December 2003 Archives
NORTHERN SACRAMENTO VALLEY-CENTRAL SACRAMENTO VALLEY- SOUTHERN SACRAMENTO VALLEY-CARQUINEZ STRAIT AND DELTA- NORTHERN SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY- 400 AM PST MON DEC 29 2003 ...WIND ADVISORY THIS MORNING FOR THE ENTIRE SACRAMENTO VALLEY... CARQUINEZ STRAIT AND DELTA...AND FOR THE NORTHERN SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY... A POWERFUL PACIFIC STORM SYSTEM WILL GENERATE STRONG SOUTHERLY WINDS OVER MUCH OF THE CENTRAL VALLEY AND DELTA. SUSTAINED WINDS OF 25 TO 35 MPH WITH GUSTS IN EXCESS OF 40 MPH ARE EXPECTED THIS MORNING. A COLD FRONT IS FORECAST TO SWEEP ACROSS INTERIOR NORTHERN CALIFORNIA BY LATE MORNING. THE WINDS WILL DECREASE WITH THE PASSAGE OF THE FRONT.
A friend said that back in his hometown that when the winds got really bad, the local news would issue a small dog advisory. Legend has it that one extremely windy day, a small dog was literally blown away. Safety tip: use a sturdy leash.
From In the Shadow of Two Gunmen Part One:
Josh: The Democrats aren't gonna nominate another liberal academic former-Governor from New England. I mean, we're dumb, but we're not that dumb.
Leo: Nah, I think we're exactly that dumb.
Bravo will be running West Wing episodes all day Friday.
EFF has the scoop.
Washington, DC - In a victory for Verizon and the privacy of Internet users, the D.C. Circuit Court today dismissed the recording industry's subpoenas for user identities. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has filed nearly 3,000 subpoenas in Washington, D.C., as a prelude to lawsuits against 382 alleged filesharers. The court today ruled that those subpoenas are not authorized by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
"Internet users are the winners in the Verizon case," said Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) Staff Attorney Wendy Seltzer. "The effect of the appeals court decision is that we do not lose our privacy simply by connecting to the Internet. The ruling stops the record labels from taking our free speech rights as collateral damage in the campaign against the American music fan."
EFF filed an amicus brief supporting Verizon on behalf of 45 consumer, privacy, and Internet industry groups.
From Talk of the Nation:
On Tuesday, Jan. 6, the Democratic candidates for the White House will gather in Des Moines, Iowa, for the only radio debate of the presidential election season. NPR's Neal Conan will act as moderator. Talk of the Nation invites you to join in.
We ask that you send one specific question forone specific candidate to election@npr.org. Send it soon -- we'd like to include you in the public radio presidential debate.
I'm sure Neal will do a more respectable job than Ted Koppel. At least I hope he does.
Thanks Kat.
If you had to rate my jadedness on a scale of 1 to 10, what would you rate me?
If you had to rate my cynicism on a scale of 1 to 10, what would you rate me?
Would you classify me as an optimist or a pessimist?
Update: Comments now closed, thanks to all of you (singular) who voted.
The Automated Online Role-Player
The Autocamp 2000 talks to other players with following rules:
- If someone says something ending in a question mark, respond by saying "Dude?"
- If someone says something ending in an exclamation point, respond by saying "Dude!"
- If someone says something ending with a period, respond by randomly saying one of three things: "Okie," "Sure," or "Right on."
- EXCEPTION: If someone says something directly to you by mentioning your name, respond by saying "Lag."
- (And remember to accept all trade requests from other players by giving them a melon.)
Yes it's old, but I forgot to post it.
It really makes you want to wretch when Karl Rove can look at an attack ad paid for by Democrats and think "Gee, I wish I had thought of that."
ARGH!
"Thanks for saving us some cash," Rove didn't add.
3. Screening
When a player screens in front of or at the side of a stationary opponent, he may be as close as he desires providing he does not make contact. His opponent can see him and, therefore, is expected to detour around the screen.
If he screens behind a stationary opponent, the opponent must be able to take a normal step backward without contact. Because the opponent is not expected to see a screener behind him, the player screened is given latitude of movement. The defender must be given an opportunity to change direction and avoid contact with the screener.
To screen a moving opponent, the player must stop soon enough to permit his opponent to stop or change direction. The distance between the player screening and his opponent will depend upon the speed at which the players are moving.
If two opponents are moving in the same direction and path, the player who is behind is responsible for contact. The player in front may stop or slow his pace, but he may not move backward or sidewards into his opponent. The player in front may or may not have the ball. This situation assumes the two players have been moving in identically the same direction and path before contact.
Just in case you were wondering...
You can now get an Atom .03 feed for Vertical Hold. Why? Because so many other people already did the hard work. Too many to list here, but I figure the least I could do was to help it spread like the new super-flu going around. If you are running MT, grab Mark's template. It's really easy as long as you know the url of your feed, can install plugins, and can modify mime types through .htaccess or by some other means.
Update: You can use the wonderful Bloglines service to read atom feeds now.
If you can't laugh at yourself, quit.
Magnetic Field Is Fading, but No Dire Effects Are Foreseen
Scientists have known for some time that the magnetic field is in fact collapsing, at a rate faster than it would if flows of molten iron in the core had stopped completely.
There was a cool NOVA episode on this very topic. Bottom line is we are overdue by tens of thousands of years for a flip of the poles. The theory is that the field will weaken, then flip, then go back to normal. Rinse, lather, repeat. It won't happen in my lifetime (probably), but it will happen soon, geologically speaking of course.
Yes, yes...I know. Chandler will be a world changing PIM and Remail is a world changing e-mail client. That's all fine and well except they both seem to want to do the same thing. Organize your digital communications. E-mail, calendar, chat, addresses, and every other communication that you store in bits.
I wish them both all the luck in the world. I also wish I could get a nickle every time they get asked, "will it work with Exchange?" I'm sure I could retire in less than a month.
David Cross warmed up a crowd for Dean. It didn't go so well.
The jokes got mixed reactions from the mostly white crowd. Some snickered and some shook their heads at what they said were inappropriate remarks. But Dr. Dean and his staff were not amused.
I love David Cross. He is genuinely funny. A bit "rough around the edges" one might say. I wonder who the hell thought this was a good idea anyway. I mean, I love Bill Hicks, but I sure as hell wouldn't have him warm up for me at a political fundraiser.
The big question is will this stick? I don't think it will. He showed sufficient anger at the situation and will not make the same mistake again.
It's odd when I can visualize my brain working. I'm going through the morning news in SharpReader and I see there are some new Zeldman posts. One is on writing efficient CSS at CommunityMX. This of course grabs my attention. I like articles like this. As I'm reading through the article I can't help but feel like I've read something on this topic before with a very different slant.
A few google searches later I've tracked it down at Mozilla.org. It was that shady character David Hyatt who wrote about how to write efficient CSS for the Mozilla parsing engine.
One is about cutting down on the file size of your CSS and the other is about how not to make the Moz CSS render engine work hard. I would say those are two very different takes on "efficient CSS," but both are well worth reading. I'm not sure how relevant the Moz optimizations are to how other browsers parse CSS, but they look like good ideas.
I haven't been to a concert in a while. Mostly because I'm getting old. They start too late. A friend/co-worker convinced me to go see Tainted Love. I had a blast as you can tell.
(Picutre © Ryan Esposto)
Of course, I've been tired all weekend and now Monday morning is staring me in the face. I wish they would have played West End Girls...
No, not Clinton's sexual problems, his policy making. While I was reading this Washington Post article on the behind-the-scenes Dean, I couldn't help but think about Clinton and why I liked his approach to making decisions.
Friends and colleagues, as well as Dean, say his decision-making process reflects his training as a physician. "My style is to get everyone in a room and keep asking them questions until I'm satisfied," Dean said. "I pick apart everyone's ideas until it all fits together or falls apart. I make the decision, but I want all the information. It's like being a doctor. You never get all the information you want, but you try to get as much information as you can."
The two obvious ways to spin this are that he is a "waffler" or genuinely open to having his mind changed if the case is strong enough. Clinton got tagged by the right and the left as a waffler. In some cases I'm sure it was true. But I also liked that fact that he didn't just wake up one day with a decision and that was that, the facts be damned. The key for Dean will probably be to emphasize that this is how he works. Phase 1: Get information. Phase 2: THINK. Phase 3: Make decision. If he can be clear about this, he might be able to avoid the "waffler" tag that nailed Clinton.
I hope that Clinton has talked to Dean about how hard his first term was. How many things he thought he could do and in the end had to change his mind. Gays in the military springs to mind. Just read the first part of The Clinton Wars to get more examples.
A good friend of mine has a very detailed way of reviewing movies. I like the system a lot, although I have to admit that I'm usually too lazy to put this much effort into a movie review. It would be cool if it caught on though.
Read on for Ben's Movie Review Method (the rest of this is copyright Ben Kite and is not covered by my CC license but is covered by his. So if you use it, make sure you attribute it. Thanks.):
- If the Noose Fits...
Readers of The Register sound off on iTunes DRM - Patriot Act Expanded on the Sly
Via provisions tacked on to a new spending bill, Congress recently made it even easier for the FBI to spy on citizens without judicial oversight - Fair Use in Double Jeopardy
"DVD-Jon" Johansen is once again on trial in Norway for writing code that allows him to view his lawfully purchased DVDs - Fair Use in Double Jeopardy--Part II
321 Studios, already battling the major motion picture studios over the legality of its DVD-backup software in California, faces a second suit in New York - Ohio Discovers Flaws, Requires Fixes for E-Voting Machines
Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell says the machines can't be used until the bugs are fixed. As a bonus, Blackwell has made the reports of these flaws available online in their entirety - Fighting the War On...Food-Stamp Fraud?
Apologists justified the broad, civil liberties-corroding powers granted the feds under the Patriot Act by arguing that they would put terrorists behind bars. So why are they being used in postal, tax and welfare offices? - It's Not Whether You Pay, But How
John Schwartz writes about the slippery concept of "free" on the Internet (NYT; registration unfortunately required.) - It's Not Whether You Pay, But How--Part II
A group representing Canada's songwriters is asking the Supreme Court of Canada to require ISPs to pay them royalties for the digital music downloads by Canadian Internet users (CTV) - DirecTV Defendants Pack NJ Court
DirecTV is shaking down residents of the Garden State. Who knew that the satellite giant would both offer *and* emulate "The Sopranos"? (New Jersey Star-Ledger) - Music Industry: Stop Shirking
Red Herring's Umair Haque looks at the economics of file sharing and argues for a new "implicit contract" between music companies and listeners - Posner No Friend to Amici
The Honorable Richard Posner rejected EFF's amicus brief in the Aimster case, but we're not taking it personally - it turns out that he simply doesn't like the friendly filings (Howard Bashman's "How Appealing") - Hack the Vote
New York Times columnist Paul Krugman with a stirring editorial on the importance of the e-voting debate (NYT; registration unfortunately required)
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