Luke.stirling

(via ashley banks)

More than once I referred to the $65-million lawsuit Roy Pearson filed in 2005 over a missing pair of pants as the “gift that keeps on giving.” As I admitted in my May 2010 post, “A Farewell to Pants,” I had mentioned the case “as many times as I possibly could,” but alas, it then appeared to finally be over. How many posts did I devote to it, exactly? I ran a search to find out.

At least twenty-seven (not counting occasional offhand references). Hence the title of this post.

Let me try to summarize.

This was a titanic struggle between Roy L. Pearson, Jr., then an administrative-law judge in the District of Columbia, and his neighborhood dry-cleaning establishment. Pearson claimed Custom Cleaners lost a pair of his suit pants. Here they are, the cleaners said. Those aren’t mine, he said. It escalated. The cleaners offered to settle, but Pearson could not be satisfied. He refused settlement offers of $1,150, then $3,000, then $12,000 (for lost pants, remember). He eventually sued, alleging multiple violations of a consumer-protection statute; saying he was entitled to $1,500 per violation per defendant per day, he demanded $65,462,500. See “Lawyer Seeking $65 Million for Pants-Related Fraud” (Apr. 27, 2007); see also here for more on his math.

Later Pearson filed a brief changing the focus of his claim from the pants to allegedly misleading signs (“Satisfaction Guaranteed”), but he refused to dismiss the case. See “Judge Drops Pants; Suit Still On” (June 6, 2007). Sans pants, his demand was now a more reasonable $54 million. The case went to trial, and was every bit as ridiculous as I had hoped. See “Live-Blogging the Pants Trial” (June 12, 2007). Pearson called no fewer than nine witnesses, including himself; he wept on the stand; and claimed that he hadn’t wanted to litigate but felt the law “gave him no choice.” Nor did it give him anything else. See “Judge Who Lost Pants Loses Case” (June 25, 2007). He appealed.

The timing of all this was unfortunate, since Pearson was up for another term as an ALJ. Some (like the Washington Post) felt the matter called his judgment into some question. Eventually his employers agreed. Surprise! He then sued them for wrongful termination. (He only wanted $1 million for that.) He lost.

How did Pearson’s appeal of the pants case go? Well, from bad (at oral argument) to worse, ending in a unanimous decision that his claim was “not supported by law or reason.” Okay, but that was just one panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals. Surely the court sitting en banc would see things differently? Nope. I was on pins and needles hoping he would petition the Supreme Court or maybe take it to the International Court of Justice, but he did stop short of that, at least.

But he did appeal his loss in the wrongful-termination case. Now he claimed, among other things, that he had been retaliated against for pursuing a “public interest lawsuit” trying to benefit “thousands of consumers”—by which he meant the pants thing. This did not even persuade the D.C. Circuit to hear oral argument, which it cancelled, saying it would decide the matter based on the papers. See “Judge Who Lost Pants Forced to Rely on Briefs” (May 10, 2010). And later that month, it ruled against him, saying his quest was not so much in the public interest as it was “a personal vendetta against a dry cleaners over a pair of pants.” And that’s when I bid “farewell,” saying it might be the last time we heard of Roy, but “I wouldn’t count on it.”

Five years passed.

In April 2015—more than a decade after all this started, and more than six after the pants case ended—D.C.’s Office of Disciplinary Counsel filed legal-ethics charges against Pearson, and on June 3 a  committee of the Board of Professional Responsibility agreed with two of them, which is why this is back in the news.

Not exactly a “rocket docket” there in D.C., as you may have noticed, and Pearson argued the delay was unconstitutional. A six-year delay is a little startling, but the committee found the delay itself hadn’t harmed him. And while it is tempting to say they should have just let it rest, it’s also worth remembering this was a lengthy and expensive vendetta over a pair of pants, based on the legal argument that a sign saying “Satisfaction Guaranteed” means the customer can make any demands whatsoever—anything at all—and the merchant has to agree.

As the committee’s report notes, Pearson is still insisting he’s right about this. At the hearing he argued the defendants were liable whether or not they actually lost his pants in the first place, and that he would have been entitled to a trillion dollars if that’s what it would have taken to satisfy him. In fact, he acknowledged that if there were any “reasonable limits” on the interpretation of “Satisfaction Guaranteed,” that would have “eliminated the basis” for his legal claims. That’s somebody who’s just not getting it.

The committee did not agree with all the charges, but it did agree that while his underlying argument was not totally insane, he had pushed it “beyond the bounds of reason” and had “interfered with the administration of justice” by doing so. It recommended two years of probation, so if he can go that long without making any frivolous arguments, he should be in the clear.

This assumes the board itself approves the report, and then of course that can be appealed. Maybe 12 or 13 years after the saga began, Roy will finally be vindicated?

I wouldn’t count on it.

Michał Kaźmierczak has built a stunning spaceship — the Spectre. Whilst the model is decked out in Classic Space blue and gray, it’s anything but a retro throwback, making use of new parts and modern building techniques to deliver a creation so packed full of detail it’s a delight to zoom in on the photo and look around. Kudos for the opening hatches and the packed interior — excellent stuff.

And if the model itself isn’t cool enough for you, Michał has used his photo-editing skills to fantastic effect on this hero-shot of the Spectre touching down on an asteroid. Cracking photography and editing show off the ship in all its glory. I’m getting a total Chris Foss vibe off this picture, and that’s about the highest praise I can offer on a creation like this. Beautiful.

Currently there is a huge and coordinated effort by the world’s major copyright holders to push for changes to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

In a nutshell, key entertainment industry players believe that the DMCA is no longer fit for purpose and has been twisted out of shape by pirate sites, Google and even YouTube, to work against their best interests.

One of the main problems is taking down infringing content. The legislation allows content to be removed following the issuing of a so-called DMCA notice, but copyright holders say that this descends into a game of whac-a-mole, with content repeatedly reappearing.

To end this cycle they’re pushing for a new mechanism provisionally titled ‘Takedown, Staydown’ or ‘Notice and Staydown’. This would order web platforms to ensure that once content is taken down it will never appear again on the same platform. These proposals are currently under review by the US Copyright Office.

But while copyright holders feel this would be a great tool for them, it’s perhaps unsurprising that content platforms are less enthusiastic. After weighing in earlier in the year, the latest warnings from the Internet Archive, a gigantic public repository of a wide range of media, and are among the sternest yet.

Noting that even the current system is regularly abused by those seeking to silence speech, the Archive says that on a daily basis it receives wrongful takedowns for content that is in the public domain, is fair use, or is critical of the content owner. Therefore, further extending takedown rights could prove extremely problematic.

“We were very concerned to hear that the Copyright Office is strongly considering recommending changing the DMCA to mandate a ‘Notice and Staydown’ regime. This is the language that the Copyright Office uses to talk about censoring the web,” the Archive warns.

The Archive has a number of concerns but key issues involve due process and user monitoring. Once a platform is in receipt of a “staydown” order, it will be required to ensure that content never reappears, regardless of the context in which it does so. This means that users posting content subject to fair use exceptions will effectively be denied their right to issue a counter-notice when their upload is blocked, thus trampling due process.

But of course, blocking content also requires that users are monitored, and the Internet Archive doesn’t like that idea at all.

“The current statute protects user privacy by explicitly stating that platforms have no duty to monitor user activity for copyright infringement. Notice and Staydown would change this – requiring platforms to be constantly looking over users’ shoulders,” the Archive warns.

With free speech potentially at stake here, the Internet Archive says that taking content down and keeping it down has constitutional implications.

“Notice and Staydown has a serious First Amendment problem. The government mandating the use of technology to affirmatively take speech offline before it’s even posted, without any form of review, potentially violates free speech laws,” it says.

Such an automated system would amount to a censorship “black box”, the Archive adds, to which the public would be denied the key.

“It would be very difficult to know how much legitimate activity was being censored.”

Fair use has come up time and time again during this DMCA debate and the Internet Archive is clearly very concerned that it receives protection. Worried that content filtering technology isn’t even up to today’s challenges, the Archive warns that systems that can identify instances of fair use simply don’t exist.

“So far, no computer algorithm has been developed that can determine whether a particular upload is fair use. Notice and Staydown would force many cases of legitimate fair use off the web,” it warns.

“Further, intermediaries are not the right party to be implementing this technology. They don’t have all the facts about the works, such as whether they have been licensed. Most platforms are not in a good position to be making legal judgments, and they are motivated to avoid the potential for high statutory damages. All this means that platforms are likely to filter out legitimate uses of content.”

Finally, there is the not insignificant matter of who is going to pay for all of these systems should platforms be forced to adopt them. While copyright holders would apparently reap the benefits, sites like the Internet Archive would probably be expected to foot the bill.

“Developing an accurate filter that will work for each and every platform on the web will be an extremely costly endeavor. Nonprofits, libraries, and educational institutions who act as internet service providers would be forced to spend a huge amount of their already scarce resources policing copyright,” the Archive warns.

“The DMCA has its problems, but Notice and Staydown would be an absolute disaster,” it concludes.

Source: TF, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing, torrent sites and ANONYMOUS VPN services.

pdlcomics:

Portal

And get a copy of my book while you’re at it.

cybercircuitz:

cosmicwolfstorm:

Neos City by jordangrimmer

Follow for more corporate approved content.

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vintagelasvegas:

The strip, January 1976. Photo by Hank deLespinasse.

mirkokosmos:

Daryl Mandryk

Basically my life, summed up in two tweets that happened to cross my dash on the same day.

cybercircuitz:

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Brock Allen Turner, a former Stanford student, was recently convicted of rape and received a paltry six-month jail sentence (plus probation). His name has been in the headlines not only because of his laughable sentence but also because the survivor of his attack (referred to as Ms. Doe to protect her identity) published the letter that she read aloud to him in court. The letter is here, which I suggest that you read (if you’re able).

I found this part from her letter to be very striking:

And then, at the bottom of the article, after I learned about the graphic details of my own sexual assault, the article listed his swimming times. She was found breathing, unresponsive with her underwear six inches away from her bare stomach curled in fetal position. By the way, he’s really good at swimming. Throw in my mile time if that’s what we’re doing. I’m good at cooking, put that in there, I think the end is where you list your extracurriculars to cancel out all the sickening things that’ve happened.

This guy is accused of rape. But he’s also a guy who participates in sports and has other human interests! Seriously, where do people learn to write shit like this. Maybe the same place where people who write articles about convicted rapists who use the term “had sex with” instead of “raped”? Just a thought.

Somehow, even after listening to the survivor’s account, the judge only gave Turner six months in jail and three years of probation because he feared the “severe” impact that a harsher sentence would have on Turner.

“The question that I have to ask myself is … Is state prison for this defendant an antidote to that poison?” Perksy said. “Is incarceration in prison the right answer for the poisoning of (the woman’s) life?”

Maybe if the victim was poisoned for real, instead of just raped, the judge would’ve considered a prison sentence more seriously? Who knows.

Unsurprisingly, Turner is planning on appealing the verdict. He also wants to spend his time lecturing college students on the effects of alcohol and “sexual promiscuity,” as if raping an unconscious woman has anything to do with being “promiscuous.” I’ll let Doe speak to this one, as her response is enough to send Turner straight to the Burn Ward:

Campus drinking culture. That’s what we’re speaking out against? You think that’s what I’ve spent the past year fighting for? Not awareness about campus sexual assault, or rape, or learning to recognize consent. Campus drinking culture. Down with Jack Daniels. Down with Skyy Vodka. If you want talk to people about drinking go to an AA meeting. You realize, having a drinking problem is different than drinking and then forcefully trying to have sex with someone? Show men how to respect women, not how to drink less.

Drinking culture and the sexual promiscuity that goes along with that. Goes along with that, like a side effect, like fries on the side of your order. Where does promiscuity even come into play? I don’t see headlines that read, Brock Turner, Guilty of drinking too much and the sexual promiscuity that goes along with that. Campus Sexual Assault. There’s your first powerpoint slide. Rest assured, if you fail to fix the topic of your talk, I will follow you to every school you go to and give a follow up presentation.

I didn’t expect to read more about this case after Doe’s published letter, but apparently I was wrong, because Turner’s dad wrote a letter too, about how he feels his son is the real victim here. Clearly, we see where the apple doesn’t fall far from the rotten tree.

#brockturner father: son not "violent" only got "20 mins of action" shouldn't have to go to prison. @thehuntinground pic.twitter.com/IFECJs687b

— Michele Dauber (@mldauber) June 5, 2016

Transcript here (plus my response):

As it stands now, Brock’s life has been deeply altered forever by the events of Jan 17th and 18th. He will never be his happy go lucky self with that easy going personality and welcoming smile. His every waking minute is consumed with worry, anxiety, fear, and depression. You can see this in his face, the way he walks, his weakened voice, his lack of appetite.

Wow, going through a rape trial must have been so violating for him! If only he had never been caught, he wouldn’t have to be going through all of these yucky feelings right now! He’s so feeble now, he wouldn’t even rape a fly.

Brock always enjoyed certain types of food and is a very good cook himself. I was always excited to buy him a big ribeye steak to grill or get his favorite snack for him. I had to make sure to hide some of my favorite pretzels or chips because I knew they wouldn’t be around long after Brock walked in from a long swim practice. Now he barely consumes any food and eats only to exist.

I can’t help but think of the point in Doe’s letter where she wrote about how she sleeps with a nightlight. How she has nightmares about being touched in the dark. How she couldn’t get to sleep before daylight for three months after she was attacked. But poor Brock, let’s take a minute and cry for the fact that he no longer enjoys his favorite steak.

These verdicts have broken and shattered him and our family in so many ways. His life will never be the one that he dreamed about and worked so hard to achieve.

It’s not the fact that he’s living with the guilt of raping a woman that haunts him. It’s the verdict. OK then. Also, does Turner think this is the life that Doe dreamed about? Does Turner’s dad think this is the life she worked hard to achieve? At least she was able to get some amount of justice in court, however small it was.

That is a steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action our of his 20 plus years of life.

He was only a rapist for 0.0002% of his life! For some reason, Turner’s dad thought this was a strong argument? And also, referring to the rape of an unconscious woman who suffered severe abrasions and had dirt inside of her body is not even on the same planet as “action.”

The fact that he now has to register as a sexual offender for the rest of his life forever alters where he can live, visit, work, and how he will be able to interact with people and organizations. What I know as his father is that incarceration is not the appropriate punishment for Brock. He has no prior criminal history and has never been violent to anyone including his actions on the night of Jan 17th 2015.

Poor guy, all he did was commit one rape, and now he has to suffer for it. Will he ever be able to enjoy a nice steak again?? (Also, did his dad really just say that his actions on the night that he raped someone were not violent?)

Brock can do so many positive things as a contributor to society and is totally committed to educating other college age students about the dangers of alcohol consumption and sexual promiscuity. By having people like Brock educate others on college campuses is how society can begin to break the cycle of binge drinking and its unfortunate results. Probation is the best answer for Brock in this situation and allows him to give back to society in a net positive way.

And here we go again with blaming “drinking” and “sexual promiscuity” instead of the man who raped someone. I’m going to be charitable for a minute and say that Turner’s dad is just sticking up for his son because it’s what parents do–we are supposed to love our children unconditionally. But we are also supposed to not let our children grow up to be rapists. We are supposed to teach them about consent and respecting other people’s boundaries.

Nowhere in that letter did Turner’s dad talk about the effect that his son had on Doe, her family, or her future. He would rather go on about how his son only committed (or rather, was caught in the act of) one rape. He wasn’t violent up until the point where he committed that rape! He can use this rape to learn a lesson and teach other kids about… drinking!

Another sad thing about this is that Turner likely won’t even have to serve the whole six months–with credit for good behavior, he will likely be out in three. I wonder if he will have to sleep with a nightlight when he comes home too? Most importantly, will he ever be able to enjoy food???

On a positive note, I’m going to end with Doe’s last two paragraph’s from her letter:

Most importantly, thank you to the two men who saved me, who I have yet to meet. I sleep with two bicycles that I drew taped above my bed to remind myself there are heroes in this story. That we are looking out for one another. To have known all of these people, to have felt their protection and love, is something I will never forget.

And finally, to girls everywhere, I am with you. On nights when you feel alone, I am with you. When people doubt you or dismiss you, I am with you. I fought everyday for you. So never stop fighting, I believe you. As the author Anne Lamott once wrote, “Lighthouses don’t go running all over an island looking for boats to save? they just stand there shining.” Although I can’t save every boat, I hope that by speaking today, you absorbed a small amount of light, a small knowing that you can’t be silenced, a small satisfaction that justice was served, a small assurance that we are getting somewhere, and a big, big knowing that you are important, unquestionably, you are untouchable, you are beautiful, you are to be valued, respected, undeniably, every minute of every day, you are powerful and nobody can take that away from you. To girls everywhere, I am with you. Thank you.

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More information here.

micdotcom:

This powerful tweet nails the simple truth about rape

Sexual violence has increasingly become a part of public discourse and this tweet breaks it down. Even VP Joe Biden is speaking out about rape on campus as part of the White House’s “It’s On Us” campaign.

“

Hillary Clinton’s recent foreign policy speech was an attack on Donald Trump but was also a reminder that Clinton is a deeply flawed and worrisome candidate. Her record as Secretary of State was one of the worst in modern US history; her policies have enmeshed America in new Middle East wars, rising terrorism, and even a new Cold War with Russia. Of the three leading candidates, only Bernie Sanders has the sound judgment to avoid further war and to cooperate with the rest of the world.

Clinton is intoxicated with American power. She has favored one war of choice after the next: bombing Belgrade (1999); invading Iraq (2003); toppling Qaddafi (2011); funding Jihadists in Syria (2011 till now). The result has been one bloodbath after another, with open wounds until today fostering ISIS, terrorism, and mass refugee flows.

In her speech, Clinton engaged in her own Trump-like grandiose fear mongering: “[I]f America doesn’t lead, we leave a vacuum - and that will either cause chaos, or other countries will rush in to fill the void. Then they’ll be the ones making the decisions about your lives and jobs and safety - and trust me, the choices they make will not be to our benefit.”

This kind of arrogance - that America and America alone must run the world - has led straight to overstretch: perpetual wars that cannot be won, and unending and escalating confrontations with Russia, China, Iran and others that make the world more dangerous. It doesn’t seem to dawn on Clinton that in today’s world, we need cooperation, not endless bravado.

”

-

Clinton’s Speech Shows that Only Sanders is Fit for the Presidency

I thought Clinton’s speech was good. It was a very well-delivered speech, and nailed Donald Trump (and to a lesser extent) the Republican party on all of his disgusting … well … everything.

But what this writer said is what I kept thinking while I listened to her. “Okay, so we can’t trust Donald Trump or the Republicans with the use of military force, but we are supposed to trust you?”

Months ago, I linked an article that observed that Hillary Clinton lacks political courage. She mistakes military strength for diplomatic strength, and she never saw an opportunity to drop bombs on people that she didn’t enthusiastically embrace. 

She’s a warmonger. She will embroil the United States in conflicts that we don’t even know exist right now, because she believes that leadership means killing people until they agree to follow you.

So her speech was good, as speeches go. She baited Trump into every single trap she could, and he sprung them all. Good for her. That needed to happen a year ago.

But the thing that is getting lost, the thing that the national political press is ignoring, is that she very clearly and unambiguously committed to embracing and expanding a neoconservative foreign policy that has embroiled our country in wars of choice for a generation.

Collected from a few people I follow on Twitter.

This is a stark example of how shitty Trump is, but it also illustrates what happens whenever someone well known and influential dies, in the age of social media: all these shitty people who want to hop into the news cycle and get attention weigh in with their hot take about the person who died, and the cable news and click-bait sites are happy to play along.

If you care about him, and value your friendship, try reaching out to him and see if you can help him realize how he makes you feel. See if you can help him consider and internalize another point of view without attacking him (because MRAs are notoriously thin-skinned, and will shut down discussion with talking points they collected from reddit).

Hopefully, he’ll not only listen, but hear you. I mean, I was in my mid-twenties before I had any concept of how lucky and privileged I am compared to most of the world, and in my forties I still forget sometimes. I genuinely believed that feminism wasn’t about equality and kindness and respect, but was about tearing down men, and that drove me crazy because #notallmen. It wasn’t until I realized that every woman I know has been harassed at some point, that I realized there was a systemic problem in our culture. At that moment, I decided that I could continue to be part of the problem by being passive (because as a dude it didn’t make my life bad in any way), or I could start being part of the solution.

It’s a complicated thing, and it’s hard for men who genuinely believe that they’re good people to not realize how hurtful they are being, or how dismissive they are, or how they make everything about themselves without even realizing it.

Hopefully, your friend will care about you and your friendship and just being a decent human, and will work to change these things in himself.

But if he doesn’t, there’s nothing wrong with ending the friendship, and removing him from your life.

Nobody is ever under any obligation to maintain a hurtful or toxic relationship, no matter who it is with.

styro:

thulium:

What good is the GIF search if I can’t find that one of the girl dancing with the chicken on her shoulder?

Here you go.

The Internet always delivers.

“He lost five years between 23 and 28, the prime time for a prize fighter. By the time he fought Frazier and Foreman, he didn’t have the lightning speed and endurance that would have made him the greatest ever. And his willingness to go to jail for Vietnam – being the heavyweight champion in those days was by far the greatest honor in sports. Nothing compared to it. It was as if Shakespeare had been willing to go to jail and stop writing in the five years he wrote Hamlet, Othello and Lear. It was an unbelievable sacrifice, and would be enough – if he had never fought again – to make him a great hero.”

- When Muhammad Ali was still Cassius Clay

Read this Hollywood Reporter story about the reactions to an awful billboard for X-Men: Apocalypse.

It’s hard to believe that the billboard was even approved in the first place. Flippantly employing misogynistic imagery to show how bad a villainous character is trivializes the experiences of actual victims of gendered violence.

For more on the harm of using gendered violence in this way, see our video Women as Background Decoration, Part 2.

Birds have already become an independent genre of brick-built sculptures. And whether they’re redoubtable birds of prey or it’s a sly magpie — as built by AnActionfigure here — they all look fascinating and wonderfully realistic.

The title picture of the model barely reveals its main peculiarity. Besides an astonishing, instantly recognizable shape for the bird, its color scheme is much more interesting than one may think. Dark green and dark blue pieces, which are clearly visible from another angle, create the same play of colors as real feathers.

this-is-life-actually:

Kristen Bell is opening up even more about her struggles with depression and mental health. In an essay for Motto, Bell talks about the talk with her mother that changed her life — and the absurd doctor double standard.

Follow @this-is-life-actually

micdotcom:

This tweeted sums up 238 years of racism and hypocrisy in America

A pillar of the classic LEGO Space community, Mark Neumann has emerged from myth and legend to bring us Universal Explorer LL2016. This 11-foot-6-inch behemoth of a ship is complete with giant guns, a science module, a motorized ring, interior lights, a huge cargo bay big enough to fit most official LEGO sets, and over a dozen smaller vehicles stored on board. We’ve sat down with Mark to learn a bit more about this incredible creation and Mark’s journey to build it.

 

The Brothers Brick: Mark, thanks for taking the time to speak with us. The Universal Explorer LL2016 is amazing!
Mark Neumann: Thanks! I am really proud of this ship.

TBB: Tells us a bit about your Adult Fan of LEGO (AFOL) history.
Mark: I re-entered the world of Lego from childhood around 1999. I was shopping in Fred Meyers and saw Star Wars LEGO. The inner child in me cheered with joy as my partner (not quite wife yet) watched in puzzlement as I scooped up five or six LEGO sets. I spent that evening putting the sets together, admiring the new parts and wondered how soon I could acquire my childhood LEGO stored at my parents house.

Always a fan of the Battletech miniatures war game and the Mechwarrior video games, I set out to build LEGO mechs with the new click hinges. I spent some time honing my LEGO Mecha skills for a while.

Spending a lot of my extra time in research of LEGO builders I surfed LUGNET and Brickshelf. I gathered some courage and emailed a builder to ask some questions. Mark Sandlin turned out to live nearby and he invited me to come with him to a SEALUG meeting.

Many LEGO MOCs were had.

Around 2002, SEALUG started a LEGO fest in the Pacific Northwest. I spearheaded the organization for it. We were tired of going to Washington D.C. for BrickFest and there were quire a few of us AFOLS in the Pacific Northwest region. We would be competing with Bricks West (a now-defunct convention), so we scheduled 6 months opposite of it. When it was conceived it was called NWBrickCon. Today you know it as BrickCon.

Many more LEGO MOCs were had.

After several years—ten or so—I started to slow down. I’ve built a boat load of MOCs, mostly space and mecha. A little burned out? Perhaps. Distracted? Absolutely. I have been refocusing my time on my family. My son has recently become a teenager and this year or next he will be coming to Brickcon along with me with his own badge. But don’t worry—I am not done building. I call my LEGO collection my retirement plan; it is what I plan to do when I retire.

TBB: What was the time frame to build the Universal Explorer LL2016?
Mark: I have been wanting to do another big ship for some time. The idea has been percolating in my brain for a year or so. I started this ship in January. I worked on it when I could, weekends mostly. I have around 120 hours into LL2016. She is done. Mostly. Probably. Let us be honest, I’m going to keep fiddling around with bits on it until BrickCon most likely. Heck, I may make it bigger.

TBB: How long is it, and how many pieces are in it?
Mark: LL2016 currently sits at 11 feet, 6 inches long. I should mention that LL2016 is modular. I could keep adding modules to make it bigger. I could subtract modules and make it shorter. It has well over 15,000 pieces.

TBB: Did you already have most of the pieces to build this ship, or did you acquire them specifically for this creation?
Mark: One of my goals on this build was not to buy any more pieces. I have a lot of LEGO. I did not meet my goal. I had to buy 1 section of monorail track and I ended up buying some extra pieces. I probably spent around $30 in parts specific for this build. I spent far more on the lights.

TBB: This ship is liveried in Classic Space colors. What draws you to the Classic Space theme?
Mark: I actually just started building when making the SHIP. I had the idea for the front cannon and I was going to light it up. That’s how it started. I did have a napkin sketch of a rough design, but nothing solid. As the ship started to come together I looked at my bins of brick. I had lots of grey and blue. I said to myself, “Right! Classic Space it is!” I have a lot of fond memories of my old Classic Space sets so it was an easy decision to make.

TBB: What inspired the physical design of the ship?
Mark: I let my models talk to me. I like to think I am simply the vehicle to place the bricks together where they need to go. So there is kind of a rough vision and I see where the brick takes me. It is all very emotional. When I get it right and I can see it coming together, I feel really giddy and laugh. I laughed a lot during the LL2016 construction. Wooshing noises too. Lots of wooshing noises. Those are important.

TBB: What features does the ship have? What’s your favorite feature?
Mark: There were several design guidelines for LL2016; no interior, lights, and modularity.
First, no interior. I did not want a model that I was going to spend a lot of time at each convention assembling and disassembling to show off a detailed interior that is hard to get at. I have been there and done that. I have listened to other builders complain about it. So no detailed interior. Instead I would do windows. Visitors can peer into the ship and see what is going on. But beyond the vignettes you can see, there isn’t any interior.

Second is lights. I have interior spaces for visitors to view through windows, and it’s dark in there. I have two different lights for LL2016. I found some simple LEDs from the dollar store. They create a kind of decent ambient light. I also have these little shop lights from Wal-Mart. They have magnetic backs and are ridiculously bright. Those light the cargo bay, bridge, engines, front cannon and miscellaneous windows.

Third is modularity. Around January, I was brainstorming with another AFOL, Roger Hill. We were talking about a modular system for building SHIPs as a community project. I came up with an interlock design for modularity. This was my proof of concept. LL2016 breaks down in to 8 distinct modules: fore/mid-ship/living/science/ring/lander/cargo/engines. I can swap, remove or add sections at will. It also makes LL2016 transportable. This proof of concept kind of works. The interlock is a solid connection method and is scale-able. This design, however, is a little big and gets really heavy fast. It can be unstable if not properly supported. I have a sample interlock as an example to show off with the LL2016. Roger and I are working on another design for modular SHIP building. It has a smaller cross section and I think it’ll work better for multi-builder participation. This will be a topic I think needs discussion with other builders at BrickCon to see the true feasibility of it.

The motorized functions came later. I got the idea that moving bits on the engines would be cool, so I did that. Then later I came up with the idea for a rotating ring, and I figured that out too. Since the LL2016 is modular, it’s pretty easy to add onto when you have an idea.

Other features include a large cargo bay with doors on either side. It took some time to design the doors so they would sit level when open. In this way they become a shelf for minifigs and models. The cargo bay is pretty big, It can fit Benny’s Spaceship inside.

LL2016 has two landing craft. They are mounted on the lander module. There are docking clamps that hold the ships in place. Once released, the landers come right off. I have one lander set up for passengers and one for cargo.

There is also the Hopper. It is a Classic Space exploration vessel. It is meant to go planet-side and see what’s there.

The mid-ship has 10 smaller utility craft for whatever use may be needed. The original design was to have them as escape pods, but I think they are too cool for that.

The cargo module holds 12 containers. I made a space truck to carry a container. I call it the Space Pork Chop Express, named after a truck of the same name in Big Trouble in Little China. Many of the containers do have cargo inside.

Favorite feature? Probably the gripper robot arms that come out of the side of the science module.

TBB: What kind of space do you have for building big?
Mark: I have a small 200 square foot outbuilding that is my shop. As I mentioned before, LL2016 is modular. I didn’t build it as one piece. It has only been in the last month that I actually got to see her fully assembled.

TBB: How do you go about building something so large? What was your process like?
Mark:  I don’t over think it. I use the advice given to me by many other great builders. Big builds are simply lots of little builds mashed together. You picture the end result and break it down more simply and then do that.

Also for SHIP building specifically, I remember Jon Palmer telling me to keep in mind the scale of LEGO SHIPs. We make them big and they look cool. But in scale, the largest of LEGO SHIPs still only scale out to very large yachts. To get to true Captial SHIP scale, these things would need to be 20 or 30 feet long. In that vein the LL2016 is a small SHIP. An exploration vessel roughly the size of a mega yacht.

TBB: What unique challenges did you encounter while building this model?
Mark: The most challenging part… was two things now that I think about it. Getting the spinning ring mounted and the docking clamps for the landers.

The ring is attached by four bogeys. The bogeys are spring loaded in a chassis pushing outwards. They keep the ring centered and provide friction to turn. One bogey is powered and has a reduction gear so the ring does not spin too fast.

The docking clamps took some engineering to create a release so that one lever can hold and release the ships. There is one spring loaded lever that when pulled back releases four arms that hold the ships in place.

How do I figure it out? You know in the Lego Movie? Where the master builders just see pieces floating around and put them together to make some thing work? I do that. My wife calls it my Borg brain.

TBB: One last bonus question: which is your favorite Classic Space Set?
Mark: 924 Space Transporter!

Thank you again, Mark, for your work on this amazing ship. If you want to see Universal Explorer LL2016 in person, be sure to come out to BrickCon 2016 in Seattle, Washington!

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If you don’t stand with Amber Heard, then you’re an active part of the problem (Opinion)

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I’m not saying Yusuf Abdi Ali is a war criminal. But I am saying he’s an alleged war criminal, accused of murder, torture, arbitrary detention, and other crimes while a commander in the Somali National Army during the 1980s. He allegedly fled to Canada after the regime fell, claiming to be a refugee, but Canada deported him. Then he came here, but left “voluntarily” while we were getting ready to deport him. He later came back, apparently with a fake visa, but was arrested by INS agents in 1998 for lying on application forms about whether he had ever “participated in genocidal acts.” He wasn’t deported then, though it’s not clear why.  He’s being sued right now by someone who claims Ali detained, tortured, and shot him in 1987. Again, these claims haven’t yet been proven, I’m just saying that one who looked into his background to any extent might see a few red flags.

I’m also saying that neither the FBI nor the TSA apparently did that, because CNN just found him working security at Dulles International Airport.

According to CNN, Ali and his wife have lived, under their real names, in the DC area for almost 20 years now, currently residing in Alexandria. That’s more than an hour by train and bus from Dulles, but you go where the work is, I guess. And to get this job, though he works for a private company and not the TSA, he still had to clear a “full, federally mandated vetting process” that included an FBI background check and a TSA assessment.

Neither of which, obviously, found anything to worry about.

And that means one of two things: either they didn’t find anything, or they weren’t worried about what they found. Not sure which is worse, to be honest, but the first one seems kind of unlikely, or at least it would in a world that made any sense at all. Because to find out that Yusuf Abdi Ali has a somewhat questionable background, all you need to do is Google “Yusuf Abdi Ali”:

Those results are what you would have seen before the CNN report hit the news, had you been at all interested in someone named “Yusuf Abdi Ali,” let’s say because he was applying for a job that requires a background check because the person will have access to secure areas of an airport terminal, and if your background check includes something as robust as a Google search. While I might have doubts about a TSA administrator’s ability to do that—on average I’d expect about the same computer literacy as Derek Zoolander—surely an FBI agent could handle it.

But the alternative is that being an alleged war criminal—a charge not yet proven in court, admittedly, but not without supporting evidence—is not necessarily a deal-breaker when it comes to an airport-security job. I suppose his experience with arbitrary detention might be seen as a plus. But any evidence of a past willingness to murder and torture others seems like a good reason to select a different applicant, all else being equal. I’m not an employment lawyer, but I think that’s an OK reason to turn someone away. While Ali is not accused of the kind of terrorism we’re currently super worried about, one might suspect him of a certain, shall we say, moral flexibility that one would not favor in an employee granted free access to secured areas.

On the other hand, it has been a long time since the alleged crimes. Not that there’s a statute-of-limitations issue, but maybe the TSA is focusing on more recent threats. Which would explain why it not only let an actual convicted terrorist fly, it gave her PreCheck status. It had been a while. Or maybe only specific crimes matter, which would explain why a person who’d been indicted for insurance fraud, with a nationwide warrant out for her arrest, was found two years later working for the Department of Homeland Security.

‘Cause, again, the alternative is that they don’t really check people out all that closely.

Only, they tell us they do. And the point isn’t really that they make mistakes. Mistakes are inevitable. (Although this particular one maybe was not. See Google, supra.) The point is that truly vast amounts of money and other resources are being consumed, and individual rights have been limited, on the thinking that each new sacrifice is justified because it will make us a little safer. But it’ll never make us “safe,” because there’s no such thing, and I think stories like this highlight the lack of return we are getting at this point from the massive investment.

I guess I’d put it this way: if you flew through Dulles lately, the government treated you as a potential terrorist, while an alleged war criminal had the run of the airport. There’s something wrong with both sides of that equation.

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