Interesting Links for 21-08-2013

[andrewducker]

• Divekick, the Ridiculous Joke That Became a Revolutionary Fighting Game
  (tags: games )
• A blood test for suicide? US study raises controversial prospect to identify people at risk
  (tags: suicide )
• Should we judge people of past eras for moral failings?
  Interesting article, although it fails to note that the same applies to people in different

Comments

[naath]

YAY FOR SOCIALISTS.

I wish I could move to Scotland.

[andrewducker]

What's keeping you?

[naath]

I have a job and loads of friends in Cambridge

[anef]

Also, the weather?

[bart_calendar]

What we'll be blamed for 50 years from now.

1. The way we treat trans people.

2. That gay marriage was ever questioned.

3. That banks were not held accountable for actions that led to the vast majority of people in prosperous nations living at the edge of the poverty line.

4. Prison terms for mild altering substances.

5. Reality television (it will be looked at the way we look at throwing Christians to lions today.)

6. Marriage being confined to two people.

7. The fact that men make more than women.

[crazymeandave]

personally, i see nothing wrong with the incarceration of these so-called "mild altering substances" :P

[andrewducker]

I'd add on vegetarianism. I strongly suspect that twenty years after _nice_ artificial meat is available the idea of killing animals to eat them will be seen as barbaric.

Oh, and 20 years from now, if you suggested rolling back the clock on healthcare America would throw another revolution :->

[alitheapipkin]

I'll be interested to see how the vegetarian thing goes. Stopping rearing animals to eat would have some pretty wide ranging impacts on farming and landscape management. I disagree with your prediction but I do have a horrible feeling that eating real meat may become the preserve of the rich.

[momentsmusicaux]

Hmm so should we pay attention to the Oatmeal on who/whom or the one about grammar rules? ;)

[andrewducker]

Yes :->

Grammar rules are "some patterns that evolved out of general language usage, and was then codified by some people, with tweaks to make it sound good to them" - you can use them when you agree that they make the language more understandable, or when you agree with The Oatmeal that some language usage makes you sound awesomer.

In fact, The Oatmeal makes it clear that he's not saying people _must_ follow the Who/Whom rule, just that following it triggers associations in him with various archetypes/tropes that he really likes.

[steer]

I must admit to feeling very out of step on the Greenwald/broken computers story. I'm a complete supporter of what Snowden did and we have some hugely overly broad terrorism laws

[andrewducker]

I'm with you on the first one. The original press release didn't say that he was holding stolen security information - just that he was Greenwald's partner. If they knew he was carrying stolen data, then yes, absolutely.

I'm actually not entirely sure what happened with (2) - the timeline seems a bit confused, and I'd like more detail/clarity over what the steps were.

[steer]

Yes... the whole "he was a journalists partner" was a bit disingenuous to say the least

[andrewducker]

The explanation for why he didn't want to go to court is here:
http://liberalconspiracy.org/2013/08/20/guardian-editor-cannot-explain-why-gchq-agents-destroyed-computers-at-their-offices/

Basically, if they went to court the judge could say "Not only must you hand it back, but you can't talk about it any more." It was less of a risk to destroy it than go to court.

[makyo]

The theremin Ode to Joy is pretty cool, although as modern arrangements go, I still prefer Wendy Carlos' version from the soundtrack of A Clockwork Orange.