links for 2009-07-02

"
It's true that Borden's father, David Borden Sr., initially wrote a personal e-mail about the visit, according to Master Sgt. Joseph Liptok, the deputy director of the Marine Corps liaison office at the medical center. But, Liptok told us, the chain e-mail now being forwarded and posted on Web sites is an altered version of the original. He also emphasized that the views in the chain e-mail are not those of 1st Lt. Borden. We made several attempts to speak with Borden and his father, but they declined to comment."

"And Bachmann is flat wrong about ACORN going door-to-door and gathering data. Being "partners" with the Census Bureau doesn't entail as close a relationship as one might think. For the most part it involves getting the word out that it's important for everyone to participate in the decennial event that helps determine where federal money goes and how House of Representatives district boundaries are redrawn." So basically ACORN is doing nothing.

"We’re not indexing all of Twitter at this time… just a small set of prominent and prolific Twitterers to start. We picked a few thousand people to start, based primarily on their follower count and volume of tweets. We think this is an interesting first step toward using Twitter’s public API to surface Tweets in people search." Bing now including tweets, I'm interested.

"A press release from NASA: Ulysses, a joint NASA and European Space Agency mission, officially ceased operations today, after receiving commands from ground controllers to do so. The spacecraft, which operated for more than 18 years, charted the unexplored regions of space above the poles of the sun." Sad to see this amazing mission ending.

"This is a classic example of the Gay Panic Defense. In the very recent past all a straight man who brutally murdered a gay man had to say was, "He made a pass at me!", and the jury would ignore the evidence and let the murderer off. The Gay Panic Defense doesn't fly in many courts of law these days but it still has currency in the court of public opinion. And the chief of police in Forth Worth, a major U.S. city, is attempting to use the Gay Panic Defense to convince the citizens of Fort Worth to ignore the evidence—to ignore photographic evidence and credible eyewitness accounts—and let his officers off." Dan Savage on the raid of the Rainbow Lounge.

"A photo ostensibly showing a 15-year-old nude girl has appeared in an iPhone app, highlighting Apple’s inability to safeguard its application store from prohibited content." Oh great, though we all knew it was going to happen.

"Some 20 net users have come forward claiming they have been wrongly accused of illegally sharing video games." This is news?

"The newly installed government in Honduras has rejected international calls to reinstate deposed President Manuel Zelaya. The Organization of American States has given Honduras a 72-hour deadline for reinstatement or warned it could face suspension from the regional group." I'm shocked they didn't undo the coup.

A new site designed essentially as a social networking site for gadget lovers.