Pretty damned cool looking.

Now if only they made a wireless keyboard and mouse standard . . .

via Apple

Posted at 09:12 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Do issues matter to voters?

A resource is available this year that previous generations of voters never enjoyed: Gathered in one place, a web collection of all their views on major and miner issues, including voting records, quotes, all annotated with links to sources.

Very cool stuff . . .

John Kerry
http://www.issues2000.org/Senate/John_Kerry.htm

George W. Bush
http://www.issues2000.org/George_W__Bush.htm

Posted at 07:32 AM in Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Is it just me, or does Blockbuster Video, well, kinda blow?

Between the satellite dish and TiVo, I rent videos much less than I used to. Every now and again, I'll rent something special like LOTR Return of the King or The Triplets of Belleville.

So I do just that today. I learn: 1) the price has crept up to $4.49 per rental; and b) I owe a $4.49 late fee from June.

Splain this to me, Lucy: I rented a movie in June for $4 for a week. It got returned a day late. The fee is another $4 for the extra 12 hours. WTF?

That's why I think Blockbuster blows. Its penny ante, nickel and dime bulls$%# like that which is just so annoying. They always seem to have their hands in my pocket.

Funny thing is, DVDs are actually a much better experience -- picture-quality wise, alternative endings, out-takes, additional material.

Oh, well, too bad. Video on Demand inches closer every day, and dinosaurs like Blockbuster end up with customers who cannot wait for them to go belly up.

I know I am not the only one waiting to say: Buh-Bye!

Video:

The Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King

The Triplets of Belleville

Posted at 06:05 AM in Film | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

Seriously, you mean to tell me that people who own iPods, do not know they can custom craft playlists? Its one of the absolute coolest things about iTunes!

In the days of Vinyl, I was a mixed tape junkie. It used to take me hours and hours to make a 90 minute mix. Now it theoretically takes seconds.

But how can you not know about Smart Playlists?

A recent article in the NYT addresses the issue:

"There are ways to circumvent Shuffle - on an iPod at least - by using iTunes, most notably by creating a Smart Playlist. Indeed, one could argue that the most innovative thing about the iPod is not the number of songs that can be stored on it, but the intelligent ways in which the iTunes software can manage users' music. After all, having 10,000 songs on a tiny device is relatively useless unless you can play exactly what you want, when you want it.

Creating Smart Playlists enables users to slice and dice their music libraries using pretty much any criteria they want. One can produce, for example, an entire list of songs that share nothing other than that they occupy the seventh track on their respective albums. The Date Added subcategory can be used as the selection criteria to generate a mix of songs that have been added to the iPod over the course of, say, the last two weeks.

The Smart Playlists function is relatively easy to use - there is even a Web site, www.smartplaylists.com, devoted to creating them - but it is more difficult than simply clicking on Shuffle, and it seems to be popular among more technically inclined iPod owners. (Most people interviewed for this article had never heard of Smart Playlists, let alone used them.)"

Here's the discussion of "Shuffle Play"

Shuffle commands have been around since the dawn of the CD player. But the sheer quantity of music on an MP3 player like the iPod - and in its desktop application, iTunes - has enabled the function to take on an entirely new sense of scale and scope. It also heightens the risk that a long-forgotten favorite song will pop up, for better or for worse, in mixed company.

There is an unintended consequence of the allure of Shuffle: it is causing iPod users to question whether their devices "prefer" certain types of music . . . These people are not the only ones who think that iPods have minds of their own. IPod enthusiasts are throwing all manner of Shuffle conspiracy theories around on Internet message boards, ranging from the somewhat plausible to the absurd.

At the macslash.org discussion site, one posting said: "I'm pretty sure iTunes is not sorting my songs randomly. It seems to learn. I'd say it's using some Bayesian logic and/or simple neural networks to vary probabilities of songs to be selected and adjust parameters of selection by the users history of song skipping."

When confronted with such elaborate theories, Stan Ng, Apple Computer's director of iPod product marketing, laughed. "The funny thing about it is that it really is random," he said. "When you turn on Shuffle Songs, it creates a randomized list of all the music on your iPod without repeating a song."

That is to say, if you listened on Shuffle to all 1,000 songs stored on an iPod Mini, you would theoretically never hear the same song twice, much the way you would never get two queens of hearts if you pulled cards from a single deck one by one. (Conversely, if you select Random on the iTunes Smart Playlist function, you might hear the same song twice in a row, though it is unlikely.)

The popularity of the listening mode led Apple's product design team to add Shuffle to the main menu on the fourth-generation iPod, which was introduced on July 19. Now, instead of having to scroll down into Settings to turn Shuffle on or off, users have it at their fingertips.

Mr. Ng said that the technology behind the Shuffle function has remained the same since the first-generation iPod. He declined to reveal the algorithm used to generate randomness on Shuffle, but said the only reason that an iPod might seem to know a listener's preferences is that the listener, after all, chose the music in the first place.

Source:
Tunes, a Hard Drive and (Just Maybe) a Brain
By RACHEL DODES
New York Times, August 26, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/26/technology/circuits/26ipod.html

Posted at 07:51 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Posted at 07:33 AM in Art & Design | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Now this is amusing:

Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2004 18:21:43 -0100 (GMT)
From: anakata
To: KMWLAW@flash.net
Subject: Re: Unauthorized Use of DreamWorks SKG Properties

On Mon, 23 Aug 2004 KMWLAW@flash.net wrote:

Dennis L. Wilson, Esq.
KEATS McFARLAND & WILSON, LLP
9720 Wilshire Blvd., Penthouse Suite
Beverly Hills, CA 90212
Tel: (310) 248-3830
Fax: (310) 860-0363

August 23, 2004

VIA ELECTRONIC MAIL AND U.S. MAIL

ThePirateBay.org
Box 1206
Stockholm 11479
SWEDEN

tracker-40-aa-5f-03-412675c8@prq.to

Re: Unauthorized Use of DreamWorks SKG Properties
http://www.thepiratebay.org

To Whom It May Concern:

This letter is being written to you on behalf of our client, DreamWorks SKG (hereinafter "DreamWorks"). DreamWorks is the exclusive owner of all copyright, trademark and other intellectual property rights in and to the "Shrek 2" motion picture. No one is authorized to copy, reproduce, distribute, or otherwise use the "Shrek 2" motion picture without the express written permission of DreamWorks.
[...]
As you may be aware, Internet Service Providers can be held liable if they do not respond to claims of infringement pursuant to the requirements of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). In accordance with the DMCA, we request your assistance in the removal of infringements of the "Shrek 2" motion picture from this web site and any other sites for which you act as an Internet Service Provider.

We further declare under penalty of perjury that we are authorized to act on behalf of DreamWorks and
that the information in this letter is accurate. Please contact me immediately to discuss this matter
further.

The response is utterly priceless

"As you may or may not be aware, Sweden is not a state in the United States of America. Sweden is a country in northern Europe. Unless you figured it out by now, US law does not apply here.

For your information, no Swedish law is being violated.

Please be assured that any further contact with us, regardless of medium, will result in

a) a suit being filed for harassment;
b) a formal complaint lodged with the bar of your legal counsel, for sending frivolous legal threats.

It is the opinion of us and our lawyers that you are fucking morons, and that you should please go sodomize yourself with retractable batons.

Please also note that your e-mail and letter will be published in full on http://www.thepiratebay.org.

Go fuck yourself.

Polite as usual,
anakata

via BoingBoing

Posted at 08:28 AM in Humor, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Via Political Strategy

Posted at 05:37 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Holy Snikeys!

When I wrote last week that "If I was advising the Kerry campaign, I’d schedule him for Monday's show -- on the condition that Stewart rerun that bit about the SBVFT" (here and here) I didn't think that anyone in the Kerry camp was paying attention -- but apparently, they were!

TONITE -- John F. Kerry -- ON THE DAILY SHOW!

Here's the 411 from WaPo:

"When John Kerry decided it was time to do his first national TV interview since the Swift boaters for Bush launched their attack on the senator's Vietnam War record, he did not choose CBS's "60 Minutes," ABC's "Nightline" or "NBC Nightly News."

Kerry picked Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," where he will appear tonight in an extended interview.

Now I bet you feel terrible that you dismissed as fools those TV critics who, back in July, collectively crowned "The Daily Show" the year's best news and information program. I know I do.

This marks the first time "The Daily Show" has bagged an actual presidential nominee. Which is not to say that "The Daily Show" lacks political heat. In 2000, vice presidential candidate Joe Lieberman showed up, and this election, every one of the 10 Democratic hopefuls except Kerry appeared on the show before the party's convention last month. John Edwards actually announced his intention to run for president on the show, and Carol Moseley Braun dropped out of the race the very next day after appearing on Jon Stewart's program.

In fact, Stewart's show has so much buzz during this election, it's annoying some of the traditional TV newsies . . ."

Source:
Seriously: Kerry on Comedy Central
By Lisa de Moraes
Washington Post, Tuesday, August 24, 2004; Page C01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27439-2004Aug23.html

Posted at 02:53 PM in Humor, Politics | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

I forgot the author I got this from (anyone know the name?), but its astounding in its simplicity and resonance:

"At a recent luncheon with friends, the topic surfaced about someone who quit his job on short notice. The fellow who knew the details was asked, “Well, what did he say was the reason?”

“I’m sorry, but he talked to me in strict confidence,” my friend replied.

The topic quickly changed, but I thought about that meeting later. If I ever needed someone to talk with, where would I turn? I would likely gravitate toward the person who knew how to keep his mouth shut. In fact, my opinion of this gentleman’s character grew immensely when he spoke that one sentence about confidentiality.

Some people think it’s fun to gossip, yet they quickly gain a reputation as someone who can’t be trusted. If you want to raise your status among colleagues, here are four rules to follow.

1. Never betray a confidence.
2. Steer the conversation toward important ideas rather than about people.
3. Ask at least four questions for every answer you give.
4. End every conversation on a note of optimism about the future.

You’ll be surprised at the growing number of people who will request the pleasure of your company."

Posted at 10:59 AM in Philosophy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

To hell with the IPO! Want to learn some of the really cool things you can make Google do? Check out The Google Guide

Here are all the advanced functions the story describes:

Advanced Search http://www.google.com/advanced_search
Anacubis http://www.anacubis.com/googledemo/google/index.asp
Google Answers http://answers.google.com/answers
GoogleAlert http://www.googlealert.com
Google Features http://www.google.com/help/features.html
Google Indicateur http://google.indicateur.comGoogle
Guide: http://www.googleguide.com
Google Help Central http://www.google.com/help/index.html
Google Labs http://labs.google.comGoogle
News Alerts http://www.google.com/newsalerts
Google Services and Tools http://www.google.com/options/
Google Ultimate Interface http://www.faganfinder.com/google.html
Something Awful http://www.somethingawful.com

Sources:
The Google Guide
Garrett Wasny
Backbone Technology
May 07, 2004 - 02:20
http://www.backbonemag.com/php_site/home.php?m_column_id=php_news/wmview.php?ArtID=889&r_column_id=php_news/rightcol_archives.php

Posted at 06:53 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Unbelievably fascinating post about "Kerry the Slayer" and the foolishness of GOP funded Swift Boat nonsense. The original is quite long, but here's an excerpt that will give you the flavor of the original:

"Look at you people with this Vietnam boat nonsense. Every day, you're pounding home the fact that Kerry fought in Vietnam. You jackasses started this stuff so early -- with the "Oh he protested the war" and the Jane Fonda photoshops -- that the Kerry people turned the whole Democratic convention into a celebration of the Vietnam War. Nobody even remembers being against Vietnam anymore. The next Vietnam movie will be a buddy comedy starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt, and all they're going to do is kill Charlie and win medals and dance with beautiful girls. It'll make $300 million on the opening weekend. They're going to tear down that bummer memorial in Washington and put up a 1,000-foot statue of a smiling American soldier proudly standing on a stack of golden skulls. You morons have made Vietnam the Democrats' favorite memory and greatest victory. Then you scream hooray when a gang of addled old Nixon bagmen show up in a teevee commercial to bitch about Kerry fighting in Vietnam, and once again the normal people with lives only remember, again, that Kerry fought in Vietnam and Bush didn't."

"But," Tim sputtered, "Kerry clearly claimed he was in Cambodia several days before he was in Cambodia. It was seared--"

"Stop that," I said, poking his neck with the corkscrew worm. "Listen to yourself. What are you doing, again? That's right, you're reminding people that the other guy fought in Vietnam. Have you become so brain dead that you think this helps your girly boy Bush? Do you honestly believe the coward boy can beat the War Monster?"

Blair tried to shake the confusion from his head. Then his eyes brightened for a moment and he said, "Four months! Kerry was only in Vietnam for four months!"

"See? You did it again. You people can't stop reminding everybody that Kerry was in Vietnam, taking lives like your boy eats cookies. Killing people, saving people, holding Life & Death in his hands like a savage gift. He kills the Viet Cong or anybody else he chooses, he saves a U.S. sailor who fell out of the boat, he walks the halls of the Senate deciding who he'll kill or who he'll save In Vietnam, Kerry is a death's head of gruesome power, while your Bush hides in Alabama, a scared little girl. And what did little Bush do in Texas?"

Blair grinned, foolishly thinking the ball was again in his court. "He killed many people in Texas. All those executions ...."

"Ha! Your girly Bush killed nobody. He signed off on lethal injections. He's a middle manager in a cubicle at the suburban branch of the Bank of Death, initialing memos he doesn't even know how to read. What kind of Texas oilman is your little girl? You ever see 'Dallas'?"

Posted at 06:48 AM in Humor, Politics, War/Defense | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

More on the swift boat brouhaha via the Washington Post. The rest of the media has followed up on this, from the NYTimes to Knight Ridder.

I continue to think this is a losing approach by the incumbent, replete with the potential to backfire.

click for full size graphic

graphic courtesy of Washington Post

Combined with the recent revelations of the other surviving Swift Boat Captain in the Chicago Tribune, this issue should be laid to rest.

I believe its in the GOP's interest not to make this a centerpiece of their campaign. (They must think otherwise).

This is going to lead to places that they will be rather unhappy with . . .

Source:
Swift Boat Accounts Flawed
By Michael Dobbs
Washington Post, Sunday, August 22, 2004; Page A1
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21239-2004Aug21.html

Graphic
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/graphics/swiftboat_082104.html

Military records support Kerry's account of Vietnam service
BY Joseph L. Galloway
Knight Ridder Newspapers, Fri, Aug. 20, 2004
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/9455159.

Friendly Fire: The Birth of an Anti-Kerry Ad
By KATE ZERNIKE and JIM RUTENBERG
Published: August 20, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/20/politics/campaign/20swift.html

Records Counter a Critic of Kerry
Fellow Skipper's Citation Refers To Enemy FireBy Michael Dobbs
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 19, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A13267-2004Aug18?language=printer

Swift boat skipper: Kerry critics wrong
Tribune editor breaks long silence on Kerry record; fought in disputed battle
By Tim Jones
Tribune, August 21 2004
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/chi-040821kerry,0,298096.story

Posted at 07:56 PM in War/Defense | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

I get a lot of email from various readers. It comes with the territory of having a media profile. Most of the time, the letters are thoughtful, intelligent, and bring up excellent points I might have overlooked.

Then, there are the idiots. Like the jackass that blamed the Bear Market on "the Jews." Or the guy who said I was responsible for eliminating his job (I was discussing the merits of the BLS Payroll versus Household surveys)

No big deal; You chalk it up to stupidity and move on.

Soon, I'm gonna start emailing this to people who are complete and total jerks:

via the fabulous gaping void

Posted at 08:57 AM in Art & Design, Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

These guys gals seem to do a very nice job on blog skins.

I'm thinking I could use a new look -- here, and at The Big Picture.

Any thoughts?

Posted at 06:50 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

We previously mentioned Bob’s radio show backin March 2004, and he hasn’t dissappointed yet.

Anyone who can mix AC/DC’s It's A Long Way To The Top to the Stills’ Gender Bombs, then slide into Chuck Prophet’s Bomp Shoobee Doobee Bomp, only to effortlessly segue into Joni Mitchell’s Coyote has got mad skills.

Check out his BBC 2 show (Saturday) or my favorite, the BBC 6 show (Sunday show).

Shows stay up on line all week; You can see his playlists here

My ongoing affection for the musical programming prowess of Bob Harris continues unabated . . .

Posted at 05:09 PM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

The Daily Show skewers the dishonest Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

Jon Stewart delivers an absolutely devastating critique of this “dishonorable” group of liars.

Its more than merely hysterical -- its instructive to the rest of the media. Too bad the mainstream press isn't as savvy as Stewart.

If I was advising the Kerry campaign, I’d schedule him for Monday's show -- on the condition that Stewart rerun that bit about the SBVFT:

(Commercial intro: 4 different SBV each say "I served with John Kerry")

Jon Stewart: These are powerful indictments -- or rather, they would be, had any of these guys served on Kerry's Boat. You see, by "serving with Kerry" they mean they were in Viet Nam the same time he was . . . Kinda the way Snoopy "served" with the Red Barron . . ."

Then I'd have Kerry lay down a challenge to the rest of the media: See if you can keep up with the standards of a low budget, basic cable channel comedy show. If not, then keep the candidate coming back to TDS to have them do what the media simply has has not been able to: Tell the truth.

As an aside, the “Press” is rapidly becoming the "overpriced CD" of news content. Blogs and TDS are the MP3s in this equation (with blogging software as the P2P in this equation). If the media doesn't catch a clue -- and real quickly -- they will find themselves becoming increasingly marginalized, just as the big music labels have. Blogs didn't arise in a vaccuum -- they came about due to the incompetance and failures of the major press to find the truth, post-2000.

See also "It's Funny Because It's True "

UPDATE: August 20, 2004 11:28am

The New York Times actually got a clue! So does They went how wild today, with a front page story. Inside, they do a full chart which looks like it was lifted right from various left center blogs.

click for larger chart

graphic courtesy NYT

click for larger chart

graphic courtesy NYT

Sources:
Friendly Fire: The Birth of an Anti-Kerry Ad
By KATE ZERNIKE and JIM RUTENBERG
Published: August 20, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/20/politics/campaign/20swift.html

Records Counter a Critic of Kerry
Fellow Skipper's Citation Refers To Enemy FireBy Michael Dobbs
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 19, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A13267-2004Aug18?language=printer

Posted at 12:02 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Toogle: Google image search represented in ASCII.

via Metafilter

Posted at 01:39 PM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

This is a fascinating story, pointed to via Dan Froomkin' WaPo blog:

It seems a College Prof did a small experiment: He went to a Bush speech, and a Kerry speech. The twist was, he wore a Kerry/Edwards shirt to Bush's speech, and a Bush/Cheney shirt to Kerry's speech.

Guess what happened?

Posted at 05:41 PM in Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Last we posted on Bill Hicks (No joke), it was the 10th anniversary of his death.

Through the miracle of archived content, the New Yorker was nice enough to make the following story available for free. Go read the whole thing, than buy some Hicks CDs.

Here's an excerpt:

On October 1st, the comedian Bill Hicks, after doing his twelfth gig on the David Letterman show, became the first comedy act to be censored at CBS’s Ed Sullivan Theatre, where Letterman is now in residence, and where Elvis Presley was famously censored in 1956. Presley was not allowed to be shown from the waist down. Hicks was not allowed to be shown at all. It’s not what’s in Hicks’ pants but what’s in his head that scared the CBS panjandrums. Hicks, a tall thirty-one-year-old Texan with a pudgy face aged beyond its years from hard living on the road, is no motormouth vulgarian but an exhilarating comic thinker in a renegade class all his own. Until the ban, which, according to Hicks, earned him “more attention than my other eleven appearances on Letterman times one hundred,” Hicks’ caustic observations and mischievous cultural connections had found a wide audience in England, where he is something of a cult figure.

I caught up with Hicks backstage on a rainy Sunday last November at the Dominion Theatre, in London, where a record-breaking crowd of two thousand Brits was packed so tightly that they were standing three deep at the back of the dress circle to hear Hicks deliver some acid home truths about the U.S.A., which to him stands for United States of Advertising. Hicks thinks against society and insists on the importance of this intellectual freedom as a way to inspire others to think for themselves. “To me, the comic is the guy who says ‘Wait a minute’ as the consensus forms,” Hicks told me as we climbed the stairs to his dressing room. “He’s the antithesis of the mob mentality. The comic is a flame—like Shiva the Destroyer, toppling idols no matter what they are. He keeps cutting everything back to the moment.”

Even then, the talk about courting comic danger had Hicks worrying about his prospects in America. “Comedy in the States has been totally gutted,” he told me when we’d settled into the dressing room. “It’s commercialized. They don’t have people on TV who have points of view, because that defies the status quo, and we can’t have that in the totalitarian mind-control government that runs the fuckin’ airwaves. I can’t get a shot there. I get David Letterman a lot. I love Letterman, but every time I go on, we have tiffs over material. They love me, but his people have this fictitious mainstream audience they think they play to. It’s untrue. It doesn’t exist. I like doing the show, but it’s almost like working a puzzle: How can I be me in the context of doing this material? The best thing I do is make connections. I connect everything. It’s hard to do it in six minutes.”

Very cool . . .

Source:
The Goat Boy Rises
by John Lahr
Issue of 1993-11-01
Posted 2004-08-02
http://newyorker.com/archive/content/?040809fr_archive01

Posted at 06:30 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

via Defective Yeti

Posted at 02:04 AM in Film, Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Welcome to the 6,437 14,404 Boing-Boingers who apparently showed up while I was at lunch!

Hey, as long as you are here, have a look around. If you are at all interested in what's wrong with the Music Industry, see these posts. If politics is your thing, check these out.

You can also check some of my favorite posts out:

· Your Coffee Sucks!

· Greatest American R&R Band?

· Shrill Blonde Harpy

· War Coverage Shifts Dramatically

· Last of the Independents

· Dead Centagenarians

This is pretty interesting photo collection: Firetruck Graveyard

These are prolly too wonky for ya pervs, but have a looksee anyway . . .

· Oil price rises are not tax increases

· Self-Employed Work-at-Home Contractors

Thanks for coming by . . .

Posted at 05:31 PM in Weblogs | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

100 Science Fiction Books You Just Have to Read
http://listsofbests.com/list/29

very cool list, via linkfilter.net

Posted at 01:03 PM in Books | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

This is what happens when you play with matches on a boat . . . Seen in Oyster Bay Harbor, NY

Posted at 06:07 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

If you are an architecture fan, than you will surely enjoy this site on Frank Lloyd Wright's Malcolm Willey House.

Fascinating tour, history, architectural plans and other details.

Posted at 05:44 AM in Art & Design | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

As someone who appears on Fox regularly as a guest commentator, I am very curious about "Outfoxed"

I have yet to see this -- but at $5.99 plus free shipping, how can I not? That's the price I saw OUTFOXED-RUPERT MURDOCH'S WAR ON JOURNAL on sale for at "Deep Discount DVD.com"

At this price, its practically the same as renting it . . .

DVD Description: OUTFOXED-RUPERT MURDOCH'S WAR ON JOURNAL Director: Greenwald, Robert Release Year: 2004 Running time: 114 minutes

For the first time ever, the documentary reveals the secrets of former Fox News producers, reporters, bookers and writers who expose what it's like to work for Fox News. These former Fox employees talk about how they were forced to push a "right-wing" point of view or risk their jobs. Some have even chosen to remain anonymous in order to protect their current livelihoods. As on employee said, "There's no sense of integrity as far as having a line that can't be crossed."

"Outfoxed" examines how media empires, led by Rupert Murdoch's Fox News, have been running a "race to the bottom" in television news. This film provides an in-depth look at Fox News and the dangers of ever-enlarging corporations taking control of the public's right to know.

Source:
OUTFOXED-RUPERT MURDOCH'S WAR ON JOURNAL
http://www.deepdiscountdvd.com/dvd.cfm?itemID=RYK000005

Posted at 01:57 PM in Film, Media, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

This was one of little Beasties in West hampton last weekend: A Ferrari F50.

Pretty monstrous . . .

Posted at 06:08 AM in Art & Design | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

My dog is simply too cool:

Posted at 07:42 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Ted Rall tends to be too over the top for my tastes . . . Be he just may have hit on something here:

Posted at 06:18 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

very clever advert:

(too bad its not real)

via adrants

Posted at 07:46 AM in Art & Design, Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

This is making the email rounds:

Very amusing . . .

Posted at 07:29 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

One of the very earliest posts I put up on this side of the blog -- back in the Beta-testing days -- was Lebowskifest. Today, I see the NYT describes the film as "a monumentally disjunctive text that is much more fun to savor a second, third and tenth time, when all one's petty-bourgeois narrative concerns have dissipated like so much marijuana smoke."

That's a fairly apt description, which comes to the Times via Slate film critic David Edelstein. Here's an ewxcerpt of the Gray Lady's discovery of the Dude:

"A CULT gives its members license to feel superior to the rest of the universe, and so does a cult movie: it confers hipness on those who grok what the mainstream audience can't. Joel and Ethan Coen's 1998 hyperintellectual stoner noir bowling comedy "The Big Lebowski," starring Jeff Bridges as Jeff (The Dude) Lebowski, has the requisite exclusivity of a cult classic: it bombed at the box office; it was met with shrugs by many critics who had arguably overpraised the Coen brothers' Academy Award-winning "Fargo" (1996); and it has amassed an obsessive following on cable and video and by word of mouth. Nowadays, quoting its intricate, absurdist, often riotously profane dialogue earns you coolness points in widely disparate circles. Some would even say that the cult of "The Big Lebowski" is going mainstream.It has a rolling national convention, for starters: the Lebowski Fest, which in June attracted 4,000 followers in Louisville, Ky., and on Friday arrives in New York City. For two days, Lebowski fans (referred to as Achievers) will dress up as their favorite character (or prop, like a severed toe), dig some far-out rock bands at the Knitting Factory, bowl in far-out Queens, imbibe White Russians (and maybe less licit substances) and spend a lot of time shouting lines at one another like:

"This aggression will not stand, man."

"You're entering a world of pain."

"You want a toe? I can get you a toe. Believe me, there are ways, Dude. You don't want to know about it, believe me. Hell, I can get you a toe by 3 o'clock this afternoon, with nail polish."

And, of course, the Zen-like sign-off, "The Dude abides."

The Times recognizes that the "central joke — the raison d'être — of "The Big Lebowski" is a disjunction. The Coen brothers take a disheveled stoner layabout, a former 60's activist the Dude — seen mostly in baggy shorts, sandals, an oversize T-shirt through which his gut is visible, often sucking a joint, mixing a white Russian or lying on his rug with headphones listening to bowling competitions or whale songs — and make him the gumshoe protagonist of a convoluted Raymond Chandler-style Los Angeles mystery-thriller in the tradition of "The Big Sleep."

Indeed. Shomor Shabbos, Dude!

Source:
You're Entering a World of Lebowski
By DAVID EDELSTEIN
NYT August 8, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/08/movies/08EDEL.html

Posted at 08:09 AM in Film | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Thirty-eight dishonest tricks which are commonly used in argument, with the methods of overcoming them:

In most textbooks of logic there is to be found a list of "fallacies", classified in accordance with the logical principles they violate. Such collections are interesting and important, and it is to be hoped that any readers who wish to go more deeply into the principles of logical thought will turn to these works. The present list is, however, something quite different. Its aim is practical and not theoretical. It is intended to be a list which can be conveniently used for detecting dishonest modes of thought which we shall actually meet in arguments and speeches. Sometimes more than one of the tricks mentioned would be classified by the logician under one heading, some he would omit altogether, while others that he would put in are not to be found here. Practical convenience and practical importance are the criteria I have used in this list. If we have a plague of flies in the house we buy fly-papers and not a treatise on the zoological classification of Musca domestica. This implies no sort of disrespect for zoologists; or for the value of their work as a first step in the effective control of flies. The present book bears to the treatises of logicians the relationship of fly-paper to zoological classifications. Other books have been concerned with the appraisal of the whole of an argumentative passage without such analysis into sound and unsound parts as I have attempted. Undoubtedly it is also important to be able to say of an argued case whether it has or has not been established by the arguments brought forward. Mere detection of crooked elements in the argument is not sufficient to settle this question since a good argumentative case may be disfigured by crooked arguments. The study of crooked thinking is, however, an essential preliminary to this problem of judging the soundness of an argued case. It is only when we have cleared away the emotional thinking, the selected instances, the inappropriate analogies, etc, that we can see clearly the underlying case and make a sound judgement as to whether it is right or wrong.

The full list of all 38 tricks can be found at this site.

via 246

Posted at 12:22 AM in Philosophy | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack

Apple's iTunes has a very cool free offer: Any of the speeches from the Democratic Convention, the Republican Convention, or the 9/11 National Commission on Terrorist Attacks are availalble for free at the iTune music store. (note: you must have iTunes installed (Mac or Windows) for this to work!)

Way cool . . .

You can either launch iTunes, select Music Store, and then enter a search for " "9-11 commission" or "Democratic Convention" to bring up a list of selections . . .

or, just click below:

Democratic Convention

National Commission on Terrorist Attacks

UPDATE: 8/5/04 6:38am
NOTE: This link takes you to the downloadable version of the full 9-11 commission book; To access the testimony before the commission (for free), simply search for "9-11 commission."

To find any individual speaker, in ITMS, make the category titled "album" as wide as you can (to the right side of the screen). This will show the names of all the various speakers who testified before the commission. Download your favorite, or collect the entire set!

Posted at 12:29 AM in Politics, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Tom Toles hits anotehr home run . . .

Posted at 10:18 PM in Humor, Politics | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

I am totally enjoying Jamie Cullum's Twentysomething

Definitely worth checking out . . .

Posted at 12:02 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Some fascinating historical examples of turning failure into success, From Failure to Famous:

If starting your own business is what you'd like to do, please note that studies at Tulane University suggest the average entrepreneur fails 3.8 times before making it work.

When he was 22, he failed in business. When he was 23, he ran for the legislature and lost. When he was 24, he failed in business again. The following year he was elected to the legislature. When he was 26, his sweetheart died. At the age of 27, he had a nervous breakdown. When he was 29, he was defeated for the post of Speaker of the House in the State Legislature. When he was 31, he was defeated as Elector. When he was 34, he ran for Congress and lost. At the age of 37, he ran for Congress and finally won. Two years later, he ran again and lost his seat in Congress. At the age of 46, he ran for the U.S. Senate and lost. The following year he ran for Vice President and lost that, too. He ran for the Senate again, and again lost. Finally, at the age of 51, he was elected President of the United States. Who was this perpetual "loser"? Abraham Lincoln.

In the Irish uprising of 1848, the men were captured, tried and convicted of treason against Her Majesty, Queen Victoria. All were sentenced to death...

Passionate protest from all over the world persuaded the Queen to commute the death sentences. The men were banished to Australia --as remote and full of prisoners as Russian Siberia.

Years passed. In 1874 Queen Victoria learned that a Sir Charles Duffy who had been elected Prime Minister of Australia was the same Charles Duffy who had been banished 26 years earlier. She asked what had become of the other eight convicts. She learned that:

• Patrick Donahue became a Brigadier General in the United States Army.
• Morris Lyene became Attorney General for Australia.
• Michael Ireland succeeded Lyene as Attorney General.
• Thomas McGee became Minister of.. Agriculture for Canada.
• Terrence McManus became a Brigadier General in the United States Army.
• Thomas Meagher was elected Governor of Montana.
• John Mitchell became a prominent New York politician and his son, John Purroy Mitchell, a famous Mayor of New York City.
• Richard O'Gorman became Governor of Newfoundland.

There's about 50 more examples here

Posted at 06:34 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

OK, I've given you grief over your lousy coffee. And while I showed you exactly how to make really good java, some of you have balked at the spending 2 beans on a top notch Grind and Brew.

Help is on the way. The old version of Cuisinart Automatic Grind and Brew -- the DGB-300BK -- was reduced to $69 at Amazon.

Macy's had in the weekend circular for $49 bucks.

Is it as good as the Capresso?

No, but its 1/4 the price.

Thank me later . . .

Too lazy to go to Macy's? Here's Amazon's:

Cuisinart DGB-300BK Automatic Grind and Brew 10-Cup Coffeemaker, Black

Posted at 05:25 PM in Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

While it is reassuring that counter terrorist work is making progress, would it be asking the DHS too much to actually update the warning level on their home page?


click for larger graphic

screen shot captured August 2nd, 2004 9:55am EST

UPDATE: 11:38am
The Threat level was raised to Code Orange, but apparently ONLY for the financial services sector in New York City, Northern New Jersey and Washington, D.C. It is not being raised for the entire country . . .

Here's the DHS homepage
http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/index.jsp

Let's see how long it take sthem to update the warning level . . .

UPDATE: 8/1/04 10:15am
I just sent out a request to a small circle of geeks, some of whom might know people in the IT department of DHS. Perhaps they can relay a message to DHS to update the threat warning on thgeir home page.

Posted at 09:59 AM in War/Defense | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Gaping void is a wonderful site I discovered thru Steve of adrants.

Here's a particularly astute observation: Pick your poision:

Posted at 07:11 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

We had brunch at a nice little place in the Hamptons, Sunday morning. We've been there before, the food is always good. We usually go early -- avoid the crowds -- but today we straggled in about 10:30.

What a mistake.

There's something about people who are early risers: farmers, teachers, joggers, overseas currency traders. They are motivated, self-sacrificing, taking a path less traveled . . . or at least less traveled at 6:30 am.

That was assuredly not the group who surrounded us over Blueberry Pancakes and Challah French Toast.

This crowd was simply heinous. An arrogant collection of rude and pompous jackasses. They were just awful. (Don't these people know what happens when you are horrible to the wait-staff?) If I didn't witness it myself, I would never have believed it:

1) A late 30s couple with an occasionally loud and obviously bored 2 year old ask the waitress for crayons. When she says,. "Oh, I'm sorry, we don't have any," they looked at each other and rolled their eyes. Mind you, this was at a restaurant at an Inn, not a Denny's or an IHOP. It was all I could do to not scream: HEY IDIOTS! ITS NOT THE RESTAURANT'S RESPONSIBILITY TO ENTERTAIN YOUR CHILD. ITS YOUR KID – BRING SOMETHING NEXT TIME YOU JERKS.

2) Next up was a 60-something couple -- he was wearing a bicycle helmet (which he kept on for way, way too long). "Helmet man" asks the waitress if the chicken hash and eggs takes longer to cook than the granola (They were late for another event). He was insistently rude and arrogant, wanting to know if they could "hurry up my eggs" on a busy Sunday morning.

Lemme ask you a question: Imagine you recently suffered a blunt trauma to the cranial region – say, a shovel upside your head (that what I was thinking, nay dreaming, about) -- even in that disoriented condition, which would you think would take longer: a bowl of cold granola, or hash and eggs? That was too complex for this soon-to-be hunk of soylent green.

3) Going the opposite direction, an Ally McBeal anorexic walked in, draped in gold and diamonds, including the necklace around her waist, just at the top of her size 0 jeans. She ordered a massive breakfast, too. If she didn't barf it up shortly after, than she has a tapeworm. They also barked at the waitresses.

4) I do not know what this other 60-something woman who joined Helmet Man was thinking, but for future reference, may I suggest a bra? Really, no one needs to see that during breakfast.

5) Say you are a woman of a certain age, and are about 40 pounds overweight. Is the wisest fashion choice you can make skin tight spandex? Hey, I'm no lightweight -- but I'm not running arounnd in one of those marble sac Speedos, either. She actually wasn't too bad to the waitress (its all relative), but her outfit was so absurd that it demanded comment.

Consider that the next time you feel like being an asshole in a restaurant.

Unless, of course, you like the taste of spit -- or worse -- in your food . . .

Posted at 11:25 PM in Humor, Travel | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack