Happy Button?

Damn Interesting » Technology and the Pursuit of Happiness

This reminds me of an old comic book I read, where a cyborg (part human/part machine) was wired up with a big red "pleasure button" on his chest, but was wired to be unable to press it himself. So he would walk around trying to convince people to press it for him. AH! Found some info about the comic I remember. He was called Axel Pressbutton. So there.

To get back on topic: There is some discussion in the linked article about the social ramifications of having people be able to "press their own buttons". Much of the talk indicates that society would fall apart as people sat around getting off without the will to work. There may well be some truth in that, but there is also a great deal of puritanical guilt in the idea that things that are pleasurable are inherently dangerous and must be controlled.

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Courtney Love (!?) Does the Math

Courtney Love Does The Math

It's another link to a lot of text, but it's worth the time it take to read it. Believe me, I'm at least as surprised as anyone that I'm linking to a thought-provoking speech given by Courtney Love.

According to her numbers, the earnings of even a very successful artist are really quite meager. It does give some indication why most of the noise about music piracy is from the record companies, rather than the artists themselves.

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George W. != Ipod Shuffle

From a couple of weeks ago on the Washington Post's website.

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A favorite from the previous post.

FEMALE, n. One of the opposing, or unfair, sex.

The Maker, at Creation's birth,
With living things had stocked the earth.
From elephants to bats and snails,
They all were good, for all were males.
But when the Devil came and saw
He said: "By Thine eternal law
Of growth, maturity, decay,
These all must quickly pass away
And leave untenanted the earth
Unless Thou dost establish birth" --
Then tucked his head beneath his wing
To laugh -- he had no sleeve -- the thing
With deviltry did so accord,
That he'd suggested to the Lord.
The Master pondered this advice,
Then shook and threw the fateful dice
Wherewith all matters here below
Are ordered, and observed the throw;
Then bent His head in awful state,
Confirming the decree of Fate.
From every part of earth anew
The conscious dust consenting flew,
While rivers from their courses rolled
To make it plastic for the mould.
Enough collected (but no more,
For niggard Nature hoards her store)
He kneaded it to flexible clay,
While Nick unseen threw some away.
And then the various forms He cast,
Gross organs first and finer last;
No one at once evolved, but all
By even touches grew and small
Degrees advanced, till, shade by shade,
To match all living things He'd made
Females, complete in all their parts
Except (His clay gave out) the hearts.
"No matter," Satan cried; "with speed
I'll fetch the very hearts they need" --
So flew away and soon brought back
The number needed, in a sack.
That night earth range with sounds of strife --
Ten million males each had a wife;
That night sweet Peace her pinions spread
O'er Hell -- ten million devils dead!
G.J.

The Devil's Dictionary - F

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Short one today.

Devil's Dictionary. Read it and weep (with laughter.)

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No need to worry about the PATRIOT act, we're here to help you.

[Edit 12/29/2005] This story now appears to have been a hoax.

As reported in a number of places, including the Standard-Times, Homeland Security Agents visited the home of a student after he requested a copy of a Mao Tse-Tung's The Little Red Book via interlibrary loan. The article goes on to point out that the student had spent a fair amount of time abroad, and he combination of those two factors warranted a visit from Homeland Security.

The thing that really bothers me about this is that it would appear that The Little Red Book is on some sort of "watch list".

Firstly: Why is ANY book on a "watch list"? I don't understand why the consumption of ideas (of any ilk) is an activity that should be "watched".

Secondly, IF we are going to "watch" books, why in the hell are we watching books by a dead Communist? How many Cold-War leftovers are we still employing in the US security structure? Communists? Good grief! I do believe that dead horse has been beaten beyond recognition by this point in history.

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What? I'm sorry, I can't hear you, I seem to have an unconstitutional domestic wiretap in my ear.

As reported in the BBC's website, the US Administration backed the wiretapping of people inside the US without a FISA review or a search warrant. How much more can we afford to let our Civil Liberties erode before we lose the ability to assert them at all?

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Big Telcos Want 2-Tiered Internet

Reported many places, but this comes from the Boston Globe. The core of this is that core network providers, like AT&T and SBC want to be able to prioritize traffic on their networks so that they can offer "premium" services and access (particularly, video on demand). Obviously, content providers such as Google aren't really hip to this plan.

Here is what concerns me: The plan to add video on demand to these Inet offerings is that the increased competition will benefit consumers. My anecdotal evidence is exactly the opposite. I believe that the only time providers drop pricing is when they are changing service types. When VoIP started to threaten tradition phone revenues, they didn't drop prices to compete, they just started to create their own, higher-priced VoIP services while continuing to milk the old sservice customers that aren't savvy enough to have switched.

For example: Through Bellsouth (in my area) unlimited, non-VoIP local and long distance costs about $80.00 a month. The same thing from a VoIP provider costs about $20.00-$25.00. Did this cause Bellsouth to drop the cost of their unlimited-local-and-ld plan? Nope. What they have done is sign a deal to sell Packet8 VoIP service, rebranded as their own, at about 50% higher than if you bought it directly from Packet8. Time Warner, the cable Internet provider in our area also offers VoIP service, what do they charge? $39.95! That's almost 2x what you would normally pay for that service. Why do they charge it? The have an inroad into your house already, and can sell themselves as more reliable, easier to use and so on.

Given that in the 2 cases where I've seen big carriers get into the phone business they have attempted to charge 50-100% more than the established VoIP guys, I have no faith whatsoever that the new services they offer will be any sort of a boon for consumers. Tiered network access is nothing more than a sham designed to allow them to lock out other, competitive providers and extract more dollars out of consumers.

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The FOX That Stole Christmas

Not that anyone should be stunned by the idea that O'Reilly lies, but good grief! Can this man not come up with anything better to lie about than Christmas?

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Fox News -- Need I say more?

As reported in News Hounds: Sean Hannity attacked two universities for accepting money from Saudi Prince Al-waleed Bin Talal for their Islamic Studies programs, $20 million dollars each, according to a number of sources. What Sean forgot to mention was that that very same Prince owns over 5% of the parent company of Fox News, News Corporation. By News Corporation's own press release (from 1999), his investment was worth over 1.4 billion dollars. If 20 million might come with "...with some type of strings attached...", what does 1.4 billion come with?

[Edit]
It's important to note that News Corp is really Rupert Murdoch's baby, and he's been threatened recently by LIberty Media taking a 18% voting stock share in News Corp. Al-waleed's 5.46% represents an important hedge against a potential hostile takeover bid, as the good Prince has publicly indicated his support for Murdoch

[Edit, again]

Some sources are presenting Al-waleed's purchase as having happened in September 2005, but that doesn't jibe with the News Corp press release I've linked above. AIM's website seems to indicate that the purchase was recent, as well.

Ok, I think I've got it sorted out. His original investment was the 1999 $1.4 billion. He recently bumped up his investment to include 5.46% of the voting shares in News Corp.

Not directly related, but an example of how things get mis-reported: This site, "The Ultimate Middle East business resource" reports:

"In the Western world, Prince Al Waleed holds 49% shares of News Corp, the corporation that owns Fox TV, B Sky B TV, Star TV, 20th Century Fox studios, Harper Collins Company, as well as the newspapers New York Post, The Times, and The Sunday Times."

Wow! 49%, huh? Somehow, I think Rupert Murdoch wouldn't sit still for that.

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Christianity, Science and Capitalism

This article in the Chronical of Higher Education is a pretty interesting read. The author, Rodney Stark, examines why Europe (and, later, America) seem to have "won" the science race in the last 2k years or so. I'm not necessarily buying into the whole thing, but I think he does have some good points.

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Thorazine for the Wall Street Crowd?

This is a link to a review of a film that came out in 2004 called The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power. The film takes the idea of a corporation as a legal entity to it's logical conclusion: If a corporation has the rights of an individual, it should be evaluated by the same criteria we use to evaluate other individuals. When placed on the therapist's couch, most corporations start to look a good deal more dangerous than the guy down the street that argues with fenceposts.

It really boils down to the fact that you can't create an entity with profit as it's sole responsibility and then allow it the freedom to act as it sees fit. The results will not be to the benefit of society.

I know I'm late to the party on this one, but I'm hoping to find this film under the tree this year, and so should you.

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God and Caesar, and the question of rendering

The Washington Post has an article up about the Archdiocese of Portland filing bankruptcy in an attempt to avoid paying damages from the numerous sex abuse cases they are facing.

Legal questions aside (Hell, I have no idea who owns property in the Catholic church), there is a really pressing moral question here: Is attempting to avoid compensating the victims of your abuse morally acceptable? In many of these priest sex scandal cases, the church isn't even claiming that the alleged offenses didn't happen, they're just claiming that they shouldn't have to pay for them.

Sure, going bankrupt is the smart business decision. Giving everything you can, up to and including liquidating assets and asking parishioners to donate directly to a victims fund would be the moral thing to do. Wouldn't a properly contrite church be willing to do any and everything possible to alleviate the pain of those it has offended against? Contrition is a big part of the Catholic approach to sin and forgiveness, and I sure don't see much of it going on with cases like this.

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Neil Bush, Rev. Sun Myung Moon and money-money-money

AlterNet is reporting on Neil Bush (the Prez's younger brother) touring with Rev. Sun Myung Moon. This isn't as odd as it first sounds, unfortunately. The good Reverend gives enormous amounts of money to conservative causes. Enough money, in fact, that congressmen were willing to attend a ceremony in which Moon was delcared to be the Messiah. It strikes me as a little odd that the conservative religious crowd finds it acceptable to take money from someone that, by Evangelical Christian standards, would have to be considered a false-phophet (at the least).

A quick Google search turns up a ton of information on Moon, with a predictable spread of pro and con. I was somewhat suprised to find that Moon was still active and powerful. I really thought Moon was part of a the past, a group and figure that rose and fell in the 80's and early 90's.

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An "alternative" look at intelligent design

If you haven't already, take a little while to check out the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. They've got a great take on ID, along with a good selection of merchandise that you can use to communicate your personal relationship with pasta.

Go Forth and Witness, my Pastafarian Brothers and Sisters!

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On a related note:

Sometimes, it just feels right.

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Since when is it irresponsible to have an opinion

The CNN site has an article about the Whitehouse claiming that critisizing the war is somehow "irresponsible".

Let's see what our friends at Dictionary.com have to say about the word "irresponsible"

ir·re·spon·si·ble adj.

1. Marked by a lack of responsibility: irresponsible accusations.
2. Lacking a sense of responsibility; unreliable or untrustworthy.
3. Law. Not mentally or financially fit to assume responsibility.
4. Not liable to be called to account by a higher authority.

Hmm. Numbers 2 and 3 seem to explicitly refer to the Bush administration, so those can't be what the Whitehouse is referring to. Number 4 doesn't seem to fit either, given Bush's interpretation of the presidency as a "faith-based initiative". That leaves only the first item on the list: "Marked by a lack of responsibility". Just to be clear here, Mr. President: Somehow it's not irresponsible to mislead a nation to war, destroy a soverign government with no plan to rebuild the nation and toss high-dollar contracts to cronies, yet it IS irresponsible to ask questions about how things were done and what our plan should be?

Sir, I beg to differ.

I would hold forth that the ONLY responsible thing to do in this (or any other, really) case is to ask questions. These decisions are too important, with too many implications for families (American and Iraqi, I might point out), the economy and our safety for congress to simply rubber-stamp your choices. We tried that before, right after 9-11. If you'll recall, that's how we got in this mess to start with. If more Senators had asked more questions and insisted on direct answers, we'd be in much better shape today.

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