Nice little interview with David Twohy, regarding whom I am a staunch fanboy. It’s mostly about Below with a little news about the upcoming three-movie Chronicles of Riddick. (Vin Diesel was here.)
Population: One
I’ve upgraded MovableType to the just released 2.5. Looks good. Perceptive people will note the search box on the left (for the fancy-pants version of the blog) or below the main title (if you’re reading the plain version).
Edit: I have also made a couple of small tweaks to the alternate view section of the sidebar. You don’t care about those but I wanted to point them out so that I could say “There’s one additional change I made; prize to the first person to notice it,” and not have people say “You added another syndication option.”
This post is mostly about this, but also about this.
For what it’s worth, I don’t find Gary Haubold’s comments very compelling. Let’s break it down.
He presents no evidence that “If (2) did not exist… then odds are WE WOULDN’T ACTUALLY HAVE TO DO ANYTHING…” Unless you count all caps as evidence; I don’t. He doesn’t state his premises. Which is a shame, because one of them (whether he realizes it or not) is that there’s no reason for Saddam’s inner circle /not/ to defect if they know Saddam is going to lose power.
But that’s flawed, by current pro-war doctrine. One of the stated reasons for invading as quickly as possible is that Saddam is the kind of person who would set off nukes purely for vengeance, in the event that he was losing a war. If he’d nuke the US in a case where it would gain him nothing, how much more likely is he to take revenge on his own people if they betray him?
I suspect that even if Saddam’s inner circle was inclined to defect, fear would a powerful incentive against that decision — even in game theory terms, which Mr. Haubold didn’t actually use. Risk analysis requires them to consider the possible outcomes of betrayal in combination with the probability of each outcome. When the worst outcome is torture, followed by death, the probability of that outcome doesn’t need to be too high before that decision starts looking bad.
It’s worse if these people care about potential torture and death for their families, of course.
That covers my opinion of Mr. Haubold’s game theory. However, even if you accept his odds at face value, it’s an interesting and rather abrupt jump from “odds are” to his pentultimate paragraph, in which he says that war protestors are doing damage to the war effort simply by protesting. No mention of the odds, whatever he thinks those odds are — it has gone from a matter of probability to a definite statement of fact.
Protestors are only doing damage if in fact Saddam’s inner circle would betray him in the event that the inner circle was convinced that the US would go after Saddam full-bore. Since that has not in any way been proven, or even analyzed, it’s premature to say we should recognize the damage protestors are doing.
Whether or not free speech is more important than engaging in hard-core fighting, finally, is a personal question. I believe that free speech is in fact worth fighting for, whether directly (as Voltaire had it) or indirectly (as in the situation Mr. Haubold posits). What are we defending, if not the principles of our nation?
It requires courage to willingly adopt a course of action that may lead to harm to oneself. This is true when applied to soldiers fighting a war. It is also true when applied to those protesting tactics which are both effective and unjust.
The House has passed a bill which will give small webcasters some breathing room. Small webcasters (i.e., the ones that aren’t making significant revenue) will pay 7% of their expenses in royalty fees yearly. This is very reasonable compared to the proposed .07 cents per song per listener.
It’s still higher than a traditional radio station pays, and there’s some question about how much of the resulting revenues will filter down to the artists. It’s important to remember that while this is better than the original proposal, it is not fair. It’s also important to remember that we ought to donate to our favorite stations, since they clearly need the cash.
Albeit I’m not much of an action figure guy, these Stikfas things are pretty darned cool. They’re basically stripped down articulated action figures, that come unassembled. You snap ‘em together and if such is your wont, you customize ‘em.
My fearless prediction: these are going to sell like hotcakes, particularly because they’ll tap into that need for customization I’ve talked about before. Reskinning your action figures? Sure, that’s cool.
The National Geographic Photo of the Day is absolutely great — your own little dose of National Geographic photography on a stick. I guess this is sort of the natural complement to the Astronomy Picture of the Day.
I honest to god am not sure why Below hasn’t gotten more attention. OK, sure, it’s a submarine movie, and we’ve seen one of those this summer. It’s a B movie, clearly. But surely Miramax remembers that David Twohy has directed two B movies so far, and while The Arrival kind of tanked there’s a rumor that Pitch Black did fairly well and launched some bald guy’s career.
Or perhaps they don’t. In any case, a week or so before it opens, they released a trailer. No spoilers in the trailer, although it gives the setup for the movie and makes it clear that it’s a horror flick. I am so much going to see this.
I’ve got to stop doing this; it’s raising my blood pressure.
But where does the Pentagon get off complaining about Iraq sneakily hiding arms before the UN inspectors arrive? I’m sure Iraq is hiding arms, yes; it’s a fairly obvious conclusion. Now. Who’s been holding back UN inspectors? Where’s the delay coming from? Hint: it’s not bloody well the inspectors dragging their feet.
The anonymous TPB, Esq. presents this compelling explanation of the proper interpretation of the word “shall” in New Jersey’s election law. It is compelling because he provides examples to support his argument; take careful note, oh pundits of all stripes. This is why I like most lawblogs.
You know how you can be muddling along in your life, never realizing there’s something missing, and then all of a sudden boom there it is? That one object that will fill the elusive hole in your existence? The object that calls to you, not like siren luring you to disaster, but like an old friend you’re meeting for the first time?
That’s how I feel about this. Now with Mac OS X support.