Life and times of Jason since 2001
And more as I think of it. Suggestions are welcome.
Ripping a ten song CD could end up costing you up to $1.5 million if the RIAA and Rep. Conyers (D-MI) have their way.
Global Warming’s greatest threat: ZOMBIES!
Microsoft vs. Yahoo! – Earlier this week Microsoft announced an aggressive buyout bid of Yahoo! valued at $44 billion. CNet News has put the two companies Web 2.0 properties side by side to see which products might win out in a merger.
iPhone Vs. Semi: a draw?
Can a Jedi lightsaber cut through Superman?
Warner Music’s business plan – Step 1: Report Loss. Step 3: Give Bonus.
News Corp. might be looking to merge with Yahoo! too.
TMZ is reporting that the medical examiner has ruled that Heath Ledger’s death was caused by “acute intoxication by the combined effects of oxycodone, hydrocodone, diazepam, temazepam, alprazolam, and doxylamine.”
Spice Gun NOT for hunting Spice Girls – BAM! You just shot some flavor into that dish!
YouTube banned Santeri Ojala’s account earlier this week after copyright infringement complaints. His videos mash guitar rockin’ footage with his purposefully bad playing skills with pretty funny results. Never fear, though, WIRED has the videos here.
Charles Fawcett passed away on February 3rd at the age of 92:
When the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939 Fawcett joined the Polish army but had been in barracks for only a week before escaping from the advancing Nazis and hitchhiking back to Paris. When the French rejected his application to enlist, Fawcett joined the Section Volontaire des Américains – the ambulance corps.
He was sharing a studio with another young American, Bill Holland, whose mother was a German aristocrat. One of Holland’s relatives, General Otto von Stülpnagel, had been appointed commander-in-chief of occupied France, and when Holland introduced Fawcett to senior German officers he was able to pass important information to the French Resistance.
In Paris Fawcett also took part in the rescue of a group of British prisoners-of-war who had been placed under French guard in a hospital ward by the Germans. By impersonating a German ambulance crew, Fawcett and a comrade marched in at 4am and ordered the French nurses to usher the PoWs out into the yard. “Gentlemen,” he announced as he drove them away, “consider yourself liberated.”
“You’re a Yank,” said a British voice.
“Never,” came Fawcett’s lilting southern burr, “confuse a Virginian with a Yankee.”
Fascinating life. (h/t Kottke)
Recommended Reading: Harry Frankfurt’s “On Bullshit”
All the web designing cheat sheets you might ever need. (via Kottke)
All natural male enhancement, mail fraud, bank fraud and money laundering in one little pill thanks to Enzyte.
Immigration becomes less and less an issue every day. A report by the Public Policy Institute of California says that foreign-born folks aren’t more likely to beat you up. In fact, it looks like the opposite. (h/t Doug)
I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords.
Roger Clemens was totally at that bitchin’ party Jose Canseco threw and he is so busted. Because, you know, the government doesn’t have better things to do.
Richmond’s got itself a new literary journal: Makeout Creek. The first issue features writings and art from David Berman, Tom De Haven, R. Kuszyk, Clint McCown, Sto, Allison Titus and more. You can find copies at Chop Suey’s two locations and a place up in NYC if you find yourself up there. Read more about it at RVANews.
Style Weekly’s Scott Bass has a little ditty this week that cherry picks from River City Rapids as an example of Jon Baliles readiness and presumed eagerness to take a job with Mayor Wilder’s press office. Because, clearly, if you support something you must be looking to get a job with that thing as well.
Where to begin…
Let’s start with the cherry picking. You grab four posts out of three and a half years of blogging and he’s begging for a job? You find four instances where Jon is supportive of the Mayor, one from Jan. 2005, the most recent from Oct. 2007, and this is supposed to be a feeler for employment?
Now, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Scott’s onto something here. I mean, I wrote an awful lot about IHOP’s Free Pancake Day. Who wouldn’t want to be the spokesman for Free Pancake Day? I could be IHOP’s Jared, only instead of losing a ton of weight by eating their food I’d be the fat guy that became large and in charge thanks to IHOP and their all you can eat pancake special!
Second, minor, but Scott Bass wrote the article and the first quoted post happens to mention, wait for it… a Scott Bass article! Dear Scott, now that I have cited you and an article you wrote, can I expect a piece to be written about me quoting the time I wrote about you? Please? Maybe I can hook you up with free pancakes. (I jest.)
Third, I think Jon’s being honest when he says the offer surprised him and he really had to think about accepting it.
While there certainly are bloggers out there who blog hoping and praying that someone will see their work and hire them on the spot to do what they’ve been doing, many bloggers simply write because they care about something. Jon cares about Richmond and at times he has found himself in agreement with Mayor Wilder on how to exactly “care about Richmond”. But I’m pretty sure there’s more to Jon than just his blog. Just as there is more to any number of bloggers who have been offered professional jobs in fields they blogged about (Conaway Haskins, John Henke, and Shaun Kenney to name a few).
Style and Scott have a right to pick on Jon a bit. That’s fine. But it’d have been nice if they provided the full URL to River City Rapids in the article and provided Style readers an opportunity to visit RCR and see for themselves how much Jon cares not for Doug Wilder but for the City of Richmond and its people.
Yesterday I commented on Turkey’s recalling of their ambassador in face of a House resolution calling the Armenian Genocide an actual genocide (read the resolution here). The post pulled a good number of anonymous responses that tried to create excuses that either fell into the “what about the others that have suffered?” or the “they deserved it” categories as a defense for Turkey.
The second point has been based merely on accusations that have not been backed up by any links or citations. It is not even conjecture and, barring evidence to support such claims, is easily dismissed as propaganda. Besides, the non-binding resolution does nothing to blame the current Turkish government for what happened, though it does shed light on Turkey’s denial of the events even occurring and attempt at white washing their own history.
The first point is a bit more touchy and understandable, yet fails in the face of “two wrongs don’t make a right”. If an error has been made in one area, is it wrong to try and correct a similar area elsewhere? When someone says “what about the others that have suffered?” you’re absolutely right. That others have suffered the same should be addressed as well. Certainly that might keep us busy for a long time to come, but we should not ignore it. That we haven’t addressed every human atrocity over the last 100 years is unfortunate, but that does not mean we should avoid addressing any of them. One thing at a time. This time it’s Armenia.
One point the comments failed to make against the resolution is the political one.
Why now?
Many see this as a political ploy by Democrats in Congress to slow bleed our military in Iraq and force an early withdrawl. As the CNN article noted:
Armed Services Committee Chairman Ike Skelton, D-Missouri, sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi opposing the resolution, and said the backlash threatened by Turkey could disrupt “America’s ability to redeploy U.S. military forces from Iraq,” a top Democratic priority.
Turkey, a NATO member, has been a key U.S. ally in the Middle East and a conduit for sending supplies into Iraq.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Wednesday that good relations with Turkey are vital because 70 percent of the air cargo sent to U.S. forces in Iraq and 30 percent of the fuel consumed by those forces fly through Turkey.
U.S. commanders “believe clearly that access to airfields and roads and so on, in Turkey, would very much be put at risk if this resolution passes and the Turks react as strongly as we believe they will,” Gates said.
Bagis said no French planes have flown through Turkish airspace since a French Parliament committee passed a similar resolution last year.
This massacre occured 90 years ago. Why are we only now drafting resolutions calling it a genocide? Certainly they’re overdue, but if this is happening merely as a method of draining our efforts in Iraq, is the sentiment really genuine? Are the Armenians and Ottoman Christians who suffered merely to once more be political pawns?
I find myself torn. On one hand, a genuine recognition and discussion of what happened needs to occur. It was our failure to remain involved and care about the Armenian genocide that inspired Hitler’s plans in Europe.
Yet to remember what happened and recognize it merely to score a backdoor political victory on an unrelated issue is disengenuious and does nothing but dishonor the memory of those who suffered through these horrible events.
A recognition and discussion of the Armenian genocide needs to occur, especially within Turkey itself. But if this is merely an opportunity to grand stand on an issue that no one cared about until they realized the political victory it could achieve on an issue they can’t seem to win when facing it head on then it is a disservice not only to our soldiers in Iraq but the Armenian people.
If it is not happening for the right reasons is it worth happening at all?
Turkey has recalled its ambassador in protest of a House resolution that recognizes Turkey’s massacare of Armenians for what it was: genocide. The Armenian Genocide saw the Ottoman Empire kill anywhere from 500,000 to 1.5 million Armenians and Ottoman Christians during forced round-ups and deportations, measures that are thought to have inspired Hitler. What happened needs to be recognized, whether or not Turkey wants to face it’s own history.
UPDATE: The issue was large enough to be front page news at the time and pull American’s into the international community. See New York Times articles from the era, using the search terms “armenians massacre”.
Some scientists may have figured out what exactly the appendix does other than get infected and try to kill you:
It produces and protects good germs for your gut.
That’s the theory from surgeons and immunologists at Duke University Medical School, published online in a scientific journal this week.
For generations the appendix has been dismissed as superfluous. Doctors figured it had no function. Surgeons removed them routinely. People live fine without them.
And when infected the appendix can turn deadly. It gets inflamed quickly and some people die if it isn’t removed in time. Two years ago, 321,000 Americans were hospitalized with appendicitis, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The function of the appendix seems related to the massive amount of bacteria populating the human digestive system, according to the study in the Journal of Theoretical Biology. There are more bacteria than human cells in the typical body. Most are good and help digest food.
But sometimes the flora of bacteria in the intestines die or are purged. Diseases such as cholera or amoebic dysentery would clear the gut of useful bacteria. The appendix’s job is to reboot the digestive system in that case.
While the new Iron And Wine album “The Shepard’s Dog” is very good, I’ve found myself prefering the “Boy With A Coin” single. “Carried Home” and “Kingdom Of Animals” are great songs that are only on the single and really makes it a must listen.
CBS: Gauging The Internet’s Political Power
In 1972, computers and campaigns were just getting acquainted. Fundraising appeals using direct mail lists were considered revolutionary – and helpful to a young Karl Rove working on the Nixon re-election campaign.”Young people have got to reach other young people,” Rove told CBS News at the time, “and that is what we are seeking to do.”The merger of politics and technology was so new the Nixon campaign felt its use of computers should be shielded from the public.
Time: Why Facebook Is The Future
Many view the web as a current generation thing, a way to engage teens and twenty-somethings, while aiming for anything beyond that has proven all but impossible. Facebook is slowly but surely pulling it off, broadening its market into demographics that matter most to politicos and campaigns focused on using new means to target traditional voters.
Orgeon Hill now has a neighborhood blog. Any bets on how long before VCU tries to take it over?