JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

“Go away, we are reading.”

Sociologists tell us that popular acceptance of a technology is determined by how efficiently it can distribute pornography. The printing press, photography, video and the Internet are among the technologies that have thrived thanks to their porn distribution capabilities.

How many porn sites are there on the Net? We’re guessing there are bajillions; we will not delve into that topic lest we invite the unwanted attentions of online pharmacies offering penile enlargement treatments. However, even a cursory trawl online tells us that there are bajillions of websites devoted to cats, and even more pictures of cats on social media and sites that aren’t even about cats.

The real purpose of the Internet: Ask a cat today in the Philippine Star.

The Dune Universe has come to us.

Ixian Insignia

Read Demonstration of temporal cloaking.

Thanks to Din for the alert.

Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale

In barely one generation we’ve moved from exulting in the time-saving devices that have so expanded our lives to trying to get away from them — often in order to make more time. The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug. Like teenagers, we appear to have gone from knowing nothing about the world to knowing too much all but overnight.

The University of Coimbra General Library, Coimbra, Portugal

The Joy of Quiet by Pico Iyer in the NYT, via 3quarks.

University of Salamanca Library, Salamanca, Spain

VF illustration by James Taylor

The only thing that has changed fundamentally and dramatically about stylish objects (computerized gadgets aside) during the last 20 years is the same thing that’s changed fundamentally and dramatically about movies and books and music—how they’re produced and distributed, not how they look and feel and sound, not what they are.

You Say You Want A Devolution by Kurt Andersen in VF.

COMDDAP, the Philippines’s leading computer and technology trade association, holds its biggest IT sale yet, with prices on a wide range of products slashed by up to 70 percent.

More than 30 exhibitors will participate in Got I.T.!, the 28th edition of COMDDAP Expo Manila, to be held from December 9-11 2011 at SMX Convention Center at the Mall of Asia Complex in Pasay City. COMDDAP EXPO Manila 2011 is open to the public free of charge from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. at Hall 1.

“We are targeting technology-savvy individuals and forward-looking companies with a lineup of consumer and corporate products and services made more affordable for the gift-giving season,” says COMDDAP president and event director Juan G. Chua.

During the three-day event gadgets from top brands will be on sale at huge markdowns or as outright giveaways. These include personal computers, laptops, printers, monitors, consumer and home electronics, digital cameras, smartphones and tablets.

Visitors to the expo can attend free seminars on topics such as innovations on specialty retail and how social networks can threaten your business.

COMDDAP is a non-stock, non-profit IT trade association that promotes the sustainable development of the country’s information technology industry. Through the voluntary support of member-companies, it has funded IT-related advocacy projects over the past 25 years.

For inquiries contact the COMDDAP Expo Manila 2011 secretariat at 810-3814, 892-7947 and 815-6531 (fax), email exhibit@comddap.org or info@comddap.org, or visit www.comddap.org or its Facebook page.

Tech/travel news

- Heard about the 2 BlackBerry executives who were so unruly on a Toronto-Beijing flight, the pilot had to turn the plane around? Lost 18 hours. They should’ve tasered the two.

- Company is in trouble. Probably explains the drinking.

- And we’re having this conversation on BBM.

Sports via text

David Beckham visited a shelter for street children in Manila. Photo from Unicef. Sweet of him. We’re still not into the tattoos or the hair product.

- Pogi ba talaga si Becks?

- Tangkad. Pero kaya pala laging long sleeves, puro tats. Kadiri. Eurotrash.

Entertainment via email

- Why are there two Snow White movies? One with Julia Roberts and the other with Charlize Theron. Oscar winners playing the evil stepmother. Oh dear, Kristin Stewart’s mono-expression is in the Charlize Theron version. Waaaaaahhhhhh!

- Nagkopyahan. Hindi naman siya ang titingnan natin kundi si Chris Hemsworth. Thor vs Winklevii!

- Sa bagay. Ang ganda ni Winklevii hahaha. Makikita ko na naman ang abs ni Chris Hemsworth!