ones that can inspire or suck the life out of staff; the can ensure success of daily tasks; provide career opportunities; encourage, etc. Middle managers are the ones who build trust and engender loyalty in an organization. They are essential to organizations -- and care must be taken in choosing them for their roles.

I think I need a raise.

Related reading:

• Gender, managerial level, transformational leadership and work satisfaction -- Tracey T. Manning, Women in Management Review.