Author Archive
The demonisation of Julian Assange hits turbulence
As noted before, I’ve been uneasy about the pursuit of the WikiLeaks frontman Julian Assange — concerned at the [presumably] US and other intelligence agencies attempts at launching a ‘decapitation attack’. The Swedish prosecution seems half-baked — an arrest warrant, solitary confinement, extradition for questioning? Eh? Extradited for questioning? Now, according the Wall Street Journal‘s Julian […]
Beware the ubiquitous PDF? Really?
Oh no! First Flash, now PDF? Do we need to worry? My (profesional) life changed for the better with the widespread adoption of Adobe’s wonderful Acrobat PDF (portable document format). I use it every day — to communicate with others, to archive information or make it available for others … and to print and publish. […]
Uncovering the Scientology cult and its practices
Writing in The New Yorker, Lawrence Wright gives a comprehensive and illuminating account of the cult known as the Church of Scientology. His article is a follow-up the controversy surrounding writer/film director Paul Haggis’s public defection after 35 years as a Scientologist. I quoted Haggis’s resignation letter with its core message: ‘Silence is consent … […]
Heady assumptions, a get-rich-quick climate, wishful thinking …
I’ve just read a fantastic article Rethinking the Great Recession by Robert J. Samuelson in the The Wilson Quarterly. Wow. Instead of hand-wringing and wailing about ‘What’s happening to us?’ Samuelson’s plausible analysis points to a widespread forgetting of the boom-bust lessons of history… The great economic and financial crisis that began in 2007 … […]
Oh.
315 million reasons to build an internet following … Well done to the crew at Huffington Post. I guess. Huffington Post Gets Bought by AOL for $315 Million The Huffington Post has confirmed tonight that it has been acquired by AOL. According to a report by Kara Swisher, site-cofounder Arianna Huffington will become Editor in Chief of […]
But, but, but … well, bravo!
I hate to be a nag about Facebook, but this is the sort of thing that makes my blood run cold. Good on these guys for exposing what can happen … What they did was set up a fake ‘Dating’ website called Lovely Faces .. and populated it with REAL names, locations and photos — […]
Quite a lot of wannabe Hemingway
Oh zing! From Ed Vulliamy’s The Observer piece about WikiLeaks publishing US State Department cables re the background of the Egyptian — gee, what do we call it? Uprising? Revolution? Riots? Julian Assange: ‘How do you attack an organisation? You attack its leadership’ Julian Assange … has been up all night disseminating, on his WikiLeaks […]
Bad scene in Egypt — round up the usual suspects
A crackdown on the truth often starts with rounding up the journalists… images from Huffington Post. + UPDATE 5/2/11 Bugger!
JP Morgan execs: Useless as [insert expletive here]
In today’s NY Times… Senior executives at JPMorgan Chase expressed serious doubts about the legitimacy of Bernard L. Madoff’s investment business more than 18 months before his Ponzi scheme collapsed but continued to do business with him, according to internal bank documents made public in a lawsuit on Thursday. Oh. My. God. If this is […]
If you prick us, do we not bleed?
I had the opportunity for a long face-to-face discussion with Dean Letfus yesterday, as earlier forecast. For those of you who haven’t met him, let me say first off I find Dean an intelligent, personable chap, with good communication skills and a sense of humour. (I’ve never subscribed to the ‘Say no good thing about […]
Shock! Horror! Scandal! Microsoft COPIES!
O hardy-har-har-har. Here’s a turn up for the books (NOT!)… via Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Land Google: Bing Is Cheating, Copying Our Search Results Here’s the slightly novel bit: Bing Admits Using Customer Search Data, Says Google Pulled ‘Spy-Novelesque Stunt’ The details of the sting, which Danny Sullivan lays out, are interesting. Google artificially […]
Get your own little piece of the subprime crisis
In my in-box today* from the UK-based property spruiker hawking Memphis distressed real estate … a chance to buy mortgage bonds … at 40% discount! Oh boy! I wonder if this is how they offer “amazing finance packages” (no-questions-asked??) to the offshore suckers … sorry, investors buying up Memphis distressed real estate … um, er, […]
SPAM as an indicator of the economy?
Among all the SPAM touting for anatomy-enlargement and performance-enhancing pills and replica watches (for replica people?) and, oh boy, online casino gambling (!) …. I’ve noticed a recent apparent increase in SPAM messages targeting job seekers … Subject: Job offer match, respond to apply Subject: Job opportunity – hurry to apply! Subject: Employment you’ve been […]
Is this for real?
Does anyone know if this works? I got a spammy-looking ‘link exchange request’ with this as the last line: IF YOU’D LIKE TO MAKE SURE WE DON’T CONTACT YOU AGAIN, PLEASE FILL IN THE FOLLOWING FORM: emailsnomore(dot)com ; PLEASE ACCEPT OUR APOLOGIES FOR CONTACTING YOU. … which redirects to what looks like a different website […]
