New Scrutiny for Facebook Over Predators (NYT)

There's an article on the New York Times about predators turning to Facebook.

Business / Media & Advertising

New Scrutiny for Facebook Over Predators

By BRAD STONE

Published: July 30, 2007

Like MySpace before it, Facebook, the online social network, is being subjected to accusations that it does not do enough to keep sexual predators off its site.
Permalink (pops)

Apparently "a concerned parent" opened up an account posing as a 15 year old girl. This pedophile turned concerned citizen listed their relationship status as "Whatever I can get" and joined such groups as:

• addicted to masterbation...and you know if you are!
• Facebook Swingers
  
• I'm Curious about Incest

Now I don't know from firsthand experience, but I'm going to guess that you are not going to find particularly savory members of society in any of these groups.

Furthermore, the 'concerned parent' accepted friendship with people much older than this 15 year old made up girl. Including a bald man with a goatee from Toronto.

Now I watch To Catch A Predator with Chris Hansen, and I think we all know that bald men with goatees are bad news bears.

I mean lets be serious now, if I buy Porsche convertible, take it to Flatbush, park it with the top down and keys in the ignition, I can't really get mad because someone stole my car.

Yes there are bad people on the internet, but I think Facebook has done a very good job about keeping them away from the disillusioned youth of Facebook.

The only reason the story got picked up by the Times is because Reuters released it first and was hyping it up. So just keep your pants on America, Facebook is still safe. As long as your not an idiot.

Lindsay Lohan, You Stupid Stupid Person

So I don't know if you've read this, but Lindsay Lohan got busted last night for a DUI. She also happened to be in possession of cocaine. What an idiot.

I mean the girl just got out of rehab for Christ sakes. Come on Lindsay, Haven't you ever heard of livery service? You're rich and famous so I must assume you have.

At the very least, if you do decide to drive while under the influence, you could at least have the common courtesy to remove the cocaine from your pocket. I mean you've been out of rehab for what, 11 days?

Lock it up Lohan

Looking for love in all the wrong places

Quite possibly the best Craigslist post I've ever seen.

I don't know how long the link is going to be active, so I've taken the liberty to repost the entire ad. If you can't figure out what this person's talking about, you're an idiot.

I can see the trees - w4m - 26

---

Reply to: pers-380265904@craigslist.org
Date: 2007-07-23, 12:49PM EDT


Hey there

I am a woman looking to unload some trees - I bought too many. I will only meet in public since I am not interested in hooking up (sexually). Please be normal and just a lover of good things. I can meet as early as 2 or 3pm today. Please be discreet. Pork-free products :0) Merry Jane

• Location: washington DC
• it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

PostingID: 380265904


The link:
http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/doc/stp/380265904.html

A Short Story

The Quick Brown Fox Jumps Over the Lazy Dog

This was all he could write. He had covered the Balkans, Iraq I, and the 2000 election fiasco. Now, for the last four years he was a freelance writer—correction, fiction writer.

His editor had said he lost his spark. That was seven years ago. The paper kept him on for another three years, hoping that he could get it back. Finally they got fed up and let him go. He hadn’t written an article that was published in over three years.

The paper was kind enough to fire him, so he could file for welfare. This was how he’d survived—that and his extremely modest 401K.

Now, two weeks into his project, he had one sentence on paper. And he only had that because he couldn’t think of anything better.

Initially he had wanted to write something big, to be the next Hemingway or Salinger. Now he just wanted to be published.

There was no computer in his apartment—he wrote everything by hand as a matter of course.. Next to him on the left was a stack of blank paper. To his right was a mostly finished bottle of scotch. Beside desk lay a garbage can mostly filled with totally empty bottles of scotch.

Sitting at his desk, he poured the remaining scotch into an old-fashioned glass with two ice cubes. He wasn’t worried, he had another bottle in the cupboard.

He caressed his pen, drawing lazy circles on the paper. Nothing. There’s always tomorrow, he thought to himself, downing the remaining scotch.

My Phone is a Racist

I got a replacement Motorola RAZR today, and discovered a fun little fact while using the T9 feature for text messages.

Fun Fact:
Typing in the numbers 7, 4, 2, and 5, as in my buddy "nick" defaults in the word "mick" as in look at that stupid fucking Irish mick.

Motorola, propagating racial stereotypes one cell phone at a time.

Harry Potter's Cock...

Sometimes I wonder if they do this stuff intentionally just to get people to click on the link. This is an actual screenshot of the YouTube homepage at around 5:00pm, I just enlarged it a bit

Ho-Ho-Kus

I don't know why this is agitating me so much but it is.

Whenever I try to type any of the following words on T9:

• go
• im
• in

My damn cell phone keeps defaulting to "ho". I don't recall ever using the word ho, let alone using it enough to become the go-to word.

In conclusion, pick it up Motorola. And for that matter, AT&T/Cingular, make up your mind, pick a name and stick to it. First we were AT&T customers, then they got bought out by Cingular, so we became Cingular customers. Now Cingular is the new AT&T. Make up your mind!

Done.

Random Stories of the last Week

A bunch of rather bizarre occurrences happened to me over the last few weeks, and I thought I would take the time out of my busy day to share them with you, my loyal reader.

Lets begin with Drunk Metro Girl, a fable about a girl, on the metro, not even the tiniest bit sober.

What makes this story so interesting (or bizarre, or both), is the setting. It takes place between the Foggy Bottom metro stop and McPherson Square. At around 8:45 in the morning. The train was crowded, but not packed. For most of the ride she was just standing, staring at nothing with a smile fixed on her face. She was standing next to the right-hand exit, i was standing across from her, on the left.

For a while, I thought she was high on meth or some equally worthless street drug. (While not homeless, this woman was obviously not well dressed, she was also probably early 20's).

Between Farragut West and McPherson Square, the train stopped--not an uncommon event given the frequency of trains running in the morning. Our protagonist immediately begins shouting "head on!" to the whole car. For a while, I didn't understand what she was saying, then suddenly it clicked.

She was cackling, literally cackling like an old evil witch in between her bouts of shouting. Then, and I can't say when the rest of the car figured out, i realized she was hoping for a head-on collision of trains. Wow.

Finally the train starts moving again, and we pull into McPherson Square. She looks disappointed. She sets out a sigh signaling her disappointment that we are all still alive. As the first person off, Our Heroine informs me that I am not worthy to get off. Pushing past her, I may or may not have made a comment about her level of intoxication and what time it was. She may or may not have jumped out of the train, yelled "What the fuck did you just say to me" and then get at least part of her body (I heard her yell "Oh Shit") stuck in the closing doors. The very same doors that the voice of the Metro tells you to stand clear of.

There's no real good end to this story, so I'm just going to stop it here. It amused me, and really, that's all that matters.

Story #2, much shorter, and once again, more of an anecdote than a story:
A Loan to a Homeless Man

I was walking down the street the other day, when this man I know to be homeless asked me if he could borrow 50 cents. Though I just kind of shrugged my shoulders in that "no" kind of way, I had a couple questions I was dying to ask.

1. Do you have any collateral to put up for this loan?
2. Do you have a cosigner?

I also planned to ask for his personal information to perform a credit check, but alas, I never got around to any of these things.

Closing up my delightful anecdote, I wonder if he has better luck "borrowing" money than he does just asking for hand outs.

Then again, who am I to judge, maybe he does really give it back.

Entourage D.C.

While some Entourage fans may think they know everything about the show, a little known fact is that Executive Producer Mark Wahlberg actually pitched the idea to George Bush and his entourage first. Although most of these original episodes have been lost, the team from SuperNews has recreated one of the best episodes just for Current.