Google just got more evil

Google have launched their own browser, bringing them one step closer to world domination. Now they will (presumably) be able to track your every move on the internet, even if you reject their cookie.

Rather than launch into a full-blown technical review of the browser, let me outline the reasons why we should all surrender and hand over control of the world to Sergey and Larry.

Point 1: Inevitability. Why bother going through the show of resisting Google, when they are poised to wrench power from the people any day now? A struggle will only delay the inevitable, and make the transition to Googocracy that much more painful.

Point 2: Democracy didn’t work anyway. An unpopular viewpoint in the west, to be sure, but certainly one which I have been musing over the past few months. I believe that in light of the challenges now facing the world with regards to sustainability and climate change global warming, it has become quite apparent that democracies are simply not equipped to deal with long-term challenges.

Take Masdar, the zero-waste, zero-carbon city being built in Abu Dhabi. Sure, it may just be a giant show-pony, but the technology being developed for this city will have uses all around the world, and is sure to rake in the big dollars. Without the long-term vision of Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, would this project ever have gotten off the drawing board? With an election looming in the next three years, would any sane democratic government ever commit to spending $22 billion on such a crazy idea?

Even on the issue of carbon trading we find our triumvirate of Rudd, Wong and Garrett banging their collective heads against the proverbial wall. Despite a strong green paper on the topic, I think we will find that by the time these monkeys come to implementation, the cap and trade will be so watered down by industry concessions, fuel rebates and Middle Australian tax offsets that the whole thing will be a debacle. After all, what is more important - leading the way in terms of environmental policy, or keeping the voters hip pockets insulated from the reality of trying to maintain a fundamentally unsustainable growth-based economy?

So, the solution then is simple. Hand over our entire political system to Google. Give them the keys to parliament house! Clean out the press gallery! Shut down the public service, remove taxes, and fund the entire shebang with Google AdSense revenue!

And just so that we can maintain some sense of our national pride, we should replace the G-G with an Australian monarchy to rubber stamp everything. Hold a meat raffle every 10 years, and the winner gets to serve their term as king or queen.

Democracy bites!

Dreamhost woes

Pardon my erratic website, I’m having database problems. If you are one of the numerous people piggybacking off my hosting, I’m working on it. In the meantime, feel free to do someting slightly more productive than composing your latest treatise on the injustice of the padded brassiere.

Senator On-Line

Now here’s a dangerous concept. Senator On-Line is a political party which, if elected, will run a web poll for every piece of legislation passing through the senate. The elected senator will then vote according to the result of said web poll.

Now, putting to one side the small issue that (if elected) one lucky person will be paid $127,060 plus expenses per annum to sit on their arse in Canberra contributing (presumably) nothing to the parliamentary process other than their vote (decided by the poll), let’s look at the implications of the aforementioned system.

39 seats are required for a majority in the senate. The Coalition would need 20 seats, and Labor 25, to fulfill this quota. Unlikely. Therefore the balance of power will be held by the Greens, Family First, and any other minor parties who happen to scrape through (No Pokies for example). In the highly unlikely situation that Senator On-Line (SOL) was to win a seat, they would share in this balance of power.

Readers may recall that in these tight senate situations, just one vote can be enough to swing the balance and pass government legislation (and subsequently destroy an entire political party… Meg Lees anyone?). In the situation where SOL was elected, legislation could then come down to an online poll. Assuming this on-line polling system is robust enough that they can enforce their policy of one vote per person (unlikely), we could start to see massive grass-roots political campaigns running all year around.

The long and short of it? Increased government spending on advertising, and a barrage of union officials knocking at your door 365 days per year. And that’s not even the scary bit.

With a democratically elected senator actually giving their electorate the chance to vote on policy, we would start to see some semblance of democracy being introduced to the parliamentary process. This is clearly dangerous, and should be prevented at all costs. Canberra is no place for democracy - let’s keep that stuff to Australian Idol where it belongs.

Worryingly, with the increased internetisation (yes, it’s kind of a real word) of the younger generations, it’s only a matter of time before this SOL senator becomes a reality - maybe not now, or 2010, but certainly within 15 years. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Boogle

Why Google it when you can Boogle it?

Rudd Cam

Our favourite PM-to-be in the history of the universe now has his own dedicated fan site! Rudd Cam will follow the movements of the prince of teflon all the way up to the election, through his first term as PM, and beyond into the inevitable decline in morals and values.

Dodo: the world’s fuckedest cunts.

Sorry to be so crude, but Dodo Internet is probably the worst company in the universe. When I finally snap and start gunning people down, the first place I will be visiting is Dodo head office in Melbourne. You have been warned.

Conservapedia

A conservative encyclopedia you can trust is how Conservapedia bills itself.

I’d say more like a barrel of laughs.

The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy devotes chapters seven, nine, ten, eleven, fourteen, sixteen, seventeen, nineteen, twenty-one to eighty-four inclusive, and in fact most of the rest of the Guide, to sex. Conservapedia doesn’t even have an entry.

Browse through the Islam, Big Bang, and Kangaroo entries for a small insight into the minds of fundamentalist American christians.

Here’s an hilariously inaccurate snippet from the atheism page:

Popularly-known Atheists include Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein, Stephen J. Gould, Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris.

Albert Einstein, the greatest physicist of all time, turned his back on the theories of Bohr, Heisenberg and Born, theories which were founded in Einstein’s own work. Why? Because these theories implied that chance plays a role in subatomic interactions. His famous quote?

God does not play dice with the universe.

Atheist? I’d say no.

Likewise Stephen Hawking - an excerpt from his best-seller “A Brief History of Time”:

However, if we discover a complete theory, it should in time be understandable in broad principle by everyone, not just a few scientists. Then we shall all, philosophers, scientists, and just ordinary people, be able to take part in the discussion of the question why it is that we and the universe exist. If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason— for then we would know the mind of God.

Unfortunately, the second half of the article (the bit panning atheism) had been edited recently, to point out that atheists don’t actually go around killing indiscriminately because they’re not subject to the sixth commandment.

Anyway, for some cheap amusement, head on over.

Tool Lyrics

A little something for tool lovers like me…

All you need to do is post the following code on your site:

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript" src="http://marsupialmusic.net/stu/scripts/fortunes.php?file=tool"></script>

You can also add the Tool lyrics to your Google home page.

Chuck Norris Generator

With the increasing popularity of my George W. Bush generator, it’s time to expand.

All you need to do is post the following code on your site:

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript" src="http://marsupialmusic.net/stu/scripts/fortunes.php?file=chucknorris"></script>

You can also add the quote generator to your Google home page.

Chuck Norris Facts were provided by Paul Kessler’s Chuck Norris fortune module. The generator runs using Pascal Hakim’s excellent fortune program.

Slashdot stories

Three interesting stories today on Slashdot.

Firstly, MySpace will offer a program for parents to track thir kids’ profiles.

Parents who install the monitoring software on their home computers would be able to find out what name, age and location their children are using to represent themselves on MySpace. The software doesn’t enable parents to read their child’s e-mail or see the child’s profile page and children would be alerted that their information was being shared. The program would continue to send updates about changes in the child’s name, age and location, even when the child logs on from other computers.

The only suprise here is that Rupert Murdoch waited for 18 months before selling out his users (after all, my scientific research shows that 93% of MySpace users are under 13). Will this spell the end for the popular site? I say yes.

Secondly, political bloggers in the grand old US of A could soon be forced to register their details with the Ministry of Truth, or face a gaol sentence.

Section 220 of S. 1, the lobbying reform bill currently before the Senate, would require grassroots causes, even bloggers, who communicate to 500 or more members of the public on policy matters, to register and report quarterly to Congress the same as the big K Street lobbyists. Section 220
would amend existing lobbying reporting law by creating the most expansive intrusion on First Amendment rights ever. For the first time in history, critics of Congress will need to register and report with Congress itself.

The bill would require reporting of ‘paid efforts to stimulate grassroots lobbying,’ but defines ‘paid’ merely as communications to 500 or more members of the public, with no other qualifiers.

On January 9, the Senate passed Amendment 7 to S. 1, to create criminal penalties, including up to one year in jail, if someone ‘knowingly and willingly fails to file or report.’

Scary stuff. Hopefully this time Mr Howard won’t feel the need to follow the lead of his closest ally.

And finally, my favourite story, again from the US (hey, as far as I can tell, 97% of the internet population live there, so it’s hard to escape). The US Navy Surface Warfare Center has successfully fired an 8 MJ rail gun!

For those of you who don’t know what a rail gun is, here’s a demonstration from my favourite actor of all time.

These things are good. The next step is to develop a 64 megajoule version, capable of firing over 460 km. The projectiles actually leave the atmosphere at maximum trajectory, reaching an altitude of over 150 km. Reagan’s Star Wars system lives on!