MonthFebruary 2009

NATO Wants Sim Afghanistan to Test War Plans

NATO commanders in Afghanistan want a virtual version of the country, to test out battle plans and forecast future unrest.

Afghanistan’s often-explosive mix of tribal, ethnic and religious power politics has been catching outsiders off-guard for the last couple-thousand years. This time around, America and her western allies are trying two controversial, competing approaches, to prepare for the surprises. One embeds in combat units social scientists, trained in making foreign cultures more understandable. The other dumps everything that’s known about the country into a software model — and then watches what develops in this Sim Afghanistan.

Last last week, NATO began its search for for the newest “simulation capability.” This one should “be able to model the Afghanistan engagement space in the Political, Military, Economic, Social, Infrastructure and Information (PMESII) domains,” a call for white papers notes. With all that information in hand, war planners can then “assess and validate how specific future events or actions could impact on the current situation through the creation and simulation of a hypothetical/simulated environment.”

Full Story: Danger Room

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The furry fungi art of Amy Ross

the art of amy ross

More pics

(via Coilhouse)

Bruce Sterling assesses 2009

First, Sterling grimly runs through all the various potential threats we face in 2009.

So 2009 will be a squalid year, a planetary hostage situation surpassing any mere financial crisis, where the invisible hand of the market, a good servant turned a homicidal master, periodically wanders through a miserable set of hand-tied, blindfolded, feebly struggling institutions, corporations, bureaucracies, professions, and academies, and briskly blows one’s brains out for no sane reason.

Full Story: SEED

Then he runs through the opportunities we have:

We now come to the useful word “precarity,” which is part of the American lifestyle but distant from American politics. “Precarity” is, of course, the condition of existing precariously. The condition of losing one’s safety and security, of losing predictability and the ability to rationally plan ahead, the condition of being humiliated and in danger. […]

Normally Americans and Europeans fail to agree about “precarity”?—?Americans think their precarity is a kind of fluidity and dynamism, while Europeans are lazy featherbedders dawdling over two-hour lunches. But what’s certain is that, whatever its definition, precarity is now global. The wealthy and powerful?—?especially the wealthy and powerful?—?are precarious. They are being flung about like flotsam, and the precarity once reserved for blue-collar workers is now inside the corner office and the corporate boardroom as well.

Full Story: SEED

I first came across the term precarity last year when I found The Tarots of Precariomancy. It perfectly describes the nature of work in the US today. I’ve come to see precarity as inevitable, but certainly it would be nice to be free of.

Ring Around the Rosy, Mouthfuls of Water

“In Africa, The kid-powered Playpump solves critical water issues during recess.
If we get thirsty here in the U.S., we just turn the tap on and let it run till it’s nice and cold—even in the wilderness, all we have to do is drop in a tablet and take a sip. But the truth is that over one billion people worldwide don’t have the same access to clean water. Over 6,000 people per day die from drinking water filled with chemicals, bacteria, and disease.

PlayPumps wants to change that: By installing 4,000 of their patented water systems around the world, parched people in impoverished places like Africa could soon simply just turn the tap like us. The best part? Their pumps work by utilizing the power of children at play.

The process is simple: Kids on a playground spin a multi-colored merry-go-round with their hands. This hand-pushed merry-go-round drives an underground pump that pushes water into a 2,500-gallon storage tank on stilts above ground. The water filters in the tank, and users operate a tap connected to the tank, which they can use to fill bottles.”

(via The Daily Dirt)

Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon Wipes Nose With Steelers Terrible Towel

http://www.westol.com/~banding/terrible%20towel2.jpg

Just don’t bring a goat to the game

“Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon wiped his nose with a Pittsburgh Steelers Terrible Towel during a pep rally earlier this week. Moments before, the Cardinals mascot wiped his underarms with the yellow towel, which has become a symbol of the Steelers organization. Fans in the crowd chanted “Burn It!” in reference to the Terrible towels.

[..] Such antics aren’t likely to go over well in Steeler Nation. Earlier this season, the Tennessee Titans were accused of disrespecting the team after LenDale White and Keith Bulluck were seen stomping on Terrible Towels during the Titans regular season win over the Steelers. Defensive end Jevon Kearse wiped his nose with a Terrible Towel in front of TV cameras. Even though the Steelers are in the Super Bowl and the Titans were knocked out to the post-season early, some Pittsburgh players aren’t over it. “The Steeler gods are always with us, so you never know,” cornerback Deshea Townsend said with a smile.”

(via Now Public)

The Amazing House of Bones

“Restored and remodeled by the Spanish modernist architect Antoni Gaudi in the years 1905–1907, Casa Batllo is now one the most overlooked buildings by the tourists who visit Barcelona. Although Casa Batllo is a museum now, Gaudi designed it for for a wealthy Barcelona Aristocrat. The local name for the building is Casa dels ossos (House of Bones), and indeed it does have a visceral, skeletal organic quality.”

(via Unusual Things)

Defense Department sets up its own Sourceforge

The dam holding back U.S. federal adoption of open source just burst with the introduction of the Defense Department’s Forge.mil.

Forge.mil is an open-source project repository built in the image of Sourceforge.net, Federal Computer Week reported Friday.

Despite being based on Sourceforge’s technology, Forge.mil has one significant difference: security. As David Mihelcic, chief technology officer for the Defense Information Systems Agency, told Federal Computer Week, the Department of Defense’s code repository has been “upgraded to meet DOD security requirements,” with smart cards used to provide log-in credentials.

Full Story: CNET

(via Steven Walling)

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Where Did The Pajamas Media Money Go?

And sure, there had to be operating costs, but running a site like PJM and an ad network is not a massive operation. The staffing model is distributed by its very nature and can easily be managed by 5 key staff and a network of part time contractors. And even if their operating costs were $500,000 a year, with the 50% capacity utilization I was talking about before they’d have a nice tidy sum of $250,000 of profit and $250,000 left over to pay out to their bloggers.

So going back to why this doesn’t add up…either Simon paid bloggers more than they actually made, which is INCREDIBLY dumb, or he’s lying and just wants to focus on PJTV, which I think is probably a lot more likely. Also, the PJM news portal will remain as is with staff to support it. So where do you think the money to start up PJTV and keep PJM going came from? It doesn’t make ANY financial sense to shut off the ad network and keep the other sites going.

Full Story: Donklephant

(via Jay Rosen)

See also: Economy Hits Pajamas Media: Pajamas Media Ad Network To Shut Down As Bigger Focus To Be On Internet TV

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