Day: July 17, 2016

Why I Hate Blogger

I have been blogging for damn near 10 years and most of it has been here on WordPress….I originally started my blog on the popular site Blogger but then it was titled “Studies And Observations”….I was never happy over there…..something felt hinky with the site….I got lots of hits a day but seldom any comments….I found out later that a lot of those hits were from some “bot”….not real people at all…..

After about a year I switched to WP and have never looked back……so when I read some news the other day I told myself that my gut reaction was spot on……let others know that may be bouncing between the two…..

Artist Dennis Cooper made a horrifying discovery June 27: His 14-year-old blog—the sole home of his writing, research, photographs, and more—was gone, Art Forum reports. According to Fusion, Cooper’s blog was hosted by Google-owned Blogger. In addition to his blog, Google also deactivated his gmail account, which held his contacts and gig offers, the Guardian reports. The only explanation Google gave Cooper, who considers his blog a “serious work of mine,” was a stock message that he was in “violation of the terms of service agreement.” “I can’t even get a response from them or anything,” Cooper says. “I have no idea why they did it or what’s going on.” Google tells Fusion it’s “aware of this matter” but wouldn’t comment any further.

Cooper, the author of a number of acclaimed novels, isn’t even sure if his work is still out there somewhere. He’s considering suing Google to get the answer. “This will not be easy for me for the obvious reasons, but I’m not going to just give up 10 years of my and others’ work without doing everything possible,” he tells Art Forum. The incident is raising concerns among the art community about the power Google and other corporations now have to control artistic voices. “I think this is definitely censorship. The problem is nobody knows what the specific issue is and certainly Dennis has posted images that one might find troubling,” Stuart Comer, curator at MoMA, tells the Guardian. All Cooper knows is that other artists need to learn from him and “back everything up.” “Obviously I’m a living example of not to be blind like that and think that everything is hunky dory.”

If you like your hard work then……DO NOT TRUST BLOGGER!

Don’t Be A Philistine

Sunday so why not something sort of religious…..the Bible goes on and on about those darn pesky Philistines….Goliath and the boys…..the problem is that there has been little evidence that they actually existed…..some even thought they may be figment of someone’s imagination…..

When I was in college and studying Middle East I was fascinated by the early history of the region….and consumed all I could on the subject (I shall write about this a little later).

In the past there have been a few pieces of pottery but no actual physical evidence……well that has been put to bed…..

Harvard University archaeologist Lawrence Stager has led the Leon Levy Expedition to Ashkelon since 1985, clocking more than 30 years of excavations in a 150-acre site in the ancient seaport 35 miles south of Tel Aviv, reports the Harvard Gazette. Now, a major find related to the little-known Philistines, some of the Hebrew Bible’s “most notorious villains,” as National Geographic puts it, with Goliath and Delilah (of David and Samson infamy, respectively) among their ranks. To unlock the mysteries of the Philistines, archaeologists needed to find bodies, not just artifacts, but until now human remains have been elusive. “Archaeologists who study the Philistines began to joke that they were buried at sea like the Vikings—that’s why you couldn’t find them,” one archaeologist tells National Geographic. Sunday brought the news that the expedition has for three years been excavating the first Philistine cemetery to be found.

From the time the Ashkelon expedition team first discovered a human tooth in 2013 until this week, when the year’s final expedition came to a close, archaeologists have counted at least 145 sets of human remains in several burial rooms, reports the BBC. Most are buried without any objects or ornamentation, though some perfume, food, jewelry, and weapons were unearthed, and the small number of children and infants buried were found covered in a “blanket” of broken pottery. DNA analysis and carbon dating will hopefully shed light on some long-running mysteries about the Philistines’ origins and whether they have a connection to the mysterious Sea Peoples who tore across the Mediterranean in the 13th and 12th centuries BC; the remains date to the 11th to 8th centuries. “So much of what we know about the Philistines is told by their enemies,” says the expedition’s co-director. “We’ll really be able to tell their story by the things they left behind for us.” (Check out where these Philistine pottery shards were discovered.)

I have been doing research on the Hanging Gardens Of Babylon and the event we call the Exodus…..all of which I shall share as soon as the research is done and I compile my findings…..

Have a great day….I shall return to normal tomorrow….peace out…..