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28 Aug

Answers for Today’s K-12 Network

Answers for Today's K-12 Network

Summer time fun is over and kids all over the country are going back to school or are already back in school.  The image of a small kid hauling a backpack filled with books is fast fading in favor of computer savvy kids with laptop, smart phones, tablets, and ipad’s!  Juxtaposed with the rapid movement of teaching, homework assignments, student records on line, etc. are bound to increase the workload and stress of most network administrators.

The Internet plays a vital part of daily activity in today’s K-12 network.  Students, teachers and administrators are using this tool as a means of expanding the classroom experience.  Network administrators are facing increasing pressure from federal, state, and local regulators to ensure it can meet ever growing demands.

Limitations in access to the Internet and other wide area network resources can affect an institutions ability to meet these directives.  Slow speeds and unresponsive systems are sure to raise the heckles of students, teachers and parents alike (not to mention school administrators).  Unfortunately, the network admin staff is the first ones blamed.  But fear not, planning and the use of technology can assist in overcoming and resolving many network related problems.  BYOD, PARCC and other requirements can be met along with a marked reduction in stress.  You can learn more from this informative paper.

Click HERE to download the white paper


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30 Apr

FatPipe Networks, the Inventor of SD-WANs, Recommended by Gartner as Offering One of the Market’s Most Advanced WAN Path Controllers With WAN Optimization Features

Gartner Recommends That Companies Should Consider FatPipe for WAN Optimization When It Is Beneficial to Combine WAN Optimization Features With Good WAN Path Selection Control Capabilities

SALT LAKE CITY, UT–(Marketwired – April 30, 2015) – FatPipe Networks, the creator of software defined networks for wide area connectivity and hybrid WANs, today announced that Gartner commented that “FatPipe offers one of the market’s most advanced WAN path controllers and companies should consider FatPipe for WAN optimization when it is beneficial to combine basic WAN optimization features with good WAN path selection control capabilities.” They listed FatPipe’s strengths as:

  • FatPipe is one of the leading vendors for WAN link load balancing and has very good WAN path control capabilities
  • FatPipe supports comprehensive application identification, classification and control capabilities
  • FatPipe offers detailed network visibility and reporting capabilities
  • The FatPipe solution is relatively easy to operate, as all functions are integrated onto one platform, and managed with a single high level user interface
  • FatPipe has a good range of commonly used WAN optimization features, including substantial storage for caching

Gartner continued on FatPipe’s strength, referencing its “simple to operate” solution that integrates traditional WAN optimization features with WAN path control integrated onto one platform managed with a single high-level user interface.

According to Gartner, “the WAN optimization market remains dynamic, gradually integrating other functionality, such as WAN path controllers.” FatPipe has been the leader in the integration. For the past 15 years FatPipe has lead the industry in software defined WAN path selection and redundancy, improving the overall performance and reliability of the WAN and since 2012, introduced WAN optimization as a feature on FatPipe MPVPN and FatPipe IPVPN.

“FatPipe is pleased to be recognized again in the Magic Quadrant for WAN Optimization with its products that provide a combination of WAN optimization with multi-path WAN load-balancing, failover, security and Quality of Service for a highly converged, SD-WAN edge product line,” said FatPipe’s CTO, Ms. Sanch Datta. “FatPipe’s vision of providing more than just WAN optimization puts us at the forefront of this market. We are able to fully meet the needs for the modern corporate network as businesses continue to move to hybrid wide area networks to address cloud based services and open more branch offices. With a large number of Fortune 1000 companies, and large institutions having deployed FatPipe for over a decade, our proven and time tested products lead the way in new WAN frontiers.”

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Spray Cake (Think Whipped Cream) Is Now Actually a Thing

by in News, July 12th, 2014

Spray CakeIs a ready-to-bake cake you spray like whipped cream from a can (and then pop in the oven or microwave) “the future” of dessert? That may be an overstatement, but Spray Cake, an award-winning product created by a couple of Harvard University undergrads, does seem increasingly poised to gain some millennial market traction.

Back in April, Harvard sophomores Brooke Nowakowski and John McCallum took top honors in the Harvard Innovation Lab challenge, along with a $10,000 prize, for their innovative cake in a can (not to be confused with cakes you bake in a can).

Nowakowski told the Boston Herald that the team planned to use to the award as a “launchpad” to bring the product, originally created for a science-of-cooking class, to market.

The prize money, McCallum told KNOE 8 News, would “go toward buying machinery and after that just producing the first few runs to get those in stores” — perhaps even by the end of this summer.

The product got another boost in late June, when Providence, R.I.-based ad agency Nail Communications won first place in The Ad Club of New England’s first-ever “Brand-a-thon,” which aims “to provide startups with the kind of marketing and branding genius typically reserved for the biggest, global brands,” with a fresh and brash campaign for Spray Cake. Nail’s campaign featured plans for pop-up shops and store delivery via a high-tech car with gull-wing doors, positioning Spray Cake as a dessert for millennial cake eaters.

Meeting its target audience where it was, the campaign also featured a fab and sneakily funny YouTube video. Here’s wishing we could can the look on the video star’s face and spray it whenever we were in need of a laugh.

(Photo: Spray Cake)

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Clear, Colorless Coffee That Looks Like Water Now Exists

A London-based company founded by two brothers is making see-through coffee it claims is “the first colorless coffee in the world!”...


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Sunday, March 20, 2011

Mar 19 - Through the blinds

Mar 19 - Through the blinds, originally uploaded by Glen Adamson.

Well missed the largest moon in a while as there was thick cloud cover in the mountains. Settled for a shot insideusing the small amount of light from the outside as a source of light. This gave the effect of daylight outside with no light inside. Although it was past 10 o'clock at night.

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The DIA launches the first public mobile tour to integrate 3D wayfinding and AR experiences with Google Tango augmented reality technology

On January 25, the Detroit Institute of Arts (DIA) has premiered a mobile tour called Lumin that uses Google’s Tango technology to provide visitors with new, in-depth ways to engage with the DIA’s renowned collection.

The DIA is the first art museum in the world to integrate this 3D wayfinding and smartphone augmented reality (AR) technology into a public mobile tour, leveraging GuidiGO’s new augmented reality platform, AR Composer.

The Grand Palais Google Tango App for “Eternal Sites” Wins First Prize For Innovation At RNCI 2017

The RMN-Grand Palais won first place in the “Virtual and Augmented Reality/Immersion” category for their exhibition entitled “Sites Eternels” (Eternal Sites). We are particularly pleased with this news as GuidiGO created the Tango app used for this exhibition in collaboration with the Google Cultural Institute and Iconem.

GuidiGO AR Composer

Augmented Reality Comes to Museums with GuidiGO AR Composer

We are excited to announce the release of our new Augmented Reality product AR Composer which runs on the Google Tango platform. We have already had the opportunity to showcase this technology at several museums.

GuidiGO AR Composer opens up incredible new opportunities for museums and cultural sites, as they can now design their own AR experiences in just a few simple steps, and make them available on site or for remote use by schools and other educational institutions.

GuidiGO for Education / “Viewing Angles” —The Unveiling

At the close of this school year, the prestigious town hall of Paris, district 4, hosted the Paris release of the Viewing Angles project. This unveiling followed five months of diligent work.

Back when the project was launched, its goal was to bring educational establishments and cultural institutions together. We can now see the success of this collaboration, which produced tours and cultural games accessible to all through tablets and computers.

Wearable devices in Museums: Ready for everyone

For the first time in history, museumgoers will have the opportunity to enjoy a completely new experience using Google Glass, during the Velázquez exhibition at the Grand Palais, in Paris.

This exhibition will be the first of its kind, not only because Velázquez has never been featured in an exhibition in France before but also because visitors can experience it in a completely new way, through Google Glass.


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Exclusive Stream Benoit Pioulard: Hymnal

Posted by Jakub

We’re honored to be able to share Benoit Pioulard’s new album Hymnal on its day of release, he is probably the blogs most written about and loved artist for many years. Let this one play in full, my highlights include: Reliquary, Excave, Margins and Litiya. Enjoy.

01/ Mercy
02/ Hawkeye
03/ Reliquary
04/ Homily
05/ Excave
06/ Gospel
07/ Florid
08/ Margin
09/ Censer
10/ Litiya
11/ Knell
12/ Foxtail

Purchase the LP | digital

2 Comments Leave A Comment

Antique Log says:

April 15, 2013 at 6:11 pm

Your position on a exclusive stream conforms to that of other authors I encountered, which makes me wonder whether this consencus in pulic opinion signifies the beginning of a new way of thinking. Thanks for your nice post. Nice work Jakub.


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Milton Glaser Contest Winners

Posted by Alex

The Milton Glaser giveaway has come to a close! Here are the winners:

Grand Prize: David Bilodeau
Runner Up: Christian W

Congratulations guys! Your prizes are in the mail and should arrive within the next few days. As for everyone else, thanks for entering, it was great to see so many people excited about Glaser and the new film. We’ll be holding more contests and giveaways in the future, so if you didn’t win this time, keep an eye on the blog for more to come.

Comments are closed.


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What’s Up?! #ChewbaccaMom, Top Cannes Movie And Short Film

#Chewbaccamom (movies and short film)

Internet Sensation ##Chewbaccamom (aka Candace Payne)/Twitter

What’s up good people?! Memorial Day is near and WE’RE HERE with the movie and short film news of the week.

The power of short film was on full display as a 4-minute Facebook video turned Texas mother Candace Payne into an internet sensation.

If you were orbiting Saturn last Thursday and missed Payne’s video, have a look-see.

Payne walked into a Kohl’s store looking for some Yoga pants and discovered an electronic Star Wars Chewbacca mask for $20. She bought the mask, filmed the video and the rest, as they say, is ‘herstory’. As of Tuesday, Payne’s video scored a whopping 142 million views on Facebook.

It also landed her interviews on Good Morning America, NPR and the BBC. It also earned her a drive with Star Wars: The Force Awakens director J.J. Abrams and CBS The Late Late Show’s James Corden.

It was also the perfect marketing moment. Since Payne’s video, the Chewbacca mask has sold out at major retailers and went for as much as $500 on eBay.  Kohl’s delivered Star Wars merchandise to the Payne family and $2500 worth of gift cards, according to the New York Times.

Just as cool was the fact that Payne’s uproarious rendition of the famed Star Wars character earned approval from the actor that played the Wookiee.

Critics Say This Was The Best Cannes Film

Toni Erdmann (movie and short film)

Toni Erdmann poster/Facebook

The Cannes Film Festival wrapped on Monday, and a modest German comedy ended up being its most beloved movie.

The film “Toni Erdmann” got shut out from the top prize at Cannes. The coveted Palme d’Or award went to the film “I, Daniel Blake” by socialist filmmaker Ken Loach. Loach’s win was stunning because it was not recognized as Cannes top film. According to critics, Toni Erdmann earned that distinction.

It was Toni Erdmann that lifted the mood of the festival and had critics chuckling, says the New York Times. While it lost out to I, Daniel Blake, the film’s popularity has raised the profile of 39-year-old director Maren Ade.

The rave reviews of Ade’s third feature earned her 30 hours of interviews with 60 journalists from more than 15 countries.

And despite being shut out, Toni Erdmann ended up garnering some cool consolation prizes: international rights deals out the wazoo. Sony Pictures Classics bought the rights to distribute Toni Erdmann in North America.

So expect this Cannes crowdpleaser to debut at a theater near you.

Top Short At Cannes

Timecode Director Juanjo Giménez (short film and movies)

Timecode Director Juanjo Giménez/Facebook

The top short film at Cannes was about the lives of two security guards.

Timecode, by Spanish director Juanjo Giménez, won the short film Palme d’Or. Timecode is about the relationship between two security guards on duty. In filming this short, Giménez utilized parking lot cameras in order to deliver the short film.

According to one publication, Giménez prefers the short film genre to longer movies because they allow him to bring out the best in cinematic language in a way that provides more freedom than that of long motion pictures.

For a list of all the Cannes 2016 winners, click this amazing link.

We Looove LA — The FilmFest, That Is

LA Film Festival Poster (short film and movie news)

LA Film Festival Poster/Facebook

As we announced last week, the next stop on the film festival circuit is the vaunted LA Film Festival, which runs June 1-9 in the City of Angels. This fest is all about independent filmmakers. And this year, it will also be about EDM music. Zedd, one of the world’s most popular Electronic Dance Music (EDM) artists, will have his feature-length documentary “Zedd True Colors” premiere at the LA Film Festival.

Zedd and Ariana Grande (short film and movie news)

Zedd and Ariana Grande be jammin.

The LA Film Festival is also a destination event for short filmmakers. A short film selected to the LA Film Festival automatically qualifies for consideration by the Academy Awards in the Narrative, Animated and Documentary Short Film categories.

For more information about this fest, check out this link.

Our Mission

Itsashort.com is a platform for filmmakers and creators the world over. We love the short film genre. Plus, we at itsashort.com want to introduce audiences to award-winning and award-nominated artists who create movies, web series and videos. Check out itsashort.com and register to see the wonderful work of these creatives here.


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Kagame Hits Back on Kikwete’s call to negotiate

From: Judy Miriga

Good People!

FDLR controls 50 percent of the South Kivu Province but they are a mixture of both Hutu, Tutsi and Congo Rebel groups. M23 is predominantly Tutsi of the Kagame tribal group which is why, Kagame gives its full financial support and protection for Kagame’s benefit looting from Congo. Kagame is the aggressor terrorizing and killing innocent Congolese and driving them our of their land for Tutsi to occupy Congolese land, for which he has created a government within another government inside the DRC Congo for his benefit.

Kagame made M23 to be a strong voice demanding what does not belong to them in Congo.

From intelligence observation, M23 is working with FDLR to benefit Kagame. He has made it a smart business to loot from DRC Congo. This is why Kikwete requested him to talk with FDLR and stop Congolese massacre. If they are able to talk when it is business, why should they not talk when Human Rights demands, after-all, both Ribel group were created by Kagame and Museveni. Kagame created this group was fighting the Habyarimana regime, in 1980s and this part cannot be ignored. Killing Congolese children and women is not justifiable matter. Kagame must be forced to eat a humble pie……..

Judy Miriga
Diaspora Spokesperson &
Executive Director for
Confederation Council Foundation for Africa
email: jbatec@yahoo.com

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Rwanda, Zambia agree on refugee repatriation

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Zambia agree on refugee repatriation

Rwandan refugees registering upon arrival

Rwanda and Zambia have agreed on a comprehensive strategy for former Rwandan refugees living in Zambia.

In a joint communiqué signed on Friday night following a bilateral meeting by the two governments held in Lusaka last week, the two countries reiterated the call for the two countries to establish diplomatic missions in their respective capitals for enhanced bilateral cooperation.

The Zambian delegation was led by Minister of Home Affairs Edgar Lungu while the Rwandan team was headed by that country’s Minister of Disaster Management and Refugee Affairs Seraphine Mukantabana.

These deliberations come as a follow-up to the regional assessment meeting of the global strategy on the search for durable solutions for former refugees, that was held in April in South Africa.

They also come following the effect of the cessation clause for Rwandan refugees that took effect on June 30.

The two delegations agreed that voluntary repatriation will remain open and efforts to encourage it will continue.

It was also agreed that former Rwandan refugees who wish to stay in Zambia will be facilitated by the Rwandan government in collaboration with the Zambian government.

“This is in order to facilitate processing and issuance of immigration permits in Zambia. The criteria and procedures for the eligibility to local integration will be set and published by the Zambian government,” reads the joint communiqué in part.

The communiqué further states that passport application forms for former Rwandan refugees shall be made available in Zambia through the office of the Commissioner for Refugees (COR) as the focal point for the process in Zambia.

While the focal point in Rwanda will be the Directorate General of Immigration and Emigration. Additionally, the two governments also agreed that the said forms shall be available online for downloading and submission to COR.

Since the coming into effect cessation clause, hundreds of Rwandan returnees from regional neighbours have been streaming into the country on a daily basis.

According to MIDIMAR, intense registration program is under way to provide passports for tens of thousands of Rwandans who lost refugee status on June 30 as a result of the UN cessation clause, but prefer to stay in the host countries.

Stop Paul Kagame From Destroying Rwandan and Congolese Lives

The Petition

Paul Kagame visits Said Business School at Oxford University on 18/05/13.

We the undersigned hereby affirm that continued support to the Rwandan president Paul Kagame and his country by British institutions and government are irreversibly destroying the lives of millions of Rwandans and Congolese. This sounds contrary to the Western media coverage of the politics of region and for particular reasons.

Since July 4th, 1994, when Paul Kagame and his Rwandan Patriotic Front took power in Kigali after the genocide, they invested heavily and continue to do so in lobbying influential personalities such as Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and American investor Howard B. Buffet to portray his regime as a model of development in Africa.

But it is not rightly weighted how undemocratically his regime operates. On August 9th, 2010 the Rwandan president scored 93.4% of the votes in staged presidential elections. And this happened after assassination of politicians and journalists and imprisoning others. His regime took its criminal activities in foreign countries: United Kingdom, Tanzania, Kenya, and South Africa.

The reality is that the Rwandan government has put in place policies of killing imprisoning, and oppressing its citizens at levels never experienced in the country’s history. The claimed and drummed about development concerns only Kigali the capital and benefits less than 10% of the population. Instead the Rwandan president criminal activities have not stopped within national boundaries of his country. Since 1996 he waged wars in the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo.

According to the United States Geographic Survey, Rwanda produced more than 25% of the world’s coltan in 2011 more than what their coltan deposits should be able to provide. Rwandan coltan mining relied on mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, some of which are in conflict areas and others not.

More than 6 millions of Congolese lives have been lost and five hundreds thousands of women girls and even men raped by militia and military groups he has been funding to help him plunder the country’s enormous mineral resources. The last of these groups is the rebel movement M23 operating in Eastern Congo and whose the ICC indicted General Bosco Ntaganda was part of.

On May 18th, 2013 the Rwandan President Paul Kagame is invited as a guest speaker at the Said Business School – University of Oxford. This might not be his last visit in the United Kingdom if the British members of parliament continue to be blind at the crimes he has been accused of by many UN reports and renowned human rights organizations including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, both in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Being at the side of the victims of the Rwandan dictator is what the undersigned would normally expect from institutions that claim universally to advocate for democracy, human rights, justice and development.

For the UK government and institutions to persist in being blind at the never ending crimes that President Paul Kagame is committing in DRC and indescribable suffering he causes to millions of his citizens would confirm complicity, which would look as criminal too.

Africa will not fold its arms amid terrorism: Kagame
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Africa will not fold its arms amid terrorism

There are numerous Rwandan troops keeping peace around the World

Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame stated in a press conference last month that terrorism is spreading within African continent and it is not advisable to continue folding arms despite such a threat.

Many people across the globe wonder why Rwanda continues to be a model in terms of peace keeping missions in different parts of the planet.

The same question will always be asked as long as the world does not yet understand the way Rwandans treat the security issues, especially with the fact that Rwanda as a nation was hurt by genocide and experienced horrifying human rights violence.

What makes Rwanda an outstanding peace keeper?

Discipline and determination are key qualities that are keeping Rwanda’s image on a high scale, and that goes down in the troops’ minds from the high commanding system. Rwanda is now praised all over the world for the role it plays in securing post-conflict regions and making an impact on the populations welfare in delivering vital services to them.

That goes round with top Rwandan militaries nominations by international organizations to head those missions. The recent nomination was when Maj. Gen Jean Bosco Kazura was appointed by the UN Secretary General to lead MINUSMA (Mali) which is the third largest UN mission with 12,000 soldiers.

Nevertheless, the Rwandans nominations cannot serve if the inside authorities don’t believe in their men and/or if they are not determined to facilitate them. The appointment of Gen. Kazura comes while another Rwandan Gen. Patrick Nyamvumba had finished his term as head of United Nations Mission in Darfur (UNAMID).

President of Rwanda Paul Kagame is committed to help Rwandan military to be professional and useful not only in the country but also all over the world, one of many remarkable and developmental issues he deals with for Rwandans and their country.

Olivier Nduhungirehe, Rwanda’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN, says General Kazura was appointed Force Commander of MINUSMA, “first, because of his personal competence and experience” and secondly “because of the role Rwanda has played in peacekeeping operations for the last nine years, particularly in Darfur.”

If Rwanda would not have done what was done in Darfur, Haiti, and Liberia or if Kazura would have been well facilitated to acquire professionalism and military knowledge, we would have been writing another story.

Can Rwanda send troops in Mali?

The mission led by Gen Kazura will undoubtedly play a key role in Mali’s presidential polls scheduled for July 28. This means the security has to be priority and given the terrorist groups’ experience in the region, the battle might not be easy.

One of the challenge the new Commander would face is the fact Rwanda did not deploy soldiers in Mali and that would be difficult to command the troops you have never been with before. The question repeats: is Rwanda ready to deploy in Mali?

According to the President Kagame’s words it is possible that Rwandan peacekeepers may also be deployed in the near future. In a news conference last month, President Kagame acknowledged that “There is a possibility of sending troops to Mali.” And a request had already been made, he said.

“Africa cannot, and should not, fold its arms when terrorist and criminal groups are occupying over half the territory of a Member State, carrying out the most atrocious crimes against innocent civilians and destroying monuments that are of great significance to Africa’s heritage and civilization.” Kagame stressed

Rwandan exiles warned of assassination threat by London police

Two dissidents living in London told that Rwandan government poses imminent risk to their lives

Haroon Siddique
The Guardian, Friday 20 May 2011 06.38 EDT
Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame
Rwandan exiles warned about threats to their lives may have been targeted because of criticisms made of President Paul Kagame (above). Photograph: Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images
The Metropolitan police have warned two Rwandan exiles living in London that they face an “imminent threat” of assassination at the hands of the Rwandan government.

The dissidents received letters within hours of one another which advised them to take extra steps to increase their safety and raised the possibility of them leaving the country, the Times reported.

“Reliable intelligence states that the Rwandan government poses an imminent threat to your life,” the warning letters read. “The threat could come in any form. You should be aware of other high-profile cases where action such as this has been conducted in the past. Conventional and unconventional means have been used.”

One of the men, Rene Mugenzi, 35, stood as a Liberal Democrat candidate for Greenwich council, in south-east London, and now runs a social enterprise which aims to help disadvantaged communities. He may have been targeted because of comments he made about the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, in March when asked on a BBC programme about the prospect of the Arab spring uprisings spreading to his homeland. He replied that criticisms of Kagame suggested that he was “a despot who doesn’t tolerate any form of opposition; that under his leadership, Rwanda has become a dangerous place for those who publicly disagree with him or his ruling party”.

Mugenzi told the Independent: “How can it be that in Britain, a foreign government can be allowed to threaten the life of a person? Every time I go outside, I am looking over my shoulder, wondering if there is an assassin around the corner.”

The other recipient of the warning letter was Jonathan Musonera, a former officer in the army of the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front. He is one of several exiled military officers behind the founding of the Rwanda National Congress, a new political party that earlier this month called on the Rwandan president to stand down “if he cannot stop killing, jailing and exiling innocent citizens”. The group recently held a meeting in London. Musonera told the Independent he was “terribly scared. We know what the Rwandan government can do.”

A Rwandan suspected of being part of the assassination threat was stopped at the Eurotunnel terminal in Folkestone, Kent, last week, according to the Times. It said the man, a naturalised Belgian aged 43, left after being questioned by police.

Western governments have praised Kagame for his efforts in transforming Rwanda since the 1994 genocide, with Britain committing £83m a year until 2015 to help rebuild the country. But political violence and suppression in Rwanda have shaken faith in Kagame.

Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa, another founder member of the Rwanda National Congress and former head of Rwandan intelligence, was the subject of a failed assassination attempt in South Africa in June, last year.

The Independent reported last month that MI5 had warned the Rwandan high commissioner to London, who attended the royal wedding, to halt an alleged campaign of harassment against critics of Kagame living in the UK or face a cut in British aid.

A Rwandan government spokesman said the allegations contained within the warning letters were “without foundation. The government of Rwanda does not threaten the lives of its citizens, wherever they live,” he said. “The Metropolitan police have not approached us with evidence of these allegations but we are ready as always to work with them to ensure that nobody, be they Rwandan or not, is the victim of violence on British soil.”

Kagame speaks out on Kikwete’s call for negotiations with FDLR rebels

Rwanda President Paul Kagame. Photo/File

Rwanda President Paul Kagame. Photo/File

By EMMANUEL RUTAYISIRE, Special Correspondent

Posted Monday, June 10 2013 at 18:32
President Paul Kagame of Rwanda has described calls for the country to negotiate with the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) as “utter nonsense.”
(Read: Unease in Kigali over Kikwete’s call for talks with FDLR)

Speaking on Monday at the Rwanda Military Academy (Nyakinama) in the northern part of the country where he was attending a graduation ceremony of 45 officers, President Kagame said:

“I kept quiet about this because of the contempt I have for it. I thought it was utter nonsense. Maybe it was due to ignorance but if this is an ideological problem for anyone to be thinking this way, then it better stay with those who have it.

“We will have another time to deal with this. As Rwandans, being who we are, achieving what we want to achieve for ourselves is not a myth, its real”.

The call to talk to FDLR was made by Tanzania’s President Jakaya Kikwete at a meeting of Heads of State from the Great Lakes Region in Addis Ababa, on the sidelines of last month’s African Union Summit in Ethiopia.

Kikwete’s remarks have soured the already shaky relations between the two neighbouring countries with foreign affairs ministers from both countries issuing statements.

(Read: Dar-Kigali spat a serious matter)

Kikwete had suggested that Rwanda should consider direct talks with the FDLR rebels since the military option didn’t seem to be working.

President Kikwete also urged Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni to talk to the Allied Democratic Forces and the National Army for the Liberation of Uganda, as well as asking DR Congo’s President Joseph Kabila to talk to the M23 rebels and other forces operating in eastern Congo.

This is the first time President Kagame is personally responding to President Kikwete’s remarks even though both presidents attended the Addis Ababa meeting.

(Read: Rwanda can’t talk to FDLR; they’re stone cold killers)

Tanzania has said it is not going to apologise to Kigali over the statements.

The remarks have triggered a diplomatic row between the two countries although observers say it is a pointer to the fact that despite the cordial relationships, Presidents Kagame and Kikwete have never been friends.

The FDLR is a sensitive issue in Kigali because of the former’s role in the 1994 genocide as well as its continued security threat to Rwanda. The militia draws most of its members from the genocidaires who participated in the 1994 mass killings.

Kagame publicly threatening to hit President Kikwete.

4 juillet 2013

Kagame publicly threatening to hit President Kikwete. jeannet-300×200
She has reason to be worried

It is remarkable that the Rwandan president’s own wife has already understood the dangers of criminalizing a whole population group. In her own speech in the same event, she emphasized that criminal responsibility was individual and “every knee will have to kneel for itself”.

It has almost become a tradition in his improvised speeches to hear Rwandan president Paul Kagame spit his anger and express his contempt for Western donors and other foreigner s who do not share his peculiar ideas about governance and political freedom. He does not miss any opportunity to slam what he calls their attempts to give him lessons, while he has no lesson to receive from anybody. We have heard many insults and derogatory words, but an outright threat to “hit” the president of a sovereign neighbouring nation, this is something even those who know him for a long period would not easily had predicted. On Sunday June 30, in a speech to the “youth connect” meeting convened by the Ministry of Youth together with his wife’s own Imbuto foundation, Paul Kagame threatened Tanzanian President Kikwete in unmistakable terms that he will wait for him at the right place and hit him, in response to the latter’s suggestion that Kagame initiate talks with the armed Hutu opposition FDLR.

“And those whom you recently heard speaking for the Interahamwe and FDLR, saying that we should negotiate with them. Negotiate with them? As for me, I do not even argue about this issue because I will wait for you at the right place and I will hit you!! I really did not… I didn’t even reply to him, I never arg… uh… it is known, there is a line you can’t cross. There is a line, there is a line that should never be crossed. Not once. It’s impossible!!…”

From these words pronounced partly in his hallmark unstructured Kinyarwanda mixed with English, Kagame made clear that he is still deeply angered by the mere suggestion to engage in talks with political opponents. That is why he vowed to wait for the right opportunity to strike back at Tanzanian President. It is unheard of in world diplomacy, to see a head of state threatening to hit another head of state of a sovereign nation in time of peace.

This threat should be taken seriously. Kagame has already proven in the past that he is able to strike his adversaries and silence them. Whether fellow presidents or his own (former) trusted collaborators, his prowess in murdering those he thinks are his enemies would not shy from a comparison with L. Sulla’s famous bragging. Melchior Ndadaye, Juvénal Habyarimana, Cyprien Ntaryamira, Laurent-Desiré Kabila are all heads of states in whose assassination he has allegedly had a hand. Théoneste Lizinde and Seth Sendashonga, are former collaborators eliminated in covert operations from afar. The last known feat in this series is the failed assassination of his former army chief of staff Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa, who survived a shooting in Johannesburg, South Africa. The lesser known cases of eliminated military officers who had knowledge of damaging secrets of his cruelty or could become rivals for power in the military, is no less impressive.

The grudge against Kikwete has other sources as well. Kagame’s big ego does not suffer being second to anybody. Being overshadowed by Kikwete as the most visible leader in the region is an additional source of personal resentment towards the charismatic Tanzanian President who, in less than a year, has been honoured by the official visits of the presidents of the two most powerful nations in the world. The recent attempt by Kagame, Museveni and Uhuru Kenyatta to bypass Kikwete and meet in Entebbe without him underscores a rampant feeling of discomfort at the growing strategic importance of Tanzania in the region.

Tanzania’s resolve to play its full role in restoring peace in the region has borne him many enemies among the neighbours who most benefit from the chaos they have helped perpetuate in the Eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. Uganda and Rwanda will namely be the losers if peace returns in the region because violence has long been their cover and their opportunity to loot Congolese resources. But whether they like it or not, Kagame and Kaguta will have to understand that time for peace has now come.

Kagame doesn’t seem to notice the changing circumstances however. In his self-righteousness, he said in the same speech that he was the paramount example of tolerance because he accepts to live in the same country with an ethnical group of genocidaires. He said that allowing Hutus to stay alive is the biggest political space he could think of, anywhere in the world. He urged the Hutus, even those who were not born at the time of the mass slaughters of 1994 to repent and ask forgiveness on behalf of their ethnical group (Suddenly. There are ethnical groups in Rwanda again!). He made them understand that they owed their lives to him because his soldiers would have slaughtered the entire Hutu population that he characterizes as a genocidaire ethnical group, was it not for his magnanimity that forced him to stop the RPA soldiers. In return for RPF soldiers not slaughtering all Hutus, he urges them to bear the burden of perpetual guilt, because, according to him, crimes were committed on their behalf.

It is remarkable that the Rwandan president’s own wife has already understood the dangers of criminalizing a whole population group. In her own speech in the same event, she emphasized that criminal responsibility was individual and “every knee will have to kneel for itself”. She underlined the importance of liberating the youth from the burden of event in which they did not take part. When Kagame’s own wife starts signaling that she has understood the dangers of his principal political principle (criminalizing all Hutus), the peace in the region can’t continue to be held up by just one individual.

This is what Tanzania has understood much earlier. But Kikwete also knows that those who sow chaos in order to harvest in violence will not easily give up their booty. By accepting to step in, to make his voice for peace heard, Tanzanian President Kikwete knew there was a price. It is now up to the entire population of the region (Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and obviously Tanzania) to step in and stand with President Kikwete, ensure his protection and denounce any attempt to threaten his physical integrity.

Dr Alexis Habiyaremye

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text:
Saturday, October 10, 2009

The Blue Angels And A funny Animal Stock Photo

The Blue Angels And Stock Photography
From my Sausalito studio I can catch glimpses of the Blue Angels as they make their practice runs for Fleet Week.  Whenever they fly overhead I have this vague sense of guilt that I am not out there photographing them. Last year at this time I decided that I would figure out something I could do with them for stock images. I even went as far as to pull out my longest lens (Canon 100-400 zoom) and shoot a few frames. I downloaded the images and pulled them up on my screen, then sat there puzzling?  Speed was the obvious concept with this image, but how could I take this further? What could I do to create an image that went beyond the obvious and the doubtless hundreds, maybe thousands, of flickr images of the blue angels?

Focus, Fire and Duck!
I began to go through a folder I keep of interesting photos that I think have potential, but pictures that I haven't figured out what to do with yet.  I came across an image of a duck in flight.  I had been on that little tourist train at the San Diego Zoo, with that same zoom lens at the ready, when two ducks came flying alongside.  I frantically tried to focus and fire and managed to squeeze off three shots before they were gone. To my utter amazement two of the tree images were actually sharp! That never seems to happen for me in those kinds of moments.

A Duck, A Jet Fighter, And Photoshop
At any rate, here is this duck image, which just jumps out at me.  I can put the duck in the formation of jets. If nothing else it will be a pretty funny picture.  This poor duck working like hell to keep up! But the shots I had of the jets were just too far away and they just weren't working.  Then I remembered that in my studio I had, packed away, a realistic model of a jet fighter.  It was left over from some project that I know longer remember. Luckily the box was labeled and in sight.  I pulled the model out and had a friend hold it up while I photographed it.  I used a clipping path in Photoshop to silhouette the plane and strip it into a sky background.  I did the same with the duck. I duplicated the plane image several times, positioned the elements into a formation that seemed to work, and then applied some motion blur to disguise some less-than realistic detail.

Believable Isn’t One Of My Criteria
This whole process took about two hours to go through. Isn't digital great? I uploaded the image to the Getty portal. Three weeks later they informed me that the image wasn't believable and rejected it.  Wasn't believable? Duh! “Believable” however, isn’t one of my criteria.  One test I have for my stock photos is, can I put a headline to it.  In this case it might be “Having A Hard Time Keeping Up?” or “Feeling The Need For Speed?”.  OK, marginal.  But another test I have is do people smile when they see it? And the answer with this image has been yes.

Funny Animal Pictures And Photographer’s Choice
I could have followed-up my Getty effort with their Photographer’s Choice program, in which case as long as the technical criteria are met they will take the image (and I pay a small fee).  However, in this case, because the image is pretty much a “funny animal” picture, and I was feeling a little miffed at Getty, I submitted the image to Kimball Stock, an agency specializing in, of all things, animals and cars. Maybe I should have had the duck driving a race car! Oh well….

donfarrall said...

What a classic editing miss-step on Getty's part. And to think I have had images accepted with the statement "it's so fake it's cool". Sometimes I really wonder? I can't complain, my accepts rate has been very high, but this is a clever image that would sell. Maybe the editors at Getty are too depressed to have a sense of humor anymore. I like it, and as you say it's not a hard image to ad a tag line to. Personally I would have gone the PC route, but best of luck with it. Made me smile.

John Lund said...

I love hearing that it made you smile!
Every agency I work with makes decisions that I don't understand. Oh well....

David Sanger said...

JOhn - I like the fact that you started out going in one direction, shooting the Blue Angels, and then went with it as it led you somewhere quite different. It's a great example of the creative process.

Sometimes it is really hard to let go of our first thought, but that can be what opens us to new idea.

Great duck!

John Lund said...

Yes, that is one of the great things about stock...freedom to go with the flow!

blaneyphoto said...

Perhaps its unimportant, but I'm pretty sure those aren't the Blue Angels. The Blue Angels are bright blue and yellow and are F/A-18's - those appear to be F-16s, which the Air Force Thunderbirds fly.

John Lund said...

You are right, those aren't the blue angels. I started off trying to use a shot of the blue angels but ended up shooting a model airplane instead....


text:
Surprise Tea Party {Personal}

My oldest turns seven on Sunday.

I can’t even go there…(you know where, how did this happen? where did time go? I just can’t)

She’s awesome.

I love her to pieces. I can’t go there either, or I will cry about that, too.

My mom does, too. And (lucky me) she lives in our neighborhood and has an amazing way of making people (especially her grandkids) feel like the most special people in the world. My girls adore her.

Mimi made her a special surprise lunch today for the soon to be seven year old, her good buddy, and her little sister, complete with homemade banner, my great grandmother’s teacups (“what? are they from 1980??”), and a wheelbarrow ride full of water.

Happy seven!

May 26, 2012 - 2:43 am

Life with Kaishon - I think a great Grammy is one of the best things on earth. What a special party! Happy birthday to your baby girl.

May 26, 2012 - 2:46 am

Taryn Boyd - you are seriously a rock star at telling stories! AMAZING. Happy 7 to your oldest!

May 26, 2012 - 2:54 am

amy grace - these are darling. what an amazing thing to have a mom who does that, and to have her so close, in your girls’ lives. you really are incredible at weaving stories with pictures.

May 26, 2012 - 4:22 pm

Lisa - You have one lucky little girl with an awesome grandma!

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text:
Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Updated: Officer Brent Aguilar of Clovis (NM) PD- newly registered Liberty Offender

Since this event is local to me, I feel I should help spread it around:
Passenger Asks Police Why They Were Stopped, So They Handcuffed Him Then Broke His Face

The Clovis Police department's Facebook page is doing damage control (in other words, lying and excusing and trying to deflect attention to this aggression by tax addict), and the copsuckers are helping- although at this time they are vastly outnumbered by the people who simply aren't buying the "justifications" anymore.

So, I think we have another addition to the Liberty Offender Registry: Congratulations Tax Parasite Officer Aguilar. I'll update this with your full name, you spineless pig, once I find out more information.

I'll also name your disgusting accomplices (Still believe in "good cops"? LOL)

I'll say it again: "resisting arrest", especially when it is an illegal "arrest- more accurately called a kidnapping- can NEVER be a "crime". You have an absolute right to defend yourself from kidnappers with any amount of force it takes to stop them- yes, even deadly force. Every single time a kidnapping of this sort is attempted I would love to see the kidnapper dead.

Watch below for updates and more links.

UPDATE: Seems it was Officer Brent Aguilar who was the brutal pig: link

"Corona was charged with concealing his identity and resisting arrest"

So, if I demand to know who someone is- without any cause whatsoever- and they refuse, it's a "crime". Good. So now let's see Brent Aguilar charged with the same crime since he and the police chief concealed his identity. Abolish the police.

UPDATE 2: You knew it was coming: Officer Brent Aguilar's victim has been kidnapped, charged with "felony aggravated assault and battery". Expose the crimes of a cop, expect retaliation. And, he didn't simply "accuse" Brent Aguilar- video evidence and eyewitness testimony backed him up. Even if he had said nothing, the evidence would have been there- in fact, he wasn't the one who recorded or released the video of the crime.

UPDATE 3: Apparently Aguilar has a history of brutal, thuggish behavior. How many other Clovis cops simply haven't yet been exposed for the same thing? All of them?

An impossible "free society"?

The next time you hear some "pragmatic" person tell you there will never- CAN never be a "free society", just remember how few years it took to adopt a collectivist, socialist system in America.

A really bizarre, unnatural and broken "system" which can't work- never has worked any time it has been tried, and never will work unless humans evolve into some sort of drone organism, has been "successfully" imposed on people who still believe they are the "anti-socialists". And even though they suffer the failures on a daily basis, they still refuse to see what has happened.

But we're the crazy ones for suggesting a free society is possible, and working to make it happen.

So, yes, a free society is possible, no matter how unlikely it may seem today. And it can happen a lot faster than you imagine if more people simply start implementing it in their own lives instead of worrying that it will never be and seeking reasons why.


text:
Live Video: David Bazan

photo by Dave Lichterman

Seattle songwriter David Bazan is no stranger to KEXP, having performed live in-studio and at station events going back years as Pedro the Lion, The Headphones, and most recently with his self-titled project. He’s also no stranger to his fans, as his albums are typically self-critical, all-baring, soul-searching affairs. On his latest album, though, David Bazan looks more critically at the world outside, and while the topics of Strange Negotiations may seem a little bleak (society=bad), his songwriting and performing never is. Joining him for the first time more cohesively on album, and in the KEXP studio for a live session on the Midday Show with Cheryl Waters, is his band — drummer Alex Westcoat and bassist Andy Fitts. Check out videos from the session and the full performance here:

This entry was posted in KEXP, Live Video, Local Music and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

One Comment

  1. scottyg
    Posted September 19, 2011 at 9:16 pm | Permalink

    I like Bazan’s music. Great voice, sparce musical style, meaningful lyrics. Very cool. I discovered his song ‘People’ via a KEXP podcast; it caught my ear. I had no idea he was local to Seattle. Definitely going to catch one of his shows. Seems partial to the key of Bm/D.

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text:
June 28, 2004

make some noise

One of my new speakers is finally near completion. The french polishing took FOREVER, 10hours or more. Right now the crossover is hooked up wtih alligator clips and draped over the piano bench. Very ghetto, I know. So far I absolutely love the Morel MDT20 tweeter. The word pure comes to mind . . . As for the rest of the speaker, I like it, but am not sure if I'm done with the crossover. The speaker sounds a little forward in the 1khz region. Also, the vertical off-axis response seems a little spottier that I thought it was going to be. Keep in mind my testing consisted of me moving my head up and down. Other than that, all I can say for sure is that the vifa midranges are very detailed and with a few more tweaks, these speakers are going to sound very nice in a small room.

Posted by mrpibb at 5:24 PM | Comments (0)

I got my butt out and onto the saddle this sunday. I had the cubs game crankin' while I was pedaling. Why is it that the cubs always play horribly against the whitesox? Anywho, I rode to Batavia/Geneva and back again (48miles). One of these weekends when I have some time I'm going to go VP->Aurora->St. Charles-VP. While I was out, I unknowingly got into a race with another guy. Well, not really unknowingly, but unexpectedly. I passed him in Geneva as I started heading back east. About 5 miles after I passed him I started slowing to take a swig of gatorade. zZOOMm He rockets right past me. I could tell he had sped up considerably to pass me; it's kind of a tough-guy thing to do. I'd have done it too :) So I followed him at a reasonable distance for another 5 miles or so. He wasn't very good on the climbs. As we entered West Chicago I started riding his tire. He seemed kinda peaved. I took a short cut I knew and ended up 30ft in front of him. Then HE took a different shortcut and passed me. By this time we were in downtown WestChicago. He started blowing through red lights. I chose not to. I was behind by a quarter of a mile or so but that didn't matter. I kept up a good cadence and eventually caught him again at Geneva Rd. and County Farm Rd., but alas, he saw me and went through that light too. I gave up right there. Too much chasing. Hopefully he'll be out next weekend. Maybe I'll bust out my road bike (he was on a road bike).

Posted by mrpibb at 5:09 PM | Comments (0)

June 21, 2004

always more

I've always wanted one, but for the last week or so it's been driving me nuts. I'm talking about a motorcycle. I'm not sure why I want one or what kind exactly, but gimme, gimme, gimme! I'd probably stick to a Japanese made bike (ie Honda or Yamaha but no Suzuki). Right now I'm a big yamaha fan. They make amplifiers too! anywho, I can't decide if I want a super-sport touring bike or just a super-sport bike. I came across this picture of a Yamaha R1 and decided I definitely want a straight-up super-sport. And none of this R6 crap, gotta be an R1.

here's the pic

Posted by mrpibb at 4:26 PM | Comments (6)

June 19, 2004

like glass

So I started my french polishing. My test board came out really bad. The shellac wouldn't adhere to a large spot on the mahogany. Nonetheless, I started polishing the back of one of my speakers. The same problem was happening. The shellac wasn't sticking to a couple of spots. I changed my rubbing technique and voila, the wood started to shine! There's two more processes of polishing to go, but so far everything looks very promising. A few rough spots remain, but most of the wood is smooth as glass.

Here's a picture:

Posted by mrpibb at 4:03 PM | Comments (0)

June 13, 2004

SSSun Burn

I finally got a REAL ride in this year. I went from VP to Batavia up to Geneva and back to VP. At some point I'm gonna try going from VP to Aurora to Elgin and back to VP. I'll save that for a little later in the season :). Nothing really interesting happened during the ride. Oh, what the heck is with the ladies between the ages of 17 and 23? What do they do? Probably everything that I don't. The only ladies out riding bikes today were either too young or too old. Grrrr

Today's stats:
Distance 47.7miles
time ~3h20
avg ~14.5mph
note: I bought a cheap ass cycling computer ($8) so it doesn't have all the fancy features that my other computer has.

Here's a picture from last week when I was in Aurora.

Posted by mrpibb at 7:29 PM | Comments (0)

June 10, 2004

Riding the tube

the tube tester is up and running! Well, kinda. A light, which acts as a fuse, has burned out. But anywho, the massive box of tubes in my room will be sold soon via e-bay. Apparently tube testers are selling for ~$500 on ebay! I don't think we'll (dave and I) sell ours though. The testers are really hard to come by now adays. Besides, I'm probably going to be constructing some tube amps down the road.

I started piecing together the other speaker. Man, one of the boards is really warped. I had to clamp it down crazy style. Hopefully the glue will hold. I've been trying to research 2.5-way speaker designs, but I haven't been able to find much info. I guess I'll just have to model the thing out on the computer and then test it by listening and maybe if I get my jig built, I can measure it. It shouldn't bee too hard (the 2.5-way design). I think it'll work out well because of the reduced number of passive components.

Here's a pick of the tube tester. OOooh that's a lot of knobs.

Posted by mrpibb at 10:32 PM | Comments (0)

June 8, 2004

who's ashamed?

so why doesn't america get it's bitch ass out of the middle east and help some people who really want our help? (ie Africa) it's fucking sick seeing what is happening in Sudan right now and how America hasn't stepped in at all. BBC reports that an estimated 250,000 people are dead do to the ethnic cleansing that is happening in Sudan and that's just within the last month or so!!! i'm not usually so vocal about human rights, which is sad I know, but talk about looking after our own interests. if we're going to pretend like we care about Iraqis then we shouldn't make it so obvious that we're looking after our own interests. if Bush doesn't do something soon, I'm going to have to say that he is, by quite a marging, the worst president ever when it comes to dealing with foreign affairs. he's a disgrace, really, to what America should stand for.

Posted by mrpibb at 10:36 PM | Comments (1)

June 5, 2004

transcendental riding

I just read this post on a forum and thought it was a great description of what happens during long, continuous and repetitive exercise.

"Zoning out- letting my eyes relax to a lazy, drunken type of state. Something becomes clearer this way. Forgetting about the spin, just letting the spin happen. Purposefully losing awareness. Clearing the perceived understanding of the moment, and replacing it with a void. Senses aren't either emanating from me or being absorbed by me. They are simply hovering there, just outside of my realm. The tension on my muscles loosen, creating a fluid essence to my body. I am no longer an entity traveling about through time and space, but have become that time and space like hydrogen and oxygen become water. I am the green when my previous yellow aura and the blue of the world are mixed together with the finger paints of a child. A truly innocent human yet uncorrupted by the convention of truth. Truth to her is the tree, not the scientific name of the tree. A good time playing with her neighbor. Riding her bike down the path, not to get somewhere, but just to ride. Petting her dog, because he is her friend... In a few years she will be taught what is important, and the world to her will become nothing more than a categorized succession of truths. Realities which she doesn't need to understand, but only needs to accept. Right now, though, she is finger painting, and that is all that matters...

Bike lane blurring underneath. A comfortable hum, a breeze, a smile on my face all at once. An air that becomes the ground, the ground a cloud. A whisper that started nowhere, but heading in all directions. It said to me, as I said to it: Be.
A young man a child again. A young man everything. Peacefulness riding with me as I breath in, turn the crank, and be."
- gonesh9

Posted by mrpibb at 10:03 PM | Comments (1)

June 4, 2004

Today's ride

pedaled aroung fermilab and batavia today. I'm going out riding sunday with some guys from work. Hopefully I don't get dropped too soon :)
today's stats

time: 1:38
distance: 26.89m
avg: 16.3mph
max: 26.5mph

Posted by mrpibb at 9:42 PM | Comments (0)

June 3, 2004

How come it seems like there's never enough hours in a day. . . I finally brought the moped out for this year. VVvvrooom. Took it on over to Al's Hobby Shop to get some Klotz 20% castor oil. The bottle says don't use with oil injection systems. Hmmm...

On a side note, I've started reading "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". I must say that the classical french authors that I've read (Leroux, Hugo and Dumas) rock socks. I have a hypothesis that France's culture has been all downhill since WWI. I dunno, it's just that I haven't heard any great things about the French in a long ass time. The history of France and the French people is definitely noteworthy, but as of late there hasn't been much coming out of France.

Posted by mrpibb at 8:51 PM | Comments (3)

June 1, 2004

dirt machine

well the picture doesn't do the dirt justice. It really looked nasty.

Posted by mrpibb at 6:32 PM | Comments (3)

New Speakers!

Well, here's my new speaker project. It's no where near done, but I have high hopes. This is going to be the first speaker that I've totally designed by myself. I'm using mahogony to build the enclosure (uh-oh!) because I want to use a french polish as the finish. I've never tried a french polish before. . . I'm off to work.

Posted by mrpibb at 6:31 AM | Comments (1)


text:
K2yo234hkjh23r0a: Encryption, privacy, e-mail, and instant messenging

I am quite pleased to see Google's new option for Gmail to have your Gmail session in https by default. Basically, that means that the data communicated will be encrypted, rather than passed across the Internet in plaintext. Previously, and still, you could explicitly request an encrypted session by designating the protocol to be HTTPS in the URL, like https://www.gmail.com. To ensure your Gmail sessions are encrypted, go to your Settings and scroll to the bottom, and select the option "Always use https".

While there are performance penalties, I think that encryption is generally a good idea. In particular, I find it almost scandalous that Instant Messengers do not offer an option to encrypt your conversations by default. A popular IM encryption software suite, providing plugins for a number of messengers, is Off the Record. Of course, both sides need to be using it for the encryption to work (or how would the otherside decrypt your messages?), so that is a massive barrier to using it commonly.

One "feature" I dislike about OTR is deniability, which I probably don't understand very well. They do not employ digital signatures that would certify messages were from you outside of your current session. This is considered good, I think so that people cannot be held strictly responsible for forged messages purporting to be from them: hence deniability. I can see applications for it, but I think that, while I appreciate the privacy of encryption, I don't necessarily want deniability. I am generally responsible for what I do and say.

the second raid to be discussed another day (but oh, the hair!)

To-day I got to save a beetle that hissed at me, hissed at me! I saved it from the ground and saved it onto grass. It wouldn't move. It's legs would wiggle, but the only real movement was its hiss vibrating into my ears. It sounded like an empty aerosol can, trying to poison my dinner. Hiss- hiss- hiss! I wonder if it will survive the night or be silenced before the sun returns? Perhaps it was just asleep, hissing its nocturnal annoyance. Sidewalks make poor beds. Shoes make poorer blankets. Picture to follow?

To-day a ghost dryer helped me cheat the system and dried for me without charge. Just a little, here and there. Hopeful that no one would notice. I was complicit. I waited quite a while before betraying this charity to an employee, to whom, effectively neutered by the barrier between languages, couldn't seem to appreciate the consequence of the machine's crimes. 6 minutes/25¢ isn't that shabby, anyway. (Every minute after finishing, it would run for an additional 15 seconds, the door open or not (frightening, having your favourite thong flying out at you) until all your clothing had exited (what senses has it?!)).

To-day Liv and I worked on a culinary masterpiece. It's too good to describe. Photos must be supplied! To-day I got to be.

Yesterday I got wet. Thoroughly. Soaked, drenched, and then cooked alive. Boiled red? Fried dry. I attended a flashmobby romp in the park. Stanley Park, host of Vancouver's second annual waterfight. We came unprepared, but like any good team of mercenaries, improvised. Water-tight bag? Check. Discarded cup? Check. Alliances were made, and summarily betrayed. Wheee. My girlfriend was even a key figure in the background of someone's photograph!

Last week I go to work. A fair deal of overtime. I really don't mind it. I enjoy getting things done. I hope to better manage my non-work time, though. I am having sufficient levels of fun, it would seem, but I'm barely meeting schooling requirements, and Open Source contributions are, let us say, stalled?

Yay for life, and stuff. :)

Right-click on a Macbook

My girlfriend's hard drive on her Macbook recently crashed, so a new hard drive and installation of Fedora later, we were refaced with "How to right-click?" I have forgotten the name of the application we were using last time, but we had it set up to substitute the Enter key (near the space bar) with a mouse's right click. Searching around for the optimal solution revealed that the kernel by default might have facilities built in to support this redirection of input. Indeed, and this is how we do it:

# cd /proc/sys/dev/mac_hid
# echo 1 > mouse_button_emulation
# echo 96 > mouse_button3_keycode

I tried using dumpkeys to find out which keycode belonged to that Enter. It turned out to be KP_Enter for the keypad which mapped to 96 for us. Yay.

To make the change more permanent, we're setting the following in /etc/sysctl.conf:

dev.mac_hid.mouse_button_emulation = 1
dev.mac_hid.mouse_button3_keycode  = 96

Credit for this knowledge goes to Mactel-Linux.org.

Oh, and sysadminblog advised us to set

Option "MaxTapTime" "0"

in the synaptics section in /etc/X11/xorg.conf to disable the trackpad click. However, in her Fedora 9 install, there was no synaptics section. Adding a bare one with the entry stopped the trackpad from clicking, but it also made it unbearably slow. Now the entry for the input device looks like:

Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier      "Synaptics Touchpad"
        Driver          "synaptics"
        Option          "SendCoreEvents"        "true"
        Option          "Device"                "/dev/psaux"
        Option          "Protocol"              "auto-dev"
        Option          "HorizEdgeScroll"       "0"
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Sweet savings for Ag Innovation Showcase Davis and St. Louis

By | April 10th, 2017|0 Comments

  Now in its ninth year, the Ag Innovation Showcase is synonymous with an ecosystem of success for investors and innovators alike. “The Showcase” brings together a mix of people [...]

Ideas, energized: XTB Laboratories Quarterly Series, Installment 1

By | April 10th, 2017|0 Comments

Last September XTB Laboratories won Larta Institute’s first “Ideas, energized” prize at the 2016 Ag Innovation Showcase. The prize included $10k, a year of commercialization consulting from Larta Institute, and [...]

Rohit Shukla to Key Note at AURI New Uses Ag Innovation Forum

By | March 14th, 2017|0 Comments

Larta CEO, Rohit Shukla, will be one of two keynote speakers at the upcoming Agricultural Utilization Research Institute (AURI) Forum in Minnesota, March 22nd. Read about it in AgWeek. Attendees [...]

2016 Annual Report

By | February 27th, 2017|0 Comments

We are proud to share our 2016 Annual Report with our Vox readers. 2016 was marked by continued success for Larta Institute, and further underscored our mission to energize innovations in [...]

Larta Institute receives prestigious Tibbetts Award

By | January 18th, 2017|0 Comments

Some economists contend larger companies are more productive than small ones. Further, that the mantra of small business being the “engine” of the economy is overblown. That far from being [...]

12 Larta CAP companies win Tibbetts Awards

By | January 18th, 2017|0 Comments

For the last three years VOX has reported on many of Larta CAP companies’ success with the esteemed Tibbetts award. This year, Larta Institute joins this distinguished crowd with our [...]

Seven key insights into the art and practice of working with partners on innovation

By | December 16th, 2016|0 Comments

In a ballroom almost next door to LAX, 90 or so innovators, all recent grantees of the National Institutes of Health, gathered for a commercialization workshop organized by Larta Institute. [...]


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Welcome to the Little Tokyo Blog

We've set up this space where members of the Little Tokyo community could share information, thoughts, ideas, and opinions about the Little Tokyo neighborhood, it's people, politics, culture/history, businesses, and events.

Reflections on Redress, 20 years later...

This post is completely personal (and doesn't reflect the thoughts of any of the organizations which I work with and respect):

It's an interesting feeling to celebrate the accomplishment of redress in 2008, and as the year comes to a close it makes me think about how far we've come, but more importantly how far we still need to go.

Questions arise:

If redress defined a generation, what defines this generation?

If redress united the community, what unites us today?

and most importantly if redress was truly meant to ensure that "hate, discrimination and prejudice are to never occur again" what are doing today to continue that legacy?
At first it's frustrating when you hear members of your own community more or less complacent with their place in society, not interested in fighting for today's causes or standing in solidarity with communities that need us. It's even more frustrating as the next generation who holds the legacy of "insuring that it never happens again" simply lets it go.
But then again, maybe on second thought when really thinking about redress and thinking about it's legacy one can remember.... it's not going to be that easy; but that's what also makes it so great when, one by one, the community does come together. Redress was clearly a movement, but we (and I) sometimes forget until i hear the stories again, that even that movement was slow to start, and seemed impossible; it was no easy task to pull the community together. Maybe now, on third thought, we've just got our work cut out for us......... but i more or less feel ready for it, how about you???


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Washington State Ranked #1 For Sweet Corn Farming In The U.S.

October 22, 2012

Sweet Corn Production

While the state of Washington is far from the U.S. farming hotspots in the corn belt, farmers in the region helped the state grab the number one spot for sweet corn production, the Tri-City Herald reports.

According to the media outlet, farmer Clayton Voss had a hand in helping the state earn the title, as the 28-year-old farmer has been double-cropping sweet corn with green peas for about six seasons. Although dozens of other crops grow all over his land, he said sweet corn production provides the bulk of the operation’s income.

It’s a massive amount of work, but it pays off,” he said.

Sweet corn production, which is sold in markets as the corn used for grilling in the summer and for soups in the winter, has been a huge source of income for Minnesota farmers for years, who have historically planted the most acres of the grain, but new figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture show Washington has climbed to number one.

The value of corn is one reason farmers continue to grow it, however many producers are attracted to it for a different reason. Often, farmers use the crop for its important role in farm management, maintaining soil health and ensuring operations can support a wide range of crops over multiple seasons.

According to the media outlet, nearly all of the state’s growing operations are found in seven counties in the central and southeastern regions. The corn grown on these farms holds more moisture than field corn, and can be eaten either fresh or processed, said Tim Waters, vegetable specialist with the Washington State University Extension in Franklin County.

Regional farmer Scott Knight grew sweet corn crops for years for its unique ability to ward off pests and diseases that can affect other crops, such as wheat, alfalfa and timothy hay.

It breaks up the chemistry of the ground,” he said.

According to the news provider, Corinne Nosal, spokeswoman for Del Monte Foods, said the drought that has swept the country will likely prompt farmers to take cost-saving measures due to the lower supply. Corn prices have fallen in recent weeks in response to USDA  downgrades of sweet corn production.

Still, according to the Des Moines register, the outlook for the crop is improving, with about one-quarter of this year’s harvest suggesting yields could be better than many expected after the drought.

Photo Courtesy Of: http://www.treehugger.com/renewable-energy/corn-ethanol-back-in-the-game-under-new-epa-renewable-fuel-standard-rules.html

Categorized: Agriculture