Credit Is Due

Always give credit where credit is due
if you didn't write it, don't say it's by you
just copy the credit along with the work
or else you'll come off as an arrogant jerk

Always give credit where credit belongs
we know that you didn't write Beethoven's songs
pretending you did makes you look like a fool
unless you're Beethoven -- in that case, it's cool

A transparent system makes cheating unwise
the simplest web search exposes your lies
no one wants their reputation besmirched
which happens to liars when they are web-searched

Proper citation will make you a star
it shows that you know that we know who you are
Plagiarization will only harm you
so always give credit where credit is due!

-- Credit is Due (The Attribution Song), by Nina Paley

Check out the video:
http://blog.ninapaley.com/2011/06/27/credit-is-due/

Equality

I think you're going to see this message resonate all across the country now. If New York can do it, it's OK for every other place to do it.

-- New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo, speaking at New York City's gay pride parade about the legalization of same-sex marriage, New York Times, 27 June 2011

A Little Bit Less

Among the many lessons that I've learned from this whole experience is to try to speak a little bit less.

-- Former Illinois Governor Rod R. Blagojevich, after being convicted of 17 counts in a corruption case, New York Times, 28 June 2011

LulzSec Manifesto

Do you think every hacker announces everything they've hacked? We certainly haven't, and we're damn sure others are playing the silent game. Do you feel safe with your Facebook accounts, your Google Mail accounts, your Skype accounts? What makes you think a hacker isn't silently sitting inside all of these right now, sniping out individual people, or perhaps selling them off?

This is what you should be fearful of, not us releasing things publicly, but the fact that someone hasn't released something publicly.

This is the Internet, where we screw each other over for a jolt of satisfaction.

Lulz Security

-- "Hacker" group LulzSec, from their 1000th tweet statement, 17 June 2011 (pastebin.com/HZtH523f); interestingly LulzSec apparently went out of business over the weekend

Constitution

A constitution is not the act of a government, but of a people constituting a government; and government without a constitution is power without a right. All power exercised over a nation, must have some beginning. It must be either delegated, or assumed. There are not other sources. All delegated power is trust, and all assumed power is usurpation. Time does not alter the nature and quality of either.

-- Thomas Paine (1737-1809), Rights of Man (1791)

Administer Justice

In a free society the state does not administer the affairs of men. It administers justice among men who conduct their own affairs.

-- Walter Lippmann (1889-1974), "An Inquiry into the Principles of the Good Society" (1937)

Old Crises Never End

If one looks at what's happening in today's world, we are seeing a multiplication of new crises -- since the beginning of the year, Cote d'Ivoire, Libya, Syria, Yemen. And at the same time, it seems that old crises never end. Look at what's happening in Afghanistan, more than 20 years of fighting; in Somalia, again, 20 years of fighting; in the Democratic Republic of Congo. New crises multiply. Old crises never end.

-- Antonio Guterres, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, reporting that the current 44 million refugees is a 15-year high, 21 June 2011

First Principle

The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.

-- Richard Feynman (1918-1988), American physicist, What is and What Should be the Role of Scientific Culture in Modern Society", lecture at the Galileo Symposium in Italy (1964)

In A Cave

It's probably tough to count votes when you're in a cave.

-- Defense Secretary Robert Gates, on the 7 weeks it took Al Qaeda to name Ayman al-Zawahri to succeed Osama bin Laden, final Pentagon press conference, 16 June 2011

Fathers Day

The good-enough father is not simply a knight in shining armor galloping to the occasional rescue; he is there through good times and bad, insisting on and delighting in his paternity every pleasurable and painful step of the way.

-- Victoria Secunda, American psychologist and author, Women and Their Fathers, ch. 4 (1992)

Sunset

The best thing we did with the Patriot Act was to sunset it. Almost 800 foreign nationals, immigrants, mostly Arab-Americans or people who looked like Arab-Americans, were arrested, put in jail, held without charges, no notification for their families and no right to counsel. That's un-American and I'll fight to end that. If we fight the terrorists who attacked us because of our liberties by compromising our liberties, shame on us.

-- Senator Joe Lieberman I-CT (1942-), American politician, CNN "Rock the Vote", Nov 5, 2003

Creativity V. Art

Creativity is allowing oneself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.

-- Scott Adams (1957-), American cartoonist and satirist, The Dilbert Principle (1996)

Inaction

Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.

-- Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), Italian Renaissance architect and artist, The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci I, English translation by Jean Paul Richter (1888)

Unable To Recognize Truth

A man who lies to himself, and believes his own lies, becomes unable to recognize truth, either in himself or in anyone else, and he ends up losing respect for himself and for others.

-- Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881), Russian novelist, The Brothers Karamazov (1879-1880)

A Happy Chance

We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.

-- William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965), English playwright, novelist, and short story writer, The Summing Up (1938)

A Perilous Affair

Why is it that one can look at a lion or a planet or an owl or at someone's finger as long as one pleases, but looking into the eyes of another person is, if prolonged past a second, a perilous affair?

-- Walker Percy (1916-1990), author, Lost in the Cosmos: The Last Self-Help Book (1983)

Tiger's Blood

Trial or not, John Edwards is the Charlie Sheen of American politics -- great hair and no chance for rehabilitation.

-- Democratic consultant Jack Quinn, John Edwards' indictment in the cover-up of an extra-marital affair, 3 June 2011

Paid To Go Slower

In our job we get paid more when we go faster, but (with) lawyers, it seems to be the other way round.

-- Cyclist Cadel Evans, on the delayed hearing of Tour winner Alberto Contador's doping case, 26 May 2011

Revolution

The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live.

-- Gil Scott-Heron (1 April 1949 - 27 May 2011), American poet, musician, and author, "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" (1970)