Via William Gibson’s blog, William Schneier explains why RFID Passports are a bad idea: Since the terrorist attacks of 2001, the Bush administration–specifically, the Department of Homeland Security–has wanted the world to agree on a standard for machine-readable passports. Countries whose citizens currently do not have visa requirements to enter the United States will have to issue passports that conform to the standard or risk losing their nonvisa status. These future passports, currently being tested, will include an embedded computer chip. This chip will allow the passport to contain much more information than a simple machine-readable character font, and will …
Month: October 2004
Gaa with the SpamBlockers and all…
Okay, well, I have been finding that MT-Blacklist has been having some problems. I’m waiting to hear back from tech support about that, and to make sure my database isn’t damaged. But I’m planning on installing this software by James Seng, which confirms it’s a real person entering the comment. MT-Blacklist is great for automated spam deletion and blocking, as long as it works, but this solution seems just as good, to me… at least till I get the MT-Blacklist problem fixed. So expect a new panel checking for a little more input if you’re commenting next week.
Neal Stephenson Interviewed at Slashdot
Neal Stephenson is still cool. Thanks for the link, Marv.
Reality-Based Is Passe?
Marvin linked to this disturbing post that says a lot about the Bush Administration. No, no, wait, this is the scary article, by Ron Suskind! Plus some commentary on it at The Revealer. It ends wonderfully: ‘Where people often get lost is on this very point,” he said after a moment of thought. ”Real faith, you see, leads us to deeper reflection and not — not ever — to the thing we as humans so very much want.” And what is that? ”Easy certainty.”
On Iraq
As Ritu, who posted these links, said, nothing is new about this stuff except the sources. Here are over seven hundred scholars of international relations, history, foreign policy, and security who want you know how badly the Bush Administration screwed up on this Iraq thing. And here is an article on soldiers objecting to the war, including many who have been there. Interestingly, one of them reports that his commanding officer said, on his arrival in Kuwait in 2003, “You’re not going to make Iraq safe for democracy,” the sergeant said. “You are going for one reason alone: oil. But …
Comments Screwed
Due to some downright bizarre behaviour in handling comments, I have had to disable my blogspam filter, MT-Blacklist. So my comments section may be flooded with comments in the next few days, till I get it back in working order again. Apologies to all. And I’m thinking of updating to the new MT while I’m at it, so I can install the new MT-Blacklist which I’ve heard good things about. But since that’ll take some time, I am not digging into it right away. Later, maybe this weekend or next week. For now, I need to get a few groceries, …
More Evidence of Student Insanity
Here are some lines and snippets of conversation from student-prepared dialogues I’ve heard this week during conversational English exams: Student A: What are you doing these days? Student B: I’m selling drugs. Student A: (shocked silence) Student B: What? It pays well, and I sell drugs, but I don’t take a medicines! Let’s change the topic of conversation! What are you doing these days? Student A: I’m studying criminology. You’re a really good subject of study! How often do you go out to sell drugs?… At this point they launched into the “How often do you____? Where do you ____? …
not likely to be useful to my story, but I’d like to see it nonetheless
This article from the Korea Times Teen edition, A house for sale, Ghost Included, came up when I googled “ghost Korea”. I doubt it will be of any use to my in writing my ghost story, but I would like to see the movie nonetheless. And I think I shall print the article out, as it has a vocab list at the end… I didn’t know there was such a thing as the Teen Times, nor that they presented Hangeul for learners of Korean.
Testing, Day #3
Testing today was more fun than before. I got a chance to test my best class, and some of what they had to say was hilarious. I wanted to type out some highlights, but it’ll have to wait till tomorrow. Which is just as well, as I have some work to do on my story tonight. But I will mention one standout line from today’s dialogues: Hey, your father is a swindler, my father is a crook: we have so much in common, my brother! Then the two guys hugged, and one shushed the other, warning that the FBI sometimes …
Rambling Thoughts: What Dreams May Come, Religious Fantasies, Theological Simpletons, and Why Humans Can Be Sad Animals
I just watched the Robin Williams movie What Dreams May Come, a film I watched a long time ago in another part of my life. At the time I read it fairly differently, but I enjoyed it when I first saw it. Seeing it again, I was struck not so much by the imaginativeness of the depiction of Heaven and Hell but more by the way it handled human nature, mercy and love and compassion and pain and respect. I like especially how it handled love: how many movies do you see which discuss love that is broken and mended, …