The best best of list compilation for 2001 that I have run into. From - Fimoculous.com: Feeding Time
This (John Derbyshire on NRO) is truely sick stuff. Its a rather dated item. I went there via Mefi. I am embarassed that I even read NRO sometimes.
Reuel Marc Gerecht, a former CIA spy in the Middle East, argues that the only way to douse the fires of Islamic radicalism is through stunning, overwhelming, military force.
Atlantic Unbound | Interviews | 2001.12.28
Raphael Carter's Home Page from Sylloge.
Very cool personal site. Want to go back there and explore.
This Is Not a Test is a great op-ed piece in today's NYT about the latest flare-up between India and Pakistan in today's NYT
Jorge Colombo site has illustrations, pics, sketches from daily life in NY. (Via Mefi). Very cool.
My contribution to the public discourse on the Kashmir conflict in Metafilter.
......I can't believe that I spent so much time trying to explain my position on Mefi. I need to go back to functional reading.
Russia - its history, its land, its art and literature has always inspired awe in my mind. I dont quite understand what is happening in Russia today. Usually whatever happens there is of epic proportions and usually tragic in natureThis A story in today's LA Times about Putin's Q&A with the people make me feel so sad. I come from a country where people expect very little from there politicians. So a little bit of decency makes them grateful. And the politicians exploit that. Putin's exploitation of the media seems to be in similar vain. A lot of people write that this guy is different. That even KGB can breed a decent man. I certainly hope so. The tragedy of Russia, its maffia,its nuclear arms, its hard working and bitter and bright engineers,its alocoholism, the stoicism of its people - it all has the potential of coalascing into something very sad and potentially dangerous for the world.
Great Style Guide in Economist. Never noticed it before.
I start feeling outdated whenever I start reading a music magazine or go to a music review site. I usually dont know many of the names. Anyway, I have been browsing through the net scouring for the 'Best of 2001' lists and ran into the Jumping Fences list of best music of 2001. While I dont know many of the names mentioned there either, they have apparently covered over 20 year end issues to music magazines to arrive at their list. Should have a fair crop of mainstream music. of course, they have their own list too ...
A Hatred Smoldering In the Hills is a sad poignant story from a year old issue of NYT. I got the link while browsing through caterina.net. That site has references to lots of interesting books, art, music etc.
Dave Winer's Scripting News Weblog
AWESOME weblog about tech stuff in general and scripting in specific. Winer seems to define scripting rather broadly. Links to some other very cool weblogs. Actually most people probably know this site already. I just felt like linking to it.Not many people take off on Lessig just like that!
A slightly technical link:
TheServerSide.com - The State of The J2EE Application Server Market: History, important trends and predictions. Its a little outdated, but still quite relevant if you want a bird's eye view of what is happening in that space.
Among things that appear to have changed since the article has been written
- I am told that HP/Bluestone 8.0 is an awesome product, a huge improvement on the previous version AND open source to boot (though if the unlikely-to-happen marriage between HP and Compaq does happen, this product might be gone with the wind. I dont have much faith in Compaq's commitment to Java)
-IBM's Websphere is apparently playing catch up with BEA. A lot of bluechip clients are looking a lot more seriously at Websphere. IBM is also - cleverly branding their entire middlware product line (including MQSeries) Websphere. This would not only rub off some of the much deserved brand equity of those products onto Websphere -the application server, it may also allow them to claim a market share in advertisements that may not necessarily be that of application servers. That's a huge perceptual advantage. Between IBM and BEA, they may just redefine the application server /middleware space. Anyway, they are getting ready for a battle royale.
-iPlanet is trying to ride a 'Web services' wave. They certainly have a strong product line (Disclosure: My current employer is an iPlanet partner).
-Jboss - the freeware (?) product appears to be creating quite a buzz.
This post is probably very different in content from the others on this page. But I have committed myself to functional reading for the holidays. So, over the next fews days there would probably be more stuff in this vain.
I have been looking for a primer of Cyberspace law for some time. I stumbled into
'CyberSpace Law Lessons' while browsing this evening. Its written by very well respected people in the industry and appears to be good.
'Is Ripping a Crime?' is an account of firsthand experience with Universal Music's new copy protection technology. Its rather Funny.
At the risk of being considered a neanderthal, let me say I believe that the music companies should continue have a right to incorporate rights protection in their CDs. However, they are such complete buffoons about adapting to new technology and are so hamhanded about trying to protect their oligopoly, that I hate to admit that they have the moral right to do as they please with their property. I think Partick is being a smartalek, but it is because of smartaleks like him that the music industry is being forced willy nilly to adapt themselves to change.
'Rising Threat, Uneven Response' (washingtonpost.com) is another good story on US response to Terrorism during the Clinton years. Together they give a fairly comprehensive view of US thinking on terrorism during those years and what really went wrong.
'Broad Effort Launched After '98 Attacks' (washingtonpost.com) is a fascinating story about the behind the scene efforts to take out Bin Laden during the Clinton presidency.
This was the original, rather rambling Jonah Goldberg?s article on National Review about what John Walker's crossing the line and the media commentary on the subject says about the American society. It predictably took off on what he calls 'libertarians' and not so predictably took off on Andrew Sullivan too. I thought that it was rather well written and had some interesting, provocative ideas. It caused a predictable furore. Subsequently a lot of people including Andrew Sullivan (www.andrewsullivan.com) published rejoinders and Goldberg has been penning rebuttals ever since. I think what he wrote originally (including the NYT link the article points to) is worth reading. I havent bothered to read the subsequent articles
I rather like Jonah Goldberg's writing. At various points of time in my life, I have called myself a liberal or a centrist. I usually hate to declare myself - since you are then kind of expected to defend all sorts of orthodoxies associated with that position - that you may not agree with. And the label becomes a royal pain. Also I realize that my political and moral beliefs have evolved quite a bit over the last few years as I migrated across different cultural and gegraphical boundaries. If you are intellectually honest and lead an vibrant life where you are open to ideas - the absolute positions that you have taken in the past may in hindsight seem embarassing. Well, what I am trying to say here is - by Goldberg's definition, I would probably be considered a libertarian.
Journal E: Real Stories From Planet Earth is an incredibly beautiful site. There are a few new features. The story on the WTC tragedy by the Magnum photographers present some of most powerful images of 9/11
Thomas Friedman's columns in NYT are almost always very lucid, articulate, specially when he is writing about the middle East or Islamic fundamentalism. His years as foreign correspondent in the middle east light his commentary.Spiritual Missile Shield is right in the sense that Islamic countries do need better quality of leadership. I dont really agree with his view of the masses being hungry for a new breed of leaders. But that is food for another day.
In the Loop is one of my favourite columns for political gossip in DC. Al Kamen has a dry wit and there is very little that happens on the capitol that he doesn't get to hear about.
This log is primarily to showcase interesting links on the net that I come across. And when I have the time, energy and inclination - my scintillating commentary! ..Since I spend a lot of time on the net, I do run into lots of interesting stuff. Its a little tiresome going back to hotmail and sending out e-mails. So, from now on - whenever I have a good link, I would post it here. And whenever you guys get bored - you can check out this page :-).
For those of you who have been monitoring the travails of my previous weblog - the account on server101.com was a trial account. The account lapsed and the log got deleted. This one - hopefully - is for keeps.