I haven’t been on the computer much this weekend, thus no posts. I just went and quickly got caught up on blog comments, etc. tonight.
If ever there was a reason to criticize Microsoft, this is it. This article applies to the MS blog offering, called “Spaces”.
Microsoft censors Chinese blogs
Weblog entries on some parts of Microsoft’s MSN site in China using words such as “freedom”, “democracy” and “demonstration” are being blocked. Chinese bloggers already face strict controls and must register their online journal with Chinese authorities. Microsoft said the company abided by the laws, regulations and norms of each country in which it operates. The censorship is thought to have been introduced as a concession to the Chinese government. Also being restricted on the free parts of the site are journal entries that mention “human rights” and “Taiwan independence”.
According to Reporters Without Borders, China is using a system called Night Crawler to patrol web journals and make sure that only registered blogs are published. Unregistered blogs will be shut down.
“Following Yahoo, here is a second American internet giant giving way to the Chinese authorities and agreeing to self-censorship”, said the group in a statement.
“The lack of ethics on the part of these companies is extremely worrying. Their management frequently justifies collaboration with Chinese censorship by saying that all they are doing is obeying local legislation.”
“We believe that this argument does not hold water and that these multinationals must respect certain basic ethical principles, in whatever country they are operating.”
This is cool. Especially the “flying” in from space to a city, and then from city to city. Thanks to Michel for the link.
opens Friday. Who wants to go, and when?
Analysis of last Tuesday’s speech by the president on Iraq: (full text here)
- Five more deliberately misleading references (within 30 minutes) to 9/11, despite the fact that even the administration themselves admits that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.
- Two mentions of bin Laden by name, (which the administration has done very little of in the last few years), even though he has nothing to do with Iraq. Hmm, is this the same bin Laden he was referring to when he said “I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is. … I don’t really think about him very much. I’m not that concerned.”
- 34 mentions of “terror” or “terrorism”, without mentioning the fact this so-called “hotbed” of terrorism in Iraq arose after we invaded, it wasn’t there before.
- Zero mentions of our original (now disproved) claims of WMDs threatening the U.S.
- No mention of the numerous polls in which a majority of both “liberated” Iraqis and Americans disapprove of the continued occupation of Iraq.
I have been hovering around 30K hits per month for the last several months, until last month, when it jumped up to 81,902. I’m guessing it’s because of the plugins; maybe it’s time to revamp my pages about my plugins to make them look a little better. I’ve been wanting to group them all together and put a better, more consistent presentation on them, so I guess I will have to find the time to do that.
In responding to a recent question posted to my review of Blogsome, the excellent free WordPress hosting service, I discovered that Blogsome offers my Recent Comments plugin as part of its “out of the box” package. Pretty cool!
The only drawback is it’s a very old version (1.7 - it’s currently at 2.3), but oh well.
While I love stuff like this, it always gets me into a bit of a mental quandary, which I have yet to satisfactorily resolve.
On the one hand, I have a great interest and appreciation for all things “astronomical”. This is in part due to one of my most respected mentors, who not only taught me to love learning, but also to see a glimpse of God in the wonders of creation. It’s also rooted in my understanding that, as in other areas of science, sometimes the most beneficial discoveries to mankind are uncovered in the process of looking for something else entirely.
The conflict for me is that I also know that this particular brand of science is very expensive, and I can’t ignore the many areas of need in our society as well as the larger world, which would seem to be a better candidate for such resources.
Perhaps you would expect the socialist in me to suggest that taxes could simply be raised to pay for both, and/or make cuts in other areas where we are overspending. That’s certainly one idea, but not a very likely one.
I guess the best case scenario would be Roddenberry’s vision of the Star Trek future, in which an encounter with an extraterrestrial species puts the whole planet on a fast track to unity (and thus putting aside petty international differences), spurred on by a dramatically shifted world view.
Oh well, I didn’t see any signs of pointy-eared distant neighbors in last night’s footage, but here’s hoping…
People will be attending the upcoming city council meeting on Monday to confront the city on the issue of their “crackdown” on such evil things as feeding the houseless or underprivileged. The b does a meal on Thursdays at Mission Park, and we have been told that we shouldn’t do it there anymore, since that kind of thing leads to (gasp) people having to see that part of society that some may deem “undesirable”. What a load of arrogant, snobbish, $#!!.