[Quote...]

The world’s rarest cat, the Amur leopard, is facing extinction in the wild, conservationists have warned.

They have blamed a recent decision by the Russian government to approve an oil pipeline through the leopards’ only habitat, on the harsh eastern coast.

It is estimated that only about 30 of the animals survive in the wild.

Human settlements and forest fires have already pushed the Amur leopard to the brink of extinction – there are more in captivity than there are in the wild.

At the end of December, Russia approved a plan for a pipeline bringing oil from Siberia to a new terminal on the coast, opening up export routes to east Asia.

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The pipeline will pass through the Amur leopards’ only remaining range – and conservationists working with the Zoological Society of London say it could be the last straw.

They are appealing to the Russian government to re-route the pipeline and give the world’s rarest cat one more life.

…And it’s not just the leopards who are in the sights of the oil companies;

The Sakhalin Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North have chosen January 20, 2005 as a day to protest the two oil and gas pipelines that are being developed by Exxon, Shell, British Petroleum, Sakhalin Energy and their subsidiaries…..

….The indigenous peoples of Sakhalin, who practice a traditional self-subsistence economy based on fishing, hunting, reindeer herding and wild plant gathering, disproportionately suffer the negative ecological impacts of the pipeline project.

Structural engineering has destroyed reindeer pastures and forests and works on the shelf have led to an abrupt decline in fish stocks, making traditional handicrafts the only source of livelihood. The absence of complete and reliable project information and the companies’ unwillingness to seriously dialogue with indigenous peoples’ organizations have forced them to commence a process of civil disobedience. …

….representatives of Sakhalin Energy Investment Company Ltd and Exxon Oil and Gas Ltd are putting pressure upon participants of Green Wave protest action. For past several days their representatives visited indigenous people settlements and tried to persuade them not to participate in the action. They also threatened to fire those employees who would participate in the action – about 30 indigenous people representative are involved in different oil companies’ projects. These people receive threats to be fired even if their relative would participate in the protest. For today there was a meeting with indigenous groups scheduled by Exxon Oil and Gas Ltd – also aimed to persuade people to withdraw form the action.

Green Wave organizers became aware that oil companies’ security squads arrived in Nogliki settlement on January 19, also to put pressure on protesters. Action organizers called on oil companies to keep within legal and ethical norms, however no one knows how things will end up today and tomorrow.

[Quote...]

This week, the BBC re-launches its internet Radio Player to make almost every BBC Radio programme available live and on-demand for seven days after broadcast, creating a massive, ever-changing library of music, talk shows, dramas and documentaries.

Latest figures show more than 10 million hours of BBC radio is consumed online per month and, from 25 January, the new Radio Player will offer 500 extra hours of programming and offer a range of new features.

The re-launch puts audiences in control of their listening, allowing them to listen at convenient times, control their schedules and fast-forward through programmes while exposing them to new shows – and perhaps whole networks – they otherwise wouldn’t come across.

The new Player provides all the programmes and benefits of the current model – which makes many of the BBC’s radio programmes available online – but includes over 80 more programmes, making virtually all of the BBC’s national radio output available on-demand via the internet.

….

Radio Player – some facts

A record 6.15 million unique users visited BBC Radio websites in November 2004 – a 55% year-on-year increase.

48% (3.2 million) of those visitors made use of the BBC Radio Player, listening live for 6.2 million hours and requesting over 7 million programmes on-demand.

More than 10 million hours of BBC radio is listened to online each month (live and on-demand) – a year-on-year increase of nearly 60%.

More than 160 million page impressions are generated per month.

Some programmes are available as mp3 downloads including Five Live’s Fighting Talk and In Our Time (which received 70,000 download requests in November 2004).

In Our Time is also available via podcasting – the BBC is the first British broadcaster to use this technology.

Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy illustrated the popularity of internet radio with an incredible one million on-demand listens.

[Quote...]

Iran has accused the US government of ordering an American internet service provider to stop hosting the website of an official Iranian news agency.

The Iranian Student News Agency said no explanation had been given by the server, called The Planet, for its abrupt move to terminate the contract.

Isna, which is widely read in Iran, says it has moved to another server, which it did not name.

The Planet was unable to comment immediately on the allegations.

Isna said it had received an e-mail from The Planet warning that the website would be terminated within 48 hours and that the decision was final and non-negotiable.

The thin edge of the wedge….

[Quote:]

During the past few years the US has become dependent, not so much on millions of investors around the globe but on a few individuals in a few of the world’s central banks.

In 2003, the most recent year with full international statistics, central banks financed 83 per cent of the US current account deficit, with Asian central banks accounting for 86 per cent of flows.

[..]

In November, Alan Greenspan, US Federal Reserve chairman, suggested foreign investors would reach a limit in their desire to finance the US current account deficit and diversify into other currencies or demand higher US interest rates, “elevating the cost of financing” the deficit and “rendering it increasingly less tenable”.

Until recently there had been little evidence to back up these fears but this has begun to change. Members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries have cut the proportion of deposits held in dollars from 75 per cent to 61.5 per cent in the past three years.

The Bank of Thailand said this month it was considering reducing the proportion of its $50bn reserves held in dollars from 80 per cent to 50 per cent. Russian officials have made similar noises.

A detailed survey out today suggests that central banks are increasingly moving official reserves out of the dollar and into the euro.

Asian central banks are unlikely to pull the plug on dollar assets altogether. But they may be close to ending their willingness to provide cheap financing for an ever increasing US current account deficit.

[Quote:]

Senate Democrats put off a vote on White House counsel Alberto Gonzales’s nomination to be attorney general, complaining he had provided evasive answers to questions about torture and the mistreatment of prisoners. But Gonzales’s most surprising answer may have come on a different subject: his role in helping President Bush escape jury duty in a drunken-driving case involving a dancer at an Austin strip club in 1996.

After reading that, here’s an older story about this incident:

[Quote:]

Bush, announcing his selection of Al Gonzalez as White House counsel: “I understand how important it is to have a person I can trust. … I know first-hand I can trust Al’s judgment.” In 1996, as Gov. Bush’s general counsel, Gonzalez helped Bush avoid jury duty in a drunken driving case that could have forced the governor to disclose his own 1976 DUI arrest. Instead, the story broke in the press just days before Election Day.

[Quote:]

Criminelen hoeven wapens of andere middelen die zij bij het plegen van een misdrijf gebruiken, niet altijd zelf te betalen. Dat meldt De Telegraaf maandag.

Volgens het Openbaar Ministerie (OM) kunnen kosten die een directe relatie hebben met het strafbare feit worden gedeclareerd. “Kosten die een crimineel anders niet gemaakt zou hebben”, aldus een woordvoerder van het OM in de krant.

Vorige week kreeg een 46-jarige man uit Roermond een ‘vergoeding’ van tweeduizend euro voor de aanschaf van het pistool dat hij gebruikte bij een bankoverval. De man moest de buit van 6.600 euro terugbetalen. De kosten voor de aanschaf van het gebruikte wapen werden hiervan afgetrokken. De regeling geldt ook voor andere vergrijpen. Zo kunnen hennepkwekers de kosten voor huur van een loods en aanschaf van plantjes terugkrijgen.

Residents dig out as a blizzard dumps some two feet of snow in the area, Sunday, Jan. 23, 2005, in Boston. Whiteout conditions grounded airplanes and sent fleets of plow and salt trucks trundling through snow-clogged roadways before the storm began to ebb at midday.(AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)

[Quote:]

Patrick Resta is a citizen soldier. In November, the 26-year-old South Philadelphia resident returned from a 10-month tour in Iraq where he served as a combat medic for the Army National Guard.

Specialist Resta had been living in South Carolina, where his wife was attending school, and joined the state’s National Guard unit for the college tuition benefits, which he hoped would get him through nursing school. He was working as a dialysis technician, taking college courses and training one weekend a month when the world changed on 9/11. He lost an aunt and uncle at the World Trade Center and was called to active duty a month later.

“I did what I had to do. I signed a contract to defend the Constitution and the people of this country. But, of course,” he says in a voice tinged with anger, “that’s not what we’re doing over there.”

[..]

Resta, like many returning guardsmen and reservists, complains of inferior equipment, insufficient training and scant notice before being pressed into service. His first mission was Operation Noble Eagle, a security detail guarding Fort Jackson, S.C., the Army’s largest training base. His unit was ordered to guard the gates against suspicious vehicles that may try to run roadblocks and detonate suicide bombs. They weren’t given ammo for their weapons.

And it goes downhill from there…

[Quote:]

United States Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has cancelled a planned visit to Munich.

Rumsfeld has informed the German government via the US embassy he will not take part at the Munich Security Conference in February, conference head Horst Teltschik said.
The New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights filed a complaint in December with the Federal German Prosecutor’s Office against Rumsfeld accusing him of war crimes and torture in connection with detainee abuses at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison.

Rumsfeld had made it known immediately after the complaint was filed that he would not attend the Munich conference unless Germany quashed the legal action.

The organisation alleges violations of German legislation which outlaws war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide independent of the place of crime or origin of the accused.

The prosecutor’s office in Karlsruhe reportedly is examining the roughly 170-page complaint to see if an investigation is warranted.

The Center for Constitutional Rights said it and four Iraqis tortured in US custody had filed a complaint with German authorities against Rumsfeld, former CIA director George Tenet and eight other senior military and civilian officials over abuses at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere in Iraq.

The organization said it had turned to German prosecutors “as a court of last resort” because the US government “is unwilling to open an independent investigation” and had “refused to join the International Criminal Court”.

[Quote:]

After I purchased Srey Mom from her brothel for $203 a year ago and brought her back to her village, the joy was overwhelming. Her parents and siblings had assumed she was dead, and they shrieked and hugged and cried.

I had doubts about the other sex slave I had purchased, Srey Neth, whom I wrote about on Wednesday – and who in fact is thriving and is now preparing to become a hairdresser. But I was pretty sure that Srey Mom would make it.

So I’m devastated to say that a year later, I found Srey Mom back here in the wild town of Poipet, in her old brothel. She’s devastated, too – when she spotted me, she ran away to her room in the back of the brothel until she could compose herself.

“I never lie to people, but I lied to you,” she said forlornly. “I said I would not come back, and I did. I didn’t want to return, but I did.”

Yet, sadly, such an experience is common. Aid groups find it unnerving that they liberate teenagers from the bleak back rooms of a brothel, take them to a nice shelter – and then at night the kids sometimes climb over the walls and run back to the brothel.

It would be a tidier world if slaves always sought freedom. But prostitutes often are shattered and stigmatized, and sometimes they feel that the only place they can hold their head high is in the brothel.

Srey Mom, too, has zero self-esteem, but in her case no one in her village knew her background, and she was clear of debts. The central problem, as best I can piece together the situation, is that she was addicted to methamphetamines, and that craving destroyed her will power, sending her fleeing back to the brothel so that she could get her drugs.

Folks,

The coming week I’ll be at the NOT, the biggest exhibition in the Netherlands on education. As a result, it will be extremely quiet on this weblog.

Manhattan ice : A man pushes a baby buggy on a causeway along the Hudson River where ice is forming in lower Manhattan, in New York City.. (AFP/Mandel Ngan)

[Quote:]

The Pentagon, expanding into the CIA’s historic bailiwick, has created a new espionage arm and is reinterpreting U.S. law to give Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld broad authority over clandestine operations abroad, according to interviews with participants and documents obtained by The Washington Post.

The previously undisclosed organization, called the Strategic Support Branch, arose from Rumsfeld’s written order to end his “near total dependence on CIA” for what is known as human intelligence. Designed to operate without detection and under the defense secretary’s direct control, the Strategic Support Branch deploys small teams of case officers, linguists, interrogators and technical specialists alongside newly empowered special operations forces.

Military and civilian participants said in interviews that the new unit has been operating in secret for two years — in Iraq, Afghanistan and other places they declined to name.

Today’s public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books, and there is some evidence that they can’t read them either.

Gore Vidal (1925 – )

Fuck.

Here’s a promise. If this ever catches on, this weblog will be stop.

[Quote:]

GM has launched a unique national outdoor campaign that reveals a new, one word billboard each day. On January 31, when all 17 boards are revealed, a sentence will be formed. The campaign includes a website called findthemessage which reveals each day’s word and places it in proper order, provides message boards for people across the nation, prior to January 31, to work together towards solving the puzzle and allows visitors to enter a sweepstakes to win 100 daily prizes along with one grand prize consisting of a choice between eight new 2005 GM cars. So far, 6 of the 17 words have been revealed. The 17th word appears to simply be a period leaving 10 more words to be revealed.

However, all the words are readily available in the source code of the findthemessage website. One programming-literate literate sole on the message boards claims the sentence is, “This is the last time you will ever have to feel alone on our nation’s highways.”

[Quote:]

Everyone knows about the Super Bowl. Now there’s the Blog Bowl.

What better sign that blogging has gone mainstream than this: The popular act of online journal writing by anyone with a PC or laptop is now part of the Super Bowl ad sweepstakes.

Market research company Intelliseek will be monitoring the blogosphere for the buzz on Super Bowl ads to give their clients instant feedback on their ad extravaganzas. Intelliseek, a Cincinnati company that owns blogpulse.com, also will set up a panel of 50 to 100 bloggers to offer comments on ads during the game for its clients.

“The Internet is becoming a water cooler on steroids,” said Pete Blackshaw, Intelliseek’s chief marketing officer. “That presents both opportunities and threats for brands.”

A convergence of factors — the near-religious fervor in which Americans identify with, and talk about, their favorite products, the mass appeal of online communication and the buzz factor tied to Super Bowl ads — has led marketing experts to focus more closely on what consumers are writing in blogs and on other Web forums.

“It’s like meta commentary,” observed Adam Hanft, a marketing and branding expert who is chief executive of Hanft Unlimited in New York City.

Okay, although it’s a bit late for new years resolutions, here’s one from me: I will not talk about the super bowl ads.

more here

[Quote:]

For months, Renee Jensen has stirred up controversy in Elkins by posting anti-war and anti-Bush administration signs on her front porch and in her front yard.

Last Tuesday afternoon, Secret Service agent James Lanham and State Trooper R.J. Boggs spent 90 minutes questioning Jensen in her home.

�They asked me a lot of questions,� Jensen said. �He [Lanham] told me they were investigating a call they had received. The person who called said I was running for city council, came knocking on their door and said I wanted to cut off President Bush�s head.

�I told Lanham it is true I am running for city council. But everything else the person said is untrue. I had not even begun door-to-door campaigning, and I would not tell anyone to cut anyone�s head off.�

Matthew Rugh, resident agent in charge of the Secret Service in Charleston, said Friday, �I cannot comment on any investigation that may, or may not be, going on in this instance.� Boggs has also declined to comment.

[..]

Jensen said the two officers asked many questions about her personal history, employment history, her family and friends.

Lanham also asked for permission to search her house. �I said, �Well, sure. I do not have anything to hide.� He said if he found something, he would take it. But apparently he didn�t see anything worth taking,� Jensen said.

Lanham also asked Jensen three times to sign a form to give the Secret Service permission to obtain all her personal medical records.

- advertisement-

�I refused and told him that Big Brother would not ever get permission from me to do that. He told me it would be good if I cooperated fully and that was not fully cooperating. But the whole time, he was very, very cordial.

�He also had me write out a statement that I did not make any threats of harm to Mr. Bush. I signed that,� Jensen said. �He also took three Polaroid pictures of me and pictures of my signs.�

Last week, someone stole Jensen�s political signs from her front yard and put up a new sign reading: �We Love George Bush.�

Jensen described herself as a �tenacious person who will never stop questioning this regime. I am not afraid of people trying to put fear in me. I look at the way the Bush administration uses fear as a tactic and trying to destroy the basis of our civil liberties.�

Maybe you think the Spanish “running of the bulls” is a insane, needless, violent celebration that puts too many people and too many bulls in danger. But it’s nothing compared to the Indian “jallikattu”, sometimes part of the Indian Pongal, what sounds like a harvest/new season/thanksgiving sort of four-day holiday.

According to the wikipedia entry on Jallikattu: In Jallikattu, an agitated bull is set to run in an open space. Several people, empty handed, try to tame it by controlling its horns. The winner gets a prize, which is generally tied to the horns of the bull. On most occasions, the bulls are intoxicated with alcohol. Only men take part in this macho game. Sometimes, more than one bull is loose at the same time. The village farmers take this game as a display of their masculine strength. Betting is also common during the game.

Get the bull drunk and try to pull gold chains off of its horns. This year 13 people died and about 500 were wounded. Nice little practice!? This Telegraph story has more info.

[Quote:]

Public access to FBI records could be diminished if the bureau wins a court fight to limit the extent of searches required for documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act, a principal law to ensure openness in government.

In court, the FBI is defending a recent automated search that missed some documents released years earlier in a separate case under the act, known by its initials, FOIA.

Representing the FBI, the Justice Department asked a federal judge this month to dismiss the lawsuit and said its request should not be undermined �by an unsuccessful search for a document as long as the search was adequate.�

Justice Department guidelines say the law requires a search �reasonably calculated to uncover all relevant documents.�

[..]

The FBI told Trentadue on Nov. 18 that it had found no documents matching his requests.

Trentadue responded Nov. 30 by filing with the court a copy of the January 1996 message, which he had learned in the meantime had been released under FOIA in 1997. Trentadue also submitted a copy of an August 1996 teletype from Freeh�s office that said two of the bank robbers were present when Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh called the Elohim City compound. That, too, had been released years earlier under FOIA.

Trentadue asked the court to order another FBI search.

So, let us know what documents you already have and we’ll be happy to provide you with a copy. For other documents, sod off.

Christian Conservative groups have issued a gay alert warning over a children’s video starring SpongeBob SquarePants, Barney and a host of other cartoon favorites. The wacky square yellow SpongeBob is one of the stars of a music video due to be sent to 61,000 U.S. schools in March. The makers — the nonprofit We Are Family Foundation — say the video is designed to encourage tolerance and diversity. SpongeBob is shown in a scene from ‘The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie.’ (Paramount Pictures via Reuters)

[Quote:]

President Bush’s “Hook ‘em, ‘horns” salute got lost in translation in Norway, where shocked people interpreted his hand gesture during his inauguration as a salute to Satan.

That’s what it means in the Nordics when you throw up the right hand with the index and pinky fingers raised, a gesture popular among heavy metal groups and their fans in the region.

Security officers stand in front of demonstrators against US President George W. Bush along the Inaugural Parade route in Washington, DC. Though the demonstrations were peaceful — mainly booing of Bush’s motorcade and marches and rallies — about 50 anarchists tried in one incident to push past security checkpoints and advance toward the parade route, but were pushed back by police(AFP/Leslie E. Kossoff)

the supposed replacement of Suprnova is available:

[Quote:]

eXeem is a brand new Peer-To-Peer program, which is based on the BitTorrent idea. eXeem eliminates the need for trackers as nodes in the program will be taking their role. eXeem also features easy publication of files to the network as well as a rating and comments system. eXeem contains NO SPYWARE

And from their privacy page:

[Quote:]

The ads appearing on the Exeem.com Web site and within eXeem� application are delivered by our web advertising partner, Cydoor. Information about users of eXeem� and Exeem.com, such as the number of times they have viewed an ad (but not user name, address, or other personal information), is used to serve ads to users.

Cydoor is one of the worst pieces of spyware there is:
[Quote:]

Cydoor is a spyware program that causes popup and pop-under ads to be displayed while you are browsing the Internet. It also re-routes your web requests through third-party servers for the purpose of capturing your web surfing habits.

Cydoor consumes about 3.4Mb of hard drive space, and cannot be uninstalled using the Windows uninstaller. Typical with spyware, no uninstaller is provided.

And they know bloody well that this is the case. From their “End User License Agreement”:
[Quote:]

6.5 In exchange for downloading the Software at no cost, you expressly agree that you accept the Embedded Third Party Software and that so long as you have not entirely deleted the Software from your computer you will not take any action, including downloading other software which modifies, is intended to modify or permits others to modify registry or other settings on your computer to, disable, remove, block, prevent the functioning of, or otherwise interfere with any of the Embedded Third Party Software.

I strongly suggest you keep this crap as far away from your computers as you can.

[Quote:]

I find myself talking about nerd things with my friends and peers who could usually careless. Every once and a while, someone who really doesn’t have a clue, says something so crazy, it makes you take a step back. I can’t remember who had the idea of a rotary cell phone – needless to say it had something to do with quite a few rum and cokes. They didn’t have a clue how to do it, they just thought it would be cool. So did I…

Why wouldn’t it be cool to see a rotary phone, ringing, with no wires attached? It might mess with your brain a bit.

[Quote:]

Planned Parenthood may be the world’s oldest and largest provider of reproductive health care, but a recent study shows it still has a learning curve with its own brand of condoms.

Consumer Reports magazine compared 23 different types of latex condoms for its February issue, and ironically, the two poorest performers were Planned Parenthood brand.

[Quote:]

Annoyed with their reputation as slow-moving laggards, two tortoises, spotting a camera, decided to put that stereotype to rest once and for all, sprinting along merrily at a pace which, if not, cheetah-like, at least matched the speed of a Sunday shopper browsing the market stalls in the zocalo in Coyacan.