text:
Kepler figured out he had it all wrong after a career spent trying to prove bad theories (Platonic model of the universe? Really?)
I'm anxious read Mr. Lynas' coming works.
Kepler figured out he had it all wrong after a career spent trying to prove bad theories (Platonic model of the universe? Really?)
I'm anxious read Mr. Lynas' coming works.
I don't have mod points today, so I'm just going to add to your sentiment. I have a great amount of respect for anyone that can look at the evidence they were wrong about a particular belief, and admit to their mistake. And it only gets harder to do so the longer that belief has been held, and the greater the audience you're admitting that mistake to. This guy is to be commended for a true commitment to the truth, not to ideology.
If GMOs are really so safe, why the tremendous resistance to putting a simple label on the food?
If you're referring to the california proposition from last election, I don't think many people objected to the labeling so much as the fact that the law was written by a trial lawyer to be intentionally confusing and open to abuse. It basically paves the way for ADA style shakedown lawsuits against mom and pop food producers
Now that's a different perspective that I didn't hear about in the news or other sources I've reviewed. I would like to see the law written in a way that makes it easy to determine what is labeled and where liability can be traced. Maybe there is a better way to do this.
Thanks for the perspective on prop 37.
Because "safe" and "perceived to be safe after this guy spent two decades badmouthing it" are very different things. Consumers will avoid GMO-labeled foods regardless.
That, and the fact that there are some costs involved keeping the GMO and non-GMO streams completely separate. They've already had some notable failures in that regard.
Personally, regardless of the benefits of GMOs, and their probable safety, I don't trust Monsanto as far as I can throw them. I don't have any faith that they've done their tests properly, and I believe they're completely willing to take a $5B fine if they can take in $40B in profits before they get called on it.
I don't have a strong opinion as to whether GMO foods are dangerous or not. In fact, I think the question is wrong - it seems most likely that some modifications could be harmful while others could be harmless. I'm fairly certain that BT sprayed on an apple tree in the spring is not harmful to humans, but I'm not certain that BT-toxin expressed by the apple and present in the eaten food is harmless to humans. For some modifications it might be that both 'conventional' pesticides and GMO-expressed pesticides are both harmful, one may be more harmful than the other, or that organic is the only safe way to go. But not eating vegetables because of the price of organic may be worse. Science should inform this, but it seems to be incomplete at this time.
The separate issue of labelling has important consequences. In the US, a Natural Rights Republic, the issue of Free Speech is a very important one. It's incredibly dangerous to tread on it for some perceived short-term benefit. For that reason I'm glad the California proposition to mandate labelling failed (whether it really did or not is a separate issue). Compelled speech is one of the worst kinds of free speech infringements.
But the root of the problem lies not in compelled speech, but restrictions on free speech imposed by the FDA. It forbids companies from putting "GMO Free" on their products, so voluntary labelling can't happen. They told Polaner (All Fruit maker) that they couldn't put "GMO Free" on their strawberry spread because a strawberry is produce, "not an organism". They told Spectrum (oils refiner) that their No-GMO label would imply that there is something wrong with GMO's so they couldn't use it.
I'd like to have more information on the foods I buy at the store. It's clear that 'the market' wants to provide it. Freedom of speech isn't just a good idea, it's the Supreme Law. It's time the FDA stopped breaking it.
I understand Lynas' conversion.
However, the environment [sic] of GMO crops is what is troubling, Monsanto being the focus of this, primarily.
As nice as Lynas' worry about all of us having freedom to have access to foods, what about the freedom of farmers to continue to produce said food crops? If the only legal way for farmers to get seed is to buy it from Monsanto, every year, then we're all fucked. The farmers who try to raise crops w/o using Monsanto-infected products risk losing it all if Monsanto deter
To feed a growing world population (with an exploding middle class demanding more and better-quality food), we must take advantage of all the technology available to us, including GMOs.
There is OVERPRODUCTION of food, but the capitalists do not allow for redistribution of goods (they prefer destroying food) so the USA is fat and Africa is dying of starvation. Also the GM crops don't have significantly higher yields for this "argument" to hold water or even grain. The sole purpose of GMO now on the market is to control food production (see India's "success" with GMO) or we would see abundance of drought and frost resistant, nitrogen fixing crops.
And I'm going to call bullshit on that:
To feed a growing world population (with an exploding middle class demanding more and better-quality food), we must take advantage of all the technology available to us, including GMOs.
There is OVERPRODUCTION of food, but the capitalists do not allow for redistribution of goods (they prefer destroying food) so the USA is fat and Africa is dying of starvation. Also the GM crops don't have significantly higher yields for this "argument" to hold water or even grain. The sole purpose of GMO now on the market is to control food production (see India's "success" with GMO) or we would see abundance of drought and frost resistant, nitrogen fixing crops.
i see your whining and i raise you one Norman Ernest Borlaug [wikipedia.org] who HAS saved lives with his modified plants... A BILLION OF THEM
Norman Ernest Borlaug (March 25, 1914 – September 12, 2009) was an American agronomist, humanitarian and Nobel laureate who has been called "the father of the Green Revolution" and "The Man Who Saved A Billion Lives". He is one of six people to have won the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal and was also awarded the Padma Vibhushan, India's second highest civilian honor.
Borlaug received his Ph.D. in plant pathology and genetics from the University of Minnesota in 1942. He took up an agricultural research position in Mexico, where he developed semi-dwarf, high-yield, disease-resistant wheat varieties.
During the mid-20th century, Borlaug led the introduction of these high-yielding varieties combined with modern agricultural production techniques to Mexico, Pakistan, and India. As a result, Mexico became a net exporter of wheat by 1963. Between 1965 and 1970, wheat yields nearly doubled in Pakistan and India, greatly improving the food security in those nations. These collective increases in yield have been labeled the Green Revolution, and Borlaug is often credited with saving over a billion people worldwide from starvation. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 in recognition of his contributions to world peace through increasing food supply.
Later in his life, he helped apply these methods of increasing food production to Asia and Africa.
capitalists do not allow for redistribution of goods (they prefer destroying food) so the USA is fat and Africa is dying of starvation
Western governments subsidize crops produced in their own countries and African producers can't compete because of those subsidies - that's not capitalism.
Also the GM crops don't have significantly higher yields for this "argument" to hold water or even grain.
The first generation of commercial GM crops targeted lowering costs by reducing herbicide/pesticide use, not increasing yields, because that was the simplest, easiest thing to try. Water- and nitrogen-efficient crops are in development now that the technology is more mature, the regulatory environment is stable, and more companies are working on the problem.
The sole purpose of GMO now on the market is to control food production or we would see abundance of drought and frost resistant, nitrogen fixing crops.
Right, because reworking large parts of a plant's metabolism is exactly as difficult as adding a gene for a single protein. *eye roll*
Platonic model of the universe? Really?
Really. How ridiculous was that. Everyone knows the model of the universe is purely sexual.
I don't know. The way I read it, he was first an anti-GMO crusader, and now he has become a pro-GMO crusader. Neither one I'm too fond of.
Genetic manipulation is a tool. It's neither good nor bad. There's all kinds of baggage associated with GMO (hi, Monsanto patents!), and some GM techniques I find highly questionable (plants that produce their own insecticide and which we're supposed to eat?). All are things that can make GMOs bad - but they are things that need to be considered in the context of creating GMOs, not as being a fundamental characteristic of GMOs.
I really wish that people would stop fighting over whether something is genetically modified, and focus on what the modification is, what its impact is on organisms consuming it, its impact on non-GMOs of the same family, and whether there are any patents on it that can escape into the wild (still waiting for someone to sue Gaia because she is copying stuff that someone has a patent on).
Unfortunately, I don't see too much discussion around this, and just a lot of yelling around GMO bad! GMO good!
The problem is, GMO is not something easily identifiable. For people who are not that interested in the science involved it's fairly intangible. You can't really go out and say non organic apples! these must be monsanto! or Organic apples! These cannot be monsanto! Not to mention that governments dont tend to give a shit, outside of Europe.
Monsanto, patents aside, does horrible shit with GMO. It's not limited to their patents. So does Cargill, who happens to make all sorts of falsely claimed "healthy products". Unethical companies continue to perpetually do unethical things. That doesn't change.
So where's the answer? I don't see one. I don't even see a path towards meaningful dialogue given that the gov't is too busy allowing things like corn subsidies to give a shit about whether or not organic food has side effects, etc.
The path to win is radical transparency. GMO-producing companies want to prevent their products from being labeled as GMO products, because people won't buy them. This is a legitimate concern, but may be motivated by a legitimate concern as well: the product may have been genetically engineered to be harmful. Instead of making GMO labeling illegal, which it is in many cases now, make it more detailed, so that I can see the difference between GMO that I'm fine with, and GMO that I'm not fine with.
E.g., I never want to buy a GMO product with built-in insecticides or herbicide resistance (I don't care about the herbicide resistance per se, just the fact that any such product was no doubt heavily sprayed with herbicides). I also never want to buy a GMO product that contains suicide genes. And I never want to buy a GMO product that is patented by any company that is willing to sue a farmer for patent infringement, even if the product is otherwise winning.
If you have a GMO vegetable that doesn't fall into any of these categories, I have NO PROBLEM buying it. But that's tough, because right now I pretty much have to avoid anything that isn't labeled organic if I want to avoid the types of GMO I object to, and even that isn't a guarantee. So if someone comes out with a GMO product that I would in principle buy, I won't in practice buy it.
Actually, by far the most questionable GM that I'm aware of is the terminator gene, in which plants are designed to not produce a viable seed. The sole reason for that is to prevent a farmer from doing what farmers everywhere used to do (and many still do) of saving some of the crop to plant next year, forcing the farmer to buy more seed than they otherwise would.
Did you RTFA? The guy actually admits that "terminator gene" is one of those common "everybody knows" fallacies about GM crops that he himself believed in, but which aren't true - i.e. that it is not something that is actually used.
Genetic manipulation is a tool. It's neither good nor bad.
His point, so far as I can take away from TFA, is that GM crops are necessary to maintain crop yields required to feed everyone at the future stable population level (which he puts at 9 billion). So he's not saying that GM is good per se, but rather than the goal it helps achieve (no starvation, better caloric yields for everyone) is good.
(plants that produce their own insecticide and which we're supposed to eat?)
You mean like garlic? Or peppers? Cinnamon?
Why do you think they tastes like that? It's only when you dilute them that they taste good. They evolved that way, modifying their own genes, to thwart the things that would eat them. They're trying their damned best to be poison, and failing deliciously.
But yeah, snorting cinnamon or eating nothing but garlic will mess you up. Because when concentrated, they ARE poison. Dosage makes the drug. With all GMO food-stuffs, there's a need to test just what the hell is different about it. Which is... yeah... exactly what you said. But anyway, built-in insect repellant, not that crazy of an idea. There's prior art in nature.
I don't know. The way I read it, he was first an anti-GMO crusader, and now he has become a pro-GMO crusader. Neither one I'm too fond of.
Did you read his speech? Because I did, and I don't agree with you at all.
Lynas was a knee-jerk environmentalist who was an anti-GMO crusader. Then he got into climate change... and became wise in the ways of science (though, mercifully, he has not yet shared his theory on the prevention of earthquakes using sheep bladders).
In his speech, he dug into some of the specifics you bring up... and emphasized the importance of the science.
If you don't see a lot of discussion about the specifics, you're probably not looking very hard.
I find this refreshing. If only everyone would take the time to reevaluate their beliefs from time to time we might be so much better off.
this is exactly why I never put anyone on ignore on web forums. (Well... I shouldn't say *never*... it's exceedingly rare, anyway - and only if the person is obviously delusional and belligerent in their communication with me. If they form their arguments well, though, I'm going to read it for comprehension.)
If you don't agree with me, then persuade me as to why I'm wrong... if you're rational, I'll listen. (read, whatever.)
I agree. I rather enjoy listening to a well-formed opposing viewpoint. If someone makes a statement and can answer follow-up questions (particularly, "Why?"), it's usually a statement worth considering. It's unfortunate how many people can't explain why they believe something (especially in politics, but that's wandering off the point), but are still unwilling to listen to other viewpoints.
I find this refreshing. If only everyone would take the time to reevaluate their beliefs from time to time we might be so much better off.
It cuts both ways though. Ever met someone who has recently "found god"?
Most likely not. Saying that GMO is not evil is not the same as condoning Monsanto's actions in court. Strawman much?
You can't separate the two so yeah. If you're supporting GMO's then you are supporting a framework that allows for the corporate monopolies in farming.
Patents are part of the landscape. You can't just pretend they're not there.
No, there is also open source, publicly funded GMO research being opposed or deliberately sabotaged by anti-science activists. Monsanto =/= GMO. Saying GMO is bad because Monsanto is bad is like saying operating systems are bad because Microsoft.
Saying that GMO is not evil is not the same as condoning Monsanto's actions in court. Strawman much?
Until/unless the two are seperable, GMO will be evil for as long as it enables corporate control of the food supply.
I mean, there are entire countries were farmers cannot save last year's seeds to plant next years crops.
This is nothing more than another form of economic rent, made even worse by the fact that it is rent on something that was previously free.
Most likely not. Saying that GMO is not evil is not the same as condoning Monsanto's actions in court. Strawman much?
Agreed the two should not be conflated, although it's hard not to since Monsanto has 90%+ of the market share, so it's their way of the highway. If there were an AMD-like underdog, the first thing they would compete on would be reasonable licensing terms. But instead, we have a company that is acting like MicroSquash in the '90s, and just as with MS they prefer their critics to promote Luddite-ism rather than focusing in on the antitrust aspects of this.
I do disagree with TFA, however. It's not anti-GMO activism that kills small GMO startups, Monsanto does that very well on their own. If they don't buy out a promising startup outright they just deny it access to the market and it dies a slow death. For all the waving and shouting, anti-GMO activists can't even get labelling laws passed.
Cross contamination & subsequent loss of organic certification isn't an issue then? How about Monsanto dragging innocent farmers into court?
I would personally advocate slicing GMO issues into separate bins. What you're referring to is the Intellectual Property bin which is a problem with (at least the US) most countries and the ownership (whether an instance of or the general use of) genetic material. Put all those lawsuits and patents and copyright crap in one bin.
Then you have another bin where we analyze the human element of consumption of GMO foods. What is the process to determine when something has undergone enough testing and is ready to push it forward? How many years of human trials must be held before it can be released? We do this with drugs but strangely, I haven't heard of much about this with GMO crops -- why is that?
Lastly we have a more open problem like environmental issues both surrounding the plant's effect on its environment and also the adjusted actions of the humans cultivating this crop. For example: with Roundup ready plants from Monsanto, have we really analyzed what the increased usage of chemicals like Roundup has on the immediate vicinity of the fields? Do we know that these genetic constructs that are taken from an insect and inserted into a plant do not adversely affect the pollen and have indirect affects on hay fever or honey bees? Again, how do we test this and how long should it be tested before it's pushed nationwide.
Lynas raises an interesting point I had not considered -- that my above desires for process and bureaucracy will prevent a small company from venturing into this field. On the other hand, we've been using selective breeding to move past a lot of the hurdles Lynas mentioned that GMO crops are supposed to move us even further past. It's unfortunate but this isn't a black and white issue and I'm against the unfettered proliferation of gene constructs that have been taken from other organisms and inserted into plants without sufficient testing.
The process of DNA -> Amino Acid -> Protein is still a very difficult puzzle for us as humans and I feel we should not openly experiment with inserting stuff at Point A when we don't know the full effects that yields in points B and C. I feel like there is still a lot to be achieved with selective breeding and until we have a better understanding of protein folding, we should shy away from smashing DNA into strands of plants unless it's absolutely critical to humanity. Go ahead and do that stuff in a lab to better understand it but leave it in a lab until there's a process that ensures it is safe.
Plant have evolved to produce a tremendous amount of pesticide and herbicide, fungicide chemicals to compete and survive. They have also evolved to be tolerant of herbicides produced by other plants and viruses. Thus even organic produce has large numbers of completely untested chemicals that are naturally produced by the plants themselves. I think many people somehow form a cognative dissonance if they think about this too much, so they basically do doublethink.
Some of these natural defensive chemicals i
To vilify GMOs is to be as anti-science as climate-change deniers, he says.
Sounds like he has already found someone else to vilify.
Yes, he is going after other anti-science people. Climate change is happening and has been verified even by studies commisioned by groups seeking to disprove it. Anyone still denying it is either an industry shill or someone with an agenda.
This is great and all that he saw the light when it comes to science... but with technology and science comes responsibility as well. Two key issues come to mind:
(1) Cross pollination of farmers crops, and then demanding royalties from the seed owners,
(2) and engineering the crops to disable re-planting the same seeds for the purpose of profit.
One actual example would be allowing a patent to monsanto on basmati rice...
link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2004/jan/31/gm.food [guardian.co.uk]
You realize that Issue 2 disables issue 1 right? The crops they are making sterile can't cross pollinate because they are sterile.
This is something I've always thought is ironic about anti-gmo. People will in the same breath condemn cross pollination and the spreading of the genes and at the same time condemn the sterilization gene because it prevents cross pollination and seed reuse.
As others have said there is two issues, the intellectual property issue and the GMO issue. They are separate and arguing the
Seriously, there is plenty of science that shows issues related to GMO crops. If not the crops themselves, the fact that a round up ready corn means several times more round up applied to the ground. This is scienfitically documented.
So I am of the opinion this guy is probably just some bought out loon.
Science, and advocate of real science, would concede there is far too much we just do not know at this point. And MANY fears that were pointed to, have been proved valid. Like infection of wild specieis.
That's SCIENCE...
Seriously, there is plenty of science that shows issues related to GMO crops. If not the crops themselves, the fact that a round up ready corn means several times more round up applied to the ground. This is scienfitically documented.
Can you cite your sources? Peer reviewed papers from respectable sources?
I don't ask to be dickish; I'm genuinely keen to read it. A cursory Google search found a French study that showed "Roundup ready corn to be toxic", which was then widely panned by the scientific establishment. Anything better?
The two options aren't unquestioning acceptance and total ban. GMO with strict regulations can be useful. Without it, it's a disaster waiting to happen. He is just a professional activist who can't accept that the world isn't black and white.
Congratulations, that doesn't mean GMO is always good.
It is a bad thing to breed pesticides into our food supply without absolute certainty of they are safe.
It is not a bad thing to have to label GMO foods for what they are.
....population reduction.
This can be in part accouplished with sterilizing GMO's
The real reason he changed his mind
for the science - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umFnrvcS6AQ [youtube.com]
population reduction is as well in United Nations Agenda 21 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agenda_21 [wikipedia.org]
A few years ago the closest grocery store to where I was living was a Coop. Which was great in the summer because it was stocked with a lot of fresh stuff from local farmers (it was a rural college town).
Well one of my biggest sources of income is the family farms I've inherited along with my Dad that we lease out. We're semi involved helping the farmer with trying new methods on our farms trying to boost yields (Rice & Soybeans are the primary crop, some years corn). This is mainly my father as he's retired and it gives him something to do, but as he's gotten up into his 70's I've started to take a more involved role in things.
One time I was at the Coop and commented about rice and lack of a particular brand that we sold our rice to which led to a conversation with one of the patrons who flipped out when I mentioned we had switched to a new hybrid seed. She went on this total anti-GMO rant at which point there were several people looking on and I said, "I said Hybrid. As in Rice A was bred with Rice B to produce the strain we plant. Farmers have been doing this for centuries now. Pretty much everything in your bag has been Genetically Modified using cross breeding."
Then I left and went on about my business leaving her red in the face not exactly sure how to respond to that.
And that's what I've never understood. To these people using cross breeding and classical Mendelian genetics to modify plants are fine. But go in scientifically and do the same thing in a sophisticated lab and suddenly it's evil.
And that's what I've never understood. To these people using cross breeding and classical Mendelian genetics to modify plants are fine. But go in scientifically and do the same thing in a sophisticated lab and suddenly it's evil.
There is much you're leaving out, but I don't have time to address it all. I'll address the biggest problem with your posting, which I quoted above. If we were to go in and do exactly the same thing that natural crossbreeding does, but just do it faster and more efficiently, I don't think there would be nearly the opposition that we're seeing with GMO crops.
But that isn't what we're doing. We are genetically modifying crops in ways that would never happen naturally, such as splicing frog genes into our vegetables. Even this, by itself, could possibly pass muster if there were anything even remotely close to enough data over anything even remotely close to an adequate period of time showing that the practice were safe. Unfortunately, what little data we have over the short time period we've been evaluating that data are indicating that it's a dangerous practice. Putting this kind of crap in our food supply at this point in time, with what we know about the results (such as it is), should be a criminal act.
Um Not Correct. People seem to misunderstand the origins of GMO technology. The technology that allows transplanting of genes was developed by copying natural processes that do exactly the same thing.
Transposons, retrotransposons, proviruses and other mobile genetic elements naturally translocate to new sites in a genome, and over long time scales will move genetic material across species. It happens all the time, in all forms of life. The speed at which it can happen is sometimes frightening - the rapidity at which resistance to antibiotics spread is due directly to natural genetic transfer.
Plant tissue culture and introduction of foreign germ plasm across species lines is a technology that is hundreds of years old. Almost all of our grain is produced by trans-species crops developed long before modern GMO came into existence.
The lack of basic understanding of what is going on here after so many years of debates on this topic is shocking.
Who cares what he has to say?
Any blanket assertion of GMOs being bad for you is just as idiotic and pointless as a blanket assertion GMOs are not bad for you.
Every case must be judged on the merits and it must not stop with the question of the qualities of the product. One must also consider the secondary effects playing god has on the environment and fucked up geopolitics of globalization meets Monsanto.
Who goeth a-borrowing goeth a-sorrowing. -- Thomas Tusser


text: This news item expired on 6/8/2013, so the information below could be outdated or incorrect. Attention Bicyclists - Classes Just For You - June If you are a bicyclist or considering becoming one, these classes are for you. The classes will be held on the second Saturday of March, April, May and June and include bike selection, fit and equipment; route selection and back up plans; vehicular cycling; safety and emergency maneuvering. Check out the flyer below for more details and contact firstname.lastname@example.com with any questions. Table: News Item Documents File NameSizeTypeDate & Time Added Second Saturdays Bicyclists 256 KB 02/15/2013 11:43 AM

subset: commoncrawl


text:
(By Delegates Frazier, Shaver, Givens and Moore)
[Introduced January 12, 2011; referred to the
Committee on the Judiciary then Finance.]
A BILL to amend and reenact §50-1-1 of the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, relating to electing magistrates by division.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That §50-1-1 of the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, be amended and reenacted to read as follows:
§50-1-1. Magistrate court created.
(a) There is hereby created in each county of this the state a magistrate court with such numbers consisting of the number of magistrates for each court as are hereafter provided that is authorized by the provisions of this article. There shall be elected by the voters of each county, at the general election to be held in the year one thousand nine hundred seventy-six, and in every fourth year thereafter, such number of magistrates as is provided in section two of this article. The filing fee for the office of magistrate shall be one percent of the annual salary. The term of magistrates shall be for four years and shall begin on January 1 of the year following the year of election. The filing fee for the office of magistrate shall be one percent of the annual salary.
(b) Beginning with the primary and general elections to be conducted in the year 2012, in every county there shall be, for election purposes, numbered divisions corresponding to the number of magistrates in each county. Each magistrate shall be elected at large from the entire county. In each numbered division of the county, the candidates for nomination or election shall be voted upon and the votes cast for the candidates in each division shall be tallied separately from the votes cast for candidates in other numbered divisions within the county. The candidate receiving the highest number of the votes cast within a numbered division shall be either nominated or elected, as the case may be.
(c) In counties where voting machines or electronic voting systems are used, the procedures of section eleven, article four, chapter three and section twelve, article four-a of said chapter three of this code shall apply respectively to the election of magistrates in the same manner as they apply to the election of members of the House of Delegates.
Notwithstanding the provisions of section seven, article five, chapter three of this code, for purposes of the primary election to be held in the year one thousand nine hundred seventy-six, the last day for filing certificates of candidacy for the office of magistrate shall be extended to the twenty-seventh day of February of that year.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to provide that magistrates of a county shall run for election in numbered divisions similar to the election of circuit judges and family court judges.
Strike-throughs indicate language that would be stricken from the present law, and underscoring indicates new language that would be added.


text:
Nope. Imagine Vista on this.
Rrefresh = reboot!
Just what you want - an even easier way to lose data from your VM. Why rely on bugs and crashes when an accidental refresh can reboot your machine?!
Maybe you should run it in some sort of java applet container, I hear they are fairly readily available these days. HIGH TECH SHIT!
Meanwhile, it seems like a cool way to host teeny abandonware DOS games.
A java applet container like a web page in a browser, perhaps? That's what they're seemingly aiming for
I was wondering, if we run a Java x86 PC emulator that is emulating an Amiga that is emulating a Spectrum, is it still faster than a real Spectrum or do we need to optimise it a bit?
Yeah, you'll still need to optimise windows
There's no reason the applet couldn't just be a VNC terminal connecting to a VM that runs for as long as your session is allowed to exist. In other words, if you're on wireless, get disconnected from the net, come back in range about 14 minutes later, and refresh, you should see your desktop again. Works with the javascript-based consoles that hosting companies provide.
Wow! I can have a program emulated by an interpreter runnning on it's own virtual emulated pc. Think of the pure speed!
For their next main event, may I suggest running a java-based java-interpreter, on the java-based java-interpreter as a host, think of the speed gain!
I heard you like running x86 so we emulated your x86 in java to run on your x86.
It would be great (and dangerous) if it were possible to bypass the emulator and JVM and run x86 code directly.
Java-interpreters are so 1996. Nowadays, JVM all have one form or another of "Just In time Compilers". This means the Java byte code is compiled once and that the x86 machine code is then cached so the next time it is used, the Java byte code doesn't have to be re-interpreted
This is 20 to 30 times faster than a 1996 interpreter and this is the only reason why Java applications now comes to par with C++ applications in terms of speed. Often Java applications can be faster because JITs usually also do run-t
Fuck that Java shit.
I know you were kidding... But I wonder what would happen if you ran this through the Google Web Toolkit [google.com]
Fuck that Java shit
..., let's do it in JavaScript!
I was thinking of being able to run a cool linux distro like Backtrack, inside the corporate firewall, using known and approved IP addresses, etc. To SOME people, this is a feature; to others a threat. Regardless, i want to know about the possibilities to do my job better.
Microsoft is making a big deal in Windows 7 about being able to lockdown USB drives in the enterprise. But with this info, they should also considering locking-down web-browsers.
Oh, wait. Nevermind I just said that about Microsoft.
While you are at work, why don't you focus more on doing your job than jerking around with Linux and trying to be a mad hax0r. Trust me on this one, you fail as a mad hax0r.
Of course, the browser doesn't have full permissions to do whatever it wants to your network card anyway, so you aren't going to be able to enter promiscuous mode, so you aren't going to be able to pretend to be another IP address in your little sandbox are you? No spoofing, no listening to other packets on the network (which is probab
Thank you for your enlightening and detailed technical comments.
It is often my job, as a manager, to try to understand and then to mitigate risks which you have explained and detailed well. I see in a network you have setup, I would be blocked from doing many cool things with Backtrack as OS in a browser.
How about another classic trick to watch out for? How would you prevent someone running standard OS in a browser (or of a USB stick, etc.) from running an SSH proxy, on port 443, to their home dd-wrt router
I'm not the original person you replied to, but I'll answer a few of your questions that I'm familiar with.
The easy one is the 'ssh on 443'. In our environment, we use authenticated proxies to get to the Internet, which also are doing SSL MITM attacks, ie terminating the client's ssl session on the proxy, inspecting the traffic, and then re-encrypting it to send out. We feed it via ICAP to a couple of boxes that do virus scanning, data loss prevention, etc. There are two key bits here. First, everything goe
The easy one is the 'ssh on 443'. In our environment, we use authenticated proxies to get to the Internet, which also are doing SSL MITM attacks, ie terminating the client's ssl session on the proxy, inspecting the traffic, and then re-encrypting it to send out.
How do you prevent the user from getting an SSL security warning? Or they just know what's going on and have to deal with it...
Certs are managed via our internal PKI implementation, and our internal CAs are trusted by all internal clients.
PKI is a big nasty can of worms, but it can be useful if you actually have a need for it. We finally put ours in after many years of debating, because it got to the point where the administrative overhead was outweighed by the benefit. If you don't want to go down the PKI route, you can just use GPOs to push out the proxy certs to all Windows clients, and then Linux/OSX ones can manually import th
Secure, yeah sure, adding more code doesn't make it more secure, you'll just have more security bugs:
http://kerneltrap.org/OpenBSD/Virtualization_Security [kerneltrap.org]
Sup dawg, I herd yo like inner platformz. So we put a browser in yo OS in yo browser on yo OS, so yo can compute while yo compute, and browse while yo browse!
Yo dawg! I heard you like Linux, so we put Linux in your Linux so you can use Linux while you use Linux!
Yo dawg,
I herd you like Operating systems, so we put a Operating system in your Browser so you can Browse Operating systems while you browse in yo operating system!
...we put a Operating system in your Browser so you can Browse Operating systems while you browse in yo operating system!
software does seem to have a soft spot for recursive acronyms, (GNU, LAME, WINE,etc). This seems to be the next logical step. Recursive operating systems! neat.
Yo dawg,
I herd you like Operating systems, so we put a Operating system in your Browser so you can Browse Operating systems while you browse in yo operating system!
Like Navigator in EyeOS (http://eyeos.org/) in Safari in OS X?
I herd you like Operating systems, so we put a Operating system in your Browser so you can Browse Operating systems while you browse in yo operating system!
p.s.: try not to use the browsing features while browsing operating systems in your browser in your operating system. One or more of the operating systems might not like it. Of course, if you want to browse in your operating system that your browsed to in your operating system, that's fine.
A Beowulf cluster of these.... In tabs on your browser.
You're sick... I like that!
A Beowulf cluster within each node constructed with the tabs of each node's browser. Then put this within an actual Beowulf cluster.
Then grab some popcorn and watch.
... is now available with online demos and downloads.
No it's not. Site's down.
... is now available with online demos and downloads.
No it's not. Site's down.
Well if it wasn't slashdotted...
OT: Any chance of writing a bot that visits coral-cache versions of the links in any article that's about to hit the front page? At least latecomers to the article would then have a fighting chance of seeing what the fuss was about in the brief seconds the server was online.
I heard you like virtual machines and browsers, so I built a virtual machine to run on a virtual machine so you can browse from your virtual machine that's running on a virtual machine in your browser.
Puts a whole new meaning in "it is virtualized all the way down"
Yes. It's an operating system running on a virtual PC running on a Java virtual machine running on a PC emulated by the Matrix. But the reality the Matrix is running in is itself just a virtual reality created by a Holodeck of a simulated spaceship.
But actually, there is a bottom. The bottom is a self-emulating virtual machine.
The bottom is a self-emulating virtual machine.
I thought self-emulating caused bad eyesight and weakness of the spine?
But actually, there is a bottom. The bottom is a self-emulating virtual machine.
What, no turtles?
JPC has been around for at least 3 years, and on Slashdot at least twice before.
And we'll keep on posting it until they learn how to survive a slashdotting.
I saw this article and couldn't figure out why I would want to run an x86 emulator in my browser, so I clicked to see other people's comments. Apparently no one else on slashdot can figure out why someone would want to do that either.
Are you serious? Just imagine those things running in a Beo^H^H^H Firefox Cluster!
Run from a stick (or from a basic web server) on a computer without a lot of privileges?
I don' think Applet deployment is the target for that project; if they are offering this option it's certainly just for quick demo sake. Notice also that the applet would need some serious time to download because (1) the emulator itself is reasonably big, (2) you need a virtual disk image containing the whole OS and apps; even a small FreeDOS distro with a couple of tiny DOS games will weight in a few hundred Kb, although the problem is mostly for first run as the Java PlugIn can cache everything.
As I see it, JPC's main goal is showing off some amazing virtualization technology that they have developed - the emulated x86 code is JIT-compiled by JPC's engine into Java bytecodes, which are in turn JIT-compiled by the JVM to native code, so the net result is full native-to-native translation. (If both steps are sufficiently efficient and the host platform is also x86, the compiled code may even be very similar to the original code.) This remembers of similar systems like Transmeta's Crusoe.
As a secondary goal,. JPC is becoming a pretty nice general-purpose PC emulator, so it's potentially just as useful as other PC emulators like Bochs. If JPC reaches sufficiently close to native performance (I tested it ~1yr ago and it's slashdotted now), and includes sufficient hardware compatibility, it's obviously an advantage to be a Java program, fully portable including UI.
it's obviously an advantage to be a Java program, fully portable including UI.
Imagine playing quake on a beow^W^H Android phone cluster of those.
"Let's see, down the water, swim back in, enter the tunnel, nightmare difficulty. Yeah, episode 1. Take that, you ugly gru... huh? Out of battery, wtf!!"
I, for one, think that running Windows 3.1 on a phone is quite cool.
You need to get out and breath some fresh air.
Running Windows 3.1 on your phone isn't cool even in the purely academic sense.
The fact that you think its cool means you have absolutely no clue what your operating system is there for in the first place.
First intelligent comment.
Indeed there are a large number of old, decrepit applications out there, such as those running on MSDOS, old Cobol programs, or even worse, IE5 intranet crapware.
Infidel. Turn your geek badge on the way out.
So, you're saying I have it upside down?
Perhaps to help introduce Windows users to alternate operating systems without needing them to install anything? Assuming this works like any Java applet. Although any presentable average-user desktop would have to come with a pretty big HD to download into your cache...
I saw this article and couldn't figure out why I would want to run an x86 emulator in my browser, so I clicked to see other people's comments.
Duh, so that you can run ActiveX in your Firefox on Linux, obviously! Now how cool is that, eh? ~
I saw this article and couldn't figure out why I would want to run an x86 emulator in my browser
I'm running Cell, you insensitive clod.
the world's most secure means of isolating x86 software
I seriously doubt this claim...
What about? http://www.nsa.gov/research/tech_transfer/fact_sheets/nettop.shtml [nsa.gov]
Or its predecessor? http://www.nsa.gov/ia/programs/h_a_p/releases/hapr1.shtml [nsa.gov]
Using two layers is the most secure. That's why I encrypt all my important data with ROT-13 twice.
do they provide sourcecode ?
(really interested if they do )
virtualbox is pretty nifty but inside a JVM is pretty impressive from a engineering point of view
have they published any work on this ?
John Jones
virtualbox is pretty nifty but inside a JVM is pretty impressive from a engineering point of view
I don't see how this is impressive at all, I've written several emulators myself, it's pretty easy stuff.
Also, it seems you're confusing virtualization and emulation, which are totally different things.
Emulation: instructions are interpreted (or JIT-compiled), as if they were a programming language
Virtualization: instructions run directly on the machine, either being patched to reroute some stuff elsewhere or be
It's so we can run Windows 3.11 on top of Windows 2000 on top of Windows XP on top of Windows Vista on top of Windows 7 which is inside a browser running on Java inside Windows 2000 which is on top of Windows XP, which is on top of Vista, which is on top of 7.
And it may even have enough speed to run as fast as a 386 25MHz...
So what happens when I load this site up, load up Firefox within the "OS in a browser", navigate to the site, and load up Firefox within the "OS in a browser in an OS in a browser"?
"Classic DOOM and DSL Linux Desktop inside your Java-enabled browser! The latest JPC, the fast 100% Java x86 PC emulator, is now available with online demos and downloads. JPC is open source [...] Visit the website to try out some classic games and [...]"
Where it mentions playing DOOM and other DOS games, JPC is booting FreeDOS. So yes, this can run FreeDOS.
Here's a screenshot [pcworld.dk] of FreeDOS in action on JPC, if you need one.
In fact, we've discussed the Java PC emulator on the FreeDOS web site [freedos.org] since JPC was first released. We even link to it on our "About" page [freedos.org] and "Links" page. [freedos.org] It's a great way to introduce new users to the idea of running DOS, without asking them to install their own PC emulator, or even install FreeDOS at all.
Java PC has been released under the GNU GPL since May 2007 [mail-archive.com], so to answer your question: source code is available. We mirrored an old copy [ibiblio.org] of the source code from 2007, but looks like we haven't made further copies. But maybe it's enough to interest folks who don't want to wait for the JPC site [ox.ac.uk] to recover from its slashdotting today.
2 layers (applet sandbox, JPC sandbox) of independently validated security make it the world's most secure means of isolating x86 software
I contest this notion (if I understand their setup correctly; the website is broken so I've some uncertainty about what they're doing). I agree that it's likely a very secure setup, but I disagree that the two lawyers of Java VM security makes it the most secure setup for running x86.
The common Java VM is a single point of failure. Both layers of "independently validated security" are running in Java VM, so if there is an exploit in the runtime interpreter (or compiled executable, if they're compiling things now), it may be used to circumvent both sandboxes. Using two different Java VMs would be an improvement, but better still would be orthogonal interpreters (on the plane of security vectors) such as a Java VM and a Python interpreter. Both are nevertheless still probably calling some version of glibc on x86 machine code.
If I were to speculate (and I will), I'd say that Xen et al virtualization has fewer vectors, and better still would be x86 virtualization running on top of a mainframe ala. z/VM. That would, in theory, be more secure than this Java VM on Java VM setup. Of course, it all comes down to the implementations in the end (and, as a practical matter, how big a target they are - Java is a big target for security, z/VM less so).
Again, though, I think this Java VM is likely very secure. Claiming it's the world's most secure is puffery, though, in my humble opinion.
Now this might bring about the micro OS, just enough OS to run the application you require. I already have a mimimal linux to run in my VMWare server, but something custom made to work in the hypervisor would be more efficient.
But really, as I can start a couple of VMs including Vista on my Mac Mini Why would I mess around with Java in a browser. Which version of Java and which browser, and on what hardware? In my experiance Java has always been very fussy about the version of the JVM you need to run certai
Skynet will wake up there, say "WTF? Where am I?!", get confused and die, thus saving humanity who will never appreciate how JPC saved us from our machine overlords. Security through serious obscurity FTW!
Or the computer the JVM is run on will need rebooting long before Skynet can complete the thought. Whichever.
The origin of the term is from the thedailywtf.com site. It means to have layers upon layers of pointless abstractions that do nothing but slow everything down and make it more error- and security-hole-prone, as compared to abstractions that make sense.
It as an antipattern, and all in all a massive failure.
Compare this thing to running the app right on the CPU. Or even running it in VirtualBox (if you need that encapsulation).
I'm guessing that it only runs on x86 plartforms?
Just tried it out on my PS3 with YDL 6.1 installed, no dice.
The intelligence of any discussion diminishes with the square of the number of participants. -- Adam Walinsky


text:
Neither rain nor wind could stop people from coming and having a good time at the Filipino Society's sold-out Benefit Dinner and Show at the Secaucus Senior Center on Saturday, March 29.
In addition to enjoying a show directed by Ruben and Myrna Cordova, the attendees gave generously to the typhoon rehabilitation donation box. All proceeds from the event will be sent to charities in the Philippines for the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the economy, lives, and livelihoods of people and communities affected by Typhoon Haiyan.
The society's organizers of the event expressed their gratitude for support to Mayor Michael Gonnelli, Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto, Lisa Snedeker and her staff, Cathy Wolf and the volunteers of Wrap-4-A-Smile Foundation, Adriana Napolitano (soloist), Janet Xiang, Fina Araullo, Carrabba's Italian Grill, Olive Garden, Toscana Cheese, Walmart, White Toque, Inc., and the Philippine Consulate.


text:
|2007-05-31, 16:13
|Link #81
Obey the Darkly Cute ...
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the whole, I'd rather be in Kyoto ...
Age: 60
Well.... I'd not go so far as to call Canada/US the most close-minded in the world (let me direct you to Saudi Arabia, Iraq, some parts of Africa or Asia...).
But the ideals which cement the underpinnings of each country depend on an educated, well-informed populace. We have very mixed results on that. There are factional elements that have emotionally bound, irrational views (irrational meaning their opinion is counterfactual or justified with emotional underpinning... "think of the children").
If we were *really* close-minded, we wouldn't be able to even discuss this, they'd be burning us for witchcraft already But it is (and should be) an ongoing discussion with a lot of light shone on all viewpoints (including my own).
|2007-05-31, 16:15
|Link #82
we girls arnt safe!
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: In the space between your walls
Age: 30
Conan-san - what did you just say?
GammaRed - man your geting prity deep on us
EDIT: vexx - wel thank gosh we have the right to bear arms....no ones burning me alive for reading a book.
|2007-05-31, 16:25
|Link #83
Join Date: Feb 2006
Age: 41
Maybe it was a tad deeper than my normal fair. But I feel that in the free world, things like this should be made avalabul to everyone. And let them make the choice as wot to do with it.
That said, I am a woman who beleaves that dispite arguments that this Manga is "unacseptabul" It should have been published anyway. Mostly because, then the choice is still there for the public at large. By droping the title compleatly, they have taken that choice away from everyone.
Thats the Crux of my anger at this situataion.
And its a clasic case of judgeing a book by is cover. I HATE THAT!
|2007-05-31, 16:32
|Link #84
we girls arnt safe!
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: In the space between your walls
Age: 30
well GammaRed
Im a bad person when it comes to judging books by their covers..not harshly but I do belive that if the book has a butiful relivant cover than its actualy trying to sell its self. but im working on it
and yes I second fairly most of what you said
|2007-05-31, 16:52
|Link #86
we girls arnt safe!
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: In the space between your walls
Age: 30
awww sorry I spell worse when im typing....all those stupid randomised keys for "convinence"
also I hate english and its my native language
Last edited by Diaboso; 2007-05-31 at 17:05.
|2007-05-31, 16:57
|Link #87
Join Date: Jun 2006
Jason DeAneglis explains his decision to cancel Nymphet.
There is one problem with his justification.
Said pages are not offensive at all.
If that is his justification that the manga was too offensive for the US market, i have no idea what to say. For crying out loud, Berserk has pages of people getting raped by demons. It even has incest, people being tortured, massive blood and gore, etc, etc.
And yet its popular and over a dozen volumes are already in the market, and more are coming out at an amazing rate.
I can see the manga getting cancelled because vendors were spooked and he didnt have enough orders. But really, i cant see any offensive content in it at all. So a loli has a crush on her teacher and fools around with her....and? Unless it gets directly into underaged sex, its pretty tame compared to the many titles that are on the market already which everyone has pretty much ignored. Really, the only reason vendors were cancelling their orders were because they ordered it in the first place before people started bullshitting that it was a lolicon h-manga online, and they believed them.
I would like to know just how many of the vendors who cancelled their orders did it purely because they read through the japanese volumes and decided that it was too inappropriate, instead of panicking over media reactions if they are found carrying a "lolicon h-manga".
|2007-05-31, 17:07
|Link #88
Obey the Darkly Cute ...
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the whole, I'd rather be in Kyoto ...
Age: 60
Jason would have been better off sticking to the business reasons: his vendors abandoned him. His justification only works if you ignore everything that leads up to that scene and the aftermath. Once again, its "pick a random page out of context" day. One can demonize almost anything that way.
I don't know that the vendors actually had any clue ... their reaction may simply have been from Jason noting that the series might experience some controversy over a precocious child trying to seduce her teacher. bingo..... easier to run and hide than to ask for more details, especially for something that might only sell a few thousand copies.
|2007-05-31, 17:24
|Link #89
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
I think it's a pity it was dropped, but at the same time, I don't blame them. Neither the vendors nor Seven Seas.
Even if they'd like to spread manga, they're in the industry primarily to earn a living. It's their day job, not their hobby. And there's no point in picking that kind of fight. Not unless it was a promise of a big commercial success to offset the trouble they'd go through, and KnJ isn't that.
I agree it would have been cool if it'd passed under the radar like so many potentially outrageous titles before it, but it didn't. Get over it.
|2007-05-31, 17:28
|Link #90
Obey the Darkly Cute ...
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the whole, I'd rather be in Kyoto ...
Age: 60
I'm working through my "grief" You'll have to get over it that I'm not quite over it yet.
(sorry, but "get over it" is just funny ... its just as silly as the japanese proverb that translates as "It can't be helped." --- it sustains fatalism)
|2007-05-31, 17:36
|Link #91
I disagree with you all.
Join Date: Dec 2005
I wasn't talking about you. More about those who out and out blame Seven Seas for not sticking their neck out for the sake of KnJ and make it matter of Principles, Justice, and the American Way.
And yeah, I suppose I'm fatalistic about the fact that people like to, you know, earn a living.
|2007-05-31, 17:47
|Link #93
Obey the Darkly Cute ...
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the whole, I'd rather be in Kyoto ...
Age: 60
@Ahn: aye.. I'm more sorry for SevenSeas stumbling so bad. (sorry if that sounded snippy ... it was meant to be a lame play on words)
However, recently I've seen more than a few anime and manga where it was pretty clear the acquisition people and the marketing people HAD NOT viewed or read the material past the first few chapters.
Tsukuyomi Moon Phase -- the anime previews were completely offbase about the series. I keep wondering if Tokyopop will go "o shit" when they get to the more recent volumes of the manga.
Negima (first season) -- it was pretty clear from the previews (again) that they had not viewed the series. In the case of the manga, there was a hubhub, they shrinkwrapped the first few... and now no shrinkwrap though the situations in the manga are often far more explicit.
SevenSeas was doomed the instant they queried the vendors --- who go to their lawyers and insurance people .... who respond "lolita again??? you've got to be joking, run away". Given Jason's "moral justification" I'm having trouble believing he actually *read* all 3 volumes but just flipped the pages and read sections that looked scary.
Meh, just means that I'll keep reading KnJ the hard way like I do L*S or Yotsubato .... it's good practice.
@Question: eeeeeyeah. That's pretty much describes the incident. Some of the staff over at ANN are long time anti-moe (and anything related) types. Few or perhaps none of them have ever cracked the books open. Anyone who disputes their tactics they label as pedophiles. The posting trolls and bookburners pretty swirled up into flames ... "think of the children!!!!" after that. Basic Hysteria....
What has been really hilarious is the backpedaling at ANN over them being one of the prime instigators of the wildfire.... an all too familiar tactic :/
((side note: interestingly, B&N just took my order for the first volume without blinking. I'm just curious to see how it all filters...))
Last edited by Vexx; 2007-05-31 at 18:56.
|2007-05-31, 19:32
|Link #95
Senior Member
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: State of denial
Age: 60
I may not like it, but from a risk-analysis standpoint I can understand Seven Seas decision. Where I think they really screwed the pooch (ooops, now I'm going to be labeled as some kind of perverted caniphile) is in the public relations department, and not just from the fandom standpoint - if I was an investor I would be a little leery of them right now.
But having had the chance now to view the portions of the manga that could "not be considered appropriate for the US market by any reasonable standard", I'm not sure whether I should be saddened or amused. Was I subjected to images and vivid descriptions of violence, depravity, and perverse debauchery far too horrible to detail on a public forum? No, I saw a male teacher in his early twenties holding a shivering female third-grader inside his jacket so that he could warm her without becoming chilled himself. I'd be morally outraged if I hadn't seen similar body positioning used in survival manuals that demonstrate ways to keep another person from suffering hypothermia by using your own body heat. Then came what had to be the most unacceptable thing of all. The male teacher experienced a perfectly normal physiological response when the previously mentioned female third-grader started wriggling around on his lap. Correction - it wasn't shown, it was implied by his thoughts and facial expressions. He did not want it to happen, he did not appear to be enjoying himself, and he certainly gave no indication that he was about to lose control and rape her.
Let me clarify something for anyone reading this who hasn't been, never will be, or has forgotten about ever being a male in his early twenties: what happened to that teacher is an absolutely normal physiological response for a healthy male when subjected to that sort of physical stimulus. The fact that the stimulus was provided by an underage girl does not make him a pedophile. I would be willing to wager a large sum that if you were to take a healthy young adult male and apply the same stimulus to their groin with a bag of warm mashed potatoes you would see the same response far more often that not. But that doesn't mean that that man should be banned from entering the state of Idaho, or ordered to stay more that 1000 feet away from any McDonalds so that they won't try to molest the Fry Kids®. If he begins experiencing regular erections just by thinking about tater tots, without any physical stimulus, then I will start to be concerned.
Sigh. I hadn't even planned to buy this manga in the first place, so I guess it is just the principle involved. I've got two young girls of my own, so I certainly have no tolerence when it comes to real live pedophiles. I'm well aware that they are out there, but I'm not ready to fall into the trap of seeing them behind every tree and rock.
|2007-05-31, 19:54
|Link #96
Join Date: Jul 2006
As much as I am a vehement supporter of free speech and a hater of censorship, I am relieved that the title has been canceled. It really pisses me off when a small loud group of opinionated people, who would be victims, prevent free speech by figuratively cutting off the purse strings allowing for the broadcast/publication of what would be controversial material. I suppose my stance on Kodomo no Jikan is that as long as it is legal under the laws of the United States, there should be no reason for it not to be published. The problems arise when a group of close minded "pundits" start spoon feeding people their uninformed opinions, and in turn the people gobble it up without doing thinking or research for themselves. That intellectual laziness is one of the greatest faults of the modern age of instant communication. So why am I a relieved that it was canceled? Seven Seas totally bungled the publication from the beginning, expecting to sell the title in retail stores was a stupid idea. Although many may dismiss the argument about a American media hysteria over "Obscene Pedophilic Japanese Cartoons/Graphics Novels" I really think it would have been a real possibility had it been published and shipped to retail stores. If Seven Seas had been more subtle in the marketing and sale of the series i'm sure it could have been a success, after all they are targeting a hardcore American otaku market to begin with so how would online only retail sales hurt them with this title? I certainly don't see hardcore yaoi or eromanga when I go to B&N or Borders, but that hasn't prevented yaoi from becoming a popular and successful niche genre in America. It is because they attracted so much attention to themselves with this title, and the ignorant douche bags at ANN and other places (does anybody know a good alternative to their encyclopedia? I really ******* hate them now) that that the title has been doomed. Some of the scanlations I saw of the series posted on blogs really, really creeped me out, HOWEVER unlike many Americans, I feel that just because I did not like DOES NOT MEAN THAT OTHER PEOPLE SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED ACCESS TO IT
|2007-05-31, 20:04
|Link #97
Join Date: Mar 2007
|2007-05-31, 20:07
|Link #98
Join Date: Feb 2006
Age: 41
BRAVO Furudanuki!
Very well said. I agree with you on every point made!
I dont blame SSE for the drop of the manga, but I am disapointed in the outcry that was made as a result of the whole materal issue.
You have stated some very powerfull reasions for the Manga to be looked at in the PROPER light, and I admire your input. I beleave that meny others would as well.
*smiles warmly*
|2007-05-31, 22:13
|Link #99
Obey the Darkly Cute ...
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: On the whole, I'd rather be in Kyoto ...
Age: 60
I tried to cookie you Furu, but I apparently try to cookie almost every post you make (I'll come back and do it later). Nicely summarized. I find it kind of aggravating (as a parent) when bookburning types and their ilk claim to represent or know how I think
@grgspunk: Google is your friend... but it stands for File Transfer Protocol. It is one of the original methods of transferring files from computer to computer on the Internet. Visit tucows.com to look for a freeware FTP client. It isn't very different from other file transfer protocols (http, for example).
Relisting Matthew's blog for Great Truth
(which has pictures and translations of the exact "offending" frames that Jason claims disturbed him. .... remember these two are locked in a locker and are freezing). Sorry, Jason would have been much better off just saying the vendors bailed because he let them know there were bookburners at the door because they erroneously thought he was selling porn.
Last edited by Vexx; 2007-05-31 at 22:30.
|2007-06-01, 04:17
|Link #100
Tsuruya Cultist
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: San Francisco, CA
You say you keep running into Title 18. How do you keep missing the stuff that invalidates it?
As Congress's findings demonstrate, Congress understood the the "appears to be a minor" and "conveys the impression" of a minor to refer to depictions that are virtually indistinguishable from unretouched photographs of real children. 18 U.S.C. 2251 note (Supp. IV 1998) (Finding 5). Drawings, cartoons, sculptures and paintings of youth-looking persons engage in sexual activity do not satisfy that standard. The Act therefore does not cover such artistic works.
I believe this is the governments argument, as it came from a petition from the Solicitor General. The government was never after cartoons or comics or sculptures or paintings. They were interested in the real thing or computer generated images that were "virtually indistinguishable" (whatever that means) from the real thing.
It was all moot. The Supreme Court in John Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition found much of Title 18 unconstitutional:
The contention that the CPPA is necessary because pedophiles may use virtual child pornography to seduce children runs afoul of the principle that speech within the rights of adults to hear may not be silenced completely in an attempt to shield children from it. See, e. g., Sable Communications of Cal., Inc. v. FCC, 492 U. S. 115, 130-131. That the evil in question depends upon the actor's unlawful conduct, defined as criminal quite apart from any link to the speech in question, establishes that the speech ban is not narrowly drawn. The argument that virtual child pornography whets pedophiles' appetites and encourages them to engage in illegal conduct is unavailing because the mere tendency of speech to encourage unlawful acts is not a sufficient reason for banning it, Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U. S. 557, 566, absent some showing of a direct connection between the speech and imminent illegal conduct, see, e. g., Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U. S. 444, 447 (per curiam). The argument that eliminating the market for pornography produced using real children necessitates a prohibition on virtual images as well is somewhat implausible because
few pornographers would risk prosecution for abusing real children if fictional, computerized images would suffice. Moreover, even if the market deterrence theory were persuasive, the argument cannot justify the CPPA because, here, there is no underlying crime at all.
No victim. No crime. While you kept running into Title 18, you somehow managed to avoid running into the Supreme Court decision invalidating the passage you quoted -- a passage that never intended to cover any drawing, comic, painting, or sculpture in the first place. Frankly, I just don't know why people so adept at finding (and in your case, running into) Title 18, just can't find a key definition from the Government and the Supreme Court's decision that invalidated the language those same people are so fond of quoting (and putting in bold text).
Last edited by Maids! Maids! Maids!; 2007-06-01 at 04:28.
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The Boston Early Music Festival has announced details of its upcoming festival and exhibition (June 9-16). This year's installment of the biennial festival, which attracts early music fans from across the country and abroad, will be titled "Youth: Genius and Folly" and will present as its theatrical centerpiece Handel's first opera, "Almira," directed by Gilbert Blin. It will also reprise a double bill of works by Charpentier — "La Descente d'Orphée aux Enfers" and "La Couronne de Fleurs" — first staged for BEMF's chamber opera series in 2011.
Among this year's 16 festival concerts will be an evening of Mozart's chamber music to be performed on the composer's own violin and viola, traveling to the United States for the first time. The lineup of official festival concerts will also include performances by the Newberry Consort, the Hilliard Ensemble, and gambist Jordi Savall alongside BEMF's signature mix of symposia, master classes, dance workshops, and a concurrent set of more than 100 Fringe concerts by established and emerging performers.
More information is available at 617-661-1812 and www.bemf.org.
Jeremy Eichler


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OPTIMISM about the performance of Australian equities in the long term is based on marketing and the past. It is not a divine right in the future.
And if you ever want some objectivity about the sharemarket going up in the long term, just ask someone from Japan. The Japanese sharemarket has had a woeful run. From Christmas 1989 to Halloween in 2008, it fell 82 per cent.
Take us up to today and the Japanese sharemarket is still down 70.8 per cent in the past 23 years.
Although this suggests we should have avoided investing in Japanese equities over this period, the truth is the equity market is opportunity - even within that terrible performance there have been eight bull markets averaging plus 61.6 per cent and eight bear markets averaging minus 44.3 per cent.
Each lasted more than a year on average; substantial and tradeable periods.
And despite the overall fall of 70.8 per cent, the Japanese market is still up 62 per cent from the bottom and has delivered an average annual compound return of 12.1 per cent for four-and-a-bit years.
The point being that even in a long-term bear market, even when a country has gone effectively ex-growth and is in the grips of deflation - a predicament that must inevitably catch up with both Europe and the US - the equity market can still defy the big trend for long periods and provide plenty of opportunity to make money.
Fast forward to the Australian market today and we are up 23 per cent in seven months.
It is scaring some people, rational people in particular. We seem to be ignoring terminal issues such as rampant money printing and ballooning US and European debt levels.
Are we all mad? We may well be, but the big issues are not the point: the point is that there is money to be made and we owe it to ourselves after five lean years to try to make it.
And in the Japanese context, we could rally another 38.6 per cent and still only discover in hindsight that we were in an average bull market.
So it is no good wagging fingers about how the problems are still there and how central banks have only kicked the can down the street. The game in equities, especially after the global financial crisis, is to "just get on with it" and make money while you can.
While the market goes up, grand predictions about it all ending in tears are as useless as the equally grand declarations that we are now in a new long-term bull market that will leave you in denial when it starts going down. It's all bull.
All you know is to make money when stocks go up and get out when they start going down. You can't do that with a head-in-the-sand, long-term investment approach alone.
To take advantage of the equity market "trends within the trend", you're going to have to time the market.
It's here that 90 per cent of investors and advisers are going to fail, because they insist on resurrecting the pre-GFC finance industry mantra that "the market always goes up in the long term".
It's a mantra that the 93 per cent of the working population who choose to make their superannuation contributions to their employer's default balanced fund have also, unwittingly, bought into as well.
They are all going to experience the big trend and in a UEFC world (US and European Financial Crisis - yes, they are still in a crisis), managed funds and long-term investment are a much bigger gamble than they were.
So my advice is to disregard the daily macro rubbish, dismiss your long-term "faith", dismiss your grand declarations about the future and just get on with making money in individual stocks when you can.
Get in when they're going up and get out when they're going down. It's a mistake to adopt long-term investment again just because the market's gone up 23 per cent. You have to do better than that.
Rule 1: Strike when they're hot and cut when they're not
OPTIMISM about the performance of Australian equities in the long term is based on marketing and the past. It is not a divine right in the future.
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