Virtual Taxation

We live now in a world where the are rogue states routinely defying the rest of the world and developing nuclear weapons. A world where some states laugh at UN sanctions and rush ahead with their nuclear weapons program. A world where resurging authoritarianism is undoing whatever progress toward democracy Russia had made. A world that has US senators actively trying to go beyond their constitutional authority to try to inject themselves into foreign policy.  A world where it is vital we get our priorities straight. And Congress is doing just that. They are working to solve a really, really major problem.

Taxing the virtual reality of internet gaming.

Veronica Brown is a hot fashion designer, making a living off the virtual lingerie and formalwear she sells inside the online fantasy world Second Life. She expects to have earned about $60,000 this year from people who buy her digital garments to outfit their animated self-images in this fast-growing virtual community.

But Brown got an unnerving reminder last month of how tenuous her livelihood is when a rogue software program that copies animated objects appeared in Second Life. Scared that their handiwork could be cloned and sold by others, Brown and her fellow shopkeepers launched a general strike and briefly closed the electronic storefronts where they peddle digital furniture, automobiles, hairdos and other virtual wares.

"It was fear, fear of your effort being stolen,'' said Brown, 44, whose online alter ego, Simone Stern, trades under the name Simone! Design.

Brown has reopened her boutique but remains uncomfortably aware that the issue of whether she owns what she makes — a fundamental right underpinning nearly all businesses — is unresolved.

As virtual worlds proliferate across the Web, software designers and lawyers are straining to define property rights in this emerging digital realm. The debate over these rights extends far beyond the early computer games that pioneered virtual reality into the new frontiers of commerce……

…..Congress has taken note and is completing a study of whether income in the virtual economy, such as from the sale of gowns that Brown makes, should be taxed by the Internal Revenue Service. The Joint Economic Committee of Congress is expected to issue its findings early next year.

"There seems to be a lack of ground rules in an area that would have explosive growth in the next decade or two," said Christopher Frenze, the committee's executive director.

Let's put aside the issue of a society that is more interested in a cyber-reality than in the real world for a moment. Let's look at the fact that lawmakers have spotted a potential new revenue source that doesn't actually exist. But may - probably will - end up being taxed. I don't begrudge Ms. Brown taking an opportunity and applying a talent to it to make money. Heck, I wish I could make money blogging.

But if we are now more concerned with virtual reality than actual reality, we have a problem. If Congress is more involved in worrying about taxing that virtual world than they are in the real events and challenges this nation faces from outside, then we have a huge problem.

Right now, the problem looks huge. Or bigger.

Phantasm

phan·tasm [fan-taz-uhm]–noun
1. an apparition or specter. 
2. a creation of the imagination or fancy; fantasy. 
3. a mental image or representation of a real object. 
4. an illusory likeness of something.

Arlen Specter has decided to join the gaggle of US Senators parading themselves over to Syria to pump up the Assad regime with faux prestige.

DAMASCUS (AFP) - The fourth US senator to visit Syria this month arrived in Damascus, where he was expected to hold meetings with senior officials.

A US embassy official confirmed Arlen Specter's arrival, but she could not say how long the Republican from Pennsylvania — who chairs the senate judiciary committee — would be staying.

Former presidential hopeful John Kerry and fellow senator Christopher Dodd, both members of the foreign relations committee, were in Damascus last week where they met Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

I frankly don't care what party the individuals doing this are from. It is not the role of the US Senate to engage in foreign policy in this manner. Period. It is certainly contrary to the interests of the US to fawn over thugs who are helping conduct war against fellow citizens. Specter is engaging in an exercise of number 2. of the definition if he thinks kissing up to Assad will a) help the situation or b) increase his standing.

Quite the contrary. On both counts.

Christmas Odds and Ends

Hopefully, everyone is having a wonderful Christmas day. Obviously, I have not been posting very much today, it is a day for family, after all. But I have a few minutes while the turkey is in the oven and I am, after all, a news junkie. So briefly, here are a few things that caught my eye today.

Kim Jong Il is out of his tiny little mind and the world media cooperates:

SEOUL (AFP) - A mysterious halo appeared in the sky over North Korea just before its leader Kim Jong-Il marked an important anniversary, the communist state's official media reported.

The "unprecedentedly great halo" appeared over the city of Kusong on December 23 during a day of cloud and gentle hail, the Korean Central News Agency reported Monday.

"The big ring around the sun stayed for 30 minutes, throwing bright rays of seven colours. And when it disappeared, the hail stopped and not a speck of cloud was seen," the agency said.

"It occurred the day before the 15th anniversary of leader Kim Jong-Il's assumption of the supreme commandership of the Korean People's Army and the birth anniversary of anti-Japanese war hero Kim Jong-Suk."

AFP is right there to report this as straight news instead of the delusional propaganda of a tyrant.

The Godfather of Soul, James Brown, is dead at the age of 73.

The pompadoured dynamo whose classic singles include "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag" and "I Got You (I Feel Good)" died Monday of heart failure, said his agent, Frank Copsidas of Intrigue Music.

"People already know his history, but I would like for them to know he was a man who preached love from the stage," said friend Charles Bobbit, who was with Brown at the hospital. "His thing was 'I never saw a person that I didn't love.' He was a true humanitarian who loved his country."

The entertainer with the rough-edged voice and flashy footwork also had diabetes and prostate cancer that was in remission, Bobbit said. Brown initially seemed fine at the hospital, Copsidas said. Three days before his death, he had participated in his annual toy giveaway in Augusta, and he was looking forward to his New Year's Eve show.

Regardless of whether you were a fan of Brown or not, if you ever had the chance to see him , even on television, he was a showman with an incredible stage presence. Rest in peace.

Gotta love copycats. The Calendar Girls, those British women in their 50's through their 70's who promoted their not really nude calendar to help raise funds for cancer research have prompted an entire industry of various other groups copying them.

MILWAUKEE - Miss December is wearing nothing but a Santa hat and a smile. Oh, and holding one strategically placed cat. Chandra Gates, 39, decided the Humane Society of Jefferson County was a worthy enough cause for the 39-year-old to bare nearly all for a nude-calendar fundraiser.

"I'm shy about the picture but definitely proud of the cause," said Gates, an animal caregiver there.

The Humane Society in the city of Jefferson is one of countless nonprofit organizations around thew world selling tastefully nude 2007 calendars.

A group of women aged from mid 50s to early 70s in Yorkshire, England, pioneered the idea in 2000 when they sold a calendar of discreet nude photographs of themselves to raise money for cancer research.

The women, whose story inspired the 2003 movie "Calendar Girls," raised $2.55 million through sales of 800,000 calendars as well as book and film royalties.

There's a story about Johnny Carson and the line, "Move the damn cat", but it may just be one of those urban legends.

Oops - gotta check on the turkey.

Christmas Morning

Santa tries hard to get it right and listen for the little hints during the run up to the holiday. A wistful hint dropped, something admired. Any clue is analyzed and discussed to try to decipher just what they really want. Sometimes it's easy, when they come right out with it, other times it is more like breaking a Cold War code. But you eventually get everything you think they want.

All the shopping, all the braving of the crowds to get just the right gift all hopefully worth it. Hours spent shopping matched by hours spent wrapping. Then the late night bustle of getting everything under the tree after the kids finally go to bed. The stockings are stuffed, the gifts arranged just so. Despite dire threats of getting everyone up at a really early hour, the kids mercifully let you sleep until all of 6:30 before they begin asking when they can open presents. Ah, youthful patience.

All of the time spent wrapping undone in seconds as the paper and ribbons are torn away revealing the new treasures. Gifts unwrapped and displayed proudly for all to see. Parents doing the dreaded "some assembly required". (The "some" part being relative, of course. Often it seems like you only missed injection molding the plastic or smelting the metal itself - everything else is on you.) The children trying to figure out how to break the new gift, disguising that intention by saying they're only trying to get it to work.

Taking the time to tell your spouse you love them when you open the gift they bought you. That gift never comes from them , of course. It is from Santa, or the kids, or the pets. The tag says so every year. And every year you do the same to your spouse. The cockatiel has deep pockets, apparently. Each year it is only one or two gifts for the adults, Christmas is about the children. They make out like bandits each year. And each year it gets harder and harder to buy for each one, too. They grow up so fast. 

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Merry Christmas

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