I’d like to ask a favor of all my readers. If you’ve heard of a bill in Congress called SOPA, but you don’t know exactly what it is, please click this link and read about SOPA now.
Up until today, I’d heard that it was something that a lot of people opposed, including big tech companies like Google, Amazon, Facebook, and Twitter, and that I should oppose it too. Now that I’ve read about SOPA, I realize how much it could limit people’s freedom on the Internet. Honestly, if someone showed me this proposed law and asked me to guess which country was trying to put it into effect, I would guess China, Syria, or Iran. Please take the time to read about SOPA and make up your own mind, but to me it seems like it would send social media into the Dark Ages.
Okay, on with the news. Grace Askew plays an acoustic set at the Blind Bear from 8-11 PM tonight. Should be a good show and I plan on being there.
Congratulations to the Union Mission. Their expansion was approved by the Land Use Control Board yesterday, so they’ll soon have more space to serve those in need.
I’ve posted this once before, but in case you missed it, @RealTimeWWII is a great Twitter account to follow. It’s tweeting the Second World War day by day from 1939 to 1945. Today it’s tweeting wartime news as if it were January 13, 1940. Things are starting to heat up: Belgium is mobilizing its forces at the German border in preparation for an invasion, and Jews in Poland are being sent to labor camps. Berliners are required to get an ID card for their half-pint daily ration of skim milk. The account lets you learn about the war in a way not possible with history books. There are often links to photos or historical documents in the tweets.
This is really cool: Amazon now provides software to make documents available to Kindle devices. The documents are converted to PDF and then sent to Kindle. Over the past three years, I’ve typed up a lot of notes on poker books I’ve read. I’d love to have those notes on my Kindle Fire and iPhone Kindle App. The downside: I’m going to have to fire up my rarely-used netbook to get the files transferred, because the transfer tool is not yet offered for Mac OS.
All right, time for lunch. I’ll be at the Bear for Grace Askew’s show. Plans before and after TBD.