Having grown up and lived through the last 20 or so years of the cold war, I remember all too well the tension and fear caused by saber rattling.
That is why news like this causes some long buried unsettling feelings to resurface.
Terrorism is quite bad enough, thank you very much. I hope our children don't also have to grow up with another cold war as we did.
Showing posts with label Cold War. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cold War. Show all posts
Thursday, April 26, 2007
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
February 14 - Ballantines Day, Nikita Khrushchev and HDDVDDRM
Happy Valentines Day. And, for you folks who think that's silly, Happy Ballantine's Day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballantine%27s_Day
Laws and techniques that are supposed to curb the dishonest but only wind up hurting the honest really get my britches in a twist. In yet another it-was-only -matter-of-time blow against copy-protection, HDDVD (and BluRay) copy protection was reported cracked, today. It seems like the RIAA and MPAA are tilting at windmills. Every time they come up with a copy protection scheme someone breaks the scheme. The damage done to us, the consumers is that even after this is accomplished we still have very restricted access to our media because the investment to implement the crack is high and still, potentially, illegal even if our use would not be. For the people that wish to steal music and movies and distribute them, the investment is ridiculously low. Without license, the RIAA and MPAA have taken away our fair-use rights by making the actions needed to exercise them illegal.
In other news, acronyms and initialisms declared illegal :-)
The 20th congress of the Communist Party in the U.S.S.R. began on this day in 1956. This event was marked by an event that had significance for two reasons. Proving yet again that there is no honor among thieves, the event was Nikita Sergeyevich Khruschev denouncing Joseph Stalin as a criminal and describing his crimes. While controversial at the time, this marked the beginning of a return to the governing principles of Lenin and the rise of Krushchev to eventually be Premier of the U.S.S.R. Krushchev is probably most popularly famous for his outbursts in the U.N. In particular, the image of him removing a shoe and banging it on a conference table while yelling is indelibly etched into the memory of those that were aware of such things during the cold war. He is also famous for the quote "We will bury you" in a reference he made to capitalism. For those that want a little picture of the man before he was the leader of the then second most powerful country in the world, "Enemy at the Gates" is another movie that is worth a few hours of your life. In that movie, Bob Hoskins plays Khrushchev when he was a military leader and one of Stalin's henchmen during the siege of Leningrad in W.W. II.
Finally, in a savory bit of irony, the U.S. House of representative canceled it's hearing on Global Warming today due to an Ice storm.
Laws and techniques that are supposed to curb the dishonest but only wind up hurting the honest really get my britches in a twist. In yet another it-was-only -matter-of-time blow against copy-protection, HDDVD (and BluRay) copy protection was reported cracked, today. It seems like the RIAA and MPAA are tilting at windmills. Every time they come up with a copy protection scheme someone breaks the scheme. The damage done to us, the consumers is that even after this is accomplished we still have very restricted access to our media because the investment to implement the crack is high and still, potentially, illegal even if our use would not be. For the people that wish to steal music and movies and distribute them, the investment is ridiculously low. Without license, the RIAA and MPAA have taken away our fair-use rights by making the actions needed to exercise them illegal.
In other news, acronyms and initialisms declared illegal :-)
The 20th congress of the Communist Party in the U.S.S.R. began on this day in 1956. This event was marked by an event that had significance for two reasons. Proving yet again that there is no honor among thieves, the event was Nikita Sergeyevich Khruschev denouncing Joseph Stalin as a criminal and describing his crimes. While controversial at the time, this marked the beginning of a return to the governing principles of Lenin and the rise of Krushchev to eventually be Premier of the U.S.S.R. Krushchev is probably most popularly famous for his outbursts in the U.N. In particular, the image of him removing a shoe and banging it on a conference table while yelling is indelibly etched into the memory of those that were aware of such things during the cold war. He is also famous for the quote "We will bury you" in a reference he made to capitalism. For those that want a little picture of the man before he was the leader of the then second most powerful country in the world, "Enemy at the Gates" is another movie that is worth a few hours of your life. In that movie, Bob Hoskins plays Khrushchev when he was a military leader and one of Stalin's henchmen during the siege of Leningrad in W.W. II.
Finally, in a savory bit of irony, the U.S. House of representative canceled it's hearing on Global Warming today due to an Ice storm.
Saturday, February 10, 2007
February 10 - More Viral Marketing and the Price of Gary Powers
Yesterday I wrote that viral marketing seems wrong. It comes down to a matter of trust. We have an understanding of what the rules are in advertising. We know that an ad is a biased statement and we generally know who stands to gain. Even with something as potentially subtle as product placement we generally recognize it for what it is. With viral marketing, however, we often have no way of knowing. Viral marketing seeks to create a situation where the market has no idea that it is being sold to. It is fundamentally dishonest. I'd call it lame, like paying famous folks to attend your party, but it is potentially harmful.
Dissecting the Boston WMD party, though, I come to a different conclusion than most I've read or heard. First, the act itself of putting up those signs was no more than graffiti and should be treated as such. Perhaps less because not even semi-permanent defacement was involved. That the officials of Boston were not savvy enough to be aware of something that has been happening all over the world for over a year now does not make the guys who did it criminals. Some say that the guys had a responsibility to say something when they saw the panic. Now that we know it was a viral marketing campaign, I think we'll find that they were contractually bound to say nothing. I don't know this for sure, but I'd bet a Franklin it's so. Who was responsible to say something and fast was Turner, owner of the Cartoon Network that sponsored the event. I figure the $2,000,000 fine they were levied does not even come close to the costs involved. While I am generally a small government sorta guy, I hope that this is the event that causes the appropriate governmental entity to have a look at drafting legislation regarding viral marketing.
While working in the San Jose Bay area, I once saw a U.2. land at Moffet field.
We all know who Gary Powers is. Right? Well, for a re-cap, Gary Powers is the American Air Force pilot who was shot down while flying his U2 over Soviet air space. He was capture alive and held by the Soviets for almost 2 years. We got him back by swapping him for some other fellow named Vilyam Fisher, a KGB agent who the U.S. was holding. Actually the U.S. also got an American student named Fredric Pryor returned. So, Gary Powers = Vilyam Fisher - Fredric Pryor. Maybe not. Anyway, Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher was a classic cold war spy, trained for physical infiltration into the U.S. Probably a fairly good spy, too, as his capture came about when he was betrayed by his defecting assistant, not through any mis-step on his part. This happened in 1957. He is also interesting because before he was caught he was the handler for the couriers that carried the nuclear secrets betrayed by the Rosenbergs.
If you've ever wondered why we endured 50 years of cold war, why the concept of "Mutually Assured Destruction" became doctrine, then you have the Rosenbergs and a few others to thank. After W.W.II the Soviets did not have the bomb. Any significant aggression by the U.S.S.R. would have had the potential of serious ramifications for them. However, Klaus Fuchs and David Greenglass (Ethel Rosenberg's brother) of Los Alamos leaked construction details to Ethel and Julius. Folks who should, wondered why the U.S.S.R. was able to develop their own nuclear weapons so quickly and this was found to be why. The U.S.S.R., once on an equal footing with the U.S., felt more free to promote communism in the world, again.
The U.S. now had a powerful enemy that they needed to keep track of and began developing some of the most interesting weapons and systems we have ever seen. To this day, the U2 remains one of the most advanced airframes in existence and it still sees service, though not military. Anyway, as amazing as the U2 was, it still needed a pilot. So, on that fateful day, May 1, 1960, Gary Powers boarded his airplane at Incirlik Air Force Base in Turkey and took off for a reconnaissance mission over the U.S.S.R.
Dissecting the Boston WMD party, though, I come to a different conclusion than most I've read or heard. First, the act itself of putting up those signs was no more than graffiti and should be treated as such. Perhaps less because not even semi-permanent defacement was involved. That the officials of Boston were not savvy enough to be aware of something that has been happening all over the world for over a year now does not make the guys who did it criminals. Some say that the guys had a responsibility to say something when they saw the panic. Now that we know it was a viral marketing campaign, I think we'll find that they were contractually bound to say nothing. I don't know this for sure, but I'd bet a Franklin it's so. Who was responsible to say something and fast was Turner, owner of the Cartoon Network that sponsored the event. I figure the $2,000,000 fine they were levied does not even come close to the costs involved. While I am generally a small government sorta guy, I hope that this is the event that causes the appropriate governmental entity to have a look at drafting legislation regarding viral marketing.
While working in the San Jose Bay area, I once saw a U.2. land at Moffet field.
We all know who Gary Powers is. Right? Well, for a re-cap, Gary Powers is the American Air Force pilot who was shot down while flying his U2 over Soviet air space. He was capture alive and held by the Soviets for almost 2 years. We got him back by swapping him for some other fellow named Vilyam Fisher, a KGB agent who the U.S. was holding. Actually the U.S. also got an American student named Fredric Pryor returned. So, Gary Powers = Vilyam Fisher - Fredric Pryor. Maybe not. Anyway, Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher was a classic cold war spy, trained for physical infiltration into the U.S. Probably a fairly good spy, too, as his capture came about when he was betrayed by his defecting assistant, not through any mis-step on his part. This happened in 1957. He is also interesting because before he was caught he was the handler for the couriers that carried the nuclear secrets betrayed by the Rosenbergs.
If you've ever wondered why we endured 50 years of cold war, why the concept of "Mutually Assured Destruction" became doctrine, then you have the Rosenbergs and a few others to thank. After W.W.II the Soviets did not have the bomb. Any significant aggression by the U.S.S.R. would have had the potential of serious ramifications for them. However, Klaus Fuchs and David Greenglass (Ethel Rosenberg's brother) of Los Alamos leaked construction details to Ethel and Julius. Folks who should, wondered why the U.S.S.R. was able to develop their own nuclear weapons so quickly and this was found to be why. The U.S.S.R., once on an equal footing with the U.S., felt more free to promote communism in the world, again.
The U.S. now had a powerful enemy that they needed to keep track of and began developing some of the most interesting weapons and systems we have ever seen. To this day, the U2 remains one of the most advanced airframes in existence and it still sees service, though not military. Anyway, as amazing as the U2 was, it still needed a pilot. So, on that fateful day, May 1, 1960, Gary Powers boarded his airplane at Incirlik Air Force Base in Turkey and took off for a reconnaissance mission over the U.S.S.R.
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