Awesome New Yorker cartoon:


"I used to have a blog. Then I went back to random, senseless barking."

Funny cartoon. But I still don't understand why some people trash blogs. I see people say things like, "Why would I want a blog? Nobody cares about what you did yesterday? What's the point?"

Blogs are great. It gives you an excuse to write. Forces you to hone your thoughts. The more you write, the better you become at it. My blog isn't an itinerary of my daily life. It's a bunch of thoughts and ideas that I have that I don't want to forget. I can go back and search them later. Like the Adam Effect. The Hulk Fallacy. The Mouse Trap Effect.

Having these posted online is important to me. One day, some giant machine is going to scan the web and give us an etymology of ideas, and start crediting people retroactively for new words, new terms, new uses for words, etc. It's good to get things up and posted and copyrighted.

Let's say you use ComLink for your home internet service provider. One day you decide to shop around for a new cell phone, so you hop online and visit Dash, WireZon, and NexCom. Simple process, right?

But let's say that ComLink and NexCom are subsidiaries of UniCom, a giant telecommunications company. And let's say that UniCom has a secret policy of speeding up the internet connections of ComLink subscribers who are browsing the NexCom site, and slowing down the connections of subscribers who are browsing competitors' sites (sush as Dash, WireZon, or competitors of any other of its myriad affiliates).

Is this right? Is this fair? Do bigger companies with more money have the right to screw around with your internet connection and puppeteer you toward their own sites?

The Net Neutrality people say no. "Put simply, Net Neutrality means no discrimination. Net Neutrality prevents Internet providers from speeding up or slowing down Web content based on its source, ownership or destination. Net Neutrality is the reason why the Internet has driven economic innovation, democratic participation, and free speech online. It protects the consumer's right to use any equipment, content, application or service on a non-discriminatory basis without interference from the network provider."

In my opinion: China should sanctioned by or disbanded from the WTO if it doesn't clean up its net neutrality act by getting rid of its damn FIREWALL.

For a thought-provoking view of a future world where corporate allegiance is the new religion, read Max Berry's Jennifer Government.

This is old news, but I decided to throw something up in honor of Wikipedia coming back online in China. (Actually, it's not fully back on: wikipedia.org itself does not work, nor does ch.wikipedia.org, or zh.wikipedia.org; but en.wikipedia.org does work.) Blogspot.com is still banned, but blogger.com is not. That means I can post, but I can't see the results (unless I go through a proxy, such as freeproxy.ca or hideu.net, but that sometimes scews up the pages you're looking at).

China denies Internet censorship
Friday, November 03, 2006

China does not censor the Internet — not even a smidgen, said a Chinese official attending the Internet Governance Forum in Athens, Greece.

"In China we don't have software blocking internet sites. Sometimes we have trouble accessing them but that is a different problem. We do not have restrictions at all," said the unnamed official.

He also defended China's track record on freedom of expression. "Some people say journalists in China have been arrested. We have hundreds of journalists in China and few have been arrested. This has nothing to do with freedom of expression. We have criminals in our society. There are criminals in all society."

The remarks were reported by the BBC, at least outside of China they were. Typically, websites with "sensitive" material — ranging from Taiwan independence or Tiananmen Square to Tibetan advocacy, pornography or gambling — are blocked or severely filtered in China.

Companies such as Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Yahoo and Google have all come under international criticism for their alllegedly complicit roles in the sophisticated effort, which is known as the Great Firewall of China. Studies have shown that at least 15,000 to 20,000 websites are blocked in some way in China.

The official also said the government's purchases of Cisco routers are justified — some of those routers have widely been rumored to be the bricks and mortar in the Great Firewall. Many companies under fire for their business practices in China have said their presence there helps more than harms the flow of information.

The Chinese official said more attention should be paid to more Chinese gaining access to the Internet, rather than the debate over censorship.

By: DocMemory
Copyright (c) 2006 CST, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Chinese government official: We have talked a lot about China, and that's rather strange, because if we participate in forums like this, I think that we should spend more time reflecting on the issues that have been raised. There are millions of Chinese that have no access to the Internet. We are here because we would like to promote openness. But we have not really raised the issue of how we could participate more fully and how we could have better access to the Internet. We need to also protect tourists in our country. And I have to say that I am a Chinese citizen, and I feel that I need to be protected. For example, we are threatened by terrorism. We do need protection. So we should be sure that everyone can come to China, enjoy our beautiful country, and I heard with great interest what our Pakistani colleague said. I don't think we should be using different standards to judge China. In China, we don't have software blocking Internet sites. Sometimes we have trouble accessing them. But that's a different problem. I know that some colleagues listen to the BBC in their offices from the Webcast. And I've heard people say that the BBC is not available in China or that it's blocked. I'm sure I don't know why people say this kind of thing. We do not have restrictions at all.

Nick Gowing, BBC anchor and session moderator: Would you like to elaborate on that?

Chinese official: How can I elaborate on it if we don't have any restrictions? Some people say that there are journalists in China that have been arrested. We have hundreds of journalists in China, and some of them have legal problems. It has nothing to do with freedom of expression.

Richard Sambrook, director of the BBC World Service: I'm glad he listens in Geneva. But if he was in central China, he would not be able to listen on short-wave radio and not be able to read our Web site. This is very well established. (It's) effectively blocked...and has been for years.

Can someone explain it to me for real? Does lightning go up-down, or down-up? Why do I seem to recall someone trying to say it goes down-up.

Anyway. Nice pic, non?

What a charming place. Macau was settled back in the day (16-something or other) by Portugeuse sailors and Jesuits, who founded the first Western-style university in Asia, called the University of Far East Asia. Today, the same school is called the University of Macau.

Macau used to be 3 islands, but is now a peninsula and two islands. Most of its economy is driven by tourism, and most of its tourism is driven by gambling. Last year it took in more cash than Vegas, so this year, everyone's rushing to develop more attrractions. I hope the place doesn't lose its charm and its soul.

We flew into the Lantou airport in Hong Kong, then took the train to one of the islands (Hong Kong? Kowloon?). Then we went to a book store. Wow. It was just like the bookstores back home! Lots of titles, and no pressure to push state prop. The first book I saw in the Chinese section was a book my friend Victor had been looking for all over Beijing, but couldn't find, called The People's Republic of Desire:



Then we had dinner at a nice Vietnamese restaurant overlooking the harbor. When we walked out, we saw this:



Then we took a Turbo Jet ferry from Hong Kong to Macau, got in a taxi, and went to our hotel, the Wynn. Nicest hotel I've ever stayed at, that's for sure.





On our first day, we visited the Maritime Museum and learned the history of how Macau was settled, and some Eastern and Western sea inventions, such as compasses, astrolabes, etc. We also saw several types of ships, both Portuguese and Chinese, and depictions of life at sea.



An ancient myth in Macau is of a young girl who acheived goddess status at the age of 13. She protects people on the ocean. Her name is Ama. They built a temple for her in the Ama harbor, called "Ama Gao." When the Portuguese arrived, they asked if they could dock for a while. The local people said yes. When they asked the name of the place, the were told "Ama Gao," and that's why we call it Macau (Portuguese spelling) or Macao (English spelling).



The Portuguese and Macanese lived peacefully for hundreds of years. The pirates of the South China Sea surrendered to the Portuguese in 1810 on Macau. During WWII and the U.S.-Vietnam war, Macau accepted thousands of refugees. In 1949 when Mao created China, the new party declared that Macau was a territory of China, and that Macau had always been a territory of China. They decided to let the Portuguese control it for the time being. In 1999, Macau was given back to China (just as Hong Kong was given back in 1997) under the terms that their social, cultural, and economic systems would remain the same for at least 50 years.

The Macau Museum was great. It's in the same spot where the battle fortress used to be. (Walls become roads. Battle fortresses become museums. I love it.) When you walk in, there are two displays on either side. One side is the history of langauge, philosophy, religion, and technology in the East. The other side is the the history of langauge, philosophy, religion, and technology in the West. Both displays were shown side by side, given equal status. No "Us vs. Them." No desire to make one side look better than the other. Macau really seems to be a syncretist state. I love it.







I took a walk early one morning at about 5:30am. I walked past the casinos and up narrow alleys to the forest hills, where one can walk ancient paths and explore old churches and fortresses. It was so peaceful. The air was clean. The sky was blue. Lots of people out for a morning walk. None of them overly surprised to see me, or prone to staring. One of the hills has the ruins of the St. Paul cathedral at the top, near one of the fortresses used to guard against pirates. There's an authentic crypt beneath the church, with lots of bones down there, and a painting depicting the crucifiction of 23 Jesuits or so (in 16th century Japan).



Below is one of the most European-looking places we visited, the Largo do Senado, a large plaza with shops, restaurants, and happy people.



My favorite part of the trip was hooking up with Kim (Vietnamese Canadian) and Anders (Canadian Canadian) for a good Macanese meal (hybrid Portuguese/Macao food and spices) on Taipa island (lots of cool bridges), a walk toward the Venetian casino, and a music show at the Sands casino (largest casino in the world), and a murderous toast wherein blood was nearly shed.



Another thing I liked a lot about the place was that the internet worked without any trouble whatsover. Didn't matter what I wanted to look for, the internet worked every time. No blockage. No stoppage. No mafan (trouble).

In Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet thinks his father was murdered by his uncle Claudius. Hamlet stages a drama similar to the murder in order to gauge his uncle's reaction. "The plays the thing, wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king." Claudius does indeed recognize himself in the drama, and storms out of the theater.

Henrik Ibsen is regarded as the Shakespeare of Norway, but he wasn't well receive by the people of his time. He wrote everyday plays--not about kings and queens, or Romeos and Juliets, long ago in a galaxy far, far away--but about you and your spouse, duking it out verbally for all the neighbors to see and hear. It was a bit too much to handle.

All the world's a stage, but most people don't like seeing their dirty laundry spread from one end to the other. That's why writers use metaphor and euphemism. Planet of the Apes isn't about monkey aliens. The Rush song "The Trees," isn't about trees.

Stills from my friend's indie movie, shot in Estonia. Don't you think it looks cool?

A few months ago I was looking for part-time jobs. I found one doing product descriptions. I got a reply that said, "Damn, we just hired someone else. But can I keep you on file?"

I said yeah.

A month later I get an email from her again. "Do you want the job?" she says.

"No," I say. "But my friend Ben does."

So I got Ben online within a minute and chatted with him about the job. Turns out he was interested. I made plans to go in and visit Kendra and see if she couldn't work something out with him.

When I meet Kendra she says, "So you're writing a screenplay?"

"Yeah," I say. "About a group of pirates from the South China Sea. 1810."

"Is it the girl!?" she asks.

"Yeah!" I say. "It is the girl! With the husband, and the kid."

She knew who the girl was. (There was a pirate girl named Yang Shi/Zheng Shi/Zheng Yi Sao. There was also a husband and a kid.)

"How do you know about the girl?" I asked.

"I'm a pirate freak," she said. "I'm planning a pirate tour of the world."

(Time out. The people sitting next to me right now are talking about wanting ot go watch Pirates 3. Weird.) (More more coincidences.)

Here's another coincidence.

Last week some professors flew in. They asked me if I would show them around. I did. They wanted to see Forbidden City. We looked on the subway map. I couldn't remember if it was East or West gate. So I asked a girl there, in Chinese.

"Hi," I said. "Can you help me?"

"Sure."

I asked her if we should go to East or West. She didn't know. "I don't know anything about the Forbidden City," she said. But she was nice. So we exchanged information.

"What do you do in Beijing?" I said.

"I study tour guide," she said. (Haha.)

The next week I went out for lunch with her. After lunch, she went back to school, I walked around, looked for a cafe, found one, sat down, looked to my left, and saw a magazine. The cover article said, "The Truth About Pirates." It was an article on China owning up to its history of piracy (at least the real, ocean, swashbuckling variety).

Bizarre.

But wait! There's more! "Do you live here with your parents?" I asked.

"No," she said. "They live down near Zhuhai (pearl sea)." Which is where my script about the six colored Ladrone pirate fleets takes place, in Zhuhe (pearl river).

Bizarre.

But wait! There's more! Turns out one of the professors was a real Pirates fan, so I took him to a place where he could buy a pirated Pirates 3 to show his daughters and students, 哈儿哈儿. Also turns out he lives exactly six houses from the home where I grew up. Two of the other professors lived about 20 houses from where I grew up. And the other one new my grandfather in California. Turns out I must have met him there at my grandmother's funeral in 1990.

But wait! There's more!

This is non-pirate related, but it is a huge coincidence.

After I picked up that pirate magazine from the cafe (yes, I stole it, arrgghhh!) (I couldn't tempt fate and NOT take it, now could I?) I decided to go for a walk. So I put in my headphones, and I walked this way, and I walked that way, and I listened to this NPR segment, and that NPR segment.

Finally I'm near Wangfujing. So I go to the bookstore. I go up to the second floor. By now NPR is talking about the movie "Sahara" and what an awful flop it was. It's based on a Clive Cussler novel and lost $100 trillion dollars or something like that. (Clive and the Sahara makers are in the news now because they both sued each other.)

At the exact MOMENT when that Sahara NPR thing ended, I looked down, I saw a book. "Sahara" by Clive Cussler.



Bizarre.

I took a picture of it. (And you're just going to have to trust me.)

There are so many biza儿 coincidental things that happen like that here in this mysterious land. Weird. Makes me think I must be doing something right. The gods of atheism are shining down on me and making life interesting.

And now for the most bizarre thing of all: I came to Beijing to research Chinese DVD piracy and ended up writing a DVD about a Chinese pirate 啦. :)

If you want people to contract HIV and die of AIDS and actively oppose measures to research AIDS and save lives, you're a terrorist.

If you're in favor of illegally detaining and torturing people because of their race or religion, you're a terrorist.

If you're in favor of a nuclear war in the Middle East because you think you're holy book says there's gonna be one, you're a terrorist.

If you think you don't have to conserve resources for future generations or be concerned about the welfare of the planet because a messiah is going to come save you and your religious club, you're a terrorist.

You owe it to yourself to become a regular reader of Rob Breszny's Freewill Astrology. Trust me. This is more than just mild astro-related entertainment. On any given week, Rob might introduce you to some clever fable, an ancient poet, or some epic battle from history, the metaphor of which (supposedly) will guide you through the week. Whether you're a believer or not, you'll find yourself great empowered by the nuggets he presents week after week, free of charge. Have a clicksy:

This article was so good, I couldn't decided on a single paragraph to post as a lead... so I'm just going to re-print the whole thing. :)

Dick Cheney Rules

The Associated Press reported that Mr. Cheney’s office ordered the Secret Service last September to destroy all records of visitors to the official vice presidential mansion — right after The Washington Post sued for access to the logs. That move was made in secret, naturally. It came out only because of another lawsuit, filed by a private group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, seeking the names of conservative religious figures who visited the vice president’s residence.

This disdain for accountability is distressing, but not surprising. Mr. Cheney has had it on display from his first days in office, when he refused to name the energy-industry executives who met with him behind closed doors to draft an energy policy.

In a similar way, Mr. Cheney seems unconcerned about little things like checks and balances and traditional American notions of judicial process. At one point, he gave himself the power to selectively declassify documents and selectively leak them to reporters. In a recent commencement address, he declaimed against prisoners who had the gall to “demand the protections of the Geneva Convention and the Constitution of the United States.”

Mr. Cheney is the driving force behind the Bush administration’s theory of the “unitary executive,” which holds that no one, including Congress and the courts, has the power to supervise or regulate the actions of the president. Just as he pays little attention to old-fangled notions of the separation of powers, Mr. Cheney does not overly bother himself about the bright line that should exist between his last job as chief of the energy giant Halliburton and his current one on the public payroll.

From 2001 to 2005, Mr. Cheney received “deferred salary payments” from Halliburton that far exceeded what taxpayers gave him. Mr. Cheney still holds hundreds of thousands of stock options that have ballooned by millions of dollars as Halliburton profited handsomely from the war in Iraq.

Reviewing this record — secrecy, impatience with government regulations, backroom dealings, handsome paydays — it dawned on us that Mr. Cheney is in step with the times. He has privatized the job of vice president of the United States.

Ira does "This American Life" for Chicago Public Radio. He studied Semiotics at Brown University. In these four short clips, he's talking about storytelling.

Coincidence is my new favorite thing. I meet someone who knows someone who knows someone I know, etc., etc., etc. Happens to me all the time, and seems to happen about ten times as often to me whenever I'm in China. Don't know why. That's just the way it is. Weird.

Like that time a few weeks ago when I met four new friends in random ways, and each one of them lived at Tuanjiehu. Weird.

Or like how I randomly visited a site, then another, which posted to a YouTube of Regina Spektor on David Letterman; and that same week I downloaded some NPRs of Ira Glass, then just today on Wikipedia saw that he appeared on Letterman. So I looked for the YouTube and discovered that he and Regina were on the very same show (both of whom have been playing in my iPod for a few weeks now).

Or get this. This one's pretty weird. Tuesday night it suddenly occured to me for no reason at all, "I wonder if I could search for Tiananmen clips on YouTube" (because google shuts down if you try too hard). Sure enough. I could see several clips. I was touched by those on the square, particularly the rickshaw drivers who pedaled the wounded to the hospitals. Two hours later, I received a text message from a friend. "Hey, what are you doing to remember the 4th?" The 4th? I thought. What was she talking about. Then she told me that the 4th is the Tiananmen anniversary. Weird.

All these years, months, weeks, days of living in China, and not know what day the events took place -- then all the sudden I just get the urge to search for it on, of all days, the 4th? Weird.

Anyway, these bizarre coincidences happen all the time.