Please, DON'T Think Of The Children

Original Article HERE On CNN

You know, I'm not normally one to say 'leave people alone' who are probably doing bad things, but seriously, maybe we should leave these polygamists alone. Why? Well, eventually, they'll inbreed themselves into extinction. On top of that, studies have shown that genetic disorders of all sorts plague these kinds of people. (Well, any kind, actually. Amish folks suffer the same kind of effects due to the small gene puddle.) Sooner or latter, without any 'fresh' genes at their disposal, they'll run into all kinds of issues that will make sure no one will ever want them as a spouse. (Or otherwise, ew!)

War crimes?

I have followed the issue of the John Yoo torture memos with a certain amount of horror, but without really probing the implications. So this came as something of a shock

That is, it doesn't concern Yoo's ideas about the laws or communication of same; it concerns credible allegations that Yoo acted directly and deliberately, in his capacity as an employee of the US government to facilitate war crimes.

(Henry Farrell at Crooked Timber)

I have called things war crimes from time to time. I have enjoyed reading reports of war crimes indictments laid against various of the neocons in European courts. But on a certain level I saw it as hyperbole - it may be true, but on some level I didn't really feel that people like Rumsfeld set out to commit war crimes. Yoo's writings are different. I'm pretty sure that he didn't instruct people to commit war crimes. But unlike some of the others, it seems pretty clear that he did his best to allow them to happen.

NBC's "Friday Night Lights" DirecTV Deal: Big Win For BitTorrent

Good news for "Friday Night Lights" fans: NBC didn't cancel it! Bad news: Fans of the show without DirecTV have to wait until February to see the season when it airs on NBC.

Wait-- did someone say filesharing?

The backstory: NBC sold first-run rights for the third season to DirectTV, which will put the show on the air next fall. NBC did that to help finance the show, which has plenty of buzz, but low ratings. NBC gets to air the show (which it also owns) in February after the Super Bowl, six months after it starts on DirecTV.

The show won't be on the Web legitimately until February, when it will be released to NBC.com and Hulu after the first airing on the network.

So here's the conondrum for rabid "Friday Night Lights" fans (we know at least one) this fall: Wait until February while the privileged few DirecTV subscribers get to go back to Dillon, Texas (a non-starter); subscribe to DirecTV (a hassle, and costly); or familiarize themselves with Bittorrent (cheap and free.) Predictions?

Paramount's Clip Strategy: Pay Us, Or Don't

Movie clips online = great promotion, right? Not according to Viacom's Paramount: The movie studio thinks they can be money generators, too.

The company is launching a service where players in the virtual worlds vMTV (owned by Viacom) and There.com (Makena Technologies) can get Parmount movie clips and display them above their virtual heads for $1 a piece.

We're assuming that Paramount will argue that these are the virtual world's equivalent of ring tones: Not content as much as "personalization" bric a brac. But to us they look like ads for Paramount movies. Just like the clips Paramount offers through its VooZoo app on Facebook -- for free.

So if you want to play a line from "Grease" while you're hanging out in the virtual 'Pimp My Ride' room, you'll have to pay a dollar. Meanwhile the millions of people that have lives can do the same thing, gratis.

Here's our "Grease" fix: