Update: Opensewer artist Robert Banks has a few events coming up that may be of interest to you.

Update: The deadline for entries in the 4th Annual CAi Photography Competition has been extended to January 18, 2002.

According to the Environment and Energy Daily (November 16, 2001), the EPA will propose a new rule in 2002 and a final rule in April of 2003 that may allow pollution trading, a practice that would enable companies in some cases to purchase permits to pollute rather than further limiting their water pollution emissions. I know that the world is a complicated place and that tough decisions must be made all the time, but why must we so often act in ways that are completely contrary to common sense?

Today is the anniversary of the first handwritten publication of Alice in Wonderland (originally titled Alice’s Adventures Under Ground). Lewis Carroll has been accused, by a number of conservative entities and individuals, of being under the influence on drugs while writing this story. Eighty-nine years after Carroll’s handwritten manuscript was given to little Alice Liddel, Disney produced an animated version of the story. Disney likes it when you buy stuff from them. Conservatives also want us to buy stuff, because it’s morally proper and it helps us recover from September 11 and the current economic slowdown. So, should I buy a copy of Disney’s Alice in Wonderland to support the cause, or will this be too ethically confusing for everyone?

Don't forget, Buy Nothing Day is this Friday, November 23rd.

Artist Wyeth Koppenhaver uses digital collage to transpose his grandfather's observations from World War II into the visual and social context of the present.

The Harry Potter movie is opening this weekend! Are you excited? Have you been waiting for this? Are your kids excited? Coca-cola is excited, they are reaching a young audience which is smitten with the world of Harry Potter, a world in which there is Coca-cola, so it must be good right? You want some right now don't you? Some people aren't too excited about it - Save Harry is trying to teach people about just how bad liquid candy is and what it is doing to our kids.

I'm linking to this a couple of days late, but... Well put, Scott.

The economists as good guys and the humanists as bad guys? Whaaat?

These aren’t all future Susan Sontags. Carrying tattered copies of ‘in’ books is a fashion statement for some.

In the Wall Street Journal this past Friday (11/9/01, page W-1), an article entitled Look Who’s Reading by Pooja Bhatia calls attention to the fact that reading has suddenly become hip in the under-25 set—the post-Gen-X generation. “It’s a backlash against MTV culture,” according to sociologist William Strauss, author of Millennials Rising: The Next Great American Generation. Well, a backlash against MTV culture is fine with me, but what’s not good is that this movement seems to be based more on image than anything else. I quote from the article:

No one would accuse Kathleen Dodge of being a slacker. The Berkeley, Calif., 25-year-old showed up three hours early just to get a seat at a local reading by [Dave] Eggers last summer. She wore a carefully chosen outfit—green cashmere sweater, long black shirt—that she felt connoted just the right mix of intellect and style.

Mmm-hmm.

Speak from your heart, even if your voice shakes.

oh that is so sad

I actually find myself surprised these aren't real.

Hmmm...

Bush reversed a decision made in the Clinton years about mining restrictions on public lands making it easier for a Nevada company to dig an open-pit gold mine in a part of the California desert considered sacred by a local Indian tribe. As always and still, making life easier for industry. (NYTimes; username: opensewer; password: iswatching.)

Artist Sean Hopp has strange dreams. Fortunately, because he's a painter, we have a chance to see them. In his words, "a complete visual world philosophy is possible through the use of introspection and personal symbols."

Indeed, the gender gap in support for this U.S. military effort is unusually small. Historically, female support for war has lagged between 10 and 15 percent behind men's, according to Joshua Goldstein, author of War and Gender: How Gender Shapes the War System and Vice Versa. But in a recent survey released by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, 79 percent of women, compared to 86 percent of men, said they support the ongoing military intervention, a near parity Goldstein believes may be explained by the fact that the Taliban is anathema to women.