Last night I went to bed around 1:00am. I woke up and came to work. I checked my email at about 9:30am. Here is an example of the amount of SPAM I get.

Mob fully admits that he sometimes gave UT Hooligan a hard time in that AOL chatroom. But never in his wildest imagination did he expect to be sued in court for what he characterized as “razzing.”

“We gave him crap,” said Mob, a 29-year-old welder in Chicago, Ill. “I’m not going to deny it. I teased him and he teased me back. He gave it back better than he ever got it.”

UT Hooligan, 32, claims that Moband Lee, a 30-year-old Oregon resident, insulted him and harassed him in the AOL chatroom called “Romance — Older Men” to the point where it inflicted “severe emotional distress and physical injury that is of a nature no reasonable man could be expected to endure it.”

The complaint, expected in court on Jan. 31 for a pretrial conference, also names AOL as a defendant for allowing the alleged harassment to take place.

UT Hooligan alleges that the duo intruded into his “private affairs.” The complaint states that Mob actually drove from Illinois to the UK to photograph the plaintiff’s home, which he then posted on the Web. He also allegedly went to the courthouse in Chicago to dig up personal dirt on UT Hooligan, which he then also disseminated over the Internet.

Even if Mob did take a trip to the UK, posting a picture of someone’s house on the Internet does not violate privacy laws, according to Chris Hoofnagle, attorney with the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

“Those norms require the aggressor to engage in behavior that is highly offensive to a reasonable person,” he said. “Taking a picture of somebody’s house and putting it up on the Web is not that.”

Hoofnagle said UT Hooligan’s emotional distress claim will also be tough to prove.

“We live in a rough society, as compared to Europe, where offending someone or directly cursing or attacking their dignity can give you a cause of action,” he said.

“He just came in slamming on me, saying all kinds of derogatory crap: that I was a fat, bald, broke old man who sits around in a rusted wheelchair,” said UT Hooligan, who has a chronic back injury. “I don’t even own a wheelchair.”

Megan Gray, a Washington D.C.-based intellectual property attorney who specializes in cyber issues, called it “a loser of a case.” She said the Communications Decency Act gives AOL immunity from chatroom misconduct.

She also suggested the case against Mob and Lee was doomed.

“The Internet is such a vibrant, young medium, these types of cases are not taken seriously,” she said.

check the real story here.

I found this out through experience about 5 years ago, cds do not last. Sure you can take care of them and prevent scratches on them, but the data can (and most likely will) become corrupt. Cheap CDs can degrade to the point where they are unreadable in under two years. I found that out with almost every data cd i have burned containing software and files over the years. I keep all of them in protective sleeves in a cd booklet. Bought CDs that are made in the factory are different than burned CDs. The data on a bought CD is not on the surface, its embedded under some protective surface (I think).

When I want to retrieve some old data, the cd is not even readable. I wish I would have invested in some sort of magnetic tape drive. A magnetic tape has a potential life span of like 30 years or more. Burned CDs have a life span of like 2 year. Hard drives have a slightly longer life span, but how many times have you heard of a hard drive just going bad? I have heard of a few too many.

For more info read this Yahoo news article.

Feb: we are heading to the UK (london and surrounding area) for a week
and two weekends.

March: getting married in Seattle.

Summer: moving fo Philly…. dates TBA

Some stuff to think about. I was looking into the definition of meme (Memes are the basic building blocks of our minds and culture, in the same way that genes are the basic building blocks of biological life.) and ran across some interesting ideas. The following was written by Richard Brodie (best known as the the original author of Microsoft Word) and can be viewed here.

Level 3 Consciousness

1. In the beginning, there was attraction. Things attract each other because they like to be closer to some things than other things. This is the root of all change in the whole universe.

Sometimes like attracts like and sometimes opposite attracts opposite. When opposites attract, you’ve got a pair, a couple. That pair is now another unit and you can start the whole process over again. The pair, the new unit, can attract an opposite or a like or just drift along.

When like attracts like, it can end there, like an oxygen molecule made up of two oxygen atoms, or it can continue to attract like, like a Carbon atom. When things continue to attract like, something big gets created.

2. Sometimes a thing will attract just the right stuff to it that the new stuff turns into another copy of the thing. That is self-replication. Self-replication is the most powerful force in the universe. One becomes two, two become four, four become eight, and soon the universe is full of things.

Sometimes a self-replicating thing makes a copy of itself with a mistake in it. The thing with a mistake will either be better, worse, or the same at making copies of itself. If it’s better, there will soon be more copies of the new thing than the old thing in the universe.

The only way for new things to get created is by a complex series of mistakes that turn out to be better after all.

3. We are self-replicating things. We are the result of a billion years worth of mistakes that turned out to be better after all.

4. One big mistake that turned out to be better after all was that, of all the animals, we alone can communicate complicated ideas. We can tell stories. We can share recipes. We can make complicated plans. Even dolphins and whales can’t do these things, we think.

5. These ideas that we communicate are called memes. Memes are a kind of thing. Memes live in our minds.

6. Like all things, memes fit better with some things than others. Some memes naturally fit better in people’s minds. Some memes naturally fit better with other memes. When a group of memes fit well together and pull the strings of someone’s mouth and vocal cords so that they pass them on to others, a new, self-replicating thing gets created. The new thing is called a memeplex.

Self-replication is the most powerful force in the universe. One person tells two, two tell four, four tell eight, and pretty soon the whole universe is full of people sharing the memeplex.

Sometimes a self-replicating memeplex makes a mistake in copying itself. The memeplex with a mistake in it will either be better, worse, or the same at making copies of itself. If it’s better soon there will be more copies of the new memeplex than the old in the universe.

The only way for a new idea to gain acceptance is by a series of copying mistakes that turn out to be better after all.

7. All our belief systems, religions, and governments are the result of a series of mistakes that turned out to be better at making copies of themselves after all.

8. Every new idea we think of immediately becomes transformed by copying mistakes that change it into something that is better at making copies of itself after all. A key part of the idea may be sacrificed to something better for copying.

The only control we have over the spread of our ideas is in making them as resistant to copying mistakes as possible.

9. When we are born, our mind is courted by meme after meme after meme, all the result of thousands of years of practice at getting themselves copied into fresh new minds. This is Level 1. We have our instincts, born of millions of years of the genes our body carries striving to make copies of themselves.

Soon our minds become filled with memes and eventually we may develop a map of life that mostly makes sense. We speak a language that we believe expresses anything we want to say. We use geometric and physical concepts that we believe explain anything we encounter. We know stories and myths that we believe relate to all of life’s trials and tribulations. This is Level 2. We have our roadmap, born of thousands of years of the memes our mind carries striving to make copies of themselves.

10. Each of us has a purpose here. When the memes are quiet, it is possible to feel when we are on purpose and when we are off purpose.

11. Once we realize that there are millions of memes battling inside our mind, there arises the possibility of influencing the outcome of that battle. Until we realize it, there is no possibility.

The battle can be influenced in three ways. First, by noticing the memes. Second, by detaching from them. Third, by obtaining clarity of purpose.

When these three steps are achieved, we can begin to select our memes consciously. We select memes that keep us on purpose. This is Level 3.

12. A purpose is not a goal. A purpose does not feel like guilt, shame, or vengeance. Guilt, shame, and vengeance are emotions used by memes to gain mastery over your life. By choosing memes consciously, we can eliminate the control that memes have over those emotions.

A purpose feels fulfilling, satisfying, joyful, and powerful.

13. A purpose has to do with other people. A purpose is fulfilled by spreading memes. Every time we speak, write, create, or act we are spreading memes. To fulfill our purpose we must be conscious of which memes we are spreading.

Life is largely composed of conversations. Conversations are composed of memes. In Level 1 we are unaware of this. In Level 2 we see the world as a solid, understandable body to be interacted with. In Level 3 we see the world as a canvas to be painted, an instrument to be played, or a block of marble to be sculpted by us for our purpose. We choose to do this for good or for evil. If we choose good, good is returned to us in unexpected ways. If we choose evil, evil is returned. Either way, it looks like the way we choose is the way of the world.

14. In Level 1, we do not understand the world and consequently fear it. In Level 2, we replace the fear with understanding. The price of understanding is limits. Our approximate models of the universe are never completely accurate, never useful in all situations.

In Level 3, we start with a vision of what we want to create. From there we choose our models. Sometimes a chosen model may seem insane to the other inhabitants of the little patch of space-time we happen to occupy. No matter. Men with a vision of goodwill have often looked insane in times of mistrust and scarcity. But in Level 3, we realize that the universe is not a maze to be navigated; it is a baby to be brought up. When we give it love, clarity, and opportunity, we raise a child to be a joyful, giving, successful adult. This is the opportunity we have to farm our little patch of space-time.

Richard Brodie
June 1999

I am still researching this topic, so I do not agree or disagree with all that has been said. But I do agree with expanding ones mind and being open to new ideas. Figure it out for youself and let me know what you think. I also know that there are lots of words there, and most people might not read it all, or maybe just skim it, but i posted it all anyways (enter defeatist comment here).

Happy New year Bib, Mob, K , Ginger, Lee, Rose and all others.

Anyway…

It was nice to see snow in Chicago on the news tonight. However, the story behind the city focused on how the Police of that city is concentrating efforts on gang culture and the overall disrespect for lawful authorities. Kind of a wake up call. What Mrs Hooligan said was quite right. She said that we have been adopting American ways in Britain regarding the fluffy, human rights approach and now it has gone full circle and America is slowly having to revise its stance on topics such as this. No disrespect to Americans of course, except maybe those who started re-inventing the wheel way back when, but then this applys to the Brits also. More power to Chicago Police Dept is what I say.

2006. I hope I get my new job which I am being assessed for in February and then perhaps I will settle down.

regards.

Hooligan.

Here I am sitting at work, looking at the wall for entertainment. When all of a sudden my supervisor stepped out for a cigarette I decided to post this. It’s not well written and it’s not fancy but El Jeffe posted it so it is unique. That is all continue shopping, and there is a blue light special on canned Beardbrand Tuna!
El Jeffe!

happy new year to whomever reads this.