This thread is on the side bar, and perhaps this is one subtle way to reflect how the community has spoken. I thought the original intention was to let the blog post slip away as new posts come in (which is erriely similar to the "let it slide" method used by most governments). It seems the controversy caused by the policy has stayed pretty long.

If one can say that the biggest corporations or the biggest nations of the world should be the model of the rest of the world, shouldn't the Top 25 Blogs (or perhaps the top 10 political blogs) of the world show the best of what they can do with readers' comments?

I thought "You" was the Person of the Year 2006 of Time Magazine, and all those "You"s can do is to comment on what the bloggers say, but not how the bloggers moderate all the "you"s?

What the discussion threads is running here is a benevolent dictatorship, and it's nowhere near democracy that the blog is advocating. It is the same system used by most blogs, but the fact that most moderation runs the same way does not make a good argument why it has to be the way. In fact, some corporate blogs (e.g. Adobe or Microsoft) have even more open comment policies. There is no process on how the community can help agree on the Moderation Policy, and we have a judge who is biased towards certain people (e.g. change tone when the person is Tom Neff) and likes to make a lot of public speeches. And you cannot even vote.

Sure, some commenters just like to comment and do not want to care what these governing policies are, but there is those who are paranoid about his posts offending somebody in the blog just because he is providing a different viewpoint, too. Post #469 explained this pretty well.

This blog is infected by a few commenters who pay no respect to others' comments (e.g. calling someone "utter fail") - even if those comments have flaws, they don't deserve to be slammed with rudeness like that - yet the moderator had not even made a move to stop them. After reading those rude comments that never got moderated, I don't even know what I should write to mean "polite" enough not to be disemvoweled or deleted.

Now that our angry superhero knows about such injustice in Thailand, he should go there and save our world from racism.

Or

When in Rome, do as the Romans do.

In future, we may be recommended to take Collodial Silver to deflect MRI scans.

To me, it is the beginning of the "record everything" era.

But there is one big problem: Mysteriously, everyone in your pictures look very, very confused.

I'm sure the parents twenty years later will be so psych-ed about this and wear this all the time while going on family vacation, just so that their kids will be annoyed and go goth and stare at the hidden cameras.

While I doubt I can easily convince the few hardcore extremists around here, I would urge anyone who are interested or curiously concerned people to begin a conversation instead of getting highly emotional on a foreign subject matter.

Though Americans are as hyper-provocative as they always are, it's easy to scream slogans across the oceans, yet I think most are pretty shy to actually start a conversation:

A. Get a Chinese friend, or two. While it's unlikely for the first chat to be politically-charged (though be surprised by pretty open-minded Chinese people), see if the interaction gets you any further with your understanding with China.

B. To make it less human, let's just say if anybody would ever IM/private-message up people who think the otherwise.

I had done so with some more provocative friends, while the goal had never been to convince the others, acceptance and understanding is a much further step forward than presumptions and aggression.

Back then, collecting cards helped me differentiate the counterfeit from the real. A few decades later, it helped me understand perfectionism and details in graphic design does make a difference!

It was always an educational/annoying debate/experience when a kid used a counterfeit card to win, and the other kid argued that the card was invalid ("It did not have the power! It's a fake!").

The itchiness doesn't end once you know there is an itch out there you must scratch...

Non-Japanese loves to take photographs of themselves posing outside the building with peace signs. :)

While Bush and the US flag is burnt a thousand times throughout the world, one can make China/Chinese pretty angry when some singer whispers some words at the end of a concert.

This is where the general characteristics of the cultures differ: China, as it gets more and more "open" to the world, has won praises but also an equal dose of criticism - which is something nobody there had ever heard of before 1990s.

As Americans are abrased by criticisms and anger every day from all over the world on Microsoft to MacDonalds to war on Iraq, they had either developed much better A) immunity, or B) understanding of the rest of the world.

Meanwhile, the Olympics is probably the first time many Chinese show their faces in the world. Before that, other countries in the world are just... other countries that you don't speak to, or have ever heard from.

#91 is pretty much right on point. The protests probably wouldn't bring forth any changes to the human rights condition of current China, but it definitely would make the Chinese youth become aware of the voices around the world.

It would be a long process of interactions spent between millions of conversations between people from East and West in the next few decades to come. That is why I would think a boycott on Olympics will only set up a barrier for such interactions - it's relatively much easier for a Chinese and an American talking about democracy in a dinner, than a Chinese and an American screaming at each other during a pro-unity vs pro-independence protest. It does no good for the future of the world to make a rift when both sides haven't done enough research and understanding on each other.

Let's just say, has anybody even been to China? Stayed there for a year? Made any local friends?

(Honestly speaking, I haven't been to mainland China either.)

Stop eating alligators! Get Geico!

This standing animal tastes like chicken.

Imagine the corporate possibilities...

Comparing 1932, 2008 is NOTHING! What a peaceful world we are living in! (And yes, those were bad times, honestly speaking.) All these countries should be boycott from 1932 Olympics:

1. Bonus Army: All countries should boycott the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles, for the US used army troops to forcibly remove protesters from Washington DC. Some protesters were shot and killed, just 2 days before Olympics! The protestors burned down their own camps while the public says the army burned down the camps.

2. The Soviets should boycott the US due to its worse ideology (i.e. Marxism is way more advanced than the evils of Capitalism (well, this is my generalization, of course.)) and racial discrimination.

3. The Brits should be boycott for arresting a person named Gandhi.

4. Japan should be boycott for, um, invasion of China. (Wonder why USSR was boycott for invading Afghanistan... which eventually leads to 9/11)

5. Italy for Fascism.

You wonder what happened in the classroom...

A: "Hey, can you take a picture for me with this shiny camera?"

B: "Sure."

ZAAAAAAAP-ED!

B: "Ouch, what the ****? It hurts!"

A laughed out loud.

Nobody else in the classroom laughed.

It's perfectly legal as a pedal-powered art car, but is prone to hassles because the cops don't want to get into trouble when the art car smashes somebody. It's like how cops can arrest you if you carry a small bag of flour during a party.

Can't say the cops are lame or something, they are just doing their job. A necessary evil, and it can prove the legal system is at work, I would say.

CERN in the parallel universe is probably also being sued right now! So when the LHC of our universe and the LHC of the parallel universe is switched on at the same time, we will just switch our universes... which result in hardly anything detectable! Perfect!

The original site is down. While there are some mirrors out there, I'll upload it so others can read: Link

This is a great find! Personification of world history is a great way to learn and understand... emotionally. Countries are humans, too.

The sidetext helps preventing the bias though. The author has shown a lot of sympathy about Afghanistan and Pakistan. And note how all the Western characters are villians. :p

Oh, and the evil bin Laden kitteh.

Some comments sound like Iranian responses to Hurricane Katrina.

Let's just hope that this is enough of an alarm for the people there to develop better technologies to protect the environment. This current solution of weather modification is like how some butchers dye their meat red to make it look more sellable. It's temporary but not long-term, like Western medicine. But it's not all bad, it at least is a temporary relief, while they are dealing other long-term solutions.

On the positive side of things, for the sci-fi lovers out there, this might as well be the beginning of terraforming technologies. :)

Photoshop is like a type of clothing, in this struggle between the lust to show more of the body and the guilt to show more of the sex.

Hmm... I wonder, does that mean women can show their breasts on TV and billboards as soon as the nipples are removed?

That's one of those things that read funny if it were a comic, but truly tragic in real life...

It's nice once in a while someone deliberately goes against something you learned when you were young.

Who knows? Perhaps in some weird fifth dimension, the earth is really "flat". But then, for now with all the evidences provided during the debate, I would side with the scientists. :)

Gotta show this to the Creationists in Kansas.

#10:

This guy and the Time Cube guy should have a debate.

#216:

Kid (68), I'm not impressed with your options or your analyses. The Boingers are artists and journalists. They want to enable comments and community. They don't want it to go septic again. And there's no way they have the time to keep order here themselves. That doesn't make them pragmatic politicians. Nothing could.

You and your buds are just being grumpy and pompous because you're used to doing whatever you want in online forums, and I've inexplicably failed to understand that that's the natural order of the universe.

Thanks for your reply.

Sorry you are not impressed with my analysis, I was not trying to impress anyone. The reason why I said this event "draws a line between idealistic scholars and pragmatic politicians" is that, from my understanding, Cory and company had long been advocates of 'mutant' methods of governance. They supported protests or alternative ways to protest on various issues (scientology, Tibet, Comcast, TSA and so on), and now they have a mini protest staged in their own mini government.

And here you provided the answer to my question by saying that "the Boingers are artists and journalists". Please note that I didn't say they are "pragmatic politicians" as you had interpreted, I was just saying that the subsequent actions will tell which role they fit in.

I agree fully that they want to enable comments and community, and I had, in a few comments above, thanked them for enabling such feature.

I appreciated that they don't want the community to go septic again as a result of lack of moderation, but here on the issue of moderation I would warn that an overly-moderated or arbitrarily-moderated forum would also result in a septic community. This is similar to the issues on national security, whereas an overly-stringent security would end up harming freedom and expression.

Lastly, I am offended by your sarcasm or personal criticism (I can't tell) in your second paragraph. I am not here to offend any Boingers and forum members (If I did, I did not intend to, and I apologize), but somehow my 'buds' and I are being called "grumpy and pompous" by the moderator. I am also assumed that "I am used to doing whatever I want in online forums", and even if I did, you don't the authority to criticize me personally.

(P.S. This is a duplicate of my own post #246 because I had an HTML typo in the second paragraph to make it sound like I'm calling someone grumpy.)

#216:

Kid (68), I'm not impressed with your options or your analyses. The Boingers are artists and journalists. They want to enable comments and community. They don't want it to go septic again. And there's no way they have the time to keep order here themselves. That doesn't make them pragmatic politicians. Nothing could.

You and your buds are just being grumpy and pompous because you're used to doing whatever you want in online forums, and I've inexplicably failed to understand that that's the natural order of the universe.

Thanks for your reply.

Sorry you are not impressed with my analysis, I was not trying to impress anyone. The reason why I said this event "draws a line between idealistic scholars and pragmatic politicians" is that, from my understanding, Cory and company had long been advocates of 'mutant' methods of governance. They supported protests or alternative ways to protest on various issues (scientology, Tibet, Comcast, TSA and so on), and now they have a mini protest staged in their own mini government.

And here you provided the answer to my question by saying that "the Boingers are artists and journalists". Please note that I didn't say they are "pragmatic politicians" as you had interpreted, I was just saying that the subsequent actions will tell which role they fit in.

I agree fully that they want to enable comments and community, and I had, in a few comments above, thanked them for enabling such feature.

I appreciated that they don't want the community to go septic again as a result of lack of moderation, but here on the issue of moderation I would warn that an overly-moderated or arbitrarily-moderated forum would also result in a septic community. This is similar to the issues on national security, whereas an overly-stringent security would end up harming freedom and expression.

Lastly, I am offended by your sarcasm or personal criticism (I can't tell) in your second paragraph. I am not here to offend any Boingers and forum members (If I did, I did not intend to, and I apologize), but somehow my 'buds' and I are being called "grumpy and pompous" by the moderator. I am also assumed that "I am used to doing whatever I want in online forums", and even if I did, you don't the authority to criticize me personally.

#230:

Conservatives are frequently the ones who believe that he who yells loudest wins the argument.

Sorry to go a little off-topic. I was offering one way to view the whole debate going on here. I don't mean that being a 'conservative' in this thread means that you are a conservative in real life. I would not want my method of categorization to offend anybody here. I only mean conservatism in its literal sense, i.e. people who sided with traditions, who wants to preserve the existing condition.

Some of the very good points of this thread:

- #183:

If ever I'm tempted to participate in a discussion in the comments here, I'll remember this post, which is basically an announcement that the site is overmoderated for those who didn't already know it, and I'll know better. So much for internet discourse not being lost due to moderation.

Comparing the policies applied to Boingers themselves (link), the moderator policy here is a far cry from the Kiss It Simple Stupid format. I wish our moderator would be able to shrink the whole thing to something short, less arbitrary and easily understandable, and that would eliminate a lot of people crying injustice. Humor is good, but sarcasm usually translates to arrogance during a debate.

- #174:

Personally, I find the moderation to be arbitrary and annoying. Disemvoweling is basically defacing a comment and isn't conducive to civil discourse. If someone posts something and gets disemvoweled, they are likely to be upset rather than curious as to why. The posted policy is pretty subjective, leaving a lot of uncertainty as to what will get moderated.

I spent about twenty minutes looking through the comments the other day and easily found a number of hateful, rude, and downright insulting comments with no redeeming value that had not been moderated. Boing Boing tolerates quite a lot of vicious hatred for certain groups, apparently.

Speaking of inconsistent moderation, you can read this very thread to give yourself an idea. If you look for the one-line comments in this thread, you will see that some of them downright rude or create unnecessary drama, but most of them were not taken care of and are readily available for you to read.

* * * * *

I can see an interesting conservative vs liberal debate here in this thread, as if it were a mini government.

The conservatives agree with the moderator policies, and agrees that the site is the Boinger's lawn, and they are free to do whatever they want.

Meanwhile, the liberals advocate new methods of moderation.

The most wonderful things in this thread are the self-disemvoweled posts - such alternative methods of sabotage/protest are sometimes what BoingBoing advocates, from handbags with an image of a gun to challenge the TSA, to putting mirrors on your head to challenge government CCTV surveillance.

The ironic yet wonderful part is that such sabotage/protest is applied to BoingBoing itself. If there were a site similar to BoingBoing, I would be sure that this incident would be one of their news post.

This debate is good for both the community and the Boingers, because it proves that the comments system allows a great civilized discussion to happen. Here I'll thank BoingBoing again for giving us the comments system.

* * * * *

Hi Joel! Have you return the Krups Heineken thingy yet? Still any beer left?

#70: You might agree with the whole policy, but quite a few of the comments here indicates the otherwise, and those feedbacks either need to be resolved, or simply ignored. Either way, it's a position for the admins to take.

#47: Yes, you would think that the site would advocate or experiment on some innovative ways of moderation, since the blog posts are so radical about politics and government. But in the end, when it comes to reality, the site is run traditionally with ads and moderation.

I don't mind the ads, though it does feel a little hypocritical, as soon as it keeps the site alive, I'm happy.

#61: LOL. Yes. It reminds you that you can be reported!!

* * * * *

This thread is an interesting moment in Boing Boing history, because it puts Cory and company to the test, where they are the presidents of this micro-government.

It would be interesting to see if this issue will be ignored or resolved, as that pretty much draws the line between idealistic scholars and pragmatic politicians.

#28: I'm with you. Being a moderator myself, I had gone through the stages of being a bad mod as well. I know how a moderator commenting on a topic can easily distort a discussion, when a mod is known to abuse his power.

When moderating comments, warnings and reasons should be given before taking any actions. I agree that it is extremely rude to 'disemvowel' one's comment, especially the reader did take the time to read and reply.

There is a distinction between one attacking another person, and one responding critically to another person's comment. Notice the difference: One deals with the person, while the other deals with the topic. The former is trolling, while the latter is a discussion. The moderation here does not seem to be able to differentiate between the two, and quite very often blatant attacks towards other users are ignored.

I have nothing against Miss Hayden herself, I am only commenting on the state of moderation in this blog. Please do not misunderstand.

Such long moderator policy makes you remember the days when there were no comment system in BoingBoing.

When BB launches commenting earlier this year, I had high hopes that this blog will turn from a one-way medium into a two-way medium that allows fellow readers to interact with the bloggers on the issues they posted.

It turns out that the bloggers rarely replies on the comments section, which makes this system pretty similar to the ones we have in other big blogs: An arena for those who like to argue and release their resentment. It is pretty apparent when there are blog posts on sensitive issues. You find comment warlords in every blog site and forum, and this is no different.

On the other hand, I love the Favorites system that you had implemented. Since human beings (these days) are very bad at complimenting the *wonderful* things, but very good at criticizing the things that make you wonder, the Favorites system at least shows that there is still love in humanity, supplementing the sad fact that most human beings lack the vocabulary to express their excitement and enthusiasm.

#52 (Tom): I don't think it is biased to point out China's censorship either, but the bias here is the choice of articles that Xeni picked to illustrate her point.

For example, concerning the number of deaths, she quoted the Students of Free Tibet, who are the riots themselves. For first person accounts, she used one who is irritated being locked up in a hotel during the riot - though there were hardly anything about the riot except trucks filled with soldiers. Meanwhile, there were articles in Guardian and blog articles from those who live in Tibet that she could use, if she really wants to report anything there in details. Here she quote a whole response of BoingBoing reader in China, but she missed other blog articles also written by other BoingBoing readers in China, in which links were posted in the comments.

If you read the comments from her few previous articles, you will find links posted by readers that illustrate other points of view.

The other time she quoted from an article that talks about blog reactions in China, she picked the one that has a Han Chinese who is indifferent to the situation, while she did not point out that there were also comments who cares about the people living there.

If you really spent enough time reading all the history, commentary and news articles concerning Tibet (like I did), you know that this report has its bias and objective. Note that this is different from me saying that I disagree with everything that is reported here - there are points here that is agreeable, say, China blocking Youtube.

#50:

I think China did exactly that because it knows even though there would be people like you protesting or questioning it, most of the world wouldn't care. Therefore, taking the experience of the June 4th massacre, the solution to protests with aims that can potentially overthrow/undermind the central government is to eradicate it quickly, and cover it with a layer of propaganda.

I may sound nihilistic to you, but that is only because I don't believe in revolution in a day, but rather evolution through generations.

I'm not sure where your sources are to form those last 3 questions. I don't know if you can prove them unless you had lived in Tibet for 7 years. In fact, even if you had lived 7 years in Tibet, I would still take it with caution.

#34

"Buy Indian."

The Southern tip of the original Tibet, Arunachal_Pradesh, is now occupied by India. Talk about cultural genocide: More than half of the population is replaced by Indians, and they changed the official language of the area into English.

* * *

#21 Takuan:

I read enough of your comments to see flaws and bias in them that I can disagree with, but I would never attack the person who said it.

The difference between you and me here is that I discussed and stated the other facts that is not mentioned in this otherwise one-side blog entry, and I did not spend the time disagreeing another person enough to attack them.

If this is translated to a political scale, that would be the difference between the US and China: the former allows you to speak up but not attacked, while the latter would attack if it touches something sensitive.

For the whole time on this Tibet issue, I was pointing out the bias reporting of this blog, and the violent nature of the riot by the Students for Free Tibet. That does not translate to me supporting the Chinese government prosecuting political prisoners. And in my point of view, these independence movements of Tibet had hardly anything to do with human rights condition in China.

I remember that there was a news from Hong Kong a year ago about a publisher putting Renaissance paintings on its book covers, but it was banned as obscene. The society laughed at the decision.

If art can show penises, while designs cannot, I would say it's double standards.

It's an organic rocketship. Shooting out organic lazerz.

The population control imposed back in the middle ages still reverberates today.

Estimation of amount of people killed or jailed is always a game to make either side of supporters more angry.

Chinese government news will always report a lower number, while the Students for Free Tibet will always report a higher number (of how many of them had been killed), even though they were the ones burning down the city.

But either way, it means that there were plenty of violence. And violence can't solve this problem.

And then, the whole debate will degenerate into a chicken fight of who committed more violence.

Good for Dalai Lama resigning. Now the Chinese government can rightfully rename the "Dalai clique" to "Xizhang separatists".

#14: Athletes are not thinkers? Discrimination?

#1: Yes, BoingBoing has been depressing for the whole week, due to over-reporting of depressing issues. I'm organizing a movement/petition to detach all Civlib and politics to its own BBPolitics site. Now let's see how the moderator army would react.

#5: I feel bad for your wife. She does not need to be "re-educated". Just for this I can already see a potential problem in the relationship.

And with loads of flags saying "Japan No.1".

#23: Well, it is a suggestion to the very frequent amount of political material these days. It's a win-win in the way that more civlib articles can be written, while readers aren't forced to be bombarded by the writers' political stance.

(And you know, your reply sounds very much like those "if you don't like it, go away" type of comments that I read in the Tibet debate yesterday.)

If you were really the moderator, then you should help reflect this issue.

Or at least help your fellow member by letting me know if there's a way to do www.boingboing.net/no-civlib.

#4: Not even that! It's more like that cartoon with characters drawn to look like anime but has a story and animation skills nothing like an anime! What's it called... "Avatar"?

And all the Americanized Chinese takeout places...

But then these two examples are different in the way that they had much more sophisticated origins... in which Cola doesn't have.

Ah!! yes, "French Fries". That's why the French are so angry.

Here I propose a new Boing Boing site: BBPolitics. Since gadgets are grouped in its own site, so... why not?

Now Cory can write 4 times more all he wants about privacy and DRM, and Xeni can write 5 times more all she wants about all the independence and tyrannies in the world.

Sometimes things can be cross-posted like Joel's, but all the human rights watch can be more elaborated in its own site.

And we can keep Boing Boing a directory of *wonderful* things. You know, it's about wonders, and things that make you wonder and imagine.

(Thanks for keeping Boing Boing a directory of *Wonderful* things, not a directory of political angst.)

Hehe, it's like a tennis machine for humans, but now dogs have machines designed for them as well!

The robot is aesthetically beautiful as it is, you can see each part moving and orienting as the whole robot moves.

I wonder how it would feel if it is dressed in a real dog costume, so we can test if it can pass the Uncanny Valley.

Reading today's comments is fresh air comparing the comments I read yesterday. While there are still people who thinks the rest of the world lives in America, and people who doesn't know any facts then jump to their imagination, there are more open-minded comments this time.

The two articles quoted by #8 summarized the whole situation very very well. From the article Tibet Through Chinese Eyes, Most people in the West thinks that Tibetans are suffering because 1) They discovered human rights, and they think the rest of the world should totally do it; 2) the exile society is always in the media (if Dalai Lama never speaks in public about this, I doubt you can make it an issue). But the problem is that there are some millions of Tibetans working every day for their life, happy with their literacy, stability, electricity, and all sorts of modernized things.

The Chinese in this very decade is not very different from the American a century or two ago when they begin cultivating Indian's land. And of course, the rest of the Chinese developments in recent years, it's happening at much faster pace.

For those who are angry about the current Chinese situation, it is not very different from being angry at your own nations' mistakes - i.e. the concepts of racial equality and human rights are learnt through the painful mistakes of slavery and African/Indian genocides.

And for those who likes to force China to accept your ideology of human rights, you are not very different from the Chinese who likes to force Tibet to accept their ideology of modernization and national unity. The same kind of "saving the world" colonialist heroics.

And this blog entry is not very different from amplifying the angst of the son in the house next doors, complaining about how his mom and dad are not really loving each other, as they don't show the same kind of love displayed in the novels he read.

A few responses:

#4 said that "The internet chatter from the people of 'those ungrateful minorities' is probably going to turn around to 'f*ck the government' now that China has turned off YouTube." but unfortunately most Chinese people who have Internet access would not give a f*ck about Youtube. They have a bunch of Youtube clones already. He thinks the Chinese pollute the environment a lot but he did not know that China supplies most of the solar panels right after Japan, and has heavy investments in environmental technologies.

#7 claims that "China's goal is to take over the earth and eradicate all non-Chinese." I would like to let you know that there is a province (equivalent of state as in the US) that is designated autonomous region for Muslims. I don't recall Amish has its own state. And #18 should know too.

#5 did not read the links and demonized all ethnic Chinese comments as the one quoted in the blog. There are comments who are concerned as well, please go read.

#52 claims that most people in China aren't really having happy fun time. I don't know how he knows, but probably because he thinks that a lot of workers work as cheap labor in very polluted place. I cannot prove the otherwise, but I met some illegal immigrant Chinese workers in a Chinese takeout a couple years ago. Some of them thinks that they are better off in China. In fact, I don't understand why one would like to work 365 days a year in the crowded kitchen - but I accepted the fact that some people accept their own situation.

I don't understand why some would jump to conclusions without getting the facts straight, but I hope these facts can help them understand better. (I had read enough about Tibet in books and Wikipedia these days, my brain exploded.)

The comment by #48 (Noen) is the most impressive and enlightening comment in Boing Boing I've ever read by date. He quoted the Buddhist "The world is perfect as it is" in a few posts above, and later explained that "It means accepting the world for what it is, not as we might wish it to be. Nor does it advocate passivity, far from it. It's saying that if you wish to be effective in the world you need to come from a place of acceptance."

Such philosophies that focus on harmony bring relative social peace to those 1.3 billion people squeezed in that relatively small piece of land. A land of 1.3 billion rebels would be quite a disaster. That was called Cultural Revolution.

#80:

The problem here is not as naive as:
"If you don't like porn, stay out of the adult bookstore."

but it really is:
"I really like porn, but I don't like this particular porn because beastiality between a goat and a car is just gross to me, yet I still like most of the store's porn collection, so I am going to the adult bookstore still, but I will write on my blog and complain about that particular bad piece of porn, and how is tainting the rest of my night."

I read about Cory's love for some of Disneyland's installations, so I would guess he doesn't hate it totally, but just that security measure.

Well, I hope you get the joke that I'm replying just because I want to write the second paragraph.

#29:

I agree. There is no substantial proof for such conspiracy. However, the subconscious effect that Cory mentioned is valid.

I am fortunately taught by my parents to ask if it is necessary when shopkeepers (especially in big box stores) ask for my phone number, zip code, social security or any identifications.

But I am not good at protecting my rights when it comes to filling forms. When I was at school, I was taught to fill in all the blanks in a form to get full marks, and therefore, the habit continued.

Does anyone know if it is really necessary to fill in all the fields when a landlord or a credit card issuer ask you to do it? I seriously don't think so. Anyone?

I don't think I can justify violence by any armies, and I cannot justify violence by the protestors either.

Rather than just quoting US-government-funded media agnecies and (potentially US-government-funded) insider information from the protestors, why not give the other point of views? Both the Guardian (UK) and Xinhua (China) has different accounts of the whole accident. Some details are the same, while some are different.

The blog entry above neglects a few critical details:

From http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/03/14/tibet.timeline/index.html

1. The riot did not start because the army troops arrive at the scene. In fact, the army has been defensive until Friday. Arrests were made for trepassing border and showing the banned Tibetan flag - which is well within the law.

The following points from http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/15/tibet.china2

2. Stones were thrown at not just Han Chinese, but also non-Tibetans. In fact, most accounts illustrated here are attacks towards non-Tibetans.

3. "One person told me 300 people have died in the city centre [the Guardian has no information to substantiate this claim]." Interestingly, that sounds like the same *rumor* that Xeni had added at Update #3.

From http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/15/tibet.china1

4. The so-called "Students for Free Tibet", the very people who give you the "news", are the ones causing violence. While the army troops used teargas and water cannon - which are standard in terms of dealing with violent protests (and in fact, that shows improved restraint on China's part), the students overturned buses, police cars, fire engines and beat people up with stones and knives. Why does this blog support violence? Using violence against violence is also violence. It doesn't justify itself.

Wake up, these people ARE violent separatists.

5. It is hard to differentiate between the sounds of a teargas cannon and an actual cannon.

A few points on the misquote of the leadership of PRC from NYT:

6. President Hu Jintao imposed martial law back in his days when he was the Party Leader of Tibet Autonomous Region in 1989, but he also rejected the numerous requests from the armed police to repress the protestors.

7. The current Premier of PRC, Wen Jiabao, was the head assistant to General Secretary Zhao Ziyang. He accompanied Zhao to Tiananmen Square during the June 4th, 1989 protests to meet the student leaders.

It does no good to the situation to post unverified and one-sided claims. Oh, right, it's a blog.

But, people, this is a riot, no matter what political causes are behind this, it cannot be resolved under a situation like this. It will turn all the voices into a lost cause.

Sadly enough, reading the news from Xinhua, I think with such degree of violence the protestors will be very likely neglected as some violent minorities controlled by the pro-U.S. Dalai Lama, who is almost as demonized as bin Laden in the country.

And that's why you only see them expressing their craziest rituals only when there is a viable excuse: TV show, private hidden room, secret blog, Youtube and... GENOCIDES! (Alright, I just watched an episode of King of the Hill. Pardon me.)

#6: Xeni, I agree that there is a chance some of the riots can be faked - though right now I would doubt that, because even though 'violence' is a way to discredit the protestors, the Chinese government itself would not want the news of the protest to spread all over the world, especially before the Olympics.

The state of unity of China has been quite unexpectedly turbulent for the last couple weeks, probably because it is rather easy to use the Olympics to hold its neck. Taiwan is relatively calm since Chen is over (otherwise Chen would probably do the same), while a plane was hijacked just last week by Xinjiang separatists to crash in Beijing but fortunately rescued.

It would be interesting to see if the reaction of the government is any different from 20 years ago. After all, their leaders had changed a few times. The way they will manage this issue will have tremendous effect on Taiwan as well.

The next 5 months will be the hardest challenge for the Chinese government ever since 1989.

That might be the new reason to believe in God - so you can get protection from Him, just in case the scientologists attack you.

(Actually, that might very well be the reason to be in a religion back in the Middle Ages... Gang fights, terrorizing through some mysterious higher being.)

Or you can side with the Church of Satan, to be more scary.

That was actually "With" not "Without". Spelling mistake...

We need to hope that this doesn't escalate to something like L.A. riot, because violence doesn't give the protestors more negotiation power from within the country, while bad for the image of the country in the rest of the world. And more destruction will just justify the army's actions.

Without people burning cars and shops, that is a riot. It needs to be calmed down regardless of the cause.

Should keep doing this every year, so when the dude becomes 23, he would be like, "Should I make a Star Babies Episode XXIII for myself again this year? Who would be on the poster? My ex-girlfriend?" Something like that.

Speaking of cheap bulbs, I would have recommended the Lumenlab eVo projector, which uses bulbs you can find in Home Depot.... BUT

I'm shocked to find out just now that they have discontinued the product! :(

What I'm even more shocked is that they are coming out with a RepRap robotic kit!! Awesome!

Man, Bklyn!! When can I stop by for some beer?

P.S. It was a hilarious non-review review.

#7: Well, even if the product were provided for free, Joel doesn't need to say "OMG It's awesome" to please the manufacturers. That's called a bribe. If the product sucks, then it sucks. It's not like he made the flaws of the product up.

Personally, I think the beer is good, because: 1. The two kids in the video were completely drunk, 2. They got some drunk Joel went to cut his own hair, 3. They start talking sh*t, which is exactly what drunk people do... LOL

On the other hand, I think companies will still send stuff for him to review, because if Joel finally reveal his thumbs up, that means a product is really good. And it's not like he didn't do that (e.g. iPhone and iPhone).

It does sound eerily similar to someone who had a psychedelic experience, and this is probably the first lecture I've seen that sums things up. I'm pretty stunned to watch her scientific explanation to all these phenomena, such as Out-Of-Body Experience, schizophrenia, "Energy" and Alice in Wonderland syndrome.

While I can listen to my (stoned) friends how 'wonderful' it is when they are stoned, I can tell that taking drugs to experience them is too much of a price to pay, when all I need is to train my brain to think in left or right hemispheres.

It must have been a pretty painful experience for her to recover for 8 years, but what she concluded out of it is magical. Glad to hear that she is able again.

TED Talks are great lectures to see, especially when I haven't been able to go to lectures ever since graduation. And this is the best lecture I had ever watched.

Bunnies!!! Awww

My new 7 Deadly Sins after reading the Bible, corresponding to the original 7:

1. Pride -> Memes

2. Envy -> Squirrels

3. Gluttony -> Caffeine

4. Lust -> Porn

5. Anger -> Trolling

6. Greed -> Goatse

7. Sloth -> Youtube

That's nothing more than getting the popular votes by mixing some general views that most agree (like not polluting the environment, creating poverty) and inserting some conservative views (stem cell research).

I don't know what God thinks about the Vatican adding these laws by themselves. Did God ever appoint them as His spokesperson in the first place? That was why the Protestants took place, right?

It will be perfect on a big table-top touchscreen monitor.

As rosy as the iPhone sounds, the Wii controller still has a d-pad and buttons. And optional keyboard so you can browse Opera easily.

If Apple were to design the Wii, I guess it will be just a wand with no buttons. Imagine how much less games you will find on this hypothetical Wii.

Since the iPhone doesn't have one button (except the Home button that cannot be overriden), either the game developers have to think really outside the box to program everything with the accelerometer or touch, or devote half the screen as the keypad.

The day someone makes an attachable keyboard for iPhone would be the day I can finally consider the phone seriously.

During the few days I spent with my returned iPhone, I found that my fingers got really numb after texting, and really warm after scrolling extensively. I see most people who uses the phone have to pose their fingers as if they were touching some cement on top of a brick i.e. trying to hold their hand in the position so that just the index finger touches the screen in order to prevent errors. I simply cannot imagine how much my fingers will hurt fiercely tapping on a hard piece of glass during an exciting action game.

I don't like Singapore, so that makes sense.

Dumb users are not the problem, though it's fun (for the intellectually discriminate) to read them.

Designers and programmers should not take all the fault to themselves either, because one should know that it's impossible to design a perfect software that works for everyone (though it's a great dream).

Most technical support I talked to are incredibly polite and efficient people, and I always thanked them when I'm done with a call. I tried to keep my frustration to the minimum. They are usually very professional and would hardly ever treat their callers like newbies (except Best Buy store managers).

The worst people are the ones who take their anger out of the technical support. Those who wrote in horrible languages, illegible grammar (ALL CAPS), and those who threaten to get their money back, and those who scream on the phone. Tech supp are not there to be screamed at, they were there to help people out.

It's sad that people who are "willing" to help are being treated badly.

I just need a 3G antenna, and someone to invent a Bluetooth keyboard for iPhone.

Take the facts aside, there are a few logical errors here:

1. Not considering historical aspects: If we didn't consider if China had any soverignty before and just consider the currect state, we probably also should not consider the genocides half a century ago. If we just consider Tibet at its current state, there are plenty of developments and investment from the central government. Development may sound negative over at the Western world, but it is not the case in China.

2. Considering historical aspects: If we consider history, then we know that Tibet has been part of China at least since Qing dynasty, earlier than the US declaring independence. It could have been earlier, as documents had long ago described the plateau, but the border had never been secured because: 1. Those were barren lands, 2. Hardly ever did barbarians invade from that side of China.

I find most people on this issue hypocritical, because there are way worse genocides going on around the world at this very moment, and the fact that the United States was built on a piece of land that they never owned half a millenium ago. (I guess Europeans are consistent about this issue, as we know that Europe is now divided into hundreds of countries.) And most people were just saying what they say due to Nationalism or media influence.

China needs to step up and face its history if it wants a place in the world. They were doing it at a very slow pace, but at least they did, say, for admitting serious errors in Cultural Revolution (but not a lot of other things). It's hard to escape from or erase facts or accusations in the 20th century, but then, who knows? It's not like people playing their Wiis, watching Italian soccer or driving their Mercedes know what those countries of their origin did back in the days.

If architecture of airports are cathedrals of the the modern age, bag search are its modern ritual.

#2: A writer already did not need to bother a publisher since the Internet was born. What you are reading right here is self-published.

The difference is that, you cannot make much money out of selling BoingBoing subscriptions, instead, you earn it through ads from Honda and Microsoft. Your deluxe book editions of BoingBoing (unless you are The Onion) might not sell well, but you can surely pitch in some of your own books in your high traffic web site, and perhaps your 1000 True Fans will buy it.

But there will be the day when your book doesn't even sell anymore since every book is given out free on PDFs, so you have to make money out of selling bread to your readers. Just make sure that corporations don't give out free bread by then!

That is the 1% law. 1% of the wealthy fans support 99% of those who doesn't pay.

That works for NIN and Radiohead, because 1% of their fan base is still 100,000 people.

But how about starving artists? 1% of their fan base might just be one person.

So it pretty much works like the article on Free by Chris Anderson, where starving artists have to give out records for free, while making money hopefully off live shows.

His theory works, again, only for mega-bands and mega-corporations. The rest of us can only support our endeavors with salaries from another industry.

Toxic transsexual birds hanging out in toxic grounds. I guess that's why the oil fields beneath Williamsburg made better bands after all.

Gold-plated USB cables. Laughs, period.

Nice fantasy of animals driving. There are so many straps to tie the foxtaur down! It actually strangely reminds me of those robots driven by cockroaches.

Some people love to fantasize unfairness: a higher authority steals ideas or things from those who are down there, without any sort of claims. When I first saw this blog post, I smelled this is coming already.

I think a lot of you who are designers or artists had experiences when you designed or made something and people said that they look like or asked if they were inspired by some artists or some works.

I have my haircut asked by a few people whether I am inspired by an artist. I never notice his work before people telling me about him.

Trends are sometimes inevitable enough that they inspire people to do similar things during the same period. Otherwise, why would BB get so many many many posts about steampunk objects? They must be ripping off from each other.

It's great some famous designers made something that looks like yours after you had made it. Great, that's an acknowledgement that you are ahead of your times. Besides, a scandalous exposure like this blog post will catapult your fame skyhigh.

As for the comparison above, in terms of Craft, I have to say that the one on the right has better Craftsmanship.

The psuedo-3d world map is a good idea (love the sea monster!), and I would prefer if the distortion makes the dense Northern hemisphere bigger rather than smaller, which is counter-functional. The Japanese Empire rays behind the logo is a little tired, in my opinion.

I'll check out the site, thanks for the heads up!

I was wondering about that the whole time I saw the ad, too. It is actually the only one thing that I am interested in. One of my friends' friend used to buy every single thing she saw on TV, so they can try if it works. Usually they break or are left in a corner in a week or two.

Now they should make a program that gives those folks lyrics. Then they should make a program that gives those folks a better voice. And after that a program that gives those folks better vocal techniques. And after that a program that gives those folks better looks. And better taste. And finally, replace those folks' brains. BRAINSZ!!!!

A lot of times I struggled to open a MacBook. I'll try opening an XO when I get my hands on. :)

I think it can be more melodic, and that might be because Pi is represented in the decimal system... I wonder what it would sound like in binary. ;)

So that means it's fabricated and there is not a whole song? :(

Judging by the size of the headphone, it seems to be too big to fit with Lego.

Looking forward to hearing your airport survival test results soon. :)

"...In 2006, the site earned an estimated $40 million from the few things it charges for. That's about 12 percent of the $326 million by which classified ad revenue declined that year."

Is that a vaporization of value?

Basically, if every product is seen as a composite of free and premium versions, it means that more and more items are taken out of the premium version to the free one, as the premium features become more and more of a commonplace.

In a way, it is pretty much the same trend of luxury items turning into commodity, but happenning much faster. A stone knife used to cut things used to be luxury (or even rarity), but now you can get a pile of plastic knives from any fast food places for free.

My optimistic side of the brain tells me that the vaporization of value is great for setting the foundation for more advanced products to come in future.

* Sorry, typo. "acception" -> "exception"

Anyone who can shred some light on this dilemma is welcome. :)

Lots of computer software begins its life as a tool for piracy, then turn 'legitimate' later on. This will be no acception.

Speaking of mashups and re-edits, I can compare them to graffiti. I'm not saying that there is no good or interesting art that comes out of it, but these day I have an ambivalent feeling that the cost is just too great to make these activities desirable.

In graffiti's case, lots and lots of public facilities and private houses are vandalized just because someone wants to write their name on it, while decaying neighborhoods, disrespecting other users and wasting a lot more money than needed in restoration.

Yes, I know that there is a Banksy in 1 of 100000, and I know that some homeowners are so open that they let everyone graffiti their house.

In the re-edit/remix's case, lots and lots of videos are just exact duplicates of the original, or just plain horrible work, just because someone wants to tell the whole world instead of his friends one single joke, while encourages the use of the medium for piracy and opens up an irreversible flaw for author who just wants to release their videos as CC:BY-ND-NC.

Yes, I know that there is a (you name it) in 1 out of 1000000, and I know that there are plenty of filmmakers who happily lets others cut their film into pieces.

With that said, I'm not saying that I support DRM. But I think the DRM is more acceptable - if it is not forced on all videos, and if the author has the choice on whether the video will have it or not.

#18: Interesting insight. So perhaps this "Brfxxccxxmnpcccclll mmnprxvclmnckssqlbb11116" is resulted by the kid himself banging the keyboard when his parents asked him what he wants to name himself.

That's the true power of DRM!!! IT CAN BLOCK BULLET!!!

#6: Umm, take your jealousy of celebrities aside, and view it objectively?

Isn't it some sort of electronic ransom that is rather immoral?

So you find it justified to expose one's privacy because you think the person is a "douchebag"?

So your enemies can justify themselves for robbing you because they think you are a "douchebag"?

#3: Perhaps someone should invent a "Simple Wikipedia" then, I'm sure that the new word would not be [citation needed], but [simplification needed]. ;) (I guess there is already one.)

Here is my very biased take:

The British government is the most advanced separatists in the world. In more eloquent words, the b****.

As much as I'm concerned about the Tibet issue, I don't think the Brits' words have any authority, because they put a foot there a century ago and killed lots of Tibetans as well. Tibet would have been a British colony if not because China defended the British army from Tibet! Meanwhile, the number of Tibetans dead under Communist rule is estimated, and we would never know if the number is exaggerated or understated.

From Kosovo vs Serbia to Pakistan vs India, from Singapore vs Malaysia to even USA vs Canada, (and numerous fragments in Africa) the British government down to its citizens are still subconsciously trying to live its old colonialism glory days, by stretching its political arms across the globe. It's almost as if there is a deep-rooted psychological revenge that they want the rest of the world to be as fragmented as itself, even since their pirate ancestors had fallen from being the biggest empire.

This cannot be stopped, but it is surely annoying as hell.

* * * * *

Back to Chinese olympics, I'm glad that there are still people vocal about the deadly deeds of the Chinese government. However, as far as I know, the government has always turned a blind eye to foreign voices, since certain film directors' concern with Africa would have little to do with how many iPhones they can manufacture in Shenzhen. And since nationalism (more like capitalism) is at all time high in the country, such concerns with historical issues would hardly be heard, and they would think that these foreigners are just crazy, like what I just said. :)

Now Marilyn Manson is correct on how much violence there is on the Bible.

#36: I agree that I did not put the genocide into part of the decision, but I'm not too sure if that necessarily justifies independence. There are still Serbs living in Kosovo, too.

Not to be sarcastic, I like that "anti-separatist" moniker. I am not necessarily against countries separating, but I feel that it should be done not against its people's will. Here we have a country disintegrating by two gravitional forces (EU and Russia). I guess countries are like planets. When its structure is weak, it self-explodes and shatters into pieces.

DRM is not annoying... until the day you step out of its ecosystem (or in MS case, the day it suddenly decides not to support the technology).

I guess I see the point of Doubletwist: It's a sort of a rehab for those who were drugged up by iTunes DRM. Or a sort of an 'add-on' for iTunes that gives it the liberation and sharing features.

By observing how this software acts, it implies to me that DVD Jon agrees with the iTunes delivery mechanism and doesn't mind its users to stay there, but disagrees with its DRM.

I'm still an old-school CD buyer, by the way.

I'm wondering how much overlap there is between:

1. The group that has money to buy songs from iTunes Store,
2. The group who uses MP3 and cares enough about DRM to avoid iTunes AAC at all costs,
3. The group that wants to share music or freeload from other, and
4. The group who uses iTunes store yet doesn't use an iPod or iPhone and prefer to use a Sony Ericson instead.

It seems that it is a very small group to me.

After watching the trailer, I applaud the writers of the movie to tackle a sensitive subject such as this (in comparison to their original "Amsterdam" plot). While the original movie is already a pretty big joke about racial stereotypes, this movie, from what the trailer shows so far, seems to make the issue not to stay just on the superficial level.

Can't wait to see it. :)

At least now the frat boys can know about a place called Guantanamo Bay while making fun of Asians at the same time.

#6: And don't forget the success of East/West Germany or North/South Korea! And also never forget Tibet, Northern Ireland, Alaska, and numerous African countries. It is fun to create so many countries with arbitrary names.

Some day it would be surely fun to see Midwest Union of America, Republic of Texas, United States of New England and People's Republic of California.

Metaphorically speaking, it feels like this lawyer is making a lot of money out of divorcing couples.

The United States and European Union loves to support the disuniting of other nations, the smaller and the less threatening the better. That's how you play Civilization, isn't it?

By the way, here's my other request: Incredily Bad Art of Video Conversion softwares

Finally, our voice is here!

Hey Mark, that's pretty cool. Is anime style drawings pretty big these days in California that it can feature in a science museum?

This and the horse cooking mushroom video combined are enough to give me nightmares for the rest of the week.

The problem probably is that the ice might cool the snack pretty quick, even if the snack is insulated. And that means when you reach the bottom, the nuggets taste like what it should be like (crap).

Nevertheless, this is great because this allows me to walk and drink and eat at the same time! And it also solves the "Where can the popcorn go?" issues in a cinema.

Can't wait to see the supersize version of that. ;)

#4: I think I would be grateful already if my old 5 1/4 floppies are still readable, and there is a drive to read it. ;) (Oh, wait, it's formatted for DR-DOS.)

It's pretty impressive how the design scheme of Apple's boxes had hardly ever changed in the last 20 years, and still looks modern and new.

#3: Crafty as in all video directors should not only charge you any money for viewing their work that took hours to do, but also without any chance to generate any sort of revenue? I'm quite sure you will appear as a side character in one of his later episodes soon. :D

The topic works on a few levels:

1. Bad Art?: I agree with #14 the most. Whether the art is in 'bad taste' or not does not subject to censorship, since evoking disgust or depression can certainly be a form of art. And the fact that one does not understand the deeper meaning of the a piece does not equate the art to be bad. But of course, whether the message is clear or effective is a different question. In fact, by reading the judge's statement, it seems she wants the art in the carnival to be in bad taste, i.e. the 'lesson' portrayed in the float needs to be as clear as a propaganda (and politically correct).

It is hard to define good or bad art, and there is a very fine line between the two. Nevertheless, the art being bad does not equate a ban.

In terms of craftsmanship, the float seems very well made from what I can see in the photo. All the gore is clearly depicted.

2. Contextual?: Some said that the float is to macabre for the parade comparing the rest, so that it is inappropriate. This is easily false because all art is contextual no matter what, as even antagonism is a form of context and juxtaposition.

And as #24 had mentioned, their parade is not exact like the ones in America, which portrays politically-neutral subjects and commercial products. It seems quite contextual, as massacres are similar to slavery in terms of expressing the evils of our society. Either way, contextualism does not equal a ban.

3. Racism? Hate crime?: It's hard to tell if the piece is really made against a certain race, unless the artist himself admits it, or at least had a record of doing such. Simply because an art is made to re-enact a historical event does not necessarily mean the artist agrees with a particular party in that event.

(Personal note: When I first saw "Miss Saigon", I found the portrayal of the characters pretty racist, but nevertheless it gives me another point of view to understand the event, and besides, who cares in America is some Chinese or Vietnamese newspaper wrote a sensationalist article about the hypocrisy.)

I am trying to think about the topic from my own perspective. For Chinese, the Nanjing massacre is a big deal (as #35 said). But no matter it were to be re-enacted by Chinese, Japanese or any other race, the only thing that matters seem to be whether or not the artist is glorifying the killing or the evil. While people who are easily offended would dismiss any re-enactment as evil, it seems the ultimate answer is still to ask the artist, in which the news report hardly touches on.

4. Censorship?: It seems that the judge's statement of the carnival "should not be used as a tool for the cult of hate" is hypocritical, as I looked at the slideshow on MSNBC and saw President Bush placed inside a bird cage. I guess it's like Amazon.com, in the way that things would not change unless somebody complains about it.

I'd like to read about what determined the float to be a tool for the cult of hate. While I agree that hate crime should be banned, it is also very easy for one to manipulate the law to get anything banned just because a subject is controversial. A lot of other ways can be used to express such angst, and there were a lot of good examples, from boycotting Abercrombie racist t-shirts to burning Marilyn Manson CDs. Using a legal ban to prevent others from expression is an overkill.

Anyway, I like the discussions going on in this thread here so far.

That is one reason why I wore one of those. :)

Oh, man, the big white Helvetica font on the box...!!! Now I understand why I love this typeface. Subliminal impressions since childhood.

By the way, I was just browsing too and found this very cool Lego Ferris Wheel to put in your city: http://shop.lego.com/Product/?p=4957

#1: I don't think cars can be turned off remotely though. Besides, even if the remote can do that, it will just mean that the car driver will be unable to turn their car off when they are around the building - and for that we don't have the data to prove or disprove.

Nevertheless, it only affects those who drives expensive keyless cars. :)

"Keely Motor", the Steorn of 1898.

Your bitterness with Oakley sounds very much like my bitterness with Apple.

Haha, brilliant to use the bathroom tile to forge a Tron-esque grided cyberspace. :)

Did you use Remote Assistance via WLM back in the days when he was using Windows? I feel like that would pretty much do the same regardless of OSes.

So in a way, it's really about the convenience him using the same OS as you do (so that you can use Screen Sharing), rather than which OS is easier or crashprone to use.

I wonder if it's going to end up a Tate Modern or a Lunatarium. For parties, I would wish for the latter. :)

Love the drop shadow of the photograph. And what that implies. Very Homey!

Pretty great looking, and it does not seem as hard to do as it seems. You use one-way mirror for all the doors of the cabinets. Most TVs should be able to shine through it, despite a little light loss. Or you can use one of those glass plates that can turn opaque or transparent with an electric current (Forgot what those are called.)

Of course, the joints will be critical to get such minimalist look, but the concept is probably the same as those Reflect cases for iPod from Griffin.

Another Weekend Project!!

I don't have a conclusion to write about in response to your post yet, but here's one thing: You belong to a very rare specie of bloggers - You have a good dose of self-criticism yet not self-censorship, and I applaud you for that.

Look at the major gadget sites out there. Their use of words is so vulgar decaying into to a pile of bathroom Maxim magazines. They don't care about the products, and they don't give valid criticisms. It's all bashing.

(Here is my reference chart for what I just described: http://www.arkidect.com/blog/2008/01/switching-channels.html )

#22: I am scared of that as well. Do you think it is traceable what MAC address downloaded the wrong files through your router?

I like how the picture is named "xtianatheism.jpg"

It sounds like a loss of enthusiasm in the lust for gadgets. It is definity a sign of maturity, and it lands you in a very marginal position to write about gadgets, since the lust for gadgets and maturity seems to be quite antagonistic...