Via JS, Urban Ninja in Toronto!.

Wow. I can do that.

Some of you may remember that last summer I created a bunch of Mario question mark blocks and hung them around the University of Toronto campus before heading out to Kyrgyzstan. By the time I got back, they were all gone, so I figured that they'd been taken down, but hoped that people had at least been amused by them.

Months later, I stumbled on the same website that I had got the idea from and someone had found my blocks (scroll to bottom)!



They were of course hanging originally, but it's very cool that someone captured a photo of one of them. (You'll note how absolutely hawt and true-to-game they are. That's right. I rule.)

Someone took it home and now has it hanging in their hallway.

I find this to be very cool.

I am now inspired to wreak further geeky artistry upon campus.

As I got in so much shit for saying about open source products, everything's about the packaging. If you want happy users, you need for them to go "oooo" when they just look at it.

Things that I go "oooo" at:

• The bags that the Apple Store sells things in. Yes, the bags.
• Google brand ajax hotness.
• The world of warcraft trailer.
• This warm muffin.

If people go "oooo" at the onset, they're likely to consume the rest.

But a more effective example of this, more convincing than my ranting and raving could ever be, here's a funny video of what would happen if Microsoft redesigned the iPod packaging.

It's funny cuz it's true.

Today Mcrosoft got ther 5000th patent: "The ablty for gamers to compete n onlne vdeo games, but also keep to the sdelnes as a spectator and watch the game from anywhere n the world."

Want to watch me kck Seanple's ass n Warcraft by logging n yourself and standng by the sdelnes? TOO BAD! YOU HAVE TO PAY MICROSOFT FIRST!

The patent s slghtly more complcated than that; the "watchng" ncludes replays and multple camera angles.

But my point s ths: I'm just glad that a company like Mcrosoft, who has receved so much backlash n the past few years, can finally get back nto the market by delverng a product that the publc wants, and not resortng to drty tactcs like patentng the concept of delverng products to the publc. (That one s stll patent pendng.)

By the way, curous about all the lttle hearts over the ""s that make t hard to read anythng?

fLufFy remnded me that today s International Womens Day and I know that grls lke to dot their ""s with lttle hearts. They also lke the colour pnk, but I ddn't want to make all the font pnk in case I accdentally used trademarked barbe pink. But here's a picture of a ktten with a fuzzy tummy to make up for t.

Apparently all of the Really Cool Kids already knew about this game, but for the rest of you n00bs, check this out.

If you're high attention span and want the full "holy crap!" factor, watch this video: Spore.

If you have trouble sitting still for that amount of time, lemme give you the summary: you start as a liiiiittle tiny cellular organism and you make choices about each next generation as you slowly evolve your creatures into animals and then a decently sized civilization and beyond. It's like a dozen of everyone's favourite games happily mashed into one and the tweaking options look really hot. We're not talking "you're one of the five following creatures" here.

Okay, now go watch the video above.

Seriously. It'll be the coolest thing you've seen all day.

And then you can tell people about it like "oh hey, so you know that game Spore, well I -- what? you don't know about it? you n00b! it's going to be the hottest game ever! I can't believe you don't know about it!" Doesn't that sound like fun?

When Google announced that they would be deploying a censored Google China, the subject of internet censorship received media attention like it never had before. It became a topic that the general public discussed and protested. But this isn't a story that began with Google in China. This wasn't a first for Google, and it wasn't a first for China, and it certainly wasn't a first for the world.

Now that this issue has reached public discourse, an invaluable opportunity for change has presented itself. But like all political issues, it's worthless to examine it in isolation: a lot of history and precedence has to be taken into account.

China has been censoring the web long before Google.cn came around. They block content from pornography to religious material to political dissent. When a user attempts to access this information, they see a network error instead of the requested content. China couples this technical level of filtering with a series of laws and regulations to control content that's published within its borders, and to bully its citizens into practicing self-censorship where they don't even try to access the forbidden content.

It's also important to note that China isn't the only country to censor their internet. Although internet censorship in China has received the most attention, the OpenNet Initiative has already investigated cases of internet censorship in nearly thirty countries, both authoritarian and democratic.

Internet filtering has become so widespread, that it's become a market unto itself. Companies like Cisco tailor advertisements of their routers to appeal to countries who censor the internet. Other companies provide "censorware", like Secure Computing's SmartFilter, which is sold to countries explicitly for the purpose of filtering the internet. These products provide categories like "Non-Profit Organizations / Advocacy Groups" to make it easy to censor certain topics with the click of a button.

The actual content being filtered around the world varies, depending on the country, from human rights groups to child pornography.

Google itself has engaged in self-censorship in its regional Google pages before. Back in 2002, Google removed controversial sites from Google.fr and Google.de (Google France and Google Germany) such as the neo-nazi group Stormfront. Also in 2002, Google removed links to www.xenu.net and in 2003 links to the kazaa lite program after receiving takedown notices under the United States' Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Google wasn't the only internet company who was changing their services at the request of a local government. Microsoft banned 'Democracy' and 'Dalai Lama' from the Chinese version of its blog site and Yahoo turned over information that helped the Chinese government track down and imprison a journalist who just forwarded an e-mail. Jerry Yang, a co-founder of Yahoo, explained that his company had no choice but to cooperate with the Chinese government's wishes: "To be doing business in China or anywhere else in the world, we have to comply with the local law."

However Google's history with China has been a rocky one. In September 2002, China blocked access to Google entirely. Even after the Chinese authorities unblocked Google, they continued to block the Google cache and certain searches within Google and occasionally blocked access to Blogger, Google's blog service. Note that all of this blocking was done by the Chinese government, and not Google itself.

Then, in 2004, Google began to filter its own Chinese language News site in accordance with the Public Pledge of Self-Regulation and Professional Ethics for China Internet Industry, similar to when they removed content from Google.fr when requested by the government of France, or from Google's main site when required to by the DMCA.

If Google was ever going to set up an office in China, they would have to fully comply with this Public Pledge, including filtering topics that the Pledge deemed "inappropriate" from all of Google China. When they announced that they were going to set up a local presence, and thus be forced to censor Google.cn, Google explained that the service that they had been previously providing in China was unreasonably poor and that these connectivity issues could only be resolved by a local presence.

This brings us to present day.

Internet censorship is happening all over the world, with many private corporations involved, and finally this case receives enough attention that the general public is listening. What now?

It's important to first acknowledge that Google was placed in a very difficult position. Their mission is to provide the greatest access to information to the greatest number of people. Although filtering search results compromises this mission, so does failing to offer Google search to a fifth of the world's population.

To be absolutely blunt, I don't agree with the choice that Google made. However -- and I feel that these are extremely important clarifications -- not only to I acknowledge the fact that this was a difficult decision for them that they didn't enter into lightly, I also believe that Google deserves credit for insisting that this isn't the end of the discussion and for at least trying to do this "right".

This isn't a black and white issue, and to simplify it into these extremes would remove the possibility for gradual improvement.

To explain what I mean by Google trying to do this "right", I first want to separate some of the many issues that are involved here. When it comes to tech giants participating in censorship some of the prevalent issues are user security, access to information, compliance and transparency.

"User security" comes into play when companies like Yahoo are involved in releasing information to the authorities that is used to harm an individual. Google seems to be hyper-aware of this issue: not only has Google refused to do something similar in the US, but they have also stated that they are intentionally not going to offer some Google products on Google.cn, such as Gmail and Blogger, until they feel comfortable that they can do that in a way that respects users' privacy. They also later decided to store all search records outside of China in order to prevent the government from accessing it without Google's consent. These are very important stands for Google to be taking, and certainly worthy of acknowledgment and praise in a field where no other tech giant is willing to go to such extremes to protect its users' data.

The second issue is "access to information". These websites are already blocked from within China, regardless of whether or not Google.cn lists them. The Chinese government is already blocking certain search phrases in Google, using filtering mechanisms that Google has no control over. No website previously available in China suddenly becomes blocked because of Google's decision to filter. (Though I will discuss how it is still harmful, below.)

The third issue, and the place where I feel that the most harm is done by Google's decision, is "compliance". If Google had refused to participate in the Chinese market under the specified terms, it could have contributed to the building of a legitimacy norm. Instead, other companies can now feel free to violate human rights when following the Public Pledge under the protection that they are "no worse than Google". For me, this is where the problem lies, and why I have to disagree with Google's decision. However, I believe that there are ways that Google can work to mitigate this damage, which I'll discuss later.

The fourth issue is "transparency", and here I feel that Google is much better than the rest. Transparency has become a major issue with respect to internet censorship, because it is so infrequently available. Companies that build censorware do not disclose the list of websites being filtered, because these lists are their own intellectual property. China, as well, does not disclose what content is being filtered, nor how. In fact, they even hide the fact that a website is being blocked: all that the user sees is an error page that is indistinguishable from a network error. Most companies that self-censor their services are doing so with an equal amount of secrecy about what they're filtering and why. Google, however, has promised to disclose when results have been removed, just as they currently do when they remove results from France and Germany, as already discussed. In these cases, Google has also posted the official takedown notice to Chilling Effects so that it can be publicly available. Google deserves acknowledgment for its efforts in terms of transparency in order to convince others in the field to follow suit. Transparency is so important because it's the first step towards corporate accountability.

So if Google is being "less evil" than the others in its field, why is everyone on its back? I think that this has something to do with the nature of Google in our lives. We hear a song on the radio, and Google its artist. We can't remember how many eggs go in this recipe, so Google for a similar one. Google provides us with maps of how to get from point A to point B, makes it easy for us to find that website without remembering its domain name, and allows us to find information about anything imaginable. We use it all the time and have difficulty picturing life without it.

I'm reminded of the Simpsons episode where Lisa gets a warning for failing gym and gets chewed out, whereas Bart's huge stack of warnings result in Homer's line: "I'm so proud you didn't try to forge my name. How about a present, son?". We expect more from Google just as we expect more from our straight-As student. Objectively, it's not fair. But what it says about Google is that we genuinely think of it as more than just another evil money-grabbing company: we expected a certain standard of ethics from it that we don't expect from any of the other tech giants.

So what now? There are two answers to that question: the first is "what can we do?" and the second is "what can Google do?"

The first step has already been taken: there's been enough outcry at Google's decision that the underlying issues are now being publicly discussed. Although protests are useful at raising the profile of this issue, switching to another (also censoring in China) search engine isn't; this issue goes beyond just Google. The second thing that can be done is that credit can be given where credit is due. If the steps that Google takes to try to improve the situation (for example, their transparency and protection of private data) are praised, then this can put pressure on other companies to try to meet this standard.

Additionally, pressure can be put on governments to get involved in these issues. In the US at least, Congress has been supporting a policy of engagement with China for decades, ignoring demands to penalize China until it improves its human rights record. There are also companies, many US based, who are doing far more damage in terms of internet censorship than Google is, for example any company that sells censorware to a country that is known for its internet censorship practices. Focussed political pressure could result in domestic legislation that prohibits the sale of filtering software to censoring regimes.

Lastly, we should be prepared to focus on all countries and not just China. China receives a lot of attention because of the current political climate and because its filtering is the most comprehensive, but internet censorship occurs all over the world and there are issues that go beyond this one country.

There are also a number of actions which Google can do in order to mitigate the situation. Google can make its filtering processes even more transparent: who decides which topics should be blocked, and how is it determined which sites belong to these topics? Additionally, Google should provide a transparent mechanism for users to request that misclassified content be unblocked.

Google should also review their decision on a regular basis. They state that if they're unable to achieve their objectives, they will not hesitate to reconsider their approach to China. I believe that it's extremely important that they follow through with this: their current position in China should be representative of what they feel is the best that they can do at any the given time. It should be a fluid position, improving as efforts are made (by them and us) to improve the situation.

Internet censorship is becoming increasingly common, and until active efforts are made to denounce this practice, we're likely to see more and more companies becoming complicit in this market. The situation has grown so bad that even Google felt that this was the lesser of two evils.

Despite everything, I haven't lost my faith in Google. I really and truly believe that if a more favourable option was presented to them, that they would take it. The hard part is going to be making that change happen. Google can help but they're not going to be able to solve this problem alone.

They're going to need our help.

"Roses are red,
Sugar is cane,
Who put the snakes,
On this motherfucking plane?!?!"

Just because a few months have passed since I last mentioned it doesn't give you any right to forget about everyone's favourite to-be-released film, "Snakes on a Plane"!

For those of you who haven't kept up to date with the festivities, let me bring you up to speed:

• Snakes on a Plane fan trailer (1)
• Snakes on a Plane fan trailer (2)
• Snakes on a Plane fan audio trailer
• The actual official Snakes on a Plane website (no content yet)
• Snakes on a Plane photoshop contest: what would other movies look like if they were named by the Snakes on a Plane guys?
• Tons of Snakes on a Plane merchandise brought to you by the guys from Snakes on a Blog
• An Original Song about Snakes on a Plane
• Real Screenshots from Snakes on a Plane

No news yet about when we can expect the real trailer to appear in theaters, but I assure you that I'll be there, front-row-center on the opening day. There's absolutely no way that this movie can disappoint me.

Watch it here

Remember: this is only a teaser, not a whole trailer, but it's the real one. Several squadrons of assassins had to die for me to bring this to you. Enjoy!

I'm drinking a chai latte at an organic coffee shop downtown while working on readings for my grad course on my iBook. fLufFy, across from me, is drinking a latte, eating granola and typing on her Powerbook.

In fact, I drew a picture to show how trendy this is:


You know what else is trendy? Taking a break from doing your readings to draw diagrams of how trendy you are. Oh wait, maybe that's "nerdy" instead of "trendy"...

Then again, being a nerd is trendy these days!

How convenient!