Looks like PAM has been dropped: http://www.cbc.ca/cp/world/030729/w072940.html
Phew …
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Monthly Archives: July 2003
Sick beyond belief
It’s called Policy Analysis Market, and the blurb sounds fairly innocuous:
PAM is intended to have a globally distributed population of traders. Individuals interested in the Middle East and in the involvement of the United States with the countries of the Middle East are welcome to register as PAM traders. Individuals who are interested in the use of market processes to manage risk are also welcome to participate in PAM. Whatever a prospective trader’s interest in PAM, involvement in this group prediction process should prove engaging and may prove profitable.
… until you realise that it’s basically a stock-market system in which traders can bet on the likelihoods of terror attacks and assassinations in the Middle East. Eww!
I’d heard that money was amoral, but this is straight immoral. How soon will it be before an investor consortium on this market hires hitmen to make their “investments” profitable?
And all because They say that The Market can predict anything. If that’s the case, I’ve got a nice fish I can sell you, and you can tell the future by looking at its entrails.
The return of Mayor McCA
Back on June 6, I lamented the lack of interest there is in determinedly indie Canadian musician Mayor McCA. How wrong — or premature — I was.
I just heard from Mark at Sonic Unyon records that not merely does the Mayor have a new CD out, but that they’re sending me a copy! Whee!
Better yet, the Mayor is playing a free show later in the month at The Horseshoe, Toronto. This is all on his website, mayormcca.com, along with a track from the new album. Great stuff!
Stumpy!!!
I just got a classic bike from a small ad in a bike shop: a mid-80s Specialized Stumpjumper — with ultra-relaxed 69° angles and retro tiny main tube diameters — converted into a singlespeed.
The frame’s a little rusty, but it’s still lovely. The seller had done the conversion with pretty decent parts, so I’m happy as a clam. And the price was great. And it rides like a dream.
So, only 20 years after drooling over a Stumpy as a paperboy, I’ve finally got one. Wheee!!
the wisdom of chairman ralph
You know, you can’t let people like this get away with stuff like that because if it’s a pie today, it could be something else tomorrow.
— Alberta Premier Ralph Klein, after being pied at the opening of the Calgary Stampede. Thanks to The Globe & Mail for the sharp words.
and finally… Raudelunas ‘Pataphysical Review!
Well, after many years of waiting, Raudelunas ‘Pataphysical Review has made it onto CD. It’s especially nice to see my name on the “Special Thanks” credits.
So how did a Scottish engineer who was only 5 when the original performance took place in Alabama get a credit? Well, long ago, I had a site about Fred Lane. Various people got in touch with me through the site, and before long I was putting members of the original collective in touch with Ed Baxter, who runs Alcohol Records.
So now, after about five years, I have the CD in my hands. It sounds even weirder than it always did. It’s still The Best Thing Ever