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February 20, 2002
Just came across the New
Just came across the New Yorker story on the Red Cross handouts in New York City on Metafilter. I have no words to describe my anger at the Red Cross for this stupidity, although my anger at them pales next to my contempt for those people who took the money but had not suffered any real hardship from the attacks of September 11. This kind of press does not bode well for the future of charitable giving. I understand that the amount of money they collected was enormous, and they were caught between the people who were screaming at them to do something with it and the people who wanted it applied locally, but this strikes me as reactionary stupidity. Who's in charge over there? Who passed on this as a good idea? All it would have taken was a responsible plan for (1) making sure that the true victims of the bombings were generously taken care of, and (2) using the rest of the money to do good in the world. So it was a LOT of money. So what? There are BIG problems in the world. This is just obscene. [They'll probably pull this story tomorrow, so I archived it here.]
Posted by John at 10:45 PM | Comments (0)
February 17, 2002
Like cockroaches after nuclear war,
Like cockroaches after nuclear war, online diarists rule an Internet strewn with failed dot coms. "So Blog this please." Well... OK. Henry Jenkins captures the essence of what this whole blogging thing is about, and spins it up into something maybe a trifle more important than it actually is, but interesting in its potential. The problem, of course, is that as the blogging phenomenon accelerates, the quality level goes down. Almost by definition, those with something to say are already saying it, somewhere, somehow. As it gets more and more difficult to differentiate the wheat from the chaff, fewer online readers are likely to bother to make the effort. But all that is neither here nor there. All these world-altering paradigm shifts are beyond my ken, and I am content to log the occasional thought, and leave the breadcrumbs behind as I travel through the Internet.
Posted by John at 12:49 AM | Comments (0)
February 09, 2002
So the gaming wars have
So the gaming wars have moved off the consoles (Sega, Nintendo, Microsoft) and the PCs, and on to the cell phones. Since my kids love their video games, we're going to have to have a talk about this, right away. I'm not paying any $4,000 cell phone bills.
Posted by John at 03:17 AM | Comments (0)
SatireWire with a hilarious spoof
SatireWire with a hilarious spoof on China, Libya and Syria's response to not being mentioned in Bush's "axis of evil" speech, which highlighted North Korea, Iraq and Iran. Irate at being passed over, they are forming the "axis of just as evil."
Posted by John at 03:02 AM | Comments (0)
ooooh. nice. The Big Blue
ooooh. nice. The Big Blue Marble. My new desktop wallpaper. Hi-res pictures of Earth from space.
Posted by John at 02:50 AM | Comments (0)
February 03, 2002
Opt out of everything. Banner
Opt out of everything. Banner ads were the most annoying thing in the world, until they came up with popups. This opt-out list, which covers quite a few of the most prevalent pop-ups and pop-unders (my favorite-link-to-hate, the Amazing Miniature X-10 Camera, is here), is a public service of the first order.
Posted by John at 10:24 PM | Comments (0)
Flit's compiled some statistics on
Flit's compiled some statistics on our bombing campaign in Afghanistan. I was struck by the facts that (1) our targeting has improved 600% since the Gulf War, (2) we've only dropped about 1/20 the kilotonnage of bombs as we did in the Gulf War, and our campaign in Afghanistan has already lasted 50% longer, and (3) the kiloton yield of the explosions of the World Trade Centers bombing/collapse is roughly equivalent to 8 days of bombing at the rate we've been bombing them.
Posted by John at 10:20 PM | Comments (0)
Julie, if you want to
Julie, if you want to make those English as a Second Language classes more interesting, follow this woman's example. Besides, it would be more fun to teach them the meaning of phrases like "spaced out" and "big hair" and "going postal."
Posted by John at 10:02 PM | Comments (0)
Posts have gotten sporadic these
Posts have gotten sporadic these past two months as the new job has been all-consuming. Fortunately, Julie understands that it's always that way when you start a new gig. So much new stuff to learn, new people to meet, have to figure out how the corporate machine works just to be able to get stuff done. Fortunately, it's good job, a good company with a good product, and it's real business opportunities that have been keeping me so busy. Things should calm down meaningfully after our sales conference the last week in February. Until then, I'm buried.
I did see something funny today, though. I like to drive fast. I've owned a red '61 Corvette for over a year now -- an acknowledged "ticket magnet", and haven't gotten a single speeding ticket. This is quite amazing to me. The left lane is where I drive. I'm not one of those asses who weaves in and out of traffic, and I don't flash my lights at slower drivers, or honk my horn or tailgate. But if the lane is clear and the traffic is light, I consider 90-100 mph a comfortable cruising range. And 280, the highway from San Francisco to Silicon Valley, is the American Autobahn. Several times, I've been doing 90 mph on that road and gotten passed like I was standing still. Still, I will admit, there is such a thing as going too fast.
Posted by John at 09:29 PM | Comments (0)
