Tailored Results

The Untimely Death of Ronald Reagan

The media is spinning more out of control every day. Their latest affront lies in ABC's lastest endeavor of having "common breaking-news drills," which basically mean rehearsing on the internal television network possible "breaking news" stories. The percieved fact that ABC had been behind in coverage of events like the latest Iraq conflict and the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster became the impetus for implementing the new drills.

The drills have encountered small problems, for example the one described in the above New York Times article. Apparently after seeing an internal broadcast of one of ABC's drills, word somehow leaked that Ronald Regan had died, a fallacy, but it nonetheless caused momentary panic throughout the Washington political scene. But that's trivial. Its the big picture thats worrysome to me. Does the idea of the media predicting and preparing for FUTURE 'news' strike anyone else as unsettling? It increasingly sounds as if the destiny for the media lies in Orwellian tactics.

Note:
It's also relatively disturbing that out of all the concievable "breaking-news" events that ABC would need to practice on, the fact that they chose Ronald Reagan's death makes me feel bad for the guy. It doesnt help that most newspapers already have premade obituaries for him. Im surprised the man hasn't died as a result of all the expectation.

World Diplomacy in the hands of...Bangladesh

I wondered, as I read about the latest additions to the death toll in Bangladesh due to regional floods why a country with such drastic internal problems is involving itself in the process of solving other nation's problems, namely the Congo's. Yes you heard right, a UN mission full of Bangladeshi peacekeepers is going to stabilize the region after the removal of both the current Uruguyan and EU forces in September.

Bangladesh's problems are given general overview in this excerpt from the CIA world factbook 2002: Despite sustained domestic and international efforts to improve economic and demographic prospects, Bangladesh remains a poor, overpopulated, and ill-governed nation. Although more than half of GDP is generated through the service sector, nearly two-thirds of Bangladeshis are employed in the agriculture sector, with rice as the single most important product. Major impediments to growth include frequent cyclones and floods, inefficient state-owned enterprises, inadequate port facilities, a rapidly growing labor force that cannot be absorbed by agriculture, delays in exploiting energy resources (natural gas), insufficient power supplies, and slow implementation of economic reforms. Economic reform is stalled in many instances by political infighting and corruption at all levels of government. Progress also has been blocked by opposition from the bureaucracy, public sector unions, and other vested interest groups. The BNP government, led by Prime Minister Khaleda ZIA, has the parliamentary strength to push through needed reforms, but the party's level of political will to do so has been lacking.

Does this sound at all like a country that is either capable or deserving of control in a UN mandated peacekeeping mission? Correct me if I'm wrong but it looks like this is just more UN bullshit aimed at handing the reins of world diplomacy to countries without the stigma of an imperialist past regardless of their qualifications for the job.

Orrin Hatch Revisited

So heres a quick update on the Orrin Hatch debacle. Ironically, it turns out that the lovely Senator from Utah just happened to be using unliscensed software to run the menus on his site.
Perhaps now the good Senator will rethink his position on targeting "criminal" software pirates for digitial invasion now that he's joined their ranks.

Digital Freedom Part 1

As of recently I have been inundated with news and information about various affronts to Digital Freedom, a topic that has always interested me but that i've generally kept on the backburner. The two biggest relevant concerns of mine are 1) the new RIAA campaign to target individiuals sharing a "substantial" amount of MP3s, and 2) the draconian measures proposed by certain members of Congress to punish users engaged in file sharing.

To start, let me elucidate my personal beliefs on the issue of filesharing/music ownership/etc... I always bought the argument that filesharing is if not the same thing, at least similar to making a mix tape. When one created a mix tape, one would record various songs either off the radio or off other tapes or CD's onto a tape that would circulate amongst their community. Music sharing is the same thing but just to a grander scale. Instead of relying on the radio to provide music for one to record, one has various applications to choose from that provide methods of peering into one's friends' music collections to pick and choose songs one desires to download. The music collection derived from this Peer to Peer filesharing effectively creates one's own variable digital radio. From there, one has a variety of choices: 1) keep the MP3's on your computer for sharing or listening purposes, 2) burn them onto a disc for either storage, as a mix, or as a bootleg album, or 3) delete those mp3s because you dont want to violate copyright laws. Then again there is another option, and it happens to be the one that i generally entertain. This option is to keep the MP3's on my computer as a preview of various artists before shelling out $15-20 to buy their albums. For someone who doesn't listen to much radio and who hears about most new music that I like from either friends or the internet, it just isnt plausible to spend an exorbitant quantity of money for a CD just to find out after I buy the album that I don't like it because i had no way to preview its contents and as a result I had to go entirely on the recommendations of various internet music pundits instead of my own informed opinion.

I am a music lover, and I respect artists' rights to their intellectual property but what the RIAA needs to understand is that they are not protecting artists intellectual property by fighting filesharing, they are just trying to protect their greedy distribution practices. Maybe if albums didnt cost fucking twenty dollars each and mainstream radio didn't just play inane drivel 24/7 people like me would not resort to filesharing in order to get informed about intelligent music that they care enough about to go out and buy later. The RIAA is even more full of shit when they claim that filesharers are stealing from artists; if anything people who share music are legitimately progagating artists' popularity and availability. Sure their music is now "available" for free, but when it comes to money, most musicians don't make more than $1 per CD they sell. The vast, vast, vast majority of their profits come from touring and merchandise and consequently the sales of which will increase through the advent of filesharing, due to a larger quantity of people having access to their music. You can't download a concert, or a t-shirt for free, but you can check them out in person after being exposed to an artist via a digital medium. I know from personal observation that it is filesharing that allows me to experiment with music and listen to new things. Personally its been a technology that has both allowed my music taste and my legitimate CD collection to grow.

What is especially worrying is the attitude of the nation's leaders towards filesharing. Not only is the RIAA winning more and more court cases but they are now threatening to expand those lawsuits towards individuals sharing "substantial" numbers of MP3's. Interestingly enough members of Congress namely the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah among others are pandering to the RIAA by proposing unbelievably invasive methods of combatting filesharing. Hatch's proposal is as follows: Filesharers would get two warnings, and then if they failed to cease sharing music, their machines would become legally available for attack by copyright holders and if as a result of the assault there was any extraneous damage to one's computer the attackers would legally be absolved of any liability.

"If we can find some way to do this without destroying their machines, we'd be interested in hearing about that," Hatch said. "If that's the only way, then I'm all for destroying their machines. If you have a few hundred thousand of those, I think people would realize" the seriousness of their actions, he said. "There's no excuse for anyone violating copyright laws," Hatch said. (Quoted from Silicon Valley Article linked in the first paragraph.)

Personally I like the analogy given to this plan by Gwen Hinze, a staff lawyer for EFF: "This is an entirely unreasonable proposal, tantamount to a debt collector sending you two warnings that your car payment is late and then claiming that he is entitled to burn down your garage,"

Thats all for now folks, but stay tuned for a followup article pertaining to a broader issue of internet censorship and various methods of combatting it.

Enemy of the State

Listen. So I found out today that my cousin, Colonel James E. Sabow, was murdered. Shocking, i know. But what makes this even more shocking is that it happened over a decade ago, and it remains unsolved. Even MORE shocking is that after reading extensively about it, the most likely answer to the case is that he was murdered by someone connected to the military and that there was a vast conspiracy to coverup his death. By now i bet you're thinking that this is bullshit, but i assure you all that its not. Its a long and complicated story, and there was even a special on 60 minutes about it.
I feel that any attempt of mine to describe what occurred will undermine the gravity of what really happened, so I will provide you several links to websites that document the case in greater detail.

Here is one detailed account of my other cousin, Dr. David Sabow to expose the truth about the incident.

For those of you who want a shorter version of the events. Check out this article. But be warned, it is much more complex than that, and I strongly encourage all of you to read through the first link.

Finally, here is a copy of the Statement Presented to the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on personnel by my cousin Dr John David Sabow delivered September 12, 1996.