What grinds my gears

Newspapers and the press have hundreds and hundreds of years of history, and have had a big impact on the society during all of it (for good and bad alike.) For hundreds of years newspapers have thrived, and were a staple of any society. This is because for a long, long time they were basically the only medium that people had to get information about current events (be it local, national or international) and people thirst for this kind of information. In the past 50 years or so TV has kind of become a big competitor to newspapers, but never really supplanted them. However, during the past decade or two a new form of media has become so big and prevalent that it actually has turned into an almost newspaper killer: The internet (often colloquially called "new media.") Traditional newspapers have struggled for a decade or two to adapt. Physical newspapers are selling less and less because it just is easier for people nowadays to search for information on the internet, usu...

Netflix is, basically, an online video rental service. It's available for a surprisingly large number of platforms besides just desktop PCs. Other such platforms include various Android-based cellphones and tablets, the iPhone, iPod and iPad, Apple TV, various Blu-Ray Disc players and several gaming consoles, including the Nintendo Wii, 3DS, Sony Playstation 3, PlayStation Vita, and the Xbox 360. There's one thing in common with all of them: Netflix can be used in all of them without any additional cost from the part of the platform's manufacturer. Except for Microsoft's Xbox 360. From the literally hundreds of different platforms that support Netflix, the Xbox 360 is the only one where it cannot be used without paying additional money to the platform's manufacturer (in this case Microsoft.) An Xbox Live Gold subscription is needed to use Netflix. One could argue that this subscription is needed to account for costs from Microsoft's part. I don't kn...

I had a bookmark to a YouTube video where Neil DeGrasse Tyson talks about UFOs and all the argumentative fallacies regarding them. That person is one of the smartest people alive, I really admire him, and I think that he has done an astonishingly good job at popularizing science and getting some rationality to the public knowledge amidst the widespread of irrational superstition. Today I went to watch that again because it's just such a great video. What do I encounter there? "This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by St. Petersburg College." This is really worthy of a facepalm. Double facepalm. How stupid can these people be? How completely and utterly stupid? St. Petersburg College, you are not helping the spreading of science and rationality with stunts like this. You are only doing the exact opposite. You are doing the exact same thing as the irrational fanatics are doing. This makes no sense. This kind of material that helps humanity sho...