The news thread

[James D.]

Yay, Communist Party of China! Always looking out for the people's rights!

Or not.

Major props to Google on this.

[Molly]

Michael C. Hall says he's being treated for cancer.

By LYNN ELBER, AP Television Writer Lynn Elber, Ap Television Writer 2 hrs 29 mins ago

LOS ANGELES "Dexter" star Michael C. Hall is undergoing treatment for cancer and the disease is in remission, a spokesman said.

"I feel fortunate to have been diagnosed with an imminently treatable and curable condition, and I thank my doctors and nurses for their expertise and care," Hall, 38, said Wednesday in a statement.

The actor was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer of the lymphatic system, which is part of the body's immune system. The disease is considered highly treatable with the potential for full recovery.

Craig Bankey, a spokesman for the actor, said the cancer is in complete remission and Hall's treatment will continue as planned.

When Hall was diagnosed and the name of the Los Angeles-area health facility where he's undergone treatment were not released.

Hall plans to attend Sunday's Golden Globe awards and the upcoming Screen Actors Guild ceremony with his wife, actress Jennifer Carpenter, who plays his sister on Showtime's "Dexter." Hall is a nominee at both awards shows for his role as Dexter Morgan, a serial killer working as a blood-spatter expert.

Bankey said Hall will return to production on the drama's fifth season later this year.

Source.

[SuaveStar]

Damn. Glad he's better, I love that guy.

[dc20willsave]

Ditto. The man is a true professional.

[JackFetch]

Channing Tatum "burned the skin off" his penis.

The 29-year-old actor suffered the agonizing injury while trying to keep warm when shooting 'The Eagle of the Ninth' in the Scottish Highlands in October.

He explained: "The only way to keep warm was by pouring a mix of boiling water and river water down your suit. We were finally done shooting for the day, and one of the crew guys asks if I want to warm up before I go. I'm like, Nah, I'm good. And then I thought, Why not?

"Thing is, he'd forgotten to dilute the kettle water. So he poured scalding water down my suit. And I was trying to pull the suit away from my body to somehow get away from the boiling water, and the more I pulled the suit away, the lower the water went. It just went straight down and pretty much burned the skin off the head of my (expletive)."

Channing - who describes the incident as "the most painful thing" he had ever experienced - was taken to hospital, but with the nearest medical facility over an hour away, the former stripper struggled to cope with the agony.

He added to Details magazine: "I said to the driver, who was ex-special-forces Marines, 'You might have to knock me out, because I don't know if I can take the pain. Just grab something and hit me on the back of my head.

"I had five guys looking at my shriveled, burned penis."

Fortunately, the actor - who is married to actress Jenna Dewan - made a full recovery.

He added: "I'm good... now...my penis is fantastic! 100 per cent recovered. Put me back in the game, Coach."

http://www.azcentral.com/ent/celeb/articles/2010/01/13/20100113channing-tatum.html

I saw another article saying he's got cell phone pictures of it that he loves showing everybody.

[dc20willsave]

In news that fell to the wayside this week and didn't really get covered:

Justices, 5-4, Reject Corporate Spending Limit

By ADAM LIPTAK

Published: January 21, 2010

WASHINGTON — Overruling two important precedents about the First Amendment rights of corporations, a bitterly divided Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections.The 5-to-4 decision was a vindication, the majority said, of the First Amendment’s most basic free speech principle — that the government has no business regulating political speech. The dissenters said that allowing corporate money to flood the political marketplace would corrupt democracy.

The ruling represented a sharp doctrinal shift, and it will have major political and practical consequences. Specialists in campaign finance law said they expected the decision to reshape the way elections were conducted. Though the decision does not directly address them, its logic also applies to the labor unions that are often at political odds with big business.

The decision will be felt most immediately in the coming midterm elections, given that it comes just two days after Democrats lost a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate and as popular discontent over government bailouts and corporate bonuses continues to boil.

President Obama called it “a major victory for big oil, Wall Street banks, health insurance companies and the other powerful interests that marshal their power every day in Washington to drown out the voices of everyday Americans.”

The justices in the majority brushed aside warnings about what might follow from their ruling in favor of a formal but fervent embrace of a broad interpretation of free speech rights.

“If the First Amendment has any force,” Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the majority, which included the four members of the court’s conservative wing, “it prohibits Congress from fining or jailing citizens, or associations of citizens, for simply engaging in political speech.”

The ruling, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, No. 08-205, overruled two precedents: Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce, a 1990 decision that upheld restrictions on corporate spending to support or oppose political candidates, and McConnell v. Federal Election Commission, a 2003 decision that upheld the part of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 that restricted campaign spending by corporations and unions.

The 2002 law, usually called McCain-Feingold, banned the broadcast, cable or satellite transmission of “electioneering communications” paid for by corporations or labor unions from their general funds in the 30 days before a presidential primary and in the 60 days before the general elections.

The law, as narrowed by a 2007 Supreme Court decision, applied to communications “susceptible to no reasonable interpretation other than as an appeal to vote for or against a specific candidate.”

The five opinions in Thursday’s decision ran to more than 180 pages, with Justice John Paul Stevens contributing a passionate 90-page dissent. In sometimes halting fashion, he summarized it for some 20 minutes from the bench on Thursday morning.

Joined by the other three members of the court’s liberal wing, Justice Stevens said the majority had committed a grave error in treating corporate speech the same as that of human beings.

Eight of the justices did agree that Congress can require corporations to disclose their spending and to run disclaimers with their advertisements, at least in the absence of proof of threats or reprisals. “Disclosure permits citizens and shareholders to react to the speech of corporate entities in a proper way,” Justice Kennedy wrote. Justice Clarence Thomas dissented on this point.

The majority opinion did not disturb bans on direct contributions to candidates, but the two sides disagreed about whether independent expenditures came close to amounting to the same thing.

“The difference between selling a vote and selling access is a matter of degree, not kind,” Justice Stevens wrote. “And selling access is not qualitatively different from giving special preference to those who spent money on one’s behalf.”

Justice Kennedy responded that “by definition, an independent expenditure is political speech presented to the electorate that is not coordinated with a candidate.”

The case had unlikely origins. It involved a documentary called “Hillary: The Movie,” a 90-minute stew of caustic political commentary and advocacy journalism. It was produced by Citizens United, a conservative nonprofit corporation, and was released during the Democratic presidential primaries in 2008.

Citizens United lost a suit that year against the Federal Election Commission, and scuttled plans to show the film on a cable video-on-demand service and to broadcast television advertisements for it. But the film was shown in theaters in six cities, and it remains available on DVD and the Internet.

The majority cited a score of decisions recognizing the First Amendment rights of corporations, and Justice Stevens acknowledged that “we have long since held that corporations are covered by the First Amendment.”

But Justice Stevens defended the restrictions struck down on Thursday as modest and sensible. Even before the decision, he said, corporations could act through their political action committees or outside the specified time windows.

The McCain-Feingold law contains an exception for broadcast news reports, commentaries and editorials. But that is, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote in a concurrence joined by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., “simply a matter of legislative grace.”

Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion said that there was no principled way to distinguish between media corporations and other corporations and that the dissent’s theory would allow Congress to suppress political speech in newspapers, on television news programs, in books and on blogs.

Justice Stevens responded that people who invest in media corporations know “that media outlets may seek to influence elections.” He added in a footnote that lawmakers might now want to consider requiring corporations to disclose how they intended to spend shareholders’ money or to put such spending to a shareholder vote.

On its central point, Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion was joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Alito, Thomas and Antonin Scalia. Justice Stevens’s dissent was joined by Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor.

When the case was first argued last March, it seemed a curiosity likely to be decided on narrow grounds. The court could have ruled that Citizens United was not the sort of group to which the McCain-Feingold law was meant to apply, or that the law did not mean to address 90-minute documentaries, or that video-on-demand technologies were not regulated by the law. Thursday’s decision rejected those alternatives.

Instead, it addressed the questions it proposed to the parties in June when it set down the case for an unusual second argument in September, those of whether Austin and McConnell should be overruled. The answer, the court ruled Thursday, was yes.

“When government seeks to use its full power, including the criminal law, to command where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear, it uses censorship to control thought,” Justice Kennedy wrote. “This is unlawful. The First Amendment confirms the freedom to think for ourselves.”

Source

[James D.]

I'm paraphrasing what a friend of mine at the Oratory said yesterday, but I don't see why this is such a OMGZ~ deal to people. Utah, Virginia, and a few other states have no limits on corporate contributions to candidates, and there have been no stories of "corrupted" campaigns due to those lacks of regulations. No amount of money given to a politician is going to sway someone's vote one way or another if they disagree with the viewpoints of a particular politician. And besides, there is no significant proof that these laws ever prevented any kind of corruption in the first place, so therefore, it has no grounds to subvert our rights.

[Nicolette Opal]

No amount of money given to a politician is going to sway someone's vote one way or another if they disagree with the viewpoints of a particular politician.

This. Well said.

Though, I think the issue might be with quid pro quo, "We'll give you campaign money, you get us some unfair advantages when you're in office..."

Though, this happens in any number of ways, not just by way of campaign finance...

[MaxPower]

I was about to write what you said about the quid pro quo, but then like you said, there are many other ways for corpolitic (I just made that up) back scratching...

I think the real question though is, why do people need so much money for a campaign.... and isn't it wrong when so much is spent on getting to office. I know why they need it, but why has the system developed to a point where it is like that.

[Stavros]

You shouldn't be able to vote with money, and donating vast amounts of money to lend power to people whose views support yours amounts to just that. If 10% of a nation holds 90% of the capital then through big donations they can promote their view over that which might favour the bottom 90% through disinformation. That's simplifying it a bit, but limiting campaign donations is a good principle to ensure that voting with money is as close to universal a right as traditional voting.

Its not about money changing minds, although I'm certain it has done so, its about money lending power to viewpoints.

[Venneh]

Court: Waupun Inmate Can't Play Dungeons and Dragons

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- A man serving life in prison for first-degree intentional homicide lost his legal battle Monday to play Dungeons & Dragons behind bars.

Kevin T. Singer filed a federal lawsuit against officials at Wisconsin's Waupun prison, arguing that a policy banning all Dungeons & Dragons material violated his free speech and due process rights.

Prison officials instigated the Dungeons & Dragons ban among concerns that playing the game promoted gang-related activity and was a threat to security. Singer challenged the ban but the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday upheld it as a reasonable policy.

Dungeons & Dragons players create fictional characters and carry out their adventures, often working together as a group, with the help of complicated rules.

Singer, 33, has been a devoted player of the fantasy role-playing game since he was a child, according to the court ruling. After the ban went into effect, prison officials confiscated dozens of Dungeons & Dragons books and magazines in his cell as well as a 96-page manuscript he had written detailing a potential scenario for the game that players could act out.

Prison officials enacted the ban in 2004 after an inmate sent an anonymous letter expressing concern about Singer and three other inmates forming a "gang" focused around playing the game.

Singer was told by prison officials that he could not keep the materials because Dungeons & Dragons "promotes fantasy role playing, competitive hostility, violence, addictive escape behaviors, and possible gambling," according to the ruling. The prison later developed a more comprehensive policy against all types of fantasy games, the court said.

The appeals court said the prison's policy was reasonable and did not violate Singer's rights.

"After all, punishment is a fundamental aspect of imprisonment, and prisons may choose to punish inmates by preventing them from participating in some of their favorite recreations," the court said.

Singer was sentenced to life in prison in 2002 after being found guilty of first-degree intentional homicide in the killing of his sister's boyfriend. The man was bludgeoned to death with a sledgehammer.

Department of Corrections spokesman John Dipko said the department was pleased with the decision and will continue to enforce rules that are designed to maintain a safe environment.

Singer's court-appointed attorney, W.C. Turner Herbert of North Carolina, also did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

Source: http://www.620wtmj.com/news/local/82671317.html

Only in WI. xD

[Dread]

Good.

He violated someone's right when he beat their head in with a hammer. Fuck him.

[JackFetch]

CBS has rejected a Super Bowl ad submitted by a gay dating Web site that shows two male football fans making out.

The network shot down the commercial Friday in a letter to the site -- ManCrunch.com -- saying the "creative is not within the Network's Broadcast Standards for Super Bowl Sunday."

Also the network said its sales department had difficulty verifying the credit of the site to guarantee payment of the estimated $2.5 million cost to air the ad.

"After reviewing the ad – which is entirely commercial in nature – our Standards and Practices department decided not to accept this particular spot," said CBS in a statement. "As always, we are open to working with the client on alternative submissions."

Sources said the network felt the site was using the tried-and-true tactic of generating free publicity by submitting a Super Bowl ad they knew was likely to be rejected and was ultimately unwilling to pay for.

A ManCrunch.com spokesperson denied that the ad was a marketing ploy and called CBS' decision discriminatory.

"We're 100% serious," said spokesperson Elissa Buchter. "We have the money to pay for it. If the ad showed a man and woman kissing it would have been accepted. You see ads for erectile dysfunction morning, noon and night. It's discriminatory that they wont show this."

Buchter said the site spent more than $100,000 on the ad and has raised $40 million from investors.

"They should call our bluff," she said. "If the ad doesn't air on the Super Bowl, it will air on another network. It's not like it plays like Adam Lambert [kissing another man on the AMAs]."

CBS was rocked by controversy when it accepted a pro-life Super Bowl ad from conservative group Focus on the Family and announced it was relaxing its standards on accepting "advocacy" ads. The decision put a spotlight on ManCrunch.com, which submitted an ad -- titled "Playing for the Same Team" -- that depicted two male football fans making out (video here).

http://www.thrfeed.com/2010/01/cbs-rejects-gay-dating-sites-super-bowl-ad.html

Sometimes it's hard for me to believe it's the year 2010.

[Nicolette Opal]

Yeah. Especially considering they've been denying these ads for years under the guise of "not supporting any agenda," but THIS year, have an anti-abortion ad.

Classy, CBS.

[Stavros]

Singer was told by prison officials that he could not keep the materials because Dungeons & Dragons "promotes fantasy role playing..."

No shit Sherlock. Rules are rules in prison so I'm not going to pretend I know more about how that works than the people running the place, but that description, "promotes fantasy role playing, competitive hostility, violence, addictive escape behaviours, and possible gambling" seems like the most humourless, bone-dry negative description of the hobby I've ever heard.

The football ad seems designed to draw controversy, but then any good Superbowl ad is an effort to maximise publicity. CBS probably don't want to deal with the complaints from a million angry bigots, its easier to ignore lefty homophiles because they're used to being kicked around. Hope the ad gets play time on another network, mostly just to prove that they had the cash and this wasn't a total stunt.

[SuaveStar]

The football ad seems designed to draw controversy, but then any good Superbowl ad is an effort to maximise publicity. CBS probably don't want to deal with the complaints from a million angry bigots, its easier to ignore lefty homophiles because they're used to being kicked around. Hope the ad gets play time on another network, mostly just to prove that they had the cash and this wasn't a total stunt.

Pretty much what I would say, but worded a lot better.

[Stavros]

The football ad seems designed to draw controversy, but then any good Superbowl ad is an effort to maximise publicity. CBS probably don't want to deal with the complaints from a million angry bigots, its easier to ignore lefty homophiles because they're used to being kicked around. Hope the ad gets play time on another network, mostly just to prove that they had the cash and this wasn't a total stunt.

Pretty much what I would say, but worded a lot better.

Yup, 'Lefty homophiles' is the sort of wordsmithery you can expect from me.

[SuaveStar]

Well, that and you pretty much said it right, if it wasn't just some shitty PR stunt, then they can go somewhere else and stick the middle finger up the superbowl. Also, two guys making out, couldn't they have done something less, fucking shit. Two guys holding hands or something not to so blatantly attention grabbing and annoying. When you see normal dating site ads, do they show the people making out? Not usually, they usually show them having a real connection and having fun together.

[JackFetch]

It's a horribly unfunny ad anyways. The black guy at the end eating chicken was a little over the top.

[Stavros]

Kenya fishermen see upside to pirates: more fish

Associated Press Writer Jason Straziuso, Associated Press Writer – Mon Jan 11, 12:31 am ET

MALINDI, Kenya – People here have one thing to thank Somali pirates for: Better fishing.

In past years, illegal commercial trawlers parked off Somalia's coast and scooped up the ocean's contents. Now, fishermen on the northern coast of neighboring Kenya say, the trawlers are not coming because of pirates.

"There is a lot of fish now, there is plenty of fish. There is more fish than people can actually use because the international fishermen have been scared away by the pirates," said Athman Seif, the director of the Malindi Marine Association.

On one early morning, as the sun bathed their wooden dhow in a pale yellow, four fishermen jumped out of their rickety 15-foot boat, grabbed a hand-woven straw basket and waded ashore. The basket held the bounty: 175 pounds (80 kilograms) of sailfish, barracuda and red snapper, the haul from a 12-hour night on the ocean. Each fisherman stood to make $12, enough in this town to be considered a decent night's work.

Fishermen and sportsmen say they've been catching more fish than ever. Howard Lawrence-Brown, who owns Kenya Deep Sea Fishing, said fishing stocks over the last year have been up "enormously — across all species."

"We had the best marlin season ever last year," said Lawrence-Brown, who owns Kenya Deep Sea Fishing. "The only explanation is that somebody is not targeting them somewhere. ... There's definitely no question about it, the lack of commercial fishing has made a difference."

Fishermen in the region have seen their incomes and quality of life rise. New boats and better equipment can be seen on the water.

In Malindi, a second-tier tourist town whose tastiest seafood restaurant is called "The Old Man and the Sea," after the Ernest Hemingway novel, the income of many families is determined by the number of fish caught during a half-day's turn at sea.

On a recent weekday, fisherman Abdi Ali said he has more money of late to send his kids to high school, which costs money in Kenya. As Ali spoke, a man nearby held up a 2.5-foot (.75-meter), 9-pound (4-kilo) red snapper to motorists on Malindi's main oceanfront drive in hopes of enticing a sale.

"This year the amount of fish we have caught has been very good. We get about 150 kilograms to 200 and even 300 kilograms, depending on how much we fish," said Ali. Three hundred kilograms is about 660 pounds.

"There were fish that had disappeared and have come back like the barracuda, oranda, red snapper and other types," he said. "We are very happy now that there are so many fish."

Fishermen in Somalia, too, say they've seen increased catches. Traders at a Mogadishu fish market are happy because more fish means lower prices, which means more Somalis can afford to buy.

"I remember some days I used to go to the sea early to catch fish and would return with no fish, but nowadays there are plenty. You can catch it everywhere," said fisherman Bakar Osman, 50. "I do not know the reason but I think the foreign fishing vessels, which used to loot our fish, were scared away by pirates."

Somali pirates have increased attacks the last two years because of the millions of dollars in ransom they can earn. They currently hold close to a dozen vessels and more than 200 crew hostage. Fishermen here acknowledge the horror of the attacks — they occasionally are harassed by pirates themselves.

Before the pirates came out in big numbers, fishing longliners roamed the coasts, Lawrence Brown said, laying out miles (kilometers) of line.

"They kill everything from the bottom of the ocean to the boat. They run at 22 knots. They can lay their lines for 24 hours, pick them up and get out of there," he said. "The damage on the sports fishing side is immeasurable."

A report on pirates this year by the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore said the value of illegal catches from Somalia's maritime jurisdiction is estimated at between $90 million and $300 million a year, and that foreign fishing vessels hail from all around the world.

The report's author, Clive Schofield, a research fellow with the Australian Centre for Ocean Resources and Security at the University of Wollongong, called it ironic that nations contributing warships to anti-piracy efforts are in some cases directly linked to the foreign fishing vessels "stealing Somalia's offshore resources."

"This situation has led some pirates to justify their actions on basis of illegal foreign fishing activities — styling themselves 'coastguards' and characterizing ransom demands as 'fines,'" the report said. "Without condoning acts of violence at sea, it is clear that the Somalis who hijack shipping off their coast are in fact not the only 'pirates' operating in these waters," it said.

Piracy has not had a huge effect on Kenya's overall fishing industry, which is not very well developed on the coast, according to the permanent secretary for Kenya's Ministry of Fisheries Development, Micheni Japhet Ntiba. Kenya has brought in between 5,000 and 7,000 metric tons of fish off its Indian Ocean coast each of the last several years, he said, less than a tenth of Kenya's yearly catch from Lake Victoria, on Kenya's western edge.

Piracy "is a negative thing for Kenya fisherman. It's a negative thing for the Kenyan economy. It's a negative thing for the western Indian Ocean economy," Ntiba said. "What I think is important for us is to invest in security so the government and the private sector can invest in the deep sea ocean resources."

Still, Kenya's sports fisherman say the pirates appear to have had a hugely positive effect on their industry. Angus Paul, whose family owns the Kingfisher sports fishing company, said that over the past season clients on his catch-and-release sports fishing outings averaged 12 or 13 sail fish a day. That compares with two or three in previous years.

Somali pirates, Paul said, are a group of terrorists, "but as long as they can keep the big commercial boats out, not fishing the waters, then it benefits a lot of other smaller people."

[Molly]

Well, that kicks a bit of ass.

[Venneh]

Not Safe For Work

Inventor unveils $7,000 talking sex robot
By Brandon Griggs, CNN

Las Vegas, Nevada (CNN) -- To some men, she might seem like the perfect woman: She's a willowy 5 feet 7 and 120 pounds. She'll chat with you endlessly about your interests. And she'll have sex whenever you please -- as long as her battery doesn't run out.

Meet Roxxxy, who may be the world's most sophisticated talking female sex robot. For $7,000, she's all yours.

"She doesn't vacuum or cook, but she does almost everything else," said her inventor, Douglas Hines, who unveiled Roxxxy last month at the Adult Entertainment Expo in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Lifelike dolls, artificial sex organs and sex-chat phone lines have been keeping the lonely company for decades. But Roxxxy takes virtual companionship to a new level.

Powered by a computer under her soft silicone "skin," she employs voice-recognition and speech-synthesis software to answer questions and carry on conversations. She even comes loaded with five distinct "personalities," from Frigid Farrah to Wild Wendy, that can be programmed to suit customers' preferences.

"There's a tremendous need for this kind of product," said Hines, a computer scientist and former Bell Labs engineer.

Roxxxy won't be available for delivery for several months, but Hines is taking pre-orders through his Web site, TrueCompanion.com, where thousands of men have signed up.

"They're like, 'I can't wait to meet her,' " Hines said. "It's almost like the anticipation of a first date."

Women have inquired about ordering a sex robot, too. Hines says a female sex therapist even contacted him about buying one for her patients.

Roxxxy has been like catnip to talk-show hosts since her debut at AEE, the largest porn-industry convention in the country. In a recent monologue, Jay Leno expressed amazement that a sex robot could carry on lifelike conversations and express realistic emotions.

"Luckily, guys," he joked, "there's a button that turns that off."

Curious conventioneers packed Hines' AEE booth last month in Las Vegas, asking questions and stroking Roxxxy's skin as she sat on a couch in a black negligee.

"Roxxxy generated a lot of buzz at AEE," said Grace Lee, spokeswoman for the porn-industry convention. "The prevailing sentiment of everyone I talked to about Roxxxy is 'version 1.0,' but people were fascinated by the concept, and it caused them to rethink the possibilities of 'sex toys.' "

Hines, a self-professed happily married man from Lincoln Park, New Jersey, says he spent more than three years developing the robot after trying to find a marketable application for his artificial-intelligence technology.

Roxxxy's body is made from hypoallergenic silicone -- the kind of stuff in prosthetic limbs -- molded over a rigid skeleton. She cannot move on her own but can be contorted into almost any natural position. To create her shape, a female model spent a week posing for a series of molds.

The robot runs on a self-contained battery that lasts about three hours on one charge, Hines says. Customers can recharge Roxxxy with an electrical cord that plugs into her back.

A motor in her chest pumps heated air through a tube that winds through the robot's body, which Hines says keeps her warm to the touch. Roxxxy also has sensors in her hands and genital areas -- yes, she is anatomically correct -- that will trigger vocal responses from her when touched. She even shudders to simulate orgasm.

When someone speaks to Roxxxy, her computer converts the words to text and then uses pattern-recognition software to match them against a database containing hundreds of appropriate responses. The robot then answers aloud -- her prerecorded "voice" is supplied by an unnamed radio host -- through a loudspeaker hidden under her wig.

"Everything you say to her is processed. It's very near real time, almost without delay," Hines said of the dynamics of human-Roxxxy conversation. "To make it as realistic as possible, she has different dialogue at different times. She talks in her sleep. She even snores." (The snoring feature can be turned off, he says.)

Roxxxy understands and speaks only English for now, but Hines' True Companion company is developing Japanese and Spanish versions. For an extra fee, he'll also record customizable dialogue and phrases for each client, which means Roxxxy could talk to you about NASCAR, say, or the intricacies of politics in the Middle East.

Hines believes that Roxxxy is a step above other love dolls -- the similar but mute RealDoll costs about $5,500 -- because her conversational abilities provide something close to emotional companionship. His customer base? Shy, awkward or older men who "have trouble meeting girls," he says.

In an industry known for pushing the technological envelope, observers are curious about how Roxxxy will fare in the marketplace.

"Is this a viable product? Yes," said Sherri Shaulis, an editor at Adult Video News, a trade magazine for the pornographic industry. "There's a market for it. Granted, it's a very small market."

Maybe not. TrueCompanion claims that more than 4,000 men have placed pre-orders for Roxxxy robots, and another 20,000 or so have requested information about the product.

"There's really nothing like this on the market," said Hines, who speaks of his unique creation with what seems like genuine affection. "Whenever she's out in public, everyone wants to talk to her and pose for pictures. It's so cute."

I just... I don't... I'll be in my corner now.

[Molly]

DON'T LOOK INTO ITS EYES.

[Stavros]

I know, right? Illegal corporate action ending leads to better quality of life for the ordinary person. Who knew?

Have the pirates actually killed anyone? I know they've kidnapped and ransomed people off, but so far I'm not hugely inclined to regard these people as some massive threat like the media claimed at the time.

edit: the sex-bot is a prossie Catherine Tate.

[dc20willsave]

edit: the sex-bot is a prossie Catherine Tate.

Oh dear god, it is. I am bothered.