Forecast: cloudy with a slight chance of revolution

An article in IT World informs us that the Chinese city of Chongqing is attempting to attract foreign investors to a new datacenter for cloud computing by promising "censorship-free" data access.

That has sparked an uproar among some Chinese Internet users, because the unfiltered Web access will be available only to foreign companies, according to the reports. People commenting on social-networking sites have slammed the zone as a throwback to the days of "No dogs and no Chinese allowed,"a reference to how local Chinese were prohibited in the early 20th century from entering certain foreigner communities.

Taunting your citizens ... generally not a good idea, China.  They know this freedom is out there ... waving it under their noses is an invitation to revolution.

Friday, July 8

Final Space Shuttle launch of all time is set for Atlantis

So we had a little rain last night

When the whole city is made of brick and stone, thunder does ROLL!

Cowboys & Aliens Interviews

Director Jon Favreau interviews cast members from his sci-fi flick. Some fun stuff.

U.S. Supreme Court Gets it Right

I'm not particularly a fan of violent video games ... but I'm a really big fan of the First Amendment, so I was pretty happy to see the U.S. Supreme Court get it right in upholding the appeals court ruling that California's law prohibiting the sale or rental of "extremely violent" (who defines that, again?) video games to minors was unconstitutional.  Scalia, of all people, wrote:

"No doubt a state possesses legitimate power to protect children from harm. But that does not include a free-floating power to restrict the ideas to which children may be exposed."

7-2 ... I'm pleasantly surprised.

The sun is back

It cleared up on Sunday and it looks like 80-something weather for the start of the week!

Holland Endorses Net Neutrality for Phones

Way to go, Holland!  According to a BBC story, the Dutch Parliament passed a law restricting the ability of mobile data companies from restricting users or charging extra for voice applications like Skype.

Labour MP Martijn van Dam, one of the bill's co-authors, said that KPN was similar to "a postal worker who delivers a letter, looks to see what's in it, and then claims he hasn't read it."

Hallelujah, was that so hard?

Oh, Ronnie ...

Word out of the NBA is that Lakers forward Ron Artest has petitioned to officially change his name to "Metta World Peace."

I saw World B. Free play, sir, and you are no World B. Free.

Joined the Tablet Movement

Got a netbook to replace my sturdy but underpowered Mini 9, but went partially toward the iPad by getting an Asus Transformer, which is a 10-inch Android (Honeycomb 3.1) tablet that turns into a netbook with 15-hour battery life if you dock it in the keyboard dock, which also adds a full size SD slot to supplement the microSD on the tablet, and two USB ports with full functionality for external devices.  Slick display, plays HD video quite nicely, the touchscreen response is great.

Sorry Amazon .... Asus beat you to the punch on a great touchscreen color Kindle.

Legal Again

Picked up my work permit / national ID card at the IND offices next to the Sloterdijk train station today (10 minutes from Central Station, first stop on your way to the airport). Easy as pie, showed my passport and the letter they sent me, traded old ID for new, in & out in 10 minutes.

Funky Cafe

This is in the home furnishings mall next to the soccer stadium Amsterdam ArenA:

This Could Be the Last Time

Shuttle Atlantis rolls toward the launch paid for the 135th and final Shuttle mission, STS-135:

That's an expensive dress!

The white dress worn by Marilyn Monroe in the 1955 film The Seven Year Itch has sold for $4.6m (£2.8m) at an auction in Los Angeles.

The dress was part of a collection of film memorabilia collected by actress Debbie Reynolds over four decades.

She had hoped to house them in a museum but the project never came to fruition.

Other lots included Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra headdress, a Charlie Chaplin bowler hat and the guitar played by Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music.

Reynolds, 79, was in tears as the auction on the iconic Seven Year Itch dress closed, CNN reported.

Auction house Profiles in History had expected it reach around $2m.

It was bought by an unidentified buyer bidding by telephone.

A red sequined dress and feathered headdress worn for Monroe's role in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes reached $1.47m and a saloon girl costume from River of No Return for $510,000.

Many of the items had been given to Reynolds by her close friend Dame Elizabeth Taylor, who died earlier this year. The horse racing outfit worn by Taylor as a child in National Velvet sold for $73,800.

The trademark bowler hat worn by Charlie Chaplin in several films, including The Little Tramp, reached $135,300 while a dress and pair of ruby slippers worn by Judy Garland in the filming of The Wizard of Oz sold for $1.75m despite not having appeared in the film.

Keya Morgan, a collector of memorabilia and author of a book on Monroe, said the auction was "totally crazy, especially in this recession".

She told CNN Monroe would have been amazed to see her old outfits sell for so much.

Reynolds began collecting props and costumes in 1970 and had amassed some 3,500 items.

Speaking before the auction, she said the cost of maintaining them had become too high and that by selling them "I won't have quite so much responsibility and I can rest a little more".

BBC story

Looks like June to me!

As the view from my office shows, the weeks of clear sunny weather we've had since April (and the drought affecting most of the Netherlands and Germany) had to end eventually!

The Big Man passes

Geo-Cosmos Globe, Tokyo

Yeah, somebody here must be stoned alright

According to the BBC, a Jerusalem rabbinical court has sentenced a stray dog to death by stoning.

The dog entered the Jerusalem financial court several weeks ago and would not leave, reports Israeli website Ynet. It reminded a judge of a curse passed on a now deceased secular lawyer about 20 years ago, when judges bid his spirit to enter the body of a dog. One of the judges at the court in the city's ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim neighbourhood had reportedly asked local children to carry out the sentence.

Riiiiiiiight.

Tablet Time

Okay, so that whole iPad thing didn't turn out to be a fad and the market is going towards tablets at the moment so ... time for me to try one, but not Apple, other people at the company have that covered so I'm going Android with the Asus Transformer, Tegra-2 based netbook with a docking keyboard that doubles the battery life and adds some storage slots.  I'm too fast a typist to work with a virtual keyboard only.

Amazon has shipped to Seattle, I should be receiving from Seattle on Monday or Tuesday ... tablet at least, it shipped separately from the keyboard.  I had to wait for inventories to rise, this was a *very* popular model at release and people with stock were really gouging.  Got the tablet from Amazon at list price and the keyboard dock from an Amazon vendor (free shipping) at about $30 above list price.

Michele Bachmann's Least Favorite Photo of the Day

Puerto Ricans waiting to greet Obama:

Ladies Day, Royal Ascot

The Queen seems to be enjoying herself, but one of the footmen seems to have a message for the papparazzi ...

The Loneliest Vader

At the Brandenburg Gate, Berlin:

Oh, Canada ...

Do you really need to be Los Angeles?

"Tibet is closed ... if you would like to leave a message for Tibet ..."

BEIJING — Travel agents say China has closed Tibet to foreigners until July 26 in an apparent move to head off trouble surrounding sensitive political anniversaries.

Agents say official written notice of the closure was received June 1 and cited last month’s 60th anniversary of communist rule over Tibet as the cause. However, with the May 23 anniversary already passed, the closure seems more likely targeted at the 90th anniversary of ruling Communist Party’s founding, which is July 1.

Washington Post

How many stereotypes can you perpetuate at once?

From the jungles of Bellevue ...

Three women from out of the country drove their car into Mercer Slough in Bellevue early Wednesday while trying to follow directions from their GPS.

The women, from Mexico, told police they had been following the device about midnight but obviously took a wrong turn.

The women went into the water with the rental car but were able to get out safely, said Carla Iafrate, spokeswoman for the Bellevue Police Department.

The three, who primarily speak Spanish and needed an interpreter to explain to police what happened, called 911 to say their car was floating, Iafrate said.

"They said something about being in a jungle."

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2015325599_slough16m.html

The Queen Is In

Working Palace, Den Haag ... about 5 minute walk from the office, on the way to the shopping street where we get lunch.  If the flag is flying, the Queen is working.

On the way to the train station around 4:30, I was passed by 8 motorcycles escorting a trio of big black sedans to the freeway.  Queen or visitor, most likely.

Greece on Strike

According to the BBC, there will be a general strike in Greece today to protest austerity measures required to earn the EU bailout of Greece's debt.

Which would make this ... Wednesday, right?

Den Haag

On the walk back from the office to the train station today, I got to see the new outdoor sculpture exhibit in the park that runs past the British embassy and toward Central Station.

Tyrannosaurus Red?

That is not entirely perspective, that lamp is 12 feet tall

And then there's ice cream

Escher Museum, across the street

Musical theater currently running Threepenny Opera

Dutch Ministry of Finance

Bike path & pedestrian path toward Central Station

"Good god who made that ugly piece of ..."

"Oh, right."

Come on ...

We should not be subsidizing this:

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A 20-year-old woman who recited poems critical of Bahrain’s rulers — and later claimed she was beaten in jail — was sentenced Sunday to a year in prison as part of the kingdom’s crackdown on Shiite protesters calling for greater rights.
The ruling by a special security tribunal sent a strong message that Bahrain’s Sunni monarchy is not easing off on punishments linked to the unrest despite appeals for talks with Shiite groups in the strategic Persian Gulf island nation, which is home to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet.

 Washington Post

Back in Amsterdam

Partly sunny Saturday, got out for a long walk and took some phone-cam pics.

Nice police station!

Police station looks at this small park ... hmm, not too many vagrants here, surprise surprise

Police station has a water entry *and* a tower ... nice fortress

That house on the right .... I want it

Let Freedom Ping!

Interesting article in the New York Times about a quiet effort by the U.S. to develop information technology tools that let dissidents bypass government controls over the flow of information on social networking sites. Because this could never come back to bite our own government in the ass, no ... never! Still, I would like to help with this one, because I'm a firm believer that citizens should encrypt everything and do whatever they can to keep information private when two parties communicate. Especially from governments. Especially from OUR government.

The new initiatives have found a champion in Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, whose department is spearheading the American effort. “We see more and more people around the globe using the Internet, mobile phones and other technologies to make their voices heard as they protest against injustice and seek to realize their aspirations,” Mrs. Clinton said in an e-mail response to a query on the topic. “There is a historic opportunity to effect positive change, change America supports,” she said. “So we’re focused on helping them do that, on helping them talk to each other, to their communities, to their governments and to the world.” 

Cowboys & Aliens

The Power of the Sun

Spectacular video of a massive solar eruption

Athens Friday

Street market day ... awesome olives.

Morning traffic, Athens, Greece

Voyager still phoning home

Interesting article at the BBC on the status of the Voyager probes as they approach the boundary where our sun's magnetic field gives way to interstellar space.  Messages to and from the Voyagers now take 16 hours as the probes launched in 1977 continue as the human spacecraft venturing furthest from home.

Athens Thursday

Sunset over the Acropolis

"Simply Burgers" makes a good burger at a reasonable price ... good potato wedges, too