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  Bernie Sanders "We're Trying To Buck Up This President & Get Him To Say What Americans Want To Hear"
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    Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:02
  Nancy Pelosi "If these People Win Medicare As We Know It Will Be Gone!"
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    Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:02
  Michelle Obama "I Rarely Step Foot In The West Wing"
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:11
  Leader Of Zetas Drug Cartel Believed Killed By Marines
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:10
  ARTICULATE WHILE BLACK
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:54
  Green Beret Says State Dept Told Embassy In Libya STOP ASKING FOR EXTRA SECURITY
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:41
  Interview With Code Pink In Pakistan Protesting US Drone Strikes
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:00
  Jerry Sandusky Claims He Is Innocent Speaking From Jail One Day Before Sentencing
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 04:56
  George Zimmerman's Mother Speaks Out For The First Time
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    Tue, 09 Oct 2012 04:54
Twitter says its ads pay off for candidates
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  Source: Phys.org - latest science and technology news stories
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:56
  Twitter released a study showing its paid messages pay off for political candidates, not only in garnering attention but in driving campaign contributions.
  Twitter released a study Wednesday showing its paid messages pay off for political candidates, not only in garnering attention but in driving campaign contributions.
  The study by the marketing firm Compete found the average Twitter user was 68 percent more likely to visit a campaign donation page than the average Internet user.
  The likelihood increases when Twitter users are exposed to political tweets either from those they follow or "promoted" or paid messages.
  "Twitter users exposed to any of these kinds of political tweets are almost twice as likely (97 percent) as other Twitter users to visit an online political donation page," said Twitter's head of political ad sales, Peter Greenberger.
  Greenberger said in a blog post that these Twitter users are more likely to donate and also become more engaged in a campaign.
  He said the data didn't allow an analysis of individual campaigns but that increased donation rates by Twitter users were found to be very similar across all candidates and parties.
  "We have always known that Twitter users are politically engaged; now we know that exposure to political tweets drives political contributions," he said.
  (c) 2012 AFP
Russian Press Claims Pussy Riot Offered $700 Million World Tour Deal By US Companies
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  Source: WT news feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:56
  Following today's release of one member of the jailed Russian art group Pussy Riot on appeal, the Russian press is filled with wild rumors about the possibility of a lucrative worldwide Pussy Riot tour.According to multiple press reports, the band could net around 600 million euros ($700 million) for around 100 shows, and have been offered $10 million contract to record an album.
  "Our agency just blew up calls and letters from overseas promotional and production companies with offers to host concert tours for Pussy Riot after a member of the group was to be released from prison," a representative of live music company RU-CONCERT said, according to Life News. "Many of them are trying to use our agency to get the creator of the group."
  Life News specifically mentions the US-based concert group Live Nation as being behind the news. We've reached out for comment and will let you know if they get back to us.
  Of course, some have already noted that the economics of this rumored offer don't really seem to make any sense. However, if this concert actually goes through, ticket buyers should probably remember that Pussy Riot aren't really a band, and actually exist as more of an art collective. Don't go expecting Green Day.
Greek Prosectors Doubt Authenticity of Lagarde List.
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  Source: WT news feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:41
  PASOK Socialist leader Evangelos Venizelos is on the hot seat for failing to check Greek depositors in a Swiss bank for tax evasion when he was finance minister
  Finance Minister Yiannis Stournaras reportedly is going to ask French officials to deliver the original list of 1,991 Greeks with $1.95 billion in deposits in the Geneva branch of HSBC Bank to check for possible tax evasion after special prosecutors were said to doubt the authenticity of a version given them by Prime Minister Antonis Samaras' office.
  ProtoThema reported that former finance minister Evangelos Venizelos handed over a memory stick listing the names to Samaras' office and that it was then given to Stylianos Stasinopoulos, who was appointed by Samaras to head the financial crimes squad SDOE.
  The original CD, comprised of 24,000 names of the bank's depositors that was stolen and handed over to French authorities, was given to Venizelos' predecessor as finance minister, George Papaconstantinou, in 2010 by then French finance minister Christine Lagarde.
  She is now head of the International Monetary Fund, which, along with the European Union and European Central Bank, makes up the Troika bailing out Greece with $325 billion in rescue loans.
  After Stournaras said the original CD had gone missing, Venizelos turned up with a memory stick but it was reported he handed it over without making a copy and that special financial prosecutors Grigoris Peponis and Spyros Mouzakitis doubt it is either complete or authentic and want the original along with all verifying documents.
  Stasinopoulos, who comes from Samaras' home territory, was suddenly named to replace former SDOE chief Yiannis Diotis, who said he was on the trail of tax evaders when he was yanked out of the job. Tax cheats owe Greece some $70 billion but have largely escaped while Samaras is readying another $17.45 billion in austerity measures on workers, pensioners and the poor. Peponis and Mouzakitis said if they don't get the original CD they will seek legal redress.
  The revelation has put Venizelos, now the head of the floundering PASOK Socialist party, in a storm of criticism for failing to act on it at time when, as finance minister, he was doubling income and property taxes and taxing the poor. Venizelos has tried to defend himself by saying he could not use stolen data to investigate for possible crime but Lagarde said other countries have used the names to go after tax cheats.
  Venizelos said the names of the depositors were given to yet another former SDOE chief, Yiannis Kapeleris to examine, but Kapeleris said he only had 10 names and never saw the original list. Facing a backlash within his own party, which, with the Democratic Left is one of the partners in the coalition government led by Samaras, the New Democracy Conservative leader, Venizelos will appear before a Parliamentary committee to answer questions on why he failed to act.
  A leading PASOK member and former Interior Minister, Yiannis Ragousis, quit the party in disgust and there have been several other high-level defections since Venizelos came to power earlier this year, replacing failed former prime minister George Papandreou, who resigned a year ago in the face of constant protests, strikes and riots against the pay cuts, tax hikes and slashed pensions he imposed on orders of the Troika.
  Venizelos replaced Papaconstantinou as finance minister on June 11, 2011 and both reportedly gave depositions to Peponis and Mouzakitis where it was believed they merely repeated their public stances of why they failed to examine the names for possible tax evasion.
NSA Director Pushes Cybersecurity Bill.
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  Source: WT news feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:34
  Cyberattacks have breached the Pentagon and sent businesses into bankruptcy. Still, it might take a cyberdisaster that causes damage on the scale of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 to get lawmakers to pass legislation aimed at shoring up the U.S.'s infrastructure.
  The White House has proposed an executive order to address part of the problem, but Gen. Keith Alexander, the director of the National Security Agency and commander of U.S. Cyber Command, says that is not enough.
  The Pentagon has a pilot program that will help private companies work with the government to help them protect their own information.
  But that program ''doesn't give us the ability to work with the Internet service providers and allow that to benefit the rest of the critical infrastructure and the rest of government,'' Alexander said during an Oct. 1 panel discussion at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington. ''That's really what we need this legislation for.''
  An executive order also would fail to address liability protections to shield companies from lawsuits over information-sharing that are needed to encourage participation, says Susan Collins (Maine), the ranking Republican on the Senate Homeland Security Committee and a co-sponsor of cybersecurity legislation.
  ''I think the executive order is a mistake,'' Collins says. ''I fear that it actually could lull people into a false sense of security that we've taken care of cybersecurity.''
  This article first appeared in Aerospace Daily & Defense Report.
  '' Jen DiMascio
  October 10th, 2012 | Cyber | 1861911 Commentshttp%3A%2F%2Fdefensetech.org%2F2012%2F10%2F10%2Fnsa-director-pushes-cybersecurity-bill%2FNSA+Director+Pushes+Cybersecurity+Bill2012-10-10+15%3A30%3A44defensetechhttp%3A%2F%2Fdefensetech.org%2F%3Fp%3D18619
Experts: Global warming means more Antarctic ice.
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  Source: WT news feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:31
  WASHINGTON (AP) '-- The ice goes on seemingly forever in a white pancake-flat landscape, stretching farther than ever before. And yet in this confounding region of the world, that spreading ice may be a cockeyed signal of man-made climate change, scientists say.
  This is Antarctica, the polar opposite of the Arctic.
  While the North Pole has been losing sea ice over the years, the water nearest the South Pole has been gaining it. Antarctic sea ice hit a record 7.51 million square miles in September. That happened just days after reports of the biggest loss of Arctic sea ice on record.
  Climate change skeptics have seized on the Antarctic ice to argue that the globe isn't warming and that scientists are ignoring the southern continent because it's not convenient. But scientists say the skeptics are misinterpreting what's happening and why.
  Shifts in wind patterns and the giant ozone hole over the Antarctic this time of year '-- both related to human activity '-- are probably behind the increase in ice, experts say. This subtle growth in winter sea ice since scientists began measuring it in 1979 was initially surprising, they say, but makes sense the more it is studied.
  "A warming world can have complex and sometimes surprising consequences," researcher Ted Maksym said this week from an Australian research vessel surrounded by Antarctic sea ice. He is with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.
  Many experts agree. Ted Scambos of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Colorado adds: "It sounds counterintuitive, but the Antarctic is part of the warming as well."
  And on a third continent, David Vaughan of the British Antarctic Survey says that yes, what's happening in Antarctica bears the fingerprints of man-made climate change.
  "Scientifically the change is nowhere near as substantial as what we see in the Arctic," says NASA chief scientist Waleed Abdalati, an ice expert. "But that doesn't mean we shouldn't be paying attention to it and shouldn't be talking about it."
  Sea ice is always melting near one pole while growing around the other. But the overall trend year to year is dramatically less ice in the Arctic and slightly more in the Antarctic.
  It's most noticeable in September, when northern ice is at its lowest and southern ice at its highest. For over 30 years, the Arctic in September has been losing an average of 5.7 square miles of sea ice for every square mile gained in Antarctica.
  Loss of sea ice in the Arctic can affect people in the Northern Hemisphere, causing such things as a higher risk of extreme weather in the U.S. through changes to the jet stream, scientists say. Antarctica's weather peculiarities, on the other hand, don't have much effect on civilization.
  At well past midnight in Antarctica, where it's about 3 degrees, Maksym describes in a rare ship-to-shore telephone call from the R.V. Aurora Australis what this extra ice means in terms of climate change. And what it's like to be out studying it for two months, with the nearest city 1,500 miles away.
  "It's only you and the penguins," he says. "It's really a strikingly beautiful and stark landscape. Sometimes it's even an eerie kind of landscape."
  While the Arctic is open ocean encircled by land, the Antarctic '-- about 1.5 times the size of the U.S. '-- is land circled by ocean, leaving more room for sea ice to spread. That geography makes a dramatic difference in the two polar climates.
  The Arctic ice responds more directly to warmth. In the Antarctic, the main driver is wind, Maksym and other scientists say. Changes in the strength and motion of winds are now pushing the ice farther north, extending its reach.
  Those changes in wind are tied in a complicated way to climate change from greenhouse gases, Maksym and Scambos say. Climate change has created essentially a wall of wind that keeps cool weather bottled up in Antarctica, NASA's Abdalati says.
  And the wind works in combination with the ozone hole, the huge gap in Earth's protective ozone layer that usually appears over the South Pole. It's bigger than North America.
  It's caused by man-made pollutants chlorine and bromine, which are different from the fossil fuel emissions that cause global warming. The hole makes Antarctica even cooler this time of year because the ozone layer usually absorbs solar radiation, working like a blanket to keep the Earth warm.
  And that cooling effect makes the winds near the ground stronger and steadier, pushing the ice outward, Scambos says.
  University of Colorado researcher Katherine Leonard, who is on board the ship with Maksym, says in an email that the Antarctic sea ice is also getting snowier because climate change has allowed the air to carry more moisture.
  Winter sea ice has grown by about 1 percent a decade in Antarctica. If that sounds small, it's because it's an average. Because the continent is so large, it's a little like lumping together the temperatures of the Maine and California coasts, Vaughan says.
  Mark Serreze, director of the snow and ice data center, says computer models have long predicted that Antarctica would not respond as quickly to global warming as other places. Since 1960, the Arctic has warmed the most of the world's regions, and Antarctica has warmed the least, according to NASA data.
  Scientists on the cruise with Maksym are spending eight to 12 hours a day on the ice bundled up against the fierce wind with boots that look like Bugs Bunny's feet. It's dangerous work. Cracks in sea ice can form at any time. Just the other day a sudden fissure stranded a team of scientists until an inflatable bridge rescued them.
  "It's a treacherous landscape," Vaughan says.
BBC News - Pussy Riot member Yekaterina Samutsevich freed
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  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 23:29
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Developers: We warned Apple about iOS maps quality | Apple
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  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 22:17
  App developers say they gave Apple plenty of warning about issues with its iOS maps app revamp.
  Apple's Maps app on an iPhone 5.
  (Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET )To the casual observer it might appear that Apple was caught off guard by just how bad its in-house maps app was. But the company had plenty of warning.
  Developers have been complaining about Apple's Maps since shortly after they were given the first pre-release version in early June, CNET has learned. They say they filed bug requests, sent e-mails to specific Apple employees, and vented on message boards only other developers and Apple could see.
  "I posted at least one doomsayer rant after each (developer) beta, and I wasn't alone," a developer with three iOS apps in the App Store told CNET. "The mood amongst the developers seemed to be that the maps were so shockingly bad that reporting individual problems was futile. What was needed wasn't so much an interface for reporting a single point as incorrect, but for selecting an entire region and saying 'all of this -- it's wrong.'"
  All of the half dozen developers with whom CNET spoke -- each of whom have applications that rely on Apple's maps technology -- requested that their names and the names of their applications be kept out of this story because of ongoing relationships with the company. But they say the issues were well-documented among developers, who used four pre-release versions of the software before it was given to the public last month.
  Apple declined to comment.
  Threads on Apple's developer forums described some of the problems that appeared well ahead of the final version of the software, and they still existed when Apple shipped it, these people said. That includes mixed up locations, clouds in satellite imagery, and maps that were less detailed than the ones offered by rival Google, which provided the mapping technology until iOS 6.
  "During the beta period I filed bug reports with Apple's Radar system (notorious for being ignored), posted on the forums several times, and e-mailed multiple people within Apple's MapKit team to voice our concerns," another developer told CNET.
  One Apple employee did, in fact, get back to that person who complained, saying that the issue was "well understood," but that there was no news to report on mapping updates. They added that the developer was following the correct procedures for filing their complaints. Nonetheless, the developer told CNET there had been no updates to the bug reports, or extra information on how to deal with issues that were cropping up in apps, leaving them without answers.
  "This has been a frustrating experience for us and we don't care where the imagery comes from, we just would like our customers to be able to have the same experience within our app when they update from iOS 5 to iOS 6," the developer added. "Instead, the OS upgrade broke some of the features we built within our application despite being told that only the imagery would be swapped out."
  Differences in highway exits between Google Maps and Apple's iOS 6 Maps.
  (Credit: James Martin/CNET )New mapsApple's change to its own mapping technology were first publicly detailed at the company's annual developers conference in June. It's since been reported that the move was due to a breakdown in negotiations between the two companies, where Google wanted more control and branding of the app, while Apple wanted Google to bring key features like spoken turn-by-turn directions.
  Some of the developers CNET spoke to said they didn't fault Apple for wanting to build and control its own software, but lamented that it was seemingly rushed out the door before some of the issues were fixed.
  "I think if Apple really wanted to go down this path, then they should have given themselves a year to get everything right," said a developer who makes an application that lets users bookmark locations. "In that time, they could have offered their own maps as the default, but allowed users and developers the option to use Google Maps as an alternative."
  What happened instead was that Apple pushed its own software out, with the only alternative to get Google's maps through the browser, where certain features are missing. Google is now rumored to be scrambling to get a standalone maps app replacement ready to go by the end of the year, and is adding new features to its Web app in the meantime.
  New workIn an apology two weeks ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook promised improvements while urging users towards alternatives, saying "the more our customers use our Maps the better it will get."
  In the meantime, the changeover has been harder for developers to escape. The built-in maps are part of Apple's iOS software developer kit, requiring extra work, and sometimes expense to use alternatives and workarounds inside their applications.
  Two developers CNET spoke with said they were at work on changes to their applications to make use of mapping information from Google and Microsoft to offer as an alternative to Apple's built-in solution. A large reason for that was customer response, one of the developers said, adding that more than a third of his support queries since the launch of iOS 6 have been about downgrading back to iOS 5.
  "I don't have a great answer unless [customers] did certain technical procedures before upgrading to 6, of which most people don't do those or jailbreak their phone," the developer added. "I would prefer to spend my time on improving something instead of dealing with problems like this. An option would have been nice."
  An option is just what another developer said he was working on inside his travel-focused application. While he's still using Apple's maps for showing users search results, he's building in a way to hop out to the Web-based version of Google maps when it comes to helping people drive to those locations.
  Others have put together off-the-shelf tools for other developers to use, including a project called GoogleMapsOverlayiOS that replaces Apple's maps with map tiles from Google using a solution that originally tapped the Open Street Maps project.
  "I heard a lot of people from countries like (the) U.K, that maps are not good enough in their cities, it's huge problem for people who already have some app in appStore [sic] that's based on Google maps and Google maps API," creator Mladjan Antic says on the project's landing page.
  New York's Statue of Liberty, a 3D landmark that was added to maps after iOS 6 was released.
  (Credit: CNET )ImprovementsFor all the doom and gloom, developers say there has been some noticeable improvement with Apple's maps since the product became public. Chief among them: how far users can zoom in on a map, an important consideration for any app that makes use mapping imagery.
  Developers say that when the first beta version of iOS 6 was released, the satellite images developers could use could only be zoomed to 17, whereas in iOS 5 it was 19. To put that in perspective, it's like seeing the one-third of the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris, versus the whole thing while looking at it from above. This week Apple bumped it up to 18 for developers, and 19 within its own maps app. That ends up being a critical distance for apps that used imagery for measurement, or for precise location tracking, one developer said.
  Last week consumers also noticed improvements to some locations, including added 3D views, more recent satellite imagery, and fixes to search results. Apple did not put out any official mention or benchmark on how many changes were made, although in its apology note it pledged to "keep working non-stop" on the product.
  For developers, as for iPhone users, the improvements can't come fast enough.
Obama Administration Faulters Under Benghazi Scrutiny
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  Source: The Ulsterman Report
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 22:15
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Obama Apologies for Debate Performance - Wake the F Up: The Two Jobs of Barack Obama, Polite Man
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 21:46
  Photograph by Pete Souza/White House
  One thing he doesn't need right now is the lofty disdain of a man who's already president. He should leave that stuff back in the Oval Office. He doesn't work there right now.
  All due respect, Mr. President, but, holy mother of god, just shut up with this, will you?
  I defer to nobody in my belief that Willard Romney is the single most politically maladroit national candidate in my lifetime. But, boy howdy, the current president of the United States is giving him a run for his offshore money these days:
  "Well, two things. I mean, you know, the debate, I think it's fair to say I was just too polite, because, you know, it's hard to sometimes just keep on saying and what you're saying isn't true," Obama said on the Tom Joyner Morning Show on Wednesday. "It gets repetitive. But, you know, the good news is, is that's just the first one. Governor Romney put forward a whole bunch of stuff that either involved him running away from positions that he had taken, or doubling down on things like Medicare vouchers that are going to hurt him long term.... And, you know, I think it's fair to say that we will see a little more activity at the next one."
  All due respect, Mr. President, but everybody in the country knows that you shanked the first debate last week. (No, really, they do. Ask around.) The situation does not require that you personally reinforce that feeling, especially nearly a week after the fact. And I'm terribly sorry that you find it wearying to point out that obvious lies are, well, obvious lies, but, Jesus H. Christ with his own baby walrus, that's your job. This may not be the campaign in which you'd like to participate, what with all that nasty partisan politics and all, but it's the campaign you're in.
  Has it dawned on you yet that you're holding down two jobs at the moment? You are president of the United States and you are a political candidate for re-election. Each job has different requirements and different emotional imperatives. In your capacity as a political candidate, nobody cares whether or not you find pointing out that Willard Romney was lying about his tax plan, lying about his health-care plan, and lying about virtually everything you've done as president repetitive '-- and, as long as we're being frank here, what a prissy academic word that is to describe what should be a full-throated defense of your own record against a truthless and dangerous mountebank. Calling a liar out on all his lies should be energizing. It should get your blood up. It is one of the most important things you can do in your job as a political candidate.
  In your job as a political candidate, you are not allowed to find things like Willard Romney's lying '-- and its unsightly offspring, his evolving positions on virtually every important issue of the day '-- too boring to be worthy of your time and effort. It is your job to turn this most ridiculous man and his ridiculous positions into the fuel for your campaign, the grist for your mill, the garbage for your flux capacitor. One thing you don't need right now is the lofty disdain of a man who's already president. Leave that stuff back in the Oval. You don't work there right now.
New York Shitty - The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 21:44
  After two full weeks of moving to and living in New York City, I just got back to DC for ten days (doctor's appointments, etc.). All I can say is: what a relief.
  Moving is never easy; moving to New York City even harder. Moving to New York while blogging an election was probably too large a leap for an excitable chap like myself. Visiting NYC has always been a thrill. But living there? After the initial wonderland feel, you get to adjust to a whole new rhythm. Just in some basic respects - like getting online or using your phone - it's like going back in time a little. Time Warner cable ... well, I probably don't need to tell New Yorkers what it's like there. We bought the most expensive cable package to expedite my work at home - and it just decides to crawl like dial-up every few minutes. My mifi cannot get a signal that's stable. My iPhone is suddenly iffy - calls are dropped and online access is far slower than in DC. And if you keep your wifi open, it gets grabbed by squeegee hotspots that are hard to get rid of. Not a good time to lose Google maps either.
  Then the following: we went to a store and found a couch; they delivered the wrong one. We went to Best Buy to get a new TV; they delivered the wrong one. When they did deliver the right one, the cable-box was dead. We could not get any DVR either. I had to go into the Beast offices to live-blog Obama's implosion. Scalding hot water comes out of the cold faucet - randomly. And the space we live in is one fifth the size of our place in DC. Just to walk a few blocks requires barging your way through a melee of noise and rudeness and madness. And a glance at your bank account shows a giant sucking sound as the city effectively robs you of all your pennies at every juncture. When you're there for a few days or a week, it can be bracing. But living with this as a daily fact of life? How does anyone manage it?
  I'm told I should give it a few months. Since our lease is for twelve, I don't have much choice. Adjustment to NYC is a process. A really long, exasperating, draining process. Do you just have to harden yourself to live as if this is normal? Or will it get better? Please tell me it gets better.
Avoiding Walled Gardens on the Internet
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 21:24
  June 29, 2007I occasionally get requests to join private social networking sites, like LinkedIn or Facebook. I always politely decline. I understand the appeal of private social networking, and I mean no disrespect to the people who send invites. But it's just not for me.
  I feel very strongly that we already have the world's best public social networking tool right in front of us: it's called the internet. Public services on the web, such as blogs, twitter, flickr, and so forth, are what we should invest our time in. And because it's public, we can leverage the immense power of internet search to tie it all-- and each other-- together.
  In comparison, adding content to a private, walled garden on the internet smacks of the old-world America Online ideology:
  While at Sony in 1994, I was sent to Virginia to learn how to build a Sony "app" on AOL (the #3 online service, behind Compuserve & Prodigy at the time) using AOL's proprietary "rainman" platform. Fast forward to Facebook 2007 and see similarities: If you want access to their big base of users, develop something in their proprietary language for their people who live in their walled garden.
  It was so clear to me back in 1999 that AOL was doomed. But at the time, any criticism of AOL was heresy. For a lot of companies, AOL was the internet. You had to accommodate AOL users in your web design and business decisions because of their immense user base and perceived power. Ten years later, is AOL is even relevant? Does anyone care?
  The lesson I take from this is that no matter how wonderful your walled garden is, it can't compete with the public, open internet. Jason Kottke explains:
  As it happens, we already have a platform on which anyone can communicate and collaborate with anyone else, individuals and companies can develop applications which can interoperate with one another through open and freely available tools, protocols, and interfaces. It's called the internet and it's more compelling than AOL was in 1994 and Facebook in 2007. Eventually, someone will come along and turn Facebook inside-out, so that instead of custom applications running on a platform in a walled garden, applications run on the internet, out in the open, and people can tie their social network into it if they want, with privacy controls, access levels, and alter-egos galore.
  Jason Kottke's equating of Facebook to AOL is intended to provoke. You might even say it's incendiary. But it's absolutely true, and a much-needed wakeup call. Have we really forgotten the lesson of AOL's walled garden so soon?
  Faced with competition from this open web, AOL lost. Running a closed service with custom content and interfaces was no match for the wild frontier of the web. Maybe if they'd done some things differently, they would have fared better, but they still would have lost. In competitive markets, open and messy trumps closed and controlled in the long run. Everything you can do on Facebook is possible using a loose coalition of blogging software, IM clients, email, Twitter, Flickr, Google Reader, etc. Sure, it's not as automatic or easy, but anyone can participate. The number of things to see and do on the web outnumbers the number of things you can see and do on Facebook by several orders of magnitude -- and always will.
  Facebook is an intranet for you and your friends that just happens to be accessible without a VPN. If you're not a Facebook user, you can't do anything with the site. Nearly everything published by their users is private. Google doesn't index any user-created information on Facebook. All of the significant information and, more importantly, interaction still happens in private. Maybe we shouldn't be so excited about the web's future moving onto an intranet.
  If you want to join my friends list, let's do it in public. Post a link to one of my blog entries. Enter a comment right here. Reply to one of my tweets. Send me an email or an instant message. I'll even collaborate with you, as long as it results in a public artifact of some kind.
  Just don't ask me to enter your private walled garden. There's no future in it.
  Posted by Jeff Atwood
  I'm kinda glad I've Inever looked at/i Facebook.
  Hell, I've never used twitter, or looked at someone's twitter stuff, except glancing over a coworker's shoulder.
  (I avoid MySpace like the plague it is, but that's mostly because of the quality of the content and the unavoidable music spew from every page. And yes, I know there's a pref to turn it off. No, it doesn't work for me. Anywhere.)
  People are interested in this stuff, though, right?
  Thing is, LinkedIn is not meant to be a social networking tool so far as I can tell. It's meant to be a professional networking tool. Which means the open internet argument is not applicable, because you don't want too much openness (if you'll pardon the rather underhanded sound to that expression). Otherwise, you spend all your time acting as a filter trying to tell genuine job offers and resumes from spam. In fact, it's that spam that's driving the rush towards those walled garden models - it's not the garden people are interested in, it's the walls.
  I do see what you guys are saying. But even though "using a loose coalition of blogging software... anyone can participate", the majority of people haven't.
  When I say "the majority of people", I mean people who don't generally think of computers as fun machines. People who just aren't particularly interested in computers.
  And I'm also totally guessing - it could be that more people have a blog/a Flickr account/a Twitter account than don't.
  But I doubt it. Most of the people who've contacted me through Facebook would never have set up a blog. Most of them would think Flickr horribly limited because they can't tag their friends in photos. Of course, technically they can, because Flickr lets you tag any photo with any string, so you can tag it with someone else's Flickr username or some other commonly-used identifier, and it's pretty much the same thing. But Flickr doesn't provide the little box to indicate who's who, and it doesn't have a drop-down prompting users to pick out one of their friends to tag.
  I'm not saying Facebook's going to be more successful than a loosely-joined collection of more open small pieces, but I think it's genuinely meeting the needs of people who aren't geeky, i.e. most people.
  This is one of the reasons that I've always avoided Facebook and MySpace. I always said that the real internet is better, and that I can do anything there that I can do on those sites.
  I think the popularity of Facebook is, as previously alluded to, that it allows you to do things, create content and generally put stuff out there without needing to commit to a regular blog (twitter), though if you want to you can create more meaty content (blogs), it allows you to tell the world about yourself (bio pages), message people (email), manage your contacts (contact book) and find old friends (friendsreunited). It combines so many services into one easy to use place. It allows people to easily create content and share information. However, because it is in a centralise place the individual components don't appear to be so lost (people are bad at updating content that feels lost to them).
  However, I don't think Jeff was really questioning the merits of centralising the components. It's more that, in order to see anyone's random comments, blogs and messages you have to sign up. Even if you just want to read something someone wrote that someone said was interesting. Once.
  Myself, I can't decide what is best. The problem is that for the sort of content that goes on Facebook the closed model works well. There are far too many privicy and consential issues otherwise. However, many people use Facebook far beyond the mundane such that it is their primary presence on the Internet. You ask for someone's website, they'll give you their Facebook (or MySpace or Beebo address).
  I myself have a split. I have my public blog that anyone can read and (I think) participate. And then I have my Facebook for handling the social aspects of the Internet (messaging friends, organising events etc.) The two do meet, but their roles are clearly defined. If you ask for my website, I would point you to my blog. That is my primary presence on the Internet.
  However, as previously mentioned, for most people Facebook or similar is. For a lot of them this is because they do not have the time or inclination to put together a more structured public presence. They don't necessarily want to. They want to muck around with their friends, they want to moan to them about their terrible day or share their latest conquests. They want to poke them incessantly and throw sheep at them. They don't need to have a public presence with thought provoking posts that everyone can read.
  But sometimes they do. Sometimes they do have good things to share, but because they are so used to the culture of Facebook it never sees light outside the walls of the garden. And that's a shame.
  I agree with Mark in the first response.
  "Google doesn't index any user-created information on Facebook."
  I don't really want google indexing personal information about me, my friends or any of the rubbish we talk to each other on social networking sites.. Call it tin-foil hat if you like, but privacy on t'internet is increasingly difficult to find. And im sure you've all read about Facebooks searching problems..
  I'm sure there will be an open alternative within a few years. but currently there isn't. There's no point missing out just because it won't last. With that kind of philosophy you'll never try out anything. Sure, don't invest too much into these walled-gardens, but you may as well see what all the fuss is about.
  Anyway these kinds of services often pioneer, and then later get cloned into more open services. I think frankly, we need them.
  Don't know if you've heard of mugshot, but it's exactly what you're describing. It aggregates information from any number of social-networking-esque sites. It was started by a bunch of smart hackers from Red Hat (Havoc Pennington has been an outspoken voice on the project). Anyways, check it out, mugshot.org. :)
  I think when it comes right down to it, most people want a measure of privacy.
  Plus, the majority of people like having all their tools in one single place. That's why people are addicted to MySpace and Facebook... you really don't need to learn anything else to share your life with your friends.
  Personally I abhor all social networking sites... but then, I'm a geek.
  I am not so worried about walled gardens on the internet in general, it's the mobile carriers that worry me. The charge per KB, filter per port, and make their own walled gardens free. People are just blindly walking into it. And within a few years, most people will be using some sort of portable device for internet access, maybe as their primary device.
  I have avoided social networks for a while too, finding they didn't offer much - that was until I checked out Facebook.
  There is much merit in what you have said but are you comparing apples with apples. Online cultures have changed since 1994. 1994 was early-days for social networking. Today there are many and this choice is beneficial. While some are happy to publically network others may be tired of the online instrusion and prefer a more closed personal network with just your family and friends. Loic Le Meur claims there is a shift in the way we interact with others online. In the beginning there was a rush to publically network, now there is more of a trend to hide and only netowrk with a smaller network of people. People are different and have different networking needs.
  So if there are "public parks" or "walled gardens", it doesn't matter. There are enough users online to make either flourish. What's more immportant is there are the choices.
  You've got an interesting opinion, but for those who are in college, it's the best way to keep in touch with friends and have a bit of fun while doing it. Yeah, it might be a walled garden, but if all of your friends are there collaborating, and it's free, does it really matter?
  I think I see a failure in Jeff's argument in principle, rather than based on any particular instance. Walled gardens, such as Facebook or LinkedIn provide essential mechanisms that the broader internet lacks.
  Each networking site provides a contract of what I will find there. For example, I know I can go to LinkedIn to find jobs as a job-seeker or employees as an employee. I will not go to linkedIn to find dates... If I go to a photo-rating site such as hotornot.com (not that I endorse that type entertainment), I know exactly what I will and will not find there. And may go to find former classmates and exchange photos with my friends. Thus, by accessing a specific site, I specifically choose which domain of information I want to deal with.
  What I will not do in any of the above scenarios is a Google search, because Google will inevitably return the information I do not want. Why would I go looking through blogs if I want to find employees, when there is no clear, fast way to determine from a blog what specialty you're in, what your experience is like, and even if you are looking for a job - to find any information of that sort, visual parsing would be involved. And if I'm a bored high-schooler who just wants to rate photos, I just don't see how a broadly-defined search, such as one that Google offers could crawl the internet for all photo postings that invite ratings. Simply put, different domains of information require specific semantics for dealing with that information, and the broader internet has not been designed to provide them.
  This is actually somewhat reminiscent of the WS-* vs. REST debates. Yes, the latter is more open, and can be accessible to non-specialized clients. But the former enforces stronger contracts that allow you to derive more value by specializing your semantics to the domain you're dealing with. So as far as facebook and linkedIn are concerned, perhaps if all these sights were to collaborate on creating a common "schema", for lack of a better word, for social networking entries including domain information (i.e. is this a looking-for-a-job entry, a rate-my-photo entry, a looking-for-alumni entry), then a mega-mashup service could be created to search for information on all the sites with virtually zero irrelevant information or noise. But plain-old openness and Googles searches just aren't that useful.
  For most people, creating a page on a social network is much easier than, and very different from, creating a blog or a site. Relationships are explicit, so you can see chains of relationships between people. What you also get is a kind of auto-updating address book...
  Maybe there's room here for a system that defines relationships between blogs (foaf, microformats?), but currently, a blog/website serves a different purpose than an entry on a social network.
  well its clear that you havnt joined any social networking sites :)
  first, they dont serve the same purpose as blogs or websites. its not really a question about open or closed.
  secondly, i use these (as do most people) to keep in touch with friends i already know, but who for various reasons i am no longer able to meet personally. the idea is not really to meet new people (at least not for me). in this sense i want the closedness (thts not a real word is it?)
  Send me an email or an instant message. I'll even collaborate with you, as long as it results in a public artifact of some kind.
  Your emails and IMs are public artifacts? ORLY?
  There are certain facts about that I don't want to be public, but am quite happy to share with my friends. Facebook allows me to do this efficiently. The wider internet loses nothing, because I was never going to post there anyway.
  I guess time will tell whether Facebook will outlast the internet (my money's on the net), but I really doubt the AOL analogy applies for a couple of important reasons:
  1) It's not trying to be what AOL was trying to be, namely an alternate internet. It's focus is specific, even though it can be used for many things, including blogging.
  2) As for being walled, please keep in mind that it is (at this time) free to join and the value inside is considered higher than your usual one-off Times article.
  I recommend, just for laughs an giggles, that you open an account just to see for yourself what the heck the appeal might be. Warning, the app's pretty slick (as far as these things go); highly addictive.
  See you on the inside.
  Jeff, I have to disagree with your viewpoint this time. When I sign into google, or iGoogle or whatever, I see it as a tool. A tool to search, to send emails, participate in groups, read blogs and so forth. I use it only when I need to. Every time I sign into facebook, I see new events such as my friends having gotten married. I feel like I'm part of a community, not some abstract internet. This is very addictive, and it creates a whole new level of "visitor loyalty" that sites like Google simply don't have.
  This is a psychological phenomenon. A game site that just lets you play against other people is OK, but you don't use it too much unless you're addicted to the game. A game site where you can join a community has you wasting hours and hours on it.
  I think you should try the experience, then you'd appreciate the addictiveness that "social networks" have. You can't really have a complete opinion of it solely from the outside, if you've never taken part. But be warned -- once you do, we may see a slightly less blogs from you :)
  That said, having any kind of signup creates a "walled garden"... why do I have to sign up with every single freakin' site? It's annoying to keep track of all those signups and password combinations... which can lead to a nice blog entry in itself :)
  At what point can you break down the social networking walls to nothing? Wouldn't the only way be if we all had our own customly created websites, rather than through some 3rd party? So we could make everything public all in one package without being bounded by the creative restrictions on all blogging apps?
  I've always declined invitations as well but at this point of time I feel social networking sites in general are a good thing, because really the internet is a unorganised mess. Staying connected can be hard, and remember... people are idiots. Facebook just makes it easy to connect. The problem I now find is that there are too many Facebook's, to connect you've got to have accounts in Facebook, Bebo, WAYN, Friendster...
  I've seen websites like Mugshot come and go, but the early sites were technical to set up and unknown to the masses. Though it is a step in the right direction, it just needs to be easy enough to use for the simple minded masses.
  Jeff,
  I agree with your argument to some extent, but it simply comes down to usability. Sure, as a web-savvy computer geek, I could go get my own hosting, set up a blog, set up a photo gallery, maybe code my own shoutbox in PHP, etc, and use the internet to let people interact with me publicly. But the average everyday user isn't going to know how to do this in a million years. Facebook takes all of those things and aggregates them into one coherent application and makes it easy to use, so that _anyone_ can use it without the least bit of technical know-how. This is why Facebook isn't doomed.
  Also, if Facebook wasn't a walled garden, at least providing some sense of privacy, nobody would use it because simply sharing all kinds of information about yourself on the wide-open web is pretty scary for most people. People want to be able to control this access, and Facebook provides this.
  hey sucker, everyone thinks you're wrong
  One tipping factor is spam. For many people, checking their email has gone from being a positive experience ("let's see who wrote to me today") to a negative experience ("better go clean the spam out of my inbox").
  While this may change with FaceBook given that they're "opening up" their platform, today, if I have something in my Inbox on FaceBook, it's a real message from a real friend. There's some serious value in that.
  Finally, somebody just said it. And I mean Jeff, not the rest of you. :-)
  What a bunch of little girls.
  I'll be they have petty squabbles, form up teams, and a bunch run off to start a new hive around a newly elected "queen" every 3 to 6 months too.
  People go where their friends are (especially kids who are the main users of many of these sites), and, crucially, with what they know about.
  This was true for AOL and it's true for Facebook/MySpace/Linkedin/Livejournal/DeviantArt/etc.. You need to gather a lot of knowlege from disparate sources and do some hacking in code and on the server if you want to replicate the features that those sites provide immediately.
  I only go along with LinkedIn because from time to time I bet on following the masses.But I do not particularly care for the site whatsoever.To illustrate the point : one of my recommendations is from Bill Lumbergh.
  Your argument that blog/websites can/should replace tools like facebook is a ridiculous one. Say I have 400 "friends" (yeah, sure, I probably don't care about half of those people). No one is going to try and "index" each and every site from 400 people. And then trying to visit 400 sites in a day? Sheesh. Besides, look at livejournal... blogs are 99% worthless information.
  Facebook on the other hand allows those 400 people to quickly see me and I them. All at one domain. And some of the features work more like a friend RSS feed. (When I broke up with my girlfriend, I had 3 people call me the next day thanks to facebook... good or bad I thought that was fascinating). I've also been invited to 3 wedding of people I care about but don't see very often. Those people probably would not have tried to search the vast interwebs to find my personal website in hopes of getting my contact information.
  Any tool that helps people stay in touch with friends is okay in my book. It's not really social networking as in new friends but social network maintainance.
  I thought these things were silly and for kids until I tried Facebook about a month ago. It's really a well done application, and is a great way to quickly check in on people. It's about convenience and getting things done. Blogs are different beasts entirely. There's no way that you personally could scale to the # of readers that you have on your blog - it's much more of a publishing medium aka newspaper + letters to the editor than a social networking tool.
  I agree with much of this post. However, there are some, such as LastISawYou.com that help friends, parents, families, etc. find each other again, particularly when first name and/or last name are not known. Some of these do provide a service.
  Humans are tribal and like to mark out territories. The social networking sites are just one more way of doing these things. Owing to constraints on my time, I appreciate the ease of use of these services, so my thanks to all you mysterious coders who have done the work already, enabling me to get on with what I need to do.
  **Durrr. If you have to sign up to see anything then it is not public. Imagine if you had to sign up to blogger to read blogs, or to wikipedia to read articles. It is all well and good using it if you want to keep your info tightly controlled, but for people who are using it for open, social reasons then it is counter-productive.**
  I disagree. If it's freely available to the public, which facebook and linkedin are, it is absolutely a public service. Something private would be where you have to pay a fee to use services. Facebook, like flikr and blogs, is totally free for users.
  Also, please explain why I need or want someone (for example, you) to be capable of seeing my personal information? In what odd, alternate reality does you seeing my personal information constitute a "social reason" to have facebook be open? And how is it counter-productive that you can't see my personal information?
  Answer: it isn't. I neither want to have a social bond with you, nor would I want you to be able to browse my personal information.
  Using facebook or linked in is pretty simple: you're trading your personal information for the services provided by the two sites.
  Many times, i'd tried many social network. But at least, it's nothing to me, i found nothing from it. look like, I just tested new site, new interface, it was my curious.Thanks for the postnXqd
  I'm really not sure if I get what you're trying to say. That limiting applications to a scripting language rather than turning over mounds of private data to whoever wants to write their own code is bad? That attempting to supplement -- not replace -- the internet is doomed to failure? That flickr and twitter are a good ideas, but putting them together in is a bad idea?
  Help me out here. Back when facebook was hard to join, you might have had a point; now that it takes less effort than signing up for email, I'm really not sure where you're going with this.
  When given a blank piece of paper and told to do anything with it, people block. They can't think of anything. Give them some constraints, a place in their mind for bubbles of thought to form.
  A completely open internet is a blank piece of paper. A "Walled Garden" can get people thinking so they can create new and interesting things.
  Walled Gardens may be dead ends after all is said and done, but they're *so necessary* for creativity, we keep creating them over and over.
  I heard the hype about facebook and decided to take a look. Then I discovered I would have to sign up to even see anything at all. Yeah right. Same with "become my friend to read my blog". Why the hell should I have to sign up to anything to read a blog or look at someone's profile?
  Social networking sites are for morons. I have no qualms in saying that at all. If someone is my "friend" they can give me their email address or skype id. I do not need a list of all my friends. If I need a list to remember who my friends are then there is something very wrong with my definition of that word.
  **Public services on the web, such as blogs, twitter, flickr, and so forth, are what we should invest our time in.**
  What makes you think facebook isn't public? This seems like a very nitpicky distinction: calling blogs, twitter, and flickr "public" while facebook is somehow "private" makes almost no sense to me at all.
  For what it's worth, I love facebook. I've been using it for a few months now, and it's fantastic--it allows me to link with friends and family and keep a tab on what they're doing, where they are, and so on. It's a really great tool.
  That being said, I wouldn't ever want it to be public, because it's personal information. I don't want random people on the Internet to know where I live, who my relatives are, what my current phone number is, and so forth. It's private information for totally obvious reasons to anyone who doesn't like having a google search of their name reveal rather personal information.
  I also think linkedin fits into the picture quite well; I'm fine with potential employers knowing my job history, educational background, etc, but I'm *not* fine with them contacting friends and relatives, and seeing pictures of me on my family vacation, and so on. So the divide works well: linkedin is business. facebook is personal. Neither of them are even the slightest bit similar to AOL, although you seem to think otherwise.
  ok, i've been reading this post for hours staring at the picture and i still can't find waldo... why can't i just get what i want from your system?
  Instead of seeing the "walled garden" sites as lock-in models for proprietary data storage, you just have to see them as just an another interface. While you might not have your entire digital life stored in your facebook account, you can still use a facebook account to link up with other more casual-use internet friends and even link them back into your 'own' service.
  "What makes you think facebook isn't public? This seems like a very nitpicky distinction: calling blogs, twitter, and flickr "public" while facebook is somehow "private" makes almost no sense to me at all."
  Durrr. If you have to sign up to see anything then it is not public. Imagine if you had to sign up to blogger to read blogs, or to wikipedia to read articles. It is all well and good using it if you want to keep your info tightly controlled, but for people who are using it for open, social reasons then it is counter-productive.
  Hello Jeff,
  We can't say that Internet is the best way for social networking. The best example is Orkut. I had many school mates. When I was doing my Schooling, internet and e-mail was not that popualar in India. and I'm first time operating with a computer in year 2000. I joined for new courses and my home relocated after that I got job which is another place. So I missed them all. Now I could see many of them in Orkut. It was really a nice place to see people the disadvantage is that many people taking advantage of Orkut website by asking some users to join their services and foolishly they're entering user name and password. which cause alot of spam in these days. Now daily I;m getting invitation from Jhoos, Jaxter etc... i rejected all those invitation because I satisfied with Orkut. earlier I spent alot of time for posting things finding new groups. but now it's very less but it's really nice to keep in touch with all of my friends through this wonderful site. some people loves heavy Orkutting. it's depends on the person to decide to waster their time or not with some rubbish scrapping.
  My only fear of the "Walled Gardens" like Facebook is that information that should be public will be stuck in a private network. I understand not wanting to share your cell phone number with the open internet, but people are writing content in Facebook "notes" that should be public blogs!
  But I must admit I loved moving to a new city, clicking on the city network, and seeing 4 friends who I hadn't spoken with in years that lived in the area. I immediately had people to meet up with in a new city.
  Well, you do need a walled garden in case of social networks for privacy's sake. Social networks like Orkut, allow you to block everyone else other than your friends.
  Ofcourse, if you meant "Open" as in -
  1. Logging in with Open Id,2. Making API's available for accessing data
  it does make sense to open the garden.
  I love your work here Jeff, but this time I strongly disagree with you.
  Facebook is not walled in the sense that the AOL of old was. AOL was a fee-based service that tried to contain and abstract the web. This is almost similar to a site like Digg. The internet is so large and unwieldy that it helps to have a place to start. The problem with AOL is that they tried to pretend there was nothing outside of AOL. With the explosion of content all over the 'real' internet, people left AOL when they realized they were paying more for less.
  Facebook is very different. First of all, it is free. It is not designed to be an aggregation of information, like Wikipedia. Rather, it is intended to be a tool for keeping contact with friends and sharing media. The 'walls' you refer to are not meant to keep people inside for the monetary benefit of Facebook, but to protect it's users from having the fact that they broke up with their girlfriend from being indexed by Google. Facebook users **don't want** the information on Facebook to be in the public domain.
  Opening up the API, however, is a brilliant move, because it maintains the safety and ease of use of Facebook while providing added, customizable functionality, at almost no cost to the people who run Facebook.
  While it may seem that Facebook photos should be on flickr, and Facebook notes should be on a blog, people generally don't want pictures of their private party indexed for all to see. This not a flaw with Facebook, but an integral component of its success.
  Jeff, I couldn't have said this better myself. Excellent post.
  I've been plastering my name and my content all over the internet for a decade, but I'm not a member of Facebook because I don't need to be. My content has plenty of other places it can live, and I can control most of them.
  I don't develop applications for Facebook because I'd rather spend my time developing applications that will benefit EVERYONE on the internet, not just the fragment that uses Facebook.
  The code and content in my website's CMS will be useful long after Facebook becomes MySpace and is overtaken by the next hip social network.
  I think you missed the point of the walled garden with facebook... it was able to acheive success because it WAS a walled garden. People put information up there because it is semi-private and they can selectively control who sees what. Facebook integrated these ideas of a blog, twitter, myspace etc and that is why it is successful. I believe that since facebook's new direction is to be more open and public will be it's downfall. If you were actually a member of Facebook I think you would see this.
  What about discoverability? How do I find people that I know on the internet? Even if they have a blog there's no guarantee that Google/Yahoo/MSN will consider them "important" enough to own their name?
  Kottke clarifies his argument here: a href="http://www.kottke.org/07/07/facebook-vs-aol-redux"http://www.kottke.org/07/07/facebook-vs-aol-redux/a.
  Ian hits the nail square on the head. The fact that Facebook is free and generally easy to use makes it completely different from AOL. Sure, you can do all the things you could on Facebook using open platforms, but it's messy, spread across a wide range of disparate programs, and visible to everyone.
  There's a reason that people build walls around their gardens at home--they don't want too many people peeping in! Facebook at least lets you control who gets to visit your back yard.
  I've found LinkedIn a fantastic way to stay connected to (or reconnect with) people like former coworkers who you maybe like and respect (possibly quite a lot), but who you wouldn't normally maintain frequent regular contact with (or gradually lose touch with) after you've moved on. You know, a buddy in the tranches who you gradually lost track of after he moved away, or the guy you think about every once in a while and wonder how/what he's doing now.
  Now some people can easily and naturally do that anyway just with email, etc, but I'm not socially adept enough to maintain regular contacts with a dozens of former coworkers several years after departure. Those people move on as well (and their email addrs change), and there's a better chance that their address in LinkedIn will be current than the one I last used to email a guy 8-12 months ago. Beyond that, the job hunting/recruiting aspects on LinkedIn are just icing, for me. (I do find the occasional invite from strangers a bit odd, though.)
  So, for my usage, I don't see how the open internet with blogs, twitter, etc would serve this purpose.
  I echo the comments of the folks that have talked about the advantages of the walled garden: Semi-privacy, spam-filtering and spider-proofing. Additionally, the walled garden is a content filter of sorts. Content on the internet is very uneven in quality. Once I find a source that I trust for quality content, it isn't practical or desirable for me to continue seeking other sources. I want to stay within the walled garden that appeals to me. Of course, I hope that the garden grows and changes to adjust to what's happening in the world. If it doesn't, I'm free to look for other gardens to spend my time in.
  A series of walled gardens is what the internet is evolving to. People are realizing that You Tube, blogs and twitter are cool ideas, but the reality is that the low bar to entry produces an abundance of junk. The walled garden becomes a sanctuary from the junk. I believe that some of the most successful internet companies in the future will be 'micro-media' companies. Like the mega-media companies (NBC, The McClatchy Company, etc.), they will control the quality and type of content to appeal to a small slice of the internet population. This population will appreciate them for doing that and will pay them by viewing ads or even paying them directly.
  For now, social networks are the best way for me to raise the quality of the content that I see on the internet. These social networks point me to the information that I find most interesting, valuable or entertaining.
  I think alot of these posts are missing the point. Its not a question whether FaceBook, MySpace, or the others are useful. The question is, especially in the case of the FaceBook API, do we need/want a platform on top of the Internet? Ultimatly, I think all would agree we don't want one company acting as middle man.
  The web is a universe.
  Nobody lives in the universe.
  We live in villages, neighborhood. Some people live in countries, but only when they feel nationalist or when they watch the Mondial football games.
  So, we mostly live in closed quarters among people we know and understand. Our brain doesn't function well in wide open spaces. It is a side effect of the human race being born quite lonely, in a few squattered groups in the dry valley of the Rift. We need recognizable faces. Or facebooks. Or just a magazine called Us with frontpage photos of... us, or People, with images of... faces. Well, people.
  I too resisted Facebook until I got the 3rd invite. But not because of the noble reasons you uphold more because I don't need any more distractions and I hated the fact that I couldn't see what it was really about until I logged in. But the 3rd invite hit hard and the herd mentality clicked in and I joined up like a good sheep.
  But I'm not convinvced I'll be continuing to use it because the only feature I liked about facebook was the 'Steve is ...' feature which allows me to share my pain/joy with my friends. I hadn't seen Twitter until now and it's all that I want because all I have to do is use my Jabber client. Now I have to ween my friends off of Facebook. Hmmm.
  No advertising revenue in it either, eh?
  Aaron - It's not that Facebook is revolutionary in it's technology, it's that it has a different culture about it. The other popular sites - myspace and beebo - smack of young-teenagers who have music automatically blaring out of their psychedelically coloured page. Facebook, by contrast, is much more restrained as it doesn't allows heavy customisation and as such breeds a different user base that captures a lot of the people who wouldn't use the other services. That user base just happens to loosely overlap with the more technical minded sector of the internet communities.
  The services and products that get popular are the ones that manage to take an old but still relatively new idea and package it in a more palatable way. Just because it's not completely new in it's features doesn't mean that it's not different and revolutionary in it's presentation, marketing, feel or user base.
  I don't know about Facebook or other generic social networking sites, but I wouldn't lump LinkedIn with them. LinkedIn is a social networking site with a purpose. Which is all it takes for a social networking site to be of any use, really.
  And the platform on which anyone can communicate and collaborate with anyone else isn't the Internet, it's the real world. At least, that's in theory. But saying that social networking sites cannot compete with the Internet is like saying that real-life meting places cannot compete with the world.Most times things like the local user group, the local pub, the local whatever, are much more convenient than interfacing with the whole world. I don't need the whole world, I only need a small subset of like-minded people.Plus, joining a social networking site, IMO, gives a pretty good excuse to contact other people. On the Internet, I don't expect to be emailed or IMd by a random person, just as in the real world i don't expect to be chatted up on the street. But I surely would expect to be chatted up by a member of one of the groups I belong to at a group meeting.
  I have been trying to avoid these "walled gardens" for years now. Seems like I can never explain why I don't want to join to others and end up caving and joining.
  Thank you for the articulate post that conveys my thoughts!
  hmmm.... what has this person (who admits he doesn't like social networking sites) and his feeling that social networking and password protected web sites are doomed because of AOL and the internet as a whole,,,, got to do with the real issues of privacy of information?It seems evident to me that sites like Face Book show we as an online society are:- moving towards the USA's view on private/public information collection;- becoming happier to accept more info rather than less, and self-sensor;- evaluating the positive aspects of the advancement of online storage and file sharing;to name but 3 very important sociological issues.It is my understanding that these ideas alone are far more likely to drive the progress of social network and private/public portals than whether 'social networking' as an entity resembles a failed attempt at networking previously (which also happened to exclude the very important provision of API's did it not (correct me if I'm wrong).
  The Internet is so big... so badly indexed... For the moment being social networks like linked in, facebook, myspace, livejournal and others are the chosen way to build and integrate subnets which are based on shared interests and other elective affections. These private island make the Internet smaller so that we can find each other more easily. They're like instant Internet homes. You register and pop! you've become part of a few neighborhoods.
  Maybe what's really missing is an effective way to link in various people and websites, something decentralized that's truly open. It could be a new service, a new initiative or just an innovative way to use something like FOAF. I don't know yet.
  Or we could think of these services as simple front doors to your Internet (and real life) presence...
  AOL had the world by the short curlies...and they BLEW IT!!! Their business model and culture prevented them from adapting to the internet. I'm seeing the same pattern with Blockbuster video and with cable companies. Many companies that are practically monopolies tend to "defend" their way of life instead of innovate and adapt...and then the wave of change eventually comes crashing over them (Netflix, VOD)...and then they become followers.
  You also don't have to consider Facebook to only enumerate friends. Sure, they label the links 'friends' but I see it as more of a collection of people that I may want to contact or may want to contact me. People I went to school with, or worked with, and would add them to an address book, but it maintains that for me.
  The self-updating address book idea mentioned before was a good analogy.
  You folks saying you weren't interested in SN until Facebook, please just admit that it has nothing to do with the technology or convenience, and everything to do with crossing the threshold of popularity from being part of an obnoxious fad to avoiding social isolation. - Aaron G
  but for those who are in college, it's the best way to keep in touch with friends and have a bit of fun while doing it. - Nick
  The best (or in Aarong's case - ONLY) way to keep in touch with people is through SN sites? That's a shock. From the tone of lots of people here, it almost seems that calling family and friends is pass. And that's a shame, because it's much more gratifying - for BOTH people.
  I have purposely turned down all of the invitations that I have received, because I'd rather not be another person who resorts to such impersonal and passive forms of communication. I have a phone, and my friends know that they are worth the $2/mo that it costs me to call them.
  Greate post...but i disagree....Reason-Orkut.I love orkuting...its defenitly a better way of keeping in touch with friends and to know what they are doing easly...i do agree u can mail or make a call...but just be practical...how many childhood friends name u remember atleat...u might have interacted with 100's of children of ur age...i had so many childhood crush of gals inmy class...this is the best way to peep in and see what they doing now...just kidding...but the network is so powerfull u can kkeep in contact with nay one,more importanly digg ur old friends out....
  Steve-O,
  Say you were out at the mall or a concert and you ran into someone you haven't been in touch with since high school or college. Say you used to be good friends or there was that one time you went on a road trip to a concert/party together. You just drifted apart as you got older. They got a job in another city or went to a different college. You started dating someone and spent all your time with them instead of this person. Would you shun them just because they ran into you at the mall instead of calling you up?
  That's how a lot of people use these social networks. A way of keeping in touch with people or catching up with people.
  The ones who just want to amass as many "friends" as they can so they can brag about how many people have "friended" or "linked" to them because the had the misfortune of being born with ... shrinkage, well they aren't the real users of the network and they actually benefit the least.
  On reading the post, my thought is that the distinction between technology and sociology is blurred in the discussion. From a technology point of view, open will win. From a social point of view, there's a place for both public and private discourse. Three (or everybody) can be a crowd, and I think there will always be a need for the private, even in an online, open technology, world.
  **The little prince went away, to look again at the roses.
  "You are not at all like my rose," he said. "As yet you are nothing. No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first knew him. He was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I have made him my friend, and now he is unique in all the world."
  And the roses were very much embarassed.
  "You are beautiful, but you are empty," he went on. "One could not die for you. To be sure, an ordinary passerby would think that my rose looked just like you-- the rose that belongs to me. But in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is she that I have sheltered behind the screen; because it is for her that I have killed the caterpillars (except the two or three that we saved to become butterflies); because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or ever sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is my rose.**
  Antoine de Saint-Exupry, The little prince
  I found this so interesting that I decided to share it on Facebook.
  Actually, I understand both sides of this. I avoided social networking sites for years. Now I use the social networking sites I do use to control the information that people find out, and how. My myspace page for example is very different from my facebook page which is different from my Zoints profile. Each one has a different purpose, and recieves different information.
  On the other hand, I often also participate in many open resources, of which I use to disseminate, or accumulate other information. I have a blog, I am a member of many forums, and even am an admin of my own forum. All or almost all information I put up there is free for anyone to see without signing up. I would have to say that in general, these two sets of resources have served different needs, each site serving it's own set of needs.
  I use the open sources more as a way of collecting information about others, or letting people get to know me who would not have been able to get to know me otherwise. I use the closed sources to put out information to those I already know, but I do not collect much information from other people using them.
  That is where I stand on all this.
  Oh, and you said to message you, make a public interaction, and you might interact back. Here is my public interaction. Something Profound (a href="http://profoundforum.com"http://profoundforum.com/a) is my forum. If you feel inclined to come in and check it out please do. I wanted to invite you, not just because you are knowledgeable, something we always need a little more of, but also because this is not an invite to a private thing, it is to a public thing. We are small, and sometimes abrasive, but we are in our own way a social network. Maybe you will check it out and take my offer, maybe you won't. I just thought I would invite you.
  It was said many ways by many commenters on here, but Facebook is different in that you can *find* people you otherwise would never have found or even remembered to look for. I had the same attitude as you about social sites, but I finally relented in the Facebook case because I was getting so many "invites". The interface is what attracted me first (nice and simple), and the fact I was finding loads of people I had actually forgotten about is what kept me on. Sure, the thing might get hijacked at some point, in some way (whether by the community or by the company itself adding more than the single "ad widget" or charging a fee). But for now, it's a great way to keep in touch with *your* friends. I totally agree with the on poster who mentioned sending messages with it... it is a quick and easy way to send and receive "e-mail" without worrying about spam.
  Social networking sites have their place, and it mainly goes back to the point that you don't always want everything you write on the internet to be totally public. In its original concept, Facebook would only allow you to join a school's network if you had an e-mail address from them as proof of your studentship. It not only protects kids from paedo's on the internet, but also all the other dangers facing the naive; compare the girl who put out an open invitation to her house party on MySpace last year and had tons of people turn up. On facebook, she'd at least have been restricted to her schoolmates.
  Also, sometimes they make you more discoverable to people you could potentially meet one day. That's why I joined facebook myself at uni, and I found myself put in contact with people's profiles and blogs who actually lived near me.
  The same function is provided by niche sites like Gaydar, which helps you find gay people in your area, and keeps your profile safe from people you wouldn't want to see it (your mum? your boss? whatever). It's certainly changed the nature of dating for me.
  You don't have to spend all your internet-time in a gated community, but sometimes it's just what you need.
  I think my previous comment, and some other peoples, can be summed up in "Facebook makes it simple". But for the simplicity you have to pay the price of generalisation, and one of those generalisations is finer privacy controls.
  Check out Mark Andreessen's post on why he had started Ning:http://blog.pmarca.com/2007/07/why-ning.html
  Quote:"I also think that in time, many people will decide they want to create their own social networks -- echoing the 1990's, when tens of millions of people who were introduced to the online world by proprietary online services like AOL, Compuserve, and Prodigy ultimately decided they wanted to create and live in a world of millions of web sites, not just a world of a few large walled gardens."
  Thats the thing about walled gardens: they die. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon that you showed a picture of is gone, isn't it? But it was a spectacle! It was amazing, and became apart of history. Myspace, facebook, youtube... These gardens are spectacles in themselves. I have a facebook account, just so I can be apart of the spectacle. So that I can see inside these walls and observe the paradise. But thats just because I'm easily amused. I don't actually find purpose or dire need for these walled gardens, but I like playing around and exploring them.
  I would like to point out (not that anyone accused me of saying such things, but I would like to point it out anyways) that I never said that walled gardens are a good thing. I think they are just another tool. I have gone through many blog sites over my years on the internet. Each one served a purpose, and when that purpose was done and served I found a better site that could better serve newer more prominent needs of mine.
  Much like my open sources like blogs, my walled garden sources service certain needs as well. That does not make them good or bad. That does not make them anything else besides a tool. Open garden sources are the same. Both are just tools, which when used correctly can make you prosper (in whatever you are trying to acheive with them from bringing in traffic to a website, to making money, to keepinging in touch with friends or trying to scare off a few annoying younger kids), and when used incorrectly may give you a headache.
  FxFibben, I ask that you take a look into my forum as well. This time I am asking not to promote the site or anything, but rather to give you a solid example of a open garden social network with no ads. The closest thing to an ad we have up is the occasional newsfeed reminder that we have a store. A store that is there more for fun than anything else because we never expected to be able to support ourselves on any earnings we make, and so far we have been right.
  Social Networks come in open and closed as well. Or at least I consider them to come in such. I welcome a differing opinion on this. Forums would be a good example of open social networking. It is usually a group focused on a specific topic, or has areas for a specific topic. People interested in such a topic can access that information, signed in or not, or can add to the information by singing in, which is really only to help keep spam down.
  Really, the heart of the division between people all for open gardens and closed gardens that I am seeing is the same dividing line between those who choose freesom over security and those who choose security over freedom. I think personally, I ride the fence. I like a little (or a lot) of both. The honest truth is that you can get both out of an open garden model if you are smart, I will nto pretend that you can't.
  In my final point I would like to agree with FxFibben in a sense. I personally have been known to use my walled garden accounts most for self promotion. Or rather, in a sense, free ad space. I mention my forum, my projects, or whatever information I think my built in database of readers will be interested in and may benifit them, giving them value that will then be returned to me in continued prosperity through their assistance, or busininess or whatever else that account is for. I do this a little bit less in open garden settings. That could just as easily be reversed however. This is not a set in stone way of using these tools and I know many people who use their open garden tools the way I use my cwalled garden tools.
  I have a question for anyone willing to answer it. What do you view as the main purpose of walled gardens? Open gardens?
  Jeff, I think I would even challenge you to something you challenged the world to in an earlier post. We don't need to be learning the programs necessairly. Someone well versed in several open garden or closed garden sites can usually tell you that they are usually all formed the same at the basics but serve different fuctions. What we need to learn is how to use any site, to our advantage. Individual sites accross the board, closed or open will have their peaks and their downfall, each with a different time scale. What we need to be learning is not how each site works and why, or why a site is bad, but how to use the tools a site give to the fullest advantage
  Jeff, here is my challenge, and anyone opposed to closed garden sites, this is for you as well. Find a popular one. Facebook seems to be on the rise. If you can't think of one off hand use Facebook. Now my challenge is this, choose a goal. More traffic to your personal web site, a better relationship with some group of people, making more money for your company. Now use that closed garden site to acheive your goal. I know there is no way to really measure if this works, but I can tell you that if you are doing things right and you choose the right apporaches and network right using the site it won't take you much time a day, and it can give you a large presence in that community. A presence that will bring prosperity. If nothing else, it is a good test of your marketing skills.
  How did that connect to any of your previous posts? I got the inspiration from your post about learning how to learn. We don't need to learn the sites, we need to learn how to use the sites (open and walled), like we need to learn how to use Wikipedia.
  I'm not going to say that every walled garden site is for everyone. Many places I set up a presences on and then never updated it again because the atmosphere was too stifling. But for those first few weeks I would see a burst of traffic, or a onslaught of people contacting me about something or another. It may have been coincidence, or it may be that I'm lucky, I don't know. All I know is that in my experiance, the effort pays off. How it differs from a open garden site I can tell you too.
  If you want people to come to your open garden site you promote and you promote and you push and you do all you can to get your google rating up and your search engine rating up and you tell people about it and you push it with everyone you know and plenty of people you don't know. With a walled garden the people come to you. And they will stay if you have something they want. That is why I would say that FxFibben is right, it is all about (f)ads. Isn't it time people learned to use the tools to promote their wares for free?
  Sorry this has been long, and was not nearly as good a post as my last one. It also didn't entierly stay on topic, for that I apologize. It was more a collection of thoughts and ideas that came to me as I read the responses to my post and built into something largs and unweildly. I also apologize for the spelling. I am not at my regular computer today, and have no spell check. I will now be on my merry way and get back to my original intention which was to post a link to this in my forum.
  Another great post. The main reason behind social networking is social engineering geared towards selling (f)ads, getting eyeballs and grabbing unsuspecting users by their winsocks (adware, spyware and such). It has nothing to do with social networking.
  Yeah I tend to agree with Belak. I like my walls. Different things happen on Myspace than what happens on URNotAlone, which is specifically for transgender people. I can't think of a better example of the reason for segregation than that. I'm sure the people on LDSRomances don't want a tranny in the mix. Social networking sites are not an extension of the web, they are not sub-webs or whatever... they are reasonably segregated communities which are segregated because they want to be. Myspace has lost its original focus, which is why it no longer seems like a specialized community and more like AOL...
  I almost choked up reading three variations of "seggregation" in one sentense (see previous post, the one that agrees with Belak). First come the walled gardens, then come the pedophiles, spammers and other "walled garden trash".
  It is actually great that such "clubs" work by invitation only. Main advantage of the Internet over previous concepts is The Open Concept. You can look for, find and contact whomever you want - provided there is a mutual interest in communication. Walls are not known to improve communication except if you don't want to talk to your "neighbor".
  If you like seggregation and dodging ads, walled garden is for you.
  I regularly read your articles, it's the first tech feed on my google homepage. I really enjoy all your articles. They are not just programming examples. They have easy to follow links and I can stay busy for hours, and it's not just wasting time, I think I am really learning as well.I just wanted to say thanks for every article, I look forward to them every day.
  Keep up the good work,
  Shane Calhoun
  Would you shun them just because they ran into you at the mall instead of calling you up? - ScottIn fact, yes: I did just that this passed x-mas to a number of people. It was sad, because these were friends that I'd had for a long time; not just people I lost touch with. I don't need friends who can't be bother to BE friends. I can make more - I've never had problems there - and it's much easier now that people don't expect others to actually DO anything anymore.
  Aaron: I had NO idea that things had gotten to that point (with respect to your friend's wedding). I'm sure that this trend will change, and that society will eventually level itself off again: People have a tendency to over use/abuse anything new. I am just surprised that only a few people have realized the problem.
  And when you say: "I think the main attraction of social networking (in contrast to the BS rationale that people try to feed us) is the opportunity for pure unabashed laziness." - Truer words were never spoken.
  But the upside: No-one actually interacting might mean that the population will start thinning...
  Well said. And thank you for a legible catchpa!
  "Facebook is an intranet for you and your friends that just happens to be accessible without a VPN. If you're not a Facebook user, you can't do anything with the site. Nearly everything published by their users is private. Google doesn't index any user-created information on Facebook. All of the significant information and, more importantly, interaction still happens in private. Maybe we shouldn't be so excited about the web's future moving onto an intranet."
  I've had the same uncomfortable feeling about web-based message boards. Prima facie, the walled-garden model violates the principle that information wants to be free.
  Think of how Fidonet helped to open up the insular world of BBSs. Think of how Usenet was designed to be inherently inclusive (just start a news server on a Net-connected machine and all its users instantly join the "conversation") and eternal (because decentralized). Now, Usenet is irrelevant to all but a tiny online subculture, BBSs are dead, and the traffic that those media would have borne is now happening on Web-based message boards, whose owners can edit content, forget to pay for their server space, or shut down for good at will, and whose content (more important) is essentially invisible to Google unless you know the secret password (the URL of the site's archives). Balkanized again!
  Another applicable simile might be to the shift from the open dissemination of information and knowledge in the classical period (at least if you weren't a slave) to the locked, guarded libraries and monasteries of the Middle Ages. Obviously we need a Renaissance to happen, but is Web 2.0 it? I'm not convinced (yet).
  Great insight. It's too bad that the hype around Facebook Platform obscured that the've built a really great experience for their users.
  Thousands of sites are struggling to gain users for their little service with little hope of succeeding. Facebook sets a great example for exposing these applications within their site and bypassing the signup tax for using them.
  I don't believe Facebook is the new internet, but I sure like the little world map on my profile that shows where I've been. That's cool.
  using the same idea of metaphors, let me give you one i had:the early days of the internet was a walled garden used by some geeks.out of this walled garden came the web as we know it. so Facebook is a walled garden that will open up, while at the same time keep its "semi-privacy" that attracts people to it.steps in this direction are the SumbleUpon.com and last.fm facebook applications. these apps bridge the gap between the 2 networks and facebook, which is something i think every other networks will do, so that facebook turns into a mega-network monster
  Late to the party, but thought I'd comment on some of the people advocating the "privacy" of facebook. In a way that warms the cynical cockles of my heart.
  I found it quite amusing that the supposedly private information posted on facebook by it's users, typically by college kids, stuff that they really wouldn't to be public at all. Pictures and information of them being drunk and stupid, etc. ended up being used against them by the institution that defined the scope of their privacy.
  Or more amusingly, by interns for corporations tasked to scour facebook for dirt on that person. What happens on Facebook doesn't stay on facebook. (see this wikipedia article with references, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook ). So it's like the worst of the open internet, people who might know you finding dirt about you easily because of the self-selected environment. I mean they don't even have to search to the 3rd page of results on google!. So be wary of who might be spying on you in that walled garden, since they might know you and not be your friend.
  http://www.thelongtail.com/the_long_tail/2007/09/social-networki.html
  --All this brings me back to the title of this post. As I think about the current Facebook craze and the notion of it as an all-encompassing platform, sucking in functionality from other sites across the board, I find myself skeptical. With my Long Tail hat on, I think that one-size-fits-all will fail in social networking, just as it has everywhere else (which is why I like Ning, which suppresses its own brand for the sake of those of the microsites it hosts).
  Instead, I think focused sites that serve niche communities will extract the best lessons from Facebook and MySpace and offer better social networking tools to the communities they already have. I'm sure huge and generic social networking destinations will continue to do well, but I'm placing my bet on the biggest impact coming when social networking becomes a standard feature on all good sites, bringing community to the granular level where it always works best.--
  i couldn't have done a better article, you've said all the things i've been telling my friends, kudos to you fella!
  I can appreciate the privacy argument and I can appreciate the friend-of-a-friend networking, but I can't get behind the vendor lock-in.
  Jabber and email doesn't lock me in to a specific company, why should non-public foaf-stuff?
  I'll never get a Facebook account.
  I wonder if the author has heard of OpenSocial?
  I agree with you about Facebook - it is too general and sucking in otherwise available apps from the Internet seems goofy at best. Do I really need another pseudo file system to hold all my crap? No.
  On the other hand - social networks with a specific purpose are great - specifically LinkedIn. I have ammassed 680 REAL associates and colleagues I have worked with. I am a marketing guy - it is my job to talk to lots of people. I recently got laid off, went to LinkedIn and posted my status: Rob is looking for a new gig - within two days, I was flooded with real tangible opportunities that I am currently interviewing for. Most people without a job I know feel like they are doomed to hell until macroeconomics improve - zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
  I have the luxury of a rich LinkedIn network and will likely end up being unemployed for a net of three days. So, a well purposed social network (like any other tool), when used properly, is a great asset.
  Rob
  Wait a sec'--are you trying to say that Twitter *isn't* a walled garden? Identi.ca has since demonstrated otherwise.
  What about all the people who want a much higher level of privacy for their pics and everything, and only want friends to see? There's no easy way to do all that with friends in the wild using blogs and all. Lots of people want walled gardens.
  You can always write a post for me to refer to, thanks!
  By this logic it would seem you think instance messaging apps should go. Private groupings have a deserved place. I see it like when there were BBS's... they pretty much were gobbled up by the internet. But I for one miss the one I used. It isn't the same without it. Facebook is the internet's version of a BBS.
  What I think is scary is the illusion of privacy that sites like Facebook give. People really think they are safe by posting whatever they want on Facebook. Especially the younger genreations, who are posting their entire lives on these walled gardens.
  Reading this for the first time since you posted it on twitter tonight.
  While the sentiment definitely resonates with me (I am opposed to walled gardens as well, despite having facebook and linkedin accounts) I think alot of these walled gardens are moving in the right direction via standards-compliant open APIs, such as OpenID, OAuth, microformats, and REST-based web services. This isn't the same as being truly open web, but at the same time it brings some structure to otherwise chaotic content. The fact that these APIs are present and that services are interacting with eachother means things are much better than in the AOL days of old.
  What amazes me is not that people are fickle (when it comes to social networking, that's understandable), but that they feel it necessary to rationalize their new fascination by claiming that the current state of the art is truly revolutionary.
  Facebook doesn't really let you do anything you couldn't do before. Neither does AJAX, or the iPhone, or Ruby or the WPF. They might offer some incremental improvements over the old low-tech methods, slightly more convenient ways of doing the same things you used to do, but it's always a marginal improvement and never an explosion of better living or productivity.
  You folks saying you weren't interested in SN until Facebook, please just admit that it has nothing to do with the technology or convenience, and everything to do with crossing the threshold of popularity from being part of an obnoxious fad to avoiding social isolation.
  Steve-O: Unfortunately direct communication is pass for a lot of people. One of my friends has planned her entire wedding through Facebook - not a single paper invitation, phone call, or e-mail sent out (except the automated Facebook e-mails). I still have no intention of joining - I've politely told her that I cannot read the "messages" I keep getting alerts about and that if they pertain to me, she should tell me personally. Not surprisingly, whenever I speak to her about it, she doesn't even remember what their content was; that's how little thought goes into the "socializing".
  I think the main attraction of social networking (in contrast to the BS rationale that people try to feed us) is the opportunity for pure unabashed laziness. Instead of doing the hard work of remembering or maintaining people's contact information, deciding whether or not something should be interesting/important to them, and actually, you know, keeping in touch, they just slop everything on their Facebook and assume it'll reach whoever it's supposed to. And it often does, hence the popularity of those services.
  Quaint that social networking does such a stellar job of eroding real-life social networks. Is this the Facebook "culture" I keep hearing so much about? No thanks.
  My facebook is for me and my friends in my chainlink surrounded garden. I don't want my conversations or pictures available to my current or future employers, people I don't know, or marketing harvesters. If FB targets ads to me I'm ok with that, they're providing me a free service.
  Companies and products investing time creating FB pages for reasons other than SEO or SEM is a waste of time. Create a blog as this article describes - it will be around longer.
  >>
Bombshell Obama Vetting: 1979 Newspaper Article By Valerie Jarrett Father-In-Law Reveals Start Of Muslim Purchase Of U.S. Presidency Pat Dollard
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 21:13
  Sep 28, 2012Pat Dollard
  Why would Muslim oil billionaires finance and develop controlling relationships with black college students? Well, like anyone else, they would do it for self-interest. And what would their self-interest be? We all know the top two answers to that question: 1. a Palestinian state and 2. the advancement of Islam in America. The idea then was to advance blacks who would facilitate these two goals to positions of power in the Federal government, preferably, of course, the Presidency. And why would the Arabs target blacks in particular for this job? Well, for the same reason the early communists chose them as their vanguard for revolution (which literally means ''change'') in America. Allow me to quote Trotsky, in 1939: ''The American Negroes, for centuries the most oppressed section of American society and the most discriminated against, are potentially the most revolutionary element of the population. They are designated by their historical past to be, under adequate leadership, the very vanguard of the proletarian revolution.'' Substitute the word ''Islam'' for the words ''the proletarian revolution,'' and you most clearly get the picture, as Islam is a revolutionary movement just like communism is. (Trivia: it is from this very quote that Van Jones takes his name. Van is short for vanguard. He was born ''Anthony''). In addition, long before 1979, blacks had become the vanguard of the spread of Islam in America, especially in prisons.
  Interestingly, in context with the fact that this article was written by her father-in-law, Valerie Jarrett has an unusual amount of influence over Obama (along with personal security that may be even better than his, another unusual and intriguing bit of business here). And equally interesting is that Obama, who may have been a beneficiary of this Muslim money, and may now be in this Muslim debt, has aggressively pursued both of the Muslim agendas I cited above. And, also equally interesting, is that Obama has paid a king's ransom for court ordered seals of any such records of this potential financing of his college education, and perhaps, of other of his expenses.
  Lastly, it's very important to note that the main source for the article is Khalid Mansour, ''the same lawyer who allegedly helped arrange for the entrance of Barack Obama into Harvard Law School in 1988.'' (Valerie Jarrett, by the way, was born in Iran. The one country protected by Obama from the sweep of the Arab Spring.) Now all of this may seem sensational, but let's face facts. What makes it most disturbing is that not only is it all logical, but it suddenly makes a lot of previously confusing things make perfect sense. '' Pat Dollard
  Excerpted from Daily Interlake: Searching old newspapers is one of my favorite pastimes, and I have tried to use them many times to shed light on current events '-- or to inform readers about how the past is prologue to our very interesting present-day quandaries.
  Recently, I came across a syndicated column from November 1979 that seemed to point 30 years into the future toward an obscure campaign issue that arose briefly in the 2008 presidential campaign.
  Though by no means definitive, it provides an interesting insight, at least, into how Chicago politics intersected with the black power movement and Middle Eastern money at a certain point in time. Whether it has any greater relevance to the 2012 presidential campaign, I will allow the reader to decide. In order to accomplish that, I will also take the unusual step of providing footnotes and the end of this column so that each of you can do the investigative work for yourself.
  The column itself had appeared in the St. Petersburg (Fla.) Evening Independent of Nov. 6, but it was the work of a veteran newspaperman who at the time was working for the prestigious Chicago Tribune and whose work was syndicated nationally. (1)
  So far as I know, this 1979 column has not previously been brought to light, but it certainly should be because it broke some very interesting news about the ''rumored billions of dollars the oil-rich Arab nations are supposed to unload on American black leaders and minority institutions.'' The columnist quoted a black San Francisco lawyer who said, ''It's not just a rumor. Aid will come from some of the Arab states.''
  Well, if anyone would know, it would have been this lawyer '-- Donald Warden, who had helped defend OPEC in an antitrust suit that year and had developed significant ties with the Saudi royal family since becoming a Muslim and taking the name Khalid Abdullah Tariq al-Mansour.
  Al-Mansour told Jarrett that he had presented the ''proposed special aid program to OPEC Secretary-General Rene Ortiz'' in September 1979, and that ''the first indications of Arab help to American blacks may be announced in December.'' Maybe so, but I looked high and wide in newspapers in 1979 and 1980 for any other stories about this aid package funded by OPEC and never found it verified. (Continued after the jump)
  You would think that a program to spend ''$20 million per year for 10 years to aid 10,000 minority students each year, including blacks, Arabs, Hispanics, Asians and native Americans'' would be referred to somewhere other than one obscure 1979 column, but I haven't found any other word of it.
  Maybe the funding materialized, maybe it didn't, but what's particularly noteworthy is that this black Islamic lawyer who ''for several years [had] urged the rich Arab kingdoms to cultivate stronger ties to America's blacks by supporting black businesses and black colleges and giving financial help to disadvantaged students'' was also the same lawyer who allegedly helped arrange for the entrance of Barack Obama into Harvard Law School in 1988.
  That tale had surfaced in 2008 when Barack Obama was a candidate for president and one of the leading black politicians in the country '-- Percy Sutton of New York '-- told an interviewer on a Manhattan TV news show that he had been introduced to Obama ''by a friend who was raising money for him. The friend's name is Dr. Khalid al-Mansour, from Texas. He is the principal adviser to one of the world's richest men. He told me about Obama.'' (2)
  This peculiar revelation engendered a small hubbub in 2008, but was quickly dismissed by the Obama campaign as the ditherings of a senile old man. I don't believe President Obama himself ever denied the story personally, and no one has explained how Sutton came up with this elaborate story about Khalid al-Mansour if it had no basis in fact, and in any case al-Mansour no longer denies it. (3)
  Back in 2008, while actually supporting Hillary Clinton in the New York primary, Percy Sutton was interviewed on TV and said that he thought Barack Obama was nonetheless quite impressive. He also revealed that he had first heard about Obama 20 years previously in a letter where al-Mansour wrote, ''there is a young man that has applied to Harvard. I know that you have a few friends up there because you used to go up there to speak. Would you please write a letter in support of him?''
  Sutton concluded in the interview, ''I wrote a letter of support of him to my friends at Harvard, saying to them I thought there was a genius that was going to be available and I certainly hoped they would treat him kindly.''
  Until now, there really has been no context within which to understand the Sutton story or to buttress it as a reliable account other than the reputation of Sutton himself as one of the top leaders of the black community in Manhattan '-- himself a noted attorney, businessman and politician. But the new discovery of the 1979 column that established Khalid al-Mansour's interest in creating a fund to give ''financial help to disadvantaged students'' does provide a clue that he might indeed '-- along with his patron, Arab Prince Alwaleed bin Talal '-- have taken an interest in the ''genius'' Barack Obama.
  It also might be considered more than coincidence that the author of that 1979 newspaper column was from Chicago, where Barack Obama settled in 1986 a few years after his stint at Columbia University. It is certainly surprising that the author of that column was none other than Vernon Jarrett, the future (and later former) father-in-law of Valerie Jarrett, who ultimately became the consigliatore of the Obama White House.
  It is also noteworthy that Vernon Jarrett was one of the best friends and a colleague of Frank Marshall Davis, the former Chicago journalist and lifelong communist who moved to Hawaii in the late 1940s and years later befriended Stanley and Madelyn Dunham and their daughter Stanley Ann, the mother of Barack Obama. (4)
  And to anyone who has the modicum of a spark of curiosity, it is surely intriguing that Frank Davis took an active role in the rearing of young Barack from the age of 10 until he turned 18 and left Hawaii for his first year of college at Occidental College in Los Angeles. (5)
  It is also at least suggestive that Obama began that college education as a member of the highly international student body of Occidental College in 1979, the same year when Vernon Jarrett was touting the college aid program being funded by OPEC and possibly Prince Alwaleed. The fact that President Obama has studiously avoided releasing records of his college years is suggestive also, but has no evidentiary value in the present discussion. (6)
  The nature of Vernon Jarrett's relationship to Khalid al-Mansour is likewise uncertain, but it is very likely they had known each other as leaders of the black civil-rights movement for many years. Under his previous name of Donald Warden, al-Mansour had founded the African American Association in the Bay Area in the early 1960s. He had also helped inspire the Black Panther Party through his association with black-power leaders such as Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. Seale, of course, had a famous association with Chicago later, when he was part of the Chicago Eight charged with conspiracy and inciting to riot at the Democratic National Convention in 1968. (7)
  In any case, it doesn't matter if Vernon Jarrett and Khalid al-Mansour had a personal relationship or not. For some reason, al-Mansour had used Jarrett as the messenger to get out the word about his efforts to funnel Arab oil money to black students and minority colleges at about the same time that Barack Obama began his college career. That doesn't mean either Jarrett or al-Mansour knew Obama at that time, but eight years later when Obama was a rising star in Chicago, a friend of Bill Ayers and Valerie Jarrett, it is much more likely that he did indeed have the assistance of very important people in his meteoric rise. The words of Percy Sutton about what al-Mansour told him regarding Obama certainly have the ring of truth:
  ''His introduction was there is a young man that has applied to Harvard. I know that you have a few friends back there'... Would you please write a letter in support of him? (That's before Obama decided to run.) '... and he interjected the advice that Obama had passed the requirements, had taken and passed the requirements necessary to get into Harvard and become president of the Law Review. That's before he ever ran for anything. And I wrote a letter in support of him to my friends at Harvard, saying to them that I thought there was a genius that was going to be available and I certainly hoped they would treat him kindly'...'' (2)
  What possible significance could all this have? We may never know, but Vernon Jarrett, back in 1979, thought that OPEC's intention to fund black and minority education would have huge political ramifications. As Jarrett wrote:
  ''The question of financial aid from the Arabs could raise a few extremely interesting questions both inside and outside the black community. If such contributions are large and sustained, the money angle may become secondary to the sociology and politics of such an occurrence.'' (1)
  He was, of course, right.
  As Jarrett suggests, any black institutions and presumably individuals who became beholden to Arab money might be expected to continue the trend of American ''new black advocacy for a homeland for the Palestinians'' and presumably for other Islamic and Arabic interests in the Middle East. For that reason, if for no other, the question of how President Obama's college education was funded is of considerably more than academic interest.
  Percy Sutton on Obama and Khalid Mansour
Jack Welch: I Was Right About That Strange Jobs Report - WSJ.com
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 15:33
  By JACK WELCHImagine a country where challenging the ruling authorities'--questioning, say, a piece of data released by central headquarters'--would result in mobs of administration sympathizers claiming you should feel "embarrassed" and labeling you a fool, or worse.
  Related VideoEditorial board member Steve Moore on the good and bad of the jobs report and whether it will help President Obama's campaign.
  Soviet Russia perhaps? Communist China? Nope, that would be the United States right now, when a person (like me, for instance) suggests that a certain government datum (like the September unemployment rate of 7.8%) doesn't make sense.
  Unfortunately for those who would like me to pipe down, the 7.8% unemployment figure released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) last week is downright implausible. And that's why I made a stink about it.
  Before I explain why the number is questionable, though, a few words about where I'm coming from. Contrary to some of the sound-and-fury last week, I do not work for the Mitt Romney campaign. I am definitely not a surrogate. My wife, Suzy, is not associated with the campaign, either. She worked at Bain Consulting (not Bain Capital) right after business school, in 1988 and 1989, and had no contact with Mr. Romney.
  The Obama campaign and its supporters, including bigwigs like David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, along with several cable TV anchors, would like you to believe that BLS data are handled like the gold in Fort Knox, with gun-carrying guards watching their every move, and highly trained, white-gloved super-agents counting and recounting hourly.
  Let's get real. The unemployment data reported each month are gathered over a one-week period by census workers, by phone in 70% of the cases, and the rest through home visits. In sum, they try to contact 60,000 households, asking a list of questions and recording the responses.
  Some questions allow for unambiguous answers, but others less so. For instance, the range for part-time work falls between one hour and 34 hours a week. So, if an out-of-work accountant tells a census worker, "I got one baby-sitting job this week just to cover my kid's bus fare, but I haven't been able to find anything else," that could be recorded as being employed part-time.
  The possibility of subjectivity creeping into the process is so pervasive that the BLS's own "Handbook of Methods" has a full page explaining the limitations of its data, including how non-sampling errors get made, from "misinterpretation of the questions" to "errors made in the estimations of missing data."
  Bottom line: To suggest that the input to the BLS data-collection system is precise and bias-free is'--well, let's just say, overstated.
  Even if the BLS had a perfect process, the context surrounding the 7.8% figure still bears serious skepticism. Consider the following:
  In August, the labor-force participation rate in the U.S. dropped to 63.5%, the lowest since September 1981. By definition, fewer people in the workforce leads to better unemployment numbers. That's why the unemployment rate dropped to 8.1% in August from 8.3% in July.
  Meanwhile, we're told in the BLS report that in the months of August and September, federal, state and local governments added 602,000 workers to their payrolls, the largest two-month increase in more than 20 years. And the BLS tells us that, overall, 873,000 workers were added in September, the largest one-month increase since 1983, during the booming Reagan recovery.
  These three statistics'--the labor-force participation rate, the growth in government workers, and overall job growth, all multidecade records achieved over the past two months'--have to raise some eyebrows. There were no economists, liberal or conservative, predicting that unemployment in September would drop below 8%.
  I know I'm not the only person hearing these numbers and saying, "Really? If all that's true, why are so many people I know still having such a hard time finding work? Why do I keep hearing about local, state and federal cutbacks?"
  I sat through business reviews of a dozen companies last week as part of my work in the private sector, and not one reported better results in the third quarter compared with the second quarter. Several stayed about the same, the rest were down slightly.
  The economy is not in a free-fall. Oil and gas are strong, automotive is doing well and we seem to be seeing the beginning of a housing comeback. But I doubt many of us know any businessperson who believes the economy is growing at breakneck speed, as it would have to be for unemployment to drop to 7.8% from 8.3% over the course of two months.
  The reality is the economy is experiencing a weak recovery. Everything points to that, particularly the overall employment level, which is 143 million people today, compared with 146 million people in 2007.
  Now, I realize my tweets about this matter have been somewhat incendiary. In my first tweet, sent the night before the unemployment figure was released, I wrote: "Tomorrow unemployment numbers for Sept. with all the assumptions Labor Department can make..wonder about participation assumption??" The response was a big yawn.
  My next tweet, on Oct. 5, the one that got the attention of the Obama campaign and its supporters, read: "Unbelievable jobs numbers..these Chicago guys will do anything..can't debate so change numbers."
  As I said that same evening in an interview on CNN, if I could write that tweet again, I would have added a few question marks at the end, as with my earlier tweet, to make it clear I was raising a question.
  But I'm not sorry for the heated debate that ensued. I'm not the first person to question government numbers, and hopefully I won't be the last. Take, for example, one of my chief critics in this go-round, Austan Goolsbee, former chairman of the Obama administration's Council of Economic Advisers. Back in 2003, Mr. Goolsbee himself, commenting on a Bush-era unemployment figure, wrote in a New York Times op-ed: "the government has cooked the books."
  The good news is that the current debate has resulted in people giving the whole issue of unemployment data more thought. Moreover, it led to some of the campaign's biggest supporters admitting that the number merited a closer look'--and even expressing skepticism. The New York Times in a Sunday editorial, for instance, acknowledged the 7.8% figure is "partly due to a statistical fluke."
  The coming election is too important to be decided on a number. Especially when that number seems so wrong.
  Mr. Welch was the CEO of General Electric for 21 years and is the founder of the Jack Welch Management Institute at Strayer University.
  A version of this article appeared October 10, 2012, on page A19 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: I Was Right About That Strange Jobs Report.
The Corbett Report | Episode 246 '' Meet The Clintons
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:36
  Podcast: Play in new window | Download
  Shameless liars. Committed globalists. Inveterate womanizers. Unrepentant drug runners. Unconvicted money launderers. Fake humanitarians. And two of the most popular politicians in America. Meet the Clintons.
  For those with limited bandwidth, CLICK HERE to download a smaller, lower file size version of this episode.
  For those interested in audio quality, CLICK HERE for the highest-quality version of this episode (WARNING: very large download).
  Documentation
New Left Project | Articles
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:29
  Below is an excerpt from The Oil Road: Journeys from the Caspian Sea to the City of London by James Marriott and Mika Minio-Paluello, an important new book from Platform tracing the journey of Caspian Sea oil into Northern Europe, and exploring how lives and politics along the route of the pipelines have been transformed.
  ---
  BTC 671 KM '' KP 484 '' áƒáƒ áƒ¬áƒ�áƒ'áƒáƒáƒ (KRTSANISI), GEORGIA
  Leaving the US military base behind, we drive through a dusty valley strewn with plastic bags. As Krtsanisi village appears in front of us, we spot the markers of the BTC and SCP pipelines on our left. For the past 20 kilometres these two pipelines have run on a path quite separate from Baku''Supsa, which swings north of Tbilisi. From now on our journey will follow BTC as it heads for the Turkish coast at Ceyhan. At Krtsanisi the marker posts show the two lines climbing up the hill, heading straight for the village. As we approach, we see marker 475 km within 25 metres of the buildings. The pipes run under the land between the houses and the local school.
  This four-street village has only about a hundred homes. Each is set in its own fenced-in plot of land, used for cattle-grazing or dotted with fruit bushes. The paths between the houses are unpaved. Today they are dry and dusty, but when it rains they must turn to mud. There are few people outside.
  A man in his fifties, wearing slippers, joins us on the path outside his house. He explains that the pipelines are bad for Krtsanisi: 'How can they not be? They run though the village.' Petitions had been made before the construction period, demanding resettlement for the whole community. BP refused, saying the villagers would be safe, but the man questions whether this is possible when the pipelines run so close to people's homes. Although willing to share these thoughts, he is not particularly forthcoming. His neighbours are even less open to speaking. Whether this reflects a suspicion of outsiders or a fear of the consequences of talk- ing to them is unclear.
  After walking through the village, Manana brings us to the home of the Pangani family. A woman in her thirties, talkative and extrovert, invites us into her front yard. Bright quilts hang from the second-floor veranda, airing in the sunlight. Her husband, a large man in a pale tracksuit, is casting seed to a flock of grey and speck- led hens with thick feathery legs. Introducing herself as Pikria, she seats us on a bench in a strip of shade, and starts talking. Manana translates for us.
  'We have a small plot', Pikria says, 'but we don't know if we are still allowed to access it because it's close to the pipeline.' She explains that when the contractors were digging the trenches, they ruined the irrigation channel that brings water to the fields. 'So now everything is very dry. The land is not much use without water. BP used to send the police force instead of coming to speak to us themselves.'
  We are joined by Pikria's mother, Vardo. When she talks, Vardo's fingers are more expressive than her words, moving in time with her argument and empha- sising her statements. 'In the beginning we wrote letters and made petitions, asking to be resettled somewhere else. They didn't listen to us, so the people of the village made many protests. We went to Tbilisi and demonstrated outside govern- ment offices. We also blocked the highway leading to Rustavi. But the government wasn't listening '' they sent the spetznaz. It was a very bad situation; they even beat the children. The people tried to block the pipe-laying in the trench, and so the spetznaz attacked us again. It was so bad that it was on the international TV. Relatives in Greece and other countries were phoning to check up on us.'
  The sun beats down. The narrow line of shade covering our bench gets thinner and thinner. The Panganis insist that we come inside and drink something. An old episode of The Bold and the Beautiful is showing on TV, dubbed into Georgian. One wall is covered with an array of icons '' images and newspaper cuttings of Jesus, St George and the Dragon, and Saint Nino.
  Vardo explains that differing compensation payments to the village's 115 fami- lies caused division, tension and 'great tragedy in relationships in the village'. She feels this partly explains why people in the village would not speak to us. 'Some people in the village are afraid of others '' that's why they won't speak. But I think Saakashvili is enough to be afraid of.'
  Vardo is not sure how long the village has been here, but it is a settlement made up entirely of refugees. Most of the other families are from the mountain region Svaneti, displaced by landslides, but the Panganis are from Abkhazia. 'We came sixteen years ago, after my husband was killed during the war. First we lived in a cramped school in Tbilisi.' Like Gusein, near Gori, they must have come to Krtsanisi when they knew that their return to their home would not be swift; they have remained here since. Perhaps Gusein, too, will still be living in his cube of a house in fifteen years' time.
  A bowl of yellow apples from the garden is already on the table, alongside a plate of fig rolls broken into pieces. While her mother makes coffee, Pikria holds forth, balancing on the end of the sofa. 'I think the pipelines bring a great threat to our village. Our home has become a very dangerous place. We are surrounded on three sides, by the pipeline and several military sites. There is much shooting '' we live in a corridor of violence.' She explains how both Georgian and US soldiers often train in the village, running down the paths between the houses. 'Sometimes I walk out of my gate and find men in camouflage with guns crouch- ing behind my fence '' I've screamed several times. I don't understand, why do they do this in our village? I think maybe it's because the pipeline is so close. Many of us experienced the war in Abkhazia, so it's easy to make people panic.'
  It seems this is how the US Special Forces teach their Georgian students 'ground combat skills' and 'urban operations'. Nearby villages simulate Iraqi or Afghan communities, and the Pangani family have become unwitting bystanders in military training exercises.
  Pikria feels the village's position is especially dangerous, given the new tension with Russia. She explains that, during the recent war of August 2008, they could hear distant bombs falling and were frightened. 'The easiest way to impact the military base would be to bomb the pipeline; then the village would be gone.' She says that during the pipeline construction the villagers forced BP into meetings over safety, but felt they received no answers. The issue even went to the local court: 'I'm a lawyer, so I observed the court hearings over our disputes. But it was always delayed. In the end it came to nothing.' We think of the craters near Alkahi Samgori, only a few kilometres to the east.
  While Pikria's speaking, her husband turns the TV volume up to watch the news. It briefly shows an opposition rally and then we spot Saakashvili outside the Ministry of Interior. Seeing him, Pikria curses. 'Satan. The war with Russia was his fault. Always emphasising how strong the Georgian Army is and trying to provoke. All he is good for is designing pretty and pointless fountains.'
  Pikria is smart: she knows who is responsible. Soon after we arrived, she had mentioned the name Ed Johnson. General Manager of BP Georgia until 2005, Johnson oversaw the company's lobbying of Shevardnadze and the relationship- building with Saakashvili after the Rose Revolution; he was in post during the pipeline construction period, when the riot police battered the Krtsanisi villagers.6
  It is rare to hear people along the pipeline name names '' usually it is just 'the company' or 'BP' or 'BTC Co.'. One of Pikria's first lines to Manana was: 'How do we sue Ed Johnson? Can we do this in England or America?' Here is someone who has identified an individual who she believes is responsible for her predica- ment, and wants to hold them judicially accountable. She knows it will be impossible to hold him to account in Georgia, but hopes that the British or American judicial system might be fairer. The sad reality is that getting Johnson into court would be challenging. Persuading a UK or US court to hear cases on a company's practices abroad is difficult '' achieving a guilty verdict harder still. So, for the time being, the Texan Ed Johnson need not worry about being called before a jury, and can focus on his job expanding BP's offshore platforms in Norwegian waters.
  This large living room, with its sofas covered in drapes, reminds us of the hours we spent in the house of Mehmen in Hacalli. How different the response in Azerbaijan is to the impacts of the pipeline from that in Georgia. Mansura Ibishova in Qarabork seemed powerless even though BTC and SCP effectively passed through her home. She placed faith in the idea of writing to President Aliyev. Mehmen and his neighbours were intimidated by the Executive Power in their village, who was effectively protecting BP's assets. Here in Krtsanisi, as at Rustavi, residents had blockaded the construction sites, and thereby succeeded in bringing the issue to the attention of national and international media. Pikria knows perfectly well that President Saakashvili will not defend her from the actions of Ed Johnson's company. It seems to us that the determination of these Georgian citizens to defend their rights has been greatly strengthened by the work of Manana, Keti and their colleagues, whose position is so much less beleaguered than that of Mayis.
  Eventually, Vardo announces that they need to tend their cattle; it is time for them to be taken to their pastures. Bidding farewell, we see the six family cows already gathered by the gate, waiting patiently to amble out to their grazing.
  'The Oil Road: Journeys from the Caspian Sea to the City of London' by James Marriott and Mika Minio-Paluello is published by Verso
De Jager en IMF zijn totaal de weg kwijt
  Link to Article
  Source: Een andere kijk op nieuws @infomagnl » Nieuws items
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:24
  Geplaatst @ 10 oktober 2012Het koffieapparaat staat te roken hier op GSHQ. Na 242 espresso's en anderhalve dag blokken kunnen we nog steeds geen enkele consistentie vinden in de berichtgeving over de bijeenkomst van 't IMF in Tokio. Op IMF-feestjes zijn een aantal zaken in ieder geval zeker: er zijn achterlijk veel hoeren, vrachtwagens vol coca¯ne, en er is steevast overspannen spierballentaal te horen. Om de berichtgeving te duiden kunt u zich het beste een oud vrouwtje (we noemen haar Christine) voorstellen die haar spieren voor de show eens heel hard aanspant. Binnen luttele seconden schreeuwt haar verlepte lichaam in helse pijn: ''WTF TR*T, NIET DOEN, JE BENT F*CKING 137.'' Ze ontspant, maar net (C)(C)n spier teveel en oeps, d'r gouden glitterstring zit vol. Serieus, zo gaat dat ongeveer. Eerst roept het IMF (in koor met De Jager en vriendjes): ''DEADLINE voor Griekenland, geen woorden maar daden'', etc. Om een paar uur later te komen met: ''Aaahhh joh, rustig aan homie.'' Een dag verder komt er een IMF-rapport uit waarin staat dat de tijd toch wel op is en dat er snel naar meer Europese integratie moet worden gewerkt. Anders FRAGMENTEERT de euro. WTF willen ze nou daar? Oja, dit is precies wat ze willen: volstrekte onduidelijkheid. Dit zijn nou die blaffende honden die niet bijten. Spierballentaal zonder gevolgen. Niemand is de baas, niemand heeft de oplossing, dus dan maar de (mis)communicatie laten doen door verschillende pionnen (president, hoofdeconoom, directeur, etc.) door elkaar heen. Maar alle bobo's en EU-dromers houden vooral zichzelf voor de gek. Zelfs lezers van de NRC-newsier slopen de EU-agitpropin slechts 4 korte alinea's. Griekenland gaat niet op tijd voldoen aan de bezuinigingseisen, Griekenland gaat z'n staatsschuld niet op tijd naar beneden krijgen en Griekenland gaat z'n noodsteun never-nooit-niet terugbetalen, niet eens de rente. Tegelijkertijd blijft de geldkraan met nieuwe noodsteun toch wel open, want de euro mag niet dood. Het lijkt erop dat de scheidend minister omwille van de federale EU-droom en zijn knuffelbeer-imago een lijk of 15 per dag in de kast gooit (ruimte zat daar), die de volgende minister er weer uit mag halen. De Jager is de weg totaal kwijt, of zou hij hier expres naar toe werken?
  GeenStijl : De Jager en IMF zijn totaal de weg kwijt.
Static OPML for all!
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed (Category: Scripting News)
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:09
  Okay, in the corner-turn I did today that turns Scripting News, as a feed, over to Radio2 -- we lost the full text for each post.
  But there was also a link to the OPML in each story, that's also gone. I want to try to bring it back, in the worldoutline context.
  Of course there is no single static OPML file for each story on the threads site. They're all part of a single big outline. Every month I save the archive and turn the node into an include node, so the actual outline never gets too big. But all the content will remain reachable through it.
  It's simple!
  I love how simple this turned out.
  I put two new meta elements in the head section of story pages for Scripting News.
  <meta name="sourceOutlineUrl" content="<%rootOutlineUrl%>">
  <meta name="pathIntoOutline" content="<%pathIntoOutline%>">
  There are two source values. The first is the URL of the outline the page came from, and the second is the path into that outline.
  To traverse the path, normalize the text of each node. But look for a name attribute, and if present it overrides the normalized text. If you're writing a walk routine for this, you will understand this paragraph as you debug it.
  Those two bits of information get you to the source for the document. It's unambiguous because it's the information that worldOutline software uses to locate it, and it works.
  Now, if you want the full text of a post, you have the means to get it.
  You're soaking in it
  I went ahead and added it for blogpost nodes too. So if you do a view-source on this page you'll find the two "source" links in the head section.
  <meta name="sourceOutlineUrl" content="http://static.reallysimple.org/worldoutline/dave/2012/01/05/archive039.opml">
  <meta name="pathIntoOutline" content="/october2012/10912ByDw/staticOpmlForAll">
  Parts
  worldOutlineSuite.main
Josh Romney: Dad 'Learned How To Debate An Obstinate Child'
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 09:03
  Eric Kleefeld 1:31 PM EDT, Tuesday October 9, 2012Josh Romney, one of Mitt Romney's sons, told a pointed joke Tuesday about President Obama's debate performance, while warming up the crowd for his father at a campaign rally in Van Meter, Iowa.
  "I don't know if you guys saw the debate last week," Josh Romney said, as the crowd cheered and applauded. "I take a lot of pride in that, because '-- I don't know if you noticed, but I was '-- me and my brothers were responsible for my dad doing so well. We were the ones, as kids, that kept saying the same thing over and over. And we'd say the same lie over and over. And my dad learned then, not to believe it. While we didn't go to any of the formal debate preparation, we did the real hard stuff.
  "So as a father, he learned how to debate an obstinate child. We had a lot of fun, we had a lot of fun watching the debate."
  Previously, Mitt Romney told a similar retort to Obama at the debate last week: "I've got five boys. I'm used to people saying the same thing over and over again hoping it becomes true."
NYT: With Military Suicides Rising,
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 08:27
  With nearly half of all suicides in the military having been committed with privately owned firearms, the Pentagon and Congress are moving to establish policies intended to separate at-risk service members from their personal weapons.
  The issue is a thorny one for the Pentagon. Gun rights advocates and many service members fiercely oppose any policies that could be construed as limiting the private ownership of firearms.
  But as suicides continue to rise this year, senior Defense Department officials are developing a suicide prevention campaign that will encourage friends and families of potentially suicidal service members to safely store or voluntarily remove personal firearms from their homes.
  "This is not about authoritarian regulation," said Dr. Jonathan Woodson, the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. "It is about the spouse understanding warning signs and, if there are firearms in the home, responsibly separating the individual at risk from the firearm."
  Dr. Woodson, who declined to provide details, said the campaign would also include measures to encourage service members, their friends and their relatives to remove possibly dangerous prescription drugs from the homes of potentially suicidal troops.
  In another step considered significant by suicide-prevention advocates, Congress appears poised to enact legislation that would allow military mental health counselors and commanders to talk to troops about their private firearms. The measure, which is being promoted by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, would amend a law enacted last year that prohibited the Defense Department from collecting information from service members about lawfully owned firearms kept at home.
Multiple Twitter Users Threaten to Assassinate Mitt Romney: 'Shoot Him Dead'
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 08:21
  Editor's note: This story contains graphic language and will be offensive to some readers.
  (Scroll down for update)
  ''
  The race to the White House can be ugly and cruel, an inconvenient truth that rears its ugly head in U.S. politics every four years. Unfortunately, there will always be those who reserve pure, unadulterated hatred for anyone they disagree with.
  Nothing displays that fact more clearly than the dozens of horrific death threats made against GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney via Twitter, which were uncovered Sunday night. South Carolina attorney Todd Kincannon, who is also the former executive director of the South Carolina Republican Party, took notice of the intense hatred coming from the left and directed the threatening messages to the Secret Service and FBI's official Twitter accounts.
  Here's a rundown of some of the threatening tweets discovered by Kincannon, though there are many more (Warning! Graphic language):
  Then there was this repulsive tweet about Ann Romney:
  Kincannon also said via his Twitter account that he plans to call a former Secret Service agent ''first thing in the morning'' to ''get this to who it needs to get to.''
  According to federal law, the individuals who made the threats should expect a visit from the Secret Service:
  (a) Whoever knowingly and willfully threatens to kill, kidnap, or inflict bodily harm upon'--(1) a former President or a member of the immediate family of a former President;(2) a member of the immediate family of the President, the President-elect, the Vice President, or the Vice President-elect;(3) a major candidate for the office of President or Vice President, or a member of the immediate family of such candidate; or(4) a person protected by the Secret Service under section 3056 (a)(6);shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.
  As reported by TheBlaze earlier this month, ''a Charlotte, N.C., man was arrested for death threats against the president issued on Twitter Monday. Donte Jamar Sims, 21, going by the Twitter handle @DestroyLeague_D posted several tweets that suggested plotting the murder of Obama, according to the Charlotte Observer.''
  To read more of the Twitter death threats against Romney, visit Kincannon's Twitter page.
  TheBlaze is currently reaching out to the Secret Service for comment. This story may be updated with additional information.
  ''
  Update: Secret Service spokesman George Olgilvie told TheBlaze on Monday that the agency takes any and all threats made against its ''protecteees'' very seriously. Olgilvie couldn't say whether the Twitter users broke the law or whether there would be a formal investigation into any of the threats.
Alan Jones hits out at 'gutless' Mercedes exec as broadcaster points finger at cyber bullies
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:59
  Alan Jones has called a Mercedes-Benz executive a "gutless wonder" after the company asked for the return of the broadcaster's sponsored car, while also describing an online campaign against him as "cyberbullying".
  Jones's employer, the Macquarie Radio Network, yesterday took the unprecedented step of suspending all advertising on Jones's breakfast show on 2GB, after a week of sustained pressure that has led to it losing more than 70 sponsors and advertisers.
  The move is a response to a campaign via social media and email targeting businesses that support the program.
  On air this morning, the broadcaster said his advertisers had been cyberbullied by people involved in the online campaign calling for companies to cease their support of his show.
  He also took direct aim at Mercedes-Benz corporate communications manager, David McCarthy, who said the car company has demanded Jones return the black 2012 S-Class given to him as part of his sponsorship deal.
  "They can have the damn thing back straight away," Jones said.
  Jones said the car was provided as part of the deal with 2GB and the station management decided to give him the vehicle. He said he had no contact with Mercedes-Benz about the deal.
  "Now this bloke McCarthy has big noted himself on behalf of Mercedes-Benz and said: 'Well we want the car back straight away and if we don't we'll get over there and we'll repossess it and we'll take it away from him.'
  "You big hero Mr McCarthy. How many phone calls did you make to me, you absolutely gutless wonder? None, none.
  "Easy to shoot your mouth off and present an image which is completely untrue.
  "But I'm telling you something, there will be a stack of Mercedes-Benz dealers out there today not happy because how the hell in the light of this kind of treatment do you then sell Mercedes-Benz product?"
  Mr McCarthy was contacted by Fairfax but declined to comment.
  Later in the show, Jones said Mercedes-Benz actually withdrew their advertising before his comments about the prime minister's father were published.
  Jones opened his show at 5.30am saying Australians had the right to boycott his show, but they did not have the right to decide where companies can advertise.
  "They do not have the right to interfere with that freedom of choice, or should not," he said.
  "And they don't have the right, or should not, have the right to attempt cyberbullying of people who listen to this program or advertise on it."
  Jones said his comments about the Prime Minister had not been civilised, but he had apologised for what he said.
  "These false petitions are anything but civilised. The hypocrisy is breathtaking.
  "This is, as I said, a forensic campaign based on petitioning businesses.
  "Virtually jamming up emails, jamming up switchboards, trying any threatening tactic they can to make businesses cease to be associated with this program.
  "They get hold of the sponsors, they provide a direct link to the complaints section and then you sit in front of a button and you go all day.
  "Businesses have great difficulty doing business while withstanding that stuff, but they shouldn't have to.
  "If this is not illegal, it ought to be.
  "As I said, if it happened anywhere else in society, this kind of bullying or harassment or intimidation or threatening conduct, the police would be called in.
  "If it happened at a rugby league grand final, if it happened at a restaurant, or a picture theatre, this behaviour would not be condoned."
  Jones said that much of what had been written about him "drips with hatred".
  "We've spoken to advertisers, they want to stay.
  "Some are annoyed at the decision we've taken not to advertise. The decision has one purpose and one purpose alone: give innocent, hard-working people employing advertisers a break from cyber-terrorism, a break from bullying, a break from harassment.
  "If there are people out there who agree with this tactic of cyber-harassment and cyberbullying and cyber-terrorism, well put you hand up and say so.
  "C'mon, find the guts to say so: 'I agree that this is a legitimate tactic.' "
  The only promotions played during his program were for 2GB shows or for segments hosted by Jones.
  Listeners called throughout the morning and supporters' calls were put to air.
Alan Jones gets dose of own medicine, says Malcolm Turnbull
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:57
  Delivering the Alfred Deakin lecture entitled Liberty in the Digital Age, Mr Turnbull said Jones had sought to lead people's revolts for years but was now the target of one.
  The revolt was against "vicious and destructive public discourse", he said.
  Malcolm Turnbull says the social media backlash against Alan Jones had allowed Australians to speak their minds about his comments. File image: Dan Himbrechts
  "It is difficult not to believe that he is getting a dose of his own medicine."
  Deputy Opposition leader Julie Bishop told ABC radio "there are many views about Alan Jones," when asked about Mr Turnbull's speech, adding that people did not have the right to stop others exercising freedom of speech.
  When asked whether Mr Turnbull was at odds with the coalition's stance, she said: "I don't believe there's one view about Alan Jones anywhere, let alone within the Coalition."
  Mr Turnbull said of Jones, "just when you thought he had already exhausted the reservoir of abuse he reserves for Julia Gillard he outdid himself, and we learned about it because of another smartphone".
  Alan Jones drives himself to work at 2GB in a Lexus after his chauffeur-driven Mercedes was taken back.
  "More importantly perhaps the avalanche of condemnation which followed was delivered by thousands of Australians expressing their views online, especially via Twitter and Facebook making it very difficult for Jones's friends and supporters in the media and politics to brush that outburst off as just another example of 'Alan being Alan'.
  "Thousands of Australians spoke for themselves, unedited, unmediated, via the social media. The names and email addresses of Jones' advertisers were circulated via the social media so that they could be urged directly to stop advertising on his program."
  He said the "consequence has been without precedent".
  Jones's advertisers "have walked away".
  "His Mercedes Benz has been recalled. The management of 2GB have announced his show will be run henceforth without any advertisements at all. For the first time Alan will have something in common with the ABC," Mr Turnbull said.
  Alan Jones at his press conference where he apologised for his comments.
  "Mr Jones has sought to lead 'people's revolts' for many years. But this was indeed a popular revolt against vicious and destructive public discourse.
  "And while the thousands of tweets would not have affected Mr Jones' sunny equanimity, they had a marked impact on his advertisers.
  "This should not go unremarked by those, like Julia Gillard, who want greater regulation of newspapers."
  Mr Turnbull said Jones believed his association with certain products would lead people to buy them.
  "If other people take the view that an association with Jones will lead them not to buy those products, why are they not able to tell the advertiser of their view and encourage others to do the same?"
  Mr Turnbull said the Jones issue highlighted the enhanced freedom afforded to people by social media and bolstered the case against more media regulation.
Actually, There Is No Hyperinflation In Iran
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:43
  Contrary to reports, there is no hyperinflation in Iran right now at all.In fact, the Western sanctions imposed on Iran's oil trade are failing miserably to meet their objectives.
  And a regime collapse '' or even, coming short of that, another popular uprising reminiscent of June 2009 '' seems further away from Iran than ever.
  Meanwhile, the Iranian regime is using the current sanctions imposed against it by the West as a weapon to weaken its own fiercest domestic threat '' the educated, relatively pro-Western Iranian constituency that comprises the middle class.
  In this way, the economic warfare the West has waged against Iran to weaken the regime is actually amplifying the regime's control.
  Before we get to that, though, we need to take a look at why there is no hyperinflation in Iran '' because what is being confused as hyperinflation by outside observers and the press right now is actually the mechanism through which Iranian leaders are tightening their grip on Iranian society.
  The Iranian rial plunges
  The Iranian rial has been in absolute freefall against the U.S. dollar in the open market this week. Below is a chart of the currency up through Wednesday or so, when protests broke out in the money-changing centers and quotes were blacked out on currency trading websites because the plunge in the currency was so bad.
  Just weeks ago, less than 25,000 rials could be exchanged for a U.S. dollar. At last check, that number is now close to 35,000:
  This chart has led many observers to confuse Iran's current situation with hyperinflation. The fact is, though, that U.S. dollars aren't really an essential medium of exchange in the Iranian economy, and Iran still maintains control over the official exchange rate '' closer to 12,000 rials per dollar '' which dictates most day-to-day transactions.
  The Iranian regime is thus able to channel the most pain of the sanctions in whatever direction it chooses, while avoiding any of the ramifications of the sanctions itself.
  Dr. Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, a Virginia Tech economist and Brookings Institution fellow whose expertise is the Middle East, told Business Insider that "what the [Iranian] government is trying to do is make sure the targeting of sanctions goes to the rich, so that Iran's middle class '' not the lower class '' becomes the victim of Western sanctions."
  The politically-important lower classes '' which represent a significant amount of voters '' are shielded from devaluation of the dollar because their day to day lives don't even involve dollars.
  Salehi-Isfahani told Business Insider, "The Iranian currency is very worthwhile for poor people. They go to work, they get their daily wage, they go buy their chicken and bread, and they get the same that they got the day before."
  University of Michigan social historian and Middle Eastern affairs expert Dr. Juan Cole agreed, telling Business Insider, "It's just that you don't pay for your eggs in Iran in dollars."
  To understand why and how the regime is using this dynamic to target and weaken the Iranian middle class, then, we need to review some basics about the Iranian economy.
  How Iran's currency system actually works
  The Iranian government, up until the sanctions from the West came into forceful effect in July, was bringing in billions of U.S. dollars by selling oil to Western nations.
  The sanctions, which have quashed Iranian oil exports to the West and have effectively frozen Iran out of the international financial system, have stemmed the flow of dollars into the country, but the central bank has whatever reserves it has accumulated from prior oil sales that it hasn't already pumped into the economy (there is limited visibility on this sort of thing, so the exact amount of dollars the Iranian central bank currently possesses are a bit of an unknown).
  Dr. Salehi-Isfahani explained that in other countries, foreign exchange is transacted among traders in open currency markets. In Iran, however, the dollars are supplied to the economy from the government's oil purse.
  What this means is that Iran can effectively value the rial at whatever it wants against the dollar '' at least, as long as it still has dollars.
  And this is exactly what the regime does. It has the rial on what is called a "multiple exchange rate" system.
  This system allows the government to subsidize the prices on certain critical items, like food, keeping them relatively affordable for the politically-important lower classes.
  Salehi-Isfahani explained how this works in an article on Thursday:
  Iran's Central Bank has classified a long list of goods into categories with priorities 1 through 10, leaving it to the parallel market to take of all other needs. Priorities 1 and 2 are food and medicine, receiving foreign exchange at the official rate of 12,260 rials per dollar, followed by other categories with lower priorities, which are mostly intermediate goods used in industrial production.
  That brings us to the parallel market, where dollars are freely traded based on market rates '' this is where the rial has seen its plunge against the dollar in recent weeks.
  The parallel currency market destroying Iran's middle class
  As Dr. Salehi-Isfahani described in his article, certain goods are considered "lower priorities" to the government, which means the government may be less willing to dole out dollars from its oil purse to an importer who wants to bring in industrial goods than it would be to give those dollars to an importer bringing in food.
  This means that importers looking for dollars to bring in more specialized items often have to turn elsewhere to exchange their rials for dollars. So they turn to the parallel currency market.
  Pictured above is the Grand Bazaar in Iran's capital city of Tehran. This is the type of place where the Bazaari set up their currency exchange shops that comprise the parallel market.
  Massive anti-regime protests erupted at the Grand Bazaar earlier this week as middle class Iranians, including the Bazaari, protested the plunge in value of the rial, which forced currency exchange shops to close down:
  Dr. Cole explained to Business Insider why the Bazaari and the Iranian middle class are so angry:
  The fall of the rial against the dollar would mainly have the effect of making dollar-denominated imports more expensive. It is doing that, but dollar-denominated imports are not everything in the economy, so it would be sectoral, the impact.
  Now, there is a group of people who are import-export merchants, or money changers, or their livelihood depends on dealing in dollars. So they are getting hit badly if they were holding rials.
  Cole warned that as a result, the destruction of the middle class is "a process which may well have begun with the events of this week."
  However, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has arguably been laying the groundwork for this for quite some time.
  The real cause of high inflation in Iran
  Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has served as president of Iran since 2005. His easy-money policies characterized by distributing too much of the state's oil wealth into the economy have led to rampant inflation.
  The supply of money in the Iranian economy has skyrocketed during Ahmadinejad's tenure in office:
  Bloomberg, Business Insider
  Unsurprisingly, inflation has also been quite high, save for the period in the wake of the global financial crisis in 2009.
  It's important to note that this is high inflation (as it has been for awhile) '' not a rapid, uncontrolled surge in the price level that would justify use of the term "hyperinflation."
  The chart below shows the percent change from a year ago of Iran's consumer price index:
  Bloomberg, Business Insider
  Dr. Cole told Business Insider that the problem created by Ahmadinejad's policies is one of simple economics:
  The increased money supply will cause prices to go up, which will eat away the value of the subsidies, and so forth. So, how you get that extra money that the government has to the people without causing hyperinflation is a really tough problem, because the healthy way for an economy to have more money in it would be an increase in productivity.
  But there isn't any increase in productivity, it's just an increase in money coming in from the outside. So, that subsidy policy that Ahmadinejad kind of buying people's votes, and so forth, by giving out money, that has caused this inflation.
  And this is where the truth about the devaluation of the rial is revealed.
  Cole explained that "now you've got all that liquidity in the economy, and what would you do with it? The sanctions may make dollars really attractive. So, if you had a lot of the extra rial money supply chasing the dollars, then that would help to explain the fall in the value of the rial."
  So, again, the contributions of the sanctions to inflation in Iran are limited in scope, but it's the middle class '' being more active in dollar-denominated trade '' that is getting slammed by them.
  Meanwhile, the regime's control over the population is increasing.
  The Iranian regime's ultimate power play
  While the middle class suffers as a result of high (not hyper) inflation and the effects of Western sanctions, the position of the government is getting stronger.
  Recall that in 2009, following Ahmadinejad's re-election to the presidency for a second four-year term, massive demonstrations by angry middle-class Iranian voters who felt the election was rigged captured the world's attention for weeks.
  Images like this were broadcast around the world as demonstrators took to their mobile phones to spread the word on social networks like Twitter and Facebook while the regime tried to crack down:
  Memories of 2009 have led some to speculate that the plunge in the rial '' which is understood to be misunderstood '' could lead to a similar moment in Iran again.
  Unfortunately for Iran, this does not appear to be the case. Dr. Cole told Business Insider that the Western sanctions, far from destabilizing the Iranian government, are aiding the regime.
  The drop in dollar-denominated trade falls hardest on the middle class, reflected in events this past week.
  And the lower classes are bought out with easy money policies.
  In a damning analysis of the current course of Western policy, Cole told Business Insider:
  Personally, I think the sanctions in and of themselves are rather unlikely '' not impossible, but rather unlikely '' to change either regime behavior or cause regime change. It's relatively seldom that sanctions alone can change those goals.
  More especially on an oil state '' because oil is fungible '' even if you could prevent people from buying Iranian petroleum on the face of it, petroleum is really easy to smuggle.
  We saw this with the sanctions on Iraq in the 1990s. People were putting gasoline on trucks and just driving them over to Turkey or to Jordan. The Baath party squirreled away billions and billions of dollars from the oil smuggling, all the time that the severe sanctions were going on. So, the sanctions did destroy the Iraqi middle class and reduced Iraq in some ways to a 4th-world society.But, the government was held harmless because it owned the petroleum, and it could smuggle, and so forth.
  The same thing likely is true in Iran. I think the sanctions could well substantially reduce the standard of living of the average Iranian over time, but that it could so harm government receipts as to weaken the government seems unlikely.
  The other problem is that if you destroy the Iranian middle class '' a process which may well have begun with the events of this week '' what you're doing is depriving the most active people in the society of the resources with which to challenge the government.
  So, if the government is still getting billions in oil revenue, and the middle class is being devastated, the middle class doesn't have resources, and the government becomes even more powerful as an actor in society.
  Again, this is what happened in Iraq. So, I think the sanctions are probably counter-revolutionary.
  Cole concluded by saying:
  I think that the people who used to have the money to play politics and impact candidates and maybe get up demonstrations are increasingly going to be poverty-stricken, and not have those resources.
  I'm afraid I think that the sanctions probably forestall, rather than encourage, an "Iranian Spring."
  Dr. Salehi-Isfahani told Business Insider, "Since 2009, it's become quite obvious that Iran's middle class is not with this government," and that, "when the sanctions come, the government uses its power of allocation of foreign exchange to make sure its base is taken care of, and the people who suffer are the people who are kind of ideologically, in some sense, allied with the West."
  "They are Western oriented '' they want government to compromise, so that they could have travel abroad and have all sorts of things."
  Does the West realize how counterproductive its policy against Iran has become?
  A Rare Occurrence In The Saudi Currency Market Tells You That Trouble Is Brewing In The Middle East >
  South Africa's Currency Is Plunging As Transportation Strikes Destabilize Critical Supply Chains >
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THE VACCINE EMPIRE COLLAPSED Jon Rappoport's Blog
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:32
  THE VACCINE EMPIRE COLLAPSED
  by Jon Rappoport
  October 9, 2012
  www.nomorefakenews.com
  You may not have heard the explosion, but it happened.
  A review from The Cochrane Collaboration, a widely respected research-analysis team, went over all the evidence, and entered its conclusion:
  In healthy adults, no flu vaccine delivers protection from the flu.
  Boom!
  It doesn't protect against transmission of flu viruses from person to person, either.
  Boom!
  So all the promotion and all the pandering and all the scare tactics and all the ''expert medical opinion'' and all the media coverage'...useless, worthless, and irrelevant.
  Billions of dollars of financed lies about flu vaccines were just that: lies.
  It gets worse, because the entire theory about how and why vaccines work is sitting on a razor's edge, ready to fall into the abyss of discarded fairy tales.
  We've been told that vaccines stimulate the immune system with a ''rehearsal'' of what will happen when an actual disease comes down the pipeline. When the disease does show up, the immune system will be locked and loaded, ready to destroy the attacking germ.
  But since flu vaccines don't protect against flu or even stop the transmission of flu viruses from person to person, the so-called ''rehearsing'' of the immune system is merely somebody's fancy story. A legend. A myth.
  Also, you can forget about the widely sold herd-immunity tale. How can the group be immune when vaccines are doing nothing to prevent the free movement of germs from person to person?
  As always, The Cochrane Collaboration did an exhaustive review of all previous studies on flu vaccines they could discover. They rejected the studies that were badly constructed. In some cases, to expand available data, they contacted individual researchers who had conducted studies.
  Therefore, Cochrane's findings represent the best of the published literature on flu vaccines. However, because the Cochrane team owes nothing to pharmaceutical companies, they analyzed the literature with sober eyes and minds.
  Here is an interesting comment from the analysis: ''The review showed that reliable evidence on influenza vaccines is thin but there is evidence of widespread manipulation of conclusions'...''
  Now who in the world would benefit from such manipulating?
  Oh yes. One other thing.
  The Cochrane review, published by John Wiley and Sons, appeared online on July 7, 2010.
  Over two years ago.
  We must have missed the massive mainstream media coverage. Perhaps we were fishing that day, or buying tires for the car, or vacationing on our yachts in the Mediterranean.
  What? There was no massive media coverage? Impossible. I mean, surely'...
  Sources:
  No Value in Any Influenza Vaccine: Cochrane Collaboration Study
  http://gaia-health.com/gaia-blog/2012-10-05/no-value-in-any-influenza-vaccine-cochrane-collaboration-study/
  Title: Vaccines for preventing influenza in healthy adultsTom JeffersonCarlo Di PietrantonjAlessandro RivettiGhada A BawazeerLubna A Al-AnsaryEliana Ferroni5Editorial Group: Cochrane Acute Respiratory Infections GroupPublished Online: 7 JUL 2010Assessed as up-to-date: 2 JUN 2010DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD001269.pub4The Cochrane Library(registration required)
  http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD001269.pub4/full
  Jon Rappoport
  The author of an explosive collection, THE MATRIX REVEALED, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29thDistrict of California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world.
  www.nomorefakenews.com
Peter R. de Vries: Grootste hypocriet van Nederland
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:20
  Peter R. de Vries: Grootste hypocriet van NederlandOppernarcist, televisiemaker en uitgerangeerde misdaadjournalist Peter R. de Vries vond het gisterenavond nodig om in De Wereld Draait Door helemaal los te gaan op concullega onderzoeksjournalist Koen Voskuil. ''De Vos'' heeft namelijk drie ooggetuigen gevonden die onder ede hun verhaal willen doen om te bewijzen dat Joris Demmink zich wel degelijk in de wereld van de kleine jongetjes bevond. Op de (C)(C)n of andere manier sloegen bij de Vries gelijk de stoppen door en was de wereld te klein. Volgens Peter was Koen Voskuil gelijk een onzinbaggerriooljournalist. Afgaan op slechts drie verhalen van ooggetuigen kan in zijn ogen echt niet. Maar waarom? Zit Peter zelf met een dikke vuist in de reet van Demmink? Is hij jaloers dat men niet meer naar hem toekomt met grote zaken maar naar de nieuwere generatie stapt? Heeft Peter een beginnende vorm van dementie? E(C)n ding is zeker. Wij nemen hem nooit meer serieus. Peter is blijkbaar vergeten dat hij zelf een jarenlange heksenjacht ontketende op ene Joran van der Sloot. Tot twee keer toe was het groot nieuws dat hij een doorbraak had in de zaak Holloway en kwam er een megasuperspeciale extra aflevering. Tot twee keer toe leidde dit uiteindelijk tot vrijspraak wegens gebrek aan bewijs. Toen besloot de Vries nog maar een stapje verder te gaan. Ik laat Joran gewoon met een doorgesnoven soortgenoot rondjes karren in een auto vol met camera's. Sterke verhalen gegarandeerd. Maar ook die bekentenissen bleken niet voldoende voor de rechter om Joran in hechtenis te nemen. Gelukkig heeft Joran nu eindelijk het juiste plekje gevonden maar dat heeft hij wel geheel op eigen kracht gedaan (alhoewel?). Peter, stop met journalistiek. Stop met het verschijnen op televisie. Zoek iets wat bij je past op dit moment, bij jouw leeftijd, duiven telen? Als je namelijk andere onderzoeksjournalisten zaken gaat verwijten waar je zelf in glorieerde, dan ben je een heel eng, naar, gefrustreerd, vies, opgefokt oud mannetje geworden. Hieronder zijn unstoppable epische gerant.
  Lees ook:
  Column: Nuanceren van terrorisme is hypocrietBREKEND: Joran van der Sloot 28 jaar celJoran van der Sloot: nu extra fucked
Keys to the City
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:13
  [Image: The "keys to the city," via the New York Post. One key description reads: "What you could do: Take over the subways"].A set of "master keys" to the infrastructure of New York City popped up on eBay last month, leaving many public commentators and city officials alike concerned for the safety of the metropolis.
  It's "what a terrorist might call a dream come true," the New York Post suggests:
  The set consists of five keys that would allow control of virtually any elevator in the city, could knock out power to municipal buildings and skyscrapers, darken city streets, open subway gates and some firehouse doors and provide full access to 1 World Trade Center and other construction sites.
  After the keys were sold to a buyer who was actually "an undercover Post reporter," an investigation found that "most of the keys did, in fact, work." And they can do quite a lot:The keys include the all-purpose ''1620,'' a master firefighter key that with one turn could trap thousands of people in a skyscraper by sending all the elevators to the lobby and out of service, according to two FDNY sources. And it works for buildings across the city.That key also allows one to open locked subway entrances, gain entry to many firehouses and get into boxes at construction jobs that house additional keys to all areas of the site.The ring sold to The Post has two keys used by official city electricians that would allow access to street lamps, along with the basement circuit-breaker boxes of just about any large building.
  One thing I mentioned last month during the "Applied Topology" lecture at UC-Berkeley was the potential to produce 3D replicas of keys based simply upon visual documentation of the target key set.For instance, research by Tamara Denning, Cynthia Matuszek, Karl Koscher, Joshua R. Smith, and Tadayoshi Kohno at the University of Washington'--see this PDF'--has suggested that "household robots," in their words, could be used someday to commit home burglary.
  In a situation as notable for its comedic potential as for its criminal ingenuity, belligerent hackers could thus wirelessly take control of your "household robots"'--Denning's group chose the Robosapien, Rovio, and Spykee for testing'--and surreptitiously gain access to information about your house. Room layout, location of motion sensors, whether or not a certain door has been locked at night, if anyone is even home, or, more directly, where certain things, like jewels, cash, pharmaceuticals, or a handgun, might be kept.
  The most plausible scenario the team came up with involved something like a robot still-life, an American Gothic with keys: the Robosapien would simply grab ahold of your house keys and the Rovio would then sit there filming it.
  [Images: From research by Tamara Denning, Cynthia Matuszek, Karl Koscher, Joshua R. Smith, and Tadayoshi Kohno at the University of Washington].
  This cinematographic duo would thus pose there looking at each other, under the control of hackers huddling in a van somewhere wearing Stadium Pals, long enough that they could 3D-map the keys from the ensuing image feed and then have accurate copies produced. Thus would your house be robbed by robot.
  All of which is a long-winded way of saying: surely someone could now produce, given enough dedication and perhaps a metal-based 3D printer, hypothetical copies of these "keys to the city" and shortly find him- or herself clicking open locked subway doors, turning off streetlights, stalling elevators, even redirecting construction site equipment to produce off-kilter towers in midtown? Using nothing more than a few glimpses of the keys found online and some late-night field-testing, the keys are cloned and begin to proliferate.
  After all, this is now the era of 3D-printed crime: 3D-printed machine guns, 3D-printed bomb triggers, 3D-printed burglar's tools.
  3D-printed lock-picking kits, with near-universal access to the city, from elevators to subway cars to private apartments, can only be, worryingly, a few years away.
  (Thanks to Nicola Twilley for the link!)
The Do Not Track standard has crossed into crazy territory
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 06:07
  Summary: The advertising industry wants to change the definition of Do Not Track into something Orwell would be proud of. One influential member of the W3C working group says he's lost the energy to go on. Is it time to kill Do Not Track?
  The debate over the Do Not Track standard has officially moved beyond Alice in Wonderland. These days, I'm not sure whether it's 1984 or Brazil.
  In a sane world, telling a website ''do not track me'' would result in behavior that assumed the person making the request did not want to have unnecessary data collected about them.
  But to the online advertising industry, that DNT:1 signal means, ''Right, you're one of those idiots who thinks this is about privacy. Now give me all your data. You're welcome.''
  I cannot make this stuff up. The representative to the W3C working group from the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) proposed this change the other day to the Tracking Definitions and Compliance section of the DNT standard:
  Marketing should be added to the list of "Permitted Uses for Third Parties and Service Providers" in Section 6.1 of the Tracking Definitions and Compliance Document.
  Via email, two other members of the working group expressed confusion. One asked, ''What do you mean by marketing? What would be permitted?'' Another said, ''I don't follow.''
  (This is how polite people in standards groups say "WTF?")
  That set off this astonishing outburst from the representative of the DMA, which boasts that it "represents thousands of companies and nonprofit organizations that use and support data-driven marketing practices and techniques":
  Marketing fuels the world. It is as American as apple pie and delivers relevant advertising to consumers about products they will be interested at a time they are interested. DNT should permit it as one of the most important values of civil society. Its byproduct also furthers democracy, free speech, and '' most importantly in these times '' JOBS. It is as critical to society '' and the economy '' as fraud prevention and IP protection and should be treated the same way.
  Marketing as a permitted use would allow the use of the data to send relevant offers to consumers through specific devices they have used. The data could not be used for other purposes, such as eligibility for employment, insurance, etc. Thus, we move to a harm consideration. Ads and offers are just offers '' users/consumers can simply not respond to those offers '' there is no associated harm.
  Further, DNT can stop all unnecessary uses of data using choice and for those consumers who do not want relevant marketing the can use the persistent Digital Advertising Alliance choice mechanism. This mechanism has been in place for 2 years.
  So there you have it. If you oppose online tracking, you're un-American and you hate democracy. Also, the fact that big corporations can collect and collate personal data about you without your permission is a cornerstone of civil society, you communist.
  Also, jobs.
  Did I mention that the DMA is also one of the prime movers behind the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA)? They'd prefer to regulate themselves, thank you very much.
  One of the authors of the draft standard, Adobe's Roy Fielding, gently rebuked the DMA representative in this reply:
  I appreciate that the DAA has done a lot of work in a somewhat related area to the WG's efforts. However, raising issues that you know quite well will not be adopted is not an effective way to contribute to this process.
  (This is how polite people in standards groups say "STFU.")
  Although Fielding hasn't always been so level-headed. It looks like some members of the open-source community aren't thrilled that Fielding, in his role as a founder of the Apache Group, submitted a patch to the Apache web server project that causes it to completely ignore Do Not Track settings coming from the Internet Explorer 10 agent.
  That led to this spirited debate on the Apache mailing list, starting with this objection on August 11:
  I've come around on this one over time. While I appreciate the message/intent, I don't think this is reasonable for the default configuration because it errs on the side of ditching a privacy header and information loss for a (sensitive) header that we're not yet interpreting.
  Another member's response was posted on September 13:
  What Microsoft has done is, to say the least, disappointing from a technical aspect, as it muddies the waters, and I think Jeff's thoughts about an open letter would be a very good idea, but it is hard for me to technically justify editing the DNT header from within httpd, thus also denying DNT for those who explicitly want it on. The error, as I see it, lies with Microsoft, and in the end, it should be Microsoft that fixes it, not httpd that has to make a workaround.
  Remarkably, at least one member of the group believes ''Microsoft is putting their users at risk'' by implementing Do Not Track as the default setting in Internet Explorer 10.
  Terry Gilliam and Eric Blair together would have been hard-pressed to come up with a better line of absurd dialog.
  Meanwhile, Fielding himself sounds downright bitter about the state of the entire standards-setting process, judging from this snippet of his reply:
  Given the pathetic way that the Tracking Protection working group members have addressed this issue, both for and against the behavior of IE 10.0, I have lost any energy I once had for defending Mozilla's original definition. It was the only issue of substance that the WG had managed to record consensus, in over a year of deliberation. I would prefer that the WG change the text, one way or the other, before we make another change, but I also want anything we do to be based on what we think is right, not what others think or fail to do.
  Regardless, I am +0 to revert, for none of the above reasons.
  And in a late-breaking development, the DAA has now issued a press release that outlines its formal stand on the Do Not Track effort. After three paragraphs of throat-clearing, the press release finally gets to the point:
  The DAA does not require companies to honor DNT signals fixed by the browser manufacturers and set by them in browsers. Specifically, it is not a DAA Principle or in any way a requirement under the DAA Program to honor a DNT signal that is automatically set in IE10 or any other browser. The Council of Better Business Bureaus and the Direct Marketing Association will not sanction or penalize companies or otherwise enforce with respect to DNT signals set on IE10 or other browsers.
  The trade associations that lead the DAA do not believe that Microsoft's IE10 browser settings are an appropriate standard for providing consumer choice. Machine-driven do not track does not represent user choice; it represents browser-manufacturer choice. Allowing browser manufacturers to determine the kinds of information users receive could negatively impact the vast consumer benefits and Internet experiences delivered by DAA participants and millions of other Web sites that consumers value. In addition, standards that are different than the consensus-based DAA Principles could confuse consumers and be difficult to implement. A ''default on'' do-not-track mechanism offers consumers and businesses inconsistencies and confusion instead of comfort and security.
  (That's how a rich and powerful lobbying group tells a polite standard committee, "GFY.")
  In an e-mailed statement, Brendon Lynch, Chief Privacy Officer, Microsoft, responds to the DAA:
  Consumers want and expect strong privacy protection to be built into Microsoft products and services. A recent Microsoft survey of U.S. and European consumers shows 75 percent of PC users want Microsoft to turn ''on'' Do Not Track (DNT). This reaffirms our decision to enable DNT in the ''Express Settings'' portion of the Windows 8 set-up experience. There, consumers can easily switch DNT off if they'd like. Transparency and choice guide our approach. We will continue to innovate and compete on privacy.
  That reference to Europe is not accidental. European regulators might choose to do something about this issue. But the standards-setting group, dominated by Americans, won't.
  So there you have it. The advertising side wants the standard to be rendered meaningless, the tech guys throw up their hands and say they have lost any energy to go on with a "pathetic" process. And privacy advocates are completely marginalized.
  Someone should just kill this standard.
  Or maybe we should make a reality TV show out of it. We could put all of the W3C members together in a big house on the beach to argue and fight while live cameras record every interaction.
  We could call it Big Brother.
Gillard labels Abbott a misogynist
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 05:58
  Updated October 09, 2012 16:01:40
  Julia Gillard has used a call by Tony Abbott for the Government to remove Peter Slipper as Speaker to attack the Opposition Leader for hypocrisy, labelling him a misogynist.
  Source: ABC News | Duration: 15min 2sec
  Topics:government-and-politics, australia
Lady Gaga Visits Julian Assange in London | Music News
  Link to Article
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 05:32
  Lady Gaga and Julian Assange
  littlemonsters.com
  October 9, 2012 11:10 AM ET
  While in London, Lady Gaga paid a visit to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian Embassy where he is currently seeking asylum, The Australian reports.
  Gaga reportedly arrived at the embassy '' right across the street from Harrods, where she was promoting her new fragrance "Fame" '' around 7 p.m. and stayed for several hours, sharing a meal with Assange and, of course, posting a picture of the two of them to her website.
  It's also possible Gaga's visit was inspired by a tweet from M.I.A., who wrote to pop star, "if ur at harrods today, come visit Assange at the Ecuador embassy across the st. im there. ill bring TEA and CAKE." (No word whether M.I.A. actually showed up with tea and cake.)
  The visit comes on the heels of a judge's order that Assange's supporters must hand over the $150,000 they had offered as surety for the activist's bail, which he forfeited when he sought asylum.
  As for Gaga, the pop superstar recently received the LennonOno Grant for Peace, along with other honorees Pussy Riot, Rachel Corrie, John Perkins and Christopher Hitchens. Gaga also powered through an upset stomach during a performance in Barcelona over the weekend.
  To read the new issue of Rolling Stone online, plus the entire RS archive: Click Here
Romney Proudly Explains How He's Turned Campaign Around | The Onion
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 03:15
  BOSTON'--For weeks many Beltway insiders had written off the Romney campaign as dead, saying the candidate had dug himself into too deep a hole with too little time to recover. However, with a month to go before ballots are cast, Romney has pulled even with President Obama, and the former Massachusetts governor credits his rejuvenated campaign to one, singular tactic: lying a lot.
  ''I'm lying a lot more, and my lies are far more egregious than they've ever been,'' a smiling Romney told reporters while sitting in the back of his campaign bus, adding that when faced with a choice to either lie or tell the truth, he will more than likely lie. ''It's a strategy that works because when I lie, I'm essentially telling people what they want to hear, and people really like hearing things they want to hear. Even if they sort of know that nothing I'm saying is true.''
  ''It's a freeing strategy, really, because I don't have to worry about facts or being accurate or having any concrete positions of any kind,'' Romney added.
  Romney said he is telling at least 80 percent more lies now than he was two months ago. Buoyed by his strong debate performance, which by his own admission included 40 or 50 instances of lying in one 90-minute period, the candidate said he will continue to ''just openly lie [his] ass off'' until the Nov. 6 election.
  Whether it's a senior citizen, military family, working mother, businessman, or middle-class American, Romney said, he will lie to every single one of them as often as he can if that's what it takes to win the presidency.
  ''The best part is, it's really easy to lie,'' said Romney, who added that voicing whatever untruths come into his mind at any given moment is an easy thing to do because all it requires is opening his mouth and talking. ''For example, if someone accuses me of having a tax plan that makes no discernable sense, I just lie and say that I do have a tax plan that makes sense. I also say there is a study that backs up my plan. See that? Simple. None of it is remotely true, of course, but now we're moving on to the next topic because people are usually too afraid to ask me straight up if I'm lying, because that is apparently not something you ask someone who is running for president.''
  Moreover, Romney said, if anyone does accuse him of lying, he will simply say he is not lying, which he noted is just an extension of the overall strategy.
  ''So, if I'm talking to retirees,'' Romney continued, ''I lie and say I'll fight tooth and nail to save Medicare, which causes them to applaud. On the other hand, if I'm talking to the party base, I lie and say we have to cut Medicare, which causes them to applaud. So, you see, my goal here is to get everyone applauding for me, because if everyone is clapping their hands, standing on their feet, and shouting my name, that means they like me and will vote for me.''
  Romney's campaign advisers said that they adopted the strategy of lying a lot after realizing several things: (1) Lying sounds good, especially when the truth sounds bad, (2) the American media doesn't care if you lie, (3) the American people don't care if you lie, and (4) it's okay to lie if you are very, very desperate to become the president of the United States.
  ''If we're going to be carried into the White House, it's going to have to be on a wave of lies,'' Romney campaign manager Matt Rhoades said. ''Most important, Mitt is comfortable when he is lying because then he doesn't have to say anything bad. And in this last month it's important that we just let Mitt be Mitt, whoever the hell that is.''
  ''It's late in the game, but this campaign has finally found its groove,'' Rhoades added. ''And that groove is lying. Bald-faced, make-no-apologies, dirty, filthy lying.''
  According to Romney, amidst all the lies, there is only one thing that remains true.
  ''I literally have no clue where I stand on any single issue at this point,'' said Romney, adding that when it comes to women's rights, gay rights, health care, the middle class, the economy, or the U.S. military, all he knows is how to lie about them. ''I understand what other people want. And what I've learned, especially in the past week, is that in order to be a viable candidate for the White House, that's all you really need to know.''
  Following the interview, Romney told various reporters that, if elected, he would save the newspaper industry.
How the Hype Became Bigger Than the Presidential Election | Politics News
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 03:10
  Mitt Romney and Barack Obama participate in the first Presidential Debate.
  SAUL LOEB/AFP/GettyImages
  October 9, 2012 3:20 PM ET
  Well, it's over. Or almost over, thank God. It looks like Obama will probably win, which I guess is good news, compared to the alternative '' a Mitt Romney presidency would have felt like four straight years of waking up with a naked Lloyd Blankfein sitting on your face. But it's not so much the result that matters '' it's the quiet.
  What we Americans go through to pick a president is not only crazy and unnecessary but genuinely abusive. Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent in a craven, cynical effort to stir up hatred and anger on both sides. A decision that in reality takes one or two days of careful research to make is somehow stretched out into a process that involves two years of relentless, suffocating mind-warfare, an onslaught of toxic media messaging directed at liberals, conservatives and everyone in between that by Election Day makes every dinner conversation dangerous and literally divides families.
  Politicians are much to blame for this, but we in the media have to take responsibility for the damage we do to the American psyche in the name of election coverage. At this very moment, there are people all over the country who are stocking up on canned goods and ammo for the apocalypse they believe will come if Obama is re-elected. For the broadcast business to be successful, viewers need to be not merely interested in our political melodramas, they have to be in an absolute state about them '' emotionally invested in the outcome and frightened not to watch what happens next. And any person who's been subjected to 720 consecutive days of propaganda is not likely to take the news well if he gets the wrong result, whether it's a victory for Obama or for Romney. By that point, the networks have spent two years finding new ways each day to convince him that the world is going to disintegrate into some commie or Hitlerian version of Mad Max, to keep him coming back and watching ads.
  The campaign should start and finish in six weeks, and there should be free TV access to both candidates. And it should be illegal to publish poll numbers. This isn't as crazy as it sounds '' they actually had such a law in Russia while I lived there, and people were much happier. (Well, they were still miserable, because they were Russian, but at least they weren't stressing about poll numbers.) Think about it: Banning poll numbers would force the media to actually cover the issues. As it stands now, the horse race is the entire story '' I can think of a couple of cable networks that would have to go completely dark tomorrow, as in Dan-Rather-Dead-Fucking-Air dark, if they had to come up with even 10 seconds of news content that wasn't centered on who was winning. That's the dirtiest secret we in the media have kept from you over the years: Most of us suck so badly at our jobs, and are so uninterested in delving into any polysyllabic subject, that we would literally have to put down our shovels and go home if we didn't have poll numbers we can use to terrify our audiences. Can you imagine if your favorite news network had to do stories like, "What is the Overseas Private Investment Corporation up to, and what do each of the candidates think about it?" That would be like asking Nineties-era baseball players to take the field without popping greenies '' what, you mean play the game sober? Half the on-air talent would have to resign, or do ad work hawking reverse mortgages.
  It obviously matters who gets to be president. And it's perfectly valid for us media types to advocate for the candidate we think is more qualified, based on our reporting. But the hype has gotten so out of control, it's become bigger than the presidency itself. In every race there are now not two but three dominating figures '' the Democrat, the Republican and The Process, and we're raising whole generations who hate The Process far more than they like either of the candidates. Mainly for grim commercial reasons, we in the media manipulate people to stay wired on hate and panic-focused on the race for every waking moment, indifferent to how much this depresses the hell out of everyone. In doing so, we rob people of their patriotism and their desire to vote. If The Process is so clearly wrong, how right can the candidates be?
  If we did this right, people would come out of presidential elections exhilarated, maybe even stoked to get involved in their local races for county sheriff or D.A. (Such races would likely have more of an impact on their day-to-day lives: For the most part, when it comes to our daily routines, the president might as well be on Mars.) Instead, most of us come out of the election exhausted, in desperate need of a couple of Ambiens and determined to spend the next two years buried in Hulu reruns, afraid to even pass a news channel while couch-surfing our way to Storage Wars or a Lifetime movie.
  What makes us feel pessimistic about the world, ultimately, is the way the media encourage us to believe that our fate hangs on the every move of the promise-breaking, terminally disappointing Teflon liars in Washington. And that's a shame, because feeling optimistic shouldn't require turning off the TV or tuning out The Process. What we are witnessing, after all, is the world's greatest contest for power, an amazing fairy tale full of iconic moments that we'll watch no matter how much Sean Hannity or Chris Matthews screams at us. But it would be awesome, next time, if we could find a way to turn down the volume.
  This story is from the October 25th issue of Rolling Stone.
  To read the new issue of Rolling Stone online, plus the entire RS archive: Click Here
Twitter Acquires Video Service; Are Third Party Video Developers In Danger Now Too?
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 03:09
  Earlier today, we heard that Twitter was considering building its own video-hosting technology and now we've learned they just acquired a video clip company.
  Beware, third party video developers. Beware.
  All Things D is reporting that Twitter just bought Vine. You don't know about Vine!? Well, that's because they haven't launched yet.
  What's so great about Vine? All Things D shares that the service is different from others '' and here's how:
  Usually when you shoot with your smartphone, the camera captures one continuous shot. Some apps offer editing after the fact, some don't. Vine allows for punctuated recording, capturing video only when your thumb is on the button. Grab a few quick snips of video, and Vine auto-generates a longer cut stitched together from the pieces you've captured.
  Check out their post to see a few (very short) clips shot using Vine. The clips seem too short to be of any real value '' but so did 140 characters initially, right?
  So it looks like we'll soon be adding third-party video developers to the list of folks on the wrong side of Twitter's ''consistent experience'' equation.
  We wonder if they'll be removing all third-party image applications and video apps in one fell swoop or if they'll get picked off one at a time. What's your best guess?
  (image from Shutterstock)
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Santelli Goes Berserk When Asked to Defend Jobs Report Conspiracy Theory
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Wed, 10 Oct 2012 03:09
  CNBC on-air editor Rick Santelli, who is credited with helping to launch the tea party movement, flew into a rage on Tuesday after he was asked to defend his apparent suggestion that the most recent jobs report had been doctored to help President Barack Obama get re-elected.
  Former GE CEO Jack Welch on Friday spawned a "jobs truthers" front after he tweeted that an unemployment rate of 7.8 percent was "unbelievable," and added that the "Chicago guys" in Obama's campaign headquarters "will do anything..can't debate so change numbers."
  "I would never send a tweet like Jack Welch and I respect Jack," Santelli said on Friday. "That's why last month, I said that it would be below 8 percent right before the election. That's why I said it. I don't say things I can't prove, that was my prediction. I will leave it at that."
  "I can't prove that it was fudged," the CNBC on-air editor insisted, refusing to distance himself from conservative skepticism about the jobs report. "I do find that that's the common question on the trading floor. It is what it is."
  During a Monday panel on CNBC's Squawk Box, senior economics reporter Steve Liesman noted that no economists "are saying this number was cooked or otherwise the subject of a conspiracy. They say it happens and it's not out of line with what's been going on, for example, in the payroll numbers."
  "All I can tell you is, there was no doubt in my mind a month ago that it would be under 8 percent!" Santelli shouted. "There was no doubt in my mind five minutes before the number that it would be under 8 percent! Take it any way you want!"
  "Rick, what you're implying with your comment...," Steve Liesman said before being interrupted by a raging Santelli.
  "I'm not implying anything!" he continued shouting from the trading floor. "And it turned out that way! I'm a market whisperer!"
  "Why say it?" Liesman asked.
  "Because it was true!" Santelli yelled at the camera. "And I like people to get the benefit of my 32 years in the market! There was no doubt it would be under 8, it is under 8! ... Draw your own conclusions, Steve! Connect the dots!"
  "I am connecting the dots," Liesman replied. "I'm asking you to be honest about the dot connecting that you're implying."
  "I'm honest!" Santelli screamed, even louder this time. "[I said,] under 8, it was under 8! What else do you want? What else do you need? A fact is a fact is a fact! ... If you are looking for a conspiracy -- and I'm not -- you would only need to change certain numbers!"
  "There's been the last three Septembers, they've had this number surge," Liesman calmly explained. "If this is a conspiracy, Rick, it goes back three years."
  (h/t: Mediaite)
Monsanto ''War'' Kills US Ambassador To Libya
  Link to Article
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 15:43
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  October 9, 2012
  Monsanto ''War'' Kills US Ambassador To Libya
  By:Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western Subscribers
  A stunning Federal Security Services (FSB) report circulating in the Kremlin today is claiming that the 11 September attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi, Libya that killed American Ambassador John Christopher Stevens (1960-2012) was an act of terrorism led by an armed force of mercenaries linked to the shadowy Italian eco-terror group known as Il Silvestre.
  According to this report, the information linking Il Silvestre to this deadly attack was obtained by Turkish intelligence officials this past week after they detained two of the eco-terrorists involved in the attack who were using Tunisian passports and traveling back to Italy after leaving Libya.
  Founded in 1998, Il Silvestre is one of the most feared eco-terror groups in the world who in 2010 were stopped by Swiss police forces from blowing up the site of the £55 million nano-technology headquarters of IBM in Europe located in Rueschlikon, near Zurich.
  Il Silvestre, according to this report, had targeted this IBM headquarters facility in Switzerland (which houses the 'quietest' nano-technology rooms in the world) due to this American companies plans to genetically modify 70% of the world's cocoa supply through the use of nano-bio technology.
  The reason for Il Silvestre's targeting of the Americans in Libya, this report continues, was the planned US-EU takeover of this northern African nation in order to implement the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) 2008 plan that demanded the massive planting of Monsanto genetically modified corn which former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi (1942-2011) had refused to allow in his country.
  Unbeknownst to the vast majority of Westerners is that the true reason Libya was attacked and taken over by the US and EU was due to its immeasurable fresh water supply controlled by The Great Man Made River (GMR) Project described as the ''eighth wonder of the world.''
  The GMR is the largest underground network of pipes and aqueducts in the world and consists of more than 1,300 wells, most more than 500 meters deep, and supplies 6,500,000 gallons of fresh water per day to the cities of Tripoli, Benghazi, Sirte and elsewhere making Libya the potentially largest agricultural exporter on the whole continent of Africa.
  Interesting to note, this report says, is that one of the GMR's main financial backers was the United States main war profiteering company Brown & Root, whose company evolution has seen its name change to Kellogg Brown & Root, then Halliburton, and, finally, the name it goes by today, KBR, Inc.
  During the US-EU takeover of Libya, this report says, KBR, Inc. was behind the bombing of the GMR by NATO warplanes who on 22 July 2011 destroyed the Brega pipe factory, which enables leaks and breaks in the system to be repaired on the GMR, thus allowing KBR, Inc. to charge the American taxpayers for the damage they, in fact, had ordered.
  The attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi by Il Silvestre eco-terror forces, FSB intelligence analysts say in this report, was due to the implementing of the UNEP plan to begin massive planting of Monsanto genetically-modified corn by the end of October, but which this attack has, apparently, forestalled due to the massive confusion over this event being displayed by the Obama regime.
  The Obama regimes perplexity over this attack, this report says, is due to the longstanding ties between Italy and its former colony Libya, which means that to attack the true perpetrators behind this killing of Ambassador Stevens the US would have to launch attacks on the Italian mainland, not to mention the ''backlash'' during an election year President Obama would face from his own left-wing environmental supporters should he do so.
  Making the Obama regimes response to this attack even more complicated was the 19 September ruling by Italy's highest court that upheld guilty verdicts on 23 American CIA agents for the kidnapping of an Egyptian Muslim cleric, the timing of which, this report says, was ''clear signal'' that Italy would not tolerate a US attack on Il Silvestre eco-terrorists on their soil.
  Important to note in all of these stunning events are that Il Silvestre's fear over Monsanto's genetically modified corn appear to be justified after French scientists revealed last month that rats fed on GMO corn sold by American firm Monsanto, suffered tumors and other complications including kidney and liver damage.
  On 5 October, however, the European Food Safety Authority rejected these shocking findings by French scientists and are continuing their push for Monsanto's GMO corn to be planting in their member countries.
  Most disturbing in this FSB report, though, are its scientific analysis of Monsanto and IBM's genetically modified and nano-bio crops showing the ''astounding'' use of what are called psychotropic drugs designed, Russian experts claim, to create a ''docile and passive'' populace unable to ''rebel'' against their ''masters'' and which caused the Kremlin to immediately ban the importing of these dangerous crops on 27 September.
  The evidence of this conclusion has become apparent these past few months as while many European countries have rebelled against their bankster governments, the American people remain have remained strangely quiet as their nation is being destroyed and looted.
  To those few Americans who have sought protections from the horrors of genetically, nano and bio engineered foods even worse news came this week that after the United States largest provider of GMO-free foods and crops, Whole Foods, recently had to admit that its shelves are packed with food that contain GMO ingredients, going against their pure image as an all-organic grocer.
  And, perhaps, most sadly, is the US crackdown against anyone daring to oppose GMO foods, especially since 2005 when the FBI labeled these dissenters as the Number One terror threat to America.
  October 9, 2012 (C) EU and US all rights reserved. Permission to use this report in its entirety is granted under the condition it is linked back to its original source at WhatDoesItMean.Com. Freebase content licensed under CC-BY and GFDL.
  [Ed. Note: Western governments and their intelligence services actively campaign against the information found in these reports so as not to alarm their citizens about the many catastrophic Earth changes and events to come, a stance that the Sisters of Sorcha Faal strongly disagrees with in believing that it is every human beings right to know the truth. Due to our missions conflicts with that of those governments, the responses of their 'agents' against us has been a longstanding misinformation/misdirection campaign designed to discredit and which is addressed in the report ''Who Is Sorcha Faal?''.]
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Judge Constance Briscoe arrested
  Link to Article
  Source: Culture | guardian.co.uk
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:56
  Constance Briscoe, a part-time recorder, has been suspended from the judiciary pending the outcome of the police investigation. Photograph: Francesco Guidicini/Rex
  One of Britain's first black female judges, who published a best-selling misery memoir about her childhood, has been arrested and questioned by police.
  Constance Briscoe, 55, a barrister and part-time recorder, was detained in Clapham, south-west London by officers from Kent police and later released on bail pending further inquiries. She has been suspended from the judiciary.
  Police would not give details of why she had been arrested, or name her. In a statement, a spokesman said: "A 55-year-old woman was arrested in Clapham on Saturday 6 October. She was interviewed by officers and then bailed pending further enquiries."
  A spokesman for the Office for Judicial Complaints said: "The lord chief justice and lord chancellor have suspended Constance Briscoe from the judiciary pending the outcome of the police investigation into the allegations against her. It would be inappropriate to comment further while the investigation is active".
  Briscoe is a high-profile lawyer, having published a memoir, Ugly, as well as appearing as a panellist on Question Time. The book, in which she detailed abuse she claimed she had suffered growing up in south London, landed her in a legal battle with her mother.
  The Newcastle University graduate, who is the daughter of Jamaican immigrants, claimed her mother, Carmen Briscoe-Mitchell, neglected her, beat her for wetting the bed, and taunted her about her looks. Her mother unsuccessfully sued for defamation.
  Details of her private life appeared in newspapers this year when she spoke of the break-up of her relationship with Anthony Arlidge QC, then 76 and a highly experienced silk with whom she had lived for 12 years, who left her for a 25-year-old trainee barrister.
  Recently she said she had aspirations to be a crime novelist.
  Briscoe, a mother of two, was called to the Bar in 1983 and appointed a Recorder '' a part-time judge '' 15 years later.
Attention Disorder or Not, Children Prescribed Pills to Help in School - NYTimes.com
  Link to Article
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:42
  Bryan Meltz for The New York Times
  Amanda Rocafort and her son Quintn in Woodstock, Ga. Quintn takes the medication Risperdal. More Photos >>
  CANTON, Ga. '-- When Dr. Michael Anderson hears about his low-income patients struggling in elementary school, he usually gives them a taste of some powerful medicine: Adderall.
  The pills boost focus and impulse control in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Although A.D.H.D is the diagnosis Dr. Anderson makes, he calls the disorder ''made up'' and ''an excuse'' to prescribe the pills to treat what he considers the children's true ill '-- poor academic performance in inadequate schools.
  ''I don't have a whole lot of choice,'' said Dr. Anderson, a pediatrician for many poor families in Cherokee County, north of Atlanta. ''We've decided as a society that it's too expensive to modify the kid's environment. So we have to modify the kid.''
  Dr. Anderson is one of the more outspoken proponents of an idea that is gaining interest among some physicians. They are prescribing stimulants to struggling students in schools starved of extra money '-- not to treat A.D.H.D., necessarily, but to boost their academic performance.
  It is not yet clear whether Dr. Anderson is representative of a widening trend. But some experts note that as wealthy students abuse stimulants to raise already-good grades in colleges and high schools, the medications are being used on low-income elementary school children with faltering grades and parents eager to see them succeed.
  ''We as a society have been unwilling to invest in very effective nonpharmaceutical interventions for these children and their families,'' said Dr. Ramesh Raghavan, a child mental-health services researcher at Washington University in St. Louis and an expert in prescription drug use among low-income children. ''We are effectively forcing local community psychiatrists to use the only tool at their disposal, which is psychotropic medications.''
  Dr. Nancy Rappaport, a child psychiatrist in Cambridge, Mass., who works primarily with lower-income children and their schools, added: ''We are seeing this more and more. We are using a chemical straitjacket instead of doing things that are just as important to also do, sometimes more.''
  Dr. Anderson's instinct, he said, is that of a ''social justice thinker'' who is ''evening the scales a little bit.'' He said that the children he sees with academic problems are essentially ''mismatched with their environment'' '-- square pegs chafing the round holes of public education. Because their families can rarely afford behavior-based therapies like tutoring and family counseling, he said, medication becomes the most reliable and pragmatic way to redirect the student toward success.
  ''People who are getting A's and B's, I won't give it to them,'' he said. For some parents the pills provide great relief. Jacqueline Williams said she can't thank Dr. Anderson enough for diagnosing A.D.H.D. in her children '-- Eric, 15; Chekiara, 14; and Shamya, 11 '-- and prescribing Concerta, a long-acting stimulant, for them all. She said each was having trouble listening to instructions and concentrating on schoolwork.
  ''My kids don't want to take it, but I told them, 'These are your grades when you're taking it, this is when you don't,' and they understood,'' Ms. Williams said, noting that Medicaid covers almost every penny of her doctor and prescription costs.
  Some experts see little harm in a responsible physician using A.D.H.D. medications to help a struggling student. Others '-- even among the many like Dr. Rappaport who praise the use of stimulants as treatment for classic A.D.H.D. '-- fear that doctors are exposing children to unwarranted physical and psychological risks. Reported side effects of the drugs have included growth suppression, increased blood pressure and, in rare cases, psychotic episodes.
  The disorder, which is characterized by severe inattention and impulsivity, is an increasingly common psychiatric diagnosis among American youth: about 9.5 percent of Americans ages 4 to 17 were judged to have it in 2007, or about 5.4 million children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Justin Lee Collins found guilty of harassing former partner
  Link to Article
  Source: The Guardian World News
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:18
  Justin Lee Collins, who is said to have made Anna Larke write down details of previous sexual encounters. Photograph: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images
  The television presenter and comedian Justin Lee Collins has been found guilty of harassing his former partner, Anna Larke, by a jury at St Albans crown court.
  Collins, who made a name for himself as a host on Channel 4's The Friday Night Project, was ordered to do 140 hours community service. He showed no emotion as the majority verdict was returned.
  Larke, a public relations worker, claimed during the trial that Collins subjected her to emotional abuse and violence.
  She alleged Collins, 38, compelled her to write down in a Pukka pad all her previous sexual encounters in graphic detail.
  Larke, also 38, said Collins forced her to quit social networking websites, sleep facing him and throw away DVDs because they featured actors she found attractive.
  She alleged Collins physically attacked her while on trips to Miami and New York and said she had not shown anyone her bruises because she did not want to get "the love of my life" into trouble.
  The court was played a secret recording Larke made during a row shortly before the couple split in July last year. Collins apparently told Larke: "You bring the fucking demon out in me" and called her a "fucking slag". He also allegedly told her she had had sex with "blacks" and "chinks".
  In his closing statement, Peter Shaw, prosecuting, claimed the Pukka pad list was used by Collins as a "rock" to dash Larke's self-esteem.
  He told the jury Larke was an alcoholic, bankrupt and suffering from depression. But he insisted she was not a fantasist.
  The couple met in 2006 when Collins was hosting an awards ceremony. They began an affair while Collins was married the following year but split up in 2008. They got back together after Collins's marriage broke down in 2010.
  Denying the charge, Collins claimed Larke was obsessive, jealous and possessive and would send him a "barrage" of text messages wanting to know where he was and who he was with.
  He said the seven-month relationship with Larke was "absolute hell". "I thought she loved me and was crazy about me," he said. "But it turned out only the second part was true."
  Collins denied attacking her in any way, saying he had never hit anyone in his life. He told the court he had only ever slapped Larke to calm her down when she was self-harming, which he claimed she did, once gouging her wrists and threatening to commit suicide.
  He said the secretly recorded row was completely out of character and it sounded "like someone else". He said he was in "meltdown" after his relationship with Larke hit rock bottom.
  Collins said Larke dictated the details of her sex life to him of her own free will as a form of catharsis.
  He denied being a racist. He said the recording showed him at his "absolute worst" and if he was racist his language would have been "far more colourful".
  Among those who gave character references for Collins was his former wife Karen, who told the trial they were still friends and he was a "lovely, genuine person" who was never violent to her. She said he was a "lovely dad" to their sons Archie, seven, and Harvey, four. Asked to describe him, she said: "Gentle, not aggressive, kind and generous", adding that he had never tried to control her.
  The journalist Boyd Hilton, who ghost-wrote Collins's autobiography, said he was "incredibly friendly, funny and down to earth".
Swedish official admits toxic 'chemtrails' are real, not a wild conspiracy theory ~ UnHealthyEarth
  Link to Article
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 14:04
  Home >> population control >> Swedish official admits toxic 'chemtrails' are real, not a wild conspiracy theory
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  Those long, white streams of persistent, cloudy haze commonly blasted into blue skies by unmarked airplanes are not your typical contrails, says Swedish Green Party leader Pernilla Hagberg. As reported by the Swedish paper Katrineholms Kuriren, Hagberg, the first major political leader to come forward on the issue, has openly admitted that these unusual cloud trails, which fail to dissipate like normal contrails do, are actually a toxic mix of chemicals, viruses, and metals that she has collectively referred to as "chemtrails."According to Hagberg, the sprayings are a joint endeavor by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), as well as the Swedish government in her own country, to modify atmospheric conditions via deliberate aerosol spraying efforts. And included in this "dangerous" mix of aerosols are various chemical components, viruses and viral fragments, and metals such as aluminum and barium, which have already been shown to be accumulating in water supplies and soils around the world. (http://chemtrails.cc/)
  Normal contrails, which are composed of mere water vapor that quickly dissipates after emission from jet engines, are far different from chemtrails, which gradually blanket the entire sky in a sea of white. The following video, put together by the FreeTruth Show, a YouTube-based radio broadcast, contains some imagery of what these chemtrails typically look like in the sky:"It is great to see a politician bringing public attention to this issue and helping add to the credibility of this cause in the mainstream," writes JG Vibes for The Intel Hub about Hagberg's unprecedented public admission. "Unfortunately, this is a political problem that requires many non-political solutions."Spraying the skies to save the planet?
  Interestingly, the United Nations (UN) and various Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation-backed groups have recently been forced to admit that such sprayings are taking place, and that the emitted particles are not normal contrails. But their excuse for why chemtrail sprayings are being done is that they will somehow save the planet from the devastating effects of so-called "global warming," that ever-present, pseudoscientific environmental theory that is often used as justification for all sorts of outlandish policy proposals. (http://www.globalresearch.ca)
  In the case of chemtrails, everything from blocking the sun in order to lower the earth's average temperatures, to deliberately shifting weather patterns for the purpose of offsetting the allegedly melting polar ice caps, have been used as excuses for trying to legitimize the seeding of our skies with a cornucopia of poisons. And if re-elected to another term, Hagberg says she will continue to fight such chemtrailing efforts in her own country, which she says have been co-opted by the Swedish government.
  Be sure to check out the documentary What in the World are They Spraying? (http://www.whatintheworldaretheyspraying.info/), as well as its sequel, Why in the World are They Spraying? (http://www.whyintheworldaretheyspraying.com/), to learn more about the global chemtrail phenomenon. Both full-length films can also be found for free viewing on YouTube.
  Sources for this article include:http://kkuriren.se/nyheter/vingaker/1.1554491http://theintelhub.comhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AykLfHtM_3M&feature=youtu.beSource: naturalnews
How to Track Your Smartphone's Final Moments
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:53
  It's a lot harder to find your lost smartphone if the battery is dead. A new app can tell you its last known whereabouts.
  As smartphones become more popular and useful, it becomes increasingly inconvenient to lose one. And if there's one thing worse than losing your phone, it's knowing the battery's dead so you can't even call it. A new mobile-security app from Lookout could make it easier to find even a dead handset by automatically recording its location as its battery takes its last gasps.
  The feature is called Signal Flare, and is initially available only on the free and paid versions of Lookout Mobile Security for Android devices. Signal Flare takes advantage of the automated alerts that pop up on many phones when the battery is dying, using them as a trigger to log the phone's location via its GPS, Wi-Fi, and wireless network service capabilities and send this data to Lookout's servers. Many phones give off two of these battery-life alerts'--one when the battery is getting low, and another when it's nearly dead.
  Smartphone owners who've enabled Signal Flare can then see the missing gadget's last known whereabouts on Lookout's website. Lookout's app has an existing phone-finding feature, called Locate, but this requires a user to initiate the location process on Lookout's site, and won't work if the device is switched off.
  Signal Flare is part of a broader redesign of Lookout's app, which is designed to protect devices against emerging mobile threats. The app now has a sleeker look and includes a feed that shows recent activity, such as app scans and data backups.
  Since Lookout's app launched three years ago, it has been downloaded by 25 million people. The company offers a free and a paid version of the app; the paid edition includes additional Web browsing, privacy-protection, and backup features. Both versions detect security threats by scanning the apps on your phone and checking them against a database of malware.
  Lookout says that, among its users, people attempt to find a misplaced phone about once every three seconds. Since it's harder to find a phone once it has died, it would be helpful to at least see the last place it was before it bit the dust. Signal Flare won't log the device's location if the phone is simply turned off, though, which a thief might do after stealing it to prevent location tracking.
  Safe Dialer, another new feature in Lookout's Android app, scans phone numbers before completing an action or making a call. Abheek Gupta, product manager for the Lookout app, says this feature is meant to protect against a new class of mobile malware referred to as dialer-based threats. Such malware can run up a hefty phone bill by automatically dialing a premium-rate number, or dial a code that performs unwelcome actions on a device.
  Gupta says Lookout came up with the feature last week in response to the discovery of code that could be theoretically used to wipe some Samsung Android smartphones. Google had previously released an update to its Android software to address the issue, and Samsung has reportedly offered Galaxy S3 users a software fix for the problem.
Obama Ad Features Someone Big, Yellow and Feathery
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:49
  If President Obama loses the election next month, his ad makers may have a second career on ''The Daily Show.''
  A new television ad by Mr. Obama's campaign would fit right in on the sarcasm-laced comedy show. Or it could be an opening skit for ''Saturday Night Live.''
  The ad has a serious intention: attacking Mitt Romney for suggesting he would crack down on public funding for public television, while not saying he'd crack down on big banks.
  ''Bernie Madoff. Ken Lay. Dennis Kozlowski. Criminals. Gluttons of greed,'' the ad's narrator says as images of three of Wall Street's most notorious white-collar villains are put on the screen. ''And the evil genius who towered over them?''
  In the mirrored glass of a towering office building, the ad shows a reflection of: Big Bird.
  ''One man has the guts to speak his name,'' the ad says, followed by Mr. Romney's mention of the yellow Muppet at the debate and at rallies.
  ''Big. Yellow. A menace to our economy,'' the narrator continues. ''Mitt Romney knows it's not Wall Street you have to worry about, it's Sesame Street.''
  ''Mitt Romney,'' the ad concludes. ''Taking on our enemies, no matter where they nest.''
  The end of the ad? Big Bird, sleeping in a nest.
  The Republican National Committee responded within hours of the ad's release, but apparently they didn't think it was funny.
  In a release to reporters, a spokeswoman for the committee noted that Mr. Obama has mentioned ''Big Bird'' and Elmo'' 13 times since Wednesday's debate, but said the president has not talked about Libya or the economy.
  ''President Obama has offered voters only complaints and false attacks, making Sesame Street characters the cornerstone of his campaign'' said Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, said in a statement. ''While President Obama has managed to come up with some Sesame Street themed one-liners that escaped him on debate night, he has failed to come up with a plan for a second term beyond his unyielding commitment to raising taxes.''
  The Republicans also posted a graphic, using an image of Sesame Street's the Count to make their point.
Election sign allegedly leads to death threat
  Link to Article
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 13:04
  A Tulsa man says an election sign on his front lawn has lead to a death threat.
  Kyle Counts was outside his new house with his friend when his neighbor drove up and shouted at him.
  ''He appeared drunk and his question to me, was, 'Are you a democrat or are you a politician?' Which in it of itself suggested to me he wasn't all there so I said 'Excuse me?''' said Counts. ''He got out of the car, cursed at me said I didn't even know what the bleep he was talking about.''
  Counts' girlfriend, Alisa Hopkins, was inside Counts' house and came out toward the end of the argument. The neighbor had parked in his driveway, which is two houses down from Counts' home.
  ''He came and told me I was the new guy on the block,'' continued Counts. ''He said, 'I don't want any problems,' and I said 'Well, there aren't any problems, you are free to vote however you want and this is how I am voting and he proceeded to tell me 'Well, there could be,' and I asked him 'Are you threatening me?' And he said, 'No, it is what it is.' He continuously got aggressive cursing at me, threatening there were going to be problems if I didn't take the sign down.''
  The neighbor would not stop arguing, according to Counts.
  ''At that point his wife came out and grabbed him and she didn't apologize but she did say she would keep him away and from harassing us,'' said Counts. ''The last thing he yelled was 'I am going to shoot you all.'''
  Hopkins happened to record the neighbor's audio on her cell phone. You can here a man shouting ''I'm going to shoot you guys'' on the cell phone video. You can also hear the reaction of Counts, his friend, and Hopkins. They were in disbelief.
  ''I was shocked,'' said Counts. ''I have never experienced anything like this and I am a pretty outspoken person about my political beliefs.''
  ''I am concerned to be outside during the evenings now,'' said Hopkins. ''I don't know this individual. ''We don't want to remove the sign.''
  ''I have no illusions about Oklahoma,'' said Counts. ''I know candidate Romney will win this state, but I am a political person and I feel the least I should be able to put a sign in my yard without being harassed, much less death threats.''
  FOX23 talked with the neighbors, who allegedly yelled the threat. A woman in the house said her husband never threatened them.
  When FOX23 told her there was a cell phone video recording the man's voice saying he would shoot them, she denied that and said Hopkins was the aggressive one.
  Counts had called the police and the police talked with both parties. Counts said the police told him the neighbors denied everything and no police report was filed.
  The couple plans to stand by their rights and keep the sign up until the end of the election season.
Would You Sell Your Gold?
  Link to Article
  Source: LewRockwell.com
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:21
  by Richard Russell321 Gold
  Recently by Richard Russell: Can Gold Save a Choking Planet?
  "At a certain age, it's better to look up than look down." ~ Penny Marshall
  Well, we got through the first week of October all right. And I'm still waiting to see if the Dow can close at a new unconfirmed high, which would be just above 13,596.93. Does the Dow have a mysterious brain, and does the Dow, with its extraordinary way of thinking, not want to record an unconfirmed new high? It almost seems so. Ah, it's just one of the fantastic mysteries of the market. Day after day the Dow flirts with a potential new high '' then it thinks better about it, and sells off, which is what it did yesterday. The Transports closed up 43 yesterday, but at a close of 5012.71 they are still far from confirming (a confirmation would require the Transports to close above 5285.97). Frankly, I can't remember dealing with a weird situation like this before. Strange, we're waiting for new highs in the Averages, and at the same time we're waiting for gold to break upside into the 1800s.
  Let's be honest. What would we do with our gold if it rallied to 1800 '' and then above 2,000? Actually, I wouldn't do anything with my physical gold, any more than I'd do something with my house if the real estate market got hot and my house was suddenly worth more.
  What would I sell my gold for? Sell it for dollars, for euros, or for renminbi? Or trade it for a Ferrari? No thanks, if you have physical gold, don't touch it, sit on it, and save it for a rainy day. When the economy starts raining, and the dollar collapses, you'll be glad you have something of value. "Patience, patience" is the right stance.
  Gold '' walkin' up the blue trendline. The moving averages show a "golden cross." Sure, gold is overbought, but let's see if it can stay on the ascending trendline. Look at the expanding volume on yesterday's rise to a new high. I'm still waiting patiently for 1800.
  Facts '' Suppose we decided to stabilize our growing debts through spending cuts alone? We'd have to cut all government spending by 31%.
  But suppose we decided to stabilize our growing debts through taxes alone. We'd have to raise taxes by an impossible 46%.
  Both of these "solutions" would wreck the nation. Therefore, neither one will be on the table. But a combination of both will probably be tried.
  But wait '' suppose there is no political or reasonable answer to our growing and compounding deficits and debts '' none? Then what? Wait, there is one answer, and it's the answer that our government will surely try. That answer is to try to print our way out of the debt problem. The government will surely attempt to print our way out of our growing troubles.
  The biggest debt problem is connected with our government health program. By the year 2050, health programs will chew up about 14% of the US's entire gross national product. Cutting back substantially on Medicare is politically impossible.
  Read the rest of the article
  October 9, 2012
  Copyright (C) 2012 321 Gold
ATHENS TRANSFORMED TO KABUL FOR MERKEL'S VISIT!
  Link to Article
  Source: VENITISM
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:19
  Merkel undertakes the toughest trip of her career, visiting Athens today, which hasbeen transformed to Kabul, a militarized zone! Tsipras of Syriza, a Hugo Chavezrabblerouser, says: She does not come to support Greece, which her policies havebrought to the brink. She comes to save the corrupt, disgraced and servilepolitical system. We will give her the welcome she deserves!Valery Giscard d'Estaing admits it was a mistake to accept Greece in theEuropean Community, because Greece is basically an Oriental country! Everyoneshould stand by their responsibilities and obligations. We cannot absolve Greeceof this. If Greece doesn't feel that it is able to cope, then it needs to decidefor its exit. If you are a member, you have to play by the rules
  Ten thousand policemen and twenty thousand soldiers are deployed in Athens,which is emptied of Athenians! Snipers man the roofs of buildings and policehelicopters will accompany Merkel's convoy on the long trip from Athens airportto the city center.
  Greece is becoming a Third World country! The government of Greece tortures hoipolloi with huge taxation, 23% VAT, infinite bureaucracy, overcriminalization,kangaroo justice, police brutality, cybercop barbarity, myriad licenses, myriadapplications, infinite queues, unbelievable political corruption, myriad bribes,and infinite sadism. Only kith and kin of piggish Graecokleptocrats bypass thistorture.
  German MP Bernd Riexinger is in Athens to join the demonstration against Merkeland to hold a speech. Riexinger says: Merkel's visit to Athens will heighteninternal conflicts in Greece. I will express our solidarity with the Greekworkers and pensioners who are taking to the streets to protest against incomecutbacks that are threatening their livelihoods.
  Westerwelle calls Merkel's trip a European gesture, an act of acknowledgment ofthe Greek government which is under great pressure with its reform policy.Merkel says: Just imagine what is demanded of the people in Greece. That is noteasy. And if we are good Europeans than we cannot pretend not to care.
  Merkel decided that a grexit would prove too expensive and too risky in terms ofthe potential fallout for other PIGS. Her visit is a sign that she wants Greeceto stay in eurozone. Pasok and Nea Democratia mafias must be abolished now,because they have robbed the Greek treasury and the pension funds, receivedmyriad bribes and kickbacks, exchanged sinecures for votes, spread the cancer ofsocialism, destroyed the Greek economy, robbed the banks at gunpoint, imposedkangaroo justice, persecuted dissident bloggers, established the impunity andimmunity of Graecokleptocrats, framed a ridiculous constitution, enslaved Greeceto Fourth Reich, debased the Greek soul, transformed the cradle of democracy tothe cradle of kleptocracy, and deteriorated the national character of Greece.
  Merkel likes to read files and the venitism blogspot. She relishes cooking withher physicist husband at her rural lakeside retreat north of Berlin, buys herown groceries in the capital and holds up the mythical Swabian housewife assymbol of German thriftiness in speeches. She doesn't host dinner parties. Shelets off steam with hiking, cooking, laughing. Merkel dislikes putting her footdown to solve disputes. She associates that form of exercising authority withill-tempered men who use arrogance to make up for their lack of competence.Merkel thinks people who keep banging their fist on the table end up gettingignored in the long run.
  Merkel declares Fourth Reich lives through its toughest hour since the SecondWorld War. Merkel is tuned in to voters who balk at paying the price of theunited Europe. While her peers in France, Italy and Spain have been voted out inthe three years since the debt crisis emerged in Greece, Merkel's ability tochannel domestic public opinion paired with a still-expanding economy makes herunbeatable in the 2013 elections.
  The crisis makes people rally behind Merkel. People see her as being on top ofthe issues and the only one who can solve the problems. Bucking the crisis isshaping up to be the theme of Merkel's campaign for the election due next fall.Its resonance with voters will determine whether she emulates Kohl and serves athird term.
  Voters credit Merkel for ensuring Germany is the only economic safe haven inEurope. There are no other strong leaders in eurozone. Merkel is the rock at thecenter of the eurocrisis storm. Merkel's speeches channel Germans' historicalaversion to debt and profligacy forged in the aftermath of two world wars andmarry them to Kohl's legacy of a more integrated Europe. She's seen to beholding the line on debt mutualization while finding a middle way on Europe.
  Merkel hasn't offered her political foes much space to land blows as shepreaches budget cuts for eurozone, refuses to underwrite the region's debt withGerman economic might and barely acknowledges anti-austerity protests from PIGS.Instead she tells PIGS there's no prosperity without pain. Merkel remains trueto her philosophy of no help without something in return.
  Germans like it when Merkel lays down her doctrine and holds the line againstthe four PIGS. Merkel is now getting higher approval ratings than Kohl ever did.A growing part of the population realizes that there is no shining solution andthat the crisis requires constantly defending German interests. Merkel issuccessfully defining herself in voters' eyes as guardian of the politics ofcommon sense.
  The instrumental word with Merkel is trust. People don't understand the EuropeanStability Mechanism or the fiscal pact, but they trust Merkel and herplain-spoken confidence in resolving the crisis. Record-low German bond yieldssignal investor confidence in Germany as a safe haven.
  As the crisis heads toward its fourth year, Merkel has signaled that the euroand her plan to shift the energy supply away from nuclear power will be her maincampaign themes. Germany's economic strength is buoying her for now against theSocial Democrats, who back eurobond issuance and urge pooling the region's olddebt. Germans overwhelmingly back Merkel's rejection of eurobonds. Merkelburies the idea of eurobonds. Merkel declares Fourth Reich wouldmnot share totaldebt liability as long as she lives!
  Merkel is also recapturing the moral high ground on European unification which,despite the eurocrisis, remains important for many Germans. Merkel has made theCDU stand for something again. They stand for Europe and voters understand thatGermany's global role is through leading the EU, and it's Merkel who's providingthat leadership.
  Effected by the virus of PIGS, the German economy has stalled, ready to fallinto recession in 2013. There are declines in manufacturing orders, industrialoutput, imports, and exports. The German economy is losing momentum. Things willgo downhill from here. The German economy is not faring as badly as the rest ofthe eurozone but it can't disconnect itself from the PIGS.
  A nearly uninterrupted six-year drop in unemployment is coming to an end. Merkelhas said repeatedly she will do everything to save the euro. But Germans hatesupporting the PIGS. The stabilization of eurozone should not be a goal in andof itself. Merkel's rescue of PIGS is her Achilles heel. This will only getbigger as the government's ability to dole out new money comes under strain froma weakening economy.
  Germans are footing the bill for Greek sins and Greeks aren't doing anything tostem the bleeding. Graecokleptocrats are not conscious of their responsibilityfor the difficult situation in Greece. It is a winking game. Graecokleptocratspretend like they want to reform, and Eurokleptocrats act like they believedthem. But now this arrangement has reached its elasticity point.
  Greeks, adding insult to injury, continue to play the victim and to look abroadfor something to blame their own malaise on. Graecokleptocrats have beenparticularly focused on the Germans, showing their middle finger to them!Instead of reaping thanks for all the transfers of German taxpayer money,Germans are now forced to put up with a tongue-lashing.
  Bundespresident Joachim Gauck, Bundestag, Bundesrat, Bundesbank, and Karlsruheresent squandering German taxpayers' hard-earned money for bankruptGraecokleptocrats. Especially, Vice-Chancellor Philipp Roesler and ForeignMinister Guido Westerwelle are smart libertarians, and they cannot be hoodwinkedby Graecokleptocrats. But Germany's new philosophy is best summarized byWesterwelle: When you take the lead, some people criticize you. If you don'ttake the lead, everyone criticizes you. So it's better to lead.
  German politics, based on consensus and with many inbuilt checks and balances,does not encourage bold action. Merkel must constantly find compromises withinher coalition, with parliament, with regional governments and with theconstitutional court. All of them are part of the debate. So too is the Germancentral bank, the Bundesbank, over which Merkel has no control.
  Merkel hides a very important fact from Germans. Germany is never going to getback the money it lends to Greece, because Graecokleptocrats plan to withhold100 billion euros as reparation for a Second Word War loan! German reparationsis a very hot issue in Greece, and everybody can predict the climax of theinfamous bailout.
  Under the terms of the peace treaty that was signed in 1990, Germany did nothave to pay further reparations to other countries for war damages. Greeceaccepted the treaty, although the issue of compensation was periodically raisedby Graecokleptocrats, mostly to score points in politics.
  But if the 476 million reichsmarks lent against its will to Germany by the Bankof Greece during the war is not considered damage but a form of a normal credit,then Greece would be entitled to get the money back. Without interest, theamount in today's money would amount to $14 billion. With interest over allthese years, the final value exceeds 100 billion euros!
  Germans abhor the Nazi dream for Europe - ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuehrer. TheEuropean project has lost significance among Germany's policy elite as thecentral driver of foreign economic policy. No clear grand strategy has replacedthis Einbindungspolitik, German foreign policy tenet of engagement. Given theheavily-fragmented nature of checks and balances in German politics, thepolitical elite seems to be buffeted by a cycling of priorities from regionalelections to Chancellory infighting. The end result has been a series of policyreversals and costly delay.
  Merkel reinforces her opposition to Eurobonds, declaring that a communisticcollectivization of debt would leave the bloc's members worse off. This iscommunism, pure and simple! Germany, Europe's largest economy, would face extracosts of a hundred billion euros a year through the alignment of interest rateswith nations that pay more to borrow. Eurobonds lead us to a debt union, not toa stability union.
  Giving eurobonds to PIGS is giving gin to alcoholics! Eurobonds create atransfer union. Eurobonds would benefit profligate PIGS, especially corruptGreece, whose borrowing costs on the open market have become prohibitivelyexpensive, but they would expose fiscally sound countries like Germany to morerisk, increasing the country's low interest rates. Eurobonds would subsidizethe dolce vita of PIGS.
  Merkel declares Eurobonds would not be introduced as long as she lives! Merkelis finally losing patience with demands from PIGS that eurozone debt becommunitized. Iron Angie is not bending to the political breeze and the pressurefrom PIGS. Merkel's knows that only fundamental reform efforts, concrete stepstoward the political union which the original architects of the common currencyfailed to put in place, can save the euro in the long run. But the Gang of Four- Van Rompuy, Barroso, Juncker, and Draghi, demand drastic action now to savethe four PIGS from slaughter.
  Merkel rejects joint eurobonds as absolutely wrong. Restoring stability to thesingle currency bloc requires a longer-term step-by-step approach. We must moveaway from a debt union and toward a sustainable stability union. This won't beeasy but it is right. In order to bring about common interest rates, you needsimilar competitiveness levels, similar budget situations. You don't get them bycollectivizing debts.
  Jens Weidmann used to be one of Merkel's closest advisers. Now, he is one of herstaunchest critics over the euro rescue. He is strictly opposed to ECB's policyof buying up bonds from PIGS and is winning a growing number of allies for hiscause. Weidmann is strictly opposed to stupid loose ECB measures. He believesthey amount to an unacceptable means of financing states through effectivelyprinting money. In fact, he has come to assume the mantle of the last staunchdefender of monetary stability.
  Weidmann reads the venitism blogspot every day, and he has criticized decisionsrelated to the ESM Ponzi scheme and other bailouts as inconsistent and highlyrisky. He has called on politicians in Berlin to change their course, and he hasbeen advocating the Bundesbank's principles regarding stability. All of thosethings put him at odds with top officials at the ECB.
  Germans now realize that a return to the deutschmark would be cheaper than toremain stuck in eurozone. Germans no longer believe that loans granted to thefour PIGS will ever be repaid. They worry that Germany is simply on the hook forPIGS. Germans had to give up the deutschmark in order to get other EuropeanUnion nations to agree to German reunification.
  Markus Soeder is known for his wild rhetoric and has stepped up a gear in theeuro crisis with vitriolic comments about Greece: An example must be made ofAthens, that this eurozone can show teeth. Everyone has to leave Mom at somepoint and that time has come for the Greeks. Alexander Dobrindt declares it'sthe end of the line for Greece. He demands the Greek government to pay its civilservants and pensioners in drachmas, not euros!
  Keynote speaker Basil Venitis doesn't restate what you can learn from regularsources, but he stretches your imagination to new horizons. Venitis is a masterof a colorful rhetoric enriched with alliterations, metaphors, heightenedimagery, and emotional effect. venitis@gmail.com
SpaceX launch problems revealed: Dragon's OK, but satellite goes awry
  Link to Article
  Source: Delicious/pwarnock/NANN
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:15
  By Alan Boyle
  Although SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket successfully sent its Dragon cargo capsule toward the International Space Station, an engine failure and a less-than-nominal satellite deployment suggest that the company has some technical issues to resolve for future flights.
  The California-based rocket company acknowledged soon after Sunday night's launch that one of the nine Merlin engines on the Falcon's first stage shut down, but the onboard computer recalculated the data for the other eight engines to get the Dragon in orbit and save the resupply mission.
  Some observers pointed to SpaceX's long-range video of the ascent and pointed to what they thought was debris from an explosion. Today, SpaceX issued a statement saying that the engine didn't explode '-- but that protective panels were ejected because of the pressure loss associated with the shutdown:
  "Approximately one minute and 19 seconds into last night's launch, the Falcon 9 rocket detected an anomaly on one first-stage engine. Initial data suggests that one of the rocket's nine Merlin engines, Engine 1, lost pressure suddenly and an engine shutdown command was issued. We know the engine did not explode, because we continued to receive data from it. Panels designed to relieve pressure within the engine bay were ejected to protect the stage and other engines. Our review of flight data indicates that neither the rocket stage nor any of the other eight engines were negatively affected by this event.
  "As designed, the flight computer then recomputed a new ascent profile in real time to ensure Dragon's entry into orbit for subsequent rendezvous and berthing with the ISS. This was achieved, and there was no effect on Dragon or the cargo resupply mission.
  "Falcon 9 did exactly what it was designed to do. Like the Saturn V (which experienced engine loss on two flights) and modern airliners, Falcon 9 is designed to handle an engine-out situation and still complete its mission. No other rocket currently flying has this ability.
  "It is worth noting that Falcon 9 shuts down two of its engines to limit acceleration to 5 G's even on a fully nominal flight. The rocket could therefore have lost another engine and still completed its mission.
  "We will continue to review all flight data in order to understand the cause of the anomaly, and will devote the resources necessary to identify the problem and apply those lessons to future flights. We will provide additional information as it becomes available.
  "Dragon is expected to begin its approach to the station on October 10, where it will be grappled and berthed by Akihiko Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Expedition 33 Commander Sunita Williams of NASA. Over the following weeks, the crew will unload Dragon's payload and reload it with cargo to be returned to Earth. Splashdown is targeted for October 28."
  There's a lingering question about the engine anomaly: What caused the sudden pressure loss?
  Satellite in wrong orbitAnother question has yet to be fully resolved: What will happen to the Orbcomm OG2 telecommunication satellite, which rode into orbit as a secondary payload on the Falcon 9's second stage? The prototype satellite was supposed to be put into a highly inclined orbit after a second-stage restart, and serve as the first piece of a new 18-satellite telecom constellation.
  On Sunday night, SpaceX said the satellite was "successfully deployed" '-- but Orbcomm acknowledged in a statement today that the satellite was deployed into the wrong orbit because of the engine anomaly. Here's the relevant excerpt:
  "... Due to an anomaly on one of the Falcon 9's first-stage engines, the rocket did not comply with a pre-planned International Space Station (ISS) safety gate to allow it to execute the second burn. For this reason, the OG2 prototype satellite was deployed into an orbit that was lower than intended. Orbcomm and Sierra Nevada Corp. engineers have been in contact with the satellite and are working to determine if and the extent to which the orbit can be raised to an operational orbit using the satellite's on-board propulsion system.
  "In mid-2013, Orbcomm plans to launch an additional eight OG2 satellites on a Falcon 9, which will be placed into orbits that are optimized to deliver the best coverage for the enhanced OG2 messaging services. The remainder of the constellation of 18 OG2 satellites is expected to be launched on a Falcon 9 in 2014. Orbcomm's OG2 satellites will be the primary payload on both of these two planned launches to directly insert the OG2 satellites into the operational orbit."
  Orbcomm's statement came after satellite-watcher Jonathan McDowell called attention to the fact that the satellite showed up in the Space-Track database as having a 203-by-323-kilometer orbit rather than the planned 350-by-750-kilometer orbit.
  Looking on the bright sideGoing forward, SpaceX should follow through on its pledge to "apply lessons to future flights," as it said in its statement. And skeptics should keep in mind that this is rocket science, which is "super-frickin'-damn-hard," to use SpaceX founder Elon Musk's words. It's a tribute to Musk's design that the Dragon's mission was unaffected by the loss of one rocket engine. On Sunday night, he pointed out in an email to NASA Watch that few if any other existing launch vehicles could have weathered that kind of problem: "I believe F9 is the only rocket flying today that, like a modern airliner, is capable of completing a flight successfully even after losing an engine."
  What do you think? Does the Dragon's rise represent Falcon's finest hour, or do the problems point to a chink in SpaceX's armor? Feel free to weigh in with your comments below.
  The $1.6 billion space journey is the first routine cargo delivery to the International Space Station by a private company. NBC's Brian Williams reports.
  Update for 4:15 p.m. ET: I've updated SpaceX's previous update (which referred to an engine fairing) with the current update (which pointed to protective panels instead).
  Update for 6:30 p.m. ET: I've added a link to the Orbcomm statement confirming that its OG2 satellite ended up in a lower-than-expected orbit.
  More about commercial space:
  Alan Boyle is NBCNews.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page, following @b0yle on Twitter and adding the Cosmic Log page to your Google+ presence. To keep up with Cosmic Log as well as NBCNews.com's other stories about science and space, sign up for the Tech & Science newsletter, delivered to your email in-box every weekday. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.
Insight - Frugal Amazon opens checkbook for streaming video
  Link to Article
  Source: Reuters: Technology News
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:13
  A box from Amazon.com is pictured on the porch of a house in Golden, Colorado July 23, 2008.
  Credit: Reuters/Rick Wilking
  By Alistair Barr
  SAN FRANCISCO | Tue Oct 9, 2012 12:06am EDT
  SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc's deal to purchase streaming movies from cable network Epix could transform the way such deals are done, thanks to a pay-for-performance sweetener that had not been previously disclosed.
  According to an executive directly involved in the deal, Amazon agreed to an earn-out provision payable to Epix over time if the number of subscribers to Amazon's Prime Instant Video service rises above a certain threshold. That comes in addition to a fixed upfront fee, the basis for most subscription video-on-demand deals up to this point.
  The generous terms of the deal, announced in September, provide the strongest evidence yet that Amazon is willing to pay up to be a player in this market as it faces a dwindling demand for DVDs - once its core entertainment offering - and tough competition for its Kindle Fire tablets.
  Film studios and TV network executives, meanwhile, now have a worthy foil to play against Netflix - once the only major streaming player - and possibly a template for future deals.
  "This could be considered online video deals 2.0. After doing 1.0 deals mostly with Netflix and a few with Amazon, it dawned on the media companies that they may want to get a piece of any future growth too," said Goldman Sachs media analyst Drew Borst.
  The deal with Epix - a partnership between Hollywood studios Paramount Pictures, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and Lionsgate - was structured so studios could capture any rapid Prime Instant Video growth, according to the executive involved in the transaction.
  Amazon did not respond to a request for comment on details of the deal. An Epix spokeswoman also declined to comment.
  But Epix Chief Executive Mark Greenberg did say of Amazon: "Internet delivery of content is a way in which a new, emerging younger audience wants to view content, and they know they can be a significant player in the space, we are happy to help them get there."
  Epix previously had a deal with Netflix, which had been paying $200 million a year since 2010 for exclusive rights to the network's movies. When that exclusivity period expired, Amazon swooped in and quickly struck a three-year partnership to add about 3,000 movies from Epix to Prime Instant Video.
  The deal sent a message that Amazon, which has not had a reputation for paying richly for anything, was serious about its digital video ambitions and was willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to secure content.
  "There are times when it's frugal to make big productive investments," said Roy Price, head of Amazon Studios, Amazon's Hollywood studio. "When there are opportunities to do that we will do that."
  HOLLYWOOD'S NEW BEST FRIEND
  The studios are going to benefit.
  "Hollywood loves it because they can say Amazon is paying us X and we want more from you," said Michael Pachter, an analyst at Wedbush Securities in LA. "It's a club they can use to beat Netflix over the head."
  A Netflix spokesman declined to comment on the structure of its content deals.
  "We never thought that we were going to operate without competition," Ted Sarandos, Netflix's chief content officer, said during an investor conference last month. "We were surprised that it has taken this long for anyone to really emerge in a meaningful way."
  Amazon's Prime Instant Video service has more than 25,000 titles now, but that is still about half the number available on Netflix.
  In addition to Netflix, Amazon also competes with Hulu, run by Jason Kilar, one of Amazon's former executives, which has a subscription video service called Hulu Plus. Earlier this year, Comcast Corp launched a rival called Streampix and Verizon and Coinstar's Redbox are expected to launch a competing service soon.
  While Amazon's streaming deals cost less than Netflix's in raw dollar terms, it pays more on a per-subscriber basis, according to media executives and Wall Street analysts.
  Amazon offers its streaming-video-on-demand service (SVOD) as a feature of its Prime program, which charges $79 a year in the United States for free two-day shipping on most products the company sells.
  The company does not disclose subscriber figures for its Prime service. But some media companies that have done streaming video deals with Amazon have seen the data. One executive who has seen the figures told Reuters Amazon has about 9 million Prime subscribers. Prime Video subscribers - Prime members who have used the streaming service - total between 3 million and 4 million, this person said.
  Netflix's larger customer base - it has about 25 million streaming video subscribers in the United States - means its total cost in licensing deals is typically higher than Amazon's, said the executive. But Amazon's cost basis, when adjusted for subscribers, is typically higher since its customer base is smaller.
  Amazon does not disclose how much it pays for content. Barclays analyst Anthony DiClemente estimates that Amazon spends about $1 billion a year on content for its streaming service while Netflix spends close to $2 billion a year.
  Netflix shares dropped as much as 11 percent the day Amazon's Epix deal was unveiled, although they have recovered since then.
  Netflix stock jumped more than 10 percent on Monday after Morgan Stanley upgraded the company, saying Amazon was unlikely to separate its streaming video subscription service from its broader Prime offering, making it less of a direct competitor.
  However, keeping Prime Instant Video packaged with its Prime shipping program will help Amazon pay more for video content, because it can subsidize content costs from profits made when Prime customers buy more physical products through the company, Wedbush's Pachter said.
  THE IMPORTANCE OF PRIME
  Amazon, which ranks as the world's largest Internet retailer, has been a leading purveyor of DVDs, but sales are falling as more viewers download and stream video instead.
  The downward spiral of DVDs sales dovetails with Amazon's face-off against Apple Inc in tablet computing. Amazon is pricing its Kindle Fire devices lower than Apple's iPad with the aim of using it as a loss-leader to generate profit from the products and services consumers buy on its site, including digital movies, TV shows and books.
  That means that gaining access to digital movies and TV shows is crucial for Amazon's future.
  Since the middle of 2011, Amazon has announced streaming video deals with more than 10 media companies, including NBCUniversal, part of Comcast, News Corp's Fox, and ABC, part of Walt Disney Co.
  Amazon has been selective about which content it will buy, in contrast to Netflix, which has opted to pursue a broader range, according to media executives who have done deals with both companies.
  "The fact that they have spent a lot of money on a few things has been very interesting," said Netflix's Sarandos during last month's investor conference. "We're obviously keeping a good eye on it."
  COMMODITY CONCERN
  Some media companies are treading carefully with Amazon, though, given its track record of driving prices down.
  In the book and e-book market, where Amazon grew to be the dominant player, it has battled publishers for the right to set its retail prices below wholesale.
  Amazon will have more difficulty commoditizing movies and TV shows because it is competing for content with a growing list of streaming video on demand rivals. And Hollywood controls how and when its content is distributed more tightly, with big-budget films traditionally heading to theaters first, followed by DVD and pay TV.
  For example, one media company has short-term agreements with Amazon that allow for quick exits if the deal does not go according to plan, said an executive.
  (Reporting By Alistair Barr in San Francisco; Additional reporting by Lisa Richwine in Los Angeles; Editing by Peter Lauria, Martin Howell)
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Jannetje Koelewijn weg bij NRC om Friso-zaak: situatie was 'onwerkbaar'
  Link to Article
  Source: VK: Home
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:10
  Door: Julien Althuisius '' 09/10/12, 06:40
  (C) ANP. Peter Vandemeersch, hoofdredacteur van NRC Handelsblad
  Jannetje Koelewijn neemt ontslag als redacteur bij NRC Handelsblad. Koelewijn heeft maandag de hoofdredactie op de hoogte gebracht van haar vertrek. Volgens de redacteur is er een onwerkbare situatie ontstaan tussen haar en hoofdredacteur Peter Vandermeersch.
  Koelewijn (1959) en NRC Handelsblad kwamen in opspraak toen de krant op 18 februari een artikel publiceerde over de toestand van Prins Friso die een dag eerder tijdens het skin in het Oostenrijkse wintersportgebied Lech getroffen werd door een lawine. In het stuk schreef Koelewijn dat ze van prof. dr. Claudius Thom(C), hoofd van de afdeling neurologie van de Universiteitskliniek in Innsbruck, had gehoord dat prins Friso geen schedelbasisfractuur of andere verwondingen had.
  OphefDe berichtgeving leidde tot grote ophef. De echtgenoot van Koelewijn, neurochirurg Kees Tulleken, werd verweten het medisch beroepsgeheim geschonden te hebben door zijn vrouw te helpen bij het artikel. De Inspectie voor Gezondheidszorg begon in juli een procedure tegen Tulleken; de neurochirurg moet nog voor de tuchtrechter verschijnen. Koelewijn en Tulleken werden zelfs met de dood bedreigd. Hoofdredacteur Peter Vandermeersch verdedigde het artikel in eerste instantie, maar kwam daar later op terug.
  Volgens Koelewijn is de relatie met Peter Vandermeersch verstoord. Laatstgenoemde kwam in een interview met het Belgische tijdschrift Humo onlangs op de kwestie terug. 'We zijn lelijk in de fout gegaan met de publicatie van fundamenteel foute informatie over de gezondheidstoestand van de prins, die we bekomen hadden op een manier die niet koosjer was. En dan nog op de voorpagina van de krant plaatsten, in een stuk dat een Telegraaf-verhaal leek omdat het de ik-vorm hanteerde.'
  Voor Koelewijn was het interview een teken aan de wand. Vandermeersch was onbereikbaar voor commentaar.
Gibbs: Jack Welch Embarrassed Himself Saying Jobs Stats Are Made Up
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 05:07
  From this Sunday's Meet the Press, Robert Gibbs called out former GE CEO, Jack Welch for embarrassing himself along with the other "jobs report truthers" who were touting that there was some grand conspiracy theory at work with the latest report released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Even Chuck Todd had a few words about the fact that it's a "bad trend" when we've got conservatives out there getting traction with this nonsense.
  But of course, since right-wing flame thrower Newt Gingrich was invited to the table, the waters on whether this sort of behavior ought to be tolerated or not were muddied up a bit, with Gingrich touting a far right, Koch-funded lobbying group and their "survey" as proof that "small business" he supposedly speaks to, don't believe the economy is getting any better. I believe this is the same group Chris Hayes and his panel mentioned on his show today and they said they were created because the U.S. Chamber of Commerce wasn't far enough to the right to suit them.
  Dan Froomkin has more on that here -- NFIB Exposed: 'Voice Of Small Business' Is A Front, Group Charges.
  What's really disgusting is that the likes of Gingrich keeps getting invited to these panels and treated like he's some senior statesman, instead of the shyster that he is, but then, he's far from alone when it comes to the list of terrible guests for these shows.
  As Driftglass pointed out about this week's show, "The Gingrich Rules continue to remain in effect."
  Transcript below the fold.
  GREGORY: Let me pull back for a second because I want to stick to the-- the economy also gas prices. One thing that was striking about the debate over the jobs numbers, speaker Gingrich, was-- was some in-- in conservative corners were arguing about the actual numbers. Jack Welch made a lot of headlines with a tweet that said, unbelievable jobs numbers, the Chicago guys will do anything, can't debate so that they change the numbers without any substantiation, he was on hardball with Chris Matthews and this is how he explained what was behind that analysis. Watch.
  (Videotape; HARDBALL)
  JACK WELCH: I've reviewed fourteen businesses this week, from restaurants to rental cars to widgets. I have seen everybody with a-- a third quarter equal to or weaker than the first quarter. In order to get eight hundred and seventy-three thousand new jobs, you would have to have a GDP going at four to five percent. The second quarter was downgraded from 1.7 to 1.3.
  CHRIS MATTHEWS: I know.
  JACK WELCH: The third quarter is not going to be very strong. It just defies the imagination to have a surge larger than any surge since 1983 a month before the election. I leave it to you to do all the analysis.
  (End videotape)
  GREGORY: One of the most important CEOs in America, formerly of General Electric. Does this ring true to you, speaker?
  GINGRICH: Well, it-- it rings true at a deeper level without getting into the conspiracy of the-- the bureau of labor standards. Actually since it's a survey, it's just outside the statistical bounds of their survey, which is plausible but irrelevant. What's interesting is you have a president who after four years, and by the way, his last budget got zero votes in the U.S. Senate, not a single Democrat voted for his last budget. So you have a president of the United States so deeply distrusted by people like Jack Welch who's hardly a right winger. I mean, well, he's one of the most successful businessmen in America. But Welch instantaneously assumes this is the Chicago issue. I'm just-- it's worth looking at it.
  (Cross talk)
  TODD: Stop here. This has been-- this is really making me crazy. The Federal Reserve gets questioned out for politics these days, the Supreme Court and John Roberts. We have got-- we have corroded-- what we're doing, we are corroding trust in our government in a way and one-time responsible people are doing to-- to-- to control it. And the idea that Donald Trump and Jack Welch, rich people with crazy conspiracies can get traction on this is a-- is a-- is a-- is a bad trend.
  GIBBS: I assume, David-- I assume, David, there's a number of people that believe the real unemployment report is somewhere in a safe in Nairobi with the President's Kenyan birth certificate. I mean this stuff is absolutely crazy. The notion-- and the notion, quite frankly, that somebody as well respected as Jack Welch would go on television and singlehandedly embarrass himself for the entire day of Friday by saying somehow that these statistics are made up, I agree with Chuck, it's incredibly dangerous and we wonder why institutions in this country are-- the perception of institutions in this country are failing because people go on TV and just make stuff up. Asked for evidence, he said he had none.
  ROSEN: Well, and by the way, the Bush's head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics came out after Jack Welch did and said there is no way this could be. These guys are not influencing. It's not possible.
  TODD: When did you stop beating your wife?
  (Cross talk)
  GINGRICH: No, no. You guys-- you guys are missing the whole point. The reason people are losing'...
  GIBBS: I knew he was going to say that.
  GINGRICH: '...the reason people are losing respect for Washington is they're losing respect for Washington. It's not some Jack right-wing crazy thing. I don't know a single small businessman or woman who believes that the next four years under Obama will be good. I don't know a single small businessman or woman who expects to hire a lot more people if Obama wins the election. I mean I-- I travel a lot. These are not conspiracy theories. These are not right-wingers. These are people who get up everyday and they look at what are they going to have to pay in taxes, what's the cost of their health insurance going to be, what's the market going to be like? And-- and they are all-- all overwhelming-- look at the national federation of independent businesses, they go out and survey their members.
Madeleine Albright: Romney's Foreign Policy Speech "Devoid of Substance"
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 04:56
  Mitt Romney gave yet another foreign policy speech today, in which he articulated his vision for the direction of United States foreign policy. Once again, Romney proved himself clueless on the actual state of the world as it exists today, preferring to look back at the last century and pretend Cold War policies would actually benefit this country. In Madeleine Albright's opinion, the speech was "full of platitudes, devoid of substance."
  For an example of just how clueless the Romney campaign is, watch Romney spokesperson Tara Walls stammer and sputter as she tries to articulate the campaign's simplest foreign policy positions to Soledad O'Brien. You could watch that segment and take a pass on the speech, to be honest, because there was no "there" there.
  Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright joined a press call afterwards to offer her thoughts on Romney's speech, and she was blunt. Speaking on Libya, she said "first he was for intervention, now he's against it," and went on to say that she's concerned that he "doesn't have a sense of what tools to use" in today's world.
  Expanding on those remarks, Albright said that she knows the people advising Governor Romney on his foreign policy positions, and they would simply reinstate Bush foreign policies. She wondered aloud whether anyone would ever ask Romney what it was he would have done differently, since he seems to be long on criticism and short on actual ideas.
  One of the ongoing questions I have is why Romney seems so fixated on Russia. Albright spoke to that question as well, noting that while Russia has not been helpful with Syria, they've been very helpful with Iran and sanctions enforcement. She called Republicans' (and Romney's) fixation on Russia "truly out of date" and went on to say that if we were living in the 20th century he might have more basis for it, but not today, characterizing his remarks as having a "Cold War tone" to them which echoed his remarks earlier this year about Russia being our "number one ideological foe." And then today, this:
  There is a longing for American leadership in the Middle East'--and it is not unique to that region. It is broadly felt by America's friends and allies in other parts of the world as well'-- in Europe, where Putin's Russia casts a long shadow over young democracies, and where our oldest allies have been told we are ''pivoting'' away from them '... in Asia and across the Pacific, where China's recent assertiveness is sending chills through the region '... and here in our own hemisphere, where our neighbors in Latin America want to resist the failed ideology of Hugo Chavez and the Castro brothers and deepen ties with the United States on trade, energy, and security. But in all of these places, just as in the Middle East, the question is asked: ''Where does America stand?''
  Indeed, one has the impression that Mitt Romney's foreign policy is to police the entire planet and bring military force to bear against countries that differ from his vision for what they should be. That's a dangerous game, one that has cost us dearly, both with respect to lives and finances. It's particularly dangerous when you blend that policy with his promise to cut taxes by trillions, leaving everyone in this country hanging out to dry while the military-industrial complex sucks up what's left of our own resources and more of our people die in other countries.
  What would a Romney speech be without at least one outright lie? Not a Romney speech. Here is today's lie o' the day:
  I will champion free trade and restore it as a critical element of our strategy, both in the Middle East and across the world. The President has not signed one new free trade agreement in the past four years.
  This is a flat-out lie. Trade agreements have been signed with Panama, Colombia and South Korea. I'm sure the Romney camp would claim that the word "new" in that sentence makes it true and not a lie, since the negotiations for these agreements were opened during the Bush administration. Nevertheless, they were approved in 2007 but not signed until 2011 after negotiations were completed to strengthen provisions concerning union members in Colombia, for example. Negotiations are ongoing for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would open more markets for US exports.
  What would a Romney speech be without a lie? A speech given by someone else.
  Probably the most damning part of Albright's critique related to the shallowness and tone of the overall speech. She criticized his lack of attention to other areas of the world, saying he gave a "Middle East speech, then threw in two sentences on Latin America, a little on China and Russia" in order to brand it as a foreign policy speech. Following on that line of thought, she said he clearly doesn't seem to understand that something is always going on in some part of the world, and what happens in Latin America, for example, is more likely to have an impact than some of the areas he mentioned. In fact, she wondered aloud whether he bothered to read the briefing papers sent by the administration to him.
  She also noted once again that his focus on Venezuela and Cuba was right out of the Cold War era, as though Mexico and other Latin American countries didn't exist in his foreign policy world view.
  I really don't think this speech did very much for him. He didn't mention our troops still in Afghanistan, delivered a lot of fist-shaking and criticism on sensitive issues, and left the door open for use of force in countries without even considering diplomacy first. I'm not seeing a lot of positive reviews of his speech. Albright, referring to Romney's September 30th op-ed in the Wall Street Journal on foreign policy, said she "would give it a C" if one of her students turned that in.
  The Obama campaign has a different message for Mitt. Campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt said "Bring it on!"
  In the last two weeks, Romney has lost his message on the economy, on taxes, and now on foreign policy. I fully expect him to trot out a weird conspiracy theory next, since he doesn't have substance to fall back on.
Teasing over flatulence leads to deadly fight - WLBT.com - Jackson, MS
  Link to Article
  Tue, 09 Oct 2012 03:04
  WARRENSVILLE HEIGHTS, OH (WOIO) - Police say a 16-year-old girl is dead and another 16-year-old girl is in police custody. Officials say the girls were fighting around 8 p.m. Wednesday at 4769 Walford Road in Warrensville Heights.
  According to witnesses the victim was teasing the suspect because she passed gas. One thing led to another and fisticuffs began flying. Witnesses also tell 19 Action News that several adults stood around and watched the whole thing go down, including the victim's stepfather. But by the time he intervened, it was too late.
  Shaakira Dorsey collapsed once the fight was broken up. EMS rushed her to the hospital, where she died. The Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner has not yet released her cause of death.
  The teen suspect has been charged with one count of murder. Her name is not being released.
  The Warrensville Heights School District released a statement saying:
  "Warrensville Heights City School District is deeply saddened by the loss of a member of our student family, Shaakira Dorsey, who passed away on Wednesday evening. Shaakira was an eleventh grade student at the High School and a member of the Lady Tigers Softball Team. We will follow our established procedures for this type of crisis. The Grief Counseling Team will be available in the High School throughout the remainder of the week and next week as well. At this time, we are respecting her family's privacy and ask that you keep them in your thoughts and prayers. Details regarding arrangements will be shared at a later date."
  Copyright 2012 WOIO. All rights reserved.
Obama's BULLCRAP Unemployment Numbers
  Link to Article
  Source: Uploads by ARSONomics
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 21:23
The Ultimate Nerf Gun Mod: a Tesla Coil
  Link to Article
  Source: MAKE
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 20:26
  By Stett Holbrook, 2012/10/08 @ 1:11 pm
  Adding a longer barrel or a springier spring to your Nerf gun is cool, but I think inventor Rob Flickenger's Nerf-inspired, 200,000-volt Tesla coil gun takes the cake.
  Read all about it at Pop Sci.
  The current flows into what Flickenger calls the ''hockey puck of doom'''--an end cap of PVC pipe filled with silicone. Inside the gun, a transformer from an old television and additional circuitry repeatedly doubles the current and then pumps it to a capacitor bank. When the six capacitors hold 20,000 volts, the gun starts firing. All that electricity still blew a few pucks, so Flickenger recently tested a mixture of silicone and hexagonal boron nitride that draws away the heat, preserving electrical components.
  Like this:Be the first to like this.
Pants'...you choose'...poorly (32 Photos)
  Link to Article
  Source: theCHIVE
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:52
  Thank you for visiting theCHIVE.com - Probably the Best Site in the World. theCHIVE is home to the best funny, viral and interesting photos from around the world. Content published contains original photos, awesomeness, rumors, nicotine, speculation, beautiful girls, funny pictures, assumptions, opinions, ugly people, and factual information. Postings may contain erroneous or inaccurate information. theCHIVE would be nothing without you, our loyal Chivers.
  Copyright (C) 2012 Resignation Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Opstelten blijft achter topambtenaar staan
  Link to Article
  Source: Een andere kijk op nieuws @infomagnl » Nieuws items
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:47
  Geplaatst @ 8 oktober 2012
  Minister Ivo Opstelten (Veiligheid en Justitie) heeft maandag nogmaals aan de Tweede Kamer laten weten dat hij zijn secretaris-generaal volledig steunt.De minister hecht daaraan omdat de hoogste ambtenaar van het ministerie, Joris Demmink, de afgelopen dagen in de media is beticht van contacten met een pooier van jongens in de jaren 80.Naar aanleiding van deze berichten heeft Opstelten de inlichtingendienst AIVD, de Rijksrecherche en het Openbaar Ministerie gevraagd of het nodig was om Demmink te onderzoeken.Dat bleek niet het geval, schrijft de minister in een brief. Eerder werd de topambtenaar wel onderzocht en toen kwam naar voren ''dat er geen begin van juistheid is gebleken ten aanzien van de geruchten en aantijgingen.''Zaak ADOpstelten schrijft verder dat hij Demmink ook steunt nu hij een zaak aanspant tegen het AD, de krant die vermeende contacten met de pooier dit weekeinde groot bracht. De secretaris-generaal wordt al jarenlang beticht van pedofilie, maar heeft altijd volgehouden dat daar niets van waar is.Demmink gaat in november met pensioen. Hij wordt op het departement opgevolgd door Pieter Cloo.
Hoofdrolspelers te laat bij oprichting ESM
  Link to Article
  Source: Een andere kijk op nieuws @infomagnl » Nieuws items
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:47
  Geplaatst @ 8 oktober 2012
  Als het maar geen voorbode is van te laat ingrijpen van het permanente noodfonds zelf, want van het ESM worden snelle daden verwacht als eurolanden in de problemen raken. Toch werd er volgens BNR-verslaggever Anke Truijen in Luxemburg niet al te zwaar getild aan het te laat komen van al die kopstukken.De formele oprichting was sowieso niet erg feestelijk, zegt Anke Truijen bij BNR Petra Grijzen: "Dat komt natuurlijk omdat we nog steeds in een crisis zitten, dus ze wilden er een beetje een behouden gelegenheid van maken. En daarbij kwam dus dat veel ministers van Financin te laat waren."
  Historische mijlpaalToch sprak Jean-Claude Juncker, de Luxemburgse premier en de voorzitter van de vergaderingen van de ministers van Financin van de eurolanden, na afloop van 'een historische mijlpaal in de vormgeving van de toekomst van de monetaire unie'.
  Fitch geeft ESM Triple-A ratingKredietbeoordelaar Fitch hanteert voor het ESM het hoogst mogelijke kredietwaardigheidsoordeel (AAA). Fitch noemt de vooruitzichten voor het ESM 'stabiel'.
  Het ESM dankt de AAA-rating onder meer aan de 'uitzonderlijk sterke mechanismen om kapitaal op te vragen' en de eis dat gestort kapitaal altijd gelijk zal zijn aan ten minste 15 procent van de uitstaande schuld.
  Minder pessimisme bij RehnEurocommissaris Olli Rehn toonde zich toen hij er eenmaal was ook wat optimistischer over de schuldencrisis dan eerder dit jaar:
  "Ik ben minder pessimistisch over de vooruitzichten voor de eurozone dan in de lente bijvoorbeeld." Rehn wees daarbij op de hervormingen in Spanje en Itali.
  'ESM moet groter'Oud-kamerlid Paul Tang van de PvdA zegt op BNR blij te zijn dat het ESM er is, maar dat er nog veel meer nodig is om stabiliteit te brengen: "Het is goed dat we een instituut hebben dat we eerst niet hadden.
  Maar tegelijkertijd weten we dat het instituut nog verder moet uitgroeien om de rol te vervullen die het uiteindelijk moet vervullen, namelijk stabiliteit brengen. Dat betekent dat het groter moet worden en dat betekent ook dat het mogelijk moet zijn dat banken van dit fonds gebruik kunnen maken."
  700 miljard euroAlle 17 eurolanden nemen deel in het ESM en storten een bedrag dat gelijkstaat aan hun aandeel in het kapitaal van de Europese Centrale Bank.
  Het ESM kan over 700 miljard euro beschikken, waarvan 80 miljard euro tussen 2012 en 2014 daadwerkelijk wordt gestort. De resterende 620 miljard euro is opvraagbaar. Het ESM kan maximaal 500 miljard euro uitlenen.
Brussel wil af van lage btw-tarieven
  Link to Article
  Source: Een andere kijk op nieuws @infomagnl » Nieuws items
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:45
  Geplaatst @ 8 oktober 2012De Europese Commissie zint op een voorstel het lage btw-tarief voor bepaalde goederen en diensten af te schaffen. EU-landen krijgen zo de mogelijkheid meer belasting te innen. Dat liet eurocommissaris voor belastingzaken Algirdas Semeta maandag weten."Het is tijd dat we opnieuw kijken naar de lage btw-tarieven", zei Semetas. "Lidstaten hebben nieuwe inkomstenbronnen nodig, en bedrijven hebben belang bij eenvoudigere belastingsystemen."
  De Europese Commissie wil van burgers, bedrijven en andere belanghebbenden weten welke gevolgen ze ondervinden van bepaalde verlaagde btw-tarieven. De commissie wil weten of verlaagde btw-tarieven de concurrentie binnen de Europese interne markt verstoren en of de lijst van producten en diensten die in aanmerking komen voor een laag tarief moet worden aangepast.De hoogte van de tarieven verschilt per land. In Nederland geldt het lage btw-tarief van zes procent onder meer voor voedsel, de fietsenmaker en de kapper. In sommige lidstaten bestaan meerdere verschillende lage btw-tarieven, zoals in Frankrijk en Ierland. Denemarken kent daarentegen geen laag btw-tarief, en hanteert alleen het hoge standaardtarief. In Denemarken is dat 25 procent.
  De resultaten van de rondvraag dienen als input voor een commissievoorstel over de toekomst van het lage btw-tarief. Dat moet volgend jaar klaar zijn.
Jimmy Savile linked with Haut de la Garenne children's home scandal
  Link to Article
  Source: The Guardian World News
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:43
  Haut de la Garenne children's home in Jersey, the scene of a child-abuse scandal, where Jimmy Savile visited in 1970s. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images
  The former head of the Jersey child abuse investigation has said he now suspects that Sir Jimmy Savile was implicated in the Haut de la Garenne children's home abuse scandal.
  Lenny Harper said he now has "no reason to doubt" that Savile was involved in indecent assault at the notorious Jersey children's home, despite there being insufficient evidence to question the Jim'll Fix It star when he was alive.
  The observation came on the day that the BBC's director-general, George Entwistle, gave his first interview regarding the row, and indicated that the broadcaster would "take a look properly" and hold its own inquiry whenever a police investigation into alleged sexual abuse by the late celebrity closes.
  Harper, the detective who led Jersey's three-year child abuse probe, told the Guardian that Savile's name came up in the initial police inquiry in 2008 '' but there were no specific allegations of abuse against the BBC presenter at the time.
  He added: "There definitely wasn't enough even to question him at the time, but in light of all the evidence that has come out then I'm not surprised because it fits perfectly the profile of what was going on."
  A solicitor who acted for victims of child abuse in Jersey also told the Guardian that some former Haut de la Garenne residents, both women and men, now claim they were assaulted by Savile in the 1970s.
  Alan Collins, a solicitor for several Haut de la Garenne victims, said "a handful" of former residents have now made abuse allegations about Savile. He said Savile's name was mentioned several times during the police investigation of 2008 but that the evidence did not seem to stack up at the time.
  The States of Jersey police confirmed last week that Savile was investigated as part of the 2008 inquiry into abuse at the children's home. That followed claims from a former Haut de la Garenne resident that Savile was involved in an indecent assault in the 1970s. The late BBC entertainer, who died last year aged 84, was never charged with any abuse offences.
  Elsewhere at the BBC, broadcaster Sandi Toksvig reacted angrily to the way her revelation that she had been groped on air by a celebrity was being used as a way to criticise the corporation.
  "It's not about the BBC, and I'm distressed it's being portrayed in that way," Toksvig told the Guardian, 24 hours after she disclosed that she had been "very unpleasantly groped by a famous individual" during a broadcast in the 1980s.
  "It's being used as a stick to beat the BBC, but it was commonplace, it was the culture," she said.
  Toksvig refused to name the man involved. "This is isn't about who he is '' I'm going to grant the man who assaulted me the respect he did not grant me by never naming him. Because otherwise it becomes about that one individual, when in fact it was going on everywhere."
  In a statement, Toksvig said that the man who groped her is now dead. She added: "Whilst the recent manifold revelations regarding the abuse and mistreatment of women in broadcasting have focused on the BBC, I would like to clarify that I consider this a culture endemic across the whole of radio and television and is certainly not limited to the BBC."
  Entwistle told BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Monday that he deeply regretted what had happened and apologised to the women involved for what they have had to endure, but he said he did not want to compromise the police inquiry.
  "I think this has to be done in two phases," Entwistle said. "First the police are given the chance to do everything they have to do '' that is the only way justice can possibly be done for the women in question. But once the police assure me that they have done everything they have to do, then we can take a look properly."
  Entwistle said the police are also looking at the people who worked with Savile and examining whether criminal charges will be brought against them.
  Entwistle, who rose through the ranks of the BBC as a journalist, said he had not heard about heard the rumours of sex abuse until late last year, but conceded: "Jimmy Savile was regarded by a great many people as odd, a bit peculiar, and that was something I was aware some people believed."
  He also revealed that he was told last December that Newsnight had launched an investigation '' which was later dropped '' into allegations of sexual abuse against Savile. The programme's reporters spoke to 10 women who claimed they had been abused or had knowledge of abuse at the Duncroft school at the height of his fame in the 1970s.
  Entwistle insisted that the Newsnight editor, Peter Rippon, was not pressurised to drop the film, and its shelving had nothing to do with tribute programmes that were scheduled in the wake of Savile's death last October.
  ' To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".
  ' To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook.
Why Have Gas Prices Skyrocketed in California?
  Link to Article
  Source: Truthdig: Drilling Beneath the Headlines
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:41
  Why Have Gas Prices Skyrocketed in California?Posted on Oct 8, 2012ScreenshotMotorists are paying how much for gas?
  Here's some not-so-good news for California motorists at the beginning of the workweek: Gas prices in the Golden State have soared to record levels, rising 50 cents in the span of seven days. On Monday, the average price of a gallon of regular gasoline was $4.67, a record high in the state and much, much higher than anywhere else in the country.
  So what gives with the higher prices at the pump?
  For starters, gasoline in California is usually more expensive than in other places thanks largely to gas taxes in the state that are significantly higher than the national average. Secondly, refineries have to produce higher-quality gasoline to meet California's air quality standards, so gasoline can't just be imported from any old pipeline. In fact, there's little pipeline capacity to bring the product in from other states. As a result, motorists in California pay, on average, 30 to 50 cents more per gallon than do drivers in the rest of the country.
  Coupled with some recent refinery and pipeline problems in the state, and you begin to see why some stations are charging more than 5 bucks a gallon.
  As James Hamilton at Econbrowser wrote:
  California has experienced a series of disruptions to gasoline supplies. The Chevron refinery in Richmond (across the bay from San Francisco) has a normal capacity of 243,000 barrels per day, or 8.5% of the total petroleum products supplied to Petroleum Administration for Defense District 5, of which California is a part. But a fire at the Richmond refinery in August has significantly reduced its production. The Kettleman-Los Medanos pipeline, which carries 85,000 barrels per day of crude oil to the San Francisco Bay Area, has been closed since mid-September due to organic chloride contamination. And on Monday, a power outage shut down ExxonMobil's 149,000-barrel-per-day Torrance refinery in L.A.
  To ease the pain California motorists are enduring, Gov. Jerry Brown on Sunday ordered that refineries be allowed to produce winter-blend gasoline that is normally not available to the state until late October. ''If this situation continues, it may cause unacceptable price impacts for consumers and small businesses, significant economic disruption, and serious harm to public safety and welfare,'' Brown wrote in a letter to regulators at the California Air Resources Board. ''Allowing refiners to make an early transition to winter-blend gasoline could quickly increase fuel supply.''
  The move is expected to lower gasoline prices and thus please drivers, though it could have some adverse effects on the environment.
  Los Angeles Times:
  The cheaper blend usually doesn't hit the market until Oct. 31. It evaporates more quickly in warm weather than its summer counterpart, making it potentially more damaging to the environment.
  But experts said the move could push down prices up to 20 cents in a week, though consumers likely won't see relief for several days. Even as prices hit new highs, the increases have narrowed, from 17.1 cents Friday to 12.8 cents Saturday, 4.1 cents Sunday and 1.3 cents Monday.
  Read more
  Hamiltion warned, however, that prices could remain high because of consumer demand and a willingness to pay at the pump even when prices have peaked.
  The good news is that these kinds of disruptions are by their nature temporary; in fact, the Torrance refinery was back to normal operations by Friday. Based on the current Brent price below $112/barrel, I would expect a long-run average national retail gasoline price of $3.64/gallon, about 15 cents below where it currently is, and an average price in California of $4.04/gallon, about 60 cents below Friday's price.
  On the other hand, sometimes people respond emotionally to this kind of situation. NBC San Diego reported ''many rushed to fill up their tanks Friday night for fear of prices soaring again over the weekend.'' If enough people do that, it would produce a temporary spike in demand to run up against the temporary drop in supply.
  It would also provide an instructive illustration of the economic problems that are introduced if speculators (in this case, California consumers) somehow get the notion that what they should do is buy more when the price is highest.
  '--Posted by Tracy Bloom.
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Obama's October Bombing Surprise
  Link to Article
  Source: FrontPage Magazine
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:37
  Remember this administration is now being run by mostly Clinton people. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is a Clinton vet, as is the Chief of Staff, and Hillary Clinton is the ultimate Clinton veteran. And the Clinton policy is when you're sinking in the polls, shoot off some cruise missiles. Drone strikes regularly nail, or reportedly nail, an occasional Al Qaeda operative, but this is going to take something bigger.
  The obstacle here is Obama. Obama wanted to try Osama in a civilian court. He isn't that open to shooting up Libya. Instead he expects the Libyan authorities to conduct a trial. The Libyan authorities have trouble keeping order. Expecting them to conduct a trial when their own system is rotten with Jihadists is a joke and will not impress any Americans.
  Like the Bin Laden raid, this is a choice between Obama's electability and his ideology. He let the Bin Laden raid go forward, sacrificing ideology to electability, but trying to redeem it by believing that Bin Laden would be captured alive and he would be able to use him to force civilian trials for terrorists and the end of the War on Terror. Instead the Navy SEALS killed Osama, giving Obama a political victory, but not an ideological victory.
  In Libya, Obama will want to come out with an ideological victory, but that's hard to do when the objective will be to carry out a few days of raids on terrorist camps. The amount of leaks on this already means the terrorists probably won't be there by then, which will turn it into a perfect replica of Clinton's own attacks on terrorist compounds.
  ''These targets are believed to be located throughout Libya,'' one U.S. intelligence officer told The Daily Beast. Another senior U.S. defense official acknowledged that some of the early intelligence could lose its value if there is too much delay. But this official also said there were risks in acting too quickly. ''There is always the risk of flight in a situation like this,'' this official said. ''But it's probably worth doing right and waiting a bit and trying to get more intel on these guys. You have to worry about relationships. If you do the wrong thing, the ramifications could be serious.'' The U.S. intelligence officer said the information on the 10 suspects was ''good enough to authorize action if this was Pakistan or Afghanistan.''
  Which means that again, the War on Terror takes second billing to the same old Hearts and Minds garbage. But the practical reason for delaying the attack is to capitalize on the poll leaps that it can provide.
  Three U.S. officials tell The Daily Beast that the U.S. military has the special-operations forces and other assets in place to begin going after individuals in Libya. The Naval Air Station in Sigonella, Italy, flies surveillance drones and other aircraft that are capable of reaching Libya in a few hours. There is also something known as a joint special-operations task force that operates under the authority of U.S. Africa Command, which two of these officials say have capabilities to begin kill or capture missions in Libya.
  ''At this point, the capabilities are in place,'' one U.S. intelligence officer said. ''The holdup is in Washington.''
  My guess is that we are going to see some precision raids using special forces, a bunch of drone strikes and a small bombing campaign on training camps for show.
The debate: Some healthcare 'facts' that shouldn't stand
  Link to Article
  Source: CJR
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:28
  There was no shortage of media fact checking after last week's presidential debate, much of it focused on healthcare, much of it good. Still, reporters left a lot of healthcare ''facts'' on the table, unexamined, too. Let's take a look.
  The New York Times devoted seven graphs to accurately explaining why Obamacare is not, despite Mitt Romney's assertions, a government takeover of healthcare. Glenn Kessler, the Pinocchio-dispensing fact-checker at The Washington Post, once again explained what the infamous ''$716 billion Medicare cut,'' another familiar Romney assertion, is all about. By now most in the media get it: The ''cut,'' mostly a reduction in Medicare spending growth, falls on providers'--not on seniors, who won't see any cuts to their basic benefits.
  On WaPo's Wonk Blog, Josh Hicks tackled Romney's claim that no taxes were raised in Massachusetts to pay for reform, a claim that, as he put it, ''deserves some context.'' Cribbing details from The Boston Globe, Hicks noted that the state, in fact, had to increase tobacco taxes and levy an assessment against hospitals and insurers in order to fund provisions in the law. Romney has made that no-taxes claim before. On Fox News Sunday in late August, Romney claimed he passed health reform in the Bay State without raising taxes. CJR debunked the claim at the time.
  From the Los Angeles Times came three posts. One pointed out that Romney's claim'--that the president's promise that health reform would reduce health insurance premiums by $2,500 has not materialized'--was true. Another post focused on Romney's $716 billion claim, and the third made the point there is no government body that will decide what kinds of treatments patients get'--Romney's claims during the debate to the contrary. (The Independent Payment Advisory Board is supposed to advise Medicare on controlling costs, but the law specifically says the board cannot make ''any recommendation to ration healthcare'...or otherwise restrict benefits or modify eligibility criteria.''
  NPR's blog pretty much rehashed what other news outlets had already fact-checked. Politico went further, actually adding to the fact-checking literature that's building up. It checked Obama's claim that shifting Medicaid funding to the states through a block grant was ''potentially a 30 percent cut in Medicaid over time.'' That's true, Politico said.
  But eager beavers in fact-checking land missed some big ones'-- Romney whoppers, mostly'--and they still need to be addressed.
  For starters: toward the end of he debate, Romney explained how he got reform passed in Massachusetts:
  We didn't put people in a position where they're going to lose the insurance they had and they wanted. Right now the CBO (Congressional Budget Office) says up to 20 million people will lose their insurance as Obamacare goes into effect next year. And likewise a study by McKinsey & Company of American businesses said 30 percent of them are anticipating dropping people from coverage.
  Whoa! That needs some serious fact checking. CJR examined it back in March, and found the McKinsey study was flawed and had been immediately discredited by the policy community. In fact, McKinsey walked back its study, saying it ''was not intended as a predictive economic analysis of the impact of the Affordable Care Act.''
  And when we checked on the CBO study, we learned that the estimate of 20 million people losing employer coverage was a worst-case scenario, which the CBO said wasn't likely to materialize. These errors, we reported, have not stopped some in the press from repeating them. Nor certain presidential candidates either, it seems.
  But for me the biggest whopper of all kind of hides in plain sight. It was Romney's remark that the US health system ''has produced the best health records in the world.'' Old canards don't die easily. Shortly before the debate, pollster Humphrey Tayor spoke to a meeting of New York health reporters and left them with some dismal stats about how bad the system really is.
Clinton, US envoy welcome framework agreement between gov't, MILF
  Link to Article
  Source: no corn syrup's feed
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:27
  (Updated 9:35 p.m.) In separate statements, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and US Ambassador to the Philippines Harry Thomas Jr. on Sunday welcomed the framework peace agreement between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which Thomas said holds much promise for Mindanao.The ambassador said the US has long supported peace and stability in the region, and "will continue to look for ways to support Mindanao's people as they accelerate broad-based and inclusive growth."
  "We welcome the announcement by the Government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front that the two sides finalized a framework peace agreement. While much work remains, successful implementation of this agreement would improve security, stability, and development for the people of Mindanao," said Thomas in a statement released by the US Embassy.
  Thomas also acknowledged the steps taken by all parties to maintain the ceasefire that has been in place since 2009.
  "We fully support the ongoing peace process and hope the parties can continue to avoid violence as they work toward a final resolution that will last for generations and benefit all the people of the Philippines,'' he added.
  Clinton also issued the following statement on the US State Department's website: "The United States welcomes the announcement of the framework agreement between the Government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. This agreement is a testament to the commitment of all sides for a peaceful resolution to the conflict in the southern Philippines. The next steps will be to ensure that the framework agreement is fully implemented. We encourage all parties to work together to build peace, prosperity and greater opportunities for all the people of the Philippines." '-- BM, GMA News
I need grad students
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:22
  Please, this is just a blog post, not an ad. I'm just writing aspirationally. Thinking out loud. You're welcome to listen, but do not feel compelled to act. That would be wrong. However if you're sure you know of a school that could do this, or even another kind of organization, please don't be shy.
  A long time ago, a colleague of mine at Personal Software explained that I do software development as an academic researcher would.
  It's still true, but I don't do it in an academic context. And that context is rapidly disappearing in academia, where so many students are now studying computer science not as a way to further the art, but rather to start something entrepreneurial and get rich.
  And there's nothing wrong with that. In some sense, I did that too -- when I was younger. I thought making millions was the way to get validation for my work. My family and the society I grew up in raised me to see things that way. And I was successful, and as a result have been able to work on what I wanted to for my whole career. Pretty good.
  Now it's time to take what I've learned and pass it on. There's a huge base of software, most of it open source, that reflects what I've learned. Not just as ideas, but as working code. And programming practices that are, imho, pretty far in advance of what's being done elsewhere. The only problem is, I'm not attracting the students I need to help build something substantial and long-lasting out of it.
  I've outlined in the past what I hoped for in terms of an ideal environment, from the point of view of the institution. Now I realize that I don't need the institution as much as I need the students. And I can't work with beginning programmers. I'm looking for people who have spend at least a few years learning the basics, stumbling, falling and getting up again. What I have to offer is the equivalent of an actor's studio, for people with extreme talent and drive, to be creative making software. You might get rich from what you learn, but that shouldn't be the point.
  Again, as with the previous piece this is not an ad, rather than an aspirational piece. Not looking for advice or "solutions" -- but if you have a compatible goal, I'd welcome hearing from you. Not guaranteeing anything, but I will listen.
Fox Guest Says The Pentagon Has Capitulated To Jihadists
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:22
  Fox's Peter Johnson, Jr., was wowed, just wowed on Fox & Friends this morning by a guest accusing the U.S. military of capitulating to jihadists for stopping an anti-Islamic extremist from teaching classes to military officers. Johnson was so enthralled by the accusation, he forgot to tell the ''we report, you decide'' network's viewers the nature of the instructor's views. For example: calling Islam ''a barbaric ideology'' that ''will no longer be tolerated,'' and saying, ''Islam must change or we will facilitate its self-destruction.''
  The discussion was about Lt. Col. Matthew Dooley's threatened lawsuit against the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey, for shutting down Dooley's elective class to military officers and for being given a negative Office Evaluation Report. Johnson, a lawyer himself, announced that the military had refused to respond for the segment. Apparently, Johnson felt that his obligation to do any research ended there.
  But a simple Google search would have told him '' and possibly his viewers '' that Dooley was promoting an extremist view of Islam and President Obama. As Danger Room recently reported:
  The course instructed senior officers at the lieutenant colonel, commander, colonel and Navy captain level that ''there is no such thing as 'moderate Islam,''' and that wartime protections against civilians of Islamic countries were ''no longer relevant.''
  Materials distributed by Dooley's guest lecturers suggested inaccurately that President Obama is a Muslim. Similar material taught to the FBI in 2011 compared Islam to the Death Star in Star Wars. Dooley himself taught, ''Your oath as a professional soldier forces you to pick a side here.''
  Instead, Johnson said Dooley ''is in trouble for teaching about Islam and radical Islam'' and accepted without question Dooley's accusations against the military.
  Dooley's ''cause'' has been taken up by the Thomas More Law Center. Richard Thompson, president of the Center was the Fox guest who advocated for Dooley and smeared the military this morning. Danger Room also notes that these are the same folks who defended Koran-burning Pastor Terry Jones.
  PETER JOHNSON: Let's talk about (Dooley's) promotions. His promotions are going to be blocked as a result of this. And your organization has taken a very strong position against General Dempsey. You've basically said that he's abdicated to the forces of sharia and Islam in the world in not allowing Lt. Col. Dooley to teach at the Joint Chiefs School. Is that correct?
  RICHARD THOMPSON: That is correct. In fact, we see the political correctness permeating the upper echelons of the military throughout. Apparently, we have not learned our lessons from the Ft. Hood massacre and now we attempt to appease these Muslim organizations and in doing so, we are jeopardizing our national security. In fact, one Middle East expert said that the final defense against jihadists, the Pentagon, has now capitulated and is teaching our military in accordance with the Muslim Brotherhood's teachings.
  As Johnson nodded in concerned agreement, Thompson went on to say that a nuclear attack on the U.S. was a certainty: ''These officers one day will find themselves in a position of a nuclear attack on, let's say the City of New York, and the President turns to this officer and says, 'What should be our response?' And this officer can't say, 'Give me two weeks and I'll come back to you.' This officer has to have a response. And that's what Lt. Col. Matthew Dooley was teaching.''
  This is probably not the last time we'll see Dooley cast as a free speech and terrorism-fighting martyr on Fox. Johnson asked his guest to ''keep track on this going forward because it just seems incredible to me and probably to a lot of America that a man who's dedicated to fighting for us in a war on terrorism is being held back in this way.''
British vaccine breakthrough could save cows from TB and end controversial badger culls
  Link to Article
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 19:18
  Vaccinating cows against TB currently banned under EU law because there is now way to distinguish them from infected cowsControversial pilot badger cull set to begin within the next fortnight in Gloucestershire and SomersetCampaigners have vowed to disrupt the killings, and police suspect the opposition to the cull has been infiltrated by violent extremistsBy Damien Gayle
  PUBLISHED: 03:25 EST, 8 October 2012 | UPDATED: 03:25 EST, 8 October 2012
  Cows could soon be vaccinated against tuberculosis, ending the need for culls of the badgers thought to be infecting them, thanks to a breakthrough by British scientists.
  Researchers from the Animal Health and Veterinary Laboratories Agency in Weybridge, Surrey, have found a test that is able to distinguish infected cows and cows that have been immunised.
  Currently vaccinating cows against bovine TB is subject to an EU ban because there's current diagnostic tests are unable to pick out an inoculated cow from one actually carrying the virus.
  Disease carrier? Badgers are set to be culled in their tens of thousands because of suspected links to the spread of bovine tuberculosis - but a new breakthrough could halt the killings of the protected species
  Cows that are healthy but have been given the vaccine as a result appear infected, meaning they cannot be reliably sold or traded overseas. But now a British team have developed what is called a 'diva' (differentiation of infected from vaccinated animals) test which can show the distinction.
  Used in conjunction with a new cattle vaccine that is being simultaneously developed, the test could enable the government to ask the EU for the law to be changed - potentially halting further planned badger culls.
  Bovine TB, which is thought to be spread by badgers, is rapidly spreading across the UK and the government granted the first licences for culling the nocturnal alleged disease spreaders last month.
  Controlling TB in cattle has cost the taxpayer £500million in the past decade, and costs could spiral to £1billion over the next ten years without action, according to the Department for Rural Affairs.
  However, the decision has angered animal charities which prefer a vaccination programme for badgers or cattle - and hardcore animal rights activists have vowed to take action to stop the exterminations.
  An effective new TB vaccine for cows and the test to determine their immunity to the disease could save the badgers, but they must first be validated by regulatory agencies. That process, which has to happen before EU law could be altered, 'may take years', said government Chief Veterinary Officer Nigel Gibbens.
  EAT CULLED BADGERS, SAYS FAT LADY CLARISSAOver the years, food writer Clarissa Dickson Wright has made it clear there is not much she would object to eating.
  And, true to form, the former star of the BBC's Two Fat Ladies, pictured right, has now suggested that we should start eating badgers to be killed in the controversial forthcoming cull.
  Miss Dickson Wright, 65, said: 'It would solve the problem. There's going to be a cull, so rather than just throw them in the landfill site why not eat them?
  She went on: 'There are too many badgers. It's very interesting - the reason at certain times of the year you see so many dead badgers on the road is that the badgers throw out their old and ill that aren't going to survive the winter.
  'I would have no objection to eating badgers. I have no objection to eating anything very much, really. Staple food of the population, well before rabbit because rabbit was a luxury food.'
  Miss Dickson Wright said centuries ago the badger had been widely consumed. And when she was younger it was still a popular bar snack.
  She said: 'Rabbit in the middle ages cost a man's week's wages for a single rabbit. People ate badger because badger was plentiful.'
  It has been illegal to kill badgers or disrupt their sets since the 1992 Protection of Badgers Act '' which was brought in to prevent badger hunting and baiting which saw their numbers plummet.
  'We're determined to push this through,' Mr Gibbens told the Independent. 'But to get the vaccine and the test sorted, and a change in EU law, is some years away. I really would like to say we could accelerate this whole process, but I think "years" is right.'
  In the meantime badger culls, which are overwhelmingly backed by farmers but vehemently opposed by animal rights campaigners, are set to begin in the next fortnight in pilot areas in Gloucestershire and Somerset.
  Operating at night, with bait laid nearby to entice these notoriously shy creatures, marksmen will use .22 calibre rifles and night-sights to kill at least 3,000 creatures, or 70'‰per cent of the local population.
  The hope is that this pilot, if shown to stop the spread of TB in cattle, will be extended across England over the next four years, leading to more than a third of the estimated 300,000 badger population being exterminated.
  However campaigners argue there is no scientific evidence it would work. A ten-year study commissioned by Defra found a cull would make 'no meaningful contribution' to the disease, and could make the problem worse by scaring and dispersing them.
  And with public sentiment against the cull and a string of celebrities registering their opposition, it will not take place without a fight. Police also suspect that violent extremists involved in previous acts of violence and firebombings are set to hijack the campaign against the cull.
  'Everything is fair game,' one animal rights campaigner warned the Mail On Sunday earlier this month. 'We've torn up all the stuff about peaceful protests. We've got people coming here from around the world. This is going to be huge.'
  Queen guitarist Brian May supports the Team Badger campaign which is now being infiltrated by extremists
  Celebrities are raising the profile of the campaign against the cull. Stephen Fry, Dame Judi Dench, Joanna Lumley and Jilly Cooper are calling for it to be postponed until a ruling has been made by the European courts on whether the Government is acting illegally in allowing the cull of a protected species.
  And the RSPCA is among campaigning groups which have predicted that shoppers will to refuse to buy dairy products sourced from farms where culling is taking place.
  The charity said that while it is not calling for a boycott, consumers will vote with their feet. Those opposed to planned cull of badgers in Gloucestershire and Somerset may also choose not to holiday there.
  Gavin Grant, the RSPCA's chief executive, said: 'Those who care will not want to visit areas or buy milk from farms soaked in badgers' blood.'
If Internet governance ain't broke, don't fix it: U.S.
  Link to Article
  Source: Reuters: Technology News
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 18:13
  By Tom Miles
  GENEVA | Mon Oct 8, 2012 1:52pm EDT
  GENEVA (Reuters) - The best solution to improving oversight of the Internet may be to do nothing at all, a senior U.S. official said on Monday while briefing reporters on a conference in December that could decide to consolidate control within a U.N. body.
  The International Telecommunication Union, the U.N. body convening the conference, has said there is broad consensus that the treaty governing the way international voice, data and video traffic is handled needs to be updated after 24 years.
  With the rapid spread of the Internet around the world, the 178 signatories have decided to look into ways of increasing collaboration, using telecoms to drive economic development, and making the rules more relevant and responsive to the fast-evolving industry.
  However, doing nothing "would not be a terrible outcome at all", said U.S. Ambassador Terry Kramer, who will head the U.S. delegation at the World Conference on International Telecommunications, which will be held in Dubai.
  "The natural path we're on is pretty good," he told reporters in Geneva.
  "Does that mean there aren't things that could improve? Absolutely there are things that could improve. But the best thing to do, if you could pick two options, one is to get prescriptive and get into a lot of things versus leaving things open, we're much better by leaving things open."
  He rejected suggestions that the United States was taking a negative approach to meeting, which will renegotiate a treaty last revisited in 1988, and said other countries' ideas about putting rules in place to force the Internet to develop were the more negative proposals.
  The treaty comprises international telecommunications regulations (ITRs) that set out principles for ensuring that networks can connect with each other smoothly.
  Kramer said any work done at the conference should ultimately benefit citizens, consumers and society at large.
  "We need to avoid suffocating the Internet space through well-meaning but overly prescriptive proposals that would seek to control content or seek to mandate routing and payment practices. That would send the Internet back to a circuit switch era that is actually passing in history," he said.
  He said cyber security, cyber crime and national defense issues should be excluded from the regulations, since these were better handled elsewhere.
  He declined to say if the United States was simply trying to preserve its freedom to conduct its cyber foreign policy how it chooses.
  "If people have a concern with what the U.S. does, they certainly can raise those issues and there are international environments where those things get discussed. Our message is in the ITRs, that is not the right place to bring those up," he said.
  (Editing by Alison Williams)
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News Flash: Many U.S. Reps Got Much Richer During Recession
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 18:12
  In other words, most Congress members are well insulated from the economic results of their votes -- except for the part where they use their votes to fatten their own bank accounts. While their financial status may appear to be irrelevant, it's not. They're so insulated from anyone who isn't wealthy -- or a lobbyist - that many of them have no idea at all what the rest of us are dealing with:
  The wealthiest one-third of lawmakers were largely immune from the Great Recession, taking the fewest financial hits and watching their investments quickly recover and rise to new heights. But more than 20 percent of the members of the current Congress '-- 121 lawmakers '-- appeared to be worse off in 2010 than they had been six years earlier, and 24 saw their reported wealth slide into negative territory.
  Welcome to our world, tiny group of Congress members!
  Most members weathered the financial crisis better than the average American, who saw median household net worth drop 39 percent from 2007 to 2010. The median estimated wealth of members of the current Congress rose 5 percent during the same period, according to their reported assets and liabilities. The wealthiest one-third of Congress gained 14 percent.
  I'm sure all that perfectly legal insider information comes in handy.
  Because lawmakers are allowed to report their holdings and debts in broad ranges, it is impossible for the public to determine their precise net worth. They also are not required to reveal the value of their homes, the salaries of their spouses or money kept in non-interest-bearing bank accounts and their congressional retirement plan.
  For its analysis, The Post used the midpoint of the range of each reported holding and tracked the figures over time to determine whether the relative wealth of lawmakers had increased or declined between 2004 and 2010. Previous studies of congressional wealth have looked at Congress as a whole, rather than tracking the financial trend for each individual lawmaker. The Post created an in-depth financial portrait of each member of Congress.
  Among the findings:
  '—�The estimated wealth of Republicans was 44 percent higher than Democrats in 2004, but that disparity has virtually disappeared.'—�The number of millionaires in Congress dropped after the Great Recession; the 253 who have served during the current session are the smallest group since 2004. The numbers are likely to be underestimated because lawmakers are not required to list their homes among their assets.'—�Between 2004 and 2010, 72 lawmakers appeared to have doubled their estimated wealth.'—�At least 150 lawmakers reported receiving more income from outside jobs and investments than from their congressional salaries of $174,000 for rank-and-file members.'—�Representatives in 2010 had a median estimated wealth of $746,000; senators had $2.6 million.'—�Since 2004, lawmakers reported more than 3,500 outside jobs paying their spouses more than $1,000 a year. The lawmakers are not required to report how much the spouses are paid or what they did for the money.'—�Lawmakers' wealth is held in a variety of ways: 127 primarily in real estate, 117 in institutional funds, 75 in their spouses' names, 51 in essentially cash, 36 in specific stocks and bonds, 32 in high-turnover trading, 30 in business ownership and 20 in agriculture. More than 40 had reported assets of $25,000 or less.
  The Post also found that some congressional financial interests intersected with public actions taken by legislators: 73 lawmakers sponsored or co-sponsored legislation that could have benefitted businesses or industries in which either they or their families were involved or invested.
Samsung Galaxy Note II review
  Link to Article
  Source: Engadget
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 14:16
  Samsung's first crack at a smartphone larger than five inches came last year in the form of the Galaxy Note. It was wildly different than most phones we'd seen before: it was massive, for one, and involved the use of a stylus pen, a sorely outdated concept at the time. Who would be willing to buy this thing? Yet, despite its enormous size, this tablet / phone (forgive us: phablet) captured more hearts and wallets than even Sammy had probably expected. The S Pen showed that it was more than just a simple stylus, artists and tech enthusiasts alike loved it and a successful marketing campaign helped push millions of units. The Note was an undeniable hit.
  Did Samsung realize at the time that it was sitting on a gold mine? It's hard to know for sure, but its success meant only one thing: an inevitable sequel. The Galaxy Note II, introduced a year after its parent, has some big shoes to fill. We believe it's up to the task, though: it boasts a quad-core Exynos processor, twice the RAM, an even larger display and a whole new bag of S Pen tricks. It sounds compelling, but does the new version truly trump the old? Is it worth another sound investment (pricing varies, but it starts around £530 for a SIM-free version) just a year down the road? We'll satisfy your curiosity after the break.
  HardwareTo gaze upon the newborn Galaxy Note II is to take a crash course in Samsung's preferred design language. Whereas the original bears the same overall look and squarish corners as the Galaxy S II, its successor is -- you guessed it -- just as inspired by nature and "designed for humans" as the Galaxy S III. We wouldn't rule out the possibility of you mixing them up (the size difference is a dead giveaway, but the phones look quite similar otherwise). Indeed, Samsung is now in the habit of changing things up on a yearly basis, which may seem more boring than once every couple months. By adopting an annual design cycle, however, devices like the Note II likely get pushed through the initial stages of development much faster than they would otherwise. We also imagine that the company's new strategy of consistency will have a significant impact on Samsung's brand recognition.
  Owners of the original Galaxy Note -- whether it be the global N7000 or one of its many variants -- know all too well how it feels to get the occasional "what is that thing?" from random passersby. So will the peanut gallery continue to snicker when you take this out in public? At 3.16 inches (80.5mm) wide, 5.95 inches (151.1mm) tall and 0.37 inches (9.4mm) deep, the Note II is slightly thinner, narrower and taller than its parent. This, along with the pebble-like shape, definitely offers a more comfortable experience when you're cradling it in your hand, though it's just a tad heavier at 6.35 ounces (180g). Despite being more attractive than the first Note, it's nonetheless an indisputably large device, and will continue to draw stares for that reason. (In other words, you'll want to come up with a standard talk track for those times you're approached by curious strangers.)
  While we all want our smartphones to stick around for a long time, the matter of build quality is extremely important here, given the fact that the phone's size makes it more prone to drops. That's why we're happy with the company's decision to use a polycarbonate chassis, similar to the one on the Galaxy S III. After handling the Note II on a regular basis, we're confident that Samsung's crafted a durable, solid device. (As an aside, you can find a few drop tests circulating the web. Spoiler: it holds up extremely well.)
  Because the new Note has a larger display and thinner chassis, the buttons on each side have been scaled down a notch. The power key, for instance, now rests in a much more natural position that's easier to find by feel. The only downside? It's also much easier to press the button accidentally.
  Since we're discussing button placement, we'll continue with the full Vanna White-style tour: beginning with the front, you'll find an LED notification light (which wasn't on the first Note), an earpiece, sensors and a 1.9-megapixel camera above the display, while the large physical home button found below the screen is flanked by two capacitive keys (menu and back) on either side. The bezel on the top and bottom are smaller than on the OG Note, though the left and right bezels are about the same.
  The front is frankly the busiest part of the phone; Samsung professes a policy of minimalism the rest of the way around the Note II. There's a power button on the right, volume rocker on the left, S Pen holder and micro-USB charging port (with MHL capabilities -- more on that later) on the bottom and 3.5mm headphone jack up top. Even the back keeps relatively quiet, sporting the 8-megapixel camera module and LED flash just barely above the singular Samsung logo, as well as a speaker grille that hangs out near the bottom. The battery cover lies completely flat across the back of the phone (with the exception of the slightly raised camera and speaker) and curves inward as it prepares to meet up with the edge.
  A design decision we've always appreciated from Samsung is the removable battery, which has been increased to 3,100mAh (up from 2,500mAh on the original Note). Above it you'll see slots for micro-SIM and microSDXC cards as well as contacts for NFC and wireless charging.
  Our particular review unit, provided to us by our friends at Negri Electronics, is the white N7100, the global version which lacks the superfast LTE speeds many users crave. Thus, folks looking for the fastest Note II around will need to grab the N7105, which offers the next-gen data in bands 7 (2600MHz) and 20 (800MHz). For those keeping score, you can see if your country utilizes these frequencies here. Speed demons in the US may also be interested in variants of the Note II coming out to AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and US Cellular, though there should be very few cosmetic discrepancies between them and their global counterparts -- much like we saw with the Galaxy S III series.
  Both global versions of the Note II are capable of 21.6Mbps HSPA+ (850, 900, 1900 and 2100MHz) along with quadband GSM / EDGE. They also boast dual-band (2.4 and 5GHz) WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n with WiFi Direct, Bluetooth 4.0, DLNA and NFC. If you're a gadget aficionado in need of the full spec list, we've compiled all these specifics below.
  Galaxy Note N7000Galaxy Note II N7100Dimensions5.78 x 3.27 x 0.38 inches (146.9 x 83 x 9.7 mm)5.95 x 3.16 x 0.37 inches (151.1x80.5x 9.4 mm)Weight6.28 oz. (178g)6.35 oz. (180g)Screen size5.3 inches5.5 inchesScreen resolution1,280 x 800 pixels (285ppi)1,280 x 720 pixels (267ppi)Screen typeHD Super AMOLEDHD Super AMOLEDBattery2,500mAh3,100mAhInternal storage16GB16 / 32 / 64GBExternal storagemicroSD (up to 32GB)microSD (up to 64GB)Rear camera8MP8MPFront-facing cam2MP1.9MPVideo capture1080p1080pNFCIn select variantsYesRadiosHSPA+ / UMTS, GSM / EDGE, LTEHSPA+ / UMTS, GSM / EDGE; LTE (in the N7105)Bluetoothversion 3.0version 4.0 LESoC1.4GHz dual-core Exynos 42121.6GHz quad-core Exynos 4412RAM1GB2GBMHLYesYes, but requires Samsung adapterOperating systemAndroid 2.3 (upgraded to 4.0)Android 4.1 Jelly BeanDisplay
  The Note II's display has earned a whole section unto itself because it's, well, a little different. And we're not just talking about the fact that the newer version uses a larger panel with even fewer pixels than the original: there's more to it than meets the eye (the naked eye, at least). First, a little background: when the sequel was announced with a 1,280 x 720 HD Super AMOLED panel, we naturally assumed that it would be sporting a PenTile matrix. After all, that's exactly how this type of display has been laid out in other handsets, so it's easy to break out the 'ol jump-to-conclusions mat. However, the microscope (and Samsung's spokespeople) tell us that this isn't the case at all.
  Oddly, though, it isn't the traditional RGB matrix as we've been accustomed to on most non-PenTile phones, either. Instead, it appears to be laid out in a non-striped BGR matrix in which the blue subpixels are perpendicular to green and red, rather than in parallel. This puts the display in a magical place where few Super AMOLEDs have gone before, but it's still a hefty improvement over the first Note. Don't get us wrong: we raved about the OG's 1,280 x 800 display (and rightfully so), but its follow-up looks slightly better despite the lower ppi (267, versus the original's 285). We doubt casual observers will notice the difference, but when closely viewing the two side by side, we found more pixels on the older device. Darks are a little darker on the second-gen model, and colors are just a bit more saturated, too. The viewing angles on the next-gen Note are also great for watching movies, but they're essentially the same as the original. Daylight viewing wasn't a problem with the brightness cranked up above 75 percent.
  Software
  The Galaxy Note II is the first Samsung device to ship with Jelly Bean (Android 4.1.1, to be exact). All of the OS' new and enhanced features have been worked into TouchWiz UI. This includes Google Now (long-press the menu button to activate it), expandable notifications and predictive keyboard -- heck, even the Jelly Bean easter egg is there. It also includes the laundry list of new services Sammy introduced on the Galaxy S III, such as Smart Stay, S Voice, AllShare Cast and S Beam. (S Beam, by the way, adds the ability to transfer Note II docs to other Note II devices, but since we only have one tester phone, we haven't had the chance to try this out.) Popup video, which allows your selected video to "hover" over other apps, allowing you to multitask, also makes a repeat appearance here, and it's definitely a better experience when you have such a large screen to use it on.
  TouchWiz on Jelly Bean isn't unlike the experience you've had on Ice Cream Sandwich -- Samsung, as you'd expect, wants to keep the UX as consistent as possible. One of the biggest areas of change is the notification menu: in addition to the expandable notifications (which can be accessed by taking two fingers and pulling down on the notification), the brightness settings are now accessible underneath the quick toggles, and the status bar now houses the settings button and offers the date and time in a larger font. There are plenty of other new tweaks that make excellent use of the new S Pen capabilities, which we'll explain in more detail shortly.
  Blocking mode is Samsung's take on Do Not Disturb. You can disable a number of various notifications, set a specific timeframe for them to be turned off and even set up a whitelist of allowed contacts that can bypass the block and sound a notification when they call you.
  While we expect a device like the Note II to appeal mainly to smartphone buffs, Samsung is at least making an attempt to make first-time users feel comfortable. You can opt to change from the standard home screen to what's called "easy mode," which is essentially just a different launcher complete with customized pages and large widgets. Aside from that, there are very few things that differ from your normal TouchWiz experience -- it's a rather half-baked attempt at wooing a new demographic.
  Samsung's set of motion controls are much improved from the old Note to the new, with the sequel now matching (and exceeding, in a couple cases) the Galaxy S III's functionality in this department. To recap, you can scroll to the top of a screen by double-tapping the top edge of the phone; tilt to zoom in and out of the screen in the gallery or browser; pan the phone to move icons on the main screen; shake your phone to look for updates; turn over the phone to mute sounds; directly call whatever contact is displayed on the screen; and more. There are a few newcomers to the Samsung fold: quick glance shows you a few basic notifications when you wave your hand over the proximity sensor and there are a few new advanced settings to adjust the level of sensitivity required to trigger motion when panning or tilting your device.
  Finally, another slick new feature is Smart Rotation. If you're like us, there's a certain annoyance that comes with using the phone while in bed or on the couch because it switches screen orientation on a frequent basis. While you can typically find toggles that lock this, it's not always the best solution -- watching movies or looking at pictures are a couple of examples. Smart Rotation uses the front-facing camera to determine where your face is, and will prevent the screen from switching to landscape mode if you're still using your phone in a portrait position.
  One more thing: as with the Galaxy S III, Note II owners are entitled to 50GB of Dropbox storage.
  S Pen
  The crown jewel of any Note device is its accompanying stylus (we know, we're not supposed to call it that), also known as the S Pen, and Samsung continues to improve on it with each new version. Indeed, the original Note, Note 10.1 and Note II all have somewhat unique pens, but they all have the same overarching design and can work interchangeably. That's handy information for anyone who loses their Wacom appendage, though there's one drawback: not all S Pens are shaped the same, so they don't all fit interchangeably in each other's cradles. The original Note pen fits loosely inside the Note II's cradle, and we wouldn't count on it staying in for very long before popping out.
  Ergonomics are a huge consideration when Samsung designs its pens and indeed, each iteration seems to have a better in-hand feel. The Note II's S Pen is slightly fatter on the button side, which -- when pressing your thumb against it -- contributes to more of a true pencil feel. Also adding to the nostalgia of using an old-fashioned number two is the larger rubber tip, slightly bigger diameter (8mm) and increased length of the pen itself. It also doesn't hurt that you can tell the phone if you're right or left-handed (sorry, ambidextrous users, you have to choose).
  We suppose it shouldn't come as a revelation that the second Note's S Pen and Wacom digitizer have more in common with the Note 10.1 than the original Note. First, the device recognizes when you've removed the pen from its holster and, smartly assuming you'll imminently be using it, takes you to a special page with several pen-optimized apps. (It also lets you set an alarm that activates if your S Pen and Note get too far away from each other.) Also, much like the tablet, the Note II is capable of recognizing up to 1,024 levels of pressure sensitivity, a four-fold increase over the OG Note's 256. As a result, we noticed an improvement in accuracy and precision when using the pen for writing, sketching and other activities. What's more, the screen does a much better job of calculating how much pressure you're applying.
  This only scratches the surface of what the S Pen is capable of. The Note II not only ushers in enhancements to existing features; it also brings a suite of new features that make the phone even more tantalizing than last year's model. Even the button itself is refreshed: you can now hold down the button while drawing gestures on the screen to access features like the Quick Command tool (we'll cover this later) and a few other navigational abilities. Additionally, you can now copy specific parts of the screen with Easy Clip, which is activated by holding down the button and drawing around the area you want to clip. Once it's clipped, you can choose to save or discard what you've selected. You can also select text by holding the button, tapping the screen and dragging the pen across. And we're just getting started -- the button is capable of plenty more, and we'll discuss its many new talents later in the review.
  Before we dive into the first feature, it's important to note that the Wacom digitizer included in the phone is capable of sensing the S Pen as it hovers over the screen, in the same fashion that we've seen in Bamboo Pads for the last few years. As you hold the pen above the panel you'll notice a floating cursor on the screen. This opens up a lot of interesting possibilities, one of them being Air View. Using this feature, the Note II takes advantage of the hover functionality in several ways. For instance, you can hold the pen over emails in your inbox (in the general email app for now, at least) and a pop-up box displays the first few lines. Do the same in your calendar and those pesky appointments pop out at you in more detail as you scan through. Hold your pen over an unknown icon and its function will appear, the same way as when your mouse is held over something on your computer). Our favorite use of Air View is the ability to see GIF-like previews of movies just by holding the S Pen over a thumbnail. (Cool feature worth a mention: all of the video thumbnails in the player show these same types of previews without the pen, which makes the whole screen look alive, but the S Pen makes the pop-up screen larger.)
  Next up on the list of hover-friendly additions, you can now use your S Pen to scroll up and down on a page or list. In other words, it's now just a matter of holding the pen directly above the top or bottom of the scrollable screen. Sure, it seems gimmicky and unnecessary, but we discovered that we used this feature more often than we thought we would. The scrolling action is a little slow, so it's doubtful you'd want to use this on a lengthy website, but it's handy when you just need to go down the screen a little bit at a time -- say, in a settings menu or Twitter feed.
  Another neat feature that takes advantage of the newfound hovering capability is the ability to toggle between brush, pencil and eraser simply by holding the pen above the screen and clicking the button. This makes for a quick and seamless experience when you're constantly making mistakes (or changing your mind) as you draw.
  When you're in S Note, you can also hold the pen above the screen and long-press its button to activate another new feature called Idea Sketch. A blank notepad appears, you write down the name of a particular category (or just browse through the list) and a whole bunch of possible illustrations show up for you to choose from. Once you choose one that suits your fancy, it appears in S Note where you can adjust the size and outline style -- and then you can either find inspiration from it, or just color between the lines like it's a coloring book.
  Earlier we mentioned that Popup Video is available on the Note II, but that isn't the only thing that pops up -- you can do the same thing with Popup Note, which is activated by holding the S Pen button and double-tapping on the screen. This is basically a miniature version of the S Note app, which takes up less than half of the screen real estate. This means you can take notes and watch videos simultaneously. (Popup Browser is also available.) This is the best example of true multitasking that we've ever seen on a smartphone, and there were no lags, coughs, stutters or any sign whatsoever that the quad-core Exynos processor was buckling under the load. If this is only the beginning of what these phablets are capable of with the right engine under the hood, color us impressed.
  We're not done quite yet, multitasking fans. Samsung advertises another feature called Multi-Window that parallels -- nay, exceeds -- the aforementioned Popup Note in awesomeness. We recently saw an implementation of this in the Galaxy Note 10.1, and it's back, here in the Note II as Multi-Window. The implementation is a little different this time around, with a long press on the back button brining up a side bar of apps to choose from. On its tablet incarnation, this consisted of a choice of six. This time we have much more to choose from, including YouTube, ChatOn, GMail, Maps, Internet and, well, you get the idea. This list is also customizable so you can cut the ones you don't want, and bring your faves to the top. In practice, it works well. We had videos running while we checked our email, and happily scoured Google maps whilst we kept some restaurant reviews open in the other pane. Likewise, it's nice to see that you can use this in both orientations, with the phone's buttons being applied to the window that is currently in focus (sounds obvious, but anything's possible). We'd be interested to see how this might scale down onto something with a little less display going on, but the Note II's ample square-inchage certainly makes this a feature worth using. If you've ever used a dual-monitor setup for your desktop, you'll understand the massive productivity boost such a feature could bring to your smartphone -- especially given the amount of screen space the Note II offers.
  Quick Command is another new feature that takes advantage of the S Pen's gesture prowess. It's activated by pressing the button while dragging the pen up from the bottom. A familiar-looking handwriting box shows up, prompting you to write a command symbol followed by a keyword. For instance, write "@ Susie" to send an email to Susie; "? [search term]" performs a web search; "# Joseph" tells the phone to call Joseph, and so on. On the surface, this doesn't seem particularly useful when S Voice or Google voice search can do the same stuff, but here's the kicker: it's fully customizable, and you can add in whatever commands you want -- and these commands can open up applications or perform a set of automated tasks (think SmartActions or Tasker). You could program it to turn WiFi, GPS and Blocking Mode on just by drawing a "C," if that's what floats your boat.
  S Voice makes a return appearance, despite the existence of similar functionality in Jelly Bean. Not a surprise. What did take us aback is that it now includes S Pen handwriting recognition. This is definitely an interesting addition; from our perspective, it doesn't make much sense to write down a phrase that we could easily speak in less time -- not to mention the fact that Quick Command already addresses this capability, albeit in a separate app. This seems like a feature that Samsung threw in just because it could. Yet it's there if you want it, and we suppose there are a few folks that are gushing at the idea.
  As you've no doubt come to understand, the Note II is fully loaded. The S Pen experience between the first- and second-generation devices is a night-and-day difference: the original Note seems like just a working concept in comparison. This is by far the best pen / stylus / whatchamacallit we've used on a smartphone. If you were a fan of the Note, you'll be pleasantly surprised with its successor.
  Finally, Samsung has released version 2.2 of its S Pen SDK, which gives third-party developers the ability to beef up their apps with support for hovering, new brushes, special effects and context awareness. There's no guarantee your favorite app will magically have cool new S Pen features, but the option is there for devs to put in a little extra spice if they're interested.
  Camera
  Given what we already know of the Note II's similarities to the Galaxy S III, would it be much of a shocker to see the two sporting nearly identical cameras? Thanks to a little help from Supercurio, we did some digging and discovered that the two phones use the exact same rear camera modules (known in the code as the s5c73m3). Yes, both utilize maximum resolutions of eight megapixels (3,264 x 2,448 resolution), f/2.6 aperture and 3.7mm focal length in stills, while allowing for 1080p video capture. The front-facing cameras are the same as well: they max out at 1.9MP and are capable of 720p video recording. (Warning: they default to 1.3MP, which is 1,280 x 960. The 1.9MP setting offers 1,392 x 1,392 pixel resolution.)
  But while the two devices may be hardware bosom buddies, there are likely to be a few minor differences in firmware -- especially since the Note II has additional features not yet offered in the GS III. So before we dive into the performance, let's discuss what the device has to offer. First, it has a new "best face" mode, which is Samsung's version of Scalado Rewind: it takes five group photos and lets you choose the best faces. This is handy if Bob blinks in the first picture and Julie's making a weird face in the second -- just take the best of each person and put them together in one magical finished product. There's also a new "low light" mode, which as the name implies, is meant to deliver an improved performance in that arena.
  Aside from these newcomers, you'll find the same litany of settings present in the GS III, such as HDR (with strong and normal settings, a choice you're not given on the GS III), panorama, share shot, plenty of scene modes, burst shot, macro focus, white balance, ISO, metering and exposure adjustment.
  We've always been impressed with Samsung's camera performance because the company seems more interested in quality than megapixel count. While both Notes perform admirably, the next-gen version gave us slightly better results than the original. The new Note produced more natural colors -- its senior cranked out shots that were typically oversaturated and oftentimes washed out in the daylight. You'll see a smidge more detail in the sequel, as well. The Note II was also the winner in managing dynamic range, bringing out the best contrast and producing natural colors in the shadows. As for how our protagonist performs against the Galaxy S III, it appears to be more or less a wash; as expected, the images were incredibly similar and any differences resulting from firmware processing were minor.
  The LED flash on the second Note is considerably better than the original, providing more light and color saturation. (When compared to the GS III, however, it's tough to see any difference between the two.) The Note II also does a great job of capturing low-light images, as the new low-light mode fares well at grabbing errant photons. Comparing it with the Note and GS III, however, ends up in a draw: after taking several types of low-light shots, each one had its own moment of glory in at least a few contests.
  As mentioned, the Note II is capable of capturing 1080p video in MPEG-4 format. A quick perusal of the specs shows that it uses AVC profile 4.0, has a bitrate of 17 Mbps (the GS III is 17 Mbps, while the HTC One X is 10 Mbps and the ASUS Padfone is 20 Mbps) and offers a frame rate of 30fps. You're given the option of taking high-res (3,264 x 2,176) stills as you record your movies, but if you wait until playback to grab that precious shot, the pixel count will match that of the vid it was taken from.
  In terms of features, the Note II introduces fast-motion (up to 8x) and slow-motion (down to one-eighth) recording modes for videos. You may not want to get too serious with these features, but it's a fun opportunity to be creative (example: fast motion vids are best accompanied by the Benny Hill theme song).
  Overall, the video performance was pretty good: yours truly felt comfortable taking home movies with the family and leaving the fancy camcorder aside. It did well at capturing detailed motion without getting choppy, and picked up our voices loud and clear. We heard some gusts on a rather windy day, but it was able to filter most of the additional noise out. The only issue we had was with panning back and forth, where the imagery was choppy, almost to the point of inducing nausea. Frankly, we're chalking most of it up to trying to keep such a large device stable.
  Performance and battery life
  By stating that the Note II has a shiny 1.6GHz quad-core Exynos 4412 running the show with 2GB RAM and a Mali-400MP GPU to help things along, the performance section almost writes itself. We've always been fond of Exynos, but it's especially wonderful to see it pushed to new frontiers -- in this case, four cores on a smartphone. As per our usual practice, let's first see how it holds up in our benchmark tests.
  Samsung Galaxy Note II N7100Samsung Galaxy Note N7000Samsung Galaxy S III (I9300)Quadrant6,8194,4115,189Vellamo2,4821,2431,751AnTuTu13,5396,30111,960SunSpider 0.9.1 (ms)1,0231,7611,460GLBenchmark Egypt Offscreen (fps)1146999CF-Bench15,2676,91113,110SunSpider: lower scores are better. Galaxy Note N7000 tests were conducted on Ice Cream Sandwich.We were expecting to see out-of-this-world results, but even then, we ended up pleasantly surprised: some of the Note II's scores shattered anything we've seen before, especially in tests that stress the capabilities of the CPU and GPU. Four of the benchmarks produced results that easily bested anything else currently available on the market, with the other two being among the highest we've recorded.
  As for real-world use, we briefly touched on the silky smooth multitasking we enjoyed with Popup Video and Popup Note, and we're happy to report that this wasn't the only area where the processor excelled. Gaming was a joy, with the HD display and capable GPU teaming up together to produce solid and realistic play. With internet browsing, we weren't surprised to see that the Note II is faster and more efficient, since Jelly Bean offers enhancements in that area. Our site opened up quickly and didn't sputter as we navigated, used pinch-to-zoom and did various activities on the browser.
  The Note II has incredible battery life, but with a 3,100mAh pack and a more efficient OS than the original Note (which initially launched with Gingerbread before upgrading to ICS), this is exactly what we were expecting to see. In our standard rundown test, which consists of looping a video at 50 percent brightness, WiFi turned on (but disconnected from any networks) and regular push notifications for social media and email, we were able to snag 10 hours and 45 minutes of life out of it -- up just around an hour from the last Note. Granted, we may see a slight decline in the life of an LTE-enabled Note II, but this is still a highly respectable result. We were able to get almost two full days of normal usage from the device, so this should come as even more of a temptation for hungry power users everywhere.
  For those asking, the Note II does in fact actually make calls, and it's above average in clarity. We didn't have any concerns with dropped calls, nor did our friends on the other end experience any static or other declines in quality. The loudspeaker earns its name, as it's on the top end of the sound spectrum -- it's plenty loud, regardless of whether you use the earpiece or speakerphone. This resulted in a great audio experience for us when listening to music or watching movies as well.
  Samsung's music player offers a full listing of various EQ settings, as well as a few other methods of enhancing your tunes (3D, reverb, bass boost, concert mode and plenty of others). Also, when plugging in a pair of headphones, the phone recognizes that you're ready to get serious about multimedia and shows you a specialized home page with various options that would most likely appeal to you. Overall, we were satisfied with how our music sounded -- we could pick out all of the highs and lows without any shrill or overbearing areas. You shouldn't have any problem loading up most audio formats, including MP3 / WAV / eAAC+ / AC3 / FLAC. (For movies, you'll have success with MPEG-4, DivX / XVID, WMV, H.264 / 263, MKV, FLV and AVI.)
  GPS on the Note II, which also includes support for GLONASS, was consistently accurate to within 15 meters; it swiftly locked our position and managed our navigation soundly. Bluetooth 4.0 low-energy support has been added (the device managed to receive file transfers at an average speed of 120 KB/s) as well as the same MHL capabilities as the Galaxy S III -- this unfortunately means that you won't be able to use a standard MHL cable, and instead you'll need to shell out some extra money for a special Samsung-made MHL-to-HDMI converter for HD video output and home theatre-quality audio. USB file transfers were pretty fast, pulling down 16.44 MB/s received and 20 MB/s sent. We weren't able to test the LTE version, but HSPA+ yielded faster average data downlink speeds than what we've seen on the HTC One X and Samsung Galaxy Nexus.
  Wrap-up
  To answer the question we posed at the beginning of this review, this thing is the real deal, and it's decisively better than the device that began the whole phablet craze. With SIM-free versions starting in the ballpark of £530, it's a bit on the pricey side, but for good reason: it offers best-in-market performance, an S Pen experience that blows its predecessor out of the water, a solid OS in Jelly Bean and plenty of other features that will make this a tempting offer to even the most petite-handed individual. To do so in a package that's actually thinner and narrower than the first Note is a tremendous accomplishment, and one that'll be hard to match. Get ready to have your cake and eat it too.
  James Trew contributed to this review.
  Special thanks to Negri Electronics for providing us with a review unit!
Microsoft VP: 100,000 Windows 8 apps by January | Microsoft
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 17:56
  Can Microsoft really add 97,000 apps to the Windows Store between now and January 2013? Or is someone in Redmond doing some funny figuring?
  As of last week, there were an estimated 3,000-plus Windows Store style (Metro-Style) apps in the app store that Microsoft has built for Windows 8 and Windows RT. That same week, a Microsoft sales vice president told Beet.tv that Microsoft will have 100,000 apps for Windows 8 within 90 days after the operating system launches, which is October 25.
  Unless that official, Keith Lorizio, vice-president of U.S. sales and marketing at Microsoft, is counting both Windows Store and Desktop (Win 32) apps, I can't see how these missing 97,000 apps are going to materialize so quickly. (Desktop apps in Windows 8 can be listed and promoted in the Windows Store, but they cannot be purchased and downloaded directly from it, per Microsoft's orders.)
  Lorizo told Beet.tv that Microsoft is "expecting to aggressively pursue 100,000-plus apps in the first three months" Windows 8 is available. He added that Microsoft is "putting millions of dollars against that effort."
  Yes, Microsoft is creating more tutorials, more workshops and more contests to try to encourage devs to build Windows Store apps. And yes, as WinAppUpdate -- which is tracking Windows Store app growth -- has noted, the number of Windows 8 apps is growing steadily. Microsoft is indirectly paying for development of some of these apps, by encouraging some third-party developers to build proof-of-concept apps for customers in an attempt to get them interested in Windows 8. Teams at Microsoft, like the Bing AppEx unit, also are hustling to build Windows 8 apps for the Store.
  But unless there are going to be tens of thousands Flashlight apps introduced between now and January, or unless someone's doing some funny figuring, I am really hard pressed to see the Windows Store revving up this quickly. Here's WinAppUpdate's break down of what kinds of Windows Store/Metro-Style apps were in the Windows Store as of last week:
  Microsoft officials have said previously they are not going to allow Windows Phone apps (of which there are over 100,000) to be sold through the Windows Store. Developers can use their existing Windows Phone code to rebuild Windows 8 apps, but they cannot simply put an existing Windows Phone 7.x app in the Windows Store. Microsoft is not allowing this. And -- at least for now, the Windows Store and the Windows Phone Store (formerly known as the Windows Phone Marketplace) are two separate things.
  I've asked Microsoft if Lorizio misspoke. If there's any further clarification around his remarks, I'll add it to this post.
  Microsoft isn't doing much to clarify what "counts" as Windows, as my ZDNet colleague Mary Branscombe noted recently. However, Windows 8 is not the same as Windows RT, which also is not the same as Windows Phone 8 OS. Microsoft's longer term goal is to make these as similar as possible so as to improve both the consumer and the developer experience. But not all Windows are created equal at this point. And not all "Windows" apps are, either...
  This story was first published as "Microsoft Sales exec promises 100,000 Windows 8 apps by January 2013" on ZDNet's All About Microsoft blog.
  Read the full CNET ReviewWindows 8 Release to ManufacturingThe bottom line: Microsoft makes an aggressive, forward-thinking, and bold statement for the future of PCs with Windows 8, and vast security and speed improvements more than justify the $40 upgrade price. Read Full Review
Facebook accounts could be used to prove identity to access public services | Technology | guardian.co.uk
  Link to Article
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 15:59
  You may soon be able to use your Facebook or banking login details to access official government services. Photograph: Karen Bleier/AFP/Getty Images
  Personal login details for social networking sites, bank accounts and personal mobile phone accounts could be used be used as official proof of identity to access public services, the Cabinet Office has confirmed.
  Ministers are to announce in the next few weeks the first list of potential "certified providers" for its "identity assurance programme", which will allow citizens to assert their identity safely and securely online to access public services.
  The scheme is intended to help people sign in securely to the gov.uk site that is being developed as a portal for all online government services, including looking for a job, applying for welfare benefits, paying car tax or applying for a passport or a student loan.
  The Cabinet Office says the scheme is specifically designed for citizens to retain control of their own data, avoiding the issues of privacy and security raised by a centralised database that was involved in Labour's national identity card scheme.
  Under the scheme each individual is to be allowed to choose from a range of "trusted non-government organisations" to verify their identity without centrally storing or sharing their personal data or having knowledge of the government service that has asked for proof of identity.
  The Cabinet Office would not name individual companies but confirmed that the Department for Work and Pensions is working with the Cabinet Office identity assurance team to ensure that it will be available for the launch of the universal credit scheme for the unemployed and those on low incomes scheduled for 2013-14.
  The scheme is being billed as way of tackling identity theft and to help overcome "login fatigue" '' having to remember too many logons, passwords and answers to security questions.
  The scheme has been dubbed Cabinet Office minister Frances Maude's "little brother" project.
  Privacy organisations such as the No2ID campaign, which has been consulted about the project, retain a degree of scepticism: "Although this is a fine scheme in principle and is backed by ministers the danger is that it could be sidelined and used as a fig leaf by the data-hungry government departments," Guy Herbert of No2ID told the Independent.
  Banks and mobile phone companies have a fairly secure idea of their customers' profiles and identities. But using personal profiles on social media network sites, such as Facebook, which are not necessarily verified, may raise questions about how far somebody with a fake account could use it to build an official identity for themselves with birth certificate, passports, driving licence and the rest.
Thread: They taught outlining wrong
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 15:30
  In school they taught us to outline first, then write from the outline. It's an ideal no one achieves, to have the product arrive in finished form in our mind before we start exploring.
  Instead we wrote the paper first, then the outline.
  And that was correct, because it was the only way that worked. But it didn't get us much more than a slide show presentation of our work. It's different when you have a structure editor, an outliner. Because you can revise both the text and its organization after the initial burst of writing.
  Here's how I do it today, in my outliner. I write from top to bottom. Then I review. If I find structure, I add it.
  Then I have a structure to work with, I add more ideas become apparent, more things I have to record, to tell the reader. The order might change. The process of each little project is to iterate both the work product and the narration until I feel I'm ready to move on to the next thing.
  Of course I might start two or more things at the same time. For example I have two worknotesopen now, and this blog post.
  In a blog post I play with order more than structure. They are meant to be read from top to bottom, as a story.
  But worknotes offer different things to different people. I write them for today's users and hopefully tomorrow's too. But I also write them for developers, including myself, who will continue to work on the code behind the notes. I find it very useful to be able to open my notes from a previous project, while working on something related, and find it all neatly organized, so I can skip right to the part that's relevent to me.
  I thought it would be interesting to take a screen shot of my worknotes outline so you can see what projects in various states of completion look like. At the same time here's one of my blog outline. See how they're different?
  Outlining works on a computer, as long as you revise. It doesn't work on paper because revision, especially of structure, is too hard.
Why Is David Gregory the Keynote Speaker at GOP Group Event?
  Link to Article
  Source: Crooks and Liars
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 15:29
  David Gregory & Co. busting a move, Gangnam style. Today Show, September 2012, the embodiment of journalistic gravitas
  Do you remember when MSNBC took Keith Olbermann off the air for making donations to three Arizona congresspeople without disclosing it first? Or when elder statesman Tom Brokaw took thinly veiled swipes at the appearance of liberal bias within MSNBC's line-up?
  Apparently, those same rules don't apply to NBC News hosts, especially when the bias appears conservative. Because otherwise I'm sure that the news that David Gregory has agreed to be the keynote speaker for NFIB would be much bigger deal:
  The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), which calls itself ''the voice of small business,'' is one of the Republican party's strongest allies. The group spent over $1 million on outside ads in the 2010 campaign '-- all of it backing Republican House and Senate candidates (and, Bloomberg News reported last month, ''another $1.5 million that it kept hidden and said was exempt'' from disclosure requirements). The group is the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit against the Obamacare law and bankrolled state governments' challenges to the law. The NFIB has also taken stances against allowing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases, opposing regulations on businesses, and supporting curtailing union rights.
  Given the group's obvious Republican alliance, it comes as little surprise that the NFIB's three-day 2012 Small Business Summit, which begins Monday, will feature headliners Karl Rove and House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH).
  But the first name and photo on the invitation for the $150-per-person event '-- Tuesday's ''keynote address'' speaker '-- is NBC's Meet the Press host David Gregory. He is marketed by NBC as an anchor and ''trusted journalist.''
  According to an NBC spokesperson, Gregory is donating his fee (which typically runs about $40,000 per appearance), so there is no impropriety.
  Except that it, you know, confirms his bias. But hey, we know the drill NBC, IOKIYAR, right?
DECLINE, DECAY, DENIAL, DELUSION & DESPAIR
  Link to Article
  Source: Washington's Blog
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 14:05
  The majority of Americans seem OK with just waddling through life, accepting the lies and misinformation blasted from the boob tube and their various iGadgets by their owners, gorging themselves to death on Twinkies and Cheetos, paying 15% interest on their $10,000 rolling credit card balance, and growing ever more dependent on the welfare/warfare state to provide and protect them from accepting personal responsibility for their lives. A minority of critical thinking people have chosen to question everything they see and hear being spewed at us by the propagandist mainstream media, the corporate fascist government, and the powerful banking cabal that has an iron grip upon our throats as they choke the life out of the global economy in their never ending desire for more riches and more power.
  The decline of the Great American Empire cannot be attributed to one factor or one bogeyman. There are a multitude of factors, villains, and choices made by the American people that have led to our moral, civil, social, and economic decline. The kabuki theater that passes for our electoral process is little more than a diversion from our imminent fate. Neither candidate for President has any intention of changing the course of the U.S. Titanic. Our rendezvous with destiny has been charted, and there aren't nearly enough lifeboats. Those who built the ship and recklessly navigated it into a sea of icebergs will be the 1st into the few lifeboats. The leaders we've chosen, the choices we've made, and our unwillingness to deal with facts and reality have set in motion a disaster that cannot be averted. It's a shame the majority of Americans have the math aptitude of a 6th grader, because the unsustainability of our empire can be calculated quite easily. Math is hard for Americans, but denial and delusion are easy.
  Oddly, a couple of late September days in Wildwood NJ were able to crystalize many of the aspects of our cultural and economic decline in my mind. I should have just enjoyed the 72 degree temperatures, a few beers, and the freedom to read a book on my deck. I wish I was just oblivious to my surroundings, but my weekend in Wildwood NJ was an eye opener. Everywhere I turned I saw something that made me laugh, shake my head in disgust, or wonder how our government could have become so inane, incompetent and out of control. We all generalize based upon our preconceived beliefs, but sometimes what you see is what you get. The weekend started normally with a morning bike ride on the boardwalk with my wife and son to the Hereford lighthouse in North Wildwood. Along the way we passed the usual suspects on the boardwalk: the obese, the tattooed, the pierced, and the blue haired. I wish I was exaggerating, but I saw a dozen hoveround and rascal scooters carrying extremely obese Americans on par with this person:
  If I wanted to be politically correct, I'd call the fat asses cruising on their ''free'' rascal scooters, the weight challenged disabled on their powered mobility enhancement vehicles. You know a trend has become a massive scam, when South Park dedicates an entire show to the shame of obesity and the scooter brigade. The majority of the scooter squad jamming up the boardwalk was less than 50 years old. They weren't disabled. They were just too obese and lazy to wobble down the boardwalk to the next junk food joint. They were certainly in the right place. The Wildwood boardwalk is home to pizza topped with cheese fries, chocolate covered bacon, fried Oreos, funnel cake topped with powdered sugar, and 64 ounce sugar laced lemonade. The place would make Nanny Bloomberg's head explode.
  We've all seen the commercials for the Scooter store urging anyone on Medicare to rush in and get a power scooter or wheelchair ''at little or no cost to you''. The entitlement ''free shit'' mentality permeates our culture. There is a cost and it is over $800 million per year, paid for by the 53% who pay Federal taxes. Records from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services show that the cost of motorized scooters and wheelchairs to the government health service for senior citizens rose 179% between 1999 and 2009, the last year for which full records are available. This data is fascinating as the number of Americans over the age of 65 only increased by 18% over this same time frame. The bill in 1999 was $259 million; in 2009 it was $723 million '' and is surely over $1 billion today. This is another billion dollar scam being funded by your tax dollars, but there are no spending cuts possible according to our beloved Congressmen.
  A recent report by Medicare's inspector general also showed that 61% of the motorized wheelchairs provided to Medicare recipients in the first half of 2007 went to people who didn't qualify for them. (Only people who cannot get around without one are supposed to be eligible.) The inspector general found that Medicare is billed an average of $4,018 for a motorized wheelchair that normally sells for $1,048. As a taxpayer, you will be shocked to find out that people are selling their ''no cost'' Rascal 600 B mobility scooters on eBay. I'm sure the keen eyed government drones working in the Health & Human Services agency are policing the resale of taxpayer paid for scooters. I find it amusing that scooters have various naming classes, just like BMW and Mercedes. The vast majority of people I see tooling around on their ''mobility scooters'' are just plain fat. They aren't over 65 years old. On my Sunday bike ride I was flabbergasted and amused by the sight of a 350 pound woman on a Rascal with the pedal to the metal pulling a 275 pound man in a wheelchair attached by rope. The plague of slow metabolism is sweeping the countryside.
  While I was relaxing on my deck reading and trying to blot out the nightmare visions of obese boomers in Rascal formation like German panzers invading Poland, a brand new SUV pulled into the parking lot across the street. After five minutes, the driver's side door opened and out sidled a four foot five, two hundred and fifty pound female senior citizen in all her girth. She waddled to the back of the SUV and opened the hatch to extract her walker with wheels. She began berating the three hundred pound dude that got out of the passenger side to come and get his walker. Then she motored off towards Laura's Fudge, while her hubby conserved his energy waiting by the SUV. Minutes later she scooted her way back hauling a sack of fudge. They then trundled off towards the boardwalk, most likely headed for Kohrs Bros for a double dipped fudge ice cream cone or some Boardwalk fries smothered in cheese.
  Based upon my unscientific assessment of the people walking on the Wildwood boardwalk, I would conclude that 35% of the people are obese, 40% are overweight by 20 or 30 pounds (myself included), and 25% are in relatively good shape. After checking the government statistics, my assessment appears to be accurate. Who is to blame? The easy answer is to just blame the individual for their lack of self-restraint and inability to contain their impulses. But when you consider that 160 million out of 232 million adults in this country are either overweight or obese, along with 11 million adolescents, there must be something more sinister behind the phenomenon. There is no doubt that a major portion of the blame must be laid at the fat feet of those who could have exercised restraint over their cravings, but the words of master propagandist Edward Bernays provides another factor in the equation:
  ''If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without them knowing it.'' ''Edward Bernays
  Bernays reveals a truth that is self-evident to those with critical thinking skills. Sadly, few Americans exhibit any thinking skills whatsoever. Our society has bifurcated into those who control and those who are controlled. The overlord Double Plus Alphas in our society consist of the Wall Street banker cabal, the executives of our mega-corporations, Federal Reserve governors, Washington DC politicians, Federal government apparatchiks, the propaganda experts in the mainstream corporate media, and the secretive billionaire set that manipulate and maneuver behind the scenes. The first step in controlling the Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons, as Aldous Huxley knew in 1931, was to indoctrinate them with propaganda in our government run schools. This mission has been accomplished. The vast majority of school children graduate from the government school system with no ability to think critically or question what has been spoon fed to them as facts. The fascist alliance of corporations and the state begin in the public schools, with product advertisements by corporations now subsidizing school budgets. The road to obesity is paved with chicken nuggets, fries and pizza dispensed by the government schools on a daily basis.
  Just as in Huxley's Brave New World, America has been built upon the principles of Henry Ford's assembly line'--mass production, homogeneity, predictability, and consumption of disposable consumer goods. In the dystopian novel, members of every class, from birth, are indoctrinated by recorded voices repeating slogans while they sleep. Huxley didn't imagine the power of TV and other mass media outlets to do the same while we are awake. We are bombarded day and night by propaganda from mega-corporations to buy their products. Mass consumption of processed food sold by the likes of multi-billion dollar corporations Kraft, Pepsico, Coca Cola, General Mills, Nestle, and Unilever is the chief cause of the obesity epidemic in America. The few know how to manipulate the many through messaging, repetition and persistently molding the opinions of the feeble minded non-thinking masses. The billions spent by corporations on advertising to convince the masses that eating a Wendy's Baconator, KFC extra crispy bucket, or Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese, washed down with a two liter Mountain Dew or Cherry Coke, is a tribute to the invisible government running the show. Huxley and Bernays had it all figured out eighty years ago:
  ''The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. '...We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons'...who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.'' ''Edward Bernays,Propaganda, 1928
  The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the masses by the invisible government Alphas has transmuted citizens into overweight, non-thinking, debt dependent, egocentric consumers. This was not a mistake. The powerful interests used their control over the banking system, media outlets, and political system to lure the willfully ignorant into a debt financed lifestyle through the Federal Reserve created inflation, Wall Street peddled credit cards, auto loans and ''creative'' mortgages. The manipulators convinced the manipulated that borrowing today to buy houses, cars, bling, tech gadgets, clothing, and fast food was preferable to what previous generations of Americans had done '' save to buy things they wanted or needed. This behavior seems to be completely irrational as a people that once saved 12% of their income and carried a moderate amount of debt chose to reduce their savings to 0% and not worry about tomorrow.
  It is easier to understand when you realize who benefitted from this purposeful shift in societal norms. The low debt, high savings, production era from 1950 through 1980 benefitted the working middle class, allowing millions to improve their standard of living. The rising debt, low savings, consumption era, from 1980 through today, benefits the 1% Alphas while impoverishing the middle class and sentencing the lower class to a lifetime of dependent servitude to the state. Who benefitted from debt fueled conspicuous consumption and continues to benefit today? The peddlers of consumer debt on Wall Street and the mega-corporations that convinced Americans they couldn't live without that 5,500 square foot McMansion, BMW X5, stainless steel appliances, 84 inch 3D HDTV, iPhone 5, diamond encrusted Coach handbag, and thousands of other Chinese made trinkets that pile up in underwater homes across the land, benefitted tremendously. The proliferation of debt resulted in obscene profits for the financial sector, record profits for the mega-corporations that shipped production to Asia in order to take advantage of the slave labor, and three decades of wage stagnation and increasing debt for the average working middle class American.
  The financialization of America was a conscious decision by the oligarchs. They controlled the issuance of credit. They controlled the currency and level of inflation inflicted upon the masses. They controlled the corporations selling consumer goods on credit. They controlled the Congress, courts, and government agencies with their deep pocket lobbying and buying of influence. Lastly, they controlled the media messages and molded the opinions and tastes of the masses through their Bernaysian propaganda techniques perfected over the decades. In one of the boldest and most blatant acts of audacity in world history, the Wall Street/K Street oligarchs wrecked the world economy in their insatiable thirst for profits, shifted their worthless debt onto the backs of taxpayers and unborn generations, threw senior citizens and savers under the bus by stealing $400 billion per year of interest from them, and enriched themselves with bubble level profits and bonus payouts. Meanwhile, median household income continues to fall, real GDP is stagnant, true unemployment exceeds 22%, and 47 million people are living on food stamps.
  The propaganda being flogged by the oligarchs since 2009 is the supposed deleveraging by the American consumer and trying to convince the ignorant masses to resume borrowing and spending. It's working. Consumer credit outstanding is at an all-time high of $2.73 trillion as the Federal government has dished out billions in student loans to 50,000 University of Phoenix MBA aspirants sitting in their basements quivering with anticipation of on-line graduation and future six figure job with Goldman Sachs. The Feds have also added the impetus to the ''strong'' auto sales through their 85% TARP ownership of Ally Financial by doling out 7 year 0% auto loans to subprime borrowers in urban enclaves around the country. The oligarchs aren't worried about these loans being paid back, because they are reaping the profits today. The future losses will just be foisted onto the taxpayer, as always. Total credit market debt of $55 trillion now exceeds 350% of GDP. The National Debt of $16.2 trillion will exceed $20 trillion in 2015 no matter who wins the Presidency in November. The oligarchs adapt and control whoever occupies the White House. It is essential for our owners to keep debt growing at an exponential rate or the Ponzi scheme collapses.
  Narrow minded ideologues want a simple answer to a complex interaction of generational, cultural, economic, political, and criminal factors that have conspired to put the country into a predicament that, at this point, will inevitably lead to economic collapse. The truth is the American people have learned to love their servitude. They have willfully chosen ignorance over truth. They've chosen to believe what their keepers have instructed them. They've chosen to trust the storylines generated by the corporate media rather than think critically and question everything. They've chosen obesity and sickness over health. They've chosen debt financed faux wealth over savings based real wealth. They've chosen safety and security over liberty. They've chosen dependency over self-reliance. These choices were aided, abetted and promoted by the Alphas through their ability to manipulate and control the unthinking masses. Huxley understood the power of propaganda and brainwashing decades before it was perfected by our owners.
  ''There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological method of making people love their servitude, and producing dictatorship without tears, so to speak, producing a kind of painless concentration camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have their liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it, because they will be distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing, or brainwashing enhanced by pharmacological methods. And this seems to be the final revolution.'' '' Aldous Huxley
  The saddest part of this episode of the Decline & Fall of the American Empire reality show is the continued delusion of the majority of the populace, as their desire for material goods and fair share of the entitlement pie outweighs their sense of obligation to their children and grandchildren. Their chosen ignorance is fulfilled through their attachment to their personal digital ignorance gadgets and supported by what passes for government education. The truth is obscured and hidden under waves of triviality, reality TV, and data manipulation by our government masters. The dystopian nightmare that engulfs our country has thus far resembled Huxley's vision of a shallow populace easily distracted by consumerism, pleasure seeking, cultural trivialities, and a never ending ability to be distracted by meaningless minutia. Orwell's darker vision of surveillance, captivity, information control, authoritarianism and pain will become the norm once the existing social order falls.
  ''What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egotism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny ''failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions.'' In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that our desire will ruin us.'' '' Neil Postman '' Amusing Ourselves to Death
  I despair for my country that has chosen to eat, amuse and borrow itself to death. But my despair is deepest for my children and their future. The greed, corruption, myopia, selfishness, and disregard for the well-being of future generations by current and past generations has left a barren and bleak landscape for my children. The Huxley vision of America consuming and amusing itself to death is coming to a painful conclusion, as the limits of a fiat currency and debt based lifestyle become evident. Those in power are preparing the masses for a more Orwellian vision of America when they are forced to pull the plug on the existing paradigm. The Patriot Act, NDAA, military exercises in our cities, militarization of local police forces, warrantless surveillance of our communications, searches and seizures in our airports and train stations, purchase of millions of rounds of ammo by government agencies, implementation of drone technology, camera surveillance, attempts to control the internet, manipulation of economic data, and executive orders allowing the President to take over all commerce while imprisoning citizens indefinitely without charges, are the next step in our descent into a dictatorship of tears.
  The question is whether we will stand idly by, fiddling with our gadgets, tweeting about Honey Boo Boo, or will we regain our sense of duty to the future generations of this country. The manipulators are powerful, rich, connected and FEW. Those being manipulated, controlled, and abused are MANY. There will be a revolution in this country whether you like it or not. The existing social order will dissolve during the next fifteen years. What replaces it is up to us. George Carlin described what our owners want.
  ''Politicians are put there to give you that idea that you have freedom of choice. You don't. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land, they own and control the corporations, and they've long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the State Houses, and the City Halls. They've got the judges in their back pockets. And they own all the big media companies so they control just about all the news and information you get to hear.
  They've got you by the balls.
  They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want; they want more for themselves and less for everybody else. But I'll tell you what they don't want'--they don't want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don't want well informed, well educated people capable of critical thinking. They're not interested in that. That doesn't help them. That's against their interest.''
  What do ''We the People'' want?
Environmentalist finds CO2 rises faster in good times than it falls in bad
  Link to Article
  Source: Phys.org - latest science and technology news stories
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 14:04
  Estimated effect of annual growth in GDP per capita on growth in CO2 emissions per capita. Credit: (c) Nature Climate Change (2012) doi:10.1038/nclimate1699
  (Phys.org)'--Richard York, a researcher with the Department of Sociology and Environmental Studies Program at the University of Oregon, has found that a measured reduction in CO2 emissions during economic downturns is not on par with the increase in CO2 emissions that is apparent during boon times. York made this discovery after analyzing the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of several nations during the period 1960 to 2008, and then comparing these values with the countries' corresponding annual measures of CO2 emissions. The results are published in the journal Nature Climate Change.
  Conventional thinking held that greenhouse gas emissions will tumble at the same rate as they rise depending on economic conditions. York wasn't convinced: accordingly, he decided to study the ups and downs of the economies of 150 of the world's major countries over the course of nearly a half century. He then compared each country's GDP and carbon emission measures over time. What he found was that, on average, CO2 emissions rose by 0.73 percent for every 1 percent rise in GDP during economically prosperous times, but fell just 0.43 percent for every 1 percent fall in GDP during economically depressed periods , indicating that greenhouse gasses fall at roughly half the rate that they rise.
  York has a theory regarding this observed phenomenon'-- CO2emission levels are partly based on a country's economic and infrastructure history. If a country builds factories, cars and roads during strong economic times, this infrastructure and machinery will still be there when the economy experiences a dip. And, while the new assets may be used less during difficult times, there is very little chance they won't be used at all. Therefore, carbon emissions, while somewhat decreased, will never return to their pre-development levels.
  York's findings are likely to dampen one of the few bright spots surrounding the economic malaise currently impacting many countries, particularly Europe. The hope'--that slow economic growth was decreasing the amount of CO2 being added to the atmosphere, thereby minimizing global warming, and as some have suggested, weather volatility'--may be little more than wishful thinking.
  York concludes by suggesting that, based on his results, governments worldwide will likely need to rethink their predictions regarding CO2 emissions. This might be particularly true for those countries that set their goals based on assumptions made at the 2009 Copenhagen summit, which focused on nations working together to combat the problems of greenhouse gas emissions and global warming, and which was organized around conventional theories of CO2 emissions in developed and developing nations.
  More information: Asymmetric effects of economic growth and decline on CO2 emissions, Nature Climate Change (2012) doi:10.1038/nclimate1699 (FREE article)
  Journal reference:Nature Climate Change
  (C) 2012 Phys.org
MICHA KAT OP RADIO 1
  Link to Article
  Source: ZapLog - externe links
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:53
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Living room built around NYC Columbus statue a hit
  Link to Article
  Source: Dave Winer's linkblog feed
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:49
  NEW YORK -- Anyone hoping to commune with Christopher Columbus on Columbus Day will be disappointed: He's booked solid. Monday's tickets to the conceptual art installation that surrounds a 13-foot statue of the explorer with a well-appointed living room have all been snapped up.
  The exhibit, "Discovering Columbus" by Japanese artist Tatzu Nishi, has become a must-see cultural attraction in New York since it opened Sept. 20. Some 20,000 people have made the walk up six flights of stairs for the up-close view of Columbus, as well as the unique views of Midtown Manhattan and Central Park.
  "Living room in the sky? I thought 'Cool. Check it out,'" said business analyst Brianna Goodman, who visited this past week. "I would never have thought to build a living room around a statue, but it made it like an intimate setting. And then the view from up there!"
  Artist Martha Bone said the walk up and down the stairs was well worth it. "It was one of the best installations I've ever seen. ... It's my city. I like to know what's going on in it."
  The exhibit is being presented by the city's Public Art Fund, and free timed tickets can be reserved at http://www.publicartfund.org. Another 80,000 are slated to see the exhibit before it ends Nov. 18.
  "What I have been absolutely thrilled about is that I think the project has really captured the imagination of New York," said Public Art Fund director Nicholas Baume.
  Not everyone is a fan. John Mancini, executive director of the Italic Institute of America, said the artwork turns the 1892 statue by Italian sculptor Gaetano Russo into "a stage prop."
  "How can one artist hijack the work of another artist?" he complained.
  The statue rests on a 60-foot granite column at the southwest corner of Central Park. Columbus' marble features usually are visible only from afar.
  For his first installation in the United States, Nishi has perched Columbus' home atop scaffolding that encases the column.
  The statue rises out of a large coffee table so that it seems to preside over a highbrow salon. Pink wallpaper, designed by the artist, depicts American icons Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe and Martin Luther King Jr.
  Because Time Warner Inc. and Mayor Michael Bloomberg's media company are sponsors, the magazines include Bloomberg Business Week and the TV is on CNN with the sound on low. Fresh newspapers are laid out every day
  Visitors can plop themselves on the sectional, admire the views and scan the titles on Columbus' bookshelves, which include Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass," Barack Obama's "The Audacity of Hope" and books about baseball and American history.
  "I was really enjoying trying to figure out who are these people who live in this apartment," said art therapist Bonnie Hirschhorn. "I was picturing some New York City intellectual."
Empty Pagentry
  Link to Article
  Source: Clusterfuck Nation
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:46
  The press wet its small-clothes over Mitt Romney's ebullience in last Thursday's so-called debate, as these joint interview contests are styled these days. What a jaunty fellow Mitt came off as, compared to poor Mr. Obama, cloaked in presidential gloom, the wearisome woes of high office and all that - or perhaps just some indigestible tidbit served out of Air Force One's galley, an infected cocktail weenie, a shrimp with attitude, or an empanada with the E coli blues, who knows.... To be sure, Mr. Romney's ebullience had a crafted tang to it, like one of those pumpkin-flavored beers made for the season, especially since all that verve was employed in the service of ebullient lying, statistical confabulation, and self-contradiction. At times his sheer manic zest veered in the direction of what used to be called hebephrenia in the old clinical sense of someone euphorically out-of-touch with reality. Alienation from reality being at the very core of the current zeitgeist, the American public can only admire somebody who displays such a buoyant disregard for what is actually happening in the universe. To me, Mr. Romney just gave off the odor of someone who will do anything to get elected while Mr. Obama evinced the dejection of someone doubting it was worth it. Of course, the issues this time around are framed with the presumption that all the current rackets of political economy can be kept running - everything from Fannie Mae to Medicare to suburbia to the systematic looting of the future by the Federal Reserve's shell-game operations with every loser bond instrument lately fobbed off on hopelessly rigged markets - which is exactly the opposite of what reality has in store for us. In fact, the salient feature of these times is the remorseless running down of all these rackets to their entropic end points. The sad part is that everyone from the leadership down to the lowly clientele of food stamps and gamed disability payments is locked into the vast array of rackets that constitute our national life, and the truth of their failure thresholds is too terrifying to entertain. What to many appears to be a "conspiracy of elites" is just our way of life. Evidence of this is the increasingly eerie way that the financial crimes of recent years somehow vanish into the ethers of history without any official notice from either the media or the police powers of society. In a very serious time, we are just not a serious people. Anything goes and nothing matters. The central reality broadly ignored is the unavoidable contraction of industrial economies all over the world. The action is especially brutal in the USA, which actually gave up on the nuts-and-bolts of industrial production beginning in the 1970s, but managed to cream off other nation's exertions by reserve currency hocus-pocus, pervasive executive control fraud, and a reckless spewage of glitzy "consumer" service infrastructure over the landscape, which gave the appearance of vitality in the absence of value creation - the exact specialty, by the way, of predatory private equity squads like Mitt Romney's Bain Capital. All of this was enabled by the last gasps of cheap oil, and without it our whole way of life craps out, including the creaming off of leftovers. And this illness of advanced economies is now spreading all over the world. You would think that the question of what we will do about all this might be at issue in the current election - how we might deliberately face the tasks of reorganizing farming, commerce, transportation, banking, schooling, and all the other practical matters of existence. There is an awful lot to talk about, and much to be done, but nobody is interested. Instead, we've mounted a foolish campaign to keep all the old rackets running, and there is no fundamental difference between Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama on that. The empty pageantry of these debates dresses this dangerous madness in the raiment of clowning. All of this has consequences, of course, but in a society that has ditched all sense of consequence nobody can pay attention to that either. The poet W.H. Auden called his time "a low, dishonest decade." Bad as the 1930s were, the stakes are even higher now, and our clownish inattention conceals darker falsities that could make that terrible era seem quaint.___________________________________James Howard Kunstler's newest nonfiction book, TOO MUCH MAGIC, will be available in stores in July 2012. The book will be available at booksellers, large and small, online and off. To find out how you can help support local bookstores with your purchase, CLICK HERE. Other books:
NOS Teletekst - Demmink daagt AD voor de rechter
  Link to Article
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:38
  Update: maandag 8 okt 2012, 15:30Secretaris-generaal Demmink van het ministerie van Justitie daagt het AD voor de rechter. Zaterdag schreef die krant dat Demmink in de jaren tachtig contacten onderhield met een pooier van minderjarige jongens. Demmink ontkent dat hij die contacten had.
  Over Demmink doen al jaren verhalen de ronde dat hij seks zou hebben gehad met jongens. Onderzoek leverde tot nu toe geen hard bewijs op. Zijn advocaat zegt dat Demmink de beschuldigingen niet langer over zijn kant wil laten gaan.
  Veel partijen in de Tweede Kamer willen een brief over de kwestie van minister Opstelten. De brief wordt snel verwacht.
  Dit artikel is afkomstig van Teletekst.
Kiezen tussen netvergoeding of slimme meter
  Link to Article
  Mon, 08 Oct 2012 13:36
  BRUSSEL - Eigenaars van zonnepanelen kunnen de forfaitaire netvergoeding ontlopen. Op voorwaarde dat ze een slimme meter installeren. Dan betalen ze naar rato van de stroom die binnen en buiten gaat.
  De Vlaamse distributienetbeheerders Eandis en Infrax gaan vanaf 2013 een forfaitaire vergoeding vragen aan zonnepanelen-eigenaars (DS 6 oktober). 50 euro per kilowatt zal voor een meerderheid van de Vlaamse gezinnen met zonnepanelen op hun dak neerkomen op een rekening van 200 euro per jaar. Omdat de gemiddelde capaciteit van de installaties in Vlaanderen rond 4 kilowatt schommelt.
  Opvallend is wel dat ze nog een tweede maar wel veel complexere aanrekening aanbieden.
  Voor wie bereid is om een slimme meter bij hem thuis te laten installeren vervalt de forfaitaire vergoeding. De slimme meter laat toe te zien hoeveel elektriciteit je afneemt van het net wanneer de zon niet schijnt en hoe groot het stroomoverschot is dat terugvloeit naar het net. En in dit geval moet je betalen naar rato van het effectieve verbruik en het teruggeleverde volume. De netbeheerders stellen voor om voor de terugleveringen 5,7 euro per 1.000 kilowattuur te vragen.
  Voor de zonnepanelen-eigenaars kan het nog wel eens een heel rekenwerk worden om uit te maken of ze moeten kiezen voor het forfait of het tarief per kilowattuur.
  Bij de netbeheerders is te horen dat het tarief per kilowattuur iets voordeliger is wanneer de zonne-energieproductie overwegend dient om het eigen verbruik te dekken. Wie 60 procent van zijn zonnestroom zelf verbruikt is beter af met het meer complexe tariefsysteem is te horen.
  Wie daarvoor kiest krijgt overigens een slimme meter voor een prikje. Eandis en Infrax zijn wel van plan om de plaatsing van de slimme meter aan te rekenen. Dat komt neer op 160 euro. Maar de slimme meter zelf wordt niet aangerekend. Momenteel kost zo'n toestel meer dan 800 euro.
  De distributienetbeheerders zien de plaatsing van slimme meters bij zonnepanelen-eigenaars als een onderdeel van hun proefprojecten om her en der in Vlaanderen circa 50.000 van dergelijke elektriciteitsmeters '' 40.000 door Eandis en 10.000 door Infrax '' te plaatsen.
  Het ziet er overigens naar uit dat zeker bij Eandis nog serieus gediscussieerd gaat worden over slimme meters bij zonnepanelen-bezitters. In CD&V-kringen is te horen dat Eandis er best aan zou doen om zonnepanelen-eigenaars zo veel mogelijk aan te moedigen om te kiezen voor een slimme meter-optie.
  De invoering van een netvergoeding betekent nog niet dat er volledige duidelijkheid is over het financile plaatje voor een particulier die nog wil investeren in een zonne-energiesysteem. Het is nog niet geweten hoeveel steun er na nieuwjaar nog zal gegeven worden aan zonne-energie. Op 1 augustus is de steun teruggeschroefd van 230 naar 90 euro. Maar deze regeling geldt maar tot 31 december van dit jaar. De afspraak is dat tegen dan berekend welke subsidie er nog nodig is.
  Vlaams minister van Energie Freya Van den Bossche (SP.A) stelde zaterdag dat ze het principe van een netvergoeding steunt, maar dat de prijs wel in verhouding moet staan tot wat de grote zonnepanelenparken betalen, het zogenaamde injectietarief. 'Het injectietarief komt ongeveer op hetzelfde neer', stelde Van den Bossche aan de VRT. 'Maar ik vind wel dat de verhouding tussen dat tarief en de netvergoeding billijk moet zijn, en wat mij betreft is daar nog wat verbetering mogelijk. Dat kan nog rechtvaardiger.'
  PV Vlaanderen, de organisatie van fotovolta¯sche bedrijven, vindt het bedrag te hoog. 'We hebben er in principe geen bezwaar tegen dat eigenaars van zonnepanelen een bijdrage moeten leveren, maar het moet wel billijk zijn', zegt Alex Polfliet. 'Er blijft in vergelijking met de 90 euro per groenestroomcertificaat maar weinig steun meer over.'