Linkedin: constantly striving to be more annoying than Facebook:
Mm-hmm. Wonder how many of them claimed this skill not because of emails like this?
(title: cf.)
Friday, January 13, 2012
In a sane world, everyone who knew "Bueller ... Bueller" would also memorize this
Thanks to his often-controversial beliefs, unmanned drone Ben Stein has found himself unfairly ostracized, limited to just a handful of talk show appearances, guest columns, movie cameos, theatrically run documentaries, public speaking gigs, and corporate spokesperson jobs every year.
Bow down to Sean O'Neal. Hat tip to … all right, which one of you forgot to tell me that Gil Mann is back blogging at Rumproast? (I'm so far behind.)
And speaking of shoutouts and Rumproast: Betty Cracker. 'Nuff said.
Good move
Shoutout to the NBA, and especially Mr. Grant Hill and Mr. Jared Dudley:
P.S. Not to be all stereotypical at a time like this, but seriously, IndyCarScene.com? That asshat ("geistC6") is one of your site administrators? Pretty fucking sad.
__________
[Update] Shockingly, that link no longer works. Unless you're a member of IndyCarScene, maybe. Which I guess I no longer am?
The link used to lead to a forum thread in which a bunch of yahoos were whining about being told that what apparently is one of their favorite words is needlessly offensive. I happened across that thread while looking for an online copy of the video above, after seeing the ad on TV, and decided to throw in my two cents. The forum members simply did not care for that, as the comments below also illustrate.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Not as cool as my Streb hat, of course ...
... but I passed by some high school kids today, and my pride in being able to identify the headgear outweighed my embarrassment at realizing a few minutes later, "Uh, those have probably been around since before this afternoon."
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Can't wait to hear the wingnut fury over this one!
Seen today's Google Doodle?
Happy birthday, Nicolas Steno!
(Nicolas Steno is the patron saint of all those who take dictation. Or not!)
At first, I thought ...
... (perhaps understandably) that the headline was Twinkies make Hostess seek bankruptcy protection.
(h/t: KK, via email)
Windows Updates: addendum
A follow-up from yesterday's post, where I said, in part:
If you don't have Automatic Updates turned on, please be a good Netizen and visit update.microsoft.com.
It looks like not all of the available updates from Microsoft got downloaded and installed automatically, at least for me, even though I have Automatic Updates turned on. Perhaps this is because they are marked Important instead of Critical. So, visit that above link, if you please. Or, if you're on one of them newfangled versions of Windows, just run Windows Update from the Start menu.
Your Internet thanks you.
Line of the Day: 2012-01-11
Usefulness: A
“This really depends on whether or not you find performance art useful. One moment, Filibuster will be pulling books off the shelf, the next he’ll be drowning a cat toy in his water dish, the next he’ll be taking an umbrella off the hook and walking around it (closed) in his mouth (he’s a pretty big cat, but this is still an odd sight to see.) Once, he broke into a bag of cat litter, piled it up in a big mound on the floor and took a shit on it. Matthew Barney, eat your heart out.”
(h/t: MK, via email)
Runners-up:
From the same review:
Huggability: B
“He tolerates being hugged, but he meows all the while. Look, for Filibuster, affection is an ACTIVITY. Affection is freaking ART. It’s not for laying around like a lump. He has to walk back and forth, meow like crazy and then bite you if you stop for even a second. The only time he ever sat on my lap was the one time I meditated. He put his little paw on my hand and sat there with me. True story.”
Also good (different review):
Appearance: B
“I’m not fat; I’m plush.”
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
And speaking of Internet Explorer ...
... this is an interesting wrinkle: Microsoft has announced that they will be automatically updating your copy of IE to the latest version your PC supports.
You can download a blocker if for some reason you don't want this to happen.
(h/t: Chester Wisniewski)
If it's the second Tuesday of the month, it must be?
An intriguing statement, made by Chester Wisniewski (MP3) at about 5:48 of Episode 75 of the Sophos Security Chet Chat, recorded 14 October 2011:
From Virus Bulletin [link added --ed.] last week in Spain: Microsoft presented some really interesting material, talking about 99% of attacks against a given exploit occur after the exploit has been patched, and many times, more than thirty days after that exploit has been patched.
I think this might have been said during Holly Stewart's talk (PDF), titled "Top exploits of 2011." See slide 16.
Yes, today is Patch Tuesday. If you don't have Automatic Updates turned on, please be a good Netizen and visit update.microsoft.com.
(Using Internet Explorer.)
(Just this once!)
;)
Fair enough. I mean, I consider blogging and tweeting to be crack.
Swiped from Uncle Eb, who simply does not care for the Facebook. (Although when presented like this, Eb? Hmmmm? Questions remain!)
Friday, January 06, 2012
Thursday, January 05, 2012
"It’s the first time I ever heard a programmed drum in Tuareg guitar music."
Not actually a post about VW SUVs.
ur-hipsters?
Digital filesharing doesn’t need the internet. This is the case at least in Western Africa and other parts of the developing world, where computers aren’t yet consumer goods for most and, even if they were, web access isn’t exactly New York City. Lovers of music still get it done, however, sharing files between knockoff cell phones via bluetooth connections and accumulating song collections in memory cards and bitrates that would probably make most in our lossless world laugh. It’s created a music culture that’s uniquely underground, an awesome anything-goes world of No Limit-style rap marrying Megaman-synth workouts, strange new techno-folks, and various other things so far untaggable.
Portlander Christopher Kirkley put together a compilation of stuff collected from the cell phones of music listeners in Western Africa and released it a few years ago on cassette, called simply Music From Saharan Cell Phones Vol. 1, via his Sahel Sounds. Since then, he’s taken on the mammoth task of tracking down every artist on it, who will now get 60-percent of the profits from a rerelease of the compilation last month on vinyl. Over the holidays, I got the chance to ask Kirkley a few questions about cell phone sharing culture and the process of putting the comp together.
There's more, including download links for volumes one and two.
(h/t: NYT/Bits | pic. source: National Archives UK)
[Added] So far, it's quite a bit different from what I expected. (In a good way.)
I'm sorry, but when did post-coital bliss get to be a "weird trick?"
Or maybe that ad was aimed at a visitor profile not quite matching mine?
I have more fun when I delete my tracking cookies …
Wednesday, January 04, 2012
Deep thought
I'm getting a lot of Gmail ads for Botox, wrinkle cream, and moving services. I wonder if that's their way of responding to my curmudgeonly insistence on switching back to the old look (which is BETTAR) every time they try to switch me to the new.
Audio frees the video child
If you'd like to untether yourself and you don't have a fancy enough device to stream video while you're untethered, here are links to files containing the audio portion of the last three vids I've implored you to watch. Visit the download page for each and click the big blue "Download Now" button. (Whereupon you'll have to wait twenty seconds and then you'll get the actual MP3 link, which you can then right-click and save on. Sorry. Nothing is truly free.) If that fails, try here.
[Added] In Comments, Alastair points out a more direct option for the Moglen audio files. Thanks, Alastair.
The files are a little over 100 MB each. There's a torrent option on the respective download pages.
Let me know if you have any problems. Or successes, for that matter. Thanks.
• Eben Moglen: Freedom in the Cloud: download page
• Eben Moglen: Freedom in the Cloud (Q&A): download page
• Ethan Zuckerman: Cute Cats and the Arab Spring: download page
"Freedom in The Cloud"
Sorry to have back to back posts featuring videos that are probably longer than you care to sit still for, but there it is. I guess yesterday was a big teevee day for me.
At any rate, here is something else, a talk given by Eben Moglen, that I wish I could get everyone to watch. I'll say right up front that I don't agree with everything he says, and we can talk about that in the Comments if you'd like, but I think he raises a valuable set of points that everyone who cares about privacy ought to be thinking hard about. You don't need to be a software developer, even though that's who's in the room where the talk was recorded. You only need to care about the long-term consequences of ever more efficient gathering of bits of personal information, be it by government or private industry. And remember, we're not just talking computers here. These concerns apply just as much if you use a phone, a credit, debit, or club card, an E-ZPass, the list goes on and on, and will only get longer. We like our conveniences. And we shouldn't have to suffer for that.
Sometimes I think the door has slammed shut on our ability to do anything about controlling access to our thoughts, tastes, and social connections, but Eben Moglen convinces me that the fight is not yet lost, and that all of us can still be part of that effort.
Following are two videos. The first is the talk itself, the second is the Q&A. For some quick background, you might want to glance first at Moglen's Wikipedia page. Short version: he's a guru and we're lucky to have him on our side.
Also, he is a hugely entertaining speaker. Trust me, after the first couple of minutes of technical glitches at the start of the first video, you're in for a great hour or two.
Want more? Visit Moglen's personal site and the FreedomBox Foundation.
Tuesday, January 03, 2012
"Cute Cats and the Arab Spring"
"When Social Media Meet Social Change"
Here is the 2011 Vancouver Human Rights Lecture, given by Ethan Zuckerman. Even if you think you can't stand to hear one more word about Facebook and Twitter saving the commoners from the ruling classes, I encourage you to give this a chance. Despite his obvious enthusiasm for new media and what it may afford in bringing about monumental change, Zuckerman is quite realistic about the limitations and the risks. Also, he hates the word "viral."
It's about fifty-four minutes long, plus about thirteen minutes of Q&A at the end. If you'd rather download an MP3 of the highlights, see Cory Doctorow's tweet or right-click and save this directly.
Without further ado ...
Related links: Ethan Zuckerman's blog and a cute cat.
Update your Windows machines
Microsoft released some out-of-band patches a few days ago. From your perspective as an individual computer user, they're not critical, but they are important, according to Microsoft's official terminology. From the perspective of being a responsible Netizen, you should do your bit asap. This patching only takes a few minutes and doesn't even require a reboot, so why not do it now?
Run Windows Update or Microsoft Update, depending on your version of Windows, or just visit update.microsoft.com, using Internet Explorer.
Gory details on Security Week, among many others.
[Added] Thanks, Jack, for catching the typo.
Shorter of the Day
I've been a high-level member of Scientology for over 30 years and never stirred any trouble before, but now I will.
I hate the fundraising. Scientology already has over $1 billion that it is not spending.
I hate the expensive new empty buildings.
I hate that people who reached the magic level of "clear" are told they have to re-do it so the church can make money. They did this to me too and now I'm poor.
I hate that David Miscavige has taken total power over the church when it was supposed to be run by executive committees.
I hate that the executives supposed to be in charge are in a special Scientology jail just for them, where they also sent me for a while.
I want you to do something.
I want you to stop making donations (except for buying Scientology services).
I want you to forward this e-mail anonymously to every client of the Scientology corporation you know.
(Previously).
A quick test of free-ocr.com
A short while ago, I happened upon free-ocr.com, a site that does optical character recognition on an image file that you upload (PDF, JPG, GIF, TIFF or BMP), using as its engine the open source package Tesseract. It's quite a handy site.
This post is mostly a note to self, and a way to report some results to T. Reinhardt, the site's proprietor. But I thought some of you might also be interested to see some examples of just how hard a problem this is, and where the current state of the art lies.
What I wouldn't give to hear the GOP candidates ...
... discuss this:
A once proud and subversive warrior tribe that deified freakdom, drag queens have become awfully mainstream. Tame transvestites are now passing for Kardashians …
Also: screen grab of headline, just in case Just Another Friend from L.A. doesn't click the above link.
Line of the Day: 2012-01-03
Oh, Tony, I'm sorry, but this is too good.
Again, Romo could not rehabilitate his image of being Mr. October in a league in which the most important games are played in December, January and February.
-- Jeré Longman
Harsh!
(But why does Jeré Longman hate America's Team™? Communist. Next thing you know, he'll start questioning the divine appointment of Tim Tebow.)
(h/t: KK)
Monday, January 02, 2012
Know hope! (And I do mean know.)
From Sarah van Gelder:
The 12 Most Hopeful Trends to Build On in 2012
Not a bad listicle at all.
(h/t: Nation of Change)
Happy New Year, from Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories!
Champagne: Why should only the bottle get to be a deadly weapon?
Full construction instructions over at the Labs. More pix on oskay's Flickr stream.
(h/t: KK, via email)
That old time religion
Oh, my.
She said the church is hoarding "well in excess of a billion dollars" in IAS donations, in violation of policies written by church founder L. Ron Hubbard. The money was supposed to be used to disseminate the religion, she said in the letter.
"Only a tiny fraction has ever been spent. ... Only the interest earned from the holdings (has) been used very sparingly to fund projects through grants."
The church did not respond Sunday to requests for comment.
Hard to get the story straight on a holiday, i'n't it?
[Debra J.] Cook said in her letter that the dominance of church leader David Miscavige as the sole source of power in Scientology violates a system of checks and balances put in place by Hubbard before he died in 1986. She said top church executives who could check his authority face "long and harsh" discipline programs and have been absent from their posts for years.
The above excerpts are from Thomas C. Tobin and Joe Childs. And that other valuable watchdog, Tony Ortega, is also all over it.
Says someone on the Why We Protest boards: 'This is going to be very enturbulative."
Love that word.
Line of the Day: 2012-01-02
No context. Sometimes I just like the way things sound.
(The urge of Bradshaw's largely awful characters to brutalize each other can start to seem almost logical once you get to know them.)
-- Hilton Als
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