Posted in Economics & Globalization, Politics & Public Policy, tagged 21st Century, adopting, agitators, allegations, alter the way we live, American, analogy, Asean Plus Six, Asian, bailout, Barack Obama, barriers, block, bode, body, borders, bottom line, brainwash, broken, bureaucracy, business, capitalism, challenges, change, civil unrest, codependent, coercion, collectivist, commonwealth, communism, comparative advantage, competition, concentration of power, confederacy, conflicting, consolidate, conspiracy, conspirator, Constitution, cooperation, corporation, crisis, culture, currency, customs union theory, deconstruct, deliver on, downside, economics, emergent, enmeshed, evolution by stealth, expedient, experiment, fascism, fearmonger, federation, fiction, finance, foolhardy, force, foreign policy, framework, free trade, freedom, Friedmanesque, Friedmanism, future, global, globalization, goal, groups, guarantee, H.G. Wells, H.W. Bush, history, hope, horizon, human, idealism, imagined, impersonal, in name only, independence, individual, interregionalism, is United States, Jerome Corsi, jobs, justice, language, law, legal, legislation, liberty, lies, logical extension, maps, market, Media & Social Media, member, metaphor, military complex, myth, NAFTA, NASCO, nation, national sovereignty passe, nationalization, nature, neocapitalist, neoclassical economists, net gain, new deal, new economy, new empire, new world order, North American, NWO, offset, opponents, opportunity, opt out, optimal currency area theory, organization, oversell, peacetime, policy, policymakers, practical, pragmatic, president, Prime Minister Brown, principles, progress, promise, proposals, prosperity, psychology, public opinion, push, raindrops, real, reality, reconstruct, Reform, regional security complex, regionalization, relationship, representative, representative democracy, rights, Ross Perot, rule of law, scale, secure, security, serious questions, shift, Single Market and Economy, socialism, speak out, specialization, SPP, states, stimulus, subservient, succession, SuperCorridor Project, sustainable, theory, threat, timeline, Trans-Texas Corridor, transnational, transnational progressives, treaty, trend, Union, unrest, Urban Legend, usher in, Utopian, venture, wages, weakest link, WFM, Woodrow Wilson, workers, world federalism movement, world leaders on October 30, 2009| Leave a Comment »
President H.W. Bush, borrowing a phrase from an earlier era, popularized the term “New World Order” (NWO) in the early 1990s. But while the New World Order has legitimate roots, it has come to be associated with little more than paranoid conspiracy.
Given what we’ve witnessed in recent times, however, is it wise to continue to dismiss the notion out-of-hand?
Posted in Media & Social Media, Technology & Science, tagged 21st Century, ADD, addiction, ads, advances, adverse, advertising, alter, Amazon, analog, Animal Farm, annotations, apathy, assumptions, attention span, backlit, balkanization, Big Brother, BlackBerry thumb, books, brain, business, cap and trade, carpel tunnel, cell phone, cell phones, censor, censure, Century, change, chaos, children, China, Circuit City, claims, clean, coal, competing, complacency, complex, computer, Computer Vision Syndrome, consequences, consumers, content, contracts, controversy, copies, copyright, creative control, CRTs, cultural, CVS, data centers, debate, deficit, delete, demand, dependency, deprived, development, device, digital divide, dirty, disabilities, disabled, disinformation, distributed, downloaded, dumbing down, e-book, ebook, eco-friendly, ecological, editor, education, electric, electromagnetic, electronic leash, electroshock, EMF, energy, entertainment, ereader, ergnomics, ergonomists, evolution, experiences, Eye Fatigue, eyes, eyestrain, Facebook, fatigue, fine print, finger, flat panel monitors, flicker, free, freedom, future, gadget, gatekeeper, generate, generation, George Orwell, globe, grapevine, Green, grids, growth, gullible, hand, hardware, headache, health effects, herd immunity, high technology, history, hoaxes, impacts, information, injury, insomnia, Internet, intrusions, journalism, keyboard, kids, Kindle, LCD, learning, letter, liberty, Libraries, library, life, limiting factors, literature, look back, losing, loss, magazines, margins, materiality, Media & Social Media, mentality, mind, model, monitor, musculoskeletal disorders, MySpace, myths, net, networks, neurological, news, newspapers, nostalgia, NYT, occupational, offsets, on demand, operate, optic, orthopedic, Orwellian, overload, ownership, pain, paper, PC, personal, photograph, physical, physiological, pirated, planet, plugged in, pollution, power, predecessors, price, printed, privacy, production lines, productivity, programming, progress, publisher, rates, reading, realities, reality, recycle, refresh rate, repetitive strain, response time, responsible, rights, risk factors, RSI, rumors, sacrifice, screen, sense of place, sentimental, sever farm, shared, shift, sites, sleep, smokestack, snapshot, social, social capital, society, sociology, software, Sony, static, stunt, systems, tactile, talking, tangible, tech, teens, television, texting, threatens, time capsule, touch, tradeoffs, trains, transform, trends, turn of the Century, unauthorized, unsustainable, video, view, virtual, Walter Cronkite, wary, watching, web, white space, word, world, wrist, written on July 19, 2009| 1 Comment »
Amazon’s electronic reading device known as Kindle is not exactly as “Green” as it is cracked up to be, but now we have another reason to reconsider the merits of paper-based reading: Censorship.
Kindle users may not have anticipated it, but Amazon can recall an e-book purchase at the push of a virtual button. Need those annotations for a book report? If your digital reading material is recalled, Amazon removes those too.
Tough luck.
Amazon claims they are working to amend a hasty retraction process that resulted when an allegedly unauthorized source made available a number of e-books to which the lawful copyright holder objected, reports the New York Times in “Amazon Erases Orwell Books From Kindle Devices“. Refunds for the illicitly encoded material are on the way, but the questions have only begun. And well they should.
In an ongoing series on the transformative impact of high tech, the Social Critic aims to explore the lesser known consequences of the virtual world. In this instance, we find a stark reminder that in the digital universe the price of “virtual” amounts to easy come, easy go. You can’t share an e-book. You can’t recycle an e-book reader — at least not in the Green manner one might have hoped [see “GreenSmart vs. GreenDumb”]. And you can’t take for granted that you “own” anything in the virtual realm in the same physical manner it is possible to own DVDs, books, magazines, newspapers and the like.
What this article doesn’t touch upon is disturbing in its own right: The questionable health effects, particularly on the eyes and brain, of exchanging the tangible for an imperceptibly flickering digital view screen. Over time, exposure may blunt brain development in children, promote sleep and attention disorders, lead to career-limiting repetitive strain injuries to the spine, elbows, wrists or fingers — or more commonly still, eyestrain and headaches — all while aiming electromagnetic radiation at our craniums (of which cell phones and CRT monitors are among the worst EMF offenders). None of this, however, takes into account the fastest growing concern of all: the controversial notion of Internet addiction. Until recently, in fact, China took a very heavy-handed approach to digital addicts: electroshock therapy.
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