IMHO It could also be a life insurance policy. Think about it, although Machiavelli'sinsights onto how to run a kingdom were not widely availible (The Prince wasn't written until 1513 the same year that Da Vinci died) there was enough backstabbing and evil to go around in DaVinci's day. What's to stop the local prince (or would-be prince) from killing or torturing the man himself and stealing all his books and papers. Only the fact that without him the designs are useless. If you want the weapons then you'll need the man, alive, well, and on your side not in your dungeon.
Arguing about who is right in the daily battles obscures the underlying reality.
We can debate "the underlying reality" if you like, but "the superficial reality" is that on one side you have suicide bombers targeting random families and on the other side you have police and soldiers trying to target the suicide bombers. Religion has nothing to do with it, most people are going to see one side as the bad guys and the other side as the good guys.
It's not that simpe though. In their efforts to catch the bombers or would-be bombers the Israeli Army has invaded whole towns. In their effort to catch "the bad guys" they tend to kill a lot of noncombatants (see here for one example) and cause a great deal of death and detructon for the general populace (see here ). According to NPR the Israeli Army recently won the right to destroy the homes of any bomber's relatives as a punitive response, not the kind of thing that brings people to your side. So, in terms of killings obth sides has their share of blood on their hands, both sides have killed women and children. I would argue that at least on one level you have to stop playing tit for tat if you want to move forward and, at this point, arguing about "who started it" would involve going back to well before the Roman Empire.
The fact is that the land of Israel was populated with Arabs before the Jews came. Arabs were moved off the land to make room for Jews.
If the jewish refugees showed up with guns and shipped people off in trains it's the first I've heard of it.
I'm not an expert on history, so feel free to clear up any errors here: For the most part the current population of Israel was born there. I think that's enough to pretty much end it, but I'll continue. The people who immigrated to the area for the most part did so legally, right? It's not like they showed up with guns and broke in. They mostly bought homes, or bought land and paid to have homes built, right? Possibly some of them settled on unused land? (Even in that case, if it was the US they would gain rightful ownership of the land after some number of years.) At some point the vast majority of the population of the area decided modify their government and call it Israel. Pretty much every nation on earth has recognized that government.
Are you suggesting that Israel shouldn't exist? Maybe several million people should be be "driven into the sea"? All Israelis? Or just the jewish ones? You did say they want you to kill them, right?
The problem is that, to an extent the Israelis are doing that. The new "settlements" are not (all) going into completely empty space. Many of them are being created on top of palestinian villages that have been raized. See this article that was reprinted from the NY Times. And, as other articles have shown it's not just about the amount of land being occupied by taking strategic positions, and gaining control of water. For most Palestineans what is occuring is just a long protracted invasion, house by house and street by street.
Osama bin Laden's main complaint is U.S. support for the House of al Saud.
I don't know much about Saudi government. Did the US overthrow the recognized government and install the current government? Or was the current government already the recognized official government?
He wants Saudis to determine their own fate. Logically, U.S. citizens must support that
Have free elections been blocked by the US? Or are you proposing a violent overthrow of the current government? If you're proposing violent revolution you have a pretty tough hurdle to overcome to persuade me, and you'd better have a pretty solid majority of the population demanding it. And even if I agreed with you that a revolution was appropriate, dealing with the current legitimate government would still fall into a grey area.
He did once and still does oppose the U.S.'s presence in Saudi Arabia and our support for the house of Saud. My understanding is that that is based upon two factors. Firstly, the House of Saud is a fairly repressive (and yet semi-secular) monarchy (see here for one example). Secondly, Saudi Arabia, like Iraw houses some major centers of Islamic culture, hisrory, and religion among them Mecca the biorthplace of the Prophet Mohommed and the location of his tomb.
For some hard-core muslim fundamentalists, the idea that non-muslims would be in or around Mecca especially with the backing of a secular monarchy is abhorrent. This feeling runs paralell to the abhorrence that some fundamentalist christians and fundamentalist jews feel at the idea of anyone but them being allowed to govern the holy land.
To get an idea of it take a look at the issues surrounding the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. It is sacred to all three religions and has been the focal point of much of the strife in that area going back to well before the First Crusade.
As this article shows Bin Laden has since broadened his scope a bit. And is now seeking legitimacy, and material support, for his war from many different sources besides the rich Saudis who've funded him in the past.
True those companies provide the services for voting stations and tallies and, so long as there is legal oversight I have no problem with that.
What I inferred from your statement was that corporations decide how the votes are counted and whose vote counts in secret. While these systems exist and while Florida's recent forays into them showed that proprietary systems are untrustworthy, I would still argue that we are not completely powerless, yet and that we still can take action.
I would also argue that we cannot allow the need for electoral reform to be co-opted by the private sector to make them money and to hide our electoral system further from public view.
I am also not arguiong that voting alone is sufficient.
The corporations don't count the votes (at least not yet), the major parties do that. Outside of Florida, the counting priocess is still subject to legal requiorements that (should) prevent total blatant fraud. Thr only thing that keeps those restrictions in place is the fact that the Republicans and Democrats trust each other even less than they trust Ralph Nader.
A million votes will still have an impact, especially in state senate races and congressional races. And now is the time to harness those votes before things get worse.
I disagree. Although we cannot, or do not, donate money on the same scale and microsoft, BillG is not, yet, in a position to buy our votes. All of the donations in the world can't guarantee that they will be elected if enough of us are actually paying attention.
Money or not, they still need votes to get elected and if they think their jobs are at stake, they'll kowtow so fast its not even funny. What we have to do is show them that we are paying attention, and that we do care. We also have to show that we won't be bought off with false talk of compromise.
We have a similar thing here in the U.S. The Green Party. Many people would argue that they are a "special interest" group. I would argue that any group can be labeled a "special Interest" the question is really what special interests are on my side?
True Windows hasn't succeeded in crushing Linx, but the "bandwidth" of pcs is unlimited. If I buy a new computer and put Linux on it it doesn't directly effect the neighboring systems.
WiFi is different. There you have a limited amount of bandwidth that is availible and inevitably debates will arise over who can have it. The First Come First Served argument probably won't cut it unless you can afford the same quality legal teams as IBM, Intel, and AT&T.
Take the case of Starbucks vs. Oregon's Personal Telco reported here. In that cose both sides are using open spectrum but Starbucks is claiming some sort of "inalienable right" to own the frequency since it is the same frequency that they use in any other city. Personal Telco is a volunteer project so they can hardly afford the lawyers to fight this one off.
And, even if the established free projects don't get shut down the revolution may still be stopped. Those free projects aren't ubiquitous. If Starbucks, AT&T and the rest overload the spectrum in other areas (such as rural areas) then there will be no room for new groups to start up.
I'm not arguing that AT&T has this in mind or that they have "no right" to step in and provide this service. But, I do believe that when push comes to shove (I'm certain that it will) and lawyers get involved, then the issue will be decided on the decidedly skewed playing field of the courts, in front of the FCC and in Congress where AT&T's deep pockets will hold sway.
Don't forget that most if not all of the energy used on this planet (to drive irrigation systems) comes from such environmentally friendly sources such as Coal, Petroleum, and Nuclear Fission all of which throw pollution into the air, water, and soil.
Air pollution causes disease and effects global warming. Water pollution can lead to acid rain, if not the poisoning of plants and eventually, drought. Poisoned soil does the same. And, let's not forget what would happen if radioactive materials get into the air...
I'd also point out that pumping water for irrigation can lower the water table leading to drought just as pumping a lot of water out of a river can affect areas downstream.
What is a more "future Proof" medium. Yes you could argue that Magnetic tape is a bad choice but, then again so are CDRoms, Paper and Stone tablets. All of them tend to break down over time. And, even if you print the whole thing to paper (or film for the videos) you face the fact that over the truly long term such recordings get lost or like old languages (such as Ancient Greek and Algol) we occasionally lose the ability to translate them.
IMHO the first part of your post was more on target, if we want to keep these things around we need to maintain them. We need to be porting them every so often from one format to the next.
Unfortunately the set of all data that we want to save is monotonically increasing. Therefore the cost of storing and maintaining all of the "important stuff" in purpetuity will be increasing as well. So then we have to start deciding what will or will not be kept (in other words what someone wants to pay for) and what gets dropped. What's more important, the original Domesday book or the digital version?
If the DOE is sinking money into funding this project then do they own the subsequent life form? Does J. Craig Venter get to patent its genes and control who does and does not use it. They say that they are planning to hobble it so that it can't leave the lav without their assistance.
I realize that this may sound farfetched (this is a single-celled lifeform). But, what legal precident does this establish with regards to ownership. If they argue "we made it we own it," what does that mean for clones?
Ownership of genes is already a big issue (they can patent you see here)
So that having been said I'm glad to hear J Craig mention "eithics" but I'm still not sutre that I trust him, the DOE or this project.
What was it like to do the first on-screen interracial kiss? How much effort did it take to make the studio go along with it, and how much of an effect did it have on you and the show as a whole?
What's the secret of your Mojo?
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Ask William Shatner
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· Score: 4, Interesting
Seriously, Kirk just got many more women than any other ST character in any series. Where did that mojo come from, and where can I buy it online?
BTW his official site is: www.williamshatner.com/ (predictably). It answeres many of the "what have you been up to" questions.
First of all, How do you define "promoting Homosexuality?" If by that you mean a page that says "Homosexulaity is something that all kids should try" then perhaps you have a point. But, if you mean a page of information about Homosexuality or a page promoting tolerance of it in others, even if you do not practice it yourself, then I fail to see your point.
IMHO (and so far as I can tell the Supreme Court's) Homosexuality is not a religion. Moreover making information about any view or advocating tolerance of it in others (but not necessarily practice of it) is not a promotion of the religion itself. Therefore it is not a violation of the constitution. IMHO it is the job of librarians to make information availible and to advocate a world in which all views can be discussed and herd. This is not the same as promoting the views themselves and is therefore legal.
I would then ask what you consider to be a "balancing view". If the page is (as I would guess) providing information on the subject and advocating tolerance of it in others then do you feel that you need a page advocating intolerance? Or do you want to put up a page explaining how it is "sexually destructive"? In the case of the former I would say that that does not deserve to be on the page as all you are seeking to do is to suppress any discussion which runs counter to the purpose of libraries.
In the latter, then the question becomes more difficult and you may have a point however the problem them becomes one of "what is information?" If the library page explains what homosexuality is then that is a statement of fact that you would have to counter with facts. If it is a page saying "God does not oppose Homosexuality" then that is an opinion that should be up for open debate and it may be that they put up the page in order to make a debate possible in which case I would agree with them.
My point was not that children need to be blinded. My point was that they need guidance not the automatic blinders that the CIPA calls for.
However I would disagree with the idea that "images do no harm." IMHO most five year-olds are not equipped to face an image of the Holocoust or even people having sex without some guidance. It is up to the parent to guide the kid to see those images appropriately. By that I don't mean censoring the images, I mean discuss them with the child so that they know what is going on and can learn, in short being a parent.
Personally I think I'd prefer a five year old's seeing a naked man to them seeing a maimed one. As to the Bible, I wouldn't try to pin Hollywood's glorification of violence just on that.
Actually that provision exists in the CIPA. The Justices noted it but still considered the law a problem because
although the librarians were required to turn it off they may not want to.
this would force everyone to get clearence from a librarian and basically announce to the world at large what they are looking at before they do so, opening them up to censure.
Many systems block sites "invisibly" or in ways that will prevent legitimate adults from ever knowing that they exist and thus being unable to ask for the provision to be turned off.
To which I would add two more reasons why that is an issue:
If it can be turned off all the time, it can be accidentally left off, hacked or spoofed thus making the system even less effective in the face of determined teenagers.
In the face of recent USA Patriot rulings on librarians being forced to divulge recently secret information this is one more thing that librarians can be forced to log and then divulge.
One other problem with the act that has been noted by many groups including the federal government is that the CIPA imposes the same standards on Teenagers as it does on your five-year old. While on the surface that seems (legally) reasonable it falls down in the face of teenagers doing school reports on breast cancer, etc. The rules for Teenagers really should be different. If I have to do a report on HIV in Health class it makes no sense for me to be banned from seeing the materials. Moreover, how are teenagers supposed to learn to deal with this stuff if they never see it until they turn 18?
I agree with you that children need to be protected from harmful materials online, just as they need to be protected from harmful people on the street, and from playing with handguns. However I beleive that the federally mandated systems in the CIPA and others will do more harm than good for the reasons above and because no software can make the kinds of appropriate decisions that parents can.
You might also see the American Library Association's page on the issue and the report of the COPA committee (a congressional task force) here. Note I do not necessarily agree with all of what they say however.
Cdbaby isn't a bad choice I hear. They focus on international distribution of indie bands not the localized system that the post is discusssing but they are definitely more amenable to fans than the RIAA.
"What can be done in a single state? A great deal. We will repeal state taxes and wasteful state government programs. We will end the collaboration between state and federal law enforcement officials in enforcing unconstitutional laws. We will repeal laws regulating drugs and guns. We will end asset forfeiture and abuses of eminent domain.
We will privatize utilities and end inefficient regulations and monopolies. Then we will negotiate directly with the federal government for more autonomy."
While in principle I agree with the objection to unconstitutional laws I have a real problem with privatizing everything. I see street-sweeping, electricity, etc. as one of the reasons for government. As Enron, and Colifornia have shown private companies cannot be trusted with basic infrastructure. And, as At&T, the RIAA, and AOLTW have shown eliminating all regulation is the best way to encourage monopolies.
I hate bad government, I also hate bad corporations.
Sony is, like most major conglomerates, dozens of businesses in one heading. No matter what happens one part of sony will lose something and another part will gain something. By tacitly supporting this (or rather not coming out against it) they avoid pissing off the other music publishers (Sony is one). While their electronics division makes a profit off of the current state of affairs. If the laws don't get passed they continue to make money off of the clie and their publishing arm takes a hit. If the laws do get passed then they move in to making money off of "secure" players taking a hit for sales of old rios, and the publishing arm does fine.
Eaither way they're still standing, and still making money.
Last week, Ratcliff sent the Groundwork Books collective a letter saying that its members must write an essay saying they understand they broke the law and would not do it again. "Groundwork Books will be placed on probation for the 2002-2003 academic year and may be suspended and deregistered as a student organization if during this time it posts material supporting a (foreign terrorist organization) on a Web site it maintains," Ratcliff wrote.
...Ratcliff said. "The information on the site, if you look at it, wasn't viewed as news by the institution, but information the site meant to build support for these organizations.
It wasn't an impartial, balanced presentation with analysis or interpretation. These were sites that were trying to generate sympathy."
BEGIN RANT::
Is it just Me or does this sound like a dark mixture of mindless jingoism and high-school wrist-slapping. It seems to me that the university is saying that any group who even mentions the name of "bad people" (as defined by the State Department). Is guilty of helping those [bad] people do their [bad] things. The only way, under their interpretation of the Patriot act, that one can reference any organization opposed by the State Department is to wrap all references in disclaimers such as: "These people are evil and must die according to the U.S. Government..." And, even then they are not sure that links would be permissible.
This seems to be based upon three (stupid) notions. Firstly that providing a link to someone's website or a reference to them is the same as supplying them with guns. Secondly, that it is the university's job to purge all links to "improper" views from their website and all references to "improper" views from their students' speech. And thirdly, that we are all better off not knowing anything about "bad people" rather than hearing their views and potentially learning what they are all about.
IMHO the first is foolish because providing a link is not the same as sending material resources. True it helps FARC get their word out, but so does saying their name FARC, FARC FARC FARC FARC FARC... any time that I say it someone may go to look up their site and will find their name in the TLD. Do we purge the word from Google too?
IMHO the second runs contrary to the purpose of a university, to educate and advance human knowledge. As the U.S. Government concluded in their study on children and the Internet, simply cutting people off from "bad" things doesn't help them any. All that it does is narrow their view and make them unable to deal with the "bad" things when the time comes to face them. Moreover it encourages people to take an authoritarian viewpoint of "just accepts what you are told" that is incompatible with a democracy where it is our duty to question the government. I bet the university has no problem with them linking to the free-Tibet groups that China considers terrorists. After all, they're ok.
I'm not sure what bothers me more, all that or the fact that they forced the book group to write a public letter apologizing for their views thus opening them up for public abuse. Sounds just like something a High-school principal would do.
RANT OFF
Re:There have always been 2 types of engineers
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Engineer in a Box?
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· Score: 2
On the plus side, if you actually achieve something, many of those mindless majority will adore you with almost the same fervour usually reserved for Britney Spears. Hmm, a little scary, that. Perhaps that's why there are problems with innovation...
Somehow I don't think so. Look at what has happened to HP, or the behavior of the RIAA towards musicians. In both cases, the interesting innovators are lauded just long enough to get their ideas from them and then they are tossed out so that the vultures can perform "incremental evolution" and squeeze the money out of things. They don't love you they just, like buzzards, see you as a promising meal ticket.
There's a great article at The Register that discusses this dynamic with regards to HP.
Unlike the christmas toys though, they are actually working on acheiving something. According to the article the goal is to build an infrastucture allowing the poor to communicate and thus organize for a better life.
[BTW:: I knew that you were kidding but I wanted to make the point.]
``We have to figure what happened here,'' said Greenstein. ``5C worked awfully hard to put these encryption rules into its agreement to
achieve a certain level of consumer recording rights. Having fought for it, we don't intend to relinquish it.''
This just says it all.
They negotiated carefully behind closed doors to limit our rights and now are pissed that things changed. Even this guy who says that they weren't too far admits that the whole goal was to limit our rights. Perhaps 5G is intended only for PPV but there'll be other "agreements" and other restrictions once digital copying is ubiquitous.
Slashdot Mirror
IMHO It could also be a life insurance policy. Think about it, although Machiavelli's insights onto how to run a kingdom were not widely availible (The Prince wasn't written until 1513 the same year that Da Vinci died) there was enough backstabbing and evil to go around in DaVinci's day. What's to stop the local prince (or would-be prince) from killing or torturing the man himself and stealing all his books and papers. Only the fact that without him the designs are useless. If you want the weapons then you'll need the man, alive, well, and on your side not in your dungeon.
It's not that simpe though. In their efforts to catch the bombers or would-be bombers the Israeli Army has invaded whole towns. In their effort to catch "the bad guys" they tend to kill a lot of noncombatants (see here for one example) and cause a great deal of death and detructon for the general populace (see here ). According to NPR the Israeli Army recently won the right to destroy the homes of any bomber's relatives as a punitive response, not the kind of thing that brings people to your side. So, in terms of killings obth sides has their share of blood on their hands, both sides have killed women and children. I would argue that at least on one level you have to stop playing tit for tat if you want to move forward and, at this point, arguing about "who started it" would involve going back to well before the Roman Empire.
The problem is that, to an extent the Israelis are doing that. The new "settlements" are not (all) going into completely empty space. Many of them are being created on top of palestinian villages that have been raized. See this article that was reprinted from the NY Times. And, as other articles have shown it's not just about the amount of land being occupied by taking strategic positions, and gaining control of water. For most Palestineans what is occuring is just a long protracted invasion, house by house and street by street.
He did once and still does oppose the U.S.'s presence in Saudi Arabia and our support for the house of Saud. My understanding is that that is based upon two factors. Firstly, the House of Saud is a fairly repressive (and yet semi-secular) monarchy (see here for one example). Secondly, Saudi Arabia, like Iraw houses some major centers of Islamic culture, hisrory, and religion among them Mecca the biorthplace of the Prophet Mohommed and the location of his tomb.
For some hard-core muslim fundamentalists, the idea that non-muslims would be in or around Mecca especially with the backing of a secular monarchy is abhorrent. This feeling runs paralell to the abhorrence that some fundamentalist christians and fundamentalist jews feel at the idea of anyone but them being allowed to govern the holy land.
To get an idea of it take a look at the issues surrounding the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. It is sacred to all three religions and has been the focal point of much of the strife in that area going back to well before the First Crusade.
As this article shows Bin Laden has since broadened his scope a bit. And is now seeking legitimacy, and material support, for his war from many different sources besides the rich Saudis who've funded him in the past.
True those companies provide the services for voting stations and tallies and, so long as there is legal oversight I have no problem with that.
What I inferred from your statement was that corporations decide how the votes are counted and whose vote counts in secret. While these systems exist and while Florida's recent forays into them showed that proprietary systems are untrustworthy, I would still argue that we are not completely powerless, yet and that we still can take action.
I would also argue that we cannot allow the need for electoral reform to be co-opted by the private sector to make them money and to hide our electoral system further from public view.
I am also not arguiong that voting alone is sufficient.
I disagree.
The corporations don't count the votes (at least not yet), the major parties do that. Outside of Florida, the counting priocess is still subject to legal requiorements that (should) prevent total blatant fraud. Thr only thing that keeps those restrictions in place is the fact that the Republicans and Democrats trust each other even less than they trust Ralph Nader.
A million votes will still have an impact, especially in state senate races and congressional races. And now is the time to harness those votes before things get worse.
I disagree. Although we cannot, or do not, donate money on the same scale and microsoft, BillG is not, yet, in a position to buy our votes. All of the donations in the world can't guarantee that they will be elected if enough of us are actually paying attention.
/. petitions then they would notice, and fear, because that's enough people to tip the balance in an election.
If a million of us went over the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union, Moveon.org or started our own
Money or not, they still need votes to get elected and if they think their jobs are at stake, they'll kowtow so fast its not even funny. What we have to do is show them that we are paying attention, and that we do care. We also have to show that we won't be bought off with false talk of compromise.
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Taken the Eff Challenge yet?
You can get more info on this from OpenSecrets.org.
We have a similar thing here in the U.S. The Green Party. Many people would argue that they are a "special interest" group. I would argue that any group can be labeled a "special Interest" the question is really what special interests are on my side?
True Windows hasn't succeeded in crushing Linx, but the "bandwidth" of pcs is unlimited. If I buy a new computer and put Linux on it it doesn't directly effect the neighboring systems.
WiFi is different. There you have a limited amount of bandwidth that is availible and inevitably debates will arise over who can have it. The First Come First Served argument probably won't cut it unless you can afford the same quality legal teams as IBM, Intel, and AT&T.
Take the case of Starbucks vs. Oregon's Personal Telco reported here. In that cose both sides are using open spectrum but Starbucks is claiming some sort of "inalienable right" to own the frequency since it is the same frequency that they use in any other city. Personal Telco is a volunteer project so they can hardly afford the lawyers to fight this one off.
And, even if the established free projects don't get shut down the revolution may still be stopped. Those free projects aren't ubiquitous. If Starbucks, AT&T and the rest overload the spectrum in other areas (such as rural areas) then there will be no room for new groups to start up.
I'm not arguing that AT&T has this in mind or that they have "no right" to step in and provide this service. But, I do believe that when push comes to shove (I'm certain that it will) and lawyers get involved, then the issue will be decided on the decidedly skewed playing field of the courts, in front of the FCC and in Congress where AT&T's deep pockets will hold sway.
Don't forget that most if not all of the energy used on this planet (to drive irrigation systems) comes from such environmentally friendly sources such as Coal, Petroleum, and Nuclear Fission all of which throw pollution into the air, water, and soil.
Air pollution causes disease and effects global warming. Water pollution can lead to acid rain, if not the poisoning of plants and eventually, drought. Poisoned soil does the same. And, let's not forget what would happen if radioactive materials get into the air...
I'd also point out that pumping water for irrigation can lower the water table leading to drought just as pumping a lot of water out of a river can affect areas downstream.
Considering that noone takes the time to update most Win2k boxes with the latest patches it makes perfect sense.
A properly administered linux box will take more time and money than a crappy and insecure Win2k box.
What is a more "future Proof" medium. Yes you could argue that Magnetic tape is a bad choice but, then again so are CDRoms, Paper and Stone tablets. All of them tend to break down over time. And, even if you print the whole thing to paper (or film for the videos) you face the fact that over the truly long term such recordings get lost or like old languages (such as Ancient Greek and Algol) we occasionally lose the ability to translate them.
IMHO the first part of your post was more on target, if we want to keep these things around we need to maintain them. We need to be porting them every so often from one format to the next.
Unfortunately the set of all data that we want to save is monotonically increasing. Therefore the cost of storing and maintaining all of the "important stuff" in purpetuity will be increasing as well. So then we have to start deciding what will or will not be kept (in other words what someone wants to pay for) and what gets dropped. What's more important, the original Domesday book or the digital version?
If the DOE is sinking money into funding this project then do they own the subsequent life form? Does J. Craig Venter get to patent its genes and control who does and does not use it. They say that they are planning to hobble it so that it can't leave the lav without their assistance.
I realize that this may sound farfetched (this is a single-celled lifeform). But, what legal precident does this establish with regards to ownership. If they argue "we made it we own it," what does that mean for clones?
Ownership of genes is already a big issue (they can patent you see here)
So that having been said I'm glad to hear J Craig mention "eithics" but I'm still not sutre that I trust him, the DOE or this project.
What was it like to do the first on-screen interracial kiss? How much effort did it take to make the studio go along with it, and how much of an effect did it have on you and the show as a whole?
Seriously, Kirk just got many more women than any other ST character in any series. Where did that mojo come from, and where can I buy it online?
BTW his official site is: www.williamshatner.com/ (predictably). It answeres many of the "what have you been up to" questions.
First of all, How do you define "promoting Homosexuality?" If by that you mean a page that says "Homosexulaity is something that all kids should try" then perhaps you have a point. But, if you mean a page of information about Homosexuality or a page promoting tolerance of it in others, even if you do not practice it yourself, then I fail to see your point.
IMHO (and so far as I can tell the Supreme Court's) Homosexuality is not a religion. Moreover making information about any view or advocating tolerance of it in others (but not necessarily practice of it) is not a promotion of the religion itself. Therefore it is not a violation of the constitution. IMHO it is the job of librarians to make information availible and to advocate a world in which all views can be discussed and herd. This is not the same as promoting the views themselves and is therefore legal.
I would then ask what you consider to be a "balancing view". If the page is (as I would guess) providing information on the subject and advocating tolerance of it in others then do you feel that you need a page advocating intolerance? Or do you want to put up a page explaining how it is "sexually destructive"? In the case of the former I would say that that does not deserve to be on the page as all you are seeking to do is to suppress any discussion which runs counter to the purpose of libraries.
In the latter, then the question becomes more difficult and you may have a point however the problem them becomes one of "what is information?" If the library page explains what homosexuality is then that is a statement of fact that you would have to counter with facts. If it is a page saying "God does not oppose Homosexuality" then that is an opinion that should be up for open debate and it may be that they put up the page in order to make a debate possible in which case I would agree with them.
Just my $0.02
My point was not that children need to be blinded. My point was that they need guidance not the automatic blinders that the CIPA calls for.
However I would disagree with the idea that "images do no harm." IMHO most five year-olds are not equipped to face an image of the Holocoust or even people having sex without some guidance. It is up to the parent to guide the kid to see those images appropriately. By that I don't mean censoring the images, I mean discuss them with the child so that they know what is going on and can learn, in short being a parent.
Personally I think I'd prefer a five year old's seeing a naked man to them seeing a maimed one. As to the Bible, I wouldn't try to pin Hollywood's glorification of violence just on that.
To which I would add two more reasons why that is an issue:
One other problem with the act that has been noted by many groups including the federal government is that the CIPA imposes the same standards on Teenagers as it does on your five-year old. While on the surface that seems (legally) reasonable it falls down in the face of teenagers doing school reports on breast cancer, etc. The rules for Teenagers really should be different. If I have to do a report on HIV in Health class it makes no sense for me to be banned from seeing the materials. Moreover, how are teenagers supposed to learn to deal with this stuff if they never see it until they turn 18?
I agree with you that children need to be protected from harmful materials online, just as they need to be protected from harmful people on the street, and from playing with handguns. However I beleive that the federally mandated systems in the CIPA and others will do more harm than good for the reasons above and because no software can make the kinds of appropriate decisions that parents can.
You might also see the American Library Association's page on the issue and the report of the COPA committee (a congressional task force) here. Note I do not necessarily agree with all of what they say however.
Cdbaby isn't a bad choice I hear. They focus on international distribution of indie bands not the localized system that the post is discusssing but they are definitely more amenable to fans than the RIAA.
see here
While in principle I agree with the objection to unconstitutional laws I have a real problem with privatizing everything. I see street-sweeping, electricity, etc. as one of the reasons for government. As Enron, and Colifornia have shown private companies cannot be trusted with basic infrastructure. And, as At&T, the RIAA, and AOLTW have shown eliminating all regulation is the best way to encourage monopolies.
I hate bad government, I also hate bad corporations.
Irvu.
Sony is, like most major conglomerates, dozens of businesses in one heading. No matter what happens one part of sony will lose something and another part will gain something. By tacitly supporting this (or rather not coming out against it) they avoid pissing off the other music publishers (Sony is one). While their electronics division makes a profit off of the current state of affairs. If the laws don't get passed they continue to make money off of the clie and their publishing arm takes a hit. If the laws do get passed then they move in to making money off of "secure" players taking a hit for sales of old rios, and the publishing arm does fine.
Eaither way they're still standing, and still making money.
BEGIN RANT::
Is it just Me or does this sound like a dark mixture of mindless jingoism and high-school wrist-slapping. It seems to me that the university is saying that any group who even mentions the name of "bad people" (as defined by the State Department). Is guilty of helping those [bad] people do their [bad] things. The only way, under their interpretation of the Patriot act, that one can reference any organization opposed by the State Department is to wrap all references in disclaimers such as: "These people are evil and must die according to the U.S. Government..." And, even then they are not sure that links would be permissible.
This seems to be based upon three (stupid) notions. Firstly that providing a link to someone's website or a reference to them is the same as supplying them with guns. Secondly, that it is the university's job to purge all links to "improper" views from their website and all references to "improper" views from their students' speech. And thirdly, that we are all better off not knowing anything about "bad people" rather than hearing their views and potentially learning what they are all about.
IMHO the first is foolish because providing a link is not the same as sending material resources. True it helps FARC get their word out, but so does saying their name FARC, FARC FARC FARC FARC FARC... any time that I say it someone may go to look up their site and will find their name in the TLD. Do we purge the word from Google too?
IMHO the second runs contrary to the purpose of a university, to educate and advance human knowledge. As the U.S. Government concluded in their study on children and the Internet, simply cutting people off from "bad" things doesn't help them any. All that it does is narrow their view and make them unable to deal with the "bad" things when the time comes to face them. Moreover it encourages people to take an authoritarian viewpoint of "just accepts what you are told" that is incompatible with a democracy where it is our duty to question the government. I bet the university has no problem with them linking to the free-Tibet groups that China considers terrorists. After all, they're ok.
I'm not sure what bothers me more, all that or the fact that they forced the book group to write a public letter apologizing for their views thus opening them up for public abuse. Sounds just like something a High-school principal would do.
RANT OFF
On the plus side, if you actually achieve something, many of those mindless majority will adore you with almost the same fervour usually reserved for Britney Spears. Hmm, a little scary, that. Perhaps that's why there are problems with innovation...
Somehow I don't think so. Look at what has happened to HP, or the behavior of the RIAA towards musicians. In both cases, the interesting innovators are lauded just long enough to get their ideas from them and then they are tossed out so that the vultures can perform "incremental evolution" and squeeze the money out of things. They don't love you they just, like buzzards, see you as a promising meal ticket.
There's a great article at The Register that discusses this dynamic with regards to HP.
Unlike the christmas toys though, they are actually working on acheiving something. According to the article the goal is to build an infrastucture allowing the poor to communicate and thus organize for a better life.
[BTW:: I knew that you were kidding but I wanted to make the point.]
This just says it all.
They negotiated carefully behind closed doors to limit our rights and now are pissed that things changed. Even this guy who says that they weren't too far admits that the whole goal was to limit our rights. Perhaps 5G is intended only for PPV but there'll be other "agreements" and other restrictions once digital copying is ubiquitous.