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July 19, 2002
Operation RATS - the Retrograde
Operation RATS - the Retrograde Activities and Treachery System - a tongue-in-cheek announcement spoofing the paranoia that is engendered by domestic government activities in our war against terrorism, is uncomfortably close to the real thing.
Posted by John at 01:55 AM | Comments (0)
This is a quick and
This is a quick and amusing read: The Wacky World of Japanese Ice Cream. File this under "things I wouldn't eat if you paid me."
Posted by John at 01:27 AM | Comments (0)
July 12, 2002
It's the rampant legalism that
It's the rampant legalism that amuses me. It's everywhere. I can't for the life of me figure out why putting "Please read the swordswallow.com disclaimer. Very important." on your web site should even be necessary.
Posted by John at 07:10 PM | Comments (0)
Given the incredible number of
Given the incredible number of Powerpoint slide presentations I've had to give to audiences both internal and external over the past two weeks, I wish I had discovered Conference Presentation Judo sooner. Good stuff, and right on target.
Posted by John at 07:02 PM | Comments (0)
July 09, 2002
I followed a link to
I followed a link to CBS MarketWatch today, a site I hadn't visited in over a year. I used to visit BigCharts a lot, but when CBS MarketWatch bought them, they screwed up a good thing (they didn't replace the nice charts and BigCharts is still a good place to go if all you want is charts, but now all the stock fundamentals are links back to the CBS MarketWatch site, and it sucks. If you don't believe me, go check it out. The "avatar" you get your first time there should be enough to cause you to run screaming from the site.)
Anyway, they allow you to personalize your own start page with a number of features including a customized "portfolio" that pops up in a separate window when you go to the site. The link to the story I was trying to access required registration, and I remembered that I had registered on that site before, so I tried a few name/password combinations and got in. "My portfolio" from 18 months or so ago popped up and it was a complete trainwreck. Thank God I sold all my stocks last year. Worldcom at $25.91, now $0.21, a 99.19% loss. Vitria at $18.49, now $0.73. Saba at $27, now $2.84. Metalink at $9.73, now $2.06. Fifteen stocks and not a single one showing a profit. Now, granted, I was way out on the aggressive end of the curve in my stock picks, heavily focused on technology, but still... I feel kind of like I missed my flight and then the plane went down.
Posted by John at 10:11 PM | Comments (0)
July 04, 2002
I wound up carrying home
I wound up carrying home a briefcase AND a laptop case yesterday, both of them overstuffed with paper. I have a real problem just keeping up with the information flow. I spent yesterday working on a project for Monday, and checked my office phone as I was leaving, "You have 20 voicemail messages..." [Sigh.] I checked the daily timer on my cell phone and I was on THAT for 190 minutes yesterday, even though I was trying to concentrate on getting my presentation ready. With no time to process the paperwork, I lug 50 lbs. of paper to and from work every day.
I know some people, in fact I met a CIO up in Toronto last month, who have gone completely paperless and carry everything stored in the laptop. If you give them something in print, they scan it and throw the hard copy away. I even have a couple of friends who've pretty successfully digitized ALL their stuff, from old photos and papers, warranty cards and receipts, to tax returns and Christmas cards. I'm just not that disciplined. My whole problem is that my ass is too small.
Posted by John at 12:02 AM | Comments (0)
July 03, 2002
Have you Googled yourself lately?
Have you Googled yourself lately? There is a whole emerging class of Google games, like trying to find two word combinations that result in only one hit on Google, known as Googlewhacking. Hint: try obscure, long and totally unrelated words. It's harder than you think. "Marquis" and "rutabaga", for example, returns 102 hits.
The latest Google craze is Googling your name "+is" to see what you are. "John+is" shows that:
John is dead.
John is a British artist.
John is one of New York's winningest handicappers.
John is a Fauxhemian.
John is hitting the road!
It's also interesting to check out what you are not. "John+is+not":
John is not dull. He needs glasses.
John is not Elijah.
John is not and never was a hacker.
John is not an instance of Student.
John is not a pushover.
Posted by John at 11:23 PM | Comments (0)
Just ignore this link: Daniel
Just ignore this link: Daniel Pearl videotape. It's part of a little community exercise in which we Internet users police ourselves. This one is referred to as a "Google Bomb". You can probably figure out why, since there are now thousands of these links up all over the web. Of course, now that I've used the word "bomb" twice in the same entry, I'll probably have the NSA monitoring my web site. Hey, traffic is traffic.
Posted by John at 10:58 PM | Comments (0)
I have wondered what this
I have wondered what this website would look like on Lynx, the text-only browser. Now I know.
Posted by John at 10:51 PM | Comments (0)
