Hillsborough: Teen's naivete

Hillsborough: Lawsuit says video exploits teen's naivete:

By KEVIN GRAHAM
Published April 28, 2006

TAMPA - Five years ago, when Monica S. Pippin was 16, she entered a wet T-shirt contest during spring break at Daytona Beach. The Plant City High School junior exposed her breasts as men doused her with $5 pitchers of water, she said.

She won the $100 grand prize.

Then one day, a neighbor saw Pippin in a Playboy video on cable television and called her parents.

Pippin sued, saying she never consented to be included in Playboy Exposed: All American Girls and Girls Gone Crazy: Spring Break.

Look, honey: in order to enter the contest, you had to lie and say you were 18 anyway. Now you're gonna say you didn't sign a consent form? I hope the first item up for discussion will be the clause that says "certify that I'm over the age of consent", and go from there.

Don't sign the line, baby, if you can't handle the crime.

Mexico to decriminalize pot, cocaine and heroin - Yahoo! News

Mexico to decriminalize pot, cocaine and heroin - Yahoo! News:

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Possessing marijuana, cocaine and even heroin will no longer be a crime in Mexico if the drugs are carried in small amounts for personal use, under legislation passed by Congress.

The measure given final passage by senators in a late night session on Thursday allows police to focus on their battle against major drug dealers, the government says, and President Vicente Fox is expected to sign it into law.

Oh My god. While I don't agree with people using cocaine or heroin, I'm thinking that people shooting guns and robbing other people is a bit more of a threat than a coupla hopped-up lamers. Any trouble which a pothead of junkie can get into is already covered by other laws; this one may actually make no sense now, and if so I'm glad they're repealing it.

The yanks? Repealed their 18th amendment instead. Fair cop.

Okay, what part was hard to understand the first time?

The Raw Story | Bush okays Dubai military deal:

President Bush is expected on Friday to announce his approval of a deal under which a Dubai-owned company would take control of nine plants in the United States that manufacture parts for American military vehicles and aircraft, say two administration officials familiar with the terms of the deal, the NEW YORK TIMES will report Friday.

Okay, Um, how'd that Dubai Ports deal go?

And you don't want them securing your ports, but you want them building warplane and military vehicle parts? I mean, I have no problem with either deal, but either I don't fear Arabs or I'm not American. Either way I'm not affected.

I'm beginning to wonder: How intelligent are the people pulling King George's strings? Either your president or his controllers need to have a clue about this whole thing.

ABC News: The Great Microsoft Blunder

ABC News: The Great Microsoft Blunder:

All of Microsoft's Internet-era public-relations and legal problems (in some way or another) stem from Internet Explorer. If you were to put together a comprehensive profit-and-loss statement for IE, there would be a zero in the profits column and billions in the losses column—billions.

The joke of it is that Microsoft is still working on this dead albatross and is apparently ready to roll out a new version, since most of the smart money has been fleeing to Firefox or Opera. This means new rounds of patches and lost money. Continue reading…

Friends of mine will no doubt be surprised (so get ready), but I don't agree with Mr Dvorak on this one.

What?!? Can it be that I actually agree with MS building and maintaining Internet Explorer? Well, I wouldn't go so far, but I would say that the reasons for MS to build, ship and maintain one browser in their product are really sensible, if you've been In the Business. Watch me get all elitist now.

No, really: MS needs to ship a browser of some sort; it's got so much stuff being rendered by some HTML engine, that it's got to have something shipping with the OS already. It needs those libraries, as we call them, the code that comes with IE or Firefox(ugh) or Opera, so that we can actually use the machine for something right out of the box. Otherwise, you fools who's just paid $200 to $300 for Windows would be pretty pissed that you can't do anything on the Internet. Download a browser? How?!? You can't access the internet to download Seamonkey if you don't already have a browser.

MS should not build their own, then, you'll say. I say I don't disagree with you: the Company should focus on the OS itself, and leave the applications to an application developer. Choose one it likes, pay that company a bunch to develop it, and ship that one company's products as the de facto included browser when it ships the OS. Fine.

Oh, and the coolest thing is, MS has a whack of engineers. It could step in to help out this company - let's call the winning company Spyglass, just for fun - if their product really has a problem. I mean, the security of the browser product is rather important, so toss a bunch of engineers on this thing. Oh, heck, why keep it as an external company? Buy the whole thing and make sure that we don't spend too much on it.

But what if the product itself has way too many problems? What if the company not has to compete for love from Mr Bill, and that maybe some of its assigned resources get pulled over to Windows or Office when needed? Who works on the browser? What about security?

And that, my friends, is what I'll bet happened exactly. Spyglass licensed them their Mosaic product for a whack of cash and a percentage of the profits. MS then bundled it as IE into Windows 95, and made no direct profit and so didn't have to pay Spyglass a bunch of money. MS derived all its IE off the SpyGlass code, and still credits Spyglass in the About page.

Projects in MS vie for people and importance. It's a bit of a competition, according to popular rumour, and project funding - in terms of cash and people - can fluctuate. It's unfortunate that the IE project has suffered in the past, and that several key decisions turned out to be very unsafe. I don't blame MS for that.

I blame MS for perpetuating what I consider to be a series of very unsafe features, not admitting they really blew it, and releasing more secure products instead. This is truly a mistake, and that's why I slam both IE and MS, and not because they took a very intelligent step by licensing a product and then later bringing most of it in-house.

Ohio City is Obvious, Then Redundant

Watercooler - WFMY News 2 City Proposes "Do-Not-Knock" Registry:

Parma, OH -- The City of Parma has created a unique twist on the popular 'Do-Not-Call List.'

It's the first city in the US to propose a 'Do-Not-Knock' registry.

Salespeople who come uninvited to a home with the 'Do Not Knock' sticker in the window could get a $1,000 fine and up to six months in jail.

How nice. Register yourself on some list so maybe, maybe no one will knock on your door.

Fuck that. What part of Get Off My Lawn is difficult to shout out your peephole? A couple Prowler calls and the idea that people have the right to be left alone may even - I don't know - sink in. Yes, we should open the door and see who's calling and why, but we seem to forget that bothering other people for our own purposes is quite inappropriate. Do you live here? Are you reporting a fire, gas leak or selling cookies? No? Then please, kindly, piss off and leave other people in peace.

The people who tell them anything more than Piss Off are merely enablers. They suck.

Torture on Tennessee Soil | MetaFilter

Torture on Tennessee Soil | MetaFilter:

Let me tell you what we're gonna do. We're gonna put them handcuffs in front of ya. Cut you a little slack. But if you don't start operating, we're gonna put the mother fuckers behind your back, and I'm gonna take this slapjack and I'm gonna start working that head over, you understand? ...you sign this son of a bitch, or I'm gonna hit you again.

"It's disgusting to even suspect that this kind of behaviour is How They Do Things in Tennessee. I'm appalled and I'm offended.

The officers have a frightening point: No one knows they were there, they'll all stick together to support a story where the suspect willingly and cheerfully signed a form consenting the officers to search his home, and no one would believe any contradictory story.

I can only imagine, listening to the tape recording, to just which kind of hell the poor guy thought he had descended. While beating the guy, officers threatened to shoot him and plant a toy gun to make it look above-board.

Officer Monday: Eugene, you're gonna sign this right here or I'm gonna fucking put a bullet in your damned head, and we're gonna fucking planet this BB gun.

Were I living in such a police state, I'd have a tape-recorder and mic hooked up in my home 24/7 and a method of activating it. As it is, I believe we need ot work harder to ensure their law enforcement stays away from our citizens.

It seems a shame that so much time and taxpayer money was wasted training some absolute shitbags in the hopes that they'd protect and serve the people.

No, it doesn't Beg The Question

Borland wants to be a Red Hat for developers | The Register:

This begs the question: where will Borland get the cash to sustain the R&D and sales and marketing? budgets. The company is asssessing suitors to help fund and develop the IDE business, which also features the company's database and application server.

No it doesn't. Begging the question is something else entirely. When will you half-literate wanna-bes get that through your shared brain?

Yeah, I noticed that the wikipedia article has to remain neutral as well. Wake me up when we can once again ignore the bleating of the half-wits.

MONEY Magazine: Paying for college

MONEY Magazine: The squeeze: Paying for college - Apr. 22, 2006:

'Like many kids' milestones, I just can't believe how fast this moment came up,' Schwartz says sheepishly.

Here are the stark financial facts. Together, Dick, 55, and Shari, 52, earn $110,000 a year. So far they've saved less than $10,000 for Jake's education ($4,000 in mutual funds in the parents' names and $5,500 in a 529 account). Total annual expenses at his first choice, the University of Oregon at Eugene, will top $25,000. The shortfall over four years is an eye-popping $90,500.

The family is still waiting to hear whether Jake will qualify for any financial aid. But given their six-figure income, they're not holding their breath. And they're reluctant to borrow a ton to fill the gap.

'We don't want the angst of being saddled with so much debt,' says Dick.

Like many families, the Schwartzes are facing staggering college bills at just the moment they should be tackling another oversize financial challenge: saving for retirement.

There you have it, folks: why the US will always have H1B visas.

The problem is, there cannot possibly be so many college students with each generation. The lower earning potential, higher debt-load per family and rising tuition costs set by organizations out to make a profit vs provide an education means that there can only be less and less residents attending college at all. Quite simply, today's college grads are - either directly or indirectly - tomorrow's bankrupt parents with no college money for their own kids.

The US will, in a few generations, largely be unable to even supply its own educated professionals. It will need to, more than now, import more professionals to do any kind of work not possible by a tradesman.

I'd like to think that the overpopulation caused by the "Go forth and multiply" crowd will provide a valuable source of low-cost labour for the factories of tomorrow.

Ask a Mexican!

Orange County Weekly:

Mexicans long ago learned that government won’t bail your culo out of anything, whether it’s a devastating earthquake, howling hurricane or tanking economy. So we learned to be self-sufficient in a way that makes libertarians look like socialists.

This entire column concerns me: I'm not sure if it's just a tiny bit racist or really tongue-in-cheek. I've read most of the back issues, now, and I'm not entirely sure it's one thing or another.

The columnist is hilarious in his gentle poking of fun at what I hope are his own people. He chuckles at the mannerisms and how they shake up our staid, lame social scene, and while he praises the opportunities available to the immigrant - illegal or no - who doesn't mind taking your order or cleaning house after you slobs, he also seems to be pretty fair about the country that's under invasion by hard-working generally peaceful people.

This column provides some answer to some common concerns which arise out of our preconceptions, even if it does so in a very light manner. In the end, I think I enjoy the humour, I do think that it's being done in the spirit of humour and assimilation vs discrimination and bigotry, but I fear that too much of the humour is subtly disguised by something that idiot busybodies will (half-read before they) decide must be racist.

Expect lawsuits, unfortunately.

IOL: Scientists working on beer for menopause

IOL: Scientists working on beer for menopause:

Phytoestrogen is found in the hops and barley malt used in many types of beer. Kosar said breweries could produce the special beer by increasing the levels of these ingredients.

A gynaecologist working with the institute reported good results from clinically tests with the beer on 20 women. The volunteers who drank three decilitres nightly for two months reported fewer menopausal symptoms.

IOL is one of my favourite foreign papers. I read the Globe for the news, CNN for the spin, the Beeb for the blatant truth and IOL for the kicks. They have a lot of Very Interesting stories.

I can't wait to see all the truckers accidentally drinking this beer and growing breasts.

Triple Watch Cell Phone

News & Events Details:

The Triple Watch Cell Phone is a wrist watch that can be transformed into a cell phone. “You can slide the unit out of the wristwatch band, and with a triple-flip technique, extend it to use it as a normal cell phone,” Maneenawa said. “As a wrist watch, it has a speaker phone button that allows the user to answer the phone and hang up while driving. Or the user can combine the Triple Watch with a Bluetooth headset and carry on a wireless conversation that way,” he said.

He said he found inspiration in the Transformer toys where children could turn a plastic car into a toy robot. “The watch is the same, a watch into a cell phone, and back,” he said. The other was the development of the razr phones that are almost as thin as credit cards yet contain all the technology. “When you can make a phone that thin, I knew you could make this.”

You may buy me one of these now.

Oh, wait a minute. It's still a bit bulky.

You may buy me one of these in 2008.

Study: Distraction Behind Most Car Crashes - Yahoo! News

Study: Distraction Behind Most Car Crashes - Yahoo! News:

BLACKSBURG, Va. - Those sleep-deprived, multitasking drivers — clutching cell phones, fiddling with their radios or applying lipstick — apparently are involved in an awful lot of crashes.
ADVERTISEMENT

Distracted drivers were involved in nearly eight out of 10 collisions or near-crashes, says a study released Thursday by the government.

Well, shock of shocks. I wonder if "dumbass" is more a factor in driving than even that ever-popular scapegoat, speed. Ask the Montanans and the Germans if their cherished and now lost no-limit highways were safer than they are now, or not.

A driver's reaching for a moving object increased the risk of a crash or potential collision by nine times, according to researchers at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute.

Tell Timmy to hold still while you slap him, or maybe keep your legs closed the next time there's a risk of you adding another chavvy urchin to this planet.

"All of these activities are much more dangerous than we thought before," said Dr. Charlie Klauer, a senior research associate at the institute. Data from police reports had estimated that driver inattention was a factor in about 25 percent of crashes.

I call Bullshit. Jack that number up a bit, since you're probably classing things inconsistently and also reporting more than three times that number above.

Drowsy driving increased the driver's risk of a crash or near-crash by four times to six times, the study said. But the study's authors said drowsy driving is frequently underreported in police investigations.

Hmm. Four times what? Is that in the 25%?

The cell phone industry and others say distraction takes many forms; for example, eating food, going through the newspaper or inserting CDs into the stereo system.

Agreed. Put down the Britney, honey, just go with whatever crap is in the 10-disc changer now, get your bopper chick friends to shut the hell up, and maybe you'll get daddy's Odyssey home in one piece.

Wired News: Teeny Reactor Pumps Out Biodiesel

Wired News: Teeny Reactor Pumps Out Biodiesel:

The device -- about the size of a credit card -- pumps vegetable oil and alcohol through tiny parallel channels, each smaller than a human hair, to convert the oil into biodiesel almost instantly.

By comparison, it takes more than a day to produce biodiesel with current technology.

"Sometimes I get so frustrated at the crazy things happening in the world today, and then things like this totally salvage the day/week. Converting corn oil to biodiesel almost instantly? That's incredible.

What's incredible? The idea that farmers can use local fuel to power the machinery needed to feed us, instead of paying for fuel costs to have a guy drive a big-ass truck out and sell them fuel at more cost. When the fuel bubble bursts, the food supply will be the first to go, after all.

CIA mines 'rich' content from blogs - The Washington Times

CIA mines 'rich' content from blogs - The Washington Times:

President Bush and U.S. policy-makers are receiving more intelligence from open sources such as Internet blogs and foreign newspapers than they previously did, senior intelligence officials said.

The new Open Source Center (OSC) at CIA headquarters recently stepped up data collection and analysis based on bloggers worldwide and is developing new methods to gauge the reliability of the content, said OSC Director Douglas J. Naquin.

'A lot of blogs now have become very big on the Internet, and we're getting a lot of rich information on blogs that are telling us a lot about social perspectives and everything from what the general feeling is to ... people putting information on there that doesn't exist anywhere else,' Mr. Naquin told The Washington Times.

I, for one, welcome our self-spying overlords. Let it be known that not since even President Nixon has one administration looked unsuccessfully inward for the cause of its problems.

Would that it could look a little closer to home, perhaps into its own livingrooms and bedrooms, I'm sure we'd all appreciate it.

Here's some Insight, sir: Stop spying on your own citizens in violation of their rights. Stop trying to throw your national might around. Educate your people and give them enough self-respect and personal accountability that they need no longer huddle in their bathrooms with their pistols drawn and safeties off. Hold one fair election -- just one. Give your sick people real medical care and stop dragging us down into your greedy, bankrupt system. Finally, sir, see what you are looking at: a nation in need of the kind of development your behaviour inhibits.

Make America the envy of all other nations again.

Here's some movie passes for doing what everyone else is already doing.

WLTX News19 FYI Go to School, See a Movie:

CARSON, Calif. (AP) - Go to school, see a movie. That's an enticement school officials in Carson, California, are trying.

Because, um, getting an education and learning to write well enough so that other nations of the world will no longer ridicule a person is, um, apparently not enough incentive to stay in school.

If we actually had corporal punishment, I'm sure we'd have less truant dumbasses. Paddle them like kids, maybe they'll at least start pretending like they're adults. Can it work any worse than rewarding personal accountability?

TSA proves Earth is Flat

First Coast News - Florida State News - Woman Finds TSA Uniform In Her Luggage:

CLEARWATER, FL -- An airline passenger made a surprising discovery after flying from New Jersey to Florida -- When she opened her luggage, she found a uniform belonging to the Transportation Security Administration.

I, for one, wonder how she smuggled such a clever fake into the bag. Sheyeah! This is the best part:

The TSA says her luggage wasn't searched by a TSA employee because there was no note left in her suitcase stating it was physically searched.

Because, you know, those notices are always put in there. Especially the ones in which people discard parts of their uniform. You know, the uniform: that thing most recognizable and the one thing missing from a trained social engineer's arsenal.

But, thanks to the TSA's incredibly sound logic, masquerading as proof of another policy violation, it's obvious that the bag wasn't searched. She must have faked it, somehow, including the number.

CBC Arts: Indie labels break with CRIA over commercial radio proposal

CBC Arts: Indie labels break with CRIA over commercial radio proposal:

Six leading indie record labels have split from the Canadian Recording Industry Association over the group's recent proposal to the CRTC that includes changes to how Canadian music is defined.

'It has become increasingly clear over the past few months that CRIA's position on several important music industry issues are not aligned with our best interests as independent recording companies,' the six labels wrote in a letter to CRIA president Graham Henderson, copying others, including federal Culture Minister Bev Oda.

'We do not feel that we can remain members given CRIA's decision to advocate solely on behalf of the four major foreign multi-national labels,' the letter said.

Nettwerk Records, True North Records, Aquarius Records, the Children's Group, Anthem Records and Linus Entertainment want greater support for both emerging and independent Canadian artists. They have accused the CRIA of looking out for the best interests of multinational music companies rather than Canadian acts.

While I definitely applaud this move, it's not something we should not have expected. The news article says it all: the foreign record labels were trying to enforce their empire's legal mess on us.

When any national organization is dominated by greedy outsiders, it's time to fold up that organization, I say.

Film lands Belgrade man in hot water

Film lands Belgrade man in hot water:

Perin acknowledged all the drugs in the home were his. He allegedly told police he grew the plant from a marijuana seed he 'found.'

For the combined charges of possessing drugs and manufacturing drugs Perin faces up to $100,000 in fines and up to life in prison if convicted.

"What?!? In which demented fantasy is growing a plant 'manufacturing drugs'? Literally, yeah, but I'm really sure that the sane people who made the law in question didn't have horticulture listed as a crime for which people can be sent to prison for the rest of their natural life!

So growing a single marijuana plant is now an offense on par with cold-blooded torture and murder.

Now, who was it who authorized the gitmo bay facility, anyway?

Overheard in New York: It's Not Exactly An Ability Either

Overheard in New York: The Voice of the City - It's Not Exactly An Ability Either:

Woman: Look at all these rude motherfuckin' men! Can't get up and let none of these ladies have a seat.
Man: Having a vagina is not a disability.

--L train

Ha ha ha. Fucking brilliant. If only there was a way to discern easily the nazi feminists from the regular nice people; the nice people get my seat, and the feminazis get the "How's the air up there" spiel.

I'm only angry because discrimination is only permitted in one direction.

USATODAY.com - Rice defends nuclear deal with India

USATODAY.com - Rice defends nuclear deal with India:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called on Congress Wednesday to approve an unprecedented U.S. plan to share nuclear technology with India, saying it was 'not enabling a larger weapons program.'

Civilian reactors in India would come under international inspection and India's energy needs would get a boost, Rice said.

But India's work on nuclear weapons would not be constricted, and Rice's testimony was received with considerable skepticism. 'I fear this deal could make this world less safe, not more safe,' Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., said.

Expressing concern, Barack Obama, D-Ill., noted that eight of India's 22 nuclear plants would be off-limits to U.N. inspectors 'and they will be producing large amounts of unclear material.'

So .. only some of India's reactors could be inspected to ensure that the material enrichment programme wasn't being abused.

When we're dealing with nuclear proliferation and a country which has tested nuclear devices as a show of bravado in a clow build-up of arms agsinst another very aggressive and proud neighbour, I think that inspection of some facilities isn't nearly enough in exchange for this information.

Screw that. If they want nuclear power, the UN should be ceded control of a very important section of land on the border of 2 or 3 countries. The UN builds the reactor and employs out-of-country labour (for better impartiality) and always a mix of ethnicities, and the UN sells the power back from the installation as a non-profit.

Biotechnology | Here be dragons | Economist.com

Biotechnology | Here be dragons | Economist.com:

Each computer starts with a search image (dragon, unicorn, gryphon, etc), and the genome of the real animal most closely resembling it (a lizard for the dragon, a horse for the unicorn and, most taxingly, the spliced genomes of a lion and an eagle for the gryphon). The virtual genomes of these real animals are then tweaked by random electronic mutations. When they have matured, the virtual adults most closely resembling the targets are picked and cross-bred, while the others are culled.

Okay. Check the date and tell me why I should believe that this company actually thinks it can get a unicorn from a horse or a dragon from a lizard genome.

I call shananigans, even if I hope like hell that I'm wrong.