Posts from — January 2006

I ended up looking around whitehouse.gov tonight, and I eventually browsed through the “kids section” out of curiosity.

They had a quiz on there, which actually turned out to be pretty hard in parts, hilarious in others. Quiz

I got 7/10 right, but I’m pretty sure I could beat Jenna Bush.

random tangent:

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1152561/

Two words that should never be used:
Spooktacular
Sellabration

(Void where prohibited)

There’s a lot of talk lately about Google censoring its Chinese search engine in compliance with the Chinese government. Many people equate this with a betrayal of principles, which it may be, I’m not so sure (this and this are the best posts I’ve read on it so far).

The thing that I don’t understand: who is losing something in this situation? The Chinese people aren’t getting less information than they were before. The pages that Chinese people were able to visit was censored by the government (since 2002), now Google is just doing it on their end, and letting users know when things are omitted (something that the competition doesn’t do).

Maybe I’m missing something, but I just don’t see how anyone is less free than they were before.

I wonder how much policies like this will impede China’s development in the future…

It would be cool if there were a search engine for politicians’ quotes. One of my favorite things about The Daily Show is when they juxtapose quotes from politicians to expose lies (which is funny, but really shouldn’t be, I think). I always wonder how much research it takes to find those quotes, and what sort of systems they use to do it. One problem with such a system is that there’s so much misquoting out there, and the media echo chamber makes the misquote look as real as any other. Ideas?

Worthy of consideration, at the very least…

“Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence — economic, political, even spiritual — is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.

Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific/technological elite.

It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system — ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.”

From Dwight D. Eisenhower’s last speech as president

So… The West Wing got cancelled. If they cancel The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and The Office, I’ll have a bunch more free time on my hands, so maybe it’s for the best.

I found this quote amusing:
“We have a two party system, the Democratic Party, a party of no ideas, and the Republican Party, a party of bad ideas.” – Lewis Black

I just got the word via email…

I’ve been offered an internship at

this summer, working on the book search project. I’m not going to write a whole lot about it now, but I’m very excited, needless to say.

I had interviewed on Tuesday, and that seemed to go really well, though I didn’t want to count my chickens before they hatched. I’m really excited about getting a chance to join google for a bit, and I’m sure I’ll be learning so much stuff this summer.

It’s 52 degrees in Mountain View, CA right now… it’ll be nice to be somewhere else for a change.

Though I disagree with it, there’s a moderately well-written response to Lawrence Lessig’s video about Google Book Search. It’s somewhat well-informed, at least compared to the crap that gets published in newspapers.

From the first link:
“You know who else loses? We all do. And not in the way Lessig thinks we do. We all lose because what Google is doing is hastening the demise of libraries. Hastening the demise of books. Hastening the requirement that you must have a computer, and a network connection, to get access to books.

Face it: books are toast. Google Book Search is the toaster.”

This makes libraries more useful, since that’s where out-of-print books are often found, and now they’re not just indexed by title. Computers and networks connections are already provided by libraries, anyway… most card catalogs are online. That’s like saying that the web is toast and Google Search is the toaster.

Eric Schmidt wrote a good op-ed for the WSJ on why book search is good, Books of Revelation

I just found my favorite video from high school…

I like the cool stuff

Sadly, I can’t find my favorite commercial: Nike’s “Morning After” (aired 12/31/99)