Battlestar Galactica will end its series run after next season. My remorse could not be greater, however, I would rather the producers end the series on their own terms than drag the series out and fill it with sub-standard episodes.
Microsoft has just unveiled a new and cool user interface called Surface. Users of the interface use a touch-sensitive table to interact with the software. Wired has a good intro article and video. You can also check out the official Microsoft site. This new interface has the potential to be really cool, something Microsoft is not known for.
From:engadget
Microsoft’s General Counsel claims that free and open-source software (FOSS) violates exactly 235 Microsoft patents: Linux kernel (42), Linux GUI (65), Open Office suite (45), email (15), and then another 68 patents violated across a variety of FOSS wares.
From:Best of the Web
Oh No, Not Agana!
Who says the Democratic Congress isn’t getting anything done? By a vote of 288-133, the House last week approved the Guam World War II Loyalty Recognition Act, described by Congress.org as follows:Recognizes the suffering and the loyalty of the people of Guam during the Japanese occupation of Guam in World War II.
Directs the Secretary of the Treasury to make specified payments to: (1) living Guam residents who were killed, injured, interned, or subjected to forced labor or marches resulting from, or incident to, such occupation and subsequent liberation; and (2) survivors of compensable residents who died in war or survivors of compensable injured residents (such payments to be made after payments have been made to surviving Guam residents). Defines “compensable Guam decedent” and “compensable Guam victim.”
In fairness, the bill, whose text you can read by clicking here and going to the fourth version listed, doesn’t actually refer to “living Guam residents who were killed.” Still, isn’t there something screwy about the idea that the U.S. taxpayer should be paying reparations for atrocities committed by the enemy more than six decades ago? No wonder we can’t afford the war in Iraq.
From: Patriot Post
Clearly demonstrating that they cannot be trusted with the nation’s security, House Democrats are considering an Intelligence Authorization bill that calls for an assessment of the effects of climate change on national security. Yes, you read that right, climate change. With existential threats such as al-Qa’ida, North Korea, Red China and Iran lurking around the world, one would think that the nation’s limited intelligence resources could be put to better use than studying SUV exhaust. This same misuse of defense-related programs occurred during the Clinton years, too. We wonder what clues to 9/11 were missed while satellites were photographing polar bears in the Arctic.
Describing the climate study as “cutting edge,†Intelligence panel Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) said the idea is one of several changes his party has made to intelligence policy. “This is an area that we may be vulnerable in terms of potential terrorists,†Reyes declared. The office of Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) wondered, “It’s hard to imagine how anyone could believe that climate change represents a more clear and present danger to the United States than radical Islamic terrorists armed with bombs, but that’s essentially what Democrats have concluded in this bill.†Indeed, should the U.S. ever again have to answer the question, “Was this attack preventable?†the answer will be that instead of funding the intelligence services to evaluate and warn of direct national threats, funds were diverted to study climate change. Don’t you feel safer already?
That statement came from a professor of science at Carleton University. He along with another professor believe that the debate about climate change has become irrational, on both sides. Everybody needs to just calm down and back-up their arguments with proven facts and/or rationality.
American psycho-News-World-US & Americas-TimesOnline
This is a fairly interesting article on the man who committed the vile attack on Virgina Tech University on April 16, 2007.
From: The Patriot Post
In his Commonplace Book, Jefferson quotes Cesare Beccaria from his seminal work, On Crimes and Punishment: “Laws that forbid the carrying of arms… disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes… Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.â€
The same can be said of so-called “gun-free zonesâ€
Jack Thompson Blames Bill Gates for VT Shooting
“…the worst school massacre in world history was at the hands of Robert Steinhaeuser, who literally trained on the Microsoft on-line, hyper-violent shooter game, Counterstrike… As you know, I similalry [sic] went on NBC’s Today Show with the DC Beltway Sniper still unidentified and at-large a few years ago and told Matt Lauer and the nation that the triggerman would most likely be a teen video gamer trained on a sniper video game. The tarot card was a clue, but there were other clues. I was right, as Malvo trained on your Microsoft game, Halo.”
Just for reference, according to Bungie.net, in the last 24 hours over 500,000 unique players played Halo 2 online. According to Wikipedia, 9.2 million copies of the game have been sold worldwide. Also, according to Valve, at any one time there are approximately 150,000 people playing some form of Counterstrike. How can one honestly believe that these games lead individuals to violent behavior when it is so obviously a horrible fringe minority? On top of that, if you can show me an average young male in the United States who has never played any sort of violent video game, I’d be absolutely dumbstruck.
[Update] It has come to my attention that the version of Counterstrike that Cho was playing was not even published by Microsoft. Counterstrike for the PC was published by Sierra Studios. Though, Sierra doesn’t have enough money to be the victim of Thompson’s lunatic lawsuit frenzy.
From Daily News:
“Then the gunfire started coming closer. Librescu, 77, fearlessly braced himself against the door, holding it shut against the gunman in the hall, while students darted to the windows of the second-floor classroom to escape the slaughter, survivors said.”
At this tragic time we should focus on the heroism of Professor Liviu Librescu, who saved the lives of his students, instead of starting an emotional argument about guns. We should focus on the effect his heroism will have on the students he saved, and what they think about his selfless and courageous act. There is not enough positive news these days and we all need some example that there are good forces out there, working.
From: TJ McIntyre
On the wall outside his former residence – flat number 27B – where Orwell lived until his death in 1950, an historical plaque commemorates the anti-authoritarian author. And within 200 yards of the flat, there are 32 CCTV cameras, scanning every move.
There is an interesting article on Wired.com which discusses the new faux pas of labeling a work of art “science fiction”. I understand that a good amount of science fiction is poorly done and gives the genre a bad name, but science fiction done well can introduce us to new and thought provoking ideas. I can’t understand why a director/writer/author would shy away from the label “science fiction”. Battlestar Galactica producer Ron Moore himself doesn’t like to use that label. I have news for him, whether or not he likes the label BSG is science fiction as well as drama. What BSG does that not many shows can do is use science fiction as a pre-text to get viewers to watch an extremely well done TV drama. As many critics have said before it is the best show on television.
Now a word about bad scifi. Those who continue to watch bad science fiction are part of the problem. Fans should demand science fiction that is well done and not watch science fiction just for the sake of watching science fiction. Science fiction fans as a community should expect the same level of quality in a show or movie that every other genre has.
There is a new Battlestar Galactica game demo that runs on Macs, Windows and Linux.
Demo
CAPRICA CITY, Caprica, 31 Ares — The skies were cloudy, the radiation levels moderate, and the cream of Cylon civilization was present in droves for the opening of the first Caprica City Starbucks.
“I always used to joke: How many planets do we have to destroy to get a decent cup of coffee around here?†said a Brother Cavil model while waiting. “Turns out it’s twelve. Who knew?â€
From: Lt. Col. Oliver North/Fox News
Three weeks after Pearl Harbor, nearly 100 American civilian construction contractors were killed and wounded standing shoulder-to-shoulder with U.S. Marines and sailors defending Wake Island. When the tiny garrison was overwhelmed on 23 December 1941, more than 1,000 contractors became prisoners of the Rising Sun and scores were subsequently worked to death and massacred by their captors. None of those who died received so much as a Purple Heart.
With the new Orb MyCasting software, media geeks can stream music, video, pictures or even youtube.com from their computer to their TV using any network-connected next-gen console.
From UPI
“Environmentalism should belong in the social sciences,” much like the idea of communism or other “-isms” such as feminism, Klaus said, adding that “environmentalism is a religion” that seeks to reorganize the world order as well as social behavior and value systems worldwide.
BSG spoilers, as in Battlestar Galactica. Some nugget on another blog whined that he didnt know that BSG meant Battlestar Galactica. What a frak’n dweeb.
I feel the same way Crystal does about this “Dead? Or Alive?” question and I think TomCat agrees.
From:Crystal
What do you hear TomCat?
It must be very “inconvenient” for Al Gore that people insist on debating the merits of his claims. Isn’t this the guy that also claimed to have invented the Internet?
From Best of the Web
Here we have a major American politician who is calling for policies that would impose huge costs on society but appears to be profiting handsomely himself; who is leading an extravagant lifestyle while demanding sacrifices from ordinary people; and who is calling on the media to suppress the views of those with whom he disagrees, while at the same time urging more government regulation in the name of “fairness” to his partisan and ideological allies.
Why is it left to think tanks and bloggers to investigate and expose all this? Why aren’t the mainstream media all over the story? Could it be . . . bias?