akk: (The Watcher)
Personally, I'd say "back to the Middle Ages?!", but in the Middle Ages they didn't have high-tech options to make things worse.

Originally posted by [livejournal.com profile] gabrielleabelle at Mississippi Personhood Amendment
Okay, so I don't usually do this, but this is an issue near and dear to me and this is getting very little no attention in the mainstream media.

Mississippi is voting on November 8th on whether to pass Amendment 26, the "Personhood Amendment". This amendment would grant fertilized eggs and fetuses personhood status.

Putting aside the contentious issue of abortion, this would effectively outlaw birth control and criminalize women who have miscarriages. This is not a good thing.

Jackson Women's Health Organization is the only place women can get abortions in the entire state, and they are trying to launch a grassroots movement against this amendment. This doesn't just apply to Mississippi, though, as Personhood USA, the group that introduced this amendment, is trying to introduce identical amendments in all 50 states.

What's more, in Mississippi, this amendment is expected to pass. It even has Mississippi Democrats, including the Attorney General, Jim Hood, backing it.

The reason I'm posting this here is because I made a meager donation to the Jackson Women's Health Organization this morning, and I received a personal email back hours later - on a Sunday - thanking me and noting that I'm one of the first "outside" people to contribute.

So if you sometimes pass on political action because you figure that enough other people will do something to make a difference, make an exception on this one. My RSS reader is near silent on this amendment. I only found out about it through a feminist blog. The mainstream media is not reporting on it.

If there is ever a time to donate or send a letter in protest, this would be it.

What to do?

- Read up on it. Wake Up, Mississippi is the home of the grassroots effort to fight this amendment. Daily Kos also has a thorough story on it.

- If you can afford it, you can donate at the site's link.

- You can contact the Democratic National Committee to see why more of our representatives aren't speaking out against this.

- Like this Facebook page to help spread awareness.
akk: (The Watcher)
...I've been offended by the pope!

"As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the twentieth century, let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus to a “reductive vision of the person and his destiny"
Pope Benedict XVI in the UK

No, atheism does not make you an amoral, unethical misanthropist out to slaughter world populace any more than faith makes you a morally sound, ethical philanthropist out to save the world populace by default!

If you want to read up more on this speech of intolerance and its long debunked equation of "secularism and atheism = lack of virtue and morality = Nazism", Bad Astronomy's Phil has a good summary here.
akk: AKK - Schriftzug aus Blitzen (Default)
Hi,
I just was locked out of my facebook and asked to enter a mobile phone number in order to confirm my identity. Again the site presented is a mixture of English and German. Again, each attempt to log into my account is redirected to an ssl-secured site by Facebook US. This time, I didn't try to enter a phone number. They didn't answer my help requests for the last time:

Text: http://akk.dreamwidth.org/282766.html
Screenshots: http://akk.dreamwidth.org/283068.html

This is bad, because since the last time I gathered a few FB-only friends, with one of whom I am currently in conversation and don't know (yet) how to contact offsite. This is the 2nd time FB blocks me out of the service. Since I did nothing - and obviously can't validate my phone (tried last time) - I'm out of their service. Assholes.

EDIT: Apparently, it's a new "security feature" in case they don't recognize your log-in location - like your smartphone via UMTS and you via a computer within a short time doesn't make sense to them and you get "ROADBLOCK". Only that their offered "confirm your identity" is limited to "add your phone" at my place, which doesn't work for what reason ever. Hence: FB IS DEAD! AGAIN! An especially nice touch is the new added link of "Or use a different verification method", which gives you -- yes, indeed -- "add your phone".

EDIT2: and no, I'm not the only one. Once I figured out what "feature" was in the way, it's easy to come by a 1000+ hits via Google-fu. Such as this one: http://www.geekstogo.com/forum/topic/285198-facebook-cell-phone-verification/ Unfortunately, that doesn't get my account back - and I don't want yet another one only to have it blocked again.

Okay, I have a pretty clear idea how FB gets its over 2 million users numbers. *IRONY CUDGEL!*
akk: (LJ censored)
[personal profile] helens78 acturally tested how pingback works (not): http://helens78.dreamwidth.org/860769.html
Turns out, you can't protect yourself reliably from it. Esp. the uncertain behavior with respect to locked, unlocked, and filtered posts is worrisome!

At this point, it seems prudent to stop cross-posting to LJ and empty the blog, except for a single entry stating where to find me. It's really obnoxious. I'll see how my feelings develop over the next few hours/days.
akk: (LJ censored)
FYI: I pretty much took the gist of this post from [livejournal.com profile] elbales.

Dear LJ: NO!

Seriously? When you comment in my LJ (on the old posts that still allow commenting - and I'm currently tempted to turn that off globally!), please be careful not to accidentally click Repost when you make your comment. I don't want my blog & posts cluttered all over FB! [livejournal.com profile] dysonrules did an experiment (for science!) that shows exactly what such a comment would look like. No, thank you. Copy my stuff to FB and see yourself banned the moment I learn about it. Period. And the same goes for Twitter!

Regarding the overwhelming reception of this new "feature": look here!
akk: (The Watcher)
The German magazine "Der Spiegel" currently runs an article on it's online site that in itself is highly disturbing.

Here's a link through Google translator: Apple patented the Spy-Phone.

You can find the German original at Spiegel Online - Apple patentiert das Spyphone.

Creepy is putting it *mildly*!
akk: (The Watcher)
According to this entry in the tech blog of the British Guardian newspaper, the International Intellectual Property Alliance is lobbying for countries recommending the use of open source software to be considered enemies of capitalism.

I'm speechless...
...except:

Write a "Hello, World", give it away for free, and earn an eyeflap!
HARRRR!
akk: (Akihito - with a gun)
Book dealer Amazon (.com, I didn't check .de yet) goes the way of LJ with excluding material it deems "offensive" from appearing in certain searches and from showing up in some of its bestseller lists and sales ranking.
Apparently, offensive in Amazon's books is sexual content (straight erotica, gay, lesbian, etc. pp. - prominent examples: Yamane Ayano's Viewfinder (manga; yes, draaaawn sex is bad!), Brokeback Mountain (the book) and Lady Chatterley's Lover (also the book; fugck!)).

To complete the similarity to LJ, Amazon now is also insisting that it wasn't planned policy but a glitch in the sales ranking feature. Then why this exchange with Mark Probst (including screencaps) earlier?

Tree-Talk

...Go. Learn...

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