Johannes og jeg så Max Manus på Ringen Kino i går kveld. Ringen Kino var ikke noe spesielt, men filmen kan jeg anbefale på det høyeste, særlig til andre innvandrerer. Den gir mye innsikt i norsk kultur and historie, men ikke i det minst er den en engasjerende og rørende film i seg selv. Ringen og Gimle Kino har dessuten filmen i en tekstet versjon–tekstet på norsk–noe som kan gjøre det mye lettere for folk som ikke har norsk som morsmål å få utbytte fra filmen, men jeg hadde ingen problemer med å forstå dialogen.

I kveld ser jeg Død Snø. Jeg regner med at det blir litt mindre intenst.

FOTO: PATRICK BAZ/AFP

Munitions expert Per Nergaard from Norsk Folkehjelp believes that it’s almost certain that Israel is using DIME weapons in Gaza.

DIME weapons contain tungsten, which, in addition to providing the smaller but much more intense blast radius that’s in demand now due to the trend toward warfare in more densely populated areas, is also a known carcinogen.

Mads Gilbert and Erik Fosse, the two Norwegian doctors who came back from Gaza yesterday, reported seeing dismemberments of the kind caused by these weapons. Gilbert expressed concern that Gaza is being used as a test lab for new weapons. At a press conference at Gardermoen earlier today, he said, “We’re not thin-skinned when it comes to war injuries, but these amputations are really extremely horrifying, and unsurvivable for many of the patients”.

2008–2009 Israel–Gaza conflict: Casulaties and Israeli–Palestinian conflict: Casualties are interesting links.

There have been some pretty serious riots in Oslo the past few days. On the way to see Brand at Nationaltheatret yesterday we saw some guys shooting fireworks at the Freemason Lodge. The first video here must have been taken right when out bus was going by, because this is what we saw:

Video from ABCTV.no: Her angriper de frimurerne

Video from ABCTV.no: Gatekamper i Oslo

Photos from Aftenposten: Nye opptøyer i Oslo

Apparently internet access in Norway is being filtered:

No, I wasn’t surfing for kiddie porn; here are the Google results showing the link I clicked:

What happens when you click on that link?

It turns out that it’s NextGenTel, my ISP, that’s doing the filtering:

Here is the traceroute result from the US:

I’ve linked several screenshots that tell the whole story on Flickr.

Tonight Johannes and I participated in a demonstration for peace in Gaza, along with 10,000 other people. I posted some pictures on Flickr. It was totally peaceful, although I was a little concerned that some kid would accidentally light me on fire with a torch. An earlier demonstration of Israel sympathizers didn’t turn out so peacefully, however:

http://www.aftenposten.no/webtv/?id=12574

http://www.aftenposten.no/webtv/?id=12572

http://www.aftenposten.no/webtv/?id=12571

http://www.aftenposten.no/spesial/bildeserier/article2856510.ece

Tim asked me why I participated in this march. Well, here, for example, is a quote from Reuters that pretty much sums it up:

The reported Palestinian death toll in the 13-day-old conflict topped 700. At least 11 Israelis have been killed, eight of them soldiers, including four hit by “friendly fire.”

And a very interesting thought experiment from Salon:

America’s founding sin, its dispossession of its native inhabitants, has not taken place in the 19th century, but continuously during the last 60 years. America has not completed its ethnic cleansing, has walled off millions of exiles and must contend with an armed resistance movement. Washington, despite international demands and U.N. insistence that it do so, refuses to resolve the issue by returning a portion of the land it had taken. Approximately 1.5 million of those native Americans, most of them refugees from their ancestral homes who have never been allowed to return, are imprisoned in a tiny, squalid area whose exits, water, heat, fuel, medicine and food are controlled by Washington. In their despair and their disillusionment with their corrupt leadership, those people elect a radical, rejectionist movement (which Washington had helped to foster, to undercut the native’s original leadership) that denies America’s right to exist and has a history of viciously striking at U.S. citizens using any means it can, including suicide bombers and crude homemade rockets that have killed two dozen Americans in seven years.

To punish these people for choosing a government it considers a terrorist organization, Washington imposes a harsh blockade, with a top American official joking that the U.S. is going to put the natives “on a diet.” The rejectionist government agrees to a cease-fire with the expectation that the blockade will be lifted. When the blockade is not lifted, and following a U.S. raid into their territory, the rejectionists begin firing the rockets again. Washington then launches a carefully planned aerial assault on the tiny, largely defenseless area, raining bombs down on one of the most densely populated places on earth, killing militants and civilians alike and bombing houses filled with women and children. It then launches a ground invasion of the area. Throughout, America paints itself as an innocent victim, which has been forced with a heavy heart to take surgical, conscientious military actions against terrorist fanatics who threaten its very existence.

From The Guardian:

Israel today came under fierce criticism from humanitarian groups for delaying access to the injured during its offensive in Gaza as fresh fighting killed at least 11 people, taking the death toll over 700.

The unusually strong condemnation coincided with a UN announcement that it was suspending its operations in the territory in response to what it said were Israeli attacks.

The International Committee of the Red Cross accused Israel of “unacceptable” delays in letting rescue workers reach three homes in Gaza City that had been hit by shelling.

The group said the Israeli army refused rescuers permission to reach the site in the Zaytun neighbourhood for four days.

And, again from the Reuters article:

The U.S. Senate voiced strong support on Thursday for Israel’s battle against Hamas militants in Gaza… “When we pass this resolution, the United States Senate will strengthen our historic bond with the state of Israel, by reaffirming Israel’s inalienable right to defend against attacks from Gaza, as well as our support for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said … The Senate resolution…expresses an “unwavering” commitment to Israel’s welfare and recognizes its right to act in self defense to protect citizens against acts of terrorism…

100 times more Palestinians dead than Israelis…this is what the US Senate supports. This makes me sick. AMERICANS! Try reading some news from outside your country! Then maybe you’ll understand why I’m against Israel’s behavior.

Juletre om De frivillig barnfrie :

Den mest utbredte fordommen mot frivillig barnløse er kanskje at de er egoistiske. Jeg påstår at de som velger å få barn er like egoistiske. Å reprodusere seg er vel kanskje det mest dominerende innstinktet hos dyrene og også mennesket. Å få barn er å tilfredstille dette instinktet. Hvis det ikke var dette mange ønsket å oppnå på et mer eller mindre ubevisst plan, ville vi sett mange flere adopsjoner. Hvorfor “produsere” et barn med dine gener når det finnes så mange der ute som trenger et godt hjem? Mange av de som ikke ønsker seg barn, har muligens en forstyrrelse i eller mangler reproduksjonsinstinktet, og dette åpner for en mer rasjonell tenkning rundt det å få barn. Barn velger f.eks. ALDRI selv å komme til verden. Hver gang et barn opplever lidelse, er det en indirekte konsekvens av at voksne mennesker har tvunget barnet til verden. Hvis man skal ha barn, bør man ha en visshet om at man kan gi barnet et liv som inneholder mer glede enn lidelse. I Norge handler ikke dette så mye om materielle behov, men heller mentale behov. Ikke alle har nok innsikt i menneskesinnet til å kunne oppdra barn på en måte som gjør dem sterke og trygge på seg selv. En siste ting jeg vil påpeke, er at argumentet om at samfunnet er tjent med flere barn er kynisk i mine øyne. Det reduserer barn til et middel for produktivitet.

The Electronics industry has selected Blue-Ray DVD players as Christmas Present of the Year, yet 60% of Norwegian women don’t know what what Blue-Ray is. Honestly, I didn’t, either, not precisely, until I read this article, but only because I’ve totally stopped paying attention to any news about physical storage media (well, except for Micro SDHC cards and hard drives). I didn’t pay any attention to the whole business of analogue TV signals no longer being sent, either. Those kinds of issues are no longer relevant to the way we consume media.

We still have a DVD player and the cable that comes with our rent, but neither are connected to the TV, and they haven’t been for a couple of years. Everything we watch now, we watch from our computers, either directly on the screen or connected to the TV, and our screens are big enough that we don’t usually even bother to connect a computer to the TV anymore. We haven’t had a CD player connected to a stereo system for a long time, either. If we can’t get our music, games, movies, or TV programs online (always legally where possible), we don’t bother to get it anymore.

Even five years ago, which is about when we got the DVD player, I would never have imagined that we’d be moving in this direction. Johannes and I are not quite early adopters, either, so I know we’re not the only ones who consume media in this way. We are, however, smack in the middle of the target demographic for media and electronics. Media producers really need to get their business sorted out to account for these changing patterns.

An interesting article in Aftenposten today: in light of the advertising industry’s powerful ability to influence body image, The Socialist Left Party of Norway wants to investigate whether it’s possible to alter advertisement laws to disallow advertisements pressuring people to conform to unrealistic beauty standards, and generally prohibit advertisement of cosmetic surgery and weight loss aids. They reason that while politicians shouldn’t be able to control the content of TV programs, they do have the ability to legislate the contents of advertisements. The article cites statistics that among 15-year-olds in Norway, 51% of girls and 20% of boys are dissatisfied with their bodies; 80% of the girls surveyed diet, and 10-20% have eating disorders.

As a side note, the difference in weight statistics between Norway and the US is interesting: The WHO reports that 43.4% of women and 54.8% of men in Norway are “overweight” (BMI 25 or higher), with 9.3% of women and 11.3% of men falling into the “obese” category (BMI 30 or higher), whereas in the US, 72.6% of women and 75.6% of men are “overweight” and 41.8% of women and 36.5% of men are “obese”. No wonder I feel like such a freak here!

I want one! Johannes won’t object.

I installed the Accelero S1 Rev. 2 with the turbo module on my 4870 today and am astounded at the difference in temperature. With the stock cooler I was idling around 70° and getting as hot as 99° at load (yeow!). This cooler has nearly halved my temps. I’m now idling at 41°, and haven’t hit more than 54° at load.

I also installed two Spinpoint F1 1TB disks, one for backup and one for files. I’ve never suffered data loss, but I’ve been increasingly concerned that my luck is too good to last. It was time to get a new disk, anyway, because my 400GB drive was full. I’m donating it to Elias–we’re working on setting up a nice gaming computer for him this weekend.

Also, I’ve added a new category, “Tech”, since I’ve been posting so much about my little project here. I’ve finally got some pics available:

And a video of the drive: