NPR’s Morning Edition interviewed a woman today concerning the media coverage surrounding (enveloping? choking?) the Virginia Tech shootings. The upshot was, the media is being a huge hungry hound and is exacerbating the trauma on a number of students/faculty/staff/etc. The woman interviewed was a survivor of the Jonesboro shootings in 1998 when she was a …
Category Archives: News
Abstinence Only Eductation
A study published this month concludes that abstinence only sex education is not effective in changing the behaviors of teens. A silver lining, if you can call it that, is that there was no measurable difference between the study group and the control group. So, the abstinence only education did not negatively affect the rates …
Big Schools, Big District, Big Budget
The Atlanta Journal Constitution had an article on Tuesday stating that Gwinnett County, Georgia (east of Atlanta, just outside the I-285 perimeter) climbed in enrollment by 55% this year, and now has 9.8% of all public school students in Georgia. That’s one county! Wow. Their fiscal 2008 budget is $1.7 billion. Quoting the AJC: Gwinnett …
Don Imus does not Deserve Redemption
I was sitting in the Atlanta Airport this morng, waiting for my flight to Baltimore. CNN, otherwise known as “news channel that used to be good” was covering in detail the story of Anna Nicole Smith’s child and the DNA test proving boyfriend #4a was the father. Thankfully, after 10 minutes of that coverage, they …
Blogger Code of Conduct and the Rhetorical use of Fuck
The NY Times reports today on a movement to enhance civility in the blogosphere. This code is based partly on the BlogHer community guidelines and a draft is delineated here and here. This code was founded directly or indirectly due to a flamewar on a blog posting that was interpreted as misogynistic with threatening overtones …
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Expert System labeled Fraud
A computer program has been abjured from practicing law in California. The software did, indeed, go far beyond providing clerical services. It determined where (particularly, in which schedule) to place information provided by the debtor, selected exemptions for the debtor and supplied relevant legal citations. Providing such personalized guidance has been held to constitute the …
More Suspicious Devices in Boston
Another scurrilous bomb plot is foiled in Boston. This suspicious device was detonated by the Boston Police Department. Here is the original story. Here is a video of it being detonated. Looks like I’m out of a job! Either that or we’ll have to navigate through new layers of bureacratic oversight before placing traffic counters. …
Know Your Neighbors
Befriend your neighbors or something like this might happen to you. This man was dead for a year before he was discovered. That’s just wrong.
Verizon, Holy Crap…
I’m listening to this recorded call about a humongously amazingly moronic customer service nightmare. Apparently, up until last month, Verizon did not recognize the difference between $0.002 and 0.002¢. You must listen to this and be amazed. These people are out there and doing your taxes. Be afraid. Be very afraid. Thanks to bmenyuk on …
Even NASA Screws Up Occasionally
That was tongue in cheek, by the way I guess NASA’s Astronaut psych evaluations can miss things occasionally. From CNN: Astronaut arrested on attempted kidnapping charges. Read the story. This is pretty off-the-wall stuff. What really drives home the screwiness is this line. Inside the car, police found a half-dozen latex gloves, MapQuest directions from …