My blog is worth $6,774.48.
How much is your blog worth?

Tags: blogs,

Yaba Yaba

Sorry. couldn't resist it. got an
invite to WordPress. At least they support categories..
Although, if they only allow 5 categories, and I can't mess up my sidebar, this relationship will not last.

Aumann MeUman

Tags: Nobel, Prize, Game, Theory, Israel,

The Prize in Economic Sciences 2005 - Press Release

The Prize in Economic Sciences 2005 - Press Release: "In many real-world situations, cooperation may be easier to sustain in a long-term relationship than in a single encounter. Analyses of short-run games are, thus, often too restrictive. Robert Aumann was the first to conduct a full-fledged formal analysis of so-called infinitely repeated games. His research identified exactly what outcomes can be upheld over time in long-run relations.

The theory of repeated games enhances our understanding of the prerequisites for cooperation: Why it is more difficult when there are many participants, when they interact infrequently, when interaction is likely to be broken off, when the time horizon is short or when others' actions cannot be clearly observed. Insights into these issues help explain economic conflicts such as price wars and trade wars, as well as why some communities are more successful than others in managing common-pool resources. The repeated-games approach clarifies the raison d�être of many institutions, ranging from merchant guilds and organized crime to wage negotiations and international trade agreements."

Yep. That's why I wrote my MSc about repeated games. I'm glad the Nobel prize committee has finally
come round.

Tags: Nobel, Prize, Game, Theory, Israel,

Its about time

Just heard on the radio (no links yet).

Yisrael Aumann has been awarded the Nobel prize. So that's the fifth nobelist I've met. >smug< Well, I wonder if Israeli kids will flock to game theory now, just like they all started practicing Judo when Yael Arad got her medal.

Tags: Nobel, Prize, Game, Theory, Israel,

shana tova III

wallshana
Originally uploaded by yish.

shana tova II

briut
Originally uploaded by yish.

shana tova I

rimonshana
Originally uploaded by yish.

xtreme sports

Tihomir "Tigertad" Titschko is the new world champ of....

Chess boxing!

I hear he's aiming for the triathlon next year, wich will also include Zorb poetry reading and extreme ironing.

Tags: silly, sport

Hi mum!

Wow! I'm almost a tagsphere celebrity. number 282. >smug<

Tags: folksonomy, tags,

just so

Happy Birthday t'ya

Anti-frost

Winter's coming. Mental note: print a few Howtoons to get us through those long, dark, damp Saterday afternoons.

Now will you listen?

In Plans to Evacuate U.S. Cities, Chance for Havoc - New York Times: "Sandra S. Hutchens, chief of the office of homeland security at the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. 'With an earthquake or a major terrorist attack, we'd obviously have no warning. We haven't looked at mass evacuation or temporary housing for hundreds of thousands of people.'"

No Warning?
Maybe Ms. Hutchens should read Science magazine, or the new scientist.

Or simply try http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=global+warming+climate+change+warning+hurricane

Tags: News and politics, Global warming, Climate change, Hurricane,

and the evil livin'

yup. The Legendary KO have made their claim to fame.

Tags: News and politics, music, Bush,

Evil Dead XP?

Old, but still funny. Is this the next installment of the Evil Dead?
Microsoft Supported by Dead People

Good GM, bad GM?

How do you take in the benefits of GM and biotech, and keep out its vices? Well, maybe one way is the
Open Source way. That kind of sieve should let through nutrition enhancement, but keep out herbicide resistance.

Tags: News and politics, Food, Sustainability, Technology,

tum tum da da dom

The next time the devil comes down to Georgia, he might find himself competing with a robot.

Tags: Music, cool, Research,

Keyword abyss

You think google will match me up with IBM ads?

IBM and the Holocaust home

I'm a bit behind the news on this one, the book came out in 2001, but when I saw this today it sent shivers down my spine.

Mankind barely noticed when the concept of massively organized information quietly emerged to become a means of social control, a weapon of war, and a roadmap for group destruction. The unique igniting event was the most fateful day of the last century, January 30, 1933, the day Adolf Hitler came to power. Hitler and his hatred of the Jews was the ironic driving force behind this intellectual turning point. But his quest was greatly enhanced and energized by the ingenuity and craving for profit of a single American company and its legendary, autocratic chairman. That company was International Business Machines, and its chairman was Thomas J. Watson.

And I was bitching about Cisco.

And then there were none

Sustain's report on the global state of fish is nothing short of a horror story. A real one. Here's a few leaders, but you should read it first hand, top to bottom. Its too important to ignore. Even if you don't give a hoot about the planet, you should know about the risks to your own health.

the same fatty tissues in fish that are such a good source of omega-3s are also potentially dangerous because they tend to have high levels of various types of pollutants.
Among these are dioxin, PCBs, and mercury.
PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, are a type of synthetic chemical that was widely used from the 1930s to the 1970s in products such as paint, lubricant, inks, coolants, caulking compounds, and electrical equipment. These chemicals have dispersed throughout the environment and trace levels are found everywhere. PCBs do not break down easily and they are present throughout the food chain because
they are stored in the fatty tissues of animals, including fish. The negative health effects of PCBs can include:

• Cancers,
• Thyroid problems,
• Weakened immune response,
• Neurological development problems in foetal and infant growth

PCBs accumulate in the body over a lifetime. This means that women who consume more than one or two portions of oily fish per week when they are young, will still be exposing their foetuses to the PCBs in this fish at any point in the future if they become pregnant. For this reason, the FSA recommends that women should not consume more than one or two servings of fish per week.

Mercury is another pollutant that accumulates in fish. People less than 16 years of age and pregnant women and their unborn children are among those at high risk for methyl-mercury poisoning, which damages the nervous system and kidneys. Women who intend to become pregnant should completely avoid marlin, swordfish, tuna, and shark beginning at least three months prior to conception if possible.
They should continue to avoid these fish for the remainder of their pregnancy and while they are breastfeeding. Mercury can penetrate the brain-blood-barrier and is particularly toxic to the brain development of foetuses. This advice is based on the latest guidelines by the Committee on Toxicity of Chemicals in Food at the Food Standards Agency

As for the fish themselves:

52% of the world's commercial fish species are fully exploited.
17% are over exploited.
8% are depleted.

Not only fish suffer -

Depending on the type of technology used to capture a target species, any number of nontarget species may be affected. Dolphins, whales, sharks, rays, various marine mammals, sea birds, and a large number of commercially useless fish are all accidentally killed and discarded into the sea.
Nets, trawls, and lines all contribute to the by-catch problem. Between 22% and 80% of fish by weight is discarded depending on the type of fishing operation.13 Every segment of the marine
ecosystem is damaged by these activities.

Quiz: How big is a modern fishing net?

Gillnets are another highly destructive means of catching fish. Until recently, these long open nets were set out in lengths of up to 50kms - that's the equivalent of 500 football pitches laid end to end. These nets were and are frequently lost, left to drift through the oceans continually killing sea life in their path. As many are made from non-biodegradable materials, they can continue doing damage for years. They are now limited to 2 kilometres in length (which is still 20 football pitches)

Ok, so let's eat farmed fish, right? well -

As is usually the case, unnatural crowding leads to disease problems. A primary concern to both the salmon industry and its critics is the flourishing of sea lice in salmon populations. Sea lice are small parasitic crustaceans that feed on the blood and tissue of salmon. In the wild, salmon rid themselves of sea lice by migrating into freshwater each year, but because farmed salmon are reared in the ocean for their entire life cycle, the sea lice flourish unchecked. The surrounding environment is affected because a reservoir of parasites in the farm, continually infects wild fish populations.
To protect their product from sea lice, farmers use a variety of methods including:

• Chemical bath with Azamethiphos, an organophosphate, which is ten times more toxic than the chemical Dichlorvos, which it is replacing because the sea-lice have developed some immunity to it.
• Chemical bath with Cypermethrin, a nerve-toxin, which is harmful to shellfish, and is viewed as a major public health risk when improperly used as sheep dip
• Oral treatments with Teflubenzuron, a carcinogenic insecticide that may persist in the environment, and inhibits the shell formation of invertebrates, including crustaceans in the water around salmon cages.
• Oral treatment with Emamectin, which is very harmful to shellfish and remains in the flesh of farmed fish.

It is worth noting that the above four chemical treatments of sea lice are said by some experts to be both carcinogenic and hormone disrupting

And to top it, every Kilo of farmed fish contains 2 Kilo of wild fish. Sounds absurd?

Fishmeal is used, whether or not it contains by-catch, because most species of farmed fish are carnivorous and do not grow rapidly on a vegetarian diet of grain and soy feeds. But unless fish are fed a plantbased diet, there is no net increase in the amount of fish available to us from the seas; in fact there is a net loss. Given the feed conversion ratio above - for every kilo of fishmeal fed to farmed fish, we get back only half a kilo.

But if we ban fish, what about the fishermen?

The fishing industry is happy to invoke the image of small town fishermen being driven to ruin by environmental regulation, but it is the advent of these destructive industrial operations that threatens the small-coastal fishermen and the stocks they depend on, not policies aimed at sustaining stocks. Local coastal fishing is less damaging, more efficient, produces better quality fish, and is not the primary environmental threat, but cannot compete in the current market.

There's more horrors in the original, but there's also some hope, some reasonable policy proposals, as well as simple guidelines for personal action.

The list below is far from exhaustive, so we have given lots of other sources of information if you'd like to do more. But whatever you do, do something.

• If you do not already eat fish, do not start. The health benefits of fish are scientifically valid, but there are plenty of ways to eat a healthy diet without fish.
• If you are concerned about the levels of omega-3 fatty acids in your diet, eat more walnuts (and walnut oil), and the oils from flaxseed/linseed and hemp. These more unusual sources are available at most health food stores and are widely accepted vegetarian source of omega-3s.
• If you eat beef and dairy products, make sure the animals were fed on grass and clover (all organic ones are) as this increases levels of omega-3s in the meat and milk.

If you are choosing fish

• If you do eat fish, use your purchasing power to help the oceans by supporting the MSC-Label, which ensures your fish came from a sustainably managed source.
• If you choose to purchase farmed fish, make it organically farmed fish.
• If the place where you buy your fish does not have MSC or organic fish, ask them to stock it. Most outlets should be eager to please their customers! If the fish package or label does not give you enough - or any - information about the healthiness of the product, or if it was produced sustainably - ask the retailer or write to the manufacturer. You have a right to know.
• Make sure that the fish you are eating is recommended by a reputable guide, such as The Good Fish Guide from the Marine Conservation Society. Also see A guide to healthy and sustainable fish, below.

Pregnant women should seek out the latest information on the potential harm to their babies' development from mercury, dioxin, PCBs and other pollutants that maybe found in high concentrations in certain fish. The Food Standards Agency's recommendation is to avoid all fish listed as having high mercury content. This includes marlin, shark, tuna, and swordfish.
Eat one portion of oily fish per week, or its equivalent from vegetarian sources, to maintain levels of omega-3s.
Do not eat more than one or two servings of fish per week. And when you do eat it, really appreciate it - perhaps saving it for special occasions

Get political!

Write to:

• your MP. Find out who it is by calling the House of Commons Information Line on 020 72194272 or visiting www.locata.co.uk/commons. You can write to your MP at the House of Commons, London, SW1A 0AA
• your MEP. Check the map on this website to find out who it is http://www.europarl.org.uk/uk_meps/membersmain.htm
• the fisheries minister, Ben Bradshaw, at the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Fisheries Directorate, Defra, 3-8 Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HH www.defra.gov.uk/fish/fishindx.htm

Tell them that, as your elected representative, you are not happy with what they are doing to protect fish stocks for the future. Based on what you have read in this report, you might want to suggest one or more of the following policies:

• Reducing the size of the EU industrial fishing fleet and spending the EU subsidies instead on retraining and regeneration in the areas affected.
• Establishing a network of marine protected areas around the EU, especially around spawning grounds.
• Ending the exploitation of other countries' fishing grounds, and instead spending the money on investing in those countries' sustainable fishing and fish processing industries.
• Banning the most environmentally destructive types of fishing, such as bottom trawling.
• Enforcing the existing regulations - for example by using vessel tracking - so that those who violate the law have to face serious penalties.
• Encouraging, rather than discouraging, the production of other sources of omega-3s acids. For example, VAT is currently charged on hemp seed production in the UK as it is classed as a nonfood product.
• Changing official government advice to eat more fish, from any source. If everyone followed this advice fish stocks would be in an even worse state.

If we can save the fish - we can save the planet. I'm affraid that the "if" there might be "and only if".

Tags: Food and Drink, Health and wellness, News and politics, Sustainability, Fish, Global warming

Why I love Google

First, it was just Google. Just what you wanted, no more. Then gmail, with its 2G promise and AJAX interface. Ok, there are lots of mail services out there, but I liked their style. But with ig, things started getting personal. And now they've given us the blog search. Why am I so excited? Because I can run a search on me, pick up the RSS feed, and add it to my personal portal. There. Now if you say anything about me, I know.

Any one said narcissist? Megalomenaic? Well, you know, I keep a blog, right?

ShlepoVolatic

I wonder if I can get a UK gov sustainability grant to buy one of these. Unfortunately, on an unemployed student budget, its the only chance of owning one.

eeeuuwww foto

Yeah, that much Dutch I can figure out. The rest... damn! but the image is great.

(this just came in from Marbel:

A picture of elijah wood and his girlfriend on an art show. I found it on
another dutch blog, without credits, so I can't direct you there ;)

Thanks!)

Central Park Zoo's gay penguins ignite debate

Sometimes you find the best stories in the talkbacks. This one comes from a comment Will made on collision detection

Central Park Zoo's gay penguins ignite debate: Roy and Silo, two chinstrap penguins at the Central Park Zoo in Manhattan, are completely devoted to each other. For nearly six years now, they have been inseparable. They exhibit what in penguin parlance is called 'ecstatic behavior': That is, they entwine their necks, they vocalize to each other, they have sex. Silo and Roy are, to anthropomorphize a bit, gay penguins.

Sunset in Coverack

testing our new tent in Cornwall last month

Getting closer to your game console: er, Too close for comfort?

http://www.homemade-sex-toys.com/case/

"Let’s face it: being a dedicated gamer can be lonely. Sure, you have
your Everquest clan or your Quake buddies, but communing with fellow
gaming geeks doesn’t fulfill certain…needs. At the same time, it’s hard
to tear yourself away from the computer long enough to chase tail and
engage in archaic but obligatory mating rituals. Now you don’t have to
leave your true love behind. In fact, you and your PC are about to get
closer…much, much closer."

the old photoalbum of AI

DSpace at MIT: AI Memos (1959 - 2004)

There's

Linearly Unrecognizable Patterns / Minsky, Marvin and Papert, Seymour / 1-Jan-1967

And

Achieving Artificial Intelligence through Building Robots / Brooks, Rodney A. / 1-May-1986

Or the charming

Twenty Things To Do With A Computer / Papert, Seymour and Solomon, Cynthia / 1-Jun-1971

or maybe its just me?

Hall of Technical Documentation Weirdness/Audible Penis

Looks like ATT need to send their tech illustrators on a long holiday to somewhere warm.

Hall of Technical Documentation Weirdness/Audible Penis

The Observer | Food monthly | Eat my blog

Jay Rayner did a piece/a> for the Observer food monthly on my darling Pim. A nice read (though I personally think her blog is more entertaining), and there's some tips at the bottom.

Nearly there

Great. Now all I need is a USB catheter, and I can finaly get some work done.

95% of everything is crap? Well, 50% at least.

Next time your doctor quotes medical research, you should quote Ioannidis:

THEODORE STURGEON, an American science-fiction writer, once observed that “95% of everything is crap”. John Ioannidis, a Greek epidemiologist, would not go that far. His benchmark is 50%. But that figure, he thinks, is a fair estimate of the proportion of scientific papers that eventually turn out to be wrong.

LIes, Damn lies, and ...

Fafblog! the whole worlds only source for Fafblog.

If you're gettin worried that the government won't be there to help you out durin the next hurricane or earthquake or terrorist attack, don't panic! Fafblog is here with our Do-It-Yourself Emergency Management Guide! Today we're gonna show you how to get through a major disaster just usin stuff you've got lyin around the home.

You will need:

# construction paper
# glue or glue sticks
# a can of baking soda
# some play-doh (optional)
# 200 gallons of distilled water and 100 pounds of canned food"

(thanks dutchmarbel!)

So the Guardian said it before me

Mark Tran ran a piece on Katrina, Bush and global warming on Sept. 1st, saying pretty much what I said yesterday, only much better.

Well, I was on holiday, I know, I should have googled before I blogged, but, you know..

If you're American, you can even vote on "is Bush responsible for Katrina".

Point that finger

We came back from a wonderful family camping holiday in Cornwall, plunk into the media coverage of Katrina. The horror. The bloody horror.

But what puzzles me is that no one talks about responsibility. I mean, this is no wrath of god. Its human negligence. And I'm not talking about the levee breaking or the slow response. I'm talking about heavy weather.

At some point I heard G.W. said this is worse than 9/11. Damn right. About 10 times worse. So where's the declaration of war on climate change? Where's the brave words on defending the world and cutting down carbon emissions? Did I miss something?

Its simple, you know. Extreme phenomena are a consequence of climate change. You don't stop climate change, you get more extreme phenomena. So maybe before you make a big hoo-ha about sending a man to the next planet, you want to do something about making this one livable?

At least the storm shut down some oil rigs, and pushed the prices up a bit.

Technorati:katrina, rant, global+warming

Le'chaim!

I like the ad, but I'm realy curious to know what the bear tastes like.

Is nicotine next?

Independent Online Edition > Health Medical : app1: "Coffee might soon be considered a health drink following a study showing it is a surprisingly rich source of anti-cancer agents."

Nicosia, aug. 2005

Nicosia, Aug, 2005

Guess what?

Ok, lets see who can figure out what this is:


full size

(leave a comment)

folksonomy hits the soundsphere. oh so good.

Last.fm

Are you OK?

About textOK - the free SMS service to tell friends and family you're ok

register, enter the mobile numbers of your friends, the next time something horid happens - send a single "I'm ok" SMS and it goes out to everyone. Profits go to charity.

'I kept saying, "Help me, help me." But no one did'

A man is stabbed on the bus next to you. The perpetrator has left the bus, walking slowly, with an eerie grin on his face. what do you do?

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | 'I kept saying, "Help me, help me." But no one did': "Eventually the police and paramedics came. There was blood splattered on the stairs and the floor but there wasn't that much of it. I remember thinking at the time that I must have blood on my clothes, and looked at myself. I was wearing a white T-shirt and I'd been kneeling with him but it was just my hands that were covered in his blood. I heard a girl say, as he was being taken away in the ambulance, that she hadn't wanted to give him any of her clothes. I said, 'What, in case they got messy?' Her face said yes."

Fight the Bull - Why Business People Speak Like Idiots

Fight the Bull - Why Business People Speak Like Idiots: "Feel like that document that surfaced in your inbox is taking a lot of time to say not much of anything? Get even. Send the writer an anonymous message from the Mystery Matador."

OrangeBlue.org

OrangeBlue.org
go vote.

Another example of why the web is so much safer than life.

BBC - BBC Four Drama - Blue/Orange

BBC - BBC Four Drama - Blue/Orange

BLUE/ORANGE
Howard Davies, UK, 2005
Tuesday 7 June 2005 10.30pm-midnight


The struggle for power is at the heart of this dynamic and often very funny film adaptation of a play about a young mental patient and the doctors treating him. Featuring three strong performances and a script which is continually challenging and engaging, Blue/Orange looks at serious issues without being dour or simplistic.

[Fwd: Delayed success]

hey, why not put in a bid for a £1M research project on the issue: "the
effects of telling lazy bums to get their head out of their arse"

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Delayed success
Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2005 10:58:45 +0100
From: Helen Green <H.Green@ioe.ac.uk>
To: Headac@mentor.ioe.ac.uk

As reported in the news this week, Liz Beattie, a retired headteacher
and member of the Professional Association for Teachers, has called for
the term "failure" to be removed from schools' vocabularies in favour
of "delayed success". You and Yours (Radio 4, 12-1 daily) is having a
phone-in on this next Tuesday (26 July). They would like to interview
an expert on Monday the 25th about this topic. Has any research been
done on it? Have you done any such research?

Please get in touch with me asap if you think you might be interested,
or if you know someone who would be.
Many thanks
Helen
--
Helen Green
Press and Policy Officer
Institute of Education
20 Bedford Way
London WC1H 0AL
Phone: +44 (0)20 7612 6459
Mobile: +44 (0)7734 540 870
Fax: +44 (0)20 7612 6464
Website: www.ioe.ac.uk/media

orange summer

orangesummer

is this me?

uarehere

Oh dear. Have we gone too far?

We are fine.

F@*k. S#!t. Can't believe this. I'm in London, running "standard Israeli bus blast procedure", i.e. call anyone you know in the area to check that they're ok, call anyone you know out of the area to tell them you're ok.

H. is at the office, kids in school. All well.

Thank god for Skype, blogs, email, 360. At least somethings work when there's a blast.

Et tu, Cisco?

Not sure what to make of this. Sent some questions to Cisco's account managers for the China deal. Got some answers, not completly satesfied, but more urgent matters today.

Kinda sad to see this, being a former Cisco-ee.

WikiHome

podcast wannabe

Today's playlist:

http://www.defchild.com/music/defchild.com_Bad_Man_Dub_Mixtape.mp3
http://clapyourhandssayyeah.com/
http://www.djhistorymixarchive.com/mixes/djhistmix015.mp3 (from
http://www.djhistory.com/mixes/)
random picks from http://www.insound.com/mp3/

And I almost stopped blogging

Some time ago I posted a call to ban Secure Computing, the company that makes SmartFilter.
The reason: these guys are selling their software to Tunisia, which uses it to block pornography and political debate.

Today I got a comment from Mr. David Burt, PR manager, explaining that secure computing do not licence software to Iran, due to its strick adherance to the US embargo, and any Iranian ISP using SmartFilter was doing it illeagaly.

I almost flogged myself in public, but then I re-read my original post. Hang on Dude, I say, I was talking about Tunisia. What about Tunisia? You know, they are using your software to shut people up. I even warn him that I'm going to post his response.

Here it is:

We sell to ISPs where the law allows.  It's really up the customer how they use
our software. 

right. thanks. have a nice day.


full e-mail thread starts here:
-------------------------------

We sell to ISPs where the law allows.  It's really up the customer how they use
our software.


David Burt
Public Relations Manager

Secure Computing(r)
Securing connections between people, applications, and networks(tm)
www.securecomputing.com
NASDAQ: SCUR

1-206-336-1541 (Direct Phone)
1-800-971-2622 (Main Phone)
1-206-683-9508 (Mobile Phone)
1-206-834-1788 (Fax)
David_Burt@Securecomputing.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Yishay Mor [mailto:ymor@ukfsn.org]
Sent: Thursday, June 23, 2005 4:22 PM
To: Burt,David
Subject: Re: [Yishay's blabber] 6/23/2005 03:15:16 PM

First, filtering pornography is a breach of freedom of information. Although it may be acceptable in private institutions, it is not
justifiable on a national scale.
More importantly, apparently they filter much more:
http://allafrica.com/stories/200506061286.html

I would like to thank you for your responsiveness to my queries. With due respect, I think it is only fair to note that I intend to quote this
conversation on my blog. Please advise me what is Secure Computing's general policy on providing software to countries which use it to
repress civil liberties, with reference to Tunisia as a test case.

Thankfully,

Yishay Mor

Burt,David wrote:

<>We do sell SmartFilter to an ISP in Tunisia. They use it to block pornography sites.

David Burt
Public Relations Manager
Secure Computing(r)

-----Original Message-----
From: Yishay Mor [mailto:ymor@ukfsn.org]
Sent: Thursday, June 23, 2005 3:50 PM
To: Burt,David
Subject: Re: [Yishay's blabber] 6/23/2005 03:15:16 PM

Dear David,

I just noticed - my blog post referred to the use of SmartFilter in
Tunisia, not Iran. I'd like to hear your comment on that please.

Sincerely,

Yishay Mor

Burt,David wrote:

We don't have a press release or the statement online.  However AFP news
reported much of the statement here:
http://www.todayonline.com/articles/57604.asp

David Burt
Public Relations Manager

Secure Computing(r)

-----Original Message-----
From: Yishay Mor [mailto:y.mor@ioe.ac.uk]
Sent: Thursday, June 23, 2005 8:24 AM
To: Burt,David
Subject: Re: [Yishay's blabber] 6/23/2005 03:15:16 PM

Dave,

Since this was posted as an anonymous comment, I'd like to verify its authenticity.Also, if you have a press release on-line, please point me
to it so that I can link to it.

Best regards, and apologies for targeting you unjustly,

- Yishay Mor

Anonymous wrote:

Secure Computing has sold no licenses to any entity in Iran, and any use of Secure's software by an ISP in Iran has been without Secure
Computing's consent and is in violation of Secure Computing's End User License Agreement. We have been made aware of ISPs in Iran making
illegal and unauthorized attempts to use of our software. Secure Computing is actively taking steps to stop this illegal use of our
products. Secure Computing Corporation is fully committed to complying with the export laws, policies and regulations of the United States.
It is Secure Computing's policy that strict compliance with all laws and regulations concerning the export and re-export of our products
and/or technical information is required. Unless authorized by the U.S. Government, Secure Computing Corporation prohibits export and
reexport of Secure products, software, services, and technology to Iran and destinations subject to U.S. embargoes or trade sanctions.

David Burt, Public Relations Manager
Secure Computing(r)
1-206-336-1541 (Direct Phone)
1-206-683-9508 (Mobile Phone)
David_Burt@Securecomputing.com

--
Posted by Anonymous to Yishay's blabber

Bedtime story

Last night I dreamt I was smoking. In my dream, I absent mindedly took a fag from the pack, and went outside to smoke. After I had smoked half of it, I suddenly remembered that I had stopped 3 months ago. I immediately squashed it, and went up home, full of remorse.

In the morning, when I realized it was a dream, my first thought was fuck, why didn't I smoke the whole stick.

Die, story! Die!

Looks like the LAT Wikitorial story is becoming an internet phenomena in its own right. The long tail, as always, has a long and thoughtful commentary about it. I'll try to keep it short, so that old media guys can understand:

• TalkBacks are for loonies.
• Blogs are for opinions.
• Wikis are for facts.

To demonstrate, I'm not going to add a link here as a talk back to Ha'aretz's piece on the Wikitorial.

Are you guys listening?

There's a fine thread from Anil Dash's NYT hack to the LA Times Wikitorial farce (and they blame shlashdot? get real, guys!). And no, its not goatse.cx. I won't repeat a story that has been told in more than one place, and by better story tellers than me.
What I'm trying to get at is about the subtle power shift between old and new media, and how old media doesn't get it. It's still locked in its hubris, thinking oh, this internet thing is a nice toy, lets have a go. Like the BBC h2g2. I mean, " It's like an encyclopedia, only better because all the entries are written by people like you!" hello?

All the guys from LAT or NYT had to do was a bit of journalistic research. Not in their archives, but somewhere reliable, like, you know, Wikipedia.

So maybe it is goatse.cx, in a way.

I should have gone to bed earlier.