Category: Uncategorized

Charging for content

As much as I would like to, I don’t have time right now to go into any deep philosophical musings about cyber-capitalism and online economic opportunity, or how the internet has freed information and charging money for it is against the spirit of blah, blah, blah… So just to be clear from the outset, however much what I’m about to say might or might not reflect my ideological attachments, the real purpose of this post is to let off some steam on a Friday afternoon, and the NYTand Mr. Roubini just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, so to speak. It is emotion talking, not reason, okay?

That said, here it is:

Why did you have to start charging for content!!!!!!!!!!?????????

First, the NYT required registration, which was annoying enough because if you were in a computer lab and just wanted to check one story in a hurry, you had to remember your username and password. If, on the other hand you were always using the same machine, no problem – just have your computer remember your info. That works fine of course, until you go to a computer lab for the first time in ages, or use someone else’s machine to check one story in a hurry and it’s been so long that you have forgotten your username and password (I’ve had mine since around 1996, so this has happened to me a few times.)

Then, all these other journalistic outfits started requiring registration. If you’re a regular reader, this is not such a big problem. But if you follow someone’s blog link to an out of town paper, or one you don’t normally read, then you have to register just to read one lousy article. Well, it’s a good thing that both 12345 and 90210 are actual zip codes, and that most sites will let you in even if you enter your name as “George W. Bush” or “Zamfried Hockenluger.” (And don’t get me started on bastards who want to send your password to the email address you provide before you can sign in.)

Now we have NYT Select. Not that my lone volley of anger is going to hurt something the size of the NYT, but if you think I’m actually going to pay you money to read more M. Dowd or T. Friedman, when I rarely read it for free before you’re crazy. Besides, don’t all those folks make enough money recycling their op-eds in to another book every other year?

As for Mr. Roubini, I loved his blog. It just got better and better. I recommended it to countless people. His onsite reviews are right on the money – “…best economic website in the world.” But $599 a year for a subscription to the Roubini Global Economics Monitor!!!!!

This by no means a personal condemnation of Mr. Roubini. Hell, I would have done the exact same thing. I’ll still read his papers in academic journals or what have you. And I don’t feel guilty for attacking the NYT, because it’s a faceless, evil corporation, bent on destroying all good in the world (I’m kidding, of course). So to redeem myself for my emotional outburst against the spirit of capitalism, I’ll do something that no self-respecting would-be commie would never dream of and just admit the honest truth about my ire: I’m just pissed to have lost access to such a wonderful resource.

Look familiar?

Is this the fate of all political parties when they hold power for any length of time?

Oct 6, 2005 Taipei Times Editorial

After almost six years in power, the performance of the DPP administration has disappointed a number of pan-green diehards, with some gloomily wondering whether the DPP is losing its ideals and ability to improve itself. It has also alienated a large segment of the party’s grassroots supporters, the very people who had helped to elect the then 14-year-old DPP in 2000.

Some supporters are beginning to wonder whether the DPP has turned into the equivalent of the old Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) regime it used to fight against — a corrupt party leading a corrupt government. This kind of sentiment was especially prominent in the wake of the recent spate of scandals plaguing the DPP administration — one of them being Kaohsiung’s problematic MRT project. An Aug. 21 riot, ignited by Thai laborers protesting against their poor living conditions, unexpectedly brought to light a complex influence-peddling scheme in which ranking government officials apparently exploited Thai workers while pocketing money from the project’s construction funds.

January 9 2005 Washington Post article:

Democrats and some Republicans, troubled by the moves, cite parallels between today’s Republicans and the Democrats who lost their 40-year hold on the House in 1994 after Gingrich and other conservatives campaigned against them as autocratic and corrupt, and gained 52 seats.

“It took Democrats 40 years to get as arrogant as we have become in 10,” one Republican leadership aide said.

Julian E. Zelizer, a Boston University history professor who edited the 2004 anthology “The American Congress,” said Republicans used the past week to “accelerate the trend toward strong, centralized parties.”

“This is a move toward empowering the leadership even beyond what you saw in the 1970s and 1980s,” Zelizer said. “They have been going for broke.”

Now you know why I registered to vote as an independent.

Cannibal beef

For those who were wondering why Japan has still not ended their ban on US beef, today’s NYT makes it quite clear.

The F.D.A. proposed banning from animal feed the brains and spinal cords of cows more than 30 months old. It also proposed banning the same parts of any animal not passed by inspectors as suitable for human food, any tallow that contained more than 0.15 percent protein and any meat contained in brain or spinal column that was separated from carcasses by machine.

The new proposal would still allow animals to be fed material that some scientists consider potentially infectious, including the brains and spinal cords of young animals; the eyes, tonsils, intestines and nerves of old animals; chicken food and chicken dung swept up from the floors of poultry farms; scrapings from restaurant plates; and calf milk made from cow blood and fat.

[…]

Michael K. Hansen, an expert on prion diseases at the Consumers Union, called the proposed regulations “completely inadequate,” noting that Britain “took many halfway steps in their efforts to eliminate mad cow disease and failed to stop it.” Only when it stopped feeding mammals to food animals did they cut the cases down to less than 10 a year, he said.

Drunks with guns

I read in the WaPo yesterday that there were over 50,000 deaths annually in Russia as a result of alcohol poisoning!

That’s more than gun deaths in any country in the world!

Not to worry though. Even Russia has its Anthony Burgess fans (come to think of it Nadsat was actually created largely from Russian slang) and one of them discovered a wonderful way to keep people on the wagon – scare the shit out of them!

Coding was created by a Soviet psychiatrist, Alexander Dovzhenko, who assumed a cult-like status in the treatment of alcoholism. “The Dovzhenko method is basically a form of hypnosis: You drink, you die,” said Andrei Yermoshin, a private psychotherapist who no longer uses the method, preferring long-term therapy. “It’s fast and cheap, and supposedly you don’t have a problem for a year or two years or five years, depending on how long you have been coded for.”

There are a number of variations, but here’s basically how it works:

In Svetlana’s case, [fear of death] was induced by mild hypnosis followed by injection of a temporary but powerful drug that could attack her respiratory system. Before the drug kicked in, the doctor gave her a little vodka to taste. She became dizzy and had difficulty breathing before the doctor stepped in with some oxygen to revive her.

The injected medicine, the doctor said, would stay in her system. “I’ve coded you for a year,” he said, according to Svetlana. “And if you drink in that time, you will die.” He insisted that she sign a release form saying he would bear no responsibility for her death should she drink within 12 months.

“I believed him, because we had all heard stories about people who were coded and died when they drank,” said Svetlana

How effective is it? The WaPo reports that its effectiveness has never been tested, but poor Svetlana actually called an ambulance before taking a drink when she fell off the wagon two years ago (which is a pretty powerful statement about both the human condition and the questionable effectiveness of coding.)

I sure hope the tea-totalers in this country don’t ever find out and try to start a new prohibition movement. If the anti-gun lobby sides with the anti-drink fanatics, some of us might find ourselves in a tight (pun intended) spot.

Even worse, if neo-prohibitionists ever allied with the anti-gun lobby and everyone was forced to take sides, the opposition would be a bunch of drunks with guns!

Bowling for Rio de Janeiro and Johannesburg?

The Washington Post reports today that Brazil is considering a nationwide ban on all firearms and ammunition for everyone except its police and military.

The Oct. 23 referendum, in which all adults must participate (voting is optional for those over 70), will be the first time any country has taken a proposed gun ban to the national ballot. Brazil has the highest number of firearms fatalities in the world, with more than 36,000 people shot dead last year, according to government figures.

Not surprisingly, shooting was the country’s leading cause of death. The article cites an estimate of 17.5 million guns in Brazil. That’s approximately one gun for every ten people! Must be that Brazil is a country of fear.

On a more serious note however, this prompted me to wonder about the causal link between the number of guns per capita and the number of deaths by shooting. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find data for this (and I don’t have time today to spend looking for it). However, I was able to find figures for gun deaths internationally, both absolute and for every 1000 citizens (Some of these numbers seem on the high side and there’s a pretty steep drop off between Zimbabwe and Mexico. I can’t vouch for their accuracy, but Nationmaster.com assures me that they are from UN data.). Although Brazil seems to have been excluded from the dataset, here are the results.

Top ten ranking of death by firearms per year:

1. South Africa 31,918 (2000)
2. Colombia 21,898 (2000)
3. Thailand 20,032 (2000)
4. United States 8,259 (1999)
5. Mexico 3,589 (2000)
6. Zimbabwe 598 (2000)
7. Germany 384 (2000)
8. Belarus 331 (2000)
9. Czech Republic 213 (2000)
10.Ukraine 173 (2000)

Top ten ranking of death by fire arms per year, per 1000 citizens:

1. South Africa 0.71 per 1000 people
2. Colombia 0.50 per 1000 people
3. Thailand 0.31 per 1000 people
4. Zimbabwe 0.04 per 1000 people
5. Mexico 0.03 per 1000 people
6. Belarus 0.03 per 1000 people
7. Costa Rica 0.03 per 1000 people
8. United States 0.02 per 1000 people
9. Uruguay 0.02 per 1000 people
10. Lithuania 0.02 per 1000 people

One interesting thing that immediately stands out is only three OECD member countries make the top ten in total deaths, although Mexico and Germany drop out when the data is adjusted to deaths per 1000 people.

Another thing I notice is that South Africa tops both lists. This is perhaps not surprising for a country where personal flamethrowers were actually marketed for a time as an anti-carjacking measure. Both the Economist and the New York Times recently reported that although crime rates, including carjacking (sadly, with little thanks to the flamethrower) have declined in recent years, South Africans feel unsafe than ever before. I’d love to like you to the NYT piece, which is great, but the bastards have started that “Times Select” nonsense and while I ain’t paying $3.95 for it, if you’re so inclined please feel free to check it out here.

Oy vey

In response to John’s asking if I was from New York.


Wed Sep 28, 6:44 PM ET

In this Sept. 12, 2005, photo released by the Brooklyn borough president’s office, a sign on the Brooklyn side of the Williamsburg Bridge proclaims ‘Leaving Brooklyn: Oy Vey!’ The sign, bearing the Jewish expression of dismay or hurt, is intended as a way of acknowledging Brooklyn’s large Jewish population. Borough President Marty Markowitz says motorists seeing it know it means ‘Dear me, I’m so sad you’re leaving.’ (AP Photo/Brooklyn Borough President’s Office, Kathryn Kirk)

Beneath Japan’s Cuteness

Yesterday Roy posted on Census-kun, the Giant Baby whose cuteness will compel all ethnic Japanese (and from the look of things, quite possibly Daniel Carl) to participate in counting Japan’s declining population, which is expected to peak at 127.74 million in 2006.

Not to be outdone, today I’d like to introduce readers to a valuable online resource that is not without its own brand of cuteness…The Ministry of Finance!

That’s right, The Ministry of Finance.

Seeing Census-kun reminded me of a user-friendly tax brochure the Ministry of Finance put out several years ago. The brochure, called “Let’s Talk About Taxes,” featured a cute claymation-like family of six who explores the wonderful world of government income and expenditure.

Who us? Cute?

Who, us? Cute?

Don’t let the cuteness fool you however. The contents of the brochure are excellent and provide a great introduction and overview to Japan’s current fiscal situation that most people might otherwise shy away from if it weren’t for the cartoon characters. Think of them as sugar coating on a bitter pill, or the lime wedge following a tequila shot.

But worry not dear reader, for the cuteness doesn’t end there. In visiting the MOF site I noticed a curiously cute button just above the one that takes you to the aforementioned tax guide. I clicked on it and the next thing I know I’m in Finance Town!

Go! Go! Finance Town!

In Finance town, visitors join the Finance kids, Noboru, Wataru, and Hikaru along with their two mouse-buddies and a lazy-ass cat called Doranyago, who wears a cape and superhero get up and apparently never pays his taxes. You can go fishing, perform high-flying acrobatics on the trapeze, or play dodge ball. Play the games, learn about the importance of paying taxes, and then go take the Finance Quiz. Perform well and make Doranyago pay his taxes!

Here again, don’t let the cuteness fool you. I actually learned a few things from the quiz. I don’t want to reveal too much for those of you who haven’t taken it yet, but I had no idea that there was 入湯税 in Japan, or that the symbol for a tax office on a map is patterned after the bead on an abacus!

Kabuki politics

Article from today’s NYT says:

This may be a moment of reckoning for Mr. Bloomberg, as a Republican leader in a town where being a Republican is something of a kabuki art, political analysts say.

In recent days I’ve also heard the John Roberts nomination process described as a ‘kabuki play.’ When did this become such a widespread metaphor in political reporting? More importantly, when are the actors going to start doing somersaults to keep the kids happy in between speeches?

How to screw up the military?

I found this essay, written by this guy for a miltary essay contest over a decade ago, quite an interesting read. Disguised as a science fictional story about the ‘US military coupe of 2012,’ it’s actually an analysis of everything he feels is wrong (or likely to go wrong with) the organization of the US military.

I haven’t thought enough about it to know if I agree with all of his points, but there were a couple of arguments that I found surprisingly convincing.