Meandering Monday: a few good articles

I don’t know about where you live, but it’s a glorious day here in Southwest Washington. I can’t really imagine that you have your nose stuck to the screen. But if so, I hope you’re outside–and here are some good articles I’ve run across recently in my meanderings around the Internet.

Oh, and don’t forget the sunscreen.

Article: Sharia Do Like It

good articles: woman in burkha

(CCL CharlesFred)

Why you may want to read it: Britain’s Economist runs a feature called Graphic Detail: a new chart or map each day, often interactive and with interesting external links. Oh, I know, it sounds a little wonky, but take “Sharia Do Like It.”

What exactly do Muslims who support sharia law mean by that, anyway? How does Islam in Afghanistan compare with Islam in, say, Kazakhstan? And how do fans of sharia feel about religious freedom, anyway?

Excerpt: Almost 80% of Egyptian Muslims say they favour religious freedom and a similar number favour sharia law. Of that group, almost 90% also think people who renounce Islam should be put to death. Confused? So are they.

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Web-crawling Wednesday

This whole flu thing is getting old, I must say. But, hey, my loss is your gain. Instead of listening to me blather on about a topic of my choice, you get to pick your topic today–and then listen to somebody else write about it.

Here are a few interesting articles I’ve run across lately. Pick whatever appeals to you. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.

Article: “In Defense of Skipping College and Enrolling in the Real World”

people in caps and gowns at graduation

(CCL Off. of Gov. Patrick)

Why you may want to read it: Because two-thirds of college graduates leave with debt, with an average of $26,600 per student. Because nearly half of all recent college grads are working at jobs that don’t require college degrees. And because you want to find out what neoteny means. You know you do.

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Warrantless wiretaps and the NSA’s cloak of invisibility

(CCL agitproper)

The Director of National Intelligence admitted last Friday that the National Security Agency (NSA) has violated the Constitution’s prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures.

A letter released by his office late last Friday says that:

on at least one occasion the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court held that some collection carried out pursuant to the Section 702 minimization procedures used by the government was unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.

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Offline: Diary of a year without the web

 

laptop online with three windows open

(CCL Robert S. Donovan)

Dear Diary,

I just spent 24 hours entirely without the internet for the first time I can remember in my adult life. . . .

The moment I reached down and unplugged the ethernet cable from my computer, I felt like school was out for the summer, and the simultaneous relief and boredom that last bell brings. I stood up, and I realized that I’d been anticipating this moment for ages, but for some reason I hadn’t made any plans.

That’s Paul Miller blogging over at The Verge, a tech news website that aims to not only report breaking tech news but also to talk about how technology is changing our culture. Miller, a senior editor at The Verge, signed offline–for a year–at the stroke of midnight May 1st.

But wait, you say. How does this work? How can a guy blog about being offline?

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Friday round-up: updates on recent posts

May 23rd post: Egypt’s presidential election (and why it may be more important than ours)

Campaign signs with candidate photos on a pillar

(CCL Zeinab Mohamed)

Egypt is in trouble.

Big trouble.

Egypt’s Supreme Constitutional Court, all Mubarak appointees, orchestrated a bloodless coup yesterday, just before this weekend’s scheduled presidential run-off election.

The top two vote-getters in the May presidential primary–former dictator Hosni Mubarak’s last prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, and Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsi–are scheduled for a run-off election tomorrow and Sunday.

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Maya’s story: Everyone deserves a voice

Little girl in little chair with standard poodle beside her

Maya and Parker (Courtesy Dana Nieder)

Imagine that you’ve just turned four. (If you really did, you can skip this part.) Your name is Maya. And you are, to quote your mother, wiggly and giggly. You’ve got a mischievous streak, and a perfect partner in crime: Parker, your standard poodle.

Now. Imagine that you can’t speak. You can say “done.” And, sometimes, “bye” and “mama” and “dada.” But the muscles that control your speech production are just too weak and disorganized to get you any further.

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Big Brother is watching: military surveillance drones in the land of the free

small unmanned drone (1)

(CCL Danny Choo)

Unmanned surveillance drones: They’re not just for war zones any more.

In fact, they’re coming soon to a city, town or sheriff’s office near you.

The FAA predicts 30,000 drones overhead by 2020 after Congress passed an FAA Reauthorization Act in February ordering the FAA to fast-track introduction of drones into American airspace.

They’ll have many good uses, of course: looking for lost kids, missing hikers and adults with Alzheimer’s, fighting forest fires, monitoring our borders, and so on.

But that’s not all.

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