Well, thanks but no thanks. Call me when you stop treating your customers and fans like thieves.

I think this is what they had in mind when they said, “information wants to be free”.

I’m not happy about what’s revealed in this article. I’m not sure how to feel about it at all, actually. He did what he did for whatever reasons. It doesn’t make it right. It doesn’t make it understandable or justifiable or honourable or any of that. But it is part of his story.

It’s the ugly part of this story.

“See,” I said, “I didn’t want to know that particular part of this story.” I still wish I didn’t. But I do.

My respect for the man’s writing remains undiminished. Of the man himself, I can only ask, “What the fuck?” What could you possibly have been thinking, Hunter, to have rendered yourself so much hamburger while your six year old grandchild was in the house?

Here’s the story. Make of it what you will. I…still don’t know how to react.

“You idiot kid, you don’t have a clue…sometimes you just get caught in the eye…you’re pulling him through…” – Elliott Smith

The second, recommended to me by shaver (who finally posted a new diary entry) is a short story by Woody Allen that made me laugh out loud twice while sitting in my cube at work.

And for good reason. We spend a lot of money on it and general consensus (including from me) is that we don’t get our money’s worth.

In an effort to come up with sane approaches to dealing with (or at least understanding) the problems involved, Canada created The Health Council in 2003. They released their first report yesterday. Not only am I surprised that a government committee managed to produce anything after only two years, I’m surprised by the things it apparently says. You can read the full Globe and Mail article over here, but here are some relevant bits that make it sound like that committee is actually competent.

…the Health Council report distinguishes itself in a couple of important ways. Nowhere in its 94 pages do you find the word “crisis.” There is no chest-beating call for massive increases in spending.

In fact, the report repeatedly says progress is being made in each of these areas, and offers up concrete examples of approaches that work. And the council members have the good sense — and the backbone — to wonder aloud if Canadians are actually getting value for money for the $130-billion that is spent annually on health-care delivery.

…

Hurry up and deal with the human-resources problem. Here, the council had a nuanced message. Not the typical cries of: “We have a doctor shortage” and “We have a nursing shortage,” but a call to start with a clean slate and determine how many and what kind of workers are needed to deliver health care in Canada, and create the multidisciplinary team that can do so in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

…

Hurry up and create a national system of electronic health records. Accelerating the use of information technology will improve patient care and safety and lift a bureaucratic burden from health workers.[*]

…

the Health Council also breaks new ground, making an explicit call to recognize the role socioeconomic determinants play in health and acknowledging that many factors other than health-care delivery — income, housing, inequality — have an impact on the health of individuals and communities.

[*] This part, after the fiasco that is the multi-billion-dollar-failure Gun Registry, sort of scares me. I just hope they hire some competent programmers and managers to do this.

I might actually see if I can dig up a copy of the full report sometime. It sounds, from this article, that it might be sane.

That is all, carry on.

“Of course it’s wonderful to see the human race rallying to the aid of disaster victims, but it’s the inconsistency that has me foxed. Nobody is making this sort of fuss about all the people killed in Iraq, and yet it’s a human catastrophe of comparable dimensions.

According to the only scientific estimate attempted, Iraqi deaths since the war began number more than 100,000. The tsunami death toll is in the region of 150,000. Yet in the case of Iraq, the media seems reluctant to impress on the public the scale of the carnage. ”

It goes on for a bit, and one really has to ask: why is the global reaction to these events — both so utterly devastating — so different?

Oo, there’s a whole bunch of stuff to read.

The Map Thief is one of those few. I know nothing about the man beyond what’s in this article and a few others I’ve read about him in the past, but he managed to steal a lot of valuable items over years without getting caught and without hurting anyone. He became an expert in a very niche area of theft and executed his art in a very peculiar and efficient manner simply by taking advantage of extreme security weaknesses in libraries that should have been dealt with years ago.

Of course, all things must come to an end, and he did get caught, but he managed to embarrass the hell out of a lot of people (who probably deserved to be embarrassed) in the process.

New Scientist Interview: Return of a “beautiful mind” – Interview

“The free Web browser from the Mozilla Foundation surpassed 10 million downloads on Saturday as Web surfers continue to move away from Microsoft’s market-dominating IE. The milestone highlights growing frustration with the security vulnerabilities that have dogged IE during the past few months.”

On this occassion I would like to send my crazy friends a hearty “Woot!”

Share the love.

“[T]he Orthodox clergy says, with the increasing use of computers in daily life, the time has come to designate an Orthodox Church saint to serve as spiritual guide to internet users.

A few years ago, the Roman Catholic Church nominated a patron saint for the internet – St Isidore, the Bishop of Seville.

However, the Vatican’s decisions hold no sway for Russian Orthodox believers, and the choice for them has been narrowed down to two contenders: Saint John Chrysostom, and Saint Feofan the Hermit.”

I think the “Hermit” thing might be a dig.

So, ok, maybe I’m a prude, but I don’t like games such as Grand Theft Auto. Not only do I not like them, I find them offensive, plausibly damaging, and utterly unnecessary. It’s a very particular sort of game that I don’t like at this level — games that work to provide a reasonable emulation of real-life crime, violence, drug-culture, and that encourage you, as a player, to become part of that world, rather than setting you up to fight against it. In other words, I’m not a big fan of games where the whole point is to have the player role-play a real-life bad guy.

Give me aliens. Give me Sith. Let me run around being a dagger-wielding zombie chick with a bad attitude and a distaste for Night Elves. Set me up with a BFG and some nail guns running around being a Space Marine on Mars. Better yet, give me a hunk of desert and a bit of fertile land along a river and I will build a civilisation. Let me build. Let me create. Let me fight the bad guys. Let me solve crimes. Let me make-believe in a fantasy world. Don’t…don’t have me commit serious (epic, even) analogs of real-world crimes and reward me based on how many people I kill, prostitutes I control, or drug money I bring in. Well, you can offer me the chance to do that if you like, but don’t sell it to the ten-to-fifteen year old set, m’kay?

Now, of course, there’s the ESRB and their video games rating guide, but it’s not exactly all that useful. First off, “the ESRB does not have the authority to enforce the ratings at the retail level, [but] we do work closely with retailers and game centers to encourage them to display ratings information and not sell or rent certain product to minors”. Secondly, most parents don’t have the time or wherewithal to a) know about the rating system, b) actually use the rating system to select games for their children, or c) really have the first clue wtf the kids are doing downstairs on the X-Box in the first place.

I guess that’s actually secondly, thirdly, and fourthly.

Anyhow, I think the actual creation of these games is ethically questionable at the best of times, but I understand the most fundamental reasons for doing so: they make millions and millions of dollars. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, for example, “could be looking at 3 million copies sold in the opening weekend”. At around $50 US per copy, that’s, oh, $150,000,000. In the first weekend. Not an insignificant motivation.

I suppose I just wish that ESRB ratings were (far) more rigorous and better enforced. People are going to continue making these games, for obvious bottom-line-feeding reasons. Parents, however, aren’t going to suddenly wake up tomorrow and be more actively involved and responsible with regards to their childrens’ lives. Which is sad, but true. This being the case, I’d just like to see the video games treated more like…well, more like something that’s rigorously rated that has those ratings enforced at the point of sale. Movies, I suppose. Or…porn mags. Or something.

That’s enough of that, however. I started this post talking about Apple for a reason, and that’s because the Postal people have just released their sequel, Postal2: Running With Scissors for the Mac, and Apple is refusing to carry the title. “The controversial game has been given a M-rating (Mature audiences) along with a first-ever ‘Intense Violence’ sublabel from the ESRB.” Really, if you go look at their website (WARNING: FRONT PAGE IS NOT WORK FRIENDLY) you’ll see that the “M” rating really doesn’t cut it. “AO” (Adult Only, 18+) is what it should have, and that should be enforced at the point of sale by retail drones checking valid photo ID. But I digress…

The Postal site describes their latest product as follows:

Forget what you know about first person shooters. Walk a week in the Postal Dude’s shoes.

Freely explore full 3-D open-ended environments. Interact with over 100 unique NPC’s including Gary Coleman, marching bands, dogs, cats and elephants, protesters, policemen and civilians, with or without weapons.

POSTAL 2 is all about choice; experiment with everyone and everything.

And remember… it’s only as violent as you are!

Which really begs the question: if you’re not running around exploring this open-ended environment with a shotgun and a lust to kill anything that moves, what, exactly, are your interaction options? For all I know there’s a learn-to-be-a-chef-while-playing-mahjongg mini-game, but I’m doubting it.

Wrapping up: I think the Postal people are basically dumbasses for saying things like “The company that brought us the famous ‘1984′ Superbowl commercial has obviously become Big Brother” and believing it.

You buy the ticket, you take the ride. That’s all there is to it.

China, sensitive about issues of national sovereignty, has banned a computer sports game that classifies Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau and Tibet as countries and has threatened to fine Web sites that supply the game and net cafes that let patrons download it.

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.

Hold onto your seat! Take a journey through time that you’ve never experienced before! Biblical history comes alive, as God’s Word—beginning in Genesis—explains the universe we see today.

Giant bugs—marvels of God’s creation—buzz overhead in our themed gift shop and resource center! Find shelves crammed with the latest books, tapes, CDs, DVDs, videos and other resources that’ll strengthen your walk with the Creator and embolden your defense of His Word. Stock up and tell others what you’ve discovered!

Peer back into the deepest recesses of the heavens, and discover that the latest images of the stars confirm an all powerful Creator, not a random bang!

One set of bones, two interpretations. How can two paleontologists, digging the same dinosaur fossil in the field, reach opposite conclusions?

The answer: starting points. Fossils don’t come with labels. We must begin with assumptions! But which is correct?

It just goes on from there.

“Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, already taking heat for accidentally faxing customers’ financial information to a U.S. scrapyard, apologized on Wednesday after one of its cash machines dispensed fake money.

Instead of distributing C$20 bills, the machine, located in the Maritime province of New Brunswick, spat out colorful bills used as incentives at Canadian Tire Corp. hardware stores. ”

Earth’s defences may need to be boosted against the risk of potentially deadly microbes returning on board space probes sent to study Mars, according to leading scientists.

The warning follows a detailed scientific analysis of data sent back by the roving vehicle Opportunity, which landed on the Martian surface on 25 January this year.

Jeffrey Kargel of the United States Geological Survey said: “Before proceeding with sample returns or human missions to Mars, we must review measures for planetary biological protection.”

So no whining. Buy the ticket, take the ride.

With MSN Spaces, you can easily create and manage your blog from your computer or your mobile phone. It’s a great way to share information and photos with your friends and family. And best of all, it’s free!

# Create blog entries and publish your thoughts for the world to see.
# See what visitors to your space say about your blog.
# Search other people’s blogs to find the information you want.
# Upload photos from your mobile phone to your blog.
# Create and manage your space from a mobile phone.

All well and good, I suppose. Lord knows the internet needs more blogs (oh, the irony).

Remember to read the Terms of Use, Code of Conduct, and Privacy Policy carefully, tho…

MSN collects personal information, such as your e-mail address, name, home or work address or telephone number. MSN may also collect demographic information, such as your ZIP code, age, gender, preferences, interests and favorites. Information collected by MSN may be combined with information obtained from other Microsoft services and other companies.
…
You will not use the MSN Web Sites in any way that is unlawful, or harms Microsoft, its affiliates, resellers, distributors, service providers and/or suppliers (each, a “Microsoft Party” and collectively, the “Microsoft Parties”) or any customer of a Microsoft Party, as determined in Microsoft’s sole discretion.
…
For materials you post or otherwise provide to Microsoft related to the MSN Web Sites (a “Submission”), you grant Microsoft permission to (1) use, copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, reproduce, edit, modify, translate and reformat your Submission, each in connection with the MSN Web Sites, and (2) sublicense these rights, to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law. Microsoft will not pay you for your Submission.
…
Microsoft may monitor your e-mail, or other electronic communications and may disclose such information in the event it has a good faith reason to believe it is necessary for purposes of ensuring your compliance with this Agreement, and protecting the rights, property, and interests of the Microsoft Parties or any customer of a Microsoft Party.

Etcetera, etcetera.

Having read all this now, I think I’ll stop using MSN for IM as well. As for my “blog” *ahem*, I think I’ll stick with this happy little GPL’d package hosted on a personal (albeit shared) server. Oh Microsoft, you’re so adorable.

“President Bush was traveling Wednesday to Nova Scotia to give the Canadians a belated “thank you” for helping Americans in their hour of need – a gesture aimed at warming frosty ties between the neighboring nations.”

And then he just kinda blew it by suggesting that “Canada should take a more active role in his ‘war on terrorism’“.

“Three years after the worst-ever attacks against civilians on American soil, Bush said Canada had a duty to step up its part in offensives against potential threats to North America.”

Luckily, Mister Martin seems to have his head on straight, at least for the time being. I really don’t want to have to protest in the snow :P

Demonstrations were typically Canadian, which is nice to see. Everyone I saw at the protest seemed to be in a good mood and was having a good time. Police presence was limited to a bunch of bicycle cops in yellow, and a fair number of “soft hat” OPP walking along with the group.

I have no idea whether Mr Bush knows or even cares about the protests, but I was glad to see a significant group of people (estimates range from 5 to 13 thousand) out there keepin’ it real.

All in all, it was a quiet day. President Bush is still here, of course, probably over in Quebec right now waiting for the Secret Service to finish doing a security sweep of the Museum of Civilisation (and surrounding neighbourhood) so he can hunker down with the PM for a nice meal of Alberta Beef and…er…squash. Or whatever they’re serving up over there tonight.

The security downtown was minimal from what I saw, other than the “security bubble” that followed the pres around all day. As far as I can tell from the news reports, basically nothing was accomplished, and Bush has remained wilfully ignorant of the general dislike and distrust Canadians feel towards him. Whatever.

Winning sign of the day: FREE BEER!
Winning protest group of the day: Belly Dancers Against Bush.

This is probably the most amazing thing I have ever seen, and it speaks so loudly of the power of civil disobedience. There are no guns, no riots, no beatings, no screaming. Just a country full of good, decent, normal people who are saying “No, stop, this is not right”.

And it’s working.

Pension and benefit payments face disruption after what is being described as the biggest computer crash in government history left as many as 80,000 civil servants staring at blank screens…

A routine software upgrade on a small number of PCs last weekend is believed to have gone disastrously wrong when an incompatible system was downloaded on to the whole network.

The punchline: they were experimenting with WinXP on a small number of machines. The outage lasted four days. They had to fly MS consultants in from the US.

FIRED! FIRED! FIRED!

Retailers consider it important to lure the crowds on Black Friday as this could influence shopping habits for the rest of the holiday season, when Americans are expected to spend about $220 billion, according to NRF.

For the record, “the holiday season” is November and December (2 months totalling 61 days), and $220 billion is over $500 per living citizen (all ages) in the US of A. Black Friday in 2003 saw $7.2 billion dollars in sales.

Dudes, you’re not really coming across in a favourable light these days.