Recount [a new movie from HBO Films]

Two-time Oscar®-winner Kevin Spacey leads an outstanding cast in this illuminating, highly entertaining film that pulls back the veil on the headlines to explore the human drama surrounding the most controversial presidential election in U.S. history. Debuts Sunday, May 25th at 9 p.m. on HBO.

Jon Stewart talks candidly about McCain, Obama, and Clinton on CNN’s Larry King Live

Athens’ ‘Five Fest’ draws crowd of more than 10,000

*5Fest raw video footage to be posted tomorrow*

By Natalie McGee
The Post
May 19, 2008
Click here for the original story

Olivia Hogan, a junior from Athens, and Abby Stout, a sophomore from Cleveland (on ground), mud wrestle this weekend amidst the rain at Five Fest. It is a popular event for musicians and vendors to book each year, because of the high turnout — 15,000 tickets were sold to Five Fest this year. Photo by Alicia Fidler, for The Post.

Five Fest, the fifth in a series of annual outdoor fests, was marked by the same antics that draw students to the field year after year.

It’s not the actual music that makes people want to attend the fest; it’s the idea of just partying in a field with friends, said Will Strome, a senior journalism major.

“If there was an iPod connected to the speakers, people would come anyway,” Stome said, adding, “It’s the outdoor aura.”

Although the 15,000 ticket holders are happy to party at the Big Red Barn — about three miles from campus — they might not realize the months the organizing team puts into the fest each year.

Five Fest founder Dominic Petrozzi pays Brad Ervine well for using his cattle field, which Petrozzi cleans up, Ervine said. Petrozzi has coordinated the fest since his senior year at Ohio University as a sports industry/marketing major. This year, he started talking to vendors, sponsors and bands in February.

Five Fest organizers sorted through the 74 bands that applied for 12 available slots to perform. Many of the bands that applied to play at Five Fest heard about the event through Petrozzi’s record company, Industry Standard.

Petrozzi only advertises on Facebook, MySpace and the fest’s Web site, which are geared mostly toward potential ticket-buyers rather than vendors or bands.

The vendors ask Petrozzi if they can sell at his fest rather than him approaching them. They see the fest as an opportunity to sell to multitudes of guests.

“With 11,000 people, it’s hard to pass-up,” said Joyce Cunningham of the Burrito Buggy, which made its first appearance at a fest this year. About 10,000 tickets were sold last year, according to the fest’s Web site.

Five Fest paid for 20 deputies from the Athens County Sheriffs Office, up from last year’s six deputies. The patrol was increased to control drunk driving, said Athens County Sheriffs Office Deputy John Morris.

“The deputies are a little steep. … We are spending over eight grand this year on deputies,” Petrozzi said.

Fest organizers have hired members of the football team for security since the first year, he said.

“I use them for two reasons: Number one, they’re big, and number two, they’re good guys,” Petrozzi said.

Fest staff keeps the crowd entering the field under control and cards guests carrying alcohol.

“In the beginning, the football team is a big help; unfortunately, they are allowed to drink and at night, they’re not of much use. … It’s not good to mix security and drinking,” Morris said.

The football team is not the only group who gradually became less organized; the atmosphere became increasingly hectic as the night progressed.

Mud wrestling, riots surrounding the shuttles and excessive drinking marked the night. As the crowds were trying to get onto the shuttle from Court Street at 4 p.m., the driver had to yell at the crowd to move the party-goers away from the bus so departing guests could get off first.

“The buses are brutal; they aren’t bad on the way here, they’re pretty convenient, just on the way back everyone is leaving at the same time — it’s terrible,” said Strome.

Despite bus confusion and mud-saturated clothing, students and other people continue to come to Petrozzi’s annual fest.

“Students at OU have made the event what it is,” Petrozzi said. “The fest is OU’s party.”

How to Turn Your PlayStation 3 Into a Linux PC

(Photograph by Jeffrey Westbrook/Studio D)

By Anthony Verducci
PopularMechanics.com
Click here for the original article

The Cell processor inside Sony’s PlayStation 3 is a powerhouse that lets the gaming console render highly detailed graphics at blistering speed. That same chip gives the PS3 all the processing muscle it needs to become a fully functional computer. When we first heard this was possible, we were sure the procedure had to be illegal, or that it would at least void the warranty. But as it turns out, this is that rarest of finds in consumer electronics: a perfectly legal, manufacturer-supported hack that adds significant functionality. With a little bit of effort and expense, we turned a PS3 into a Linux computer—without losing any of the machine’s native gaming goodness. And we’d like one of our readers to win it.

Conceptual image of Earth-orbiting satellites

Eighty percent of all catalogued objects are in low-Earth orbit (LEO), which extends to 2000 km above the Earth’s surface. To observe the Earth, spacecraft must orbit at such a low altitude. The spatial density of objects increases at high latitudes. View is of the North Pole.

(from esamultimedia.esa.int)
Click here for the original site

83 years ago in Omaha…

Today is Malcolm X’s birthday. He would have been 83 years old.
Do more than buy a t-shirt.

By Melissa Harris-Lacewell
TheRoot.com
May 19, 2008

I am part of the generation — the post civil-rights generation, post-black power generation — that turned Malcolm X into a T-shirt and cap. He was our symbol of racial discontent and political angst.  Though we did not live through the brutal repression of Jim Crow, we knew for ourselves, in our own way, the effects of racial inequality. We saw the systematic destruction of urban communities, the incarceration of our peers, the violence and drugs that ravaged our neighborhoods. We knew that even the new opportunities and unprecedented accomplishments that previous generations made possible for us were often marked by racial isolation and insults.

We met Malcolm through the prism of popular culture, and we embraced him as a commodity, to signal our own disbelief in the American dream.

On Malcolm X’s birthday, those of us who embraced him as a pop icon need to encounter him again.  We need to revisit Malcolm, because he has resisted all of our attempts to craft a single, well-packaged, vision of him.  We need to unpack the things about him that remain elusive, difficult, messy and challenging.

We need to pause to think about him, because he left, for us, important social and political lessons.

Though Malcolm’s life was short, it was marked by dramatic change. He was born into poverty, madness and racial violence.  His youthful arrogance, crime and indulgence led him to jail. But prison was no end for him; through a religious and political awakening, he found freedom in the context of imprisonment. He became an organization man, an orator, a world citizen and a free thinker with a cosmopolitan vision of the world.

Malcolm displayed the capacity to learn, to grow, to discern and to change direction. It takes courage to admit that society’s approach to old subjects has grown rigid and needs to evolve and change. It is hard for leaders to admit that they have been wrong in the past.  His life is a reminder that greatness is not found in arrogant self-righteousness or intellectual hubris, but in the willingness to be open to our own limitations.
(Continued)

Click here for the full article

Obama and Clinton: There can be only one (SNL Parody)