Twitter is down (so what’s new?), so I guess that means that I’m going to have to blog my outrage to the news that a judge ordered YouTube to give its user data to Viacom. All this in the midst of the $1 billion lawsuit that forced Stephen Colbert off of the ‘Tube, made Google wish it had never thought of acquiring the video sharing service, sparked one of the major reasons for the recent writer’s strike, and now led into yet the latest infringement of internet privacy.

First off, what is Viacom’s problem? Why can’t they just do what the other major networks have done and partner up with YouTube! For Pete’s sake, I can already watch The Daily Show and The Colbert Report IN FULL on their own website with almost no ads, why are they making such a big deal over YouTube?

But what really makes no sense is why Viacom even needs to see the complete records of every single video ever watched on YouTube, complete with username, IP address, and time watched (which must be millions of pages long, I would imagine), along with copies of every video ever removed from YouTube. That’s not copyright infringement, that’s privacy infringement. It shouldn’t be any of Viacom’s business how many times I watch three guys sing about their missing legwarmers or a tomato and a cucumber sing about the difference between a monkey and an ape.

But while those examples may be somewhat humorous and intentionally revealing, internet privacy is quite serious and has affected lives. The article I linked to gave an example of someone who was sent to a concentration camp because Yahoo! was forced to give up information to the Chinese government.

The judge at this case dismissed Google’s concerns over privacy as “speculative.” Well, I may not be a lawyer, and I’m certainly not one to gamble, I’d be more than willing to speculate that this is going to set a very, very bad precedent for the privacy of the internet as we’ve come to know it. I do hope that someone rules this to be illegal, and if not, then there had better be some sort of internet outcry, because this is just wrong and immoral.

Tags: court, Google, judge, privacy, ruling, Viacom, videos, YouTube

Our news media is already difficult to follow when you’re listening to it normally, but what if you’re watching it somewhere without any kind of volume, voice, or sound for context. Then you get this hilarious result, which was exemplified by The Daily Show in this awesome sketch called News at the Gym.

Tags: funny, gym, Jason Jones, Jon Stewart, media, News, The Daily Show, Video

May and June were both REALLY busy, really intense months for me, which is partially why I got so little blogging in, and is also why I’m combining the Best Of for those two months. With three trips and plenty of exams and stuff, it’s just been never-ending. School may have ended on May 29th, but it only feels like summer vacation is just now starting for me, even though it’s already 40% over. Nevertheless, here’s my normally-monthly look back on the last two months.
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Tags: Best Of, exams, June, May, Podcasts, tests, trips

Well, I’m now back from Boys State, and it’s now the end of a very long, busy, adventurous month of June. At last, even though a full month of summer has already flown by, it’s now finally starting to actually feel like summer for the first time.

Overall, Boys State was an exciting and definitely eye-opening experience. But this wasn’t some trip or some camp for relaxing and having fun, no, my week at Boys State was probably the busiest week that I’ll have had during this whole summer. The way that I’ve been catching up on sleep these past few days since I got back, you’d think that I had jet lag all over again! Now that I’ve had a day or two to recover, and because my last post didn’t have many details about what the schedule of Boys State would be like, I guess it’s time that I provide a comprehensive review of what I had the opportunity to go through. (Oh, and to prove to all of my new friends from there whom I gave the link to this website that I actually do keep it up to date.)
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Tags: American Legion, Boys State, interviews, mock government, newspaper, Parliamentarian, Sacramento, Superintendent of Public Instruction, travel

Well first of all, I am back from China. I got back six days ago–last Friday, but between getting caught up and getting over jet lag and watching two weeks worth of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, I’ve been a little delayed in getting a blog post up and out. But now is probably the best time, so here goes.
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Tags: beer, Beijing, Boys State, California, China, concert, earthquake, Great Wall, illness, itinerary, mock, Sichuan Province, state government, tour, trip

Well, however nervous I may or may not be, today is the day that I’m heading off to China. I’ll be back on Friday, June 13th and hopefully won’t be too far out from jet lag.

You’ll notice on my blog that I’ve added the current Beijing time (they’re 15 hours ahead of San Francisco time) up above and the current weather in Beijing so that you can see the conditions that I’m in at the time. Our trip also apparently has its own blog (obviously NOT designed by me) where you can follow what we’re doing, see our minute-by-minute schedule, etc.

Anyway, it’s time for me to get packing. Here’s hoping that I make it back in one piece!

Tags: Beijing, China, leaving, packing, tour, trip

I don’t know what it is about cartoonists, but somehow they have an uncanny ability to break through all the craziness of our world, find the core, and then present it in a way that makes everyone go “Oh yeah!” The good folks at the Joy of Tech have done this a number of times before, and while I don’t point out every awesome comic that they produce (because it would be occupying too many posts on my blog), one of their latest, Signs You May Need to Get a Life, essentially verifies many of my thoughts about our internet age. Having a Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube may be okay, but there are people who take it to the extreme, and I think that this comic really addresses the central issue behind it: they really need to get a life. Get out of Second Life and pay more attention to your first one!

Anyway, high five to the Joy of Tech folks on this one.

Tags: comic, internet, Joy of Tech, life, thoughts, Web 2.0

All right everyone, better get your Little Red Books out and handy because I’m off to China!!!

Uhh, say what?

Well, here’s the idea. My school’s band, choir, and orchestra (with me being a member of the latter of those three) has been invited to tour and perform in Beijing, China ahead of the 2008 Olympics (which seem to be on the news constantly these days, and not for good reasons). We were also originally going to spend a few days in Xi’an, but that canceled a week or so ago due to the recent earthquake and the declining political situation in that region. However, as it is, the trip will be an 11 day/9 night stay in Beijing (with one day lost up in an airplane or two), with a couple of concerts and a hopefully-not-too-overwhelming amount of sightseeing. But before I share my itinerary, how about a little peek at everything that I’ve gone through ahead of this trip, eh?
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Tags: Beijing, China, itinerary, music, Olympics, orchestra, tour, trip

Running the Numbers is an interesting set of photographs that analyzes just what we do to our planet and to ourselves as a society. For example, in the United States, we retire (throw out, recycle, you name it) 426,000 cell phones every day. Have you ever seen what 426,000 cell phones really looks like. Thanks to these images produced by one Chris Jordan, you’re about to find out.

Tags: artwork, images, Running the Numbers, waste

Well, today was the much anticipated last day of school, marking the end of my third year of high school. It’s kind of scary to think about the fact that I’ve only got one year left until graduation comes around. Interestingly, though, this school year seemed to whiz right by, especially compared to my sophomore year, which I eulogized in a similar post one year ago. This year was certainly academically harder and more hectic than my sophomore year was, but this year seemed to be much smoother and less controversial than sophomore year was, and it might be that I’ve finally started to strike a balance between school and my other commitments. However, I thought that I’d do like I did last year and write a blog post looking back at this past school year, but this year’s post should be somewhat nicer than the one I wrote a year ago.
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Tags: 2007-08, goals, highlights, look back, plans, school year, summer, trips