Why I Will Continue to Visit Jalopnik But...

seek to point out the hypocrisy and sleaze that exists as the ownership/editors of the Gawker media group within the Jalopnik and iO9 communities.  Sorry but I can't stand it anymore...I REALLY like Jalopnik and iO9 and their auto/sci-fi related content but I can't support the Gawker media group any longer...

I've often turned my nose up at the moronic and race/sex/economic baiting posts presented on their sister sites like Jezebel and Valleywag and often blanched at the nutjob left wing posts in some of the iO9 content but I didn't know the depths to which the owners/editors hypocrisy went...This article spells out a number of insane levels of scumbaggery they step to...We'll see if any of my future comments are posted on their sites--I doubt they will as calling out hypocrisy is almost never allowed...For all the crap that Gawker site Deadspin gives a site like Bleacher Report for being merely a search engine aggregating machine looking for clicks, at least Bleacher Report is open to virtually anyone with a computer to post and thus virtually agenda-less besides its search of the highest click through rates whereas Gawker has an inbred hypocrisy and political agenda pushed by one of the more disgusting human beings around.  Lets see how much we can irritate AJ Daulerio and Nick Denton shall we?

Look Who’s Gawking: Inside Nick Denton’s phony, hypocritical class war against tech workers (via Pando Daily)

By Paul Carr On December 26, 2013 “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” – Warren Buffett “Hypocrisy is the only modern sin.” – Nick Denton Last Friday morning…

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Early Adopters Buy Teslas....

Or at least it seems that way!

In addition to the newly minted Twitter millionaires in San Francisco likely running out to buy themselves a new Model S we now have another group of nouveau-riche that are picking up Teslas.

Yes, those lucky enough to have bought in on the BitCoin craze early enough are now turning their fortune around and spending their wealth on various things you would expect rich people to spend their money on...

First it was a trip to outer space via Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic who now accepts BitCoin for reservations (and smartly immediately cashes out of said BitCoins) and now there is the first (?) auto dealership that is accepting BitCoins as payment for their vehicles.

Newport Lamborghini of Costa Mesa, CA announced today that they had accepted payment in full via BitCoin for a Tesla Model S Performance.  Additionally they announced that accepting BitCoin is now part of their normal business process.  So if any of you have any BitCoins made via shipping arms to Chechen rebels you can now use it to pick yourself up what is THE status symbol of the early 2010's.

Tesla S Purchased with BitCoin...

Who's Coming to Commandeer a Boat in Portland, Maine With Me??

This is so William Gibson-esque its not even funny.

One of the world's largest, most technically proficient and futuristic corporations has a hand in mysterious floating barges popping up in harbors around the country.  On these barges are stacks of cargo containers holding who knows what.  Building and shepherding these barges around is by all accounts some small shell corporation with no history while the billionaire founder of said company drives his giant yacht up to said barges in order to do who knows what!!

Its like straight from a near-future sci-fi novel.  Maybe these are going to be Google Glass stores (but I don't think that's likely at all from the design and layout of these creations--too utilitarian at this point and besides...Google is already opening a retail store in NYC which fits in much better for the sale of hard goods than some floating apparatus.

There is little benefit for a very slow, moveable, retail store.  Why would you MOVE your store from NYC to say Baltimore anyway?  Wouldn't you be better off (from a sales perspective) having a stable location people know they can go to in order to buy your product?  No, a moveable data center removed from land and very possibly--the legal constraints surrounding being tied to a landmass (how about hosting a Bitcoin exchange or Pirate's Bay or Silk Road from an international waters, self sufficient, satellite linked datacenter?) makes a lot more sense.

Some one needs to get up to Portland and track the workers that are going to and coming from this ship and find out what is going on...now THAT would be some good journalism work!!  Much like finding out what was/is occurring at Groom Lake by tracking who was flying into and out of the satellite airport that catered to its workers, the same methods could be used here.  So who's up for renting a little motorboat for a few days in Portland and following around the comings and goings of these mysterious Google barges?!!?

Google Barges Popping Up Across Country....

Book Review: Ishi In Two Worlds

Published first in 1961 popular work recounts what came to be known about "Ishi" the last "wild" Indian in North America.

Walking out of the Northern California forests at the age of 49  in 1911 and arrested for trying to steal some meat, Ishi had spent the previous three years alone after the last of his tribe (Yahi) had either been killed or driven into extinction.

The book covers the long downward spiral of his tribe and northern California Indian tribes in general facing threats such as smallpox, land encroachment and just pure extermination by some of the Western settlers.  That Ishi and the Yahi hung on as long as they did was amazing and his brief incorporation into "modern" society in San Francisco is just as stunning.

The work doesn't have a lot of first hand material to work with.  Ishi could speak only minimal English before his death and no other Indians spoke his language (parts of, yes, but wholly? No).  Instead what material Theodora Kroeber had to work with were the recordings, writings and recollections of her husband Alfred Kroeber and other scientists and workers around the UCSF museum that he made his home during his brief stay in modern America.

The book is well worth the read covering a very interesting period in American history when the last vestiges of what we think of as the "old world" before the white man arrived, disappeared or mutated into reservation constrained perversions. In truth, to me the more interesting parts were those covering the decline of Ishi's tribe and culture vs. Ishi's efforts to eke out a life in modern society which, while necessary, are a sad denouement to what was a brave and remarkable life.