Earth: Mostly Harmless

Italians! Register your blog!

In a massive public relations own-goal, Romano Prodi’s centre-left government in Italy has preliminarily approved a compulsory registration system for any web site involving “editorial activity”.

And it definitely, definitely, definitely doesn’t have anything to do with silencing comedian, blogger and general thorn in the Italian establishment’s side, Beppe Grillo (Wikipedia article).

Definitely not.

Since the story broke, the article in question has been watered down to presumptively exclude ‘personal’ sites, but the discretion to make that distinction remains with the ministry implementing the law, rather than the courts.

Thanks to Maureen Lister for the Times Online article. I expect that she’ll cover the story at some point on her blog too. Maureen makes an excellent point about Grillo in an unrelated post:

Grillo is successful first of all because he is a brilliant comedian, secondly because he comes up with a lot of information (rather than bla-bla opinions) and thirdly because he uses webtools intelligently, something that hardly anyone in the media has bothered to mention.Of course blogs, used by averagely intelligent people, are a serious threat to traditional media, (and therefore to traditional politics) and have the power to undermine the present RAI-Mediaset duopoly.   

More coverage:Beppe Grillo - original postBeppe Grillo - updateSlashdot coverageTimes online articleTimes online updated articleBoingBoing coverage

Barack Obama to support any potential Filibuster on telecoms immunity?

Far be it from me to get involved in the putrid mire that is U.S. politics, but I thought this was an interesting development.For background, the Bush administration is currently attempting to introduce legislation granting retrospective immunity from prosecution to all telecoms companies involved in the illegal wiretapping of U.S. citizens.

Obama will support filibuster of any bill granting telecom immunity:
The so-called “Austin Mayor” says:

Sen. Barack Obama will back a filibuster of any Senate FISA legislation containing telecom immunity, his campaign has just told Election Central. The Obama campaign has just sent over the following statement from spokesman Bill Burton: “To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies.”Link 

(Via BoingBoing.)

Wordpress upgraded

I just upgraded the site to WordPress 2.3. Let me know if anything goes awry. The banner photo will be restored soon. 

Web zen: Bradypus lotharius, amirite?

Bradypus lotharius, amirite?:

A brief video about a philandering sloth who wears a necktie. 

(Via MetaFilter.)(Psst - it’s actually a viral ad campaign for Alfa Romeo, shot in Barcelona).

Nightblogging

If you’re using a Mac, and are prone to unhealthy sleeping patterns involving late night computing (like myself), then save your eyes by hitting command-control-option-8 on your keyboard. It’ll invert the screen.

You can also access this from System Preferences –> Universal Access.

Bonus: 25 super ninja night-vision kudos points.