Sequoia's Optical Scan Vote Counting Machines Giving Different Results Every Time

Wired is running a long, and somewhat scary, report about the ongoing situation in Palm Beach, where every time the votes are counted, a different vote count comes out. A test was set up by the local newspaper to scan a sampling of ballots, and every time the results of those tests were different -- sometimes in extreme ways. Quite often, the machines seemed to count perfectly marked ballots as invalid, while at other times it accepted votes from invalid ballots. In other words, the machines basically don't work. And we're relying on them in many areas for the election coming up in a month. Isn't that comforting?

High Court Grants Marriage Rights For Same-Sex Couples

The Connecticut Supreme Court grants same-sex marriage rights. The state Supreme Court's 4-3 decision Friday that same-sex couples have the right to marry swept through the state with the force of a cultural tidal wave. While lead plaintiff Beth Kerrigan and her partner -- soon to be wife -- embraced and sobbed after learning of the ruling, opponents vowed to pursue a long and complicated route to change the constitution to ban gay marriage. The Supreme Court released its historic ruling at 11:30 a.m. Citing the equal protection clause of the state constitution, the justices ruled that civil unions were discriminatory and that the state's "understanding of marriage must yield to a more contemporary appreciation of the rights entitled to constitutional protection." "Interpreting our state constitutional provisions in accordance with firmly established equal protection principles leads inevitably to the conclusion that gay persons are entitled to marry the otherwise qualified same sex partner of their choice," the majority wrote. "To decide otherwise would require us to apply one set of constitutional principles to gay persons and another to all others." A relevant comment about that topic from the Connecticut Supreme Court ruling:

Although we acknowledge that many legislators and many of their constituents hold strong personal convictions with respect to preserving the traditional concept of marriage as a heterosexual institution, such beliefs, no matter how deeply held, do not constitute the exceedingly persuasive justification required to sustain a statute that discriminates on the basis of a quasi-suspect classification.

Barack Obama - The American Promise

Barack Obama's American Promise

Sarah Palin - Working With Her Daughter

MeetWay Lets You Meet in the Middle

MeetWays is a Google Maps mashup with one simple but useful goal in mind: to help you find the perfect meetup point. In use it's simple—just enter the your address and the address of the person you're meeting with, then specify what sort of meeting place you'd like to find (e.g., coffee, pizza, library). MeetWays finds and marks the halfway point, then drops pins in the nearest businesses matching your search.

Quick Joke of the Day

A man walked into a bar on a slow night and sat down. After a few minutes, the bartender asked him if he wanted a drink. He replied, "No thanks. I don't drink. I tried it once, but I didn't like it." So the bartender said, "Well, would you like a cigarette?" But the man said, "No thanks. I don't smoke. I tried it once, but I didn't like it." The bartender asked him if he'd like to play a game of pool, and again the man said, "No thanks. I don't like pool. I tried it once, but I didn't like it. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't be here at all, but I'm waiting for my son." The bartender said, "Your only son, I'm guessing." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

News from Saturn (and JPL)

A quick update on the Cassini mission and the flyby's of Saturn's moons Enceladus and Titan.

It's a Sad Day in Jumbledtown

As is my normal practice, I do a backup of my files and software once per week. I have a more time intensive backup that I do once a month (and store in an off-site location). Today, I turned on the external hard drive which holds my movie and TV show collection... and was greated with "whee whEE whee whEE" (never a good sound to hear from your hard drive). I tried everything I could - plug in the USB cable instead of firewire cable, try different cables, connect the drive to another computer, use a special USB tool for connecting internal drives to a USB port. Nothing worked. The drive is shot and and I can't get any Windows (XP nor Vista) to recognize it. *cry* I have two problems. First, the movie drive is my second largest hard drive, so when I do backups, I'm not able to back up all the movies and TV shows I've accumulated over the years. Second, I recently upgraded the hard drive in my TiVo, and in the process, repurposed the movie backup hard drive (because I didn't yet know the original movie drive was dead). Now I have no movie drive, and no movie backups! The movies I can get again, for the most part, as I have the original DVD's. But, I'm really mourning the loss of the TV shows I've collected, most of which don't play on TV, now. Shows such as Spy School (where brits learn to be MI6 spies), Taken, and more. This is the second time I've lost the movie drive. At least the first time, I had a 50% backup to restore from. Now I've got nothing. *cry*

Quick Joke of the Day

A wealthy family took their frail, elderly grandmother to a famous and expensive nursing home and left her, hoping she would be well cared for. The next morning, the nurses luxuriously bathed her- fed her a tasty breakfast cooked by a famous chef, and set her in a chair at a window overlooking a lovely flower garden. She seemed okay, but after a while she slowly started to tilt sideways in her chair. Two attentive nurses immediately rushed up to catch her and straighten her up. Again she seemed okay, but after a while she slowly started to tilt over to her other side. The nurses rushed back and once more brought her back upright. This went on all morning. Later, the family arrived to see how the old woman was adjusting to her new home. "So Grandma, how is it here? Are they treating you all right?" "It's pretty nice," she replied. "Except they won't let me fart." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

Can You Really Die of a Broken Heart?

Dying beside the love of your life and passing into eternity together is the stuff of legends, but it’s also a documented phenomenon among longtime couples. Studies around the world have shown that the rate of mortality spikes among bereaved spouses soon after their beloved has died. One study published last year by researchers at the University of Glasgow followed more than 4,000 couples and found that, on average, widows and widowers were at least 30 percent more likely to die of any cause in the first six months following a spouse’s death than those who hadn’t lost a partner. Another large study in Jerusalem found the bereaved spouse's risk of death during those first six months rose by up to 50 percent. “We see it all the time,” says Dr. Hope Wechkin, the medical director of Evergreen Hospice in Kirkland, Wash. “Often a patient will come on to [hospice] service and we find out their spouse has died six weeks earlier or so. … I think it’s about connection. For many people, their spouse represents their greatest sense of connection to this world.” Some theorize the toll of grief can be too much for those who are already aged and physically fragile. The more spiritually minded believe that the bond between some couples may be so strong that when one soul departs, the other chooses to follow. Others say there are medical causes at work. The No. 1 cause of death of a bereaved spouse is heart disease and sudden death, meaning the heart stops, says Dr. Lee Lipsenthal, an internist and expert in cardiac rehabilitation who founded Finding Balance in a Medical Life, a Marin County, Calif., organization that focuses on physician well-being. "Generally within 18 months is the risk period," says Lipsenthal, "It's relatively close to the death and it diminishes over time." Those who are elderly and physically fragile are more likely to die after the death of a spouse than a younger widow or widower, says Wechkin, whose own grandparents died less than two weeks apart. “The death of a spouse places you at risk … but context matters a lot,” she says. “If you’re perfectly healthy, your risk is very low.” Doctors have long known that stress hormones such as cortisol, epinephrine and norepinephrine that are raised by grief can take a damaging toll on the body. But there may be other forces at play as well. Research shows that in some cases, one person’s heartbeat can affect, even regulate, another’s, possibly acting as a type of life support. In one such study, Rollin McCraty, research director at the Institute of HeartMath in Boulder Creek, Calif., looked at what happened to six longtime couples' hearts while they slept. Heart-rate monitors revealed that during the night, as the couple slept beside each other, their heart rhythms fell into sync, rising and falling at the same time. When the printouts of their EKGs were placed on top of each other, they looked virtually the same. “When people are in a relationship for 20, 30, 40, 50 years, they create sort of a co-energetic resonance with each other,” says Lipsenthal, who is the past director of Dr. Dean Ornish’s Preventative Medicine Research Institute in Sausalito, Calif. “A simple analogy is two tuning forks, put next to each other. They create a co-resonant pitch. What happens when two people sleep together for 50 years? What happens when one goes away?” In recent years, another condition has come to light: Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, also known as “broken heart syndrome.” The condition nearly always follows a traumatic emotional loss, such as death of a spouse, parent or child and it primarily affects women. It causes chest pain and sudden heart failure, believed to be brought on by a surge of fight or flight hormones, says Dr. Barbara Messinger-Rapport, a geriatrician at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. Patients with the condition tend to recover faster than most other heart patients, says Messinger-Rapport. And if they survive the initial bout, it almost never recurs. “Is it possible to die of a broken heart?” says Wechkin. “Absolutely.”

The Best of Late Night

During the debate, John McCain sparked a controversy when he referred to Barack Obama as "that one." Afterwards, McCain said, "What — like I’m supposed to remember everyone's name now?” -Conan O'Brien I don’t want to say the debate was boring, but I didn’t think a political event could be that dull without the help of Al Gore. -Jay Leno Because of all the international focus on the election, the debate was broadcast in foreign countries all across Europe, Asia, and South America. Or as Sarah Palin calls them — "Russia.” -Conan O'Brien I did take exception to McCain calling Obama “that one.” I can’t think of anytime it would be appropriate to call a United States senator “that one.” Well, maybe if you had to pick a senator out of a lineup. -Craig Ferguson "Possible controversy for the Obama campaign. Republicans are now accusing Barack Obama's campaign of voter fraud, because some of the people they've registered sound like they have fake names. Apparently, the fakest-sounding name is Barack Obama." -Conan O'Brien "Yeah, the economy is going to hell, but at least we're getting leadership from the White House. That's the important thing, ladies and gentlemen. Thank God for that." -David Letterman "Nation, what a debate last Thursday. Both candidates surpassed expectations. Sarah Palin proved she could speak, and Joe Biden proved he could stop speaking." -Stephen Colbert "John McCain has pulled out of Michigan. I guess the surge wasn't working. Yup, this is stunning to me. John McCain blew off Michigan. Well, I know how they feel. Maybe you noticed that all of John McCain's problems began when he bailed out on this show? Were you aware of that? The road to the White House runs right through here." -David Letterman "The second presidential debate is tonight. And beforehand, I don't know if you heard this, John McCain said, 'The gloves are coming off.' That's what he said, yeah. Yeah, then McCain said, 'but don't worry, the diaper is staying on.'" -Conan O'Brien

After nearly 45 years of marriage, a couple was lying in bed one evening, when the wife felt her husband, begin to massage her in ways he hadn't in quite some time. It almost tickled as his fingers started at her neck, and then began moving down past the small of her back. He then caressed her shoulders and neck, slowly worked his hand down, stopping just over her stomach. He then proceeded to place his hand on her left inner arm, working down her side, passing gently over her buttock and down her leg to her calf. Then, he proceeded up her thigh, stopping just at the uppermost portion of her leg. He continued in the same manner on her right side, then suddenly stopped, rolled over and became silent. As she had become quite aroused by this caressing, she asked in a loving voice, 'Honey, that was wonderful. Why did you stop?' To which he responded: "I found the remote." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

Government: Data mining doesn't work

The most extensive government report to date on whether terrorists can be identified through data mining has yielded an important conclusion: It doesn't really work.

A National Research Council report, years in the making and scheduled to be released Tuesday, concludes that automated identification of terrorists through data mining or any other mechanism "is neither feasible as an objective nor desirable as a goal of technology development efforts." Inevitable false positives will result in "ordinary, law-abiding citizens and businesses" being incorrectly flagged as suspects.

The whopping 352-page report, called "Protecting Individual Privacy in the Struggle Against Terrorists," amounts to at least a partial repudiation of the Defense Department's controversial data-mining program called Total Information Awareness, which was limited by Congress in 2003.

The report was written by a committee whose members include William Perry, a professor at Stanford University; Charles Vest, the former president of MIT; W. Earl Boebert, a retired senior scientist at Sandia National Laboratories; Cynthia Dwork of Microsoft Research; R. Gil Kerlikowske, Seattle's police chief; and Daryl Pregibon, a research scientist at Google.

But the authors conclude the type of data mining that government bureaucrats would like to do--perhaps inspired by watching too many episodes of the Fox series 24--can't work. "If it were possible to automatically find the digital tracks of terrorists and automatically monitor only the communications of terrorists, public policy choices in this domain would be much simpler. But it is not possible to do so."

By itself, of course, this is merely a report with non-binding recommendations that Congress and the executive branch could ignore. But NRC reports are not radical treatises written by an advocacy group; they tend to represent a working consensus of technologists and lawyers.

The great encryption debate of the 1990s was one example. The NRC's so-called CRISIS report on encryption in 1996 concluded export controls--that treated software like Web browsers and PGP as munitions--were a failure and should be relaxed. That eventually happened two years later.

Quick Joke of the Day

A woman announces to her friend that she is getting married for the fourth time. "How wonderful! But I hope you don't mind me asking what happened to your first husband?" "He ate poisonous mushrooms and died." "Oh, how tragic! What about your second husband?" "He ate poisonous mushrooms too and died." "Oh, how terrible! I'm almost afraid to ask you about your third husband." "He died of a broken neck." "A broken neck?" "He wouldn't eat the mushrooms." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

How Many Cigarettes Do You Smoke?

I quit smoking about ten years ago, but it still amazes me how many cigarettes I smoked (or could have smoked if I didn't quit). SmokeCount shows you, in a fun and entertaining way, how many cigarettes you've smoked (or could have smoked). It also has tools to help you quit smoking (or, if you want to continue to smoke, they have tools to help you do that, too ;) SmokeCount And remember, smoking could be good for the economy, because we all need to buy, buy, buy (hint, that was sarcasm).

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

Two fraternity brothers decide to go sailing one afternoon and become lost. After twenty hours with nothing to eat or drink, one of them spots a lamp floating by. He picks it up and a genie pops out. The genie notices the poor condition of the brothers and grants them one wish between the two of them. After a lot of arguing over who gets the wish, one of them blurts out, "I wish the ocean was made of beer." Magically, the ocean turns to beer. Infuriated, the other guy yells, "You idiot! Now we have to piss in the boat!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

Call Yourself to Politely Escape Social Situations

Fake Call is a quick and easy way to "call yourself" in order to politely escape social situations. While pretending to receive a phone call is possible without any special software, this usually takes too many awkward key presses and fumbling. Fake Call makes it as easy as pressing 1 button, and provides an extremely realistic incoming call experience. It also includes powerful scheduling and personalization features in a simple, unobtrusive user interface. Fake Call Features * Schedule a Fake Call in advance, or generate one on demand. * Simple, touch-friendly user interface to quickly schedule a call using predefined intervals (5 minutes to 1 hour). * Select a caller from your phone's Contacts. The selected contacts photo and phone number appear when the phone rings. * Totally realistic incoming call experience using your phone's default ringtone and profile settings. * Fast, small and optimized for Windows Mobile using native C++ code. Does its job and gets out of your way quickly. Fake Call For Windows Mobile Phones

A Plan to Save the Country

During the much-anticipated (and, I'm guessing, soon forgotten) debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin last week, there was a small kerfuffle after Palin accused Biden of saying that raising taxes is patriotic. Turned out that what Biden really said was that paying taxes is patriotic, a view so heavily endorsed by all parties that it's actually illegal not to pay them - unless you maintain a post-office box in the Cayman Islands or find write-offs that offset what you owe.

That's probably not you, though, so it would be a good idea for you to keep paying your taxes unless you want to pay lawyers later. I understand that's something of a bummer, but then so is an irregularly shaped mole on your neck.

But the thing is, see, if Biden had said what Palin said he said (which he didn't), he would have been right. Raising taxes is patriotic. Raising taxes is what we can do to make our country, our patria, stronger.

It is amazing to watch the political discourse. Here we are about $10 trillion in debt, not counting whatever this latest bailout is going to cost; social services are being cut all over the place; entitlements are rising with no plan about how to cap them or pay for them; veterans services, national parks, NASA, the EPA, pick your own favorite - underfunded, decaying, not doing whatever it is we want them to do.

Oh, and where are we going to get the money? Oh, we will cut wasteful spending, that's what we'll do. Even better, we'll give people a tax break, so that will stimulate spending and we will grow the economy and then finally people will owe taxes and the government will get more money. Like that worked.

There is a different way that doesn't depend on some elaborate and discredited triple flip off the high board of economic theory - raise taxes. The American people have a whole lot of wealth. Is it excess wealth? That depends. When the fire truck that is paid for by the government comes and puts out a fire in your house, were the higher municipal taxes you paid extra wealth? Or were they a sound investment?

Oh, but suppose it's your neighbor's house that is burning down. You don't get anything from a rapid response, do you? No, but see, we are social creatures and we live in a society, and that means we help each other. I help you for selfish reasons, because I believe you will help me when the tables are turned. That's why, say, we help out the indigent, because one day we (or, say, our mothers) might be indigent; we help sick people because one day we might be sick, and so forth. It's almost like a contract, a social contract.

I wish once, just once, a politician would say, "You know, given how messed up everything is, probably we should raise taxes." Of course, all the other politicians would make little o's with their mouths, because the unspeakable had been spoken, but maybe a few people who've actually been paying attention would say, yeah, OK, I could kick in an extra $5 a month if my brother is suffering, if my sister is jobless, if my water is dirty and my son is dying on a desert far from home - yes, I could do that.

Then that politician would get demagogued to death by the power-drunk plutocrats, but it would be a nice effort.

So here's my plan: Instead of cutting taxes for the rich or for the middle class, how about we raise them for everybody? Why? Because we need the money!

Source: Jon Carrol - A Modest Like Proposal

Quick Joke of the Day

Three young boys were fighting over whose dad was the best. "My dad is so good he can shoot an arrow, run after it, get in front of it, and catch it in his bare hands." "My dad is so good that he can shoot a gun, run after the bullet, get in front of it and catch it in his bare hands." "I've got you both beat. My dad's so good because he works for the city. He gets off work at 5:00 and is home by 4:30." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Creative, Artistic and Geeky Cake Designs

Over at Web Urbanist, they have a list of 20 Creative, Artistic and Geeky Cake Designs. I know what kind of cake I want for my next birthday :D

Loss of Control Can Make You Superstitious

Paranoia, superstitions, and conspiracy theories may result from our need to take control of chaotic moments in our lives. Psychologists Jennifer Whitson and Adam Galinsky proposed in the current issue of Science that "when individuals are unable to gain a sense of control objectively, they will try to gain it perceptually." For example, if your productivity and competence at work are unappreciated and unrewarded, you may feel powerless over the situation. As a result, you might associate random, unrelated events with positive or negative moments at work. You could start seeing nonexistent conspiracy theories against your success, feel paranoia toward your coworkers, and perform good luck rituals to have better days.

In a series of six experiments, Whitson and Galinsky attempted to directly correlate lack of control with illusory perceptions. In the first two, they were able to establish that participants will seek patterns to compensate for unmanageable conditions. To simulate lack-of-control circumstances, they gave volunteers random feedback that was unrelated to their responses. Participants lacking control saw more nonexistent images in pictures and scored higher on the Personal Need for Structure Scale than those who were not treated to random feedback.

Superstitions and good luck rituals may also result from the human need for control. Whitson and Galinsky presented participants three scenarios that each contained two unconnected events, like "knocking on wood before an important meeting and getting one's idea approved." Participants who were asked to remember uncontrolled situations from the past saw more connection between the unrelated events and thought that good luck actions were important in the future.

The relationship between control and false perceptions can be applied to a volatile stock market, as well. Whitson and Galinsky offered two companies to participants after giving them performance statements about each company. The percent of positive statements was the same for both companies, but the total quantity was different. Company A had eight negative and 16 positive statements, while company B had four negative and eight positive statements. Participants were asked to recall how many negative statements there were for each company after making a choice. In an unstable market, 75 percent of participants chose company A over B. They remembered more negativity toward company B because they "overestimated the infrequent type of information (negative) with the infrequently represented group (company B)."

Self-affirmation appears to combat the disorderly feeling from losing control. After lack-of-control conditioning, participants who self-affirmed saw just as few imaginary patterns in pictures as volunteers who were not treated to any type of conditioning.

The next time you feel control sliding away, it may help to remind yourself of all the positive qualities that you possess. Self-affirmation procedures can provide a sense of control that is healthier than illusory pattern seeking. Whitson and Galinsky write that psychological security "reduce the obsessive-compulsive tendencies or sinister attributions engendered by seeing too much meaning and intentions in others' innocuous behaviors."

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

A retired gentleman went to the social security office to apply for Social Security. The woman behind the counter asked him for his driver's license to verify his age. He looked in his pockets and realized he had left his wallet at home. He told the woman that he was very sorry but he seemed to have left his wallet at home. "I will have to go home and come back later." The woman says, "Unbutton your shirt." So he opens his shirt revealing curly silver hair. She says, "That silver hair on your chest is proof enough for me" and she processed his Social Security application. When he gets home, the man excitedly tells his wife about his experience at the social security office. She says, "You should have dropped your pants. You might have gotten disability too." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

World of Warcraft Bot Site For Sale

One of the leading World of Warcraft Bots, Rhabot, has placed itself up for sale on business/website auction site SitePoint. The bot appears to be making some good money, $1,300 per month according to the auction information. This could be a great invest for a gold farming company or power leveling company. I have used Rhabot for a long time, and find it to be one of the best commercial bots. It has support for auto equipping, training, questing, and the author recently finished an auto navigation module. World of Warcraft Bot Company For Sale on SitePoint.com.

The Best of Late Night

A new poll shows only 1 out of 4 people approve of the job President Bush is doing. That means when he’s having dinner with his wife and two daughters, he’s the only one at the table who thinks he’s doing a good job. -Jay Leno During the Sarah Plain interview with Katie Couric on CBS News, Sarah Palin could not remember the name of a newspaper or magazine that she reads. I was thinking, “Wow — possibly, a leader of the country who doesn’t read.” Then I thought, “Well hell, it’s worked pretty well for George Bush.” -David Letterman Economists are now claiming that our nation’s leaders didn’t properly explain the bailout plan to the public. After hearing this, President Bush said, "While you’re at it, someone should explain it to me.” -Conan O'Brien The vice presidential debate is tomorrow night. Joe Biden already gearing up: He went to the hair salon and told the guy to put a little more on top. -Jay Leno Last night during an interview on CBS, Sarah Palin said, "One of my best friends is a lesbian, and I love her dearly." After hearing this, Bill Clinton said, "Prove it.” -Conan O'Brien Congress voted against the bailout. They were told to vote their conscience. That totally confused them . . . they said, “What?!?” -Jay Leno New York’s Mayor Bloomberg, he’s been in office for two terms, wants to be mayor for three terms; and right now he’s trying to get around the term limits so he can run again. I bet he can — by God, he got around the height requirement. -David Letterman Yesterday, the Dow Jones dropped 777 points, which wiped out $1.2 trillion dollars in the stock market. Financial experts say the last time so much money disappeared in one day was when Oprah left her purse in a cab. -Conan O'Brien To give you an idea of how bad the economy is, over the weekend, I wrote a check and the bank bounced. -Jay Leno Yesterday at the White House, President Bush was visited by Jewish leaders, who wished him a happy Jewish New Year. The visit upset Bush, because now he thinks he missed Jewish Christmas. -Conan O'Brien The vice presidential debate is Thursday. Here’s what Sarah Palin should do: Let Joe Biden have the first question. He’ll take 90 minutes to answer . . . then say, “We’re out of time! Who could have seen that coming?” -Jay Leno Today, the House of Representatives voted against the Wall Street bailout plan, a plan which House Minority Leader John Boehner called "a crap sandwich." Congress hasn’t given up — they’re already working on a new plan they call "a crap sandwich with cheese.” -Conan O'Brien

Apple Finally Realizes That NDAs For Developers Are A Bad Idea

It was definitely surprising to see Apple trying to enforce an NDA to stop iPhone developers from talking about their applications, so it's nice to see Apple (for once!) respond to the backlash by dropping the NDA. However, the company's explanation for why it had the NDA in the first place doesn't make much sense:

We put the NDA in place because the iPhone OS includes many Apple inventions and innovations that we would like to protect, so that others don't steal our work. It has happened before. While we have filed for hundreds of patents on iPhone technology, the NDA added yet another level of protection. We put it in place as one more way to help protect the iPhone from being ripped off by others.

It's good that Apple has recognized that such NDA's significantly limit its developers. It's tough to have much of a developer "community" when said developers are barred from communicating.

Quick Joke of the Day

Reaching the end of a job interview, the Human Resources Person asked a young Engineer fresh out of MIT, "And what starting salary were you looking for?" The Engineer said, "In the neighborhood of $125,000 a year, depending on the benefits package." The interviewer said, "Well, what would you say to a package of 5 weeks vacation, 14 paid holidays, full medical and dental, a company matching retirement fund for 50% of your salary, and a company car leased every 2 years -- say, a red Corvette?" The Engineer sat up straight and said, "Wow! Are you kidding?" And the interviewer replied, "Yeah, but you started it." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Warioland - Shake It Up

I love how the Wii changes the way games are played. The tilt controllers, nun-chucks, etc really make you interact with the game. I watched a promotional video for Wario Land: Shake It! which really made me want to play it right now! If ever a full-body Wii controller could be used, this is the game to use it on. Wario Land: Shake It Promotional Video on YouTube

Trapster Maps and Alerts You About Speed Traps

Trapster maps speed traps on roads near you, and offers mobile phone applications that will alert you when you're coming up on one as you drive. Trapster's trap maps are all user-generated—as one Trapster user drives down the freeway and spots a trap, she hits a button on her mobile phone's Trapster app to report it. When you approach the same area running Trapster on your phone, you get an alert, and then you can confirm that the trap is indeed in that area. Trapster offers cellphone apps for Windows Mobile, the BlackBerry, the Nokia N95 and other S60 smart phones, and an iPhone 3G app is forthcoming. www.trapster.com

How Much is Your Digg Worth?

Ever wondered how much your Digg is worth? Maximum PC wondered, too. In their article, Secrets of the Digg Economy Unveiled, they list out details of experiments they performed to understand how much value a click can bring to a site. According to the formula (see below), a Digg is worth about $15 if you Digg an upcoming story that hits the front page. Once a story is on the front page of Digg, further Diggs are worth about $2. Why? When most stories hit the front page, the result is a kind of pile-on effect, where thousands of people read the story and agree that it deserves recognition, which they affirm by Digging the story themselves. Because of this dynamic, the very first 100 to 200 Diggs that it takes to reach the front page are infinitely more valuable than the 1200 or 1800 that follow. Without the first 100 to 200 Diggs, the article would not have the additional 1000+ followup Diggs. The formula Maximum PC used for calculating the value of a Digg: D^y is the value of a single Digg. V^d is the page views referred by (that is, generated by ) Digg. R^v is the revenue generated per page view. And D is the total number of Diggs a story has received. Du is the value of every Digg that is applied before a story hits the front page, and is found by replacing D with 150, which seems to be the average number of Diggs necessary for a story to hit the front page these days.

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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Who Said Zinc Is Boring?

Weird News

The Nebraska legislature's new "safe haven" law for unwanted babies, like other states' laws, allows them to be dropped off anonymously at hospitals to discourage abortions (and neglect by unfit parents). However, unlike other states' laws, Nebraska's applies not just to infants, but "minors," because, said Sen. Tom White, "All children deserve our protection." In September, the first two non-infants were abandoned, as exasperated parents gave up on rebellious sons aged 11 and 15, and critics say the law could apply to those up to age 19. [Lincoln Journal Star, 9-15-08] In July, Abbie Hawkins, 19, a hotel receptionist in Norwich, England, said she found a baby bat nestled inside the padded bra she had been wearing for several hours. "When I was driving to work, I felt a slight vibration but I thought it was just my mobile phone in my jacket pocket," she told the Daily Telegraph. Hawkins had fetched the bra off of a clothesline that morning, where it had been hanging overnight. First reaction: "I thought how mean I was for disturbing it." [Daily Telegraph, 7-8-08] Joey Bergamine, 19, who is preparing for a re-trial in Fayetteville, N.C., on a DUI charge stemming from a July 2007 incident, will argue that he should have been advised of his right to have a lawyer present when his father kicked open his bedroom door hours after the incident to help police officers who had come to question him. Joey's father is the police chief of Fayetteville, and Joey's lawyer said entering a locked room, as well as the subsequent interrogation, constituted "police" action and not "parental" action, and since his dad failed to "Mirandize" him, the charge should be dismissed. [Fayetteville Observer, 8-16-08] Michael Mahoney, 25, is the most recent rapist (according to police in Somerville, Mass.) to believe he is such hot stuff that he gave his phone number to the victim, certain that he had charmed her into wanting to keep seeing him. Police quickly arrested him in July at home, where he lives with his parents. [Boston Herald, 7-9-08]

In July, convicted sexual molester Donald Fox, 62, of Frederick, Md., became the most recent convict to challenge the unfairness of his sentence (40 years in prison) and then have the appeals court agree it was unfair, except because it was too short (he's now serving 80 years). [Frederick News-Post, 7-23-08]

Source: News of the Weird

Bailout Bill Stuffed With Pork Apparently More Palatable

TechDirt says it better than I can, so here you go:

In my post about the financial crisis earlier this week, I explained the rationales both for and against the so-called "bailout bill." With some of the important indicators getting seriously scary, it was becoming increasingly important that something be done to keep money flowing, but this bill isn't it. Who would have thought that after the House rejected the bill earlier this week, that they would come back and approve something much worse. Rather than address the fundamental problems of the bill (and, well, the economy), what Congress did was stuff the bill full of pork, adding in every little personal favor to local industries they could dig up. Basically, all of the politicians added in little "gifts" to local industries, as a way of calming public dissent against the bill. And, of course, apparently that was all it took to get the House to approve the bill. Now they can go back home and say that they fought to "protect" their local constituents in the bill, when all they really did was put some pork in to bribe them. While there's still a chance that this plan works out -- and, at this point, it's entirely based on who will control the fund -- the bill has done little, if anything to actually address the real issues that created this economic mess, and uses a sledge hammer where a scalpel would have made more sense. If it ends up succeeding, it will be in spite of the bill, rather than because of it.

Geek Horoscope

Geek Horoscopes, brought to you by an overworked tech support worker (BBspot). My favorite is: Scorpio Oct 24 - Nov 21 You will find the source of your problems exist between the keyboard and the chair.

Quick Joke of the Day

Three women, two younger and one senior citizen, were sitting naked in a sauna. Suddenly, there was a beeping sound. The youngest women pressed her forearm and the beep stopped. The others looked at her questioningly. 'That was my pager," she said. "I have a microchip under the skin of my arm." Moments later, a phone rang and the second young woman lifted her palm to her ear. When she finished, she explained, "That was my mobile phone. I have a microchip in my hand." The older women felt very low tech, but it seemed like she needed to do something equally impressive. So she stepped out of the sauna and into the restroom. She returned with a piece of toilet paper hanging from her rear end. The others raised their eyebrows and stared at her. Finally, the old woman said, "Well, will you look at that. I'm getting a Fax!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

So How Will The Financial Crisis Impact The Wider Economy?

Once again, TechDirt has a very lengthy article discussing how the current financial crisis affects the wider economy. I encourage you to read the full article, as it is very well written and thought out. An abridged reprint is below: Getting beyond Wall Street I discussed some of that in the original post, but many people are still having trouble seeing how this crisis spreads beyond Wall Street financial firms (or, in some cases, their own stock portfolios). There are still plenty of people screaming out that these financial firms need to be punished or done away with completely, without any recognition of how that might flow through the rest of the economy. The New York Times has an excellent writeup, noting that people said the same thing as the Great Depression was happening, as well -- again, not realizing that destruction on Wall Street can flow through the rest of the economy. The basic problem is the fear that the credit markets will simply dry up. If no one will lend money (or it simply becomes ridiculously expensive to borrow money), then some very basic economic functions cease to work. This may start out at a high level with bank to bank loans and bank to business loans, but it can also filter down to things like your mortgage (if you thought things were bad before, wait until adjustable rate mortgages reset with even higher interest rates, contributing to this spiral), car loans and even credit card payments. At the top of the chain, banks are increasingly afraid to lend to each other fearing that whoever they lend to (even for very short term loans) may default before the money can be paid back. Already, some companies are seeing the direct impact. For example, Caterpillar, the maker of construction equipment is a company you would think would be separate from the financial mess on Wall Street. It has great credit and a long history of being good for paying up any debt. Yet, in a matter of days, the interest that Caterpillar has to pay to borrow has shot up. Debt isn't a bad thing Now, there are those who will say that any "borrowing" or "debt" is somehow bad (we had a few such comments on the first post), but that shows a fundamental (and, somewhat dangerous) misunderstanding of basic economics. Borrowing money and taking on debt is not, by itself, a bad thing. In fact, it's a very, very good thing. If you can borrow money at one rate, and invest it more profitably, you can contribute to economic growth and provide important goods and services. It's at the very core of a functioning economy. Money moves around so that it can be invested in more profitable endeavors, and that benefits all of society, by making sure that the money is more efficiently put to work. However, the fear of various banks defaulting at the top of the pyramid is increasing the risk down the entire chain, even to the point that relatively "safe" investments are suddenly being seen as risky. Part of that is due to uncertainty about how the crisis will impact others (sort of a self-fulfilling fear) and part of it is due to a still murky understanding of the risk involved in the assets at the heart of all of this mess: the various mortgage backed securities you keep hearing about. So what happens if things get worse? Well, it won't be pretty. Credit is such an important part of the entire economy that it's almost impossible to figure out all of the ramifications of a near total credit crunch. Plenty of companies rely on commercial paper and short-term, low risk loans to finance certain operations, while others use it to get a small, but safe, return themselves. If that were to completely collapse, money would have a lot of trouble moving from where it is to where it would be most efficiently put to work for the economy. Effectively, important projects would get starved of necessary cash and die. That may happen to some projects all the time -- and it's a natural part of the market -- but if it happens across the board, a lot of companies could go bankrupt. A lot of useful investments would go to waste, and (more importantly) the next set of important projects that require investment wouldn't be able to get the necessary money. It would shrink the economy and harm pretty much everyone. So, what does it all mean for a small business operator? Well, that really depends on what sort of business you're in. If you're a venture-backed startup, it's probably not as big a problem, immediately. As we originally noted, top tier VCs are pretty secure with the funds they have, and as we saw after the dot com bubble, the big institutional investors still can't resist allocating a segment of their cash to VC funds. That money is pretty safe. A good venture capitalist should help its portfolio weather the storm. By the way, that doesn't mean showering them with too much cash. Companies that have raised a ton of cash aren't necessarily better off, contrary to popular opinion. A lot depends on what business they're in, how focused they are on an actual business model and how much they're actually burning. As we saw after the last dot com bubble burst, it was some of the most heavily funded companies that went belly up first -- because they had focused too much on raising money and not on building a business. But, of course, venture backed high growth companies are a tiny, tiny segment of the small business arena. Most small businesses will face a different set of challenges. While they may not rely so heavily on regularly tapping into borrowed money, that doesn't mean they're not exposed in many ways. Any sort of expansion capital will be much harder and much more expensive to get. That will make it more difficult for some of those small businesses to make the investments necessary to become big businesses. More importantly, their own customers may be exposed as well. Many small businesses effectively provide "loans" to their customers, in giving terms of payment, such as net 30 or net 60 (allowing the customer to pay within 30 or 60 days, rather than upfront). Unlike constantly fluctuating interest rates, small businesses generally don't change those sorts of terms with any regularity. So, many small businesses actually become a lot more exposed: they're "lending" money at the same rates as before, while the rest of the money flowing around the economy has become more expensive. With that happening, more customers can be expected to default, putting more pressure on the cash flow of the business. And hiccups in the cash flow will be harder to overcome in the usual way: it will be more difficult and expensive to get a small business loan or a line of credit. Thus, it becomes more difficult to meet payroll and could result in layoffs. Companies may also try to tighten up their payment terms, but that effective "raising" of the interest rate can scare off customers, as well. Already, we're seeing small businesses being advised to push for early payment and change the terms of payment they offer customers. Most of this won't happen immediately for most businesses. It certainly will impact some in the very near future (and a few companies are already experiencing problems). The real worry is the cascade effect of this happening to more and more small businesses, putting even more pressure on the overall economy. More companies having cash flow problems means fewer customers for other companies, as well, accelerating the whole cycle. So what do you do? If you're a small business: focusing on cash becomes king (it should always be, but even more so at this point). Companies won't be able to rely on lines of credit as much as they have in the past, and should see what can be done to lock in any kind of line of credit or opportunity for a decent loan if they can get it. Basically, companies need to prepare themselves for the possibility of money not flowing, customers not paying and additional economic hardship.

Coming Soon - Real Working Tricorder

Oh such exciting news! Scientists at the University of California have created a device they are calling a "Universal Detector", but which in effect is a Tricorder (aka Star Trek Tricorder). As Gizmodo put it, "the facts of the matter are clear: You'll be able to point this thing at other things and figure out what they're made of". The idea uses a thin layer of metal drilled with nanoscale holes, laid onto the surface being tested. When the perforated plate is zapped with laser light, the surface plasmons that form emit light with a frequency related to the materials touching the plate. A sensitive light detector is needed to measure the frequency of light given off. The team, led by Kevin Tetz and members of the Ultrafast and Nanoscale Optics Group at the University of California, says the devices will be small and portable. They will work on a range of substances, from bacteria to explosives, and run on low power (green Tricorders!)

Free Gift For First Reader to Email Me

I recently managed to snag some extended length Netflix trial coupons. These coupons extend the regular 14 day trial out to 1 month (30 days). Here's what you get:

• 1 Free Month (no taxes, fees, nothing)
• No Due Dates
• No Late Fees
• Free Shipping Both Ways

I have one coupon left. It is valid until Oct 31, 2008. If you would like to advantage of this offer, please send me an email at: mj-netflix @ neaturl.net (remove the extra spaces). I'll give this to the first person who emails (based on when the email arrived on my mail server). Good luck to all.

Things Sarah Palin Can Name

That's right, there are a few things Sarah Palin can actually name, such as her favorite characters from "Top Gun" - Maverick. My favorite list: VP Candidates I Could Beat in a Debate

• Carrot Top
• Trig
• Ms. Teen South Carolina
• Stephen Hawking in a power outage
• Dan Quayle
• Joe Biden

Find these lists and more at Things Sarah Palin Can Name

Light Posting Day

Today will probably be a light posting day... I'm having a wisdom tooth extracted (ouch). Wish me luck. See ya'll tomorrow. I may post a few ocassional things later in the day if I feel better.

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

The skydiving instructor was going through the question and answer period with his new students when one of them asked the usual question always asked: "If our chute doesn't open; and the reserve doesn't open, how long would we have till we hit the ground?" The jump master looked at him and in perfect deadpan answered: "The rest of your life." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

New $1 Bill

The Treasury Department released a new one dollar bill, this morning:

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

A member of the United States Senate, known for his hot temper and acid tongue, exploded one day in mid-session and began to shout, "Half of this Senate is made up of cowards and corrupt politicians!" All the other Senators demanded that the angry member withdraw his statement, or be removed from the remainder of the session. After a long pause, the angry member acquiesced. "OK," he said, "I withdraw what I said. Half of this Senate is NOT made up of cowards and corrupt politicians!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

TiVo for your PC

From CNET News:

Traditionally, anyone who wanted to convert a PC into a DVR was limited to the likes of Windows Media Center, SnapStream Beyond TV, or (for the more adventurous DIYers) MythTV.

Starting in mid-October, however, people can turn their Windows PCs into a full-on TiVo DVR thanks to Nero's new Liquid TV package. The software effectively turns a standard PC into a full-service TiVo DVR, replete with the same interface, program guide, and ease-of-use as TiVo's standalone hardware DVRs--but with the added ability to burn recorded shows to DVD or export them to portable devices such as the iPod or PlayStation Portable.

Liquid TV will be available in two versions. The $200 package includes a standard TiVo remote, USB DTV tuner/antenna (for over-the-air analog and digital TV, including HD broadcasts), and an IR blaster (for controlling external cable and satellite boxes, which would then be fed into a video capture card on your PC). The $100 package is software only; it's for people who already have a TV tuner card and remote solution (or who will opt for the software's onscreen mouse controls). Images credit Nero.

I'm Confused...

Ah, now I'm not confused :D

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

House Follows Senate In Giving The President A Copyright Czar

From TechDirt: While failing to do much of anything (other than fingerpointing) to deal with the economic crisis we're facing, the folks in the House did spend some time easily passing the ProIP bill that the Senate passed last week. So, now we just have to wait for the President to sign it, and the entertainment industry gets their own person in the White House whose job it is to prop up their business model. Hell, if Wall St. gets one of those, why not the entertainment industry?

Vote Early - Vote Absentee

Already know who you're voting for in the upcoming U.S. election, and you don't want to spend Election Day standing in line at the polls? In many states you can send in an absentee ballot by mail, without having an official excuse for being absent. It's called "no excuse absentee voting," and it's allowed in 28 states. Laws around absentee voting vary from state to state—in some you need a notary or witness when you sign your ballot, for instance, and deadlines vary—but it can save you time come November if you want to get the deed done pre-Election Day. See the Early Voting Information Center's state-by-state reference chart to get the details of your home state. Florida makes it easy to register for absentee voting. You need to send an email (or snail mail) with some personally identifying information (such as driver license number and voter id number).

XBox Media Center (XBMC) Released For All Platforms

From LifeHacker:

The popular open-source media center application Xbox Media Center (XBMC) has rolled out the first beta release of XMBC Atlantis, which brings XBMC to all platforms. That means XBMC now runs on Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, the original Xbox, and even your thumb drive or live CD. Despite its beta status, this release brings XBMC even closer to cross-platform bliss—including iTunes and iPhoto integration for XBMC on your Mac. The new release also boasts a killer new HD skin, so keep reading for a closer look.

XBMC is free, works on all platforms. This release is currently in beta, so you may see some bugs. That said, so far it's been running like a champ on my machines. If you give the new XBMC beta a try, let's hear how you're liking it in the comments.

XBMC ‘Atlantis’ Beta 1 released - now serving all common platforms Download XBMC [XMBC.org]

Sad News - Glider Agrees to Pay Blizzard $6M in Bot Lawsuit

MDY, the makers of the World of Warcraft Bot Glider, has agreed to pay Blizzard $6M in the on going lawsuit brought by Blizzard. MDY realized it could owe more in damages following Janaury's (2009) trial, so it proposed this agreement. From Virtually Blind's article on the MDY v Blizzard Case:

This judgment does not entirely conclude the matter. Issues still slated for trial in January include whether MDY’s sales of Glider violated the Digital Millenium Copyright Act and whether MDY’s owner Michael Donnelly can be held personally liable for the $6,000,000 judgment.

Beyond trial, of course, there will almost certainly be an appeal to the 9th Circuit on the issue of liability, which would negate the stipulation, and thus the $6m damages judgment, if MDY prevails.

It's a sad day for us all when corporate interests override a person's fair use rights on his own computer.

Take A Deep Breath: Some Perspective On The Financial Crisis

TechDirt has a very long article on the current financial crisis, explaining how we got into this financial mess in the first place. The article is worth a read, and I encourage you to read the entire article on their site - TechDirt. First off: this situation is complicated. The deeper you dig into it, the more you can begin to sketch out a picture of what's really happening, but no one (no one!) can accurately understand all the different variables at play here. Anyone claiming to have all the answers is wrong. They're either ignorant or lying. Also, the blame game isn't just pointless, wrong and silly, it's dangerous. I've been seeing too many folks on both sides of the political aisle trying to use this crisis as a political football, and all that's doing is making it that much more difficult to come up with real solutions. If you see anyone focus on playing the "blame game," ignore them. They're not worth listening to and they'll only be misleading. Finally, any explanation you read that isn't multiple-book-length will probably be greatly simplified -- including this one. But I'm hoping that it at least kicks off an interesting discussion. So, what happened? The basic summary is that a chain of events all resulted in more and more money being put into riskier and riskier mortgages, where much of the risk was hidden away by computer models and the repackaging of those risky mortgages in bulk. Normally speaking, the idea of bundling up a bunch of risky projects into one actually does make some sense -- because you're figuring that while some will fail, the successes will greatly outweigh the failures. And, in many cases, that's true (it's basic diversification). But the problem was that very few, if any, of the models seemed to take into account the fact that these weren't independently risky items, but that many were very dependent on each other. Thus, rather than a small group of risky deals going south, outweighed by the success stories, people started to realize that you could have a domino effect, where a large portion of the risky stuff going bad could actually lead to even more of it going bad. That's just what you get for creating bad models that don't take dependencies into account. What made this even worse, however, is that a bunch of the risk was eventually pawned off to the least knowledgeable investor: the public markets. We had a long chain of players, who effectively kept "laundering" the risk through various ways until it ended up being held by people who simply had no clue how risky the products were that they owned. Then, once stuff started to go bad, the dependencies started to snowball and make everything worse -- and the confusion over how bad and how risky things were made those who actually had money on hand reasonably afraid to keep lending it to those who couldn't accurately express the risk. That resulted in a lack of liquidity -- effectively the oil in the economy's engine. Without liquidity, a lot of stuff freezes up pretty quickly and dangerously. That's what caused Treasury boss Paulson and Fed chair Bernanke to ask for the "bailout" plan. Why are we "bailing out" those who created this mess? Actually, while almost everyone is calling it a "bailout," it's not quite a true bailout, and it's not clear that it really "rewards" those who created the mess. Like everything else, it's quite complicated. Personally, I like Fred Wilson's use of the phrase "The Splurge" to describe it, because in many ways it's more accurate than a bailout. Basically, the government is asking for $700 billion to try to buy up distressed assets. The details suggest that it's starting out with $350 billion, with another $350 billion to be handed out later, if necessary. There are plenty who believe that $700 billion is just the tip of the iceberg, and eventually that number will grow to be much higher. So, why isn't this a full "bailout"? Well, because the government would be getting equity back as well, and there are plenty of smart folks who believe that this could lead to the government making a profit. Indeed, buying up distressed assets historically isn't a bad way to make a profit -- if you know what you're doing. Lots of folks tend to shy away from distressed assets, and a good fund manager can buy up distressed assets for pennies on the dollar and figure out ways to sell them down the road for nickels or dimes on the dollar. It's a perfectly reasonable business proposition, and historically, there are plenty of stories of folks who made out like bandits buying distressed assets following bursting bubbles. So, if the government can drive a hard bargain and buy up these assets at a reasonable price, it could work. So, the good news is that there's a chance that the "splurge" could result in a best case scenario: it pumps liquidity into the market, stabilizes things, gets the economy moving again and lets the government profit. But that's the best case scenario. Others are a lot less sure, noting that the upside pales compared to the downside risk, and even if an upside scenario may seem a lot more likely, the cost of the downside is much, much bigger (at least $700 billion at this point, and perhaps more). In fact, there are those who suggest that a poorly done splurge will almost certainly make things even worse. And, plenty are pointing out that the smart money seems to be betting that the government is entering the game as the "last sucker" we were discussing earlier. Given that there's still confusion over how the gov't will value these assets, it seems reasonable to worry. But isn't this just about Wall Street? There's a common refrain among many, many people, that this is just the result of greedy Wall Street bankers, and the proper thing to do here is to just let them all fail. It's not that easy. The ripple effects here would be pretty serious -- and while I don't think the economy would fully seize up, it would be really painful across the board. The lack of liquidity in the commercial paper world (short term lending, mostly) would impact a lot of businesses that you might not think have such exposure to Wall Street. And that, in turn, could create an ongoing spiral. It would stop somewhere, but where is anybody's guess at this point, and it may be pretty far down a hole, with a pretty massive destruction of wealth in the meantime. Some may believe this is the best way to get through things (the rip the band-aid off quickly belief), but the overall damage could be significant, and not so easy to come back from. Ripping the band-aid off quickly doesn't always yield the best result if it rips the scab with it, causing more damage. So, simply letting everything fail, while an option, could have serious long term consequences. To sum it all up It is a huge mess, no doubt. The splurge is quite risky -- and while I can appreciate the upside potential, if done right, that "if" scares me a lot. I'd be much more comfortable with it if it wasn't being pushed through in its entirely in such a quick manner, with partisan players on both sides going on the news yelling at the other side each night. Instead, focus on a smaller initial package and spend a bit more time working out the bigger deal later, with a lot more input. In the short term, there's still going to be a fair amount of bloodshed, and the downside will impact companies outside of the financial sector, but for those in tech, the good news is that we're probably more isolated than other industries, though certainly not completely isolated. And, since everything is changing so rapidly, you never know what shoe might drop next.

Splicd Skips To a Video Point in YouTube

Web site Splicd creates custom links to embedded YouTube videos that start and stop at any time you define, allowing you to skip straight to the good part and avoid the rest. Let's say, for example, you've stumbled onto a gem on YouTube but had to suffer through 10 minutes of complete boredom to get there. You want to share the video with a friend, but you don't want her to have to sit through the whole mess for 20 seconds of pure gold. Just paste the URL of the video into Splicd, give it your desired start and end time, and it generates a custom link that starts and stops the video where you told it to.

World of Warcraft Credit Card

The World of Warcraft Blog brings news of a Visa credit for World of Warcraft players. First National Bank of Omaha is offering a Visa credit with a World of Warcraft background. Using the card will earn you extra game time in WoW.

The World of Warcraft Visa card is available to U.S. residents with a World of Warcraft game account, putting one percent of every dollar spent on “qualifying purchases” toward time in the game and giving cardholders a free month of play the first time they use the card. The cards are available in 13 different and very sexy designs, with detailed artwork featuring the game’s various races, including Night Elves, Tauren, Dwarves, Trolls and of course, Orcs and Humans.

It may seem like kind of a weird rewards program, but with 11 million subscribers, many of whom would leap at the chance to publicly declare their WoW allegiance - not to mention the potential for free play time - I think it’s a brilliant move. Even more importantly, it’s yet another sign that gamers are being recognized as adults, and taken seriously for the “cultural demographic” they represent. Of course, laying down your World of Warcraft Forsaken Visa may not get you taken seriously by the maître d’, but sometimes legitimacy has to come one step at a time.

Quick Joke of the Day

Two men are approaching each other on a sidewalk. Both are dragging their right foot as they walk. As they meet, one man looks at the other knowingly, points to his foot and says, Vietnam, 1969." The other points his thumb behind him and says, "Dog crap, 20 feet back." Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Visual Studio 2010 to Come with 'Black Box' for Testers

Airplanes are equipped with recorders that capture both cockpit audio and flight data, so in the event that something goes wrong, investigators can try to determine the source of the problem. And Microsoft wants to give that capability to developers and testers. In the next version of its developer tool suite, to be known as Visual Studio 2010, Microsoft plans to include the ability to record the full screens of what testers are seeing, as well as data about their machine. When a test application crashes, the technology will enable developers to see the bug as it occurred. In an interview last week, Microsoft Developer Division Director Dave Mendlen said the feature is designed to avoid the all-to-frequent conflict that occurs when a software tester finds a bug that the developer says it can't reproduce. Internally, the feature has been called "TiVo for debuggers." Microsoft is also talking about new modeling tools it says will make it easier for programmers new to a team to get a sense of how earlier versions of the software work. One of the other goals is to add more business intelligence tools--things like dashboards and cockpits--that enable the project managers to assess whether a development project is on track. Now that I'm finally settled into Visual Studio 2008 and LINQ, I'm ready for 2010! I really like the TiVo for debuggers option. I can see this be very helpful for game developers, who have an even more difficult task of reproducing a state that caused a crash. We've had all sorts of workarounds in the past, including creating our own "Tivo for debuggers" (which basically records the value of all variables, and let's us load the game at any given state). I'm also excited to see what other new tools will be in Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0. I've seen hints that cloud computing classes will be included, for example. Visual Studio Team System 2010 will offer tools for managing test cases and execution, and will boost support for filing actionable bugs. (Credit: Microsoft)

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

In a murder trial, the defense attorney was cross-examining the coroner: Attorney: Before you signed the death certificate, had you taken the pulse? Coroner: No. Attorney: Did you listen to the heart? Coroner: No. Attorney: Did you check for breathing? Coroner: No. Attorney: So, when you signed the death certificate, you weren''t sure the man was dead, were you? Coroner: Well, let me put it this way. The man's brain was sitting in a jar on my desk. But I guess it's possible he could be out there practicing law somewhere. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Nodevice Hordes Missing Drivers, Manuals

From LifeHacker:

If you're stumped trying to find a Windows driver for your hardware (and you didn't back it up when it last worked), try Nodevice has a database of more than 30,000 drivers, and roughly 20,000 each of manual files and DLL files. Looking for something Vista-specific? Check out RadarSync. [via]

TIVO new User Interface in testing, features Picture in Guide at last!

The DVD Rental Video Blog brings news that TiVo will soon feature some changes to its user interface, including Picture In Guide.

If I were to list one basic feature I’ve always wanted for my TIVO is an integrate User Interface with Picture in Guide (PIG). Little has changed with its interface over the years, picture is obstructed by grid-style onscreen guide while navigating though user menu to retrieve list of recording show or change settings. Competitors such as DirectTV, Dish Network and Cable service carriers have long offering DVR with PIG. That soon to change; Tivo is cooking up a user interface with a complete new look- Featuring PIG with ability to display picture while peruse user guide.

Read the full article at the DVD Rental Video Blog.

Write Your Novel at WEbook

For those writers hoping to hit the big-time with their book ideas, new social publishing company WEbook wants to recreate for books what Digg did for internet articles. Submit your work to WEbook and collaborate and vote on which writing is the best.

Shelve the notion of a solitary writer toiling alone for years in a dimly lit attic. WEbook.com is a place for lively writing groups, groundbreaking titles, and a chance for an engaged and creative community to find unrecognized talent and select the very best written works for publication as books, eBooks, and Audiobooks.

At WEbook, writers can get immediate feedback on their work. Reviewers can tear apart bad writing and make it better and everyone gets a chance to vote. If WEbook users vote your project as one of the best, WEbook will publish it, in print or electronic form, too.

WEbook

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

VOTE FOR MARTY

I generally shun musical videos on YouTube, but this one was too funny to pass up. I kinda wanna vote for him, now :)

Man In The Box - Union Gary

Something a little fun for ya'll:

Homeland Security Gets Closer To Minority Report-Style Crime Predictor

TechDirt reports:

Ever since the film Minority Report came out, we've seen a series of stories about efforts to predict future crimes before they happen. Most of these are more about data mining to predict high crime areas and times -- but some are going much further. Slashdot points us to a story about Homeland Security apparently making progress on a "pre-crime detector." It was originally called "Project Hostile Intent," but after some folks figured that the name was a bit... ominous, it seems to have been renamed as "Future Attribute Screening Technologies" (FAST). Basically the system is designed to spot "shifty" people who may be getting ready to commit a crime of some sort. The researchers behind it say that the early tests are incredibly effective: "We are running at about 78% accuracy on mal-intent detection, and 80% on deception." Of course, there are tons of questions about privacy violations and how long it will take criminals to figure out ways to "beat the system."

What Happens When Cesium (or Caesium) Contacts Water?

How violent is the reaction between Cesium (or Caesium) and water? Why is it so violent? Because Cesium has large atoms, so it requires less energy for the water to remove an electron from the Cesium atom, which allow more energy to be used to generate heat from the reaction. Please vote on this at YouTube if you learned something: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCARhVfeX5U

How to Delete a Windows Service in Vista or XP

If you are a fan of tweaking your system and disabling services, you might find that over time your Windows Services list becomes huge and unwieldy with a large number of services in the list that will never be enabled.

Instead of just disabling a service, you can alternatively completely delete the service. This technique can be especially helpful if you've installed some piece of software that doesn't uninstall correctly, and leaves an item in the service list.

Important Note: Once you delete a service, it's gone, and it's going to be a pain to add it back. Use with caution.

Deleting a Service

The first thing you'll need to do is identify the name of the service, so open up Services through the start menu or control panel, and then find the service in the list that you want to delete.

You'll want to open up the properties by double-clicking on the service name, and then highlight the "Service name" value and copy it to the clipboard. This is what we'll need to disable it.

You'll need to open up a command prompt, and if you are using Windows Vista you'll need to right-click the command prompt and choose Run as Administrator. We'll use the sc command to actually do the work.

The syntax used to delete a service is this:

sc delete ServiceName

If your service name has spaces in it, you'll need to wrap the service name in quotes, like this:

sc delete "Adobe LM Service"

Note that I'm not recommending deleting this particular service, it's just an example.

Now if you use the F5 key to refresh your Services list, you'll see that the service is gone.

I've found that using this technique (carefully) can make your Services list a lot more useful, since you don't have to weed through dozens of items you will never have enabled.

Source: The How-To Geek

Why Do They Use Helium at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)?

Quick Joke of the Day

There once was a lady who was very concerned about her missing parrot. Not knowing what to do, she called 911. "You gotta help me find my parrot!" The operator patiently replied, "We can't help you with that, ma'am. This number only deals with emergencies." But the lady persisted, and then the operator told her not to be concerned, that the parrot should fly back in a few days. Then, out of desperation, the lady begged, "But you don't understand! The only thing he knows how to say is, "Here, kitty, kitty!!!" Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes

Your Moment of Cat Zen

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

The Best of Late Night

Yesterday at a big campaign rally, Sarah Palin drew a crowd of 60,000 people. After hearing about it, Joe Biden got new glasses and a boob job. -Conan O'Brien John McCain wants to postpone Friday’s presidential debate. And, he has temporarily suspended his campaign . . . until he’s ahead in the polls. Right after he announced that, Sarah Palin said, "That’s OK - I don’t really need him, anyway." -Jay Leno Yesterday, President Bush gave a speech on the economic crisis. The title of Bush's speech: "Two More Months and It Ain't My Problem." -Conan O'Brien Clay Aiken is on the cover of People magazine announcing that he’s gay. This on the heels of last week’s People shocking cover: Ruben Studdard announced he’s black. -Jimmy Kimmel More bad news today, from President Bush: Remember those rebate checks from a few months ago? He wants them back. -Jay Leno Don Rickles and Kathy Griffin presented an award last night. It’s great to see that grizzled old timer still get the laughs. And Rickles is funny, too. -Craig Ferguson Barack Obama said today that the $700 billion bailout should not be a blank check. He said that $700 billion is a lot of money. In fact, it would take him at least 10 Hollywood fundraisers to come up with that kind of money. -Jay Leno The past several days, President Bush has been speaking out about the Wall Street bailout, and today a reporter asked him what he planned to do about AIG. Bush got upset and said, "Why does everyone always spell in front of me?" -Conan O'Brien Autumn arrived on schedule . . . at least there’s one thing Bush hasn’t screwed up. -David Letterman Sarah Palin was in New York meeting foreign leaders at the U.N. Assembly. She was very impressed with all the landmarks in New York City. As she was driving over the Hudson River, she said, "Wow - your bridges actually go somewhere." -Jay Leno All these world leaders, while they are in New York City attending the General Assembly, are doing some shopping. The Japanese premier, for example, got a great deal on Morgan Stanley. -David Letterman Bill Clinton was on "The View" yesterday. It was a frustrating appearance for Clinton - it turns out the pretty one is a conservative. -Jay Leno

Quick Joke of the Day

Q: What do you call an empty jar of Cheeze Whiz? A: Cheeze Whuz. Find more jokes at Really Funny Quick Jokes