Breath easy internet, I have returned to my blogging post. Over the last week and a half I’ve been journeying up the Pacific Coast with Bear Hunter . As it turns out, when I try and write on my laptop while in the van I start to puke all over my band mates — hence, my absence from Synthesis Blog. Over the next few days I will be recounting my harrowing journey (in between fascinating posts about pop stars getting busted for drugs, children with weird growths on their bodies and general paranoid-paranormal fodder). Get ready, dear readers. Get your asses ready.

After commissioning a study last year that found the majority of the carbon footprint of a major rock tour is created by showgoers traveling to and from the show (download the report here), Radiohead are asking fans coming out for their summer US tour to consider alternative means of transportation. Here’s the press release:

On the eve of their 2008 tour, which begins this Monday in West Palm Beach FL, Radiohead are appealing to fans to think about how they travel to and from shows.

Last year, the band commissioned carbon footprint analysts Best Foot Forward to calculate the carbon generated on their two previous US tours. The report showed that fans’ travel to and from the shows accounted for the greatest proportion of the CO2 generated during each tour, something now widely accepted across the industry.

Following the report’s recommendations, Radiohead are encouraging fans to consider public transport where available, or increased carpooling for shows outside city centers. Gig goers can compare the CO2 generated by different methods of transport by visiting an online calculator on Radiohead’s website. Some of the venues have also helped by offering incentives to fans coming by public transport or in a full car.

After the tour, the band will invite ticket holders to submit information on their methods of travel so further research can be done on carbon emissions and methods to reduce them.

Radiohead’s production team will also be posting information on how the band are trying to reduce their own carbon emissions on tour without compromising the quality of the shows.

For more info, go here, and for the tour dates, take the JUMPPPPPPPP

(more…)

Some people might find it shocking that 58% of music in the US isn’t paid for but hey - that means 42% of music IS paid for in the US!

The recent conviction of Chi Mak, a Chinese-born engineer working for a US Defense contractor who “slept” for 20 years before being activated in order to swipe sensitive military documents, is bringing to light what US Intelligence insiders have long known, that the Chinese government has a vast network of agents already at work in the US:

The Chinese government, in an enterprise that one senior official likened to an “intellectual vacuum cleaner,” has deployed a diverse network of professional spies, students, scientists and others to systematically collect U.S. know-how, the officials said. Some are trained in modern electronic techniques for snooping on wireless computer transactions. Others, such as Mak, are technical experts who have been in place for years and have blended into their communities.

“Chi Mak acknowledged that he had been placed in the United States more than 20 years earlier, in order to burrow into the defense-industrial establishment to steal secrets,” Joel Brenner, the head of counterintelligence for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, said in an interview. “It speaks of deep patience,” he said, and is part of a pattern.

Peeking duck indeed.

 From a story in today’s San Francisco Chronicle regarding the Fed’s bailout of Bear Stearns and what it signified in terms of the economic downturn spreading throughout US financial markets:

Bay Area consumers are feeling the pain. Pleasant Hill resident Caleb Mitchell, 25, had his Washington Mutual home equity line cut in half last month to $55,000 from $110,000. He had already drawn $54,400, leaving him just $600 in additional borrowing power. ”The security blanket I had for myself is now gone,” he said.Mitchell, who works as a real estate agent, used the credit line to help cover payments on investment property he owns. Now he’s cutting back on travel and other spending, and looking for other sources of financing. 

So, lets see. The SIX-FIGURE credit line, some douche used to float his INVESTMENT PROPERTIES got cut to a meager $55,000, meaning he had to face the unbearable hardship of “cutting back on TRAVEL.” No one wonder most of the world is waiting for us to crash and burn. Excuse me while I subscribe to Adbusters.    

Despite sounding less than optimistic about their plan to blow up an errant satellite threatening to come back to earth and kill a bunch of Earth people with its deadly rocket fuel, the US Navy successfully shot down the satellite with a SM-3 missle Wednesday, saying with “high confidence” that the missile destroyed the satellite’s fuel tank. Check out the footage and feel warm in the knowledge that our trillions of dollars in defense budgeting are being used to keep us safe….from our own satellites.