The US government announced yesterday that it is transitioning to relinquish direct control over the administration of the internet by ending its contract with ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) which is the organization that exerts stewardship over the internet by establishing protocols, assigning domain names, and bringing some order behind the scenes to the seemingly anarchic nature of the internet. The move by the US government has been welcomed by ICANN.
[Read more…]

In a effort to reduce pollution, the city of Paris has made its public transportation free for three days so that hopefully fewer people will drive their cars. Other French cities are doing the same in order to combat pollution levels that are approaching that of Beijing. France is undergoing a heat wave that is exacerbating the situation.
[Read more…]

The video below shows a man on a car-jacking spree, taking three cars in succession and driving the wrong way on an interstate before finally being caught. Practically the whole thing was captured by cameras from helicopters. It is incredible that no one seemed to have been seriously hurt. For more details you can read here.
[Read more…]

Some time ago, I discussed the question of how dominant cats were compared to dogs and the consensus seemed to be that it depended on the cat and the dog. But now I read of a case where a 22 lb Himalayan cat in Oregon is so dominant that not only is the family dog intimidated but so is the entire family. They had to lock themselves and their dog in a room and call 911 to recue them from the cat.
[Read more…]

With help from readers, I managed to solve the problem of spam flooding my mailbox that started happening at the same time I switched to the Mavericks operating system on my Mac.
[Read more…]

After procrastinating for some time, I downloaded the new Mavericks (aka, v. 10.9) of the Mac operating system. In general, the transition seems to have been smooth but there has been an odd quirk with respect to mail in that I am now being flooded with porn spam.
[Read more…]

I am not an early adopter of new technology. I tend to wait until I am sure that I really need or want it and often the new technology, like the mountain with Mohammed, comes to me without my seeking it, by becoming the default.
[Read more…]

Dr. John Michael Lonergan spent time in prison in Ohio for tax evasion, mail fraud, and healthcare fraud in Ohio and lost his license to practice medicine in 2005. But the forgiving people of Oklahoma decided in 2012 to let him practice in their state ‘under state supervision’ and in March 2013, the state medical board released him from the supervision and he was free to do what he wanted.
[Read more…]

Lawrence Mitchell, the dean of the law school at my university, has finally resigned from the deanship while continuing to be a tenured professor. He had been on a leave of absence while a lawsuit against him moved forward. The lawsuit had been brought by associate dean Raymond Ku who charged that Mitchell had retaliated against him for reporting numerous allegations of sexual misconduct involving students and faculty. (I know many of the law school faculty but have never met Mitchell who came here only in 2011. But I know and like Ku who has been here for some time. But not being in the law school, I have no inside knowledge on the merits of the charges.)
[Read more…]

Over at the Washington Monthly Mark Kleiman plugs the virtues of a new organization called Shatterproof that he thinks offers a promising way of helping people overcome alcohol and other drug addictions. That’s fine. What bothers me is this:
[Read more…]