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Just when you thought you've heard the bizarre, comes this little gem. A group of scientists have come up with a way of battling global climate change caused by heating up of the planet due to greenhouse gases. Their suggestion would cost somewhere between $6 to $500 trillion dollars, and calls for a dramatic effort to control the planet's climate. Their suggestion is for a space ring to be constructed around the planet , which would reflect just 1.6% of solar radiation, but be enough to overcome the slight rise in global temperatures. The ring could be constructed of small particles shepherded by spacecraft -- or small spacecrafts connected in orbit. The ring would be erected around the equator, providing shade primarily to where the planet is the hottest. If the particle solution is used, the materials could come from mining the Moon. A side effect of the ring would be the nightly illumination. We'd be able to see reflected sunlight, similar to the Moon's, at ...

Canada joins Belgium and the Netherlands in legalizing gay marriages across the entire country -- despite the efforts of the conservatives and religious wackos. Another reason for me to be proud to be Canadian. If two people want to get married, what should it matter to anyone else? I like to use the analogy of interracial marriages. It wasn't too long ago when such a thing was seen as an affront to the sanctity of marriage -- whatever the fuck that means. How different is this? Marriage isn't about having kids; it's not about raising kids -- because if it was, we would have to force married couples to have kids and single parents from raising them. Marriage is about two people sharing their lives together -- for better or for worse.

You may not have heard of the ' advertorial ' before, but if businesses have their way, you're going to be seeing a lot more of it, and won't even know you're viewing paid advertising. Advertisers are desperate . More and more, the lines are being blurred between what is paid advertising and what is news, opinions or entertainment. Already magazine spreads are filled with pages that pose as articles -- and you would be duped into reading the "article" if you didn't see the Special Advertising Section note on the page header. Then there is product placements in everything: television shows, movies, video games, books and music. Some advertising has become entertainment -- where the "show" stars the product. Things are about to escalate as businesses try even more for your eye. Now, advertisers are looking to buy articles -- they're looking to buy editorials -- where a product would be the feature of the article or editorial. Adver...

GE has joined the ranks of major companies issuing comprehensive statements about their efforts outside the regular business of making money -- on things such as corporate governance and responsibility, as well as the environment. With the report, " Our Actions ," [PDF] GE aims to tell the story of how GE does business, their impact on the communities they work in, and their efforts to be a good citizen of the world. The report, which is surprisingly candid and large, used the Global Reporting Initiative 2002 Sustainability Reporting Guidelines . GE is known as a management trendsetter, and hopefully this report, which critics argue as being not as complete as it could have been, will nudge other corporations to become more transparent and open to employees, shareholders and the public. True, GE is doing this because it makes business sense to be transparent, open and honest -- they're not doing this for altruistic reasons -- but nevertheless, the report is a step in...

Last weekend, my wife and I happened on the Barbados on the Water Festival at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre. It was the first time I've been to that festival -- the summer festivals at Harbourfront Centre actually kicks off next weekend. It was a bit cooler than is usual for the summer, but nevertheless, what we saw of the festival was great. We saw Andy Earle and his band perform, and joined by Structcha (sp); we also caught the Israel Lovell Foundation dance company performing. Between the shows, we checked out the Music Garden, and took too many photos -- which you can check out by following the thumbnail links below.

Russia is planning two missions to Mars , in their continuing attempt to explore the planet. Russia has sent 17 probes to Mars, of which only 3 were successful. The new missions, planned for 2009 and 2015, would land a craft on Phobos and place a lander on the Martian surface. The Phobos mission is quite intriguing, as it has been speculated that the Martian moons may make a suitable site for a Mars base. There is also the ongoing questions as to the origins of the Martian moons. The 2009 mission would land on Phobos and release a rover that will spend three years conducting science. At the end of the mission, the samples collected would return to Earth.

Just read a blog post on the Media Center Blog , decrying the death of mass media due to the proliferation of free, niche media. I had to respond. Sorry, I don't buy the argument that citizen journalism, aka free media, will lead to the collapse of the giant media organizations. What it means is that big media will need to change, just as the music and movie industry is having to change. There are more than one way to generate revenues from media when the distribution channel changes. The other premise, that smaller media companies will be worse off than large companies for the market is stupid. Smaller media companies can become more focused, more responsive to the market, and a hell of a lot more independent from the corporate interests that that's big media serve. The evolution of mass media is coming -- those unable to change and respond will die. Those evolve or are built from the ashes of the dead will be better equipped to serve the market that awaits them. Ther...

As China continues to lick its lips in anticipation of someday getting Taiwan, we should all be concerned. For those not in the know, China and Taiwan have had an interesting history, starting with Mao's ascension on the mainland, that resulted in a exodus of 2 million Chinese nationalists to Taiwan. The native Taiwanese were not happy with the move, and the unrest that followed resulted in martial law being declared by the Chinese minorities. It was only in the last 20 years or so that Taiwan gave up martial law and embraced democracy. Since then, Taiwanese have expressed a desire for independence from China -- which has at times caused China to hold military exercises in the waters between Taiwan and the mainland, and also prompted the US to send carrier battle groups to the region. The standoff today has China with anti-secession laws authorizing the use of military force should Taiwan declare independence, and Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian vowing to declare independence ...

Big companies with well known brands also leverage spyware and adware to get their messages out to potential customers. Hero to the common folk, NY Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, says those companies can no longer play dumb -- and will be held accountable. Spitzer made news on this topic for targeting the purveyors of spyware, but is now turning his sights on the businesses that keep spyware vendors alive. Some very well known names and brands use spyware: Orbitz, Priceline, Expedia, Vonage, JC Penney, Capital One, Mercedes, Monster, Sprint and Sony to name a few. Some get their ads delivered unknowingly via spyware -- but that just isn't an excuse. Even if that sorry excuse is used to stay out of jail, it's just stupid. Any business with a brand that's worth anything would think twice about not wanting to know the details of how their messages are getting out. Your brand is priceless. Spyware alienates potential customers and customers alike -- why would you ever...

Hubble Space Telescope has detected the Great Eye of Sauron 25 light years away. It's a newly formed solar system around the star Fomalhaut, in the constellation Pisces Austalis. The ring is offset from the star, most likely because of unseen planets are gathering stray dust within the radius of the ring. The large, outer ring around the star is most likely a cometary belt similar to our Kuiper Belt. Fomalhaut is around 200 million years old, and offers a unique opportunity for the study of an early solar system formation.

NASA is looking forward to future missions to the Moon, and possibly Mars -- involving people -- and are working on a host of issues that astronauts would have to contend with on their missions. One of the biggest issues is shielding astronauts from charged particles from the Sun or extrasolar sources. A novel concept that never took off, other than in SciFi, is the force field . NASA is currently looking at the possibility of erecting force fields around bases on the Moon. The current idea being explored is to surround astronauts with a powerful electric field [PDF] with the same charge as incoming charged particles. Since like charges repel, the incoming charged particles would be bounced back into space. The leading design sees inflatable, conductive spheres about 5 metres in diameter being mounted above a lunar base. Negatively charged spheres would be higher, blocking all negatively charged particles, while positively charged spheres would be lower, blocking positively ch...

(Nothing But) Flowers by the Talking Heads is one cool song. Click to listen [7MB, MP3] to a live version by a band I've never heard of -- Guster. They actually do a good rendition of the song. Nothing weird was done to it. It's an interesting thought -- I think most of us want to do right by the planet, but how many of us would actually want to give up this lifestyle?

Can digital piracy be an indirect marketing route to generate sales via legal channels? Chris Seibold takes that assumption with a post on the Apple Matters site. Take the piracy of music online -- surely there are those that have actually gone out and picked up a CD by an artist they've newly discovered. What about the ancillary products? T-shirts? Concert tickets? Other albums in the artist's catalogue? Could the move to the Intel architecture for Apple actually spur the curious to download a pirated copy of OS/X for their existing Wintel box? If OS/X works out of the box on Wintel machines, you bet the curious will -- especially if an underground movement starts to write device drivers and optimization parameters for the OS on Wintel. You never know, a golden age of Apple could emerge. Apple could end up selling a lot more than they planned on -- especially to users of non-Apple boxes.

Microsoft's researchers are developing a P2P protocol that promises performance gains of 20-30% over BitTorrent. The protocol, known as Avalanche, solves a problem with the current version of BitTorrent -- the problem of getting the final missing pieces of a file. Downloaders sometimes have to wait quite some time for those elusive last pieces to arrive. Avalanche solves this problem by leveraging on the concept of parity checking -- which adds information on the linear distribution of pieces to each torrent chunk. As you near completion of a download, the missing pieces you're waiting for can actually be reconstructed from the pieces you already have. Microsoft stresses that Avalanche is for legal file distributions only, and wasn't make to pirate copies of Windows and Office faster.

eWeek is reporting that BitTorrent is no longer clean. The file format and peer-to-peer network has been hijacked by Direct Revenue and Marketing Metrix Group, to distribute their Aurora product . Once installed, Aurora takes you into popup hell and doesn't let go.

Japan continues to hunt whales for scientific purposes -- as if the world believes that bullshit. Whales have been a traditional part of the Japanese diet, but industrial whaling has reduce stocks worldwide. Rather than curtail their hunt, Japan is planning on increasing their hunt to up to 900 minke whales. This is despite the International Whaling Commission asking Japan not to.

I went to see this documentary with a friend Monday night. The documentary follows the exploits of Ron English, he of hijacking billboard fame, and includes a smidgen on the culture jamming movement, especially those that skirt the law in defacing public billboards and parodying pop culture. For those who don't know Ron English, check out this site that is dedicated to everything Ron English . English takes some credit for personally causing the demise of Joe Camel. He also targets MacDonalds in his art, and does some stuff with Kiss and Jesus that simply makes little sense. He's a pretty good artist, and with his billboard hijacking, has succeeded in becoming the very thing he expressed his art against -- he's become a brand, a pop culture icon. The documentary itself just followed English's exploits. There wasn't much insight or analysis of his art or person. It was more of a fanboy documentary -- even a bit promotional of his art. Not that it was necess...

Ever wondered how Google ranks sites? Well, quite a bit of the secret is now out with US Patent Application 20050071741 . Well known is that Google relies heavily on relevant inbound links to rank a site -- what is not known is the details behind how the link information is used. Google apparently ages the links. Getting linked is important. However, if your site gains a lot of links quickly, it's probably indicative of some manipulation in the works. Google keeps tabs on how links change over time, and if they remain. The anchor words are also important for the site. If you the same anchor words are used over and over, it again indicates manipulation. More information on the patent is available on Buzzle.com .

Just read an article from BusinessWeek on the anime business , and why, despite its legions of fans, is still not a profitable business for anime studios. Anime is huge in Japan, and is growing export for the country. Anime is also very influential, influencing movie producers, fashion and western culture. What it has done to Japan is whole lot different. In fact, of the three top grossing movies in Japan, three are anime -- the biggest being Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away , which also won the 2003 Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Yet, despite critical acclaim and cult like following, the anime business isn't as robust as the animation industry of North America. Why? The artists. There is no industry. There are some 440 animation studios in Japan -- not much consolidation has occurred. Artists are bad business people. In fact, they routinely cut deals to sell their creations outright to distributors and toy makers, who make billions, while the artists hardly ...

The finale of the WWSFF was on Sunday night, and I caught the not-so-late-night show. Again, like with the other shorts I saw, this compilation was mixed. There were a couple of standouts, a few with potential and then some duds. What follows includes some spoilers. You've been warned. Skylab -- In 1979, NASA's Skylab came plummeting down. I was in Guyana at the time, and I remembered being scared that something really big and heavy was going to fall from the sky and kill us all. Apparently the film makers of this short had the same childhood experience. Skylab is falling, and for Benj Handle, the world was ending. His mom was also remarrying and he didn't really like his stepdad to be. The short had potential, but it got wasted. It was a personal story -- but that was it -- just a story -- no SciFi -- just what Skylab meant to the filmmaker as a child. The Eiffel Tower (Eiffeltornet) -- A guy wakes up from a dream, where he's running around Paris in search...