I can’t get away from Star Wars. My personality test (very scientific) says I’m Qui-Gon.

Who are you?

• What It’ll Look Like When PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN Overrun Tom Sawyer’s Island!!
  Interesting happenings @ Tom Sowyer’s Island in Disneyland Anaheim. It appears to be converted to a Pirates of the Caribbean them. Hrm.
  (tags: Disney)

The following picture was snapped on the tarmac of a Sudanese airport, specifically on the portion reserved for military aircraft:

This is not actually a United Nations aircraft. According to this New York Times article it is a Sudanese military airplane altered to have the appearance of a UN aircraft. This airplane and many like it have been used to ferry munitions to Darfur, perform observations for military operations, and even to provide direct support (a euphemism for bombing and strafing) in military operations – this is all clearly wrong.

The government of Sudan is known to be providing assistance to the militias that are burning and killing their way through Darfur. This picture is just one small crumb of an overwhelming mountain of evidence that the Sudanese government is not only guilty of the crime of genocide, but intends to continue their activities. The world community knows this, and has known this long enough for the Sudanese government supported militias and forces to murder more than 200,000 and displace an additional 2.3 million.

The appropriate response to this, of course, is sanctions (sarcasm). Because they work so well in suppressing this sort of activity. Sanctions seem to be the only tool in the tool chest of the United Nations but sanctions have an Achilles heel. Sanctions are only really (marginally) effective when nations abide by them. In the case of Sudan, outside investment has never been as active as it is now. China, specifically, is moving into Sudan big time.

What interest could China possibly have in Sudan? Why oil, of course, the resource that has encouraged so many to look the other way for so long in so many other areas of the world (so long as the oil keeps flowing).

What’s the world to do when sanctions don’t work (as they seldom do), at least in part because powerful members of the world community (China) are so openly and obviously immoral? The situation as it stands is ridiculous. China’s abuses of rights are bad, but we know that the government of Sudan is committing horrible crimes that are in another scale entirely. We know that our efforts to isolate and marginalize the government of Sudan, as a punishment for those crimes, is being actively undermined by China. What is going to have to happen to spark some action here? I get the feeling that we might just continue to turn a blind eye to Sudan up until the time that Sudanese aircraft begin their bombing runs over the east coast. And China will be there to complain when we retaliate.

The 20 Worst Lyrics Ever

A funny look at artists lyrics.
Highlights:
20. Elton John’s ‘Your Song’
19. Shakira’s ‘Whenever, Wherever’
18. 50 Cent’s ‘21 Questions’
17. U2’s ‘Staring at the Sun’
16. Slayer’s ‘Necrophiliac’
15. R.E.M.’s ‘Leaving New York’
14. Eminem’s ‘Ass Like That’
13. America’s ‘Horse With No Name’
12. Culture Club’s ‘Time (Clock of the Heart)’
11. The Bangles’ Manic Monday
10. Natalie Imbruglia’s ‘Torn’
9. Vanilla Ice’s ‘Play That Funky Music’
8. Shania Twain’s ‘Honey I’m Home’
7. Saves the Day’s ‘See You’
6. Michael Jackson’s ‘Bad’
5. Paul McCartney and Wings’ ‘Live and Let Die’
4. Diddy and Mase’s ‘Can’t Nobody Hold Me Down’
3. Madonna’s ‘New York’
2. Culture Club’s ‘War Song’
1. Sade’s ‘Smooth Operator’

There are people who have done legitimate scholarly work on the impact of Star Wars in our society. I offer the following up as further, though anecdotal, evidence that Star Wars is perhaps bigger than we might like to think.

First, a comprehensive analysis of who was doing what in the period of time spanning the first and second trilogies:

A New Sith, or Revenge of the Hope

And here is an article on the “Clone Wars” written 27 years ago:

Considering Star Wars, 27 years ago

The important thing here isn’t the fan fervor, though that’s interesting – it’s the 25 years separating these two works. Very rarely does our society maintain its focus and interest in anything for 25 years, let alone science fiction (or “speculative fiction” as some prefer). Star Trek is the only other major SF franchise that boasts the same sort of prominence in our society.

I don’t really know why I think this is a big deal, but I do. I would bet that largish portions of our society are more well-versed in the philosophies and characters of the Star Wars canon then the Bible or the Torah or American history or whatever. Star Wars is one of the few things that most of our society shares in common any more. What this will result in, I don’t know.

A while back NBEHTM postulated, and I wrote, that perhaps the iPhone is a trojan horse, an attempt by Apple to move the “iPod Halo” out of the dorm and into the board room. It now appears that getting the iPhone ready has cost Apple their ability to deliver OS X 10.5 on time, raising the question: what use is a halo when it causes problems with the core product of a company? Of course, the question above presupposes that the halo is indeed Apples goal with the iPhone. If there’s something else going on I can’t fathom it so I’m going to continue assuming that a boardroom halo is the real goal here.

In pursuing the iPhone Apple has delayed their OS delivery but is that really a problem? Won’t they get something more valuable in the long term if they do make inroads in the board room? Some would argue that there is no problem – Windows Vista has by most accounts been very slow taking off and at any rate failed to deliver any really advanced features not already available in Mac OS X 10.4. That leaves Mac fanatics with a lot to brag about, even with a slipping delivery schedule. Same with a delayed full-screen iPod (to give focus and a spotlight to the iPhone for a while)? Again, some would argue that the Zune and other media player sales numbers have been weak, no threat to the dominance of the iPod.

As you might have guessed I don’t quite see it that way. In shutting down their OS and iPod development for the sake of the iPhone Apple is undermining the two things that have been driving growth at the company. Mac computer sales reach new records every quarter, it seems, and giving consumers a reason to hold off on purchases for what is essentially a vanity product can’t be wise. Also iPod sales have been strong but the percentage of the market that Apple owns is declining, not growing. A declining share of a growing market isn’t the end of the world, but it’s a warning sign point out that other manufacturers are producing better products than the iPod, and with competing music stores becoming more flourishing this is going to put big pressure on iTunes.

And there’s the rub. All this is going to hurt iTunes and whether or not you want to believe it, that’s where Apple’s future will be made or destroyed. I’ve said this before and this Cult of Mac article over at Wired shows very clearly how important iTunes is.

I don’t think that an iPhone, produced in some relatively small number of units, will have as profound an effect on iTunes sales growth as a cheaper, updated iPod and AppleTV would. The halo that Apple will earn for themselves in the board room will have to be pretty extraordinary in order to compensate for the lost potential in iTunes growth that Apple will be giving up.

Association of International Glaucoma Societies.

It’s overwhelming, but don’t take my word for it. Check out the site and make sure to listen to the “hymn”. This is why God created the Internets.

• Russia threatening new cold war over missile defence
  (tags: Politics U.S.A. Missile_Defense Russia)
• Diabetics cured by stem-cell treatment
  This looks like good news.
  (tags: Health Research Stem-Cells)
• Robert Fisk: America’s plan for Baghdad
  (tags: War)
• Fire Destroys Longtime Johnny Cash Home
  So much American Music History gone up in flames.
  (tags: News)