Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Fed’s Dirty Little Secret: “The Gold Isn’t There… Exists as Paper IOU’s”

Mac Slavo
January 21st, 2014
SHTFplan.com


The assumption by global depositors who have entrusted their national savings with the Federal Reserve and US Government has always been that when they request to repatriate their holdings the Fed would simply open the vault, access said assets and ship them back to where they belong.
That’s exactly what Germany expected would happen last year when the country requested that the Federal Reserve return about one-fifth of their gold reserves. But that’s when things got really dicey. The Fed announced that Germany’s gold would be returned… but it would take seven years to get back home.
The response to Germany’s request turned heads all over the world and raised concerns that the Federal Reserve had squandered its gold holdings. But this isn’t the only red flag that was raised. Public pressure reached such levels that the Fed was forced to take steps to maintain confidence in its operations, so it started shipping gold to Germany. Except it turns out that the gold being sent back to the Bundesbank wasn’t actually German gold. It contained none of the original serial numbers, had no hallmarks, and was reportedly just recently melted.
The implications are earth shattering and hit the very core of the problems facing America today. The whole system as it exists is just one big paper IOU.
In this must-watch interview with Future Money TrendsJefferson Financial CEO Brien Lunden weighs in on Germany’s gold, what is happening at the Fed and what other central banks are doing right now. Brien also shares his thoughts on where the gold market is today, what to expect in coming years as gold supplies tighten up, how mining companies like Brazil Resources are taking advantage of the current environment, and how to profit from gold in coming years.

The Fed Doesn't have the Gold - Brien Lundin Interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FzFMMdvSwo

For the reply to be that it would take seven years for this Gold to be sent back to you, your Gold to be sent back to you, was an obvious admission that the Gold just isn’t there.

Yes, it’s an admission that the German reserves were not still sitting there in the vault in the same form that they were sent there after WWII. They were not the original Central Bank Gold bars, same serial numbers etc. It’s an admission that at some point since then, that Gold has been used for other purposes.

So the dirty little secret here, is that a significant portion of central bank Gold reserves, including the U.S., don’t exist now in their original bar form. In fact, they exist as IOU’s, paper IOU’s, from the very banks that were bailed out in 2008 by the Federal Reserve.
So the Gold isn’t there, and the secret that they’re hiding is that it’s been replaced by IOU’s, and importantly those IOU’s are for Gold that was borrowed at much lower prices.
The Fed, through their recent actions, has essentially admitted that the gold stored in their vaults isn’t really there. Just as our government refuses to be openly transparent to with the American people, the Fed has resisted all calls to open their books (and vaults) to impartial third-party accountants for review.
The whole system, it seems, is now operating on IOU’s. Be it consumers, banks, the Fed or even the US government, all of the US dollars being exchanged are nothing but worthless pieces of paper, because given the lack of transparency at the Fed, we have to assume that the physical assets supposedly backing all this currency have already been spent.
Are we wrong in making this assumption?
If you were to store some emergency funds with a friend who promised to get them back to you whenever you asked, and then you ask and are told it’ll be a few years before he’ll get you the cash, what assumption would you make?  That your friend has the money on him right now, or that he’s used it for other purposes and doesn’t really know exactly when he’ll have it available for repayment?
Our entire consumer economy, as well as the credit worthiness of our nation, is built upon confidence. It’s took decades to get America in a position where our country’s monetary issues and services would be trusted by the international community. It’s taken just a few years for that confidence to be lost.
It’s now only a matter of time before our creditors and global investors pull the plug on the whole thing.

Media Blackout on Smart Meter Dangers 

Major power utilities continue to deploy “smart” electrical meters on businesses and private residences throughout the United States and Canada. Yet those in North America and elsewhere remain in the dark on the negative health effects of such devices that systematically blast their homes with radio-frequency (RF) radiation on a minute-by-minute, round-the-clock basis.

In 2009 the Obama administration partnered with utilities by allocating $3.4 billion in federal stimulus funds toward building a nationwide “smart grid,” where smart meters figure centrally.[1] The project is part of President Obama’s “Climate Action Plan” that under United Nations auspices seeks to reduce US carbon emissions 20% by the year 2020.[2]
There is more than ample research available that has associated negative health effects of RF radiation emitted by smart meters [3] for regulatory authorities to place restrictions on power utilities and compel them to abide by the precautionary principle. Such restrictions would require power providers to refrain from wide scale installation of smart meters until a sufficient body of scientific research demonstrating the safety of such devices has been produced and rigorously evaluated.
Yet in the US and elsewhere the imperative of having a “smart grid,” the prospect of a carbon trading scheme, lax (and in at least some cases corrupt) state and federal regulatory bodies, and the sheer power of the utilities combine to jeopardize the long term health of the entire population.
In a purportedly democratic society news outlets play a decisive role in such an impending health crisis. By failing to report on the dubious health research of smart meters and the fact that the public is being involuntarily subjected to such technology, news media are a key factor in the citizenry’s continued ignorance and inaction.
In May 2011 the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer categorized “radiofrequency electromagnetic fields as possibly carcinogenic to humans based on an increased risk for glioma, a malignant type of brain cancer, associated with wireless cellphone use.”[4] Despite this warning from a well-recognized source, the utilities stubbornly insist that all residences must be equipped with a smart meter issuing dangerous electropollution.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ceased studying the health effects of radiofrequency radiation when the Senate Appropriations Committee cut the department’s funding and forbade it from further research into the area.[5] Thereafter RF limits were codified as mere “guidelines” based on the EPA’s tentative findings and are presently overseen by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
These weakly enforced standards are predicated on the alleged “thermal effect” of RF to which the FCC subscribes. In other words, if the energy emitted from a wireless antenna or device is not powerful enough to heat the skin or flesh then no danger is posed to human health.[6]
To this day power utilities cling to this severely outmoded and unscientific standard when confronted with the formidable body of research linking RF to cancer, destruction of DNA, and other negative health effects. News media seldom question the FCC policy when it is cited by utilities and regulators alike to underline the supposed overall safety of smart meters.[7]
An electronic LexisNexis search of newspaper articles referencing “smart meters” appearing between May 31, 2011, the date WHO classified RF a Class 2B carcinogen, and June 19, 2014, yields close to 839 pieces published in English language papers. Yet for the same time span only one tenth of the sample (82 articles) mentions “smart meters” and “carcinogen” or “carcinogenic” in the same report. Of these, 65 of the articles appeared in Canadian, and to a much lesser degree Australian or UK papers. Note that each sample includes guest editorials and letters to the editor penned by concerned citizens.
Using parameters from the date May 31, 2011, the date WHO declared RF a Class 2B carcinogen, to January 19, 2014, of 93 newspaper articles referencing “smart meter” and “World Health Organization,” 76 were published in Canadian, and to a much lesser degree UK, Australian, Malaysian or New Zealand outlets.
As the above suggests, the extremely limited awareness especially in the US of the potential health consequences of exposure to the continual RF emitted by smart meters is primarily because the issue is being blacked out in the press. When such dangers are reported, they are tempered by the refrain of the FCC’s “thermal effect” policy, which in light of the abundant countervailing research amounts to disinformation.
In December 2013 I contacted the reporter at the local metro-daily Palm Beach Post covering the state power utility, Florida Power and Light, and its smart meter policy to remind her of the bevy of public health and medical research documenting the likely consequences of sustained RF exposure. I also directed her to the WHO statement classifying RF as potentially carcinogenic.
To the Post’s credit a subsequent story highlighting Florida Power and Light’s “opt out” policy referenced the WHO statement. Yet the piece appeared deep in the business section of the paper, and the WHO warning was accompanied by the Florida Public Service Commission’s familiar rejoinder.
In 2011 the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified radio frequency electromagnetic fields such as those emitted by cellular phones, microwaves and smart meters as possibly carcinogenic to humans.
The PSC has said its authority does not extend to health issues related to meters. Smart meters are certified for compliance with radio frequency emission standards by the Federal Communications Commission, and the FCC has deemed that meters in compliance with the standards do not have adverse health impacts.[8]
While one or more hidden agendas likely exist to keep the public unaware of the health dangers associated with RF and smart meters (again, think carbon trading, in addition to the social control possibilities via energy rationing and surveillance soon to be realized through the “smart grid,”) a more immediate cause for such censorship is simply profit and continued media monopoly control of public opinion and discourse.
The telecommunications industry whose services are largely predicated on RF has recently exhibited the largest growth in advertising outlays, which are surely recognized in bottom line terms by the news and media industries.[9] With potential continued revenue growth on this scale, raising questions and relaying information that can safeguard public health and allow citizens to ask intelligent questions concerning the health of themselves and their loved ones simply constitutes poor business practice.
Notes
[1] “President Obama Announces $3.4 Billion Investment to Spur Transition to Smart Energy Grid,” The White House, October 27, 2009.
[2] Ed King, “Obama Promises to Cut Carbon Pollution in Climate Action Plan,” Responding to Climate Change, June 26, 2013.
[3] See, for example, the American Association of Environmental Medicine EMF-RF Reference List (PDF) and AAEM’s April 12, 2012 Press Advisory (PDF).
[4] World Health Organization International Agency for Research on Cancer, “IARC Classifies Radiofrequency Electromagnetic Fields as Possibly Carcinogenic,” May 31, 2011.
[5] Susan Luzzaro, “Field of Cell Phone Tower Beams,” San Diego Reader, May 18, 2011,
[6] FCC Office of Engineering and Technology, http://www.fcc.gov/oet/rfsafety. See also James F. Tracy “Wireless Technology and the Accelerated Toxification of America,” memoryholeblog.com, July 7, 2012.
[7] When this author obtained documents through a public records request from the Florida Public Service Commission on Florida Power and Light’s smart meter campaign–a very simple and routine endeavor for any journalist–it was evident that no human health impact studies on statewide smart meter deployment were ever considered. The PSC merely accepted FPL’s rationale and related public relations literature.
[8] Susan Salisbury, “Media Opt-Out Fee to Be Considered, PSC Staff Proposes Enrollment, Monthly Cost for Device For Device Foes,” Palm Beach Post, January 3, 2014, B4.
[9] “Ad Spend By Sector: Consumer Goods and Telecom Take the Cake in 2012,” Nielsen.com, April 25, 2013.
Republished at GlobalResearch.ca on January 21, 2014. // http://memoryholeblog.com/2014/01/21/media-blackout-on-smart-meter-dangers/

Video: Boston Marathon Bomb Simulators Exposed http://memoryholeblog.com/2014/01/16/video-boston-marathon-bomb-simulators-exposed/

Photos and Eyewitnesses Confirm BOTH Boston Marathon Bombs Were Fake
This brief (9:47) video presents a compelling argument and set of video and photographic evidence concerning the incendiary devices detonated shortly before 3:00PM on April 15, 2013 at the Boston Marathon finish line.

Specifically, the exposé uses footage of controlled bomb simulations and on-the-scene eyewitness testimony from Boston to suggest that the explosions appear to have originated from pyrotechnic instruments or props resembling trash cans. The purported “bombs” in fact consisted of mortars and flammable powder that generate a more-or-less benign explosion devoid of any shrapnel, a hypothesis that conforms with the absence of shrapnel at each bombing scene.

Photos and Eyewitnesses Confirm - BOTH Boston Marathon Bombs Were Fake


The theory involving detonation of controlled pyrotechnic devices and an overall staged event at the April 15 Boston Marathon was developed here on April 22, 2013. From Witnessing Boston’s Mass Casualty Event:
Available video of the first bomb detonating at the Marathon finish line suggests a direct upward discharge rather than the horizontal dispersion that would have wreaked the havoc to lower limbs so widely reported in physicians’ statements.
Moreover, the fact that whole pieces of the pressure cookers were produced by police further points to a more channeled dispersal of the bombs’ force–indeed, one that may not have involved a broad lateral distribution of shrapnel.(Comment on pressure cookers based on Jon Rappoport, “Is the Boston Pressure Cooker Bomb a Lie and a Hoax?Jon Rappoport’s Blog, April 17, 2013.)
From the Boston Marathon Bombing Timeline:
4:00PM [estimate]
An eyewitness tells WMUR Channel 9 that the second bomb originated in a trash can. The interview is broadcast on India’s ABP News. “I saw the first explosion happen,” the eyewitness recalls, “and there was some commotion. I saw fire and smoke, and I didn’t know what it was. And then from about me to where that gentleman is standing over there I saw a trash can explode and people started throwing down the barricades and running over each other and I just ran in the other direction as fast as I could.” “So the second explosion came from a garbage barrel?” the reporter asks to confirm. “Yes,” the man responds, “it came from a—I literally saw the garbage barrel explode.” “Boston Blasts: Eyewitness Accounts,” APB News, April 15, 2013.
In addition to highlighting the eyewitness account above, I suggested that a potential vendor for the Boston event might have been “Strategic Operation” or a comparable company offering such services. From Witnessing Boston’s Mass Casualty Event:
This brief news report profiles “Strategic Operations,” a private military training company offering “hyper-realistic” combat simulation complete with amputee actors.
[Since the posting on April 23, 2013 the channel owner with Strategic Operations' video has terminated the YouTube account.]

A similar video from Strategic Operations is available here.

Strategic Operations Business Card.mp4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQ8JG-Uyltk

-JFT

Study: Vaccine adjuvant aluminum hydroxide causes neurological disease

naturalnews.com

Originally published January 22 2014
aluminum hydroxideby J. D. Heyes

(NaturalNews) For years following the first Gulf War (1991), scores of returning American and Western military personnel suffered through a set of mysterious symptoms that doctors and scientists eventually described as "Gulf War Syndrome" (GWS), if for no other reason than because they simply could not identify a core set of causes for a variety of different symptoms.

There have been a number of definitions for GWS, but perhaps the most comprehensive of them can be found at Wikipedia:

Gulf War syndrome (GWS), also known as Gulf War illness (GWI), is a chronic multisymptom disorder affecting returning military veterans and civilian workers of the Gulf War. A wide range of acute and chronic symptoms have been linked to it, including fatigue, muscle pain, cognitive problems, rashes and diarrhea.

Aluminum hydroxide

The percentage of veterans of that conflict who ultimately suffered from GWS was astounding: More than one-third, or approximately 250,000 of the 697,000 vets who served in the first Gulf War campaign, are afflicted, according to the National Academy of Sciences.

In 2009, a study published in the Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry posited that that the substance aluminum hydroxide could be the primary GWS culprit, as documented at Science.NaturalNews.com:

Gulf War Syndrome is a multi-system disorder afflicting many veterans of Western armies in the 1990-1991 Gulf War. A number of those afflicted may show neurological deficits including various cognitive dysfunctions and motor neuron disease, the latter expression virtually indistinguishable from classical Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) except for the age of onset. This ALS "cluster" represents the second such ALS cluster described in the literature to date. Possible causes of GWS include several of the Adjuvants in the Anthrax vaccine and others. The most likely culprit appears to be Aluminum hydroxide.

The study, conducted by Canadian researchers from the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, involved a set of experiments in which researchers examined the potential toxicity of aluminum hydroxide in male mice that had been injected subcutaneously with two doses that were equivalent to that given to humans.

Later, researchers examined the animals' spinal cord and motor cortex using immunohistochemistry:

Aluminum-treated mice showed significantly increased apoptosis of motor neurons and increases in reactive astrocytes and microglial proliferation within the spinal cord and cortex. Morin stain detected the presence of Aluminum in the cytoplasm of motor neurons with some neurons also testing positive for the presence of hyper-phosphorylated tau protein, a pathological hallmark of various neurological diseases, including Alzheimer's disease and Frontotemporal Dementia.

Multiple additional causes of GWS?

In a second set of experiments, scientists injected mice with six doses of aluminum hydroxide and then conducted behavioral analyses, which "revealed significant impairments" in several motor functions, as well as diminished memory capacity.

The ground combat phase of the Gulf War lasted a mere 100 hours and began in late February 1991, but troops were on the ground in a toxic environment in Kuwait and Iraq for several months. As such, from 1995 to 2005, the health of combat vets got worse compared to military members who had not been deployed to the combat zone.

Those affected experienced a host of problems ranging from new chronic diseases to functional impairment, repeated clinic visits and hospitalizations, chronic fatigue and related symptoms, posttraumatic stress and other problems.

In addition to the 2009 study, other research has suggested that the syndrome may also have been caused by depleted uranium (which was used by U.S. tanks against Iraqi tanks, as well as U.S. Air Force planes like the A-10), sarin gas, smoke emanating from oil wells that had been set on fire by retreating Iraqi forces, predeployment vaccines and psychological factors. That said, only two substances - pyridostigmine (an antitoxin for nerve agents) and organophosphate pesticides have been strongly, and routinely, associated causally with Gulf War Syndrome, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.


Sources:

http://science.naturalnews.com

http://www8.nationalacademies.org

http://www.va.gov




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Of Course, China's Bad Air Is Polluting the West Coast

Of Course, China's Bad Air Is Polluting the West CoastExpand
The latest fear-mongering study about pollution in China has arrived, and it's frightening. According to a new paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, bad air in China is blowing across the Pacific and polluting the West Coast. Scary!
Well, not really. It's hardly a surprise that dirty air from China could become dirty air in the United States. After all, global wind patterns are kind of a thing. With the Pacific jet streams flowing directly from China to the West Coast, it seems obvious that some of the nasty particles being burped up by manufacturing plants there would end up hovering over Los Angeles and environs.
In fact, this is hardly the first time that roving Chinese pollution has made news. Back in 2006, a lengthy and similarly frightening story about "a dangerous brew of soot, toxic chemicals and climate-changing gases from the smokestacks of coal-burning power plants" in China made the front page of The New York Times. Then, two years ago, we learned more about the United States' own role in producing that pollution in a study published by the Journal of Geophysical Research. That's only to name a couple.
Here's the thing, though. Americans seem to bask in the schadenfreude of watching China's pollution problems spiral out of control. That's why we're so quick to believe images like this one—supposedly showing a simulated sunrise—that make China seem much more dystopian than it actually is. (Ironically, the sunrise image actually comes from a tourism video.) But when those problems hit our shores, it's really time to panic, huh?
Whatever makes us feel better for being the number one global warming offender, I guess. Just blame China! [Washington Post]
Image via Getty

The Freaky, Bioelectric Future of Tattoos

The Freaky, Bioelectric Future of TattoosExpand
America loves tattoos. From tribal designs to tramp stamps, this country can't get enough ink. Last month, a Pew study showed that tattoos grace the bodies of nearly 40 percent of Americans under 40, a massive number of customers in a $1.65 billion industry. Like any industry, however, the tattoo industry must innovate.
But what on Earth does tattoo innovation look like? What are we going to do next? Make them light up, or monitor our health, or turn into computers? What is the future of tattoos?
Everyone from neurologists to biohackers is reinventing the very idea of the tattoo. With the right technology, tattoos can do a lot more than just look beautiful or badass. They can become digital devices as useful and complex as the smartphone that bounces around in your pocket. It sounds wildly futuristic, but the technology already exists.

History

Before wading too deep into the future of tattoos, it's useful to understand where the custom comes from—and it sort of comes from everywhere. Ancient cultures, from Africa to the British Isles to the South Pacific, practiced some form of tattooing, often for ceremonial purposes. Even cavemen did it.
The Freaky, Bioelectric Future of Tattoos
One of the earliest known examples of tattooing was found on Ötzi, a Neolithic man mummified in the Swiss Alps and uncovered in 1991. Ötzi's well preserved skin shows signs of tattooing in several places, including dots on his back, knee, and ankle, locations that suggests they were given as a form of healing, a more artistic form of acupuncture. Ancient Egyptians also used tattoos as a form of medicine, but the body art took on a more cultural role elsewhere.
Tattoos took on a new meaning when the British began exploring the world. The name "tattoo" can actually be traced back to a series of journeys through the Pacific that Captain James Cook made in the late 18th century. There, his sailors learned of the Tahitian art of tatau, a ritual involving ink and needle, and many returned to England with their own tattoos. Over the years, tattoos became associated with sailors, who reintroduced the art to Europe and, eventually, to the United States.

High Tech Ink

Modern tattooing has evolved beyond the crude methods of the British Navy—but not by much. In 1891, New York tattooist Samuel O'Reilly patented the modern two-coil electromagnetic tattoo needle, borrowing the design from Thomas Edison's electric pen. The basic concept behind the device is still what powers tattoo machines today. What's improved dramatically, however, is the ink that goes along with it.
Traditionally, tattoo ink was made of anything from soot to metal salts. As health concerns cropped up around the use of potentially toxic substances as a pigment, natural vegetable-based organic pigments have come into fashion. That doesn't mean that chemicals are out of the picture. It's possible, for instance, to use ferromagnetic ink in tattoos, ink that responds to electromagnetic fields. A couple years ago, Nokia patented a technology that would enable the ink in a tattoo to interact with a device through magnetism. With this technology, your phone could ring and you could literally feel it through your tattoo.
Then there are the more visual innovations. The 90s rave scene helped spawn an ongoing trend of using ultraviolet and glow-in-the-dark ink for tattoos, for example. Often invisible in the daytime, these designs light up under blacklights in the club. Think of them as Tron tats. It's worth noting, however, that the health risks of these radioactive-looking tattoos remain unclear.
The Freaky, Bioelectric Future of TattoosExpand
The other major innovation in tattoo ink relates to permanence. You see, sometimes people get permanent tattoos—then later regret them and want them removed.
While it's possible to remove permanent tattoos, the process is painful and leaves scars. Or at least it did before scientists from Harvard, Brown, and Duke teamed up to create Freedom-2 ink, a removable ink that stored the dye in microscopic capsules that can be easily eradicated with a laser. So it's entirely possible in the 21st-century to get a tattoo made of vegetables that glows and can be removed almost painlessly. Progress!

Tattoos as Gadgets

The future of tattoos doesn't really lie in the ink, on the other hand. A new era of tattoos essentially reinvents the very definition of the art by pushing the boundaries of technology. Think of putting ink in your skin as analog, and you can start to get an idea of what a digital tattoo can do. Some will amaze you.
In the future, tattoos will do things. If you imagine a sort of post-ink tattoo, you can comprehend the emerging field of bio-hacking. This term refers to a practice that's part body modification, part computer hacking, and all kinds of crazy. Artist Anthony Antonellis is one of the true pioneers of the movement. Last year, he stunned the geek world when he implanted an RFID chip in his hand that could store and transmit one kilobyte of information through a tiny antennae. He started out with a simple animated gif (below).
The Freaky, Bioelectric Future of Tattoos
It makes you think: Is that rotating rainbow the tattoo? Or is it the RFID chip Antonellis is carrying around in his hand? Or both?
The animated gif tattoo brings to mind Rich Lee, a 30-something salesman from Utah who implanted sound-transmitting magnets in his ears. The magnets are powered by a coil apparatus that includes a little amplifier and battery pack and plugs into Lee's Walkman (or whatever). The coil creates an electromagnetic field that vibrates the magnets in his ears and creates sound. Lee says the quality is akin to a cheap pair of earbuds—a pair of earbuds he wears at all times. It sounds like a pretty crazy rig, but it sure is a conversation starter at parties.

Gadgets as Tattoos

Now, I know what you're thinking: Putting magnets in your ears or a chip in your hand doesn't really seem like a tattoo. After all, aren't you supposed to see tattoos? Well, remember that the future of tattoos is most likely going to be a post-ink enterprise. In some cases, ink will become ephemeral, like the data for an animated gif floating in the ether. In other cases, though, the ink is actually a gadget itself.
The Freaky, Bioelectric Future of Tattoos
Take LED tattoos. Instead of ink injection, this form of tattooing involves implanting LED displays under the skin. More specifically, LED tattoos are made up of silicon electronics less than 250 nanometers thick, built onto water soluble, biocompatible silk substrates. When injected with saline, the silk substrates conform to fit the surrounding tissue and eventually dissolve completely, leaving only the silicon circuitry. The body won't reject the electronics which can be used to power LEDs that act as photonic tattoos.
This is not science fiction. The University of Pennsylvania's Brian Litt, a neurologist and bioengineer, is perfecting a form of this technology that could be used to build futuristic medical devices—say, a tattoo that gives diabetics information about their blood sugar level. (The idea that futuristic tattoos might serve a medical purpose sure brings us full circle back to Ötzi and his arthritis treatment, huh?)
However, the technology could also power next generation body art, like animated tattoos that make you look like a mutant. Philips imagined what that might look like in this (rather sexual) video from 2008:

Until Then...

Philips Electronic Tattoo

The tattoos of the future inevitably have to work with the technology of today. We're probably a few years away from the Philips fantasy up there, but creative tattooists are figuring out ways around the limitations. Karl Marc, a tattoo artist from Paris, says he created the world's first animated tattoo that makes use of a QR code and a smartphone. The code basically activates software on the phone that makes the tattoo move when seen through the phone's camera. It's legitimately cool.
Then there's the temporary approach. Things get very tricky when you start putting foreign bodies—ink, silicon, or otherwise—into the body. But if you're just putting the electronics on top of the skin, well, that changes the game.
Materials scientist John Rogers is doing some pretty incredible work with flexible electronics that stick to your skin like a temporary tattoo. These so-called "epidural electronics" can do anything from monitoring your body's vital signs to alerting you when you're starting to get a sunburn. Rogers and his company MC10 are currently trying to figure out ways to get the electronics to communicate with other devices like smartphones so that they can start building apps.
Google isn't far behind them. This year, the company's Motorola division patented a device that looks like a neck tattoo. Like Rogers' technology, this device is attached directly to the skin where it picks up vibrations from the vocal cords creating a microphone with virtually no interference. It's hard to tell if they filed the patent because they wanted to win some attention or because they actually want to build and sell the thing. But it's still cool to imagine.
Along those lines, don't expect to be able to walk into your local parlor and ask for a digital tattoo any time too soon. While the technology exists to make some pretty incredible stuff, it's still very specialized and incredibly expensive. It'll take some time for the demand to increase enough so that industry offers up the supply. Because remember: body art is a business. And businesses need incentives to change course.
Images via Shutterstock / Wikipedia / AP / MIT

None Dare Call It Genocidal Fascism

                                                                                             

None Dare Call It Genocidal Fascism

(Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
By Dave Hodges
(INTELLIHUB) — It turns out that Carl Jung was correct, we do have some form of collective consciousness which resides in human beings which is also transmitted from one generation to another. Whether it is confronting a bear or a snake, scientists have found that genetic memories are indeed transmitted along one’s DNA. Subsequently, we come into this life hard-wired to face previously faced dangers.
If the above is so irrefutably true, then why does mankind fail so miserably in dealing with the nature of despotic rule? For example, democide took an estimated 265 million innocent lives in the 20th century by the hand of the victims own government.  Are our psychological and genetic programming failing us this miserably? Literally, our preprogrammed genes should be screaming “Danger Will Robinson”.

America Is a Virulent Fascist State

As I am writing these words, I am keenly aware that the NSA is tracking every keystroke. You should also be cognizant of the fact that as you read these words, the NSA is increasing your threat matrix score which makes it more likely that you are now a prime candidate for an all expenses paid vacation to a re-education camp.
We have significant anxiety as we try and fly because of the “stranger danger” which lurks at the airport with blue-uniformed pot-bellied perverts foaming at the mouth in anticipation of the opportunity to touch the breasts of our wives and to stick their hands down the pants of our young boys.
We see more stories everyday about the martial law preparation of the police along with their DHS provided paramilitary equipment, their SWAT team raids, their killing of an average of 500 innocent American citizens per year. We know that our prisons have been privatized which incentivizes these paramilitary police to arrest people for petty drug offenses which supports an industry supported and controlled by our tax-supported CIA.
Federal entities consistently are seeking to deprive Americans of life and property. FDA SWAT teams raid raw milk producers and confine the owners to lengthy jail stays before releasing them without charges.
The EPA is the hardest working organization within our Federal government. While our President is busy vacationing and playing golf, his minions are busy stealing the properties of innocent, hard-working Americans under some silly notion that a damn fish is more important than the economic welfare of its citizens.
Nancy Pelosi admits to insider-trading, but ordinary Americans go to jail for far less. Dianne Feinstein entered the Senate as a millionaire and now she is worth over a quarter of a billion dollars. Where is the IRS? If you have unexplained income, you are likely to do 20 years in prison.
You now live in a country where our contrived enemies want to attack us over these mythical freedoms. Yet, in land of the free, we incarcerate 2 million people for mostly petty offenses. We guarantee private prison profits and the US has over 25% of the prison population on this planet.
We live in a country which allows its courts to steal the children of anti-Agenda 21 protesters (e.g. Stacy Lynne). We permit unelected bureaucrats to shut the power and water off for citizens who are legally opting out of the installation of cancer-causing smart meters (e.g. Virginia Farver).
The stories are rampant with regard to government harassment of political opponents through misusing the authority of the IRS. In fact, a person would be hard-pressed to identify even one federal agency that exists to truly serve the needs of the people.
Our skies are chemtrailed with elements such as barium and aluminum and we wonder why our cancer and Alzheimer’s rates are skyrocketing. Our water is fluoridated with IQ-lowering jet fuel. Our children, with structurally developing brains, are massively prescribed methamphetamines for the imaginary illness of ADHD. Our food is poisoned by GMO’s and we don’t have the right to opt out of eating GMOs because the government allows Monsanto the right to get away without labeling which foods contain GMOs .
Most concerning is the fact that our military is being turned upside down. Over 260+ senior command officers have been fired by Obama. Why? Because Obama and his handlers plan on purging the public as they have the military and it is obvious that these military leaders will not participate in the coming mass unwarranted arrests and genocidal exterminations of American citizens for holding on to such beliefs as liberty and freedom.
After completing multiple combat tours of duty, our soldiers are drugged, have their guns confiscated and incarcerated at an alarming rate. Our children are committing suicide at an alarming rate.
Our government continues to forge job-killing free trade agreements (e.g. TPP) which ships millions of American jobs out of the country.  As a result, over half of the country is on some type of federal welfare.
Our children are subjected to one curiosity-killing federal education program after another (e.g. Common Core). This has resulted in our students being dead last in the developed world in educational achievement. After decades of these failed programs, our adult population has become dumber than a box of rocks. The globalists have us right where they want us. Fat, dumb and not-so happy.
The biggest insult of all, which has been levied against our Republic, is the fact that the total collapse of our economy and ultimately our government, is being led and orchestrated by an illegal alien.
Did you ever believe that you would live in an America where you could be snatched off of the street without any form of due process and secretly held without the hope of having a trial? Did you ever believe that the government could take all of your property and enslave you without any due process of law? Under the NDAA and Executive Order 13603, ownership of your possessions and your freedom has been transferred to the dictatorial mandates of the state.
Most frighteningly, this country has been subjected to one false flag attack after another and the worst is yet to come. But the biggest attack upon America, and all of humanity, is transhumanism. While the elite try and obtain immortality, they are simultaneously seeking to violently reduce the population by any means possible. We are being radiated by Fukushima in conjunction with massive poisoning of ordinary people as detailed in the abovementioned paragraphs.

Conclusion

Americans are playing in a totally rigged game. Anyone who dares question the emerging fascist status quo is labeled and marginalized as a “conspiracy theorist”, as if two bad people would never conspire to do anything wrong.
America needs to engage in its own conspiracy. However, before we can hope to be successful in any resistance movement, we must first and foremost increase our numbers. All fully-aware citizens must become disciples of the truth and you must become obsessed with spreading the word as to what is happening to the United States and our citizens.
I have been studying the tactics of past reformers and trying to judge which tactics might prove most useful in terms of resisting the tyranny which has overrun our country. I would invite your comments to this regard as this will be the topic of part two of this series.
Time is very short, we are literally being poisoned to death and we need to collectively act before it is too late. And I realize that it may already be too late. If this is the case, then at least we have the satisfaction that we died on our feet while resisting tyranny instead of being an accomplice in our own demise.
Just a quick reminder to everyone that The Common Sense Show is going to be debuting on Revolution Radio (www.freedomslips.com) on February 9, 2014 from 5pm to 8pm (EST). There will be a listen live button at The Common Sense Show’s website.

U.S. Cattle Herd Is At A 61 Year Low And Organic Food Shortages Are Being Reported All Over America

Drought 2014If the extreme drought in the western half of the country keeps going, the food supply problems that we are experiencing right now are only going to be the tip of the iceberg.  As you will see below, the size of the U.S. cattle herd has dropped to a 61 year low, and organic food shortages are being reported all over the nation.  Surprisingly cold weather and increasing demand for organic food have both been a factor, but the biggest threat to the U.S. food supply is the extraordinary drought which has had a relentless grip on the western half of the country.  If you check out the U.S. Drought Monitor, you can see that drought conditions currently stretch from California all the way to the heart of Texas.  In fact, the worst drought in the history of the state of California is happening right now.  And considering the fact that the rest of the nation is extremely dependent on produce grown in California and cattle raised in the western half of the U.S., this should be of great concern to all of us.
A local Fox News report that was featured on the Drudge Report entitled "Organic food shortage hits US" has gotten quite a bit of attention. The following is an excerpt from that article...
Since Christmas, cucumbers supplies from Florida have almost ground to a halt and the Mexican supply is coming but it's just not ready yet.
And as the basic theory of economics goes, less supply drives up prices.
Take organic berries for example:
There was a strawberry shortage a couple weeks back and prices spiked.
Experts say the primary reasons for the shortages are weather and demand.
And without a doubt, demand for organic food has grown sharply in recent years.  More Americans than ever have become aware of how the modern American diet is slowly killing all of us, and they are seeking out alternatives.
Due to the tightness in supply and the increasing demand, prices for organic produce just continue to go up.  Just consider the following example...
A quick check on the organic tree fruit market shows that the average price per carton for organic apples was $38 per carton in mid-January this year, up from an average of just $31 per carton last year at the same time. At least for apple marketers, the organic market is heating up.
Personally, I went to a local supermarket the other day and I started to reach for a package of organic strawberries but I stopped when I saw that they were priced at $6.99.  I couldn't justify paying 7 bucks for one package.  I still remember getting them on sale for $2.99 last year.
Unfortunately, this may only be just the beginning of the price increases.  California Governor Jerry Brown has just declared a water emergency, and reservoirs throughout the state have dropped to dangerously low levels.
Unless a miracle happens, there is simply not going to be enough water to go around for the entire agriculture industry.  The following is an excerpt from an email from an industry insider that researcher Ray Gano recently shared on his website...
Harris farms has released a statement saying they will leave about 40,000 acres fallow this year because the FEDS have decided to only deliver 10% of the water allocation for 2014. Lettuce is predicted to reach around $5.00 a head (if you can find it). Understand the farmers in the Salinas valley are considering the same action. So much for salad this summer unless you grow it yourself.
The reason why the agriculture industry in California is so important is because it literally feeds the rest of the nation.  I shared the following statistics yesterday, but they are so critical that they bear repeating.  As you can see, without the fruits and vegetables that California grows, we would be in for a world of hurt...
The state produces 99 percent of the artichokes grown in the US, 44 percent of asparagus, a fifth of cabbage, two-thirds of carrots, half of bell peppers, 89 percent of cauliflower, 94 percent of broccoli, and 95 percent of celery. Leafy greens? California’s got the market cornered: 90 percent of the leaf lettuce we consume, along with and 83 percent of Romaine lettuce and 83 percent of fresh spinach, come from the big state on the left side of the map. Cali also cranks a third of total fresh tomatoes consumed in the U.S.—and 95 percent of ones destined for cans and other processing purposes.
As for fruit, I get that 86 percent of lemons and a quarter of oranges come from there; its sunny climate makes it perfect for citrus, and lemons store relatively well. Ninety percent of avocados? Fine. But 84 percent of peaches, 88 percent of fresh strawberries, and 97 percent of fresh plums?
Come on. Surely the other 49 states can do better.
Are you starting to understand how much trouble we could be in if this drought does not end?
About now I can hear some people out there saying that they will just eat meat because they don't like vegetables anyway.
Well, unfortunately we are rapidly approaching a beef shortage as well.
On January 1st, the U.S. cattle herd hit a 61-year low of 89.3 million head of cattle.
The biggest reason for this is the 5 year drought that has absolutely crippled the cattle industry out west...
Back in the late fall 2013 there was a freak snowstorm that killed close to 300,000+ cattle. This is a major hit to the cattle market.
I know in Texas where they still have a 5 year drought they are dealing with, they are having to ship grass bails in from Colorado, Utah and other parts of the country just to feed the cattle. Ranchers are sending their female cattle to the slaughter houses becasue they can not afford to feed them anymore. It is the females that help re-stock the herd. SO if you are slaughtering your females, your herd does not grow. It is expected that the US will not see cattle herd growth returning until 2017, maybe even later.
This is a problem which is not going away any time soon.
According to the Washington Post, the U.S. cattle herd has gotten smaller for six years in a row, and the amount of beef produced is expected to drop to a 20 year low in 2014...
The U.S. cattle herd contracted for six straight years to the smallest since 1952, government data show. A record drought in 2011 destroyed pastures in Texas, the top producing state, followed the next year by a surge in feed-grain prices during the worst Midwest dry spell since the 1930s. Fewer cattle will mean production in the $85 billion beef industry drops to a 20- year low in 2014, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said.
It would be hard to overstate how devastating this ongoing drought has been for many ranchers out west.  For example, one 64-year-old rancher who lives in Texas says that his herd is 90 percent smaller than it was back in 2005 because of the drought...
Texas rancher Looney, who is 64 and has been in the cattle business his whole life, said his herd is still about 90 percent below its size from 2005 because of the prolonged dry weather. It will take years for the pastures to come back, even if there is normal rainfall, he said. About 44 percent of Texas was in still in drought in the week ended Jan. 7, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor.
And it isn't just the U.S. that is dealing with this kind of drought.  The largest freshwater lake in China that was once about twice the size of London, England has almost entirely dried up because of the ongoing drought over there.
Meanwhile, global demand for food just continues to rise.
If this drought ends and the western half of the nation starts getting lots of rain, this could just be a temporary crisis.
However, the truth is that scientific research has shown that the 20th century was the wettest century in the western half of the country in 1000 years, and that we should expect things to return to "normal" at some point.
So is that happening now?
Over the past couple of years, I have warned that Dust Bowl conditions are starting to return to the western half of the United States.  Just see this article, this article and this article.
Now the state of California is experiencing the worst drought that it has ever gone through and "apocalyptic" dust storms are being reported in Colorado and Nevada.
Just because things seem like they have always been a certain way does not mean that they will always stay that way.
Things out west are rapidly changing, and in the end it is going to affect the lives of every man, woman and child in the United States.

Obama Birth Certificate: Confirmed Forgery According To Top Experts

Michael Thomas
by
December 15th, 2013
Updated 12/17/2013
No attempt to even hide the forgery by those who fabricated the fraudulent document
The birth certificate in question is actually a purported copy of Barack Obama’s original birth certificate which is currently held by Hawaii’s Department of Health. This copy was posted in April of 2011 on the official whitehouse.gov website where it still appears today. The following document is an exact copy of what appears on the website.
barack-obama-birth-certificate
Just in case the facts contained in the subtitle are not entirely clear, the allegations concerning the fraudulent and forged birth certificate have been re-stated by competent experts as follows. The first excerpt is from an article that was recently published on a major alternative news platform.
He said Douglas Vogt, an author and the owner and operator of a scanning business who also has an accounting background, invested over two years in an investigation of the authenticity of document.
Vogt, along with veteran typesetter Paul Ivey, conducted “exhaustive research of the document provided to the White House Press Corps on April 27, 2011 – not the online PDF, a critical distinction that must be understood,” Hagmann said.
“Using their combined experience of 80 years in this realm, they conducted extensive examinations of the ‘copy’ that was used as the basis for the PDF document. They acquired the same type of equipment that was used back in the late 1950s and early 1960s in an attempt to recreate the document presented as an ‘authenticated copy’ proving the legitimacy of Barack Obama. Instead, they found 20 points of forgery on that document and detail each point of forgery in the affidavit,” wrote Hagmann.
“Even more interesting, Mr. Vogt claims to have identified the ‘signature’ of the perpetrator, or the woman who created the forged document, hidden within the document itself. Her identity, in addition to the identity of other conspirators and their precise methods are contained in a sealed document supplementing the public affidavit.”[1]
What follows is a second excerpt from the same article quoting a second graphics expert which is equally as compelling.
More recently, Grace Vuoto of the World Tribune reported that among the experts challenging the birth certificate is certified document analyst Reed Hayes, who has served as an expert for Perkins Coie, the law firm that has been defending Obama in eligibility cases.
“We have obtained an affidavit from a certified document analyzer, Reed Hayes, that states the document is a 100 percent forgery, no doubt about it,” Zullo told the World Tribune.
“Mr. Obama’s operatives cannot discredit [Hayes],” the investigator told the news outlet. “Mr. Hayes has been used as the firm’s reliable expert. The very firm the president is using to defend him on the birth certificate case has used Mr. Hayes in their cases.”
The Tribune reported Hayes agreed to take a look at the documentation and called almost immediately.
“There is something wrong with this,” Hayes said.
Hayes produced a 40-page report in which he says “based on my observations and findings, it is clear that the Certificate of Live Birth I examined is not a scan of an original paper birth certificate, but a digitally manufactured document created by utilizing material from various sources.”
“In over 20 years of examining documentation of various types, I have never seen a document that is so seriously questionable in so many respects. In my opinion, the birth certificate is entirely fabricated,” he says in the report.[1]
These extremely serious and substantive developments in the Cold Case Posse investigation will have extraordinary repercussions for the Obama Administration.  The governmental, political and legal ramifications are so far-reaching that Watergate will pale in comparison.
The relevant filed affidavits give every indication that this nation is about to enter an unprecedented constitutional crisis. Because there are two presidential terms involved, numerous executive orders issued and various treaties signed by this president, a nullified term(s) as president presents various legal and constitutional issues never confronted by the US Federal Government.
Screen Shot 2013-12-15 at 9.43.56 AM
Top investigators make serious allegations about what has been officially labeled a forged, fraudulent birth certificate.
Mike Zullo is the lead investigator in the Cold Case Posse investigation initiated by Phoenix Sheriff Joe Arpaio.  Because of recent developments with the case indicating the likelihood of criminal charges, “sheriff’s investigators now are assisting the Cold Case volunteers”.  Zullo has recently issued the following statements:
“When this information is finally exposed to the public, it will be universe-shattering,” Mike Zullo told WND. “This is beyond the pale of anything you can imagine.”
Zullo explained that because it’s an active investigation that could produce criminal charges, he’s unable to reveal details at the moment.
But the allegations, he said, which go far beyond a fraudulent birth certificate, could be public as early as March.[1]
Zullo goes on the record with the following explosive assertions:
Zullo has testified that the White House computer image of Obama’s birth certificate contains anomalies that are unexplainable unless the document had been fabricated piecemeal by human intervention, rather than being copied from a genuine paper document.
“Mr. Obama has, in fact, not offered any verifiable authoritative document of any legal significance or possessing any evidentiary value as to the origins of his purported birth narrative or location of the birth event,” he explained. “One of our most serious concerns is that the White House document appears to have been fabricated piecemeal on a computer, constructed by drawing together digitized data from several unknown sources.”
Zullo also has noted that the governor of Hawaii was unable to produce an original birth document for Obama, and it should have been easy to find.[1]
The entire Executive Branch will surely receive a tremendous amount of criticism for the part they played in this conspiracy to deceive the American people. Of course, the hundreds of individuals involved in the vetting process of this president will likewise take on their fair share of culpability in what has to be the “political crime of the millennium”. That would include a significant number of those in leadership throughout the Democratic Party to include both Bill and Hillary Clinton.
It is quite difficult to see how the Democratic Party will emerge from their direct involvement with covering up such a serious forgery.  Years of outright collusion in this highly convoluted and complex crime will certainly call into question the integrity of the entire DNC leadership. The many staff attorneys who participated in the vetting process and, therefore, in the coverup will also be subjected to intense legal and ethics scrutiny.
Screen Shot 2013-12-15 at 9.45.48 AM
Why has the leadership of both major political parties failed to proceed with the appropriate congressional investigations in light of so much compelling and irrefutable evidence of numerous crimes having been committed in the filing of the forged birth certificate?
Especially criminal activity so serious and premeditated as filing a completely fake birth certificate which was used as proof of meeting the constitutional requirements of federal election law, as well as the additional statutory requirements of the fifty states.
24 Attorneys General Investigating Obama’s Birth Certificate
When faced with substantial allegations of a felony being committed, law enforcement authorities are obligated to see the investigation through to it end.  They are required by law to determine the merits of the case and then make a criminal referral to the appropriate State Attorney.   Apparently that process is exactly what is being played out throughout the nation regarding Obama’s forged birth certificate.
At least half of the State’s Attorneys across the country have been looking very closely at the Obama birth certificate forgery case for many years now.  Each of them knows that their failure to pursue the legal merits, given the conclusive results of an official investigation, exposes them to charges of official misconduct.  Misprision of felony is just one of the many offenses that each of the involved state officials can be charged with.
Phoenix Sheriff Refers Criminal Investigation Of Obama’s Birth Certificate To State Attorneys
Conclusion:
It is inconceivable that the mainstream media (MSM) has not only avoided this story for over five years; it has gone to extremes to cover up the many “high crimes” involved.  Likewise, never in US history has the entire political establishment been AWOL concerning a matter of such national significance and legal import.  By neglecting to properly investigate these crimes, the nation is now faced with the prospect of a full blown constitutional crisis of epic proportions.
YES … it is that serious and much more!
“Totally unparalleled and unprecedented, with nary a whit of historical precedent” is the way that one commentator described the unfolding constitutional crisis.
Michael Thomas
December 15, 2013
Author’s Note:
The Israel Science and Technology website performed exhaustive analyses and technical assessments on the posted copy of the Long-Form Birth Certificate. Here are the final and categorical conclusions which they published on their web page entitled:
Long-Form Birth Certificate of Obama is a Forged Document
“The analyses presented below reveal without a doubt that the Long-Form Birth Certificate of Mr. Obama is a fabricated, fake and forged document.
The publication of such a blatantly fake document about something so basic as the birthplace of Mr. Obama, should raise great concern about the suitability of the person who is holding the reins on the most powerful country of the World.
Moreover, the lack of action on the part of the members of the United States House of Representatives and Senate, as well as the courts of the United States, despite many previous appeals to these three branches of American government, also raise a concern about how the governmental institutions of the reputedly best, and certainly the most important democracy in the Free World have avoided this issue.”
Endnotes:
[1]‘Universe-shattering’ twist in Obama birth probe by Bob Unruh
References:
Long-Form Birth Certificate of Obama is a Forged Document
President Barack Obama Posted A Fraudulent Birth Certificate On The White House Blog 
Forensic findings on Obama’s birth certificate: ‘A 100 percent forgery, no doubt about it’
Articles: New Obama Birth Certificate Forgery Proof in the Layers
Mike Zullo on The 100% Forged Obama Birth Certificate
Arpaio: Obama birth record definitely forged
Why Sheriff Joe Arpaio insists Obama birth certificate a fake
Ariz. sheriff says Obama birth certificate is fake

Three Strikes Law Does Nothing to Curb Piracy, Research Finds

Several countries including the US and France have implemented so-called “strikes” systems to warn and punish P2P file-sharers. The goal of these programs is to reduce piracy, but do they have any effect on people’s downloading habits? New findings published by U.S. and French researchers show that these anti-piracy measures don’t stop or even reduce piracy.
pirate-runningIn recent years many initiatives to curb online piracy have emerged and in several countries so-called “graduated response” schemes have been implemented.
In France, New Zealand, Taiwan and South Korea strikes schemes are baked into law, a similar policy is in place in Ireland, and last year the United States rolled out its voluntary “alert” system commonly known as six-strikes.
The goal of these policies is to track down copyright infringers and warn them that their behavior is not acceptable. After repeat warnings, these accused file-sharers then face a penalty ranging from a fine to prolonged Internet disconnection.
But are these programs the anti-piracy silver bullet copyright holders believe them to be? A new paper published by researchers from the U.S. and France suggests they’re not.
Based on a large survey among 2,000 French Internet users, the study finds that the local three strikes law didn’t stop or even reduce piracy.
“Consistent with theoretical predictions, our econometric results indicate that the Hadopi law has not deterred individuals from engaging in digital piracy and that it did not reduce the intensity of illegal activity of those who did engage in piracy,” the researchers write in their paper.
“While several factors affect the perceived probability of detection under the law, our results show that the propensity to engage in illegal file-sharing is independent of these beliefs,” they add.
In other words, threatening to punish people for online piracy does nothing to reduce copyright infringement. A result that’s independent of people’s perceived chance of getting caught.
One weakness of the “strikes” systems is that they only cover P2P file-sharing, and not any of the alternative ways people use to download pirated material. This leaves the option open for Internet users to switch to these unmonitored services, but the researchers don’t find any evidence that this is happening across the board.
The results do suggest that those who have more pirates in their social networks switch to alternatives, such as direct download sites and newsgroups.
“There is evidence that the law encourages Internet users who better understand the law and alternative piracy channels (those with many digital pirates in their social network) to substitute away from the monitored P2P channel and to obtain content through unmonitored illegal channels,” the researchers write.
Overall the searchers conclude that the three-strikes law failed to curb piracy, suggesting that similar initiatives such as the U.S. six-strikes scheme are not very effective either.
Previously the French government sanctioned a panel to investigate the effectiveness of their three strikes law. This panel concluded that the law had failed to benefit authorized services as promised. It also recommended that the ultimate sanction of Internet disconnections for infringers should be dumped, which happened soon after.
While disconnections are now off the table, the graduated response scheme lives on in France for now. But according to this new research, it is unlikely to achieve much in the fight against piracy.
Update: We initially linked to the wrong paper, the article was updated with the right link.