president

While it stopped short of changing its stance with respect to Holocaust-denial groups on its Web site, Facebook has confirmed that it has disabled a group I brought attention to on Saturday, called "I Hate Muslims in Oz."

"We disabled the 'I Hate Muslims in Oz' group a day or so ago because it contained an explicit statement of hate. Where Holocaust-denial groups have done this and been reported, we've taken the same action," Facebook's Barry Schnitt said in an e-mail Wednesday.

Given President Obama's clear statement that Holocaust denial is "hateful,&… Read more

I wonder how management at Facebook might have reacted should they have come across some of President Obama's words Friday.

The president was speaking at the Buchenwald concentration camp, one of whose sub-camps, Ohrdruf, was liberated by his own great uncle. And he made sure to express his own feelings very clearly on a subject that Facebook believes should freely be discussed, Holocaust denial.

"To this day, there are those who insist that the Holocaust never happened--a denial of fact and truth that is baseless and ignorant and hateful," he said. "This place is the ultimate … Read more

Presidential commemorative merchandise is always a hot seller, but the First Face is usually reserved for porcelain dishes, stamps, or squeezy cheesy T-shirts. Being that our 44th president is a twittering BarackBerry user, it's fitting for Amazon to finally offer an Obama USB Flash Drive. I just wish it weren't so unbearably ugly.

The 2GB drives are manufactured by Active Media Products and sold on Amazon for $9, plus shipping. The design looks unfinished, though, bearing Obama's painted profile across the front of the drive. Also, isn't it a little sad and ironic that the most patriotic part of the drive is its packaging? They couldn't have put those red, white, and blue stripes on the drive itself? Also, the store claims the drive is waterproof, but that smells fishy to me without material specification. For all its faults, the drive does have one neat feature: it comes loaded with almost an hour full of Obama's speeches in MP3 format, including his famous inaugural address.

Buy the 2GB Obama Drive for $8.95 here.

More pics after the jump.… Read more

After months of waiting, President Obama will soon get his super-secure BlackBerry.

The Washington Times newspaper reported Thursday that the presidential BlackBerry 8830 is "in the final stages of development by the National Security Agency." The agency is still testing the encryption software to ensure it's up to snuff. And the president could have his new device in a matter of months.

A Washington, D.C.-based company, Genesis Key, developed the software called SecureVoice that will be used to secure the high-security BlackBerry. Research In Motion, the maker of the BlackBerry, has also been involved in development, the Washington Times said.

Since the inauguration in January, President Obama, who vowed security officials would have to pry his BlackBerry out of his hands, has been using a cumbersome work-around to communicate with key members of his staff and close aides. … Read more

Imagine the Queen of England hitching up her tartan skirt and twirling around one of the large, but I'm guessing cold, drawing rooms at Buckingham Palace with U2's "In the Name of Love" transmitted down her earholes via characteristic white earphones.

Yes, President Obama has just gifted the queen an iPod.

Now we can all delight in the mere thought that the Her Majesty, or Liz, as some in her native land call her, will be perched over a MacBook and downloading a little Celine Dion or some early Snoop.

Four years ago, when she was conferring an honorary knighthood upon the burdened shoulders of Bill Gates, the queen admitted she had never used a computer. But these days she is no tech-illiterate. She has her own BlackBerry, just like the president's.

And I have very bad news for the president. The queen already has an iPod. At least two, it seems.… Read more

Two U.S. senators introduced legislation on Wednesday that calls for naming a national cybersecurity adviser who reports directly to the president and who would have the authority to disconnect federal or critical infrastructure networks from the Internet if they were deemed to be at risk of attack.

This proposed legislation comes amid a review ordered by the Obama administration into the government's policies for defending itself against cyberattacks and follows the resignation of Rod Beckström as director of Homeland Security's National Cybersecurity Center in response to what he said was a power grab by the … Read more

Faced with a whopping $1.7 trillion deficit, President Obama is proposing tacking on a spectrum license fee to wireless operators to help generate revenue for the government.

The Obama administration's proposal was loosely outlined in the new budget plan for 2009 and 2010 submitted Thursday. In that plan, the administration proposes adding a new fee to be paid by wireless carriers that license wireless spectrum from the government.

These annual fees would start at $50 million in 2009 and jump to $200 million in 2010, Reuters reported. The fees will gradually increase over the next 10 years to $… Read more

In this episode we find out that Hulu might be getting stomped, the government is spying on you through DTV boxes, and Natali prefers wrestling to cuddling. Seriously. She just doesn't like the word cuddling. But when a wrestling match offers to advertise Buzz Out Loud she's all for it.

Hulu being removed from Boxee http://blog.hulu.com/2009/2/19/doing-hard-things http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-10167152-93.html

Judge throws out lawsuit against Google Street View http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2009/02/judge-throws-out-lawsuit-against-google-street-view.ars

Pirate Bay floats safe … Read more

Eliot Van Buskirk over at Wired has an interesting post today about Seattle band Presidents of the United States of America.

In addition to selling its songs on iTunes in the normal fashion, PUSA has just released a $2.99 application for the iPhone and iPod Touch that will let you stream songs from four albums (the ones whose rights are owned by the band), plus assorted other flotsam (live tracks, demos, whatever).

The application was built by Melodeo, whose vice president of business development is none other than PUSA's Dave Dederer.

The songs are streamed, not downloaded, which … Read more