Gas Prices

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When I was a teenager, I played a paper-and-pencil game called Car Wars with a group of similarly geeky friends. In this game you designed armed and armored vehicles and played them against one another or in missions.

The game was set in the far future (2040s, maybe?), and one of the things that constantly reminded you of this was that most cars were powered by electric motors. Gasoline engines were available, and they gave superior performance, but gas prices were ludicrously high, a tactic which usually worked to discourage their use.

That “ludicrously high” price? Five dollars a gallon.

Looking at today’s gas prices, I suspect that five dollars a gallon by 2040 was… optimistic.

Spammity spam, spammity spam…

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SpamBayes marked this one “unsure” (only 87% probability of being spam) so I looked at it to make certain. Then I decided to give my tongue-in-cheek “answer” to it here:

To: (someone else’s e-mail address at my ISP)
From: jeanette (random nonsense e-mail address)
Subject: hi from jeanette

I would never have guessed.

Hi
It`s jeanette again.

Um, I kind of got that impression in the “from” and “subject” lines. Do you work for the Department of Redundancy Department?

Will you ever contact me?

The answer lies somewhere between “no” and “hell no.”

I made those nude pictures especially for you

Especially for me, eh? Hm, curious that you couldn’t even get my e-mail address right.

and I wont write to you again!

I should be so fortunate.

If you wanna see them just drop me a line at (completely different e-mail address)

Thanks, but I think I’ll pass.

What kind of complete drooling moron would actually reply to this kind of message?

Um… on second thought, I retract the question. I don’t think I really want to know the answer. 😉

“Pirate Party takes two EuroParl seats!”

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I have no objection to people getting compensation for their work. I’m happy to pay for value. But I find it nauseating that certain groups — who add no value to a product after its creation — think that they have the right to charge the public for it repeatedly and in perpetuity. There are very good reasons why copyrights were originally granted only for a very limited period of time.

But, as the music industry should have predicted would happen, their very public excesses of greed have spawned a backlash, and that backlash is gaining momentum. I’m not sure I’d support the Pirate Party (I’d have to take a careful look at what they really stand for first), but I have to applaud them for focusing the public’s attention on the problem.

As Cory Doctorow says, “This should be interesting.”