Archives: News
Return to the archives.
October 2002
- Embrace Oblivion, Big 5
- Not a day goes by where I don’t see or hear of at least one example of the major “Recording Companies” doing something stupid to kill their own business. The RIAA and Hillary Rosen are things you can scare your kids with. Anyway, there’s a... full entry
- Stanford Prison Experiment
- In the summer of 1971, a psychology experiment was conducted in which a prison was simulated with students for both prisoners and guards. The results are both fascinating and frightening. How can ordinary people turn into both meek and submissive prisoners and sadistic guards in... full entry
September 2002
- All porn… All day…
- Look at that… two entries in a row that deal with porn in some way. I wonder if that means something? It appears that a politician running for a seat in Sweden’s parliament is calling for porn to be broadcast every Saturday. It’s her belief... full entry
- Greece bans all video games
- This is just bizarre. According to CNET.com news, the Greek government has banned all electronic games across the country. This includes computer games, consoles, portable games, and even mobile phone games. Internet cafes will be allowed to continue to operate, providing no games-playing takes place.... full entry
August 2002
- ISPs fighting back against the RIAA
- It appears that at least one ISP is going to “fight back” against the RIAA‘s plan to essentually hack into customers’ computers. The Infomation Wave ISP is going to block the RIAA’s IP from it’s network. I can’t decide if that’s a good or bad... full entry
- Here’s your inheritance… an ATM card
- This is just plain bizarre: a Montana rancher died recently and left his money to his heirs. Sounds normal enough, right. Well, in this case, his heirs get their inheritance by visiting an ATM installed in his tombstone. $300 a week, it seems. I don’t... full entry
- Giving Vision to the Blind
- Wired has a fascinating article about a successful artificial vision system. For just a little more than a hundred grand, you can get your sight back. This is certainly incredible news and quite the scientific achievement. (via Boing Boing)
- Godzilla Comes Smashing Down
- Toho, the company that owns the rights to Godzilla—you know, that giant, fire-breathing, radioactive lizard that’s terrorized the citizens of Tokyo for decades—is apparently scared that Dave Linabury’s Davezilla blog might be infringing on their copyright and trademark. So, in good company-overreacting-because-it-has-its-head-up-its-ass fashion, they’ve threatened... full entry
- Go ahead and “Free the Mouse”!
- You like the internet, right? You like your freedom, too, I’d wager. If so, waste no time and head over to BumperActive’s Free The Mouse campaign. You can learn about some of the background behind it (basically, dealing with “Intellectual Property” and copyrights) as well... full entry
- Love, Prison, and a Stripper
- It’s a bit hard to believe this story about an Orthodox Jewish lawyer who fell so hard for a stripper that he invited her to his kids’ bar mitzvahs. It’s a true story, but it reads like a plot from a hollywood movie. Crazy, but... full entry
- Janis Ian’s follow-up
- Some of you may remember that I posted something talking about Janis Ian and an article she wrote about downloading music, the RIAA, etc. Well, she’s now written a follow-up article to complement it. As with the original, there’s some great stuff in here.
July 2002
- Musician Tells the RIAA What’s What
- Janis Ian, a musician with 25+ albums out over a span of 37 years, has written an interesting article about the whole internet music/RIAA thing. It’s quite a change of pace to see an artist/musician speak out so vocally about the subject. Or, at least,... full entry
June 2002
- Death to VeriSign
- Merlin started a new website that contains, among other things, information on how to transfer your domain away from VeriSign. In case you haven’t heard, Network Solutions (the registrar owned by VeriSign) has been implicated in numerous instances of fraudulent billing, complicity on domain stealing... full entry
- Don’t laugh at Smokey!
- Wow. I’m never making fun of Smokey the Bear again. The woman charged with starting the recent fire in Colorado is facing “as many as 10 years in prison and as much as $500,000 in fines”. That’s certianly nothing to sneeze at…
- Oh no… not again!
- As if computer viruses didn’t complicate our lives enough as it is… McAfee is reporting that is has received a new virus that can infect image files (specifically JPG files). Thankfully, it isn’t in the wild yet, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of... full entry
May 2002
- Keep their attention!
- I guess that’s one way to keep a class’s attention… A british math professor decided to surf pornography during an exam. Only problem was that his computer was still hooked up to the projector! (via BoingBoing)
- Gotta do it yourself
- Apparently, the old saying is true: “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” It seems that’s just what Richard Ankrom did when he modified a California Department of Transportation freeway sign. Nine months and no one noticed…
- FOX really scares me
- I was watching the last episode of the fantastic series 24 last night and they showed ads for Celebrity Boxing II, which will air tonight. I mean… Screech?!?! The only thing that saves the whole night is that there’s also a new episode of The... full entry
- Patenting Life
- Apparently some biotech companies are trying to skirt around the issue of being able to patent DNA sequences. Instead, they encode the sequences as MP3s, which are covered by copyright laws for 95 years. Personally, I think it stinks. It does, however, give a whole... full entry
- Some people are just dumb
- Sometimes I wish natural selection would work more quickly. We’d sure be better off if we didn’t have so many dumb people around. (Incidentally, I got my degree at Texas A&M, very near the story.)
- Page 7 of 8 pages « First < 5 6 7 8 >
Return to the archives.