Table of Contents

Thou Shall Share ......................................................3 Ticket and a Date.....................................................5 Dot Anything ..............................................................6 Pass Immigration using iPad ...............................8 Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy .....................................10 How to Dissolve a Dead Body ...........................12 Go Green ...................................................................14 The Next American War ......................................16 End Comic .................................................................21 Thank you for reading! ........................................22

God of Sharing

Thou Shall Share

The made up religion of Kopimism finds legitimacy
A "church" whose central tenet is the right to file-share has been formally recognised by the Swedish government. The Church of Kopimism claims that "kopyacting" - sharing information through copying - is akin to a religious service. The "spiritual leader" of the church said recognition was a "large step". But others were less enthusiastic and said the church would do little to halt the global crackdown on piracy. The Swedish government agency Kammarkollegiet finally registered the Church of Kopimism as a religious organisation shortly before Christmas, the group said. "We had to apply three times," said Gustav Nipe, chairman of the organisation. The church, which holds CTRL+C and CTRL+V (shortcuts for copy and paste) as sacred symbols, does not directly promote illegal file sharing, focusing instead on the open distribution of knowledge to all. It was founded by 19-year-old philosophy student and leader Isak Gerson. He hopes that file-sharing will now be given religious protection. "For the Church of Kopimism, information is holy and copying is a sacrament. Information holds a value, in itself and in what it contains and the value multiplies through copying. Therefore copying is central for the organisation and its members," he said in a statement.

God of Sharing "Being recognised by the state of Sweden is a large step for all of Kopimi. Hopefully this is one step towards the day when we can live out our faith without fear of persecution," he added. The church's website has been unavailable since it broke the news of its religious status. A message urged those interested in joining to "come back in a couple of days when the storm has settled". Despite the new-found interest in the organisation, experts said religious status for file-sharing would have little effect on the global crackdown on piracy. "It is quite divorced from reality and is reflective of Swedish social norms rather than the Swedish legislative system," said music analyst Mark Mulligan. "It doesn't mean that illegal file-sharing will become legal, any more than if 'Jedi' was recognised as a religion everyone would be walking around with light sabres. "In some ways these guys are looking outdated. File-sharing as a means to pirate content is becoming yesterday's technology," he added. The establishment of the church comes amid a backdrop of governmental zero-tolerance towards piracy. The crackdown on piracy has moved focus away from individual pirates and more towards the ecosystem that supports piracy. In the US, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) aims to stop online ad networks and payment processors from doing business with foreign websites accused of enabling or facilitating copyright infringement. It could also stop search engines from linking to the allegedly infringing sites. Domain name registrars could be forced to take down the websites, and internet service providers forced to block access to the sites accused of infringing. The government is pushing ahead with the controversial legislation despite continued opposition. .

American Idiot

Ticket and a Date

Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac sometimes
A Chicago police officer allegedly turned a $132 speeding ticket into a pickup opportunity when he later tracked down the female driver and asked her out, saying the least he could do for the money he cost her was to treat her to dinner, according to a lawsuit the woman filed in federal court. Evagelina Paredes filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Chicago, accusing police officer Chris Collins of violating her privacy, according to the Associated Press. She alleges that after she was ticketed on Oct. 22, Collins searched for her address in the motor-vehicle database and left a handwritten note on the windshield of her car, which was parked outside her apartment in the Chicago suburb of Stickney, asking her out on a date. In the note, a copy of which appeared was included in the court documents and was obtained by the Associated Press, the 27-year-old police officer tried to woo the female driver with humor and a seemingly heartfelt plea. "It's Chris that ugly bald Stickney cop who gave you that ticket. I know this may seem crazy and you're probably right, but truth is I have not stopped thinking about you since. I don't expect a girl as attractive as you to even go for a guy like me, but I'm taking a shot anyways." "I did cost you $132 - least I can do is buy you dinner," the note reportedly read. The scenario is not that far off from the "meet-cutes" of Hollywood romantic comedies. In the 2011 hit "Bridesmaids," Kirsten Wiig's character starts a relationship with the traffic cop who let her out of a ticket for a broken taillight. Arguably, it's a lot less "cute" when it happens in real-life. Paredes claims that the note caused her to "suffer great fear and anxiety." In the lawsuit, which seeks unspecified payments in damages, saccording to the Associated Press, she alleges that Collins used his position as a police officer to "manipulate" her into going out with him. Collins declined to comment to the Associated Press.

Internets

Dot Anything
Making up your own domain extension has never been more expensive

The Internet is getting a makeover. Starting Thursday, the web will make a big step in moving way beyond dot-com, dot-net, and the like. For the first time since 2000, ICANN, the administrator of Internet addresses, will begin taking applications for a huge range of new top-level domain names. Now, companies large and small are racing to cash in on the transition, the Wall Street Journal reports. They're ready to pay the $185,000 application fee to become "registry holders" and control the letters to the right of the dot. "I've dedicated the last 10 years to this," says one entrepreneur, who's seeking charge of "dot-shop" addresses, which he believes could eventually pose a threat to the stalwart dot-com. Others are hoping to snap up "dot-eco" to appeal to green companies or "dot-bank" for financial firms. But making a powerhouse out of a new suffix won't be easy, experts note. "You're going to have to have a widespread marketing campaign to build up consumer recognition," says one.

Internets Indeed, some companies have already spent millions on the process, and many such businesses are poised to fail, the Journal observes, noting that those who secure the domain names will also need to spend plenty of money on tech support.

iPassport

Pass Immigration using iPad

The Canadian who used technology

A Canadian man who realised he forgot his passport as he approached the US border found a new way to gain entry - his iPad. Martin Reisch said on Tuesday a slightly annoyed US border officer let him cross into the United States from Quebec after he presented a scanned copy of his passport on his Apple iPad. Mr Reisch was a half hour from the border when he decided to try to gain entry rather than turn back and make a two-hour trek back home to Montreal to fetch his passport. He told the officer he was heading to the US to drop off Christmas gifts for his friend's kids. He said that true story, the scanned passport and his driver's licence helped him get through last week.

iPassport He said the officer seemed mildly annoyed when he handed him the Apple iPad. "I thought I'd at least give it a try," Mr Reisch said. "He took the iPad into the little border hut. He was in there a good five, six minutes. It seemed like an eternity. When he came back he took a good long pause before wishing me a Merry Christmas." Mr Reisch said the officer made an exception. Canadians began needing more than a driver's licence for identification for US land border crossings in 2009. US Customs and Border Protection says it only accepts a passport, an enhanced driver's licence or a Nexus pass from Canadian citizens entering at land crossings. The list doesn't mention facsimiles, like scans and photocopies. A spokesman for the department did not immediately respond to questions on whether scanned passports are also commonly accepted at US points of entry. Mr Reisch, 33, said he took a scanned photo of his passport years ago in case it was over lost or stolen while travelling. He said he also successfully used the passport on his iPad to get through Canadian Customs on the way home later that day. He said he doubts he'd get away with it again and will bring his passport next time. But he hopes border officials will eventually make digital identification an official form of travel document. He noted that many airlines now accept digital boarding passes stored on smartphones. "I see the future as 100 percent being able to cross with your identity on a digital device - it's just a matter of time," he said.

Reel Take

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

The British version of a spy flick

Whilst revelationist nuts hell-bent on armageddon await prophecy of the Mayan calendar coming to fruition, or WW3 breaking out as a result of mounting tensions in the Middle East, I think back to a time when war was fought by proxy -- when intelligence meant counterintelligence, and nuclear deterrence was maintained by the looming threat of the proverbial finger hovering over the 'little red button.' Such is the case with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. You'll find no explosions here; it's a 2 hours plus thrill ride of suspense set at a cool, methodical pace, mixed with the perfect blend of espionage and action. Set during the height of the Cold War, veteran George Smiley is forced out of retirement to help uncover the identity of the Soviet sleeper agent within the ranks of MI6. In a performance mirroring perfection, Gary Oldman stars as Smiley, the character previously made famous by Alec Guinness in this adaptation of the 1980 miniseries based on the classic John Le Carre spy

Reel Take novel of the same name. Oldman shines among a star-studded cast including and among the likes of Colin Firth (fresh off his 2010 Oscar win), John Hurt (Alien), Mark Strong (Body of Lies), Benedict C*mberbatch (War Horse) and Tom Hardy (Bronson). Perhaps the greatest testament to Oldman's excellence comes in the fact that fifteen years ago, he bore a Russian accent and was hijacking Harrison Ford aboard Air Force One in order to secure the release of a famed Russian General. His performance here as retired British Intelligence Agent George Smiley is even more impressive than its Russian counterpart, further proving why he's considered by many as the greatest character actor the business has to offer. Taking his cue from Spielberg's 2005 espionage thriller, Munich, director Thomas Alfredson (Let the Right One In) also brings his A-game. Alfredson's stylish use of coloring and imagery screams Cold War-era, evoking a tone and sense of realism indicative of what an espionage thriller should entail. As with Spielberg's Munich, Alfredson gives us the feeling that he's letting us in on information we aren't privy to seeing -- only adding to the film's heightened sense of cool. Perhaps slow compared to what most audiences have become accustomed, the film is not without its share of payoffs. It's sleek, smart, and a refreshing change of pace from other mindless "spy" movies such as Mission Impossible 4 and the like. With top-notch performances by an outstanding and perfectly-assembled cast, and a pacing symphonic-smooth, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy comes in as the coolest and most original espionage movie perhaps of all time. As far as Cold War-era films are concerned, however, that honor will forever go to Dr. Strangelove. .

Self-Help

How to Dissolve a Dead Body

Use Mountain Dew; dont over do it

Pepsi Co., facing a lawsuit from a man who claims to have found a mouse in his Mountain Dew can, has an especially creative, if disgusting, defense: their soda would have dissolved a dead mouse before the man could have found it. An Illinois man sued Pepsi in 2009 after he claims he "spat out the soda to reveal a dead mouse," the Madison County Record reports. He claims he sent the mouse to Pepsi, which then "destroyed" the remains after he allowed them to test it, according to his complaint. Most shudder-worthy, however, is that Pepsi's lawyers also found experts to testify, based on the state of the remains sent to them, that "the mouse would have dissolved in the soda had it been in the can from the time of its bottling until the day the plaintiff drank it," according to the Record. (It would have become a "jelly-like substance," according to Pepsi, adds LegalNewsline.) This seems like a winning-the-battle-while-surrenderingthe-war kind of strategy that hinges on the argument that Pepsi's product is essentially a can of bright green/yellow battery acid.

Self-Help The lawyers still appear to be lawyering behind the scenes but we cannot wait for this to come to trial (though we think a trial is about as likely as the chances of us "Doing the Dew" ever again).

Kindle

Go Green
This cool new cover lets you harness the power of sun

One of the joys of the Kindle, as I've discovered anew while traveling in summery Argentina, is that it enables you--indeed, encourages you--to read in the brightest of sunlight. Now, with a new cover called SolarKindle, that benefit becomes a gift that keeps on giving. You've probably already guessed what SolarKindle does, but I'll tell you anyway. It's simple enough: an elegant case with a large solar panel in the front that gathers up energy even while in shade. There are two ways you can use that energy: at night, you can turn on the 800 lux LED reading lamp inside the case, if the bedside lamp bothers your bedmate. During the day (or really anytime), the energy can also serve as reserve battery power for the Kindle itself. Gizmodo says the device can so extend your reading time that you might not need to hit up the power outlet for as many as three months. If you use the pop-up reading lamp, though, you'll deplete that store a lot more quickly: within 50 hours or so. The catch? It ain't cheap. The cover, which comes out January 15, runs $80. As one commenter on Gizmodo's post cheekily points out, since $80 is more than the cheapest Kindle, you might arguably just buy a second Kindle an alternate which one you charge. It's a funny argument, but an incomplete one, of course--the built-in LED light and the pleasure of charging using renewable energy are part of that $80 price tag.

Kindle Most importantly, though, SolarKindle reinforces that pleasurable feeling that the e-reader, alone in sea of glowing screens, was meant to be taken outside, just like a good book.

Pax Americana

The Next American War

The United States may be preparing itself and its citizen for a new middle-east war.
For many Americans the progression toward war with Iran has the feel of cattle being herded from the stockyard into the slaughterhouse, pressed steadily forward with no turning back, until some guy shoots a bolt into your head. Any suggestion of give-and-take negotiations with Iran is mocked, while alarmist propaganda, a ratcheting up of sanctions, and provocative actions like Wednesdays assassination of yet another Iranian scientist push Americans closer to what seems like an inevitable bloodletting. Even the New York Times now acknowledges that Israel, with some help from the United States, appears to be conducting a covert war of sabotage and assassination inside Iran. The campaign, which experts believe is being carried out mainly by Israel, apparently claimed its latest victim on Wednesday when a bomb killed a 32-year-old nuclear scientist in Tehrans morning rush hour, Times reporter Scott Shane wrote in Thursdays editions. Though U.S. officials emphatically denied any role in the murder, Israeli officials did little to discourage rumors of an Israeli hand in the bombing. Some even expressed approval. Brig. Gen. Yoav Mordechai said he didnt know who killed the scientist but added: I am definitely not shedding a tear.

Pax Americana The latest victim, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, was the fifth scientist associated with Irans nuclear program to be killed in the past four years, with a sixth scientist narrowly escaping death in 2010, Fereydoon Abbasi, who is now head of Irans Atomic Energy Organization. As might be expected, Iran has denounced the murders as acts of terrorism. They have been accompanied by cyber-attacks on Iranian centrifuges and an explosion at a missile facility late last year killing a senior general and 16 others. While this campaign has slowed Irans nuclear progress, it also appears to have hardened its resolve to continue work on a nuclear capability, which Iran says is for peaceful purposes only. Iranian authorities also have responded to tightening economic sanctions from Europe and the United States with threats of their own, such as warnings about closing the oil routes through the Strait of Hormuz and thus damaging the Wests economies. Target: USA Another front in Israels cold war against Iran appears to be the propaganda war being fought inside the United States, where the still-influential neoconservatives are deploying their extensive political and media resources to shut off possible routes toward a peaceful settlement, while building support for future military strikes against Iran. Fitting with that propaganda strategy, the Washington Posts editorial page, which is essentially the neocons media flagship, published a lead editorial on Wednesday urging harsher and harsher sanctions against Iran and ridiculing anyone who favored reduced tensions. Noting Irans announcement that it had opened a better-protected uranium enrichment plant near Qom, the Post wrote: In short, the new Fordow operation crosses another important line in Irans advance toward a nuclear weapons capability. Was it a red line for Israel or the United States? Apparently not, for the Obama administration at least. In a television interview Sunday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said: Our red line to Iran is: do not develop a nuclear weapon. He asserted that Tehran was not trying to develop a weapon now, only a nuclear capability. The Revolutionary Guard, which controls the nuclear program, might well take that as a green light for the new enrichment operation.

Pax Americana While portraying Panetta as an Iranian tool, the Post suggested that anyone who wanted to turn back from an Iran confrontation was an Iranian useful fool. The Post wrote: The recent flurry of Iranian threats has had the intended effect of prompting a new chorus of demands in Washington that the United States and its allies stop tightening sanctions and instead make another attempt at engagement with the regime. The Ahmadinejad government itself reportedly has proposed new negotiations, and Turkey has stepped forward as a host. Almost certainly, any talks will reveal that Iran is unwilling to stop its nuclear activities or even to make significant concessions. But they may serve to stop or greatly delay a European oil embargo or the implementation of sanctions on the [Iranian] central bank and buy time for the Fordow centrifuges to do their work. The Posts recommended instead that every effort must be made to intensify sanctions and to stop Iranian sale of oil anywhere in the world. In other words, continue to ratchet up the tensions and cut off hopes for genuine negotiations. A Vulnerable Obama The escalating neocon demands for an ever-harder U.S. line against Iran and Israels apparent campaign of killings and sabotage inside Iran come at a time when President Barack Obama and some of his inner circle appear to be looking again for ways to defuse tensions. But the Posts editorial and similar neocon propaganda have made clear that any move toward reconciliation will come with a high political price tag. Already, a recurring Republican talking point is that Obamas earlier efforts to open channels of negotiation with Iran and other foreign adversaries proved his naivete and amounted to apologizing for America. Obama also has faced resistance within his own administration, especially from neoconlites such as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. For instance, in spring 2010, a promising effort led by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Brazils then-President Luiz Incio Lula da Silva got Irans President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to agree to relinquish Iranian control of nearly half the countrys supply of low-enriched uranium in exchange for isotopes for medical research.

Pax Americana The Turkish-Brazilian initiative revived a plan first advanced by Obama in 2009 and the effort had the Presidents private encouragement. But after Ahmadinejad accepted the deal, Secretary Clinton and other U.S. hardliners switched into overdrive to kill the swap and insist instead on imposing harsher sanctions against Iran. At the time, Clintons position was endorsed by editors at the Washington Post and the New York Times, who mocked Erdogan and Lula da Silva as inept understudies on the international stage. If anything, the Post and Times argued, the United States should take an even more belligerent approach toward Iran, i.e. seeking regime change. As Clinton undercut the uranium swap and pushed instead for a new round of United Nations sanctions, Lula da Silva released a private letter from Obama who had urged the Brazilians to press forward with the swap arrangement. However, with Washingtons political momentum favoring another confrontation with a Muslim adversary, Obama retreated and lined up behind the sanctions. Over the next nearly two years, the sanctions have failed to stop Irans work on enriched uranium which it claims is needed for medical research. Israel, the neocons and other American hardliners have responded by demanding still more draconian sanctions, while promoting anti-Iran propaganda inside the United States and winking at the murder of Iranian scientists inside Iran. In this U.S. election year, Israel and the neocons may understand that their political leverage on Obama is at its apex. So, if he again searches for openings to negotiate with Iran, he can expect the same kind of nasty disdain that the Washington Post heaped on Panetta on Wednesday. The Carter-Begin Precedent Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Likud leaders appear to fear a second Obama term when hed be freed from the need to seek reelection much as their predecessors feared a second term for President Jimmy Carter in 1980. Then, Prime Minister Menachem Begin thought that Carter in a second term would team up with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat in forcing Israel to accept a Palestinian state. Begins alarm about that prospect was described by Israeli intelligence and foreign affairs official David Kimche in his 1991 book, The Last Option. Kimche wrote that Begins government believed that Carter was overly sympathetic to the Palestinians.

Pax Americana Begin was being set up for diplomatic slaughter by the master butchers in Washington, Kimche wrote. They had, moreover, the apparent blessing of the two presidents, Carter and Sadat, for this bizarre and clumsy attempt at collusion designed to force Israel to abandon her refusal to withdraw from territories occupied in 1967, including Jerusalem, and to agree to the establishment of a Palestinian state. Extensive evidence now exists that Begins preference for Ronald Reagan led Israelis to join in a covert operation with Republicans to contact Iranian leaders behind Carters back and delay release of the 52 American hostages then being held in Iran until after Reagan defeated Carter in November 1980. Today, Obamas relationship with Netanyahu seems as strained as Carters relationship with Begin was three decades ago. And already many American neocons have signed up with Obamas Republican rivals, including with GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney whose foreign policy white paper was written by prominent neocons. So the question now is: Will the President of the United States take his place amid the herd of cattle getting steered into the slaughterhouse of another war?

Laugh Out Silently

End Comic
Hope you like boring stall images

Thank you for reading!

THE END