The Raven

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• Commented on More Insight on Those Leaked Climate Change Emails
  "The emails read of nothing but really under handed data manipulation." You've made the one of the most serious professional accusations that can be leveled at scientists, and based on anonymous, unsourced, unreliable texts. Don't you feel any doubt? Any...
• Commented on More Insight on Those Leaked Climate Change Emails
  As to the FOI requests, this from from Halldór Björnsson of the Icelandic Met covers the ground: the requests are refused because the labs don't have the right to distribute data given them by various national meteorological agencies. The FOI...
• Commented on Goldwag: I Was A Teenaged Straussian
  "Philosophy calls into question the conventional morality upon which civil order in society depends; it also reveals ugly truths that weaken men's attachment to their societies [...]" I think Strauss gave ideas too much credit. People confronted with truly new...
• Commented on Shroud of Turin reproduced
  Or perhaps, the body originally wrapped in the shroud was still alive?...
• Commented on Oligarch's yacht has a laser anti-photo screen
  "The camera detection system relies on sweeping the scene with a low power laser and looking for an unusually bright and direct reflection." To my bright beady eyes, it seems that this is likely to detect and attack eyes. Or...
• Commented on Apple kills Google Voice on iPhone
  I think the gPhone is going to win....
• Commented on Land mine "donated" to Good Will
  Wow, domestic terrorism. Where did they get the damn thing?...
• Commented on ATM to guy depositing California state IOU: "Come back without a [registered] warrant."
  For this we bailed out Chase, BofA, Wells Fargo, and Citibank? I know! Let's start calling Schwarzenegger the the Collector!...
• Commented on Prominent Black professor arrested for entering own home while Black
  "There is no human situation so miserable that it cannot be made worse by the presence of a policeman." I believe Gates. The story is a common one. The Boston police are notorious for both racism and heavy-handedness. For those...
• Commented on Delete this book
  "Ipods should not be the universal player of music on the same way that Kindle should never be the universal player of books. This should be illegal." Perhaps, instead, regulated? If natural monopoly is the order of the day, perhaps...
• Commented on ATMs that spray attackers with pepper-spray
  Ah, yes, one of the classic problems of chemical and biological weapons: blowback....
• Commented on Amazon Kindle contract sucks
  I note in particular this remark from the contract committee: All you can ever collect, under any theory, is what they have paid you over the last twelve months. In other words, Amazon is uncollectible. This means that your sole...
• Commented on Taser releases new "shock shotguns" - safety tests MIA, but they're on Twitter and Facebook!
  The non-lethal purpose convulsers is the induction of pain. Corvids don't care too much about hominid pain...but perhaps hominids do....
• Commented on Taser releases new "shock shotguns" - safety tests MIA, but they're on Twitter and Facebook!
  Sednaboo: depends on the results, doesn't it? If you're corvid food, you're still food regardless of how you get there. US cops are using these things instead of talking people down, and the cops are using them a lot--more people...
• Commented on Bruce Sterling's closing talk at Reboot -- life in the next decade
  Atemporality--We cease to be able to date anything within centuries, let alone decades, by the language of its ornamentation.Cranky Ozzie Spengler. Lots to dislike about him. But he knew something....
• Commented on Amazon Kindle contract sucks
  It's a distribution contract, not a publishing contract; an author who signs it is self-publishing. I bet Amazon offers better distribution contracts to pro publishers. I remember when self-publishing through the 'net was supposed to be the salvation of authors....
• Commented on Abusive "coal-thugs" try to break up anti-mountaintop-removal festival
  These are what union people call "goons"--company cops. They're scary. The local police and prosecutors office are probably part of the problem, for those of you saying this should be actionable. Of course a threat of murder is against the...
• Commented on Reverse-engineering SSNs from publicly available data
  SSN's aren't and never were PINs. May this report lead to reform....
• Commented on Justice Department to review wireless carriers for anti-competitive practices
  Heee. Near as I can figure, cell service is leased at a gross profit of 5 or 10 times cost. ...wonder if the DoJ will address that....
• Commented on BB Video - Pirate Bay Surrenders to Hollywood: Peter Sunde interview
  You didn't think the people running Pirates Bay were doing it out of high idealism, now did you?...
• Commented on Illustrators upset over Google's invitation to contribute free art
  Y'know, they don't ask the lead Chrome software engineers to work for free. They pay them. & some people do make free or "free" contributions to the software, but they're usually offered for free, not solicited. I want to see...
• Commented on Illustrators upset over Google's invitation to contribute free art
  "I initially didn't understand what the problem was. As fledgling freelance designer, I would consider working for exposure for a multimillion dollar company. Even if they could well afford to pay me as the exposure of my work would be...
• Commented on Illustrators upset over Google's invitation to contribute free art
  Top pros don't need more publicity--their names are already known. There's other reasons to give some stuff away. Phil Foglio (Girl Genius) commented once that he tells older pros that he's giving a lot away & still making money &...
• Commented on Chinese court hands down prison for extortion of virtual wealth
  No, the RIAA is trying to defend its members intellectual property; they see people who republish members IP without their consent as thieves. There's a cognitive difference, I suppose; property in a game, within the game, "feels" (is perceived as)...
• Commented on Chinese court hands down prison for extortion of virtual wealth
  How does virtual property differ from intellectual property, I wonder?...
• Commented on "Kurzweil will probably die"
  Y'know, AI is starting to seem like the modern version of the philosopher's stone. And people have broken their hearts looking for AI, too!...
• Commented on BB Video - Guatemala Protests: Eyewitness Cellphone Video from Twitterers
  I was going to write a more extensive reply, but "what Jeaguilar said" will mostly do. I will add that when I hear a political movement complain of crime, that movement may well be used support an authoritarian crackdown. My...
• Commented on BB Video - Guatemala Protests: Eyewitness Cellphone Video from Twitterers
  The internet vastly widens the scope of the agent provocatuer. Most of the people protesting could be apolitical. But this could be skillful trolling. I do know something of Latin American history, politics and activism, though not so much of...
• Commented on BB Video - Guatemala Protests: Eyewitness Cellphone Video from Twitterers
  We are reminded how the people with Twitter and Youtube access in Guatemala is the out-of-power (and horrible) Guatemalan right. Are we being played by some magic realist version of wingnuts?...
• Commented on How kids use the net now, from danah boyd
  And Wikipedia, I suppose. It's the triumph of the Wiki World News. Krawk!...