Aug 12: Olympic Crash
This is amusing:
Full article:
CTRL+ALT+DEL: software malfunction at the opening ceremony (via Slashdot)
The first line of the article is priceless:
Turns out that Bill Gates was not the only famous Microsoft identity to be spotted at the Olympic opening ceremony.
This is amusing:
Full article:
CTRL+ALT+DEL: software malfunction at the opening ceremony (via Slashdot)
The first line of the article is priceless:
Full article:
CTRL+ALT+DEL: software malfunction at the opening ceremony (via Slashdot)
The first line of the article is priceless:
Turns out that Bill Gates was not the only famous Microsoft identity to be spotted at the Olympic opening ceremony.
Jul 30: Good BoingBoing day
I noticed three interesting items on BoingBoing that I thought I'd point out.
- Orwell's Diaries in Blog Form
Quote from the actual blog:
From 9th August 2008, you will be able to gather your own impression of Orwell’s face from reading his most strongly individual piece of writing: his diaries. The Orwell Prize is delighted to announce that, to mark the 70th anniversary of the diaries, each diary entry will be published on this blog exactly seventy years after it was written, allowing you to follow Orwell’s recuperation in Morocco, his return to the UK, and his opinions on the descent of Europe into war in real time. The diaries end in 1942, three years into the conflict.
- Mom, Dad, I'm into Steampunk: an imaginary monologue
Now, I'm not into steampunk (BoingBoing obviously is), but I read this anyway. The imaginary monologue is here at McSweeney's. My favorite part is quoted here:
This looks like a late-18th-century organette, correct? Look again. It hides the Dell laptop you got me when I went to college. This bronze hand crank turns it on, and I've hidden a miniature photo printer where the tune sheet is supposed to go. I even installed Linux.
- Gawker reports on "monster" washed ashore
What the?
Ok, it's probably a fake...but if not, yikes!
I noticed three interesting items on BoingBoing that I thought I'd point out.
- Orwell's Diaries in Blog Form
Quote from the actual blog:
From 9th August 2008, you will be able to gather your own impression of Orwell’s face from reading his most strongly individual piece of writing: his diaries. The Orwell Prize is delighted to announce that, to mark the 70th anniversary of the diaries, each diary entry will be published on this blog exactly seventy years after it was written, allowing you to follow Orwell’s recuperation in Morocco, his return to the UK, and his opinions on the descent of Europe into war in real time. The diaries end in 1942, three years into the conflict.
- Mom, Dad, I'm into Steampunk: an imaginary monologue
Now, I'm not into steampunk (BoingBoing obviously is), but I read this anyway. The imaginary monologue is here at McSweeney's. My favorite part is quoted here:
This looks like a late-18th-century organette, correct? Look again. It hides the Dell laptop you got me when I went to college. This bronze hand crank turns it on, and I've hidden a miniature photo printer where the tune sheet is supposed to go. I even installed Linux.
- Gawker reports on "monster" washed ashore
What the?
Ok, it's probably a fake...but if not, yikes!
Jul 10: Is nothing sacred?
Jul 9: Who Killed the Electric Car?
Has anyone seen the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?"? We watched it last night, and I'm still all fired up.
It deals mainly with the GM EV-1, and all-electric car that came about because of the zero-emissions mandate enacted by California in the early 90's. It shows how they were fast (really fast!) and quiet, but doesn't shy away from their downsides, mainly their limited range (60 miles per charge at first, but 120 in the later models--newer lithium-ion batteries in an EV-1 could easily do 300).
They were much loved by the people leasing them, but then when the leases were up, GM wouldn't re-up the leases, collected all the cars and destroyed them. No official explanation was given, but several auto industry representatives said that no one wanted a car that could only go 120 miles per charge and required charging overnight (but could get an 85% charge in an hour). This was in spite of a huge waiting list due to the fact that they insisted on hand assembling the cars, which artificially drove up the price and increased production time.
Personally, I would LOVE a car that I could plug in overnight that would take me to work & back each day with some charge left over for some errands. To think that such a thing existed, was actually on the roads and was killed really turns my stomach, especially in light of the mess we're in right now with gas prices. Since they were taken off the roads, we could've had 6 more years of development and improvement on these cars, but instead we're wasting money and time on pie-in-the-sky ideas like hydrogen cars and half measures like hybrids, with a bright light being plug-in hybrids that should be here 'soon.'
I can only imagine how well these would sell these days. If only GM had stuck with it, they'd be raking in the money instead of losing billions on big gas-guzzling SUVs.
I highly recommend this movie. I can't recommend it enough.
This guy, however, disagrees. While there is some truth to some of the points he makes (specifically the list in #1), mostly he's having fun calling conjecture 'fact.' You can have your own fun by comparing his argument tactics to Wikipedia's list of logical fallacies. While you're at it, you may as well figure out which one I'm using in this paragraph 
On a side note, the movie also touches on how, in the mid 20th century, GM bought out a bunch of streetcar companies, dismantled the electric streetcars and replaced them with GM buses. More info here.
Has anyone seen the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?"? We watched it last night, and I'm still all fired up. It deals mainly with the GM EV-1, and all-electric car that came about because of the zero-emissions mandate enacted by California in the early 90's. It shows how they were fast (really fast!) and quiet, but doesn't shy away from their downsides, mainly their limited range (60 miles per charge at first, but 120 in the later models--newer lithium-ion batteries in an EV-1 could easily do 300).
They were much loved by the people leasing them, but then when the leases were up, GM wouldn't re-up the leases, collected all the cars and destroyed them. No official explanation was given, but several auto industry representatives said that no one wanted a car that could only go 120 miles per charge and required charging overnight (but could get an 85% charge in an hour). This was in spite of a huge waiting list due to the fact that they insisted on hand assembling the cars, which artificially drove up the price and increased production time.
Personally, I would LOVE a car that I could plug in overnight that would take me to work & back each day with some charge left over for some errands. To think that such a thing existed, was actually on the roads and was killed really turns my stomach, especially in light of the mess we're in right now with gas prices. Since they were taken off the roads, we could've had 6 more years of development and improvement on these cars, but instead we're wasting money and time on pie-in-the-sky ideas like hydrogen cars and half measures like hybrids, with a bright light being plug-in hybrids that should be here 'soon.'
I can only imagine how well these would sell these days. If only GM had stuck with it, they'd be raking in the money instead of losing billions on big gas-guzzling SUVs.
I highly recommend this movie. I can't recommend it enough.
This guy, however, disagrees. While there is some truth to some of the points he makes (specifically the list in #1), mostly he's having fun calling conjecture 'fact.' You can have your own fun by comparing his argument tactics to Wikipedia's list of logical fallacies. While you're at it, you may as well figure out which one I'm using in this paragraph
On a side note, the movie also touches on how, in the mid 20th century, GM bought out a bunch of streetcar companies, dismantled the electric streetcars and replaced them with GM buses. More info here.
Jun 23: Tweeting for Votes -- UPDATED
I posted recently about the presidential candidates' usage of new tech, including twitter.
I'm still following both McCain & Obama (Clinton, too, but that's just because I haven't removed her yet). The stats in that previous post have continued along the same trajectories. McCain continues to tweet 2.5 times for each Obama tweet (M:343 , O:138; Obama still has about 29 times as many followers (M: 1,482, O:42,557).
I still can't decide who is using twitter to it's fullest potential. Obviously, Obama's tweets are spreading much faster than McCain's due to his overwhelming follower count, but McCain is using it more. Also, McCain will often reply to a direct message, showing that someone is actually reading the feed of people he's following. I haven't seen any replies from Obama, which indicates that he's using it more as a soapbox and less as an interactive communications medium. So, McCain probably wins on actually embracing twitter, while Obama is probably getting the most benefit from it.
While analyzing the statistics like this is interesting, it's obviously only a side note. What's far more important is the message that each candidate is putting out. To that end, here are a few recent tweets that I think are illustrative of each canidate's use of twitter. These are all pulled from the tweets currently showing on their twitter page, which shows the most recent twenty or so tweets. In case you think that my selections are biased, I invite you to visit either candiate's twitter page and see for yourself. I've linked them to their names in the second paragraph above. I'm certain that whenever you do this, even months from now, you'll see a similar tenor on each feed.
McCain:
New book "fleeced" by Dick Morris http://twurl.nl/iiayyc What would Obama do to country as President?
Obama with more endorsments: http://twurl.nl/vlexa4 from North Korean and Libyan Dictators, next Zimbabwe?
What do you think, has the surge worked? http://tinyurl.com/5vss6a
@MrBabyMan sorry I don't. Do you happen to know any dem leaders willing to help us lower oil prices by allowing drilling? Just looking
@MargaretSchaut Naw, that's not the case, ask average Joe who works all week to gain a Saturday with family, does he want Obama, nope
More hypocrisy http://twurl.nl/8y67d6 Obama manipulating patriotic images though he says there's too much manipulation of patriotism
Why are the Democrats working so hard to increase the price of gas?
Mitt Romney on Obama's problem http://tinyurl.com/6f7xsc
Israel taking precautions to protect themselves if Obama wins http://twurl.nl/1vsi3i and tries to force them to concede
Obama:
In Chicago,holding an economic discussion with the Democratic governors. Watch it live now at http://my.barackobama.com/l...
Made an important decision today and wanted to share it with you. Visit http://my.barackobama.com/m...
Honored to be endorsed by Al Gore in Michigan tonight. Watch live streaming video at 8:30pm EST at http://my.barackobama.com/l...
Wishing everyone a Happy Father's Day. Spoke today at the Apostolic Church of God in Chicago. Read remarks at http://my.barackobama.com/dad
Pleased with today's Supreme Court decision to bring terrorists to justice while also protecting our core values. http://www.barackobama.com
Kicking-off a two week tour focusing on the current economic crisis & the need for new economic policy: http://my.barackobama.com/N...
IN St Paul, MN speaking after securing the nomination. Watch the speech live on TV tonight or streamed http://my.barackobama.com/n...
In Middletown, CT. Pinch-hitting for Senator Kennedy and delivering the commencement address for Wesleyan University.
In MI, unveiling my manufacturing agenda. It's time to recapture the spirit of innovation that has always fueled America's economic success.
So, McCain is on the attack, while Obama is spreading ideas (wow, that doesn't sound at all like I'm drinking the Obama Kool-Aid, does it? ). Seriously, though, McCain's feed is filled with vitriol and sarcasm, while Obama is talking about his platform and campaign. You have to go back to April 3 to see a tweet that mentions McCain, and it's not the silly fear-mongering (next Zimbabwe?) coming from McCain:
Troubled by today's unemployment figures, the latest indicator of how badly America needs fundamental change from Bush-McCain policies.
While, the fact is that Obama will probably win due to Republican's current unpopularity (unless he royally screws something up, of course) this difference in attitude or strategy sure won't help McCain. It really shows him to be the same old politician that we all know and hate. It's really too bad, because for a long time, he was the only Republican a Democrat or left-leaning hater-of-all-parties like myself, could respect. But, just as Romney sold his previously-more-centrist political soul to the right-wing, so has McCain.
Update 6/23 2:00: Apparently, I'm not the only one thinking about politics & twitter: Twitter As a Campaigning Tool and How Twitter Can Change the Presidential Debate.
I posted recently about the presidential candidates' usage of new tech, including twitter.
I'm still following both McCain & Obama (Clinton, too, but that's just because I haven't removed her yet). The stats in that previous post have continued along the same trajectories. McCain continues to tweet 2.5 times for each Obama tweet (M:343 , O:138; Obama still has about 29 times as many followers (M: 1,482, O:42,557).
I still can't decide who is using twitter to it's fullest potential. Obviously, Obama's tweets are spreading much faster than McCain's due to his overwhelming follower count, but McCain is using it more. Also, McCain will often reply to a direct message, showing that someone is actually reading the feed of people he's following. I haven't seen any replies from Obama, which indicates that he's using it more as a soapbox and less as an interactive communications medium. So, McCain probably wins on actually embracing twitter, while Obama is probably getting the most benefit from it.
While analyzing the statistics like this is interesting, it's obviously only a side note. What's far more important is the message that each candidate is putting out. To that end, here are a few recent tweets that I think are illustrative of each canidate's use of twitter. These are all pulled from the tweets currently showing on their twitter page, which shows the most recent twenty or so tweets. In case you think that my selections are biased, I invite you to visit either candiate's twitter page and see for yourself. I've linked them to their names in the second paragraph above. I'm certain that whenever you do this, even months from now, you'll see a similar tenor on each feed.
McCain:
Obama:
So, McCain is on the attack, while Obama is spreading ideas (wow, that doesn't sound at all like I'm drinking the Obama Kool-Aid, does it? ). Seriously, though, McCain's feed is filled with vitriol and sarcasm, while Obama is talking about his platform and campaign. You have to go back to April 3 to see a tweet that mentions McCain, and it's not the silly fear-mongering (next Zimbabwe?) coming from McCain:
While, the fact is that Obama will probably win due to Republican's current unpopularity (unless he royally screws something up, of course) this difference in attitude or strategy sure won't help McCain. It really shows him to be the same old politician that we all know and hate. It's really too bad, because for a long time, he was the only Republican a Democrat or left-leaning hater-of-all-parties like myself, could respect. But, just as Romney sold his previously-more-centrist political soul to the right-wing, so has McCain.
Update 6/23 2:00: Apparently, I'm not the only one thinking about politics & twitter: Twitter As a Campaigning Tool and How Twitter Can Change the Presidential Debate.
I'm still following both McCain & Obama (Clinton, too, but that's just because I haven't removed her yet). The stats in that previous post have continued along the same trajectories. McCain continues to tweet 2.5 times for each Obama tweet (M:343 , O:138; Obama still has about 29 times as many followers (M: 1,482, O:42,557).
I still can't decide who is using twitter to it's fullest potential. Obviously, Obama's tweets are spreading much faster than McCain's due to his overwhelming follower count, but McCain is using it more. Also, McCain will often reply to a direct message, showing that someone is actually reading the feed of people he's following. I haven't seen any replies from Obama, which indicates that he's using it more as a soapbox and less as an interactive communications medium. So, McCain probably wins on actually embracing twitter, while Obama is probably getting the most benefit from it.
While analyzing the statistics like this is interesting, it's obviously only a side note. What's far more important is the message that each candidate is putting out. To that end, here are a few recent tweets that I think are illustrative of each canidate's use of twitter. These are all pulled from the tweets currently showing on their twitter page, which shows the most recent twenty or so tweets. In case you think that my selections are biased, I invite you to visit either candiate's twitter page and see for yourself. I've linked them to their names in the second paragraph above. I'm certain that whenever you do this, even months from now, you'll see a similar tenor on each feed.
McCain:
New book "fleeced" by Dick Morris http://twurl.nl/iiayyc What would Obama do to country as President?
Obama with more endorsments: http://twurl.nl/vlexa4 from North Korean and Libyan Dictators, next Zimbabwe?
What do you think, has the surge worked? http://tinyurl.com/5vss6a
@MrBabyMan sorry I don't. Do you happen to know any dem leaders willing to help us lower oil prices by allowing drilling? Just looking
@MargaretSchaut Naw, that's not the case, ask average Joe who works all week to gain a Saturday with family, does he want Obama, nope
More hypocrisy http://twurl.nl/8y67d6 Obama manipulating patriotic images though he says there's too much manipulation of patriotism
Why are the Democrats working so hard to increase the price of gas?
Mitt Romney on Obama's problem http://tinyurl.com/6f7xsc
Israel taking precautions to protect themselves if Obama wins http://twurl.nl/1vsi3i and tries to force them to concede
Obama:
In Chicago,holding an economic discussion with the Democratic governors. Watch it live now at http://my.barackobama.com/l...
Made an important decision today and wanted to share it with you. Visit http://my.barackobama.com/m...
Honored to be endorsed by Al Gore in Michigan tonight. Watch live streaming video at 8:30pm EST at http://my.barackobama.com/l...
Wishing everyone a Happy Father's Day. Spoke today at the Apostolic Church of God in Chicago. Read remarks at http://my.barackobama.com/dad
Pleased with today's Supreme Court decision to bring terrorists to justice while also protecting our core values. http://www.barackobama.com
Kicking-off a two week tour focusing on the current economic crisis & the need for new economic policy: http://my.barackobama.com/N...
IN St Paul, MN speaking after securing the nomination. Watch the speech live on TV tonight or streamed http://my.barackobama.com/n...
In Middletown, CT. Pinch-hitting for Senator Kennedy and delivering the commencement address for Wesleyan University.
In MI, unveiling my manufacturing agenda. It's time to recapture the spirit of innovation that has always fueled America's economic success.
So, McCain is on the attack, while Obama is spreading ideas (wow, that doesn't sound at all like I'm drinking the Obama Kool-Aid, does it?
). Seriously, though, McCain's feed is filled with vitriol and sarcasm, while Obama is talking about his platform and campaign. You have to go back to April 3 to see a tweet that mentions McCain, and it's not the silly fear-mongering (next Zimbabwe?) coming from McCain:Troubled by today's unemployment figures, the latest indicator of how badly America needs fundamental change from Bush-McCain policies.
While, the fact is that Obama will probably win due to Republican's current unpopularity (unless he royally screws something up, of course) this difference in attitude or strategy sure won't help McCain. It really shows him to be the same old politician that we all know and hate. It's really too bad, because for a long time, he was the only Republican a Democrat or left-leaning hater-of-all-parties like myself, could respect. But, just as Romney sold his previously-more-centrist political soul to the right-wing, so has McCain.
Update 6/23 2:00: Apparently, I'm not the only one thinking about politics & twitter: Twitter As a Campaigning Tool and How Twitter Can Change the Presidential Debate.
