JKane

Actually, it makes some sense if business drops off in the evenings. Much of their real-estate is expensive so I can understand why they'd want to expand the periods of profitability. But who would want to go to Starbucks to drink? And what coffeehouse patrons want to deal with a bar atmosphere? It's been predicted before, but perhaps Starbucks is one of those companies doomed for a big fall because they've lost sight of their core business.

I hope so too! Hopefully the EFF and others like them are drafting the appeals right now. On the other hand, this isn't as bad as customs or a routine police stop requiring she grant access, there is reason to believe she used the computer in commission of crimes and now has a court order/warrant... so it's not 'unreasonable' as in those cases... But "tell the court the password so we can use your personal files to incriminate you" does sound like 5th amendment. Then again, the judge may have drawn the wrong parallel: what is the legal position on safes or safe deposit boxes which may contain incriminating evidence? I'd assume that (with a warrant) the police routinely break in, am I right? I wonder if there is a legal precedent, perhaps involving the kind of safe that would destroy the contents if forcibly opened?

I saw the first couple then drifted away, maybe I should catch back up.

Yay! Now to work on getting some people (any people) in office who aren't thralls of big business so this doesn't keep happening...

My god, except for not being crowded as all fuck that is the Venice boardwalk in a nutshell! Botox, toe rings, and 420 doctor!

Ever since I saw somebody act out the patented George Clooney smirk, look down then back up I've always kinda seen him that way, but he's still been quite good in a couple things, both where that kinda quality is called for and occasionally managing to transcend it. And I like the idea behind Participant (production company). I'm just not that big into family dramas, but if it's supposed to be good... I dunno why Hugo missed for me, so much about it I should've liked. But it was just too precious. The 90 minutes of pussyfooting around stuff as we explore a train station in 3D... it was at times gorgeous but still, for me, meh. The Help was absolutely great though! I lived in the rural south as a child, lower middle class so didn't have direct exposure to families with 'help', but the casual, endemic racism was still very much present even in the 80s... and feeling like the only one who had any problem with it. So it had a little extra impact for me.

The senate vote was coming up and it still had pretty good support in the senate. The fear was it'd get through, sure, weakened all to hell, but would set a framework and precedent easily expanded upon. With big money AND the 'liberal media' behind it, the danger was too great. The protest has been a great line in the sand, that we're not going to lay down and let them fuck everything up in the name of big media profits yet again. NOW here's to hoping they take this and MOVE FORWARD with it instead of just being reactionary. Copyright reform! Patent reform! But sadly any such bill that actually goes anywhere will be written by and for the people with the money and it'll be back to another protest like this to stop things from getting worse...

Just remembered, wasn't it NBC that originally had this show? Thank got TNT had the balls to pick it up and do it right! Makes sense, took them a season to get rid of all the stupid lowest-common-denominator stuff the non-creative execs had them put in to get greenlit on the network. Pretty damn ironic that crap is why it damn near didn't survive. Hope to hell it's amazingly successful now without it and somebody somewhere in Hollywood leadership actually realizes what that means about the usefulness of their boardrooms full of fucking MBAs.

Exactly, I was going to go back and edit in a reference to that. His character is fucking perfect, his problems, and his interactions with Liu in this first episode are damn near priceless--like when he thinks she's alluding to him being gay. But the way it's also not a main storyline is great too. It's understated, in the background, like in The Wire when you just happen to see the captain (or was he deputy chief?) in a gay bar and the understated lesbian relationship, NOT like the Shield where it became this huge story arc that got more and more annoying. I liked The Shield, but don't really miss it... it was supposedly LA (Rampart pretty much exactly, it turned out!) but never actually felt like LA at all. I think I only really miss the Dutch and Claudette stuff. Wish those actors would get more than bit parts... she's good on Warehouse 13, but that's pretty piss-ant. It's cool to keep seeing people from Band of Brothers pop up in great stuff, this patrol sergeant in Southland, the new big bad on Justified, and of course the lead on Homeland.

Wait, Gary Oldman in a movie one could fall asleep to??? I want to see it just for that, I don't think I've ever seem him play anything but fucking off the wall bonkers! Was a guy snoring when I saw The Artist, I could easily see how that could happen but I still found the movie very charming and endearing. It managed to give me the sense of wonder that Hugo tried so hard for and failed at.

I used to really like about half of Southland and hate the other half. Loved the patrol officers and Lydia (young black detective) but couldn't stand most of the other detective stories. Deep into lives I didn't give a shit about to tell yet again the dime-a-dozen(-hundred) story of a marriage on the rocks because the idiot wife married a cop yet can't stand being married to a cop... Luckily they killed off an annoying detective or two and divorced the cunt-wife (hope we never have to see her again, she played annoying way too well), and the other stories have gained some great depth and texture. And the stuff about LA, hearing two officers joke about different areas of the city, seeing places I know well... I'm starting to love this show, actually. Hopefully they don't get back into the stupid little petty dramas again. And I like what they've done with Lucy Liu, the video that made her 'famous' isn't at all what I expected, fucking brutal! Also liked Justified a lot. The way the episode ended, realizing Raylan had kinda given him exactly what he'd asked for was awesome. It's rare I look forward to non-UK TV this much!

Still haven't seen Tinker Taylor (or Descendants), really want to (and kinda want to). A little surprised to see Drive on that list... didn't see it either but it didn't seem like the kind of movie that'd wage a political campaign to get nominations/awards... I like Bafta, used to work a bunch of people in it, liked the stuff they organized around LA, don't think I've ever watched their awards show though...

Specifically bought an android smartphone in the hopes of being in the forefront of NFC payment technology, turns out my phone may not even have the damn hardware! The cell phone carriers are fucking up the market pretty bad, disabling Google's stuff in favor of their own proprietary bs (so they can collect whatever fees)--even when their stuff isn't even out yet. Still, not sure how quick it can catch on, tap to pay credit has been around forever (Mobil had the pumps what, 15+years ago?) and still at least 4/5 places I go don't have a reader for it... I'm looking forward to my new credit union getting the check-deposit via photo technology up and running!

And then David Bowie realized he could afford to pay people to do this for him.

Woo hoo, I'm almost to 600! Took me years to get to 500...

Can't believe how apathetic this site is to something that affects it so directly... Boxer and of course Feinstein seem to remain firmly under the thumb of their big west-coast media masters, but something like 17 senators changed their position, 10+ of whom were originally co-sponsors of the bill. Not that anybody here seems to give two shits. Ok, back to talking about TV!

Or, if you prefer a quick video (be sure to watch the addendum at the end too!)... <iframe src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/31100268?byline=0&portrait=0" width="400" height="225" frameborder="0" webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen></iframe><p><a href="http://vimeo.com/31100268">PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/fightforthefuture">Fight for the Future</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p> (Can't figure out how to embed Vimeo...)

Great .PDF summarizing the bill and the problems with it. R41911.pdf

If you've been under a rock on the Internet and not heard, the US government is moving ever-towards being nothing but corporate toadies, next week it's a bill that would have grave repercussions for the Internet (worldwide!) and this forum in particular. Entire sites would be shut down or formidably taken off the Internet (via DNS blocking) if they failed to kowtow to any and all copyright notifications immediately and without reasonable opportunity for question or appeal. It is basically a bunch of media corporations pulling a "recording industry", trying to enact/enforce crippling laws instead of keeping up with the times, to their eventual doom. But in the meantime we Americans could have to learn ways around internet censorship common to those who live in places like China, Syria, and Iran. Now sure, there are some provisions in the bill as it currently stands that leave a fair number of loopholes, but that's the point. Anybody saying "oh, well, it's OK because there's a exemption for X", what will you do in a year or two when a rider buried deep within a defense spending bill or something reads "delete provision 45 sub c from the the Protect IP Act / SOPA"? NOW is the time to make a stand! And don't assume your liberal senator / congressperson is on the right side of the issue!!! In California, Feinstein is of course carrying the corporate water, but BOXER is on the wrong side TOO! Even Franken, who I otherwise support 110% needs people to tell him he's wrong on this one. It takes less than 5 minutes to call your senators. And you'll feel better about it every time you come across a black "STOP INTERNET CENSORSHIP!" page today! Info: http://americancensorship.org/ http://www.reddit.com/r/SOPA https://www.eff.org/

I've seen an ad online (mostly on gay websites) for an MGM property in Vegas that touts the spa/sauna with one hot guy looking towards another... surprisingly provocative, I wouldn't think any resort would encourage stuff like that to go on...

I watched the first season or two of the UK version, have been so sick of vampires and werewolves I didn't even make it through one episode of the US version. It's actually good?

It, (and season 1) are easily downloaded...

I got to see her in person about 6 months ago, she has the kinda typical rich white woman of Los Angeles look about her, especially as they age. Gaunt, loose skin. But surprisingly down to earth, and you have to be almost anorexic to look good on camera, sadly. I've seen skinnier.

I still need to see several movies to have any opinion on that facet of awards season, but the TV stuff is pretty agreeable... I really liked Homeland and Danes did a great job, and I fucking loved Idris Elba in both seasons of Luther so far. And Dinklage, steals the show just like Tyrion stole the books. Anybody watching Boss? Sounds interesting. I still need to see Downtown Abbey as well.

Just finished watching... http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1475582/ I can never get enough of Sherlock Holmes for some reason. I like the recent movies; didn't think anybody could outdo Jeremy Brett's performance of the role; but the new, modern Sherlock played by Benedict Cumberbatch is damn near perfect as well. There's a cool-ass rumor that Cumberbatch may play Kahn in the second new Star Trek...