Beautiful City Billboard Fee: "
How much of the world around us is covered in advertising? It's nearly impossible to escape brand logos (I see about 10 in front of me at my desk, without turning my head). Is there some way to use advertising space for a civic purpose?
The Canadian art group Them.ca thinks so. They've proposed the 'Beautiful City Billboard Fee' for the city of Toronto, requiring that all billboard advertisements pay a special tax, based on the size of the sign. Funds derived from this tax would be disbursed to artists for the creation of public art.
This is clever on a few levels. The proposed fee is small enough that it won't cut significantly into advertising (that is, it won't put anyone out of business), but with the number of billboards in the city, will still generate six million dollars each year. At the same time, with the fees going directly to public art instead of to the city's general coffers, there will be limited incentive on the part of the city to allow for a greater number of billboards. The proposal has broad community support (over two-thirds of Toronto residents polled are in favor), and is in line with a number of other proposals and initiatives Toronto is considering.
Writer David Bollier (from whom I heard about this project) links the BCBA to a piece of public art in Vienna called 'Delete!'
For a period of two weeks in June, Viennese shopkeepers agreed to let Christoph Steinbrener & Rainer Dempf put monochrome yellow fluorescent foil on all advertising signs, slogans, pictograms, company names and logos on Neubaugasse, a popular street for shopping. (Only signs needed for public safety were uncovered.)The result (reproduced above; a larger image is at the artists' site) is a clever-yet-sobering demonstration of just how much of our public space is taken up by commercial messages. Some reactions from Viennese (including graffiti saying 'I need consumer information! Argh!') can be found at Moblogging Vienna.
(Posted by Jamais Cascio in The Means of Expression - Media, Creativity and Experience at 12:24 PM)"
Friday, July 22, 2005
Background on Bretton Woods 2.
The beginning of the end of Bretton Woods 2?: "China's central bank posted the following announcement on its web site today: 1. Starting from July 21, 2005, China will reform the exchange rate regime by moving into a managed floating exchange rate regime based on market supply and demand..."
(Via Daniel W. Drezner.)
Whole Whit Wherewithal
Would it be wrong for me to return Harry Potter 6 at this juncture?
Both I and a roommate have finished it.
I'm not convinced I want to keep a copy.
It's not in British English anyways...
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
FW: [IP] yet-another INCREDIBLY-stupid airport "security" story
-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Wednesday, Jul 20, 2005 7:54 pm
Subject: [IP] yet-another INCREDIBLY-stupid airport "security" story
Begin forwarded message:
From: Jim Warren <jwarren@well.com>
Date: July 20, 2005 4:26:42 PM EDT
To: Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>
Subject: fwd: yet-another INCREDIBLY-stupid airport "security" story
Just received this from a friend. If true, it's ... well ... [what words???]
--jim
> This was taken from today's issue of an email newsletter published
by the AirFinance Journal. Gotta love it.
> And finally
Before deploying from Savannah, Georgia, to Iraq by a chartered
airliner; the troops of the 48th Brigade Combat Team, a National
Guard unit, had to go through the same security checks as any other
passengers.
> Lt. Col. John King, the unit's commander, told his 280 fellow
soldiers that FAA anti-hijacking regulations require passengers to
surrender pocket knives, nose hair scissors and cigarette lighters.
"If you have any of those things," he said, almost apologetically,
"put them in this box now."
> The troops were, however, allowed to keep their assault rifles,
body armour, helmets, pistols, bayonets and combat shotguns.
-------------------------------------
http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip
Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
FW: [IP] Anyone know if this is for real?
I agree. We call these Republicans who are all talk about National Security Chicken Hawks.
-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Wednesday, Jul 20, 2005 3:19 pm
Subject: [IP] Anyone know if this is for real?
Begin forwarded message:
From: EEkid@aol.com
Date: July 20, 2005 3:12:41 PM EDT
To: dave@farber.net
Subject: Anyone know if this is for real?
CIA Agents Letter to US Senate and House
18 July 2005
AN OPEN STATEMENT TO THE LEADERS OF THE UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AND THE SENATE.
The Honorable Dennis Hastert, Speaker, U.S. House of Representatives
The Honorable Nancy Pelosi, Minority Leader, U.S. House of Representatives
The Honorable Dr. William Frist, Majority Leader of the Senate
The Honorable Harry Reid, Minority Leader of the Senate
We, the undersigned former U.S. intelligence officers are concerned with the tone and substance of the public debate over the ongoing Department of Justice investigation into who leaked the name of Valerie Plame, wife of former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, to syndicated columnist Robert Novak and other members of the media, which exposed her status as an undercover CIA officer. The disclosure of Ms. Plame�s name was a shameful event in American history and, in our professional judgment, may have damaged U.S. national security and poses a threat to the ability of U.S. intelligence gathering using human sources. Any breach of the code of confidentiality and cover weakens the overall fabric of intelligence, and, directly or indirectly, jeopardizes the work and safety of intelligence workers and their sources.
The Republican National Committee has circulated talking points to supporters to use as part of a coordinated strategy to discredit Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife. As part of this campaign a common theme is the idea that Ambassador Wilson�s wife, Valerie Plame was not undercover and deserved no protection. The following are four recent examples of this "talking point":
Michael Medved stated on Larry King Live on July 12, 2005, "And let's be honest about this. Mrs. Plame, Mrs. Wilson, had a desk job at Langley. She went back and forth every single day."
Victoria Toensing stated on a Fox News program with John Gibson on July 12, 2005 that, "Well, they weren't taking affirmative measures to protect that identity. They gave her a desk job in Langley. You don't really have somebody deep undercover going back and forth to Langley, where people can see them."
Ed Rodgers, Washington Lobbyist and former Republican official, said on July 13, 2005 on the Newshour with Jim Lehrer, "And also I think it is now a matter of established fact that Mrs. Plame was not a protected covert agent, and I don't think there's any meaningful investigation about that."
House majority whip Roy Blunt (R, Mo), on Face the Nation, July 17, 2005, "It certainly wouldn't be the first time that the CIA might have been overzealous in sort of maintaining the kind of top-secret definition on things longer than they needed to. You know, this was a job that the ambassador's wife had that she went to every day. It was a desk job. I think many people in Washington understood that her employment was at the CIA, and she went to that office every day."
These comments reveal an astonishing ignorance of the intelligence community and the role of cover. The fact is that there are thousands of U.S. intelligence officers who "work at a desk" in the Washington, D.C. area every day who are undercover. Some have official cover, and some have non-official cover. Both classes of cover must and should be protected.
While we are pleased that the U.S. Department of Justice is conducting an investigation and that the U.S. Attorney General has recused himself, we believe that the partisan attacks against Valerie Plame are sending a deeply discouraging message to the men and women who have agreed to work undercover for their nation�s security.
We are not lawyers and are not qualified to determine whether the leakers technically violated the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act. However, we are confident that Valerie Plame was working in a cover status and that our nation�s leaders, regardless of political party, have a duty to protect all intelligence officers. We believe it is appropriate for the President to move proactively to dismiss from office or administratively punish any official who participated in any way in revealing Valerie Plame's status. Such an act by the President would send an unambiguous message that leaks of this nature will not be tolerated and would be consistent with his duties as the Commander-in-Chief.
We also believe it is important that Congress speak with one non-partisan voice on this issue. Intelligence officers should not be used as political footballs. In the case of Valerie Plame, she still works for the CIA and is not in a position to publicly defend her reputation and honor. We stand in her stead and ask that Republicans and Democrats honor her service to her country and stop the campaign of disparagement and innuendo aimed at discrediting Mrs. Wilson and her husband.
Our friends and colleagues have difficult jobs gathering the intelligence, which helps, for example, to prevent terrorist attacks against Americans at home and abroad. They sometimes face great personal risk and must spend long hours away from family and friends. They serve because they love this country and are committed to protecting it from threats from abroad and to defending the principles of liberty and freedom. They do not expect public acknowledgement for their work, but they do expect and deserve their government�s protection of their covert status.
For the good of our country, we ask you to please stand up for every man and woman who works for the U.S. intelligence community and help protect their ability to live their cover.
Sincerely yours,
_____________________________________
Larry C. Johnson, former Analyst, CIA
JOINED BY:
Mr. Brent Cavan, former Analyst, CIA
Mr. Vince Cannistraro, former Case Officer, CIA
Mr. Michael Grimaldi, former Analyst, CIA
Mr. Mel Goodman, former senior Analyst, CIA
Col. W. Patrick Lang (US Army retired), former Director, Defense Humint Services, DIA
Mr. David MacMichael, former senior estimates officer, National Intelligence Council, CIA
Mr. James Marcinkowski, former Case Officer, CIA
Mr. Ray McGovern, former senior Analyst and PDB Briefer, CIA
Mr. Jim Smith, former Case Officer, CIA
Mr. William C. Wagner, former Case Officer, CIA
http://www.crooksandliars.com/stories/2005/07/19/ciaAgentsLetterToUsSenateAndHouse.html
-------------------------------------
Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
We remember one who inspired us today. Karl Rove and John Roberts can wait until tomorrow.
To engineers in popular culture
the war heroes that played them
may their dreams inspire our futures.
As Wil says:
LOS ANGELES -- James Doohan, the burly chief engineer of the Starship Enterprise in the original 'Star Trek' TV series and motion pictures who responded to the command 'Beam me up, Scotty,' died early Wednesday. He was 85.I'm too shocked for a thoughtful eulogy right now. Everyone who watched Star Trek liked Scotty, but everyone who met him loved Jimmy . . . I'm sure I'm not the only person today who feels like they lost a friend. My thoughts are with his family.Doohan died at 5:30 a.m. at his Redmond, Wash., home with his wife of 28 years, Wende, at his side, Los Angeles agent and longtime friend Steve Stevens said. The cause of death was pneumonia and Alzheimer's disease, he said.
"
From the comments:
I had the distinct pleasure of working with Jimmy in my capacity of sign language interpreter at a Star Trek con in Chicago several years ago. I don't think Jimmy thought of anyone as just a fan. He loved spending time with them and treated each person as if they were a long-lost friend, including me. On Saturday night, Jimmy hosted a dinner for the fans, dressed in full Scottish regala. He patiently posed for pictures with each individual attendee and with groups. When it was the security team's turn for a photo, they asked me to join them. Quite an honor. Jimmy saw me coming and called for me to stand next to him. He put his arm around my shoulders, his other arm around another woman from the security team. Just as everyone smiled for the camera, it failed. The photographer apologized and said the batteries had died...it would take a few minutes to replace them. Jimmy just grinned and in that famous burr said, "It's alright, laddie. I've got a beautiful woman in each arm. Hell, take your time!" That broke everyone up. I will miss his wonderful sense of humor and gentle spirit. My thoughts and prayers are with his family.
Posted by: VoxyLady at July 20, 2005 10:34 AM
HR-2 bot walks, talks, sets fires: 
Almir Heralic at the Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden looks like he may be the next toymaker to the king
— either that, or he’s getting ready for world domination. His HR-2 robot may be small — think
Kondo KHR-1, rather than
ASIMO — but don’t let its size fool
you. According to Heralic, his bot has fluid movement, a neural net, speech functions and stereo vision coupled with
facial recognition and tracking capabilities. We just hope that the pic shown, from Heralic’s website, is meant to
merely show HR-2’s scale, and not a predilection for playing with matches.
[Via Slashdot]
(Via engadget.com.)
This patent appears to cover my Feed Reader and some RSS feeds that it reads.
Flexible subscription-based event notification: "Subscription-based notification using event channels that each correspond to a particular scope. Each channel manages notifications through the use of a a schema definition. The event subscriptions identify the position and attributes that any desired event notification"
(Via FreshPatents.com: Notable Patent Applications - 03/03/2005.)
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Interesting Times Ahead For My American Friends: "
A quick google finds this:
"…those who know Roberts say he… is a reliable conservative who can be counted on to undermine if not immediately overturn liberal landmarks like abortion rights and affirmative action.
Indicators of his true stripes cited by friends include: clerking for Rehnquist, membership in the Federalist Society, laboring in the Ronald Reagan White House counsel’s office and at the Justice Department into the Bush years, working with Kenneth Starr among others, and even his lunchtime conversations at Hogan & Hartson. ‘He is as conservative as you can get,’ one friend puts it. In short, Roberts may combine the stealth appeal of Souter with the unwavering ideology of Scalia and Thomas…
(Via Warrenellis.com.)
Hilarious Passion of the Christ poster in Japan: "Mark Frauenfelder:
Here's a crazy ad that appeared in a subway station in Tokyo for Passion of the Christ.
It appears that some advertising company was asked by a Tokyo distributor to do a special ad for Christmas for the Passion of the Christ DVD. Apparently nobody who was actually Christian got to review the ad before it was posted for thousands of people to see on their way home for Christmas Eve.
Not many Christians in Japan, I guess. I once asked a Japanese friend if he knew what Christmas was about. He said it was to commemorate 'Julius Christ's birthday.'
Link (thanks, Mark Hurst!)Reader comment: Save Gallardo says: 'The whole thing with sects in a foreign land & collision of cultures is pretty interesting. I remember being approached by a Chinese Christian in Xian, (there's some irony there, I suppose), who didn't seem to have very firm grasp of his apparently new-found faith.
Anyway, I thought you might enjoy this story that Brad Warner, author of Hardcore Zen, and a Buddhist teacher who lived in Japan for many years tells about a debate he witnessed between Japanese Hare Krishnas & Japanese Jehovah's witnesses: Link
Reader comment: Tian says: 'My sister has been living in japan working for a pharmaceutical firm
for over ten years now. She said the Japanese celebrates Christmas by
eating KFC chicken. Apparently the resemblance between Colonel
Sanders and Santa Klaus has mislead them to believe the Jolly St. Nick
would jump down the chimney with buckets of delicious fried chicken.what the hell, all you white people look alike."
(Via Boing Boing.)
If you're already paying for the bandwidth that can support p2p, why not just carry a small laptop or computer with a normal sized OS around...
Symella, a Gnutella client for Symbian Smartphones: "
This is way cool! Download it here.
"(Via Om Malik on Broadband.)
I decided to sleep with Nuvo next to me on my large bed, plugged in and recharging through the night. Its blue power light slowly pulsated, as if it were breathing.
During our first night together, I was woken by movement. Something had activated Nuvo, and it moved its arms slightly and turned its head toward me. Half asleep, and a little annoyed, I mumbled, "Nuvo, sleep," to which it shook its head no.
It took three tries before Nuvo straightened and shut down, the blue light serenely pulsating again. I was reminded of those sci-fi films in which robots, like HAL in Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey," turned on their keepers.
My boyfriend called me the next day and asked if I was sleeping in the same room with Nuvo. When I told him we were sleeping in the same bed, there was an awkward pause.
A brilliant article on companion robots interacting with humans, and it isn't even speculative fiction.
Discussion: New Sake Flights: "Co Co has added a Sake tasting to their drink menu. It is $10.50 and you choose three selections from four different types (Dry, Strong (I think), Mild & Other.)
"
They have a great selection of Sake & Shochu.
They also have a $19.99 all you can eat Sushi and a $25 all you can drink special 7 days a week.
The service is great!
co co sushi restaurant & bar
154 W 26th Street, New York, NY 10001
Between 6th & 7th Avenue
P: 212.243.4800 | F: 212.229.2073
http://www.cocosushi.com/
Lefty
Left Behind: "
Left Behind is the latest free offering over at eReader and it sounds....a strange read. Passengers aboard a Boeing 747 en route to Europe disappear. Instantly. Nothing remains except their rumpled piles of clothes, jewelry, fillings, surgical pins, and the like. All over the world, in a flash, cars are left unmanned. Terror and chaos continues worldwide as the cataclysm unfolds. For those left behind, the apocalypse has just begun. This bestselling end-of-time fiction series tells the riveting stories of people who, after the rapture of the church are 'left behind' to experience the tribulation and other events prior to Christ's return to Earth. With the prophetic teachings of the Bible as the background, this dynamic apocalyptic series begins with this first volume.
(Via PalmAddicts.)
An interesting coincidence is the use of the term "rendition" in the context of sending escaped slaves back to the states of their origin in Antebellum America. This usage is found in South Carolina's Declaration of Independence during the US Civil War:
The Constitution of the United States, in its fourth Article, provides as follows: "No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up, on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."
This stipulation was so material to the compact, that without it that compact would not have been made. The greater number of the contracting parties held slaves, and they had previously evinced their estimate of the value of such a stipulation by making it a condition in the Ordinance for the government of the territory ceded by Virginia, which now composes the States north of the Ohio River.
The same article of the Constitution stipulates also for rendition by the several States of fugitives from justice from the other States.
Monday, July 18, 2005
CULTURE: Bale Banned From the Batmobile: "Christian Bale, who played the title role in Batman Begins, has been barred from driving the Batmobile in any future publicity outings after he got in an accident with it on the way to the film's Canadian premiere.
The disappointed star said: 'The best part of the job to be allowed to drive the Batmobile. But it's safe to say the locals were bemused to see it cruising down the street.
Unfortunately, one guy saw the Batmobile and completely freaked out. He must have thought aliens were coming to land and smacked into the side of it.That was the last time I was allowed to drive it on a public highway.'
'It really flies. I asked if I could keep it but they wouldn't let me!'
Bale then chopped the drunk driver into tiny bits with an axe.(Written by: Keith)
"(Via SuicideGirls: News Wire.)
Sunday, July 17, 2005
TOM DESANTO TRANSFORMERS PRODUCER: "
TO ALL THE FANS (BOTH AUTOBOT AND DECEPTICON) FROM ONE TRUE BELIEVER TO ANOTHER WELCOME TO THE LAUNCH OF THE TRANSFORMERS WEBSITE AND THE COUNTDOWN TO 07-04-07. MUCH LIKE THE BEGINNINGS OF X-MEN IT HAS BEEN A LONG AND HARD ROAD, BUT I PROMISE YOU IT WILL BE ALL WORTH IT. FROM THOSE FANS WHO KNOW ME FROM X-MEN AND GALACTICA THANKS FOR THE TREMENDOUS SUPPORT AND FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO DON'T I AM THE FANBOY WRITER/PRODUCER WITH OVER 30,000 COMICS WHO GOT TO MAKE X-MEN, A MOVIE I DREAMED OF DOING SINCE I WAS A KID. AFTER X2 I WENT AFTER TRANSFORMERS, ANOTHER FILM I DREAMED OF MAKING ONE DAY ( I HAVE LIST OF DREAM MOVIES SO STAY TUNED ) AND AFTER A PHONE CALL TO MY FRIEND, BROTHER, AND FELLOW PRODUCER DON MURPHY, DON AGREED TO PARTNER WITH ME ON IT AND WE WENT INTO HASBRO. WE PITCHED OUR HEARTS OUT ON HOW WE WOULD HANDLE THEIR CHARACTERS AND LOW AND BEHOLD WE GOT THE RIGHTS AND WENT AROUND HOLLYWOOD KICKING DOWN ALL THE STUDIO DOORS ( DON IS THE MASTER OF THAT). WELL AFTER A LARGE STUDIO BATTLE, DREAMWORKS AND PARAMOUNT EMERGED VICTORIOUS AND WE COULD NOT ASK FOR BETTER PARTNERS. WITH STEVEN SPIELBERG EXEC. PRODUCING AND MICHAEL BAY DIRECTING WE COULD NOT ASK FOR A BETTER DREAM TEAM TO BRING OPTIMUS PRIME AND MEGATRON TO LIFE. SO REST EASY AND KNOW IF YOU ARE A FAN, THAT SO AM I AND I'M ON THE INSIDE AND WE WILL GET IT RIGHT, IF YOU ARE A NOT A FAN.... YOU WILL BE.
SPREAD THE WORD AND AUTOBOTS TRANSFORM,
TOM DESANTO
"(Via Transformers LIVE.)
I assume that in the other 23 states, it is popular enough to be legislated upon.
CULTURE: Hung Like a Horse, Dead as a Doornail: "A Seattle man has died, and the cause of death has been ruled 'Death By Sex with a Horse'.
When a car dropped the man off for treatment, a camera picked up the license plate of the driver's car, which led police to find a farm, operating in Enumclaw, apparently known as a place people could go to have sex with livestock.'A significant number of people, we believe, have likely visited this farm,' said [sheriff's Sgt. John ] Urquhart.'
The horse sustained no noted injury, and bestiality is not against the law in Washington State. However, authorities did express concern that animal cruelty could be a factor in the case.'[...]because investigators found chickens, goats and sheep on the property, they are looking into whether animal cruelty — which is a crime — was committed by having sex with these smaller, weaker animals, he said.'
I am at a loss fo a witty comment, so will just say 'Euuuuuuggggh'.(Written by: ElizaGirl)
"(Via SuicideGirls: News Wire.)
Toyota Votes with Its Feet for the Canadian Model: "
Brayden King observes Toyota voting with its feet for the Canadian rather than the American model:
Pub Sociology: More concern about the costs of employing U.S. workers: Via the apostropher and Blog on the Run, I found this story about a new Toyota plant being built in Woodstock, Ontario... despite the offer of millions of dollars in subsidies to put the plant in the U.S.... Toyota is tired of training ignorant (i.e. illiterate) American workers, and the second is that in the long run it's cheaper to operate in Canada because of the reduction in corporate health care costs.
Industry experts say Ontarians are easier and cheaper to train - helping make it more cost-efficient to train workers when the new Woodstock plant opens in 2008, 40 kilometres away from its skilled workforce in Cambridge. 'The level of the workforce in general is so high that the training program you need for people, even for people who have not worked in a Toyota plant before, is minimal compared to what you have to go through in the southeastern United States,' said Gerry Fedchun, president of the Automotive Parts Manufacturers' Association....
He said Nissan and Honda have encountered difficulties getting new plants up to full production in recent years in Mississippi and Alabama due to an untrained - and often illiterate - workforce. In Alabama, trainers had to use 'pictorials' to teach some illiterate workers how to use high-tech plant equipment....
In addition to lower training costs, Canadian workers are also $4 to $5 cheaper to employ partly thanks to the taxpayer-funded health-care system in Canada, said federal Industry Minister David Emmerson.
'Most people don't think of our health-care system as being a competitive advantage,' he said.
...Universal health care might not be the anti-business gateway to socialism that some on the right want you to believe.... Other countries increasingly have a comparative advantage in production industries because their workers are better trained (or at least as well trained) and less costly.... [P]art of the U.S. disadvantage comes because the standard of living in the U.S. is so much higher... but if we offer a superior level of human capital we should be able to find a niche... when even that advantage begins to deteriorate (AND health care costs serve as a disincentive), we should be worried.
"(Via Semi-Daily Journal.)
On top of that, the reception in my room is extremely sketchy, and even though I have setup my Airport Express as a WDS (wireless distribution system) access point, my laptop with a first generation airport card can not connect, making it useless.
So I'm looking at replacing my primary router (I have two) with some Pre-N MIMO router.
The questions I have:
Will Pre-N routers have any better handling of 802.11b wireless cards (extended range)?
This is the primary reason I'm looking at these.
If this is true, can they handle MIMO/Pre-N mode simultaneously with 802.11g & 802.11b? Belkin's router specifically says that their router handles b,g & pre-m better than anybody else.
Also, what router would you recommend?
I'm thinking of the Belkin Router, though at $150, it is pretty expensive...
Alternatives?
