Misc.

At the time I started blogging maintaining my personal web site had become a bore. A friend wanted to start a blog and asked for my assistance. Therefore, I started a blog to learn the mechanics of blogging. This friend has since decided it was not to their liking and chose not blog. Another friend has just started a blog. Why I kept blogging is a question that I have no honest answer to. I like reading other peoples blogs and enjoy the hunt to verify anything that is put out as “fact” without references to back it up. I do confess, one of the bloggers here has caught me “over stating”. I decided that if I took the time to research and verify, I might as well post my findings. Some days I am in the mood for political subjects, and, some days, I just want share a picture of my dog.

Craig at Donkey Path posted an interesting piece in reference to another blog’s article. Here is the line in Craigs post that I felt expressed an ideal worthy mention “… people who notice useful things need to get that information out more and they need to help each other do so.” It seems that I am not the only blogger around considering the questions of why people blog and their expectations. He also did a nice survey of the blogs listed on Technorati.

A slice of why the writers of some of the blogs I visit – blog (in no particular order):

A lot of us got involved on message boards long before we started commenting on blogs and then starting our own blogs; one of the primary motives is that tens of thousands of us felt the Bush Administration wasn’t being straight with us and the press didn’t seem to be doing its job. So people were scouring the Internet for news sources in the United States as well as all over the world.

Craig at Donkey Path

The reason was my disappointment of what I used to read about what and how the Middle East is represented to the world online. It was (and maybe still) an image drawn with black painting on a black background. I felt that I have a duty to do. At least try to erase one line from that dark painting and replace it with a white one that represent some of the unknown shiny facts about this part of the world. That’s when I decided to focus my own blog on Mideast. Slowly the blog topics encouraged healthy discussions, which encouraged me to write more on political, cultural, religious and life of Arabs.

Haitham Sabbah at Sabbah’s Blog

I got interested in weblogs a couple of months before the war when I accidently stumbled on Where is Raed by Salam Pax. I was impressed, then I discovered other blogs and got hooked to this new medium of interaction with the world. After the war other Iraqis joined the scene such as Riverbend which had quite an impact on me. I had become frustrated with the negative media coverage from Iraq so I decided to start a blog myself to present the positive side which was not getting enough attention.

Zeyad at Healing Iraq

it occurred to us that there are too many fine blogs getting overlooked outside the top-rated sites. So I intend to browse the blogosphere at my own idiosyncratic pace and catch some of the better blogs and posts I find

Poechewe at Cold Flute

I spent an hour surfing looking for reasons people blog. Of all the reasons I found, for some reason, this one stood out:

Back in Jun of 2002, my friend Wu Hao told me a story about the monk and the well. It was about two monks living in the same mountain. Both of the two monks go to river far away to get water. One year later, one monk did have to go to the river while the other had to go. The reason is, the smarter monk used the year to dig a well by himself everyday, while the other one did nothing. It reveals the importance of accumulation

Jian Shuo Wang’s Blog

Here is a blog that I visit everyday. I have no idea why I do. I have no idea why Eugene started blogging. I never know what the topic will be or where he is going but it is another view in the blogoshere. Eugene if you read this I will try and remember to close my tab in Firefox when done reading. Eugene wants readers – lets us give him a few – why not?

Eugene Weixel at Fat Old Jewish Guy Who Lives In The City

My friend impeachinator has started a blog Smell Test. I hope you take the time to drop by. She is a very intelligent woman and with the help of other blogger’s I hope she will master the blogoshere and get her voice heard.

Now the question is…why do I blog? . … . .If you have an idea why I blog please give me a clue.

With all the surveillance initiatives, programs, and policies it would be easy to think that we are safer than ever. I personally do not see how scanning my email, web communications, or listening in on my phone conversations with my mother can be a good thing. I have only heard of one account where this use of technology has saved me from anyone. I guess that is classified. I have read numerous accounts of Homeland Security taken overboard and blog authors discussing privacy rights.
Not to worry some say, the government is doing all this to keep us safe and secure. What are we sacrificing? Pre Patriot Act and warrant less times, I never thought much about discussing topics that might include the words bomb, a terrorist related name, nasty comments about the President, Congressional members, or the ELF fires. Now, I think about these words and how I use them. I would like to tell you that I have nothing to fear, after all if I am not doing anything wrong, why worry. I am not as worried as I am disgusted. I assume that if I were a terrorist that I would know enough to realize that Uncle Sam is listening and would circumvent the system somehow.

How many citizens will be falsely accused, questioned, maybe detained over false computer interpretations analyzing threat potentials. We already know our government disregards the grand daddy of law, our Constitution. Some wayward military personal find nothing wrong with torturing their prisoners and to heck with the Geneva Convention. I no longer trust my governments system to work for me and not against me if caught in this situation.

Racial profiling, our presence in Iraq, and rhetoric about the Clash of Civilizations creates more terror. Mass surveillance, tracking, biometrics, Echelon, Carnivore, Magic Lantern, MATRIX the infrastructure of the operations roadmap is surrounding us, systems that may convert our constitutional republic into a very large panopticon.

“… each man is a coded number and the telescreens spy on every activity.”

“Science and technology were developing at a prodigious speed, and it seemed natural to assume that they would go on developing. This failed to happen, partly because of the impoverishment caused by a long series of wars and revolutions, partly because scientific and technical progress depended on the empirical habit of thought, which could not survive in a strictly regimented society.”

George Orwell in 1984

Winston Smith, the protagonist in George Orwell’s novel, 1984, ultimately had nowhere to hide.