FW: [IP] Risks Digest 24.10] Risks of applying to law school

law school maw schpool.

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Thursday, Nov 24, 2005 3:49 pm
Subject: [IP] Risks Digest 24.10] Risks of applying to law school

No, not the risks you're thinking of.

A friend is applying to law school. He's young but knows something about computers. Law schools collaborate with the Law School Admissions Council
(http://www.lsac.org) to use a single application form. This form is created using OmniForm (published by Nuance, formerly known as ScanSoft). OmniForm requires that you install an ActiveX control on your computer. This control apparently only works on Windows computers. Macs are not welcome. (So much for "Legally Blonde.") Linux and other flavors of UNIX are beyond the pale.

My friend was mumbling obscenities about installing this control. The computer he was working on apparently died during the process so I took a deep breath and said he could work with my notebook computer. He dug into the application, got to the ActiveX installation screen and the control refused to install. At that point I took over (not wanting him messing with my security settings). I finally got the control to install after doing the following:

- Disabling my anti-spyware software (ewido security suite). I then tried to install the control with no luck.

- Setting the privacy permission for lsac.org to "allow." Again no luck installing the control.

- Eliminating all security by making the security settings (Tools/Internet Options/Security/Custom Level) completely open. I enabled each and every ActiveX and other control including unsigned controls and controls marked as not safe. The control then installed successfully.

Now perhaps I didn't have to go quite that far but a deadline was
approaching and I really didn't want to take the time to perform the trial and error that would apparently be required to determine exactly how much security to give up.

It occurs to me that this is truly THE law school admission test. If you're dumb enough to let this control install you're probably good law school material. OTOH if you don't let the control through then you're too smart to be a lawyer. (That's about all the humor I can manage after 1.5 hours fighting with this stuff. I've disconnected from the net and am running my usual four scanning programs right now.)

Tony Lima, Prof. of Economics, California State University, East Bay tony.lima@csueastbay.edu (510) 885-3889

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[IP] Risks Digest 24.10] Risks of applying to law schoolDavid Farber <dave@farber.net>To: ip@v2.listbox.com Reply-To: dave@farber.net

The Triangles

This is what I call a damn good catch.

The Triangles: "

The Triangles are the new Polyphonic Spree. Only they’re Australian, there’s only five of them, and they don’t sound all that much like the Polyphonic Spree. But you know what I mean, right? Listen to ‘Applejack.’ Then read the lyrics, because it’s not often you hear the words ‘lungfish’ or ‘mitochondria’ in a song.

And if you don’t understand the line ‘Sing a song/About how things seem more important at night’… forget it. You won’t get it.

"

(Via Warrenellis.com.)

Farewell Sensei

Pat Morita 1932-2005.

Say what you will about your fond memories of The Karate Kid, but Pat Morita made it cool to be Asian in America, and for that he will always be remembered.

Farewelll Pat.

Also an article about Morita in Stars & Stripes from 1967.

Today I learned

Conjunctions of predicates demand no commas.

The small PRT tracks are only three feet across,
and compliment modern office architecture.

Psst, the word you want is 'complement' with an 'e'.
If you 'compliment' (with an 'i') something, you praise it.
If you 'complement' (with an 'e') something, then you complete it.
(In the realm of aesthetics, things that complement each other
mutually enhance each other.)
Mnemonic: 'complement' = 'complete'.

The comma is incorrect as well.
This is a conjunction of predicates, not of clauses,
and therefore demands no comma.

[Raymond is currently away; this message was pre-recorded.]

"

(Via The Old New Thing.)

Reducing Firefox's Memory Use

Somebody write a firefox patch quick...

;-)

Reducing Firefox's Memory Use: "Many people have complained about Firefox's memory use. Federico Mena-Quintero has a proposal for reducing the amount of memory used to store images, which, in his proof of concept code, 'reduced the cumulative memory usage [...] by a factor of 5.5.'"

(Via OSNews.)

Farewell Sensei

Pat Morita 1932-2005.

Say what you will about your fond memories of The Karate Kid, but Pat Morita made it cool to be Asian in America, and for that he will always be remembered.

Farewelll Pat.

Flights: PriceGrabber Travel

This could be cool.

Flights: PriceGrabber Travel: "

Comparison-shopping agglomerator PriceGrabber has moved into the travel-vending game, with a simple interface and broad range of air carriers and hotels forming a nascent challenge to other meta-searchers. A particular innovation is the seamless integration of basic data from FlightStats, allowing you to quickly check the historic on-time reliability of a particular flight. The PriceGrabber search results are pretty extensive as well, listing pretty much every possible carrier and flight (a few filtering options let you narrow things down). A pretty good way to check out a lot of possibilities quickly.

PriceGrabber Travel [Official site]

Previously: FlightStats, Kayak Multi-City Airfare Search, How to Survive Extended Grounding, Reserve Airport Parking, The Road to BA Clublife

"

(Via Gridskipper.)

From a dear friend.

i'd marry him, i just don't know if i want to marry his country

FW: [IP] American corporations wouldn't sponsor the Darwin exhibit

My Poor Country.

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Wednesday, Nov 23, 2005 9:18 pm
Subject: [IP] American corporations wouldn't sponsor the Darwin exhibit

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: American corporations wouldn't sponsor the Darwin exhibit
Date: Wed, 23 Nov 2005 20:40:44 -0500
From: Steven M. Bellovin <smb@cs.columbia.edu>
To: dave@farber.net

According to the Telegraph, a British news paper, the exhibit on Charles Darwin at the American Museum of Natural History in New York has been unable to attract any corporate sponsors.

"It is a disgrace that large companies should shy away from
such an important scientific exhibition," said a trustee
of another prominent museum in the city, who was told of
the exhibition's funding problem by a trustee of the AMNH.

"They tried to find corporate sponsors, but everyone backed
off."

More details at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/20/wdarwin20.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/11/20/ixportal.html

Perhaps equally interesting, as far as I or Google News can tell, no American news website has picked up the story, even though it's been out there for three days. Is it that the story couldn't be confirmed? To me it would certainly seem newsworthy.

--Steven M. Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb

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Michigan is Fucked

Check out the article.

MS Offer File Formats as Open Standards, Sorta Open

Typical bullshit.

MS Offer File Formats as Open Standards, Sorta Open: "You may have heard the news that instead of just supporting ODF, the format Massachusetts has chosen, Microsoft has announced they areoffering their file formats as an open standard. According to the press release from Microsoft, there are some co-sponsors, including Apple and Intel: Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT)today announced it will take steps to offer the file format technology behindbillions of documents to customers and the industry as an internationalstandard. Apple, Barclays Capital, BP, the British Library, Essilor, IntelCorporation, Microsoft, NextPage Inc., Statoil ASA and Toshiba will co-sponsora submission to Ecma International, the standards organization, of theMicrosoft(R) Office Open XML (Extensible Markup Language) document formattechnology.Here's an article in ComputerWorld with some thoughts on what this could mean: Microsoft Corp. today said it will offer its Word, Excel and PowerPoint document formats as open standards, a move that could spark a war with technology rivals over standard document formats.Microsoft said it would submit its Office Open XML document format technology to the International Standards Organization (ISO) to be adopted as an international standard in time for the launch of the next version of its Office software suite, code-named Office 12. So, looks like it's war. Read the licenses on these file formats. That's my advice. If the license makes it impossible for GPL'd software to use the standard, then it isn't an 'open' standard. It's just an anticompetitive maneuver against Microsoft's only real competition. This is so basic. Does Apple not know? Intel? It is interesting and telling that Microsoft found so few to stand up with them, but two is enough to make the assertion that the standard, if approved, is not tied to one vendor. You may wish to review David A. Wheeler's Open Letter to Microsoft for many more details: Basically, if you choose Microsoft’s XML format, you have decided against open competition, in perpetuity. . . . If a specification cannot be implemented using the GPL, it discriminates against open source software (because the GPL is the most common such license). If a specification discriminates against open source software implementations, then it is not a specification that allows open competition. This was not as big an issue decades ago, when large-scale open source software systems were uncommon, but it sure is now. Andy Updegrove hassome quick thoughts on the subject on his blog, which I asked if I could share withyou. What does it mean? And then after that, I'll provide the full press release."

(Via GrokLaw.)

The Avenging Unicorn

The Avenging Unicorn
Originally uploaded by wigu.

For every leetle girl & boy.

Sunday Mornings

Getting up early (Ten am) on a sunday morning after a fabulous night eating heavily at Jeanne's Thanksgiving party.

Cleaning with Dave & Gali, with nobody else up.

Then relaxing with coffee & Veal & Potato Pelmeni, and watching Intolerable Cruelty with them.

Perfection.

Dr. Pepper commercials

Stacey's Mom in a commercial?

Tying in prune juice tinged sugar water?

Just Brilliant.

Users sue Match.com for date fraud or Taking Cheap Shots

The Whois information for match.com:

Registrant:
Match.com, L. P. (DOM-1326381)
3001 E. Pres. George Bush Hwy Ste. 100 Richardson TX - 75082 US


Just sayin...

Users sue Match.com for date fraud: "Xeni Jardin:





Frustrated Match.com users are suing the online dating service over complaints that company employees posed as interested date prospects -- online and in-person! -- to trick accountholders into re-upping paid subscriptions. Please stifle your ROFLs.

Match.com is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic e-mails sent out by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends, people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a marketing ploy.

'This is a grossly fraudulent practice that Match.com is engaged in,' said H. Scott Leviant, a lawyer at Los Angeles law firm Arias, Ozzello & Gignac LLP, which brought the suit.

Link to story (Thanks, Mo)"

(Via Boing Boing.)

Roll Call

Isn't "your honor, it was the truth" a defense against charges of impugnment?

Roll Call: "

Roll Call (sub.req.) ...

The partisan spat over the veracity of testimony by oil company executives last week spilled over into personal barbs on the Senate floor Wednesday, with Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) accusing Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) of impugning his character on the chamber floor.

‘It’s been brought to my attention that the Senator from Illinois has unfairly maligned my character,’ Stevens declared on the floor almost three hours after Durbin accused Stevens of making it easier for oil executives to lie to Congress about whether their companies were involved in closed-door energy policy meetings with Vice President Cheney in 2001.

How often do witnesses not get sworn in when they go before congressional committees?

"

(Via Talking Points Memo.)

Looking West at 39th St & 6th Ave

Looking West at 39th St & 6th Ave
Originally uploaded by satmandu.

The sun was shining down NY streets at & this morning, on what felt like the first morning of Winter at a bitter 33 Degrees F.

Notable.

POLITICS: The War on Gaping Assholes: "Abraham Lincoln once said that when you ‘familiarize yourself with the chains of bondage you prepare your own limbs to wear them.’ Pat Robertson quoted Lincoln when he launched his Presidential bid, as did Paul Giamatti in The Negotiator. The sentiment, that when we are exposed to oppression we act as though we are oppressed (even when we are free), can be applied to the war on porn. Or the war on the hardest of hardcore porn. And the war on pee in porn. Those at SuicideGirls and SG’s members know of the potential of prosecution because of depictions of simulated gore and urination.



Because the Devil lives in Photoshop and people’s urtheras, many other hardcore porn sites are seeking web hosting outside of the country and, like SuicideGirls, have changed or removed images.



Of course, if you are a guest of the CIA at Guantanamo Bay, those acts aren’t vulgar; they’re standard operating procedure.

Ironically, the behaviors described as prosecutable and obscene in the FBI memo overlap quite directly with behaviors that FBI agents and others have witnessed at U.S. facilities holding prisoners in the War on Terror. At these facilities, actual torture—not adults hurting each other for sexual pleasure, but adults torturing other adults in order to coerce confessions—has reportedly occurred. Pictures have surfaced showing U.S. soldiers engaging in a level of brutality that makes the brutality dished out by Max Hardcore seem gentle in comparison. And at the U.S. prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, an FBI agent has reported seeing prisoners 'chained hand and foot in a fetal position to the floor, with no chair, food or water. Most times they had urinated or defecated on themselves, and had been left there for 18 to 24 hours or more.' One had pulled his own hair out so that it lay in a pile on the floor next to him. Even more ironically, it was Gonzales who, in 2002, as White House Counsel, signed off on a memo widening the possibilities for violent behavior by U.S. interrogators, a memo that led directly to Americans viewing, in pictures from Abu Ghraib and reports from Guantánamo Bay, the sadism, urination, and defecation that Gonzales appears to abhor so greatly in another context.



And still more ironically, this month top Bush administration officials have been fiercely lobbying against a move by Senator John McCain to outlaw any further torture of prisoners held by the United States, with Vice President Dick Cheney emerging as the most prominent and passionate administration defender of torture. Meanwhile, American conservatives have responded positively to Gonzales's move to curtail the sadistic porn available to Americans, with the Family Research Council announcing 'a growing sense of confidence in our new attorney general' as a result of the new obscenity squad.

It’s very easy to apply a ‘slippery slope’ argument to the idea that torture is ‘acceptable’ in certain circumstances of national security, or that it’s a ‘slippery slope’ if you condone or censor people like Max Hardcore. But there is a huge difference between the investigation and prosecution, case by case, of obscene, nonconsensual acts and inciting fear in people who share the predilection for rubberized hoses in asses, enjoy viewing or taking part in double-fisted, double-penetration, and/or like peeing on themselves or their man-whore.



But there’s something to be said that if pictures were posted on the internet of CIA interrogators ‘protecting freedom,’ they would be violating federal obscenity laws.

(Written by: Christopher)

"

(Via SuicideGirls: News Wire.)

The Democratic Hawks are calling for withdrawal from Iraq.

The AP article on Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa.'s ( [After serving in the Marines in the early 1950's, he re-enlisted in 1966, at the age of 34, and served in Vietnam, earning a Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts and the Vietnamese Cross for Gallantry, according to The Almanac of American Politics.] ) comments are far harsher.

On Cheney's comments criticizing criticism:

Vice President Dick Cheney jumped into the fray Wednesday by assailing Democrats who contend the Bush administration manipulated intelligence on Iraq, calling their criticism ''one of the most dishonest and reprehensible charges ever aired in this city.''

Murtha, a Marine intelligence officer in Vietnam, angrily shot back at Cheney: ''I like guys who've never been there that criticize us who've been there. I like that. I like guys who got five deferments and never been there and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done.''

And there's this bit:

...he related several stories of visiting wounded troops, including one who was blinded and lost both his hands but had been denied a Purple Heart because friendly fire caused his injuries.

''I met with the commandant. I said, 'If you don't give him a Purple Heart, I'll give him one of mine.' And they gave him a Purple Heart,'' said Murtha, who has two.

Here's more about Mutha.

Bethany reminds me that my most excellent high school English/US History teacher Dr. Doug Collar celebrated 25 years of his jazz shows on WKAR radio this summer.

I suddenly feel very, very young. I can only hope to look that good after 25 more years.

;-)

I call this "Woodward getting taken down a notch".

Woodward is Woodward: "

I'm not sure I have an opinion on Bob Woodward's culpability for keeping silent about the fact that he'd been a target of the Valerie Plame leak well before other reporters. While courts at all levels concluded that Matt Cooper and Judith Miller were required to testify, nothing would have required them or Woodward to rush forward unbidden. Woodward's worst offense was joining in the Victoria Toensing/Joe DiGenova chorus of 'there's no crime here,' which is only a little more shameful than it already was, now that we know what he knew.

Much more interesting are the obvious strains in his 'odd relationship' with his Post colleagues, especially Walter Pincus. I should say that I know nothing about what goes on in the Post newsroom. But for as long as I've been reading the Washington Post regularly, I've found it sort of ironic that the paper has some of the most amazing investigative reporters in history, reporters who really earn that overused modifier. Pincus and now retired George Lardner are the best examples, but Morton Mintz was another and in the younger generation, probably Dana Priest is a fourth. All are the kind of reporters who understand how to break open a federal agency, nurture an unhappy bureaucrat with a story to tell until he's ready to tell it, or read through 10,000 pages of public records to find the connections between two events. And none of them are or were all that well known.

Meanwhile the paper also had someone who was probably the embodiment of the term 'investigative reporter' to a generation, but who is actually not that at all. Woodward instead is a stenographer of the narratives of the people at the very highest levels of power, recording their semi-official versions of history. Not that there's anything wrong with that; it's just a different activity. Even Deep Throat turns out to be not a White House underling shocked at what he's witnessing but basically a rival center of power in Washington at the time, the post-Hoover FBI. I've always wondered if that caused a little tension at the paper. (When I say 'stenographer,' echoing Maureen Dowd's criticism of Judith Miller, I don't mean to associate Woodward with Miller, whose 'entanglement' with sources and her role in the story, makes her something other than a journalist.)

I was glad to see that Greg Anrig linked to an old Joan Didion essay about most of Woodward's books. To my mind the most interesting and revealing of those books is the most unlikely: Wired, his out of print 1984 biography of John Belushi. Wired is almost like a French experimental novel of the 60s, like the novel whose name and author I forget right now that is written entirely without the letter 'e': It is a book about humor written entirely from the perspective of a person without any sense of humor or irony. It's years since I read it, but I vividly remember the flat earnestness with which Woodward recounts the 'Bees' segment from the early Saturday Night Live, and Belushi's dislike of it, the same tone he would later bring to Colin Powell's march to war. He has no idea why people would dress up as bees, laugh at people dressed as bees, or that there are motives and paradoxes underneath the surface. Woodward's mind has a total literalness to it -- as Anrig says, he believes that 'what's really going on' is exactly the same as what his sources tell him. That's wired in, not something he can do anything about, and so I've always been a little sympathetic to Woodward. (And before anyone says 'Asperger's,' let me just say my name's not Bill Frist and I don't do remote medical diagnosis.) And you can get something out of his reporting, if you bring your own sense of irony and skepticism.

p.s.: The book I was thinking of is 'Le Disparition,' by Georges Perec, which I cannot claim to have read either in French or in its English translation. From Google and Wikipedia, I learn that such texts are called 'lipograms' and that 'writing this way is impractical.' Indeed.

"

(Via The Decembrist.)

If you're savoring the Nouveau, I'm going to laugh at you.

Paris: Beaujolais Nouveau Wino Weekend Begins: "

In North America, people celebrate Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November; it's a day of gratitude, love, and generosity. France, being France, celebrates a wine -- the year's new Beaujolais -- on the third Thursday of November. It's a day of drinking, drinking, and, uh, drinking. Beaujolais can be most charitably described as simple, young, and fruity. Most Frenchmen, however, describe the arrival of the Beaujolais Nouveau as a great excuse to drink the cheap vinegary stuff. In large quantities. This is not one of those wines where you sniff at the cork, take a sip, then swish around in your mouth to fully appreciate it in all its exquisite complexity. It's more of a 'whoo, the weekend's almost here, let's go to some smoky old wine bar with friends, and drink bottle after bottle of the stuff while snacking on little sausages-on-a-toothpick!' No tips needed to find a good place to quaff the ol' Beaujo': almost all cafés, brasseries, and wine bars in Paris and the rest of France will be offering a special today and in the next few days to come. So elbow up to your favorite bar counter with your friends, and let all that astringent goodness flow. Incidentally, in New York, today's advent of the Georges Duboeuf vintage shall be commemorated with various Frenchish restaurants serving dishes and/or cocktails created with the wine, available through November 20.

Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau 2005 [Official site]

[Eric Z. Chang]

Previously: Best Lebanese Dining in Paris: El Fares, Chocolate, Meet Booze, Digital Living Festival, The Campbell Apartment, Music Mash

"

(Via Gridskipper.)

Once there is PC hardware that supports the CableCARD device, we should be able to see linux devices coming out soon afterwards that also support it.

Which means finally a workable MythTV setup without needing external Cable Box Tuners.

I can't wait.

Microsoft announces CableCARD for late 2006: "

We know they’ve been long and hard at work getting it, and now Microsoft’s finally got the
missing link to their Media Center
platform strategy: CableCARD support. This
means, of course, that no longer will Media
Center users (or Vista users, as it were) be subject to the whim and fancy of cable operators and their boxes, but
will be able to get true, integrated high definition cable television support straight to the PC. There is a caveat,
however. Microsoft is only penned to get one-way CableCARD support (v1.0), meaning Pay-Per-View, on-demand programming,
advanced EPG, and the like (v2.0) are out of the question.



[Thanks, Dave]

Read | Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments
© 2005 Weblogs, Inc.

"

(Via engadget.com.)

I know there's a purchasing power parity joke in here somewhere...

Guy fixes computers in exchange for sex: "Mark Frauenfelder:
Sync has a short piece about a 34-year-old guy named 'Ray Digerati' who placed an ad of Craig's list that said 'WILL FIX COMPUTERS FOR SEXUAL FAVORS,' and he says it's been non-stop action ever since.

Most of the calls I get are for spyware removal and viruses. One girl didn't even wait for me to finish the virus scan—she just grabbed me and gave me a blow job.

Do you have a set, um, pay scale?

No, I leave it up to their discretion. One girl didn't want to have intercourse, so she offered me a massage and then finished me off with a hand job. It's basically all about the time I spend: If I'm working for one or two hours, I'd like a blow job. An orgasm for every two hours of service is pretty fair. If it's something simple that I can fix in 15 minutes, I'd like to get a foot massage.

Link"

(Via Boing Boing.)

For the record, after watching House last night, I'm giving up Sugar Free Chewing Gum.

Do you have to have a habit before you can proclaim that you are giving it up?

Umm, I've also stopped beating my wife.

Open Source is a fairly good program. It's on my list of podcasts I try to keep up with.

You've most likely: "

You've most likely heard of Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's former Chief of Staff who's been making the media rounds recently, discussing what really happened during the lead-up to war and after. This evening he's going to be on Chris Lydon's Open Source radio show. He'll be taking listener questions both off the air and also from the show's website. If it doesn't play in your area, they also stream it from the site.

"

(Via Talking Points Memo.)

As usual, Ted Stevens makes me sick.

The executives [ from Exxon Mobil Corp., Conoco (before its merger with Phillips), Shell Oil Co. and BP America Inc. ] were not under oath when they testified [ about meeting with Vice President Cheney's energy task force in 2001 -- something long suspected by environmentalists but denied as recently as last week by industry officials testifying before Congress ] , so they are not vulnerable to charges of perjury; committee Democrats had protested the decision by Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) not to swear in the executives. But a person can be fined or imprisoned for up to five years for making "any materially false, fictitious or fraudulent statement or representation" to Congress.

Frakking wankers all, I tell you.

Desperate Santorum: "

Desperate Santorum makes play for post-Enlightenment Era voter bloc ...

U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum said Saturday that he doesn't believe that intelligent design belongs in the science classroom.

Santorum's comments to The Times are a shift from his position of several years ago, when he wrote in a Washington Times editorial that intelligent design is a 'legitimate scientific theory that should be taught in the classroom.'

But on Saturday, the Republican said that, 'Science leads you where it leads you.'

Actually, to insulate themselves from charges of liberal bias aren't journalists supposed to refer to this as 'what some Democrats refer to as 'science''?

Just asking.

"

(Via Talking Points Memo.)

Ann Arbor...

Finally, I Am A Bathroom Graffito: "

Received in email from Tanner Beck, who says:

Suprisingly obscure bathroom graffiti I found in the men’s room at the 8-Ball in Ann Arbor, MI. If people were writing my name above trough-style urinals, I’d like to think random people would email me pictures of it.

"

(Via Warrenellis.com.)

you should be happier for me, but I understand: ""

(Via a softer world.)

FW: [IP] Young Britons flock east to answer India's call-centre crisis

This feels too cute to be true, but I suppose it's easy to get lost in a rising tide.

;-)

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Monday, Nov 14, 2005 7:22 am
Subject: [IP] Young Britons flock east to answer India's call-centre crisis

Begin forwarded message:

From: Brian Randell <Brian.Randell@newcastle.ac.uk>
Date: November 14, 2005 6:15:00 AM EST
To: dave@farber.net
Subject: Young Britons flock east to answer India's call-centre crisis

Hi Dave:

Here's a surprising new twist on the out-sourcing issue, an issue which was featuring a lot in IP a little while ago.

cheers

Brian

====
From the Independent - a national UK paper - yesterday:

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/article326822.ece

Young Britons flock east to answer India's call-centre crisis

In a remarkable reversal, the subcontinent's telesales firms are eagerly recruiting British labour to fill a skills shortage
By Stephen Khan
Published: 13 November 2005

An army of British workers is being recruited to staff India's vast network of call centres because of a shortage of suitable candidates on the subcontinent.

In a remarkable reversal of the outsourcing that has seen thousands of jobs lost in the UK, telesales operations are looking to fill a skills gap in the east with young Britons willing to work on Indian wages.

And they are eagerly taking up the challenge. Both recent graduates and those with experience of working in British call centres are flocking to sign up for jobs in Bombay, Delhi and Bangalore that pay just �350 a month.

It might not sound like much, but many are finding that they can earn enough to live on for six months or a year before heading off travelling. Indeed, a stint in the call centres followed by a period mellowing out on Goa's beaches or touring the palaces of Rajasthan is becoming the fashionable way for single young Britons to spend a gap year.

However, with surveys suggesting that India's telesales industry will be short of more than 120,000 employees over the next two years, many of the newcomers are expected to stay on.

The problem has arisen because while millions of Indians aspire to work in the call centres, managements are becoming more particular about whom they hire. This follows complaints from callers in the UK about staff being unable to understand them.

There has also been a high attrition rate in many of the centres, as Indians became fed up with punishing hours and abuse from callers.

That has not put off young Britons, though. The clamour for jobs in India has reached such a level that agencies have been set up to place them with Indian firms.

One is Launch Offshore, founded by Tim Bond. "People are desperate to sample a slice of another way of life," Mr Bond said. His firm has close to 100 workers in India and expects to place more than 200 next year. Those who sign up are given flights out and accommodation as well as Indian wages.

Among the first to land in the subcontinent was Kenny Rooney, a 28-year-old from Livingston in Scotland. He had worked in a call centre at home, but after nine months in India says he does not want to return. "This is an incredible country," he said, speaking from Bombay. "I have had a brilliant time and met people from all over the world."

Further down the west coast is Pune, a hub of the call-centre industry. Ian Hussey, a 20-year-old business studies student at Sheffield Hallam University, recently began working there. "Doing the work from the bottom up, you learn about the people and the company. It's great."

Young Britons of Indian origin are also finding the jobs offer them a chance to rediscover their roots. Among them is Hasmita Patel, who is also working in Pune. "This has been the best thing I've ever done," said Ms Patel, from Leicester. "It has really allowed me to see the country and get to know people. I've learned so much about myself."

Those operating the centres are delighted by the newcomers. "The cultural fit of the British works wonders. They are very enterprising. They tell me about how we can enhance what we are doing here, what we can share," said Sukaya Katoch, head of training at Pune call centre GTL.

An army of British workers is being recruited to staff India's vast network of call centres because of a shortage of suitable candidates on the subcontinent.

In a remarkable reversal of the outsourcing that has seen thousands of jobs lost in the UK, telesales operations are looking to fill a skills gap in the east with young Britons willing to work on Indian wages.

And they are eagerly taking up the challenge. Both recent graduates and those with experience of working in British call centres are flocking to sign up for jobs in Bombay, Delhi and Bangalore that pay just �350 a month.

It might not sound like much, but many are finding that they can earn enough to live on for six months or a year before heading off travelling. Indeed, a stint in the call centres followed by a period mellowing out on Goa's beaches or touring the palaces of Rajasthan is becoming the fashionable way for single young Britons to spend a gap year.

However, with surveys suggesting that India's telesales industry will be short of more than 120,000 employees over the next two years, many of the newcomers are expected to stay on.

The problem has arisen because while millions of Indians aspire to work in the call centres, managements are becoming more particular about whom they hire. This follows complaints from callers in the UK about staff being unable to understand them.

There has also been a high attrition rate in many of the centres, as Indians became fed up with punishing hours and abuse from callers.

That has not put off young Britons, though. The clamour for jobs in India has reached such a level that agencies have been set up to place them with Indian firms.

One is Launch Offshore, founded by Tim Bond. "People are desperate to sample a slice of another way of life," Mr Bond said. His firm has close to 100 workers in India and expects to place more than 200 next year. Those who sign up are given flights out and accommodation as well as Indian wages.

Among the first to land in the subcontinent was Kenny Rooney, a 28-year-old from Livingston in Scotland. He had worked in a call centre at home, but after nine months in India says he does not want to return. "This is an incredible country," he said, speaking from Bombay. "I have had a brilliant time and met people from all over the world."

Further down the west coast is Pune, a hub of the call-centre industry. Ian Hussey, a 20-year-old business studies student at Sheffield Hallam University, recently began working there. "Doing the work from the bottom up, you learn about the people and the company. It's great."

Young Britons of Indian origin are also finding the jobs offer them a chance to rediscover their roots. Among them is Hasmita Patel, who is also working in Pune. "This has been the best thing I've ever done," said Ms Patel, from Leicester. "It has really allowed me to see the country and get to know people. I've learned so much about myself."

Those operating the centres are delighted by the newcomers. "The cultural fit of the British works wonders. They are very enterprising. They tell me about how we can enhance what we are doing here, what we can share," said Sukaya Katoch, head of training at Pune call centre GTL.

--
School of Computing Science, University of Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne,
NE1 7RU, UK
EMAIL = Brian.Randell@ncl.ac.uk PHONE = +44 191 222 7923
FAX = +44 191 222 8232 URL = http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/~brian.randell/

-------------------------------------
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Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/

Charlie alerts me to why xfs & reiser can be bad on PC hardware.

Don't trust your hardware: "align="texttop" border="0" height="325" hspace="4" vspace="4" width="400" />

I wasn’t able to see David Maynor’s ‘You are the Trojan’
(pdf) talk at Toorcon, but it’s a really
interesting subject. With such a large emphasis being placed on tightening perimeter security with firewalls and IDS
systems how do attacks keep getting through? The user: bringing laptops on site, connecting home systems through a VPN,
or just sacrificing security for speed.

Peripherals can also be a major threat. USB and other computer components use Direct Memory Access (DMA) to bypass
the processor. This allows for high performance data transfers. The CPU is completely oblivious to the DMA activity.
There is a lot of trust involved in this situation. Here’s how this could be exploited: Like a diligent individual
you’ve locked you Windows session. Someone walks in with their hacked USB key and plugs it into your computer. The USB
key uses its DMA to kill the process locking your session. Voila! your terminal is now wide open and all they had to do
was plug in their USB key, PSP, iPod… With the XBox 360’s eagerness to work with your iPod, I’m guessing it is probably
just vulnerable to this attack as anything else.

Has anyone done this? Maximillian Dornseif presented 0wn3d by an iPod at CanSecWest. The firewire protocol allows
direct memory access and doesn’t require a host which makes this attack even easier. He’s got presentation materials
and code for iPod Linux on his site. There are
legitimate uses. If you were doing forensics you could copy the live memory contents of the machine with minimal
effects.

Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments
© 2005 Weblogs, Inc.

"

(Via hack a day.)

Noice.

CULTURE: London Dating Scene: Brains, the New Black: "Tired of looking for your soulmate in sea of drunken louts at a bar? Or trying to have a talk at a club pounding music out at 150 decibels? Perhaps the new 'intellidating' scene is for you!

Speed dating and clubbing just don't seem to fill the void for many lonely hearts any more. 'Intellidating' is being acclaimed as the hot new way to romance.



Debating societies, art classes and poetry readings -- all are thriving in the British capital as dating turns cerebral.



The trend has been spotted by a wide range of social commentators and even prompted the heavyweight magazine The Economist to declare: 'Seriousness is booming.'



The appropriately named Sebastian Shakespeare wrote in London's Evening Standard newspaper: 'Debates and poetry readings are fast becoming London's most romantic nights out.'

OK, I'm not so hot on poetry readings, but a break from the typical dating schemes is a welcome change according to Ginny Greewood, who runs a club dedicated to cerebral lonelyhearts.

'You are not concentrating on what is happening from the navel to the knee -- you are connecting to the gray matter,' she told Reuters.



'They have got the income and the intelligence: they just need someone to organize their social diaries.'



'I think intellidating is a great phrase,' she said. 'I'm sure it will end up in the dictionary. If you are an intelligent person in an important position at work, you are not going to hang out in a bar or go speed dating.'

John Gordon and Jeremy O'Grady have set up a similar scene -- a debate club called Intelligence Squared that has sold out every night they've organized.

So cerebral daters out for rarefied seduction are treated to mind-stretching debates like 'Better rough justice than another 9/11' and 'The rise of China spells the decline of the West.'



'Whether it is dating or debating is debatable but this represents an opportunity for people who want intelligent dating,' O'Grady said.



'There is such a lack of institutional fora other than the dance floor or the club for them to meet. It is all so hideously difficult.'

Sounds like my cup of tea.

(Written by: Noctua)

"

(Via SuicideGirls: News Wire.)

FW: [IP] November mini-AIR - Not Valid in Kansas

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Friday, Nov 11, 2005 3:24 pm
Subject: [IP] November mini-AIR - Not Valid in Kansas

Begin forwarded message:

----------------------------------------------------------
2005-11-06 Not Valid in Kansas

Many things are no longer valid in Kansas, thanks to the November
8, 2005 mandate by the Kansas State Board of Education.

As a public service, we have created warning stickers that say:

NOT VALID IN KANSAS
as per order of the Board of Education,
November 8, 2005

Use of this device or substance may
require, imply, and/or endorse the existence
of one or more of the following:
chemistry; evolution; electromagnetism;
gravity; mathematics; thermodynamics;
education.

You can download a printable PDF file:
<http://www.improbable.com/teach/lessons2005/NOT-VALID-
INKANSAS.pdf>.

NOTE: The Kansas Board of Education is co-winner of the 1999 Ig
Nobel Prize for Science Education for its earlier work on this
subject.

-------------------------------------
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Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/

Scott enlightens me tonight with the knowledge that Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, and Janis Joplin all died at the ripe age of 27.

Check out the 27 Club.

darn

I accidentally deleted Yo La Tengo's and then nothing turned itself
inside-out.

Does anybody have a copy?

Finally, a raison d'être for my 20" widescreen monitor.

Download it and watch it full screen.

The scene with the gendarmes is really, really rich.

C'était un Rendezvous: "

C'était un Rendezvous:

On an August morning in 1978, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a friend, a professional Formula 1 racer, drive at breakneck speed through the heart of Paris. The film was limited for technical reasons to 10 minutes; the course was from Porte Dauphine, through the Louvre, to the Basilica of Sacre Coeur.

No streets were closed, for Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit.

The driver completed the course in about 9 minutes, reaching nearly 140 MPH in some stretches. The footage reveals him running real red lights, nearly hitting real pedestrians, and driving the wrong way up real one-way streets.

It has just been remastered and released on DVD.

Quicktime here. It's absolutely terrifying, despite looking a lot like a video game. 'Red light! Red light! Red light! GARBAGE TRUCK!!!' The only thing it's missing is a woman pushing a baby carriage, and a couple of guys carrying a plate-glass window.
"

(Via jwz.)

Senator Joseph Lieberman is a tool.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 10 - The Senate voted Thursday to strip captured "enemy combatants" at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, of the principal legal tool given to them last year by the Supreme Court when it allowed them to challenge their detentions in United States courts.

...


In addition to Mr. Specter, Republicans voting against the bill were Senators John E. Sununu of New Hampshire, Gordon H. Smith of Oregon, and Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island. The five Democrats voting for the bill were Senators Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Kent Conrad of North Dakota and Ron Wyden of Oregon.

FW: [IP] Greetings from Idiot America

It has been 11 years since I read any hofstadter.

Perhaps too long.

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Thursday, Nov 10, 2005 9:21 am
Subject: [IP] Greetings from Idiot America

Begin forwarded message:

From: Kurt Albershardt <kurt@nv.net>
Date: November 10, 2005 12:40:36 AM EST
To: dave@farber.net
Subject: Greetings from Idiot America

Greetings from Idiot America

by Charles Pierce
Nov 01 '05
Esquire Magazine, by way of <http://templeofpolemic.proboards42.com/index.cgi?board=theo&action=print&thread=1130126466>

..

The rise of Idiot America is essentially a war on expertise. It's not so much antimodernism or the distrust of intellectual elites that Richard Hofstadter deftly teased out of the national DNA forty years ago. Both of those things are part of it. However, the rise of Idiot America today represents�for profit mainly, but also, and more cynically, for political advantage and in the pursuit of power�the breakdown of a consensus that the pursuit of knowledge is a good. It also represents the ascendancy of the notion that the people whom we should trust the least are the people who best know what they're talking about. In the new media age, everybody is a historian, or a preacher, or a scientist, or a sage. And if everyone is an expert, then nobody is, and the worst thing you can be in a society where everybody is an expert is, well, an actual expert.

In the place of expertise, we have elevated the Gut, and the Gut is a moron, as anyone who has ever tossed a golf club, punched a wall, or kicked an errant lawn mower knows. We occasionally dress up the Gut by calling it "common sense." The president's former advisor on medical ethics regularly refers to the "yuck factor." The Gut is common. It is democratic. It is the roiling repository of dark and ancient fears. Worst of all, the Gut is faith-based.

It's a dishonest phrase for a dishonest time, "faith-based," a cheap huckster's phony term of art. It sounds like an additive, an artificial flavoring to make crude biases taste of bread and wine. It's a word for people without the courage to say they are religious, and it is beloved not only by politicians too cowardly to debate something as substantial as faith but also by Idiot America, which is too lazy to do it.

After all, faith is about the heart and soul and about transcendence. Anything calling itself faith-based is admitting that it is secular and profane. In the way that it relies on the Gut to determine its science, its politics, and even the way it sends its people to war, Idiot America is not a country of faith; it's a faith-based country, fashioning itself in the world, which is not the place where faith is best fashioned.

..

How does it work? This is how it works. On August 21, a newspaper account of the "intelligent design" movement contained this remarkable sentence: "They have mounted a politically savvy challenge to evolution as the bedrock of modern biology, propelling a fringe academic movement onto the front pages and putting Darwin's defenders firmly on the defensive."

A "politically savvy challenge to evolution" is as self-evidently ridiculous as an agriculturally savvy challenge to euclidean geometry would be. It makes as much sense as conducting a Gallup poll on gravity or running someone for president on the Alchemy Party ticket. It doesn't matter what percentage of people believe they ought to be able to flap their arms and fly, none of them can. It doesn't matter how many votes your candidate got, he's not going to turn lead into gold. The sentence is so arrantly foolish that the only real news in it is where it appeared.

On the front page.

Of The New York Times.

..

--

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Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/

I want to go see Iron & Wine on December 6th.

Anybody want to join?

I'm a bit confused. Does this acknowledged use of White Phosphorous rounds in Falluja contravene any Chemical Weapon Use Convention that we've signed?

Or not?

Thanks to Seth, I'm in Sufjan Stevens immersion.

I haven't been this excited since I first heard the White Stripes.

winter, or dandruff from up on high

I'm seeing some white flakes floating down.

I think it is snow.

This is why I like Lessig.

this is very funny: "

Apparently, the 'Progress' and Freedom Foundation has joined the publishers in the GooglePrint case. James Delong filled the inbox of countless many to inform them about 'Google Print and the Aerospace Analogy: Lessig's Counterfactual History.' The whole missive was a response to a blog post I had written when Google was first sued.

As DeLong writes (I can't find the post online, but I'll happily add the link if someone sends it):

In a recent blog about Google Print, Stanford Law Professor Larry Lessig repeats a story that is also at the center of his book Free Culture. He cites the 1946 airplane noise case of U.S. v. Causby as clearing the way for the air age by overthrowing the old legal doctrine that a landowner's property extends to the heavens, thus making the airspace into a commons. He then draws an analogy to Google Print, arguing that the old copyright regime must be similarly overthrown in the name of the new commons of the Internet Age. Unfortunately, his depiction misstates the issues in Causby, ignores the fact that the landowner actually won, and fails to mention that the case stands for close to the opposite of the principles for which he cites it.

Who could have thought such drama could be generated by a blog post? Or that such mistaken drama could be generated by a blog post?

My use of the story -- in both contexts -- is perfectly apt, and correct. Here's the passage I quoted from the case in the book, and referred to in the blog post:

It is ancient doctrine that at common law ownership of the land extended to the periphery of the universe - Cujus est solum ejus est usque ad coelum. But that doctrine has no place in the modern world. The air is a public highway, as Congress has declared. Were that not true, every transcontinental flight would subject the operator to countless trespass suits. Common sense revolts at the idea. To recognize such private claims to the airspace would clog these highways, seriously interfere with their control and development in the public interest, and transfer into private ownership that to which only the public has a just claim. 328 U.S. at 261.

The use I've made of this paragraph is simply to remark an old property rule (that property extended to the 'periphery of the universe') that modern 'common sense' changed (by making the 'air a public highway'). What might have made sense with one technology (a world without airplanes) no longer makes sense with another technology (airplanes) and so society thus faces a choice: respect the ancient doctrines despite the consequence for progress (by which I mean the ordinary meaning of 'progress' and not the very different meaning intended in the title, 'Progress & Freedom Foundation'), or let 'common sense' revolt against that regressive idea. The case recognized, and respected, the revolt. The law of property does not extend to the 'periphery of the universe.'

DeLong says this is wrong. Again, as he describes, I had described the case as 'overthrowing the old legal doctrine that a landowner's property extends to the heavens, thus making the airspace into a commons.' This description, DeLong asserts, 'misstates' the case. For in fact, the Causby's won. And that instead, as DeLong explains the case,

Its basic teaching is that not even a government, let alone a private party, is permitted to simply decree that something is now a commons, without regard to the impact on existing rights.

This is now my favorite example of the kind of binary thinking that pollutes Washington. My claim had been that the 'ancient doctrine' was declared void -- that the right of property did not extend to the 'periphery of the universe.' DeLong is right that the Causby's prevailed in the Supreme Court on a takings claim. But their victory was not because, as DeLong states, 'not even a government, let alone a private party, is permitted to simply decree that something is now a commons.' Their victory was because the invasion they alleged was so extreme. But the Court is absolutely clear that the old rule -- that property extends to the 'periphery of the universe' is no longer the law. As Douglas writes,

The airspace, apart from the immediate reaches above the land, is part of the public domain.

'[P]art of the public domain.' How did it become part of the public domain? By a 'simpl[e] decree that something is now a commons.' Does that mean everything is in the public domain? Of course not: as the case recognizes, the 'immediate reaches above the land' may still be claimed. But beyond the 'immediate reaches above the land,' property that before was claimed by landowners was now decreed to be 'in the public domain.'

Did anyone receive compensation for that taking? No. Has DeLong provided anything to contradict that claim? No. Instead DeLong's analysis follows precisely the binary thought of most in Washington: If someone is claiming that the extreme claims of property are wrong, then someone must be claiming that there is no claim of property.

But of course, no one I know makes such an extreme claim. I think Google has a 'fair use' right to build an index to books. (See a careful account of this by Bill Patry.) I don't think Google has the right to scan copyrighted books from a library and serve full copies of those books to anyone in the world. That is, I distinguish between some rights, and all rights.

The Causby case matches that distinction precisely:

(1) The law gives copyright owners an exclusive right to 'copy.' That's the equivalent of the law giving land owners rights to the 'periphery of the universe.'

(2) A new technology (digital networks; airplanes) now renders absurd respecting that exclusive right as it was before that technology.

(3) The proper response is for commons sense to 'revolt' against the extreme claim (that the publishers get to control every copy, even one to simply produce an index; that the rights to land extend to the 'periphery of the universe')

(4) Revolting against the extreme claim does not entail abolishing all rights absolutely. The Causby's can complain about planes flying within the 'immediate reaches' of the ground. The authors and publishers should be able to complain about, e.g., someone who scanned and made full copies of a copyrighted book available online.

But there is one great and true part to DeLong's email. As he writes,

Causby was entitled only to the decline in his property value, not to a share of the gains from the air age.

Truly, if there is a principle here, that should be it. The baseline is the value of the property BEFORE the new technology. Does the new technology reduce THAT value. Put differently, would authors and publishers be worse off with Google Print than they were before Google Print?

To ask that question is to answer it -- of course the authors and publishers are better off with Google Print.

Are they as well off as they could be, if the law gives them the power to extort from the innovator some payment for his innovation?

To ask that question is to understand why this case has been filed: Like Valenti with the Betamax, the publishers and Authors Guild simply want to tax the value created by Google Print. They are not complaining about any 'decline in [their] property value' caused by Google Print. They are instead racing to claim the value that ancient law is said to give to them, despite the harm that claim produces for 'progress.'

"

(Via Lessig Blog.)

Innuendo. Get it?

The best of England's new "Let's Keep Crime Down" campaign: "

Engadget editors, for instance.

So the Home Office crime prevention department in the UK just launched this three year ‘Let’s Keep Crime Down’
campaign with a specific bend on consumer electronics and portables to, um, help reduce crime. So without further ado,
may we present our picks for the best of ‘Let’s Keep Crime Down’...





[Thanks, Adrian]

... including the corner of a shop in order to snatch the sweet, sweet
olives within.

Wonder which phone they used for this ad?

How’d they get a picture of Engadget HQ?

Read | Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments
© 2005 Weblogs, Inc.

"

(Via engadget.com.)

The President acting out scenes from Secretary. Also, a Panda.

Bush's Butterstick: "

There's been a lot talk lately about whether or not Bush should fire Karl Rove in an effort to stop his precipitous slide down into approval rating hell. (Also it would be what he promised to do.) Say he does -- what then? How do you get people to fall back in love with a White House that's grown distant, cold and ugly?

We think we know:

"

(Via Wonkette.)

Cradle to Grave: "

Jill Fehrenbacher and Sarah Rich write about the ongoing evolution of sustainable design at Inhabitat.

When it comes time to bury a loved one, our otherwise expansive worldview is often funneled down to the immediate and necessary. Thinking of the environmental impact of final arrangements is rarely a priority. But there are people out there, from product designers to funeral home owners, who are trying to make it a little easier to make an eco-conscious choice when the time comes.

It is generally thought that cremation is more environmentally responsible than traditional burial, since the latter uses all kinds of toxic substances to embalm the body, as well as in the manufacturing of the casket, which is often lined with heavy metals and finished with harsh resins. Additionally, gravesites are deep, concrete-lined vaults, the creation of which is not a low-impact endeavor. While vast cemetaries full of concrete and stone memorials do have a certain haunting beauty, there are alternative guises for a cemetary that do greater service to the land, and can be a more pleasant place for visitors to come memorialize the dead. The green burial movement began in the UK, where there are now numerous eco-cemeteries full of trees rather than headstones. In the US, land restoration projects such as Fernwood use natural burial as a means of restoring native species to large areas of land.

Some more high-tech alternatives have been springing up, as well, one of the most intriguing being Biopresence, another UK venture which creates 'living memorials' by literally implanting human DNA into a tree, thus allowing the 'essence' of that person to live on.

This is really an untapped area of opportunity for design and innovation. It will never disappear and it impacts every one of us. The challenge, more than anything, is in the fact that death is a taboo subject for many of us, or at the very least something to which we avoid devoting much thought. But these slowly emerging evolutions in the arena of death rites and burial are proving that there is a great deal of room for improvement, both for the individual and the earth.

FERNWOOD ECO-CEMETERY

Fernwood Cemetery has existed for over a century, though their natural burial offerings are fairly new. The Mill Valley, CA, establishment is a funeral home, crematory and cemetery with an underlying mission of completing a longterm land restoration project through eco-friendly burials. Each burial that takes place there provides an opportunity to remove invasive species and renew the landscape through the use of native plants, trees and flowers.

In contrast to a traditional burial, which uses toxic embalming fluids, caskets lined with heavy metals and harmful finishes, and invasive excavation of the land, a natural burial uses a biodegradable casket without embalming fluids or a concrete vault. Native trees and plants are grown above the burial site, and Fernwood uses GPS to digitally keep track of gravesites. They also offer a digital 'Lifestories' biography as a means of preserving memories of the deceased.

SOUL ASH SOLACE

Back in July, we wrote about the Bios Urn, a container for cremation ashes which biodegrades over time, distributing seedlings into the earth and sprouting trees in memory of the deceased. Belgian design company, Maximal Design has also been inspired by the universal need for designs surrounding death rites. Their Soul Ash Solace is a cremation coffin and urn in one.

The coffin itself is made from lightweight, eco-friendly cardboard, wood and paper maché, all of which burn easily without emitting harmful vapors into the air. The stainless steel urn, which is shaped like an hour-glass to symbolize that 'time heals all wounds,' sits on top of the coffin. The urn withstands the heat of the burning process and gains a uniquely colored patina from the flames.

The idea with Soul Ash Solace is not only to bring beautiful design to a process we all go through, but also to create an inexpensive, environmentally-friendly solution to a ritual that can often be costly and polluting. The design was a nominee in this year's Index: in Copenhagen, a well-deserved recognition of forward-thinking design for a largely unacknowledged, though truly universal life event.

BIOS URN

Some things in our society are completely over-designed (how many handbags does one person need?) Other things are so solemn that design is rarely, if ever, considered. Rituals surrounding death fall into the latter category.

Although it happens to everyone at some point, there is not a wide variety of choices out there when it comes down to dealing with human remains. That's why the Bios Urn is such a thoughtful idea.

Designed by the Azuamoline duo, (Martin Ruiz de Azua and Gerard Moliné) the Bios Urn is a container for cremated ashes, made from compacted coconut shells, organic fertilizer and tree seedlings. As the container biodegrades, a seed will sprout, recycling you or your loved one back into the circle of life.

According to designer Azua:

Death always comes and somehow it has to be designed. The actual ritual is old-fashioned and also increases space problems in large cities.

In theory, the Bios Urn would allow graveyards to be turned back into forest over time.

Unfortunately, this design is still just a concept and not out on the market yet, as far as I can tell. Hopefully crematoriums and funeral parlors will make this option available in the near future.

CAPSULA MUNDI

The most earthly looking eco-burial container that we've found is the Capsula Mundi, created by a pair of Italian designers who wanted to remove the taboo from the burial process and give it a new conception.

The Capsula Mundi is an egg-shaped container made of bioplastic. The body of the deceased rests in a fetal position within this capsule, which gets planted in the earth like a bulb. A shallow circular depression is dug above the capsule to symbolize the presence of the body, in the center of which a tree is planted. Over time, the groups of burial sites become a sacred memorial grove.

The Capsula Mundi has made appearances as a design piece in exhibitions around Europe, including one with Droog Design last year. As a show piece, the design is a quintessential representation of a sprouting seed, perfectly encapsulating the designers' goal of regarding death as an opportunity to nourish the earth for the future.

BIOPRESENCE

Genetic modification is a controversial subject. We've got corporations promising to reduce world hunger by introducing badly needed nutrients into staple food crops. The same companies sue farmers over ownership of corn whose seedlings were dropped by birds. Such omniscience is both awe-striking and highly suspect given the short past and unpredictable future of biotechnology.

In an artistic response to the advancement of biotech, Biopresence has become its own godlike entity. Biopresence is an art venture currently based in the UK, which, in short, aims to preserve human genetic material by inserting it into living trees. The trees thus become 'living memorials' or 'transgenic tombstones' for the humans whose DNA they contain. This may top cryogenics for unusual final resting options.

Founders Shiho Fukuhara and Georg Tremmel established the venture 'with the purpose of exploring, participating and ultimately defining the most relevant playing field of the 21st century: the impact of biotechnologies on society and the human perception of these coming changes.'

The creators of Biopresence emphasize that their procedure does not result in a genetically-modified organism (GMO). Their method, which comes from collaborating artist/scientist Joe Davis's DNA Manifold Algorithm, allows human genetic information to be stored without affecting the genes of the tree. The 'physical essence of the human body' is produced in the tissue of the tree. As it decays, it releases its decomposition products in order to nurture new plants. Biopresence suggests that the method offers a desireable alternative in countries that have anti-burial laws.

Suffice it to say, Biopresence offers a fascinating new twist on biotechnical experimentation. It's a complex collision of genetics, art and ecology, with a touch of social commentary. And given that the future of genetic modification is as mysterious as life after death, it might be a perfect pairing.

(Posted by Jill Fehrenbacher and Sarah Rich in Sustainability Sundays at 10:35 AM)"

(Via WorldChanging: Another World Is Here.)

FW: [IP] more on Anonymous sperm donor traced using DNA, Internet

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber <dave@farber.net>
Date: Friday, Nov 4, 2005 8:37 pm
Subject: [IP] more on Anonymous sperm donor traced using DNA, Internet

Begin forwarded message:

From: Bob Alberti <alberti@sanction.net>
Date: November 4, 2005 7:22:31 PM EST
To: dave@farber.net
Subject: RE: [IP] Anonymous sperm donor traced using DNA, Internet
Reply-To: alberti@sanction.net

What a fantastic story, and what a resourceful young man.

As a reunited adoptee and one of the founders of Bastard Nation
(http://www.bastards.org ) I have to say that I am encouraged by this lad's
ability to unearth his heritage. But I am disturbed that a child undertook
all the cost and risk involved in meeting this stranger, and that the donor
agency stresses the confidentiality of the adult donor over the emotional
and physical well-being of the searching child.

The forgotten member of the anonymous donor contract is the offspring. These persons did not agree to the contract of anonymity. The fact of their
conception does not obligate them to adhere to a contract to which they did
not agree. Likewise, adoptees all over the world are held to adoption contracts and promises to which they were not a party.

Adopted persons and donor offspring are more vulnerable than other citizens
to genetically-inherited vulnerabilities to disease. They do not have contact with blood relatives, increasing the difficulty of locating organ or
marrow donations. And these liabilities are handed down to their own offspring, who certainly have no responsibility for the conditions under which their parents were conceived.

Adoption and sperm donorship are excellent and necessary institutions. But
for too long agencies have made promises that they have no right making in
order to facilitate their business. And they maintain policies of secrecy
and privileged information without appropriate oversight: policies that deny
the rights of the adult citizens who emerge from their practices.

It is long past time that these organizations revisit the core beliefs that
underly their placement policies: that children are a commodity, that secrecy is beneficial to the donor or adoption process, and that they have
any right at all to keep from adult citizens the personal and medical information that can profoundly affect the lives of those citizens and their
own chilren.

And as this story indicates, if these agencies cannot grow and change they
will be bypassed. Mightn't it have been better in this case for the 15 year
old to be encouraged to wait until he was an adult, with the understanding
that at that time he would have the right to contact his biological father?
Wouldn't it have been better if, refusing to accept that delay, he and his
parents could have received counselling in concert with the meeting with his
biological father? Instead, a child took matters into his own hands and faced all the risks without any professional guidance.

Secrets and lies are not an appropriate foundation for such well- intentioned
businesses as donor banks and adoption agencies. It's long since past time
that these ill-considered secrecy policies be discarded, and open practices
be put into place to protect all parties and guarantee the full rights of
everyone involved - including the adults who trace their origins to these
organizations.

Bob Alberti, "Founding Foundling," Bastard Nation, http:// www.bastards.org
Phone: (612) 486-5000 ext 211 PO Box 583453
http://www.sanction.net Mpls, MN 55458-3453

"They SAY that your network is secure, but how can you be certain?"

-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber [mailto:dave@farber.net]
Sent: Friday, November 04, 2005 5:47 PM
To: ip@v2.listbox.com
Subject: [IP] Anonymous sperm donor traced using DNA, Internet

Date: November 3, 2005 2:35:14 PM EST
To: Multiple recipients of list talk <talk@privacy.cs.cmu.edu>
Subject: PRIVACY:: Anonymous sperm donor traced using DNA, Internet
Reply-To: talk@privacy.cs.cmu.edu

Here's a clever 15 year old. First he uses DNA to find two men with very similar genes to himself and the same last name. His mother knew the date and place of birth of the unidentified donor. Only one
person with that name was born at that time in that place. It seems
to be time to figure out the risk of re-identifiability using {DNA,
DoB, place of birth} along with genealogical databases.

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18825244.200

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If this doesn't scream MUG ME, I don't know what does...

But Damn it IS hot.

Cool Cans With Nano Dock: "


MacAlly's mTune is a sweet looking set of cans with a dock for the iPod nano. Only $50 -- though no ship date has been set.

They're cordless, naturally, and don't even require any batteries. There's a standard jack for use with a computer or other music player."

(Via Cult of Mac.)

I don't know what this is, but Kt sent it to me.

I'll play it when I get home.

Somebody let me know how it is...

Paris Burning.

POLITICS: Paris: The Beirut of Europe: "They say Beirut is the Paris of the Middle East. Does that mean Paris is the Beirut of Europe? Or is that an insult to Beirut?



Paris has been on fire for 11 days. The violence is out of control and it has spread to 300 towns. Some are calling this the French Intifada.

PARIS, Nov. 7 -- France's national police chief warned Monday that a 'shock wave is spreading across the country' as rioting intensified in cities throughout France during an 11th night of violence. Officials from neighboring countries expressed concern that the unrest could leap across international borders.



Gangs of young men burned 1,408 cars and trucks in dozens of cities across France, national police chief Michel Gaudin said at a news conference Monday.



[…]



In one of the most extreme episodes of violence Saturday night, youths in Evreux, a city in northwestern France, assaulted police and set fire to a strip mall, two schools, a post office and 53 cars.



'Rioters attacked us with baseball bats,' Philippe Jofres, a deputy fire chief, told France-2 television. 'We were attacked with pickaxes. It was war.'



In Corbeil-Essonnes, a suburb south of Paris, a car rammed into a McDonald's restaurant, setting it ablaze and burning it to the ground. And Justice Ministry officials said they discovered a crude bomb-making workshop in a dilapidated building in Evry, south of Paris, that contained 100 empty bottles and gallons of fuel, according to the Associated Press.



Throughout the Paris suburbs, arsonists hit gymnasiums, schools and other symbols of the government.

Meanwhile, Beirut is peaceful and calm. And Beirut has and has had a lot more political problems than Paris.



The Lebanese people threw off the yoke of Syrian occupation, oppression, and de facto annexation while committing no violence. The supposedly ‘Western’ model of civil disobedience and protest worked beautifully even in the Middle East against a vicious military dictatorship.



The disgruntled of Paris, on the other hand, are inviting a brutal crackdown from a state infinitely less oppressive that the Syrian Baath regime. While some parts of the Middle East import liberal ‘Western’ political ideas into their culture, some parts of Europe import pathologies from the illiberal places in the Middle East and North Africa. Ah, the ironies of globalization.



It is slightly bizarre watching Europe explode from the tranquility of Beirut. But I'm getting used to it.

(Written by: Michael_J_Totten)

"

(Via SuicideGirls: News Wire.)

Laura Tony & I went to go see Safety Last! this afternoon at the Brooklyn Public Library.

Free Showing of Brilliant Silent Slapstick with live piano accompaniment. I suppose it takes very little to get me to go out to a movie...

For those of you that missed Guy Fawkes day...

remember remember

"All right!" says England. "Wha...: "

remember remember



'All right!' says England. 'What're you two doin there with that gunpowder!'
'Why sir I am offended by your implication,' says me. 'We were just collectin gunpowder for charity.'
'Yes very true,' says Giblets. 'Millions of children go without gunpowder to eat every day.'
'Well that sounds reasonable,' says England. 'But what's with stickin it under Parliament!'
'Well Parliament has so much gunpowder to give,' says me.
'Yes, especially with all the gunpowder we stuck under it,' says Giblets.
'Everything seems to check out then,' says England. 'I'll just need your names and occupations for my report.'
'My name is Plausible Alias an this is my good friend Bomby McTreason,' says me.
'And we are violent regicidal conspirators,' says Giblets. 'No wait! I mean cookie merchants.'
'Everything checks out then,' says England. 'Carry on folks!'
'Oh no!' says Parliament.


'And that's how a bill becomes a law,' says me.
'Giblets is confused,' says Giblets.

"

(Via Fafblog.)