Groundhog Day Roundup

As I generally am paying less attention to the news lately, as can be seen by my post content, I am unaware of what the fat little animal in Pennsylvania decided was the weather forecast. Chances are he’ll be just as accurate as the guy on your TV, so take it all with a grain of salt.

Moving randomly from topic to topic, Michael Bane had a link to a guy who has way more spare time than I do. I aspire to have the kind of free time necessary to create things. It ain’t happening soon, I don’t think. I have many other things to do. There’s a deck on the back of the house that needs to be built. There’s a vehicle that needs to be relocated and rebuilt. I have a motorcycle to sell. There’s a whole bunch of other stuff that needs to happen. Someday, I can have more time for hobbies.

Next random topic: how much do you trust Google? Given the recent kerfuffle over the decision to comply with Chinese demands for censorship, you might not be inclined to trust them at all. Simon Garfinkel raises some legitimate questions over privacy and security. Me, I got no Gmail account, so I don’t have to trust Google. I have to trust the reborn AT&T and Yahoo. At some point, your internet access is dependent on a corporation that may or may not have your best interests in mind. Are you surprised? You shouldn’t be.

Google is also up for a fight over copyright. I enjoy watching the copyright wars because I think a lot of organizations are trying to desperately retain the old ways of doing things and refusing to adapt to reality. The issue is only going to get worse before it gets better. Old media organizations and companies are going to continue to try to lock down content tighter and tighter. I don’t foresee it working. The only way is to cripple the hardware deliberately, which consumers won’t accept completely. You also have to have complete buy-in from hardware makers, which, absent some government action, I just don’t see happening.

Moving along to yet another random topic, the Danes pissed off the Muslims pretty hard, and some people added fuel to the fire by reprinting the cartoons that started the whole mess. Cathy Young points out many of the problems involved in bowing down to people and self-censoring because you might offend them. I’ll just add that if you don’t want your religion to be thought of as a bunch of intolerant, hateful barbarians, get your co-religionists to quit threatening to kill anyone who offends your delicate sensibilities. I don’t have a whole lot of patience for a group of people who think the appropriate response to speech is murder. It doesn’t do anything to promote the whole “Religion of Peace” bs people keep spouting nowadays.

Anyhow, go forth and celebrate the day of the earthpig in whatever fashion you deem appropriate. I’m going to bed.