More Wikileaks

So this Wikileaks stuff is still going, and there are two things that I would like to mention.

The first is that Kevin Rudd, the current Minister for Foreign Affairs and former PM has gone on record stating that Assange shouldn't be blamed for the leaks.

And former PM John Howard has also stated something similar.

It's good to see that two people who probably won't have the most flattering things said about them (Rudd is a control freak - US Embassy, Canberra) and Rudd has said that he is providing consular support. It's good to hear that our country is actually doing something.

The other thing is this "insurance.aes256" file that Wikileaks uploaded about a year ago. Since Assange's arrest people have been speculating on what will happen to this file.

So I'm going to jump on the rampant speculation bandwagon.

I think the file contains one of three possibilities:

1. Nothing
2. Uncensored documents
3. Stuff that's really important for various countries

Personally I'm leaning towards #3. Wikileaks has most likely managed to get their hands on some pretty interesting documents that they haven't released for whatever reason (right now I'm guessing insurance) which could be really damaging. Perhaps it's a bunch of "plans to deal with Wikileaks" from various countries, who knows.

The reason I think #3 is that these would be documents that are potentially damaging now, but, when they become irrelevant could simply be released later on.

#1 is more of a jerk move. It might not be nothing, it could just be a text document that says "thanks for downloading this for us". And #2 depends on the nature of the uncensored documents.

I guess we'll just have to be patient and find out when they release the password.

6 Degrees of Ken Doll

It's something from RationalWiki. They're calling it Hunt the Sausage. Basically you start at a random Conservapedia page and then try to find your way to one of the pet articles of the user "conservative". So you are trying to get to either their page on Evolution, Atheism or Homosexuality.

My first try I went from "Geometric progression" to "Interest" to "Interest rate" to "Usury" to "Homosexuality". According to Conservapedia usurers would end up in the same circle of hell as homosexuals.

I did make "Evolution" in three. Dave Rosenberg -> Fiscal conservatism -> Conservative -> Evolution. The link was that conservatives reject "junk science" such as evolution.

I'm playing the Ken Trio, but there are other kinds as well.

Liberal Broadband "Plan"

The Liberal Party have released their broadband plan. See apparently Labor's plan, which is spend $43 billion on a complete overhaul of the entire telecommunications network, is too expensive and probably too communist since the government is doing it. So the Liberal Party have decided that the best way to solve this is to spend $6.25 billion (broken down in various ways) and pretty much expect Telstra to do it in time.

The executive summary of "The Coalition's Plan for Real Action on Broadband and Telecommunications" reads:

The Coalition’s plan will deliver a uniform national broadband network, under which 97 percent of premises are able to be served by high speed networks capable of delivering from 100 Mbps down to a minimum of 12 Mbps peak speed, using a combination of technologies including HFC, DSL and fixed wireless.

I don't buy that one bit. I live in a middle class area, odds are I might get the "minimum" speed. I say that because I know that what will happen is that 12 Mbps will be the maximum available speed, and that's if they can even be bothered to upgrade the exchange any time soon.

Frankly I'd be surprised if 97% of the country will be able to get the minimum 12 Mbps peak speed.

As the Liberals go on to say:

Labor is heading down the wrong track. Its government owned and government run broadband network will be a taxpayer funded ‘white elephant’ when it is completed in eight years time. It does nothing to deliver lower prices. It just substitutes one monopoly for another. It gives no priority to those who do not get an adequate service today. Under Labor’s plan Australians will be waiting up to eight years before they see a change.

And? The only reason that NBN Co even exist is because Labor didn't like the offers from private companies and said "screw it we'll just do it ourselves". I do think that it's rather funny to see the Liberal party consider upgrading to fibre to the home as a "white elephant".

The rest is just empty rhetoric. I honestly prefer a government monopoly on telecommunication infrastructure then the current Telstra based monopoly. I don't actually mind waiting up to eight years because I know that my service will be improved.

But I shouldn't worry because apparently the Liberal plan will:

Instead of creating a new, inefficient Government run monopoly, the Coalition will create a vibrant, private sector-based broadband market, with Government involved to encourage competition and ensure services reach all Australians.

I don't see that happening. Telstra own basically all the infrastructure, and because they are forced to share they don't have any incentive to upgrade. That's certainly what I've noticed in my area.

Naturally the Liberal party have 13 points that make up their plan. In an earlier incarnation of this post I went through the points. But there is no point. There isn't a plan. It's not even a "plan", it's just "we'll give money to the private sector".

They want to waste time creating a "National Broadband Commission" so they can ask for tenders (again), they want a "National Broadband Database" which is to apparently gather information for no real reason, but has something to do with being able to "optimise" areas that are "underserved".

Frankly I don't see the private sector doing that any time soon. The underserved areas are either poor or in areas that are to expensive to connect to. They are areas that are unprofitable.

They're complaining that the Government is spending so much money and their plan is to give us much less and save two years doing so. So my options are wait 6 years and possibly get 12 Mbps or wait and extra 2 and get 100 Mbps.

Then they propose satellites. Labor promised satellites for those who can't be connected to the fibres, they also said that they would be 12 Mbps. The Liberals haven't even told us what speed people on the satellites would connect to.

Frankly their offer is a joke, and their section on how Labor has failed is even worse.

But there is a sad side to this. For once the Government have done the right thing, a comprehensive upgrade to our telecommunications systems and we've got a party who are trying to claim that they are "responsible" giving us crap. Who cares if Labor cancelled the coalition broadband policy when they came to power, they actually had something far superior.

But then I've noticed that many Australians fail to understand that the cheap option is not always the best one.

I might be against Labor's internet filter, but I'm now more inclined to preference them over the Liberal party.

Attorney-General's Department sure likes black highlighters

The Sydney Morning Herald managed to get their hands on a report that says the government pretty much wants ISPs to record all our browsing history.

Unfortunately it seems that Claudia Hernandez, the department's legal officer and person who handles FoI requests, tried to be helpful and highlighted all the important bits for the SMH. Too bad the highlighter was black, and the important parts is apparently 90% of the document.

Now unlike the CIA who've only just realised that they were using them accidentally, the government did this deliberately.

The Document

The document can be found here.

The proposal page is very enlightening:

Mandatory Data Retention Proposal

Telecommunications data is information about a communication, but does not include the content of the communication. Examples include subscriber information and call charge records.

[10 censored paragraphs follow]

That's the entire proposal that we're allowed to know. The contents of the document has a background a section A that discusses... something, and a section B that discusses something else, but Hernandez was kind enough to tell us that B.2 is "defintions" and B.3. is "Illustrative data". And C. is "Industry Feedback".

Of the background section, the "What is telecommunications data?" section is mostly unscathed, but it has the sentence:

This includes information about the identity of the sending and receiving parties ('A and B parties'), when a communication started and stopped, and the type of communication [censored]

The next section is "How important is telecommunications data?". The answer, apparently, is very. Of 5 paragraphs, one is uncensored, and is basically "The UK found that such a policy was helpful when it comes to solving crime".

Then we get four pages of what looks like a contents of some sort, but it's completely censored. Then four pages of a table, at least we know that the numbers are some sort of "Requirement", but what they are means nothing.

Most of the definitions get off unscathed, however the definition for Broadband Remote Access Server (BRAS) has the last line censored, so I know that it is aggregating information into a core network of some sort.

All the illustrative data (it's another table) is censored.

The "feedback" is not actually any feedback, it's a request for feedback. They are asking ISPs to consider 8 questions, of which we're only allowed to know 5.

So basically you can learn nothing from this document.

The Reasons

But the SMH didn't stop there. They've also given us the reasons from the AG department.

Under "Decision" Hernandez wrote:

3. You will see, however, that I have made some deletions to the documents. ...

Which is, quite clearly, an understatement. It wasn't "some deletions", most of the document is censored. There are two pages that don't have black highlighter. The "Information Sheet" page, and the title page.

Then there is, in paragraph 11 under "Reasons for Decision":

Further, subsection 36(1)(b) [of the Freedom of Information Act] requires that it also be shown that disclosure would be contrary to the public interest. I have considered the particular circumstances of the request and those factors which are specific to the facts at hand. Although I acknowledge the public's right to participate in and influence the processes of government decision making and policy formulation, given the early stage of this consultation, the premature release of the proposal could, more then likely, create a confusing and misleading impression. In addition, as the matters are not settled and proposed recommendations may not necessarily be adopted, release of such documents would not make a valuable contribution to public debate. Rather, I consider that release of such documents may lead to premature unnecessary debate and could potentially prejudice and impede government decision making

Yep. The premature release of the proposal could create a confusing and misleading impression. Clearly the answer to that problem is not any form of transparency at all but instead it's to get out the black highlighter.

And why? Because it might lead to "unnecessary debate". This is not an unnecessary debate. The government is potentially suggesting, and Electronic Frontiers Australia put it best, that "if it's logged (or could be logged), the A-G wants it saved."

Frankly I find it more insulting that they even bothered to give the SMH something. If you're going to censor most of the document you might as well not release it at all.

The Greens are annoyed and will probably look into this during their Senate inquiry. Maybe they'll get a more transparent version if the document. They might know what the other two questions in the "feedback" section are and also the four completely censored definitions.

Perhaps they'll be kind enough to tell us what they are.

Well I haven't written for a month...

... or have I?

Well, from a "what have I published" perspective, no. I haven't written anything.

The thing is that I actually have written posts.

I don't really know about other people, but I get ideas and start writing them down, and then I find them to be stupid. Other times I start writing on certain issues and find that I can't find enough information, or I just get distracted.

I'll start writing something from an emotional standpoint and then I look for information to double check things and I start to lose those emotions and then I start to wonder why I even bothered writing all that stuff.

I think I need to re-think how I write this blog. I'm thinking that I'll make sure I get at least one post per week on something. The topic shouldn't really matter, I should just write something.

More on Ubisoft's DRM

If you're reading this then you've most likely read my previous post regarding Ubisoft's DRM for Assassin's Creed II.

I want to write my own review of the game, but I don't know how many spoilers I want to include (if any) but I want to get this out there.

First off, my opinion of the DRM now that I've actually got the game is that it's not as bad as I first thought.

It doesn't use that much bandwidth, probably because I've turned off the cloud saving.

But it still sucks and I still don't like it. Right now I have to make sure that anything else that's downloading isn't, and that includes Windows updates, so no downloading pod- or vodcasts while playing single player games, or frankly, downloading anything because the game becomes a little glitchy.

At one point I wanted to play the game and had to spend some time figuring out why my internet connection wasn't working properly, which if I was playing any other single player game, even those using Steam, I could play offline without worrying.

But the most annoying thing is being interrupted in cutscenes or a fight where all of a sudden you get a message telling you that it's trying to re-connect to the server. Then I have to see what is causing the problem, if it's indeed something on my end or actually just some stupid thing out of my control.

It ruins the experience. Especially when you're at say, the pivotal moment of the reveal and then you're given the crappy gaming equivalent of the intermission in Monty Python, only with fewer colours and no organ music.

But if this Escapist article is anything to go by, other people are just as annoyed when the server happens to go down. That is something beyond their control.

Personally I believe that Ubisoft should not take the stance that those of us who bought/received legitimate copies of this game as our approval of the DRM. The reason that there are people who aren't pirating the game is because they want to acknowledge the work of the programmers, not the idiots who thought the DRM would be a good idea.

At least Steam give us an offline mode.

More on the Australian Internet Filter

This is some more information that I've managed to find, continuing on from yesterday's post. The move is becoming controversial and it looks like news bodies outside of Australia are starting to take notice. Google News already has a list of articles, some of which are from Australia and some are foreign which talk about this.

Google joins the anti-filter side

The Official Google Australia Blog has a post on their views of the filter.

Google has joined the list of groups that don't like the filter. Remember that groups that oppose the filter aren't just groups like the EFA but also groups like Save the Children. As well as essentially all the ISPs in the country.

They link to an interesting report from professors Catharine Lumby, Leila Green and John Hartley titled Untangling the Net: The Scope of Content Caught by Mandatory Internet Filtering, but more on that later.

They do make a good point in one case though, their SafeSearch allows the search engine to filter out unsavoury content. It must work quite well because Cracked have an article that uses the filter (for porn, so I guess that even though it's censored it will be blocked if the filter goes through.

There is one thing that they add though, Germany has a filter but it only filters child porn. Not potentially most of the internet.

Part of the issue, as I said yesterday, is that it's not just the Government's job to protect people on the Internet, it's also the role of parents to be vigilant and to teach their kids about internet safety. It appears that many, if not most Australians understand this, but some groups don't.

They also add that controversial topics should not be censored because it stifles discussion. This is correct. But most people will agree that it's quite fine to censor child porn because it's one issue that is believed to be wrong by most people regardless of their views on other things.

However stifling discussion is not a valid proposal.

The Filter and Euthanasia

This article was on the ABC today. Apparently the filter will restrict information about euthanasia.

Now it is clear that euthanasia is a touchy issue in society. However this is one of the issues that should not be censored.

Dr. Phillip Nitschke, a prominent voluntary euthanasia advocate has some of his websites listed on the ACMA blacklist.

Michael Duffy reported on the adding of Nitschke's work to the blacklist back in May. And if you search for the website for the online version of his book The Peaceful Pill Handbook on the Wikileaks copy of the blacklist you will find it there (just search for "peacefulpillhandbook.com") right below partypoker.

But this is not the only issue where we see information being censored.

The Report

We now turn back to the report that I mentioned earlier (link to article here).

The key findings are listed on page ii.

Overall the conclusion is that there shouldn't be a filter. Especially based on Australian law and the scope of the blacklists. It also states that it may lull people into a false sense of security.

One of the interesting things that they found was that only 32% of the blacklisted stuff was child pornography. Some of this content that has been prohibited falls under R18+ and X18+ classifications from the Office of Film and Literature Classification and are technically permitted as long as they are not sold to people under 18.
Yet it states that at present there is a strange contradiction in that under voluntary filtering X18+ is prohibited (so for internet purposes it's Refused Classification).

Strange huh? You can buy porn from stores in the ACT, or over the phone, but you're not allowed to do it over the internet.

But it lists various other hypothetical websites that could be considered RC based on their content including a website for LGBT people to discuss their sexuality, or a literary website. Which just goes to show that the classification system has the potential to paint most of the internet as RC, and therefore fair game for any filter.

Other potential issues include transparency, the article suggests some form of judicial review on blacklisted sites. But also whether we should be allowed to know what is on the blacklist. And also a section on balancing the filter, what happens if we over or under filter.

At present though we have to wait until Labor draft some legislation to see how some of these issues are sorted out.

Wanted, Reliable Proxies. Apply in Australia.

The government has given the go ahead for an internet filter. This has been an issue since the previous government but the measures were not so drastic. At present we are looking at the possibility of adults being prevented from looking at legal websites as they are advertently and inadvertently blocked, or a massive throttling of broadband speeds from either active or passive filtering. Something that goes against the Federal Government's attempt to provide Australians with faster internet. It also may see websites blocked by groups who wish to censor content for certain arguments, violating ideals that Australians believe in.

Electronic Frontiers Australia has a site on the feed.

The October Report: What may be censored

Part of it has to do with the content that is filtered.

The recent October report from the government about the filter states that Enex (which I believe is the company that did the test) used the ACMA (the Australian Communication and Media Authority) blacklist.

Wikileaks managed to obtain a copy of the blacklist, I'm using the most recent one that I could find, dated 18 March 2009.

Now some of the sites listed I can understand. They are sites that clearly violate laws in this country with content such as child porn. That's fair, and I think many people would agree with that.

But other websites are on there as well. Wikileaks itself is on the list, after ACMA added their page on Denmak's Internet Black List. As are three youtube links, a page from the Zombie Survival Wiki on tips and tricks, and three pages from Encyclopedia Dramatica (Offended, Kittens and something called "snapesnogger". I don't read ED, so I don't know) and a couple of pages from Wikipedia. There may be some legitimate, legal porn sites on there too, but I'm afraid to check because some of the URLs don't really make themselves clear.

The report continues to tell us on page 15:

Inappropriate for children test list
Content on the inappropriate for children test list included:

• Gambling
• Adult
• Lingerie/Swimsuit
• Drug-advocacy
• Nudism
• Gross-content
• Profanity
• Racism/Hate
• Sex
• Terrorism/Crime

This is the content inappropriate for children. Will homes without children be able to opt out of this? As far as I'm aware nobody will be able to opt out completely, but we would be able to opt out of this stuff.

I guess this will bring about a censorship of the news though. Many news sites have been using some of the things in that list to get more people to click on links.

Connection Throttling And the Filters: The ACMA Report

Will the filter (or filters) chosen throttle connections. This is also based on how well they block since this variable will weigh more heavily on the Government's choice of filter then speed. Looking at this report from ACMA gives us individual results in Appendix F and grouped results on other pages.

The report itself gives graphs showing that over between 2005 - 2008 the abilities of ISP filters has improved. Except in performance, where we see on page 5 that in the three years between tests that the range has increased dramatically.

Moving on to Appendix F, which is a breakdown of the filters. We can see that some of the filters were pretty good in a passive mode, but in an active mode filters like Alpha and Gamma would throttle a connection. Theta was a major exception, throttling when it was passively filtering.

We don't know how much any of these filters cost, but it would be terrible if either of these were the cheapest. (Personally I think that the Delta filter is the best to choose in terms of active filtering.) Knowing the Australian Government they are going to choose the cheapest because if there is one problem that Governments in Australia have it's that they think in the short term, not the long term.

If we find that Alpha or Gamma are chosen then the Government will have a lot of pressure when it comes to who is next on the list for the National Broadband Network (incidentally, Tasmania was first and they are already in stage 2. It also makes it completely pointless. Part of the idea was to make Australia more attractive to businesses. Being told that they might have to use internet with a filter that would throttle speeds by 80% is not attractive at all.

At present the issue would be moot in a place like Tasmania, which will have had the broadband upgrades completely finished by July next year, but would affect the other states that have not, which for some people would be "welcome to broadband, just as fast as dial-up."

Ramifications of Blacklists and Censorship

Websites will need to be identified before they are blocked. A complaint will need to be lodged with ACMA and they will do something and the website may be put on the list. (As I understand it's Phase 1. Collect Websites. Phase 2. ? Phase 3. Blacklist). It was found on the Wikileaks blacklist that a website of a dentist was on the blacklist.

As noted in the Sydney Morning Herald article just linked, being blacklisted gives the impression that your website hosts content that is very unsavoury. If the filter was in effect and a page appeared to notify you that the page you are viewing is blacklisted then what will you think?

Without proper oversight, which also includes ACMA actually checking the websites to make sure that they complaint is valid, the ACMA blacklist may end up being like the Hollywood Blacklist of 1950's America, you're on the list you're guilty, even if you aren't. Will there be methods available to stop the abuse of such a blacklist?

This raises issues regarding how extensive the blacklist will be. Will all pages of a website be blocked? Or will each individual sub-page be blocked depending on the content?

If it is the former then there are further ramifications that may actually infringe on the few constitutional rights that we have as well as other legal avenues that may arise through being thought of as guilty by association.

As there are a couple of Wikipedia pages on the ACMA blacklist, will that affect access to Wikipedia in general?

Do People Want A Filter?

In most cases it appears to be a no. According to the Sydney Morning Herald back in February 26 stated that a Galaxy poll conducted around that time found that only 5% of people (of 1100) wanted the ISP to filter, and 4% wanted the Government to do it.

In another poll of 10 000 Netspace customers 61% of people opposed such a move.

It isn't just opinion polls of random Australians that show this. The ABC reported back in July that the organisation Save the Children have stated that the filter won't protect children and it won't stop child porn from being leaked around the internet.

And today we see that The Greens have also opposed such a move, joining numerous other groups, like the EFA (linked to at the start of this post), GetUp!, the Australian Sex Party (who state the filter 95% of all porn sites which, in terms of the popular view of the internet is most of it.) and other groups who consider it to be a waste.

Groups that will support such a measure are primarily religious. And this is an important point to be made.

Potential Legislation and the Senate

According to Opposition Senator Nick Minchin (Liberal Party) legislation will be required for Australia to undertake such a task. I assume that has more to do with punishments for circumventing the filter and issues regarding defamation from being added to the blacklist for no good reason rather the censorship.

The reason I say that is because in terms of free speech Australia is a country where it is enshrined as an ideal, not a political reality. We have no right to free speech, the closest we have is that you aren't allowed to censor political communication.

This aside if legislation is required then the odds are that it will easily pass the Lower House based on numbers and the party line being enforced. The real fight will be in the Senate. The passing or defeat of this bill relies on a majority in the Senate, and it looks like Labor will need to woo many people into joining them.

In October of 2008 it was reported that Steve Fielding would support the filter if it would block all porn, and Nick Xenophon would try to use the bill to block foreign gambling sites (following his platform of "no pokies").

At present however only one of these two key members of the Senate support the filter. That member is Steve Fielding, the Family First Party.

For those that don't know, Family First are essentially the religious party in Australian Politics and they hold one of the two important positions in the Senate.

Nick Xenophon is the sole independent senator in the Senate, and a senator from my home state of South Australia. In a Q&A with ARN in November of this year, Xenophon has stated that he does not support the mandatory filtering of the internet.

Essentially at present the Senate would be hostile to filtering legislation. With the Coalition, the Greens and Xenophon voting no, and all along party lines, then the Senate would be hostile to any filtering legislation. It is quite possible that it will fail in the Senate.

I would question whether Tony Abbott, the Liberal leader and devout Christian, would pressure the Senate Liberals into voting for the bill, but I suspect that even he sees that it would cause him to lose leadership as it would probably fragment the party even more.

This issue will not go away however, but if the mandatory filtering does manage to pass through Parliament, or is implemented in another way, it will most likely become an election issue at the next election.

We may see either a change of government or a radical change in the political makeup of both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Conclusions

What should be concluded from this? Well firstly it's that we do need proper protections of our rights. It is not good enough to see them as ideals that are culturally engrained, because it allows for abuses of power. This is part of the issue here. Will we see the abuse of power from minorities who don't want people to have access to certain information because they don't agree with it?

Will we see proper oversight of the ACMA blacklist, and if other, foreign, blacklists are used (like say the UK's Internet Watch Foundation blacklist) what chances of recourse will we have if they blacklist a site?

And do we need filtered internet? In terms of protecting children it seems that most Australians feel that it should be the job of parents and not the government. Groups like Save the Children prefer proper education rather then stopping everyone from visiting certain sites. If these groups see that filtering is not the right way to go then the claim that "it's to protect the children" is more likely to be a smokescreen.

Like issues regarding the media part of the onus is on the viewer. If you don't like what it is that you are watching/listening to/reading then you should stop. Change the channel or radio station, turn the page or close the tab. Don't try to force your morality on other people, which appears to be part of the reason for this filter in the first place. Just because you don't like websites that feature legal porn does not mean that you can tell me that I can't look at that legal porn.

At present this issue is not even at a stage where you could make a bill. There are too many holes, not enough oversight and quite possibly secret blacklists. The fight may be far from over, but it's not one we can afford to lose.

Accountability of Demagoguery Creating Disinformation

Every now and then you'll see on RationalWiki's What is going on at Conservapedia page entries referring to "conservative words" and "geometric growth". The page they refer to is this one.

Which raises the question, what is a "conservative word"? If you can be bothered to read the Conservapedia article you will see that the words in this title are actually in the list of "conservative words".

This raises a second question, how exactly do you define a word as a "conservative" or "liberal"?

My gut says that all words are inherently neutral until they are used by someone to express an opinion using a political viewpoint.

The thing is that Conservapedia don't seem to give a definition of how you can tell if a word is "conservative" or if it is "liberal". Without at least explaining how words fit into these two groups it's quite simple for anyone to say that the list is useless.

Based on the edit history and also the words chosen for the "conservative" and the "liberal" section, it's rather clear that the words in the "liberal" section are ones that they don't seem to like. The converse is also true. Words like "atheism", "quote mining", and even "Big Bang" are classed as "liberal" while words like "competitive", "cross-examination", and even "demagogue" are listed as "conservative". Some of the other "conservative" words include things like "Good Samaritan" or "Trojan Horse". Apparently "local" is a "conservative" word, as is "transistor". Even "conservation of charge" which is more of a phrase then a word is "conservative".

The other thing that should be noticed is that the words are also being added to the list to create a geometric rate. They are giving this in the form of "1-2-4-8", starting at 1612, because of the King James Version. I'm starting at 1600 because that's where their table starts.

In the 1600's the number of new "conservative" words was 14, or on average 0.14 new words per year. 1700's, 28 (0.28), 1800's, 56 (0.56) and in the last century 112 or about 1.12 words are year. That means that last century we apparently saw a new "conservative" word every year. That would mean that at the end of this century we should see 224 new "conservative" words.

I'm aware that new words don't appear in a nice progression like that. If that were true we should already have about 20 new "conservative" words by now. According to the table the number is 5 (preliminary).

The other question is if "1000 new words are created every year" what will happen when the growth of "conservative" words exceeds the "actual" growth of words? Does that mean that the actual growth of words will increase? Or will the number be bound by 1000?

Lastly I think it's fair to ask how you could include words that predate modern conservatism as "conservative"? To someone from the 1600's a modern conservative would appear to be extremely liberal to them. If conservatism was really on an "inevitable triumph" wouldn't that mean that the world should technically be more conservative compared to someone in the 1600's?

Oh, and my own personal opinion of the article: It's completely bollocks.

Conservapedia v. Student Sixteen

I honestly feel sorry for Student Sixteen. The comments on this homework (If it doesn't work try here.

I mean this person who is apparently called Charles Thoreaux actually did quite well in my opinion, based on what I have seen of these "World History" homeworks.

I wonder what exactly Andrew Schlafly uses as a benchmark to mark people. Compare the above to Student Eleven.

I know I'm not a teacher, but if I were I would not have given Student Eleven 100%, I would probably give a low pass mark because said student did give dates.

However, I get the feeling that Student Sixteen has actually done some research regarding Roman Philosophy. Sixteen chose Marcus Aurelius as his favourite Emperor because of his philosophical insight. Unfortunately he is getting marks from a guy who thinks that the Romans didn't actually do anything apart from conquer the Mediterranean and most of Western Europe and build roads.

You even see this regarding his comment on the answer to Question H1 (it's an "honours" question). Student Sixteen mentions Greek Philosophers in his answer, and then mentions Roman Philosophers who were influenced by them, apparently Cicero, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius and Virgil were all Greeks. Who knew?

The sad thing in a way is that for someone who does that "honours" question, you have to work around the definition of "truth" that Schlafly uses, a "truth" that involves the Bible and Christianity. So in essence the question is flawed to the extent that every civilisation before the birth of Christianity would not know what "truth" is.

I mean this student actually picks up and mentions the flaw in the question (judging an entire civilisation based on the actions of one man, in this case Pontius Pilate).

I think in a way the irony of the question is that Schlafly claimed that the Romans just took what the Greeks had with regards to philosophical ideas and ran with it, without making their own contributions, but still somehow can think that they wouldn't have applied Greek philosophical teaching to their lives. It doesn't make any sense.

I would, to be honest, have not deducted any marks in that case because I think he answered the question quite well there. He gave examples (albeit more passively) that shows that the question is wrong, and showed the main flaw in the question.

Other instances that make me feel for the guy is that he lost marks on a question about Latin because he didn't argue for the "inherent advantages" of Latin (which, by the way, was based on what I think is a rather ridiculous definition of "caveat emptor") which somehow means there is a "Liberal bias".

Schlafly's comment regarding question 3 ("more depth in analysis is needed") is rather hypocritical considering that Student Eleven answered the same question with far less depth then Student Sixteen did. Eleven gets full marks for writing something along the lines of "The Eastern Roman Empire had fewer attacks then the Western Empire and lasted far longer". I'm trying to be grammatically correct here and make sure you understand what I'm going on about.

So if I was to take any lesson away on Schlafly marking things then it would have to be "you can be as grammatically incorrect as you want as long as you spell your words right".

That being said, I would never give Student Sixteen full marks, because there were some answers that were clearly wrong, and a lack of dates in answers that should have them would also mean that you couldn't give full marks either.

The last thing that I am going to comment on is that I don't believe that Student Sixteen should lose marks because of a perceived bias, which is clearly what happened in question six. Question seven is a different can of worms. I feel that the answer that was given is actually quite good, the problem is that Schlafly undercuts his own comment regarding deducting marks and opinions, by having done exactly that in the previous question.

Question six was worded in such a way that you would be getting opinions as answers. Nobody, anywhere knows all the facts for a current event, because it is exactly that, a current event. It's pretty easy to form an opinion of the US at present based on the Fall of Rome, however it is ultimately opinion.

I think that most people who know anything about Conservapedia understand that Schlafly is not the most consistent of markers.

Hiatus

I'm leaving for a bit (two months) so there isn't going to be any new posts until I get back.

So you are more then welcome to read the archives.

Bible Quiz

Just a little fun thing for you to try.

The Freedom From Religion Bible Quiz.

See how well you do. I got 30 out of 50.

I don't really want to spoil the quiz, or inflate the results, so I'll try to be as vague as possible.

The last actual commandment is actually quite interesting. I think I'll have to re-read Exodus.

All Christians are wrong when it comes to who created evil.

It's very odd to read what the Bible says about how you should feel about killing babies.

You really have to wonder what Jesus thinks about his own father who his himself.

The Problem with Wikipedia and WWI In Games

My though process for this post is based on this xkcd comic on Wikipedia.

I remember starting my search on the film Full Metal Jacket (which was on SBS last night, it's 2am when I write this so it's valid). I then went to the article on the film Paths of Glory. That took me to an article on a board game called Paths of Glory. That was the most direct route (the indirect involves things like Blackadder Goes Forth and the 1914 Christmas truce and the 1915 football game) The flash game Dog Fight: The Great War sprang to my mind.

Now here is the interesting thing. Beyond flash games like Dog Fight that I linked to above, or Warfare 1917 the gaming world is, as Gamespot says for this review, under-represented in games. Yes, there was in Rise of Nations and Empire Earth II and I'm also assuming other games of that type, have such a concept, but it isn't really the same thing.

I guess it's a little hard to make a WWI game. Although untrue, the popular perception of WWI is summed up nicely in the last episode of Blackadder:

[B]oth sides advanced further during one Christmas piss-up than the next two years of war

In the European theatre this is basically true. WWI was basically long periods of nothing followed by extreme action. I know I'm describing something else (technically the narrative of Mafia is like that, except you only play the action) but I can't remember what it is.

It would be unappealing to play a game like that.

I can already think of one exception. Paul Erich von Lettow-Vorbeck commander of the forces of German East Africa in WWI. His army was the only one of the German colonies to be undefeated. He ran a very fluid campaign, although this was essentially to tie up as many Allied forces as possible, which he did quite well.

You could make a game about that. But I'm guessing that the reason that you don't seem to find one (or that at least I haven't found one) is because a) it's German not Allied, and b) He surrendered peacefully on November 14, after a British magistrate called Hector Croad notified him that the war was over.

As I see it WWI and WWII were a turning point in conventional warfare (like Vietnam was a turning point in unconventional warfare). WWI saw the end to the traditional army. From then on people wouldn't fight on a single battlefield or a series of battlefields with set armies, but saw the "scope" of a battlefield increase exponentially. It also saw the end of traditional tactics, something that many Generals at that time did not seem to comprehend.

WWII saw the rise of very fluid warfare. In a way it was an about face when it came to taking land, but the emphasis turned towards mobility rather then strength alone.

Both wars saw a change in the use of technology and the use of different types of "unit" (I am thinking games here, remember) and tactics to win.

The question is how to translate WWI into a dedicated game. Personally I have no clue what to do for an FPS. I'm sure that you could have a Battlefield-type game, but maps would be limited since jumping out of your trench would most likely equal suicide.

I personally have a bit of an aversion to a total RTS or TBS. I don't really like the idea of having to build proper bases on the battlefield in question ("Hold your fire, I SAID HOLD YOUR FIRE, I need some men so I can build a farm right outside this trench") and I don't really like the idea of taking turns to move people around and fight.

I think that an RTS/TBS (like Aggression: Reign over Europe for example or a Total War game) would probably be the better option. Think about it. You could make your units away from the battlefields (like in real life) and send them there, and have the fighting in real time. Although I still don't know how you would get the fighting done properly. But you would have the advantages of a better overall diplomatic system (something which you would have to implement a "carry over" system for in a total RTS) and a wider variety of things that could be done.

There is one more alternative that I have thought of. Expanding on the "Home City" concept from Age of Empires III. Either have a bunch of cards that you can select to be sent to you, or you could have a "home city" in real time that you could switch to. The added advantage would be that you could ensure that the levels go to specific points of action. I suspect however that this option might be hard to implement without a really, really good system to play it on.

But I'll close with what I have said now, and I'll open the floor to anyone else who has a better clue then I would about why WWI isn't represented as well in games as other wars. Oh, and does anyone know if someone has made a game on the Korean War?

Interesting Developments

Firstly, I have to apologise to Robert Lancaster and his wife for this post. I've been a bit naughty.

I've been looking at the blog that has appeared, replacing the excellent Sylvia Browne articles written by Robert Lancaster.

As we all know, Robert Lancaster's website, Stop Sylvia Browne has been taken over by someone.

That's right. I now have no clue as to who owns the website. According to the site, it now supposedly belongs to a bloke called Matt.

See, as far as I can tell this Matt clearly isn't Boris Kreiman.

As a side, the linked page says that Kreiman has been accused of taking anabolic steroids. Clearly I don't know what they do, since Kreiman is a chess player. I mean I'd understand if it was say, chess boxing, but chess???

Anyway.

This person is asking (I'm trying out the "nofollow" html, so I hope it works, unless Blogger is already using it, then it would be a bit redundant.) for people to submit evidence of readings whether successful or not.

Sounds like this has never been done before right?

Oh wait, just take a look at this Sylvia Browne related link.

Yep.

Robert Lancaster has tried to get people to provide examples of readings being successful.

Doesn't seem to have worked at present.

Well the comments are interesting, there is somebody there called "Mike" who is claiming that Stop Sylvia Browne is biased against Sylvia Browne.

He also suggests that people who support Sylvia Browne should link to that site.

I think that if they want to support her they should link to say Go Sylvia Browne. Yep, there already is a site dedicated to supporting Sylvia Browne.

The one thing that I'm assuming will happen is that what once was Stop Sylvia Browne will turn into a pro-SB site.

Stop Sylvia Browne Still Lives On

Stop Sylvia Browne

Take that people on the internet who support Sylvia Browne and were most likely cheering for the demise of the site. You've lost anyway.

This is an excellent site, with plenty of resources that show how Sylvia Browne is a fraud and a liar etc.

I know that many of the people who read this blog will know of the site, I just thought that I would point it out.

And considering recent events involving the original domain name being taken over by an apologetic, foolish, possibly illegal "entrepreneur" slash "chess grandmaster" most things are well with the universe.

Except people who find news sources with the old address on it.

However, in the vein of Stop Kaz, RSL's family has found a new place to host all the lovely, eye opening information about everybody's favourite psychic, Sylvia Browne on the Kaz-like address of Stopsylvia.com.

If you really want to help, link to the new site. And make the git who pounced on the old domain rue the day they chose to hijack a site with a good search ranking by moving it off the first page of google.

A Challenge to The Skeptic Zone

I've been listening to The Skeptic Zone. (I also was the first person to digg the site, but do I get credit for that? No...)

It's an excellent podcast (at least at the moment).

However, I've got a bone to pick with them.

It has to do with their theme song.

You can download it from the link above.

It has to do with the lyrics:

"The Skeptic Zone,
a miracle of technology.
A universe of reason,
the Skeptic Zone"

Now my problem is the bolded bit. I'm skeptical of that if you will.

I want them, and I feel quite confident that someone who has something to do with it will find their way here, maybe from the JREF forum.

Prove to me that The Skeptic Zone is indeed a miracle of technology.

Honestly. How do we know that there wasn't some other schmo out there who wanted to start a podcast called "The Skeptic Zone" and was beaten by you guys.

I can put money on it if you want but then I'll have to create some criteria.

I'm thinking something along the lines of "prove beyond a reasonable doubt that The Skeptic Zone is indeed a miracle and that nothing else could have created it".

And if you do you can win 1,168.46 dollars*. To be paid to you in person when you were last in Adelaide.¹

I await your response.²

By the way, to other people who still haven't figured out what I am going on about, go to The Skeptic Zone page and find out.

For once there is a podcast where the Australians (i.e. all the main people) all sound normal compared to the Yanks.

*By dollars I mean Zimbabwe dollars and by 1,168.46, I mean 10 Australian. This is the current exchange rate from here at 2008.10.10 14:02:22 UTC.

¹And if you are wondering, yes. I did choose my "criteria" from here

²If you haven't figured it out by now, this is a joke. Just listen to the damn podcast...

What Are We Going To Do About VenomFangX?

Before I start, there will be many Youtube videos on this post, some of which you may have to watch. I will be sure to keep it at a reasonable amount though. The videos are provided for those that don't have a clue as to what I am going on about.

It all starts a week ago with this video:



VenomFangX (or Posterboy for Creationist Stupidity, PCS for short), decided to file DMCA claims against Thunderf00t because, as far as I can tell, Thunderf00t had the gall to use portions of VFX's videos for the purposes of education.

That falls under "Fair Use" of US copyright law, since we all know that the internet is under the jurisdiction of the United States. Actually I don't have a clue on legal matters and jurisdiction, I think it has more to do with where the webiste itself is and not the individual Youtube user.

At the time, Thunderf00t responded with the following video:



And then when more information came up this one:



The second video here is actually an important one. We learn that another Youtube user who filed a bunch of DMCA claims on VFX behalf actually said that Thunderf00t most likely wasn't breaking the law.

A couple of days ago Thunderf00t posted the following video:



Which outlines a case involving a guy called Crook, who had to read an apology for his actions online. It sounded like there wasn't going to be too much VFX and Thunderf00t facing each other in court, and more of VFX having to read an apology.

As a side note, he mentions a user called LiberalViewer, part 1 of his videos on him and Viacom can be found here.

This has divided people. There are people who want to see VFX fry and there are people who agree with Thunderf00t.

kurtilein3 is one of the VFX should fry group:



Now I do agree with much of what he has to say. He has a good point, VFX broke the law and he should be punished.

It also raises the good question of what is a foreigner supposed to do if their videos are DMCA'd. What exactly are we supposed to do? Do we have to hire a lawyer in the US or is there some provision in the DMCA for such a problem?

There are quite a few flaws with the DMCA, but I'm not going to get into that.

Essentially VFX deserves to face a punishment for willingly breaking the law.

themaskedanalyst, however makes a very, very good point:



At present I am swayed by his argument. (a response specifically to kurtilein3 can be found here.

In kurtilien3's case, he has been rather annoyed at the censorship that goes on at Youtube and their lax policy of actually determining whether a video is breaking copyright or not. Especially since ExtantDodo has been suspended again.

I don't know about the other VFX should fry people, but kurtilein3 seems to be of the opinion that DE was affected by the VFX DMCA spree (the linked video thinks Creation Sceince Evangelism, Kent Hovind's people who would be more likely be the culprits here).

However I am confused at the moment because of the lack of information regarding the Thunderf00t/VFX situation. Since we haven't actually heard anything from Thunderf00t, we don't know the details of the settlement at all.

I'm confused as to my course of action. I can't choose a side here.

There is one thing that I am certain of. I don't support the "flag the VFX apology video" idea from kurtilein3 without knowing all the details first. At present that is a stupid idea because we don't know enough about the settlement.

I agree that the video would be humbling, but I do want to see VFX answer to a court because of his actions.

The one thing that I do want to know about this apology is whether he will have to allow free commenting on that video instead of the moderation that he currently uses to censor dissent from his videos.

Voices In Unison

While researching stuff for my last post, I found myself at Ex Scientology Kids (which I found through Operation Clambake).

Anyway, they have started their second submission period of Voices in Unison. But they also have put up the stories from the first one.

If you are someone who doesn't really know too much about Scientology, but wants to hear some stories about it then you should really go here.

These people are not celebrities, so they don't get the "baby-Scientology" that Tom Cruise goes on and on about. They are the regular people in proper Scientology, the one that critics and Anonymous don't like.

The one that needs to change.

Bork Bork Bork.

I fuoond thees vheele-a guugleeng.

It's a bork feelter.

Noo iff yuoo hefe-a Fureffux (Teke-a thet IE!) yuoo tuu cun eejuy veb peges thet reed leeke-a zee Svedeesh Cheff frum zee Mooppet Shoo.

Vhy nut luuk et thees veet it oon?

Oor vhy nut check oooot zee heeleriuoos seete-a Preesunplunet?

Leern ebooot "sceeence-a" frum ieezeer zee Deescufery Institoote-a, oor Unsvers in Genesees?

It elsu trunsletes blug pusts.

Audiosurf

I've become hooked on Audiosurf. If you download the demo be aware of two things, first you need to get Steam to play it, and second you'll only be able to play five songs.

The US$9.99 is worth it though, especially since the real dollar (Aussie) is nearly at parity.

As I said, I've become hooked.

What I have found is the following:

1. The hardest song that I have encountered is "Million Way of Drum" by Force of Nature. I guess that's how the game engine designates blocks and such because there are millions of them since the song is basically, as the name suggests, drums (there is a bass guitar in it for a little bit as well).
2. The songs "Kalinka" and "Korobelniki" as sung by the Russian Red Army Choir give plenty of red blocks.
3. I haven't tried it yet but I think that it would be entirely possible to listen to say Skeptoid while you play. I don't know if it recognises a difference between podcasts and songs.
4. No matter how obscure you think something is, there will usually be someone who already holds the #1 spot.

I'd say get it and have fun. The game is fun, and the music is always excellent.