04 Aug 2007
Ethanol leads to increased beer cost

Now this is really going too far ... if Bush takes the rap for this, it sure ain't gonna help the Republicans among the NASCAR crowd. In fact, I'd wager that Bubba will be right pissed off when he finds the price of his Bud has gone up thanks to government ag subsidies for the energy sector. Even if he can't spell "subsidy"...

Having a few too many beers may soon hurt your wallet as much as it could your liver.

(link) [Denver Post]

via within the crainium

17:50 /Agriculture | 0 comments | permanent link

The matrix of autism

I've observed this kind of reasoning ability in my autistic grandson. It seems to me that autism and mental retardation are two completely different things: there may an autistic child who is retarded, but the percentages probably aren't any greater than for the population as a whole. Autism seems to have more to do with perceptual and communicative skills than reasoning abilities.

Autistic children are doubly stigmatized. On the one hand, they are often dismissed as "low functioning" or mentally retarded, especially if they have poor speaking skills as many do. But when they display exceptional visual discrimination or memory for detail, they are dubbed "savants." New research in Psychological Science is discovering the level and nature of autistic intelligence.

(link) [EurekAlert! - Breaking News]

17:43 /Home | 0 comments | permanent link

Broadcasters Want Cash For Media Shared at Home

What would I say in this case? "Well, that's not a 'right' I care to pay for - and therefore you have no content I care to buy."

What would you say if told you that there are people out there that want to make sharing your media between devices over a home network illegal? According to Jim Burger, a Washington, D.C attorney who deals with piracy in the broadcasting industry, certain broadcasters want to do just that. Speaking in a recent podcast, Burger remarked that the broadcasting industry is keen to put controls on sharing media between devices even if those devices are on a home network and even if the sharing is strictly for personal use. When pressed as to why broadcasters would want to do this, Burger replied simply 'because they want you to pay for that right'.

(link) [Slashdot]

17:40 /Copywrongs | 0 comments | permanent link