consolejockey

Who doesn’t want USB drum pads? Add one of these M-Audio mini keyboards and you can be Nine Inch Nails on a budget.

The coverage of the YouTube anti-Clinton 1984 video is just ridiculous. I think ABC news overstates it best with:

… the attack on Clinton, which ends with a plug for BarackObama.com, is a polished and sophisticated take: the overarching metaphor of the athlete (Obama) rescuing the numbingly mindless public from the evil establishment (Clinton).

There’s a lot I’d like to say about how any mention of “evil establishment” should be accompanied by the name Bush, not Clinton. But instead I’ll just say that anyone who has been paying attention to online video parodies and mash-ups for the last ten years knows that Apple’s 1984 Mac ad is a favorite of video geeks with with too much time on their hands. A while back there was a version of the ad with Bill Gates on the big screen. Apple themselves re released the commercial with an iPod CGI’d added onto the runner. Seriously, this latest video says nothing other than, “That 1984 ad was cool, I wanna rip it off.” Reading anymore into than that is just ignorant.

This is just an FYI for all the cat and dog people out there, there’s been a wet (canned/pouched/etc.) pet food recall for many brands of cat and dog food. Some of these brands include Iams, Nutro, Eukanuba and a whole lot more. Info can be found here:

http://www.menufoods.com/recall/

Not to be a fear monger, but this genuinely worries me:

SEC. 802. DEFINITION OF DOMESTIC TERRORISM
‘(5) the term ‘domestic terrorism’ means activities that–

‘(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State;

‘(B) appear to be intended–

‘(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;

‘(ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or

‘(iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and

‘(C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.’.

Vague enough for you?
More information from the ALCU

This combined with the also disturbingly vague Federal Animal Enterprise Protection Act really starts to make me worry. Seven people were thrown in jail last year for just running a web site that protested and encouraged protest against an animal testing lab, based on this Act.

The likelihood of me or anyone else who engages in activism (be it civil rights or animal rights) being charged as a terrorist in near future just increased to an uncomfortable level.

Thinking about these guys pretty much 24/7.

Tim Ziegler, who some of you may know as they guy who wrote a rock opera based on robots named C9 and Alarmo, has been at the center of a Digg news link. The domain name of his long time pet project FamilyAlbum was more or less hijacked by GoDaddy. The article that’s linked to leads here. I’m sure this is not how Tim wanted FamilyAlbum to get mentioned on Digg.com. At any rate, I transfered over the domains I had on GoDaddy to a registrar I trust more today. I hope GoDaddy gives Tim his domain back.

Check out the suck that is Fox News pathetic attempt to take on The Daily Show. When I first heard about The 1/2 Hour News Hour I was intrigued. I thought, if it was cleverly done, it might actually be funny. Then I watched the clip and was reminded that it’s on Fox News, which has never had anything to do with clever.

I think all the BS that went down in Boston (talk about over reaction) over the placement of a bunch of flashy LED signs for Aqua Teen Hunger Force is proof that the terrorists have won. At the very least the terrorists now know, if you decide to plant bombs throughout a major metropolitan area, don’t light them up like a neon sign. Cause, you know, it does scare people, but it also makes them really easy to find.

And in case you’re not in the know…

Came across this wacky video on YouTube promoting Windows 386 (Windows 2.1, circa 1988). It starts out with your basic corporate BS, then gets all weird and freaky, 1980’s style. I think I’ve had nightmares like this.

Carol, of Angels in Fur Cat Rescue, Simon’s former home, emailed me a few corrections about Feline Leukemia after reading my post. I know a lot of people who have cats and would find this information useful:

“False positives” on the in-office test for FeLV are not actually rare - they are common. Moreover, they are technically not “false”, as they accurately detect the presence of the virus in the cat’s blood. But a positive result on the in-office test does not mean the cat will necessarily develop a persistent infection with the virus. In fact, according to some veterinarians, 60% - 80% of cats with a healthy immune system who are exposed to the FeLV virus will develop antibodies that prevent the progression of the infection (for example, see: http://www.acfacats.com/felv.htm). That means the “false positive” rate on the ELISA test can be as high as 80%. (But again, I would argue that the term “false positive” is not really appropriate here.)

When Lucas had a positive test result, I made the error with him that I think Nancy also made with Simon, and that was not to either: (1) retest him immediately using a different test called an IFA test (indirect immunofluorescent antibody assay) that has to be sent to a veterinary diagnostic lab; or (2) retest him via the in-office ELISA test (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) in 6 - 8 weeks.

What I have learned since then is that an otherwise healthy adult cat who tests positive for FeLV via the in-office ELISA test should ALWAYS be retested in one or both of these two ways to confirm that the FeLV infection is persistent and not transient, because the majority of healthy adult cats who test positive using the ELISA test shortly after being exposed to the virus are able to mount an effective immune response against it. Weeks later, these cats will test as virus-free.

A very good pamphlet on feline leukemia that includes a description of the differences between the in-office ELISA test and the IFA test, and why both are needed, is available at http://www.vet.cornell.edu/fhc/brochures/felv.html.