March 2002 Archives
AdCritic To Return [Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
Gee, think they will give their employees the back pay that they earned?
Yeah, me either...
Survey Says Web Sites Collect Less Data. WASHINGTON (AP) -- Internet sites appear to be collecting less personal information from users and doing a slightly better job of explaining how sensitive data are used, according to a survey by an opponent of new privacy laws. By The Associated Press. [New York Times: Technology]
I think this is a usability issue...sorta. People don't like to fill out long forms. It's that simple. Of course the amount of information that people can pull from your zip code would probably scare more people. Combine that with your phone number and I wouldn't be suprised if they could then pin point what your next purchase was going to be...
Microsoft To Start Running Anti-Unix Ads [Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
Didn't they already do this once...sure it was in Germany, but is this really news?
That was as clasic slashdot joke by the way...you know...in case you didn't catch it ;-)
My Philosophy at Microsoft. The thoughts in this essay have been brewing in my head for a long time. The recent focus on... [Tommy's Thoughts]
So I was reading this and thought to myself...this guy work for Microsoft in SF...he must have worked at BCentral...with Obi...
I email him and sure enough his is good friends with Obi.
Obi is John Oberon, a guy I commuted with on the Golden Gate Ferry for many months. Great guy. Hope you are doing well John!
Adam Curry: "My I/O has already replaced my email conversations with 4 people in one day!" 
[Scripting News]
I guess as long as you know how many people are subscribed to your Outline.
Did you watch The West Wing last night? What a great show. I loved the part about LemonLymon.Com. It reminded me of a few sites I sometimes watch but mostly don't. [Scripting News]
Yes. It was a great episode.
A .22 caliber mind in a .357 Magnum World..
As far as the website bit...it reminds me more of USENET. More specifically alt.music.nin. There was a "mom" figure that yelled at people and stuck up for others. It was...in a word...scary.
I wish West Wing was on every night for two hours.
Rumsfeld Defends Plan to Hold Afghan War Detainees. The defense secretary today defended plans to hold some Afghan war detainees indefinitely even if they are acquitted. By David Stout. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
Why don't we just kill them? I mean...if we are going to hold them forever...what's the point in that? I'm sure that would give a bunch of people stiffies...
What do you mean you don't know what MORE is? What kinda Mac use are you! [ModWheel]
Did it come out before or after Multi-finder?
I wondered how Dave was going to make it so people could, and you know I hate using this word, blog but only have a few people see it. Smaller than email, but easier than instant message. Okay. Cool.
Instant Outlines are here to stay. Have they even shown up yet!?!?!
Matt Goyer: "Let's buy a senator!" $300K. [Scripting News]
Why aim low and go for a Senator when you can get a President?
Walter Hewlett Sues to Void Compaq Vote. Dissident Hewlett-Packard board member Walter Hewlett on Thursday asked a court to invalidate shareholder votes in favor of the $19 billion acquisition of Compaq. By Reuters. [New York Times: Technology]
Okay, I didn't think the merger was a good idea. I'm not a shareholder, so I didn't vote obviously. But he was, he voted, he lost. It's not like he is Al Gore or something.
If it doesn't work...click the help link below it. Get on the band wagon and get out of your studio once in a while... ;-)
Diablo for OS X released [MacSlash: A daily dose of Macintosh News and Discussion]
At least I have something besides StarCraft to play when we are off in Chico.
Newsweek: Islamic Fundamentalists Big Republican Donors [Plastic]
...seem to be flocking together.
Ryan Naraine at InternetNews thinks Google's News Search feature is a weblog. It's funny. It's a joke, right? An early April Fool? [Scripting News]
Having seen more than my fair share of goofy tech stories...I can't really say that I'm surprised at this. Dave shouldn't be either...he's older than I am ;-)
Although it is one thing to get a few technical facts wrong, but it kinda sucks when the entire story is based on wrong assumptions. Oh well.
Content Management Nightmares [Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
Seems like the only stories I read on /. these days are the rants.
Express Yourself Like The Asshole You Are [Plastic]
I think I just may...
Bull Mancuso: "I'm going to share my displeasure with McNealy in person. Looking forward to that." [Scripting News]
Don't get me wrong. I know how much fun it is to write under another name. You feel free to say things you would never say, outloud anyway.
Bring It On AOL. I'm Ready.. Today News.com published a piece entitled “Web developers wary of AOL switch,” that takes a look at the ramifications AOL's... [What Do I Know]
Targeting IE 5.5 and up along with Mozilla isn't that big of a deal...
Documents Reveal Energy Head Met No Environmentalists. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham did not meet with environmentalists as the administration crafted its energy plan, newly released documents show. By The Associated Press. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
What? The NYT must be part of the Liberal Media! That can be the only explanation...
This Modern World. Who poses the greatest evil of all? [Salon.com]
You will read This Modern World...you will tell a friend...
Apple Cuts Off Under-18 Darwin Developer [Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
I love it when slashdot posters get all righteous about Apple. Makes for great comedy.
NY Times: "Sun will roll out a new set of Web services standards intended as an alternative to Microsoft's .Net." [Scripting News]
I beat you to this one. You must not have had your morning cup of coffee...
Online Surpasses Catalog at J. Crew. For the first time, J. Crew's Web sales eclipsed its catalog sales in February. By Bob Tedeschi. [New York Times: Technology]
Of course this won't make as many waves as Amazon making a profit, probably because there were already making a profit and expected to make a profit.
Ah, the life of an offline business...
Sun Aims to Extend Its Lead. At its annual JavaOne conference, Sun will roll out a set of Web services standards intended as an alternative to Microsoft's .Net. By John Markoff. [New York Times: Technology]
Dave always has a few BigCo posts in the morning...did I beat him? Yup!
Law Limiting Internet in Libraries Challenged. Librarians and their allies are trying to overturn a law passed by Congress requiring schools and libraries to use Internet filtering software. By John Schwartz. [New York Times: Technology]
Funny how Congress is always the ememy of information...except when it comes to spending lots of money to tell you bogus information about who is running against them...
Ximian Connector 1.0 Available [Slashdot]
Looks like they have taken any mention of Exchange 5.5 off the FAQ. Bummer. I'm certainly not going to pay for Exchange 2000 just so I can hook up my linux box though...
My step dad is a truck driver, an independent owner-operator to be more precise. He contracts primarily to one company because they have a good dispatcher that keeps the work flowing and doesn't try and sell him any bullshit. He appreciates this a great deal since having a good dispatcher makes his life a lot easier. When his life is easier he gets more trips and the company gets more money and everyone is happy.
Now, driving truck isn't a hard thing, just ask my step dad about it sometime, and yet most people still do it poorly. So while there may be a lot of truck drivers out there, especially in these tough times, it is still hard to find the people that will do the job right so the company can make money.
Things weren't always happy at the company he contracted to though. He figured that his favorite dispatcher was going to leave. Now he knew this was going to make his life harder and decided that if she left, that he would leave too. He mentioned to a few other people that his favorite dispatcher was going to leave and they became worried about the situation as well. You see, while you can replace the position of dispatcher, you can't replace what the person had become to the company. She had become the glue that held people there since she made other people's lives easier. The company didn't understand that value of that one dispatcher until people started to call the boss and ask why the dispatcher and their best truck driver were leaving.
They were quite shocked to hear this and asked my step dad why he was leaving. He explained that her last day was his last day too. They asked what they could do to change his mind. He told them that they had to keep her happy enough to stay.
Suddenly they saw the value of the dispatcher. Luckily they saw it before it was too late.
None of this ever happened. Any resemblance to any company or person, living or dead is purely and entirely coincidental.
I swear, or my name isn't Chris Webber.
A long time ago, at least last year, in a land far, far away from Siberia lived a humble engineer working for a humble on-line advertising agency. It was a nice little agency that had a lot of very hard-working people. Unfortunately for them, they were trying to make a living during one of the worst recessions in modern times. It was this that let their clients treat them like dirt. That and they didn't always stand up to their clients. Since the economy was so weak, they didn't have enough confidence to stand up to the client most of the time.
Everyone at the company was getting tired. Tired of being pushed around. They knew they worked hard and gave every client very good work. Often times giving the client a lot more than they paid for.
Then along came Client X. It started out pretty low key. Only four simple units to produce all based on a previously designed template. We were told all we would have to do was change small parts of the template. That's all we had to do. It didn't sound that bad. The business guys thought we might even break even on the job.
Then reality sunk its cold fangs into our engineer[base ']s neck and started to suck his will to live. Not to worry everyone said. It's only four units. How bad could it be?
This is how bad...
Our person on the other side had problems differentiating between comps and built out versions. "Why do they look different," she would ask. This went on for some time on our first unit. We did nine versions of the first unit. But wait, you ask...this was supposed to be simple changes in a template. Yes. Yes it was. Right off the bat the job was something we didn't sign on for. Our company had already spent more time on the first unit then we expected to on all four. Things weren't looking good.
Then it got worse.
It turns out that a part of the unit didn't work when a person viewed it though a Hotmail web account. Since it was based on a template that we only changed the artwork in, we knew it wasn't something we did. We thought it might be in the delivery technique. We look into it. We don't have to look too hard to discover that it isn't the delivery technique, but rather Hotmail itself.
Yes. Once again, the $34 billion gorilla rears its head and lets out a mighty roar, instructing all to bow before it and conform to it's ways. It works like this; Hotmail wants people to stay in Hotmail. When you are viewing a message in the Hotmail web interface, URLs are re-written to pop-up in a new window with a frame at the top telling you that you might be leaving Hotmail, but they were nice enough to put the content of the URL in the bottom frame. Hotmail doesn't just do this to URLs, but to form action URLs as well. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, except that it doesn't preserve the method of the form. So, if you are trying to POST data, it will be re-written as a GET. Again, normally this would be a problem since most people write their CGI programs to take data from POST and GET. But if you write your CGI to not grab data sent via GET, your stuff will not work when viewed in the Hotmail web interface.
But how could Hotmail get away with this? Easy. They don't care. They don't have to care. They probably didn't even do it on purpose. They could have easily made it work and preserve the method of the form. But they didn't, and they don't have to change anything because they are Hotmail.
Once we were sure of our findings, we went to Client X and explained that they would have to change their CGI. This didn't go over well with Client X. They had come to us for a simple batch of four units with a template all ready to go. How could anything need to be changed on their end? It always worked before...or so they claimed. Although, anyone looking at the evidence would see that it couldn't have worked because of the way that Hotmail re-writes the URLs and that the data clearly isn't getting to the CGI on Client X's server correctly.
Client X gets very unhappy and calls our hard working advertising gnomes arrogant and act very disappointed in our little company. The hard working people wonder if it is really worth it. But then they remember, they have nowhere else to go.
The End
Thanks to my editor Kim
Some people think business logic is what you build business applications around. While this is technically true, I don't feel it really represents how a business thinks. How can a business think though? It is just an organization made up of people. It can't have thoughts of its own. Can it?
I think business is pretty much the same everywhere. Big companies and small companies usually share one thing at some point, a person with an MBA. Now before you think I'm going to lay into people with MBAs, my MBA is a great guy. He just happens to suffer from a case of business logic.
MBAs are the root of business logic. They all go to business school. Now, I've never been to business school, but I'm beginning to think that they pretty much teach the same things everywhere. It's like science really. Everyone thinks that science is all open and ideas flow freely. Nothing is further from the truth. Ideas that stray too far from the mainstream are ridiculed, get no money, and get laughed out of whatever University they are working at. So, with an MBA, they learn business logic at business school, and everyone sticks to the status quo.
Recently I've made some observations about business math. Business math is a subset of business logic. Now, these are only observations. I have no hypothesis, no concrete data, and no double blind tests to back anything up.
If you have five people doing the work of five people, you lose money. You aren't productive enough to compete with people willing to do more work for the same amount of money. They will get your business because they are willing to make sacrifices.
If you have five people doing the work of six people, you are breaking even. You are right about the level of everyone else.
If you have five people doing the work of seven people you are doing great. You are taking work from everyone else.
If you have five people doing the work of seven people, and then one person leaves but you keep the same amount of work you are making even more profit!
You see, as long as you can keep adding work without adding employees you can make a killer profit. Employees are the biggest roadblocks to profits. I know Scott Adams probably already wrote this in one of his books or Dilbert strips, but I'm living it so it matters a little more to me now.
The big problem is that business logic only makes sense to the people with MBAs. I don't have an MBA, so business logic and business math don't make a whole lot of sense to me. I see things from a different perspective. Of course, I don't have to pay the bills to get the doors open, the T1 up, and make sure all those profit sucking employees have a paycheck every two weeks.
To the people with MBAs, I feel your pain, can you feel mine?
Thanks to my editor Kim
test
Fraase's Elephant Dance essay linked to yesterday is getting a lot of interesting comment. It's cool that Michael is collating the discussion. To Glenn, who liked my story about talent and Dan Gillmor, I've seen countless companies win or lose on the quality and commitment of the talent. Too many times the suits swoop in, resentful of the role talent plays, and screw the whole thing up. I was part of one of those disasters, Visicorp, as was Dan Bricklin, Bob Frankston and Mitch Kapor. Mitch had a great story to go with the mess. He said the corporate types treated the talent with as much respect as Nine-Lives treated Morris The Cat. Bring the pussy cat in to the meeting. Meow. Nice kitty. Now shut up. [Scripting News]
Oooooh...so that's why they do it.
After way too much effort, I have an opml file rendering. Here are the books I'm currently reading:
<%workspace.renderDesktopFile("Maximus:Applications:Radio Userland:www:stories:misc:reading.opml")%>
North Korea's Other Axis: With Moscow. In the wake of President Bush's "axis of evil" remark, North Korea has courted Russia, Europe and Southeast Asia in a push to diversify trade and diplomatic relations. By James Brooke. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
Russia is going to out capitalize us on North Korea. Where Bush sees "evil doers", Putin sees money. Being a "business friendly" guy Bush should see this.
Obviously Bush thinks there is more money in war.
Well, he has never been accused of being the sharpest tool in the shed.
Easier Internet for Older Users. Software and hardware companies, which have traditionally focused on a younger market, are beginning to develop ways of helping seniors surf the net. By The Associated Press. [New York Times: Technology]
The best way to make something easy to use is to design it to do less things, or rather more of the things that the target audience will actually use. You can simplify the interfeace and yet they have everything they need.
Apple started doing this with the Finder in Mac OS Classic. There was a simple option in the Finder prefs to switch from simple-mode to kitchen sink-mode. That way once you felt comfortable and were looking for more power, you hit the switch and there was a whole new set of toys to play with.
Of course, that is gone in Mac OS X. Oops.
Lefties in Berkeley Up in Arms Against Leftover Coffee-Cup Sleeves [Plastic]
Well, you know...with things going so well in this country you have to complain about something.
First off, Las Vegas is a nutty place. I'm sure most people, even those that haven't been there already know that Vegas is a bit 'off' from everywhere else. Although, I've never been to Atlantic City. I'll bet it's pretty 'off' as well.
A good travel tip for Vegas now is to not leave on Sunday. The line at the airport on Sunday to get out was insanely long. It was rumored to be three hours, just to get through the security check point. That blows.
We stayed at the Bellagio. Most people I've talked to thought it was really expensive, but kat found a package deal for the plane and the hotel for really cheap. Pays to shop around I guess.
The Bellagio is nice. It looks nice. It has good food. It's clean. It's comfortable. It's also not for the cheapskates! The food is expensive. There aren't a lot of "rookie" tables in the casino. But it's really nice.
We saw a couple of shows. We saw "O" from Cirque du Soleil. The "O" stands for "Oh my gawd..." It was clear that all the performers were not human. We also say The Amazing Jonathan. No offense, but his TV special was funnier. The funniest thing about the show was all the people who had no clue what he was all about. I will show you his best trick though...you just have to send me a $20 bill.
We got out of the city one day in a rental car. We drove out to Hoover Damn. I could spit out all kinds of facts about the dam, but you don't care. Just know that it's really big. On the way back we jumped over to Arizona and I talked Kat out of driving to Utah. it would have been dark by the time we got there and I'm sure they have the same dirt... We did drive back through the Lake Mead Recreation Area though and the Valley of Fire. The Valley of Fire is just like everywhere else in Nevada, dirt and sage brush...only the rocks are red instead of, well...rock colored.
Then Vegas burnout set it. When you just wander around with that blank look on your face. It was time to go home. We didn't know what the airport would be like, so we got there two hours early. Mistake. Nobody was there. The security line was about thirty seconds long. So we had some time to blow.
Overall, a good trip.
Egypt's free pass. Bush officials stand up for Afghan women. So why do they say nothing as Egypt jails and tortures gay men? [Salon.com]
Because he doesn't care...
U.S. Acts to Shrink Endangered Species Habitats. The Bush administration is urging federal judges to roll back legal protections for nearly two dozen populations of endangered species. By Greg Winter. [New York Times: Science]
Thank god that tree hugger Clinton is out so we can get back to trashing this planet. Genetic divversity is way over-rated anyway. I mean really...do we need 200 million species of beetles?
G.O.P. Says Checks Show Democrats' Hypocrisy. Republican Party officials said today that it was hypocritical for the Democratic Party to accept $12 million in soft money. By Don Van Natta Jr.. [New York Times: Politics]
Ralph Nader took in something like $12.37 in soft money and nobody is yelling abbout that...
Ex-Gateway Executive Says Microsoft Bullies PC Makers. A former Gateway executive testified Thursday on behalf of states seeking tough antitrust remedies against Microsoft. By Bloomberg News. [New York Times: Technology]
What's next? News that the Earth is round?
I mean...really...who is actually suprised by this?
ranchero.com: Rolling Referers Page with PHP/MySQL. [mac.scripting.com]
Cool. I will have to implement this on patandkat.com.
evolt.org: Regular Expression Basics. “If you’ve seen a regular expression before and thought it looked like alien space-algebra, it does, but have no fear—you’ll be fluent in alien space-algebra in no time!” [mac.scripting.com]
Much like porn, you can never post too many "getting started with regex" story links.
Senate Votes to Require Increase in Use of Wind and Solar Power. The Senate gave environmentalists a modest victory on wind and solar power, but put off conclusive votes on broader energy policy until next month. By David E. Rosenbaum. [New York Times: Science]
I bet this made Kuch happy. Which I can understand...even though he is a big "get the fucking goverment out of my life" kinda guy.
Oh, my headline may have been a little inflamatory and not related to the article. But it sounded good and I'm feeling mischievious this morning.
8.0.7 test
I got back from Chicago last night. It was a quickie business trip where we flew out Thursday morning and back Friday afternoon. Everything was going fine until we got to the airport to come back home. The security line sucked.
Why do I have to take my laptop out of my bag to be run thorugh the X-Ray machine? Can the machine not see through my bag? If so, then why am I sending my bag through? I didn't ask anyone because I didn't feel like getting a more detailed search.
Then we almost didn't get our seats on the plane because it was overbooked. We were almost the last four people on the plane. Then we got news from the pilot that there was a delay at SFO due to thunder showers, so we didn't even have a departure time now. Oh and by the way, if anyone wants to get off the plane we have to take everyone off and run everyone and their luggage through security again.
Okay, I can almost see the situation where somebody gets on the plane, plants something and then gets off the plane. Fine. Great. Then check the damn plane and not the people you idiots! If someone planted something on the plane what good will it do to re-screen all the passengers?
ARGH!
The scariest part was when I got to SFO to leave Thursday morning I overheard one of the military guys talking to another person about how the lady who had just watched my luggage go through the X-Ray machine shouldn't be opperating it.
Great. Just dandy.
The choker. In addition to giving an excellent throat massage, Bobby Knight is a world-class whiner and excuse-maker -- and his teams keep losing, too. [Salon.com]
I don't like his style at all. But he did take a team with only 9 wins last season to the big dance.
Andersen Pleads Not Guilty to Obstruction Charge. Arthur Andersen promised today to fight a federal criminal indictment for shredding of Enron-related documents at its Houston offices. By The Associated Press. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
Before the arraignment, hundreds of employees from Andersen's Houston office stood across from the federal courthouse chanting, ``Save Andersen!'' and ``Drop the indictment!''
I feel bad for the employees because it wasn't thier fault...at least the ones who were out there protesting. But I don't see the logic in letting AA off the legal hook because people will loose their jobs. They should be pissed at AA not the SEC.
I mean, any company could argue that they should be exempt from the law because if they had to follow the law they would loose money compared to if they could break the law.
U.S. Acts to Shrink Endangered Species Habitats. The Bush administration is urging federal judges to roll back legal protections for nearly two dozen populations of endangered species. By Greg Winter. [New York Times: Politics]
Who needs California red-legged frogs anyways? I mean, what good do they do for society? They don't pay taxes. They can't operate machinery. Kill 'em all.
Final Whitewater Report Finds Not Enough Evidence for Charges. An independent counsel said today there was insufficient evidence that Bill or Hillary Rodham Clinton knew of any criminal conduct. By Reuters. [New York Times: Politics]
Boy it's a good thing we found this out so fast, otherwise it might have had an adverse effect on President Clinton...oh wait, he isn't even in office anymore.
When did this crap start anyways?
Seeing Bush's Brains Despite Mangled Words. Frank Bruni, who covered George W. Bush's presidential campaign for The New York Times, has written a judicious portrait of our 43rd president. By Robert Dallek. [New York Times: Politics]
When I was a boy," Clarence Darrow said, "I was told that anybody can become president. I'm beginning to believe it." Frank Bruni's "Ambling Into History: The Unlikely Odyssey of George W. Bush" will make believers of us all. But Mr. Bruni, who covered Mr. Bush's presidential campaign for The New York Times, will also strengthen our faith in a president's capacity to rise above personal limitations in times of crisis.
No. No it won't. Not for me anyways. In every "crisis" so far he has acted exactly as I feared he would.
Doc Searls: Death by Content Management. [Scripting News]
Is it really the fault of CMS or is it lack of planning in the move?
Flangy: "If I was doing some for-pay web work, and it was going to be IE/Windows only, then there would certainly be some CSS going on." [Scripting News]
Heck, doing it that way would get you mozilla for free! Maybe... ;-)
Adam Fisk: Lose the Joel-Worship!
[Joel on Software]
Adam should read my site. I go on and on about what a big idiot I am.
Heh.
I actually emailed Adam and he totally regrets posting that...simply because it was like poking a hornets nest.
André Radke: the PostgreSQL Extension for Frontier is a DLL and set of verbs for calling PostgreSQL from Frontier. [mac.scripting.com]
This is exactly what I need!
The Republican war critic. Today's GOP demonizes any dissent, but one of its most influential forebears openly criticized WWII plans -- and just 12 days after Pearl Harbor. [Salon.com]
How typical.
Kuch points me to a scary story at Fortune.
While most of the conspiracy theories are amusingly overblown, this is a firm that's been built on the backs of Bush and other big shots who have lent Carlyle their names, their golden networks of friends in high places, and their insights into how government works.
So let's dig into this enclosure business. Beware anyone who is subscribed to my RSS feed! Buwahahahahahaha!
MX Application Dev Center. Contrary to Flash 5 and 4, the upgrade to MX is receiving far more resources, tutorials, and general assistance from... [What Do I Know]
While the products seem very cool...I still think Macromedia should have started marketing these products a little earlier. It's a hard road to go down because if you start too soon, you may start the hype too soon and burn people out. On the other hand, you may end up with new products that people would buy if only they know about them.
So I'm sitting at home today reading The Career Programmer: Guerilla Tactics for an Imperfect World. Seems like it could be pretty cool. I know I do primarily "web stuff" at work, but I'm hoping the same tactics can apply to any techy vs pointy hair situation.
Besides, how could I possibly be expected to go to work on a day like today?
Bill Bennett's War On The Terror-Lovin' Left [Plastic]
Ah yes...welcome back McCarthyism. Are you now, or have you ever been an anti-American liberal?
AP: Email, Web at Work - Is the Free Lunch Over? [via Slashdot: No More Unrestricted Internet At Work]
As for personal web use, this can be solved by installing monitoring software and make the log reports public within the company. A previous employer of mine used WebTrends (but this is not an endorsement); technically the reports were not supposed to be public, but once one person found them (in an unprotected section of the IT department's intranet), word spread rapidly. Meta-monitoring was quickly implemented, scripts were written, irregularities were discussed over coffee, cigarettes, and lunchtime jogs (depending on who you were). Personal web use quickly fell to acceptable levels, and the 'sinful six' plummeted off the charts.
[diveintomark]You know...whatever. I know Mark's take is pretty sane, but you know there there is a lot of insane stuff companies are trying to do.
"An employee will be executed every half hour until morale improves."
Spolsky Stands Firm on Linux on the Desktop [Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
In a logic match between Joel and Slashdot, I'll take Joel.
More on Dell Dropping Linux Support [Slashdot: News for nerds, stuff that matters]
We have one of their PowerEdge servers at work. It's pretty cool, but it certainly wasn't cheap ;-)
Microsoft defends anti-trust deal. Founder Bill Gates is set to appear as a witness as nine US states
pursue their case for tougher penalties against the software giant. [BBC News: world]
Something about this deal really stinks...
Top notch Mac OS X utilities. MacFixit: OS X Download Library. Some amazing stuff here that no Mac OS X user should be without. I've used DragThing for years (since 1.0), and I finally tried LaunchBar last weekend. All highly recommended. [diveintomark]
How did I miss all this cool stuff?
This Modern World. Help keep our nation safe with the Junior Homeland Security Fun Kit! [Salon.com]
Lighthouse on the Web: "Countless managers of small to medium sites have wondered how to cross the chasm from hand-built pages to a true content management system. Now a product called CityDesk provides the best answer yet."
From the Flogging of Dead Horses department
Rick Chapman interviewed me again... no, I still don't think you should rewrite large software products from the ground up. Not even Outlook.
[Joel on Software]
Joel, as always, making good points.
ugly corporate webpages. Finding ugly corporate webpages is like shooting fish in a barrel. Hey pictures, stop MOVING UP AND DOWN. [TheFlangyNews News]
The first post today is a "softball" since I've been crazy friggin' busy at work. Picking on web pages is exactly like shooting fish in a barrel though. Rarely does a "professional" site do anything for me. Most are busy as hell and probably look that way because their CEO likes it.
It isn't about you Mr. CEO. It's about your customer. You should have learned that in your fancy business school classes that you probably got low C's in.
I'm not bitter.
Bender's One Commandment
GOD NEEDS BOOZE
All Futurama episodes are kickass, this one is particularly excellent and hilarious. [ModWheel]
You know it's a good episode when Greg has a post up before King on the Hill is over ;-)
Monsters, Inc. doesn't come out until September, and yet it is the 2nd best selling DVD on amazon right now. Crazy
The Usual Suspects (Special Edition) is coming out in April on DVD. Is this basically going to be the laser disc re-released on DVD? If so, I already heard the commentary and I don't need animated menus...
Looks like KMFDM has redone their site. Looks like they actually paid someone to do it this time ;-) Sorry Sasha. I liked the old simple site too!
The new design is very slick and table heavy. Note that I didn't say this was a good or bad thing. They got the job done and it looks good.
Buy their stuff!
3D Finder. MacWarriors: 3DOSX [via Cory Doctorow] Says it works poorly on laptops, due to the lack of advanced graphics cards, but I might be able to persuade D to try it on her iBook anyway. [diveintomark]
I can attest to the fact that it sucks on laptops. My TiBook 500 screams in horrible pain when I try to run this. It does seem cool though...
Frank Zappa Spins In His Grave Again - Tennessee Democrats Want Tipper Gore in the Senate [Plastic]
Hilary I was okay with...Tipper no. To quote KMFDM:
Our records have stickers with a warning from Tipper
'Cause they're no good for kids if we'd get her we'd strip her
Buchanan Blasts Immigration Bill - Is He Full Of It Again? [Plastic]
Wouldn't again imply that there was a time when he wasn't full of it?
Believe it or not, John Ashcroft once opposed indiscriminately wiretapping the Internet. [Memepool]
Pat will never believe it.. [ModWheel]
Sure don't...it must have been a different John Ashcroft.
How Not To Lose Your Humor If Your Neighbor Reports You To The Secret Service [Plastic]
This guy can still laugh about it...but it depressed the hell out of me.
Bill Hicks, the black-humored articulator of doubt. One of America's best and darkest comedians is eight years gone, but with a new biography and a new CD, his career shows no signs of stopping. [Salon.com]
Bill Hicks was always one of my favorite comedians. We need him now more than ever. Damn.. [ModWheel]
I add this excerpt from the article:
The United States thrives on "protecting" its citizens, and despite the Land of the Free hokum, if you dare to speak your mind and have more than 10 people ever hear it, you'll encounter offers of compromise. You'll hear unqualified taste-makers in every industry say the same things: Where can we fit you into what we're doing? No, no, no, we don't care what you think or how you feel. Can you do what this other guy did, only slightly different? How about a combination of x and y? Can you tone this down, beef this up? Can you be edgy? (A magazine editor once told me to make an article sound "undergroundy.")
Here we have the same story, only now you can read the silly slashdot comments.
BBC: Google hit by link bombers. A tempest in a teapot. Much ado about not very much. [Scripting News]
Not only is it that Dave, the BBC/Sci-Tech writer clearly doesn't get it. Of course I want a search on pberry at google to turn up pberry.weblogger.com, just as I'm sure the BBC would like a search for BBC to turn up their web page.
Oh but since I'm an individual and not a company run by induhviduals I'm the one who is being sneaky and "tricking" google into returning me as a search result.
The Other (Basketball) Shoe Drops - Introducing the Fighting Whities [Plastic]
Nice! Wonder what Jim Rome had to say about this?
Rubber Band Machine Gun [Slashdot]
Okay, I've been trying to cut back on /., but this toy is too cool.
test test
Martha Stewart must be behind these color coded terrorism alerts...
Tip from beej...get em while they're hot!
Hybrid cars: They're here, but nobody's buying. Everyone from stars to greens to President Bush seems to be hyping gas-and-electric cars. So why do we keep buying SUVs? [Salon.com]
It's the cost stupid. I want to buy one, but can't really afford paying that much more.
Mozilla 0.9.9 Released [Slashdot]
Grab it. Everyone else is...
WebStar Faster Than Apache? [MacSlash: A daily dose of Macintosh News and Discussion]
Apache not the fastest web sever on the planet? Wow, thanks Einstein. We haven't noticed until now. Thanks for pointing out that Apache has never claimed to be the fastest web server.
Just the best.
Scraping bottom there kids...
Herding Cats: A Primer for Programmers who Lead Programmers
J. Hank Rainwater
The Career Programmer: Guerilla Tactics for an Imperfect World
Christopher Duncan
[Joel on Software]
This Modern World. The Republican Party: The questions may change, but, by God, our answers stay the same! [Salon.com]
Must...link...to...cartoons...
China Issues Report Condemning Human Rights In US [Plastic]
Looks like China is trying to turn the tables. It's just another kettle/pot situation though.
The Economist. A long article on friction between the US and Europe over plans to topple Saddam.[John Robb's Radio Weblog]
The numbers from this article are staggering to say the least...
Josh on irc: "Too bad violence doesn't solve anything, because there are a lot of people I'd like to smack around a bit."