On Thursday I wrote another hardware review for Andrew Christy, manager of GetMusic.com and MP3.com hardware guy. Today, Tuesday, Andrew is gone, axed, bagged, cut, let go. On Friday they had another round of layoffs in order to keep their burn rate at $0, which it got down to after the last few rounds, from $22 million a month, down from $43 million a month before the layoffs six sets ago. So Andrew is gone. Wow. But at least he got six weeks severance, last round they got only two.

What do you say when someone offers you drugs? Here is a novel one: “Well, I don’t want to, but there really aren’t very many creative ways to say no to drugs, and those that I’ve heard just sounded cheesy and contrived.” So, yeah, okay.

Farscape doesn’t yet cease to amaze me in its provocative and powerful stories, its wonderful dialogue, and its amazing characters. I shall share this dialogue, by John Crichton, as the last seconds of his life slip away, consequences of massive radiation poisoning as a result of his noble sacrifice to save the world from a deadly threat. He sits with Aeryn, the true love of his life, who only hours earlier had pledged to follow him across the universe, back to his home of Earth whatever the consequences, so that they could be together. Crichton takes his final breaths and says:

They say…
it’s a lucky or an unambitious man
who goes when he’s ready.

That said–
Scorpius is gone.
I’m at peace.
I don’t hurt.

I… I did some good things.
I’m proud of my life.
And I’m with you.

Don’t worry about me. I’ve never felt better.

When I die I want to die humble but proud of my life. I want to die at peace, with people I love, feeling that I have lived productively, that it has been worth it. And not worth it in the typical 9-5 routine of life, but worth it because I have truly experienced wonders, I have felt true happiness, and I have done noble deeds.

Some can die content that they lived a life of good service, and this I find comforting, but it is not enough for me. I need not die with a legacy, but I must die in a world that is a better place than the one I entered. And so my quest need be only this: to make the world, in some small way, a better place.

Even if no one knows it but me.

I finally recognized That Girl from Cheaters! She was Young Ellie in Contact. Why didn’t I figure this out sooner?! That’s my favorite movie!

Children frequently bullied at school were at risk of developing clinical levels of depression and anxiety, a child psychology conference heard today.

Things to write about

1. OCHSA Show and Cineplex
   
2. Death of the AgBox and the continuing saga
   
3. Rant on MP3.com culture
   
4. Visit to UCSD
   
5. Car troubles

and my site is back online, somewhat. No authentication, no pictures, but these things I will figure out in due time. Does anyone happen to know what to use instead of $PHP_AUTH_USER and $PHP_AUTH_PW in PHP 4.2, since those seem to be dead? I figured maybe $_AUTH[‘pw’] or something, but its not documented anywhere. Grr.

I forgot to mention this earlier, but in line with my earlier post, Nina, a PC user on 24, WAS the mole. All the Mac users stayed good. 🙂

Jane Gross was struggling for the right words, the words that would make her essay stand out from a crowded pack. The competition was fierce this year. In a high-pressure field where judgments often seem arbitrary, she was determined to distinguish herself.

Welcome to the fast-paced world of articles about college admissions.

Looks like Clear Channel Communications just keeps losing money. Read this article and watch for the humorous (and very telling) conclusion. Oh, poor massive company with their Top-40 garbage and nationwide syndicated format, with no local content or care for the community…

I really, really, really hope that a mainstream press source takes notice of a recent NewsForge story on how a recent Reuters article may violate the DMCA. The Digital Millenium Copyright Act makes it illegal to publish or disseminate any method to circument copy-protection, no matter how flimsy that protection may be, or how damaging it is to fair use.

While many in the computer science and education communities have seen great faults in the legislation, most mainstream people (and the press that represents them) simply sees the DMCA as a legitimate way to prevent illegal use of commercial products.

So where did Reuters go long? They published a story detailing exactly how to circumvent Sony’s CD protection technology. The circumvention device: a 99 cent magic marker. The distribution of this story: everywhere. At least a dozen mainstream sites, newspapers, and television networks, including CNN and Yahoo!, distributed this story — all of them are responsible for spreading information about circumvention Sony music CDs and allowing a customer to play them in his or her computer for less than a dollar.

I certainly wouldn’t want to post how to do it here, as I follow the law and wouldn’t want to violate the DMCA, a law with very stiff penalties (max $500,000 fine and 5 years in jail). So while Reuters may be a scoff-law, I certainly will not. I respect our recording industry, and the government that allows them to violate the fundamental rights of Americans for some short-term capital gain. No sir, not me. I say the record companies are using their FREEDOMS to create protectionist legislation to perpetrate their LEGAL monopolist practices and LEGITIMATELY destroy the notion of fair use, which hurts their business. I mean, who listens to music on their computer (or MP3 player, or portable, or car player, or cell-phone player) anyway? And why should they have the RIGHT to listen to music?

Seeing as at this point I am abusing sarcasm, I’ll stop.

People talk about time, and taking advantage of what you have, and enjoying the moment, and planning for the future, and hurrying up, and slowing down, and you’re gonna be late, and its too early to be up, go back to bed, and is it Christmas yet?

I agree with all of it.

I believe that we should all take advantage of moments of beauty and happiness. I believe we should try to be on-time to our appointments, to not make other people wait, but I also recognize that things happen, and waiting half an hour doesn’t much upset me, as long as I have something to think about, look at, or listen to. I like waking up early, watching the sun rise. I like staying up late, looking at the stars and typing away, knowing that most of the people around me are in a deep slumber. I hate being sick, and wish it would end more quickly. I both love and loathe the strange non-ability of humans to remember physical touch — we can’t recall pain, which is good, but we also can’t recall softness, freshness, roughness, smoothness, the touch of skin, the feel of water, the coolness of beach sand.

I try to live every day as if it were my last. I don’t do this, but I try. I try to look at pain and annoyances as silliness. When it took me over two hours today to get from MP3.com to meet my grandma, and it usually takes me only 90 minutes to go 35 miles past her house to my home, I was upset, and I drove recklessly, and then I was calm, and listening to Les Miserables, and singing along, and looking at the pretty hillsides, and smiling.

I will never say “if I live to be 100.” Because I don’t want to have that obligation. And I don’t want to limit myself. I was just watching Scientific American Frontiers, a great series that I rarely get to see, and a guy was talking about artificial organs. 2000 years ago the average life expectancy was 30 years. One hundred years ago, the average life expectancy was 47. Today, the average lifespan is 75 years, and there are plenty of people at 75 who are still of sound mind, with only a messed up muscle or bone, a hip, say, or a leg, or a heart, which is really just a complicated pumping mechanism.

I expect medical science to extend life remarkably. It is already happening, and it will continue to happen. We can regrow retinas. We can make artificial hearts. Once stem cells are re-legalized (and they will be), we will be able to regrow body parts that are genetically compatible, if not identical. You lost your hand in a light saber duel? No problem, we can make you a new one, and the cells, with their millions of years of evolution, will figure out how to connect together and talk to each other and flex and bend and join up with your wrist and start working again.

The body is amazing. The advances in biotechnology are astounding. And I have no idea how long I will live. Can I die tomorrow? I can. Can I live to 150, 200, 300? Anything is possible, and I don’t plan on setting any cut-off dates for myself.

If I live to be 100, then that will be that, and perhaps I’ll just keep on living some more.

In order to get a workstation for my job at MP3.com, I had to go down and build it myself. Basically they had a G4 lying around with no RAM and no hard drive, so I scavenged 256MB RAM and got a 20GB hard drive from the tech people, and got to install Mac OS X and Mac OS 9 and some software.

And here is the fun part – I’m currently downloading at 1.5 megabytes/second from Macromedia over the MP3.com internet connection. See, I can still be amazed by little things in life. 1.5 Megs, thats like five T-1 lines! Neat.

Webalina in this FARK.com story says:

You shouldn’t feel GOOD when you do something nice. You should feel BAD when you don’t.

I just read an interesting article on News.com about MS’s new hiding features and other stuff to appear is Service Pack 1 to Windows XP. Basically MS is not doing any of the stuff talked about in the current remedy hearings, but they are basically renaming and centralizing the box that always pops up urging people to “make this my default.”

The new control panel lets you basically “hide” other installed programs and make certain programs default, overriding the annoying prompting. This is somewhat useful but not very. You aren’t allowed to delete Internet Explorer, only “hide” it, so it still takes up all the memory and is used in other apps, but it doesn’t appear on your desktop. Big woop. And you can hide other programs you’ve installed.

WHY???? If I installed the program, why would I want to hide it? Why not just uninstall it? I mean, if you don’t want to normally use it (say, only use RealPlayer for the occasional RealAudio stream) you can remove it from the Start Menu or the desktop already, just drag them to the Trash Recycle Bin. So what does this add? Not much.

But in one important respect Microsoft is being really nice, and I’m not really sure why. For people who are running stolen versions of XP using codes obtained from a big company, their systems will be frozen in that state, meaning no upgrades unless they pay, but will not be disabled:

“Basically we’re freezing their computer where it is,” Cullinan said. “We’re not preventing them from using it, but obviously one of the benefits of having a license is keeping your PC updated.”

If they’re ripping you off, MS, why not just completely disable their computer. Its their own darn fault for pirating your wares. Of course, I say this not being a user of XP, as I don’t buy ANY MS software, as I despise them, but I still understand that if they’re selling a product and someone is stealing it from them, they can do whatever they want to stop the people. Just as long as Adobe Photoshop doesn’t institute similar restrictions. 🙂

Oh yeah, Fox. Not the broadcasting company. Michael (J.) Fox was on Charlie Rose, and I caught a bit of it, and I found it very refreshing that he stated outright, without even being asked, that the reason he came forward with his disease was not because he cared about a cause, wanted to save the world, wanted to enlighten everyone to the evil of the disease, etc., but simply for himself, because it was becoming harder to keep lying to people, and to act, and whatever.

I really appreciate him telling the truth and not retroactively making his “coming out” about caring for the world. He cared for himself. He hid the disease for, like, seven years. Eventually it got bad, so he told people, because it was impacting his relations and his career. Makes sense to me. Really its not the public’s business except because he is a public figure, and of course he helped “shine the spotlight” on another disease, put a celebrity behind it, etc., which I guess actually is Good For the World ™. So it all worked out Mr. Fox. And by the way, I”m really sorry about your disease and am glad you’ve been so open about it. Maybe I’ll buy your new book. 🙂

UPDATED (2:07AM) Addendum at end
I have lots of thoughts about stuff, and I have to comment on the OCHSA season finale, but I’ll do that in the morning. While what can be said about 24 generally has been said on various sites, what I really hated about the ending was how many wonderful plot threads they just left hanging, and which I doubt they’ll clean up next season.

Let us count:

• What’s up with Kim’s boyfriend, Rick?
  
• When will Jack find out about Teri’s doctor friend? Does he have family? He is kinda dead. And what is up with her stupid memory loss thingy just appearing and disappearing with no explanation?
  
• Why did Nina have an affair with Jack? How did it further her goals? Why did she then start dating Tony?
  
• What happened with the, oh, I dunno massive plane explosion in the pilot? That seemed somewhat important. Why the hell did they do that? And don’t tell me its because that is the only way to get that ID card.
  
• Why did they have Gaines and Co. do the thing in the first place, if they already had half of their family in the country and they were already planning the breakout and all?
  
• Keith and Palmer’s evil financers and the Dr. Ferragamo thing. We forgot about it in three hours?
  
• Fallout for the not-revealing-he’s-dead and then afterwards not telling the truth at the press junket.
  
• The woman at the beginning who blew up the plane, where did she go? We saw Kevin die, we saw Gaines die, she stuck around…what happened to her?
  
• That lady took over CTU for a bit, then disappeared. Why?
  
• George Mason disobeyed Chappell’s direct order. And? I’m sure Chappell found out, why is George still in command at CTU?

And of course they left a bunch of important things unresolved, like who Nina works for, whether Teri is dead, and how Lady Mac is going to react to Palmer’s little divorce thingy. But those were intentional.

So, yeah. I’m annoyed. It’s like the writers decided it was much to complex and just started dropping plot threads left and right about the fifth episode, and then kept doing that throughout the show. Grr. Bad writers! Bad! But the show was still very well written with regard to dialogue and much of the plot, so it wasn’t terrible. And I’m glad it’s coming back next year — I still find the whole 24 hour gimmick incredibly appealing.

ADDENDUM
Yet another great article about 24 on Flak magazine. Seth brings up a lot of the things I was angry with, plus several more very interesting and insightful points. Even if you didn’t read my whole entry, if you’ve watched 24 you should give his article a read.

Chance encounters are so cool! So I pick up my parents from the airport after their wonderful week in Hawaii, and I suggest dinner. Claim Jumper being closed, we just happen to realize a Denny’s is right next door. So we go in, order, and not six minutes later (meaning, about five minutes later) who appears but my old school chum (heh) Franny. The UCSD girl happens to be up here for the weekend, happens to have been at a dance show, happens to have gotten hungry at midnight, happens to show up at the SAME EXACT PLACE WE ARE.

Well, it was really cool to meet up with her and talk and such. And as a Discordian I can not believe that this had anything to do with “fate.” Strange things happen all the time, thats just the way of the world.

We discovered that college kids across the country are obsessed with poker and Counter Strike, not just in my dorm. And she gets to live in an on-campus apartment next year, so lucky her! And, of course, do homework at the beach…

Despite the heavy campaigning I noticed when I was at SD the last time, voting in their AS (Associated Students) election was still only something like 20% of the student body. Go figure. We get more votes and we have “clean” elections.

What else? Got home, started watching the finale of 24, which I missed the first and second times around, but which my TiVo caught for me, yay TiVo. So I’m gonna watch that, and then maybe post my thoughts.

The entries that I mentioned before to be up? They weren’t up. But now they’re up. So check out farther down this page for six delicious never-before-seen entries, rescued from the hard drive of the AgBook.

For the past three days or so that I’ve had my computer, I’ve been happy to have it back online. Only, very quickly I realized that it was not on the internet. I could FTP, I could SSH, I could ping, but I could not get to web. So I thought, okay, try an alternate port…but port 8080 also did not work.

Finally I got an idea and typed “cox port blocking” into Google. Lo and behold, my wonderful ISP by default blocks port 80 and 8080. Why? Because of their stupid “no servers” rule, as if this web site is going to get more traffic than my rampant downloading if ISOs anyway! I mean, please!

So, long story longer, AgBlog is back, up, and actionable, at least until my next cable outage. I HEART Brandeis networking people, and the wonderful restriction-free network they maintain so well.

Yeah, FedEx pergatory was a bit grueling, but our precious AgBox is finally returned and serving again. Yay!!! I wrote a few entries in the interim, they are posted below.