May 30, 2004
Sudan
11:09 UTC » Emergent Democracy - Global Politics - Warblogging
Passion of the present is covering the genocide in Sudan.
See Jim's blog for more information on how you can help googlebomb to stop genocide.
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Garbage day in the village
10:35 UTC » Japanese Culture - Joi's Diary
May 30, or 530. 5 3 can be read "gomi" in Japanese which means garbage. So what does May 30 mean in our village? Garbage 0 day. This morning, I participated with most of the village in picking up trash and junk around the village. Along one of the roads, there was an area that was clearly being used as an illegal garbage dump by many people. There were mufflers, car batteries, toilets, beds, bicycles and even a car dumped there. We spent the morning hoisting this junk out of the mud and carrying it in trucks to a location where the local government would come and collect it for us.
There were many children helping out as well. Hopefully this annual garage day will help educate them not to dump trash by the road.
I got a chance to meet more of my neighbors so it was nice. I still have a hard time remembering everyone's name but sharing this massive chore with the whole village was quite a bonding experience. These village chores are called gyoji and there are many others including trimming hedges and trees, cleaning common spaces and fixing roads.
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May 28, 2004
Hearing conservation and earphones
18:12 UTC » Advanced Science - Gadgets - Health and Medicine - Music
Today I met the founder and president of Sensaphonics, Michael Santucci. He is a hearing conservation expert and audiologist. He is one of the few audiologists who work with the music industry. The relationship is interesting. Hearing conservation is about protecting your ears from continued exposure to loud sounds in order to preserve your hearing. He told us that baby boomers have a higher rate of hearing loss than senior citizens, probably because of devices such as portable music devices. He shows us pictures of a healthy inner ear and a damaged inner ear and had the same effect on my as the healthy lung and smoker lung photos we often see.
The traditional logic behind headphones and earphones is to increase the volume of the music reaching your ears for better sound. The brain compensates for background noise so, as most people have experienced, music in your car stereo suddenly sounds loud when you come to a stop and the background noise disappears. The damage to your ear is based on the total amplitude of the sound, whereas the perceived loudness of the signal is based on the amplitude above the background noise.
One way to have great earphones and not lose your hearing is to isolate and block the outside sound. Then you can listen to music at much lower volumes and it will still sound loud and clear. This protects your hearing while providing super high fidelity.
This is the theory behind the Shure E2cs and the E5cs that I've written about before. Michael takes this a step further and replaces the ear plugs that come with the Shures and replaces them with custom silicon molds. Sensaphonics also makes their own earphones.
Today, my second cousin Cornelius and I got molds taken of our ears. They are going to send me their ProPhonic Soft 2X earphones as well as molds that will work with my E5cs. They're also going to send me the TC-1000-totally-overkill ear set and the Elacin/Sensaphonics ER-9/15/25 high fidelity earplugs. I look forward to my future ear-mold-a-rama lifestyle, comparing the E5cs with the Sensaphonics and protecting my hearing.
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Chopping pinkies and swords grips
I recently started Kendo and had a sore left pinkie after my first practice. The proper grip of a Japanese sword relies on a grip focused on the pinkie of the left hand. Today, I learned that the tradition of chopping the left pinkie as punishment for disgrace was based on this fact. Without a left pinkie, it's quite difficult to grip a Japanese sword.
In the May 15 incident the Prime Minister of Japan, Tsuyoshi Inukai was assassinated by eleven young Naval Officers. After the court martial, eleven severed fingers were sent to the court house.
Today, the Yakuza continue this tradition, even though swords are no longer the weapon of choice.
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May 27, 2004
Meeting up in the UK June 6?
Planning on arriving in the UK on June 6th. Anyone want to get together in the evening?
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Creative Commons 2.0
After considering a lot of the feedback and statistics from the original Creative Commons licenses, we (I personally was only a small part of this) have launched the 2.0 licenses which I think make them easier to use and easier to understand. Congratulations and thanks to the team for all the work and an excellent step forward.
The details are on the Creative Commons page.
I have changed the license for this blog from the 1.0 Attribution, Noncommercial, Share Alike license to the 2.0 Attribution license.
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Something for Nothing: The Free Culture AudioBook Project
Suw has a nice essay describing Lessig's Free Culture and the audio book project that emerged from that. It describes the whole process and really helps show Free Culture in action. It's a longish post, but worth reading, even for those with short attention spans. Her 15 word summary of this essay is:
SuwFor the terminally short of attention out there, here's my Free Culture audiobook essay in 15 words:Lessig++
RIAA--
Free culture = more creativity
New publishing models
Download, read, buy = sales up
Discuss!
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"Targeted" ads on CNN terror warning story
05:04 UTC » Marketing - Media and Journalism
The CNN "Transcript: Ashcroft, Mueller news conference" story has travel ads from Overture. "Targeted" advertising at its best.
via redheadatwork
UPDATE: Hmm... Seems the travel ads are gone now. ;-)
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RTMark reports false arrest of artist by FBI who mistakes art for bioterrorism
04:26 UTC » Art - US Policy and Politics - Warblogging
It reminds me a bit of when the Secret Service came after etoy.RTMarkFBI ABDUCTS ARTIST, SEIZES ART Feds Unable to Distinguish Art from Bioterrorism Grieving Artist Denied Access to Deceased Wife's Body DEFENSE FUND ESTABLISHED - HELP URGENTLY NEEDEDSteve Kurtz was already suffering from one tragedy when he called 911 early in the morning to tell them his wife had suffered a cardiac arrest and died in her sleep. The police arrived and, cranked up on the rhetoric of the "War on Terror," decided Kurtz's art supplies were actually bioterrorism weapons.
Thus began an Orwellian stream of events in which FBI agents abducted Kurtz without charges, sealed off his entire block, and confiscated his computers, manuscripts, art supplies... and even his wife's body.
Like the case of Brandon Mayfield, the Muslim lawyer from Portland imprisoned for two weeks on the flimsiest of false evidence, Kurtz's case amply demonstrates the dangers posed by the USA PATRIOT Act coupled with government-nurtured terrorism hysteria.
Kurtz's case is ongoing, and, on top of everything else, Kurtz is facing a mountain of legal fees. Donations to his legal defense can be made at http://www.rtmark.com/CAEdefense/
RTMark is nortorious for social hacking, but this story appears to have at least two supporting news stories.
WKBW Local News - Local Investigation Into Ub Artist Continues
WKBW Local News - Bio Hazard Or Art?
The weird thing is that these news articles are archived on RTMark's site and I can't seem to find them on the WKBW site. Having said that, a search on Google News shows an article about this, but it has "expired" and can't be accessed.
IF this is true, it's another example of patriotic stupidity, but it's often the role of artists to help us understand this stupidity.
Anyone else heard about this? Lately I'm becoming more wary of single source news stories. ;-) Any help in veting this story before I get really excited would be greatly appreciated.
via Scott
UPDATE: Email from artist, Steven Kurtz.
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Woman racing through Chernobyl a fraud?
03:20 UTC » Cool Web Sites - Media and Journalism
I blogged about a woman taking a motorcycle through Chernobyl and her web page. It looks like it was a fraud.
This sucks. It was such a cool story. One thing that I realized when thinking about this is, how do you fact check the fact check on something that so far away... Is there anything other than this post to e-POSHTA debunking this story?Neil GaimanA fraud exposed, and a true thing...Found this on the infiltrate.org forum - thought you might find it interesting. You'd wonder why somebody would go to the lengths to fake something like this.
deeChornobyl "Ghost Town" story is a fabrication TOP
e-POSHTA subscriber Mary Mycio writes:I am based in Kyiv and writing a book about Chornobyl for the Joseph Henry Press. Several sources have sent me links to the "Ghost Town" photo essay included in the last e-POSHTA mailing. Though it was full of factual errors, I did find the notion of lone young woman riding her motorcycle through the evacuated Zone of Alienation to be intriguing and asked about it when I visited there two days ago.
I am sorry to report that much of Elena's story is not true. She did not travel around the zone by herself on a motorcycle. Motorcycles are banned in the zone, as is wandering around alone, without an escort from the zone administration. She made one trip there with her husband and a friend. They traveled in a Chornobyl car that picked them up in Kyiv.
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May 25, 2004
Weblogs and Authority
16:37 UTC » Blogging about Blogging
Interesting paper which has an impact on the power-law discussion. The chart shows that I'm not popular, but I have influence, whereas Anil may be popular, but doesn't have influence. ;-)OverstatedWeblogs and AuthorityThis week I'll be presenting a paper at the International Communication Association Conference in New Orleans titled Audience, Structure and Authority in the Weblog Community. The paper is an analysis of two different metrics for measuring authority within weblogs:
* Blogroll: A link from one weblog to the top-level of another, (e.g., links to http://overstated.net, http://www.overstated.net or http://overstated.net/index.asp). I assume this is a proxy to popularity.
* Permalink: Any link from one weblog to deep content on another (e.g. a link to http://overstated.net/04/05/24-weblogs-and-authority.asp). I assume this is a proxy to influence.
The following table shows the top 20 for each measure. One observation is that many of the top ranked sites are community weblogs (e.g. Slashdot or Memepool). These sites play the important role of hubs, maintaining ties to more weblogs than a single person would be able to. They allow information to diffuse quickly between distant parts of the network of readership.
Blogroll Degree Rank Permalink Degree Rank links url links url 1. 2581 metafilter.com 1322 boingboing.net 2. 2434 slashdot.org 1270 diveintomark.org 3. 2146 boingboing.net 1096 metafilter.com 4. 1825 kottke.org 1073 slashdot.org 5. 1604 instapundit.com 982 kottke.org 6. 1527 scripting.com 976 weblog.siliconvalley.com/column/dangillmor 7. 1307 evhead.com 956 instapundit.com 8. 1220 andrewsullivan.com 828 andrewsullivan.com 9. 1062 memepool.com 827 themorningnews.org 10. 1007 doc.weblogs.com 826 rathergood.com 11. 977 megnut.com 819 textism.com 12. 961 littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog 683 denbeste.nu 13. 899 diveintomark.org 626 doc.weblogs.com 14. 880 littleyellowdifferent.com 625 asmallvictory.net 15. 848 textism.com 582 rightwingnews.com 16. 846 rebeccablood.net 577 microcontentnews.com 17. 758 plasticbag.org 568 joi.ito.com 18. 737 dashes.com/anil 560 buzzmachine.com 19. 719 ftrain.com 553 waxy.org 20. 714 plastic.com 522 a.wholelottanothing.org A second observation is that the lists are fairly distinct. While some webloggers hold top positions in both ranks, the list diverges considerably as the position increases. While Blogrolls tend to support the weblog elders (scripting.com, evhead.com, etc.), permalinks suggest a different set of authors as influencers (joi.ito.com, buzzmachine.com, etc.). Looking at the differential between the ranks in the figure below, it is apparent that as soon as the rank passes 100, the correlation between Blogroll and Permalink rank becomes less defined.
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May 24, 2004
freekaneko.com
05:21 UTC » Intellectual Property - Japanese Policy - Software
Isamu Kaneko is the guy who got arrested for developing P2P software. More details about that in my earlier post.About freekaneko.comthis web site 'freekaneko.com' was created by official Isamu Kaneko supporters. We are consisted by software engineers who deeply concern our freedom to create and research software.We are conducting a publicity, and fund raising. We need a lot of attention from the people of the world. You can help us by telling the issue to your family, friends, and co-workers. Also, translation volunteers (and English proof readers) are needed to let the people know this issue.
Freekaneko.com marked a million hit only a day after an opening. Also, we raised 10 million yen ($100,000) in 2weeks
via yonderboy
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May 23, 2004
Rumsfeld bans camera phones in Iraq
22:15 UTC » Emergent Democracy - Photo - Privacy - US Policy and Politics - Warblogging - Wireless and Mobile
via SmartmobsNews24.comRumsfeld bans phone camerasLondon - Cellphones fitted with digital cameras have been banned in US army installations in Iraq on orders from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, The Business newspaper reported on Sunday.
Quoting a Pentagon source, the paper said the US defence department believes that some of the damning photos of US soldiers abusing Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad were taken with camera phones.
"Digital cameras, camcorders and cellphones with cameras have been prohibited in military compounds in Iraq," it said, adding that a "total ban throughout the US military" is in the works.
The increasing reliance of this administration on secrecy is really disturbing. When your government starts to strip the people of their privacy and civil rights and consistently marches forward with a variety of efforts to hides its own movements, you know you're in real trouble.
I've worked on whistleblower protection bills and thought a lot about the importance of the ability for people to come forward outside of the chain of command. It is an essential protection measure against coverups and corruption. I can understand arguments about why allowing random photos could be bad, but I'm sure the importance of having "eyes on the ground" outside of the "main channel" out-weigh the risks.
UPDATE: There are many media sites and blogs running this story, but they all seem to quote the same source. We still have no corroborating original sources. Please see comments on this entry for more.
UPDATE2
This morning, I asked a Defense Department spokesperson whether or not the reports of a phonecam ban were true. This spokesperson said that these reports were technically inaccurate -- that the Pentagon is not issuing a new ban on camera phones per se, but that a Directive 8100.2 was issued on April 14 establishing new restrictions on wireless telecommunications equipment in general. The text of this directive is available online here in PDF format: Link. The intent of this April 14 directive, and how commanders in the field will be expected to enforce it, are matters I'll be reporting on in more detail for the NPR program "Day to Day," later this week.
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Off to Helsinki
Last minute change in plans and I'm off to Helsinki for two days... too much travel...
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May 22, 2004
Creative Commons presentation in Helsinki on May 24
12:43 UTC » Creative Commons - Joi's Diary
Lawrence Lessig will be giving a public Creative Commons presentation in Helsinki. It will be at Korjaamo organized by Aula. It will from 5:30PM on May 24. It's open to the public and will be in English. Details are on the Aula web page. I'm leaving for Helsinki tomorrow and will be there.
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May 21, 2004
Bill Gates talks about blogging
17:21 UTC » Blogging about Blogging - Software
So, we already knew that Microsoft knows about and cares about blogs. Does the fact that Bill Gates explained blogs to a bunch of people who already knew what blogs were mean anything substantive?ReutersMicrosoft's Gates Touts Blogging as Business ToolGates described to his audience, which included Warren Buffett, Jeff Bezos, Michael Dell, Carly Fiorina, Barry Diller and other top business executives, how blogs worked and suggested that they could be used as a tool for businesses to communicate with customers.
[...]
Microsoft, which has already amassed more than 700 employee bloggers talking up its products and software in development, is embracing blogs and RSS technology because they are yet another potential threat and opportunity, said Joe Wilcox, analyst at Jupiter Research.
[...]
Instead of RSS, however, Google is also promoting a rival syndication standard called Atom.
Scoble, can you give us the inside skinny? Is this going to turn into a Google-Atom vs. Microsoft-RSS war as the article insinuates?
via Gen Kanai
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Anil takes responsibility for MT 3 mess and moves to SF
12:18 UTC » Blogging about Blogging - Neoteny
To use the requisite automotive analogy, if Six Apart were a shiny new car, I feel like I was the person who put the first dent in it, and then a couple thousand people stood around pointing and saying "It's totalled!"It's been a hard week for everyone at Six Apart with the difficulty with the launch of the Movable Type 3 and the licensing and communications about this. Anil seems to feel quite responsible. It sounds a bit like Rummy getting set up to be the fall guy, but fine. It was Anil's fault. ;-)
Having said that, I think everyone at Six Apart feels very responsible and is working really hard listening to all the feedback and fixing the licenses and communications of them. They're sincerely trying to be "good" so I'd appreciate any slack people are willing to cut them. Also, please continue to send them and myself ideas and feedback on how we can make the MT 3 license better for everyone. Thanks!
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Email problems
11:19 UTC » Email - Joi's Diary
I've been having email problems and have been missing email the last few weeks. I'm pretty sure I'm caught up on my email so if I haven't responded to an email you've sent, can you try sending it again? Sorry about this!
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Technorati Meetup in Tokyo May 27
11:13 UTC » Blogging about Blogging - Joi's Diary
Dave Sifry, the CEO of Technorati is coming to Tokyo next week. We're having a meeting for users and developers. Dave and I will speak and Dave will give some cool demos etc. If you are a Technorati fan, want to know more about Technorati or just want to hang out with Dave, please sign up and come. We will be charging 2000 per person for simple drinks and snacks. There will be wifi. The details are below:
5/27 Thursday, 18:00-21:00
18:00-19:00 Demo, Talk & Discussion
19:00-21:00 Reception with drinks & light snacks
Place, Tokyo 21c Club, 7th Fl of Marunouchi Building
Speakers
David L. Sifry, CEO, Technorati
Joichi Ito, head of International and mobility, Technorati
2000 yen fee for participation
Deadline to apply, May 24th Mon, 18:00
Please RSVP to Kenta Ushijima. We have a 50 person limit.
Please promote this on other blogs, particularly Japanese blogs. Thanks in advance and see you there!
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May 20, 2004
What should I do between June 4 and June 10?
As you can see, I have to be in Naples on June 4 and Helsinki on June 10. It's kind of a waste to fly back to Japan and turn around and fly back to Europe again. Is there anything interesting going on, or can we make something interesting happen in Europe between June 4 and June 10? I've started a wiki page to think about what to do between the 4th and the 10th. If you have any ideas, let me know. Thanks!
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Panel in Helsinki June 10
07:05 UTC » Business and the Economy - Joi's Diary
I will be on a panel at a conference in Helsinki on June 10. It is the Annual Meeting of the International Network of Private Business Organizations - COMPETITIVENESS THROUGH CREATIVITY. I will be representing the Keizai Doyukai (The Japan Association of Corporate Executives) and will be speaking about "Creativity and Innovation - Rare Virtue or New Standard?". I'm not sure who they're inviting to participate, but if you're going, please let me know.
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Speaking at Weblog Conference in Naples June 4
06:54 UTC » Blogging about Blogging - Emergent Democracy - Joi's Diary
I will be speaking at a Conference in Naples on June 4. The conference is called: Culture Digitali: I WEBLOG E LA NUOVA SFERA PUBBLICA, or Weblogs and New Public Opinion. The Conference has a blog and here is the entry with the program.
The conference registration is not yet open, but I will blog about it when it opens.
Some of us are thinking about getting together for lunch on June 5. If you want to hang out with us, please fill out this form. Look forward to meeting everyone.
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Sinking support for Iraq War
06:06 UTC » US Policy and Politics - Warblogging
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May 19, 2004
Lamborghini police car in Italy
Those Italians... ;-) I'm looking forward to visiting Italy again next month. This articles reminds me of some of the reasons why I love Italy.italiaspeed13.05.2004 Lamborghini have donated one of their Gallardo sportscars, complete with siren & flashing lights, to the State Police on the occasion of their 152nd anniversaryFor the first time, Italian State Police (Polizia di Stato) will use a Lamborghini Gallardo Police Car.
The supercar, in State Police colours, with a siren and flashing lights on the roof, has been donated by the House of Sant’Agata Bolognese to the State Police on the occasion of its 152nd anniversary, held in the customary setting of the Piazza del Popolo in Rome on the 14th, 15th and 16th May 2004.
The Gallardo Police Car will be used by the traffic police (Polizia Stradale) during emergencies and alarm situations on the Salerno-Reggio Calabria highway, also under the powers of the special safety operative which is already being employed along this tract of highway.
The Gallardo will also be used in first aid activities – thanks to its special defibrillator equipment, which performs electrocardiograms and automatic diagnoses of arterial pressure and the presence of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the blood, as well as the transportation of plasma and human organs for transplants.
Apart from being fitted with medical equipment, the vehicle will also have advanced technological apparatus’ for receiving and transmitting information and images relating to particularly critical situations, such as road traffic accidents, fires and other disaster situations.
via Louis
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May 18, 2004
Rubik's cube solver done in Lego
05:47 UTC » Cool Web Sites - Gadgets
This robot solves the 3x3x3 Rubik's Cube®.Amazing.I started to think about this problem in about August of 2000. In Jan 2001 fellow Mindstorms forums user 'agiecco' announced his intention to work on a robotic solution and, simultaneously, I saw that Rubik's Cubes were on sale at www.target.com. So I bought a couple of cubes and started getting down to business...
I produced a 'late beta' version in mid-April 2001 that was a little clunky. The final version (presented here) is smooth and fairly reliable.
via Brian
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May 17, 2004
We, the Media by Dan Gillmor
23:52 UTC » Blogging about Blogging - Books - Emergent Democracy
Just finished reading the Galley Proof of We, the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People by Dan Gillmor. O'Reilly is the publisher and it should be coming out mid-July. The book will be published under a Creative Commons license and you will be able to download it free for non-commercial use.
Dan is one of the few professional journalists that really understands the impact of blogs and other new technologies on journalism. It's amazing how many professional journalists I know pooh pooh blogs and keep on chugging like nothing is changing. We, the Media is a excellent book that should be enlightening and humbling for professional journalists. It is also a great guide for us little "j" journalists about what the possibilities are as well as what the difficulties will be. Anyway, it's an amazingly important book for anyone interested in journalism and democracy. It goes well with Lawrence Lessig's Free Culture and Howard Rheingold's Smart Mobs.
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May 16, 2004
Report: "Rumsfeld and Rice Approved; Bush Knew"
17:10 UTC » US Policy and Politics - Warblogging
How accepted is this view in the US now?Lauren WeinsteinReport: "Rumsfeld and Rice Approved; Bush Knew"Greetings. Seymour Hersh of The New Yorker, who exposed so many aspects of the Iraqi prisoner abuse story, now reports that U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and national security advisor Condoleezza Rice secretly approved the expansion of a clandestine program that encouraged physical coercion, sexual humiliation, and blackmail of Iraqi prisoners, setting the stage for the abuses that these same officials have recently been condemning so publicly.
According to the report, President Bush was kept informed regarding this program. The Department of Defense called the accusations in the story "outlandish, conspiratorial, and filled with error and anonymous conjecture."
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Mena answers some questions about MT 3.0
10:20 UTC » Blogging about Blogging - Neoteny
Most people are aware that Six Apart got a lot of feedback on the release of Movable Type 3.0 and there was a bit of confusion as well. Mena has a good post that addresses many of the issues people have been asking about.
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May 15, 2004
Full Red Cross Report
16:10 UTC » Human Rights - US Policy and Politics - Warblogging
I'm sure most people have seen it, but the full Red Cross report on Iraqi Prisoner Abuse is online on Cryptome.
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p-p-p-powerbook!
16:07 UTC » Cool Web Sites - Heckling - Humor
Another funny example of scamming a scammer. This time on eBay. (PDF file of the scam | Web Site)
via user0
UPDATE: The links above seem to be blocked now. Maybe they got too much traffic. I'm uploading the PDF here.
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Off to Tokyo
I'm off to Tokyo today. See you later Switzerland and thanks for all the cheese!
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May 14, 2004
etoy uses 2D barcodes at etoy.DAY-CARE
 "etoy.DAYCARE is operating. A first group has been graduating from our camp in Amsterdam." - etoy.TALK |
etoy is an art group that won the Golden Nica in the net category at Ars Electronica in 1996.
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La Claustra
17:00 UTC » Eating and Cooking - Joi's Diary
 Our host Jean Odermatt |
La Claustra is this amazing project that Jean Odermatt just completed. He purchased an old Swiss Army base built into the mountains of Gotthard. Inside of these caves, he built an extremely modern hotel and meeting room that looks like a scene from James Bond. It fits 26 people. Our plan was to have our super-secret etoy.MEETING at La Claustra, but since we couldn't go, we had our meeting at Jean's offices in Andermatt instead.
For dinner we had Raclette, kind of a precursor to cheese fondue where they shave slices of Raclette cheese of as they heat the surface. The trick is not to drink a lot of cold water with the cheese or it turns into a hard ball in your stomach. It was great though. Yum.
Anyway, our host Jean Odermatt, his assistant and his team were extremely hospitable and we are DEFINITELY going to come back to La Claustra to have a retreat soon. It's truly amazing.
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ISC Pre-conference session with Martin
16:46 UTC » Emergent Democracy - Joi's Diary - Social Software
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May 12, 2004
Dodgeballed awake
18:18 UTC » Social Software - Wireless and Mobile
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Those Sexy Iranians
00:37 UTC » Gender - Global Politics - Religion
 photo from Hoder's photo blog |
Iranian blogger Hoder has started a photo blog and some of the recent images show us what they're talking about.The New York TimesThose Sexy Iranians...True, girls and women can still be imprisoned for going out without proper Islamic dress. But young people are completely redefining such dress so it heightens sex appeal instead of smothering it.
Women are required to cover their hair and to wear either a chador cloak or an overcoat, called a manteau, every time they go out, and these are meant to be black and shapeless. But the latest fashion here in Shiraz, in central Iran, is light, tight and sensual.
"There are some manteaus with slits on the sides up to the armpits," said Mahmoud Salehi, a 25-year-old manteau salesman. "And then there are the `commando manteaus,' with ties on the legs to show off the hips and an elastic under the breasts to accentuate the bust."
Worse, from the point of view of hard-line mullahs, young women in such clothing aren't getting 74 lashes any more — they're getting dates.
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Government trying to use hostage crisis to squash NGO's in Japan
00:18 UTC » Japanese Policy - Japanese Politics - Warblogging
The Japanese government is taking this way too far and totally agree with the author of this article that this is a bad bad thing. As I've said before, legislation during emotionally charged times often ends up being stupid and poorly thought through. The ramifications of such a law would be devastating for NGO's and aid workers from Japan, just when such activity is becoming recognized. It almost feels like some stupid conspiracy to use this incident to squash the NGO's in Japan. Bah. I have less and less respect for the Japanese government every day.The Japan TimesKidnap crisis poses a new riskIn Japan's case, laws are being proposed to punish those entering designated "danger zones" without an official reason.
Victims -- or their families -- will foot the bill for their rescue, which will amount to airfare, if not more. "This is standard practice for mountain rescues," one line of reasoning goes.
But consider two things: One is that an aid mission to a danger zone is not a forest stroll gone astray. The very comparison indicates a misunderstanding of what aid missions do.
The second is policy overstretch and political abuse. This law would place a degree of government control over aid organizations, something many don't want. Particularly NGOs (by very the nature of their title) eschew government support, especially when they take on problems governments would rather avoid.
Under this law, they would effectively need official permission to work in some places overseas. Those "unsponsored" who get unlucky will face a "rescue fine" -- which could bankrupt the person or the organization. Thus this new system of rents will curtail Japanese volunteerism.
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May 11, 2004
Off to Switzerland
Off to Switzerland in a few minutes. See you on the other side. Going to St. Gallen.
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May 10, 2004
Developer of Japanese P2P system arrested
18:10 UTC » Japanese Policy - Music - Network Technology - Reforming Japanese Democracy - Software
Today, an associate professor at the most prestigious university in Japan, Tokyo University was arrested today for developing a tool that enables piracy. The program is a P2P system cally Winny. Previously two of the users had been arrested. I got a call from Asahi Shimbun (Japanese newspaper) today asking me for a comment for the morning news tomorrow. I hope the print it. I think it's an absolute disgrace to Japan. While the US is fighting in congress, Hollywood pushing to ban P2P and Boucher et al are fighting for DMCRA, Japanese police go and arrest someone developing P2P software with a VERY sketchy case. The thing is, it's quite likely he will be found guilty.
I once served as an expert witness on the FLMASK case. FLMASK was a program that could be used to allow password protected scrambling of areas of an image so that porn sites could post pictures that passed the Japanese censors, but allowed users to unscramble them. The police were so upset that they cracked down on the hardcore porn sites with the argument that even with FLMASK'ed "clean" images, they would be deemed hardcore. The problem was, this left the developer of FLMASK free from claims that his software enabled anything illegal. So they busted him for LINKING to these porn sites that got busted as users of his software. They deemed linking to a porn site as the same as actually running a porn site. I was the chairman of Infoseek Japan at the time so I obviously had a lot to say about that. The amazing thing is... after overwhelming evidence of the stupidity of the allegations, the guy was found guilty.
Anyway, Japan is yet again leading the world in stupid Internet policing.
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Halliburton Pulling the Plug on GI Communications