So, about NGOs. Non-governmental organizations, if you’re not down with the acronyms. I think the events of the last five years have made it patently clear that NGOs of whatever sort can have a huge effect on the world we live in. Example one is 9/11. Al Qaeda is not a government in any sense of the word, but they’ve touched everyone who lives in the United States and most of the rest of the world. Example two is Microsoft. The antitrust trials of the last few years have been simply fascinating from the point of view of a territorial government trying to deal with an economic powerhouse whose interests don’t coincide with the country in which it resides. Further, when Bill Gates gives a hundred million dollars to India to combat HIV — that’s power; that has results. ...

I’ve been peering at this Scripting News post about cell phones (original) all day, trying to figure out what struck me as weird about it. I finally figured it out. Check this quote: “So why not make them just a teensy bit bigger and put a real qwerty keyboard on the darn thing and let me type into it like a human being.” That seemed totally reasonable to me the first zillion times I read it. I just went out and got a Sidekick, cause I wanted a keyboard on my cell phone. But wait — “like a human being.” He wants a keyboard-based interface, cause he wants to use the cell phone for more than just the classic telephonic voice based interface. “Like a human being.” ...

Shut Out: A Story of Race and Baseball in Boston looks like a fascinating book, judging from this interview. I’d never heard the Jackie Robinson story, but being a serious Celtics fan, the issues surrounding race and Boston sports have interested me for a while. He seems to have at least a little to say about basketball, although his surprise at the color barriers broken by the Celtics makes me wonder about his general research. Tagged for later consideration. ...

In keeping with my theme for the day (terseness. will talk more later), here’s a quick link to a Bruce Sterling interview. It’s happening right now. Like, real time. Maybe it is to talk about it in this thread, which is hijacked from Boing Boing. Transfictionalism now!

This is what we call an excellent cause. You know what’s even better? The people he’s trying to help grow coffee (original). This matters; donate if you can.

Happy Tolkien’s eleventy-first birthday! At 9 PM, raise your glass and toast “The Professor.” (Via MetaFilter.)

We pause in our mobile blogging frenzy to present some biographical information regarding Jarvis A. Wood. They say you should find your niche and stick with it; possibly this is mine. Someone asked, by the by, if I knew who the businessman mentioned in regards to the Sherman Act in Special Delivery 2. I don’t know, but I’ll see what I can dig up. The following excerpts are from The History of an Advertising Agency, Ralph M. Hower, Harvard University Press, 1949: ...

I’ve watched this trailer around five times now. Last night, this morning. Watching it again right now. And I believe. Yes, I do. I have no qualms about saying this: In 2003, Uma Thurman will Kill Bill (original).

It’s pretty much traditional among a certain class of geek bloggers to come up with a way to set up an email->blog gateway. I’ve sort of put this off for a while, but since I’m pretty sure I’m about to go out and indulge in a Sidekick (original), the day can be delayed no longer. Thus: this entry, which was in fact posted wholly from within my email client. Which is mutt, and you can’t tell me that doesn’t make it worse.

This Christmas, my mother gave my brother and I complete sets of something that my great-great-grandfather (my maternal grandfather’s maternal grandfather), Jarvis A. Wood, wrote every Christmas for the last several years of his life. They’re little booklets in ivory covers, about half the size of a mass market paperback and perhaps forty pages thick. The words “Special Delivery” are embossed on the front, along with hashmarks in later years to mark the volume number. The first one, which I’m looking at right now, is printed in red and green — mostly green, with lovely use of spot color. Inside the front cover there’s a little sketch of a tag, inscribed “Tag! You’re it!” It’s also signed, by hand, “Uncle J.” Turn the page, and there’s the title page in front of you. A photograph of the author is glued to the left hand page. If you’ll allow me the liberty, I’d like to share some of his writing with you. I find myself struck by his eloquence, and his turn of phrase. He was a minister, and worked in advertising, so perhaps his skill with the word is not entirely surprising. The year is 1912; it’s Christmas. Turn the page again.