PostSecret This Week

This was in PostSecret this week. Its pretty funny. I didn't know people were so militant to get thanked for doing something. I never knew that thank you notes were so important. Why can't people just do something nice without requiring a formal thank you. BTW, if for any reason anyone didn't get a thank you from us for a wedding gift they gave to us... there were a couple items that didn't have cards, so if you were one of them, sorry you didn't get a thank you. Thanks!

While You Were Out

So, I've told Mary many stories about the strange things about my family, and I've tried to warn her, but I'm not sure that she ever takes me seriously. I try to warn her that at all extended family functions, we all tend to gather in the corner and talk amongst ourselves rather than mingle with our cousins. Or that my mom does some pretty amazing things to save a few pennies, closes the closet doors so you don't have to A/C the air in the closets, or saving old jam jars to use a glasses. No matter what it is, I'm not really sure that Mary ever takes me seriously.

Well, this weekend we went to Kentucky to visit Mary's sister, as I'm sure you know from this. Anyways, we had my dad drop us off at the airport, but before we left, my mom asked is she could go over to our house and try out or recumbant exercise bike. Since we turned up the air to like 90 while we were gone, I told her that she would need to go over and turn the air down so she doesn't roast in there. When we got back, she mentioned that she did if a couple times and that she sort of liked it. Mary and I go home and start to unpack and put things away, etc... all the sudden, Mary stops and asks me, "Why are all of our closets closed?". You see, most of the time, the closet in the study/den stays open since thats where all of our supplies are; paper, stamps, etc. Same with the bedroom closet. I think about it, and it dawns on me... finally, I have proof. My mom went through our house and closed all the closets so that when she turned the air down to 80 while she worked out, we wouldn't have to pay to cool the air from the closets. I'm not sure if this is funny to anyone else but me, but I think its hilarious.

Currently Playing:

Zelda: Twilight Princess

Just got to the Sky levels. This game is awesome!

Dang Blue Shells

For those of you who played, you know what I'm talking about.

Pearl Jam Censored by AT&T

On Sunday, Pearl Jam played a concert for Lollapalooza, and AT&T agreed to webcast their concert on their "Blue Room". During their rendition of Daughter, they wandered into a version of Pink Floyd's Another Brick in the Wall, which they often do. During this rendition, Eddie changed a few of the words. He sang "George Bush, leave this world alone!" and "George Bush, find yourself another home!" AT&T decided that these 2 phrases would be deemed offensive by the public and cut them out of their webcast.

Now, many of you who know me, know that I love Pearl Jam, so any story about Eddie, Stone, Matt, Mike, and Jeff is bound to grab my attention. The other thing that grabbed it, is that Pearl Jam is turning this into a Net Neutrality issue. For those of you who don't know what Net Neutrality is, let me try to explain it.

Basically, the phone/cable lines that the internet currently runs over are getting used quite often, and the more and more people that have websites, and the more people that use the internet, those lines are just going to get more and more backed up. Now before you go thinking that your email is going to take a few days to show up, let me state something. Currently it takes milliseconds for data to travel around the world on the internet. Even if the lines get backed up, it just means that its going to take 3/4 of a second for your email to get to your Japanese penpal, rather than 1/2 a second. But eventually, there is going to need to be an upgrade. Anyways, the phone companies, including AT&T, want to create a new internet backbone, basically an internet freeway, which will be bigger and better than the current phone/cable lines. This is great news for the internet, now everyone will be able to get their information quicker and everything will work better right? Wrong. The phone companies want users to pay a premium for their content to roll across these higher quality lines. Which means everytime you request information, your ISP will look at who you are requesting it from. If it's from some big corporation, that can afford to pay for the higher bandwidth, then you get your information lightning quick. But if you are just getting your info from some random hole in the wall website, then your traffic is going to get thrown onto the old phone system.
This means that the ISP is inspecting your data, and determining if it is worthy to get to you quickly. In my opinion, this goes against everything that the internet is based on. Take for example Google. Google is probably one of the biggest internet search engines in the world, but it was started by 2 college students in California. If this was in place back when they were developing their search engine, companies like Yahoo and AOL would have already paid for the faster service, and they wouldn't have the capital to have that luxury. Even though their search engine could search the web super quickly and get the information you needed, it would take much longer for the data to get to your computer, compared to the search results from AOL or Yahoo, so even though AOL and Yahoo have inferior products, because their results can move across the web faster, it appears that they are faster. If this was the case, why would anyone start using Google when its slower than the others. This could/would happen to ever facet of the internet. Why use Tom's MySpace when Yahoo personals are way faster?
The beauty of the internet today, is that anyone can come a long with an idea, and have an equal footing with their corporate competition. If the phone companies had their way, this would no longer be the case.
Anyways, back the Pearl Jam. The decided to make their issue an example of what could happen if you let companies like AT&T decide what information gets to your computer. If they decide that this content may be offensive, even though there is no legal precedent or law preventing it, then you don't get it. The net neutrality concept is called that so that ISPs continue to stay neutral, and the phone companies don't get to look at the information moving across it's wires, and they just let everything through with equal priority.
If you'd like additional info about the Pearl Jam AT&T thing, see this, or you can read about Net Neutrality

756*

Busted Tees has a new shirt design that I think is awesome:

Hank Aaron didn't even like to take vitamins, because he felt like it gave players an unfair advantage. Also, I read an article a couple days ago about 6 ways Bonds cheated to get the home run record, and none of them are steroids. I don't really agree with him, but it's an interesting read. Anyways, I definitely think there should be and asterisk in the record book for Bonds' home run record, and this shirt is a great way to say that. We'll see if I end up picking it up.

ps... I found another, this one is even better:

I Don't Feel like Dancin'

So the band Scissor Sister has a new album out, and an awesome new web-app for their song 'I Don't Feel Like Dancin'. You can see Mary and I get down here, or you can make your own here. Enjoy

human sled

  I wanna try this. It looks so fun, but a lot slower, and with no on-coming traffic!