The Lil' Zet

nerdshares: Sexy T-Rex considers the state of his soul. I can...

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 09:33:54 -0800

Sexy T-Rex considers the state of his soul.

I can dig it.

Exxon Backs Away From Pledge

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 15:33:00 -0800

In 2008, under pressure from shareholders including the descendants of Standard Oil Founder John D. Rockefeller, Exxon made the pledge to stop funding climate crisis deniers, writing:

“In 2008 we will discontinue contributions to several public policy research groups whose position on climate change could divert attention from the important discussion on how the world will secure the energy required for economic growth in an environmentally responsible manner.”

Now it seems they have backed away from that pledge. According to Mother Jones:

“Free-market, anti-climate change think-tanks such as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation in the US and the International Policy Network in the UK have received grants totaling hundreds of thousands of pounds from the multinational energy company ExxonMobil. Both organizations have funded international seminars pulling together climate change deniers from across the globe.”

Exxon needs to be honest with its shareholders and consumers. It’s time for them to once again live up to the pledge they made in 2008.

Thanks, Al.

If the iPad does textbooks right, it’ll win the impending Tablet Wars.

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 12:47:32 -0800

If the iPad does textbooks right, it’ll win the impending Tablet Wars.

If you become a KVO observer of an object, but don’t want a change dictionary, ask for one...

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:56:51 -0800

If you become a KVO observer of an object, but don’t want a change dictionary, ask for one anyway. Or she won’t call back.

A privacy-sensitive design hack from Google Latitude. On a...

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 23:55:43 -0800

A privacy-sensitive design hack from Google Latitude. On a regular basis, the user is reminded of the applications that have access to personal location tracking data, much like monthly listserv membership reminders.

Baby steps.

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass Huh. So they topped treadmills. I...

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 23:38:00 -0800

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass

Huh. So they topped treadmills.

I love the creativity behind these brilliant, low-budget videos. And the song is great.

The idea of progress: Onwards and upwards | The Economist

Thu, 31 Dec 2009 16:40:36 -0800

The idea of progress: Onwards and upwards | The Economist:

“Why is the modern view of progress so impoverished?”

I’d hoped to write a reaction to this, one of the best things I’ve read this year, before 2010. I’m a technologist, so the idea of lasting, meaningful social progress is especially elusive—and personal—for me.

I didn’t write my reaction, but here. It’s the right thing to read as 2010 begins.

"Piracy is essentially the consumer’s wish to have everything on demand. It’s not like people want to..."

Wed, 30 Dec 2009 15:36:11 -0800

“Piracy is essentially the consumer’s wish to have everything on demand. It’s not like people want to necessarily have it for free”

- Daniel Ek, founder of Spotify, in the New York Times back in July

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - All I Want For Christmas

Fri, 25 Dec 2009 09:00:00 -0800

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - All I Want For Christmas

Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal

Fri, 25 Dec 2009 08:30:00 -0800

Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal

Fa La Freezing by My First Earthquake Happy Christmas,...

Fri, 25 Dec 2009 08:00:00 -0800

Fa La Freezing by My First Earthquake

Happy Christmas, all!

[ftw]

"How do you rank yourself among writers (living) and of the immediate past? I often think there..."

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 17:37:25 -0800

“How do you rank yourself among writers (living) and of the immediate past?

I often think there should exist a special typographical sign for a smile— some sort of concave mark, a supine round bracket, which I would now like to trace in reply to your question.”

- Nabokov’s interview. (11) The New York Times [1969]

"We live in a world of partial order. There is no total ordering on experience."

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 17:36:19 -0800

“We live in a world of partial order. There is no total ordering on experience.”

- Knowing and Doing: December 2009 Archives

Yet.

Photo

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 13:54:33 -0800

Nonprofit offers tours of L.A. gang territory; worries over American "slumming" abound

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 18:03:28 -0800

Nonprofit offers tours of L.A. gang territory; worries over American "slumming" abound:

A group of civic activists, united by faith and a belief that the poor economy in the interior of Los Angeles is a social injustice, is preparing to offer bus tours of some of the grittiest pockets of the city, including decayed public housing, sites of deadly shootouts and streets ravaged by racial unrest.

Fascinating.

The idea is to turn the profits from these tours back into the neighborhoods, creating, more literally than usual, a relationship where the nonprofit works for its own destruction.

From nonparametric: Re: Regents Approve 32% Increase Protest...

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 23:16:00 -0800

From nonparametric:

Re: Regents Approve 32% Increase

Protest ensues…

This is not meant to somehow imply that I am opposed to protesting. Instead, I would like to emphasize that although the collaboration and unity of UC students is key to incite public (both community, regional and national) awareness that is fundamental for social change, that is not the entire agent for improvement. Ultimately, there is no perfect solution; The state of California has no money and there has to be some give and take in regards to fiscal investment by the state. In turn, everyone will be affected financially to some degree unless the state wants to deep itself bigger into debt that will only grow with interest. The point here is this: Instead of trying to promote change through awareness, direct action and reform should have been considered at the source. To finally make this point salient and explicit, it took an email sent to the student body by student affairs. Perhaps prior to protesting which calls in for additional police supervision, risk of property damage, and the arrest of students—all factors to which generate the investment of even more CA taxpayer dollars— one should question the source of the disparity itself. In this case, the drafters and implementers of The Compact, both the Governator, Yudof, and the CA Legislators, not those who simply work under the rule of these superiors.

A tip of the hat goes to student groups at UCI—supported, of...

Tue, 01 Dec 2009 17:14:26 -0800

A tip of the hat goes to student groups at UCI—supported, of course, by UC administrators—turning our admirable student activism on legislators. Maybe next we’ll see a California politician willing to tell voters that, if you want to keep your university (and social services, and golden state), you need to pay for it.

If you’re a student at UCI, come to the budget write-in today (Tuesday) at the Phineas Banning Alumni House.

Skolar, one of the most beautiful fonts I’ve seen in a...

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 12:56:00 -0800

Skolar, one of the most beautiful fonts I’ve seen in a while.

Surfacing the topic of blowing up networks

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 12:54:00 -0800

A few links and notes, quickly.

The United States has successfully employed so-called “cyber-warfare” in Iraq. It is unclear whether or not the Military will maintain an overt “cyber-attack” capability, or what that would look like, technically speaking. Okay, great.

But what about policing/homeland security? Government and financial institutions are, I’m sure, on the defense radar, but what about local infrastructure/utilities? Earlier this year (2009):

Just after midnight on Thursday, April 9, unidentified attackers climbed down four manholes serving the Northern California city of Morgan Hill and cut eight fiber cables in what appears to have been an organized attack on the electronic infrastructure of an American city. Its implications, though startling, have gone almost un-reported.

Worrisome.

The article is called A Cyber-Attack on an American City. (It also ran on businessinsider.com.) It goes on to make the arguments you would expect about less centralized infrastructure, redundancy, etc.

Does it make sense to try to protect communications infrastructure at this level? Can you imagine locking up all manhole covers to try to protect San Francisco’s water supply? Maybe communications infrastructure is cheaper and more politically viable to defend in light of omgterrorism rhetoric.

Okay. Kitchen time.

The thing to buy tomorrow. Or at least, nothing that...

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 10:00:00 -0800

The thing to buy tomorrow.

Or at least, nothing that wasn’t on your list a month ago.