Walk Like an Egyptian

So, as it seems, the Christopher Street week in Egypt is still going on. When I look at pictures like this, I get an idea why it isn't over yet. "Day of Departure", what was that? Note for freedom fighters around the world: it's always a good idea to occasionally take a stroll to the presidential palace. If you assign a special title to a certain day, make sure that at that day something special happens, else you may look like fools. So far, it's just camping. Has the term "Egypsies" already been coined?

Apart from that, I find myself in lots of work recently, so I'm not too sure how often I find the time to update this blog. I will of course continue to scan blogs for inspiration, not as a hero, but as a silent guardian, a watchful protector ...

Girls in Management

No, I'm not talking about managing cooking, cleaning and ironing, this is about the real business management. A study found that in our German corporations there are only very few women in top management positions. OF COURSE this is due to discrimination, there can't be any other explanation, so immediately there was talk about introducing a law that commands corporations to employ a certain quota of females in top positions.
Funny sidenote: When asked about a timeframe for implementation of such a law, our Secretary of Labor (btw, she was an avid supporter of Internet censorship before she switched ministries) said "it should be done in less years than I have fingers on my hand". So it appears she can't even count to five, but argues for women in directorate positions?
Thank God such a law has been widely denounced, as it may attach a stigma to every woman in a leading position, since people might suspect her to be just a "quota woman" that only got the job due to her gender.
Personally, I don't have a problem putting girls on a pedestal, especially if they are strippers. But if they want to get into the inner circles of the board of directors, it may help if they get into golf and play a few rounds with the bosses, just like everybody else.

Facebook Conquers the World

And let me make it clear, of course I don't like it.
Latest information I got about them is the following: If you are logged into Facebook and do not log out, and start surfing the web, every page that has the famous "Like" button incorporated will deliver a report of your visit to Facebook. You do not even have to click the button, it's enough if it get loaded, and immediately Facebook has another hint of what pages you visit. And this damn button is spreading like cancer around the web, apart from all the community websites, forums and comment sections that enable you to log in with your Facebook account. Since I got fed up with Facebook long ago and deleted my account (yes, you can actually delete it if you are patient enough), I now use a fake account for comfort. I plan to get famous later in life, and I don't want Mark Zuckerberg to be able to blackmail me then.
Another frightening experience for many occured when they downloaded a Facebook application for Blackberry phones and it immediately, without notifying the owner, contacted EVERYONE in the contact lists of that phone and sent an invitation to become friends on Facebook. I was not among the victims, thank God, I have a lot of contacts in my phone that I don't wnat to talk to, that I just keep in case you absolutely NEED to contact them once again. Again, Facebook behaved like cancer.
I'm sure a lot of people had similar experiences with this social network. Be aware and take precautions. I can't help the feeling that Zuckerberg in his secret volcano lair is planning something evil ...

To cheat or not to cheat - and with whom

A new study on cheating, yay! This one focussed on the sex of the person you cheat with (well, not you, neither me, of course).
It seems that 50 percent of men would forgive their girl if she has an affair with another girl. Effect of millions of lesbian pornos? No, simple reason is that men are concerned about paternity, and if the missus cheats with a girl, there's no chance she could get pregnant and one would end up raising the child of another man. Plus, with another girl around, he might end up getting it on with both of them (sweet dreams).
Only 22 percent would continue a relationship if she gets in bed with another man.
Now for girls, on the other hand, security is first concern (if they get pregnant, it's their child anyway), so they want to be sure that the man won't leave. And this probability raises if the man gets down and dirty with another man, so only 21 percent of girls would forgive a gay affair.
If he screws around with another woman, it's 28 percent that would get over that.
Complex matter. Thank God nobody cheats (except for those that are actually catched).

"Cairo factions clash as camels charge through crowds"

This is currently the actual headline of CNN.com, I think it sounds hilarious. Unfortunately, I turned to watch the live stream a little too late to see the camels. What can be seen are protesters, one faction on the left, one on the right, empty space between them, and they are throwing stones at each other. It looks like some kind of mass tennis without rackets.
The caption just read "Activist via Twitter urges women and children to clear the streets". Wow. Again, I highly doubt that a Twitter message reaches the people on the street, especially with the internet down and all. I read that Twitter now offered phonelines to the people in Egypt, where they can leave a spoken message that will then be tweeted out into the world. So this is working the other way round as well? If I send a tweet adressing the people of Egypt, will Twitter call them all by phone and inform them of my tweet?
Apart from that, it was of course a useful security information. Not everyone might realize the danger for children inmidst violent clashes with flying stones, mass brawls, teargas and shots fired and all this.

How Mobile Phones Kill People

So I was on my way home the other night, walking through a park. I was behind an unknown girl, we both came from the subway station and apparently had the same way home. Upon exiting the station, she had taken out her mobile phone and was now talking on it, while I followed her on the dark paths.
She didn't say much, just "Yes" and "uh" from time to time, and it gave me the impression that THERE WAS NO ONE ON THE LINE. That she only took out her phone and pretended to talk to someone to prevent me from raping her. But why would I do that? Yes, she was cute and seemed to have a great body, but it was approx. 20 °F, I'm sure as hell not raping anyone under this freezing conditions! Well, of course, I never rape anyone, but even if I would, I wouldn't. Not if it would be embarassing for me.
But maybe it was just to prevent me from talking to her? There are girls everywhere, constantly talking on their phones or texting or surfing the web and whatnot, or having their headphones plugged in. That creates an additional barrier, preventing men from approaching them, so I dare to say that a lot of romantic encounters are not taking place (including rape). That means, there are children unborn, just due to the fascination and overuse of mobile phones. Guys, this is worse than abortions! With an abortion, at least there was sex before, there was fun. I'm talking real fun here, not playing some stupid games on the phone.
This should stop, at least in the public. I can't help imagining someone travelling back in time. Medieval people see them, a string attached to their ear, suddenly starting to speak to some invisible person. They would sure as hell get burned as witches or locked away as crazy people. And I second that, we should introduce that again!

Sad news: Composer John Barry died

One of my all time favorite composers, John Barry, died today. He won Academy Awards en masse, and - more importantly - his music was really good. I know this depends on taste, but his compositions always stroke a chord in my heart. Although best known for the "James Bond Theme", I want to bid him farewell with one of my most beloved tunes, which also seems fitting to this occasion, the main theme of "The Black Hole":

May he find whatever he desires on the other side.

Internet Revolution in the Industrial World

Now, let's say you planned to organize protests in the US, Europe, Russia, Japan or other modern countries. You sure have to be careful, because if you don't ask the government to allow your protest, they will come and arrest you. And they are surely not waiting for you to show up, with some unknown number of followers. They will come to you and have a little talk with you to stop your shenanigans. The internet is easy to monitor, especially when you try to reach a lot of  publicity. If everyone can hear you, the government can, too. And they have means to track you down. AND they don't care if you're only a 12 year old boy that wants to protest the closure of a youth centre (read the articles in the guardian or the mirror, if you like).
Yes, anti-terror police is monitoring closely, not only the events in Egypt, but also Facebook and Twitter, for hints of anything similar being planned in their countries. And it's easy. They don't have to go out and talk to people, gain their trust, collect information, tap phones of suspects, intercept mail etc. - nowadays, they can just google.
So be careful, hide behind 7 proxies, or even better, make use of internet cafes (remember wearing a hat in case there are surveillance cameras inside, doesn't necessarily have to be a tin foil hat). But as I wrote in my previous post, all you really need is a cause, and people that want something to happen. If they are not there, or not in large enough numbers, nothing will happen. If they are there, things will happen even without the respective Facebook group.

P.S.: The uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt were allegedly started (or "fueled", ha) by people that set themselves on fire. Hint, hint!

Freegypt! or How the Internet Overthrows Dictators

Well, it doesn't.
Isn't it short and simple and therefore has to be a universal truth? "No! You lie! The internet is a mighty weapon", the geeks shout with tears in their eyes, and they may have a point here and there. The internet can indeed be quite useful, but recently I've seen so much sickening news articles about how a revolution is started by Facebook, Twitter and the guardian.co.uk's comment section, I'm fed up with it. "OMG OMG Egypt stopped the internets, the protesters need internet, help them please!!!!!!1" is one of the pathetic battle cries you could read ... well, almost anywhere. Websites posted instructions on how the Egyptians can bypass the blockade, not aware of the irony, reminiscent of written ads "You can't read? Start learning it today, call 1-800 DSYLEXJA".
So, what exactly did happen after Egypt blocked the internet access? The protests got even bigger. How can that be? Following the internet communities logic, the protesters, left with no means of communication, should have just stayed home, scared and confused. But they didn't, they did what most of those internet fanboys rarely do: they went outside. They found a new subversive way of communication: They talked to each other. In person! Weird, isn't it? How did they do that? Maybe some website can explain how to communicate outside of message board posts or Facebook status updates, we could use that in a future revolution as well.
So maybe - just maybe - some people will sit down, shut the fuck up and think about revolutions that took place long before Al Gore invented the internet. Yes, they did! Look it up on Wikipedia, I'm not shitting you! Wanna hear some really crazy stuff? People actually started revolutions not only before the internet, but before mobile phones as well! It gets even crazier, they started revolutions before ANY phones were invented, even before morse code or, fuck, even printing. Remember printing? That was with ink on paper and ... oh, forget it.
For me, this is just another sign on how dependent we are on modern technology. And I'm talking dependent in a strictly mental sense. Is it just me, an old guy who grew up without the internet, to be able to think outside the box which is the monitor? Do all the young ones think that back in 1789, there was a Facebook group "Let's storm the bastille lol" that many people joined and "liked"? That Robespierre had thousands of followers on Twitter when he tweeted stuff like "#guillotine@Louis XVI"? Or just jump to a more recent event, the uprising in Eastern Germany in 1989. No internet, but a revolution similar to the events in Egypt nonetheless.
The internet makes it easier to communicate and to coordinate, sure. But to consider it the backbone of a revolution is just ridiculous. A revolution is fueled by the spirit of the people, people that actually go outside, that take their fire to the streets. Look at all the masses in Cairo. Watch them on CNN or Al-Jazeera. What do you see? Right, they are NOT in front of a computer. Imagine they were: Empty streets. No fires. No chants.  No revolution.
Those that cry for internet access are mainly the bloggers that would just report what they see from their window (provided they don't live in a basement, you know the clichés). Those would not be the people to actually do something. You want change? Turn off your computer, go outside and take action.
But be warned: It won't be safe. You can't hide behind a proxy. You may have to endure hardships that go beyond a slow connection, you have to put in way more effort than it takes to press some buttons on a keyboard. You have to go outside and face other people, people that want to suppress you, and you have to look them in the eye and make your stand. People who are willing to do that are all it takes to start a revolution.

Kruger's Rant

Named after the famous South African gold coin, this blog will contain editorials for free use under Creative Commons licenses. Details and license may vary, especially for commercial publishers, so if you intend to use some or all of this material for commercial purposes, please contact me beforehand. I do this for a living in Germany, but this blog is supposed to be a fun project for me, so don't expect real gold or even regular updates here. Nonetheless, international job offers will be considered, especially if they include a relocation of my humble self to a sunnier location.
But now, enough with the words! Let us see some deeds! (Which, in fact, will be more words, but anyway ...)