General

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16706 ª April 28 3:09 PM. Israel refuses the UN factfinding mission , as if anyone ever had any doubts about a government that has consistently refused any third party monitoring, fact finding, or international observers, in any aspect of the conflict with its Palestinian neighbors. In doing so, Ariel Sharon’s government yells out once more its disdain for international public opinion, and kicks yet another attempt at establishing an impartial view of the situation in the balls. If Israel acted in rightful self-defence in Jenin, then a UN fact finding mission could only confirm this state of affairs, now couldn’t it? How long will we all stand by and watch this happen over and over again? Can we be critical of Israel without being labelled anti-semitic? Does the Holocaust provide permanent immunity from compliance with international law to the state of Israel? If as a white Christian I feel anger and frustration, what should my muslim brothers in other parts of the world feel? Am I surprised that some of them resort to dispicable means to make their point? [MetaFilter]

I went to Borders Ft.

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I went to Borders Ft. Lauderdale today and found a CD, “Dakar” by John Coltrane, that I’ve been trying to find for many years. I also bought some music by Franco and a copy of Dirty Linen. I love this store – it’s a lot better than the one in Boca Raton, although not as good as the one in Ann Arbor, MI. It also happens to be less than 15 minutes from my home.

What is up with Real

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What is up with Real Networks?. The makers of Real Player and its many various forms of Internet media players continue to be a thorn in the side of OS X users, and I am starting to wonder whether this company, which is local to me here in Puget Sound country, even has a clue that it is snubbing a growing group of multimedia-wise users?

I am thinking of this tonight because I may start doing some online work that requires me to listen to streaming news reports on either Windows Media Player and/or Real Player. WMP exists on OS X, but there is not way to natively play a Real media file under OS X. Yes, I can load an aging version of Real’s software for Classic, but that just doesn’t cut it now that we are more than a year into regular consumers using OS X.

Real…are you listening? Is there anyone really working at Real? Or do you all think that the high-end Mac users who are working with OS X don’t have any real money to pay for your Real products?

The lack of any solid announcements about moving this media reader to the hottest OS, which has a slew of developers from the Mac, Unix and Windows world working on cool software, is Real stupid…

[Mac Net Journal]

Real’s lack of OS X support really irritates me. There are a lot of Real broadcasts I would like to listen to, but the quality is just plain awful running under classic.

Salon: A law to protect

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Salon: A law to protect spyware. But Hollings’ bill should outrage Internet users just as much as Brilliant Digital’s spyware. For while it talks a good game about protecting “sensitive” information, the truth is that it would place a congressional stamp of approval on precisely the kinds of practices that purveyors of spyware are eager to engage in. [Tomalak’s Realm]

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16577 ª April 23 3:30 PM. “All democracies turn into dictatorships — but not by coup. The people give their democracy to a dictator, whether it’s Julius Caesar or Napoleon or Adolf Hitler. Ultimately, the general population goes along with the idea… It isn’t that the Empire conquered the Republic, it’s that the Empire is the Republic.” George Lucas talks about the politics of his new Star Wars films. [MetaFilter]