toastykitten

I have been fashion-obsessed for the past few days. I have no idea why. Maybe it was the sale at Express.

Blogging Project Runway has a cute April Fool's joke.

Torrid interviews Andrae. I love Andrae.

Nick Verreos on people trying out for Season 3.

Diana Eng's blog - we are planning to go see her at the Maker Faire, where she and her friend Emily Albinski will be having a fashion show. It should be interesting. I'm hoping she brings her self-inflating dress.

This is way too early to be going WTF DUMBASSES? But the fashion industry wants to copyright their clothes. 1. How exactly are they going to enforce this? 2. Copying is the bread and butter of the fashion industry! Are they going to pay back people from the seventies for turning bell-bottoms into "flared pants"? Are they going to pay people in China for stealing Mandarin collars? Really WTF DUMBASSES? And fuck Deborah Wilcox, who thinks the fashion industry may have a case: "You don't need to clothe yourself just for warmth. This is one area that has stood out that has not had protection that seems close to other areas that do have protection." Fuck you if most of us don't want to pay 2 months' rent for a dress. How much are these designers paying their workers anyway? Not much, I bet.

Eh, to take my mind off the stupidity, I offer you these food blogs:
TacoHunt blog Burrito Blog Burritophile

Mark's rules for a good Mexican eatery? 1. Questionable cooking practices. (This one applies to Chinese restaurants, too.) 2. Christmas lights.

Wal-Mart bows to pressure to sell morning-after pill in US!

And eh:

However, Mr Chomiuk said Wal-Mart would continue to allow individual pharmacists who objected to refer customers elsewhere.

Mark is sick, so not much going on tonight. Last night's Daily Show was hilarious. That isn't the only news story I've been following, though. I've been keeping track of the China&theInternet stories for the past few weeks, shaking my head, going, "Are you fucking kidding me?" for both the American and Chinese responses. Long list of links below, mostly taken from Slashdot.

This BBC Op-Ed from Bill Thompson claiming that Google's self-censorship in China makes sense. Business sense, that is. And for some reason, everyone else should be behind that because hey, there's censorship everywhere else, why not? I exaggerate, but really, what the FUCK?

Here's the thing that really annoys me about these arguments about the issue of censorship - that the idea that self-censorship is somehow more desirable or less dangerous than regular, state-enforced censorship.

Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and Cisco invited to Capitol Hill for a meeting on U.S. business practices and censorship in China.
US tech firms that abet China censors face scrutiny
Bill Gates, the billionaire founder of Microsoft, took the rare step of standing up for arch-rival Google today as he argued that state censorship was no reason for technology companies not to do business in China. This quote just about killed me: "Software piracy is a problem that will likely be solved over time, because as Chinese-made technology evolves, the country’s respect for intellectual property rights will improve, he added." - Hey, has he seen the movie industry there lately?
US congressmen have condemned major IT firms including Microsoft and Google for helping China censor the internet.

The Justice Department asks a judge to approve Patriot Act e-mail monitoring without any evidence of criminal behavior.

Net-savvy outfits are finding ways to let citizens see banned sites - "The company distributes software, called FreeGate, which disguises the sites a person visits. In addition, DIT sends out mass e-mails to Chinese Web surfers for clients such as VOA, which is banned in China. The e-mails include a handful of temporary Web addresses that host off-limits content and springboards to other forbidden sites."

Executives from Google Inc. and other Internet companies head to Capitol Hill next week, where they will become feature players in an awkward debate: Are U.S. companies giving in to China too easily?

"I was asked the question the other day, do U.S. corporations have the obligation to promote democracy? That's the wrong question," says Rep. Chris Smith, the New Jersey Republican and chairman of the House human-rights subcommittee that is holding the hearing. "It would be great if they would promote democracy. But they do have a moral imperative and a duty not to promote dictatorship."

Ironically, the controversy comes as Google, Yahoo and others are fighting for "Internet freedom" in the U.S. Google is resisting a Justice Department request for information on user searches to help prosecute violations of a federal child-pornography law. Meanwhile, the company has joined competitors to resist plans by telephone and cable companies keen on exerting more control over Internet lines, which has led to concerns about discrimination and content blocking.

Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., is drafting a bill that would force Internet companies including Google, Yahoo and Microsoft to keep vital computer servers out of China and other nations the State Department deems repressive to human rights. - Good luck, Smith.

Chinese authorities are determined to stop "harmful information" from spreading through the Internet, but the controls it places on Web sites and Internet service providers in mainland China do not differ much from those employed by the United States and European countries, a senior Chinese official responsible for managing the Internet said today.

Ok, I've had enough of this. I'm going to sleep. Read Glutter for better coverage.

Clearly, everyone read this story today about Dick Cheney shooting someone.

I am a little bit confused. Didn't the article say that the VP was hunting quail? If so, doesn't that mean that he mistook a very large human for a very tiny bird? And how many times do you have to shoot a quail dead? Because the article says "Whittington was "peppered" with birdshot" and he was hit in the face and chest.

What a terrible shot. And what a dumbass.

Woman struck, killed by train - it's the one I take every day (not at that time). They still haven't identified the woman or whether it was a suicide or not. There are only two reasons to be crossing the Caltrain tracks - 1. You really, really want to die, or 2. You're stupid or in the care of someone really stupid. There are several big warning signs; one of them says "Tracks are for trains", which always makes me think of "Trix are for kids", for some reason.

We had our "holiday lunch" today. I know, I know, we're two months late; what can I say, we were really busy. My secret Santa gift was really nice - I got a Death Cab for Cutie CD and a gift certificate to Borders. Guess what's across the street from my workplace?

The short cab ride there was hilarious. Do you know how many liberal rants you can cover in ten minutes? Our cab driver was very nice, but as soon as we got settled in, we were captive to his opinions on Social Security, the State of the Union address, big oil, poverty, Katrina, etc. until he dropped us off in front of the restaurant. I now know more about his politics than many people I talk to everyday, like my coworkers. (On the other hand, I work in a pretty liberal company.)

I seem to keep having some variation of this conversation with people:

Me: Could you please get me an apple?
Other: Here's an orange.
Me: Thanks, but that's not what I asked for. Could you please get me an apple?
Other: But I gave you an orange.
Me: I know, but that's not what I need. I really need an apple.
Other: It's the same thing, really. Have the orange.

On the way home, I picked up SFBG for some light reading on the train ride home. I read Tim Redmond's editorial, and had to put the paper down, because it was the most moronic thing I have read in a while. In the editorial, he compares Craig Newmark, the guy who runs Craigslist, to Wal-Mart, because When Craig comes to town (and he's coming to just about every town in the nation soon), the existing community institutions – say, the locally owned weekly newspaper – have a very hard time competing. In many ways, he's like a Wal-Mart – yeah, landlords get cheaper real estate ads, and consumers find some bargains, but the money all goes out of town. And he puts nothing back into the community: He doesn't, for example, hire reporters or serve as a community watchdog.

I mean, really, how's that for hyperbole? I admit that I feel pretty defensive about craigslist, because I owe a lot to it. I got my job, apartment, and a bunch of furniture through craigslist, and I didn't have to pay a dime for any of it. (Well, some for the furniture, but not much, and it's not like any of that actually went to Newmark.) Craig Newmark's given back plenty to the community - I mean, craigslist itself was created initially because he wanted "connect with people better".

The whole thing just seemed like sour grapes. Is Craig Newmark hiring illegal immigrants? Is he outsourcing labor? Is he paying subpar wages to his employees? How, exactly, is he actually acting like Wal-Mart, besides being successful?

The alt-weeklies and mainstream print papers are all terrified of how he's going to basically shut them down or something, but I have yet to see them offer an alternative that's even close or better than what craigslist offers. If I wanted to look for a job, the only ones I would find in the alt-weeklies are for bartending or egg donation. If I wanted an apartment, I'm stuck reading acronyms for exorbitant San Francisco lunchbox apartments in a tiny 1 inch ad, and if I wanted to buy some cheap furniture from someone the person posting the ad would probably spend more than I'm willing to pay for it.

This rest of this week's SFBG sucked as well. That editorial irritated me a lot.

I should be cleaning up.

I'm still pissed that Google decided to censor its search results for the Chinese version of their search engine. Pissed, and disappointed, but not surprised.

I was, however, really surprised by all the praise that was initially heaped on Google for refusing to provide the U.S. government with search records the week before. First of all, it's not that fucking hard to say no to the U.S. government, especially if you are a large corporation making millions of dollars. Second of all, it took no courage. Courage would have meant standing up to the Chinese, meant saying no to gobs of money, and risking something - the anger of the Chinese government, business interests, etc.

This bullshit isn't what my parents signed up for.

School suspends kid for speaking Spanish - the suspension was rescinded after the boy's father complained. Watts, whom students describe as a disciplinarian, said she can't discuss the case. But in a written "discipline referral" explaining her decision to suspend Zach for 1 1/2 days, she noted: "This is not the first time we have [asked] Zach and others to not speak Spanish at school." (And you know what the kid actually said? "No problema." Two words.)

Back in elementary, all my friends spoke Cantonese, and I actually picked it up from them. There was an all-too-brief period where I spoke Cantonese with no American accent. My second-grade teacher, Ms. H, who was Chinese, kept admonishing us to "Speak English. You live in America now." She meant well. It still pissed me off, and us kids ignored her anyway. I remember my parents visiting her on Back-to-School night, and while I listened to her struggle to talk to them in their dialect, I figured out why she was the way she was.

It didn't annoy me any less.

A 13-year-old girl cannot be held at fault for having sex with her teacher, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday, rejecting a school district's argument that it shouldn't have been sued because the girl was partially responsible.

Why does so much ancient Greek art feature males with small genitalia?

Dov Charney on 20/20 about American Apparel. I can't watch the direct link because Mark has ancient software and hasn't updated his stuff since he graduated. :P Going to watch it later.

David Krumholtz really grew up. He's so cute now! I didn't even recognize him as Goldstein from Harold and Kumar or Michael from 10 Things I Hate About You, but he is so hot now as the mathematician on Numb3rs.

Dear David Spade,

The "Me love you long time" joke is not only not funny, it's been played out for over twenty years.

Kim

Dear Dean Koontz,

"My grandmother is Jewish" is not an indicator of whether you're racist or not. Your words and actions are. I've got plenty of racist relatives, and you know what? They have the good fucking sense not to broadcast it in public because they know they will get beat down for it.

No love,

Kim

Dear Zhang Ziyi,

Ugh. Please tell me you can make them un-Photoshop those ads where they gave you blue eyes.

Kim

Dear Bai Ling,

Stay crazy.

Love,

Kim

It may be the oddest tale to emerge from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Armed dolphins, trained by the US military to shoot terrorists and pinpoint spies underwater, may be missing in the Gulf of Mexico.

I seriously can't tell fact from fiction anymore.