Clipmarks | papananook's Comments

Brave New World of Digital Intimacy

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 12:15:43 GMT

clipped by: wildcat
clipper's remarks: It is easy to become unsettled by privacy-eroding aspects of awareness tools. But there is another — quite different — result of all this incessant updating: a culture of people who know much more about themselves. Many of the avid Twitterers, Flickrers and Facebook users I interviewed described an unexpected side-effect of constant self-disclosure. The act of stopping several times a day to observe what you’re feeling or thinking can become, after weeks and weeks, a sort of philosophical act. It’s like the Greek dictum to “know thyself,” or the therapeutic concept of mindfulness. (Indeed, the question that floats eternally at the top of Twitter’s Web site — “What are you doing?” — can come to seem existentially freighted. What are you doing?) Having an audience can make the self-reflection even more acute, since, as my interviewees noted, they’re trying to describe their activities in a way that is not only accurate but also interesting to others: the status update as a literary form.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

On Sept. 5, 2006, Mark Zuckerberg changed the way that Facebook worked, and in the process he inspired a revolt.

Pundits predicted that News Feed would kill Facebook, but the opposite happened. It catalyzed a massive boom in the site’s growth. A few weeks after the News Feed imbroglio, Zuckerberg opened the site to the general public (previously, only students could join), and it grew quickly; today, it has 100 million users

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

In essence, Facebook users didn’t think they wanted constant, up-to-the-minute updates on what other people are doing. Yet when they experienced this sort of omnipresent knowledge, they found it intriguing and addictive. Why?

Social scientists have a name for this sort of incessant online contact. They call it “ambient awareness.” It is, they say, very much like being physically near someone and picking up on his mood through the little things he does — body language, sighs, stray comments — out of the corner of your eye.

Tags: brave new world, digital intimacy

New evidence of Global Warming

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 16:59:54 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: For all the denialists--more fodder for your insanity

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

ScienceDaily (Sep. 2, 2008) — Researchers confirm that surface temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere were warmer over the last 10 years than any time during the last 1300 years, and, if the climate scientists include the somewhat controversial data derived from tree-ring records, the warming is anomalous for at least 1700 years.

"We looked at a much expanded database and our methods are more sophisticated than those used previously," says Mann. In today's (Sept. 2) online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers note, "Conclusions are less definitive for the Southern Hemisphere and globe, which we attribute to larger uncertainties arising from the sparser available proxy data in the Southern Hemisphere."

study shows that, with caveats, tree-ring data can be used, but that even without including that data, it is clear that the anomalous nature of recent warmth, which most scientists believe to be a result of human impacts on climate, is a reality.

The real scoop On Palin from a neighbor

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 16:06:50 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: This is the real deal ...now that's ALL on Palin for me!

Clip Source: syndicated.livejournal.com

http://sailorjim.net/wordpress/?p=999

Here’s a bit of reading for all of you:

I am a resident of Wasilla, Alaska. I have known Gov. Sarah Palin since 1992. Everyone here knows Sarah, so it is nothing special to say we are on a first-name basis. Our children have attended the same schools. Her father was my child’s favorite substitute teacher. I also am on a first-name basis with her parents and mother-in-law. I attended more City Council meetings during her administration than about 99 percent of the residents of the city.

Her husband works a union job on the North Slope for BP and is a champion snowmobile racer. Todd Palin’s kind of job is highly sought-after because of the schedule and high pay. He arranges his work schedule so he can fish for salmon in Bristol Bay for a month or so in summer, but by no stretch of the imagination is fishing their major source of income. Nor has her lifestyle ever been anything like that of native Alaskans.

Records show McCain was NO Hero

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 23:46:29 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: Here's some readin for all you hero worshippers to chew on. See the truth about this war criminal for once. Even as he was bein shot down he made sure he delivered his bombs on the people of Vietnam ...and got a medal for it. urrrrg.

Clip Source: www.pensitoreview.com

Do internet news sites and blogs go over the top in questioning John McCain’s
military record? It seems that more and more groups are questioning whether or
not his record is worthy of the praise he’s receiving:

McCain’s military record is fair game The War Secrets Sen. John McCain Hides

FACT SHEET: Military record of John Sidney McCain III

McCain’s Military Record Shows He Is Unfit To Be President

McCain’s Secret, Questionable Record

Flummoxed By Vietnam Vet, McCain Falsely Claims He ‘Received Every Awars…

McCain’s military record

Is McCain’s War Record Fair Game?

Does John McCain’s Military Record Really Qualify Him to Be President?

McCain’s Spotty Military Record Is Declared Off the Table - And Obama Appears to Accede

Clip Source: enewsreference.wordpress.com

Analysis: Privilege and Arrogance, McCain's Annapolis Years

John McCain's Military Record

Westmoreland calls Obama ‘uppity'

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:52:35 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: Absolutely amazing. To speak in such a snobbish/old money way, would not be tolerated at this level by Australians. A part of the culture that should be changed. And to further show ignorance, L W is shepherded into a world of name calling.

Clip Source: www.michaelmoore.com

Georgia Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland used the racially-tinged term "uppity" to describe Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama Thursday.

Westmoreland was discussing vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's speech with reporters outside the House chamber and was asked to compare her with Michelle Obama.

"Just from what little I’ve seen of her and Mr. Obama, Sen. Obama, they're a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they're uppity," Westmoreland said.

Asked to clarify that he used the word “uppity,” Westmoreland said, “Uppity, yeah.”

Other Democrats have charged that the Republican campaign to paint the Illinois senator as an “elitist” is racially charged, and accused them of using code words for “uppity” without using the word itself.

In August, Rep. Shelley Berkley (D-Nev.) told reporters, “When I hear the word ‘elitist’ linked with Barack Obama, to me, that is a code word for 'uppity.' I find it extremely offensive and John McCain should know better.”

Google Chrome and Big Brother

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 17:39:38 GMT

clipped by: blueridge
clipper's remarks: Wow. Read this and it will raise your eyebrows and make you wonder about Google. This appears in the Money report for good reason. Anyone noticed all the government, even CIA contracts, that Google has obtained lately? Consider how the "love of money is the root of all sorts of evil", and that surveillance and security merchandisers are driving the changes in government, globally, toward more totalitarian population control and that Google increasingly holds all the data and technological means they want.

The public image of Google should change based upon this and other evidence as it moves closer toward the globalist corporations and the fascism they are enabling and building by partnering with governments for revenue while the people's liberties are increasingly trampled and power becomes consolidated.

Clip Source: www.abcnews.go.com

Is Google Turning Into Big Brother?

The Debut of Chrome, Google's New Browser, May Have Been Quiet for a Reason

Is Chrome, Google's new browser, part of an ambitious effort by Google to own all of the world's data?

(ABC News Photo Illustration)

While we're transfixed by the presidential election, in the world of high tech another duel between two well-funded, take-no-quarter candidates has just emerged … and in the long run the impact on our daily lives may be nearly as great -- and perhaps even sinister.

As you probably heard, on Monday -- that is, on a national holiday, when business announcements are almost never made -- Google rolled out Chrome, its new Web browser.

why would a company that knows it has a solid and newsworthy product on its hands intentionally dampen media coverage of it?

If Google pulls off this strategy, it will be the most valuable company on the planet. It will also be the scariest … and we should start worrying about that right now.

totalitarian) tendencies

Tags: google, big brother, surveillance, government contracts, globalism, fascism

Read this clip and try not to say WTF!!

Fri, 30 May 2008 01:49:04 GMT

clipped by: egoldstein
clipper's remarks: I mean, are you kidding me!? Rachel Ray and Dunkin Donuts were offering "symbolic support for Muslim extremism and terrorism" because she was wearing a black and white scarf. After this one, it's going to take a whole to shock me

Honestly, i just tagged this clip dunkin donuts, rachel ray and terrorism - WTF indeed!!

Clip Source: money.cnn.com

BOSTON (AP) -- Dunkin' Donuts has pulled an online advertisement featuring Rachael Ray after complaints that a fringed black-and-white scarf that the celebrity chef wore in the ad offers symbolic support for Muslim extremism and terrorism.

Tags: dunkin donuts, rachel ray, terrorism, wtf

Think, but do not eat

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 09:28:39 GMT

clipped by: balthazarus
clipper's remarks: well the study... i think i'll have a bite first

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Thinking People Eat Too Much: Intellectual Work Found To Induce Excessive Calorie Intake

The details of this discovery, which could go some way to explaining the current obesity epidemic

measured the spontaneous food intake of 14 students after each of three tasks: relaxing in a sitting position, reading and summarizing a text, and completing a series of memory, attention, and vigilance tests on the computer. After 45 minutes at each activity, participants were invited to eat as much as they wanted from a buffet.

The researchers had already shown that each session of intellectual work requires only three calories more than the rest period. However, despite the low energy cost of mental work, the students spontaneously consumed 203 more calories after summarizing a text and 253 more calories after the computer tests. This represents a 23.6% and 29.4 % increase, respectively, compared with the rest period.

Tags: obesity, calories, intellectual work

Zen training speeds the mind's return after distraction, brain scans reveal

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 00:32:01 GMT

clipped by: Silkweaver
clipper's remarks: Can you hear the sound of one hand clapping ?
Yes, but keep on clapping, it does not distract me at all...

Clip Source: thezenfrog.files.wordpress.com

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

Experienced Zen meditators can clear their minds of distractions more quickly than novices, according to a new brain imaging study.

After being interrupted by a word-recognition task, experienced meditators' brains returned faster to their pre-interruption condition, researchers at Emory University School of Medicine found.

Giuseppe Pagnoni, PhD, Emory assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, and co-workers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine changes in blood flow in the brain when people meditating were interrupted by stimuli designed to mimic the appearance of spontaneous thoughts.

The study compared 12 people from the Atlanta area with more than three years of daily practice in Zen meditation with 12 others who had never practiced meditation.

"This suggests that the regular practice of meditation may enhance the capacity to limit the influence of distracting thoughts.

Tags: meditation, neuroscience

War Protesters Denied Free Speech: Hundreds Arrested

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:07:16 GMT

clipped by: citizenbfk
clipper's remarks: 1,000 people marching in the streets. Thousands on the day before. Over 500 arrested in the week. Raids on homes before the convention. Another FBI informant agent provocateur turning in his room after encouraging his actions for months.

Bad...bad, bad protesters, refusing to stay in the 'protester cattle pens," trying to walk down the street to get within a mile of the RNC convention center.

Or...maybe bad...bad government that now prohibits legal protest that are, actually, allowed to line up across the street from any hotel or business, wave signs, chant , try to have their voices heard while for 8 years the media pretends they don't exist and the government wants to fence them in cattle pens.

Clip Source: www.reuters.com

UPDATE 1-250 protesters arrested before McCain speech

ST. PAUL, Sept 4 (Reuters) - Police arrested 250 anti-war protesters on Thursday shortly before John McCain accepted the Republican presidential nomination at the party's convention a short distance away.

Marchers chanted "Who is the terrorist? McCain is the terrorist" as they tried to cross several bridges that span Interstate 94 into downtown St. Paul, but were blocked by police.

After several standoffs, police in riot gear ordered the protesters to disperse. The group marched away from the convention, at one point trying to walk onto the highway.

Officers used flash grenades and teargas after two hours to herd them onto a bridge one mile from the convention hall.

Why Palin's weaknesses may be irrelevant

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 17:41:00 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: And why Democrats (including me!) miss the point when they campaign against them. Thought-provoking! This clip just grazes the surface of a very important article.

Clip Source: files.tikkun.org

the Palin nomination is not basically about external realities and what Democrats call "issues,"

The Republicans can't win on realities. Her job is to speak the language of conservatism, activate the conservative view of the world

Our national political dialogue is fundamentally metaphorical, with family values at the center

Conservative family values are strict and apply via metaphorical thought to the nation: good vs. evil, authority, the use of force, toughness and discipline, individual (versus social) responsibility, and tough love

Palin is the mom in the strict father family

Yes, the McCain-Palin ticket is weak on the major realities. But it is strong on the symbolic dimension of politics that Republicans are so good at marketing

But such truths may nonetheless be largely irrelevant to this campaign. That is the lesson Democrats must learn

initial Democratic response to Palin

based on realities alone

indicates that many Democrats have not learned the lessons of the Reagan and Bush years

Tags: palin

Greetings from "the angry left"

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 13:21:04 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: Great column...Read all for the full bene's.
Speaking about Bush's jingoistic label...
So then, trust me when I say, try as they might, "the angry left" won't stick. As anyone with the slightest sense of history and poetic justice knows, such a jab is merely the final, desperate wailings of the bankrupt, the shameful, and the doomed.

Clip Source: www.sfgate.com

"Fellow citizens, if the Hanoi Hilton could not break John McCain's resolve to do what is best for his country, you can be sure the angry left never will."
-- George W. Bush, RNC '08

What's wrong, buttercup? Right-wing politics got you down? RNC '08 making you gag? Toxic and inexcusable events of the past eight years make you deeply sick to your stomach, spleen, heart, mind, spirit and even your kneecaps? Or is it the wretched notion that the bizarro-world McCain-Palin agenda wants to continue more of the same?

Or maybe it's this: Maybe it's all this terrifying new evidence that there still seems to be this huge pile of Americans who aren't all that concerned with -- or even aware of -- just how violently the GOP continues to dump all over their very heads. Is that what's making your blood boil? Aww, there, there, now.

terrified throngs (aka "Bush's base"): You know who should be running this country if and when I don't make it through my first term? Hot chicks with guns!

Right-wing media hypes Palin but the Lefty's Not so much

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 16:00:57 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: All I saw in Palin's speech was a lot of self-serving bullshit and false Patriotism...Woo-hoo!

Clip Source: www.politico.com

ST. PAUL, Minn. — NBC political director Chuck Todd, weighing in shortly after Sarah Palin’s fiery speech before the Republican faithful, declared: “Conservatives have found their Obama.”

Right-wing radio host Laura Ingraham agreed, telling Fox’s Greta Van Susteren that it was the “night conservatives have been waiting for.”

Ingraham continued with high praise: “It’s one of the best political speeches I have heard — ever!"

A trio of former presidential contenders slammed the Fourth Estate: Mitt Romney brushed off “the editorial pages of the Times and the Post;” Mike Huckabee said the “elite media” is unifying the Republican Party; and Rudy Giuliani told the crowd that the election wouldn’t be determined by the “left-wing media” (or “Hollywood celebrities” for that matter).

“People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like,” Olbermann said.

At no time during her entire presentation, did I think of Hillary Clinton,” Matthews said. “They have nothing in common.

Ecuador Constitution Would Grant Inalienable Rights To Nature

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 21:43:43 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: A wonderful thing, this....Good for Ecuador and we could take example.

Clip Source: www.commondreams.org

Ecuador's proposed constitution includes an article that grants nature the right to "exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles, structure, functions and its processes in evolution" and will grant legal standing to any person to defend those rights in court.

A sea lion pup on Santiago Island, one of Ecuador's famed Galapagos Islands. (MELANIE STETSON FREEMAN/STAFF/FILE)

Voters will get to decide on Sept. 28 whether to adopt the new constitution, which would allow the president to run for reelection, to dissolve Congress, and to exert great control over the country's central bank. According to Reuters, 56 percent of Ecuadorans approve of the proposed document.

The blog Green Change quotes the five articles that acknowledge rights said to be possessed by nature, or "Pachamama," a goddess revered by indigenous Andean peoples whose name roughly translates into "Mother Earth."

rights to nature may represent a larger shift in how humans view their place

War Crime now in Pakistan

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 22:04:24 GMT

clipped by: papananook
clipper's remarks: Will they ever learn?

Clip Source: www.commondreams.org

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The Pakistan government blamed NATO-led troops in Afghanistan for a cross-border attack that killed at least seven women and children as they prepared to eat breakfast before dawn Wednesday, the second day of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

The attack, which a NATO spokesman denied, could add pressure to the Pakistani government, being asked by the U.S. to do more against terrorists in the mostly lawless tribal areas while many Pakistanis want the army to do less.

A Pakistani official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the soldiers who landed in the helicopters stormed into a house and started firing as women cooked breakfast. During Ramadan, many Muslims fast during daylight hours and typically eat a large meal before the sun rises.