End Of e-Stonia?

A very significant article was posted yesterday on the wesbsite of ERR, the Estoinan state broadcaster, or the Estonian BBC if you will, concerning the effects of US governmental encroachment on internet freedoms.

Many of us have followed to varying extents the developments in the progress of the US SOPA and PIPA proposed laws; indeed if you use Wikipedia at all regularly it would have been hard not to, but, just in case anyone didn't get the message that the ramifications of these acts are not confined to US soil, here are the ways in which it will affect Estonia, as seen by Otto de Voogd, a Dutch developer living in Tallinn.

It is particularly poignant given that one of Estonia's 'unusual selling points' is its internet freedom, high degree of connectivity, online governance etc. etc., much of which may now be under threat. In any case, even if you are not in Estonia the results of this phenomenon are likely to be the same.

Anyway I'll stop rambling and let the article speak for itself. It's at this address.

Thought for the Day..

A story I liked..

Diogenes was knee deep in a stream washing vegetables. Coming up to him, Plato said, "My good Diogenes, if you knew how to pay court to kings, you wouldn't have to wash vegetables."

"And," replied Diogenes, "If you knew how to wash vegetables, you wouldn't have to pay court to kings."

 ..courtesy of Edward Hugh's blog, check him out on Facebook if you want to keep up with the Euro saga (or better still, don't :-(   ).

New Year, New Post, Old Topic

First post for a very, very long time, and the first for 2012 - after all, those New Year's resolutions take a couple of days to come into effect - and I'm going to continue where I left off. The topic, if you can stand it, will be the same as before, polyphasic sleeping (another NY resolution evidently).

The last couple of posts on the topic from way back in the white nights of June when I was struggling with it even then are here and here, and an in depth explanation (from a very smart person who carried out the experiment successfully albeit in a more conducive environment than mine I would think) can be read here, but in the meantime I am embarking, crazily enough, on the Dymaxion schedule, supposedly the hardest one and supposedly followed by Buckminster Fuller, the inventor of Geodesics, which involves four naps of half an hour each, one every six hours.

Next week when the holiday is over I won't be able to do that anyway, and my schedule will necessitate a long stretch of more like nine hours in the afternoon/evening, but I may not make it that far anyway, let's see. Oh, and we'll call this day zero...