What I'm Working On

I'll be brief - my step-son's father is coming in an hour or so to come and pick him up, so I need to head on home. Here's what you can look forward to in the next few days here at Rizzn.com:

• Some re-vitalisation over at ModernOpinion.com - I've got a few things planned, and hopefully the beginning of some monetization over there. I can't wait for that thing to start making some money so I can start promoting it! I thank my writers there for being so dedicated in this lean time of slow growth.
• An interview with Barry Cooper - a fellow has been making headlines lately. He's an ex-Narc who's instructing people with a penchant for pot how to not get busted. I sit down with him and talk about what he's doing get the inside scoop and all that jazz.
• The next iteration of PoddedMeat - A lot of fans out there are wondering what's going on with PoddedMeat. I gotta say, we have some exciting things in the works, and pending a few pitch meetings next Thursday, I can start talking about what we have in store.
• OblongBox - I'm going to do something about OblongBox. The momentum has sort of died around here, and I've got a few ideas to pick things back up.
• UT Tyler - I'm working on creating a news engine for the UT system's websites. I'll give the inside scoop on how I'm putting all that together.
• Optimus Rhyme - I'm finishing up my remix for the new Optimus Rhyme CD. It's gonna be neat.
  

Look for information on this stuff in detail tomorrow and next week. For now, gotta jet!

/rizzn

I 4M 571LL H4x0r 31337

Okay, so I’m having a weird life right now.  I’m all off my game, and, well, I don’t know how to explain it.  I think what it is right now is I’m editing this old book of mine that has a lot of emotional and mental ties to my past, and it’s putting me in a really funky headspace.  On top of that, the rest of my life is in a wacky state of flux, too, so I’m just off-kilter in general. None the less, I’m a trooper, and I’m still going to some blog posts for you peoples here.

Spill the beans already!
On the topic of the book, I recently found out (last night) that there is a new real-life chapter to the character’s lives the book is based on. I guess, I’ll go ahead and spill the beans on the book here, so I can try to figure out how I’m going to tackle this last chapter.  The book is based off the journal I kept during the nine month period of time where my engagement to my ex-fiance was dissolving.  It starts out all eloquent, heart-broken, and full of wistful love, and ends up as the writings of a mysogenistic, bent, and spurned author. I’m not sure how I’m eventually going to pitch it, but it’s definately an interesting read.

Well, as to the extra chapter, I was just informed that my ex-fiance got married a couple weeks ago to a fellow who she and I used to hang out with.  This guy was good friends with the guy who broke up our marriage, both of whom were in highschool at the time.  I was under the impression that she had changed, and spun off all her old bad associations, but apparently not.  Not sure what to think about all of that now.  I mean, I’m completely over all of that, but editing through the book as I am right now, like I said, puts me in a weird headspace, so it’s affecting me none-the-less.

A Podcast that Explains a Lot
Smokehouse is uploading a podcast we did last night on my feed. We talked about the upcoming Hurricane Wilma, old leftover topics from Hurricane Katrina, Tom Delay stupidity, my vacation, and a bunch of other rediculous stuff (including my fiasco at work this week).

It’s long, but I think it maintains interest all the way through. If you’ve got an hour to kill, check it out.  You should be subscribed to my feed anyways.  This may be the return of some more regular podcasts from me, anyways.

Excited about the Fellowship Of The Corpse
The adventure to revive Caligh’is returns tomorrow night at iRP.  I haven’t posted another chapter up here yet mostly because not enough story advancement has occurred yet, but there should be enough story advancement by the end of tonight, so look for another exciting chapter in the Fellowship of the Corpse series.

To quickly summarize where the story is at currently, the adventurers who ended up on the Fellowship ended up being Doidialdi, Lutherous, Rizzn, and Marigold.  We spent a fair amount of time last week stocking up for the trip at the market, and then headed north, following Pendleton’s (the horse) lead.  We reached a forrested area, and made camp for the night.  Rizzn stood watch, and after a couple hours we were attacked by a couple bandits on one horse.  We killed one  of the bandits, but he was scooped up by the horseman, and they fled the scene.  At the moment, Rizzn is mounting up to give chase.

Stick around this week, I’ll try to transcribe some of the logs into story form for the next installment.

Hacking the On Time Payment Protection System
A friend of mine from Tyler called me up, and said a friend of his had bought a car from a loan shark who was protecting the car with a payment protection system called ON TIME. I did a little quick research on the device and found that it’s an ‘embedded system’ that may or may not run on TinyOS. The way it works is that if you don’t enter your payment code into the system at the given intervals, it will prevent your car from starting properly.  The code is usually a six digit number preceded by a 1 (1–######).

It allegedly has a tamper protection system built in as well. From what the fellow was telling me, the device only had two wires leading out, that traced back to the starter, which presumably disables that functionality if it deems it so.

My advice (purely unqualified) was if he were to try to defeat the system, he should strip back the wires carefully, to see if they expose copper or more wires inside.  If they simply expose more wires, then give up, because they probably lead back to the computer, and we’d have to reverse engineer the box itself.  If the two wires stripped back only expose copper, then my advice would be to bridge them so as to short circuit the box itself, which theoretically would allow the car to start normally.

The next part is important.  If the car starts normally, you should take the box (which is attached, by adhesive, to the steering column), detach it, and take it to the nearest lake, and pitch it in, reason being is it contains a GPS device, which they will use to come tow your car when you stop making payments.

This advice is not meant to show anyone how they can steal a car, just simply what I told this guy on the phone today.  I do not endorse stealing, nor do I endorse getting out of your bills.

I am curious to see if this all works, because if so, if that is all it takes to defeat the security on the device, then ON TIME PPS is a rip off.

Liz Taylor Deadpool Update
According to the IMDb, Hollywood legend Elizabeth Taylor has expressed her wishes at having her ashes scattered in Wales, England, the home of the biggest love of her life Richard Burton.

Taylor is reportedly seriously ill following a string of health problems. Last month it was revealed that the 73 year old actress is now sleeping up to 14 hours a day and hasn't left her Californian Bel Air home for weeks.

A source close to the actress recently said that she had almost given up on life, felt asthough she has nothing left to live for and dreamnt of being reunited with her former husband.

Despite being married seven times, Taylor has revealed she wants her remains strewn at Cardiff's Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama to be close to Richard's theatre there.

She’s definately moved to the top of my list. Get ready to send your funeral flowers.

/rizzn

Music on the Turntables Currently: DJ Rizzn - Basket Case (Kool Kannon Remix)

Merchandise: A Lesson in Capitalism

Alright, I don't do enough shameless promotion around here, and I'm far too lazy to type anything up of substance today, so I'm going to take the day to promote myself and all the crap I've been putting out lately. This is a cattle call for all of you to buy something from me. The idea is that if I can get sales to go up, I can drop prices. I'm ordering everything piecemeal right now, so prices are high. If I can get volume up, prices go down. It's all about economics.

	Kate Moss did some coke, and the biggest surprise of all was that millions of people came to my website because of it. This shirt celebrates that. She pushed the rock, she's a star, she's a rock star. Do the math. This ain't high-brow humor here or anything. The biggest reason to get these shirts is that they may not be around long -- I keep getting TOS'ed everywhere I go to have them printed up. I'm not dedicated enough to the cost to buy a screen printing machine for my room, so when they're gone, they're gone..
	$25 + 5
	Adam Curry is a Jerk. That's what the shirt says, and that's what he is. Why do I say this? Why am I so mean? Frankly, it's simply because Adam claims credit for everything ever done, he doesn't return emails or phone calls, and he steals my ideas and tries to enter into competition with me every chance he can get. It's annoying as hell, so I figured I'd put it on a shirt. I own this shirt, I wear it once a week, so how's that for endorsement. Be like me (a spiteful, bitter, grudge holding blogger). It's attractive.
	$25 + 5
	Play God. This is the infamous ‘Play God' shirt we used to wear back in our days in the Dallas geekhouse, featuring the old Rizzn.Com sitelogo on the front pocket, and a pensive image of Alan Greenspan on the back. Alan Greenspan is the fed chairman, for those of you who don't know politics. He controls the US Economy, and ergo the world. Since Earth is the center of the universe, it's fair to say he has God-like powers, influencing intergalactic politics with as little as an inopportune sneeze.
	$25 + 5
	Ladies <3 Rizzn. They do! That's not to say that most of the ladies who love Rizzn don't eventually crack and become crazed and legally insane shadows of their former self, but they do love Rizzn. This is the shirt you wear when you're a lady, and you want to proclaim your love for me. It's got a picture of me in my Patron Saint of Whatever icon garb. Seriously, the ladies do love me. Seriously.
	$25 + 5

	Soundtrack to My Car. This one, if you've gotten any of the old Riz Mix CDS, has a lot of material from Riz Mix 6 or 5 that was reworked into something that you'd actually want to listen to. I finished some decade old projects for this CD, and came out with some stuff that actually sounds cutting edge, instead of horribly dated. (that which is old is new again). You can buy the CD, or even download it for free from the website. Do both!
	$10 + 5
	John Garvin Fan Club vs. DJ Rizzn. This one's actually been up for sale for about three or four or five years now, I just never got around to marketing it for personal reasons (grudge with the band leader). I've since gotten over my emotional trauma, and am open for business. It's a split – half me djing, and half my production work for JGFC. They've got an atypical indie sound. If you hunt around on Last.FM or acidPlanet, you'll be able to find something of theirs laying around.
	$10 + 5

Where the longhorn cattle feed on the lowly gypsum weed. Back in the saddle again!

Hey guys.  A few things to talk about here.  I’m taking it easy this weekend, recovering from vacation.  Yes, I said recovering.  For reasons I’ll explain later, my face has been burnt to a crisp.  All in all, though, the vacation was a blast – I’ll get into that in a second. 

The Band is Back Together
As a few of you have heard, we’re getting the band back together.  Yes, that’s right, it’s the return of the MADshow/Out In Right Field.  Everyone has been itching to do another podcast/radio show, including me, so Smokehouse, Darrell and I have been doing some planning sessions on what we want the new show to be.  The trick is going to create a format that’s going to work for all of us – it’ll be somewhat politics based, and I’m pressing everyone for a thirty minute daily format, with pre-recorded bits and rants mixed in.  That’s pretty much all I can say about it at the moment, although if you want to be in on the planning sessions, you should join the RIC mailing list here.  We’ll eventually move the discussion to it’s own list, but this is where it’ll all start.

When They Roll Up the Streets in Toledo Ohio
I woke up this morning to the sounds of violence in Toledo, Ohio coming from my TV.  I tend to leave my TV on the cartoon channels on the weekend, but for some reason I fell asleep watching one of the news networks, and so I wound up being serenaded this morning by the police chiefs of Toledo instead of Scooby Doo re-runs.

In another example of how piss-poor American MSM is, I had to go to the BBC website to find out that these ‘race-riots’ were actually not race-riots, but gang warfare (in Toledo Ohio? Who knew!?).  There were only 20 non-violent Nazi’s protesting (as opposed to 500 violent ‘anti-Nazi protestors’), and the Nazis were dispersed before the violence even began.  I’m not going to make some racist comments here about how it’s those darn blacks acting up again, I’m just saying how is it that the Main Stream Media has this aversion to reporting facts?

I know, Nazi’s are bad, mmkay.  But still, I think this is a good example of violence being somewhat glorified by the media, just because, y’know, well … who wants to defend skinhead Nazis?  Facts are facts.  Report them, regardless of how it makes the ratings or your public image go.

Apologies go out to the late John Denver for my abuse of his song title.

Hillary vs. Condi
I really don’t want to comment on this, but I feel I have a couple words to say on the topic of mild interest.  I think it’s patently absurd that the presidential race next term will be Hillary Clinton vs. Condileeza Rice, but the media is now fixated on these two running for president against each other.  The reason for this is most likely because of the hit series on whatever network it’s on where Geena Davis plays the POTUS.  I’ve been discounting the idea that Hillary could get the Democratic nomination, much less the highest office in the land on a couple of premises, but I’m being forced to reconsider due to the media attention.

To explain, one of the craziest conspiracy nuts I know (and have had the unfortunate experience of having to deal with him as a semi-crucial business affiliate the last couple years) once said (completely in a serious tone) that he had inside information that the powers that be have sat down and decided that Hillary is going to be president no matter what.  I tend to take the words of lone nuts like him, and whatever they predict, count on the opposite being true.  The sky doesn’t fall on command.  Conspiracies work by the numbers, and there’s just no percentage in any conspirators putting a woman in the nation’s pilot seat.

The other reason I can’t see Hillary taking the election is that Democrats are weak weak weak right now (despite a slight bounce in their numbers over the Rove/Delay/Frist scandals).  Hillary was the weak link in the Whitehouse PR chain for four years.  It’s a wonder she won a senate seat.  I honestly can’t see her winning votes for dog-catcher in all but the most liberal of precincts.

Unfortunately, though, because whomever the media fixates upon, that’s who ends up running for president.  If the media isn’t fixated on them, they get no votes (Perot ‘92 vs Perot ‘96, or Perot ‘92 vs Nader ‘02 for instances).  I’m just a bit saddened by this because damnit, if we’re going to elect a woman president, why can’t it be someone who isn’t a consummate liar, crook, and (dare I say it) unattractive?  I mean, crap, this is my criteria for a woman running for president – they must not maintain but one of those characteristics.  They can be a liar, but not a crook and ugly at the same time.  I’ll vote for an ugly woman candidate, but she better be a friggin’ saint.

I’m saying this for the children.  I mean we were all subjected to Susan B. Anthony dollars when my age group were young.  We were all, “Who’s this ugly chick?”  Do we want our first woman president to be talked about in this manner when history looks back at her? No!

So, um, let’s elect Uma for president or something. Yeah.  Hell, I’d settle for Geena, she’s still lookin’ pretty good.

My Vacation in the Bahamas, part I October 17th, 2005
I haven’t finished converting all my video yet, but I’ll go through the first bits of my vacation. Monday noonish, I hopped in the jalopy and drove down to the port of Miami, which was surprisingly easy to find (and not very trafficky getting there either).  I parked in a garage, walked directly across the street, and was all checked in within less than 15 minutes.  Interesting bit of trivia – you don’t need a passport if you’re traveling from America to the Bahamas.  A photo ID and your birth certificate will do just fine.

So I arrive on the boat, and as I enter the rotunda, there’s art all over the place, and I feel like I’m in the upscale section of a mall. I find my room without too much difficulty, down two decks, and in the front of the ship (it’s a ship, by the way.  they hate when you call it a boat).  It’s a small room with two seperate beds, probably a quarter the size of my efficiency.  Still, its ample room to move around, just not big enough to turn a cartwheel in. I’m not big on cartwheels, so I’m okay with it.

I wandered around the ship for a couple of hours waiting for my dad to board.  The ship had eleven main decks, and three more decks up in the tower.  As I found out the next night, it was in the top ten list of biggest ships of all time, accomidating around 2700 passengers and 800 crew. Another fun fact about the ship – there were about nine bars/lounges on board, about a third of them allowed smoking.

The first evening was pretty uneventful.  I got some good portside video of us leaving the Port of Miami, and some interesting birds eye video of South Beach.  They have this all day buffet thing that goes on from deck 10 to 12 on the front of the ship, from which my dad and I partook, and then went to bed.

I’m looking at the clock now, and it’s 4:50 in the morning on Sunday, so I’ll save the next day for tomorrow.

Deuce!

/rizzn

 

Music on the Turntables Currently: DJ Rizzn - Basket Case (Kool Kannon Remix)

So What is iRP about anyhow?

Hay Rizzinites! Been a solid minute since I posted on this site. Speaking of solid, veterans may recall me as The Shit back in the hey-day of Dj Colonoscopy and his sidekick, The Shit.

Todays subject: Addiction...

Addiction is a horrible beast that will one day rear it's ugly in head in our direction. I used to play WoW (World of Warcraft) and Ever-crack and all that stuff. Indeed, my life was consumed. I always figured that if someone wanted to make a quick million they could open a computer free clinic that helped people reclaim there lives from there level 55 shaman lieutenant. I know many desperate wives that would gladly pay for there husbands treatment.

Yom Kippur is the Jewish holy day of attonement where Jews everywhere come together to celebrate their overwhelming guilt. I plan on including a few prayers for forgiveness this year for all the time I wasted on my MMORPGs.

It would go somthing like this: "Dear God of the Hebrews, please forgive me for killing so many other players and wasting all my time focused on doing so."

God's response would go somthing like this: "Dearest guilt ridden Hebrew male, thank you for your consideration, however the only way I could consider exonerating you is if you mitigate your addiction somwhat by playing the only RPG that matters and forgetting all of the others. I, the Lord your God, of course now speak of Iroleplay.net.

Now what the Lord my God doesn't realize of course is that the site is run entirley by a nutso group of heathens, but don't tell him I said so. Don't tell them I said that either for that matter.
Iroleplay.net has been the most singularly unique roleplaying experience I have ever enjoyed on line, and would encourage Rizzn readers to give it a try. The action occurs in four (or more) hour stints usually tuesday and friday night in the IRC based chatroom, Heroes Haven Inn. Incidentally that is the also the in game location where most games start from.

Top 5 Reason's to play Iroleplay.net

#5 - Great Characters
Avid Rizzn readers are already familiar with some of the wackier ones.

Doidaldi- (the cross dressing giant/would be giantess) is a reason unto himself. This show tune singing twin's most recent exploits, include selling himself to a group of sailors, and walking bow legged back into the bar. Here is one of his posts on the message boards
"The tall, gorgeous giant of a transvestite urdon turns and walks away defeated once more from ever finding a man that can see past appearances. A tear and sadness plays across his mishapen, but otherwise womanly features as he turns his head toward the moon and sings in a horrible tone def glory: ((in what would anachronistically seem to be the tune of "It's raining men)) "Somewhere there is a man for me... perhaps out on the open sea My Urdon heart I give freely for the man who loves me for me..." A nearby cat shrieks and dies..."

Zoot- the mentally unstable goblin shaman has his own fashion line that consists entirley of pots and pans strapped to various body parts. There exist hosts of other characters, and please understand that not all of them are over the top. We aim to keep the game believable enough to take seriously. I would encourage any who are interested to check out the message boards to verify this. http://iroleplay.net/viewforum.php?f=15

There are many more worth mentioning, but the grand reason why so many players are so creative with there character concepts, is because characterization is richly rewarded in this game. It is one of the main ways experience is earned. The act of character creation and the process of creativity is cherished among this group. If you feel like you are a creative person than IRP is a home you never knew you had, because you will be playing with nothing but.
#4 -The Adventure
Our GMs are some of the most well established veteran text based Game masters in the world. This wealth of creative, veteran talent has compiled the rules of this game over an eight year period. They have been adapting the system to online play for over a year. Please check out the history section to learn more. http://iroleplay.net/index.php?page=history

I still wonder at some of the brilliant characters and dynamic scenarios my characters have encountered. I will never forget Hannibals barbecue grill. Having retrieved it from the enemy and his horde of angry dingoes, we quickly started it up to cook some griffin meat. We were told that "It's use had altered the fate of kingdoms". We should have taken a hint. Expecting permanent stat increases from the consumption of the meat cooked on it, we were not surprised when magical plumes of smoke began belching out. We were shocked when those fumes knocked us all out. We should have died, but thank the gods, we were inside the heavily warded walls of the Heroes Haven inn and the army of Fire elementals that the grill summoned instead decided to burn down every other standing structure in town.

#3 - The Setting
The world of Gwyreth is richly detailed and provides custom reflections for almost all cultural and racial scenarios of this world. I have a middle eastern style character from a region called the scorched lands, there is actually an entire empire not unlike Rome called Folnir. There are also many fantastical environments that have no paralell here on earth. The race and class combinations for your characters are vast at more then 100 possible combinations. These include an array of special classes your character can evolve into. Evolution will happen by happy accident, because qualifications for these classes are entirley secret and depend on how you develop your character (PSST...GMs are accomadating and in game will drop obvious hints to steer you toward your secret class of choice). Skill choices, alignment, in character ambitions, all come into play when determining whether or not your character can evolve to an elite class.

#2 -The addiction
The reason I stopped playing MMORPGs is that I eventually discovered what a consuming and awful thing an addiciton can be. Even if it is just a roleplaying game. Ultimatley, It is depressing and after awhile I lose the joy of the experience. It becomes automatic. One of the most delightful aspects of this game is that it is an addiction that is only fed twice a week. In this regard IRP is a safe, wife + having a life friendly addiction. As much as I would like to I can't IRP all the time. It is a select occasion that I really look forward to all week.The limitations are a built in restraint to my addiction while at the same time providing a haloe of ritual to the entire thing that has in my many months of playing, never diminished.

And, (very cliche' drum roll.....)

The NUMBER ONE REASON TO PLAY IRP IS....
Its Free. We need people to play. We really want you to help in developing rich history for the game. A wealth of creative talent will be required in this monumental effort and while we have alot of talent amongst us, we really need more. If you have some interesting character ideas, we want you now! Creative roleplaying provides not only the only characters playing with a good time and a fulfilling experience, but also all of those playing with them get the same. IRP is in the process of transitioning out of Beta. Once out, it will be a paid service. (one time five dollar member for life fee) All of those who help us out in Beta will be free for life, Our little way of saying thankyou.

And the number zero reason that IRP Rocks...

Free Booze.

All members of the Heroe's Haven Inn are entitled to free room board and drink. If you do decide to play try not to get your characters plastered before the dragon slaying mission. I am sick and relying on a bunch of drunks to get my back on major baddies.

Thanks for the post Mark! See you in Gwyreth Rizzinites.

A little bit of everything before I get back to work

If you emailed me between about 4:00 PM and 5:30 PM yesterday, I need you to email me again, as I had a minor workstation crash that I spent the better part of the evening recovering from. In other news, I’m getting pretty excited about my upcoming adventure a few weeks from now in iRP, where my little kobold is going to lead a band of adventurers to the northern Temple of Bianesse.  So far, the party looks like it’s going to contain the following assorted characters: a junkie Kei’Dyn (a catlike race – this one’s poison is catnip), a one-armed ameteur dwarven mage, a cross dressing Urdon, and possibly a female halfling troubadour, all led by my character, a 3’9” ninja kobold.  I’m not sure if this is going to be a comedy or a tragedy, but it will definately be one or the other. 

I’ll check with the GM and see if there’s any interested in just observing if I can give out the server info here on the blog.  If you’re interested in participating though, just head on over to the site.

The fabled Blip migration should be done by the end of the day.  We’re going to flip the DNS switch tonight, assuming all goes well.  Some podcasts may not be available for a short period of time, and we may have some weird outages for as many as three days, but it’s the weekend, and it’s typically a slightly lower traffic time for the site.  By Monday we’ll definately have all this straightened out (famous last words, yes, I know).  All this means is that I’m going to be harder to get a hold of this weekend than normal, but I do want you to report to my email any irregularities you experience, as I’ll be relying on you guys to tell me how the DNS propogates.

Michael Brown of FEMA and his Statements
I wonder how many of you read your homework last night like I told you to…  probably not many, and I don’t blame you.  That is one long winded opening statement.  There are, however, some passages from it that I’d like to point out to you that have been completely glossed over by the MSM, and to a large extent the blogging community (if only because no one broadcast the statement in its entirety except C-SPAN, and only then just the first time, no repeat).

There is this prevailing opinion of late that Michael Brown is part of some crony network, an old friend of the Bush family or something that got the job by being the friend of a drunken cokehead bound for presidency at the right place at the right time.  I think what the hearings and especially his opening statement shows is that this is not true at all.  Don’t get me wrong, there is examples of this in the Bush cabinet for instance, but the director of FEMA was qualified for his job, as it turns out.  This is simply an example of the press piling onto the wrong guy, and supressing the evidence of their mistake.

FCC blinks again on VoIP disconnects
For a second time, the FCC has postponed a deadline affecting VoIP providers that failed to get all of their customers to acknowledge 911 service limitations. Customers that hadn't responded to their providers' notifications faced termination of their service last Wednesday. The agency on Tuesday agreed to extend the deadline by another month, acknowledging the work many of the providers had already done to inform their customers of the limitations of 911 over VoIP. The original deadline set by the FCC was Aug. 29.

The FCC now says it won't begin enforcing the rule until Oct. 31. Many VoIP providers have already submitted reports, and the FCC has felt encouraged so far by the level of compliance. In a public notice, the FCC said that 21 companies had received notices of 100 percent compliance, and at least 32 others had heard back from more than 90 percent of their customers.

From the “Privacy is Dead, Get Over It” Department
All over Canada, local police departments are making use of fake recycling bins to trap speeders in residential zones, according to numerous email reports we’ve been getting.  One rizznite sent photographic proof (ostensibly taken by a the local media) of police officers setting up one of these trashy speed-traps.

They basically use radar guns to track your speed, and if you exceed the limit, take your photograph. From the emails I’ve recieved, they appear to be in use in Alberta, as well as Calgary.  I used to think this type of stuff only happenned in Britian, but now it’s creeping into North America.  The United States is next.  Several cliched quotes come to mind.  If we don’t say something about it, we’ll all have to drive the speed limit soon! According to my research, ones very much like these units have been used in South Australia and Germany as well. 

I’m of the opinion that our country’s personal transport system is oppressive enough.  Just by joining the driver’s club in most states, you waive several very important civil rights, subject yourself to the high cost of moving yourself around the distances that our advanced society requires, as well as risk being harassed routinely by whatever local yokel street beat cops you may be nearby to.  The United States (and I would imagine Canada as well) can’t afford too many more significant barriers to private transportation before it has a significant negative impact on the economy.

Consider the cost of insurance, car maintainence, gas, and now guaranteed ten or so speeding tickets a year?  Think about it.  How often do you go 20 mph in a 15 mph or 40 mph in a 35 mph?  No matter how much negative reinforcement that goes to your pocketbook a year for minor infractions, a lot of us have a lead foot that gets away from us on occasion, no matter how hard we try.  The camera won’t care if you’re going 5 of 35 over the speed limit, and since these things are so cost effective, it won’t take long before they spread to 80% (or more) citywide coverage.  They’re cash machines for a city.  Think about it!

Fetuses found at Bogota Airport
In a very disgusting turn of events, Colombian police have found the bodies of three human foetuses hidden in statues destined for the United States. The discovery was made by officers searching for contraband at Bogota Airport on Tuesday.

The corpses were wrapped in plastic and concealed inside statues of Christian icons, which were smashed open. According to Colombian police chief Gen Jord Alirio Varon, the four- to five-month-old foetuses could have been intended for use in Satanic rituals. He said officials are trying to find out who sent the packages, which came from Barranquilla in Colombia and were destined for Miami in the US.

Of course, I’ve read by a lot of liberal bloggers who’ve blogged this that it was more likely they were on their way to be used for stem-cell research.  What these bloggers fail to recognize is that stem-cell research isn’t illegal, just not government funded.  There would be no reason for the dead babies to be smuggled in, as there is a ready supply in America of our own to use. Gen Varon said the foetuses were found alongside crucifixes and medals, which is what probably gave rise to the ritualistic angle.

RICR #2: The Next Generation
It’s Friday again, so this must be the Rizznite Inner Circle Roundup.  Of course the really big news is that Smokehouse got a smokin’ hot chick to DJ on Rant by the name of Soccergirl. I’m sure all of us rant heads are going to enjoy the sexy goodness on the Talk station now.  I mean, come on guys, how long has it been a complete sausage fest over there.  It’s a good thing.  In other news, Kelly turned into an aunt (of sorts) as her ‘homefrye’, and best friend Jayne had a baby. 

Lucas Dwayne A——. (last name withheld) was born sometime on September 25, 2005. Jayne was heard saying, “ Kel! I have a healthy baby boy and he is so awesome. Yeah:) YEAH!!!!”

The next day, Darrell was pitched into the throes of a horrendous depression after viewing a ‘very special’ Daria episode, only to be fully recovered three days later.  Jon, on the other hand, has decided to take a zen-like approach to his social and personal life in order to suppress the depression typically brought on by failed romantic endeavors or sad episodes of Daria.  As if this upturn in his approach to life wasn’t enough to make us all want to be Jon, he too (much like myself on Tuesday) was invited to go pre-screen the nunreleased movie Serenity.

Also, as an aside to Jon, you know my policy with Hot Chicks and Rizzn.com – they have to be together as often as possible – which is why I’m stealing this picture from your entry and putting it here.  Bwahahaha.

Finally, from the RICR mailing list, not a whole lot of activity again this week, but a few comments came in from Matthew and VikiBabbles.  Regarding the Michael Brown transcript, Matthew said:

Wow, Rizzn, I am glad I had an opporitunity to read this transcript. I found it very enlightening. I had just assumed that he was another suit latched onto Bush's crony network. That part about FEMA's real function and the size of it's budget, is gold. In particular, where Brown goes on TV and tells the people of New Orleans to just get out despite what their Mayor is saying... That is very vindicating. Good job defending the underdog, you made a true believer out of me, because I would never have seen this on CNN. I'm sure it went totally unreported minus that. At least the CNN crowd knows whats up... all 50 of them.

Regarding the Walken for President Hoax Confirmation, VikiBabbles had this to say:

This is hilarious. I was just searching for myself (yes, I'm that vain), and I came back across this comment I left. WTF was I thinking? I do appreciate ham n eggs sticking up for me. yeah, that's right, I meant Jeb!

Actually, I meant the Bush machine, whoever they put on as the face of it in 2008.

I'm so laughing at myself right now, I can't even believe it. It's good that I'm as drunk now as I was when I left that comment.

That’s the RICR for this week.  Head on over to Rob’s website and welcome him to the inner circle.  Until later guys.

/rizzn

 

Hamachi and the Soundtrack To My Car

Alright, I’ve been hinting around about a new CD I’ve had done for a number of months now, but not really forced on anyone really but Darrell. Well, it’s everyone’s turn today, because I’m bored and I found a new utility to make it easy to publish.

We’ll try this method out and if it works well, you can refer back to the Music page periodically whenever I upload some of my older CDs.

First things first. Here's the directions on how to download the stuff quick and dirty:

1) Go to www.hamachi.cc and download the latest version here.
2) Next (once it's completely installed and set up), click on the following URL: file:////5.4.205.233/djRizznSTTMC for the latest CD, or right-click and save the files from the detailed track listing below.
1) Click on this link to download the album.
2) Skip Step 2
3) Listen to the MP3s
4) Comment and/or email me and tell me what you think.

1. My Fury: A remix I did for a contest that ended up coming out quite original. The vocals were uncredit public domain, all instrumentation is my own.
2. Southeast: A mix I made back in 1999 or 2000, with some assistance from Peter Hitt and Louis Hebb. My first foray into acoustic djing.
3. End Takes Care: Another song that was acoustically inspired by Southeast. I get accused of mocking a lot of 80's music with this tune. Some assistance from Peter Hitt and Louis Hebb.
4. Take You There: A mix I made to go with the lyrics written and sung by a girl named Meigh. She's got a good voice and mysterious writing style. She told me that she wrote these lyrics when she was a little girl, and used to sing it to herself when she was on the playground.
5. Far North: Yet another song inspired by Southeast. As you can tell at the time I was a little hard up for song titles, but the song itself is fairly original. It has a familiar ring to it for most people, they can't quite place it where they've heard it before. I don't know why since it's completly an original piece. Some assistance from Peter Hitt and Louis Hebb.
6. Yellow Ghost: This is what I like to call electronic emo. I'm not sure where the style came from (other than my oft-deranged brain), but once again the lyrics and singing came from the beautiful talent known only as Meigh.
7. Discernment: Of all the songs on the CD, this one had the most collaborators and spent the longest time on the shelf before I finally ended up producing it last year. On vocals is a girl that made my six month stay in Ft. Worth in 2001 non-maddening, Lauren Strickland. The author of the lyrics is a great friend of my old Dallas clique named 'Rissa Winland. Of course, I did the mixing. The original recording was so bad that I shelved it until I could improve my mastering skills enough to make a good version of the song. I think, all in all, it turned out great. Some assistance on the mix itself from Peter Hitt and Louis Hebb.
8. Leylines: This is actually the title track off of Riz Mix 2: Leylines, the one that had the blue porno chick on the front (for you long time collectors, you know the one I'm talking about). The ending of it has actually been modified from the original CD, as the voices used to be up in a higher pitch to allow for a smooth transition into Halcyon On and On, but I think as a standalone it sounds better with it down low.
9. Slimee Is a Flatworm: I've dated some crazy-ass women, but this crazy song was dedicated to the craziest woman I EVER dated (and not in that good sorta way). Ever. I sang the vocoded lyrics.
10. Outback: the only song I've ever mixed using a Digeree-doo.
11. Black Beans: a mashup of a couple obscure ambient tunes.
12. You Didn't Think I Was Listening, Did You?: a hidden track from the CD. I recorded it off a hidden mic in Ricky McGill's office (Ricky is a partner in AACS).

/rizzn

On the Turntables Currently: DJ Rizzn - Discernment

Actually, pretty interesting...

I usually don’t post quizs and stuff, but this one was interesting enough for me to want to pass along:  http://www.crush007.com/love.cgi?id=1126539091hjz

/rizzn

On the Turntables Currently: DJ Rizzn - My Fury

MTV Video Music Awards and AngryShirts

I’m off to South Beach now.  Apparently the parties are back on again, and we’re going to go cover them for Blip. Expect interviews, pictures, and video of the following people:Carmen Electra, Kanye West, Paris Hilton, Hillary Duff, Haylie Duff, Orlando Jones, Nick Cannon, Jill Marie Jones, Brooke Valentine, Jeremy Piven, Tori Kittles, Joel Madden (from Good Charlotte), Jaime Pressly, Jamie Foxx, Baby Face, DJ AM, Missy Elliot, Jermaine Dupri, Dave Meyers, Janet Jackson, JayZ, Destiny’s Child, Ciara, Alicia Keys, Fat Joe, Blacked Eyed Peas, and (I quote) Many Many More.

Usually about 5% of the list shows up to these things, so we’ll see.  Some of these names I have no idea who they are, so I’m going to work on puttin a dossier together for my PDA.  If you have tips for me while I’m out, leave a voice mail @ 800.900.2552 x 302, and I’ll pick it up periodically over the next couple days.

I’m also featured on the front page of Angryshirts right now. See?  I am a celebrity!  I’m helping them sell more shirts just by being me!

We have updated stock on the RantRadio t-shirt. It has been sold out of it for some time and I got tired of all the RR people sending death threats so I printed more. Buy them before they are sold out again!

In the photo to your left you will see Mark from BlipMedia a loyal RantRadio fan and a Angryshirts customer. You might have heard Mark on the "Mark and Darrell Show" on RantRadio. He has also been on the Rant airwaves with Smokey on the show "Off in Right Field".

So there you go.  People do remember me.  Hopefully I won’t be eternally remembered for the host of idiotic questions I’m going to be throwing at celebrities this weekend, but hey, here’s to hoping.

/rizzn

Oh, Nixter, btw, I’ll be wearing my RR tshirt tonight.

David May Beat Goliath, But Will He Make a Living? : ProBlogging and Independent Journalism

I was speaking with Brian yesterday afternoon, and he suggested what should have been obvious, that I open up to the public and talk about this with the blog-o-sphere. It all started a couple days ago when we at BlipMedia reeled in a new client interested in pursuing an aggressive marketing plan in launching his new website. Amongst the many resources we at Blip have to offer in the way of marketing new products and services, we have a quite a few very popular and influential podcasters and bloggers that are users at Blip. Suddenly, it occurred to us that there are people in our client base and beyond, who would like to pay our bloggers and podcasters for their positive opinion of their new or existing venture.

This excited us at first. It presents a great opportunity for us to facilitate more interest (figuratively and literally) in independent journalism and it’s with those two words we stop short. We’re talking about independent journalism here. What does a journalist have but his credibility, anyways? If a journalist starts selling his opinion to the highest bidder, doesn’t that run counter to our stated mission?

In case you missed it, we at Blip have a stated mission of fostering independent media, and turning on it’s ear the flawed business model that has sustained Mainstream Media since it’s inception. Very directly, the question becomes: “What are the ethics involved with independent journalism and profit models?” As with most good questions, the answers aren’t very cut and dried, and they become more complex the more you analyze them.

It isn’t coincidence that this topic is coming up in front of the podcasting community of Blip, I would imagine. A lot of bloggers are starting to look at the various business models involved with blogging for dollars, although there is a growing community of those who would wish we’d call it “ProBlogging.”

On the whole, a recent conversation from BlogHer-Con was pretty revealing on the aspects of pro-blogging I have questions about. Elisa Camahort started the session by asking her panel the question we just asked: “Where do you draw the line when you start thinking about money? Are you trading credibility when you put ads on your blog?” After we discard our wishy-washy ‘create-your-own-ethics’ answers, we aren’t left with much. My personal opinion on this is that if you are using a service with a model close to Google’s AdSense or Overture, there isn’t much credibility question.

Let me explain. The genuine flaw in advertising models today comes from conflicts of interest. If your entire television program is underwritten by pharmaceutical interests, how can we trust you to be honest when it comes to revealing the side-effects of popular dieting pill, for instance. Services like AdSense and Overture take that problem out of the mix – you aren’t bound to the advertisers that are on your site or media project, they are just randomly mixed in based on keyword bids and context searches. To dig a little under the surface on this one, yes, I’m aware there are sneaky ways to cheap the system into making more money for you, like blogging about topics who’s keywords are above average on the pay-per-click scale, but in my experience, efforts like that are entirely transparent, as bloggers who engage in that tend to not have much other interesting content.

Back to our original question, though: “Is credibility destroyed when you’re paid for your opinion?” Let’s not forget history here, the Daily Kos is still reeling from it’s run in with lack of disclosure when they took money from the Dean campaign to say positive things about him (to the tune of $12,000). On the other hand, how many people do you know stop listening to their favorite drive-time DJ because he’s doing a 120–second spot for flowers, car insurance, and record stores? Independent journalism comes in just as many forms as mainstream media, and a one-size-fits-all approach can’t be used for paid-placement.

The trouble comes, I think, from the blurred lines of blogging and podcasting. One of the elements of independent media is the personal feel to it –  you not only feel more connected to your favorite blogger or streaming radio host, you are more connected to them. You count on their periodic injections of personal opinion or mundane goings-on to keep things interesting for you. It is this feeling that makes paid-placement an attractive marketing tool – the sales pitch can be thrown in under the radar (to mix a few metaphors).

I have a couple proposals for how to deal with this, and I’d like to invite my readers and users in on this discussion so that we can refine them and come to a consensus. If you are going to be paid to write an opinion piece to market something, I think that it goes without saying for those who consider themselves journalists that it should be marked somewhere in the entry itself that this is a paid-opinion piece. A clever blogger or podcaster will be able to work it into the entry seamlessly, instead of having a stamp somewhere denoting it’s status. For those that consider themselves entertainment based, I’m not certain a disclaimer should be required; certainly not for those that are link and review based sites.

Who makes the decision on the genre? It’s hard to imagine that anyone but the author would be qualified to make that judgement call, but on the other hand, who wants to tempt an otherwise credible journalist with a decision like that, and possibly bring controversy down on their head? If the folks over at the Kos were never approached by the Dean campaign, who knows if they would have sold out like that?

Let’s come to a conclusion on this – I encourage you to comment here on the site or to email me privately with your thoughts

/rizzn.

Lack of updates: a comprehensive apology, and funny MADshow stuff

Rizzn is back, but not rested, it
would seem.

There has been a distinct lack of updates around here at rizzn.com, and there's good reasons for it.  Just so you aren't left completely in the dark, I'll take some time out to share with you, my loyal 10 or so readers.

First and formost, business at AACS/CyberDyne has been picking up quite well after the hurricanes.  It has actually gotten to the point where I can focus on minor infrastructure systems at the company, like the company radio station or improving fax automation and database synchronisation (instead of a hand done procedure, the affiliate database synchronises four times a day automatically with the content manager). 

Disputing and Data Entry

Laura from Disputing

The foyer and the COO's office

Secondly, the Aveary project is starting to take off.  The articles of incorporation are ready to go to press, the site is almost completed, and next Monday, we hope to do our first demo in front of a billionaire (obviously looking for investment capital). This is a big step, and due to the sensitive nature of the product, I really can't go into the specifics of what we're doing, but I can say that this will change the way the world works, once we go to market.

Thirdly, I've been getting involved with podcasting, in conjunction with my radio shows. Along that vein of thought, we had on the Mark and Darrell show one of the rising stars in the Podcasting world, Sondra Lowell, otherwise known as the deliverer of the tapdancing podcaster news (yeah!).  Here is the 30-minute interview between Darrell, Doug, myself, and Sondra ---> (download 13.5 meg, 64k stream).

In other miscellaneous things, I'm upgrading the site to version 7.7 here within the next few days.  Joel and Matthew (currently known as DJ Colonoscopy and the Sh!t) wish to upgrade their credibility a little bit, as they've been making some amazing contacts and working on some comprehensive stories, and everyone keeps telling them that they have to drop the vulgarity in the name to be taken seriously (darn this square world).  In addition, I'm adding a podcasting category to the front page, adding RSS feeds, dropping ndmovies and whatever, and then combing them and a few others into a community blog.  Also, I'm in talks with a few "unsigned" bloggers/podcasters in attempts to lure them over to the rizzn.com community.

Lest I forget to plug this again, New Media News Network is still in active development.  Darrell and I are nearly completely done with pre-production work, and we will very shortly being talks with podcasters in an attempt to sign them up to join. 

Well, in about thirty seconds, the COO is going to be breathing down my neck and notice my non-productivity, so I'm going to finish up this entry.

Oh, for absolute hilarity, check out what has to be the funniest moment in recent history of the MADshow here due to James being drunk and calling in ---> (download 949 KB. 64k stream).

/rizzn

FN Radio

I had a particularly productive night last.  I finished doing the initial setup for FNRadio/Skynet Radio, my company's radio station.  Essentially, the desire for the station came from the need to share our tunes across the network.  It seems that I've become the offical company DJ, since in our close quarters at the old office everyone grew accustomed to listening to my tunes blaring from my computer, and now that everyone's all spread out and such, it makes it difficult to hear anything except from one's own machine.  The problem is if everyone plays different music, it sounds cacaughonous in the office.

So essentially, I got everyone playing from the same song-sheet.

As it turns out, I've done something good here with the station.  It's been up for a day, and I've already over 47 listeners -- wacky, eh?  AKA radio could never manage more than 14.

If you want to listen/request music, go to http://aacs.kicks-ass.net/fnradio/playing.html - the site's not exactly done, but it is functional.

/rizzn

Music on the Turntables Currently: leftfield - open up (FN Radio: Smooth Sounds of SkyNet)

British Journalist Bigley Beheaded

I'm posting this video up today because it's one of the topics on the MADshow today.  Forgive me for perhaps trivializing what may be another U.S. related death in Iraq, but this strikes me as yet another fake video.  Discuss here on the board and on the show tonight.  Watch the video here first, though.

Music on the Turntables Currently: DJ Rizzn - My Fury

Conservative Values Won't Protect Your Genitals SweetHeart (p4): These values just might protect the genitals after all

Read Part Three



Once again, we continue the discussion on Conservative Values, especially in relation to sexual education programs, and how everything anyone says that is conservative is at the very least misguided, or failing that intentionally evil. Let us clear the air a little bit and examine the source of the facts as I take up DJ Colonoscopy's challenge to tear holes in these sources.



The sources listed in his article were The United Kingdom's Guardian, the Center for Disease Control (CDC), UNICEF, and the United Nation's children's fund as well as the Bush Bashing quote from the L.A. Weekly.



I was unable to identify a quote or even a source article from the UK's "the Guardian" or the Associated Press.



I did happen to find a second article from a slightly less left leaning news source than the LA Weekly, ABCnews. The headline pretty much told me that the information that DJ Colonoscopy had given us was misleading: "Virginity Pledges Work."



Not satisfied with simply reading a secondary source, I searched for the primary, the original report from columbia University. I was unable to find online (for free) a copy of the report which was originally published in the "American Journal of Sociology" (Volume 106, Number 4 (January 2001), pp. 859-912), but I was able to find several direct quotes that correlated one another.



"Since 1993, in response to a movement sponsored by the Southern Baptist Church, over 2.5 million adolescents have taken public virginity pledges, in which they promise to abstain from sex until marriage. This paper explores the effect of those pledges on the transition to first intercourse. Adolescents who pledge are much less likely to have intercourse than adolescents who do not pledge. The delay effect is substantial. On the other hand, the pledge does not work for adolescents at all ages. Second, pledging delays intercourse only in contexts where there are some, but not too many, pledgers. The pledge works because it is embedded in an identity movement. Consequently, the pledge identity is meaningful only in contexts where it is at least partially nonnormative. Consequences of pledging are explored for those who break their promise. Promise breakers are less likely than others to use contraception at first intercourse."

So the evidence shows that the program actually does work.



Let us return to DJ Colonoscopy's article; he mentions various studies (including the CDC) ranking Texas as having the fourth highest incidence of Sexually Transmitted Diseases. This, in fact, is not true. The CDC article DIRECTLY LINKED from DJ Colonoscopy's article lists Texas as the state with the 11th highest incidences of Gonorrhea and Syphilis, the only list where Texas gets failing marks. It should be noted that compared to the states in the top 10, Texas is a distant 11, where Illinois is 193.1 instances per 100,000, Texas is 166.6 per 100,000. An interesting side note would be to track where Texas was before the abstinence programs took effect.



Other states ranked ABOVE Texas include Maryland and Illinois -- two states I'm quite certain do not run abstinence based programs in their school systems.



The words of the LA Weekly article certainly sound vitriolic and overly dramatic now, don't they? Lethal new regulations? Rupublican's goal of gutting HIV prevention? The CDC agrees: "The surest way to avoid transmission of sexually transmitted diseases is to abstain from sexual intercourse, or to be in a long-term mutually monogamous relationship with a partner who has been tested and you know is uninfected." (http://www.cdc.gov/nchstp/od/latex.htm)



Does anyone dispute that sexually transmitted diseases are, well, sexually transmitted? Ergo, if sex is abstained from, will not the diseases cease to spread? Furthermore, if monogomous relationships are encouraged on top of this, will not the chance of partner-sharing (and by virtue of this, disease sharing) also decrease?



Assuming that there is an equal chance that if one uses a male latex condom it could work as intended, somehow magically passes the virus with no reason given, has an invisible leak, or has a visible leak, there is still roughly a 2 out of a 1000 probability that you'll have a greater chance to pass the virus than if unprotected sex is practiced (according to page 10 of this NIH report: http://www.niaid.nih.gov/dmid/stds/condomreport.pdf)



The report futher states: "It should be noted that, for many STDs, risk of infection might not be proportional to exposure to a volume of semen. Estimation of risk requires further extrapolation because it depends on additional variables, especially the infectious agent of interest. The concentration, infectivity, and mode of transmission of the specific STDs clearly need to be considered."



Essentially, the takeaway is that condoms, if they work as designed (of which there is no guarantee), and if they are applied with care (which they rarely are), then they will PROBABLY protect you from disease.



As to the 'censorship' mentioned by DJ Colonoscopy, once it is put to print, it is certainly a lot less horrible than it sounds. When one says "Bush is censoring and suppressing the CDC's data about AIDs," it sounds facist.



Even in a left-leaning restatement of what the policy decision is, it sounds a whole lot less oppressive.



What Bush is actually legislating is not censorship, but that local authorities exercise their constitutionally protected rights, which is to determine what is obscene in their constituency. If a survey, pamphlet or education program is obscene, a federal government would be remiss if they were to shove it down a community's throat.



The term of legal significance is "obscenity", which, after struggling for many years and through many cases, the U.S. Supreme Court defined in Miller v. California in 1973. It is a three-part test, as follows:



"The basic guidelines for the trier of fact must be:

(a) whether "the average person, applying contemporary community standards" would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, Kois v. Wisconsin, supra, at 230, quoting Roth v. United States, supra, at 489;

(b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and

(c) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value."



The information that a condom helps prevent disease can be communicated to a young person, no one is contesting that at all... what could be considered obscene in certain communities is the application of said condom to a phallic symbol, or offending their sensibilities with questions of sexuality. People in Los Angelos or San Francisco are not going to have the same sensibilities as people of Dade City, Florida or Albequerque, New Mexico. For the Federal Government at any agency level to define what is or is not obscene across the board is unconstitutional.



The quote that DJ Colonoscopy attributes to the CDC is in fact NOT from the CDC, but a message from a political activist left on a CDC message board (http://www.cdc.gov/nchstp/od/content_guidelines/comments/comment_105.htm).



Once again, I challenge your facts memes, DJ Colonoscopy. You are proposing a very liberal meme of your own, so by virtue, it is a hard sell. I'm not going to let you off easy on this one, so you'll have to dig hard for your support. Even worse for you, conservative meme-holders have an advantange on this one, since it is not such a hot-button issue like gay marriage or adoption, there is no knee-jerk reaction from the public, and facts and theories can be examined for what they are without emotions coming to play.



/rizzn

Conservative Values Won't Protect Your Genitals SweetHeart (p2)

Read Part One

Conservative values are not fraud. Does anyone honestly believe that our parents and grandparents were trying to kill us all off by telling us to wait for marriage to have sex? Do you think it was the goal of the Bible most other religious texts to actually promote promiscuity by telling us it was wrong to commit adultery and respect our (now or future) significant others?

Explosive as the aforementioned statement was, the most explosive statements in the narrative were the following: "When [G.W. Bush's] cherished abstinence programs failed to reduce the rate of teenage births, he instructed the US Centers for Disease Control to stop gathering data. He also forced them to drop their project identifying the sex education programs that work, after they found that none of the successful ones were "abstinence only"."

There is no support for this claim, no documentation. I understand the outrage if this is in fact a true statement, and this type of behavior is certainly not out of character for the type of people Bush runs around with, but it is unsupported in the research I have done, and is the type of statement that if left unsupported can blow an entire article's credibility.

On the one hand, I am glad to see that DJ Colonoscopy is trying to use facts to support some his statements, however. Facts are important tools to better understanding the world around us, and help us to step outside of ourselves.

On the other hand, memes are not useful always in ascertaining the truth. Every person involved in debate is generally guilty of using memes. Memes like Bush had for-knowledge of 9/11 and had the bin Ladin family extracted from America without questioning before the flight ban was lifted. Memes like Richard Nixon's attempted "I'm not a crook." Or even non-partisan memes like "China has ICBMS that can be pointed at America."

Memes are repeated over and over, quoted, requoted, and their original sources obscured to the point where everyone just accepts it as truth. The bin Ladin family wasn't extracted from America till after the flight ban was up, Richard Nixon was a liar and a crook ("I have a secret plan..."), and China's ICBMs, under the most liberal estimates, might reach the West Coast, with a favorable tail-wind.

What is a meme? It is a term coined on analogy by Richard Dawkins with the word 'gene.' An idea considered as a replicator, especially with the connotation that memes parasitize people into propagating them much as viruses do. Dawkins further defines it as "a unit of cultural inheritance, hypothesized as analogous to the particulate gene and as naturally selected by virtue of its 'phenotypic' consequences on its own survival and replication in the cultural environment."

A good way to examine a piece of data for its integrity is to track down it's source, examine the primary source's for bias, process, and method.

Let's take this nugget of information from DJ Colonoscopy's report, "Conservative Values Won't Protect Your Genitals, SweetHeart":

"Texas has the fourth highest AIDS rates and ranks second, behind Mississippi, in births among teens ages 15 to 17, according to a new study by the Annie E. Casey Foundation that draws on federal statistics. "

First of all, it turns out that Annie E. Casey Foundation did not do the research on this topic, and did not do the study, and did not get their source material from federal statistics. They pulled their information from a liberal watchdog group called "Advocates for Youth" (http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/). To be fair, Advocates for Youth did not do the research, study, or statistics themselves either. They got them from another liberal watchdog group called the "Alan Guttmacher Institute" (www.agi-usa.org).

The most recent statistics gathered by the AGI were in 1996, and these statistics are being quoted as much more recent in daughter reports. Secondly, data came from two primary sources: a) Abortion Providers and b) the Census Bureau. Census Bureau data is compiled every 10 years, so in 1996, the relevant Census Bureau data would have come from 1990, much before Bush's policies were implemented and far before they could take effect. Data from other government agencies are at least in part derived from Census Bureau statistics, and in 1992-1996, the likelihood that they were dealing in the most recent Census Bureau statistics decreases even further, so the age of our data in the present time begins to age anywhere from fourteen years (optimistically) to twenty-two years (pessimistically).

I don't even have to begin to acknowlege the inherent bias of trying to create a statistically accurate study based off findings of an industry who's interests are being represented by the outcome of the study.

So, in summation, one of the cornerstone "facts" of the narrative is in fact ... Well ... Not.

I know that I have probably been guilty of perpetuating harmful memes in the past as well, everyone does it. Back before Dawkins, it was called gossip. What's harmful about the new-gossip, memes, is that they very closely resemble facts, enough to fool even the most skeptical of people, not just the sheep of the world.

I don't blame DJ Colonoscopy for misleading us, I believe he is just as misled as the rest of us. Perhaps there are indeed facts out there to support his theory, but these aren't the facts he is looking for, they are simply memes.

Read Part Three

/rizzn

Mark and Darrell Show & the MTV Music Video Awards

The Mark and Darrell Show this weekend will be live with remotes from the afterparties of the MTV Music Video Awards.  Over the next three days I will be attending the parties of P. Diddy, Paris Hilton, Jessica Simpson, and others, and I will be getting the good interviews ... hopefully ... if they let me in.

Well, I'm invited, I'm just in a bit of disbelief at the moment ... I do however intend to attend these places and discover if this is simply a cruel joke played on a simple internet radio dj like myself or if it in fact is a Real Thing.  We'll See!  Stay tuned for details.

/rizzn

Abortion, Gay Marriage and Common Sense Part IV

I'll just come right out and say it, this is the next installment in the round-robin writing exercise between DJ Colonoscopy and myself. :)

I have never contended at any point along the way that it was strictly religious influence that the anti-gay marriage people have to support your cause.  In today's day and age, there is no way to take a stand in politics on strictly moral superiority, and those that do will be called on that stance. 

This is, in fact, what I aimed to do (at least in part) with my original article.  The primary contention people of the pro-gay marriage stance have -- that it's simply "right" that all of us re-define our idea of marriage.  This is what we're talking about is re-defining society's image of what's "right."  A minority think it should be one way, the majority another. 

There aren't an overabundance of facts on either side of the debate, yet we persist in arguing them despite this; and in so doing we draw into the debate some of the biggest "hotbutton" issues of all time: Christian values, perversion in relation to the fall of old societies, and religious hypocrasy.  I'm given to wonder if the point is to really convince one side or another of what the merits of one's argument is, or if the point is simply to rile the conservatives up in such a tizzy that they all jump off a cliff like lemmings once the liberals have their way.

Since we're mentioning the foibles of the right, let's illustrate the same for the left.  At some point or another during the 80s, it was recognized that teen pregnancy and STDs were becoming an issue.  To remedy this, instead of teaching our children (hrm, that would have been me at the time) that you can avoid all these pitfalls by the tried and true method of abstinence, children were told that "we know you're going to have sex, and we know you're going to do drugs -- here's clean needles, here's some rubbers."

If you need to learn the problems with this approach to teaching, you may want to go back and read [this article] about how succeptible the mind is to suggestion.  If you want to learn how effective the teaching progam actually was, read [this recent report] linking drug abuse and teenage (and pre-teenage) sexual activity.

So to bring this all back around, just because marriage is already in trouble, do we throw the baby out with the bathwater?  Do we just say "Michael Jackson ruined marriage for us all -- if he can get married, what can it really mean anymore?" and let centuries old definitions be re-written?

It is so easy to point to the solution of the moment, but I think few people outside the conservative arena realize the gravity of what is being proposed (and most of those people just kinda go along with the crowd of the moment, and don't have a clear picture of what they are arguing for).

I don't want to see idiots on television debating from their gut on this one.  I don't want to see liberals comparing gay rights to the civil rights movements -- that's assinine.  I don't want to see conservatives telling us to kill gay people -- that's evil.  If I'm going to be subjected to Gay Marriage debate on a national level, I want to see an honest discussion of the facts.  I want to see the best of what both sides has to offer.  If I wanted trash-talking and sub-culture bashing, I could watch Jerry Springer, re-runs of the DNC or the upcoming RNC.

(I'm skipping the obvious joke about [the unmentionable station], but it's there.. you know it.. I know it..  I don't have to say it).

The first thing that needs to happen is that both sides need to stop calling each other liars.  Both sides need to treat the other side some way besides 'beneath contempt.'  We all have to share this country, and the Dwarves of Narnia like myself are sick and damn tired of you people fighting like Narnians and Calormen. (I hope you people like that reference, it works on a few levels).

To address DJ Colonoscopy's final point of "looking up America's very dark orifices to see what kind of sh!t we can really find..." I would have to agree.  There are certainly more important issues at stake than this, but let's agree on something before we let this subject pass from the hallowed pages of rizzn.com:

The gay marriage debate is never going to pass in America. This is a fact of life we must endure -- there are far more of them than there are of us who want to make this an issue in the face of America, and they all have their various reasons why.  We must keep our composure.  You will be asked for you're opinion.  Research the facts. Find out why you believe what you believe.

If you can face the issue of gay marriage in America with a straight face, don't lose your cool, and perhaps find a solution that is amicable to both diverse points of view, I believe we could take on any American issue facing us and defeat the problems.

Just a thought.  This may be our litmus test as a country.  Don't fail it.

/rizzn
on to looking up the annals of america or whatever.

Now playing: Thelonious Monk - In Walked Bud

RIZZN.COM Version 7.4 is out

I hope you all enjoy the new layout.  I spent a couple evenings on this when I should have been catching up on work.... so if my life turns to shambles because I'm behind the eightball, I'm holding each and every one of you responsible.  Or something.

At any rate, let me answer a few questions before they come up.  The picture on the front page is my hand showing off my new Microsoft Watch.  Or, if you prefer, you can think of it as a picture of my girlfriend.  Either way, that should elimated the jokes and the such about the pink website (an undoubtably give rise to a slew of new jokes).

What's on the horizon for rizzn.com?  Well, we're shifting focus a little bit.  I've got about a half-a-dozen sub-sites, and I'm currently seeing who wants to join me on this, but what will end up happening is we'll be rolling out in minor version numbers until we have a full flegded community out.  RickyWorld, DJ Colonoscopy and the Shit, Knight_tyme, Daizy, Whatever, and a few others, hopefully, will be joining forces and doing what they have been doing all along, basically being creative with the webspace they have... except they'll all be branded with the same design, and hopefully draw some new readers to their site.

That's the hope anyways... watch for period revisions culminating into version 8.0 as we move toward this goal.

BTW, I know it's probably still fairly buggy ... any bug reports (i.e. dead links, missing graphics) should be reported to guesswho@rizzn.com. Much appreciated.

/rizzn

Now playing: Pedro the Lion - Simple Economics

Now playing: Darude Vs Robert Miles - Children Of The Sandstorm (DJ Arnie)

A Chat log in which Dave pretends he's not secretly laughing about AKA's stream and site going down.

Rizzn: Hey dave... Something happenned that you and I can share a laugh about.
DJ Ep1phany: why would i share a laugh with you?
Rizzn: AKA Radio killed itself last night ... just after they fired me.
DJ Ep1phany: like i care?
Rizzn: eh
Rizzn: i figured you'd get some vindication out it.
DJ Ep1phany: i was never out for vindication
Rizzn: ach
Rizzn: nevermind
Rizzn: as you were.
Session Close (DJ Ep1phany): Mon Aug 09 11:04:50 2004

Session Start (AIM - mrundo5:DJ Ep1phany): Mon Aug 09 11:04:51 2004
DJ Ep1phany: i just dont like to associate myself with losers and infidels
Rizzn: oh, now I remember why i don't talk to you.
Rizzn: a bit too dramatic for me.
DJ Ep1phany: oh what? because you cant stand up to the fact that you have no balls and use people?
DJ Ep1phany: you're the dramatic one
Rizzn: losers and infidels.
DJ Ep1phany: you think you're the don of internet drama
Rizzn: do you even know what the word infidel means?
DJ Ep1phany: riz, my education will get me a lot further in life than your loser ass
*** DJ Ep1phany has signed off.

Just watch ... EP1 and AKA will become butt buddies after this.  :)  I give it two weeks.

Incidentally, a definition of infidel, in case Dave reads this:

 infidel:
 
 Noun
 1. An unbeliever with respect to a particular religion, especially Christianity or Islam. 2. One who has no religious beliefs. 3. One who doubts or rejects a particular doctrine, system, or principle.

(Isn't Dave a non practising Jew? eh, whatever.)

Now playing: Pete Namlook & Tetsu Inoue - Hands Of Light 5 (Drone Zone: Atmospheric ambient space music. Serve Best Chilled. Safe with most medications. [SomaFM])