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Domain: ohio.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to ohio.com.
Stories · 8
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Ohio Recount Rigging Case Goes to Court
The Akron Beacon Journal is reporting that the trial of the three election workers accused of rigging the 2004 presidential election recount in Cuyahoga County is finally underway. As you may recall, this was the case where poll workers 'randomly' selected the precincts to recount by first eliminating from consideration precincts where the number of ballots handed out on Election Day failed to match the number of ballots cast and, then opening the ballot boxes in private and pre-counting until they found cases which would match up. What is interesting here is that they have already admitted doing this and that it was clearly counter to the letter and the spirit of the law, but still insist it wasn't really 'wrong,' presumably since they only did it to avoid having to go to the bother of a full recount as required by law.
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Firefox News Roundup
Spaceman40 sent in this ZDNet story. PeterPumpkin collects way too many links to Firefox stories: "According to SpreadFirefox.com , there were almost 3 million downloads of Firefox 1.0 in the 5 days since launch, which comes to over 500,000 downloads per day. There are news bites coming out about Firefox everywhere you could possibly imagine. According to a report on MozillaZine, Denmark's largest television channel, TV2, reported on the release of Mozilla Firefox 1.0. PC-WELT, the German equivalent of PC-World, is distributing their own customised version of Firefox to customers." Thomas Hawk writes "Rather than go outside for the past 48 hours, Scott Granneman prefers to burrow in his den and come up with one of the first definitive lists of Firefox links. Good geeking Scott. And way to overcompensate." -
Monty Python's Holy Grail goes Broadway
Sixyphe writes "First sighted on Yahoo News, it would seem that Eric Idle of Monty Python fame is working on a Broadway musical adaptation of everybody's favorite source of accurate medieval data, Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The goal is 2005, and the working title is Spamelot (and not Spamalot, contrary to what an AP wire claims). And as a bonus to all you North-American Python fans, Eric Idle is soon to be touring in Canada and the US." -
GTA Played By More Than 70 Percent Of Teens
cdneng2 writes "This Yahoo!/Reuters article indicates that more than 70 percent of American kids have played Grand Theft Auto. The study also indicates that those who played are more likely to be in fights. It's a good thing the authors cautioned that this study did not prove a link between game violence and real-life behavior." The Gallup poll editors specifically and sensibly advised: "The data can't demonstrate causality - boys who are more prone to fighting may simply be more attracted to violent video games." -
Warriors Of Freedom Prompted Rampage Attempt?
Thanks to an anonymous reader for pointing to a Philadelphia Inquirer article linking videogames to an alleged spree killing attempt. According to the article, "Investigators suspect the three teens arrested.. as they allegedly were about to launch a killing rampage in the small town, found inspiration in violent computer games.. [police] learned that the name the three reportedly had given themselves - Warriors of Freedom - is also an Internet-based combat game." But only a few media reports mention that the violent game connection was made by Jack Thompson, a Miami lawyer and outspoken critic of violent video and computer games - is this a case of shameless Googling to find any obscure game with a similar name and make a connection, or is there genuine evidence here? -
DARPA Developing 'Combat Zones That See'
t0rnt0pieces writes "DARPA is developing an urban surveillance system that would use computers and thousands of cameras to track, record and analyze the movement of every vehicle in a city. Officials claim that the project is designed to help the U.S. military protect troops and fight in cities overseas, but police, scientists and privacy experts say the technology could easily be adapted to spy on Americans. Combined with other technologies, such as software that scans databases of everyday transactions and personal records worldwide, the government would have a reasonably good idea of where everyone is most of the time. Read the news story and the contracting document." -
Video Games Share Blame in Florida Murder Case
EH writes "Yet another article making the case that video games force young children to ruthlessly bludgeon people to death. Or at least a South Florida lawyer thinks so. 'Whatever happened [in JoLynn's death], it was not murder,' Thompson wrote in a news release. 'The American video industry must share the blame.' Articles like this make me so angry." I'm really getting sick of video games being used as the scapegoat for the evils of society. It's not like Nintendo is blamed everytime an Italian becomes a plumber. -
Where Has All The Rubber Gone?
Makarand writes "We all recognize vehicle tailpipe emissions to be a source of pollution. But what happens to the castoff rubber from your tires that have lost tread? No one knew where this rubbber was going until recently. Allison Draper, a professor of environmental chemistry at Bucknell University, is conducting research to end all guess work on this topic and with the hope of finding ways to make tires less polluting. She found for every kilometer a car travels, about 90 milligrams of tread wears off in particles ranging in size 10-75 microns.Toxins in the larger suspended particles leach out when exposed to water and the run off harms plant and animal life. These toxins are still being identified."