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The Daily Dose/June 23, 2011
By Gaylon Kent
The Writer's Shack
GAYLON DOT GAYLON: Without getting too technical, the people who run the Internet decided to allow unlimited domain suffixes. This would allow individuals, companies, you name it, to come up with their own versions of .com or .net, further meaning next year you could be reading this at dailydose.writersshack.
Or Not: In order to keep the riff-raff - like us - from snapping up .pepsi or .congress, it's not going to be cheap to do this. It will cost $185,000 to apply for your own suffix, and $25,000 a year to keep it. Applications will be accepted beginning next January and you could see the first wave of new suffixes by late 2012.
Get Your Official Writer's Shack Policy Right Here: Being unabashed fans of the free market here at the Writer's Shack we're onboard with this, though we are wondering who gets the rights to .apple, Steve Jobs or some growers in Washington state.
Dot Dry, Technical Matter: This development can be either comforting or problematic, depending on your world view. The $185,000 price tag could, to some, seem like another attempt by The Man to give Modern American Marketing another vehicle to dominate our lives while blocking out the Little Guy.
OTOH: You do need some oversight. There would be a lot of confusion without a governing body, kind of like playing a baseball game without umpires. No aspect of the Human Experience is perfect, so we're happy enough to let ICANN, a non-profit company contracted by the US government to run the Internet, sort all this out.
The US Government Ran The Internet? Uh, yeah. Before ICANN the government was in charge of Internet domain names.
The Bottom Line: The Internet is no different than any other aspect of the Human Experience. It's survival of the fittest and, besides, there is no guarantee this will prove to be a success, as pointed out by the general failure of the .biz and .info suffixes to gain general popularity.
Start Saving Your Pennies: The push is on to raise the $185,000 needed to secure .thebottomten. Stay tuned for opportunities to contribute!
DULY NOTED: Like he did last year in the first round at Wimbledon, American Joseph Isner defeated Frenchman Nicholas Mahut Tuesday. Far from the historic, eleven hour, three day slugfest of last year, Isner dispatched Mahut in fairly short order, needing just over two hours to win 7-6, 6-2, 7-6.
We Now Return You To Your Regularly Scheduled Tournament: Nobody really expected anything other than a routine match because it's hard to make history year after year. Or so we've heard. We don't have a whole lot of experience making history here at the Writer's Shack.
In All Candor: Frankly, we were pleased merely to have the opportunity to write about last year's 70-68 fifth set again.
THE BROWN FOX JUMPED OVER…: Christopher Latham Sholes of Milwaukee receives a patent for the first practical typewriter on this date in 1883. Though influenced by past attempts to produce a typewriter, Sholes' invention grew from his attempt to produce a machine that could put numbers on pieces of paper, like books and tickets.
QWERTY: Sholes invented the QWERTY keyboard in 1873, but until then his typewriter had two rows, with 3,5,7,9 and the letters N-Z on the top row, with 2,4,6,8, a period, and the letters A-M on the bottom row.
Goose Eggs: In what may well be the greatest relief pitching performance in major league history, Ernie Shore of the Boston Red Sox retires 26 consecutive batters on this date in 1917.
Shore came on in relief of Babe Ruth in the first inning because Ruth had gotten snitty after walking the Washington Senators first batter, Ray Morgan, and was ejected by plate umpire Brick Owens. Shore came in and after Morgan was caught stealing, retired everyone he faced, and the Red Sox won 4-0.
Dry, Technical Matter: For years Shore had been credited with a perfect game, then major league baseball, appropriately, redefined what constituted a perfect game, and Shore found himself not credited with a perfect game anymore.
Get Your Official Writer's Shack Policy Right Here: As he should've been. It wasn't a perfect game because a runner reached base and in a perfect game nobody reaches base.
Do You Still Wonder Why You Don't Get Invited To More (Any) Parties: Still though, we're not completely on board with the new official definition, which limits perfect games to efforts of at least nine innings.
Numbers Racket: Four times in major league history a pitcher has thrown a perfect game of less than nine innings. Now, three of these do not merit inclusion on the main list because they were shortened either because of rain or darkness and these efforts deserve to be mentioned seperately.
Fly In The Ointment: However on August 11, 1907 Ed Karger of the St. Louis Cardinals pitched seven perfect innings against the Boston Doves in the second game of a doubleheader. The game went seven innings because it was customary back then to shorten the second game of doubleheaders to seven innings because games generally started in the mid-afternoon and nobocy had lights back then.
Old Habits Die Hard: Even today, both games of doubleheaders in the minors are still seven innings and minor league record books credit seven inning perfect games. In fact, our Pacific Coast League record book shows nine perfect games, five of which went seven innings one which went five.
This Isn't Going To Lead To More Goddamn Writer's Shack Policy Is It? Not yet, but we see no reason why Karger shouldn't be included on the list of pitchers credited with official, major league perfect games. The custom of the day dictated his game was not scheduled to go nine innings, and there is no reason to penalize him for this. Sure, put an asterisk by it, explaining why the game only went seven innings. That would be appropriate, but there is no reason not include Karger on the list of major league perfect game pitchers.
Great Moments In Veto Overriding: President Harry Truman's veto of The Taft-Hartley Act is overridden by the US Congress on this date in 1947. The act, which gives the president assorted powers to intervene in labor disputes, had been opposed by Truman who said it would:
…conflict with important principles of our democratic society.
LOL: What's kind of funny though is Truman's objections to the bill didn't stop him from implementing it from time to time during the rest of his presidency.
Thought For The Day: One who cannot cast away a treasure at need is in fetters. - J.R.R. Tolkein, The Lord of the Rings
Answer To The Last Trivia Question: Jim 'Catfish' Hunter is the only pitcher to have more than two RBI's in a perfect game. Hunter had three in his 1968 perfect game.
Today's Stumper: When did Babe Ruth last pitch in the major leagues? - Answer next time!
Comments? Recipes? Complaints? Email the Writer's Shack here!
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