I’ll Tell You What…

I found this on USAToday the other day.

A man wielding a cordless power saw in each hand rampaged through a Manhattan subway station early Thursday, using one of the buzzing blades to carve into the chest of a postal worker who later said it felt like “he was trying to cut through me.”

I just don’t understand why people do this kind of stuff to other people.

…Jim Guigli of California. Mr. Guigli won the coveted Bulwer-Lytton literary parody prize.

His winning entry:

Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you’ve had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean.

I think that a great opening line to a novel!

The runner-up winner was Stuart Vasepuru from Scotland. His entry was:

“I know what you’re thinking, punk,” hissed Wordy Harry to his new editor, “you’re thinking, ‘Did he use six superfluous adjectives or only five?’ — and to tell the truth, I forgot myself in all this excitement; but being as this is English, the most powerful language in the world, whose subtle nuances will blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel loquacious?’ — well do you, punk?”

That’s a winner, too!

…in Argentina or you might lose something more valuable than food!

According to CNN,

Argentine tax officials hit a tax cheat where it hurts most on Wednesday, confiscating the man’s plasma TV two days before Argentina plays Germany in the World Cup quarterfinals.

The man must have cried.

A chinese company has claimed that they have cracked the Skype protocol enabling them to create compatible applications and, more importantly, enable the Chinese government to tighten its grip on free speech in China by blocking voice-over-IP connections from certain parts of the world.

From CIO Tech Informer:

By cracking the Skype protocol, the company claims it can also block Skype voice traffic, Paglee said. “They could literally turn the lights off on Skype in China very, very quickly,” said Paglee, who is also a lawyer and engineer, speaking from California on Friday.

The company could transfer the technology to the Chinese government, which has continually sought ways to tighten its filtering and control over the Internet. So far, the company doesn’t have any plans to market its blocking capabilities, Paglee said.

The company claims it can block calls by exploiting Skype software functions, he said. Skype’s software taps users’ computers to route calls. Paglee said the Chinese company can detect, map and block the computers that are passing on calls, and in doing so shut down Skype calls.

The company, however, has not been able to decrypt the phone calls passing through those computers and listen in because of the complicated encryption keys used during calls, Paglee said.

“Skype’s conversations are still secure, but what’s not secure is their present business model of using everybody else’s computer to propagate the Skype network,” Paglee said.

Well, at least they can’t listen to the conversations. I’m sure there would be mass arrests made by the Chinese government if they could.