Not poker related at all, but the Knox guilty verdict is of interest to me, and maybe you. Didn't think it was worth it's own thread.
I've been following this case casually since the beginning pretty much, and I think it's a lot more interesting than many people may realize at first. I won't be talking as much about the case specifically here, but if you are interested at all (warning: huge time sink potential) then there's a guy on 2p2 who's pretty well known that lays out a lot of the case from a pro-guilt perspective in this thread. He gets into a pretty long winded debate with a guy named "239", and although he generally sticks to discussing case specifics, at one point Henry and a few other people sort of snapped and accused him of astroturfing.
From there, I came across blogs/posts/etc. where people claim to have been paid by the PR firm to turn over their social media accounts on most of the top 100 visited online forums (boybuilding.com, 2p2, reddit, etc. etc). It appears to be a new tactic where people try to buy relatively (1 year+) old social media accounts solely for the purpose of expressing biased opinions, or in the case of sites like Reddit perhaps to manipulate the voting system so certain things don't appear on the front pages.
After the guilty verdict, this thread on reddit seems to have took off. I couldn't help thinking there may be heavy astroturfing going on simply based on the numerous ludicrous opinions being shared that extraditing Knox would be a violation of the constitution, and constant references to Double Jeopardy when there was never a 2nd trial - not to mention that Knox was found guilty initially before the judge forced what is effectively a retrial. (I don't want to get into the specifics of the Italian justice system here, but essentially a guilty verdict isn't 100% final, and although Knox was found guilty, a judge ruled that the jury came to that conclusion incorrectly and so there was more or less a forced retrial)
Anyways, I must admit my own bias in that I initially was of the opinion Knox was likely innocent, however as I read more and more non-U.S. sources my opinion began to sway. In the end I think she did play some hand in the murder but should not be found guilty due to a lack of real evidence.
All that being said, I think there is clear evidence of an organized PR campaign being run through social media and internet forums attempting to sway the general U.S. public into feeling as though Knox being extradited or imprisoned would be a gross miscarriage of justice, probably in hopes that the U.S. gov't will be swayed in the same direction. At the very least, I think it's fair to say that the current general perception of the case would make the U.S. extraditing Knox a PR failure on their end, and probably something that is met with huge backlash stateside.
The whole concept of Astroturfing and social media manipulation as it is alleged to have occurred here is pretty wild. The practice is a little unsettling but if there is an astroturfing campaign among major media outlets, it appears to be a success.
Pretty rambly here, but I had nowhere else to put any of my thoughts on this. As I said I've really only done casual research into the whole thing but I'm always open to other peoples opinions or thoughts on social media manipulation in high profile criminal cases.
You can get it off of pirate bay itself obviously.
There is also a youtube for convenience.
Haven't got around to watching it just yet but saw it came out recently and figured I'd share as there would probably be some people here who may be interested.
I think the telegraph might lean a little towards sensationalism in their reporting but still a bit concerning.
From a geo-political standpoint the situation in the Korean peninsula is very tense. China in particular is in a very precarious position with regards to somewhat needing the status quo situation in Korea and at the same time being irritated at the position North Korea threatens to put them into if they were to actually act out toward South Korea or US Military bases.
Oddly enough, this is all also tied into the situation in Syria.
I know North Korea has more or less been a pretty sick bluffer for the past few decades but there are a lot more indicators than usual that things are getting pretty dicey.
I, for one, am perpetually nervous about the situation in the Korean Peninsula.
Gotta say the Swedes are unrecognized ballers to the general public
Part of me has to wonder what it is that makes swedes appear to me as being so progressive in general. I'm sure it's just an effect of media and my own personal exposure via the poker world but Swedes seem to be balling hard on a progressive moral sense since back in the day.
Came across something pretty disturbing/sick today on Reddit.
If you're in a bad mood or don't have a strong stomach for human fucking garbage I wouldn't recommend reading about it.
Anyways, Anonymous somehow came across a home video made by a high school football/baseball team laughing and reminiscing about gang raping, urinating on, and dragging outside a comatose young girl. The video is incredibly disturbing. They keep making references to how 'dead' she is now which I assume means her reputation because she's still alive. Apparently anon sent out some youtube video threatening to release the video and dox them all if they didn't turn themselves in for the crime. They didn't turn themselves in, so now it's on.
Interestingly, Anon had to host their evidence on this site I linked above. I know it's a sketchy .ru link but apparently every time they hosted it on a NA domain it got taken down for whatever reason. The link above should be safe.
Anyways, on to the real question.
How do you feel about anonymous and their vigilante internet justice? I must admit I am mostly fist-pumping about 95% of the stuff they do, but I think it's a bit scary if they get into a situation where they are misguided and are going after innocent parties. Someone playing devil's advocate brought up the point that what if these are just drunk/stoned high school jackasses making 'shock humor' about something that didn't actually happen. There's enough evidence outside of just the video to make you believe that this probably DID really happen, almost certainly, but it does make you wonder.
Like them or not, I do think everyone can agree Anonymous has had a very interesting impact on the internet as a whole.
Man, this is the best show ever. I always forget about it then randomly see it on late night TV or something and end up stuck to the tele watching it.
I have no idea why I find it so entertaining but it really is good stuff.
Anyways, I've always had one question that maybe LP can answer. What is up with people from asian countries always trying to bring in food? I swear like every other episode is an asian family trying to bring all kinds of meat and food into NZ/Aus.
I have been traveling on a terrible road trip Miami->Texas and so when I check in at the end of the night I have nothing to do but read the internet until I fall asleep. Lately, most of this involves reading reddit/gawker and just looking for anything that is interesting.
Lately, all I've been reading about has been the Fermi Paradox and 'Men's Rights'. My sister actually somewhat put me onto the Men's Rights stuff when I talked to her while driving as she was talking to me about how some of her friends at Uni have been 'brainwashed' by the Women's Studies program. This actually tied in a little bit to my last blog post as well so I did some more prodding around on the topic.
Apparently the most recent high-profile incident was a protest at U of T (Toronto) for some guy I'd never heard of before Warren Farrell who was doing some kind of conference there. An admittedly pro-Farrell video clip of some of the protests here:
Anyways, I find this whole thing mildly interesting. It is interesting to look at the real differences between men/women in the western world in regards to education, medical spending, longevity, etc. etc. I'm really on the fence and without an opinion but I must say I am surprised at the amount of academics who seem to be popping up to champion the 'cause' of men and boys possibly getting the short end of the stick in today's society.
The Christina Hoff Summers woman has some interesting writings/youtube stuff as well.
Anyways, what do you guys think? I know this stuff is kind of dull, but don't worry my next blog post will be advanced and talking about the Fermi Paradox, the Great Filter, and the upcoming Technological singularity.
Also, I have another 10 hour drive coming up, and am running out of podcasts. I got the Joe Rogan ones etc but if anyone has a recco on any good/controversial science/sociology/current events podcasts please let me know!
I think Political Correctness is pretty fascinating. There is a clear 'party line' if you will on what types of things are OK and which are not.
Anyways, being a bored retired poker player I stumbled upon a pretty interesting (to me anyways) e-battle between some people in Vancouver.
I don't want to present links just yet but the basic cliffnotes are that a university group in Vancouver attempted to open a 'Men's Center.' It arguably, is a response to the Women's Centers that already exist and the extensive "Women's Studies" courses taught there.
Anyways, I'm clearly a bit biased in this regard being a male and such, but it had in the past bothered me a bit that a lot of the groups/student unions at myown Alma Mater were certainly female-centric. I suppose bothered is perhaps not the best word, but it was noticeable that there was a general atmosphere of catering to the female student body ahead of the male one. It was common to walk past signs such as "MEN RAPE" and "MEN CAN STOP RAPE CULTURE" etc. I found these a bit troubling then as I do now.
Anyways, I'm typing a whole lot of blah blah to really just to ask something I'm curious and undecided on. That is, does the replacement test hold weight?
The placement test is simple, and I'll use an example from a random Women's Studies facebook page that was linked on Reddit.
'Woman, without her, man is nothing'
Clearly, a lot of woman would fist pump about a statement like this. Many men would as well. However, clearly if you switch the wording
'Man, without him, woman are nothing'
This would be a horrific thing to say worthy of much derision.
My real question though, is does this 'replace Subject X with Subject Y and now watch the reaction' hold weight as a form of argument?
I've always been aware of the whole women's studies/rape culture liberal stuff that's going on but to be fair I hadn't given it a ton of thought until recently. I also hadn't considered how much things such as Men's Centers may actually be neccesary, particularly in a place such as North America where many young men are involved in military actions and exposed to a lot of raw violence.
Anyways I know that wasn't very cohesive but I wanted to get some of this out there and maybe someone from LP digs it and can give me some interesting links or alternative viewpoints on this type of stuff, cause I'm admittedly ignorant to most of it.
