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MIT Peeps: Have you heard what JonMon is up to nowadays?

Monday, May 6th, 2013

This post is mostly for the benefit of my fellow MIT alumni.

Remember Jonathan Monsarrat?

If so, then you may have gotten the same impression of him back at the ‘tute that I did, to wit, that he gave off creep vibes.

Judging from what has been written about him online since then, he’s done other things to reinforce that vibe, but this just about takes the cake… He has recently filed a lawsuit against several people, including Ron Newman whom many of you probably also know, alleging that they defamed him in discussions that took place in various forums on LiveJournal almost three years ago.

The lawsuit is clearly baseless and doomed to fail if it makes it to trial, but it seems likely that JonMon isn’t so much interested in prevailing in court, but rather in scaring people into removing their LiveJournal postings by raising the specter of an expensive legal defense.

Ken White has put up the Popehat signal asking for pro bono legal help defending against this attempt to suppress people’s free speech.

I’ve known Ron online for over two decades. He’s a good guy, and if he ends up needing financial help defending himself against this suit, you bet I’ll be contributing to his legal defense fund.

If there’s anything you can do to help — whether it’s providing pro bono assistance yourself, hooking Ron up with somebody who can provide such assistance, or just kicking in a few bucks to his legal defense fund if one is set up — then I encourage you to do so. And if you’re an MIT alum, make sure to mention it when you help…. It’s important to let people know that JonMon’s conduct is considered neither normative nor acceptable to most of the MIT community.

Tags: Free Speech, Jonathan Monsarrat, LiveJournal, Popehat, Ron Newman, SLAPP
Posted in Blogging, Boston, Computers, Internet, Law, Social Activism, Web | No Comments »

MBTA responds to my public records request

Wednesday, February 13th, 2013

Last month, I sent the MBTA a public records request, trying to obtain more information about how aware they are of the problem of air quality problems in the passenger compartments of their buses, and what they are doing about the problem.

The Massachusetts Public Records Law requires “custodians of records” like the MBTA to respond within ten days to such requests. It took the MBTA 26 days to respond, which they did only after I appealed to the supervisor of records in the Secretary of State’s office Correction: I mailed my appeal to the Secretary of State’s office on February 11, and I received the response below from the MBTA on February 12, so it appears that they although they were quite late in responding to my request, they did respond before my appeal was brought to their attention. The job of the supervisor of records is essentially to force custodians to obey the law. This is necessary because custodians regularly violate the public records law until the supervisor is involved, and sometimes even then. This sorry state of affairs persists because there are no penalties for violating the law (stupid!).

Anyway, here is the response I received from the MBTA yesterday (click here to see it in a separate window), followed by the letter I sent back to them this morning. (more…)

Tags: diesel exhaust, diesel fumes, MBTA, toxic MBTA buses
Posted in Boston, Consumer activism, Government activism, Social Activism | No Comments »

Public Records Request to the MBTA about air quality in buses

Monday, January 14th, 2013

I just sent the following letter to the MBTA.

January 14, 2013

Beverly A. Scott
General Manager, MBTA
10 Park Plaza, Suite 3910
Boston, MA 02116

Re: Massachusetts Public Records Request

Dear Ms. Scott:

This is a request under the Massachusetts Public Records Law (M.G.L. Chapter 66, Section 10).

I am requesting that I be provided a copy of the following records:

All complaints and inquiries received by the MBTA from passengers in the past year, through any medium including but not limited to telephone, U.S. Mail, facsimile, electronic mail, Web form submission, and Twitter, concerning air-quality issues (e.g., engine fumes) in MBTA buses. If such complaints and inquiries are consistently logged in a single computerized tracking system, then a spreadsheet, report or other document produced from said system, including the details of the relevant complaints, is sufficient and indeed preferable for satisfying this request.

(more…)

Tags: diesel exhaust, diesel fumes, MBTA, toxic MBTA buses
Posted in Boston, Consumer activism, Government activism, Social Activism | 1 Comment »

Why gays talk about leaving the country if Romney gets elected

Wednesday, October 3rd, 2012

To:askamy@tribune.com

Amy,

Responding to “Confused Neighbor,” you wrote, “Sophisticated people living in a country devoted to free speech should be able to tolerate different — or even offensive — perspectives without wanting to leave the country, but you don’t seem able to see things this way. This is something for you to work on.”

Rather than try to explain to you myself by just how much your comment above misses the point, I am going to refer you to someone who said it far better than I possibly could. I urge you to read this blog posting. When you’re done with that, do a little research and see if you can find out how many people have been killed in the United States of America in the past five years just because they were gay.

These will, I hope, help you to understand, that to gays living in the U.S.A. in 2012, it isn’t about free speech or offensive perspectives; it is about serious threats to their happiness, their well-being, and even their lives.

Regards,

Jonathan Kamens

Posted in Politics, Social Activism | No Comments »

Pittsfield judge orders local blogger to stop writing about the news

Friday, June 29th, 2012

Ken at Popehat reports on Pittsfield judge Bethzaida Sanabria-Vega ordering a local blogger not only to stop writing about the daughter of a local public official who was the perpetrator of a hit-and-run accident which nearly killed someone and got off virtually scott-free after the courts “lost” some of the paperwork related to her case, but also to delete all articles on his blog that he had previously written about her.

Judge Sanabria-Vega’s order is blatantly unconstitutional and abhorrent to anyone who cares about civil rights and an involved citizenry.

If you are or know a lawyer admitted to practice in Massachusetts who might be able to provide the blogger, Dan Valenti, with pro bono legal assistance getting the judge’s order overturned and restoring his free-speech rights, please email ken@popehat.com.

Tags: Dan Valenti, Free Speech, Planet Valenti, Popehat
Posted in Computers, Government activism, Internet, Journalism, Law, Social Activism, Web | No Comments »

International Criminal Court Indicts God for Mass Murder

Friday, February 10th, 2012

One of God's victims?

The Hague, The Netherlands – February 10, 2012 - The International Criminal Court today announced a sweeping indictment of the Lord God Almighty for mass murder.

An ICC spokesman explained the indictment. “We are emerging from a dark era in which humanity failed to recognize the full personhood of fertilized eggs. Now that we know the truth, we must seek justice for the trillions of innocent babies slaughtered in cold blood by the Creator. Even now, as I make this statement, the killing continues unabated.

“Since a fertilized egg has all the rights and privileges of a full-fledged human being, anything which prevents one from developing into a healthy baby is an act of murder. Anyone who has watched a teen-aged girl pee on a stick, look at it five minutes later, and cry out ‘Thank God!’ while slumping to the floor crying hysterically, knows that when a zygote fails to implant itself in its mother’s uterus, the Master of the Universe is to blame.”

“The target of this indictment is the most cruel, merciless, evil, psychopathic mass murder the ICC has ever pursued,” the ICC spokesman continued. “Since the birth of man, the the Heavenly Father has caused countless deaths of the most defenseless and innocent of victims. Not only that, but he openly boasts about his crimes in his memoir, The Old Testament, where he admits preventing the implantation of zygotes in Sarah, Rachel, and Hannah, among others.”

The indictment is not limited to the zygote murders mentioned by name in The Old Testament, which are merely specific examples of the Prince of Peace’s crimes. The Just One also readily admits to the general accusation against him: “Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward.”

The indictment includes only the crime of preventing zygote implantation, not of causing miscarriages. According to the ICC spokesman, “Everybody knows that when a woman miscarries, it’s her own damn fault, so the Court expects signatories to the Rome Statute to to speedily enact legislation mandating murder charges for any woman who loses a baby.”

The Merciful One, Blessed Be He, was unavailable for comment.

Posted in Politics, Religion, Social Activism | 2 Comments »

Abhorrent proposal to close the MBTA’s budget gap

Thursday, January 5th, 2012

To:	Kevin.Honan@mahouse.gov, William.Brownsberger@mahouse.gov, mayor@cityofboston.gov, City.Council@cityofboston.gov
CC:	fareproposal@mbta.com

Dear Gov. Patrick (via Fax), Rep. Honan, Rep. Brownsberger, Mayor Menino, and members of the Boston City Council,

I am writing to you all in incensed opposition to the abhorrent plan currently under discussion to close the MBTA’s budget gap by decimating Massachusetts public transportation.

(more…)

Tags: MBTA
Posted in Boston, Government activism, Social Activism | 2 Comments »

Google AdWords is staffed by poorly trained monkeys

Monday, April 4th, 2011

Back when I was doing my week-long Shave a Redhead for Israel fundraiser, Google’s search index was taking an unusually long time to index the fundraiser page. This was a problem because I was publicizing the fundraiser and telling people they could find it easily by searching for “Shave a Redhead for Israel”, but they actually couldn’t.

The fundraiser was only a week long, and four days in, Google still hadn’t indexed it. Luckily, Google had recently sent me an offer for $100 in free AdWords advertising to get me to try AdWords. I decided to take advantage of that $100 offer and set up an AdWords campaign to match searches for “Shave a Redhead for Israel”.

I called Google’s AdWords department and worked with the sales representative there to set up the campaign. I told him, several times and in several different ways, that my only goal was to direct people who Googled for “Shave a Redhead for Israel” to my campaign page. I told him I didn’t wants ads to be placed on other pages — I just wanted sponsored links on Google’s search page — and I told him specifically that I just wanted that one phrase, “Shave a Redhead for Israel”.

Despite my repeated instructions, he set up a campaign which matched all sorts of keywords and ran ads all over the Internet, not just sponsored links. By the time I discovered this the next morning and fixed the campaign, it had racked up almost $60 in charges for ads I didn’t want and didn’t need.

But that’s not the worst of it. In addition to screwing up the campaign, he failed to apply the $100 promotional credit to my account. As a result, a few weeks later Google charged my credit card for almost $60 in advertising that was supposed to be free, and, to be clear, was for a non-profit fundraiser from which I didn’t make a cent of profit.

(more…)

Tags: AdWords, Google, Google AdWords
Posted in Computers, Consumer activism, Internet, Social Activism, Web | 3 Comments »

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