June 2004

"Under laws introduced by the coalition, possessing illegal weapons carries a minimum sentence of 30 years"

diets were much broader during these times than previously thought: "We can say that such dietary breadth was never seen again in the Levant"

no copyright infringment by "photographer who posed Barbie dolls naked in suggestive positions in or around household appliances"

"Abu Ghraib is not an isolated occasion of rogue junior soldiers ... but part of a strategy that was in place long before the invasion of Iraq"

"it is surprising Saddam chose the novel at all, as in wider Islamic culture it is the poet who is most revered"

"It's not a hatred of us as a society, it's a hatred of our policies"... but the US needs to be more violent, to undertake "a Sherman-like razing of infrastructure"... but "the war in Iraq was bin Laden's dream come true"

I've never understood this before: in Australia we have one university system, though some are more prestigious than others

"from late 1944 the Japanese launched 9,000 balloons from their eastern shores... armed with incendiary and antipersonnel bombs"

"The complexities of living together require a higher level of intelligence. Corvids and parrots are highly social - and smart - animals."

"sick of crappy brain-dead reports by moron journalists about completely fictional animal communicative abilities"

"a supplier of Nescafé and Maxwell House is accused of avoiding tax payments to the developing countries from which it buys."

"Scientists are supposed to specify their main objectives before beginning a trial, to protect against selective reporting."

"the business model of commercial publishing now threatens to undermine and pervert the course of research and teaching"

"Surely someone, somewhere can propose something snappier [than] 'non-proprietary peer-production of information-embedding goods'"

"The book's academic reputation waxes and (at the present time) wanes, but its more durable appeal among fans is largely a DIY phenomenon."

juror: "I was surprised to learn that people could say whatever they want, providing it would not cause imminent action."

"It is a small force, but of huge symbolic significance. This month, 1,200 Brazilian troops arrived in Haiti"

(Thank you to anyone who's been supporting me this way - due to Amazon's strange incentive scheme, I get an exceptional commission on any new items that ship before June 30th.)

"Justice Department lawyers fear a crushing defeat before the U.S. Supreme Court in the next few weeks"

"The term 'Indonesia' was first used in 1850 by the British anthropologist J. R. Logan to designate islands called the 'Indian Archipelago' by others."

"Marine trash, mainly plastic, is killing more than a million seabirds and 100,000 mammals and sea turtles each year"

"It's leading people to buy cars that aren't affordable at normal costs. It has to move toward real market prices as quickly as possible without instability."

no mention of any public oversight, and it seems users won't be informed why their HTTP requests are failing...

"We simply got it wrong. Iraq was a dangerous country, Saddam was an evil man... But we were wrong in our estimation."

"The ancients, who were less apt than we are to confuse size with import, knew that an epic without a focus - without a single action, a coherent plot, a single terrible point to make - was just a very long poem."

"Japanese men and women are finding relationships too messy, tiring and potentially humiliating to bother with anymore."

"Last year, American investment in Ireland alone (population 4m) was $4.7 billion, more than 2.5 times American investment in China (1.3 billion)"

part of the Revolutionary Guard's business dealings, or a hint at "possible militarization of the regime"

"at least 100 semi-trailers loaded with what is billed as scrap metal are streaming each day into Jordan"

three countries with 1 million people each outvoting a country with 8 million is ok, but a country with 2 million outvoting one with 1 million is unfair...

"It wouldn't surprise us if Amazon.com eventually becomes largely a middleman, rather than bothering with all those expensive warehouses"