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Obama Doomsday Scenario Contest Results!

Fri, 09 May 2008 02:33:59 GMT

clipped by: wiccantexan

Yesterday, Trailhead invited readers to imagine what would have to happen for Barack Obama to lose the Democratic nomination. And boy did you respond. You, dear readers, are a motley assortment of creative and disturbed geniuses.

We can’t possibly share them all, but here’s a sampling organized by category. Winners are at the bottom.

Embarrassing revelations:

Major screw-ups:

Clinton ex machina:

Unfortunate occurrences:

The winners: The best submissions managed to make a concise joke, summarize all of Obama’s vulnerabilities at once, or vividly capture the mind-bending paucity of Clinton’s odds of survival. Here are three that did the job:

Tags: politics, humor, obama, clinton, democrats, contest

Teachers’ private postings may make waves in school

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:05:11 GMT

clipped by: wiccantexan

Clip Source: www.firstamendmentcenter.org

Free expression is an essential guarantee of the First Amendment — the freedom to speak and write as we will, without censorship by the government.

But the freedom to express oneself doesn’t necessarily provide a buffer against the reaction to what is said or written. For public employees like schoolteachers, that’s increasingly an issue in the Internet Age, when off-campus postings easily reach the school community.

Example: A recent Washington Post story that reported on area teachers who had placed personal material or photos on social-networking sites like Facebook. The article is headlined, “When Young Teachers Go Wild on the Web.”

The Post’s report might just pass as noting a titillating curiosity — if not for the potential pitfalls it and other news reports highlight for public school educators who might assume speech away from the workplace is protected by the First Amendment from on-the-job consequences.

Tags: government, privacy, teachers, free speech, first amendment, censorship, school, social networking

FBI withdraws national security letter issued to digital library

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:03:49 GMT

clipped by: wiccantexan

Clip Source: www.firstamendmentcenter.org

A nonprofit digital library has successfully fought an FBI attempt to seize information about one of its users, and is calling on other groups to challenge government agencies' attempts to obtain online customer information without a judge's order.

The FBI presented the San Francisco-based Internet Archive with a national security letter last November asking for a library patron's records. The group sued the agency a month later, alleging the letter violated free-speech rights because it prohibits recipients from talking to anyone else about it.

The Internet Archive said yesterday that the FBI agreed to withdraw the letter last week and make the case, which had been filed under seal, public.

Yesterday, the FBI defended its demand on the Internet Archive in particular and the letters in general as important weapons to fight terrorism.

"Without judicial or public oversight, there is literally nothing stopping the FBI from issuing improper demands for records," Goodman said.

Tags: security, personal, privacy, fbi, library, digital, government, online, customer, free speech

Gas tax battle was a political gift to Obama

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:02:13 GMT

clipped by: wiccantexan

Clip Source: www.reuters.com

The heated presidential campaign battle over a federal gas tax holiday turned out to be a much needed gift for Barack Obama -- and he can thank Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.

The fight, which dominated the final days before the North Carolina and Indiana contests, gave him an opening to talk about the economy with working-class voters and helped Obama at least temporarily bury the controversy about his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Democratic strategists said Obama's focus on the economy as he rejected a summer-long suspension of the gas tax as a "political gimmick" will make him a better candidate heading into a likely battle against Republican John McCain in November.

"The game changer in the last week was when Clinton went after him on the gas tax," said Simon Rosenberg, head of the Democratic advocacy group NDN. "Obama pivoted very well to the economy and figured out how to talk about the struggles of everyday people."

Tags: politics, obama, clinton, gas, taxes, campaign, democratic

Consumers driving demand for Macs at work

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:00:18 GMT

clipped by: wiccantexan

Clip Source: www.msnbc.msn.com

Soon after Michele Goins became chief information officer at Juniper Networks in February, she decided to respond to the growing chorus of Mac lovers among the networking company's 6,100 employees. For years, many had used Apple's computers at home and clamored for them in the office as well. So she launched a test, letting 600 Juniper staffers use Macs instead of the standard-issue PCs that run Microsoft's Windows operating system. As long as the extra support costs aren't too high, she plans to open the floodgates. "

Funny thing is, she has never received a single sales call from Apple.

Millions of consumers are seeing the Mac in a new light. Once an object of devotion for students and artists, the Mac is becoming the first choice of many.

What's less obvious is that the enthusiasm is starting to spill over into the corporate market. It's a people's revolution, of sorts, with workers increasingly pressing their employers to let them use Macs in the office.

Tags: consumer, mac, macintosh, computer, work, office, microsoft, apple

Your blog can be group therapy

Thu, 08 May 2008 23:57:35 GMT

clipped by: wiccantexan

Clip Source: www.cnn.com

When a 24-year-old woman who called herself "90DayJane" launched a blog in February announcing she would write about her life and feelings for three months and then commit suicide, 150,000 readers flocked to the site. Some came to offer help, some to delight in the drama. Others speculated it was all a hoax.

Few, however, questioned why she would share her deepest thoughts and feelings with strangers online. In the age of cyber-voyeurism, the better question might be: Why wouldn't she?

Overeating, alcoholism, depression -- name the problem and you'll find someone's personal blog on the subject. Roughly 12 million Americans have blogs, according to polls by the Pew Internet and American Life Project in 2006, and many seem to use them as a form of group therapy.

But it's the public nature of blogs that creates the sense of support.

Tags: blogging, blogs, therapy, personal, community, social, social networking