Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries ….
- Pickup Lines – December 25, 2010
- Flickr .Net Screensaver – Oooh … looks like this works with Win7. Excellent.
- The 6 Most Terrifying Work Commutes in the World | Cracked.com – Okay, this might make even my brother feel a bit better …
- What WikiLeaks revealed to the world in 2010 – Well worth reading, especially Greenwald’s commentary on the story of the reaction to WikiLeaks being as important as the information revealed. The only caveat (as we saw with the Cuba/Moore tale): diplomatic cables are not objective truth, and at least some fraction of what was “revealed” was what folks were reporting on to their bosses, or rumors that were being passed on, not necessarily smoking guns (cf. your own company’s email system).
- Badass Quote of the Day [Dispatches from the Culture Wars] – The problem is, it’s not a binary thing. There is a lot of good the US has done. There’s a lot of good ideas we’ve shared, too. I hold no truck with the “America is TEH EVILLL!” croud. But by the same token, the idea that God has mysteriously favored this country to be the moral (if not economic and political) arbiter for the world, or that this somehow gilds all of our actions into some sort of exceptionalism (i.e., that we are an exception to … what, the forces of history and the nature of humanity?) is equally ludicrous, and just as dangerous.
- Congress Should End Ethanol Subsidies : Dispatches from the Culture Wars – Imagine spending $6 billion / year, not on subsidizing net-fossil-neutral ethanol subsidies for major agribusinesses (don’t fool yourself it’s all for Mom-n-Pop farmers), but on some actual renewable energy sources — heck, wouldn’t it be nice to be able to recycle all those Amazon boxes from gift-giving into fuel?
- South Carolina Holds Secession Ball [Dispatches from the Culture Wars] – “But we do celebrate the courage and the integrity of 170 men who signed their signatures to the Article of Secession – the courage of men to do what they think is right.” But doesn’t WHAT they thought was right play into the question of whether it deserves celebration?
- Listening – Dilbert for December 24, 2010
- Porn site: publicizing takedown notices is copyright infringement – Yes, by slapping a copyrighted image in your takedown notice (so you can notify someone in the notice of what you say they are violating), you are now making it a copyrighted document in and of itself, which means it has to be kept hidden. Brilliantly evil!
- Guns for Christmas – All I can think of here is that Zombies for the Holidays video …
- Newly Discovered Molecule Will Make Rocket Fuel Super Efficient [Rockets] – Cool.
- More ISS photos from space poet & NASA astronaut Wheelock | triggerpit.com – Lovely.
- Economy Forces Big Budget Cuts for Science Fairs – FoxNews.com – Who needs Science Fairs?! We can just have Bible Memorization Bees!
- I love – HA!
- My Christmas Tree – I want.
- Tomes 2010: Harry Potter Mania Edition – Nicely written. And, yes, setting the movies aside (though they do have something to recommend them, esp. later on), these are books that a lot of adults would get a lot of entertainment (and thrills) from. I’ll probably be ready to reread the series again after the next (last) movie comes out.
- Reading as inclination leads – I think it’s good to push oneself (or to be pushed a bit), but I’m also very much (obviously) a believer in Reading What You Like, and then encouraging yourself to like more.
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