This is my last ever journal entry.

HeironymousCoward is signing off.

The news today that criminal gangs have been spotted selling botnets, the day after the FCC considers spyware to be a valid model for software producers...

In case there is any doubt at all, let me summarize the near furture of the Internet in two words: Robber. Barons.

Actions speak louder than words. But words survive when actions are dust.

Price of download single (3-4 minutes high quality music): $0.99.

Price of downloaded ringtone (30 seconds radio quality): $4.00.

Why? Because phone manufacturers don't allow mobile phones to play MP3 ringtones. Why not? Because they also profit from the ringtone business (Nokia sells ringtones and logos in Europe).

The music industry already makes more from ringtones than singles...

Some wars of the future...

1. Microsoft vs. Free Software

Last week saw some stimulating debate on Slashdot, especially concerning Microsoft. Inspiration strikes me to jot some random analysis apropos to Microsoft, open source, Linux, security, et al.

1. Microsoft and Sun

Genes produce proteins that construct the body.

It's a simple statement, yet incredibly deep. We know that it's true because we can observe the process, yet we have almost no understanding of how the process actually works.

I propose to try to build a machine that will give us this understanding.

My little daughter is growing up and doing wonderfully, seven months now. Words fail me, she's so cute. Here, let me show you a picture. I have one in my wallet. OK, it's a little out of date: taken when she was two months old.

What I need is a digital photo that fits into my wallet. Just a handful of these, credit-card sized, and I can keep my friends and colleagues rightly bored with baby stories.

So here comes more damn prior art number 8.

People, it seems, spend an extraordinary amount of effort and energy in conflict. Now, in evolutionary terms, a certain amount of conflict is inevitable and desirable, but the wholescale violent conflict between groups that dominates the news is clearly wasteful.

Everyone shares the common human spirit, but some more than others.

-- HeironymousCoward

What's the opposite of a euphemism? A way of saying something so crudely, with so much emphasis and descriptive innuendo that its impact is felt overpoweringly. Where a euphemism is a gentle caress, the anti-euphimism is a kick in the groin. "Did you feel that?"

Apparently I'm not the only one to see the hand of the Mad Colonel behind the wars in West Africa.

The BBC is reporting on accusations made against Libya by the chief prosecutor of the Sierra Leone war crimes court.

I'll leave you to ruminate on the morality of someone who invests in war in order to create client states.

Past wars were fought by kings and emperors against each other in order to aquire power and wealth. Today's wars are fought by the rich against the poor in order to maintain the status quo.

(c)2004 HeironymousCoward

"Long sleeve, short sleeve?" was the question they asked you in Sierra Leone. One answer meant they cut your hands off above the wrist. The other meant above the elbows.

The use of terror against civilians as a weapon of political control seems to be the core of modern African wars. In some cases it's the government, in other cases some obscure rebel group. In almost all cases the world looks, sighs, and turns away.

After much consideration (see BTFTD 1), I have decided that the entire modern debate about genes vs. nurture can be brought down to a single, simple, brutal point.