bah bah blah blog

Last Day at the Rocky Mountain News

2011-01-24T15:01:00.001-08:00

http://vimeo.com/3390739

coming soon to a newstand near you

2009-09-10T22:54:00.003-07:00

http://www.talltimbertelegraph.com/

new url for bah bah blah blog

2009-08-29T19:11:00.000-07:00

There's a new url for bah bah blah blog it's http://bahbahblahblog.blogspot.com/
Of course you know that ... you're here

2009-01-27T22:39:00.000-08:00

Check out the book "Tear Down this Myth" by Will Bunch:

Why Reagan still matters: A sneak peak at "Tear Down This Myth"

Jan. 20, 2009, was such a transformative day in American politics that it was easy to forget it also marked a 20th anniversary as well. The inauguration of President Barack Obama also meant it was two decades to the exact day since Ronald Reagan last sat in the Oval Office. When he and his wife Nancy boarded the Air Force One jetliner – the one that was later decommissioned, de-assembled and reassembled at the Ronald Reagan Library (and mostly paid for by oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens) – for the long trip back to California, it wasn’t clear how the world would remember Reagan’s presidency.

For the majority of his second term, Americans told pollsters that the nation was on a wrong track, and in 1987 a 55-percent majority said we needed a new direction away from Reagan’s often divisive policies. But in little more than five years after leaving Washington, the Great Communicator would be silenced by Alzheimer’s -- and a new generation of neoconservatives would construct a mythologized, iconic version of the 40th president that increasingly bore little resemblance to the flesh-and-blood Ronald Reagan. It is that modern version – and warped policies that could be collectively called Reaganism – that has given us an unfathomable national debt, a wide gulf between the nation’s rich and poor, the denial of basic science on energy and the environment, and which was even used to justify an unjustifiable war in Iraq that the real Gipper himself would never undertaken.

Twenty years gone – but Reagan still matters. About this time one year ago, unceasing Reagan idolatry hijacked the race for the White House. Sometimes it was voiced in the name of policies on immigration or toward Iran that were the exact opposite of what really happened a generation ago. The power of this political fantasy – expressed mainly, of course, on the GOP side but occasionally even spilling over to the Democrats – caused me to begin work on a book about the Ronald Reagan myth. The result – “Tear Down This Myth: How the Reagan Legacy Has Distorted Our Politics and Haunts Our Future” – is coming out now from Simon & Schuster’s Free Press. (You can purchase the book here or receive news from the book’s Facebook group here). Here’s a short excerpt from Chapter One that cuts to the core of Reagan’s distorted legacy:

It was Ronald Reagan himself who, as the spotlight faded on his presidency in 1988, tried to highlight his eight-year record by reviving a quote from John Adams, that “facts are stubborn things.” The moment became quite famous because the then-77-year-old president had botched it, and said that “facts are stupid things.” The tragedy of American politics was that just two decades later, facts were neither stubborn nor even stupid – but largely irrelevant.

Any information about Iran-Contra or how the 1979-81 hostages were released (Rudy Giuliani had falsely claimed during the 2008 race they were freed when “the Gipper” looked Iranian leaders in the eye) that didn’t fit the new official story line was being metaphorically clipped out of the newspaper and tossed down “memory hole” – the fate of any information that would have undercut Reagan’s image as an all-benevolent Big Brother still guiding the conservative movement from above.

A more factual synopsis of the Reagan presidency might read like this: That Reagan was a transformative figure in American history, but his real revolution was one of public-relations-meets-politics and not one of policy. He combined his small-town heartland upbringing with a skill for story-telling that was honed on the back lots of Hollywood into a personal narrative that resonated with a majority of voters, but only after it tapped into something darker, which was white middle class resentment of 1960s unrest.

His story arc did become more optimistic and peaked at just the right moment, when Americans were tired of the “malaise” of the Jimmy Carter years and wanted someone who promised to make the nation feel good about itself again. But his positive legacy as president today hangs on events that most historians say were to some great measure out of his control: An economic recovery that was inevitable, especially when world oil prices returned to normal levels, and an end to the Cold War that was more driven by internal events in the Soviet Union and in Eastern Europe than Americans want to acknowledge.

His 1981 tax cut was followed quickly by tax hikes that you rarely hear about, and Reagan’s real lasting achievement on that front was slashing marginal rates for the wealthy – even as rising payroll taxes socked the working class. His promise to shrink government was uttered so many time that many acolytes believe it really happened, but in fact Reagan expanded the federal payroll, added a new cabinet post, and created a huge debt that ultimately tripped up his handpicked successor, George H.W. Bush. What he did shrink was government regulation and oversight -- linked to a series of unfortunate events from the savings-and-loan crisis of the late 1980s to the sub-prime mortgage crisis of the late 2000s.

The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 papered over some less noble moments in foreign policy, from trading arms for Middle East hostages to an embarrassing retreat from his muddled engagement in Lebanon to unpopular adventurism in Central America. The Iran-contra scandal that stemmed from those policies not only weakened Reagan’s presidency when it happened, but it arguably undermined the respect of future presidents for the Constitution -- because he essentially got away with it. Over the course of eight years, the president that some want to enshrine on Mount Rushmore rated just barely above average for modern presidents in public popularity. He left on a high note – but only after two years of shifting his policy back to the center, seeking peace with the Soviets than confrontation, reaching a balanced new tax deal with Democrats and naming a moderate justice to the Supreme Court. It was not the Reaganism invoked by today’s conservatives.

There has always been a place for mythology in American democracy – the hulking granite edifices of the Capitol Mall in Washington are a powerful testament to that – but this nation has arguably never seen the kind of bold, crudely calculated and ideologically driven legend-manufacturing as has taken place with Ronald Reagan. It is a myth machine that has been spectacularly successful, launched in the mid-1990s when the conservative brand was at low ebb.

The docudrama version of the Gipper’s life story, successfully sold to the American public, helped to keep united and refuel a right-wing movement that consolidated power while citing Reaganism – as separate and apart from the flesh-and-blood Reagan – for misguided policies from lowering taxes in the time of war in Iraq to maintaining that unpopular conflict in a time of increasing bloodshed and questionable gains.

OK – but you may ask whether the Reagan myth matters as much now that George W. Bush is back at the ranch and President Obama in the White House. I would argue that it does. Increasingly, the GOP minority in Washington, including 41 senators with just enough votes to derail the administration’s proposals, is going to invoke the Reagan myth to continue to justify a tax system that harms the middle class and policies that ignore the scientific consensus on climate change. Look at the first major policy debate of the Obama presidency, over the proposed $825 billion economic stimulus. Democrats are under enormous political pressure to weight the plan toward tax cuts, and away from spending programs, which Republicans quickly branded as much pork – despite evidence that jobs programs stimulate the economy at twice the rate of tax reductions. "I remain concerned about wasteful spending that might be attached to the tax relief," House GOP leader John Boehner said – and right-wing talk radio was a lot less restrained. Ironically, the spending sought by the Democrats seek to undo the crumbling of America’s infrastructure and the failure to create “green-collar” jobs that dates back to the Reagan era.

And here’s another reason the Reagan myth still matters, and that’s because there’s a pundit class inside the Beltway that cuts its teeth in the 1980s and remains firmly convinced that America is a “center-right” nation, despite massive evidence to the contrary. These pundits will urge Obama to enact an economic recovery package in the Gipper’s image, ignoring the long-term harmed caused by Reagan’s brand of “trickle-down economics.”

Unless we don’t let them – and tear down this myth.

Readership Institute publishes study on newspaper readership and website usage

2008-07-18T11:34:00.000-07:00

The Readership Institute released a study, including 100 US newspaper markets, to tally Reader Behaviour Scores between 2000-2008.

Use of newspaper web sites was measured using a self-reported metric called SUM (Site Usage Measure). Individual online "experiences" with newspaper sites were analyzed. Web newspaper consumption and a newspaper site's social involvement were also studied.

www.readership.org/consumers/rbs/data/websites2008.pdf

Green Drinks

2007-12-03T07:14:00.001-08:00

Celebrate with Green Drinks--Madison's networking opportunity for people interested in sustainability, green business and all things related!
Madison's own chapter of the internationally famous *Green Drinks*!*Green Drinks* is a monthly event where you can meet people in the industry, network, do a business deal, learn something new or maybe even find a job!
Next Madtown *Green Drinks* is Dec 5, 2007! You won't want to miss it!
Join like-minded people in an informal and unstructured setting to talk about the latest sustainability happenings in Madison and globally. Meet people in various green professions. Have a drink (alcoholic or non-alcoholic). What: Madtown *Green Drinks* part of the world-famous *Green Drinks*
When: First Wednesday evening of each month; 5:00 to whenever.
Dates: December 5, January 2, February 6, etc.-every first Wednesday of the month at 5!
Where: The Local 102 King Street Madison (SE Corner of Capitol Square) (formerly the Flatiron Tavern--new name, same place)
Who: Artists, Attorneys, Business, Developers, Engineers, Entrepreneurs, Government, Non-profit, Politicians, Real Estate, Students-Anyone who wants to talk with people in the field of sustainability and green business, environment, conservation and all things that go along with those topics. New? Just look for someone and ask them "Are you green?" You'll be made to feel welcome!
Remind: To subscribe to the Madtown *Green Drinks* email list, please send an email to madtowngreendrinks@charter.net.
Privacy: This email list will only be used for *Green Drinks* reminders. We will not sell or give your email address to anyone else for any other reason.
Status: Informal, self-organizing networking event. Since 1990. *Green Drinks* has events world-wide. www.greendrinks.org.
For more info contact:Madtown GreenDrinksmadtowngreendrinks@charter.net
Madison Berlin Boston Brooklyn Green Bay Hamburg London Milwaukee Oxford Portland San Francisco Seattle Sweden Tokyo Washington, DC
If you would like to receive this email in text format please email madtowngreendrinks@charter.net
If you do not wish to receive this newsletter please visit http://www.responscomm.com/gd/users/
No virus found in this incoming message.Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.503 / Virus Database: 269.16.13/1164 - Release Date: 12/2/2007 11:30 AM

2007-11-27T22:21:00.001-08:00

CC is turning 5 and to celebrate we’re throwing a community-wide party. If you’ll be in the San Francisco Bay Area on December 15, join us for a night of celebrating the commons at a party generously sponsored by Mozilla and Last.fm. The evening will feature announcements by Joi Ito and Lawrence Lessig, a live acoustic performance by Gilberto Gil, video remixing by Phi Phenomenon, and music provided by DJ Spooky. Space is limited so please RSVP to party@creativecommons.org as soon as possible to let us know if you will be joining us (seriously, please do this!). Details are listed on our birthday flyer.
If you’re not in the Bay Area, don’t worry. There will also be parties in Berlin and New York City. For more details about these events, or if you want to register a party in your own part of the world, check out our wiki page for more information. Air Mozilla will be streaming Gilberto Gil’s performance for those who won’t be able to attend any of the parties. And of course, please feel free to celebrate CC in Second Life as well.
No matter where you are in the world, we invite you to celebrate CC’s five years of helping to keep culture free and celebrate the future of participatory culture.

2007-11-27T21:43:00.001-08:00

Ireland frees up some public data
Free O’Data: Ireland makes (some) data free, Free Our Data: the blog, November 26, 2007. Excerpt:
...Ireland’s geographical agency, the GSI, has made a number of its datasets about boreholes available for free online.
Announced by the minister, the web page itself is a bit spartan: “Minister Ryan launches Spatial Data Projects to allow free online access to Departmental data. GSI, along with PAD, EMD and Engineering Divisions of DCENR, all contributed data to these series of web map viewers, data download pages and GIS web services. Click on www.dcenr.gov.ie/spatial+pages [Note: this isn’t a valid page, or at least not to me on my Mac] or http://www.gsi.ie/mapping for further details.” ...
An interesting contrast with the Environment Agency for England and Wales, which as we pointed out in May, is trying to charge people for details about water extraction locations....

2007-11-27T19:14:00.001-08:00

Swedish couple names baby boy "Google"
From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!
Jump to: navigation, search
October 21, 2005
A Swedish Lebanese couple, Walid Elias and Carol Kai, has chosen to name their first born son Google, after the well-known search engine.
The Swedish tax authority, which normally frowns on unusal names, apparently had no objections.
The father, Walid Elias Kai, says he's a "great fan" of the search engine and wanted to honor the service by naming his son after it. But Mr. Kai says he and his wife also chose the name because of the similar word googol. "[Googol] means 1 followed by 100 zeroes," stated Mr. Kai, "and I want my son to have lots of friends – I want him to be social, so the name also symbolises this."
Upon hearing the news, authors of the Google weblog wrote, "We wish him long life and good health, and hope his schoolmates aren't too hard on him."
Google Kai already has his own website at http://www.google-kai.com/

Sources
"I name this baby “Google”". The Local Newspaper Sweden, October 20, 2005
Karen Wickre, Google Blog team "We get letters". Google, October 18, 2005
This page is archived and is no longer publicly editable. Please note any corrections or other issues with the article on the administrators' alert page. Also, sources may no longer be available online.

2007-11-27T19:14:00.000-08:00

From WordPress...
Survey: Finland is the world's greenest country
From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!
Jump to: navigation, search
October 5, 2007
A new survey into the world's greenest and most livable countries has concluded that out of 141 countries reviewed, Finland is the greenest.
Some of the top 20, in order, were Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Austria, Switzerland, Ireland, Australia, Uruguay, Denmark, Canada, Japan, Israel, Italy, Slovenia, France, Netherlands, Portugal, New Zealand and Greece. The poorest results went to African countries, which dominated the bottom of the table, with Ethiopia coming in last place.
"Finland wins high marks for air and water quality, a low incidence of infant disease and how well it protects citizens from water pollution and natural disasters," commented the study. Other factors taken into account when ranking the countries included quality of education and income level.
Some other results were the United Kingdom at 25th, the United States at 23rd and China at 84.
The study also looked at individual cities. Of the 72 examined, Stockholm came out on top, followed in order by Oslo, Munich and Paris. A total of four German cities were ranked in the top ten - Munich, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Dusseldorf - and French cities Lyon and Nantes joined Paris in the top ten as well. New York came in at 15th and London at 27th. At the bottom end were mainly Asian cities, with Beijing's air pollution problems earning it the lowest spot in the table. Guangzhou and Shanghai were also near the bottom.
Have an opinion on this story? Post It!

[edit] Sources
"Reader's Digest study says Finland best for living". Reuters, October 5, 2007
Annabella Bulacan "Finland Ranks As World's Most Livable Country; Beijing Is Dirtiest City". allheadlinenews.com, October 5, 2007
"It's official! Ireland really is green". U.TV, October 5, 2007
Retrieved from "http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Survey:_Finland_is_the_world%27s_greenest_country"

2007-11-27T16:39:00.000-08:00

Claiming your blog establishes that you are its owner, and allows you to use Technorati services to increase your blog's visibility.

2007-11-27T15:26:00.001-08:00

Boing Boing is the most popular blog in the world, as ranked by Technorati http://www.technorati.com/blogs/www.boingboing.net

2007-11-27T15:06:00.000-08:00

This is a blog about the art and science of blogs, bloging, and bloged blogs.
Below is an interesting look at copyright from Public Knowledge: http://www.publicknowledge.org/issues/copyright

Copyright, put simply, is a personal monopoly on an original writing, song, piece of art, or a group of any of those, for 70 years after the death of the creator. If a corporation is the creator, the copyright monopoly lasts for 95 years.
Generally, copyright prevents others from being able to show, copy, perform, modify, or distribute the original work without the owner’s permission. The amount of control copyright gives to creators lets them charge more for their work, or determine how they want their works to be used.
As with most things in life, though, there are exceptions to the general rule of broad control. For instance, copyright does not trump free speech because as a society, we hold higher the right to uncensored communication than the monopoly rights of an artist.
Why do we have copyright?
The Constitution (Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8) reads Congress shall have the power to:
promote the progress of science…by securing for limited times to authors…the exclusive right to their respective writings…
What does that mean? The easy answer is that scientists and artists alike, who enrich our society with their discoveries and works, are granted an additional incentive to innovate and create new works of art. It’s an exchange—share the work with society and society will allow you a limited monopoly. The goal is to disseminate ideas and enrich the public, while creating an incentive for the artist. After a limited time the artist’s monopoly would dissolve and the work would return completely to the public.
The concept of “returning” works to the public suggests that no new idea is truly new, that it is only built from some previous societal knowledge. Perhaps this return concept can be best understood through the words of Sir Isaac Newton, “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” The Constitution specifies, “limited times” to ensure that artists to not rest on their laurels but continue to innovate.
What are the limits of copyright?
Without limitations on the scope and application of copyright, it would be nearly impossible to share, resell, lend, or even talk about creative works. For instance, selling a used CD and lending a book to a friend both implicate the copyright owner’s exclusive right to distribute the work. Quoting from a news article or your favorite movie on a blog implicate the reproduction right. Singing aloud, or playing a radio so that others can hear implicates the performance right.
But instead of requiring us to get written permission from copyright owners in each of these cases, copyright law provides limitations and exceptions to creators’ rights, so that ordinary uses of the work aren’t hampered, and information and expression can flow freely.
For instance, the first sale doctrine says that once a particular copy of a work has been sold, the owner of that copy can distribute it however they want—reselling it, lending it out, or giving it away.
Fair use is another limitation to copyright, and a particularly flexible and useful one. Basically, fair use balances the creator’s need for protection against the user’s need to use the work without permission, taking into account whether this use will hurt the market for the original work. It is the primary (but not the only) way that the law balances copyright with the need to use copyrighted works when reporting news, conducting research, or criticizing or discussing works. It also allows for new, beneficial uses, like home recording.
These aren’t the only limitations and exceptions to copyright, just some of the more prominent ones. Other limitations deal more specifically with certain public performances, library uses of works, and other situations.
Other laws
The exchange in copyright between the creator and the public—limited monopoly in return for certain usage rights—has been worked out over the years, and continues to evolve. But other, non-copyright laws have been springing up that control how the public can use copyrighted works, while remaining outside of the normal boundaries of copyright law. For example, there are specific anti-bootlegging laws that prohibit making video recordings in a movie theater. While this is already a violation of copyright, the anti-bootlegging law isn’t necessarily subject to the same exceptions and limitations as copyright law. Thus, someone recording a short clip and charged under the anti-bootlegging statute wouldn’t be able to claim fair use as a defense.
The anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA represent another example of this “para-copyright.” Although the DMCA is part of copyright law, circumventing DRM isn’t a copyright infringement, so the exceptions and limitations to copyright don’t apply. So even if a user circumvents DRM in order to make a fair use of a work, the circumvention is still illegal, even if the use isn’t.
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Legislation
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Publications
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Filings
Recent Blog Entries
House Committee on Education and Labor Puts out "supporters of intellectual property theft" Propaganda
Nov 15 2007 - 1:44pm
A look at S. 2317, The Intellectual Property Enforcement Act of 2007
Nov 13 2007 - 6:36pm
ACT NOW! House Sneaks Higher Ed Filtering Requirement in 750 Page Education Bill
Nov 12 2007 - 5:05pm
iPod, Ringtones, Guitar Hero, and Phase: All Music Apps are not treated equally
Nov 8 2007 - 6:21pm
AT&T's Copyright Filtering Technology No Better (and Maybe Worse) than the Rest
Nov 8 2007 - 11:22am
more
Recent Legislation
H.R. 2033: Design Piracy Prohibition Act
Apr 25 2007 - 5:00pm
H.R. 1201: Freedom and Innovation Revitalizing U.S. Entrepreneurship (FAIRUSE) Act of 2007
Feb 27 2007 - 11:10am
S.522: Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Act
Feb 7 2007 - 5:00pm
S.256: Platform Equality and Remedies for Rights Holders in Music (PERFORM) Act of 2007
Jan 11 2007 - 4:29pm
H.R. 6052: Copyright Modernization Act of 2006
Sep 11 2006 - 10:06am
more
Recent Litigation
Twentieth Century Fox et al. v. Cablevision Systems Corporation et ano.
Atlantic Recording Corp., et al. v. XM Satellite Radio Inc.
RIAA vs. Alleged File Traders
RIAA v. Verizon
Online Policy Group v. Diebold
more
Reading List
CDT: Policy Beta
Susan Crawford blog
Cybertelecom
EFF: DeepLinks
IPac Blog
KEI Policy Blogs: WIPO Casting Treaty
Lawrence Lessig
On the Commons.org
Open Access News
SIVACRACY.NET
The Technology Liberation Front
Tim Wu: What’s New
Organizations

first post

2007-09-12T10:36:00.000-07:00

This blog will review blogs and online journals of interest to its members.