Linkee-poo after dark is a junk food junkie

Artlandia's glossary of pattern design terms. Just in case you need it. (Grokked from Mary Robinette Kowal)

And if you're looking for poisons, here's the Poison Review blog and Wired's Elemental blog (which talks about poisons). (Grokked from Kelly Swails)

Oh no, there goes Tokyo, go, go Giant Jellyfish. From some research trying to find if this is photoshopped or not (I believe it is, it looks that way looking at the light sources) "No one knows for sure what's causing this jellyfish traffic jam (in the Sea of Japan). It's possible that oceans heated by global warming are creating the perfect jellyfish breeding ground. Another theory is that overfishing has decreased the numbers of some fish, which may allow the jellies to chow down without competition for food." History shows again and again how nature points up the folly of man.

"Mint Press News reported that real wages fell across the board by 2.8 percent between 2009 and 2012 as global food prices continue to rise. As a result, the value of SNAP benefits decreased by seven percent during that time, according to a recent report by the USDA. And as we reported in June, cutting SNAP would disproportionately affect children who depend on the benefit for vital nutrition in their first years of life." The GOP is planning to cut SNAP even more than their first attempt, which failed. Someone once said, "Let them eat cake" (which we can debate as a reference to a popular play and not a political statement, but in either case), how did that work out for them? (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Back after Egypt's Arab Spring there were many (mostly conservative) talking heads spouting that the Muslim Brotherhood should have been kept out of the process. Well, even though Moressy was "removed from office" for other reasons, the Muslim Brotherhood took it as a sign of an attack on them (which, truth be told, probably isn't so far from the truth as some would like to believe). Now we have a live experiment on what they were advocating for. This. Warning, some of those images may be disturbing to you. (Pointed to by John)

"Who would be so callous as to put partisan spite over the basic health care needs of their community?… Desperate right-wing activists know the law won't be repealed; they know it can't be stopped in the courts; and they know there's a limit to Republican efforts to sabotage the federal health care system. So they've been reduced to one last-ditch effort: convince people with no health care coverage to voluntarily turn down affordable insurance so as to advance their ideological cause." I wonder if Freedomworks will cover all these people's fines? See, I would guess that's part of the strategy. Make people not get insurance, who will then have to pay fines for not getting insurance. This tactic has been successful in the past, it's the basic protest strategy of people begging to be arrested because they know the police and courts can't process them all. But here's the thing, in this case we have these things called "computers" that will do much of the work. But then, the opposition to Obamacare continue to peddle on well debunked lies. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

You know how a lot of people (again, mostly conservatives) like to spout about how the minimum wage needs to be kept low so they can keep their prices low and give better service to their customers? Well, what about those companies that don't buy into that and pay and treat their employees well. Turns out a number of them do quite well and tend to have a better brand and customer loyalty (just a note, I would love to go to Costco, but the only store in the area is very inconvenient for us to get to). Oh, and that canard about these companies that pay low wages creating jobs? Yea, turns out that isn't true either. But then you need to factor in that, for fast food minimum wage workers, "(h)ead honchos get $11.9 million a year on average, including options, while full-time employees earn $15,080…/ And what's one of the major problems? Companies in pursuit of the quarterly profit statement (see link to Tobias Buckell's site previously on shareholder value), we've returned to the horrendous practice of considering employees as "cost units." "Employees are seen not as valuable assets but rather as 'costs' which must be reduced as much as possible to increase profits for the corporations which are already earning record profits and pay huge salaries and bonuses to further line the pockets of top employees who are already rich." I really can't believe we're back to this mental pygmyism (which gives a bad name to pygmies, sorry about that) and moral bankruptcy. I've said it before, we have real life experiments regarding these policies and ideologies. And it hardly ever looks good. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Linkee-poo is too busy for a fancy headline

"What follows is the quickest, dirtiest, most simple route to writing a novel and getting it published by a traditional publisher, which I accomplished from my own couch in Atlanta while nursing a baby and having neither an MFA nor any previous contacts in publishing." Delilah Dawson takes over Chuck Wendig's blog and posts 25 steps to being traditionally published.

A video game about a novelist's life. I guess the game about watching paint dry was copyrighted or something. I also sincerely hope the game is more complex than what is portrayed in this article. As a young designer at one of the jobs I had I was told that I would need to "sacrifice" for "the art." In this case all the designers were divorced at least once and they all seemed hell-bent-on-leather to brake up my relationship. While chasing a dream can certainly strain connections when both people don't share that dream, there are other ways to run than to keep your head down and charge through the barriers. (Grokked from Tor.com)

And infographic on the SF predictions of Ray Bradbury that have come true. I think I need to do a post about this sort of thing.

Don Harmon, could you explain your story breaking process? something about thoughts, ideas, and drawing circles and lines. Best part? "Please note that at this point, people around you will start to express confusion and frustration, because they thought the idea was fine already. Depending on your mood and standing, these people are called hacks, traitors, parasites, scabs or successful colleagues." (Grokked from Tor.com)

"This is why Ursula Le Guin novels don't become movies." A meditation on the lamentable state of SF in film. Or why does every movie come down to "two guys in super-powered suits hitting each other."(Grokked from Tor.com)

The Waitomo Glowworm Caves in New Zealand. (Grokked from Jay Lake)

First paleontological digs in the US. Apparently S. American tribes ascribed the bones to giants. Where as in Greece, they chalked them up to titans and cyclopses. Totally different things. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"Go here, go to Street View, and click on the double white arrows in the street beside the police call box. Once inside, you can travel around by using the arrows in the white circle in the top left hand corner." You're welcome. (Grokked Jennifer Crusie)

"If dirt is not purposeful and evil, then the bad faith must lie on the other side." Fred Clark on the grand conspiracy that is global climate change. Apparently, the bugs and the dirt are in on the conspiracy as well. For some reason, Christ's answer to the pharisees in the song "Hosanna" in Jesus Christ Superstar is going through my head.

Tobias Buckell talks about raising the minimum wage. In there he argues, "If conservatives argue against a minimum wage, to me it seems an admission that they don’t really believe in capitalism…". Actually, this is a thought that has been forming in the back of my mind. Conservatives, in their overwhelming zeal to by anti-Obama on anything are abandoning their classic position of being pro-capitalism (for the basic fact that many of Obama's policies are very capitalism oriented). Including passing a law that forbids Florida's Insurance Commissioner from negotiating prices for the health care exchange. And Florida isn't the only state. IIRC, Ohio's commissioner doesn't have her hands tied, but she refused to do the actual negotiations (and listening to an interview of her position, doesn't actually seem to understand health insurance at even a basic level). Medicare is prohibited from negotiating drug prices for Part D, the VA has also had their hands tied recently (the VA was an actual model of government efficiency on this end until hamstrung by conservative policies). And in many states conservative administrations and legislatures are enacting laws that will increase their overall costs while simultaneously reducing services to their citizens. I believe it's North Carolina (again) that passed a law that all cars must be sold through the dealership model (in an attempt to keep Tesla Motors, which sells direct, out of the state). This is not smart business. This isn't really any kind of business. So I'm also coming to the conclusions that many conservatives keep using the word "capitalism", but don't actually know what that means (okay, what they really want it to mean is, "I do what I want how I want and you don't get to do anything").

Another reminder of just how crazy the Cold War was, there was a plan to launch millions of copper fibers into orbit to create and artificial ring around the Earth that would insure against those Ruskies jamming our radio signals. Oh, and it would also help with solar interference. (Pointed to by Dan)

An atheist pro-life supporter tries to help the cause and gets the door slammed in her face. As Fred Clark (whom this is grokked from) says, "It didn’t matter that she fully shared their ideas about what they said was the central purpose of their groups. She didn’t understand the larger, unspoken cultural agenda that they consider far more important than that." (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Tobias Buckell is on a economic roll lately. This time it's about what is really wrong with this recover, quarterly shareholder value. "Executives at publicly traded companies are paid to generate higher share prices, which is done by hitting quarterly earnings targets. This leads to underinvestment relative to the behavior of managers of privately held firms. Not because managers of private firms are indifferent to the interests of shareholders, but because there’s less need for creating the shareholder value link via a simplistic relationship between compensation, share price, and quarterly earnings."

Linkee-poo knows this world is killing you

I'm going to break with the usual flow of links in this post because I think the next two are related. Old man grumblings about "kids these days" are boring and annoying, especially when I find myself doing it. These post relate to a few others I recently did. The first one relates to Tobias Buckell talking about quantity vs quality and how the former often leads to the later but starting with the later leads you nowhere. And the second relates to the article about how kids can't use computers. There's a mindset that locks one into "user" status. Many of these kids who are "computer literate" aren't more than users because they don't know there's a different way to be. I've also overheard complaints of some parents of kids who are now of an age to learn to drive. Most of them are having great difficulty because they've been so distracted all their life they never really watched how their parents drove nor how they got to wherever they were going.

Here's part of what's wrong with design these days. Here's a Sr. Art Director talking to "Juniors" about "where's the craft." Craft? And thinking computers have only changed what we're doing for the past 10 years? Dude, really, it's been 25 years since the computer revolution in design. If it's only affected you the last 10 years, you are way behind the curve. Now in the main I agree. What we do today as compared to what we did 2 decades ago, design is a very diminished form. I don't think I've handled more than a handful of what I would call "quality" photographs (even hiring a "professional" these days is no guarantee) in the past decade. Design has been democratized. If you haven't seen it until lately you have been living a rarified life. Here he is again talking about "craft as beauty", but it's the same argument. Now actually, like I said, I agree with him (except when he calls people "Juniors", which is a reference to Junior Art Directors and Junior Designers, to which I say a hearty "fuck you, dude", let's purge the condescension crap from some of the "Seniors" and we might be able to get back to craft). Today we're beset by ugly but wonderfully manipulated communications. And I would love (love) to have a job where I could do an actual "creative process" instead of having to grind out the work faster today than I did yesterday to drive more profits to the owners' pockets. The sad thing is, with the creative process I could drive even greater profits, but that's a long term game. So, yea, I have contempt for "Seniors" who talk down instead of across, but I also have regret that kids these days are taught computers without learning the basic forms of communications.

"Bret Victor's The Future of Programming should probably be required viewing this fall for all CS majors." And here's a direct link to the video of the presentation. Computing from the viewpoint of a 1973's IBM engineer, back at the dawn of the ARPANET (which is probably the least interesting tech he outlines as "the future of programming"). Also pointed to because of the simplified presentation form of using overheads (every Powerpoint user should take notes - when some of us old codgers talk about the death of the presentation form, this is what we're talking about). This is one of the few anachronisms in his presentation, it's clear his overhears were laser printed. Also good to keep in mind both the progression of "future programing", and how the world is different than what we imagined. Just so much in there and so much to unpack. Highly recommended if you're interested in technology and especially if you're a computer programmer/scientist. What's really sad is I remember a lot of what he's talking about. Man I'm old. And watch until the end. The last 5 minutes are very interesting. "The most dangerous thought you can have as a creative person is to think you know what you're doing." Substitute "computers" and "programming" with "science fiction" and "fantasy" and I believe you also get a cogent statement between the "Golden Age" and the current market of SF/F. (Grokked from Dan)

Elizabeth Bear is running her book sale.

If you're taking photographs, know your rights. I don't do that much photography anymore and I've had to explain to an officer what I was doing. Another tip is to keep calm and be polite. Also, don't give up your rights just because an officer looks and behaves imposing. They're trained to do that. (Grokked from Matt Staggs)

Two stories about wind power. “Wind farms are being given around £30million a year in compensation to switch off or slow down their turbines because nearly half the electricity they make is not needed.” We need bigger batteries. "'The prices offered by wind projects to utility purchasers averaged $40/MWh for projects negotiating contracts 2011 and 2012, spurring demand for wind energy.' That’s $0.04 per kWh." Wind is now cheaper than some other forms of production. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

"The goal of Project Pterosaur is to mount an expedition to locate and bring back to the United States living specimens of pterosaurs or their fertile eggs, which will be displayed in a Pterosaur Rookery that will be the center piece of the planned Fellowship Creation Science Museum and Research Institute (FCSMRI). Furthermore, the rookery facility will establish a breeding colony of pterosaurs in order to produce specimens that could then be put on display by other regional institutions or church groups." Um, yeah, Bob. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

And now in real science news, the Sun is about to flip magnetically. Queue the End Times and Tin-Foil Hat Brigades. (Grokked from Tor.com)

The internet troll as the modern equivalent of the witch hunt. (Grokked from Tor.com)

"This doesn’t mean that there’s any racial profiling going on(in Atherton, CA), of course. Could be that Latinos in the area just converge on Atherton for the purpose of driving without a license, which is also the most common violation listed." I'm sure there's no racism here, in one of the countries most wealthy communities. "We’ll have to assume that Atherton cops are just really, really good at spotting the telltale signs of a driver whose license is expired. Black hair and brown eyes are among the most common." I'm mean, we're a post-racial society, aren't we? Take the good folk of Beavercreek, OH, just outside of Dayton. I mean, they only want those people who might take the bus into their community to be comfortable with requiring AC and heating in all bus shelters. Might as well add an electrical outlet to charge up your cell phone while you're at it. And I'm sure it's just activist judges who basically said, "BS, get on with it," and are making the good citizens of Beavercreek accept bus service from Dayton to their suburb (also, I wonder how much their legal council makes, if they have them on salary or on an hourly basis). It's just like the good people of King of Prussia, PA who have only charity and warmth in their hearts when they say, "If somebody can't get to King of Prussia by car, they shouldn't be coming at all." And, you know, we can't have brown kids singing our National Anthem. Because, hell, I don't have anything here. My daily allotment of sarcasm has been used up. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Idiots gonna be idiots. And just a reminder that being an idiot knows not real party affiliation. "Progress Kentucky, the bumbling liberal super PAC that did more harm than good for Democrats during its eight-month existence, is no more."

Yea, the anti-Obama people aren't racist. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

The Onion often takes people along for a ride, here's 35 times.

"After the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a new benchmark was set for business behavior. Once you hung out your shingle, you could not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, national origin, or sex, regardless of your religious justification or personal belief. Ironically, the re-emergence of attempts to claim constitutional protection for discriminators over those discriminated against is a measure of the success of the expanded vision of the women’s rights and gay rights movements." But now we're trying to roll those back. One of the first places we saw it was in the pharmacy. State lawmakers would pass laws that would allow pharmacists (and now pharmacy workers) to not have to provide "Plan B" (and now any form of birth control) which would go against their consciousness. Then they expanded it to hospitals, doctors, and nurses to not have to perform abortions. Really? I was approached to do a calendar for the local Right-to-Life group. While I could charge them double, technically I couldn't refuse the work (and unfortunately I worked for someone who supported their cause - fortunately they never had the money and my boss didn't want to do it for free). And if we start allowing these "exemptions" from "commercial businesses", there is no end to discrimination in sight. And, seriously, refusing a booking because the people make you all squicky? Sigh, you want to go down that road? Okay. Many Christian religions are anti-masterbation. Start asking all your customers if they've ever pleasured themselves and then refuse them service if they have. How about if someone enters your establishment wearing poly-blend clothes? No, really, this is a bullshit response unless you want to start enforcing Kosher Laws. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"Mike Huckabee doesn’t want you to think he’s a bigot. He just wants you to know that he sees himself as superior to more than a billion people whom he regards as sub-human. Huckabee thinks it would be unfair for you to twist that into making him out to be a bigot." Fred Clark wants you to understand that it is a moral imperative to shout back at hate speech (since hate speech is usually shouted to begin with). The form that shout back takes can be of your choosing. In this case, I'll fight fire with fire (as it were) and say "Mike Huckabee, bless his little heart."

Shocked, shocked we are that…

Crazy thought for the night, and because I'm seeing some twitter traffic about it, I guess Director James Clapper is getting the nod to run the review of our surveillance programs.

And people are up in arms.

When last we saw Dir. Clapper, he was lying to Congress on C-Span (and then on all the news programs) about the extent of the NSA classified eavesdropping programs.

Read that again. Director Clapper was asked, live on C-Span, to out a classified program of surveillance in front of a Congressional committee (that could have held their meeting, or part of their meeting, behind closed doors).

People are shocked. Shocked he lied and he hasn't been thrown out on his boney arse.

Obviously we don't understand what "Classified" means, anymore. Seriously. Has it been that long since the end of the Cold War that we can't comprehend the very basic necessity of 1) not asking the Director of National Intelligence the scope of NSA data gathering on live TV (that's what closed door meetings are made for) and 2) not comprehending on how, if Dir. Clapper had said, "Oh, yea, NSA is pulling down a lot of this stuff and storing to use for future data mining", that he would have been committing a) a felony with possible jail time, b) betrayal of trust and c) violation of his oath? Are we totally confused by the effort to put Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden in jail?

Is this the effect of all those Perry Mason and Matlock shows where the lawyer has a witness on the stand and turns the whole court case around by asking pointed questions and showing the witness is actually the guilty party? Real life doesn't work that way.

Director Clapper knows secrets. That's his job. Keeping those secrets is also his job.

Overall, it's good to be upset that he lied to us (well, to Congress actually). But to really have expected him to answer that question, in front of cameras, truthfully and fully is a degree of naiveté that we really shouldn't have these days.

CLEAR! (zapf!)

So, checking lottery tickets this weekend and for the Powerball drawing ($40 million, not the $450 million), and I hit the first two numbers… Nearly had a heart attack. Of course, those were the only two numbers I had (didn't have the "powerball" number so no payout). So for me it's back to the salt mines tomorrow. Sigh. So close. Just one more monkey at one more typewriter.

Weekend Linkee-poo could hang out by the pool

Pixar's storytelling rules done in Lego.

Use what works, dump the rest. Or, if what you're doing isn't working, maybe you need to try something else?

"This sentence has five words." If you want a quick lesson on sentence and paragraph structure and pacing.

Cat Rambo on getting away with wordy prose. There is a line you can sidle right up to, but if you cross it woe will come to you. I also hope that poetic prose doesn't always equate to wordy.

Best Clippy Evar. And if you don't know Clippy or get the humor, count yourself lucky.

Tobias Buckell on quantity producing quality. Having seen these arguments up close, yep.

Why we can't have nice things. A review of Elysium. One of the most unique critiques I've ever received was being told my words were my own.

"I’m going to say it again because it’s important: There is no wrong way to have a body." Wise Bear is wise.

Vince informs us that August 8th was apparently the International Day Of The Female Orgasm. Now there's holiday I can get behind.

Living with 4 cats (who was recently the only human at home), I approve this message.

Jim Hines' comic regarding sexual harassment and the various canned responses.

"(W)atching these discussions is like watching an adult struggling to reach an agreement with a child who literally doesn't understand what a compromise is." An allegory on how our divided government "works", at least from the conservative side. It's either an incredibly cynical play, or just gross incompetence. These days I'm not sure which. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

North Carolina and buyer's remorse. I'm not so optimistic as this author that people will realized they went the wrong way with electing in a bunch of social conservatives when they thought they were getting fiscal conservatives. And the damage might already be too great. To paraphrase Machiavelli, do your big evil first and people will forget and forgive. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"Researchers have 'resurrected' a 4 billion-year-old protein that may shed light on how life evolved on Earth." Someone send this lab 20 copies of "Jurassic Park", stat! (Grokked from Dan)

Apparently I'm out of the loop. Seems there's new energy efficiency standards for the ceiling fan industry that they're all up in arms over. Except, "The efficiency standards for ceiling fans were requested by the industry itself so they wouldn't have to deal with a patchwork of state-by-state regulations, and the standards were approved in 2005. For those keeping score at home, in 2005, there was a Republican White House, a Republican-run Senate, and a Republican-run House." By why let facts get in the way of a good rage against the Obama administration. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"Tomorrow’s politicians, civil servants, police officers, teachers, journalists and CEOs are being created today. These people don’t know how to use computers, yet they are going to be creating laws regarding computers, enforcing laws regarding computers, educating the youth about computers, reporting in the media about computers and lobbying politicians about computers. Do you thinks this is an acceptable state of affairs?" It's an oft told story about how "the kids" are so techno-literate. They are users of technology, but most of them don't understand it. (Grokked from Mer Haskell)

More on that PA wackaloon. Wackaloon knows no political affiliation.

Speaking of whackaloons, Eric has a theory about the GOP policies regarding birth control and abortion. I think I agree with Erich and his conclusion about the direction of these policies, but not so much which his final reasoning. After all, an impoverished, cheap labor force to those who know history can become an army, but to others is a business strategy.

"Well, okay. Christians say that. But it’s not enough. We cannot just hope for the kingdom to come, squeak out the closing hymn, and go have coffee. That’s just not helpful." It lightens my steely, flinty heart that some Christians in the US still get it. With all the flash and noise from ecumenical, apostolic and eschatology battles, some people still get it.

Linkee-poo rushes out the door

They're rebooting Omni Magazine. True story, my first rejection was from Omni and Ellen Datlow. The rejection letter began something like, "We regret to inform you that Omni Magazine is shutting down, so we're returning your submission unread…". Hey, I killed it once, don't force me to kill it again. (Pointed to by Dan)

Chuck Wendig on forcing art. Having worked in an industry that's really close to art (waves at Vince here) for 20+ years now, and having been trained in "arts", I think I can say a little on this matter. Stop thinking of what you're doing as art and just get on with it. People can disagree with "what is art" (I'm firmly in the camp of what I do is very much not art, although it's art's kissing cousin). In the context of writing, the "you can't force art" is often used as an excuse to not write. I also have experience here as well. It is always "better" to write when you're "inspired", but you shouldn't think of that as a requirement. It took da Vinci some 3-5 years to paint the Mona Lisa (and there's debate if he worked on it for another 10 years). While it wasn't his only project, do you think all of that 3-5 years time was spent in glorious bliss of "ZOMG, people are going to LOVE this"? Think he may have had a few weeks of "this is total shit, no one is going to buy it" and "if I have to paint one more stroke I'm going to fuckin' shoot someone"? Yea, I think he might have. Because that is art. It's damn hard work. I could go into the "what's the definition of art" thing, but people have been debating that for centuries (and probably back to the guy painting at Lacroix and Ogg coming up behind him saying, "You call that a horse, my kid painted a better one using his own shit last night"). By the time your book is done (unless you go right to self-publishing) it's a group effort. Can groups make art? Yes, I'd say they could. But that group effort isn't there to make art, it's there to make commerce. And that right there makes it non-art (yes, art can make a profit… but that's not what's going on here, do you really want me to write 4000 words on this? I can. Without breaking a sweat. Don't force me to turn this blog around cause I will). But people can say they "suffered for their art" (you're going to suffer anyway), and if people don't understand it, well, they're "Philistines", and that seems to be more important to people who "make art" than actually "making art." So, can you force art? If you say what I do is art, well I did a lot this morning and I'll do a lot this afternoon. And I'll be forcing it all.

Some more followup to that "professional writer" thing. Chuck Wendig has a nice, simple flowchart to help you figure this out. Catherine Schaff-Stump has some things to say. :: points to her post :: YEA!

What social media marketing is all about. As someone who deals with this, you wouldn't believe the utter idiocy of what goes on in corporate circles when it comes to social media. Especially since the rules are so damn simple. First hint, no, you do not want to hire that kid just out of high school because "kids get it." No, no, no.

"I miss the days when supposed religious folks didn't try to scare you about the government in order to pull the money from your pockets…" Ah, but some "religious folks" have found that scaring you brings in more money than telling you that what you're doing probably violates one of the Big Ten or the Killer Seven. And some"religious folks" are more interested in the money. These people give "professional liars" a bad name. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Xerox to patch that scanner "glitch" (actually, it really was a "feature", they just didn't think about how their customers used their machines). (Pointed to by Dan)

Bring out yer dead! Bring out yer dead. That's the problem with history, you very rarely bury your problems. London workers uncover plague graves. (Grokked from Mrs Tadd)

"In other words, the environment is changing, and much of what we’ve come to take for granted — clean water to grow food in dry places, lakes to swim in and skim over on jet skis and kayaks and rowboats — won’t necessarily be there when we need it." This is the real problem for us when it comes to global warming (other than a sharp decrease in biological diversity). Our society is pretty well structured around "we do this here, we do that over there." With climate change, we'll need to rethink all that. If you're wondering what the problem of that would be, think about property values, eminent domain, and moving whole cities. Kinda sucks, doesn't it? (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"Northern Snakeheads are known for having sharp teeth, slimy skin, a voracious appetite and the ability to survive on land for days at a time. A spawning population as found in a pond in Maryland near the Potomac River in 2002." A record fish is caught in the US. They're not native to the US. One way to try and eradicate them is to sell them as tasty. But then, almost anything deep-fried is tasty.

"Is it possible Republicans are trying to make the gender gap worse? Are politicians like Gingrey embracing misogyny as some kind of deliberate campaign tactic?" Yes. I know it's rhetorical, but yes. What is it about "angry, white men" that is confusing? Don't think so? How about giving people protesting your anti-abortion legislation cookies (while having your security detail hold traffic and summoning a representative to the center of the road). I love the look on that woman's face holding the plate. Not to mention the still existing, open misogyny in the Texas (and other) legislature(s). And then forcing girls to leave sports teams because boys must have "lustful thoughts." Hint to old people, boys will always have lustful thoughts. I'm sure this has nothing to do with the fact that it shows women can be equal to men even in the time-hallowed halls of sports. Yea, I'm sure that has nothing to do with it. BTW, did you know that where women are forced to wear the Burqa it's because men may lust after them? And just like how Millennials are leaving the Church as they discover what they were told to be the Truth turns to dust when it meets people who actually look for the truth, when confronted by institutionalized sexism, young people find they are feminists after all. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"But discrimination like the kind that Charlesworth (fired after her abusive husband came onto the campus where she worked and caused a lock down) experienced can lead victims to shy away from reporting. Of the 4 million workplace crimes committed against women from 1993-1990, less than half were reported to the police." Just in case you were wondering why women don't report abuse and rape.

Have I mentioned how the political parties have already gotten past the 2014 mid-term elections and are now hashing out the 2016 election? Have I? Okay, have some kitten therapy courtesy of Elizabeth Bear. I don't know if we have enough kittens this time.

For a friend

Thinking of you in this time of troubled seas.

Crossing the Bar
Alfred Lord Tennyson

Sunset and evening star,
    And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
    When I put out to sea.

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
    Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
    Turns again home!

Twilight and evening bell,
    And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
    When I embark;

For though from out our bourn of Time and Place
    The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
    When I have crost the bar.

Linkee-poo bought a beat up six-string in a second hand store

Yesterday was book day for Jim Hines' latest. You go, Jim.

What 50 Shades of Grey can teach us… about writing. "It’s so poorly written, it’s so surface, it’s so… compelling people can’t seem to put it down." Insert any popular author who sells a bazillion books and you get the same sentence.

A lot has been said about Lisa Morton's 10 questions to see if your a professional writer post. As Jim Hines has said, if you write, you're a writer. As John Scalzi has said, if you're paid to write, you're a professional writer.

"'If petascale computers like the K computer are capable of representing 1 percent of the network of a human brain today, then we know that simulating the whole brain at the level of the individual nerve cell and its synapses will be possible with exascale computers hopefully available within the next decade,' Markus Diesmann of the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine at Germany's Forschungszentrum Julich said in the release." Note the synaptic connections were random, and all they simulated was the electrical flow through the matrix. And again I'll note, the brain is not a computer, we just use it as a comparison because the computer is the most complex thing we have right now. We barely understand where things occur in the brain, let alone how. And intelligence and consciousness is still in the realm of philosophy. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

Tobias Buckell also runs out an interesting thought experiment. It's actually something I've thought about in a different way, that is how much of an endowment would be needed to run a small, local government. But Tobias' vision is grander, how to replace the welfare state with a program that provides a "citizen's dividend." The only fault I can see (besides the amazingly large political bar to cross) is that prices, despite lots of blathering to the contrary, aren't based on cost of production, but what the market will bear. So as income would raise across the board, prices would also raise to transfer that dividend to the 1% (or the 10%), which would negate any increase in income form the dividend.

That bastion of good GOP boot-licking, I mean propaganda, wait, that place that the GOP sends their talking points to first thing in the morning, Fox News, would like you to know about the Democratic War on Women. Here's the difference in these scandals. Those Democrats are assholes, and an offense to women. But while they're assholes they're not trying to rob women of their rights, violate their bodies in an institutionalized way, or discount them as a part of the human race. That's the difference here. Oh, and Dems have pretty much labeled these people as assholes. However, because we don't bow and pray to the iconic God of Party as the GOP does, our calls for them to leave are done without much note because they aren't done on national TV to make the person calling them out feel and look better about themselves.

"So I'm out of work. Again. And because healthcare in this country is tied to employment, we are out of luck. Again. I had cancer. My daughter was hit by a car and got a concussion and a fractured ankle. I know bad things can happen to me, to my family. We have to have health insurance. And we have to pay for it ourselves. And that keeps me up at night." The night terrors of the uninsured. So know that feeling. Also noted for heinousness of higher-education points. "Without insurance, we would have lost our house, decimated the college funds, spent every bit of savings we had, and, six years later, I'm sure we'd still be paying off those bills. Or we would have gone bankrupt. Some 700,000 Americans every year declare bankruptcy because of medical bills. The number in Japan? Zero. The number in Germany? Zero." Also noted for the failings of Obamacare and the lack of a single-payor system. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

A man in PA goes gunning for his local politicians. Yep, know the type. So now we enter that time period when people with guns think they're above the law. It is, after all, what the "ZOMG, Obama is comin' fer yer guns and daughters" crowd has been priming the pump over for years.

So, just how many people has God killed? You know, directly. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

"Judge Mark A. Ciavarella, one of two Pennsylvania judges who (were) paid bribes by a private prison contractor to send black children to prison and keep the for-profit prisons full… He was convicted of racketeering, and has been stripped of his state pension." His appeal was denied. Justice can be slow, but sometimes it does right. Unfortunately he ruined a lot of lives along the way. (Grokked from Matt Staggs)

"It's a great country for guys like me. People let you be yourself, you know? I get a real kick out of being here. Doing my part. Prowling around in the dark and making sure everything looks just the way it should. Just like I want it." This guy just wants to ask you a few questions. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Building a full-auto gauss gun. Not a lot of power yet, but enough to do some damage at close quarters. There's a 3D printing project to be worried about (although how you'd 3D print those magnets and circuit-boards, still a lot of things to buy and get right that doesn't involve 3d printing). (Pointed to by Dan)

Big Oil isn't so much anymore. Although they're still pretty damn big, but note the lowering of production numbers. Not a good sign in an upticking economy (world-wide). There's a lot of economics that are being ignored here (such as one of the reasons oil maybe at $94 is because of lowered production, whether that's intentional or a by-product of the end of oil is hard to say). (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

I guess Reince Priebus doesn't like anyone but Fox and feels they have to "control the referees" of the next election (2016 that is). CNN (and supposedly NBC) is putting together a documentary about Hillary Clinton and the GOP is having a freakout. I'm sure this has nothing to do with their candidates coming off as nut jobs trying to out do each others nuttiness during the last election cycle. Yea, I'm sure that has nothing to do with "controlling" the "referees". Like when you have a moderator having to correct your candidate who was speaking a falsehood. Or the (still playing on Comedy Central) performance of Texas Governor Rick Perry, "… I forget the third one. Oops." Plus, I'll just remind you that "Citizens United" was all about a hit job "documentary" about Hillary Clinton that was run for the 2008 election. Can't have any other narrative out there trying to compete with the echo-chamber world view of conservative politics, can we?

"(Some) say the secrecy has helped the industry resist more stringent environmental and health controls – by burying evidence of water contamination and health problems associated with natural gas operations. The Hallowichs' lawyer… told the court he had never seen a gag order imposed on children in his 30 years of practicing law, according to the released transcript." Sure, nothing wrong with the technology of fracking. Save as bugs in a rug being sprayed with a can of Raid. How many gag orders are there now? "…once that gag order came to light… the company told reporters it did not agree with Swetz's comments. 'We don't believe the settlement applies to children,' a Range Resources spokesman told the Gazette. He went on to tell the paper that there was no evidence that the Hallowich family was affected by exposure to gas development." Put it in writing, please. Also, it's easy to say that when you know you can sue the pants off the people who could provide concrete evidence to the contrary. If there was "no harm, no foul" as it were, why the gag order over everything to do with the case and not just the settlement part? (Pointed to by John)

Walmart can tell their employees to share "happy stories", but then you never know just what the employees are going to share. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

I mean, who would want to see these kinda nuts being paraded on TV? Seriously, Rep. Ted Yoho (R-FL), you could get whiplash going back and forth like that on birtherism. And then you have Peter "Hezbollah Comin' Over the Border" King.

Bread and Circuses, and we're only going to get the circus because the TP has announced they don't want to give away bread.

Linkee-poo, history shows again and again how nature points up the folly of man

"(T)hen those are my stories, too." Greg van Eekhout on the "other." (Grokked form Dr. Doyle)

"This book may contain adult content including but not limited to orbital mechanics, advanced mathematics, and linguistic descriptivism." That's from disclaimers for books never written. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

John Scalzi's note to the self-appointed "gatekeepers" of geekdom.

"The Czech Republic is the second country to accept the cooking utensil as official religious head gear, following Austria when businessman Niko Alm won the right to wear a similar sieve on his driving licence photo. Many countries still refuse to accept the pasta strainer as such, and other people in counties such as Poland have failed." His Noodliness starts gaining recognition. This is what happens when you have silly laws about religion. I wonder when I can have my Ohio drivers license photo taken with my Jedi cloak? (Pointed to by John)

Some Xerox workcenters randomly alter numbers. At first I thought it was an OCR error, but turns out it's much worse. Skynet is just messing with our minds now. (Grokked from Phiala)

"Malware planted on the servers of Freedom Hosting—the 'hidden service' hosting provider on the Tor anonymized network… may have de-anonymized visitors to the sites running on that service. This issue could send identifying information about site visitors to an (IP) address that was hard-coded into the script the malware injected into browsers. And it appears the IP address in question belongs to… NSA." Well, there's a hand in the cookie jar. (Pointed to by John)

The stories we tell ourselves. In this case, why a bus driver didn't intervene to stop a student being beaten by bullies. I'll also comment that pepper-spray in the confines of a school bus, not a good idea. To stop the violence the driver may have needed to be violent as well. Imagine the headlines, "Bus Driver Loses Control, Beats Kids." Intervening is a tough thing. (Grokked from Wannbewriter06)

"Reuters reported on previously undisclosed documents showing that a secret Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) unit uses information collected by intelligence agencies—including the National Security Agency (NSA)—to build evidence for criminal cases." And other shoes begin to drop. Now this is the scandal the GOP was so desperately searching for last year. I wonder if they'll pick it up and run with it. Their problem is that it involves law enforcement, something which they've vigorously supported in the past. Did I ever mention how the Patriot Act was originally a drug enforcement act that was hurriedly rebranded after 9-11? (Pointed to by John)

Say, remember this? Boom-deyadda. Yeah, The Discovery Channel says "fuck all" to that. I caught the end of the replay of that show. Had to double check that I wasn't on Syfy. Seriously, WTF?

"The New-York Historical Society’s current exhibition 'AIDS in New York: The First Five Years' accomplishes a neat trick: it takes a black mark in New York City’s history — its homophobic, apathetic response to the early days of AIDS in the early 1980s — and transforms it into a moment of civic pride, when New Yorkers of all stripes came together to fight the disease." I seem to remember living through that time. It wasn't a bright chapter of American History. (Grokked from Morgan J Locke)

"Ben Shapiro, Breitbart.com Editor-At-Large, pushed a baseless conspiracy theory that the sale of The Washington Post to Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos revealed "crony capitalist" collusion with the Obama administration, because President Obama visited an Amazon facility in Tennessee a week before the sale was announced." Freeze-dried whackaloon quotient continues to rise. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

Tweet of my heart: @wilw Baseball players who used steroids have faced more meaningful consequences than bankers who wrecked our entire economy. #MURICA

Because after all that and the various news organizations agreeing that the 2016 Campaign is already underway, you need a cat, in a shark suit, riding a roomba.

Linkee-poo same trailer, different park

Over the weekend I went down the stairs on my tailbone. I don't recommend this course of action to anyone. Seriously not fun, and the inflatable donut doesn't help all that much.

Sure, you've heard all the arguments about "self-publishing", but here are five good reasons to go with a traditional publisher. And if I hear the false argument about how the music industry has changed and that means story writers need to do the same changes I think I'll spit. First off, just because they're both entertainments doesn't mean they're the same thing. Second, we consume and learn about the medium by different routes (seen any good book-trailers lately?). And while publishers' contracts can be as one-sided as the music industry contracts, there are a lot of differences (I've never heard an author say they're publishing under a pseudonym to avoid contractual obligations they signed to decades ago).

The care and feeding of the author/agent relationship. As always, follow Weaton's Law, don't be a dick.

Some people don't believe in the magic of writing. And, well, they have a point. I, again, often talk about the Muse, being inspired and "In the Zone." But here's the thing, you can't wait for those things (unless you know the way to the Zone, like we all knew how to get to Sesame Street, or you have your Muse on speed-dial). You need to write cold, uninspired, and when you're dead tired (here that advice, Steve, you better follow it). And then, during the process, that's where you find the zone and hear the Muse's voice (hopefully).

"The quality of books seems tied to this homogenization of knowledge… The result is that mainstream agents and publishers select new books based almost exclusively on what they believe will sell, and that means the internet-addicted public ultimately gets to make the choice of what gets published… It creates a vicious, unimaginative circle in which publishing has become trapped—agents and publishers won’t take on anything different because they’re afraid the market won’t buy it, and mainstream readers can’t buy anything different because they rarely get exposure to it." A little cynical, but you can see similar cycles in most other forms of entertainment (note recent link to article about how all the movies are becoming the same). Eventually someone takes an educated guess/chance on something new, and then that becomes the standard. It's the old academy vs. succession cycle.

Today saw the first public preparation of cultured beef. No word yet on if it tasted like chicken. Okay, update since I wrote this, we do have some taste evaluation. (Pointed to by Dan and John)

Why Millennials are leaving the church. For similar reasons that Baby-Boomers and Gen-Xers left the church. Coming of age brings exploration and a leaving of the parent's life, and now because of a rise in "Biblical Inerrancy", the younger people raised in that tradition become disenchanted when they discover the lies. Don't worry, Church people, many will return as they reach their middle 30s and have children of their own at an age to be confirmed. But it will be a decreased number.

John Scalzi talks about Matthew Chapter 6. I think there was a link to that chapter earlier.

"While Chief Kessler and his armed followers may be able to delude some people into believing that they are 'exercising their First Amendment rights,' there is no doubt these militia members are aware that their actions and speech are causing many others who live in the borough of Gilberton to feel threatened, intimidated and terrorized. When armed men stand in doorways, with the direct intent of interfering with the rights of other members of society, when they seek to deny the rights of other persons to participate in open public meetings, when they verbally or physically threaten other citizens who hold opposing political views, when they interfere with the rights of others to speak freely about their fears and concerns, and most importantly, when they use their weapons as a way to intimidate public officials, and members of the general public, there should be no doubt these people are terrorists and need to be treated as such." Just so it's on the record of which side drew first. What this will probably take is State Police Action, or Federal Action. You might remember this wingnut from a previous post. (Grokked from Matt Staggs)

"This is an example of CNN doing PR and stenography for the White House. They did it when Bush was president, and they’re doing it now."

As the joke goes, "You say we all look angry. This is not angry face, this is hot face. It is very hot. Put me in air-conditioning and I'm so happy. Rising temperatures tend to make us more aggressive toward each other (personally and as a group). Thing is, the Pentagon already knew this. They've been preparing scenarios for the coming rise in temperatures and sea levels for almost a decade now. (Grokked from Tor.com)

"According to Alpert’s analysis, 69% of the jobs created in the second quarter – and 57% in the first half of 2013 – were in the three lowest-paying sectors of the economy: retail trade, administrative and waste services, and leisure and hospitality. These jobs, which account for 33% of all private sector jobs, pay an average of $15.80 per hour." On why the economic recovery doesn't feel like one and why the GDP isn't growing faster. But hey, I'm sure if we remove the onerous restriction of the minimum wage, we all could have jobs that pay shitty-wages. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

On a side note, this is one of the reasons why I'm having so many sleepless nights. I'm trying to figure out a new career path that pays well, doesn't suffer from ageism, has enough growth that I can get a job in it, and is something I can do and train for. There's very few positions that meet all of these criteria. This is also why some of us are champions of raising the minimum wage. Not only does that improve the individual's personal economy, it also improves the overall economy.

Also, want some more authoritative pronouncement that raising the minimum wage would be a net positive? Yea, that right there. Also read those points closely, if you're tired of supporting the "welfare/entitlement state", you should directly supporting higher minimum wages.

Weekend Linkee-poo, odds are he won't see tomorrow

Chuck Wendig with ten thoughts on Story. "If you don’t understand why a character does something, you don’t understand the character." Yea, that.

No one told me women don't write Science Fiction. (Grokked from Tor.com)

"There are few overnight successes and many up-all-night successes." Tobias Buckell on time and where you spend it. Something I've been giving lots of thought to.

"Take yourself lightly. You're not J.K. Rowling, darling." A writer's life list in the various stages of life. (Grokked from Catherine Schaff-Stump)

"The list below contains 100 pieces of short (science) fiction – short stories, novelettes and novellas – by women writers, published between 1927 and 2012." (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Wil Wheaton explains what being a nerd/geek really means and why it's important while giving a message to a fan's infant daughter. (Grokked from Tor.com)

The epic epic-ness of the epic trailer. Pulls all the tricks and pushes all the buttons. As my favorite Doctor (Tom Baker) once said, "When in doubt, pull all the wires." I'm not sure if this trailer was meant to be satire and commentary on the current state of movie entertainment, but man does it hit the mark. (Grokked from tor.com)

Consider this pale blue dot. We're just a faulty pixel in the grand universe of, well, the universe. (Pointed to by Dan)

What might happen to you if you're swallowed by a whale. (Grokked from Matt Staggs)

The "science" of advertising. Nothing new under the sun. How and when the marriage of "psychology" and "advertising" came about.

Mastering the Landing Page. Filled with the necessary quota of eye-rolling concepts. But there are a few good points in there. Except for the big one, landing pages are dead. See, the "Landing Page" was a concept developed way back in the last Ice Age of HTML 2.0 as a good way to develop your "content is king" website. There were whole books written about this philosophy. And then people realized with deep links and the flexible nature of the web and how people actually like to navigate, the concept of landing pages was seen as a quaint, archaic throwback to when designers believed they could "direct your experience". Well, I guess it's better than resurrecting the "exit portal." Basically concepts like these are developed to sell books on how to do them (note numerous links to a book on designing websites which you can get for the low price of $80, which is a discount of some gazillion dollars so get 'em before we raise the price).

Turns out the Prisoner's Dilemma doesn't test out as well on actual prisoners. Or, in other words, prisoners are actually nicer to each other and cooperate more than those of us in the general population. Of course these are German prisoners, so YMMV. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

In case you're ever tempted to make editorial changes to your live website without having a developmental site to try things out on first, you need to read/see this. What goes wrong on the Chicago Tribune website stays on the internet forever. (Pointed to by John)

Jim Wright on the Bradley Manning verdict. And here I'll just say there's been lots of people talking about how "whistle blowers" are important to history and the role of Daniel Ellsberg (the Pentagon Papers in case you don't remember that). There are significant differences, including the fact that Daniel Ellsberg knew criminal prosecution was a definite outcome of his actions. Also, there is a difference between "keeping secrets" and "intentional lying" to the public. The Pentagon Papers showed the later was happening, and it was the reason why Mr. Ellsberg went down the path he did. Also, the papers were highly selected from the report on Vietnam relations and then washed through the analysis of the NYT. In Manning's case, much of the information seems to be just a indiscriminate data dump and there was very little analysis or selection in their publication on Wikileaks.

The problem: "But when it comes to a prescription for the party’s electoral ills, a majority of GOP voters said their leaders should move further to the right, not the center." Those cool, cool, considerate men. Always to the right, forever to the right, never to the left.

John Scalzi on Anthony Weiner and Bob Filner. Somebody really needs to go up to both of those asshats and saying, "That's it, you're done here." Both show that asshattery knows no political party allegiance.

"The 'numerous related assumptions' (about poverty) he says have 'fallen along the way' reads like a transcript form a 2012 Republican presidential primary debate." I think I've said this a few times that I can't believe we're still discussing some of this stuff in 2013, but people's world views are the hardest things to change.

Nuns, what can you do. "Rep. Reid Ribble (R-WI) indicted (nuns who were testifying before committee) and the Catholic Church for not doing enough to fix poverty on their own, asking, 'What is the church doing wrong that they have to come to the government to get so much help?'" What a wonderful human being. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

The cost of getting the drone campaign wrong (which we seem to be doing with alarming regularity). I've come out before in favor of drone strikes, and I still hold my position. Collateral "damage" is to be expected in some cases (war is a very messy business, even in our "smart bomb" era - smart is a relative term, not a definitive one). However, if we get this wrong and launch against innocents (for various definitions of "innocent") even if it is a 1 in 100 event, this campaign will do more harm than good. Already the drone war is being portrayed as a war against Muslims, and that thought is gaining a lot of traction in the world. Hopefully the transfer of responsibility for targeting and approval to the Pentagon from the CIA will help eliminate these errors. There are people in the world who wish to help us, who are doing their own part in this "war" of ideology. Killing them is a Bad Idea™. (Grokked from Wil Wheaton)

Tobias Buckell with a NASA animation of 130 years of temperature data. Yea, what what climate change.

"All of this information, the primary order says, is dumped into something called the "corporate store." Incredibly, the FISC imposes no restrictions on what analysts may subsequently do with the information. The FISC's primary order contains a crucially revealing footnote stating that "the Court understands that NSA may apply the full range of SIGINT analytic tradecraft to the result of intelligence analysis queries of the collected [telephone] metadata." In short, once a calling record is added to the corporate store, anything goes." The ACLU on some of the recent revelations about NSA pulling in all that "metadata" (note section of the link to Jim Wright's blog about Manning where all this "metadata" is sometimes more valuable than the actual content). Just in case anyone tries the old "progressives always stick up for wach other and march in lock step." (Grokked from Wil Wheaton)

Ah, well, at least they're no longer calling Obama the anti-Christ. Now he's just "preparing the way" as it were. And obviously this supposed reverend hasn't heard about how Obama is destroying his religious liberty by having passed Obamacare by fiat or something. (Grokked from the Slactivist)

Tweet of my heart: @austinkleon "Bread winner" is now "health insurance winner."