Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 11:31 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Look, I'm a member of the Whitebread Rap Haters Club. I find most of the genre actively repulsive. But you know what? A lot of people probably feel that way about classical music, Finnish heavy metal and/or bagpipes. 

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 04:15 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The Nobel Prize for Peace has had something of a chequered history in recent years, but both the recipients this year richly deserved their title. In particular, Malala Yousafzai is awe inspiring. The youngest recipient ever, she took a Taliban bullet to the head in retaliation for demanding that women be allowed to go to school. 

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 02:35 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Brett Kimberlin, a cyberbully and convicted terrorist has lost his defamation suit against several bloggers who pointed out that he is a genuinely nasty piece of work. This was an important case as it threatened to set a troubling precedent with regard to the ability of individuals to shut down online free speech via lawfare and intimidate those with different political views . Additionally, some of the defendants in the case had endured death threats and SWATTings. 

Popehat has a roundup. It is particularly pleasing to me that this was not just a legal victory for the defendants. It was also a thorough, total and ignominious defeat for Kimberlin. Sometimes the good do win.   

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:18 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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Suburban Banshee has an extensive, link-heavy post on the utter monstrousness of Marion Zimmer Bradley, child molester and protector of her child molester husband.

Go read the while thing.

I mentioned this to my friend BOB! last night and he said that he'd heard about a lot of this years ago and had written off the author for that reason. Another friend mentioned yesterday that she'd known about enough of this for years that she had long ago burned Bradley's books. 

I, on the other hand, had muddled trough life blissfully ignorant of this.

It's a squalid, foetid affair that involves a couple of truly evil people. That word "evil" gets bandied about a lot, but this is the real deal.

But the reason I'm most angered by this is that the story is actually far worse than the depredations of 2 fiends. 

What is REALLY disturbing about this is the fact that elements in the Sci-Fi community had been covering this up since 1963. Oh, they had banned Breen (Bradley's eventual husband) from a con, but no one bothered to call the cops. 

This passage from the letter is particularly disturbing...After laying out the fact that Walter Breen is a CHILD MOLESTER, he suggests that Breen be...get this...banned from a con.

 I came to this conclusion most reluctantly. I have no axe to grind. And quite apart from my emotional reluctance, I expect some of my friends to get mad at me if I do anything about Walter. Others will be "disappointed" in me because of my "persecution" of Walter, poor innocent Walter who loves and understands children. Also I rather expect some damage in my race for TAFF in 1965.[/quote]

You know, I have something to say to the author of this letter....

Hal 9000, Skynet, and the Krell mind machine, combining their processing power and crunching numbers for a decade could not calculate all the fucks I do not give about your fanboy electioneering. You have, with that paragraph, proven yourself to be a soulless, malignant waste of skin that could be put to vastly better use by burn victims. You know of a child molester and you do not report it to police because you are afraid it will harm your popularity? If ratting out a pederast will endanger ones social standing, then I suggest that it is time to get another peer group. You have no axe to grind? ARE YOU HUMAN?

This was 1963. How many children were raped because no one on this mailing list had the spine to call the cops? (ed: at least 22) Why in the hell didn't SOMEONE call the authorities? Is it because as a member of fandom you'd been bullied and didn't want to cast judgements? If so you deserved every wedgie you got and more...far more. This was not being a beatnik, or some other alternate lifestyle, this was children, and this was a hell of a lot more children who suffered agony and terror because not ONE person in this circle of fen had sufficient ethical grounding to call the police.

The Kitty Genovese story was utter bunk, but this is as real as it gets. 

You know what's almost as disturbing than that?

This.

No news here, just a couple of glowing testimonials...well, the only people covering this are the French and the Italians.

Someone from Google must be an MZB fan.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:12 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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In honor of the day here is an animated celebration of the third 5 year plan,

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 06:46 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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 ...we note that Tamara K. has summed up a good bit of recent news in one quote.

If they really hated us because of our freedoms, then they can probably stop hating us any ol' time now. 

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 07:17 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 10:33 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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If one is on a passionate and not entirely unwarranted tear about casual sexism and the need for respect in fandom, then referring to a male fan who makes an ass of himself as a "sperm sack" might not be the best was to advance this argument.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 02:18 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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 The Anchoress explores an outburst of both theological and logical fallacy.

Of course hatred rarely follows logic so this message is lost on the haters, but it's these asshats who get all the press. Given the depths of their hate they don't know much about their professed theology either.

She also has kind words for classy behavior.

The server has responded to the incident, saying "The offers to help pay me back are much appreciated, but not at all needed. I’d prefer to let my work ethic and my service do the talking, nothing else.”

That’s a classy response to a rank hatred.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 12:47 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Hah! Saw this on Instapundit. It is rich.
It seems that ABC sent a bunch of actors to incite anti-gay asshattery at a blue collar diner  in Texas. For comparison they did the same at an upscale restaurant in NYC....because...'Journalism' means that narratives must be reinforced.

Well, things did not go as planned.

^{Whaever WILL we do about these provincial
bigots and their pre-conceived notions?}

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 11:03 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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I had no idea that by not pursuing a law degree I was condemning myself to mugglehood.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 02:58 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Via Paterrico comes a fascinating piece by Ken White over at POPEHAT who has a very long, informative and downright creepy piece on his (and others) dealings with a particularly nasty internet stalker whose attentions he attracted when he did pro-bono work for a gentleman on the stalkers hate list.

He leaves no sense of what values he promotes, only of what groups and individuals he hates. There's only one circumstance when you get a sense that he's enjoying what he does, that he has a craft or a calling. That's when he's describing someone being raped, murdered, or otherwise abused, or when he's pursuing the families of someone he hates.

This has led to trouble.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 04:48 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Gahlran just tweeted to alert the world that that this idiotic, counterfactual word salad exists.

BEHOLD.

The only way to stop Pyongyang's cycle of brinkmanship and extortion is to address the real problem -- South Korea.

Instead, it spends billions of dollars to develop its proudly "indigenous" T-50 jet fighters, Surion helicopters, and coastal defense frigates -- alternatives for which could be much better, and cheaper, imported from the United States.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 07:52 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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In the previous post I mentioned the unwelcome fact that the textbook category "under 200 bucks" was in the minority for me this year by a wide margin.

This was demoralizing, but not as demoralizing as it must be for the people who work in the bookstore. These kids and their parents can't get in the face of the provincial, detached professor that ordered a 274 dollar book with no resale value because it comes with a one use online access code...because they'll get expelled.

However, they can scream at the clerk...who works for the store that ordered the book they were told to order by the professor...
...or weren't...as I explained to one angry angry mother who as I walked past was berating a stock clerk and demanding to know why the bookstore didn't even have the book her darling little social promotion needed.

You see, several professors do not order their books, expecting the students to buy it online....before the semester starts. I happened to have in hand my syllabus for a class where that was the case and showed it to her.
She stopped screaming at the clerk, but damn...
No effing class...
I was out of the bookstore in 40 minutes which was an impressive performance by their staff, but the staff are stuck in there dealing with angry entitled millennials and their parents  7 days a week for about 3 weeks straight.

I'm glad I don't work in retail any more.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 03:52 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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236 years ago today the 13 southernmost of England's North American colonies had sent representatives to Philadelphia to discuss what to do about the various political disputes they had had with London...disputes that had been festering for a decade.

One of these representatives, Benjamin Franklin, had spent 11 years in London trying to resolve these disputes. He had attempted to, amongst other things:

*set up a process for the colonists to elect MPs.

*represent their interests in policy discussions

*relay the London perspective back to the colonies.

While he was in England, he was increasingly treated not as a representative, but an ambassador from a hostile nation. Finally, in 1775, he was brought before a crown representative and was called everything but a child of God. He was told his people were nothing more than subjects and were not entitled to representation of any sort. He was summarily dismissed.

One of the most respected Britons of his age had gone to bring the nation closer together and returned convinced it was not possible.

The various delegates conferred and decided on a course of action. They published their conclusion and the reasons they reached it. It bears remembering that they did not come to their agonizing conclusion lightly.

Their statement is below.

Today is the day we celebrate their difficult, but demonstrably fortuitous decision.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

The Signatures.....

Georgia:
   Button Gwinnett
   Lyman Hall
   George Walton

North Carolina:
   William Hooper
   Joseph Hewes
   John Penn

South Carolina:
   Edward Rutledge
   Thomas Heyward, Jr.
   Thomas Lynch, Jr.
   Arthur Middleton

Massachusetts:
John Hancock

Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Pennsylvania:
   Robert Morris
   Benjamin Rush
   Benjamin Franklin
   John Morton
   George Clymer
   James Smith
   George Taylor
   James Wilson
   George Ross

Delaware:
   Caesar Rodney
   George Read
   Thomas McKean

New York:
   William Floyd
   Philip Livingston
   Francis Lewis
   Lewis Morris

New Jersey:
   Richard Stockton
   John Witherspoon
   Francis Hopkinson
   John Hart
   Abraham Clark

^{The flag of the 13 United States of America after July 4th}

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 02:43 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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So...today I went to buy some stuff of of iTunes.
They've changed the terms of use, which I cut and pasted below the fold.
(emphasis is mine). Let's see what one of our resident experts thinks about this...

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 08:14 PM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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1 I've never purchased anything from iTunes. I buy my music downloads at amazon.com. They're just plain, ordinary, DRM-free mp3 files.

Posted by: Don at Sun Jan 22 20:44:20 2012 (yNG5l)

2 I usually buy mp3 albums on Amazon.com rather than iTunes; they're usually a buck or two cheaper.
I doubt that bit (requiring that you play their mp3s on apple devices) would be enforceable; I think a reasonable person would expect the mp3s he purchased to be usable on any device capable of playing them. 

Posted by: wfgodbold at Sun Jan 22 20:45:14 2012 (DbD8R)

3 Cool. Thanks!
"plain, ordinary, DRM-free mp3 files" is what iTunes used to be. I've been listening to them on the blackberry for about a year now...then suddenly this.
Feh.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sun Jan 22 20:47:38 2012 (EJaOX)

4 I don't think you're reading this right. I THINK you're mistaking "iTunes Services" for "mp3 files", instead of "iTunes Store". Or is there something else buried in there? I'd have thought if Apple was bringing back DRM, a quick Google search would verify it.

Posted by: Uncle Willie at Sun Jan 22 22:09:35 2012 (xZueN)

5 I don't believe there's any actual DRM software. That would be a PR disaster.  I think it's signing an agreement that you'll only use Apple hardware. This is easily ignored, of course but it might open one up for complications down the road. 

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Sun Jan 22 22:41:39 2012 (EJaOX)

6 Where are you seeing this?

Posted by: Uncle Willie at Sun Jan 22 22:46:09 2012 (xZueN)

7 Amazon.  Simple.

Posted by: Wonderduck at Sun Jan 22 22:47:55 2012 (f/6aJ)

8 Item vi of Usage Rules removes the Apple-device-only rules for iTunes Plus (DRM-free) music, and they no longer sell any other kind. The clause only applies to music purchased before they stopped adding DRM, most of which was upgradeable to iTunes Plus for a small fee.

Many people still own substantial DRMed libraries, though, either because they didn't want to pay, or because those exact tracks were no longer available in the store, removing the upgrade option.

-j

Posted by: J Greely at Mon Jan 23 00:07:29 2012 (ar1+v)

9 I paid the 39 cents and upgraded my iTunes library to DRM-free.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Mon Jan 23 05:27:01 2012 (PiXy!)

10 And yes, while the iBook license is utter crap, the endless list of restrictions don't apply to the DRM-free music.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Mon Jan 23 05:28:42 2012 (PiXy!)

11 OK after rereading that, not only are my eyes bleeding but I think I was conflating the iTunes rental service with iTunes proper. The rental service really is like DIVX and the iBook thing is just obnoxious.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at Mon Jan 23 15:53:31 2012 (EJaOX)

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I cut on the news this afternoon to find that that the only news is the re-run of the wedding.

I'm an American. The notion of people born to the purple is rather alien and not something I want to see here. The grand experiment that is this nation is a rejection of such ideas, and I rather like that.

Still, I don't begrudge the UK their Monarchy, indeed, having read Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn's disquisitions on the subject I think that a good case can be made that such institutions can help strengthen a country and be a force for some good.

Professor Jacobson, in an uncharacteristically fluffy post, says that the wedding gives him hope that there will always be an England.

I tend to disagree. Albion is dead if she allows this sort of rot to go too long unopposed.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 02:40 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Today is the day we remember one of the most unspeakable horrors of our time.

The founders of this nation could not have imagined the sheer magnitude of the unspeakable evil that befell the Jews of Europe. However, knowledge of far lesser horrors that a government can wreak on an unarmed populace was one of the reasons this country has its second amendment.  As it was, all the Jews of Warsaw and Bialstock were only able to cobble together about a hundred weapons of various types between them when they realized that the unimaginable was happening to them. They fought like tigers, but with so few weapons the odds were impossible.

Since this atrocity was stopped, people have periodically, with great solemnity declared that this type of horror will NEVER AGAIN be allowed to stand. Since 1945, we have seen in no particular order Rwanda, Maos horrors, the Khmer Rouge,  and many other examples of the unspeakable evil in the hearts of some of our fellow men. This includes The leader of Iran who talks openly about finishing the job that Hitler started as soon as he has a nuke to do it...while the rest of the world acts with all the decisiveness of Chamberlain and Daladier. Thus, at this point admonitions about "Never again!" are poor comedy.

There are wicked people in this world. Whether attired in sheets, keffiyeh, jackboots or jaunty berets they will not be dissuaded from their evil  by harsh language, kind words, tribute or solemn promises of peace in our time. Force is the only language these monsters understand. The real lesson of the worlds history since the Shoa is that all too often the good do nothing ensuring evils occur.  This leaves the oppressed groups, whomever they may be, to their own devices.

It is widely believed that something like the above could never happen here. I certainly don't think it's at all likely.

However, it was not that long ago that strange fruit adorned southern trees, and only a little longer ago that the 5 Civilized Tribes got their answer to their request for congressional representation.

It should be remembered that Germany was one of the foremost leaders of science, reason and art yet they went mad. The Khmer Rouge were beatniks in Parisian colleges before they came to power and Robespierre was at first an idealistic humanist who was going to bring justice to all...

History can turn on a dime.  

One of the lessons of the Holocaust is that granting a monopoly of power to a government is a dangerous gamble indeed, for governments are necessarily composed in large part of the sorts of people who seek and crave power over others.

We have in this country checks, balances and the first,  second and fourth amendments. We can take some comfort in these as they greatly increase the likelihood that we will never see the likes of the above here.

But likelihood is not certainty, and never is a very long time.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:30 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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This is astonishing.
An American grad student has landed an interview with Dr. Bernhard Frank, a German WW2 veteran.
But there is more, because it turns out that Frank wasn't in the Kriegsmarine, or the Luftwaffe, or the Panzer Corps.
Oh no. He was in the SS.
He was the number 4 man...in the SS.
He was THE Nazi.
The Nazi who signed the order that started the whole unspeakable hell in motion. He has proof.

...and Dr. Frank doesn't exactly seem contrite.
Watch the whole thing.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 08:00 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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