STOP E$$O

Recently while looking for the Esso logo online, I came across a website called StopEsso. This is a campaign by Green Peace against Esso (a.k.a ExxonMobil in the US).

Why Esso ? What makes it worse than the rest ?

Here’s what they answer to that:

The company that has done more than any other to keep the US hooked on oil is Esso (known as ExxonMobil in the USA). This addiction is causing global warming.

Esso has spent the last decade sabotaging international action on climate change and directing US climate and energy policy. Esso paid the Republicans $1.2 million up to the 2000 elections – and sure enough President George W Bush pulled the US out of the international global warming treaty, the Kyoto Protocol.

Esso has consistently questioned the accepted scientific consensus that burning fossil fuels like oil is causing global warming. It is still misleading the US public and policymakers over the economic implications of tackling the problem.

It funds ‘industry front groups’ to lobby on its behalf. In turn, they promote climate sceptic scientists to question the science of global warming.

I don’t use Esso anyway as I try to always use Agil, a Tunisian company, as a way to encourage local companies and investments.

Anyway I think other people should consider Esso’s actions and see what little step they can do towards protecting our world.

Sex makes you clever

Sex stimulates the brain and makes people more intelligent, according to a top German researcher.

Werner Habermehl, from the Hamburg Medical Research Institute, says that regular sexual intercourse promotes intelligence.

He said that love making not only excited the body but also the brain and the increased amount of adrenaline and cortisol hormones that are produced stimulates the grey matter, reported magazine Unicum Campus.

“Sex makes you more intelligent in that experiences are collected that can be used later on in areas of life not linked to sex,” said Habermehl.

He added that the added injection of endorphins and serotonin that resulted from an orgasm strengthened self-confidence – giving the body a mental as well as physical work out.

[Source: Ananova]

Is that interesting or what ?!
But, wait a second, that should make pornstars the world’s smartest people and the biggest geniuses!
Now that’s something…
No wonder they chose to have sex for a living. It’s fun, they get paid for it and it makes them smarter 😉 That sure is smart 😛

Free Culture

Today I’ve started reading Lawrence Lessig’s book “Free Culture” about how big media uses technology and the law to lock down culture and control creativity.

Up to now it seems like quite an interesting read.
I’m rather interested in the topic the book discusses.

Lawrence made this book available for free download here.

I really like the initiatives writers like Lawrence and Cory Doctorow are taking by making their books free to download under a Creative Commons License.
I hope more people follow, not because I like to have stuff for free, but because this way I can learn about these books and get a chance to read them.

US knew al-Qa’ida would attack cities with aeroplanes !

‘I saw papers that show US knew al-Qa’ida would attack cities with aeroplanes’
– Sibel Edmonds

Sibel Edmonds, a former translator for the FBI with top-secret security clearance says she has provided information to the panel investigating the 11 September attacks which proves senior officials knew of al-Qa’ida’s plans to attack the US with aircraft months before the strikes happened.

She said the claim by the National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, that there was no such information was “an outrageous lie”.

“I gave details of specific investigation files, the specific dates, specific target information, specific managers in charge of the investigation. I gave them everything so that they could go back and follow up. This is not hearsay. These are things that are documented. These things can be established very easily.”, She said.

She added: “There was general information about the time-frame, about methods to be used

Star Academy LBC : And The Winner Is…

The last prime of Star Academy on LBC just ended, and after wrecking everyone’s nerves, the winner was announced.

The last 2 students left were Bashar El Shatti from Kuwait and Mohamed Attiah from Egypt.

And the winner of the first arab Star Academy was: MOHAMED ATTIAH !

I didn’t really follow the previous primes, so I don’t really don’t know the students well, but from today’s prime, I felt Bashar should have won, and most probably would have voted for him.
Anyway, I’m sure that if Attiah won, then he deserved it for some reason or another.

Congratulations to Mohamed Attiah, and congratulations to all the students for the great time they spent.

One thing is for sure, I’ll be watching every prime of the next Star Academy.

Amr Khaled

I’ve heard a lot about the Islamic preacher Amr Khaled over the past couple of years. And I’ve known or seen a lot of people who were really touched by him. From women who have started praying and wearing the Hijab (Muslim Head Scarf) to men who have started praying and stopped their bad habits.

Even though I heard a lot of talk about him and about what he has to say and how he says it, I never really got to catch him on TV and see the show he hosts on the Iqraa channel. Not until this past week.

The first thing that struck me was how nice the guy is and how smoothly he talks. He’s nothing like other preachers who frighten people and tell them that this or that is the right thing to do or else God will punish them. In fact what he does is the complete opposite, he talks to people in a very friendly manner and explains everything in detail; showing the good sides of things and making it more a matter of the people wanting to do certain things than having to do them.

The show I saw him in is called “Life Makers”, in which he talks about Islamic values and principles, how they can help in life, their benefits, goals and reasons behind them.

I truly enjoyed the couple of episodes I saw because I like the way he presents things and the fact that he really knows what he’s talking about inside out.

Another thing I like is that he presents Islam as it truly is, a religion of peace, high values and strong principles.
He’s no radical or fundamentalist, he’s extremely moderate and what every muslim should naturally be.

For anyone who’s interested, the show is aired on Iqraa channel, both on Hotbird and on Nilesat.
Iqraa on Nilesat also provide English subtitles.

Kinja

Kinja, a new web portal for aggregating and reading blogs has launched as a beta.

It enables the user to create a digest of his favourite blogs which is displayed like a blog itself and which the user can share with other people.

If you’re interested, here’s my current digest. I’m still working on it though, and not all my faves are in yet.

Gmail : Free Gig of Email

Google announced today a new service called Gmail that will offer a gigabyte of free email to it’s users.

The service is currently in it’s beta phase, but should be out soon.

Google plans to make money from the service by inserting advertisements into messages based in part on their content, effectively extending its AdWords program for presenting contextual ads in Web pages to e-mail.

More information on the service can be found here: Gmail.

Personally, I think this is an April Fool’s Day joke by Google even though there have been rumours about Google launching an email service for some time now.

Update:
It seems this is not an April Fool’s Day joke and that it’s really for real.
Google announced the service on April 1 to generate a lot of fuss, talk and speculation about it in order to inform as many people as possible.
Very smart guys those Google people.

Well with 1 GB of email space, I’ll sure be signing up when subscription is enabled. I think I might even stop using all my other webmail accounts too.
Who needs a few MBs when they can have 1 GB ?

April Fool’s Day ;)

Some of you guessed it, some fell for it, but in the end, the truth is my previous post was an April Fool’s Day joke.

In fact, I truly wish I could just pick myself up, leave and go live in Phi Phi Island, a place I fell in love with ever since I visited it.

Of course I wouldn’t go for the whole buddhist and name change part.
But living there would be a dream.

Anyway, the truth is I just can’t at the time being.
So it’ll remain an April Fool’s Day joke until I can.

Sorry for the people who believed the lie, and thanks for your support 🙂

Full Stop ! New Beginning !

This morning I woke up a changed man.
I looked at my life and just realized that this is not what I want, it’s not what I’m here for, It’s not what I want to do, It’s not how I want to be.

And so I’m quitting everything, and I mean everything.
I’ve already started making arrangements for my new life.

I’m going to leave everything that’s in my life now behind me, change my name, my religion, my nationality, my everything.

I’m going to change my name into Sikotai, become a buddhist and go to Tibet for a year of meditation to find my inner self and reach peace with my surroundings.
After that I’ll be off to the small Phi Phi Island in Thailand, where I’ll open a little shop where I’ll make natural remedies and potions.

Every once in a while I’ll go to nearby Phuket for half a day to sell my potions to some dealers there and to visit the big buddhist temples.

Yep, that’s what I want to do.
And I’ve started my way to true enlightment.

PS: This should also be the last blog I’ll be posting here.