{"id":8861,"date":"2013-12-20T11:14:24","date_gmt":"2013-12-20T19:14:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/?p=8861"},"modified":"2013-12-20T12:10:03","modified_gmt":"2013-12-20T20:10:03","slug":"the-names-may-change-but","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/?p=8861","title":{"rendered":"The Names May Change, But&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-5009\" alt=\"userpic=observations\" src=\"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/userpicobservations.jpg\" width=\"100\" height=\"72\" align=\"right\" hspace=\"5\" vspace=\"5\" \/>Today&#8217;s collection of lunchtime news chum brings together a collection of articles dealing with what you call things, and how that colors our perceptions of them:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Work Tools<\/strong>. The IRS allows business tax deductions for work tools. Normally, this isn&#8217;t a problem. However, in Nevada&#8230; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.lasvegassun.com\/news\/2013\/dec\/17\/coburn-government-subsidizing-breast-implants-pros\/\">Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) argues that Nevada&#8217;s prostitution industry is effectively being subsidized by the federal government through business tax deductions<\/a>. Specifically, his report notes that \u201cBrothels can take deductions for groceries, \u2018salaries and wages of prostitutes, rent, utilities and taxes and licenses. Breast implants and&#8230;costumes\u2019 have also been ruled allowable deductions by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).\u201d In other news, <a href=\"http:\/\/worldnews.nbcnews.com\/_news\/2013\/12\/20\/21984331-canada-high-court-strikes-down-all-restrictions-on-prostitution\">Canada has struck down all restrictions on prostitution<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>What Is a Blog?<\/strong> I&#8217;ve been blogging (or journaling, as LiveJournal called it) since 2004. As always, late to a trend. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.niemanlab.org\/2013\/12\/the-blog-is-dead\/\">According to Jason Kottke, the blog is dead<\/a>, but then again, <a href=\"http:\/\/kottke.org\/13\/12\/rip-the-blog-1997-2013\">it may not be<\/a>. Essentially, the &#8220;TL;DR&#8221; generation has moved on to shorter-attention-span venues: Facebook, Tumblr, Snapchat, Instagram, Reddit. Kottke doesn&#8217;t peg it in those words, but that&#8217;s where things have moved. Folks like me &#8212; who like to write and are not terse &#8212; are left behind as old-fashioned. Further, the article notes that in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/technology\/archive\/2013\/12\/2013-the-year-the-stream-crested\/282202\/\">a piece at The Atlantic<\/a>, Alexis Madrigal says that the reverse-chronological stream (a.k.a. The Stream, a.k.a. <a href=\"http:\/\/buzzmachine.com\/2006\/08\/22\/the-river-of-news\/\">The River of News<\/a>) is on its way out. Perhaps this is why Google killed Reader, but I know many who still like that form. The news stream is how I read Facebook; I also depend heavily on Newsblur.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The Take Away<\/strong>. You get to-go food. It comes in a styrofoam container, right? Wrong. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/wonkblog\/wp\/2013\/12\/18\/you-have-never-actually-used-a-styrofoam-cup-plate-or-takeout-box\/\">It turns out that Styrofoam\u2122 is like Kleenex<\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/wonkblog\/wp\/2013\/12\/18\/you-have-never-actually-used-a-styrofoam-cup-plate-or-takeout-box\/\">\u2122<\/a> &#8212; a specific product from a specific vendor typically used for specific purposes. You&#8217;re actually getting generic polystyrene. So be careful out there, or the trademark police will come after you.<\/li>\n<li><strong>I Was Born in 213.<\/strong> In fact, where I live was once in the 213. Now I&#8217;m in 818, although I could be in 747 (although I&#8217;ve never seen it in the wild). In fact, over the years 213 has gotten narrower and narrower (323, 310, 424, 626, and many more). <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sfgate.com\/news\/article\/End-of-line-for-415-2nd-area-code-coming-for-5079322.php\">I mention this because 415 is suffering the same fate: it is getting a 628 overlay<\/a>. Soon, you won&#8217;t be able to use area 415 to stigmatize or characterize people anymore. I will note that overlays seem to be occurring less frequently than they used to &#8212; even with the growth of devices, numbers don&#8217;t seem to be gobbled as fast.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today&#8217;s collection of lunchtime news chum brings together a collection of articles dealing with what you call things, and how that colors our perceptions of them: Work Tools. The IRS allows business tax deductions for work tools. Normally, this isn&#8217;t a problem. However, in Nevada&#8230; Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) argues that Nevada&#8217;s prostitution industry is <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/?p=8861\">Read More &#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-chum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8861"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8861\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8865,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8861\/revisions\/8865"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cahighways.org\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}