Published by jon at May 21, 2008
in Notes.
Lu and I arrived back to SF for a couple of months in a’Merica today to the lovely immigration control guy who wouldn’t even look at us. We had to ask ourselves, geez, does this guy really want us to come into the country or not? I feel for all who have to go through the gates to the golden promise land who don’t have a passport and get looked down at by immigration officers. On a positive note, My Aunt Dorothy is amazing and gives me great hope for America. Here is an exchange between us she said ok to blog:
Hi Jon this is Aunt Dorothy Yeah yeah I’ve already voted absentee at the sr. citizen center about 2 weeks ago and my vote is recorded for OBAMA. Betty sent me somethin;g she got in email about obama too and i just wrote back and told her if she would read his book she’d find out all about his early growing-up life and some ;of the thin;gs in it were also in the book. and i told her i really like his approach and presentations.and beliefs. He’s a very intelligent man. Politics can really get nasty. The Il teaachers’ association came out today in favor of Obama. i do think McCain is the best in republican party. We are all pretty good up here.
Which I of course talked with her more about and she followed with this, which is such a common encounter in American families and esp. seems foreign to me in not interacting much with my extended family ;):
Hi Jon and Lu I’m so glad you will be home in US this weekend and so thankful you were not near each of the earthquake. I talked to Betty night before last for over an hour. She and Gary are pretty good. Youu are getting home the day after mike’s birthday I think you grandma said your dad and mom were meeting you in Kansas city on the 24th. Marcie is having her dad’s birthday party at her house on friday evening. we are just having pizza and birthday cake and ice cream. He will enjoy that. I hope this earthquake doesn’t extend to bother the upcoming Olympics.! All my family are pretty good–Mike has good and bad days with this MS that he has.and today was a bad one for him but he and sue met me at bishops for dinner. Tricia had a baby boy born on May 13 Hunter James and Marcie had a baby girl Bailey McKinsey born on Jan. 24th. I just watched the San Antonio Spurs beat New Orleans out on the 7th game of the basketball playoff. Goodnight Love you Aunt Dorothy
And, after this I asked if I can blog this all, upon which Aunt Dorothy replied:
Hi Jon Yes, is you want to put my political note on your blog go ahead. I don’t know about the cool part!!!Ha. Wish I always felt cool!!! it’a a beautiful day here in the Quad Cities not to be any rain for at least 3days yeah! I play bridge today aat 1130and then I play bingo tonight–kind of a fun day. I haven’t seen the little chipmunks and squirrels in my flower pots for a couple days-I put black pepper in them so just maybe they won’t like it and they’ll stay out of them~~ Have a good day Love Aunt Dorothy
Aunt Dorothy is cool. Lu and I just spent ~ 6 months living in Guangzhou, China with her parents, house worker Achanga and her almost 98 year old grandpa, Agong. That is the longest I’ve lived with family since I lived with my parents and the most time I’ve spent with someone as old as Agong, who exercises twice a day and has learned Chinese calligraphy from Lu’s dad in the last few years. Living with Lu’s family has been totally amazing. I hope to spend more time with my family now too and am eager to see what those interactions are like…I’m super excited to interact with Aunt Dorothy and am excited to see the Obama-fever break out the demographics of which I’m a part.
Published by jon at March 24, 2007
in Notes.
Lu and I watched Blood Diamond last night and while the movie comes off a bit cheesy on the disney-ification at times, the massive wikipedia search I just led on the subjects brought me to an amazing nuggest about our good ole friend, Pat Robertson of the 700 Club! Check this snippet out from Wikipedia:
According to a June 2, 1999, article in The Virginian-Pilot,[9] Taylor had extensive business dealings with televangelist Pat Robertson. According to the article, Taylor gave Robertson (who also had business dealings with Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire) the rights to mine for diamonds in Liberia’s mineral-rich countryside. According to two Operation Blessing pilots who reported this incident to the state of Virginia for investigation in 1994, Robertson used his Operation Blessing planes to haul diamond-mining equipment to Robertson’s mines in Liberia, despite the fact that Robertson was telling his 700 Club viewers that the planes were sending relief supplies to the victims of the genocide in Rwanda. The subsequent investigation by the state of Virginia concluded that Robertson diverted his ministry’s donations to the Liberian diamond-mining operation, but Attorney General of Virginia Mark Earley blocked any potential prosecution against Robertson.[14]
Ok, so, my knowledge of this entire subject area is weak except for about Pat Robertson. I am though most interested in African issues now especially after dealing with many South Africans and trying to understand the intracacies there and how this interestingly intersects with Open Source and Open Content communities.
NOTE: Charles G. Taylor as a website for people to donate money to his cause as well as many mp3s of his speeaches - a trove of media for the remixers.
Does anyone out there have any more information on the Pat Robertson linkage above or general advice for getting a large picture view of African affairs. Yes, this is a big request for a big continent with countless cultures, but curious nonetheless.
Published by jon at March 5, 2007
Uncategorizedin .
Come on Japanese government, do the right thing, fess up to the crimes against women forced into sex slavery in WWII.
Amazing at the level of denial going on by the Japanese government over past crimes. If you have Japanese citizenship, let your government have it until it fesses up!
Published by jon at November 8, 2006
in Notes.
So, first off, looks like Democrats are taking control of the House and Senate hopefully repealing and changing the current bad state of the United States. Then Rumsfeld resigns his post! What a great day!
I’m also feeling optimistic about the Microsoft/Novell deal now as well, as the complexities of it unfold.
Then, come to find out, one of my areas of major interest, Open Source Cellphones received a major boost with the announcement of the OpenMoko phone and Harold Welte’s involvment. This is great because I will be speaking at a conference in Taiwan in January, so hopefully can connect them up with Creative Commons Taiwan so we can get some properly licensed content onto these phones.
Oh, and to top it all off, tonite is the 10th Creative Commons Salon in San Francisco where the Homebrew Mobile Club, featuring Matthew Hamrick (who works for ACCESS, used to be palmsource) will be presenting about the “Complete Open Phone.”
UPDATE: The good news doesn’t end now that I see this post that Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt is calling for making data EXPORT a key strategy and encouraging others to do so, similar to something I wrote in the past. This is so great. I want to work with Google more!
Published by jon at October 8, 2006
Uncategorizedin .
Since Al Jazeera’s English news site is pretty lofi, here is a link to a syndicated version of their award-winning journalism in English.
Published by jon at October 8, 2006
Uncategorizedin .
Metavid now has an embedded Java video viewer which helps in viewing videos they recorded of Mark Foley.
Ironically, Mark Foley discusses sexual predators and children in a few of these clips. It is quite amazing to do this research myself (with the help of metavid).
