January 31, 2005

Credit card fraud

Every month, one of my credit cards is charged $9.95 from a web hosting company. So I probably wouldn't have looked twice at a $9.95 charge from "MACROCYBERLINC" on a recent statement. Luckily, I hadn't used the card for quite a while, so it was the only charge on the statement. I quickly realized that it wasn't my normal monthly charge and that I had never heard of this "Macrocyberlinc" company.

So I googled it... and what did I find? The only references Google could even find were a few sites about a $9.95 credit card fraud scheme. Swell. To make a long story short, I called the bank, reported the fraud, and canceled my card number.

It's probably related to using the card online. People mentioned Amazon.com and PayPal, both of which I have used recently... but I've also used this card number at a number of other sites, so it's hard to tell. Most - if not all - of the sites were reputable, secure sites with what appeared to be decent privacy policies... but I'm not sure that means as much as people say it does. I still love to tell the people the story of how I got e-mails asking for extra info. on the PowerBook I was selling on eBay... except that I wasn't selling a PowerBook on eBay. It turned out someone had hacked into my eBay account and was selling fake merchandise. In another long story I'll make short, I eventually tracked it to Microsoft's Passport service that was linked to my eBay account. Luckily I didn't have anything else in my "passport" (credit card numbers, other passwords, etc.). Interestingly, eBay announced a few weeks ago that it would no longer support logins through Microsoft's Passport or .Net services, and Microsoft has abandoned its Passport efforts (see also).

Anyway, be careful out there. I'm thinking about starting to use virtual credit card numbers, even though it sounds like a nuisance.

31 Jan 16:09 | Link | Category: Site/Life News, Technology & Computing

Self-defense with a walking stick

After reading Self-defence with a Walking-stick from the Feb. 1901 edition of Pearson's magazine, I think perhaps I will buy a walking stick and go around beating people up. (I know that's not technically "self-defence" but you must admit it would be an odd and somehow humorous sight.)

31 Jan 11:36 | Link | Category: Humor

Students: First Amendment goes "too far"

I ran across a story this morning that is disturbing and depressing. According to a recent study (which surveyed more than 100,000 students, nearly 8,000 teachers and more than 500 administrators at 544 public and private high schools), the First Amendment is an unimportant issue to many high school students.

More than one in three high school students in the study felt that it goes "too far" in the rights it guarantees. Only half of the students said newspapers should be allowed to publish freely without government approval of stories. (Half!)

The results of the study indicate that students are both indifferent and ignorant. 3 out of 4 students said they "took the First Amendment for granted or didn't know how they felt about it." The same proportion had the notion that flag burning is illegal. And half of them thought the government can can restrict any indecent material on the Internet.

Another interesting note is that students are "even more restrictive in their views than their elders." 97% of teachers and 99% of principals said people should be allowed to express unpopular views, while only 83% of students did.

(More coverage here and here.)

31 Jan 11:03 | Link | Category: Current Events, Opinion & Thoughts

January 28, 2005

Ten science books you should read

Tim Radford of The Guardian has compiled a list of ten essential science books (and the reasons why you must read them).

If you aspire to any understanding of the world around you, these 10 books offer wider horizons and deeper perceptions, and a chance to revel in the power of language.

I'll sheepishly admit that I've only read two of them, but I can say that I wholeheartedly endorse Radford's selection of E.O. Wilson's The Diversity of Life. You should also add something by Richard Dawkins, Stephen Jay Gould, and Carl Sagan.

28 Jan 22:02 | Link | Category: Science

Photography Links

28 Jan 21:51 | Link | Category: Photography

January 27, 2005

PostSecret

PostSecret is a blog made up of anonymous postcards with secrets on them.

You are invited to anonymously contribute a secret to the PostSecret project. Your secret can be a regret, fear, betrayal, desire, feeling, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything - as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before.

27 Jan 12:44 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

The Thought Project

Over a period of three months Simon Høgsberg stopped 150 strangers on the streets of Copenhagen and New York City and asked them what they were thinking about the second before he stopped them. He recorded their response and took their picture. 55 of the responses are presented on his website, The Thought Project.

27 Jan 12:36 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

Original samples

Listen to clips of originals that have been sampled in recent tunes. (Also check out the covers section.)

Most of electronica, hip-hop and in general trendy sounds is based on music from the 60s, 70s, and early 80s.

The recycling of old stuff through sampling must be seen as evidence of the talent and creativity of artists from these days.

Here you will have a taste of the originals that empower these tunes, so check this out and enjoy!

27 Jan 12:30 | Link | Category: Music

Freeing Sex Slaves: A Year Later

A must-read series:

Last year, Nicholas D. Kristof paid to free two young Cambodian sex workers. Readers came to know the girls, Srey Neth and Srey Mom, and followed their stories as they left their brothel and were reunited with their families. Now, Mr. Kristof is back in Cambodia to see how Srey Neth and Srey Mom are coping with freedom.

27 Jan 12:18 | Link | Category: Current Events

More inauguration comment

Not to beat a dead horse, but I found two other thoughtful commentaries on Bush's inaugural address.

27 Jan 12:10 | Link | Category: Opinion & Thoughts, Politics

Strategic Support Branch

I'd love to know the real story behind the Pentagon's secret espionage unit, the Strategic Support Branch. The Washington Post says it "arose from Rumsfeld's written order to end his 'near total dependence on CIA' and operates under the defense secretary's direct control." (This is also intriguing: "A recent Pentagon memo states that recruited agents may include 'notorious figures' whose links to the U.S. government would be embarrassing if disclosed.")

The Pentagon refutes the notions that the unit reports directly to the secretary or that they are reinterpreting law.

Senator Chuck Hagel says: "The concern I always have in these matters as well as others when it comes to power in government is too much power concentrated in too few hands. That's when a country gets into a lot of trouble, when you brush back the Congress and you don't have oversight and you don't have cooperation, and I see too much of that out of this Pentagon."

Seymour Hersh's The Coming Wars (which I mentioned earlier) offers the most interesting and senseful take.

27 Jan 12:01 | Link | Category: Current Events

Middle East Item #3: Perception and Media

The other day, I attended a talk by Mideast scholar and pollster Shibley Telhami. He polled residents of the Middle East and found that "the majority believe Iraq is less democratic since the United States toppled Saddam Hussein; that Iraqis are now worse off; and that the U.S. motivation for invading Iraq was oil, Israel and the desire to weaken the Muslim world." From the report of one of my local papers:

In the Middle East, "people don't have much faith in elections," Telhami said, because in some countries their governments have supported U.S. actions that the public opposed. And, he said, because they are nervous about public opinion, those governments have tightened controls and limited freedoms.

The ironic upshot, Telhami said, is a lessening of democracy and liberty.

According to Telhami, anger at the U.S. is largely grounded in a perception that the U.S. is out to get Arabs and - what seems even more worrisome, if like me you don't yearn for global culture wars - Muslims everywhere.

One of the most interesting notes was that when he polled Mideasterners to find out how the media affected their opinions, he found that watching TV stations like al-Jazeera made no difference. He polled Arab-Americans who watched CNN and Fox News (yes, Fox News - a few people chuckled at that) and found that their answers were close to those of Arabs elsewhere.

It is fashionable, he said, to blame the Arab media, particularly networks such as al-Jazeera, for the growing resentment of the United States. But the resentment is now worldwide, he said.

27 Jan 11:26 | Link | Category: Current Events

Middle East Item #2: Iran

Read The Coming Wars, written by Seymour Hersh for The New Yorker.

Rumsfeld added that America was committed to staying in Iraq and that there would be no second-guessing.

"This is a war against terrorism, and Iraq is just one campaign. The Bush Administration is looking at this as a huge war zone," the former high-level intelligence official told me. "Next, we're going to have the Iranian campaign. We've declared war and the bad guys, wherever they are, are the enemy. This is the last hurrah—we've got four years, and want to come out of this saying we won the war on terrorism."

In a radio interview earlier this week, Dick Cheney insisted diplomacy would be used, but threw in this threat about Israel:

"Well, one of the concerns people have is that Israel might do it without being asked," Mr. Cheney said. "If, in fact, the Israelis became convinced the Iranians had a significant nuclear capability, given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first, and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards."

Iran says it "has plans to defend itself."

I can see this going all kinds of places, none of them particularly good.

27 Jan 11:20 | Link | Category: Current Events

Middle East Item #1: Iraq

According to a new analysis by Knight Ridder reporters Tom Lasseter and Jonathan S. Landay ("who have done some of the best reporting on Iraq during the past two years"), unless something "dramatic" changes — such as a newfound will by Iraqis to reject the insurgency or a large escalation of U.S. troop strength — the United States is heading toward losing the war in Iraq.

It is axiomatic among military thinkers that insurgencies are especially hard to defeat because the insurgents' goal is not to win in a conventional sense, but merely to survive until the will of the occupying power is sapped. Recent polls already suggest an erosion of support among Americans for the war.

There is no denying a few positive trends. Money is flowing into reconstruction efforts, providing jobs for many Iraqis. Some major cities have become relatively peaceful. And many Iraqis are looking forward to voting late this month.

But the unfavorable trends of the war are even more clear.

The article (also here) takes a look at various statistics (combat deaths, wounded, insurgent attacks, bombings, electricity / oil production) and comments from experts.

While I hope the authors are being overly pessimistic or missing some important trend, I have a nagging feeling their analysis might be right.

For more depressing reading on Iraq, look at A shooting after nightfall or visit growabrain's Iraq archive.

27 Jan 11:16 | Link | Category: Current Events

January 24, 2005

Let Freedom Ring - 42 times

Those of you who watched/listened to/read George W. Bush's second inaugural address surely noticed that he used the words freedom and liberty a few times... well, forty-two times (as illustrated by this excellent Daily Show clip, courtesy of Lisa Rein).

The funny thing is that only a week or two before the address, the topic of a class I'm taking at school was the basics of political ideology. We covered the fact that all ideologies (you name it - liberalism, communism, conservatism, even fascism) claim to defend and extend "freedom" & "liberty", condemning societies that don't promote freedom and promising to take steps to promote it themselves. The problem, of course, is that different ideologies define "freedom" (along with "democracy") in different ways.

The point I'm trying to make is that politicians and pundits throw these words around as ideological tools and little else. In the last fifteen or twenty years, they've gotten even better at it - while the public has seemingly become even more gullible. (Think of the "Contract with America" or the Orwellian Frank Luntz and his "Global Warming" vs. "Climate Change", "Healthy Forests," "Clear Skies", etc.)

So - back to the State of the Union address - was it all just ideological clichés and sloganeering, or was there any substance to be found in and among Bush's endless use of "freedom" and "liberty"? If there was some depth beneath the rhetoric, what are the implications?

Instead of offering you my own 'opinion in a nutshell' (since I can't really claim to have an opinion in a nutshell), I'll just throw some interesting links and quotes at you. (They might elucidate my line of thought anyway.)

In Give Me Liberty or Give Me... What?, Fred Kaplan of Slate muses:

In any case, what is this thing called "freedom"? The speech did note, "America will not impose our own system of government on the unwilling. Our goal instead is to help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom, and make their own way." But what if the freely expressed view of some downtrodden people happens to collide with our views or interests? Does "freedom" always mean a Western-style, or pro-American, democracy?

Whatever freedom is, how do we go about spreading it? The president said in his speech that the mission "is not primarily the task of arms," though he added that sometimes it must be. If not with arms, then how do we spread freedom? With rhetorical encouragement? Bush's answer was intriguing: "All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: The United States will not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you."
...
This sort of talk raises three questions. First, does the president really know what he's saying here? ... If the leaders of a democratic underground in some dictatorship hear this speech and rise up tomorrow against their own tyrants, will George W. Bush "stand with" them? Really?

Second, the United States does have good relations with several repressive governments--China, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, to name a few--and chooses to do little or nothing about the way they treat their own people. ... We can argue about whether the trade-off is correct, but the existence of a trade-off is indisputable.
...
Third, can we undertake this mission to spread freedom all by ourselves?
...
One could say that an inaugural address is an opportunity to express grand themes with broad brushstrokes, and shouldn't be read closely as a blueprint for the future. But it is well known that many presidents--including this one--dwell on this speech with great care. Certainly the theme of President Bush's address is consistent with the theme of his first term's foreign policy. It therefore offers little hope that his second term's will be formulated with any greater care.

A couple of basic articles from the BBC look at the speech from an international perspective. From Bush plays variations on freedom theme:

One thing seems clear: this is not a president who intends to turn back from his doctrine of taking pre-emptive action, in the interests of American security (or, as he would put it, American freedom).
...
And there was a stark message to regimes which have already found themselves players in the president's rhetoric.
...
The warning bells will be ringing in foreign capitals such as Tehran and Damascus.

From Bush speaks - now what?:

The Bush second inaugural has implications for America's friends and foes.

For friends, it should make uncomfortable reading.

"We will encourage reform in other governments by making clear that success in our relations will require the decent treatment of their own people," Mr Bush declared.

Does this mean that the Saudi royal family, the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, the Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and President Vladimir Putin of Russia, let alone a raft of obscure governments in Central America and Africa, not to mention China, have to radically change their ways?

It would be nice if they did, but not absolutely necessary, if comment by the White House is to be believed.
...
And what of America's foes? They of course have been on notice for some time under the doctrine of the pre-emptive strike.

The speech was not a manual of specific foreign policy goals. One has to look elsewhere for detailed policy objectives.
...
The strength of the speech was in what it said about freedom, its weakness was what it did not say about Iraq, which can be seen as an effort to impose that freedom.

Since the project in Iraq is likely to help define this presidency, it cannot be ignored.

Its absence suggests uneasiness in the White House, a sense that the reality in Iraq does not match the rhetoric of the speech.

Scott Rosenberg of Salon offers some of the harshest commentary in a blog post entitled The fire this time (forgive me for quoting so much of it):

This speech wasn't just soaring rhetoric. It was a lighter-than-air burst of helium verbiage -- lofty language untethered from the perplexing world we occupy and from the messy events of the last four years, sentences floating off into an empyrean of millennial vagaries.

The world is a simple place to Bush. For him, "the moral choice between oppression, which is always wrong, and freedom, which is eternally right" is one that involves no hard calls. And since America represents freedom and freedom is eternally right, it must still be right even when it locks hundreds of people away for life without trial or it tortures prisoners in a war launched on a lie. We are the forces of freedom; we can admit no wrong because we can do no wrong.

Sounding like a bizarre cross between Hegel, Woodrow Wilson and the nihilists of "The Possessed," Bush spoke of a "fire in the minds of men" (Dostoyevsky's phrase, adopted by James Billington as the title of a famous book about "revolutionary faith") that would spread freedom around the world. Freedom! Who would oppose it? But it is a word so universally embraced, even by those who flout its essence most crudely, that it means nothing when simply uttered; it has meaning only when our actions make something of it, when our deeds fill in its outline.

While Bush's text spoke of freedom, his imagery told a different story, a tale of retribution and flame. America's enemies set "a day of fire" on 9/11. We must respond with the "untamed fire" of freedom that America will bring to the benighted world. Fire with fire.
...
He's talking Biblical conflagration. His fire is the cathartic inferno dreamed of by people who are confounded by a world they know is out of their control -- one that, incomprehensibly, is not moving in a visible direction.
...
There must be people out there who find Bush's fiery talk uplifting. I found it alternatingly depressing and horrifying. Idealism fueled by ignorance and unanchored by reality can be the savagest fire of all.

My favorite short summation of the speech comes from Kevin Murphy of Ghost in the Machine, who writes:

All in all, the inaugural wasn't an embarrassing speech as delivered -- Gerson's too good at his job for that. But, like too much in this administration, it was all style and no substance, offering false simplicity and sanctimony in the place of good ideas or hard-won truths. In short, it was just like Dubya.

24 Jan 12:00 | Link | Category: Current Events, Opinion & Thoughts, Politics

Keeping Darwin in the Schools

(I'll call this an addendum to my entry from a few days ago.) As I was skimming through the New York Times today, I noticed a selection of letters to the editor regarding an Op-Ed from Jan. 19. I enjoyed some of them.

24 Jan 11:31 | Link | Category: Science

Most depressing day of the year?

According to the calculations of a British psychologist, today (January 24) is the most depressing day of the year. So, hmm. Try to cheer up. Tomorrow should be slightly better.

(via Ghost in the Machine)

24 Jan 11:25 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

World gone wrong

Whenever we have the chance to a study a foreign world, it's only natural that we make comparisons to the one and only place we know well. (It's our best frame of reference, I suppose.) This can sometimes lead to erroneous assumptions and biased thinking, but at the same time it can be extremely useful. In many ways, visiting other planets is an excellent way to learn about Earth - past, present, and future.

It's funny, though, how we always look at other worlds as 'failed' Earths -- particularly Venus and Mars, but now Titan as well. From a basic Time article called Postcards from Titan:

If Titan is a chemical cousin of Earth, it's an Earth gone terribly wrong. The surface is etched with riverbeds and shorelines carved by the methane rains.

24 Jan 11:17 | Link | Category: Science

January 22, 2005

Intelligent Design

A Pennsylvania school district is requiring students to be made aware of "intelligent design" (a term I'm very tired of hearing). I've commented on this topic many times (see here, here, here, and here for starters) so I won't rant about it today.

At the moment, I've been finding good links & commentary on the topic at Pharyngula. That's where I found these:

22 Jan 12:35 | Link | Category: Science

Top 50 Albums of 2004

From Amy's Robot:

Our friend Greg has exhaustively compiled the Top Albums lists of pretty much every publication in the universe to bring you this Mega List. He even aggregated the data and assigned each album a score based on its standing on all the lists.

It's interesting to see the statistical consensus of all the critics, though I'm not sure it says anything beyond that (i.e. what the best albums of 2004 really were, or if there can even be such a thing as a 'best' album).

22 Jan 12:15 | Link | Category: Music

House of the Rising Sun

"House of the Rising Sun" is one of the most recorded songs in history. Check out this collection of 250 versions, including the most famous ones by The Animals and Bob Dylan as well as lots of other takes. (One interesting version is the Blind Boys of Alabama singing "Amazing Grace" to the tune of House of the Rising Sun, from their very good Spirit of the Century album.) Do be aware that many of the songs probably aren't legal, so download at your own risk.

22 Jan 11:40 | Link | Category: Music

January 17, 2005

A few quotes from Martin Luther King, Jr.

I thought it might be nice to mark the holiday by sharing just a few of my favorite quotes from Dr. King...

"We must constantly build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear."

"Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and our nation; and this means we must develop a world perspective."

"We have ancient habits to deal with, vast structures of power, indescribably complicated problems to solve. But unless we abdicate our humanity altogether and succumb to fear and impotence in the presence of the weapons we have ourselves created, it is as possible and as urgent to put an end to war and violence between nations as it is to put an end to poverty and racial injustice."

17 Jan 11:34 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

January 15, 2005

Photography Links

A few interesting photo links:

15 Jan 13:20 | Link | Category: Photography

US military investigated building, among other things, a "gay bomb"

According to a BBC News report, in 1994 the US Air Force "sought Pentagon funding for research into into what it called 'harassing, annoying and 'bad guy'-identifying chemicals'."

Among the ideas were a so-called "love bomb" that envisaged an aphrodisiac chemical provoking widespread homosexual behaviour among enemy troops, causing what the military called a "distasteful but completely non-lethal" blow to morale. Also considered were a "sting me/attack me" chemical weapon to attract swarms of enraged wasps or angry rats towards enemy troops, a substance to make the skin unbearably sensitive to sunlight, a chemical causing "severe and lasting halitosis" so enemy forces would be obvious even when they tried to blend in with civilians, and a "Who? Me?" bomb, which would simulate flatulence in enemy ranks.

It's all pretty funny and off-the-wall, but I guess one does need to give them credit for at least trying to come up with creative non-lethal weapons.

15 Jan 13:08 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

What Age Do You Act?

Another stupid quiz... this time you can determine what age you act. According to the quiz, I act like I'm 19 years old. (Sadly, it's probably accurate.)

15 Jan 13:00 | Link | Category: Interactive

January 14, 2005

Huygens makes successful landing

I meant to jot a note here last night exhorting all of you to cross your fingers and do a little dance to ensure Huygens would have a successful landing on Titan. Luckily, it landed safely anyway.

Update: First images from Titan. Cool.

14 Jan 11:41 | Link | Category: Science

January 10, 2005

This would be a cool house

I'd love to live in this house (although maintenance might be a bit of a chore): 137,000-square-foot building with stunning views of the Catalina and Tortolita mountains through 6,500 windows.

That's right, folks. Biosphere 2 is up for sale.

10 Jan 22:48 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

January 9, 2005

The Hipster PDA

Not too long after I bought my Palm m125 off eBay, I decided it was a pain in the ass to use (not to mention that it really eats through batteries). I keep trying to use it, but it's always a nuisance at some level.

I think it's finally time to build a Hipster PDA. (See also: Organizing Your Hipster PDA)

09 Jan 21:24 | Link | Category: Technology & Computing

January 8, 2005

Stop sketching museum art, little girl. It's copyrighted!

This is funny (but depressing, in a way): A second-grader got in trouble with museum security for sketching Matisse and Picasso. "A museum guard told Julia's parents that sketching was prohibited because the great masterpieces are copyright protected, a concept that young Julia did not understand until her mother explained the term."

Of course, the guard was mistaken, and the museum is telling people they're welcome to sketch away. Still, the fact that such a silly incident can even happen is indicative of a certain cultural mentality.

08 Jan 13:12 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

Bill Gates and 'New Communists' part II

A couple of days ago, I mentioned that Bill Gates referred to free culture advocates as "new modern-day sort of communists" and linked to a blog entry by Lawrence Lessig. BoingBoing posted a link to a 30 minute video (torrent) from the Creative Commons 2nd Anniversary, the highlight being Lessig "taking on both BillBoard and Bill Gates." Worth a look.

(I liked these parts: "The key obvious part here right... communists? I dunno, not quite. Communism was where the state owned everything. Fascism was where monopoly corporations owned everything. Creative Commons is not about communism or about fascism. It's more common-ist. We are commonists here. Jefferson was a commonist in this sense." and "If we are a serious threat, then let us be a serious threat to lawyers' income. I'm all for that. If we are a 'virus', then let us be a virus that helps enable artists and spread this culture and free this culture, so that the next generation looks back to this moment and recognizes that here and now we fought to regain the freedom that was always ours against those who don't know what communism or fascism or 'threat to culture' really are.")

Update: Wired News story here. And thoughts from Dan Gillmor.

08 Jan 1:15 | Link | Category: Technology & Computing

Current Playlist

This month's installment...

Luna - Malibu Love Nest >>
The guitar in this song had me hooked from the first listen. Luna at their best (from what will be their final album).
Belle & Sebastian - It Could Have Been A Brilliant Career >>
Classic quirky Belle & Sebastian from one of their best albums. "He had a stroke at the age of 24. It could have been a brilliant career."
Bob Dylan - One More Night >>
One of several simple, catchy tunes from "Nashville Skyline," complete with that album's polished easy-going country sound and those odd vocals.
Nick Lowe - Poor Side of Town >>
A cover of a Johnny Rivers song by the pub rocker & new wave pop craftsman. It's a perfectly produced, smooth & sugary version of the doo-wop ballad.
Lambchop - Your Fucking Sunny Day >>
Brassy soul as done by Lambchop. Brilliant song (as so many of theirs are).
Spoon - The Way We Get By >>
A simple piano-driven song that's bouncy enough to have been a hit, if radio stations actually put decent bands on the air.
The Decemberists - Here I Dreamt I Was An Architect >>
A bewitching song with which I can find no fault. The band's music and lyrics are both superb. The closest comparison might be Neutral Milk Hotel, but this is more accessible. My interpretation of the lyrics for this one is that it's bittersweet love song told through three metaphorical dreamscapes. (One about a soldier in Birkenau who recalls how heavenly the town was before war but won't lay his rifle down to be with his love, another about an "unparalleled" architect who tries to build a balustrade to keep his love safe from the world but fails, and another about a womanizer in Spain recalling his past affairs (who might be dying and seems to be currently traveling with a teenage girlfriend - maybe his final crazy fling). I love lyrics this unique and rich.
Hula - Taking Pictures >>
A simple song with a sound that caught my ear and a melody that got caught in my head.
Galaxie 500 - Crazy >>
A slightly odd selection... it's a favorite old Galaxie 500 b-side with great guitar, off-kilter vocals, and these lyrics: "and you're so old / you must be twenty-three / you spent the year in a drunken frenzy / lied to your friends / adopted false ideas / and quit your job / because they made you crazy"
Ugress - Turning Wheel >>
A very simple piano & beats track. I love the vibe. Free download of this and others, plus more info. from their web site.
DJ Dangermouse & Zero 7 - Somersault Remix feat. MF Doom >>
This remix is very different from - and easily ten times better - than the (boring) original. DJ Dangermouse's mix takes the song somewhere quite different with drum breaks and such, but it's MF Doom who really makes it something.
Leonard Cohen - In My Secret Life >>
Some Leonard Cohen songs have a way of cutting to the bone, spelling it all out. This is one of them. Stripped-down arrangements (that utilize a bad synthesizer - but it works) and vocals balanced between Cohen and Sharon Robinson make this a subdued song equally gloomy and soulful. Another Cohen classic.
"I smile when I'm angry / I cheat and I lie / I do what I have to do / To get by / But I know what is wrong / And I know what is right / And I'd die for the truth / In My Secret Life // Look through the paper / Makes you want to cry / Nobody cares if the people / Live or die / And the dealer wants you thinking / That it's either black or white / Thank God it's not that simple / In My Secret Life"
(FULL LYRICS)
Jim White - Bluebird >>
A haunting, stunning work of painterly melancholy about a father's love for his daughter.
Alfie - Montevideo >>
A wonderfully relaxing, mellow song with a meandering feel, laid-back vocals, and cool electronic instrumentation in the background.
Garvy J. - War Is Over... Again >>
I can't remember where I found this melodic, reflective pop gem, but I've played it many times over the last few weeks. Download this one and others, plus get more info. from Garvy J.'s web site.
UNKLE - Glow >>
Joel Cadbury contributed this hazy tune to the latest UNKLE album. It makes me want to sleep and fall into a blurry dream.
The Decemberists - Grace Cathedral Hill >>
A vivd, beautiful song. The instrumentation gets me every time and, once again, I think the lyrics are just astounding. (It's an exquisite poem set in San Francisco on New Year's, with the narrator wandering through the city lights trying to cheer up a girlfriend.)

08 Jan 0:22 | Link | Category: Music

January 7, 2005

"What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?"

The Edge Annual Question was: "What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?"

120 contributors offered their thoughts, including Freeman Dyson, Bruce Sterling, Richard Dawkins, David Gelernter, J. Craig Venter, Esther Dyson, Jaron Lanier, and Benoit Mandelbrot.

07 Jan 0:03 | Link | Category: Science

January 6, 2005

Bill Gates and 'New Communists'

In a recent interview, Bill Gates described free culture advocates as a "new modern-day sort of communists"

Lawrence Lessig says: "It's one thing to read this sort of thing from a studio exec, or head of a record label -- surrounded as they are by the sort that surround them. But the people I've met at Microsoft are miles beyond this sort of silliness. Does Mr. Gates not even talk to them?"

(If you haven't read any of Lessig's books, please do.)

BoingBoing provides one, two, three pieces of propaganda for you, comrades.

06 Jan 23:50 | Link | Category: Technology & Computing

Conspiracy theorists, check this link

20 Amazing Facts about Voting in the USA should be great fodder for conspiracy theorists. I'm passing it on because there is much that needs improvement in U.S. voting, conspiracies or not. If a technologically advanced country like the United States can't count on a flawless voting system, something's terribly wrong. (See here, here and here.)

06 Jan 23:37 | Link | Category: Current Events

Science Blogs

I've discovered a couple of good science blogs lately. One is Science Blog, which links to a variety of interesting stories each day. The other is Pharyngula, a blog run by an associate professor of biology. Lots of interesting links and thoughts on biology, evolution, and more. (Also be sure to check all the links in the right-hand column.) You've gotta love a blog named after a period of embryonic development.

06 Jan 23:29 | Link | Category: Science

American Ritual

My webhosting company features a site in each of their monthly newsletters. This month's site was American Ritual. Check "Current" and "Archive" for some nice photos.

06 Jan 23:11 | Link | Category: Photography

January 5, 2005

Asia tsunamis, part two

Below are a few good spots on the web for information:

How you can help: www.tsunamihelp.info

News & information: tsunamihelp.blogspot.com, Wikipedia entry, and BBC News aerial photos.

And, to frighten those of you along the eastern coast of North America... I watched a Discovery Channel / BBC show called "Megatsunami" a few years ago about a theory that a massive tsunami could occur sometime in the next few thousand years if there's an eruption on La Palma (in the Canary Islands) and a large chunk of the island falls into the ocean. Wikipedia entry here.

05 Jan 23:40 | Link | Category: Current Events

2004 In Pictures

Most news organizations have put together "best of" photo collections for 2004. I liked the collection from the New York Times best.

05 Jan 23:14 | Link | Category: Photography

100 things we didn't know this time last year

From BBC: 100 things we didn't know this time last year. The list includes:

  • The heat generated by a laptop, and the knees-together pose needed to balance it, can damage a man's fertility.
  • Brazilians are the nationality most likely to read spam.
  • Ronald Reagan started planning his own funeral the year he entered the White House almost quarter of a century ago.
  • Bob Dylan originally planned to use his first two given names, Robert Allen, as his stage name, because it sounded like the name of a Scottish king. After he saw some Dylan Thomas poems, he chose Dylan as his new surname instead.
  • Saddam Hussein's son Uday kept nine lions as the centrepiece of a bizarre menagerie of exotic animals. In July the lions were moved to Baghdad zoo.
  • Britons throw away enough rubbish every hour to fill the Royal Albert Hall.
  • Just one in a hundred workers goes to the pub for their lunch, according to a study. The same proportion spend lunch having sex.
  • An American girl aged between three and 11 has, on average, 10 Barbie dolls in her toy box.
  • Bill Clinton revealed in his autobiography that he didn't learn to ride a bike properly until he was 22.
  • More than one billion birds crash into buildings in the US every year. Mirrored office blocks are a particular hazard.
  • A cruise ship can put more than 130,000 litres of sewage into the sea each day.
  • Lord Baden Powell wanted a section on the dangers of "self abuse" in his Scouting for Boys. His original manuscript read: "A very large number of the lunatics in our asylums have made themselves ill by indulging in this vice although at one time they were sensible cheery boys like you."
  • Bill Clinton sent just two e-mails while he was president.

05 Jan 19:31 | Link | Category: Misc. Tidbits

Accidental Hipsters

I had a good laugh at this Slowpoke strip: Accidental Hipsters.

05 Jan 19:17 | Link | Category: Art & Entertainment, Humor