Tue Mar 04, 2008 22:30 EST (UTC -5)
To my surprise, the Esperanto article I was supposed to be interviewed for was published today. The reporter interviewed my friend Andy at my suggestion and never got back to me. I'm glad for him, anyway. Plus, our hopefully-soon-to-be-launched Esperanto club got a mention. From the article:
At the University of Florida in Gainesville, some students say they plan to launch in the fall a social club called Esperanto at UF to encourage students to learn the language, said Andrew Rosenbaum, a freshman from Coral Springs.
"It is difficult to get people interested in Esperanto," said Rosenbaum, 18. "In some ways it will be an uphill battle; I compare it to trying to get the U.S. to try to use the metric system."
Rosenbaum said he first learned of Esperanto at J.P. Taravella High School in Coral Springs. None of his peers spoke the language, so he enrolled in an online course for two weeks. Now he practices by speaking with a handful of friends at UF and reading various texts in Esperanto on Wikipedia.
Teaching other young people to speak Esperanto could improve America's reputation abroad, Rosenbaum said.
"Potentially, this could facilitate having other countries view us as more progressive," he said. "Perhaps by learning the same language, they would see that we are more open to experiencing their cultures."
Rosebaum [sic] said he met fellow Esperantists through Facebook and lernu.net, a language networking and teaching site. He exchanges e-mails in Esperanto with a Costa Rican college student he met on Facebook a month ago.
Here's the full article: Esperanto fans in S. Florida cling to idealistic language.
Okay, this is something I really can't figure out for the life of me. Why do a few of my blog posts attract so much comment spam? This old post, "Where's my trailer?", gets upwards of hundreds of spam attempts a day. (No comment spam actually gets through thanks to the two anti-spam measures I've had in place for about a year.) "Really bad Rita" is another eternal favorite for spammers, as are "Where's my trailer again?", "Tornado waste of time", "Here's to 16 more", "From the song files of Jordon Kalilich", and a few others. I find it interesting that they were all posted in 2005. Other than that, I can't find a common link. I haven't done a word analysis of those posts, but it's not like I'm talking about mortgages, ringtones, gambling, World of Warcraft gold, or prescription drugs. (Am I asking for it here?) What's the deal? I challenge my other blogging readers to find (if possible) their most frequently spammed entries. What do they have in common that's so attractive to spammers?
As I was writing this, I heard a voice call out in the hallway. That's funny, I thought in italics, that sounds like Shannon, our RA from last semester who has since graduated. Then I heard another voice: "Shannon!"
It was Shannon indeed. She was her same old bleach-blonde self with her same old Midwestern accent, though she was looking tanner than ever. She's been applying to moderately prestigious law schools throughout the country, but, frustratingly, she's been waitlisted by most of them. Since moving back home to Chicago, she's been thinking about retaking the LSAT, and she's gotten a job (at a tanning salon). She said she's here in town with her friends till Saturday, and that she'll be around to hang out with her (not so) old floormates.
And now, the links.
Read about the Curious Histories of Generic Domain Names.
Dot-com days are here again? Check out some Web 2.0 Workplaces.
In this quiz, you're presented with six paintings. You have to guess whether each was painted by an artist or an ape. My roommate got four right.
). All content of
I can see how the song post would get a lot of spam - my music posts get the most spammy trackbacks. The trailer ones I'm guessing attract a lot of mortgage based spam, and the others I can't even begin to understand. I know there's a plugin out there that closes older posts (you set the age) to comments, which might come in handy in this case.
Kirsten -- Wed Mar 05, 2008 02:07 EST
i got five out of six! yay.
kristen -- Wed Mar 05, 2008 10:07 EST
Yes, Kirsten, I used to use a plugin for mass-closing trackbacks on old posts, and I could do it on comments too, but I'd rather have old posts open to comments since the comment spam never actually gets through -- only the attempts are logged.
Jordon -- Wed Mar 05, 2008 11:30 EST
so, i took that quiz.
and i got five right.
my friend remy,
currently sitting beside me in my media arts class,
actually got them all right.
yay.
:)
talk to you soon.
xoxox.
natasha -- Thu Mar 20, 2008 07:52 EST