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The Man is not me. The Man is the 1% who are turning the world into a giant Panopticon and looting my pockets.

It depends. Globally, if you own about $500k in stuff you're in the top 1%. A house counts, a car, a TV etc. all count. Do you? If not, about $60k will put you on the top 10%. And even if you aren't there yet, if you're in a first world country, absent a catastrophe there's a very high probability at some point you will.

I assure you, I'll hate them every bit as much no matter how old I get, and pity those who don't for suffering from a severe case of Stockholm Syndrome.

Every single older person out there will tell you they thought so at the same point in their lives. You're human. You're a typical human at that. You follow the exact same psychobiological patterns of human development the other 7 billion people currently living and the 40+ billion who lived before went, are going and their descendants will go through. Just wait and see.

Don't forget the US. Chavez was giving away oil to the poor in the US while Obama was busy cutting budgets and safety nets.

It's nice to see a mention of one of my great state's reps that, for once, doesn't involve them doing/saying something unspeakably stupid...

Yea, I'm talking about you, Todd Akin and Rory Ellinger.

[Hold on a second wern't these the same publishers] ...that were in a cartel with these very same publishers who had sided with Apple against Amazon http://www.policymic.com/articles/6812/apple-founder-steve-jobs-leader-of-ebook-price-fixing-cartel that Steve Jobs what a player.

Yes, however this complaint is headed for the rapid dismissal path to ruin. They merely plead that "a series of contracts and/or combinations" has violated sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act.

They haven 't alleged any coordination (where all the parties communicate with each other privately, whether directly or through an intermediary, to set similar terms), and they haven't alleged any contractual term or private agreement which forbids the publishers from selling them eBooks. Apple is in the hot seat beacause it served as an intermediatry in private communications which established the 30% charge and MFN clause amongst all the publishers at essentially the same time.

These sellers are only complaining that the publishers have not entered into contracts with them. Tough. You cannot force an individual business to sell to you, and you cannot force a group of businesses who individually decide not to sell to you to sell to you. Coordination requires a private agreement -- antitrust coordination does not reach natural cartels, such as airlines or petroleum, so long as all the members independently react to the public actions of the others. Other laws regulate mergers tending to further concentrate an industry, but that's not relevant here.

They need to plausibly allege a coordinated and concerted refusal to deal with them (Google "Twombley" and "Iqbal" and "supreme court"). They haven't. Case dismissed with leave to refile.

Even when they refile, they're unlikely to pull it off since the government's Apple investigation grew out of an initial investigation into Amazon. Those contract terms would have stood out like flaming beacons of illegality. They're likely going to have to beg for permission to engage in a fishing expedition concerning unspecified private agreements to exclude them. The problem is, the courts don't look favorably on that sort of discovery. It's not going to happen. Second dismissal, with prejudice.

Welcome to ruin.

...that were in a cartel with these very same publishers who had sided with Apple against Amazon http://www.policymic.com/articles/6812/apple-founder-steve-jobs-leader-of-ebook-price-fixing-cartel that Steve Jobs what a player. I love the quote from the article on this "a move that was widely seen as benefiting Amazon's dominant position among ebook retailers"..clearly not the best understanding that, the move would simply shift the scale to Apple, and making it impossible for independent vendors to compete on price.

I actually agree with the reality that books need to be transferable [and films, magazines...oh and Applications hell anything stored on a computer with a price tag attached.]...so that the better technology competes. In fact lets go further I see no reason at all why you can't have multiple store fronts on every device you own...like say Android :)

Some engineers at NASA must be very sad right now. SpaceX is doing what they couldn't: More economical space flight" .

Then again they might've set their sights a little bit further, but still opportunity missed.

By the way, you are missing part of the formula for GDP, it's the deflator that they are supposed to apply to discount inflation. Of-course their deflators are ridiculously low, I have an 'informative' post with many numbers and links in it here, which shows a few things about inflation and GDP. AFAIC GDP has been shrinking for a long time now in 2 ways.

1. The 'production' part of GDP is shrinking all the time. Look at the trade deficit numbers, here is a page with history on it in PDF or text. For the year 2011 the trade deficit was 559Billion dollars and it's growing all he time. Of-course the total personal consumption in USA is mostly on services, not on goods, in fact 2/3 of all consumption is services and only 1/3 is goods. 11Trillion was spent by US consumers in 2011, so about 3 Trillion was spent on goods and the rest was energy, food and services (like healthcare and education for example), so in that sense US consumer consumes mostly 'US' service. However if you look at the goods (go to Walmart and compare how many things are made in USA vs foreign made, like China), you'll find that most of the goods bought and sold (and even food, 90% of sea food comes from Asia) is made elsewhere.

2. The deflator that is used is reverse engineered to fit the propaganda. With the nominal and pre-deflator GDP being 2.9%, the deflator is set to be 1.6. (read the linked comment, I give quotes and links there), that's GDP revised down from 1.7% to 1.3% (post deflator) for the second quarter.

70% of GDP could very well be consumption, at least in countries with unusually low government spending

- I am sorry, this sentence makes no sense. 70% of GDP is consumption, that's not because of low gov't consumption, the exact opposite is the case, that's because of very high consumption stimulated by gov't (especially non-existing interest rates and free money allocated by the Fed to the member banks, who then buy T-bills and bonds and allow gov't to keeps spending). It's low production that is the problem, that's why GDP is 70% personal consumption, it's the actual number, what can I say? You see, when the production portion of GDP shrinks, the consumption portion becomes bigger and bigger part of the number, and if the consumption is stimulated artificially with fake money and 0% interest rates, and as long as the foreigners are willing to take dollars for their exports, then consumption even grows, doesn't just stay the same.

The reason that the consumption is mostly of foreign goods is exactly because the production part of GDP is disappearing.

How exactly do you make this play together with a worldwide Internet? You can shout pretty much anything on it, knowing that it'll reach people all across the globe, and you are pretty much guaranteed to get someone somewhere offended. So now what, we should crack down on all offensive speech on the grounds that someone got mad and did something nasty?

That is a very good question.
And I'm sad to say that I don't really have an answer, though these guys seem to be on the right track.

I don't think that "cracking down" by government or some other "high authority" would help.
Two things MIGHT though.

Education of public that "it's not nice to do some things - online or off" (Yeah, I know.) and ridicule of those who practice such trolling, presenting them for what they really are.

My problem comes when people don't think they should "work their way out of" poverty, but that the government should do it for them, not by helping them to get better work or creating an environment where business thrives so jobs are created (not a liberal strong point), but by simply giving them the money to support a better lifestyle.

Slight problem with that Randian storyline - even if it were true - giving poor people money to support a better lifestyle is not only a more moral system than the "up from your own bootstraps" nonsense, but it makes for vastly better economics than cutting taxes on the rich.

Working stiffs can't take lengthy unpaid internships to get a job in their field after college. They better hope that they find one though before their student loans become a weight around their neck. If George Bush was George Johnson, he'd be lucky to be the assistant manager of a Burger King, if he wasn't in prison for cocaine possession. Not handed business after business no matter how many he drove into the ground, much less the presidency. Or have beautiful women sent to your hotel room to have sex with you because your last name is Bush.

Social spending isn't about "hand outs". It's about basic human decency and equality of opportunity.

From the email Georgy sent out after the release of emails.
"The release of these emails is, however, a direct attack on Stratfor. This is another attempt to silence and intimidate the company, and one we reject. As you can see, emails sent to many people about my resignation were clearly forged.
We do not know what else has been manufactured. Stratfor will not be silenced, and we will continue to publish the geopolitical analysis our friends and subscribers have come to rely on. "

Well possibly they were forged or maybe not.

If you go to their web page allegedly they are giving out all their "information" for free for a limited time, however what I see is nothing new or interesting and quite a bit of poorly written analysis (yes I know my writing sucks as well) after going through several of the articles I started wondering "what's the big deal about Stratfor?"
Decide for yourself:
Top 5 Stratfor Wikileaks Revelations (So Far)
http://www.policymic.com/articles/4833/top-5-stratfor-wikileaks-revelations-so-far

http://www.benzinga.com/news/12/02/2381070/wikileaks-stratfor-e-mails-reveal-an-investment-plot-worthy-of-a-spy-novel

All sources are suspect but you can always get the torrent file with their emails (alleged emails)
http://wikileaks.org/the-gifiles.html

My advice is download them from a wireless cafe not your home IP, not sure what the legality is here and I am staying away from it.

GoDaddy apparently had a material benefit in SOPA.

Shouldn't that be "has"?

By the way, Dump GoDaddy Day (or "move you domain day") appears to be still on for tomorrow, Dec 29 2011. And... even Danica Patrick isn't able to stop it!

/WARNING: scoffers, "tin-foil hatters" and "don't make me thinkers" should skip this post. Closed minds need not apply.

Many have made the point here that Google can certainly sell my viewing habits as a persona to ad agencies and be just as effective in reaching my eyeballs/wallet without a wallet-name. My profile as a long-maintained pseudonymous writer contains a boatload more information on my viewing habits and pathways than my wallet name would (as I am extremely careful about the security of that data). So, they can sell me stuff; I still control my typist's wallet. There's also a huge difference between anonymous and pseudonymous. Those arguments have been made before and above.

A couple pieces of this puzzle can be set next to each other for contemplation:

1. Google is currently undergoing an FTC probe for antitrust violations concerning its dominance in the web-advertising market.

2. Put that piece next to the piece that shows Google's continuing handling of this issue in the face of a real groundswell of negative opinion and debate from a cross-section of users (including the security community) and the information coming from Skud (aka Robert Kirrily) about the database he is compiling of purged accounts and Googlers quitting their jobs over this issue.

3. The just-passed Protecting Children from Internet Pornographers Act aka the Data Retention Bill.

There's a pertinent paragraph in the above-linked article about PCIPA:

"The Constitution protects privacy against government intrusion, but it doesn't stop the government from forcing private companies to do its dirty work."

Is that happening? I don't know; I don't think it's "crazy-land" to ask questions about this latest "real names or nuthin'!" push. When the government tried to push Real ID (2006) many states said "no fscking way!" and killed that movement. This latest trend smells to me like it might be an end-run around that kind of resistance; after all, if people are offering their data (on condition of using a "free" service), why then, it's perfectly legal for the government to simply buy it as another customer.

So sure, call tin-foil hat on me; call crazy-nut. There's a lot of questions about this issue that aren't being asked because of the knee-jerk reaction of "there ain't no conspiracies anywheres!" crowd. Perhaps I need to re-brand that in today's terms and call it cronyism, collusion or #trending. I'm not a "true believer" but I do have serious questions about this all being about "marketing" and "ad sales."

Miso Susanowa