Jonathan Bailey writes: In short, Bello, an author who admitted to plagiarizing in her now-cancelled debut novel, wrote an article about the experience and, in that article, included poor paraphrasing without attribution of an article that I wrote over a decade ago. It’s a moment that even 16 years of work in this field did not prepare me for. To be honest, even as I write this, I am still…
Journalists at a Kremlin-controlled news website published at least a dozen anti-war articles today — a brave attempt to undermine the propaganda campaign attempting to justify Putin’s unprovoked and immoral acts of violence against the Ukrainian people. The articles were quickly taken down, but you can still read them on the Internet Archive. Internet Archive backup of Lenta.ru for May 9, 2022. One of Russia’s leading news websites, Lenta.ru, briefly…
In May, 2002, I was blogging about Rating historical movies on how accurately they represent period typefaces The average UK reader spends 17 minutes a day reading a newspaper, compared to 11 minutes reading a novel. Paul Dirac, honorary poet laureate of modern physics. Student web project on poet Stewart Conn’s “Luncheon of the Boating Party” Fired for making a game (a government meat popsicle creates a satirical game that…
Rewatching ST:DS9 Kira is annoyed to learn the Cardassians thought of her a minor errand-runner. The scene is played for comedy, but it also sets up Kira as proud of her accomplishments as a freedom fighter. The Kai Opaka pays a surprise visit from Bajor. Kira is a bit overwhelmed in the presence of her spiritual leader. Sisko offers to take the kai through the wormhole. Bashir invites himself along. …
Rewatching ST:DS9 At the bar, Quark and Odo bicker expositionally about this week’s guest stars, one of whom is killed by another in the very next scene. The victim’s twin brother swears vengeance against the shooter Croden. Odo suspects that Quark arranged for Croden to interrupt a surreptitious business deal and steal the macguffin, but just when the mystery gets going, the A plot drops: Croden casually compares Odo to…
The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, attacked a publication owned by the world’s third-richest man, Jeff Bezos, last month for reprinting a column published by the world’s 13th-richest man, Mike Bloomberg. The Bloomberg opinion article, posted by The Washington Post, asked whether Musk’s recent investment in Twitter would endanger freedom of speech. “WaPo always good for a laugh,” Musk wrote in a tweet, with smiling and crying emoji. The jab underscored an…
With the lethal threat of COVID-19 on the decline, many colleges are relaxing policies to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. Disability advocates fear that high-risk individuals will suffer. “Universities aren’t necessarily listening to disabled students,” said Eiryn Griest Schwartzman, who co-founded COVID Safe Campus, an advocacy organization for students and employees with disabilities. “That push to return to normal has persisted. It gets demoralizing, and it gets harder to…
Rewatching ST:DS9 In a runabout, Kira reluctantly expresses admiration for Bashir’s medical skill. Instead of humbly accepting the praise, Bashir monologues about his giftedness. A distress call brings them aboard a burning ship, where the pilot is dead, and a semi-conscious woman warns Bashir not to rescue a prisoner who started the fire. That prisoner regains consciousness long enough to grab Bashir and gasp, “Du musst Caligari werden” — no,…
Villanueva has repeatedly singled out LA Times reporter Alene Tchekmedyian, who is just doing her job by covering his department. Tchekmedyian has published a series of stories about an incident in which a deputy kneeled on an inmate — including an article on Monday regarding an allegation that Villanueva was implicated in a cover-up. At Tuesday’s press conference, Villanueva displayed and pointed to a photo of Tchekmedyian, plus one of his…
The whoops echoed through airplanes as flight attendants and pilots announced midair that a judge in Florida had tossed out the federal mask mandate that has been in effect since January 2021. On a Southwest flight from Nashville to Charlotte, passengers hooted and hollered and twirled their freshly ditched masks in the air with giddy delight. They reveled in the knowledge that while they might be required to buckle their…
Rewatching ST:DS9 After threatening a man who later turns up dead, Constable Odo becomes the prime suspect. The episode takes its time getting started, with character-driven bits developing Bashir’s one-sided interest in Dax, Sisko’s adjustment to his former mentor Curzon Dax’s new identity as Jadzia Dax, Sisko’s insistence that the Javert-like Odo play within the rules, Quark and Odo’s grumbly familiarity, the beginnings of a friendship between Jake and Nog,…
Rewatching ST:DS9 The pilot of a Bajoran ship under Cardassian fire requests asylum. Tahna is a former resistance colleague of Kira’s. Kira sees Sisko’s level-headed reaction as a sign of weakness, and on her own she works with Bajor to secure amnesty for her former comrade. A camouflaged Odo observes a clandestine meeting between Tahna and the Klingon sisters Lursa and B’Etor. The suspiciously charming Cardassian merchant Garak arranges to…
I think enough time has passed that I can tell this story. When I was a PhD student at the University of Toronto in the mid 1990s, the department asked me to sit through a week of undergrad presentations and proctor a final exam for my advisor, who needed to take a brief medical leave. I made a cup of tea for an afternoon of marking, tallied up and posted…
Many of the same people who reject masking and vaccinations on the grounds that they allegedly threaten the free will of the citizenry are perfectly OK with authoritarian police systems that harass and assault citizens who are exercising their First Amendment rights to a free press and free speech. If you’re worried that vaccines are part of a deep state plan to surveil and suppress the populace, what until you…
In April, 2002, I was blogging about Instructions for “Asking a Girl on a Date” (autistics.org) The Inform Beginner’s Guide (I edited this book on programming text adventure games in Inform 6) Broken Links: Just How Rapidly do Science Education Hyperlinks Go Extinct? (yes, the link was broken but I linked to the backup on the Internet Archive) Faking It: Sex, Lies and Women’s Magazines “Prenatal memory and learning” (language…
Still recovering from this morning’s three-hour training session. Huge echoey room. Lots of masked people talking, some of whom were shouting their comments and questions from their seats instead of using the microphones. When we were asked to share a time we felt excluded, I went up to the mic, mentioned my auditory processing disorder, and said I feel excluded right now by the people who weren’t using the…
Rewatching ST:TNG The newly promoted Lt. Ro, overwhelmed at a surprise “welcome back from tactical school” party, is disappointed when she sees Picard leaving. When it turns out he did so only so he could order her to report to him (and thus give her an excuse to leave the party), she’s grateful. After a brief action sequence introducing the Maquis raiders (Federation civilians and former Starfleet officers who oppose…
Rewatching ST:TNG An obviously troubled Cadet Crusher visits the Enterprise. Picard lays out muchies to prepare for an in-person visit from Admiral Necheyev, in an effort to make their relationship less confrontational. She notices and appreciates his efforts, but still gives him very difficult orders to relocate a colony founded by Native North Americans. Necheyev (having herself already voiced all the objections Picard brings up) feels this is a reasonable…
