Some interesting lessons learnt by the BBC News website from last week#8217;s coverage of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, according to a blog post by editor Steve Herrmann. The site used Tweets which seemed to be reports from Mumbai as part of its live updates page, which also featured news updates and excerpts from correspondents and [...]img width='1' height='1' src='http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/367/f/5716/s/27f9f8b/mf.gif' border='0'/div class='mf-viral'table border='0'trtd valign='middle'a href="http://res.feedsportal.com/viral/sendemail2.html?title=Mumbai and Twitter: how the BBC dealt with Tweets and accuracylink=http://blogs.journalism.co.uk/editors/2008/12/04/mumbai-and-twitter-how-the-bbc-dealt-with-tweets-and-accuracy/" target="_blank"img src="http://rss.feedsportal.com/images/emailthis2.gif" border="0" //a/tdtd valign='middle'a href="http://res.feedsportal.com/viral/bookmark.cfm?title=Mumbai and Twitter: how the BBC dealt with Tweets and accuracylink=http://blogs.journalism.co.uk/editors/2008/12/04/mumbai-and-twitter-how-the-bbc-dealt-with-tweets-and-accuracy/" target="_blank"img src="http://rss.feedsportal.com/images/bookmark.gif" border="0" //a/td/tr/table/divbr/br/a href="http://da.feedsportal.com/r/25853577265/u/49/f/5716/c/367/s/41918347/a2.htm"img src="http://da.feedsportal.com/r/25853577265/u/49/f/5716/c/367/s/41918347/a2.img" border="0"//a

img src="http://m1.cdn.spikedhumor.com/1/" align="right" border="0" width="175" height="150" alt="Milton Friedman - Greed" vspace="4" hspace="4" /pI'm not this guy's biggest fan, but he does make a point. (Excerpt from Phil Donahue, 1979)hrRated strong4.519/strong / 5 | 141 views | a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/articles/169098/Milton-Friedman-Greed.html"5 comments/abr//ppa href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/articles/169098/Milton-Friedman-Greed.html"strongClick here to watch the video/strong/abr/Submitted By: a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Profile.aspx?userid=55224"JamMcFar/abr/Tags: a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Default.aspx?p=searchtag=truequery=milton"milton/a a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Default.aspx?p=searchtag=truequery=friedman"friedman/a a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Default.aspx?p=searchtag=truequery=greed"greed/a a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Default.aspx?p=searchtag=truequery=donahue"donahue/a a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Default.aspx?p=searchtag=truequery=economics"economics/a a href="http://www.spikedhumor.com/Default.aspx?p=searchtag=truequery=capitalism"capitalism/adiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/Spikedhumor?a=Jk78O"img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~f/Spikedhumor?i=Jk78O" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Spikedhumor/~4/474675490" height="1" width="1"/

pobject width="494" height="413"param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/09_YaUw9Rm8hl=enfs=1"/paramparam name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/paramparam name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"/paramembed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/09_YaUw9Rm8hl=enfs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="494" height="413"/embed/objectbr / Set your TiVos, folks: Author of ia href="http://lifehacker.com/software/book-excerpt/parkinsons-law-and-the-4+hour-workweek-262343.php"The 4 Hour Workweek/a/i and Lifehacker a href="http://lifehacker.com/357666/how-to-stop-checking-email-on-the-evenings-and-weekends"guest author/a Tim Ferriss debuts the pilot episode of his new TV show, "Trial By Fire," on The History Channel tomorrow night. Hit the play button above to get a taste (and hear them call him a "lifehacker"!). Ferriss explains what it's all about:br / blockquoteThe concept is simple: I have one week to attempt to learn what is usually learned over 5-20 years. I either crash and burn — or survive by the skin of my teeth — in a final test (trial by fire) each time. If it’s made into a series, which depends entirely on viewership numbers on Thursday night, I’ll deconstruct a new complex skill each week. It will show you exactly how I approach learning, and no fake TV drama will be required to make the stakes real./p/blockquote p The pilot airs tomorrow night at 11PM ET/PT on The History Channel (though do double-check your local listings), and here's what you'll see./p blockquotepThis episode was shot in HD in Tokyo and the mountains of Nikko, where I rolled the dice on Japanese horseback archery, or yabusame: full gallop, no hands, no safety gear, with wooden poles lining the track on either side of the horse. Please don’t do this at home. I had access to the best in the world, and you’ll get to see some never-before-seen footage of a rare and brutal samurai sport few non-Japanese have ever attempted./p/blockquote p Like Tim said, this is a pilot that hasn't been turned into a series yet, so only your eyeballs will determine whether the show continues. Planning on watching? Tell us what you think about the teaser clip in the comments. div class="related"a href="http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2008/12/02/tim-ferriss-trial-by-fire-tv/"BIG NEWS and Sneak Peek - Tim Ferriss TV Show Debut 12/4/a [The Blog of Tim Ferriss]/div /p br style="clear: both;"/ a href="http://www.pheedo.com/click.phdo?s=fc79cb89c0bef883641fda40e9797f9ep=1"img alt="" style="border: 0;" border="0" src="http://www.pheedo.com/img.phdo?s=fc79cb89c0bef883641fda40e9797f9ep=1"//a img src="http://www.pheedo.com/feeds/tracker.php?i=fc79cb89c0bef883641fda40e9797f9e" style="display: none;" border="0" height="1" width="1" alt=""/div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=9Xo1TAvf"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?d=120" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=Fw9ZN9TO"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?d=41" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=lGWdUtD9"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?i=lGWdUtD9" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.gawker.com/~f/lifehacker/full?a=NDrIREar"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/lifehacker/full?i=NDrIREar" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~4/PIGcentRoGo" height="1" width="1"/

div class="image"a href="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/big_show.php?/avaxhome/7b/f9/0009f97b.jpeg" target="_blank"img src="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/7b/f9/0009f97b_medium.jpeg" id="external_img_653691"//a/divbr/ div class="center"bMONTSERRAT CABALLE: Rarities ; Rossini, Donizetti, Verdi (rec. 1967-69)/bbr/ Opera | 2CDs | EAC, FLAC, CUE, LOG, covers | 650 MB/divbr/ div class="justify"Back in 1967-69 Montserrat Caballe, not yet the star she went on to become, recorded 3 LP of (then) extremely rare, forgotten and underestimated opera excerpts: Each LP dedicated one composer. The concept was not only extremely audacious (even for the immediate post-Callas years) but also very innovative: Montserrat, a pioneer even there, proposed entire scenes from each opera, not just the arias out of context. Of course, in the meantime she was preparing the revivals of many, if not all, of the (then) rare operas she was presenting. The singing is magnificent troughout and the variety of the items just as striking. All the trademark Caballe qualities are of course present, magnificent voice, fearless coloratura, incredible pianissimi, inepuisable breath and so on. The sensation that these issues provoked made the LPs quickly very sought-after, until they were reissued in 1992 in 2 CDs (the edition presented here),.There has been a recent reissue by BMG, in a super-budget series. Possibly one of the greatest Caballe recordings ever./divbr/ table class="quote"trtd class="quote_left"#8220;/tdtd class="quote_center"idiv class="justify"...She's at her best here, singing with the fire that sometimes seemed to elude her, flaunting her ravishing pianissimos, and never breaking a sweat or taking an untoward breath as she tosses off difficult coloratura passages with ease [...] This is a must for any lover of great singing. [1/28/2005]/div/i Dan Davis, in www.classicstoday.com/tdtd class="quote_right"#8221;/td/tr/table

div class="image"a href="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/big_show.php?/avaxhome/48/f9/0009f948.jpeg" target="_blank"img src="http://pixhost.ws/avaxhome/48/f9/0009f948_medium.jpeg" id="external_img_653640"//a/divbr/ div class="center"bMONTSERRAT CABALLE - SHIRLEY VERRETT: Great Operatic Duets/bbr/ b(Rossini;Donizetti;Bellini;Verdi;Puccini;Offenbach;Ponchielli) Rec. 1969/bbr/ Opera | EAC | FLAC | CUE | LOG | Covers | 220MB/divbr/ div class="justify"A friend recently gave me this CD and I fell instantly in love: Recorded back in 1969 when both artists were at their pic, this is one of the essential recordings of vocal music: The two voices blend magnificently and we can feel that they both enjoy the collaboration. There is no point highlighting this or that excerpt; Verrett has recorded Giovanna Seymour against Sills' Bolena, Caballe Norma with Cossoto: Just compare these quite famous versions and the excerpts here and you will understand what I mean: Two powerhouses. Perhaps some more dramatic elan (never Caballe's forte) would had made the Gioconda duet more exciting. Anyhow, it would be cheap to discuss this and that detail, when one can enjoy this impressive showcase of what two voices can achieve in romantic opera./divbr/ div class="center"bI wish to thank Audiomar for his most generous and invaluable help in EAC ajustments :-)/b/div

coondoggie supplies an excerpt from Network World that might make you consider a lock for your pipes: "The FBI today ratcheted up the clamor to do something more substantive about the monumental growth of copper theft in the US. In a report issued today the FBI said the rising theft of the metal is threatening the critical infrastructure by targeting electrical substations, cellular towers, telephone land lines, railroads, water wells, construction sites, and vacant homes for lucrative profits. Copper thefts from these targets have increased since 2006; and they are currently disrupting the flow of electricity, telecommunications, transportation, water supply, heating, and security and emergency services, and present a risk to both public safety and national security." (A July, 2006 post on Ethan Zuckerman's blog gives an idea of how widespread cable theft has affected internet infrastructure, and basketmaking, in Africa.)pa href="http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/03/1922254amp;from=rss"img src="http://slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rssamp;op=imageamp;style=h0amp;sid=08/12/03/1922254"/a/ppa href="http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/12/03/1922254amp;from=rss"Read more of this story/a at Slashdot./p pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CvMvXVT8xWDjzpEmq1tNz2xJakk/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/CvMvXVT8xWDjzpEmq1tNz2xJakk/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~4/I5BIm4FzF_g" height="1" width="1"/

Bangkok’s airports are now open. The protesters have agreed to end their protests after the country’s top court ordered the dissolution of the ruling party which forced the Prime Minister to step down. Military troops are now guarding the airports. Tourists are advised to contact their airlines and tourism offices to check for flight schedules.

Last week protesters belonging to the People’s Alliance for Democracy have occupied Bangkok’s two airports demanding the removal of the corrupt government. The airport takeover has stranded more than 300,000 passengers in the country.

Because of the favorable court order, the protesters have declared victory. However, they vowed to launch similar protest actions in the future if reforms are not instituted. Excerpts from PAD’s statement:

“The PAD would like to call on whichever side that attains power to run the country to find a solution for the current problems and not to create conditions for another political turmoil in the country. Do not bring to power people from the Thaksin regime. Address the wrongdoings conducted by those in the Thaksin regime. Join with the people in making new politics a reality.”

The PAD would like to make the following pledges.

1. If a proxy government of the Thaksin regime is set up again or if there is an attempt to amend the Constitution or the law to whitewash the wrongdoings of those in the Thaksin regime, to benefit politicians, or to lessen the power of the King, the PAD will return.

2. From now on, if there is any government which comes into power but is insincere in its efforts to launch new politics with the people, the PAD will return.

Thaksin is former Prime Minister of Thailand who was ousted in a coup two years ago. PAD accused the last two Prime Ministers of being puppets of Thaksin.

Thai Politico interprets the PAD statement:

“The implication at the moment is that if the next PM is not to the PAD's liking they will occupy the airport again. Will the security forces now completely secure Thailand's airports so that nothing like this can take place again? Or will we see the army back off like scared rabbits into the corner?”

New Mandala believes PAD’s victory will be short-lived:

“The celebrations by the yellow shirts at Suvanabhumi will be short-lived. The parliament has not been dissolved and the government looks very likely to maintain its majority. The Democrat-except-when-you-can’t-win-an-election-and-then-a-judicial-coup-is-OK Party simply can’t muster the numbers. More blatant judicial or military intervention will be required to remove the government.”

Political cartoon by Sacravatoons

PAD is popular in Bangkok (but the airport takeover has made it less popular today). PAD is accused of having close ties with Bangkok’s elite. On the other hand, most of the rural voters are supportive of Thaksin’s party. Someone asked: What if the farmers staged their own protest against PAD and the urban elite by refusing to plant rice?

Stranded tourists are now recounting their experience in Thailand. Tuesdaynight narrates how he and his wife were able to leave the country by traveling to Malaysia and Singapore by land. He writes:

“Finally, I have to say, after all this, I consider us to be lucky. We found a way out of the country and it worked. I truly feel for the hundreds of thousands people whose travel was impacted because of this. More importantly, I feel for the Thai people who have yet to find some form of political stability.”

Despite the airport chaos, life in Bangkok seemed like normal the past week. Oneditorial writes:

“During the week, I called my family to get their views on this event. They did not seem to be thinking too much about what is going on. They still carry on their daily lives as usual. As a matter of fact, on the day I talked to my mother on the phone, the entire family was completely absorbed in watching a Thai soap on the telly, never mind the fact that the country is in a state of political turmoil. I just wish I could be as detached as them.”

Andrew Biggs asks if the airport crisis would produce positive results:

“Could it be that the pain, shame and anger we have all experienced with the PAD’s closure of the airport actually be heralding a new era of politics in Thailand? Could it possibly be that something good is going to come out of all this?”

An anonymous commenter criticizes the organizer of the protests:

“Im sure terrorist groups in South-East Asia have witnessed the complete lack of security at the airport and thus it would be a sitting duck for groups who plan terrorist attacks against planes and passengers. Bangkok as a major hub? I dont think so any more. What airline will want to fly in and out of Bangkok when the airports own security guards ran like scared children from their own people. Shame on Thailand for allowing this anti democratic group to act like terrorists and hold an entire country to ransom. Thailand is about to see the trickle down from this catastrophe and I pity the ordinary people who were not involved in this protest but could lose jobs.”

Gabriella Haynes describes the mood in Bangkok:

“The atmosphere in wider Bangkok since the protests started has been calm and business as usual in general. While the city’s residents don’t take the sporadic and seemingly random spurts of violence and the loss of life and income lightly, there is no sense of widespread panic and concern. International news agencies report airport mayhem and interview distressed and worn-out tourists stranded in the country, yet most Thais I have spoken to only express concern about the potential violence of the situation and concern for the economy.”

And let’s not forget that pro-government supporters are also numerous in the city:

“The PAD has ceased their protests for now but the capital has also been inundated with pro-government supporters, which means the situation has not been completely diffused.”

Flickr photos from Ronn Ashore and Willie Lunchmeat

Thomas Wanhoff from Vietnam is disappointed that tourists are complaining of missed flights while Bangkok protesters are fighting for some cause:

“This is just unbelievable. There are people in Thailand trying to fight for democracy (but of course is their understanding of), at least stand up against the corrupt government, and tourists are just complaining about missed flights.”

The current issue of Rolling Stone has posted its Prop 8 article online, which takes to task the "No on 8" campaign for its failure to anticipate that it had a major opponent in the Mormon church and criticizes its strategies both on the ground, and on the air.

An excerpt:

"But evidence of entrenched homophobia and religious intolerance obscure a more difficult truth. Prop 8 should have been defeated — two months before the election, it was down 17 points in the polls — but the gay-rights groups that tried to stop it ran a lousy campaign. According to veteran political observers, the No on Prop 8 effort was slow to raise money, ran weak and confusing ads, and failed to put together a grass-roots operation to get out the vote. 'This was political malpractice,' says a Democratic consultant who operates at the highest level of California politics. 'They fucked this up, and it was painful to watch. They shouldn't be allowed to pawn this off on the Mormons or anyone else. They snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, and now hundreds of thousands of gay couples are going to pay the price.' From the start, the leaders of the No on Prop 8 campaign and their high-priced consultants failed to realize what they were up against. According to Geoff Kors, who headed the campaign's executive committee, the No side anticipated needing no more than $20 million to stop the gay-marriage ban. The Yes side, by contrast, set out to change how initiative politics are played, building a well-funded operation that rivaled a swing-state presidential campaign in its scope and complexity. It also built a powerful, faith-based coalition that included the Catholic Church, Protestant evangelicals and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 'The direct involvement of the Mormon church — moving donors in a very short window to give early — was stunning,' says Patrick Guerriero, who was called in to take over as campaign manager of No on Prop 8 in the final month. "It was unprecedented — and probably impossible to predict."

National Center for Lesbian Rights executive director Kate Kendall (katek), hit back at the magazine in a comment to the article online.

"When Dickinson called to interview me about the No on Prop 8 campaign it became obvious he wasn't interested in the facts about the campaign, he wanted only information that supported this hit piece. When he didn't like my answers, he just asked more leading questions. We lost. Yes, as in any campaign, mistakes were made, but to quote from unnamed sources and anonymous gay leaders running for cover in the wake of this devastating loss while ignoring all facts that don't support your assasination attempt against those who worked tirelessly for months is not jouralism, it's just trash. Dickinson should ply his 'blaming the victim' tactics with the National Enquirer."

Same-Sex Setback [rolling stone]

centerobject width="400" height="324"param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/HcvN1dt0yJohl=enfs=1"/paramparam name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/paramparam name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"/paramembed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/HcvN1dt0yJohl=enfs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="400" height="324"/embed/objectbr /Excerpt 1/centerbr /centerobject width="400" height="324"param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/wH0MXZ-T4Jshl=enfs=1"/paramparam name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/paramparam name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"/paramembed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/wH0MXZ-T4Jshl=enfs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="400" height="324"/embed/objectbr /Excerpt 2/centerbr /centera href="http://www.well.com/~cuba/VideoArt.html"An interview with Larry Cuba by Gene Youngblood/a/centerbr /centera href="http://www.well.com/user/cuba/"Larry Cuba's Homepage/a/centerimg src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/rhizome-fp/~4/472877841" height="1" width="1"/

img src="http://cdn.thesuperficial.com//bfm_gallery/2008/12/1202 Brad Pitt Today/post_image/post_image-1202_brad_pitt_today_00.jpg" border="0"br Brad Pitt sat down for an interview this morning in New Orleans with a href="http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/28000192/"The Today Show's/a Ann Curry (a href="http://thesuperficial.com/2008/12/brad_pitt_today_show.php"Video after the jump/a). He's currently in the 9th Ward building affordable solar-powered houses for Hurricane Katrina victims. But that shit's for suckers; Let's talk about those Brangelina babies! Here's some excerpts of the interviews including a fake one. See if you guess which one it is: strongOn raising six kids:/strong “I look at my sons and my daughters, and one's from Vietnam and one's from Cambodia and one's from Ethiopia, and ... they're all brothers and sisters. And they're fighting, they're laughing, they're going into hysterics and staying up late, and they're messing with their parents, and they're driving me crazy and I'm really proud." strongOn his reluctance to discuss his family in interviews:/strong “It just gets cheapened somehow, as it goes through the filters in the airwaves,” he explained. “And some things you just want to keep close.” strongOn the media:/strong "Listen, if I single-handedly rebuild New Orleans into a thriving metropolis complete with flying cars, then will you people please forget that I cheated on Jennifer Aniston and am criminally less sexy than that guy who writes The Superficial. It's embarrassing." strongOn getting married to Angelina Jolie:/strong “If we feel it’s important to our kids, we’ll do so.” Hope you put your thinking caps on! smallstrongAnswer:/strong “If we feel it’s important to our kids, we’ll do so.” Ha ha ha! No, seriously, who fell for that one? You might want to get checked for tumors./small div style="width: 425px; margin: 0 0 0 30px; padding: 0;"ul style="list-style-type: none; display: block; width: 425px; margin: 0; padding: 0;"li style="display: block; float: left; width: 90px; height: 134px; margin: 0; padding: 0 10px 10px 0;"a href="http://thesuperficial.com/2008/12/brad_pitt_today_show.php" style="display: block; width: 90px; height: 134px; background: #CCC; overflow: hidden; margin: 0; padding: 0;"img src="http://cdn.thesuperficial.com//bfm_gallery/2008/12/1202 Brad Pitt Today/gallery_thumb/gallery_thumb-1202_brad_pitt_today_00.jpg" style="display: block; border: 1px solid #cccccc; width: 88px; margin: 0; padding: 0;"/a/lili style="display: block; float: left; width: 90px; height: 134px; margin: 0; padding: 0 10px 10px 0;"a href="http://thesuperficial.com/2008/12/brad_pitt_today_show.php?bfm_index=1" style="display: block; width: 90px; height: 134px; background: #CCC; overflow: hidden; margin: 0; padding: 0;"img src="http://cdn.thesuperficial.com//bfm_gallery/2008/12/1202 Brad Pitt Today/gallery_thumb/gallery_thumb-1202_brad_pitt_today_01.jpg" style="display: block; border: 1px solid #cccccc; width: 88px; margin: 0; padding: 0;"/a/lili style="display: block; float: left; width: 90px; height: 134px; margin: 0; padding: 0 10px 10px 0;"a href="http://thesuperficial.com/2008/12/brad_pitt_today_show.php?bfm_index=2" style="display: block; width: 90px; height: 134px; background: #CCC; overflow: hidden; margin: 0; padding: 0;"img src="http://cdn.thesuperficial.com//bfm_gallery/2008/12/1202 Brad Pitt Today/gallery_thumb/gallery_thumb-1202_brad_pitt_today_02.jpg" style="display: block; border: 1px solid #cccccc; width: 88px; margin: 0; padding: 0;"/a/lili style="display: block; float: left; width: 90px; height: 134px; margin: 0; padding: 0 10px 10px 0;"a href="http://thesuperficial.com/2008/12/brad_pitt_today_show.php?bfm_index=3" style="display: block; width: 90px; height: 134px; background: #CCC; overflow: hidden; margin: 0; padding: 0;"img src="http://cdn.thesuperficial.com//bfm_gallery/2008/12/1202 Brad Pitt Today/gallery_thumb/gallery_thumb-1202_brad_pitt_today_03.jpg" style="display: block; border: 1px solid #cccccc; width: 88px; margin: 0; padding: 0;"/a/li/uldiv style="clear: left;"/div/div div class = "credit"Photos: a href="http://www.splashnewsonline.com"Splash News/a/div pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/lC4o6jO5Tsb0jxFCa9V9zlMcZxI/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/lC4o6jO5Tsb0jxFCa9V9zlMcZxI/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/thesuperficial/SNxk/~4/WqNwYsIc8Xk" height="1" width="1"/