lix blog

“Man gestattet uns regelmässig Demokratie zu spielen”
One regularly grants us to play a little democracy.
Hagen Rether

If you are not paying for it, you are not the customer. You are the product.

“No mud No lotus!”

Hagen Rether‘s Auftritt bei “Neues aus der Anstalt“.

English transcription:
(Link to Youtube video with english subtitles)

Rether! Hello.

Winners don’t exist any more. Only loosers exist nowadays. There are just to types of loosers. The guilty ones and the un-guilty ones.

In Libya there were no winners as well. But a Libyan now has the possibility having four women again. Wouldn’t this be the moment introducing womens rights now? Let us bomb Libya.

Since Peter Struck are SPD ordered air strikes a suitable mean for development aid. Democracy-bombers, we’re sending now. Because it’s so easy. Now Peter Struck became a member of the board of the “Friedrich Ebert Foundation”. Poor Friedrich Ebert. If he knew, he would alternately turn over in his grave and vomit, turn over in his grave and vomit, turn over in his grave and vomit.

And if, in Afghanistan, the aid of the women would continue to be so successful, we should be obligated to do so as well in other coutries. Everything else would be failure of performance. In Uzbekhistan, where women are being kidnapped, and in Saudi-Arabia where they aren’t alowed to drive a car. But we just don’t bother. It’s just not our business. We don’t even manage to support the opposition in Syria or in Iran. We just don’t bother. We don’t see any interest. It’s not our business.

Let us finally bomb India, for example. In India half a billion women are living in a caste system, which has nothing to do which rights for democracy, human rights or rights for women. But we fly there for Goa parties for enjoying the Ayurveda massages. They even get the nuclear weapon, as India is known for being a stable democracy.

There we stand in Calcutta with our back pack and watch how the kids are dying in the sunk. “Come on Hagen this is a tradition in India. The Indian does not know other than his caste system. They have a total different handling over dead and poverty. Who are we to think we should interfere, this would be arrogant and colonial.” “Yes true.” “Further the Indian lives from tourism. How would it be if India could finally live from what it produces? But no they aren’t allowed to do so. They get seeds by Monsanto, which doesn’t work. Thousands of Indian farmers commit suicide, which isn’t so bad for us, as the farmer’s widows perfectly know how to offer us Ayurveda massages.”

We just don’t bother. We don’t see any interest. It’s not our business.

And here everyone shouts for transparency and information. For the sake of what? We don’t do anything with it. We know everything, but don’t permutate our know-how. We would have to change our lives. Information for the sake of informing? That doesn’t help.

We know all under what poor circumstances these iPhones are being produced. But instead of feeling bad about it we buy that crap and stand in the queue for it. And Bill Gates, ahm sorry, Steve Jobs will be praised as employer-god for the next 300 years and clever inventor. “Hey Hagen, they don’t even have agreed wages in China. You can’t compare that. If the Chinese or the Indians would pay agreed wages, IKEA could close their business.”

Try buying a jogging suite in a store here which doesn’t come from a oblique Police state. We just don’t bother. We don’t see any interest. Nothing. Never. It’s not our business.

Mexico? I don’t know anything about it. I know that they starve because they can’t bake Tortillas any more, as the Maize price is being speculated to high. Our cattle gets that stuff in Germany and the rest used is as fuel.

“Oh shit the mineral oil is getting scarce soon. What should be using to tank up now?” “Mhmmm. Let us maybe tank up aliments.” “Oh good idea, but not our aliments, theirs.” “Well sure. It also was their mineral oil, stupid. Moron.”

We just don’t bother. We would have to do something. Which is silly. No we don’t. We are happy as it is.

And we think these undemocratic misogynist tribal structures in Afganistan are unappetising. Where we should do something against it. “Let us finally bomb the Masai in Africa. They live in tribal structures there. A Masai women is worth less than a sugar beet.” Is this of interest to us? “The Masai need elections for mayors, WIFI, suburban railways and washing machines. The Masai warriors marry 12 and 14 year old girls. This is unsupportable for us democrats. We should bomb away these Masai finally. This is hardly bearable. The Masai warriors will then be transmuted into ISAF Police men and the girls then go to schools and the kids being adopted by Madonna. For that they learn waht Democracy is. And then we’ll do this everywhere.”

Sure. It’s about free trade, not about Democracy. Horst Köhler (former German President) was the only guy who had the guts to name that we’re waging economical wars and a week later he was gone. It’s about free trade. And after that in the future we can sell our subsidised chicken feet to the Masai. – Happy christmas goose!

The preparations for the upcoming 28th Chaos Communication Congress are under way, the content team scheduling the 4 days congress plan, examining and extracting the presentation submissions. The pre-sale ticket system can be found on presale.events.ccc.de and reduced train tickets ordered at the Deutsche Bahn Website.

Find further information on the CCC events blog

Cory Doctorow: It’s Time to Stop Talking About Copyright

“The story of modern Internet regulation and copyright goes back (at least) to 1995 and Al Gore’s National Information Infrastructure hearings, where Bruce Lehman, Bill Clinton’s copyright czar, pushed for expansive new copyright rules for the net. These proposals were pretty bonkers, so Gore sent him packing, and he scurried off to Geneva, to the UN’s World Intellectual Property Organization, where he instigated the WIPO Copyright Treaty, which became US law in 1998, as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

We’ve been arguing about copyright and the Internet for at least 16 years now, and the arguments keep going back and forth over well-defined ground, wearing deep grooves in the discourse.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the 21st century: copyright policy ceased to exist. Because every copyright policy that we make has a seismic effect on the Internet, and because you can’t regulate copying without regulating the Internet.” […]

read more

Jürgen Trittin: “Wenn Sie heute das Gesetz ansehen, das entspricht ziemlich genau dem, was ich 2001 in den Deutschen Bundestag eingebracht hab’. Also die geistige Leistung von Frau Merkel ist, was den Atomausstieg angeht, ungefähr so gross wie die geistige Anstrengung des Herrn zu Guttenberg die er bei seiner Doktorarbeit aufgebracht hat.” (Min. 49:22)
Quelle: ZDF Mediathek

… when humans are as stupid as digital e-mail address validators.

=^.^= !

This is becoming a hassle again. The way the Apple operation system OS X evolves is not convenient to my personal needs and the way I want to use my computer. Apple managed to incorporate impure and illicit functionalities into their operation system, that locks the user into a product range, which they control. The users freedom of choice and control fades away, thus OS X Lion is based on BSD UNIX. The command line is the only application that is turning out to allow full straightforward and controlled accessibility to the system and information. After intensively having tested and deployed OS X Lion, I decided that my next computer has to be a complete GNU/Linux machine again. Steve is dead now anyways, so things won’t improve.

Looking around in the local stores, no vendor seems to offer a up-to-date notebook computer, which respects the users choice for freedom. Either I am offered a 1 years old computer, for which I would have to wait for 3 weeks, or I’d have to “bite into the sour apple” and buy a computer, which, – illicitly, – comes together with an operation system, for which I’d have to pay for, thus I’d never use it.

In my e-mail to Lenovo I get the answer:

“Dear Alex,
Thank you for contacting Lenovo.
We apologize. We do not support any other Operating System apart from Windows.
Sincerely,
Deboshree Mukherjee”

… whereas my answer follows like

“Dear Deboshree

That is very sad to read. Sounds like your company is bound to unfair
competition* and does not allow users freedom either.

Do I at least have the possibility to acquire a computer, without
having to pay the license of an operation system, such as M$ Wind00ze,
which I wouldn’t use?

Sorry to say that I won’t acquire a computer that forces me to use an
operating system that is unresistant to viruses and locks me into the
choice of the manufacturers formats and applications.
How comes that M$ is legally capable to establish such a contract with
your company that your products are bound to an operation system that
violates human rights?
Thus technology still evolves thanks to innovators, that are freely
sharing their ideas and creativity, based on the principles that
know-how and knowledge want to be free (as in freedom).

Let me kindly remind you, that your company, that was former IBM, has
historically evolved based on this principles!

As I am working in the field in technology research, I strongly have
to make sure, that I have complete control over my devices and
instruments. – This is only possible with software that is
non-proprietary, such as GNU/Linux & UNIX.

Wishing you all the best & remaining with kindest regards, Alex

*(which in my country is a crime.)”

I need a hardware manufacturer and vendor who grants me my human rights and freedom, without violating international competition laws and rights.

[Update 4th of October 2011]
Lenovo, – surprisingly, – writes back.

“Dear Alex,

Thank you for your feed back and for your time and patience! We will surely forward this e-mail to the appropriate department to review for the betterment of the company. Thank you once again.

Sincerely,
Deboshree Mukherjee”

“Dear Deboshree

Thank you for your e-mail.
Would be great, if you could forward our correspondence to the respective department. I appreciate and, – honestly, – did not expect and answer.

I am sure you understand my concern and hope that we can establish a fair business relationship. It would be disappointing to see that your great computer products couldn’t be used together with an operation systems that guarantees freedom.

Have a good weekend and looking forward to read you soon again, Alex”

For its membership to take effect*, Palestine must sign and ratify UNESCO’s Constitution which is open for signature in the archives of the Government of the United Kingdom in London.

Palestine’s entry will bring the number of UNESCO’s Member States to 195.

The vote was carried by 107 votes in favour of admission and 14 votes against, with 52 abstentions.

Admission to UNESCO for states that are not members of the United Nations requires a recommendation by the Organization’s Executive Board and a two thirds majority vote in favour by the General Conference of Member States present and voting (abstentions are not considered as votes).

The General Conference consists of the representatives of the States Members of the Organization. It meets every two years, and is attended by Member States and Associate Members, together with observers for non-Member States, intergovernmental organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Each Member State has one vote, irrespective of its size or the extent of its contribution to the budget.

The General Conference determines the policies and the main lines of work of the Organization. Its duty is to set the programmes and the budget of UNESCO. It also elects the Members of the Executive Board and appoints, every four years, the Director-General.

Source
Video Link

Congratulations!

… but! Neo-Imperialism: U.S. pulls UNESCO funding after Palestine is granted full membership.

BOYCOTT U.S. now!