I don’t get cable, but I could still watch a great deal of the upcoming Olympics online if it weren’t for NBC’s stupid (and expensive) licensing agreement. Full Story, debate on /., and an argument for pirating the games.
Category: Stupid
Deschutes County Renaming “Offensive” Streets
Last month, Deschutes County required the SROA to change the name of Squaw Mountain Lane here in Sunriver to Diamond Peak Lane because the word Squaw is considered offensive. Because of this, we have to change a pile of internal paperwork and have to change our Web site because we rent two homes on that street (and I’m sure we’re not the only ones out here in this boat).
Really, the word isn’t as offensive as people would like to think (though it can be used offensively, but so could a lot of words), but thanks to a very vocal minority, it’s been deemed offensive. I’ve yet to see Squaw Valley, Big Squaw Mountain, or Squaw Creek change their names. Heck, the Squaw Creek up by Sisters, Oregon, is in the County’s jurisdiction, is it not (Update on 8/9: It maybe National Forest territory, I’m still looking into it)? Are they going to change the name of that Road, Creek, Cemetary, and other things, too? That area is full of history. I’m sure the County is full of stuff like this.
But really, it’s just going to be a mess if we keep this up. Just looking at the names of some of the lanes here in Sunriver, are they going to rename “Indian” lane? Are they going to rename “Foursome” lane because it could have sexual connotations? Are they going to rename “Killdeer” because it promotes violence to animals? “Salishan” was named after Native American tribes, too. I’m sure “Stag” could be taken a bunch of ways. What if I’m a Mets fan, can I be offended by “Yankee Mt.”? I know we’re stretching it a bit here, but you see my point: Anything can be offensive if viewed in the right light.
And now it’s only going to get worse. On Monday’s Deschutes County work session agenda is the proposal to change Hooter Road to Snowberry Lane. Last I checked, the “Hooter” referred to the owl, not the woman’s breasts. Heck, even at the Hooter’s Restaurant, their mascot is an owl, not a big boob (granted, it’s their girls that sell the food, not the owl, but that’s another story entirely, and here’s the company’s word on that debate). I’m all for removing horribly racist, sexist and bigotist names, but it’s all gone overboard. Unfortunately all it takes is one very vocal person to make a difference — and anger everybody else in the process.
I’m aware of the negative connotation of the “S” word, and believe it should be changed, too, but I think the mass name changing around the area (and nation) has brought more attention to the word that wouldn’t have been there otherwise. Most folks I’ve talked to thought it meant just a native American woman, not a reference to her genitals. The name changes have probably brought more publicity (and possibly more use by ill-mannered folks) of the word, now that they know what it means.
Thanks Barney for the tip.
Update on 8/9: Looks like they changed Hooter, but for a decent reason.
Oregon Lawyer Gets Reprimand For classmates.com Post
If you ever want to take yourself out of the running for an elected office and throw your career down the toilet, just post a false posting on classmates.com:
A district attorney candidate claims to have been just joking when he impersonated a high school teacher on the Classmates.com Web site and “confessed” to having sex with his female students.
In February 2001, Jim Carpenter created a Classmates.com account in the name of a man with whom he went to high school years earlier and posted this message: “Hey all! How is it going. I am married to an incredibly beautiful woman, AND I get to hang out with high school chicks all day (and some evenings too). I have even been lucky with a few. It just doesn’t get better than this.”
Needless to say, the Oregon Supreme Court wasn’t too pleased with the John Day lawyer, and slapped him with a public reprimand, and basically forced him to drop out of his DA race (which I read in yesterday’s Oregonian, and I’m not about to try to find the story on their site).
Thanks Barney for the link.
Duke Freshman get iPods
Just in case you missed it on the 4,000 other sites that linked to the news, Duke University is buying iPods for its entire freshman class. Spoiled little bastards.
Student Photographer Meets Big Brother
The Patriot Act pisses me off. It’s completely asinine to me that a student photographer, working on a college photojournalism project, could get harassed this much (graphical version) for photographing public property. He’s documented very well the dealings and harassment he had to put up with, all in the name of the Patriot Act. It didn’t help that he isn’t the white guy that law enforcement would just leave alone. He has a blog detailing more about the story as well.
That’s a Resume Builder
A Pulitzer-Prize-winning editor’s job is now to make sure there are no butt cracks in the comics section. He’s not really happy with it, and it suing the paper.
Despite the Money, Inmates Still Go Free?!?
I’m glad I’m not the only one that found it a bit peculiar that the Deschutes Co. Sheriff, who blitzed us to pieces with their Sheriff’s Levy ad campaign last year, has suddenly found a bunch more money — nearly $700,000 worth of extra cash.
So they get this extra money, their levy passes, and they still had to release inmates early last month. And even with this extra money, the Sheriff says he can’t help the early release of inmates. That’s comforting.
Oh, but don’t worry — because of this new found cash, they’ll be able to hire and promote some people. Hopefully those extra helping hands will keep those crooks they let out from robbing us again. He does plan on hiring a computer forensic examiner, so if you read this blog, you’ll know there’s a way to get a degree in that area of study entirely online.
Like That Will Work
The UN is going to try to take on spam. Thanks Barney for the link.
Your Tax Dollars At Work
New York City put a up fence to keep morons from diving into shallow water. Two morons climb over fence and dive in anyway, become paralyzed, sue city, win $25 million in free taxpayer money.
Microsoft Awarded Ridiculous Patents
From the Raw Feed:
Microsoft was awarded a U.S. patent Tuesday for a “Method and apparatus for transmitting power and data using the human body.” That’s right. If you want to use human skin as a data bus or muscle tissue as a conduit for electricity, you may need to pay Microsoft a licensing fee.
It may sound farfetched, but it’s a near certainty that eventually all kinds of gadgets — wristwatches, glasses, hats, etc. — will communicate with each other via electrical impulses sent through the body.
You’ll even be able to exchange contact information with someone by shaking their hand. Microsoft will get a penny every time that happens.
This wacky sounding patent comes on the heels of recent reports that the company had received patents for the ideas of double-clicking on a PDA, and a method for programmers to keep a running “to do” list in code comments. Very recently, Microsoft has been granted patents for a “Hand-held personal computer,” a “multilingual user interface for an operating system,” “thread-based e-mail” and even “one-pass greedy-pattern-matching finite-state-machine code generation.”
I don’t know what that last one is but it sounds difficult and painful.
The U.S. Patent Office even accidentally granted Microsoft a patent for a new variety of Apple tree — the Burchinal Red Delicious — earlier this year.
OK, it’s official: The U.S. Patent Office needs to be blown up. Thankfully there are groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation that are trying to fix and shoot down the worst of the bunch.