Quote: SAN FRANCISCO — California's ballot measure to legalize marijuana has a new friend: Facebook co-founder Sean Parker has given $100,000 to back the proposal.

Parker's donation was reported in Proposition 19 campaign finance filings this week.

And he's not the first big Proposition 19 donor with ties to the social networking site. Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz gave $20,000 to the campaign and has contributions $70,000 overall.

Neither Parker nor Moskovitz are still with Palo Alto-based Facebook, but both still have ownership stakes. Recent estimates put the value of the privately held company as high as $33.7 billion.

"What's interesting here is that (Parker) is a member of the generation that really gets it," said Stephen Gutwillig, a spokesman for the Drug Policy Alliance, the main beneficiary of Parker's contribution. "We think he's pivotal to the future of drug policy reform in the country."

Quote:Ozzy Osbourne sounds ready to bite somebody's head off.

The British rock god released a statement saying he was "disgusted" by a Kansas-based church's choice to perform his music on the steps of the United States Supreme Court on Wednesday.

"I am sickened and disgusted by the use of 'Crazy Train' to promote messages of hate and evil by a 'church,'" said Ozzy, referring to the iconic song off 1980's Blizzard of Ozz.

(10-14-2010, 05:59 PM)Grim Wrote: Not a news stub, but rather a blog post on the opening of Muji here.

http://chuvaness.livejournal.com/975839.html

Quote:The Wall Street Journal reports that top Facebook applications, including FarmVille, Zynga Texas Hold 'Em Poker and FrontierVille, have been sharing your Facebook ID number to advertising and Internet tracking companies without your knowledge.

This is a violation of Facebook policy, which prohibits app makers from sharing your personal information to outside companies without "explicit user consent."

(10-21-2010, 07:07 PM)atdsutm Wrote: http://www.theinsider.com/news/3371730_Justin_Bieber_Under_Investigation_for_Assaulting_12_Year_Old

Quote:“Ang Panday” creator and “massacre films” director Carlo J. Caparas has been slapped with a multimillion-peso tax evasion case stemming from a P1.3-billion contract between the Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) and his production outfit.

Commissioner Kim Jacinto-Henares of the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) said Caparas was facing 64 counts of criminal charges for violating the Tax Code when he failed to remit taxes from 2006 to 2009.

Henares said the PCSO had paid Caparas P850.95 million for the production of various programs during the period.

The BIR chief made the announcement at a press conference at the Justice department where the agency filed the case against the controversial film and TV director. Justice Secretary Leila de Lima was present at the media briefing.

From his earnings from the PCSO, Caparas must pay the government P540.21 million inclusive of surcharges and penalties, Henares said.

Quote:Lapid has filed a measure titled “Maintenance of Parents Act of 2010,” which will enable parents to ask the courts to require their children to provide them financial support.

In the explanatory note to Senate Bill No. 2519, the action-star-turned-lawmaker observed that “the incidence of elderly people neglected by their children is becoming not uncommon.”

“The onset of urbanization and commercialization has brought with it certain factors that tend to erode Filipino family ties and values,” Lapid said.

“This bill reinforces the duty of children to care for their elderly parents, providing elderly persons … recourse to the law,” he said.

SB 2519 tackles a serious subject matter that runs deep in Philippine culture—respect for the elderly.

“The state shall provide legal assistance to elderly people in the enforcement of their right to demand support from their relatives,” it reads in part.

Section 4 of the bill states that “children shall maintain and support their father or mother or other direct ascendants who are in need.”

It seeks to enable the elderly to file a court petition with the assistance of a representative of the Department of Social Welfare and Development. During trial, the petitioner will also be represented by the Public Attorney’s Office “and shall be exempt from all charges and fees.”

In ruling on a petition, the court “shall take into consideration the financial resources of the child/children and his obligation to maintain his own family before it orders the maintenance and support of the elderly member,” according to the bill.

Childhood experience

Last month, Lapid drew criticism from Education Secretary Armin Luistro for proposing that schools limit the load of students’ bags to 15 percent of their body weight.

Luistro commented that he had found Lapid’s SB 2179 quite trivial.

But Lapid argued that the measure was partly the product of his own childhood experience.

“If only I did not go through such hard labor in the mountains—I was a wood gatherer and I carried sugarcane when I was young—I should have been taller because the Lapids are very big. I should have been taller than my father who was 5 [feet] 11 [inches],” said the senator who stands 5’9”.