The "prophet" Muhammad in a bear suit

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8636455.stm

The radical Islamist assholes at Revolution Muslim told South Park's Matt Stone and Trey Parker they would "probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh". The Dutch film-maker was shot and stabbed to death in 2004 by an Islamist angered by his film about Muslim women.

revolutionmuslim.com are cowards; they have domain privacy in place to hide themselves, and the website is currently down. However, Google cache has some contact information:

Phone Number: (212) 203-7606 or (718) 312-8203
E-Mail: revolutionmuslim@gmail.com

Here's what Muhammad looks like when he isn't in a bear suit

What passes for shocking

The Register today reports that a photo shoot promoting the latest Shrek ouvre, 'Forever After' went awry, with the inclusion of scantily clothed young things amidst cartoon (well, CGI) characters.

Apparently Paramount and Dreamworks somehow didn't NIX the release of the shoot; they note they won't be suing, but did voice their concern. Please. They own the likenesses and could easily pull the plug. Sounds more to me like this tepid atempt at publicity wasn't getting any coverage, and Paramount hoped to give it a bump. Check it out here to see how tame this 'controversial' set of pictures really is.

Paramount and Dreamworks would have done well to take a page from famous non-stars from the reality t.v./straight to video movie world, perhaps having Shrek pull a Lilo, and flash his genitals at papparazzi after being hauled drunk from a club, or perhaps Princess Fiona could have taken the Tila Tequila route, and released 'I Fucked the D.J.' to attain a level of infamy by promoting bare-back sex.

I've included a helpful link for those of you not fully familiar with this latter think piece.

Misuse of the language pt. #372: "Rock Star"

"Rock Star" is a ubiquitous phrase these days. So as to clarify what the term means, we offer the following by way of definition:

Rock Stars


Not Rock Stars



Rock Star


Not Rock Star




Rock Star


Former Rock Star, now Not Rock Star

Definition of a consumer

consumer - something the size of a baby hippo, the color of a week-old boiled potato, that lives by itself, in the dark, in a double-wide on the outskirts of Topeka. It's covered with eyes and it sweats constantly. The sweat runs into those eyes and makes them sting. It has no mouth... no genitals, and can only express its mute extremes of murderous rage and infantile desire by changing the channels on a universal remote. - William Gibson

Stolen from Cory Doctorow's piece on iPads


This is why we at CAUCE are careful to refer to people as end-users, email users, recipients, subscribers, and so on; anything BUT a consumer!!

Safe Porn + Safe Web surfing

As defacto resident anti-abuse/computer security guy for my friends and family, someone recently asked me for advice about which porn sites were safe to browse.

While I can't answer specifically (everyone's tastes differ), I can say this:

Use Firefox to browse, you can download it at http://getfirefox.com

Then (and this is important) download the following plugins

Netcraft toolbar
Web o trust
McAffe Siteadvisor

(use the firefox 'addons' menu under tools press 'get addos' then 'browse all addons' then use search)

Of course, always make sure your operating system is kept up to date, (you should have your update checker to do so automatically, daily) as well as all your other software.

Run anti-virus and antu-spyware software (preferably two programs for each, if possible) and keep THEM up to date, check for new updates hourly if your program lets you.

One great way to keep software up to date is by using Versiontracker.com - you can pay $30/year and it checks everything on your hard drive and updates it automatically.

Never install plugins offered to you by a porn website (instead, install Adobe Flash, Quicktime, Realplayer and so on directly from their respective websites ONLY)

Never click on porn advertised by spam. Good porn doesn't need spam to advertise it.

Happy Surfing!