The more things change.... The Republican war critic. Today's GOP demonizes any dissent, but one of its most influential forebears openly criticized WWII plans -- and just 12 days after Pearl Harbor. [Salon.com]

This is why history can be a useful subject in school. Of course, I've yet to see a school that teaches history to kids in this manner, as something to gauge the present against.
10:56:37 PM     Discuss: []


And yet no version for Mac OS X yet... StarOffice goes commercial, and stays open-source [IDG InfoWorld]
9:31:32 PM     Discuss: []

Here's The Daily Texan on what the DRPA, DMCA and CARP Report will do to Internet radio. It's the best piece I've seen so far, and it's by a college sophomore.

[Doc Searls Weblog]
9:10:25 PM     Discuss: []


Sucked into the stars Escape Velocity: Nova.... ...is out. The latest installment of Ambrosia's space opera game clocks in at 75 MB, explaining why Ambrosia's site is essentially unreachable. Looks like I now have something to do with that short break between my last class this week and our flight to New Jersey on Friday. :)

I was seriously addicted to the previous installment in the series, Escape Velocity Overdrive, a few years back. This should be really good. [jarretthousenorth News]

And it is. I got sucked into it for several hours last night after downloading it from my iTools disk. Looked up and I had 500,000CR, and it was 5 hours later. Brrrrr...
7:26:19 PM     Discuss: []


Fast Food Nation Sort of related to the Doc "Consumer' rant, I'll mention that I just read through Fast Food Nation, which was a good read.

The key thing I came away with was not how my food is obtained (Which I knew and have accepted) but the additional costs, not just from the destruction of range herding for cattle, and the use of feedlots with Cattle. (Which I do have grave concerns about).

Worse are the practices towards humans. People call Microsoft an "Evil Empire". Microsoft is a bunch of pikers compared to these folks.

Read the book, it's worth it. I've been avoiding franchise food for local food ever since I read it, a week or so ago.
3:43:49 PM     Discuss: []


How about "sumestemer"?

Here's DigitalConsumer.org, and what Walter Mossberg says about it in the Wall Street Journal:

If you want to preserve both the music and movies we enjoy, and your rights to use them freely, there are several things you can do. First, stop stealing music online, and stop condoning the practice. Second, boycott copy-protected CDs. Third, start paying attention to the coming fight over copy-protection, and speak up for your rights as a consumer.

I like DigitalConsumer, but I'd like them a lot more if they called themselves DigitalCustomer. Same goes for Walter's last word as well.

[Doc Searls Weblog]

I know Doc is really hot on the "I am not a numb..' I mean on "I am a customer, not a consumer!" with the implicit control that those different words connote, but I think he's pretty much swimming upstream on it. Businesses have settled on "consumer" as the word of choice, and the public has accepted it. mind you...go man, go! :)
3:25:40 PM     Discuss: []


MacWorld...on the cutting edge
MacWorld reviews iTunes 2.0. “Apple has also added AppleScripting capabilities to iTunes, meaning that you can create scripts to control most iTunes actions.” [mac.scripting.com]

Ok, lemme check this; MacWorld is reviewing iTunes 2.0? It's been out for what, 6 months?
12:17:08 PM     Discuss: []