Raleigh’s proposed downtown amphitheatre

My wonderfully pleasant experience at Cary’s Booth Amphitheatre this weekend got me wondering if Raleigh’s proposed downtown amphitheatre could be as good.

Probably not. It turns out that Raleigh is negotiating with Live Nation to run the facility. Live Nation is the company responsible for trashing Walnut Creek. Thus, we can reasonably expect the smaller downtown amphitheatre to be trashy but on a smaller scale.

Perhaps part of Booth Amphitheatre’s charm is that it’s preferred promoter is not Live Nation but Outback Concerts. Since Raleigh and Live Nation can’t seem to hammer out any kind of deal after a year of negotiations perhaps the city would be wise to give Outback a look.

Pinwale: The NSA’s email collection system

The New York Times has details about the NSA’s new email collection system named Pinwale which has been used to collect not only foreign email conversations but domestic ones, too.

As a former cryptographer, this seriously disturbs me. As I said before, it used to be that the folks at the NSA took their responsibility to protect Americans and their privacy seriously. It’s a shame that that’s apparently changed.