Lasers belong on sharks

Did they think to ask first?

But then, why should they bother? Yahoo is a large American company, and they should get their way no matter what, right? I'm sure some marketroid's head exploded when he found out that the Mexicans said "no."

Yahoo Inc. has abandoned its plan to beam a digital time capsule into space by laser from an ancient pyramid after Mexican authorities refused to allow it.

Mexican officials feared the project could damage the nearly 2,000-year-old Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán, about 40 kilometres northeast of Mexico City.

Link

Illiteracy melts a server

Instead of whining, how about buying some bandwidth?

This sounds like a complete misunderstanding of webtech. Why not use the morons that think "youtube" is "utube" to makes some extra money? If you're getting 68 million mis-hits, it's time to redirect them to a page with some adverts on it. I'd be up for some free money from the illiterate. It'd be a lot like running your own state lotto.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- One place where YouTube's success isn't being celebrated is in the offices of Universal Tube and Rollerform Equipment Corp. near Toledo, Ohio.

The company, which sells used machinery for making tubes to clients worldwide, has seen its site utube.com knocked off line by millions of online searchers looking for video site.
google_youtube.03.jpg

"It's killing us," said Ralph Girkins, president and owner of the 22 year old business. "All my worldwide reps use our Web site. Customers all over the world use it to bring up photos of the machinery, descriptions and specifications there."

Girkins says his site which has been online since 1994, got 68 million hits in August.

Link

Online Gaming Ban

If you haven't noticed the U.S. Congress pulled a sneaky and destroyed $6.4 billion in stock market value. Not bad for a day's work.

We'll have to wait and see just how this will shake out, since the banks will have a lot of say in writing the enforcement rules. (If you didn't know, this is pretty common. The lawmakers lack the brains to figure this part out, so they outsource it to the corporations that will be affected by the new laws.) That'll take care of the financial side, and might cause the banks to stop dealing with Neteller, et al.

But teh funneh part is that it criminalizes promoting online gaming, while not targeting individual players. They leaned the lesson of Prohibition, where arresting drinkers proved too much of a problem. It'll now be so damn inconvenient, that people will stop playing online.

Here are some ways this could work out, if a headline hungry federal prosecutor decides to push things:

• Force ESPN to block out all online casino/poker room logos from their past WSOP coverage. Most likely ESPN (owned by Disney) would just stop the broadcasting, instead of spending the time to blur all the logos.
• Arrest "affiliate site" owners for having links and promotions for online casinos/poker rooms.
• Issue arrest warrants for U.S. citizens working for online casinos in foreign countries, effectively banning them from ever returning home.

But I have to say, this is about the best example of "revenge of the smokers" I've yet seen.

Smokers are an easy target, first having been forced outside to huddle outside in doorways, then banned from the doorways. All to "protect" them by making it so inconvenient to smoke, some might quit. Plus, the general public was "protected" from second hand smoke.

One of the advantages of online poker play was that the players didn't have to sit next to the "dirty smokers." I've heard quite a few people wish that smoking was banned from all poker rooms. They got their wish and the larger rooms in Vegas, and even smaller local Indian casinos declared the poker rooms smoke free. There was much cheering and rejoicing throughout the land.

Well it turns out that online poker players/sports betters/etc. are just as easy of targets. "Dirty smokers" and "dirty gamblers" aren't that far apart in the eyes of the righteous. So it's pretty easy for congress critters to abuse them like a red-headed page.

You're witnessing the feet of the U.S. start do slide down a very slippery slope, where all "deviant" non-approved activities are banned.

Don't look behind the curtain!

SCOTTSDALE, Arizona (AP) -- President Bush tried to drown out political anxieties about war and sex Wednesday by sounding alarm bells on national security and urging people to "vote Republican for the safety" of the country. Link

But are the children safe from the Republicans? Seriously, who came up with this idea? A Catholic priest?

I guess parents will do anything to try and give their children a boost. Including sending them to work the in cesspool of corruption that is Washington D.C. But, if have to choose who's going to molest your kid, why not have it be by someone in power.

If a pedo were to design his dream program, this has to be it. High school juniors away from home for the first time, delivered to your doorstep, in great selection to boot. The pedo congress critter even gets to request more info, if a particular specimen looks extra tasty. If the pedo was really good at grooming he could use the entire application process to find the most susceptible victims.

Which brings me to wonder, why go public with the Foley IM logs?

That's like the greatest leverage ever. If he stays in office, that kid could write his own ticket. It'd be like having your own personal congressional letter of recommendation writing machine.