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Birthday party snub sparks debate

An eight-year-old boy has sparked an unlikely outcry in Sweden after failing to invite two of his classmates to his birthday party.

The boy's school says he has violated the children's rights and has complained to the Swedish Parliament. The school, in Lund, southern Sweden, argues that if invitations are handed out on school premises then it must ensure there is no discrimination. (...)

The boy handed out his birthday invitations during class-time and when the teacher spotted that two children had not received one the invitations were confiscated.

Review as expletive gets marks

The Times reported that Assessment and Qualifications Alliance chief examiner Peter Buckroyd gave a pupil two marks out of 27 for an English GCSE paper. He is quoted as saying the candidate had demonstrated more skills than one "who doesn't write anything at all". (...) The pupil is reported to have written "fuck off", and would have had another mark for adding an exclamation point.

Mr Buckroyd is quoted by the Times as saying: "It would be wicked to give it a zero because it does show some very basic skills we are looking for - like conveying some meaning and some spelling." (...)

"The example cited was unique in the experience of the senior examiner concerned and was used in a pre-training session to emphasise the importance of adhering to the mark scheme: i.e. if a candidate makes any sort of response to a question then it must be at least given consideration to be awarded a mark.

Dia da Raça

Irelande Douze Pointe

A solidariedade dos pescadores

Os pescadores estão incomodados com a subida do preço do petróleo nos mercados internacionais, sendo que muitos apontam como causa para esta escalada de preços a existência de especulação financeira, o que causa aumentos artificiais dos preços dos combustíveis. Pretendem que os governos se solidarizem com a situação e subsidiem os custos adicionais que este aumento representa na indústria do pescado. Para atingir este objectivo, muitos pescadores europeus optaram por fazer greve em simultâneo, gerando uma escassez artificial de peixe nos mercados europeus que está a ter como consequência o rápido aumento dos preços destes bens.

Daqui a uns dias talvez vejamos nos telejornais retalhistas e proprietários de restaurantes a ameaçar que entrarão em greve (aumentando necessariamente os preços das refeições para o consumidor final) caso os governos não sejam solidários para com as dificuldades destes comerciantes e subsidiem a compra de peixe. A parte mais bonita desta história é como os sectores comerciais de vários países se conseguem organizar espontaneamente para por fim à especulação financeira e fazer tantas demonstrações conjuntas de solidariedade para com os restantes elementos da sociedade que consumem os seus produtos.

Oh it's just a harmless little bunny, isn't it?

Tres años de cárcel para Wesley Snipes: El actor ha sido condenado por no declarar impuestos durante cinco años

Logarithmic Spirals

Image Credit: M101 - NASA, ESA, CFHT, NOAO; Typhoon Rammasun - MODIS, NASA
Comparison: Lawrence Anderson-Huang (Ritter Astrophysical Obs., Univ. Toledo)

Explanation: Uncomfortably close Typhoon Rammasun (right) and 25 million light-year distant galaxy M101 don't seem to have much in common. For starters, Rammasun was only a thousand kilometers or so across while M101 (aka the Pinwheel Galaxy) spans about 170,000 light-years, making them vastly dissimilar in scale, not to mention the different physical environments that control their formation and development. But they do look amazingly alike: each with arms exhibiting the shape of a simple and beautiful mathematical curve known as a logarithmic spiral, a spiral whose separation grows in a geometric way with increasing distance from the center. Also known as the equiangular spiral, growth spiral, and Bernoulli's spiral or spira mirabilis, this curve's rich properties have fascinated mathematicians since its discovery by 17th century philosopher Descartes. Intriguingly, this abstract shape is much more abundant in nature than suggested by the striking visual comparison above. For example, logarithmic spirals can also describe the tracks of subatomic particles in a bubble chamber, the arrangement of sunflower seeds and, of course, cauliflower.

(sub-repticiamente gamado ao António)

Citação do dia

"To be GOVERNED is to be watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place[d] under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. That is government; that is its justice; that is its morality."

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, General Idea of the Revolution in the Nineteenth Century

Demand, Supply

we all have inner daemons, mate

Demons from Hellgate: London at a pub, drowning their sorrows. Intel-powered computers are making their lives miserable.

Pequena nota v4.0

Desde finais de Fevereiro, há, finalmente, telefone fixo e ADSL por aqui. Os problemas, contudo, não terminaram e alguns não estão ainda definitivamente resolvidos. Mais pormenores provavelmente em Junho, quando fizer um resumo alargado da odisseia - ou, com maior exactidão, doze trabalhos de Hércules - e do registo de sapos (de certa forma, literamente) engolidos.

Anteriores: pequena nota v1.0; pequena nota v2.0; pequenota nota v3.0

John A. Wheeler (1911 - 2008)

com as próprias mãos

X está internada há mais de uma semana por ter sido esfaqueada pelo (ex-?)namorado da filha, tendo ficado com o fígado e o baço perfurados. Também a filha ficou com uma perfuração num pulmão como resultado da mesma agressão, embora tenha tido alta no dia anterior. O perpetrador é reincidente; já tinha cometido algo idêntico em Novembro. Foi preso e celeremente presente a um juíz, mas saiu em liberdade, sem qualquer medida de coacção aplicada. Foi feita nova queixa às autoridades - com o ânimo próprio de quem se encontra entre a espada e a parede e não tem qualquer esperança em ver nada resolvido - mas o homem continua à solta e a lançar ameaças de morte, as quais aparentemente ainda não se concretizaram por mero acaso. A Associação Portuguesa de Apoio à Vítima (APAV), na falta de melhor conselho e para desespero de X, recomenda a mudança imediata de residência. Alguns presentes sugerem que a melhor solução é adquirir uma arma para matar o meliante da próxima vez que este as invective, embora isso provavelmente signifique que serão as próprias vítimas a ser detidas, apesar de agirem em legítima defesa, corrigindo um problema para o qual já a justiça portuguesa deveria ter encontrado uma resolução definitiva há muito tempo atrás. Complicado. Arranjar uma arma de fogo de forma legal é extremamente burocrático, senão mesmo impossível na grande maioria das circunstâncias, restrições estas que são impostas para alegadamente salvaguardar a segurança dos cidadãos. Restrições essas que não impediram um homem de esfaquear duas mulheres, nem agiram de forma a prevenir futuras tentativas de assassinato. Assim como não lhes permitem protegerem-se a si mesmas com algo mais do que uma faca de cozinha. De um dos lados da sala, um dos mais anciãos solta o comentário que provavelmente terá passado pela cabeça de muitos dos suficientemente idosos para partilharem da mesma opinião: "Isto no tempo do Salazar não era assim". Os mais jovens olham de forma desconfortável entre si, como se não tivessem outra solução senão aquiescer tacitamente, quando se pressuporia, de forma implícita, que, como representantes naturais do paradigma político actual e da sociedade contemporânea, teriam de possuir três ou quatro argumentos de algibeira que contrapor de imediato.

Fiat lux

©2008 ~bryantd

hear, hear

"Twenty years later I find computer security, frankly, to be kind of boring. It's tedious. The first time you do something - it's science. The second time it's engineering. The third time it's just being a technician. I'm a scientist. Once I do something, I want to do something else."

-- Clifford Stoll

MAD

Microsoft takes on the free world (Roger Parloff, Fortune)

[N]ow there's a shadow hanging over Linux and other free software, and it's being cast by Microsoft. The Redmond behemoth asserts that one reason free software is of such high quality is that it violates more than 200 of Microsoft's patents. And as a mature company facing unfavorable market trends and fearsome competitors like Google, Microsoft is pulling no punches: It wants royalties. If the company gets its way, free software won't be free anymore. (...) Revealing the precise figure for the first time, they state that FOSS infringes on no fewer than 235 Microsoft patents. It's a breathtaking number. (...)

The free world appears to be uncowed by Microsoft's claims. Its master legal strategist is Eben Moglen, longtime counsel to the Free Software Foundation and the head of the Software Freedom Law Center, which counsels FOSS projects on how to protect themselves from patent aggression. Moglen contends that software is a mathematical algorithm and, as such, not patentable. (The Supreme Court has never expressly ruled on the question.) In any case, the fact that Microsoft might possess many relevant patents doesn't impress him. "Numbers aren't where the action is," he says. "The action is in very tight qualitative analysis of individual situations." Patents can be invalidated in court on numerous grounds, he observes. Others can easily be "invented around." Still others might be valid, yet not infringed under the particular circumstances. (...)

Furthermore, FOSS has powerful corporate patrons and allies. In 2005, six of them - IBM, Sony, Philips, Novell, Red Hat and NEC - set up the Open Invention Network to acquire a portfolio of patents that might pose problems for companies like Microsoft, which are known to pose a patent threat to Linux. So if Microsoft ever sued Linux distributor Red Hat for patent infringement, for instance, OIN might sue Microsoft in retaliation, trying to enjoin distribution of Windows. It's a cold war, and what keeps the peace is the threat of mutually assured destruction: patent Armageddon - an unending series of suits and countersuits that would hobble the industry and its customers.

"It's a tinderbox," Moglen says. "As the commercial confrontation between [free software] and software-that's-a-product becomes more fierce, patent law's going to be the terrain on which a big piece of the war's going to be fought. Waterloo is here somewhere."

Leitura complementar: The Total Growth of Open Source