In a country where there are no newspapers or news organizations left that do real journalism and where there are only a small handful of real journalists left, it’s nice to see AP take a principled stand. However, it’s also sad that taking a stand like this is considered newsworthy in the first place!
AP Iraq Guidelines: ‘To Begin With, Combat In Iraq Is Not Over’
I played tennis recently at a “public” court owned by Valley Church in Cupertino, CA. I was browsing their website today and came across a page about the tennis courts:
Valley Church: Sports Ministry
I think the mission statement bears repeating:
Building bridges with people through sports, introducing them to Jesus Christ, establishing them in their faith, assimilating them into the church and training them to reproduce.
Could that possibly be any creepier? Note that they’ve since removed that text but I found an old version of it.
Seeing this latest monument to Bill Gates’ ego reminded me of the following quote from the book Slow Money by Woody Tasch:
“Wealth now, philanthropy later” is an inappropriate response to the challenges of the 21st century.
It has long bothered me that born-again philanthropists are lauded for their contributions for society, while ignoring all the suffering they caused and damage they’ve done to the environment. Suddenly they got old enough (or guilty enough) to start being concerned about their legacy.
I can’t remember the last time I used Google to find a piece of factual information and ended up with a completely wrong result.
The rare exception recently was a search I did for:
“I promise you I will” lyrics
I was trying to find the name of the artist whose song repeats that phrase over and over. Here’s what Google found:
Top result: Depeche mode
8 of the top 10 results: Depeche mode
13 of the top 20 results: Depeche mode
The real answer?
A one-hit wonder band called When in Rome. The poor guys had their one hit and pretty much everyone seems to think that it’s actually a Depeche Mode song.
This illustrates one potentially interesting weakness with web search. If a majority of people, including reputable ones, believe something to be true and keep adding links to things they believe are true, that’s what Google is going to put up at the top.… READ THE REST
Frontline is one of PBS’s greatest gift to media. They have a great new show on derivatives and it gives a good overview of the recent economic collapse:
In an era where all the major news organizations are either afraid to criticize a sitting administration (or even a past one) or are politically motivated rather than motivated by seeking the truth, Frontline can be a breath of fresh air.
Although the show generally has somewhat of a liberal bias, it’s interesting to note they had the courage to air another great program on the war in Afghanistan and give it an accurate, yet provocative name:
About 10 years ago or so, I thought of creating a website called Steal This Idea, inspired by the classic book by Abbie Hoffman called Steal This Book. Not being a web designer and lacking time, the idea never became reality.
The basic concept was very simple: the world is full of people with great ideas, but few become reality, but rarely because the person with the idea doesn’t want it to be, but because they lack the resources or know-how or even time to make it real. Ironically, this is reason my site never became a reality!
Basically the crux of the idea is that it’s better to have a great idea become reality and not profit from it than to have it forgotten forever.… READ THE REST
Good thing this hasn’t been widely reported in the local news here or parents would be keeping their kids out of any parks where large, soaring birds have been spotted:
500 Years Ago, A Giant Eagle In New Zealand Was Possibly Eating Children
Panic!
There are a lot of surveys and reports that rank countries on various criteria, but here’s one I especially like:
Global Peace Index (full report)
Instead of ranking countries by GDP or per capita income, it’s not to see a thoughtful survey that ranks countries by something more meaningful.
It’s interesting to see the mix of countries traditionally thought of as rich/stable versus those considered poor/unstable countries.
In the end, happiness can be found anywhere if people are left alone to pursue their dreams instead of getting sucked into the cross-fire between governments waving their masculinity in the air.
Nice to know there are a few sensible parents left in this country:
Stop worrying about your children!
Sadly, I don’t think her book will do much more than preach to the choir, but one can always hope. Parents need to let their kids grow up and learn the skills they need to survive on their own. They can’t do that in a cocoon.
I was reading this story today about kids in Arkansas mistakenly drinking windshield wiper fluid:
10 kids drink windshield wiper fluid at daycare
The comments are filled with:
But the question no one is asking is:
I think we need to ask questions like this more often instead of being outraged at the result of something bad happening. I watch a great show on Discovery called Dirty Jobs, which explores the most disgusting jobs people have around the country.… READ THE REST