Freyburg

….as per Jason Kottke. I’ve read some but not all o’ this list of brain food, but I’m looking forward to plowing through it.

Two more good links from Boing Boing, each with an international flavour. First, a tour into the murky world of pirate DVDs in China. Then for the main course, a tour of bathrooms in India.

John Battelle is a search engine guru/blogger/prognosticator (and also one of the people who maintains Boing Boing, one of my favorite sites.) He’s got predictions on his blog of what will happen to the search/blogging industry in 2005, as well as a look back at some predictions he made about 2004.

Not gonna say much, since it’s late and I’ve driven and flown a pile today, but I’m in Edmonton, and I’ll be here until January 2nd.

How’s about a freyburg.com meetup for all you fine discussion board folk? Which basically means a Corus bitchfest, but hey, that’s cool by me. 🙂

Here’s an article about the underlying reasons why Japan get all the whiz-bang toys, and we generally don’t. It’s not a completely accurate article (see Cam’s take on it here as a former long term Japan livin’ expat) but it does sort of explore the deep gizmo love of the Japanese more than the usual “woo boy them cell phones is nifty” article.

I’m generally on the side of law and order, but I do appreciate a well executed bank robbery.

I’ll be writing the bulk of the next paper in the next two days, and spending most of Thursday on the road and in the air on the way to Edmonton, so posting will be light if not non-existent. Feel free to roast me in the comment section. 🙂

Thinking about expanding the War on (cough, cough, nonsense) Terror to Tehran, George? Not so fast.

The Guardian has a story about how young Iranians have embraced blogging, and are pushing the (admittedly pretty thin) boundaries of free speech in their country.

They also have another article about “vlogging,” which is a pretty fruity way to refer to video bloggin. I personally don’t think vlogging is ready for prime-time just yet, but what do I know? I’m using outdated metaphors to refer to something on the net. 🙂

When I was a little kid, I asked my dad what the Bay of Pigs fiasco was all about. He said “well, my boy, after the Americans invaded Cuba, Castro traded prisoners for tractors. That guy’s got style.”

And now Fidel has done it again. Well played, Castro, well played. 🙂