Re: [Vo]:OT: Space travel, moon colonization.
The elevator cable doesn't have to be electrically conductive. Michel 2010/1/25 Alexander Hollins alexander.holl...@gmail.com: best link ive found so far. http://www.data4science.net/essays.php?EssayID=850 hmm, i think its the same one you are talking about. I THOUGHT there was another one done, but i could be wrong. On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 1:58 PM, Stephen A. Lawrence sa...@pobox.com wrote: On 01/25/2010 03:39 PM, Alexander Hollins wrote: unfortunately, space elevator research has stalled due to a lot of issues with voltage differentials in the upper atmosphere. The last test I heard of of stretching a ribbon between the ground and leo, after it got about 5 miles long, it vaporized in a discharge, acting as a ground. not pretty. I don't recall that. I know the tethered satellite experiment done on the Shuttle failed with a burned cable, but I hadn't heard of any further work with long tethers after that. I'd be interested in hearing more about the 5 mile cable drop-and-fry from LEO, if you have a link to more info. On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 1:34 PM, Jed Rothwell jedrothw...@gmail.com wrote: If the space elevator people succeed the rest will be easy. I would include the elevator advocates and experimentalists in the top ranks of those promoting space travel. I don't know how much support NSS is giving elevators but they should be a top priority. NASA, unfortunately, gave the elevator people the frozen boot years ago, in favor of retro-design rockets. - Jed
[Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
2010/1/25 Jed Rothwell jedrothw...@gmail.com: By the way, I think Bill Gates (2004) was right and spam has been largely eliminated. Jed, I see you use Gmail, have you checked the number of emails in your spam folder? (the spams you have received in the last month if you haven't deleted them manually). Mine contains more than 1400 spams, so maybe it would be more accurate to say that spam is less problematic because big email providers do a better job at blocking them. Not such a good job BTW. While checking my SPAM folder I found 3 Vortex posts in it, all 3 from Robin (mixent, why mixent BTW Robin?). I just marked them as non-spam but I, and maybe others, may have lost other posts this way. Could other Vortexians who also use Gmail check their Spam folders for such posts? E.g. in your search box, type: in:spam Vo I am curious to know if it happened to them too. Michel
Re: [Vo]:Nuclear catalysis, effective LENR isotopes, etc.
Earlier I wrote: Once the hypothesis of one of more deflated electrons and a de-energized composite nucleus comes into play the situation with regard to spin and other constraints becomes more complex, especially if there are numerous deflated (negative energy) electrons in the nucleus initially. One consequence of deflation fusion theory is that these electrons play a continuously changing role in the nucleus through time, as their wavefunctions expand out of the nucleus proper due to zero point field pressure. The problem then is how to determine composite spin and to account for spin conservation, as well as the decay probabilities which change through time. The decay time for de-energized compound nuclei is much longer that for conventional compound nuclei. One possible way to model the deflated state electrons post-fusion, and somewhat in an alternative view to the above, is as ordinary thermalized particles. As the deflated electrons escape the hydrogen nuclei to which they were lightly bound upon tunneling into a heavy nucleus they can be modeled as picking up kinetic energy via kinetic interaction with the nearby nucleons within the heavy nucleus. The zero point energy of nucleons in heavy nuclei is very high, on MeV order. For a prospective table of such energies see: http://mtaonline.net/~hheffner/NuclearZPEtapping.pdf The kinetic energies of the nucleons powerfully affect decay channels, because nucleon energy affects, in an exponential fashion, the probability of nucleons escaping the strong force barrier. When lightly bound (on the order of 14 eV) electrons enter the heavy nucleus as part of a neutral hydrogen entity, i.e. in the deflated state, they do not gain kinetic energy from the tunneling event except from the magnetic potential changes. In effect, their kinetic energy becomes mismatched with their mean orbital radius. Their Hamiltonian is suddenly changed to a highly negative regime. The electrons are trapped initially, highly bound to the new compound nucleus. However, if the prospect of kinetic energy thermalization of such electrons bound within the nucleus is accepted as a feasible (and that is not a long stretch of imagination because it is known that free electrons can pick up thermal nuclear energy when colliding with nuclei), then modeling the trapped electron cloud over time is feasible. A trapped electron picks up heat from the nucleons, momentarily reducing the nucleus heat, until eventually enough kinetic energy is picked up by the electron to escape the nucleus. This process is delayed due to the free electron radiating as it is thermalized toward nuclear temperature. Note that the energy of such electrons would tend to be near ground state when they eventually managed to escape, because they would tend to thermalize in small increments. As soon as an electron exceeds the escape energy threshold the thermalization process stops. Electrons in the high end tail of the thermal energy distribution escape. As trapped electrons increase kinetic energy and expand their orbital transits outside the nucleus, and in effect build a negative cloud just outside the nuclear boundaries, the probability of proton or alpha particle escape from the nucleus is increased for three reasons: (1) the negative charge within the nucleus is reduced, thereby reducing the electron's Coulombic contribution to the the nucleus binding energy, (2) the negative cloud beyond the nuclear boundary increases the probability of positive charges escaping (tunneling through) the boundary of the nucleus, and (3) the bound electrons interacting with protons on the surface of the nucleus provide increasing amounts of kinetic energy to some of those surface protons as the electrons thermalize to nuclear temperature, widening the surface proton thermal energy distribution. On the other hand, the overall temperature of the heavy nucleus drops initially, reducing the prospect of disintegration of any kind. Here is where zero point energy primarily comes into play. The nuclear temperature, which was reduced by the negative energy electrons, and further reduced by electron radiation, is eventually restored to normal by the zero point field. For this kind of long lasting (in nuclear time frames) process to unfold, the initial nucleus energy (as shown in brackets in the reports) must be negative. If long lasting reactions do occur, then prospects for weak reactions, such as electron capture or beta decay, increase. Best regards, Horace Heffner http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
RE: [Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
From Michel: Jed, I see you use Gmail, have you checked the number of emails in your spam folder? (the spams you have received in the last month if you haven't deleted them manually). Mine contains more than 1400 spams, so maybe it would be more accurate to say that spam is less problematic because big email providers do a better job at blocking them. Not such a good job BTW. While checking my SPAM folder I found 3 Vortex posts in it, all 3 from Robin (mixent, why mixent BTW Robin?). I just marked them as non-spam but I, and maybe others, may have lost other posts this way. Could other Vortexians who also use Gmail check their Spam folders for such posts? E.g. in your search box, type: in:spam Vo I am curious to know if it happened to them too. Most curiously, my Gmail account showed only one Vo spam casualty... Horace Heffner's Nuclear catalysis effective LENR isotopes. Etc..., sent Jan 25. My apologies, Mr. Heffner! FWIW: Subject: Spam is solved, we can all go home now http://blogs.msdn.com/tzink/archive/2010/01/25/spam-is-solved-we-can-all-go- home-now.aspx http://tinyurl.com/ylj42d5 I would love some comments on this article. Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks
Re: [Vo]:OT: Space travel, moon colonization.
Even a non conductive material will, if the voltage difference is great enough, have surface effects that can cause plasma discharges (think making plasma balls in the microwave with burnt matches. On Tue, Jan 26, 2010 at 1:41 AM, Michel Jullian michelj...@gmail.com wrote: The elevator cable doesn't have to be electrically conductive. Michel 2010/1/25 Alexander Hollins alexander.holl...@gmail.com: best link ive found so far. http://www.data4science.net/essays.php?EssayID=850 hmm, i think its the same one you are talking about. I THOUGHT there was another one done, but i could be wrong. On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 1:58 PM, Stephen A. Lawrence sa...@pobox.com wrote: On 01/25/2010 03:39 PM, Alexander Hollins wrote: unfortunately, space elevator research has stalled due to a lot of issues with voltage differentials in the upper atmosphere. The last test I heard of of stretching a ribbon between the ground and leo, after it got about 5 miles long, it vaporized in a discharge, acting as a ground. not pretty. I don't recall that. I know the tethered satellite experiment done on the Shuttle failed with a burned cable, but I hadn't heard of any further work with long tethers after that. I'd be interested in hearing more about the 5 mile cable drop-and-fry from LEO, if you have a link to more info. On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 1:34 PM, Jed Rothwell jedrothw...@gmail.com wrote: If the space elevator people succeed the rest will be easy. I would include the elevator advocates and experimentalists in the top ranks of those promoting space travel. I don't know how much support NSS is giving elevators but they should be a top priority. NASA, unfortunately, gave the elevator people the frozen boot years ago, in favor of retro-design rockets. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
Michel Jullian wrote: Jed, I see you use Gmail, have you checked the number of emails in your spam folder? Maybe 5 per day. I don't check often. I have only found real mail there are few times. I would say spam has gone from being Very Annoying to being a minor problem you have to deal with once a week (to check to see if there are any real messages). I have seen only a few spam messages get through Gmail's filter. Mine contains more than 1400 spams . . . Goodness! That's a lot. I changed my e-mail address on the front page of LENR-CANR.org to read: JedRothwell at-sign gmail.com That may have reduced automatic harvesting of the name. . . . so maybe it would be more accurate to say that spam is less problematic because big email providers do a better job at blocking them. That seems tantamount to saying the problem is fixed. Who cares how many end up in the spam filter? - Jed
[Vo]:Physics Complete
SCIENCE TECHNOLOGY World's Physicists Complete Study Of Physics JANUARY 14, 2010 | ISSUE 46•02 HARIMA, JAPAN—Saying that there was no more knowledge to acquire about the physical nature of the universe, the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics announced Monday that it had concluded the scientific study of matter, energy, force, and motion. Yeah, that about does it for physics, said IUPAP member Sukekatsu Ushioda, powering down Japan's Super Photon ring particle accelerator. All done. Math can pretty much take it from here. The world's top physicists also announced that they would celebrate the conclusion of physics by meeting at PJ's Pub later tonight for drinks. RELATED ARTICLES Study: Alligators Dangerous No Matter How Drunk You Are 05.10.06 Bacon Good For You, Reports Best Scientist Ever 02.19.03 http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/worlds_physicists_complete end Whew! What a relief!
Re: [Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
Ironically, this was the only VO message in my spam folder of about 30 total in the past month. Hey Monteverde, the Food Network says Hawaiians love spam, like spam omelette's, etc. Terry On Tue, Jan 26, 2010 at 8:50 AM, OrionWorks - Steven Vincent Johnson orionwo...@charter.net wrote: From Michel: Jed, I see you use Gmail, have you checked the number of emails in your spam folder? (the spams you have received in the last month if you haven't deleted them manually). Mine contains more than 1400 spams, so maybe it would be more accurate to say that spam is less problematic because big email providers do a better job at blocking them. Not such a good job BTW. While checking my SPAM folder I found 3 Vortex posts in it, all 3 from Robin (mixent, why mixent BTW Robin?). I just marked them as non-spam but I, and maybe others, may have lost other posts this way. Could other Vortexians who also use Gmail check their Spam folders for such posts? E.g. in your search box, type: in:spam Vo I am curious to know if it happened to them too. Most curiously, my Gmail account showed only one Vo spam casualty... Horace Heffner's Nuclear catalysis effective LENR isotopes. Etc..., sent Jan 25. My apologies, Mr. Heffner! FWIW: Subject: Spam is solved, we can all go home now http://blogs.msdn.com/tzink/archive/2010/01/25/spam-is-solved-we-can-all-go- home-now.aspx http://tinyurl.com/ylj42d5 I would love some comments on this article. Regards, Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks
[Vo]:Contropedia
http://www.bolenreport.com/feature_articles/feature_article088.htm Wikipedia Doesn't Like Me ... Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen Saturday, January 2nd, 2010 Wikipedia's General Counsel, Mike Godwin, is sending me nasty emails. Apparently he doesn't like me telling people how bad Wikipedia actually is, and he definitely doesn't want me telling you what to do about it - when it effects you personally. He actually, the other day, said I was trying to destroy Wikipedia... Stand back while I turn down my testosterone levels. Even though, in some ways, it feels good to have some people think I'm that kind of powerful, I can't really claim credit for what's happening to Wikipedia. The whole world is beginning to realize that Wikipedia is being run by the social equivalent of a pimply twelve year old. Wikipedia is coming apart. What I'm offering is a remedy for its victims. How? I'm telling people how to sue Wikipedians in the Courts to stop them from victimizing others. I've got the formula to beat them (and I'll tell what that is further into the article) - and Mike Godwin doesn't want me to talk about it. He says: Thank you providing evidence of intent to engage in strategic litigation aimed at shutting down Wikipedia. Yup, he really said that. Let me adjust that testosterone knob one more time. Mike, I don't need to destroy Wikipedia. It is doing that to itself. I'm actually trying to help you guys, but you're not listening. The WHOLE WORLD is trying to help you, and you are not listening. You need to make some changes - and here's why... Critics like Oliver Kamm of the London Times said in his November 25, 2009 article: The persistent decline in the number of Wikipedia editors may signal the end of the dominance of a remarkable online resource. It cannot happen too soon. Wikipedia is routinely cited in online articles as a substitute for explanations of concepts, events and people. It has thereby coarsened public culture. It is an anti-intellectual venture to its core. more
Re: [Vo]:Contropedia
Can't blame them when someone is spending their time teaching people how to sue Wikipedia. The afflicted need to realize that if they depend on soemthing like Wikipedia as anything other than just another resource, they will make mistakes. To sue someone over your own mistakes is a major cop out. Why sue except to make money. I really like Wikipedia, but do my own research. Thanks for trying to kill something I at least have the intelligence to use. Go sue someone who deserves it, like yourself! Gibson Elliot --- On Tue, 1/26/10, Terry Blanton hohlr...@gmail.com wrote: From: Terry Blanton hohlr...@gmail.com Subject: [Vo]:Contropedia To: vortex-l@eskimo.com Date: Tuesday, January 26, 2010, 8:42 AM http://www.bolenreport.com/feature_articles/feature_article088.htm Wikipedia Doesn't Like Me ... Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen Saturday, January 2nd, 2010 Wikipedia's General Counsel, Mike Godwin, is sending me nasty emails. Apparently he doesn't like me telling people how bad Wikipedia actually is, and he definitely doesn't want me telling you what to do about it - when it effects you personally. He actually, the other day, said I was trying to destroy Wikipedia... Stand back while I turn down my testosterone levels. Even though, in some ways, it feels good to have some people think I'm that kind of powerful, I can't really claim credit for what's happening to Wikipedia. The whole world is beginning to realize that Wikipedia is being run by the social equivalent of a pimply twelve year old. Wikipedia is coming apart. What I'm offering is a remedy for its victims. How? I'm telling people how to sue Wikipedians in the Courts to stop them from victimizing others. I've got the formula to beat them (and I'll tell what that is further into the article) - and Mike Godwin doesn't want me to talk about it. He says: Thank you providing evidence of intent to engage in strategic litigation aimed at shutting down Wikipedia. Yup, he really said that. Let me adjust that testosterone knob one more time. Mike, I don't need to destroy Wikipedia. It is doing that to itself. I'm actually trying to help you guys, but you're not listening. The WHOLE WORLD is trying to help you, and you are not listening. You need to make some changes - and here's why... Critics like Oliver Kamm of the London Times said in his November 25, 2009 article: The persistent decline in the number of Wikipedia editors may signal the end of the dominance of a remarkable online resource. It cannot happen too soon. Wikipedia is routinely cited in online articles as a substitute for explanations of concepts, events and people. It has thereby coarsened public culture. It is an anti-intellectual venture to its core. more
[Vo]:Army LENR workshop
Steve Krivit posted the following: http://newenergytimes.com/v2/conferences/2010/ARL/ARL-Agenda.shtmlhttp://newenergytimes.com/v2/conferences/2010/ARL/ARL-Agenda.shtml This is good news. I have been hearing about other small seminars like this at various places, mainly in the military. - Jed
RE: [Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
At 08:50 AM 1/26/2010, OrionWorks - Steven Vincent Johnson wrote: http://blogs.msdn.com/tzink/archive/2010/01/25/spam-is-solved-we-can-all-go-home-now.aspx http://tinyurl.com/ylj42d5 I would love some comments on this article. Okay, here goes! The article describes an interesting technique that can be used to identify some spam, but does not even begin to address the overall problem, for this technique only works to identify spam after spam has been already identified by some other means, with, quite likely, a substantial delay. Then filters can be advised and used to tag spam for rejection, but the spam traffic is unimpeded. It should be realized that even if spam traffic never gets to users, being rejected at the server level, it still adds a great burden to mail server load. It is still a serious problem, impacting ISPs directly and thus users indirectly, for we pay all the costs of most ISPs. We also pay another cost, even if we don't see spam, we pay the cost of rejected legitimate mail, which is so high, particularly when one is in businss using email, as I am, that I do not allow my personal spam filter to automatically reject mail, it merely tags it and categorizes it for my review. In practice, there is so much spam that I do rely on IP blacklist filtering, when I've been away and the queue of mail to be rejected is large, but I still have a log of rejected mails with 20 lines from each mail, after a mail is deleted, and I can restore these mails and, at least, respond and ask for it to be resent. I do not allow my mail server provided to reject mail at all, except when a major attack occurs, such as one time when it looks like some spambot got stuck and I was getting 100 spams per minute. To me, there is a generic solution to this and many other problems: organization of those most directly affected, and all those interested in the problem. Among those affected, there is a small number who will actively fight spam, and these efforts should be coordinated to be efficient. However, the general membership of such an organization can be advised to install a particular kind of spam filter, that the organization would provide. It would need money to do its central work, but the membership that would be benefited could be so large that collecting modest donations for this would be trivial. How much would you pay to substantially kill the spam problem, without doing harm to legitimate mail? How much would ISPs be willing to pay for something that made their job much easier by offloading analysis of spam to a trustworthy organization of users. Including their users. The key organizational problem is trustworthy. Spam filtering can quickly and easily become a tool for information control, and there are signs that some anti-spam organizations have been co-opted by those with particular agendas, such as by spammers whose goal is to block competitor's spam while passing their own. How would a voluntary association of mail users address spam? Well, that's a problem for the users themselves to address, gathering and vetting expert opinion, and the details of the organizational structure that would make this so efficient that a mail user could join and be effective with practically no more investment than raising a finger. I won't detail the process for right now, but trust me. It can be made incorruptible; those who attempt to corrupt it end up with a mouthful of hair. The structure is cellular, fractal, and probably bulletproof against any danger except massive governmental-level censorship and repression. If we have come to that point, we have much more serious problems than spam. Spammers have been known to successfully attack anti-spam solutions that implemented part of what I imagine the organization would do, and they were able to accomplish shutting these solutions down because the solutions were centralized, operated by a private company, depending on a single ISP, and turning a botnet to attack this company was trivial for a serious spammer. The ISP, facing massive DOS attack, booted the company in order to protect the rest of its subscribers. But the association I'm talking about would itself use distributed process and would not be vulnerable to attack by botnets; they would be able to shut down particular nodes, but, in the process, revealing themselves and their assets. Which can then be addressed directly. It's obvious that detection of a spam bot, as quickly as possible, and rapid notification of the ISP for the corrupted computer, with rapid shutdown of most internet access for that computer (everything outgoing, basically, though filtering could become more sophisticated: everything outgoing except for the ISP's own support, so that the blocked user can inquire by email and get immediate advice on bot removal and prevention of reinfection). So how to detect spam as quickly as possible? Well, users
[Vo]:Army LENR workshop
Steve Krivit posted the following: http://newenergytimes.com/v2/conferences/2010/ARL/ARL-Agenda.shtmlhttp://newenergytimes.com/v2/conferences/2010/ARL/ARL-Agenda.shtml This is good news. I have been hearing about other small seminars like this at various places, mainly in the military. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
In reply to Terry Blanton's message of Tue, 26 Jan 2010 11:05:35 -0500: Hi, [snip] Ironically, this was the only VO message in my spam folder of about 30 total in the past month. Hey Monteverde, the Food Network says Hawaiians love spam, like spam omelette's, etc. Terry SPAM - SPurious Advertising Material. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/Project.html
Re: [Vo]:Spam has been eliminated? Robin posts considered spam (was Re: OFF TOPIC Davos predictions: predictably wrong?)
On Tue, Jan 26, 2010 at 4:13 PM, mix...@bigpond.com wrote: SPAM - SPurious Advertising Material. Also SPiced hAM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwy2MPT5RE T
Re: [Vo]:Contropedia
I agree with this guy Bolen that many Wikipedia articles are anti-intellectual, but filing suits against Wikipeida is WAY over the line. That is not how to respond! Just ignore it. Don't mess with free speech. In a few cases vandals at Wikipedia defamed people. I think they have put in place mechanisms to prevent that from happening now. The comments in the Wikipedia cold fusion talk section have insulted me from time to time, mainly with accusations that I am violating copyright laws. This does not warrant a lawsuit. It does not rise to the level of defamation, in my opinion. It is just silly. This article by Bolen discusses William Connolley, who is one of the leading opponents of cold fusion. In recent weeks he and the other extremists have tossed out Pierre Carbonnelle -- permanently this time. Then they permanently tossed out someone names GoRight who had the temerity to discuss Carbonnelle's case. Then one of them posted a masterpiece of confusion and fallacies such as red herring, guilt by association, ad hominem, and circumstantial ad hominem: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Cold_fusion#the_60_minutes_video_and_mainstream_acceptance These people are extremists but so are the editors of the Scientific American, the Executive Director of the AIP and many others. Filing lawsuits would not improve this situation even if it were not a violation of free speech. It is funny that these people imagine they have a neutral point of view! I do not labor under any such illusion, but I also don't go around censoring and tossing people off of LENR-CANR because I disagree with them. On the contrary, I am trying to get more contributions from the arch-skeptical enemies of cold fusion. By the way, I do not think that the people at Wikipedia are violating Carbonnelle's right to free speech, or mine, for that matter. Wikipedia is a private organization run by a gang of fruitcakes. They can say anything they like. They can set any membership requirements they like, and accept or reject any member of the public. They don't have to have a reason. They have censored all references to LENR-CANR, which is fine with me. They would only be violating my free speech if they made efforts to shut down LENR-CANR, for example with a cyber-attack or a lawsuit. In my opinion, the Wikipedia people are hypocritical and they violate their own rules about things like neutrality, objectivity and civility. Any number of other people and organizations are guilty of this. It is not a legal matter. It is human nature. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:Contropedia
On 01/26/2010 05:27 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote: These people are extremists but so are the editors of the Scientific American, the Executive Director of the AIP and many others. Filing lawsuits would not improve this situation even if it were not a violation of free speech. They're not the Government, so it can't be. ... They would only be violating my free speech if they made efforts to shut down LENR-CANR, for example with a cyber-attack or a lawsuit. They can't violate your right to free speech, they're not the government. In the United States, your right to free speech refers to the fact that the government can't forbid you to say whatever you want in public. It doesn't have anything to do with your neighbor Joe punching you in the nose because he doesn't like your opinions. Unless Joe is a cop, the first amendment doesn't have *anything* to do with his expressions of anger or his efforts to shut you up. People seem to get confused about this -- a lot -- and it's worth pointing out that anything Wikipedia, or Exxon, or your neighbor Joe does to shut you up does *NOT* have *ANYTHING* to do with your first amendment right to free speech. Joe, or Exxon, or Wikipedia, on the other hand, may very well infringe your *CIVIL RIGHTS* which were codified some time back under Johnson, I think. The civil rights law has teeth and applies to individuals and NGOs. The so-called right to free speech, on the other hand, just constrains Congress and the States from making things you say illegal. You can say whatever you want about Obama, or George Bush, or King George, or Vladimir Putin, and not fear government reprisal. THAT is what Free Speech is about -- not about your right to get your message out on the Internet free of interference from private individuals who disagree with you. Free speech is incredibly important, but it's not a magic bullet for all communication problems. In my opinion, the Wikipedia people are hypocritical and they violate their own rules about things like neutrality, objectivity and civility. Any number of other people and organizations are guilty of this. It is not a legal matter. It is human nature. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:Contropedia
Stephen A. Lawrence wrote: THAT is what Free Speech is about -- not about your right to get your message out on the Internet free of interference from private individuals who disagree with you. However, private individuals and corporations cannot interfere with web sites they do not own. That is, they cannot hack them or cyber attack them. (The skeptics at Wikipedia who tossed out Carbonnelle do not actually own the web site. The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. does. The Foundation either lets the skeptics do as they please, or they are unaware of this situation. Either way, it is their business.) Years ago the status of the Internet was fuzzy. I asked the ACLU about this in the 1990s. They advised me that companies such as AOL and Compuserve were private and they could ban any communication they wanted. There was some discussion in the government and at the ACLU back then as to whether this was fair, but the topic faded away as the technology changed and the Internet opened up. Along the same lines, the fairness doctrine faded in importance and was rescinded as the number of television stations increased. For a time television and radio were in a fuzzy domain because they used the public airwaves -- a limited resource back then. In the 1990s the Internet evolved into a common carrier, like the phone company, and there are few legal restrictions to speech on such things. There is still a legal gray area about whether an ISP can silence a user, but I think you have to be in violation of something like the child pornography laws, or a Ponzi scheme, or illegal spamming before either the government or an ISP can ban you. It is unclear whether an ISP can be forced to host something like an extreme racist site. I think the Congress and courts have still not defined that to everyone's satisfaction. A common carrier, by the way, is: A business, including telephone and railroads, which is required by law to provide service to any paying customer on a first-come, first-serve basis. - Jed
Re: [Vo]:Contropedia
As they say, You vote with your dollar. I used to be a regular contributor to Wikipedia; but, have reduced my contributions significantly because there seem to be people who spend their day full time defending their positions. I can only wonder who is paying them. It is no longer me. T
Re: [Vo]:Physics Complete
--- On Tue, 1/26/10, Terry Blanton hohlr...@gmail.com wrote: HARIMA, JAPAN—Saying that there was no more knowledge to acquire about the physical nature of the universe, the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics announced Monday that it had concluded the scientific study of matter, energy, force, and motion. Yeah, that about does it for physics, said IUPAP member Sukekatsu Ushioda, snip For some reason, I could see that being one of Bob Park's What's New statements. He sure as hell seems to think this way. Hmm... Does the similarity mean that we should take Park's reporting about as seriously as The Onion? --Kyle
Re: [Vo]:Contropedia
At 02:27 PM 1/26/2010, you wrote: Just ignore it. Don't mess with free speech. I am editing papers for a REAL encyclopedia. Every once in a while authors will submit papers that include references to Wikipedia. I tell them all that such references are unacceptable. End of story. s
