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Doubt anyone really follows this but the FCC is auctioning off the last available piece of wireless spectrum.  Why it is relevant to everyone is because Google lobbied hard to get the FCC to adopt “open access” requirements to how this spectrum is used by the winning bidder.

“Open Access” would mean that the owner of the spectrum would have to allow any device at any time access to their network or likely Internet  (at wholesale pricing).  The FCC auction price must reach $4.7 billion to adhere to the rules outlined for “Open Access”.  It’s currently at $4.29 billion so it looks like it’ll make it.

It’s a closed auction so no one knows who the bidders are (to prevent collusion) but I imagine Google is forcing the price up.  Speculation says Google want’s the open access requirements but doesn’t really want to own the spectrum as that’s really not their cup-of-tea… hard infrastructure.

Anyhow… what this could potentially mean if Google wins and builds out an infrastructure is a rapid deployment of Wi-Fi across the nation at a cost to consumers of nothing or next to nothing.

If metropolitan areas are suddenly blanketed with Wi-Fi and I can go from my house to my work without an interruption in connectivity… that means handheld wi-fi devices will replace mobile phones.  Apple already makes one, it’s called the iPod Touch.  Come February when Apple allows native apps to run on their devices, expect a widget from Skype.  If I can run Skype on my iPod Touch then I can make phone calls for nothing, or next to nothing.  This whole concept threatens the very infrastructure of mobile phone operators.  They’ve spent hundreds of billions of dollars on cellular tower based infrastructure and Google stepping in and getting the FCC to adopt “open access” requirements and/or becoming the owner of the spectrum. 

I dunno… I’m ill informed for sure, but I see this as fundamentally changing the landscape.  (In February 2009 that is, when the spectrum is abandoned).  Google’s Android initiative, Open Social… everything… it all points to the ubiquitous access and portability of information. 

His first studio album in four years, Seal said he’s returning to his roots with “System”.  The song below has squeezed onto both the USA and UK top 50 charts.  It’s quite catchy.

Seal | System | Amazing (Thin White Duke Edit)

CNN is reporting that a 16 year old Louisiana boy had suicide plans to hijack an airplane and crash it into a Hannah Montana concert.  He’s been arrested by the FBI and there is no report on how the airline became aware of his intentions.

In 2006 the World changed.  The world changed into a place where more than half the worlds population lives in cities.  19 cities with populations over 20 million at the turn of the 21st century.  Watch the show and learn of the initiative at 192021.org

I can’t begin to say how brilliant this is.  The concept, the message, the purpose.  This is from a group calling themselves “Anonymous”.  The Church of Scientology protects at all costs it’s intellectual property and holds paramount the submission and silence of it’s adherents.  They have issued takedown notice after takedown notice for the recently released videos of Tom Cruise’s acceptance speech at one of their recent meetings of the deranged.  The group “Anonymous” has one purpose… to liberate information and thwart distortion.

Watch the video from… Anonymous.

“Over the years, we have been watching you, your campaigns of misinformation, your suppression of dissent, your litigious nature. All of these things have caught our eye.

“With the leakage of your latest propaganda video into mainstream circulation, the extent of your malign influence over those who have come to trust you as leaders has been made clear to us. Anonymous has therefore decided that your organization should be destroyed, for the good of your followers, for the good of mankind, and for our own enjoyment.

“We shall proceed to expel you from the Internet and systematically dismantle the Church of Scientology in its present form.”

“We are prepared for a long, long campaign.”

“We are Anonymous.”
“We are legion.”
“We do not forgive.”
“We do not forget.”
“Expect us.”

This makes me feel patriotic in some wierd way…

This is a photo captured with Bush on MLK day at an event in DC on the 21st of January, 2008.  What would your caption be?  How about… “Who the HELL invited YOU to this party?!?”

Speaking about the Confederate flag, Huckabee told a crowd in South Carolina last week that “if somebody came to Arkansas and told us what to do with our flag, we’d tell them what to do with the pole. That’s what we’d do.”

A radio advertisement paid for by an independent group used the flag issue to attack Mr. McCain, of Arizona, and praise Mr. Huckabee. “John McCain assaults our values,” it said. “Mike Huckabee understands the value of heritage.”

What heritage is he referring to?  Slavery?  It baffles and amazing me that in 2008 someone like this, running for office of the President of the United States has supporters.  Wako’s like the Westboro Baptist Church can try and finagle attention by being ignorant and hateful and claiming free speech, but it’s embarrassing to be in the world arena and have a candidate for President of the most powerful country on Earth say and be quoted as saying the most ignorant and bigoted things…  It’s shameful idiots like this get as far as they do… which means there are far too many idiots supporting this type of mantra.

A study by two journalism organizations have released a report that cites 935 false statements about Iraq and national security in a mere two year window following 9/11.  Administration officials, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice, Rumsfeld, Powell, Wolfowitz, press secretaries Fleisher and Scott McClellan were also part of the tally.  One would hope that at least some of this get mentioned in the history books contrary to GWB’s distorted view of himself.

Who’s knows the veracity behind this but here’s a few choice questions asked when being “audited” by a Scientologists to map your bad stuff (from Radar Online);

Have you ever enslaved a population?

• Have you ever debased a nation’s currency?

• Have you ever killed the wrong person?

• Have you ever torn out someone’s tongue?

• Have you ever been a professional critic?

• Have you ever wiped out a family?

• Have you ever tried to give sanity a bad name?

• Have you ever consistently practiced sex in some unnatural fashion?

• Have you ever made a planet, or nation, radioactive?

• Have you ever made love to a dead body?

• Have you ever engaged in piracy?

• Have you ever been a pimp?

• Have you ever eaten a human body?

• Have you ever disfigured a beautiful thing?

• Have you ever exterminated a species?

• Have you ever been a professional executioner?

• Have you given robots a bad name?

• Have you ever set a booby trap?

• Have you ever failed to rescue your leader?

• Have you driven anyone insane?

• Have you ever killed the wrong person?

• Is anybody looking for you?

• Have you ever set a poor example?

• Did you come to Earth for evil purposes?

• Are you in hiding?

• Have you systematically set up mysteries?

• Have you ever made a practice of confusing people?

• Have you ever philosophized when you should have acted instead?

• Have you ever gone crazy?

• Have you ever sought to persuade someone of your insanity?

• Have you ever deserted, or betrayed, a great leader?

• Have you ever smothered a baby?

• Do you deserve to have any friends?

• Have you ever castrated anyone?

• Do you deserve to be enslaved?

• Is there any question on this list I had better not ask you again?

• Have you ever tried to make the physical universe less real?

• Have you ever zapped anyone?

• Have you ever had a body with a venereal disease? If so, did you spread it?