PETA proposes that Ben & Jerry's use breast milk in its ice cream

How's this for a disturbing thought - if PETA has it way, your next scoop of ice cream could be made with human breast milk. PETA is asking the Ben & Jerry's to begin using breast milk in its products instead of cow's milk, saying it would reduce the suffering of cows and calves and give ice cream lovers a healthier product. PETA wrote a letter to company founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield on Tuesday, telling them cow's milk is hazardous and that milking them is cruel.

"If Ben and Jerry's replaced the cow's milk in its ice cream with breast milk, your customers — and cows — would reap the benefits," wrote Tracy Reiman, executive vice president of the animal rights advocacy group. "We're aware this idea is somewhat absurd, and that putting it into practice is a stretch. At the same time, it's pretty absurd for us to be drinking the milk of cows," she said.

It takes about 12 pounds — or 1 1/2 gallons of milk — to make a gallon of ice cream. As a standardized product under federal regulations, ice cream must be made with milk from healthy cows. Ice cream made from goat's milk, for example, would have to be labeled as such. Presumably, so would mother's milk ice cream. Ben & Jerry's responded to the open letter:

"We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child," spokesman Sean Greenwood said in an e-mail. He didn't respond to requests for an interview.

After I thought about this for a bit, I can kinda see PETA's point. It's true that we are taking milk from an animal and consuming it on a daily basis, yet we get grossed at the thought of using human milk. Personally, I can't get over the grossness of using human milk. Secondly, you would need a lot women just to produce one gallon of ice cream. How much milk can a nursing mother make in one day? Aside from that is the cost. How much do you pay a woman for her milk? Does she need to stay in the factory/milking facility all day? Can she pump it from home? And finally, cow's milk and mother's milk aren't interchangeable, according to La Leche spokeswoman Jane Crouse, who says breast milk is a dynamic substance that's different with each woman and each child and might have difficulty being processed into ice cream. I don't think we'll be seeing this come to pass anytime soon, thankfully. At the Ben & Jerry's factory in Waterbury, consumers gave a collective "Eww" to the idea:

"It's kind of creepy," said Jeff Waugh, 42, of Dayton, Ohio.

"I think it's a little nutty," said the Rev. Roger Wooton, 83, of Malden, Mass., finishing up a cup of Heath Bar Crunch.

"How would they get all that milk?" said his wife, Jane Wooton, 77.

Jen Wahlbrink, 34, of Phoenix, who breast-fed her 11-month-old son, Cameron, said she wouldn't touch ice cream made from mother's milk. She remembers her nursing days — and not that fondly.

"The (breast) pumps just weren't that much fun. You really do feel like a cow," she said, cradling her son in her hands.

Image courtesy of MSNBC.

On Fire In the Operating Room

MSNBC brings to our attention the latest under-reported operating room "accident" - surgical fires! I, for one, never thought that I might actually catch on fire while being operated on. It turns out, however, that surgical fires are at least five times as common as once thought, affecting between 550 and 650 patients a year, including 20 to 30 who suffer serious, disfiguring burns. Every year, one or two people die this way. In Pennsylvania, a state in which hospitals are required to report medical errors, fires occur in one in every 87,646 operations, according to the latest 2007 data. That amounts to 28 fires a year in Pennsylvania alone and allows researchers to estimate with greater certainty the incidents in the rest of the country. Surgical fires are still a tiny fraction of the 50 million surgeries performed each year. An excerpt of one patients horrifying tale (emphasis mine):

Rita Talbert's operation was supposed to be a simple thyroid surgery, three hours, in and out, in the spring of 2005. Instead, the Stafford, Va., woman woke up a week later in intensive care, in agonizing pain and horrified at the face she saw in the mirror. “I didn’t know it was me,” said Talbert, now 62. Her chin was gone; her nose was deformed. Her mouth was virtually melted, so damaged that after a dozen reconstructive operations, she still has trouble eating, drinking and breathing. There’d been an accident, the doctors explained. An electrosurgical tool had ignited oxygen inside a mask under surgery drapes during the operation, sparking flames that left second- and third-degree burns from Talbert’s chest to the top of her head. "It just caught fire," she said, still incredulous at the idea. "They didn't even know it had caught on fire."

The root problem seems to be one of communication between the surgeon and the anesthesiologist. In most incidents, the surgeon was not informed that oxygen (O2) was flowing under the surgical drapes. The problem is exacerbated when the surgeon does not inform the anesthesiologist he is going to power on a electrical device in the surgical area. Oxygen concentrations of 50 percent and higher will create a flash fire. About 65 percent of surgical fires occur on the upper body or inside a patient's airway, another quarter occur elsewhere on the body and less than 10 percent actually occur inside the body cavity. Whatever the source, the head and neck region is grimly suited to hosting fires, especially in a high-oxygen atmosphere. There’s the vellus, the peach fuzz on your face and head - each tiny hair burns like a tiny sparkler and propagates a ripple of flame across the face.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

At a pharmacy, a blonde asked to use the infant scale to weigh the baby she held in her arms. The clerk explained that the device was out for repairs, but said that she would figure the infant's weight by weighing the woman and baby together on the adult scale, then weighing the mother alone and subtracting the second amount from the first. "That won't work," countered the woman. "I'm not the mother, I'm the aunt." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Will Spore DRM Become EA's Rootkit Moment?

With the news coming out that some purchasers of the video game Spore have filed a class action lawsuit against EA for its inclusion of SecuROM DRM, it's reaching the point where you have to wonder if this is becoming EA's "rootkit" moment. The parallels are there. Both involved an overly draconian form of DRM that severely limited how a "purchased" product could be used. Both involved hidden files installed on a computer -- and both resulted in massive backlash from consumers, and a very slow response from the company. And, of course, the rootkit resulted in class action lawsuits as well. At some point, perhaps, companies will start to realize that treating your customers as criminals is probably a bad idea.

Apple Stifles Developer's Free Speech By Imposing NDA on Rejections

I've signed many NDA's (non-disclosure agreements) in my career as a software developer. It's a common practice for many companies, especially those dealing with new technology. However, I've never been asked to sign an NDA for being rejected for a job. If you're a developer and Apple rejects your iPhone application from its App Store, the company wants you to shut up and get over it.

Apple's serious about it: The company has extended the iPhone non-disclosure agreement, which prohibits application developers from discussing programming tips, to include rejection letters as well. Some developers in the past have shared their rejection letters on the web, but now, according to MacRumors, rejection letters include a clause that reads, "THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS MESSAGE IS UNDER NON-DISCLOSURE."

Score one for Android.

Quick Joke of the Day

Learn to speak Chinese

This is a tow away zone. - No Pah King You are not very bright - Yu So Dum I got this for free - Ai No Pei I am not guilty - Wai Hang Mi? Please, stay a while longer - Wai Go Nao? Our meeting was scheduled for next week - Wai Yu Kum Nao Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

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Find Out Where a Username is Already Registered

When you think up that perfect new handle for storming social networks and other registration-only sites across the web, run it through UserNameCheck.com first. This webapp's purpose is simple: to tell you whether or not that name is already in use at a pretty impressive list of sites, from Delicious and Digg to eBay and Xbox Live. The developer explains:

This site is a quick and dirty solution to a question that I often lay awake at night worrying about. Do I have my username registered across every site that I should? What if the next internet humiliation meme just happens to share the username I've been using for years, and suddenly people are emailing me asking "hey, is this you ???". The site is simple. I have a stack of webapp urls, the application pings the site using the username you want to check, if it returns a "no user name" error we return that.

The list of checks can take some time, so grab a cup of coffee or browse the news in another tab while UserNameCheck does its thing.

Where is Your Username Registered?

Source: LifeHacker

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

Two blondes lock thier keys in the car. One of the blondes tries to break into the car while the the other one watches. Finally the first blonde says "Darn, I can't get in the car!" The other blond replies, "keep trying, it looks like it is going to rain and the top is down". Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

The Pope dies and, naturally, goes to heaven where he's met by a reception committee of angels. After a whirlwind tour, The Pope is told that he can enjoy any of the myriad recreations available. He decides that he wants to read all of the ancient original text of the Holy Scriptures, so he spends the next eon or so learning the languages. After becoming a linguistic master, he sits down in the library and begins to pour over every version of the Bible, working back from the most recent "Easy Reading" to the original handwritten script. The angel librarian hears a loud scream, and goes running toward its source only to find the Pope huddled in a chair, shaking and crying. "The R! They left out the R!" "What do you mean?" the angel librarian asks. After collecting his wits, the Pope sobs again, "The word was supposed to be CELEBRATE!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Comcast Claims No One Has Complained About Its New Traffic Slowing Efforts

From TechDirt: Last month, Comcast, in addition to finally revealing the broadband caps it had always had, admitted that it was going to test a system where it slowed down traffic for heavy users in congested areas -- effectively, sending their internet traffic to the back of the line. The company is now claiming that this plan is a success because in five trials there were no complaints about slower traffic. Of course, what the company means is that there were no direct complaints to the company. They don't know if people were pissed off and shopping for competitive services (if any actually exist), or were complaining to friends or in online forums. Having dealt with Comcast customer service, and after seeing how Comcast (falsely) denied its traffic shaping efforts for months, perhaps customers impacted by this new system simply realized that it wasn't worth the hassle of complaining directly to Comcast.

EA Loosens DRM on Spore

The LA Times reports EA has decided to loosen the DRM restrictions for Spore after being stung by a siege of criticism from gamers who took issue with the copyright restrictions the company placed on its Spore game. EA agreed to up the install limit from 3 times to 5, claiming they may also make exceptions in some cases, and also released a patch allowing for multiple user names. While it's nice that the company finally responded, this is still a pretty weak response and doesn't address the core issues. The real problem here is the use of DRM in the first place. Companies should not be treating their customers as thieves and pirates - it only makes the customer want to be a thief or pirate. Cliff Harris conducted an interesting experiment, where he posted an open forum asking why people pirate games. The response? Purchase cost of the game is the first reason, followed by the quality of the game (the less quality, the more likely it is to be pirated instaed of being bought), and third was because of DRM. People don't like DRM, we know that, but the extent to which DRM is turning away people who have no other complaints is possibly misunderstood. If you wanted to change ONE thing to get more pirates to buy games, scrapping DRM is it. These gamers are the low hanging fruit of this whole debate.

Spore - Day Two

As promised, I played Spore again, yesterday. I played for about six hours total, taking a 5-10 minute break every hour (gotta stretch). Reviewing my first impressions of Spore, I have some updated observations: Cellular - I still enjoyed this level quite a lot, mostly because the game play is different from the other levels. I can understand, though, why they limited the time on this level. However, I still think you should be able to earn some extra DNA after you beat all your goals. Creature - I went the herbivore route today. It's definitely easier to make friends when you are a herbivore. I could have written the Spore equivalent of "How to Win Friends and Influence People". This level was definitely more fun for me the second time through. Tribal - I started right off making friends with the new tribes. I still ended up destroying two tribes, though (they smelled funny :P ). My strategy improved for picking off the opposing tribe. I had improved my stealth rating in the Creature level, and it paid off. You need stealth for food raids. I decided to raid all the food of a tribe, then kill it's gatherers - it was a resounding success. To me, this is still the most difficult level, but I think the funness improved the second time through. Civilization - Because of my previous actions, I started the civ level as a religious city. I found out that religious vehicles can indeed attack military vehicles (but economic vehicles apparently cannot). Because I was social this time through, I made treaties with three other cities. At one point, I had two cities helping me capture a third city. I did find a small bug, though. I had asked Yellow to help me attack the Blue city. Yellow and I both bombarded the city, with my military winning and seizing control of the city. After the cut video, I become the owner of the city. However, Yellow is still attacking the city! I had to install all the gun turrets in the city for defense (I didn't want to directly attack Yellow, yet). My turrets killed the Yellow tanks, and everything went back to normal. Galaxy - I played galaxy for about 90 minutes. This level is very different, but fun all the same. I know understand why you control the spaceship the way you do (using the scroll wheel to ascend/descend). After playing the galaxy level, it makes sense. It's not cumbersome, like I thought yesterday. I didn't finish galaxy. I accomplished 2 of the 10(?) goals. This level definitely needs more time than the other levels. Maybe I still don't quite understand it, but I found making money to be much more difficult in this level. Overall, Spore is a great game. I'm going to raise my rating to a 4.5 out of 5, now that I understand the reason for the decisions the developers made. One final note, about the DRM. I haven't tried to make a backup of the game, yet (I make a backup of every game, in case the disc breaks - I've had several break or become too scratched to use). One thing I did like, though, is that I don't need to have the disc in the CD-ROM drive to play the game. I HATE when the company requires that.

Spore - First Impressions

Yesterday, I played Spore for about seven hours total, mostly straight through. I took an hour break about four hours into play to eat and do some household chores. Spore has five levels of evolution: Cellular, Creature, Tribal, Civilization, and Galaxy. Each level has a series of goals you must accomplish to reach the next level. I completed the first four levels, and played about five minutes in the Galaxy level before I had to quit. Spore is definitely a different game. I found it to be quite fun, and think this is one of those rare games that would interest both boys and girls. I especially enjoyed the creature creator, and having the ability to design and modify my creature. Below are my impressions of each level: Cellular - For me, this was one of the funnest levels, but also the shortest. I completed the cellular stage after about 25-30 minutes, and now that I know how to do it, could complete this much sooner, I think. This is unfortunate, because I thought the cellular level was very enjoyable. My only other complaint is that once you reach your evolutionary goal, you stop being able to collect DNA points. You can still hunt/eat and you can mate, but anything you kill or eat does not go to your DNA bank. However, this appears to only be true on the cellular level. Creature - Once I understood what needed to be done, this was fun, also. I spent about 10-15 minutes trying to understand how to make friends with other creatures. In this level, you either need to make friends with creatures or make them go extinct. As you progress in this stage, you gain intelligence. That increased intelligence allows you add one or more creatures to your party. These can be creatures from your nest or from the befriended creatures. My creatures were more specialized for combat, which made befriending other creatures a little difficult. I made a few friends early on, but afterwards my dancing/posing/charming skills weren't high enough. When you try to make friends, you have to repeat what the other creatures does. For example, the other creature might do a little dance, so you push the dance button. Each creature in your group does the dance, and the more who dance the better you impress the new creature. However, I noticed that as I progressed, the new creatures would call his nest-mates over to dance with him. This makes it more difficult to impress them, because you need a higher skill of dancing to impress 2, 3, or 4 creatures. Don't get me wrong, this level was a lot of fun. You definitely should explore the map, as I picked up a LOT of body parts. I played this level for about thirty minutes more after I reached my goals, just so I could find new body parts (and earn more DNA points). This is the last level you can modify the base creature, so you want to find everything you can to make him the best. Tribal - This is definitely the most difficult stage. You start with a tribe of five creatures. You must make peace with or exterminate five other tribes. You must also assign food gathering tasks to some of your tribesmen. Finally, you must construct buildings so your tribesmen can use weapons, musical instruments (for making peace), and fishing tools. The first time I tried to make peace with another tribe, I found the instructions VERY confusing. The in-game instructions really did not explain to me what I needed to do. To make peace, you need to construct buildings that make musical instruments (horns, marachas, and pipes). You bring the chief and at least one tribesman with an instrument (best to bring all three types) to the new tribe. The new tribe will tell you (with pictographs) what they want to hear. Once you understand how to do this, it's very easy - much easier than making friends at the creature stage. I befriended three tribes, but two tribes tried to steal my food, so I decided to wipe them out. This is a LOT more difficult than you think. Each tribe has basically the same number of people. When I started my war campaign, we all had 12 people. The problem for the warrior is that you must leave at least one person (two is best) to do fishing and food gathering, and at least one more to protect your food from wild creatures. So, now you are invasion of 9 (at best) against 12. I found two strategies that seem to work for this. The first one is send people, one at a time to raid the food of the rival tribe. You want to send a stream (like five), one after another (not all together). Expect the first one or two to die - they are the diversion anyway. Tribes need food to create new people and to buy/repair buildings. I also found that during combat, you can send someone to raid the food, and the raider will be successful 90% of the time. The second strategy is one of attrition. I created two groups of warriors. The first group being the largest (five or six). Send the first group to the edge of the tribe. When a tribesman comes near, begin the combat. You want your five or six to distract the tribe, so let them fight all the people. Next, send your remaining soldiers to attack a building (or raid the food). The goal is to destroy the chief's hut, but the hut is very strong. One tribe I fought, I had to destroy the secondary buildings first to wear down the tribe's food supply. When they were finally broke, I was able to destroy the chief's hut. Civilization - Once you get use to the camera controls, this stage is more like an RTS (real time strategy) game. I found this level to be very fun. I played it for quite a while, mostly to experience the different methods of taking over the other cities. For this stage, you must unite the planet, which is covered by your race. You can convert the city by religious, military, or economic means. Economic takes the most time, but works best because there is no damage done to the new city (and you earn more money in the process). Religious works second best (and was a lot of fun to watch in progress). Religious takes the same time (or maybe faster) than military. However, a religious vehicle cannot fight a military vehicle. So, if you keep military vehicles around your cities, you can ward off a religious attack. Also, religious attacks don't harm buildings, except for the entertainment structures. The military attack is your standard military campaign. Build five or six tanks, send them to bombard the next city. However, you destroy all the buildings in the city. Sometimes, you even destroy city land, which means less space available for your structures, when you take over the city. Once you take over all the cities on the planet, you advance to... Galaxy - I only had a few minutes on this level, so not many thoughts. I went through the ship flying tutorial and started on the tractor beam mission before I had to stop. Flying the ship is not as easy as it could be. You control the ship with the mouse, but to ascend/descend, you use either the scroll wheel or the +/- buttons (btw, + goes down, - goes up). Maybe I will understand the reasons for this as I progress into Galaxy, but for now I'm wondering why the ship can't be controlled like the flying mounts of WoW - mouse point up to ascend (or press jump). Overall, Spore is a great game and a lot of fun to play. I'm giving it a 4, out of 5. I'm wondering how re-playable this is (for adults) once you complete the galaxy stage. I may amend my score based on what I find. Read my follow up post - Spore: Day Two

Birth of the Smiley

I didn't have a chance to post this yesterday, so I'm a day late. Yesterday (Sep 19) is the birthdate of the smiley and frowny, specifically :-) and :-(. Born Sep 19, 1982, by Scott Fahlman at Carnegie Mellon University. He had posted a suggestion on the science department's computer bulletin that users should use :-) and :-( to differentiate between a joke and non-joke message.

19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman :-) From: Scott E Fahlman

I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

:-)

Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use:

:-(

It seems that a lot of people had been posting jokes on the bulletin, but other readers didn't understand they were jokes. Scott says there were "lenghthy diatribes" from people on the message board who failed to get the joke or the sarcasm in a particular post -- which is probably what "given current trends" refers to in his own, now-famous missive. To remedy this, Fahlman suggested using :-) and :-( to distinguish between posts that should be taken humorously and those of a more serious nature. Fahlman's original post was lost for a couple of decades and believed gone for good, until it was retrieved from an old backup tape, thus cementing his claim of priority.

Light Posting Weekend

If you haven't heard already, I've claimed this weekend to be a Spore weekend. I probably won't be posting much this weekend. I haven't played the game, yet, but I do have everything installed, setup, and ready to go. Wish me fun :D

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

A cop pulls over a drunk driver. The drunk driver says, "Ossssifer, you need to get your records straight. You just asked me for my license, but you took it away yesterday!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

There was once a young man who, in his youth, professed his desire to become a great writer. When asked to define "great" he said, "I want to write stuff that the whole world will read, stuff that people will react to on a truly emotional level, stuff that will make them scream, cry, howl in pain and anger!" He now works for Microsoft, writing error messages. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Spore

Woot! Spore finally arrived! I'm driving my wife crazy talking about how I'm going to spend the weekend playing Spore. I installed Spore, this morning. Installation went very smooth. Took about twenty minutes. I did notice after the install that I had an icon on my desktop for the EA Downloader, but the icon for Spore was missing. Huh? I actually had to browse to the install folder and manually add the Spore icon to my desktop. Maybe it's just a problem in Vista? I know a lot of people have rated this 1 star on Amazon. If you read the posts, you'll find the reason is because of the draconian DRM. I agree that EA should never have DRM'd Spore. In doing so, they are actually inviting crackers to circumvent the DRM. I've heard that the DRM crack for Spore is now the #1 download on the Pirate Bay. Maybe other companies will take notice.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Cat Boxing with Casper and Toby

Casper and Toby putting on a little boxing show. Toby always cracks me up how he puts his paw on Casper's head to keep him at bay.

Congrats to EA...

Source: UserFriendly.org

Will Central Africa's Forest Wildlife Be Eaten into Extinction?

According to Scientific American, elephants, gorillas and other large forest mammals may become extinct in central Africa within 50 years if hunting meat to feed starving populations continues at the current pace. Each year, rural peoples consume some 2.2 billion pounds of so-called bushmeat from wildlife, the equivalent of four million cattle. Nathalie Van Vliet, a researcher at the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) based in Indonesia says the problem is "if the people that currently rely on bushmeat as a source of protein in central Africa had to rely on livestock, we would see the same catastrophe that is destroying the Amazon Basin: deforestation for pasture land and livestock raising." Because of the failure of antipoaching programs, CIFOR argues that a hunting ban would not work. But it also says that forest species such as elephants, buffalo and apes that are slow to reproduce need to be protected or they will disappear entirely. CIFOR recommends local agreements that allow hunting of species that can rebound quickly (such as various species of duikers, a type of forest antelope) while not allowing kills of species with long gestation periods (such as elephants who give birth after 22 months). Granting local peoples a limited right to hunt while working actively to manage specific populations of animals in the jungle, may prove the only way to truly conserve, according to CIFOR and experts from the United Nations Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity. "The question is conserving for whom?" Van Vliet asks. "For rural people that need to survive as well as for urban people that would love to see our fauna in the future—or just conserving for the sake of it?"

Quick Joke of the Day

A blonde was playing Trivial Pursuit one night. It was her turn. She rolled the dice and she landed on Science and Nature. Her question was, "If you are in a vacuum and someone calls your name, can you hear it?" She thought for a time and then asked, "Is it on or off? Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Netflix Origami

Netflix Origami shows origami patterns for those Netflix tear off pages.

NetFlix tear-off flaps are sturdy, colorful, and perfect for origami and paper airplanes, so don't just toss those wrappers into the recycling bin. Although most origami requires special paper squares, we have adapted these designs so you can use NetFlix flaps without alteration. Just tear them off carefully at the perforated line and follow our step-by-step instructions for making paper-folding magic.

Examples:

Ranting About PayPal

One of the software products I sell requires the user to pay by subscription (they are charge per month for use of the software). Generally all goes well with the users. Very few have any issues, although occasionally someone will not understand how to use something (which is to be expected). I have a low turn over rate. Generally, someone uses the product for two to six months. But sometimes I get those people who try to cheat the system, and these people really piss me off. The problem really lies with PayPal. See, PayPal always favors the buyer. It's how they are able to convince you to let them hold your money. The problem comes from dishonest buyers. The other problem with PayPal is that unless you ship a physical product (with tracking code), PayPal does not give the seller a chance to dispute the buyer. Here's how a dishonest buyer can profit: 1) Buy a software package (anything virtual, that does not have shipping). 2) Wait a day or two, then file an "Unauthorized Claim" on PayPal for the item purchased. This claim type basically says either someone stole your PayPal login or your product was not as described. 3) Wait for your full refund. Why a full refund? Because PayPal favors the buyer, and whenever a virtual good (PayPal considers software to be a virtual good) is sold, the ONLY option for a seller is to give a full refund (or risk losing their PayPal account). That's just fucked up! I get about two people a month who pull this shit on me. Now they've used the product, gotten the use they want from (or, in the case of non-secured software, made copies), and they got their money back. Come on, PayPal! This is the 21st century. Let's find a better way to handle disputes like this. I have logs of every instance someone uses my product, their IP, time logged in, time logged out, what they did in the program. I (and many other software sellers) can provide this information as proof the buyer used the product. At worst, give us the option to provide only a partial refund, since the buyer did use the product.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Quick Joke of the Day

Two blondes lock thier keys in the car. One of the blondes tries to break into the car while the the other one watches. Finally the first blonde says "Darn, I can't get in the car!" The other blonde replies, "Keep trying, it looks like its going to rain and the top is down". Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Why Tea Is Healthier Than Water

While nobody is running around extolling the virtues of cola as a replacement for water for daily hydration, researchers at Kings College London want to make sure you don't think every non-water drink is a poor substitute for water. After reviewing numerous studies on the benefits of drinking tea, they've concluded that tea is a superior drink.

Dr Ruxton said: "Drinking tea is actually better for you than drinking water. Water is essentially replacing fluid. Tea replaces fluids and contains antioxidants so it's got two things going for it."

Many people have lumped tea in with other caffeine containing drinks such as coffee and colas, as a dehydrating drink. Not a concern, the research team says:

"Studies on caffeine have found very high doses dehydrate and everyone assumes that caffeine-containing beverages dehydrate. But even if you had a really, really strong cup of tea or coffee, which is quite hard to make, you would still have a net gain of fluid."

If you're interested in drinking more tea check out the health benefits of green tea and tips for properly steeping tea.

Weird News

According to police in Bethlehem, Pa., four kids (ages 9 to 14) grabbed a donation box in August at RiverPlace park (contributions to an organization that maintains the park's portable toilets) and ran for nearby woods, with several police officers in pursuit. Three boys were caught, but the other made it a little ways into the woods before falling into a manure pit built by homeless people at their encampment. [The Morning Call (Allentown), 8-5-08] Kevin Hansen filed a lawsuit in West Bend, Wis., in August, claiming that spotting a clump of hair in a steak he sliced into from a Texas Roadhouse restaurant caused "severe and permanent injuries," pain, suffering and "disability," requiring "extensive medical treatment." In fact, said his lawyer Ryan Hetzel to Milwaukee's Journal Sentinel, "It's bothered the heck out of him." (The employee who prepared the steak was fired and later pleaded guilty to a felony, explaining that he was trying to retaliate because Hansen complained about a previous order.) [Journal Sentinel, 8-3-08] After failing the West Virginia Bar Exam for the second time (during which he was given an extra day to complete it), Shannon Kelly filed a lawsuit in July demanding even more concessions based on his unspecified cognitive disability. The second failure was also on a special version of the exam in large type, and Kelly had been permitted to work in a room by himself. He now believes he can earn his license if he is allowed four days instead of the normal two, to make up for (according to his lawyer) "severe deficits in processing speed, cognitive fluency and rapid naming" (though it is not clear how many attorney jobs are available for someone with such a skills set). [West Virginia Record (Charleston), 7-25-08] The Texas criminal justice system continues to astonish. In August, federal judge Orlando Garcia of San Antonio ordered a final-hours' stay of execution for Jeffrey Wood based on serious concerns about his sanity, that the Texas state courts had somehow summarily dismissed. Judge Garcia said substantial evidence supported at least holding a hearing on the issue but that state law seemed to require the inmate to prove his insanity first in order to obtain a hearing on whether he is insane. That, said Garcia, is "an insane system." [New York Times, 8-22-08] Adding to the list of stories that were formerly weird but which now occur with such frequency that they must be retired from circulation: (89) People who call the emergency-only 911 number for stupid reasons, such as Reginald Peterson, who called Jacksonville, Fla., police in August because Subway didn't make his sandwich correctly. Source: News of the Weird

Quick Joke of the Day

One day at a local buffet, a man suddenly called out, "My son is choking! He swallowed a quarter! Help! Please, anyone! Help!" A man from a nearby table stood up and announced that he was quite experienced at this sort of thing. He stepped over with almost no look of concern at all, wrapped his hands around the boy's balls and squeezed. Out popped the quarter. The man then went back to his table as though nothing had happened. "Thank you! Thank you!" the father cried. "Are you a paramedic?" "No," replied the man, "I work for the IRS." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

DVD Rental Video Guide

I've been working on a DVD Rental Video Guide for the last few weeks. I finally finished it today, and thought I would share it, here. Or, view the full DVD Rental Video Guide. DVD Rental Videos Online Netflix # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: 2 Weeks Free Trial Blockbuster # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: 2 Weeks Free Trial Green Cine # Titles: **** Trial Offer: 3 Movies in 10 days Free DVD Avenue # Titles: **** Trial Offer: None DVD Planet # Titles: **** Trial Offer: 50% off first month Number Slate # Titles: *** Trial Offer: 4 movies in 6 weeks Hit Movies # Titles: *** Trial Offer: 1 movie in 10 days Free Cafe DVD # Titles: ** Trial Offer: None Intelliflix # Titles: ** Trial Offer: None
Video Downloads - Movie Downloading Services Amazon Video On Demand # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: Free Downloads Netflix # Titles: ***** Trial Offer: 2 Weeks Free Trial CinemaNow # Titles: **** Trial Offer: 3 Day Trial Disney Movie Club # Titles: **** Trial Offer: None iTunes # Titles: *** Trial Offer: None Video On Demand # Titles: *** Trial Offer: 7 Days Free Trial Movie Link # Titles: ** Trial Offer: first movie 99 cents Total Vid # Titles: ** Trial Offer: None
Specialty DVD Rentals Green Cine Specialty: Indies, Foriegn, Kids Trial Offer: 3 Movies in 10 days Free Disney Movie Club Specialty: Disney and Family Movies Trial Offer: None CinFlix Specialty: Asian Cinema Trial Offer: None Tiger Cinema Specialty: Asian Cinema Trial Offer: None Anime Lane Specialty: Anime Trial Offer: 10 - 20% Off Kinectic Fit Specialty: Fitness and Health Trial Offer: None HuntFlix Specialty: Hunting Trial Offer: None Pinoy Movies Specialty: Filipino Movies Trial Offer: None Video Library Specialty: Hard to Find Movies Trial Offer: None

 

Your Moment of Cat Zen

Here it is, your Moment of Cat Zen Cat Zen Images courtesy of: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

A Lesson on Gaming With Kids From Wil Wheaton

Wil Wheaton (of Star Trek TNG fame), has an interesting idea for playing games with kids. The original idea is great when you're just learning a new game:

Rule 17a is a house rule we invoke when we're learning a new game. It basically states that, at any time, a player can say, "You know, I just realized that I did this stupid thing that I wouldn't have done if I had a little more experience in the game. I'd like a do-over." If the majority of the players agree (and we always do) then we just back up a little bit, and play on. It reduces the risk of doing something bone-headed that you can't ever recover from, and it keeps the game fun.

His new idea, termed Rule 17b, is a great one for kids, but I think can (and maybe should) be used by everyone:

Depending on your kid, the game, and some X factor that I leave to you as a parent, you could give your child up to three "roll again" markers, like poker chips or glass beads or whatever, that she can use at any time to re-roll a particularly bad dice roll. They can use it whenever they want to, but once the marker it used, it's gone for the rest of the game, so your child will have to choose very carefully about when she's going to use it. This would be especially great with a couple of smaller kids, because the parent isn't put in the position of awarding do overs and giving the appearance of favoritism (raise your hand if you've ever had to untangle that Gordian Knot.)

I'm thinking that this could be a great idea for computer and console games. Maybe I'll consider adding it as a feature in one the games I'm working on.

Let GoPlanIt Plan Your Vacation For You

Web-based travel planning service GoPlanit attempts to take the solo and tedious act of itinerary planning and inject it with a social element. Upon signing up for the service and selecting a destination city, GoPlanit can roll an itinerary for you. GoPlanIt provided me an instant itinerary for New York, which I was able to tweak based on how active or low-key I wanted to be and how much money I had. GoPlanit has a "fill in the gaps" function on its planner which will suggest fun and interesting things to do in between other commitments. GoPlanit also offers support for mobile devices (including an iPhone-optimized mobile site) and a microblogging tool to journal your trip adventures. GoPlanIt is still in beta. During the beta, GoPlanit offers planning for eight major US cities (San Francisco - Los Angeles - New York - Chicago - Las Vegas - Seattle - Boston - Honolulu)

How Much Energy Does Your PC Waste?

More than 30 billion kilowatt-hours of energy is wasted because many of us simply forget to shut down our computers when we aren’t using them. If we could just improve the efficiency of how we use our PCs, the savings in energy costs would be over $3 billion dollars! The CO2 emissions from just 15 computers are equivalent, in energy terms, to the gas consumption of one car. Download the 100% FREE LocalCooling power management tool to automatically optimize your PC's power consumption. Join today and start fighting global warming from your desktop. With LocalCooling you are directly presented with detailed information on how much power your PC is consuming, based on a large database of hardware and in-depth research. By adjusting the power mode settings our advanced algorithms will predict how much you will save based on past PC usage and statistical data. Every time LocalCooling saves power by either turning off your screen, putting your hard drive to sleep when not being used, or shutting down your PC when you are away, your savings stats will grow. Download LocalCooling today to start optimizing your PC's energy efficiency in minutes.

LocalCooling will:

• Cut your energy bills
• Reduce your greenhouse gas emissions by reducing your PC's power consumption
• Give you full control over any power mode settings
• Improve your overall computing experience and efficiency
• Show you, in detail, how much you have saved since installing the software.

Corporate users: apart from the big environmental savings you will be making, your energy bill will also be dramatically reduced. A company with 100 computers could save up to $2000 per year just by installing the FREE LocalCooling application. The fact that everyone in the company could use the same account or join the same team means you would have full control over the savings made from every single PC.

Obama's Magic

Jon Carroll recently wrote an interesting article about Obama and Palin. I couldn't agree more with what Jon has to say. I'm copy/pasting about half of the article here for ease of reading, but your can find the entire article at: Now the Fun Begins.

Yes, we're a polarized country. We're a bipolar country. Republicans seem bewildered by the appeal of Barack Obama. He has "some sort of magic," in the words of one local pundit. Well, yeah. Part of the magic is called oratory. It's been a known brain-clouder since at least ancient Greek times. Look, cadences and rhetorical devices designed to persuade the masses! What kind of witchcraft is this?

Republicans tend not to care about oratory - certainly their choices of presidential candidates indicate that. They seem to think it's cheating. I know it's a cheap shot, but let me mention the first Republican president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. They've come a long way since then, and not in the right direction.

And the other part of the Barack Obama magic, and I know we're not supposed to say this out loud, but: He's African American. Actually, half African, half Scottish American, which makes him really, truly American, a land where increasingly people are a little bit of everything, and they identify themselves according to preference, not according to genetic markers.

I think it would be really good if the United States had an African American president. There, I said it; call me a racist. I think it would be good if he was an African American president who gave really good speeches and had sensible ideas and a commitment to social justice. Sure, I disagree with him about stuff - can we say FISA? But his candidacy is basically a great idea. You know that whole slavery thing? This might go a way toward mitigating that.

Not that this counts as an endorsement. I could still vote for Barney Frank. But everywhere I look in this race, I see coded racial statements, and I hear the whispers that a black man can never get elected president no way no how. And I want to think better of my country than that, no matter what the country thinks of itself.

Look at it this way. I actually don't care about Sarah Palin's private life, any of it. In fact, she sounds like the kind of woman I might meet when I'm traveling in the West: small-town gal; nutty political ideas, but hey, it's the West; kind of mixed-up family life but a nice six-point buck over the fireplace. And I don't think the fact that her daughter is pregnant and not married has anything to do with her qualifications for public office. She's plenty disqualified on other grounds.

(OK, a small part of me does want to say, "That abstinence education thing; how's it working out for you?")

And yet ... imagine if it had been one of Barack Obama's daughters who was pregnant out of wedlock. (Imagine them a lot older, too.) Imagine the pundits going nuts. Imagine talk of the crumbling of the black family, the absent father, the culture of irresponsibility, the role of the churches, blah blah blah. Endless. Oh, we'd have a conversation about race, all right, and it would be just like the previous 812 conversations.

But does Sarah Palin represent the crumbling of the white family? Was the father's constant absences at sporting events the reason her daughter didn't get the attention she needed? Where was the church? Where ... oh, no, we're not having that conversation, because Sarah Palin is white and white families are doing just fine. Thank you, pundits. Take another week off.

I understand the Republicans had a something. I'm sure they ate well and drank well and agreed with each other. I'm happy for them.

Amazon Deleted Spore Reviews?

A lot of people have noticed that Amazon appears to have deleted all of the reviews on the Spore page. This is only going to end badly. When you try to shut down a large group of people who feel wronged, you're not just whacking the bees' nest with a stick, you're setting it on fire with a flame thrower. The folks who were complaining are only going to complain louder, and louder. Remember what happened when Digg tried to takedown the AACS crack? Whoever was responsible for removing the comments -- whether it was Amazon or EA -- they may find that the reaction to trying to shut down the angry mob is only going to make folks that much angrier, and alert that many more people to the problems they have with EA's use of DRM.

Copy a Single File to Avoid Re-Activating Windows XP

Found this great tip on LifeHacker for anyone reinstalling XP off something other than their original CD—such as a slipstreamed and automated installation—or lacking a net connection to run the activation.

Before wiping your system clean, grab a file named WPA.DBL from the System32 directory and save it to a thumb drive or other external media. When you load up your new system, skip registration, enter "Safe Mode" from the boot menu, and drop it back into that System32 folder. Now you're re-activated and free of nagging. Hit the link below for detailed explanation of each step.

How to avoid having to reactivate Windows XP after fresh install [Online Tech Tips]

Quick Joke of the Day

Three blondes are in an elevator when the elevator suddenly stops and the lights go out. They try using their cell phones to get help, but have no luck. Even the phones are out. After a few hours of being stuck with no help in sight, one blonde says to the others "I think the best way to call for help is by yelling together." The others agree with the first, so they all inhale deeply and begin to yell loudly "Together, together, together." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

YouTube To Ban Terrorist Videos

Recent Article on TechDirt - YouTube Bans Terrorism Videos; Don't You Feel Much Safer?

Back in May we wrote about Senator Joseph Lieberman demanding that YouTube remove a bunch of videos of terrorists. At the time, YouTube reviewed the videos in question, and took down the ones that violated the site's terms of service, but left most of them up, noting that the ones they left up did not promote hate speech nor show violence. As we pointed out at the time, trying to ban terrorists from posting videos to YouTube seems incredibly short-sighted. First, it won't work. Those videos will quickly pop back up on other sites that won't take them down. Second, most of those videos are preaching to the choir. It's unlikely that very many people are being recruited to the terrorists' causes by a grainy video on YouTube. Third, letting terrorists post their videos to a mainstream site like YouTube should help authorities figure out who's posting the videos and where they're coming from. Fourth, and most important, one of the key founding principles of this country is the right to free speech, no matter how much one might disagree with that speech. But, part of that principle is that it allows people to respond. So, yes, the videos may be pure propaganda, but there's no reason that people can't respond to the videos and show why they're propaganda and wrong. Confronting your critics is a reasonable stance. Demanding that they cannot speak is not. Yet, a bunch of folks have been sending in links to a story claiming that Google has now caved to Sen. Lieberman, and will now ban terrorist videos on YouTube. The article says that YouTube's new terms of service will ban footage that "advertises" terrorism or "extremist causes," which seems pretty broad, and certainly open to abuse. The article describes some videos that show how to commit violent acts -- but those were already banned by YouTube, so that's rather misleading. These new terms are more disturbing. It's not going to stop the videos, it's just going to make it harder to keep track of them, harder to counter them -- all while making the terrorists feel more legitimate. Terrorists should be tracked down and stopped -- absolutely. But we should be dealing with the actual problem of terrorists, not some videos they made.

Seabreacher - New Water Craft

I just saw the video for this and thought, "I want one of these!". This would be a lot of fun to take out on a large lake or the ocean.

XNA Game Studio 3.0 Beta Is Coming

I've been using the XNA Game Studio since the 1.0 beta. For those who don't know, XNA Game Studio is Microsoft's latest (and greatest) attempt to allow developers to create games for the PC, XBox 360, and the Zune. XNA provides several tools, the most important of which is to provide a wrapper for DirectX. For those of you who have written managed DirectX games in the past, this is a HUGE improvement. I've been using the XNA Game Studio 3.0 CTP since it was released. Version 2 only worked in Visual Studio 2005 (which was strange, since it came out after Visual Studio 2008 was released). Version 3 is great, not only because it loads in Visual Studio 2008, but because it allows me to use LINQ and has a host of new improvements. My only problem with version 3.0 has been the lack of an upgrade wizard for 2.0 projects. Yesterday, the XNA team announced XNA Game Studio 3.0 beta will be released next week. My most anticipated improvement? The XNA 2.0 upgrade wizard. Some other features of the beta include:

Zune-specific features

• Support for the upcoming Zune 3.0 firmware - note that the XNA Game Studio 3.0 CTP will not be compatible with the 3.0 firmware. My colleague Michael Klucher posted a summary of this issue on his blog, including steps to remove 3.0 CTP games from your Zune since they will no longer work with the 3.0 firmware
• Zune deployment from 64-bit OS's

Xbox 360-specific features

• Xbox 360 project templates are available
• Big button pad support

XNA Framework and Visual Studio features

• Rich presence, invites and join session in progress
• Content compression
• FBX importer improvements
• ClickOnce deployment for Windows games
• Project upgrade wizard to automatically upgrade XNA Game Studio 2.0 games
• Multiple content projects
• Cross-platform project synchronization

Your Moment of Cat Zen

Here it is, your Moment of Cat Zen Cat Zen Images courtesy of: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

Optimize Your Headlines To Increase Conversions

For those of you who don't know, I'm studying marketing and advertising techniques. It's quite fascinating for me, and has many practical (and financial) benefits. A few days ago I found a very good video on how to optimize your headlines on ads and your landing page. The video is about 45 minutes long. What I particularly like about this video is that it shows the viewer not only the A/B testing that was done to prove the author's point, but shows results and thinking behind each test. If nothing else, this is a good video for learning how to properly do an A/B test. Optimizing Your Headlines: How Changing a Few Words Can Help (or Hurt) Conversion

Cool New Robot

I LOVE robots. I love making them, programming them, playing with them (hey, that sounded dirty). I can't get enough. Trossen Robotics is announcing a new project to create an autonomous mapping robot, called T.R.A.M.P. (Trossen Robotics Autonomous Mapping Platform).

The members of the Trossen Robotics Community are at it once again, this time collaborating on a robotics project best described as “a Mars Rover, but for Earth”. This is quite an aggressive project, only made possible by the fact that the development team consists of a range of specialists working together.

The basis behind the project is to create a robot that will be shipped to various members of the Community to explore and log different areas around their house and outdoors. Once it has arrived and is set loose in its new environment it will scan the surroundings using an array of sensors and upload the results to the official Tramp website. Features include:

• The ability to track and log its travel around the world via GPS, displayed via Google Maps.
• Scan its surroundings using cameras, range sensors, and LIDAR.
• Use sensory data to create a 2D and 3D render of the area around it.
• Sample and log the environmental air quality.
• An onboard PC for the main controller.
• Pictures, video, and statistics will be uploaded to the site.

Quick Joke of the Day

Thought For the Day

There is more money being spent on breast implants and Viagra today than on Alzheimer's research. This means that by 2040 there should be a large elderly population with perky boobs and huge erections and absolutely no recollection of what to do with them. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Large Hadron Collider

I'm so excited the LHC is finally coming online. I can't wait to see the results of some of the experiments in the coming months, once everything has been setup and configured. Someone set up a webcam at the LHC. There's not usually much going on, but it's kinda fun just to watch everyone working on the equipment. LHC Compact Muon Solenoid Experiment Webcams

Your Moment of Cat Zen

Here it is, your Moment of Cat Zen Cat Zen Images courtesy of: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

Quick Joke of the Day

You're so stupid that you looked in a bowl of cherios and said...''O LOOK, DONUT SEEDS!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

You Don't Really Understand Google

A lot of people think that Google lives and dies with online success alone, and that this state of affairs will never change. I hate to have to tell you this, but you're all wrong. The Wall Street Journal reports of an advertising deal between Mountain View and General Electric's NBC Universal unit. No, Google isn't going to carpet-bomb the Sci-Fi Channel and CNBC with obnoxious brand-builder ads, the way Yahoo! yodeled all over your TV a decade ago. This deal goes the other way. Google will sell advertising time on NBC's portfolio of cable channels nationwide, according to the WSJ report. The broadcasting giant is thinking about expanding the plan to cover local NBC networks as well. In a deliciously ironic twist, this includes MSNBC, in which Microsoft still holds an 18% ownership stake. It's easy to imagine office chairs getting flung across some posh Redmond office. The companies will share revenue from the ads, although how many television spots NBC will make available through Google remains unclear. The companies said they may adapt the service for use in NBC's local markets, where NBC owns affiliates of its flagship network, Spanish-language stations and other properties, including Web sites. As impressive as Google's online advertising power is, that's still a vanishingly small part of the overall ad market compared to traditional media: television, radio, billboards, brightly shrink-wrapped cars, and so on. AdAge says that only 6.8% of the nation's marketing dollars were spent on online marketing last year, whereas traditional channels like print and television spots composed 58% of the market. That's why Google is pursuing all of these other marketing avenues as well. A diversified revenue stream is always a good idea, just in case some new upstart comes along to steal Big G's online thunder. Eventually, Web marketing just might be as traditional as a half-sheet spread in the New York Times All the same, those old tools may never go entirely out of style, and there's a lot of money still flowing through those staid old channels.

Anonymous Newspaper Commenters Protected By Same Law That Protects Reporters' Sources

From TechDirt:

While other countries often don't respect the right to be anonymous, the US has shown a strong willingness to protect anonymity rights. And, here's another such case, but for a somewhat different reason. Gigalaw points us to the news that a court has ruled that the Billings Gazette newspaper doesn't need to reveal anonymous commenters, relying on the same state (not federal) law that protects reporters in the state from having to reveal sources. The law specifically says that news organizations are protected from being forced to disclose "any information obtained or prepared" by the news organization -- and the identify of anonymous commenters apparently qualifies.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Woman Threatens To Hold Broadband Repair Guy Hostage - Arrested

We all get frustrated by the cable and utility companies when they give us a scheduled time of "between 9am and 4pm", and then the repair person arrives at 5pm. Finally someone did something to get even (although she paid for it by getting arrested). Carol Sinclair had talked to about 20 different tech support people for her broadband provider, before the company finally sent a person to fix her problem. Carol admits she was a little rude to the repair person when he arrived, though she explained the frustration to the tech when he arrived. When the repair person said the problem wasn't the broadband provider's fault, she allegedly threatened to hold him hostage. (Slashdot) Mrs. Sinclair denies the charge, and says she merely stated, "I don't want to hold you hostage, but would you mind hanging around until the other technician arrives so that the two of you can sort it out." Except, the guy did take it literally and "escaped" (though, it doesn't sound like she made any real effort to stop him) by claiming he needed something from his van to fix her connection, and then driving off. He then contacted the police, who arrested Sinclair for her attempted hostage-taking.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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A Message From John Scalzi

Dear Democrats, liberals and the like:

(tough love comments hidden behind the cut)

I know it’s a lot to ask at the moment, but could you possibly please stop publicly losing your shit all over the goddamn place? Honestly, it’s embarrassing. Did you really not know that coming out of the GOP convention, the GOP candidate might have a poll bounce? Likewise, were you somehow surprised that the GOP might try very hard to make this campaign about something other than actual issues? Did you expect them to try to run on the last eight years, or even pretend that they own them? What the fuck is wrong with you?

No, seriously: What the fuck is wrong with you? The GOP picks a woman VP 24 years after you do, for the same goddamn reason you did (a contentless call to shore up a shrinking base), and you act like you’ve never seen this movie before? I just don’t know what to say to you about that. Also: squirting yourself messy over a vice presidential candidate. Good fucking gravy, how off the fucking script can you possibly get. For God’s sake, she’s scandal-plagued Atwater spawn from a state with the population of Fort Worth, Texas, whose job it will be to work the lights of the Naval Observatory for four years. She’s a walking, taking advertisement for how easily placated religious conservatives are at this moment in history. She doesn’t walk on water, unless it’s frozen and the moose she’s hunting has wandered out on it. So will you please focus.

Read the full entry at: A Previous Message Repeated, Slightly More Forcefully

10 Things That Annoy Programmers

I found an interesting article on the Ten Things That Annoy Programmers. My favorites were #8 - Scope Creep, #6 Documenting Our Applications (oh, I hate to do that), and #3 - Vagueness. I laughed so hard at #1 (because I've found myself doing it many times)

1. Their own code, 6 months later Ever look back at some of your old code and grimace in pain? How stupid you were! How could you, who know so much now, have written that? Burn it! Burn it with fire! Well, good news. You're not alone. The truth is, the programming world is one that is constantly changing. What we regard as a best practice today can be obsolete tomorrow. It's simply not possible to write perfect code because the standards upon which our code is judged is evolving every day. It's tough to cope with the fact that your work, as beautiful as it may be now, is probably going to be ridiculed later. It's frustrating because no matter how much research we do into the latest and greatest tools, designs, frameworks, and best practices, there's always the sense that what we're truly after is slightly out of reach. For me, this is the most annoying thing about being a programmer. The fragility of what we do is necessary to facilitate improvement, but I can't help feeling like I'm one of those sand-painting monks.

Homeland Security Denies Asylum Based on Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a great source for information, especially when you understand that anyone can edit Wikipedia articles. Now comes the strange case of DHS (Department of Homeland Security) denying asylum to a woman based information found in a wikipedia article.

DHS decided to deport Badasa after consulting Wikipedia to decide whether a Ethiopian travel document known as a laissez-passer was adequate to prove her identity. Using the Wikipedia page as evidence, the government convinced an immigration judge that the document did not prove her identity, calling it a one-way travel document based on information provided by the applicant. While the Board of Immigration Appeals subsequently said it didn't "encourage the use of resources such as Wikipedia.com in reaching pivotal decisions in immigration proceedings," it allowed the decision to stand since it couldn't find any clear error.

The woman filed an appeal and won her case. The appeals court basically said Wikipedia is not an official source of information for approving/denying asylum.

The three-judge panel of the appeals court found that split decision disturbing. The court reiterated that anyone can edit Wikipedia and there's no guarantee that the information on the page at the time the government officials looked at it had any correct information at all. The site may have misled and tainted government officials' decisions in the case, the judges ruled. The appeals court sent the case back down to the Board of Immigration Appeals to have it explain why it believes Wikipedia didn't taint the entire decision-making process.

Studying - Can It Be So Easy?

I'm preparing to go back to school (ok, not until next year, but I like to prepare early). I found a couple of articles on how to study effectively and get the classes you want when you really want. The Secret Art of Stealth Studying

Imagine only having to study for one hour the day before a test? No more stress. No more long nights. It’s possible. During my research for Straight-A I came across exactly two out of the fifty students I interviewed who managed to accomplish this goal. (And were loving life because of it). Their technique is a little-known art I like to call: Stealth Studying.

How To Register For Classes

Before getting started, you need to gather all of the information you will need, including but not limited to:

• Your current class report. At LMU, these go by the euphemism “CAPP Report.” It’s the thing that reminds you which classes you have (and sometimes haven’t) taken.
• Class bulletin. You know, the thing with the information on what you need to complete your major.
• Any past roadmaps you’ve made for yourself. You might have a “timeline” of sorts with your whole 4/5-year plan. For those of us who are over-organized, this might be in the form of an Excel spreadsheet. For me, I just use paper.
• A few hours of peace and quiet. The sooner you get started, the sooner it gets done…

Your Moment of Cat Zen

Here it is, your Moment of Cat Zen Cat Zen Images courtesy of: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

Your Moment of Cat Zen

Here it is, your Moment of Cat Zen Cat Zen Images courtesy of: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

The Un-Green Revolution

I'm a big Green lover (ask my wife). I try to buy green products, organic foods, energy efficient appliances, etc. Almost a year ago, I upgrade my home PC. I love the upgrade (quad core CPU, 4G RAM, 756MB Video, 2TB SATA drives, etc). However, one thing that troubled me during the upgrade was the amount of power needed for the GPU (graphics processing unit, or the video card). I had been using a 500W power supply, but it never peaked over 250W. The new video card could put my whole system into using up to 850W! I even had to get a new UPS (uninterrupted power supply) because the old one couldn't put out 800W. Seems others are taking notice with how the GPU manufacturers are steadingly increasing the amount of power needed for their cards. We've almost hit a limit (for extreme PC's). The standard wall outlet has a finite amount of power it can supply. In fact, some new extreme PC's need a special wall outlet like you find for refrigerators and washer/dryers!

Comcast appeals FCC Web-blocking decision

Last month, the FCC determined that Comcast is violating a federal policy that guarantees unfettered access to the Internet. Now, Comcast is challenging the FCC decision in the U.S. District Court of Appeals in Washington.

The Comcast case arose from complaints by users of a type of "file-sharing" software often used to download large data files, usually video.

Tests by The Associated Press and others found that file-sharing transmissions were aborting prematurely. It was later discovered that the company was cutting off transfers without informing customers.

The FCC noted Comcast's network management practices were "discriminatory and arbitrary" and that the company's practices "contravene industry standards and have significantly impeded Internet users' ability to use applications and access content of their choice."

The agency also noted that the type of traffic Comcast is blocking has become "a competitive threat" to cable operators because it is used by people to view high-quality video that they "might otherwise watch (and pay for) on cable television."

While the FCC did not impose a fine on Comcast (unfortunately), it did require Comcast to document how it shapes network traffic, or "discriminatory network management". Meanwhile, a public interest law firm representing two consumer groups and a California company that benefits from the type of file-sharing software targeted by Comcast filed appeals in New York, Philadelphia and San Francisco. The legal challenges, filed last week, ask the court to force Comcast to cease its management practices immediately rather than by the end of the year. Let's all hope the appeals court agrees with the FCC. We really don't need our ISP's "shaping" our network traffic. This is just another attempt by the ISP's to provide as little service for as much price as possible. Network Neutrality, FTW!

Thinking Makes You Eat More

I knew this from personal experience for quite a well, but now it's official - thinking makes us pig out. According to a study that sheds new light on brain food, intellectual activities make people eat more than when just resting.

Researchers split 14 university student volunteers into three groups for a 45-minute session of either relaxing in a sitting position, reading and summarizing a text, or completing a series of memory, attention, and vigilance tests on the computer. Story continues below ?advertisement The scientists had determined beforehand that the thinking sessions consumed only three calories more than resting. After the sessions, the participants were invited to eat as much as they pleased. Though the study involved a very small number of participants, the results were stark. The students who had done the computer tests downed 253 more calories, or 29.4 percent more than the couch potatoes. Those who had summarized a text consumed 203 more calories than the resting group. Blood samples taken before, during, and after revealed that intellectual work causes much bigger fluctuations in glucose levels than rest periods, perhaps owing to the stress of thinking.

Why do we do this? Glucose is converted by the body from carbohydrates and is supplied to the brain via the bloodstream. The brain cannot make glucose and so needs a constant supply. Brain cells need twice as much energy as other cells in the body. But remember, you must exercise to balance your caloric intake. Thinking only burns a few extra calories (even though you need more glucose), so exercising to burn off the additional consumed calories is important.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Top 20 Websites - Then and Now

Forbes has an interesting article of the Top 20 Websites - Then and Now. There are some surprising (for me, anyway) results. For example, I find it hard to believe that Real Networks is number 19 this year. Maybe its just me, since I never use Real products, and won't even open .rm files (I don't trust Real, and neither should you). Is Fox really getting 70,000,000 hits a year? Really? WTF? YouTube (#6) is behind AOL Media (#5)? I thought we got rid of the AOLiens. A surprising sites which I've never even heard of - Glam Media (#17). Something interesting is that About.com is number 14 in both 2005 and 2008. MSN is #3 in both 2005 and 2008. That's what happens when you set everyone's home page in IE to be MSN. It doesn't surprise me that Google is #1, but it does surprise me Yahoo! is #2. I would have thought YouTube or one of the blogging sites (such as Blogger or WordPress, neither of which appears) would be #2.

Can Blizzard Be Beaten? Maybe...

For those of you following Blizzard's many attempts to shut down botters, gold farmers, and the like through legal actions, you may be feeling a little despondent after the recent failure of the court when a judge agreed with Blizzard that modifying an program's memory is the same as copyright violation. There may be some good news. An unnamed party sued Blizzard for banning his account. Blizzard had banned the account for botting (a violation of the World of Warcraft ToS). The unnamed party admits he botted on the account. However, the party sued citing a decision in SoftMan Products Co. v. Adobe Systems Inc, which basically says SoftMan had purchased software and not just a license. This will be interesting to watch in the future, as Blizzard contends we WoW players are buying a license, and not software. The difference is that if we buy software, we are free to modify the memory of the program on our own machine. Buying software means we bought a product, and have the rights and warranties of having bought a product. If we buy a license, we are bound by the items in the EULA and are prevented from accessing or modifying the memory of the program running on our machine. Buying a license means we bought permission to use a product, and have restricted rights and warranties. Since we have precedence of a judge ruling we actually bought software, I think this tactic could be used over and over with Blizzard. Blizzard does not want to have a recent court ruling agree with this previous ruling, as it would damage their case against MDY and other companies. If you've been banned recently by Blizzard, you might consider sueing Blizzard and cite SoftMan Products Co. v. Adobe Systems Inc. The unnamed party from above got his account back plus a free year of WoW. It cost him court costs and filing fees (which amount to about one year of WoW service).

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Reading, Reading, Reading

I've been reading this great series by Steven L. Kent. The series is based about 500 years in the future, when man has space travel and a device which allows ships to teleport to other arms of the galaxy. This device is like a hub, and allows for instant travel to other sections of the galaxy which have a similar device installed. The Unified Authority, the governing body of mankind, creates clones for it's military. The clones, however, don't know they are clones. If they learn they are a clone, a special gland in their brain activates and kills them. It's a way for the government to protect itself from its warrior class. The hero, Wayson Harris, learns he is a clone, but he doesn't die. He learns he is a special kind of clone, and the last of his batch. His breed of clones are designed for special combat. They are vicious in combat, taller than the standard clone, and are addicted to fighting. I have just finished the last available book in the series. A fourth book is coming out next month. These books are so good, I read the second and third ones in one day (each)! I couldn't put them down.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Need a Minute

I got back from my (too short) vacation to Pennsylvania, last night. Today might be kinda light on the posting while I catch up with everything. I should be fully back up and running tomorrow.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

Here it is, your Moment of Cat Zen Cat Zen Images courtesy of: http://icanhascheezburger.com/

Can You Sue for a Backlink?

Here's an interesting idea... suppose someone creates a link to your site, but you don't want that link pointing to your site? There is nothing, inherently wrong with link (for example, it won't affect your SEO), you just don't like the site or company the link comes from. What do you do? In case of a Sheboygan woman, the city of Sheboygan sent a "cease and desist" letter to have the links removed. The woman, Jennifer Reisinger, says she felt intimidated by the city, so removed the links. Reisinger alleges her First Amendment rights were violated by the city. She seeks $250,000 in compensatory damages, unspecified punitive damages and unspecified declaratory relief. After reading the article, I gotta say I agree with Ms. Reisinger. It seems to me like the mayor and his staff were trying to retaliate against her because of her (failed) effort to have the mayor recalled. I'm very interested to see how this turns out. Read the full story: Sheboygan women files landmark case over Web links