Ruling the Internet

Taking History II is making me realize summer away from Austin sucks. Going to class feels like high school again and I'm glad that I'll never have to do summer school again after this one. I'm also taking Government II, which is actually more bearable. Anyway, the UN can't get enough reasons to hate Bush and their newest reason is control of the Internet. Their complaints include the creation of controversial domain names, network security, and spam. The Bush administration has already said that it would not surrender control of internet domains and addresses to anyone, but if they don't then it could mean the fragmentation of the Internet. For once I actually agree with the UN. The Internet should be a global network, and as such it shouldn't be run as some sort of dictatorship. Other countries' interests should be considered as well. The Bush administration will really go down in history as horrid if they sit idly by and let the Internet become fragmented.



That doesn't look like a keyboard does it? But it's actually the Optimus keyboard and the keys change on the outside to reflect what you're doing (like playing Quake). The keyboard is especially good for foreign languages, and I really hope that it takes off someday. Another interesting gadget is Sharp's double-vision LCD television model that will allow for people to watch two channels on the same TV by sitting at different angles. It probably won't be very cheap and they're still working out the sound issue, but it's a great idea. If you still need more gadgets to ponder on you should look into the 3D Face Camera from Bluebear for better identification in forensic identification. It turns out that a lot of studies about the security of Linux as opposed to Windows have been biased and the reality is that Linux is only slightly ahead of Microsoft. It isn't all that surprising since it hasn't been bombarded with the kind of junk that's thrown at Windows. Lastly, we have another survey from Nielson suggesting that legal music downloading has indeed increased quite a bit this year though the RIAA is still seeking out P2Pers.

The movie news today isn't bad, and I'll start out with a couple of reviews. AICN has yet another review of The 40-year-old Virgin once again asserting that it's very funny. My anticipation for this movie is growing even more. Harry Knowles put up his review for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and he seemed to thoroughly enjoy this version of the classic children's book so I'm sure that Tim Burton did Roald Dahl proud. Speaking of Burton, JoBlo has a good interview with him that I recommend because he's quite the visionary director. He made a couple I wasn't totally thrilled with, but his other movies really make up for it. Comic-Con is going on right now and you can get some information from the booth from A Scanner Darkly over here. I'm expecting great things from the movie with a star-studded cast and amazing animation values. When I was younger, I absolutely love True Lies (I've seen it like 10 times) and I'm exciting to hear that there's talk from the actors of the movie about a sequel. Of course they have to wait on the Governor of California to finish his term, but I'm sure they'll wait if they're serious. Lastly, fans of the CollegeHumor website may be interested to know that they're in talks for a movie deal choc-ful of their crude humor. I'm hoping that it'll be better than Van Wilder.

Now for the Thursday Threesome:

Onesome: Double-- Vision? What have your seen lately that's made you stop in your tracks and take another look? Oh, come on now; there's something !
There have been a few girls at HCC that have made me turn around for multiple looks. It may not be a great school, but even hot chicks have to go to summer school sometimes. Life must've sucked for guys in the olden days when girls weren't privileged enough to get an education.

Twosome: lens-- Glasses or contacts? ...or nothing? What's your preference? ...or do you have a choice? ...or maybe you're just lucky?
I wear glasses, but I'd prefer contacts. I don't have a choice right now, but hopefully I will very soon when I get my eyes checked next. I like my eye color and I'd really like to expose them more.

Threesome: reflex-- Do you ever have a reflex reaction to a TV commercial? Is there one that your finger just reaches to change the channel on without any conscious thought? ...or maybe there's one that has caught your attention and just locked you in before you even realized it?
Not really. Sometimes I forget that it's even a commercial break and keep watching. Usually I will try to change the channel though.