Michael's posterous

Nothing to say

Seems there is a whole lot of lyrics to the songs that most everyone have heard at some point (especially when young), but never really read them, or understood them. Or perhaps never went back to see if the understanding has chosen. Last time I posted such lyrics it was "Time" by Pink Floyd, I think. Today it's Jethro Tull.

Nothing To Say 

Everyday there's someone asking
what is there to do?
Should I love or should I fight
is it all the same to you?
No I say I have the answer
proven to be true,
But if I were to share it with you,
you would stand to gain
and I to lose.
Oh I couldn't bear it
so I've got nothing to say.
Nothing to say.

Every morning pressure forming
all around my eyes.
Ceilings crash, the walls collapse,
broken by the lies
that your misfortune brought upon us
and I won't disguise them.
So don't ask me will I explain
I won't even begin to tell you why.
No, just because I have a name
well I've got nothing to say.
Nothing to say.

Climb a tower of freedom,
paint your own deceiving sign.
It's not my power
to criticize or to ask you to be blind
To your own pressing problem
and the hate you must unwind.
So ask of me no answer
there is none that I could give
you wouldn't find.
I went your way ten years ago
and I've got nothing to say.
Nothing to say.

 

iWatch - be afraid; be very afraid - that's what that video really says

Here's a video for an (apparently) American citizen reporting initiative designed to instantly report anything suspicious. Nice pathos, etc. Note how easy it is now to report anything you don't like, or are afraid of, for whatever reason, as suspicious.

And to put things in perspective, I'm attaching a tiny bit of an historical document. It's in Russian, and heavily abbreviated in places, so I'll do a little translation for you. It's an excerpt from Troika sitting, Troika being a triplet, or Trinity, if you wish, of local executives, in the times of that document endowed with almost absolute powers over people. Including life and death.

Troika-shoot-decision

so, it says, top to bottom, left to right, left column first.

Excerpt from a protocol
of a Troika session at USSR NKVD Directorate, at 26th of September, 1937

left column title: CONSIDERED

138. The case number 5504, convicting Minin Ivan Antonovich, born in MO (probably Moscow region), Kurovsky district, Zevnevo village. In 1918 served in gendarmerie with White army.  Old Believer, illegal doctrinarian. Charged in that, being an old believer and doctrinarian, systematically, under the guise of religious exhortations, conducted active counterrevolutionary propaganda, brainwashing the believers in the counterrevolutionary spirit.

right column title: DECIDED

Minin Ivan Antonovich to be shot dead

signed: Troika secretary

cultural dissonance

Lately, I often think that most of the general inability of foreigners to comprehend contemporary Russia stems from a sort of cultural cognitive dissonance. Namely, Russia gets intellectually matched to Tolstoi, Dostoevsky, Chekhov and the like. Which is very nice if you are an academic, or if you want enrich your own cultural base - all worthy causes, no doubt there. But if you want to try and grasp the nature of what's going on now, think Vonnegut Jr. Or if you want a native, try Pelevin from contemporaries or Saltykov-Shchedrin for the more historical (but quite pertinent) view.

some thoughts on Google SideWiki launch

Personally, I'm not really touched by this launch, as I never used the toolbar (neither Google's nor Yandex one, I just dislike the whole invasive concept). As the result, I only use SearchWiki sometimes, and won't be able to use SideWiki, except as a read-only data source, programmatically. However, there are some interesting points regarding the service as such:

  • how are they going to combat inevitable massive spam?
  • how will SideWiki entries coexist/intersect with SearchWiki entries, if at all?
  • kudos for getting the API out on day 1 (gimme a Python library though :) )
  • since there are no ads (yet?), I wonder a) when will they appear, if at all b) what can be the benefit to Google, besides potentially enriching the web content, making it more targeted while at the same time diverse
On the last bullet, one idea that comes to mind is harvesting reputation points and dynamics - this could serve as underpinnings of some kind of reputation network running over the Google Accounts.

Also, someone should write a Firefox plugin for those toolbar-less people like me, which would indicate if there are SideWiki entries active for the current page, and allow to display them. Should be easy enough for any plugin author to do that, what with Javascript API already available and no authentication required.

Sympathy is what we need my friend

This is a song from 1969. 40 years ago. Has anything changed? The song is still beautiful. The lyrics still stand true.

===
Now when you climb, into your bed tonight.
And when you lock and bolt the door.
Just think of those, out in the cold and dark,
`cause there's not enough love to go `round.

And sympathy is what we need my friend,
and sympathy is what we need.
And sympathy is what we need my friend,
`cause there's not enough love to go `round,
no there's not enough love to go `round.

Now half the world, hates the other half.
And half the world, has all the food
And half the world, lies down and quietly starves,
`cause there's not enough love to go `round.

And sympathy is what we need my friend,
and sympathy is what we need.
And sympathy is what we need my friend,
`cause there's not enough love to go `round,
no there's not enough love to go `round.