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behaviour and intelligence

C O L O U R K E 'Y

comment on recent schooling film - reality in british state schools

Union and government policy: “don’t ask, don’t tell, don’t pursue”.

“Thomas assumed the fault must lie with her teaching methods until she asked heads of departments to visit her classes and found her efforts were praised. 'It was when I heard lessons being taught by full-time teachers whose pupils were just as loud as mine, and who were having to shout at them just as much as I was, that I realised the state of my classrooms was normal,' she said.”
—
“ Thomas illustrates her point with an incident when a boy walked out of her class during a lesson. 'If I tried to stop him leaving by taking his arm, it would have been his word against mine that I hadn't abused him and I would be suspended while the incident was investigated, which could take three years. My name would be in the local press and my reputation as a teacher would be destroyed. The children are very worldly-wise: they know they have this power.' ”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#pluralism_240405

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the smell of fundamentalism in the united states?

“For conservatives of faith, such pluralism can allow error to flourish--and immorality to become government policy--and therefore must be limited. A conservative of doubt, however, does not regard the existence of such pluralism as a problem. He sees it as an unavoidable fact of modernity, an invitation to lives that are more challenging and autonomous than in more traditional societies. Even when conservatives of doubt disagree with others' moral convictions, they recognize that, in a free, pluralist society, those other views deserve a hearing. So a conservative who believes abortion is always immoral can reconcile herself to a polity in which abortion is still legal, if regulated. Putting government power unequivocally on the side of one view of morality--especially in extremely controversial areas--must always be balanced against the rights and views of citizens who dissent. And, precisely because complete government neutrality may be impossible on these issues, government should tread as lightly as possible. The key in areas of doubt is to do as little harm as possible. Which often means, with respect to government power, doing as little as possible.”
—
“[...] Those inclined to prudence cannot join forces with fanatics (at least not in times when national security doesn't hang in the balance) [...]!

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#uk_state_schooling_250405

on uk culture and socialism

Interesting item on the views of Orwell, Hayek and Belloc, and on the present outcomes. The article lacks depth and strength in places, but well worth a scan.

“The state action that was supposed to lead to the elimination of Beveridge's five giants of Want, Disease, Ignorance, Squalor, and Idleness has left many people in contemporary Britain with very little of importance to decide for themselves, even in their own private spheres. They are educated by the state (at least nominally), as are their children in turn; the state provides for them in old age and has made saving unnecessary or, in some cases, actually uneconomic; they are treated and cured by the state when they are ill; they are housed by the state, if they cannot otherwise afford decent housing. Their choices concern only sex and shopping.”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#uk_culture_and_socialism_210405

the difference between finding a good move and having a useful strategy

I have growing qualms about many people who seem to see pieces of the international scene but also seem to have not the slightest idea of how those pieces fit into a general world picture.

Fortunately, George Bush appears to have much greater depth and vision than this. His constant references to the spread of freedom, his excellent judgement in going into Iraq, meanwhile persisting in the modernising of that horrific and backward Ba’ath National Socialist dictatorship, has put on notice dictatorships everywhere.

Piece by piece, several countries are now looking to greater freedoms and democratic leadership is evolving.

This week, Bush extended the hand of co-operation to Ukraine, newly released from the old socialist nomenklatura.

Now Bush is reaching out to strategic partnership with the largest democracy in the world.

“This is indeed a monumental and welcome development; it's the clearest sign to date that the Bush Doctrine has a genuine strategic logic, that it's more than a justification for the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. To realize the president's goals, particularly the commitment to spreading freedom that was the core message of his Second Inaugural Address, the United States needs a workable, how-to plan, one that bends the instruments of international politics--most notably, the tools of "hard" power like military force and political alliances--to American purposes. A U.S.-India strategic partnership, if fully developed, would be the single most important step toward an alliance capable of meeting the 21st century's principal challenges: radical Islam and rising China.

“Unlike our almost erstwhile allies in western Europe, India shares an equal strategic concern with both these challenges. Perhaps even more important, India shares a commitment to democracy that transcends ethnic nationalism--Hindu nationalism, in this case, will not suffice to govern a state that includes 120 million Muslims--and an understanding of the necessity for armed strength. India's position in South Asia puts it in an essential geostrategic location from both a continental and maritime perspective. In sum, the United States could hardly dream up a more ideal strategic partner." [Quoted from weeklystandard.com.]

It is incredible to me to see the narrow, inward-looking Old Europe making such basic errors of judgement. They whine on the sidelines as Bush continues to revive and remake the modern world, meanwhile dreaming vainly of forming some counterblock against the leading Western democracy.

Is this just a triumph of the ego of a few old men over obvious historic realities, or is it socialists who have come to believe their own empty rhetoric?

related material
ukraine invited to prepare to enter nato

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#move_strategy_070405

more on the difference between finding a good move and having a useful strategy

I note the self-same narrowness in the socialist coup-‘led’ Tory Party [UK Conservative Party] as Dracula [Michael H*****, Conservative leader] continues to concentrate on moves while Bliar [Tony Blair, UK Prime Minister] attends to strategy. The Tory Party will inevitably remain becalmed until it reforms despite the current, to be short lived, euphoria.

I was most struck by a recent cameo on the BBC’s Newsnight of an American doing opinion studies on the UK party leaders, full of soft hopes for opposition to Bliar but a great hole in the ship when the testees were asked who they would want in a crisis. The answer: overwhelmingly Bliar, despite all the moaning and discontent. The self-same reaction that kept Margaret Thatcher in power so long.

related material
the difference between finding a good move and having a useful strategy

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#move_strategy2_070405

what to do with the neets, and statistical interpretation

[neet - a person who has No Employment, no Education, no Training.]

“US experience shows Britain what to do with its underclass - get it off the streets.”

Some readers have suggested that such a response is “chilling”. However, no suggestion is made on how to handle these people. The author of the original article, Charles Murray - one of the authors of The Bell Curve, is very cautious in the article not to step over the line of strict fact, while leaving himself plenty of manoeuvring room for misunderstanding, this was also done in The Bell Curve. For instance, Murray carefully avoids clearly discriminating averages from individuals.

“We know the programmes didn't work because all of them were accompanied by evaluations. I was a programme evaluator from 1968 to 1981. The most eminent of America's experts on programme evaluation - a liberal sociologist named Peter Rossi - distilled this vast experience into what he called the Iron Law of Evaluation: "The expected value of any net impact assessment of any large-scale social programme is zero." The Iron Law has not been overturned by subsequent experience.”

In this quote, exactly what does Murray mean by a net value? Does he mean that the inputs are balanced by the outputs, or does he mean that the outputs are lost?

Many programmes have, in fact, shown positive outcomes.

It is essential that social programmes

1. they start very early
2. they are persistent
3. they are sane.

This amounts to such programmes being very expensive in terms of modern social organisations.

Very few efforts meet all 3 criteria.

A further quote from the Murray article:

“I should add a corollary to it, however: "The initial media accounts of social programmes that ultimately fail are always positive." Every training programme for young men or parenting programme for young women can produce a heart-warming success story for the evening news. None produces long-term group results that survive scrutiny.”

Murray means, of course, statistical study. Intervention does, indeed, raise some of the participants, but the great majority do revert. Note my item 2 above: persistence. That persistence, in my experience, can mean a very long period, and may well be supervision for life.

Perhaps the worst obscurantism is his oft repeated comments:

“[...] Today's translation: children who grow up without being nurtured by two biological parents are at risk[...]”

That means at risk statistically. It most definitely does not mean at risk as individuals.

Or do we perhaps suppose widows in the past could not raise adequate functioning members of society? Or perhaps you suppose that a feckless (or even violent) parent forced into cohabiting with children improves the circumstances of anyone?

related material
Franchise by examination, education and intelligence

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#neets_050405

another madsam supporter shows her intelligence
[madsam = Saddam Hussein]

“People poured into the capital from across the country, including 29-year-old human rights author Susanna Akono who traveled in a coach from Kent.”
—
“ Akono, who is from Cambodia and is married to a British man, plans to go on a hunger strike from April 14 in protest against the continuing war on terror.

“ 'I want to do everything I can to make sure my child has a secure future,' said the pregnant activist.”

Link from Chrenkoff

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#maternal_instinct_280305

i’m not here really, said the octopus, as it walked down the seabed

“In Indonesia, for example, the coconut octopus looks like a coconut tiptoeing along the ocean bottom, six of its arms wrapped tightly around its body.”
—
“The other type of octopus, which camouflages itself as algae in tropical waters from Indonesia to Australia, looks like a sea monster scooting along the sea floor on two legs. Huffard filmed this creature off Australia's Great Barrier Reef easily rolling over rocks and other obstacles.”

[The movies run on/from the above linked page.]

To view the short online movies, you need to have Quicktime installed. Quicktime is downloadable from apple. (The installer advises that all open Windows programs be closed before installation, but does not require a reboot of the computer.)

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#octopus_250305

conciousness and ethics in humans and other animals

“ "These conditions are all that is needed for apes to acquire understanding of language at least equal to a three-year-old child," says Savage-Rumbaugh. For example, the bonobos can respond correctly, even on first hearing, to new sentences such as "Can you find the pine needles in the refrigerator?"

“Kanzi and Panbanisha clearly understand even more complex concepts, says Savage- Rumbaugh, for example, Panbanisha watched as a human secretly substituted a bug for some sweets in a box. When a second human tried to open the box, the first human asked the bonobo "What is she looking for?" Panbanisha replied that the human was looking for the sweets. "To answer a question as sophisticated as this, Panbanisha needs a concept of what thinking is, and that other people's thinking is different from her own, says Savage-Rumbaugh

“[Psychological experiments with children show that they don't have a concept of what is in the mind of someone else until about the age of three.These animals then, are out-thinking a three year old human -LB]

“Even more strikingly, Panbanisha added that the first person was being "bad" to play such a trick-the same comment that the researcher's four-year-old daughter made.”

related material
Good Natured by Frans de Waal
Franchise by examination, education and intelligence

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#conciousness_220305

butter wouldn’t melt - i didn’t have sex, i’m a good christianist virgin

Shades of Arkansas.

“Teenagers who take virginity pledges -- public declarations to abstain from sex -- are almost as likely to be infected with a sexually transmitted disease as those who never made the pledge, an eight-year study released yesterday found.

“Although young people who sign a virginity pledge delay the initiation of sexual activity, marry at younger ages and have fewer sexual partners, they are also less likely to use condoms and more likely to experiment with oral and anal sex, said the researchers from Yale and Columbia universities.”
—
“Since it was founded in 1993, the virginity group True Love Waits claims 2.4 million youths have signed a card stating: "Believing that true love waits, I make a commitment to God, myself, my family, those I date, and my future mate to be sexually pure until the day I enter marriage.”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#purity_pledge_200305

cautionary information that every reader should know

“Most readers and viewers have small appreciation of how little of what they see on television or read in newspapers and magazines is original with the reporters, editors, and producers involved. Yet in fact news organizations are highly dependent on predigested information from public relations firms, government officials, and advocacy groups, information that is often passed on to their readers and viewers with no indication that it is not original. That problem is not new, but it has gotten worse in recent years."

Excerpt from a chapter on plagarism in

The Appearance of Impropriety: How the Ethics Wars Have Undermined American Government, Business, and Society, Peter W. Morgan & Glenn H. Reynolds 1997, Free Press, hbk, 0684827646, out of print, secondhand from $2.49 [amazon.com] {advert} 2002, Free Press, pbk, 0743242661, $19.95 [amazon.com] {advert} 1997, Simon & Schuster Inc, hbk, 0684827646, £11.86 [amazon.co.uk] {advert}

Lead from the auroran sunset.

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#plagarism_160305

are us mafia going to take the biggest hit since Vallachi?

“Prosecutor's said yesterday's indictment was not related to the case against Peter Gotti and that the near five-year-long Gambino investigation would not have been possible without the work of an undercover federal agent who penetrated the crime family's inner ranks wearing a wiretap for more than two years. The wise-guy ruse was so believable that the Gambino's aging acting captain, Gregory DePalma, 72, had plans to induct him into the family as an official member, authorities said.

“ "Had we left him out on the street much longer, the Gambino family ranks would actually have increased by one," said the assistant director of the FBI's New York office, Pasquale D'Amuro.”
—
“The undercover agent regularly joined the crime family members for clandestine business meetings at the United Hebrew Geriatrics Home in New Rochelle, where DePalma's son, Craig DePalma, himself convicted of racketeering charges, is a convalescent patient after attempting to hang himself in prison. Prosecutors said crime-family members conducted business in DePalma's room at the geriatric home, thinking law enforcement would not have the means to monitor the meetings.”

In the 1960s, “one of [Genovese’s] soldiers, Joe Valachi, [...] gave the public the first real insider information on LCN [La Cosa Nostra]. Valachi had also been convicted of heroin charges and was suspected of being an informer. Believing he was marked for death, Valachi killed another prisoner whom he mistook for a mobster preparing to kill him. With nowhere else to turn, Valachi called the feds and began talking about his personal understanding of the history of LCN [...]. [Quoted from Gangland]

The Valachi Papers by Peter Maas, 2003, Perennial, 006050742X, pbk, $9.71 (amazon.com)

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#mafia_100305

more on the ludicrous ‘logic’ of a particular and unrealistic class
previous thoughts at ends and means and the individual

In an interview with Victor Hanson, who was interesting as usual, I came across the following:

“In my case, I've met in America, mostly on campuses and among students, one too many Europeans, Chinese, Indians, Mexicans, Arabs, or Koreans who after becoming a naturalized US citizen or a legal resident alien, begin praising the country they under no circumstance wish to return to while damning the country that they most certainly will not leave under any circumstance. I am sure the psychotherapists have various names and classifications for this sick syndrome; but abstract identification of it does not make it any easier to stomach in the here and now. So that is the burden of our diplomats and so far they are doing wonderfully.”

Similar contradictions can be seen every day in the reports from US universities, with ‘professors’ using their constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech to denigrate the USA in any way possible, how ever risible their nonsense is to any sane person. Like the students of foreign origin, these people make no effort to emigrate to more compatible venues but cling to tenure

Are they, perhaps, preponderantly those who have risen from the lower levels of society and feel guilt at no longer mixing with their less ‘enlightened’ or ‘sophisticated’ neighbours, or is it some herd wish to conform to their would-be elite status and to be ‘outrageous' or ‘interesting’ or ‘independent’?

This herd behaviour is seen so widely in the middle classes of the United States, especially those with little real-world experience outside the salons and college common rooms.

Just what drives these people to talk entirely out of accord with the way they act in reality? Why does anyone take these glass houses inhabitants or, even, why do they take themselves, seriously?

Are they, perhaps, children of the permissive generation brought up to have no self control, and finding they can ‘get away with’ throwing their temper tantrums in public, without fear of the sock in the jaw or mocking laughter they would have received in a more robust past culture?

Is it, then, that they are just permanent children in an over-indulgent ‘politically correct’ age, that has forgotten to treat overgrown children as dysfunctional?

I want to know...

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#ludicrous_logic_040305

supreme court moves usa one step nearer to civilised behaviour

No more ritual state murder in the usa for killers under 18 years old.

“The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the death penalty is unconstitutionally cruel for juvenile killers. In a 5-4 decision, the justices found that the Constitution forbids executing anyone for a crime committed before the age of 18.

“The ruling ends a practice used in 19 states and tosses out death sentences of about 70 juvenile murderers. It also blocks states from seeking to execute minors for future crimes.”
—
“ Juvenile offenders have been put to death in recent years in just a few other countries, including Iran, Pakistan, China and Saudi Arabia. All those countries have gone on record as opposing capital punishment for minors.

“The Supreme Court has permitted states to impose capital punishment since 1976 and more than 3,400 inmates await execution in the 38 states that allow death sentences.”

The language in the above report has apparently been sanitised for euphemistic communications purposes.

For those who prefer plain English, the following translations are provided.

Translations:

execution means killed or murdered.
death penalty means killed or murdered.
death sentence means intention to kill or murder.
capital punishment means kill or murder.
minors means children.
juvenile means children.

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#state_murder_020305

did you know? [politics]

This data was apparently issued by the US military establishment, I have no originating source.

Did you know that 47 countries have re-established their embassies in Iraq?

Did you know that the Iraqi government employs 1.2 million Iraqi people?

Did you know that 3100 schools have been renovated, 364 schools are under rehabilitation, 263 schools are now under construction and 38 new schools have been built in Iraq?

Did you know that the Iraqi Police Service has over 55,000 fully trained and equipped police officers?

Did you know that there are 5 Police Academies in Iraq that produce over 3500 new officers each 8 weeks?

Did you know there are more than 1100 building projects going on in Iraq? They include 364 schools, 67 public clinics, 15 hospitals, 83 railroad stations, 22 oil facilities, 93 water facilities and 69 electrical facilities.

Did you know that 96% of Iraqi children under the age of 5 have received the first 2 series of polio vaccinations?

Did you know that 4.3 million Iraqi children were enrolled in primary school by mid October?

Did you know that there are 1,192,000 cell phone subscribers in Iraq and phone use has gone up 158%?

Did you know that Iraq has an independent media that consist of 75 radio stations, 180 newspapers and 10 television stations?

caring and sharing

“That's what we all are taught. But if kids get Tori Haidinger in high school, they learn a different lesson. The California teacher invites kids to experience basic economics firsthand: "You are the head of a family that is fed by catching fish," she says. "Our fish are Hershey's Kisses. You will get to eat them." Each table gets a beaker of Kisses. She tells the kids, "Share them with your friends. You can take as many as you want, but any left over will reproduce, just like fish, because I will double them." What happens? The kids quickly empty their beakers. No more Kisses.

“ That's what has happened in the real world, too. The supply of fish in the world's oceans has dropped because the oceans and the fish swimming through them are public property - shared property. The oceans are full of fishermen who know that if they don't catch a fish, the next guy might, so they have very little reason to cut back on fishing: The fish they leave behind aren't feeding their own future - they're feeding their competitors. As one of Haidinger's students said, "I was thinking ... I probably should share, but I didn't think anybody else was sharing, so I took more." Economists call this "the tragedy of the commons." ”

related material
the tragedy of the commons

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour0501.php#caring_sharing_200205

socialist bliar’s attack on education and parental responsibility under pressure

Who owns the child

“ 'We are hoping the school can cash in on their trips and gain educational benefits for the rest of the class. The children will be keeping diaries and sending back email reports to their class, as well as video clips and photographs. I think that would be churlish to deprive children of this amazing opportunity.' ”

Another brick in the wall!

“Parents need to be told the risks though,' he added. 'If you take an entire term off, it can be very damaging, especially for younger children who need to build up a wall of blocks of work. If they miss enough of those blocks, they might never be able to gain that knowledge again.”

How irritating for them.

“Headteachers have long complained that parents do not think that taking children away is truanting. Many complained of rows of empty seats during the peak ski-holiday period and before the start of the summer holidays, when breaks are far cheaper.”

Equality before education.

“In 2003 Ivan Lewis, the education minister, said the government would be guilty of 'double standards' if it expected its policies on truancy to apply only to disadvantaged parents who allowed their children to roam the streets.”

But still some teachers are truthful and put education ahead of socialist dogma and child minding:

“ 'We wanted to show the children places that normally you can't get to in a lifetime,' she said. 'If we had only travelled in the summer holidays, it would have taken until they were 18 to cover the same ground and cost too much to contemplate. It was not difficult at all to persuade the school. We asked for their opinion, not just of the educational issues but the social aspects, and the head immediately said she was sure the children would learn far more from going around the world than sitting in a classroom for a term.' ”

mental and emotional cowardice is the key
socialism as observed in context of the iraq liberation

moved to denialism, a briefing document

a real old sportsman dies at 99 - max schmeling

“Schmeling also gave financial help to Louis, who later became destitute, and set up a ?5 million ($6.5 million) foundation to help charity groups and retired boxers in need.”

alienation and images at abu ghraib

Thin but recommended.

“There is no particular reason for the violence and intimidation - it is just staged for the camera. As Sontag wrote in the New York Times after the photos came out from Abu Ghraib, 'There would be something missing if, after stacking the naked men, you couldn't take a picture of them'. Soldiers prove themselves not by fighting war, but by staging mock-torture photo shoots to show to their friends. Kids prove themselves not by fighting or carrying out daredevil pranks, but by slapping unsuspecting passersby for film. A politician proves himself not by going hunting but by posing with his friend's collection of guns.

“In the images of British soldiers, the torturers are indifferent to their subjects. All eyes are on the camera, giving grins or the thumbs up. Both London passersby and Iraqi detainees are being played with, allotted an involuntary part in somebody else's movie. 'You starred on Happy Slap TV', was the appropriate sign-off that one of the boys used for his video clips.”

The sheriff comes to town

The inevitable and predictable consequences of old European foolishness.

“Imagine a world in which there was no United States during the last 15 years. Iraq, Iran, and Libya would now have nukes. Afghanistan would remain a seventh-century Islamic terrorist haven sending out the minions of Zarqawi and Bin Laden worldwide. The lieutenants of Noriega, Milosevic, Mullah Omar, Saddam, and Moammar Khaddafi would no doubt be adjudicating human rights at the United Nations. The Ortega Brothers and Fidel Castro, not democracy, would be the exemplars of Latin America. Bosnia and Kosovo would be national graveyards like Pol Pot's Cambodia. Add in Kurdistan as well — the periodic laboratory for Saddam's latest varieties of gas. Saddam himself, of course, would have statues throughout the Gulf attesting to his control of half the world's oil reservoirs. Europeans would be in two-day mourning that their arms sales to Arab monstrocracies ensured a second holocaust. North Korea would be shooting missiles over Tokyo from its new bases around Seoul and Pusan. For their own survival, Germany, Taiwan, and Japan would all now be nuclear. Americans know all that - and yet they grasp that their own vigilance and military sacrifices have earned them spite rather than gratitude. And they are ever so slowly learning not much to care anymore.

“In fact, an American consensus is growing that envy and hatred of the United States, coupled with utopian and pacifistic rhetoric, disguise an even more depressing fact: Outside our shores there is a growing barbarism with no other sheriff in sight. Any cinema student of the American Western can fathom why the frightened townspeople - huddled in their churches and shuttered schools - almost hated the lone marshal as much as they did the six-shooting outlaw gang rampaging in their streets. After all, the holed-up 'good' citizens were always angry that the lawman had shamed them, worried that he might make dangerous demands on their insular lives, confused about whether they would have to accommodate themselves either to savagery or civilization in their town's future, and, above all, assured that they could libel and slur the tin star in a way that would earn a bullet from the lawbreaker [...] ”

Recommended reading.

sheep, sheep dogs and wolves

“ "I mean nothing negative by calling them sheep. To me it is like the pretty, blue robin's egg. Inside it is soft and gooey but someday it will grow into something wonderful. But the egg cannot survive without its hard blue shell. Police officers, soldiers, and other warriors are like that shell, and someday the civilization they protect will grow into something wonderful.? For now, though, they need warriors to protect them from the predators.

“ "Then there are the wolves," the old war veteran said, "and the wolves feed on the sheep without mercy." Do you believe there are wolves out there who will feed on the flock without mercy? You better believe it. There are evil men in this world and they are capable of evil deeds. The moment you forget that or pretend it is not so, you become a sheep. There is no safety in denial.

“ "Then there are sheepdogs," he went on, "and I'm a sheepdog. I live to protect the flock and confront the wolf." ”

words from clinton on IT and china, plus some useful advice!
[item starts at the heading The Accoona Launch]

Bill Clinton's keynote address is down in the later part of page.

“If you do this right, every time we get another million people in China on the Internet, we minimize the chances that ten, twenty, thirty years from now there’ll be a destructive conflict over water, over oil, over territory or over anything else. And we maximize the chances that we will live in peace and harmony, widening the circle of opportunity in the 21st century. We’ve got to build a world where we share responsibilities and we share benefits, because we think that our common humanity is more important than our very interesting differences. Technology is key to achieving that goal.”

“Here's a little postscript for those of you who have made it all the way through this report. The very nice lady who gave us our accreditations and looked after us at the Accoona launch, Polina Balaban, was quite exhausted at the end of the ceremony. She stepped outside the Tavern on the Green for a quick smoke. There she was approached by a guest, who crossed the lawn to speak to her. "You shouldn't do that, you know," said the man. "Smoking is bad for your health." Polina returned to the Tavern and told us: "What can I do, I have to quit smoking. The President of the United States told me to do so." ”

pew internet report [4-page pdf]

“Blog readership shoots up 58% in 2004 6 million Americans get news and information fed to them through RSS aggregators But 62% of online Americans do not know what a blog is.”
—
“ An even more dramatic story emerges in blog readership. We began asking about this in the spring of 2003 and found that about 11% of internet users at that time had read blogs. The figure jumped to 17% this past February and leapt to 27% in November. The growth in 2004 alone amounts to 58%.”

related material
rss feeds - reading the news, or anything!

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