National Propaganda

First I want to have a look at Wikipedia’s definition of propaganda, to clarify the object I am going to deal with in this text and my following posts…

“Propaganda is a concerted set of messages aimed at influencing the opinions or behaviors of large numbers of people. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense presents information in order to influence its audience. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or gives loaded messages in order to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the cognitive narrative of the subject in the target audience to further a political agenda.

Propaganda is the deliberate, systematic attempt to shape perceptions, manipulate cognitions, and direct behavior to achieve a response that furthers the desired intent of the propagandist.
—Garth S. Jowett and Victoria O’Donnell, Propaganda and Persuasion”

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaghanda]

I rather dislike Wikipedia for some of it*s failures, but for now I will bow my head before them… this is a nice and short definition! If I should intend to accuse anybody of propaganda, I had to show, that he:

1) Changes information (means a direct lie) to encourage a certain reaction and opinion
2) Reduces information (means to focus information) to encourage a certain reaction and opinion

I will not try to deal with the big media stations of our time – I*ll leave it up to you, to decide yourself, if your media is fulfilling one or both of these two options.

Just a word of explanation, to clarify my own intention and opinion. Propaganda is not an action, that can only be used by dictatorships, or similar forms of government – this is the everyday option to lead the masses in the correct direction in every form of system and in every nation.

To add some more precise information: Every war is in need of an propagandist action, as war never is a popular step, you have to find ways, to MAKE it a popular action – you have to create an enemy. The easiest form of propaganda is to focus on all well known (by your people) negative information about the enemy – partially to recherche new negative information to add it and (as the most aggressive form of propaganda) to spread lies about the enemy and sell them as the one and only truth.

The standard way of dealing with information, that threatens the perspective you wish to create, is to censor them, to bring them down, to damage their reputation or to accuse them of being a collaborator of the enemy.

—> Information: I encourage you to do your own research and to compare the use of propaganda in the different forms of systems we know up to now – I would enjoy your opinion on this topic and would be pleased, if you could point out mistakes in my explanations.

Spoiler: You may for example compare the propaganda done by Nazi-Germany, communist Russia and the USA after, before and during WW2 – I found this piece of information to be very interesting. <—

Non-national Propaganda

What you read above is more or less my standard definition of propaganda, that never has been something special to me, as (I think) we all got – to a certain degree – used to it and knew, that this happens.

Especially during my experiences on the internet I found, that this definition is solely focusing on national propaganda and for this reason incomplete. If you simply watch big media sites like YouTube, you will find nearly all forms of propaganda, spread by nearly all forms of religious groups, all forms of political groups and sometimes – even by persons without any direct extraordinary orientation.

I found myself thinking, that the most common form of propaganda is non-national propaganda – used by common people.

You could say, that these persons are simple carriers of the information given to them and I encourage you too, that you point out that this is true – but I myself compared the official given information of the mainstream media (concerning this and that topic) with the thinking and actions of these individuals and found the following:

A lot of the information is indeed based on excerpts of the mainstream media – these excerpts/quotations/information are selected precisely to focus the message (for example of the video) on a clearly layed out conclusion… Every form of information, that does not lead to this conclusion (even if it is directly linked to the original message) will be ignored.

Many of the propagandists tend to use direct lies, where the truth is not leading to the wished target (compare for example the conspiracy theories on 9/11).

I also found the fact interesting, that individuals, that will add a comment to these videos, which is not providing the wished form of information, will be marked as spam – deleted or be accused of not knowing anything about the truth – being for example accused of supporting the true enemy.

You may agree, that this is more or less according to the definition above – but let me point out again, where this is propaganda:

1) Focus on “bad news” – bringing “bad news” which are not well known to attention.
The difficult thing to divide propagandist efforts from journalistic material, is the natural purpose of propaganda to look as if it was, well researched and entirely based on facts. But a clear sign for me is, that the information, that is given, is not just a journalistic effort, but leading to a certain conclusion, or trying to encourage strong emotions… The second and more obvious sign is, that the given information is not containing any contrary opinions – if a video is repeating the same information again and again and serving a certain purpose instead of providing knowledge, it*s time to examine it (for me).

To focus information on a certain target or opinion is the most common and basic operator of propaganda.

2) Direct lies – Spreading false information – taking original information out of context
is the most extreme, but even the most dangerous form of propaganda. One has to chose the lie carefully and has to think about the possibility, that people will try to examine the information, to show that it is not true.

The easiest way to deal with this is (already said this) to throw some dirt on them, but as this is also the most powerful tool to modify the thinking and feeling of other persons, one should be careful to not lie too obvious – there should not be any doubt, that he/she is speaking the truth…

You are used to that too, as all of us lied in our lifetime, but when acting as a propagandist you have to be even more careful.

3) Shocking audio and video content – modification of text, audio and video material – The use of media in another context – creating a threat through music and images
These is not new at all, but as the abilities of media have grown, the tools for this task have also. The basic target of propaganda is to invoke emotions… besides the intellectual information, you will find music, pictures and excerpts of speeches, which emotionally are creating a threat – this is serving a certain issue… it is to prepare you to believe the information. To make you believe, that you have to defend yourself through the new given knowledge and against the new enemy.

The message itself CAN be believed, but doesn*t have to be believed -

Whether you, for example, believe in the 9/11 conspiracy or not is not interesting – If you FEEL threatened after watching such a video – in fact threatened by the USA and believe them to be the enemy… the mission of the video is accomplished.

To be fair and to give an example for the American reader too… If you heard about the weapons of mass-destruction in Iraq… did you believe it? I say you don*t have to. The basic message is “Iraq is a threat!” if you believed that one – the task of the information is fulfilled.

And to calm down both groups… I don*t judge these, or you – one has to think about this him/herself – Whether you like it or not is your decision – what I want to say is, think about information very hard before you believe it.

My thoughts:

Some of the commentators will defend this information, as if they were defending their own life, they will get angry, thread or insult every opposition.

Indeed some of the videos I am referring to, even made it to encourage myself to feel in a certain way. I would recommend, that this is not underestimated, as some of these are true masterpieces of their art (if you can think the same way of these is up to you).

To give an interesting example (without providing too much material myself) – you may for example compare:

As this movie is taken down very often, I will add the name here, which you have to search for, to find it on Youtube.

[Zeitgeist - the movie]

A very good example, as it is using every operator I talked about. (You may have fun to watch it with this thought in mind – you may even have fun to examine my own text to find out if you can identify propagandist material – and I*m sure some of you will do that (if this text will get any comments anyway) )

My Personal Disclaimer:

These are MY thoughts on certain topics, but I don*t claim, neither that I am the first one to realise it, nor that I am speaking THE TRUTH – as this term is abused in so many ways…

I strongly encourage you, to distrust information, until you’ve examined it yourself. This is including MY information. I welcome you to point out my mistakes and to share your opinion. But I hope, that you will be fair on me and will not insult me for my perspectives.

However – there is no doubt for me, that there exist more intelligent persons on this planet than me, who know more about these topics – If you are one of these persons… I would feel honoured, if you could share your point of view with me.

I allow you to use excerpts of my texts for your own projects, if you wish to, but I don*t allow you to change my message (means to ABUSE my texts.)

The Future:

As I am very interested in these topics, I am planning to add posts where I will try to examine Anti-American (AA) propaganda and my understanding of the “Age of informational warfare” more closely.

Thanks for reading Cern4m (My blog can be found here.)

I found out today that someone has hijacked about 1/4 of my site (or more – but that’s all I have the energy to see right now). He’s not only not given me credit for my work, but has copied the entirety of my posts – one after the next (not excerpts or just links) and has also made it appear that I am responsible for posts that I had not even posted.

You can read more information about this here.

UPDATE: I read over here, that it is not a good idea to link to the blog scraping site as they can get more revenue from it! If you want any more detailed info about my stolen posts, just send me an email.

UPDATE 2: Victory!! The offending site was finally taken down after all my complaints to Google Adsense!

Thank you, Google!!!!

Splogging, content theft, blog scraping, hijacking blogs, and ripping off blog posts is becoming increasingly popular, and an infamous site that does this is FAMLOVE.CN.

Take a look at Fracas’ post for more information.

More information about stolen content can be found on this blog that has a FAQ and tips as to what you can do if it happens to you. You will also see a list of other blog scrapers and sploggers that have been found guilty.

Make your own post about it to spread the word so that when “famlove.cn” is googled, people will see them for who they really are!

It’s good to get the word out about this, anyway!

UPDATE: DO NOT LINK TO THESE SITES AS THESE BLOG SCRAPERS WILL MAKE EVEN MORE MONEY OFF OF YOU!

WordPress’s Akismet (spam eater) has seemingly hacked into my spiked granola bars and has gone mad!!

Attention: To all those using WordPress.com as there blogging platform, you ARE getting comments. Just look in your spam folder and viola, they’ll be right there waiting for you. While there will be some genuine spam that needs to be flushed away, there may also be REAL comments from REAL people. So, please check it regularly.

I am making comments all over WordPress on dozens and dozens of blogs, but either I get the “discarded” error message or they just go into OUTERSPACE somewhere to which I’ve recently found out that they are simply HIDING in your spam buckets!! So, please pull them out for me, and if you don’t mind, please send a support ticket to WordPress.com and another one to Akismet and tell them I’m not trying to sell penis enlargement pills or “free” ring tones!

For some reason or another, there are some people on WordPress that are having this problem. And it’s a very recent problem.

This is *not* a result of sending a link or some links, sending abusive messages, or being caught in the “moderation queue”. This is a quirk in the system. And it’s quite the frustrating! And for the record, I’ve sent in already 4 support tickets.

Should YOU have any problems with the aforementioned, this is the message Mark from Akismet left on the support forums:

@anyone else:
If you need to contact Akismet support you must include:

Name
Email
Website (if used)
IP address

If you do not include all that then I will just ask for it and that makes everything slower for you.

I get lost every now and then with the latest in “slanguage” (if you will), and am finding myself looking up the new slang on the Urban Dictionary website. I am either in stitches laughing my ass off or am horrified at what I’m reading. So, here I was looking up another word when I came across the tag for the definition of ‘myspace’. It is a must-read for all of those who are familiar with “the scene”.

Here’s one definition that caught my eye:

Myspace is the ultimate game of testing your ego. It becomes a competition of seeing who has the most friends, so you add everyone you’ve made eye contact with in the past 6 years, constantly posting bulletins telling people to comment on your NEW PICZ PLZ or die. Also a way for every garage band ever to make a Myspace Music profile without even have talent and/or experience as other bands have. Also a new place for every hott girl in the world to prove how slutty they are by making a Myspace and putting pictures of themselve’s where they only have 1/5 of their clothes on with the quote under it “I used photoshop to cover my boobs, So What.”

Comment on my myspace plz LOL! (Written by Brett)

I plead guilty in trying to look up all those whom I’ve befriended since elementary school.

I also plead guilty to getting my cheap thrills when I see this:

A Hat Tip to Brett for the above image.

Allie had something interesting to contribute as well:

Myspace is an absolutely pointless “networking tool” that high school students overuse in an attempt to gain and then flaunt popularity. A potentially useful dating/networking tool for adults gone awry because it became a contest to see who could get the most “friends” added… (and by friends I mean other insecure teenagers adding you back in order to increase THEIR OWN friends count). An addiction where you must sign on every .3232134 seconds to see if anyone posted a comment, sent you a message, or put up a bulletin (to tell them to check out their new “hawt sexy pics!” a horrible pixelated shot of an underdeveloped highschool freshman in their underwear trying their best to make a seductive face)

Add me on myspace so my popularity can soar!

I do like the numbers, but I am happy with the small cozy count of friends I have. But even more than the numbers themselves, they are people whom I’ve either met online or in real life. I don’t really like email that much, and I’m not all into instant messaging (although I have IM available for those special occasions). For me, myspace is a fun way to stay in contact with those I’ve befriended and have made me smile. Being that I work at home, I don’t have much human contact with others outside my husband and family, so myspace seems to fill that gap for me. I love to meet new people and having friends are very important for me and for my sanity.

Here’s another definition I found funny by deathsymphony.

1. The ultimate contest of seeing how many friends you could have without seeing any of them.

2. A place for people who have no lives to post comments about their new pics in their “friend’s” myspace.

3. A place where loners get semi-celebs.

Ex 1:

Person 1: OMG i have 200 friends on myspace.
Person 2: LOLZ i have 300 friends, loser.

Ex 2:
Person X: i love ur new pix! u better post a comment on my myspace also!

Ex 3:
Some guy: SWEET Tila Nguyen is my friend!

Oh, but… aparently Tila Tequila is the most popular chick on Myspace!!!

Vinny sums it all up right here:

Myspace is an online website for making ‘friends’, and over 70% people up there will have the following things in their profiles:

1. has ’tila tequila’ as their friend
2. the music they like include: my chemical romance, the used, green day, killers, or kottonmouth kings
3. they all hate drama and fake people
4. have a music video playing on their page
5. your computer is more likely to freeze when log on people’s pages if you have an older model due to the over-decoration.
6. we will see this “This profile was edited with Thomas’ myspace editor” somewhere in their profile.

Need an “ice-breaker” or a “pick up line”? Thanks again to Annie for this:

“Aren’t we friends on Myspace?”
“Haven’t I seen you around Myspace before?”
“Your Myspace pictures look HOT…lets fuck”

…And to thetruthlovesme for this: (This is a sample blog entry by a specific kind of “myspacer”. )

“Oh my god I was flossing my teeth this morning and I just couldn’t figure out what it was I pulled out from between my teeth and gums, is chicken? It couldn’t be chicken, I don’t eat meat, maybe it’s tofu? I showed it to my roommate and she thought it was cheese, then I remembered I had baked bread and brie last night, so that must be it. Then I thought wow I better run to my computer and blog about this experience on myspace.”

If any of you have any interesting things to share related to this entry, please don’t hold back.

Urban Dictionary is awesome and good for a laugh!

Mike Thomas from the Orlando Sentinel chooses The Bulldog Manifesto as his first victim.

Mike says…

The future is The Blog.

There are millions of bloggers out there, typing away on their keyboards, living for that glorious day of recognition when someone finally comments on their blogs.

True. Is it wrong to want to be read? Is it wrong to want feedback?

Mike rambles on…

You can blog, too. For the uninformed, a blog is any thought posted on a Web site that is not good enough to be printed in a newspaper.

Not good enough to be printed in a newspaper? You say this as if bloggers want to have their news printed in a newspaper. That is not true. I am not interested in becoming either a journalist, columnist, nor do I want anything to do with the media. And I’m sure most bloggers can attest to that regarding their own blogs as well. Us bloggers aren’t trying to be anything.

It’s like if someone rode a bike everyday for exercise and one angry redneck comes along and says, “You’re just trying to be marathon cyclist”. “You think you’re hot stuff, don’t you?”

And…..?

I don’t get Mike’s point. He continues his little rant.

Here is an example: “President Bush has totally and utterly failed the American people. Almost every day we are presented with further proof why he should not be our president.”

This is from “Bulldog Manifesto.”

Note that you would never see the words “utterly” and “totally” in the same newspaper sentence because they are redundant terms

The usage of “totally and utterly” used in the same sentence are called intensifiers.

But we all know that when someone doesn’t like the content of what they’re reading, they will resort to arrogantly pointing out grammar mistakes (grasping at straws, in my opinion). But what is he really ranting about? If The Bulldog Manifesto were Pro-Bush, he wouldn’t have been the topic of discussion in the Orlando Sentinel on 9-11.

Greywulf sent Mike Thomas a response:

Here’s the email I sent Mikeyboy:

Just a quick word of thanks for your article about blogging. I now see the error of my ways, to
know that I’ve been wasting all my time these years by putting my thoughts, opinions and ideas into the ether for all to see. There was I believing that blogging was something useful – a combination of emotional outlet, method of communicating with one’s peers, a way of storing thoughts, photographs, etc, and above all, fun – and you’ve revealed the truth to me at last.

I should have known that blogging is boring. I should have stopped immediately for fear of posting something grammatically incorrect (for the record: I’ve an English Degree, and a Business Management Degree. I don’t give a damn whether I’m intransitive or not). We should obviously shut the heck up, ignore our right to freedom of speech, and listen only to the garbage pushed out by newspapers and politicians in future. I promise never to think a free thought again, least of all to blogpost about it.

As to some blogs seeming pointless or mundane, I’m sorry you don’t get it; life is like that. Life is often both mundane and boring. It take a brave man to record the mundanity rather than fictionalise the fantastic. I take it you’ve read neither Diary of a Nobody or anything by James Joyce. When people write about their “mundane” lives, they are recording real life for posterity. It’s important to them now, it’ll be important to generations in the future.

I’m sorry most of all that you just don’t get it.

Yours cordially,

In my humble opinion, The Bulldog Manifesto is a very intelligent, well-spoken gentleman. You would know this if you ever took the time to read his blog. I couldn’t even begin to be the good writer he is.

But there’s a followup! The Bulldog Manifesto welcomes Mike Thomas into the Blogsphere. Read the latest.

Bless me father for I have sinned….

(trembling in fear)…. I made my opinions public on a website.

There are 8 million bloggers out there and 32 million people who READ blogs. Why are so many of us addicted to both writing and reading blogs? The answer is quite obvious. You can easily keep a personal journal and keep it private, but bloggers write to be heard.

Some or most of us say things in our blogs that we wouldn’t normally say face to face to anybody. The anonymity of the internet is a huge advantage in getting out our most controversial or non-controversial messages out there. I think this is a good thing. Some may think it’s “cheating”, but I think it’s great that we take advantage of our “secret selves” and “just say it”. Sometimes I may cause some feathers to fly, but I can handle the backlash.

Now that I got out the “whys” and the “need to be heard” element out of the way, I must say that there’s one thing that I don’t understand about some bloggers out there. It makes me scratch my head.

If someone could help me with this…. why are so many of you concerned about the AMOUNT of comments you get and/or the amount of viewers you get per day? Are you comparing yourselves to The Instapundit who gets approximately 300,000 hits per day? Or perhaps other popular bloggers? Are you THAT insecure about yourself that you need to make comparisons that determine your self-worth?

I won’t deny it myself that back in the day when I was blogging like a bat out of hell, I was constantly checking my stats and of course, looking for comments. I also won’t deny the fact that I am flattered to see that people are listening to me and/or taking the time to comment (good or bad). However, I don’t judge my intelligence, the richness of my blog content, my self-worth, whether I’m a good person or not by the amount of viewers and commenters I receive. I want more of both – yes, but I don’t fall prey to suicidal impulses or make an emergency call to my psychiatrist when I don’t. I wouldn’t even go as far as complain about it. Lastly and most importantly, whether I get 10 views a day or 300, this will not stop me from blogging. It’s what I like to do.

Am I supposed to feel inferior or that the content of my blog needs to be in check because I only get comments from just a few people?

When I see people like you out there complaining about “blog stats”, it actually makes me feel like I’m not as crazy as I think I am. While my mental health may be unstable at times, I feel that as far as my sense of “worth” is concerned, I’m not doing that bad.

I am a member of sites which help get my blog out there for the world to see (only used when I blog regularly). I want attention just as you do! But, I will not change my blog content because I’m not getting enough comments from a lot of different people. My blog content is ME! I’ve got my 10 viewers a day. I’m happy and those that don’t like me or my blog have a choice as emphasized in my disclaimer that I keep going on and on about.

Everyone has choice. It’s up to you to decide to make them or let others control you. Which do you prefer?

Do you prefer quantity or quality?

94% Success Rate for Cyber Dating

I recently listened to a radio show and have spoken to some people about People on the Internet in terms of Internet Dating, people who lie in their blogs, and finally people who are not who they say they are.

My biggest most burning question is — Is there any proof that people on the internet are any more of a liar than those people that we meet face to face?

When we meet people face to face, can we really read into what kind of person they are? Really? Are you really sure?

Do Fox News, CNN, and other professional journalists always keep their story unbiased and straight?

What about our own spouses? When they respond to us saying that they’re “not cheating” (even though there’s evidence) can we trust that they’re telling the truth?

For an Eye Opener (which even surprised me!) read this article on Internet Dating.

THE image of internet dating as a “fickle world” full of liars and chancers is far from the truth, according to research released today.

Instead, relations formed in cyberspace enjoy a 94% success rate, an academic study has shown.

Men who go online for love are more committed to the relationship and more emotionally dependent on their “e-partners” than women.

The study shows that where couples build up a “significant” online relationship by emailing or chatting and then meet face-to-face, 94% went on to see each other again.

Relationships lasted on average seven months, with 18% lasting over a year, according to the University of Bath research.

Dr Jeff Gavin, who carried out the survey, said: “Given that the most successful relationships lasted at least seven months, and in some cases over a year, it seems that these relationships have a similar level of success as ones formed in more conventional ways.”

He said because men went deliberately online looking for love they tended to be more committed, whereas women tended to be more cautious and safety aware.

“Men open themselves up more when chat is anonymous,” he said. “Rather than lying to each other, this means couples can form deep relationships by being more honest than they would be face-to-face.”

Sexual

Women tend to be more sexual online than they would normally as they cannot be judged when anonymous, he added.

And although there may be still a stigma attached to online dating for older generations, for younger people meeting people online is just the same as meeting in a bar, he said.

Some couples who have met online even spend their anniversaries chatting with their partners in cyberspace as the place they met “is special to them”, he added.

Some 229 people, aged between 18 and 65, were interviewed online for the study.

More on People and the Internet

As far as good old fashioned dating is concerned, let’s say that us ladies meet (face to face) a very nicely dressed man who has a very good job, a good education, a perfect IQ, talks very intelligently, is very good looking and tall, comes from a wholesome and religious family, he is rich, and has a good sense of humor to boot.

Ladies? Does this mean that we’re safe?

Remember Allen Blackthorne, Scott Peterson, OJ Simpson, Mark Hacking, The Semen Squirting Dentist, The BTK Killer, The Defrocked Priest Sentenced for Raping a Little Boy among hundreds and hundreds of more Guilty Priests (whether it got to the news or not), John and Linda Dollar, Ted Bundy, and millions (if not billions) of other people that can successfully fool us with their looks, charm, money, sharp clothing, and by making us believe that he’s a good wholesome priest, president of a church, Boy Scout Leader, foster parents who trick adoption agencies into believing they are kind and caring and even people that are our own doctors and dentists?!

While there are whackjobs out in this world that are so obviously “criminal-looking” where we can spot them out in a heart beat, there are those who aren’t “criminal-looking” that fool even the most vigilant type of people.

You can do your part to a certain extent to be safe, but we only have so much control.

I’ve just recently heard a complaint made about “the majority of bloggers” that they “use links of others” rather than composing their own original work.

WTF?

Is there really a rule of thumb to follow regarding the content of your blog? Call me ignorant, but I’ve never heard of such a thing.

So, I wonder if this person’s saying that if you own a blog, it must be your own content? Is it considered “stealing” if you find a good, funny, or an interesting post and want to share it with your viewers? Do they know more about my small group of visitors than ‘I’ do?

What if you find a newsworthy topic on CNN and are interested in sharing the link with others along with your comments? Is that bad too? Or just plain boring?

What I’d really like to know is why this kind of “blogger behavior” disturbs people so. How is this “wrong”?

I suspect these Negative Nellies are coming from blog trafficing sites such as Blog Explosion and Blogazoo. They see one post that links to another site not knowing what YOUR blog is really about and running away so fast not realizing that you offer much more a variety than their false assumptions run wild about.

People like original content? While recommending my viewers to specific links can be “unoriginal”, I know my viewers. You don’t. While I may not be entertaining ALL my viewers, there were a couple of viewers I knew who would be interested in the adorable cat picture I found on Orge’s blog.

What are Trackbacks for? I’m guessing that those so readily and enthusiastically pointing the fingers at bad link-sharing blogs, don’t use the Trackback System. They’re completely useless to them because their content is “so original”.

1) The purpose of TrackBacks are to let a site know that you are referencing them on your on site.
2) The TrackBack URL is different than the regular permanent link URL.
3) TrackBacks are fun. You should use them.

Heavens to Murgatroid! What about Instapundit.com, the most popular blog out there that’s all about linkage and random one liner comments? Instapundit receives approximately 150,000 visitors a day. From time to time, the author of this site is mentioned on the news.

I’m also aware that people constantly bitch about those bloggers that write about their personal daily lives including unedited rants and raves about the cute guy who sits next to them in their high school Biology class and what they ate for breakfast. Many people peek at these blogs, and if they’re lucky enough to still be awake to report these blogs so boring and horribly written, they will without hesitation report them. However, we must give those boring blogs credit. They’re original.

I say screw the Negative Nellies. These are the type of people that will bitch no matter what. I get approximately anywhere between 50-100 hits a day, but I’m as happy as a bee in a tree if I get at least 10. I will admit that I’m a crazed attention whore and believe “the more the merrier”, but I will not go to the ends of the earth to satisfy the grumpy miserable hit and run loser types who subject themselves to a painful 30 second time limit just so they can gain more traffic to their site.

Trust me. There are blogs that annoy the hell out of me too – especially those blogs that play music automatically and damn near knock me out of my seat when I click on their site. In fact, I was planning on making a post on my blog to tell these auto-music playing bloggers to turn their blogging radio to manual instead of auto. But the difference between Grandma-Bitchy and me is that I will gracefully give up the potential 1/3 of a point that I can earn from Blog Explosion and screw the 30-second time limit – moving on to the next blog as noted below.

Surfing too fast? You betcha. Negative Nellies? You see that? You DO have other options. Just thought I’d let you know.

When I spend time trying to design my blog, I reference many sites
on the internet for help. I thought I’d share my discoveries with you.

There’s nothing like having a good generator around:

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Free meta tag generator
            

Free Code: Generators: CSS Link Wizard
            

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Reference: HTML Cheatsheet
       

Animation Factory’s MediaBuilder – Free Backgrounds, Clip Art, Web Elements, Animations and Onl
       

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Disable Nav Bar
       

web pictures
       

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Photo Matt » Unlucky In Cards
            

eris : design
            

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CSS Vault » The Web’s CSS Site
            

francey.org: a lack of colour
            

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WP Original

Let’s Ask Thomas Jefferson

What’s my answer? No. No, No, and No. I can’t even understand why this is even an issue so big that it was broadcasted on the news.

From my point of view, I see some VERY clear differences between the two. Journalists go out and interview, quote words taken from the original sources live, and then they gather their information from press conferences, interviews, and whatnots and publish the information whether it be editorial or or not.

For the most part, bloggers rely on the sources that journalists work very hard to gather. We site the source in our blogs (hopefully) and go on either commenting on the issue or make it non-editorial leaving the opinions up to the individual reader or both.

I should have paid more attention to “who”, but one gentleman said on the news that bloggers post false information. Now, I’m sure there are bloggers who DO post false information. But I’ve read many-a-blogs in my day, and I’m sorry but I just don’t see that. Remember, most bloggers back up their facts using links and blockquotes. If the links are bad ones…. well, that’s not our problem because you know as well as I do that bias exists and who’s to determine fact from fiction?

Next, we bloggers add our own opinion. Since when does an opinion become “false information” ? The last time I checked, an opinion is neither right nor wrong.

6 entries found for opinion.

o·pin·ion
n.

1. A belief or conclusion held with confidence but not substantiated by positive knowledge or proof: “The world is not run by thought, nor by imagination, but by opinion”
   (Elizabeth Drew).
   
2. A judgment based on special knowledge and given by an expert: a medical opinion.
3. A judgment or estimation of the merit of a person or thing: has a low opinion of braggarts.
4. The prevailing view: public opinion.
5. Law. A formal statement by a court or other adjudicative body of the legal reasons and principles for the conclusions of the court.

Credits to Dictionary.com

You can’t judge the validity of anything by one man’s opinion.

Here’s yet another huge difference between Bloggers and Journalists:

BLOGGERS require no journalistic experience. All they need is computer access and the desire to blog. There are other, even important differences between bloggers and mainstream journalists, perhaps the most significant being that bloggers pride themselves on being part of an unmediated medium, giving their readers unfiltered information. And therein lies the problem.

When I or virtually any other mainstream journalist writes something, it goes through several filters before the reader sees it. At least four experienced Times editors will have examined this column, for example. They will have checked it for accuracy, fairness, grammar, taste and libel, among other things.

If I’m careless — if I am guilty of what the courts call a “reckless disregard for the truth” — The Times could be sued for libel … and could lose a lot of money. With that thought — as well as our own personal and professional commitments to accuracy and fairness — very much in mind, I and my editors all try hard to be sure that what appears in the paper is just that, accurate and fair.

Do I sometimes make mistakes? Yes, I’m only human. Do my editors always catch my mistakes? Most of the time, they do. But not always. They’re human too. The “For the Record” corrections published on Page 2 of The Times every day make our human fallibility only too clear.

Shield laws (and the 1st Amendment guarantee of freedom of the press, the philosophical progenitor of these laws) were created to enable the media as an institution to inform the citizenry, without government interference.

And it’s the institutional safeguards of the traditional media that differentiate them from bloggers and the blogosphere, even if those safeguards sometimes fail. When they do, as they clearly did in the case of several recent media scandals, heads roll.

Many bloggers — not all, perhaps not even most — don’t seem to worry much about being accurate. Or fair. They just want to get their opinions — and their “scoops” — out there as fast as they pop into their brains. One of the great advantages of the Internet, many Web lovers have told me, is that it’s easy to correct an error there. You can do it instantly, as soon as the error is called to your attention, instead of having to wait until the next day’s paper.

But the knowledge that you can correct errors quickly, combined with the absence of editors or filters, encourages laziness, carelessness and inaccuracy, and I don’t think the reporter’s privilege to maintain confidential sources should be granted to such practitioners of what is
at best pseudo-journalism.

I’m not saying that all bloggers are lazy, careless or inaccurate. I’m sure many take as much pride in their work — their professionalism — as I do.

That’s right. Bloggers are not edited. This is both good and bad. It’s bad in the sense that those should not be presenting as facts, false information. It’s good in the sense that some of us bloggers could be presenting the REAL truth without the interruption of professional editors distorting reality and promoting political correctness. In other words, sometimes it can be that only the real truth can be found from a blog BECAUSE IT HASN’T BEEN EDITED.

Look at Liberal CNN and Conservative Fox News. Reporters, journalists, and anchor persons all have their spins on almost every societal concern out there. Do they not? Yet bloggers are being condemned for their spins and being told their not journalists (well, which is true).

2 entries found for journalism.

jour·nal·ism

n.

1. The collecting, writing, editing, and presenting of news or news articles in newspapers and magazines and in radio and television broadcasts.
2. Material written for publication in a newspaper or magazine or for broadcast.
3. The style of writing characteristic of material in newspapers and magazines, consisting of direct presentation of facts or occurrences with little attempt at analysis or interpretation.
4. Newspapers and magazines.
5. An academic course training students in journalism.
6. Written material of current interest or wide popular appeal.

Credits again to Dictionary.com

I guess I can see where the mix up is. Bloggers do similar to that of journalists. However, one cannot be compared to the next. It makes no sense.

And another thing, the AP appears to be it’s own worst enemy. Read about the lies here.

Nobody should have to think for you. Stupidity is a word that also should be given to those people who cannot wade through the bullshit they read or hear on the news. But there are a lot of stupid people out there that take what the upper ups in the media say as Gospel. However, more than anything else, selective “listening” is the problem. People believe and attach themselves to certain media outlets that suit their own agendas. They do this instead of listening to both CNN and FOX and then forming their own opinion. But this is too painful for many people as they have too much trouble putting their baggage aside to think rationally.

I’m sorry if I’ve ever posted false information on my blog that wasn’t me being sarcastic or me giving my opinion. I would certainly hope that my readers don’t use me as the only source for the news. I would also appreciate it if in the event I did post false information that my reader (instead of leaving a condescending remark) would take the time to give me a link to where the correct information can be found, and I’d gladly correct it. I’ve been found guilty before and corrected my mistake before. It happens to the best of us.

But don’t assume that I think of myself as a journalist. This is just my little picnic table where I find news events that strike a nerve where you get to hear me stand on the roof tops and scream like a helpless misfit.

I never did say I was normal.

I think there may be something you’re missing here. Journalists frequently revamp or regurgitate other people’s work. By the standard for a true journalist you state, nearly the only paper in the world we could call “journalists” would be AP News. Most news agencies cite them on an hourly basis. Some bloggers can be classified as journalists, but not all.

The biggest difference between a journalist and a true blogger is that a journalist has the aid of an editor.

I consider myself a blogger AND a journalist. I have been published with my blog material in several publications throughout the internet, not just blogs. Jane Novak (http://www.armiesofliberation.com) got no less than 20 of her articles published in the Yemen Times, Arab News and several other middle eastern papers. Her continued diligence in journalism created awareness in the region and eventually led to the release of a Yemeni newspaper editor.

Bloggers in general are not journalists. Many are though.

Jeremy, thanks for your contribution.

Now that I’ve wiped the tears from my eyes from laughing so much, with my re-gained composure, let me share with you the latest Google searches from my visitors that have appeared on my Sitemeter.

I could not resist posting these. In fact, I will try to make a habit out of doing this. I need a good laugh every once in a while.

(The yellow highlights show where my site was targeted.)

Some dude in the UK was searching for "bum holes".

Then along came a passerby searching on how to masturbate with a silk scarf….

And then some innocent person searching for a website on how to impeach Judge Greer accidently ran into my entry on toilets.

If you’ve read my entries on How Not to get Fired for Blogging and Identity Theft, this is just a follow up on those entries along with my rants about idiot bloggers and stalkers.

Personal Web blogs are hugely popular. They’re also landing some people in a heap of trouble.

As many as 40,000 personal Web diaries — dubbed "blogs" — crop up
each day, reports Technorati, a San Francisco startup that tracks Web
logs.

Overall, there are just over 8.5 million virtual diaries, up from
100,000 two years ago, as Average Joes, CEOs and political foes turn to
blogs opine on everything from Pope John Paul II’s death and "First
Twin" Jenna Bush to the Red Sox and housing costs.

Well, I sure am glad to hear that I’m not the only one without a life. My hobby is consistent with 8.5 million other bloggers and the numbers (40,000) growing everyday. Even politicians have blogs.

Families too have been known to find out on a blog more information than they ever wanted to know about a relative’s uncensored sex life.

YIKES! I actually do find quite a lot of blogs out there about sex. I think this is great if people want to talk about their sex life and I support their freedom to do so. Hell, there’s a lot of people interested in reading about those kinds of things.We are all sexual animals – some repressed sexually and some not.

One day while surfing, I ran into The Spanking Blog, and ah ….I  …. couldn’t believe my eyes. However, even though my stomach turns at some of these blogs, I DO appreciate the honesty that rings through these sexual blogs.

On the other hand though, I look down on those bloggers who try to come off denying that they are trying to pick up men in their blogs simultaneously covering up the fact that they are desperately horny and sexually frustrated. Yet when you look at their blogs, there are sexual innuendos all over the place. These women are the trashiest sluts of any kind. Their blogs scream "Fuck me", but when the male sexual predators arrive, they scold them in the form of an entry on their on their "I’m a Good Catholic Girl" blog – thereby trying to convince their readers that they are innocent good little girls being unnecessarily fondled.

I hate those kinds of blogs because of the rampant denial those bloggers are in. If you don’t want sexual predators writing love letters to you, then stop talking about how you’ve had lesbian affairs and threesomes several times in your past IN YOUR BLOG so the whole world can see! Idiots! These are the kinds of women who get raped and then whine to everyone afterwords trying to draw attention to their readers. "Why oh why meeeeeeeee?" "Little innocent me….." Gimmie a break. You’re a skanky whore. Deal with the consequences! Whores are treated like whores. Period.

OK, let me get back on track here…..

Now back to the article:

"If you blog, there are no guarantees you’ll attract a readership of
thousands," states the manual. "But at least a few readers will find
your blog, and they may be people you’d least want to expect….And
there may be consequences."

Yep, just ask me. I am being stalked by a group of 19 year old "Wannabe Lawyers Vigilantes" who are just trying to learn the ropes about their new career and are using me as their guinea pig. But hey, I look at the bright side. At least I’ve proven myself useful in aiding their careers! Look at it this way too: I was the chosen one out of 8.5 million bloggers for their experiments!

Below, a few tips from "How to Blog Safely (About Work and Anything Else)":

A is for Anonymous First, the "no duh" warning: don’t post any
pictures, reveal your name or even confess you work for, say, an
unnamed weekly newspaper in Seattle. "(I)t’s clear that you work in one
of two places," cautions the guide. Posting using a pseudonym is smart
but, if you think using "Leanne" when your name is Annalee is a good
idea, think again.

Hey, but aren’t these kinds of people "cowards" ?

Technology as Alibi Superficial disguises go only so far when
every wannabe pundit also has a unique — and, unfortunately, traceable
– Internet address. The good news is, there are services like
Invisiblog.com, Anonymizer.com and Tor that specialize in helping you
keep your address and your identity under wraps.

Well, it’s too late for me. As careful as I am, I’ve already been found and my true identity revealed to the American Princess who is suing me for "plagiarizing". I’m a "Backwoods Hick" and now everyone knows.

Be Exclusive You don’t have to let the whole world watch. You
can set up a blog that is password-protected. Blogging services such as
LiveJournal let you decide who gets to see all or parts of your blog.
Turns out, you can also block Google and other major search engines
from listing your blog in Internet search results. To do so, you need
to create a special file called a "Robots Text File."

This one’s a little hard for me. As an Attention Whore, I need all the publicity I can get! Even if this means I have to get stalked by 19 year old drooling law school students.

More than half the blogs at Idiotspace.com are password protected. But then again, they do a lot of things I can’t understand.

Have a Blog and Keep Your Job Mark Jen, the fired Google
worker, isn’t the only blogger to land on the unemployment lines. Delta
Air Lines, Microsoft and Friendster, the on-line social networking
service, have all allegedly canned hired help for blogging. Countless
other employers are taking steps to prevent loose-lipped workers from
disclosing company information on the Internet.

Read more from "Practice Safe Blogging".

Have fun, but don’t forget to use protection.

Well folks, here’s how you voted:

Of course, like any other electronic polls out there, these results aren’t scientific. This poll was an unsuccessful one. Not too many people voted, and I get an average of 530 visitors a day. I might have to start creating XXX polls to get your lazy butts to vote. But to all those who voted, thank-you!

I’m just trying to see if I’m the only one with no life. No seriously, I’ve just been curious what my visitors do. Not too many students come by, and the majority appear to be working full-time.

I can see where the temptation is there for people to think those who interact with strangers on the Internet for hours a day have no life. I thought about this a lot, actually. I could be wrong, but I think it’s because interacting electronically with strangers could be thought of as talking to objects (not real people). I’m guessing that some people think that if you cannot hear their voice or see their face, that the communication is not real.

Let’s say if you spend your days talking to your pillow or your teddy bears that you would be thought of as a lonely person with no life, right? Especially if you think they’re talking back to you! On the Internet, it’s the same. There are, again, no faces or voices – just a bunch of typed words that appear on our computer screens.

More than anything else, it’s the friendly interaction with strangers. Off-line on-lookers who question the quality of our lives assume the interaction between others electronically to be that of a “friendship”. I can only speak for myself, but this is not the case with me. I may call these people “online friends”, however this is not the case when I define the word “friendship” carefully.

I love attention. This is probably the major reason I blog. I love the interaction with others as well. While we aren’t “friends” per the strict definition, it’s brings to me much stimulation and entertainment. I also love to observe people and learn about them as well.

I don’t necessarily feel that if we can’t see the face or hear the voices of others, that they cannot be real or worthy of any trust. Well, it really depends on WHERE in Cyberspace you’re having this communication. For example, if you spend all your time in chat rooms trying to hunt down a “love match” for yourself, I find it a tad bit harder to trust the person on the other end. I’ve heard people to have lied about their weight or their looks so that they can find someone who will fall in love with them. But I guess it all depends on WHO you’re talking to. This whole phenomenon should only be judged on a “case by case” basis.

Those whom have trusted before and have been betrayed badly will probably not trust the Internet as a means to communicate with people.

I think all situations should be judged “case by case” as in real life (face to face interaction), we’ve all been let down, betrayed, used and abused by those we thought loved us. This reminds me of the BTK Killer. He was the president of his church, had a wife and two kids, and worked for the boy scouts. He was trusted, and we all found out the truth in the end. Do you know who your neighbors really are?

Such is life.

I’m sure Laci Peterson had no idea she’d wind up dead on the floor of the San Francisco Bay with her unborn son by the hands of her husband that she loved and trusted. We were all so surprised to find out that many priests out there who represent God and preach his word were actually having sex with alter boys.

Vulnerable and innocent children who put all their faith, love, and trust in their parents get betrayed by them everyday in all sorts of ways in this world. The people whom we expect to protect us, wind up hurting us and turning our souls vigilant, paranoid, and a loss of innocence takes place where the world and it’s people must be interrogated thoroughly before we can trust again.

So, it’s not just the average Joe on the Internet that we cannot trust. In my opinion, we don’t know who ANYBODY is face… or no face.

….Due to popular demand.

I understand that there are a lot of people that are newbies to the Internet or about 10 + years behind the advanced world in technology. Also there are quite a few people that are new to blogs. In today’s crash course, I’m going to cover Blockquotes and Hyperlinks.

.::BLOCKQUOTES::.

There is what they call a “blockquote” . Click on the word, “blockquote” for the definition. I will give you a LIVING example here:

The Blockquote element is used to contain text quoted from another source. Typically, blockquote rendering would be a slight extra left and right indent, and possibly rendered in an italic font. The Blockquote element causes a paragraph break, and typically provides space above and below the quote.

Everything that you see on my blog that is “blockquoted” is NOT my own original text. My links provide the sources.

.::WHAT IS A LINK?::.

Next, for those of you who don’t know what a link is or how to identify one. Let me explain:

(I must say that I’m surprised in 2005 that there are STILL people who cannot distinguish a link from normal text – yet somehow wind up on my blog!)

A link is really short for what is really called a “hyperlink”. The best way that I see fit for identifying one is to move your mouse around the text. Do you notice a little hand or symbol appearing over certain parts of the text that are either highlighted, a different color, or where the style of the text changes? Yep. You got it. That is a a “hyperlink” or a “link” for short. And……… if you click on it, it will take you to an EXTERNAL WEBSITE that will give you additional information aiming to prove or back up my case!

An element in an electronic document that links to another place in the same document or to an entirely different document. Typically, you click on the hyperlink to follow the link. Hyperlinks are the most essential ingredient of all hypertext systems, including the World Wide Web.

There is a site called World Wide Learn. It provides courses and tutorials for those of you who are either still in middle school, lived under a rock all their life and just came out, for Britons, or for those people that have been using a computer for some time and need some brushing up.

The “hyperlinks” you find in my entries cite external sources. It is there, where you can find it’s origin. I hope that I am making myself clear?

It is only then and hopefully then that you will be able to notice the difference between quoting text that’s not my own in the form of a blockquote or just simply copying and pasting text tricking my readers to believe it came from me.

Seriously though, for those making an attempt to comment on anyone’s blog, online news articles/reports or anything of the like REALLY should learn how to use the internet regarding the aforementioned because if you cannot identify blockquotes and links or truly even understand the usage/meaning of them, you will never understand what you’re reading online or at least enough to make a proper comment or contribute to the discussion sounding intelligent. If you, however, are just simply lazy, commenting without having clicked the links in said text that you are responding to, it will make you look like a clown for the whole world to see.

I just got this lovely comment from a troll:

hey idit, have youre ever herd of copy writes looking at your little site hear i counted numeres violations this postink of the garbage vidao is probly the most horible you should respeckt the iintellectual propertyyy of other iwill be forwerding your web adresss two the propper people

This was written gracefully by theblur2002@yahoo.com.

First off, I go out of my way to give credit for everything I post on my site. Everything that you see here, I’ve either purchased myself or in the event that I didn’t purchase the rights to what I own, I have properly given credit to the author.

As for the video I uploaded, I gave proper credit to the authors by my linking to them. I own that video. And I’ve purchased it myself.

I don’t do P2P. I haven’t “stolen” anything. I took the video down because after the response I got, I could see where others could grab that video off me illegally. That is where I see a problem could arise. I wasn’t thinking about it when I posted it. And if I was in the wrong for doing that, then I’m guilty as charged and I admit my wrong-doing.

I’m an artist myself (if you look at the photos on my sidebar). I even have a copyright statement there. As a photographer, it’s in my least bit of interest to “steal” from others.

I have also read and understand everything that pertains to “Fair Use” and the Law. I don’t believe I’m disobeying any rules there.

Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooh, he/she is forwarding my page to the proper people? LOL.

Gayle, thank you very much for the below comment you posted in my blog:

WOW! What a nasty person! Perhaps you could have said this with less jealousy or hate in your tone and maybe the author does not know all the in and outs yet. Did you maybe ask first or give suggestions or is that too mature for you? ((

It’s people like you that make blogging worth my time.

Yes, there are ways to point out someone is doing something wrong. This “person” obviously has no class.

We Bloggers can be influential. Are we not?

Even my “favorite” conservative blogger, Cao states that she wants to influence people with her blog.

I understand what’s going on today and am carrying the tradition of my ancestors: I am still opposing the things that are wrong. I hope I can share some of these views and make a difference.

Some people are afraid of activism. I don’t know why they are. I’m guessing people have this picture in mind when they think about activists.

or this

or this

or this

or this

or this

or this

or this

and our elder hippies

But it’s not just the liberals, man. Take it from a true, right wing conservative! They keep the word alive in their blogs.

Here’s an example list I stole from Cao’s Blog of Conservative Bloggers who passionately support their political views and argue (like I do) relentlessly against the other side (the side that I’m *not* on):

10ft2ft
2Slick’s Forum
A Collection of Thoughts
A Day In Iraq
A Physicist’s Perspective
Aaron’s Rantblog
American Warmonger
Ankle Biting Pundits
Another Man’s Meat
Anti Idiotarian-Rottweiler
AntiProtester Journal
Any Soldier
BadEagle
Bayouranter
Better Living Through Blogging
BlackFive
Blogs for Bush
Bloodletting
California Hammonds
Cathouse Chat
Citizen Smash
Cold Fury
Conservative & Right
Conservative Dialysis
Conservative Eyes
Conservative Response
Davids Medienkritik
Defend America
Democrats Give Conservatives Indigestion
Dhimmi Watch
Dump Dick Durbin
Eurosoc
Everything I Know Is Wrong
Evil Conservative
Faith Freedom
Feces Flinging Monkey
Follow That Star
Freedom Of Thought
Frickeville
Give Me Liberty
GOP Insight
Human Events
Hyscience
I Love Jet Noise
IMAO
Internet Insomniac
Intolerant Elle
Iraq Files
It Is What It Is
Jihad Watch
Kenders Musings
Lady Mac
Leaning Right
Leanne Wildermuth : Artist by Nature
Louisiana Conservative
Marine Corps Moms
Michael Savage
Michelle Malkin
Michigan Blog
Military Bride
Modern Vertebrate Speaks!
Mofizixgr4fix
Montana Politics
Moonbattery.com
Mr. Minority
Nostrablogass
Obiter Dictum
Ogre’s Politics and Views
One Man’s Thoughts
Pardon My English
Peace For Our Time
Peppermint Patty
Pirate’s Cove
Rage4Truth
Rancette
Ravings Of A Mad Tech
Ravings Of John C. A. Bambenek
Rebel Rouser
Regular Ron
Res Publica 2004
Right Wing News
Right Wing Nuthouse
RightViews
Rottweiler Puppy
Sgt Hook
Shadow Of Diogenes
Sheep In Wolf’s Clothing
Sigmund Carl & Alfred
Slapinions
Soy Como Soy
Spydrzweb
Steven Kiel
Stop The ACLU
Thank My Recruiter
The American Patriots
The American Spectator
The Art Of The Blog
The Belgravia Dispatch
The Chicago Report
The Church Of Dysfunction
The Great Separation
The Hidden Nook
The Islamic Threat
The Jawa Report
The Lost Nomad
The Mudville Gazette
The Nashif Report
The Neo-Progressive
The New American
The Obama Factor
The Questing Cat
The Rising Sun
The Roth Report
The Spitball Defense
The Sunnyeside
The Underscore
Tomfoolery Of The Highest Order
Transforming Sermons
Trilogy
Truth Laid Bear
Truth Lies And Common Sense
TS Right Dominion
Uncivil Rights
Uncle Jack
Villainous Company
Vox Felisi
Where’s Your Brain?
WorldNet Daily
XBIP
Young Conservatives

They use images on their blogs to promote the beliefs they hold close to their heart.

Hear from the Republicans:

I agree that Liberals have a tendency of overstepping their boundaries when it comes to protesting or promoting their views, but not all Liberals agree with violent and chaotic protesting.

In essence, both Republicans and Democrats hold their beliefs intensely and sometimes ferociously. But bloggers come by and listen to our rants anyway.

However, the day may come that bloggers have to keep their opinions to themselves. Who knows?

Internet bloggers should enjoy traditional press freedoms and not face regulation as political groups, lawmakers and online journalists said Friday.

In separate letters, Democratic lawmakers and Internet commentators urged the Federal Election Commission to make sure that political Web sites that serve as focal points for political discussion, like Wonkette.com and Freerepublic.com, don’t have to comply with campaign-finance rules.

“Curtailing blogs and other online publications will dampen the impact of new voices in the political process and will do a disservice to the millions of voters who rely on the Web for original, insightful political commentary”, said the Online Coalition, a group of bloggers and online activists.

Fourteen members of the House of Representatives said blogs foster a welcome diversity of viewpoints.

“This ‘democratization’ of the media is a welcome development in this era of media consolidation and a corresponding lack of diversity of views in traditional media outlets”, said the group, which consists of thirteen Democrats and one Republican.

The FEC ruled in 2002 that Internet activities do not count as “coordinated political activity” and thus don’t have to comply with laws that regulate money in politics.

But a U.S. judge struck down that ruling as too broad last year, and the FEC is scheduled to consider it later this month.

If the FEC determines that online “blogs” are in fact political organizations, they could face fines if they work too closely with political campaigns by, for example, reprinting their press releases.

Let’s have some fun while it lasts!

A fellow blogger named Laurie came upon my post on Identity Theft and left a comment that she was going to write about it  in her blog. Well, I happened to come across an interesting comment left regarding anonymous blogging. Here’s the lovely comment written by a young Australian who apparently doesn’t follow the news:

“only people who are uncomfortable with who they are or what they are doing remain anonymous”

While Benjamin Solah’s comment did come off as insulting to those bloggers that remain anonymous, I found it somewhat funny in a way. I wrote the following response back to him:

Excuse me? Are you saying I’m not comfortable with who I am because I don’t want to get stalked, my identity stolen, or fired from my job because of controversial things I say in my blog? Are you serious? I can’t believe you can insult a person like that when they’re trying to protect themselves. Have you not heard what has happened to several other bloggers? Do you read American news? I didn’t think so.

If you can prove to me that you’re a safe person, honey, I’d be glad to give you my full name, address, and phone number. Oh yeah, and I’ll even tell you my blood type and tell you if I was born via natural birth or by a caesarian.

One more interesting thing I’d like to point out is how many Australian bloggers are there in comparison to American bloggers? Benjamin has nothing to worry about over there. First off, if you take a look at his blog, you’ll notice that he’s a writer. He doesn’t talk much about controversial issues. Secondly, even if he were to get stalked, do you think someone from another country will take a plane to Australia to stalk him or steal his identity? WTF? He’s also a guy. Anybody with half a brain in their skull knows that women are more vulnerable to stalkers and sexual predators in general. Next, is he at risk of getting fired for blogging? Absolutely not. I am at risk. Obviously, he’s not aware of the woman who got fired at her workplace for having a “Kerry” bumper sticker on her car. I live in a predominantly Republican state. I’ve got bills to pay. I don’t want to lose my job.

I wonder how many people actually read the news or know anything about what’s going on in the world?  He obviously didn’t read the other comments posted in  Laurie’s  entry. There was one girl who had to delete two of her blogs due to stalkers. Now, that I think about it, a male model from Journalspace was even stalked. He used his full name. Some bozo stalker sent him a pair of socks in the mail and wanted him to touch them and send it back. This guy had several stalkers because of his occupation. He eventually deleted his blog.

In any event, I mean no disrespect to those bloggers that use their full name. That’s not the point of this entry. My point is based upon the insulting, ignorant remark telling me that “I’m not comfortable with who I am” if I wish to remain anonymous. Hell, if I was in a little cubby-hole in Australia, I’d give my full name too. By the way, how do you know if bloggers are actually using their real name, anyway. Just because they “say” they’re “Jane Doe” doesn’t really mean they’re “

Oh, by the way, you gotta love those people who say they “don’t care for those who use nicknames”, yet they do it themselves. Now, there may be people that use nicknames in real life (in public). Those people are few and far between, and I find it a bit odd, but I don’t judge them. Who knows what they’ve been through already?

Idiots! Good grief!

I came to the conclusion long ago that those who write poison pen letters to those people in the public eye getting attention from the media, did not get their basic needs met at childhood. You know, the things that all children need such as touch, love, attention, encouragement, and support. Here’s the perfect example of one who didn’t get that.

Are you familiar with Heather Armstrong from Dooce.Com? If you haven’t had a chance to read her blog, I highly recommend it. Heather is an amazing woman with a superb sense of humor. For those that don’t know Heather, she was fired from her job a few years ago because of her blog — and these entries. Read them. They are hil.ar.ious! She admitted that she knew the risks involved, and when she was terminated, she wasn’t all that bitter; nor was she surprised. If you ask me, she took it very well.

From what I’ve read in her blog, she appears to have a wonderful husband and child. As we all know, nobody has the “perfect” life, but she seems to have what apparently jackson.matt@att.net doesn’t. Matt Jackson is the cretin that sent Heather Armstrong that nasty email.

Oh, and here’s his address just in case you didn’t get it the first time:
jackson.matt@att.net
jackson.matt@att.net
jackson.matt@att.net
jackson.matt@att.net

You know, these losers are so transparent, it’s not funny. It’s actually quite amazing and predictable of people of his ilk to get so riled up because someone else is getting loads of attention. If they only knew that they are the ones, attention-starved and needy. They cannot stand someone getting more attention than them. For what they didn’t receive in childhood, they crave so much as an adult now. And they will attempt to destroy those that either got it or are getting it.

For the record, Heather is not asking for attention. The media comes to her. She agrees to talk to them so that others will learn from her mistake. Believe me, I’ve learned a lot from those that have already lost their jobs from blogging. I thank the media and the bloggers willing to cooperate with them. I’m sure because of people like Heather Armstrong, a lot of people are more cautious now or at least know the risk they are taking. And this is why I’m more anonymous than ever! God forbid the people out there find out I’m a Liberal! Ack!

So, you sulkers and cry babies out there that hate to see these people in the spotlight, too damn bad. Blame the media!

Could this be why Republicans hate celebrities so much?

Pretty much the same thing happened to Amber Frey. I know there are a lot of reasons why people hate Amber, but I know some of them are secretly jealous of all the attention she has received.

Moving on back to the fired bloggers, take a look at Queen of Sky’s most recent entry. There are several users at that damned Journalspace who are whining that their server has slowed down since Queen of Sky has been getting so many comments and hits to her blog following her termination. Is this not ridiculous or what? Leave it up to Journalspace users to come up with this kind of crap! If a server cannot handle the bandwidth necessary for a few bloggers to have popularity, they shouldn’t be in business. Blame the f’n server, not the one who is getting all the attention! There are so many blogging platforms out there like Typepad, Blogger, WordPress, Squarespace, Moveable Type, Xanga, Bravenet, Modblog, Blogdrive, Blog City, Mindsay, and more. I have never once heard this problem on another server where the bloggers attack those bloggers who receive a massive amount of hits and using that as a reason the server is slow. Heck, I was a member of Journalspace about a year and a half ago, and that server was all too often slow as all hell! I don’t mean to defame all members of Journalspace, but man-o-man, I have never seen as many crackpots and whackjobs in another blogging community before in my life!

Attention seekers are in denial. They will argue that they don’t need attention and that they don’t seek it. Don’t pay attention to these people. They have never taken the time to look inwards. They are too busy pointing the fingers and whining like big babies for their mama. They look something like this:

…or this:

Go get your OWN attention, and stop sucking on sour grapes!

Why oh why do people use their “real names” on the Internet? There are two different mindsets as to why people particularly use their real names on their blogs. One reason is because they think they are being more “brave”. So, if some passerby uses a nickname in their comments section, they call them cowards. This is the case where a commenter proposes an opposing thought. Another reason people use their real names is so that nobody thinks they’re a coward.

Anonymous is being a coward; using an alias is being smart.

I’ve read some comment policies on other people’s blogs before, and damn… they are asking way too much when they want everyone’s real name. But then again, they may not be asking for their last name too. However, even if you submit your first name, that’s only one step closer to being either stalked or being the victim of either a violent crime or identity theft.

I see the looks on all your faces now. You are telling me that I’m too paranoid. Well, maybe I am. But I choose to be paranoid because the alternative is frightening to me. Why? Let me give you all two very important reasons. Listen up!

1. I . don’t . want . to . get . fired . from . my . job. While some of you think it may not be that much of a risk, I would rather be called “paranoid” or be told “It’s not your name that gets you fired” than be courageous stupid and find myself the next day on the unemployment line and not being able to pay the electric bill.
2. Now for the biggest reason: I don’t want to be victimized of IDENTITY THEFT like this person may have been! (I had to copy and paste his entire entry because for obvious reasons he has it protected. So, unless you’re a Journalspace user, you won’t be able to read it.)
   

   I’m leaving this up through Friday night. There have been some odd things happening lately that makes me believe someone is stealing my identity. Others have brought the idea to my attention, based on what’s happened, and I’m beginning to believe it.

   1. Yesterday, I noticed an unauthorized charge for $596.18 in my account. Wells Fargo immediately declared it a fraudulent charge and stated that I should suspect identity theft. I shrugged it off and thought that it was a bank error. They have since credited back the money, but have not completed their investigation.

   2. The other night, while I was leaving work, I had this strange feeling that I was being watched. When I went to get into my car, an odd boom sound was made close to my car. It was like my trunk door was open and someone had slammed it. All the way home, my car made a rattling sound in the back. I had stupid paranoia thoughts like someone was in my trunk, but then justified that it was stuff that got loose and was moving around. I was right, but it didn’t explain the loud noise.

   3. Today, I receive a call from a medical company telling me the following: “Hi, this is so and so from Big Name Medical Company calling to setup an appointment with states my first and last name.” I say, “Um, ok?” And she goes, “So, when do you want to come in to have the surgery done?” I say, “Surgery? I don’t need surgery.” She says, “Were you not in this morning for a check up? You had a insert medical condition here that needs to be taken care of?” I say, “No ma’am, I wasn’t in there today, or ever.” She says, “Ok, well, um, sorry for the inconvenience,” and hangs up. About 3 minutes later, she calls back and says, “HottTxBoi, I have just spoke to my supervisor about this and she suggests that you call our customer service hotline and report this to them. Let them know that they are using your card so that they can take action against it.” I ask her, “What card?” She says, “Your Big Name Medical Company card.” I say, “I’ve never had one of those cards.” She says, “Then you need to let them know that someone is using your number on their records.” I ask her, “Ma’am, what address did they use?” She tells me the address. Luckily, it’s not mine. I would have freaked if it was.

   However, why is someone using my number and my name? All of these three things happened in the same week and I’m exceedingly freaked out. Scared, even. So, after tomorrow night, this blog will no longer be open to anyone for a very long time. I hope all is well with everyone during this time period.

This freaked the hell out of me! However, I have to admit, I don’t know whether or not someone really stole his identity. There’s no update in his blog about it. But regardless, it makes you think. If it doesn’t put a BIG FAT WARNING sign in front of your head, I don’t know what will.

3. You know, I’ve never heard of a person being violently attacked because of something “offensive” they wrote in their blog. It may or may not have ever happened. But I wouldn’t put it past some of these wackos I find every now and then in Cyberspace. I don’t trust a face I cannot see, and even then I’m weary until I actually feel I know the person well enough. I have some very controversial beliefs, and I can easily imagine someone showing up at my front door one day with an AK-47. Yes, I have riled people up that much and even in the past in Blogsphere.

So, here I am trying to keep my life, my job, and my identity intact. It’s worth all the “outrageous” points of views I may have regarding the non-usage of my real first and last name.

Folks, if you want to be considered “non-cowardly” on the Internet, when you leave a comment or write something controversial in your blog or journal, leave your email address and a referral to your blog. How simple is that?

I am Ticklebug and will always be Ticklebug in Blogdom. If someone thinks I’m too cowardly for not using my real first and last name, then the hell with them. I will just laugh in their face if their real identities come back to haunt them one day.

With the advancement in technology these days, I can imagine anything and everything happening. Some people are smart enough to put two and two together with your little clues about yourself that you write in your blog, easily — that is, if they want to. Don’t be naive.

My links are always traceable whether it be by my email address or my blog’s URL. So, if someone wants to reply to my “offensive” comment, they are welcome to do so. If you dish it out, I agree with you all, that you must be strong enough to welcome the reciprocation. But for the life of me, why do some of you feel the necessity to reveal your real name? What purpose does it serve?

Of course, there are more obvious reasons on how your identity can get stolen.

• lurking around automatic teller machines (ATMs) and phone booths in order to capture PIN numbers (by watching through binoculars as the numbers are being entered, or more simply, by casting a watchful gaze over someone’s shoulder). Travelers are a particularly favourite target;
• stealing mail from mailboxes or re-directing mail in an effort to collect credit cards, bank statements, credit card statements, pre-approved credit offers, tax information or other personal data. Privacy Journal has also pointed out “how automated credit bureaus freely accept an address change without confirming it or notifying the consumer who is the subject of the file. An impostor can easily have a retail store enter a change of address for a consumer whose identity the impostor has misappropriated, and that is what thousands of credit fraud perpetrators are doing …;
• illegally obtaining personal credit reports;
• setting up telemarketing schemes to elicit account numbers from unsuspecting consumers;
• accessing personal information accidentally sent to the wrong fax number, e-mail address or voice mailbox;
• scavenging through the garbage in search of credit card or loan applications, employer’s files, and identification/authentication data such as login IDs and passwords. Similarly, thieves can search erased disks for any retrievable data;
• sending false messages on the Internet (spoofing) in an effort to collect private information. For example, posing as travel agents or other service providers, identity thieves can make off with your credit card number once it has been entered to purchase a ticket or service;
• sending e-mail using someone else’s computer or e-mail address;
• using various software programs such as “signals analysis” and “sniffer” programs to intercept financial data, passwords, addresses or other personal information being sent over networks;
• breaking into computer systems and gaining access to personal data. For example, names, addresses and credit card or social insurance/security numbers (SINs/SSNs) located in the databases of governments, financial organizations, employers, creditors, and credit bureaus can be downloaded by employees, former employees or external hackers. They can then sell the information or use it to open fraudulent accounts.

One security expert found that nearly 70 percent of the websites he surveyed in December 1996 had “security lapses.” Surveyed sites included banks, credit unions and government agencies.8 Even more recently, a 14-year-old boy faced multiple charges after making $3000 worth of fraudulent purchases using a collection of debit card numbers that he had downloaded from the Internet.

~~~How to decrease the risks~~~

The best way to avoid ID theft on the Internet is not to shop on the Internet or put your personal information on the Internet. Banking should be done face to face, because you are dealing with your own money. It is too easy for hackers to get personal information.

I’m “guilty” of shopping on the Internet. And I don’t see myself not shopping on the Internet in the future. Oh well.

Additional suggestions include: 1) If you have a personal Web site, don’t publish your last name, home address or other identifying information. 2) Choose an email address that does not use your real name, or at least not the commonly used first initial and last name 3) Ask your friends to blind carbon copy, or BCC, you when they send out notes or jokes to many people. 4) Purchase a personal firewall to protect your computer.

Scary, isn’t it?

So, we know there’s no real way to prevent Identity Theft, but there are ways you can decrease the risks. It’s also frightening to think that if your real name is displayed somewhere on the Internet, that someone else can link it to you somehow. It’s happened before! As the odds are slim, I still have to go with the popular cliche expression that “it’s better to be safe than sorry”.