Another New York Calamity?

Will New York City be struck by more tragedies, as the one that befell it in 2001? Some “prophets” seem to think so.

David Wilkerson, a New York based pastor, is one such a “prophet” that seems to think so. Yes this is the same David Wilkerson of "The Cross and the Switchblade".

Recently Wilkerson said that he has been impressed by the Holy Spirit that :

“An earth-shattering calamity is about to happen. It is going to be so frightening, we are all going to tremble – even the godliest among us.

“For 10 years I have been warning about a thousand fires coming to New York City. It will engulf the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America will experience riots and blazing fires – such as we saw in Watts, Los Angeles, years ago.”

Wilkerson is not the first to have impressions of New York City on fire. A lady, thought by many to be a prophet of God, named Ellen White, wrote about it over a century ago, before there were majestic skyscrapers decorating the cityscape of New York.

“On one occasion, when in New York City, I was in the night season called upon to behold buildings rising story after story toward heaven. These buildings were warranted to be fireproof, and they were erected to glorify the owners and builders. Higher and still higher these buildings rose, and in them the most costly material was used. Those to whom these buildings belonged were not asking themselves: “How can we best glorify God?” The Lord was not in their thoughts.

“The scene that next passed before me was an alarm of fire. Men looked at the lofty and supposedly fire-proof buildings and said: “They are perfectly safe.” But these buildings were consumed as if made of pitch. The fire engines could do nothing to stay the destruction. The firemen were unable to operate the engines.”

Also the politicians seem to prophecy doom for America. Remember Joe Biden’s ghastly prediction:

“Remember I said it standing here if you don't remember anything else I said. Watch, we're gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy [Obama]. And he's gonna have to make some really tough - I don't know what the decision's gonna be, but I promise you it will occur. As a student of history and having served with seven presidents, I guarantee you it's gonna happen.”

I’m forced to ask, like blogger Adam asked, how does Joe Biden know this? Is it all part of a masterminded plan? Or is he also a “prophet” in tune with the inspiration of God? I don’t know.

What I do know is that I won’t be surprised if the visions of Wilkerson and White, or the political rhetoric of Biden comes to pass. Calamity is in the air. You can smell it, can't you?

Paranoia: Savvis

Our computers are constantly bombarded with servers trying to access our systems, where they glean some of our data. I’m not sure what they are looking for; maybe the websites we visit? Most web users are oblivious to this fact because it all happens in the background.

In any case, this morning I was showered with access attempts by Savvis-Incorporated. I have PeerGuardian2 installed which blocks access from various servers to my computer. This morning PeerGuardian2 was without stopping denying requests from Savvis to my computer from 00:59:42 until I eventually gave permission at 14:14:46, just so that the assault could stop. My system was really slow and I was desperately searching for a solution.

Now why do Savvis request access to my system? Savvis is an international communication and data corporation. Are they trying to find dirt on people in order to extort them like their co-founder was recently found guilty off?

The interesting thing is that I’m blocked (somehow) from opening their website: http://www.savvis.net

I had to use a proxy browser to access their website under a fake IP.

In my own silly little retaliation here is some of their information. I suggest you use a program to block their IP-address from getting access to your system too.

Here is the IP-address of Savvis’ server: 216.34.181.97

And some more personal information:

OrgNOCHandle: NOC99-ARIN
OrgNOCName: SAVVIS Support Center
OrgNOCPhone: + 1-888-638-6771
OrgNOCEmail: ipnoc@savvis.net

OrgTechHandle: UIAA-ARIN
OrgTechName: US IP Address Administration
OrgTechPhone: +1-888-638-6771
OrgTechEmail: kelli.coburn@savvis.net

Of course, I’m paranoid, so don’t listen to a word I say.

Facebook – More intrusive than previously thought

A friend forwarded me this link to the article below from PCWorld. If people would just take the time to read Facebook’s Terms of Use, they wouldn’t be surprised at these privacy intrusions. Facebook makes it very clear that they collect information about their users outside of the Facebook-interface. I hate to tell you: I told you so!

The real question is not if they are collecting personal information about it, but rather why do it and what do they do with it?

…ooOoo…

Facebook's Beacon More Intrusive Than Previously Thought

A Computer Associates security researcher says that Facebook's controversial Beacon online ad system goes much further than expected in tracking people's Web activities.

Juan Carlos Perez

Friday, November 30, 2007 4:10 PM PST

A Computer Associates security researcher is sounding the alarm that Facebook's controversial Beacon online ad system goes much further than anyone has imagined in tracking people's Web activities outside the popular social networking site.

Beacon will report back to Facebook on members' activities on third-party sites that participate in Beacon even if the users are logged off from Facebook and have declined having their activities broadcast to their Facebook friends.

That's the finding published on Friday by Stefan Berteau, senior research engineer at CA's Threat Research Group in a note summarizing tests he conducted.

Of particular concern is that users aren't informed that data on their activities at these sites is flowing back to Facebook, nor given the option to block that information from being transmitted, Berteau said in an interview.

"It can happen completely without their knowledge, unless they are examining their network traffic at a very low level," Berteau said.

The CA news comes after Facebook scrambled on Thursday night to tweak Beacon in order to calm complaints from privacy groups and Facebook users that the ad system is too intrusive and too confusing to opt out of.

Beacon is a major part of the Facebook Ads platform that Facebook introduced with much fanfare several weeks ago. Beacon tracks certain activities of Facebook users on more than 40 participating Web sites, including those of Blockbuster and Fandango, and reports those activities to the users' set of Facebook friends, unless told not to do so.

Off-Facebook activities that can be broadcast to one's Facebook friends include purchasing a product, signing up for a service and including an item on a wish list.

The program has been blasted by groups such as MoveOn.org and by individual users who have unwittingly broadcast information about recent purchases and other Web activities to their Facebook friends. This has led to some embarrassing situations, such as blowing the surprise of holiday presents.

On Thursday night, Facebook tweaked Beacon to make its workings more explicit to Facebook users and to make it easier to nix a broadcast message and opt out of having activities tracked on specific Web sites. Facebook didn't go all the way to providing a general opt-out option for the entire Beacon program, as some had hoped.

But Berteau's investigation reveals that Beacon is more intrusive and stealthy than anyone had imagined.

In his note, titled "Facebook's Misrepresentation of Beacon's Threat to Privacy: Tracking users who opt out or are not logged in," he explains that he created an account on Conde Nast's food site Epicurious.com, a site participating in Beacon, and saved three recipes as favorites.

He saved the first recipe while logged in to Facebook, and he opted out of having it broadcast to his friends on Facebook. He saved the second recipe after closing the Facebook window, but without logging off from Epicurious or ending the browser session, and again declined broadcasting it to his friends. Then he logged out of Facebook and saved the third recipe. This time, no Facebook alert appeared asking if he wanted the information displayed to his friends.

After checking his network traffic logs, Berteau saw that in all three cases, information about his activities was reported back to Facebook, although not to his friends. That information included where he was on Epicurious, the action he had just taken and his Facebook account name.

"The first two cases involve the transmission of user data despite 'No thanks' having been selected on the opt-out dialog, and are causes for deep concern. They pale, however, in comparison to the third case, where Facebook was receiving data about my online habits while I was not logged in, and was doing so silently, without even alerting me to the cross-site communication," he wrote in the research note.

If a user has ever checked the option for Facebook to "remember me" -- which saves the user from having to log on to the site upon every return to it -- Facebook can tie his activities on third-party Beacon sites directly to him, even if he's logged off and has opted out of the broadcast. If he has never chosen this option, the information still flows back to Facebook, although without it being tied to his Facebook ID, according to Berteau.

Berteau wasn't able to determine where this data flows to in Facebook. "That's part of the concern here," he said in the interview. He repeated the Epicurious experiment with Kongregate.com, another Beacon-affiliated site, and got similar results.

In e-mail correspondence with Facebook's privacy department, Berteau was told, among other things, that "as long as you are logged out of Facebook, no actions you have taken on other websites can be sent to Facebook."

A similar statement was made by a high-ranking Facebook official on Thursday. In an interview with The New York Times, Chamath Palihapitiya, vice president of product marketing and operations at Facebook, was asked whether Facebook would receive information about a user's purchase if the user declined to broadcast the purchase to his Facebook friends.

His answer: "Absolutely not. One of the things we are still trying to do is dispel a lot of misinformation that is being propagated unnecessarily."

Facebook didn't immediately reply to requests for comment from IDG News Service.

Brother’s (time)keeper

O terrible turkey, how time flies! Ten days ago since the last post and I hardly had time to wakeup and smell my coffee … uhm … chicory.

My brother has a theory that Time has speeded up. The actual units of time are moving faster – everywhere. He says that intuitively we can feel that time moved much slower two decades back.

Now you might think that such an idea is silly, but just ponder it a moment. Don’t you feel it too? We all had much more time twenty years ago, didn’t we?

Of course we still have the same amount of time – twenty four hours a day (give or take a few thousands of a second). But what if the actual time units are moving by faster? What if a second used to last a second, but now it lasts less that what a second used to be?

You may consider it far fetched, but keep in mind Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and the phenomena of Gravitational Time Dilation. Basically Gravitational Time Dilation entails that space-time is “curved” the closer it gets to a strong gravitational pull, which results in time passing slower.

Is it possible that decades ago the Earth had a stronger gravitational pull; in the meantime it had enigmatically weakened, thus space-time is less distorted, and so time is now passing faster?

Of course we cannot test it with atomic clocks, which is the way Gravitational Time Dilation was proved in the first place. The reason for this is that we cannot communicate with scientists from the past with access to atomic clocks in order to calibrate it with our own atomic clocks here in the present.

An easier method than communicating with the long dead is to check if the Earth lost some of its gravitational pull through the years. This would happen if Mother Earth lost some mass.

That doesn’t seem to be the case. Geophysics claim that the Earth has a dynamic energy equilibrium, which means the mass it loses (maybe through radiation) it also receives back from other sources such as radiation from the sun and other space debris. The Earth receives energy from the sun. Energy = matter, said Einstein, and matter has mass.

However there is something that had been happening in the last twenty years – Global Warming. Or is it Global Cooling? (The former caused the latter.)

It comes down to lots of air pollution. All these extra dirt particles floating in the air, apart from being smoggy, also create more clouds. Rain form when moisture condensates on particles and once attaining enough weight they fall to the ground. The problem is, if there are too many such particles in the air the condensational buildup on such a particle are less, because there is not enough moisture to go around. (There are just too many smog-particles!) The result is more cloudiness. In turn this extra blanket of clouds and smog reflect more sunlight away. Even though more heat is trapped inside the Earth’s atmosphere due to the Green House Effect (i.e. Global Warming), there is actually less sunlight penetrating the Earth’s atmosphere (i.e. Global Cooling), resulting in less energy, which in turn means less matter, and therefore less accumulation of mass.

So, the Earth is not in a dynamic energy equilibrium anymore for probably at least the last approximate twenty years, and may indeed be losing mass, so it’s gravitational pull may actually be decreasing, which means that space-time may be less distorted, which results in time moving faster!

But now for the paranoia: Who is behind Global Warming, which in turn causes Global Cooling, and why do they want Time to move faster? Mmmm?

Whether my hypothesis above is scientifically sound I don’t know. I’m not a physicist, and I do not have visions – I’m merely paranoid. Verifiable tests about the Earth’s gravitational pull is possible, but even if such tests should prove that the Earth has not diminished in gravitational exertion over the past two decades it does not mean that our time is not influenced by other fluctuations in space-time. We know that the universe is expanding and galaxies are moving away from each other, which mean that the relative gravitational pulls that the galaxies had on each other are weakening.

And that is why my brother is not silly.

The Scary Right and the Frightening Left

In the previous post I flayed the idea of Darwinian Evolution. That must make me a Religious Right fanatic, right? Nope, definitely not. There are few things in this universe that scares me as much as the Religious Right. If not one of the “Righteous Right” then I must be a Liberal Lefty, isn’t that so? Wrong again. The Liberal Left, although slightly less scary, is still a terrifying monster in my books.

So where does the Paranoid Prophet stand? Well, basically I’m torn into a terrible side split like Van Damme in Bloodsport (in picture), with my left foot dangling limb on one side and my right foot in a spasm on the other.

God’s government is based on Love. Love cannot exist without the freedom of choice. What I’m seeing in both the extreme Left and far Right, each of course with their own slant, is a peculiar movement towards taking away our freedom to choose.

The Religious Right is moving towards the integration of Church and State. This has proven to be disastrous in every historical case, leading to persecution of those that do not believe like the State Religion dictates. I vehemently disassociate myself with such a movement, which is, by the way, contrary to the First Amendment of the United State’s Bill of Rights. Also can I not, for the life of everything that enjoys Häagen-Dazs ice-cream, associate myself with those (rather big) fringe movements in the Religious Right that claims Global Warming is a farce invented by the socialists, or at least irrelevant because the End is nigh!

On the other hand, the Liberal’s attack on religion, Christianity in particular, frightens me too. The strong emphasis on down playing ones religion and claiming that witnessing is equal to proselytism (i.e. unethical means of religious persuasion) and akin to a Human Right violation is worrisome.

In the end, it doesn’t matter which side is ruling. With fanatical Republicans ruling religious freedom will have to be state approved. And with fanatical Democrats in government religion (especially denominational Christianity) will become ostracized as an enemy of Human Rights.

Either way, Freedom of Religion (as prescribed by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – Article 18) will become a relic of the New World, unwelcome within the New World Order.

Man, don’t listen to me. Prophet Kangnamgu is gifted with the spirit of paranoia, not the Spirit of Prophecy.

Who's scared of Facebook?

Facebook is the handiwork of Satan’s bedfellows. Their intention is to easily gather personal information of everyone as part of a secret profiling project. Once part of Facebook it is practically impossible to get out. It’s like joining the Mafia or the Freemasons.

Okay, maybe not Satan’s bedfellows, but Facebook is creatively linked with the Information Awareness Project (IAP), which did use a fabulously symbolic logo seeped in Masonic imagery. (The all-seeing-eye spying on the whole world. I wonder what that means?!) If that is not enough to freak you out, how about this statement saying that Facebook is collecting information about you from “other sources”?

"Facebook may use information about you that we collect from other sources, including but not limited to newspapers and Internet sources such as blogs, instant messaging services, Facebook Platform developers and other users of Facebook,” Facebook, Privacy Policy.

Not scared yet? Okay, dear Facebook-user, did you know that you signed a contract with Facebook agreeing that you will keep your personal information “current”, and “promptly” update any Registration Data changes (the registration Data is your personal information).

"In consideration of your use of the Site, you agree to (a) provide accurate, current and complete information about you as may be prompted by any registration forms on the Site ("Registration Data"); (b) maintain the security of your password and identification; (c) maintain and promptly update the Registration Data, and any other information you provide to Company, to keep it accurate, current and complete; and (d) be fully responsible for all use of your account and for any actions that take place using your account."Facebook, Terms of use.

Now why would Facebook be so interested in you keeping them abreast of all your personal details? I guess it is because they are so very concerned about your wellbeing.

You thought that the stuff you post on Facebook belong to you; did you?

“When you post User Content to the Site, you authorize and direct us to make such copies thereof as we deem necessary in order to facilitate the posting and storage of the User Content on the Site. By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing. You may remove your User Content from the Site at any time. If you choose to remove your User Content, the license granted above will automatically expire, however you acknowledge that the Company may retain archived copies of your User Content.” Facebook, Terms of Use.

Whatever you post on Facebook becomes Facebook’s and the “Company” can do with it what the “Company” wants. True, it is necessary for Facebook to have a limited license over your work in order to perform the functions of their service, but an irrevocalbe, perpetual, transferable, fully paid worldwide license, with the right to sublicense?!

Hey, don’t take my word for it:

http://www.albumoftheday.com/facebook/

http://www.chycho.com/?q=node/424

http://www.commongroundcommonsense.org/forums/lofiversion/index.php/t34949.html