December 2007
Asus to unveil next-gen Eee PC with WiMAX... →
E-Lead Electronic Noahpad UMPC →
Taiwan-based E-Lead Electronic will show off its new Noahpad UMPC at CES 2008 next week. Dubbed “classmate, roommate, and travelmate,” the unit runs Ubuntu 7.10 by default but is capable of running Windows XP on its 1GHz VIA C7 Eden processor (CX700 chipset), 30GB hard drive, and 512MB of RAM. Its 7-inch display is LED backlit and lifts up and folds down backwards to reveal a QWERTY...
Borges on iTunes. Sort of. →
lp that I was, at the time, staring at a particularly large chunk of clutter that wound up in the middle of my dining room. It was a rack large enough to hold all of the family’s CDs. We have quite a lot of the
Threatened by the Internet? Music Biz Should Rock... →
“At the risk of jinxing things - I think it’s pretty clear that there’s a historic shift underway between activities we used to engage in offline and things we now do online. It’s no surprise, for example, that CD saleswere down 20% this US holiday season while online shopping was up 19%. That’s how it works, right? People are moving from one marketplace to another,...
Grids, The Rule of Thirds, and Rethinking Slide... →
“Anyhow, with my inaugural Macworld talk looming on the horizon(T-minus 16 days, thanks), I’ve been inspired by Garr’s book (and the top-notch site on which it’s based) to, among other things, try revamping the approach to how slides fit in to my overall show. As I said on the Twitter, that starts with shit-canning the PowerPoint-y Keynote templates I’ve previously torn up and pasted...
Programming is Hard, Let's Go Scripting... →
Torontoist: Villain: Pee-Pee →
“A couple of months back, a chap named Simon “Pee-Pee” Harris lost his wallet. Luckily for us, the person that found the wallet posted about it on Craigslist, enlightening us all to the enigma that is Pee-Pee. Pee-Pee’s a complicated fellow; a man of contradictions. He’s a sexually promiscuous weed-smoker, and a member of the Conservative Party. He’s also a white supremacist, which didn’t...
Watch(via Diggnation Episode 130 - Low Batteries)
Quickcursor →
For Mac users who want to use their favorite text editor everywhere. QuickCursor is menu item that allows you to edit text from any application in your favorite text editor*. Unlike custom “edit in” plugin solutions QuickCursor provides a standard open source solution that uses public API’s and doesn’t require input manager hacks to work. QuickCursor is still in development and not yet ready...
Stuart Jeffries on the fight of philosophers →
“A very public feud between two philosophers involving damning book reviews, professional roastings and personal slights shows how bitter, unforgiving - and unwittingly hilarious - academic spats can be, says Stuart Jeffries”
Private Place for Smokers, on the Web →
Le Lab, an internal Web site at Altadis, is meant to be part social networking site, part data resource, part virtual pep rally. The intended audience for the site — which started in the fall — is several hundred Altadis brand managers who could use a little inspiration as cafes and restaurants around the world continue to push users of the company’s products out the door.
Tied Up in Knots →
Knotted threads secure buttons to shirts. Knots in ropes attach boats to piers. You can find knots in shoestrings, ties, ribbons, and bows. But even without Boy Scouts or sailors, knots would be everywhere.
CATALOG OF COILS. Ropes knotted up spontaneously when tumbled in a box. Each knot (off-white) example is paired with the corresponding idealized knot (gold).
How and Why Knots Spontaneously Form →
“Scientists believe they have found the underlying reasons why knots are so common in the universe. This research helps us understand how knotty arrangements in various molecules lead to biological patterns, as in certain proteins. The article also provides a look at the field of topology, and how it relates to knots.”
Documents of Library in Boston to Go on Web →
“The historical record of the United States government will soon be more accessible. A digital library partnership, including two nonprofit organizations and the Boston Public Library, is preparing to begin making digital copies of the library’s paper-based government documents collection, which will then be made available on the Internet.”
Adobe Quietly Monitoring Software Use? →
“”For months, users of Adobe Creative Suite 3 have been wondering why some of the applicationsregularly connect to what looks like a private IP address but is actually a public domain address belonging to the web analytics company Omniture. Now allegations of user spying are gettinglouder, prompting Adobe Photoshop product manager John Nack to respond, though many...
USB flash drive payment system hits South Korea -... →
“We’ve definitely seen some outlandish attempts at improving or outrightreplacing the humble credit card, but South Koreans will soon be able pay for purchases using the most easy-to-lose system we’ve seen yet — by inserting a special USB flash drive into a slot. The system, which is being rolled out by Shinhan Card and VIsa, also lets users pay for online purchases by...
when philosophers attack →
From the Guardian, via AL Daily, a story about the nasty fight between philosophers Ted Honderich and Colin McGinn. A nice example of “doing status,” where people can get away with insane reviews that junior folks would never do. McGinn on Honderich’sOn Consciousness:
It is probably the most negative book review ever written. Or if there is a worse one, do let me know. “This book runs the full...
via someecards.com →
The Death of High Fidelity →
“Producers and engineers call this “the loudness war,” and it has changed the way almost every new pop and rock album sounds. But volume isn’t the only issue. Computer programs like Pro Tools, which let audio engineers manipulate sound the way a word processor edits text, make musicians sound unnaturally perfect. And today’s listeners consume an increasing amount of...
Anxiety - Lightweight To-do Management →
OS X Leopard only.
Hackers Run Wild Spending BitTorrent Tracker’s... →
“This all began a few days ago. Me and some friends were scoping around supertorrents irc network, when we discovered that they had a public prechan. Upon discovering this moderate scene security problem some friends and I decided to check the security of said prebot, turns out it was not so secure. Upon rooting the box and grabbing the unsecure predb and some scripts to play with we then rainbow...
Canada's most satisfied residents don't live in... →
I could have told them that. I hate this town.
Subvert And Profit Unapologetically Targets... →
“Subvert And Profit is a service that lets users pay to get their sites on Digg (and more recently StumbleUpon).
Unlike Pay Per Post, the company doesn’t waste a lot of time trying to spin their business into something socially acceptable. People pay them to pollute big social sites and get traffic, and they’re ok with being slammed for that. As long as they make money. The whole operation...
First Monday Podcast →
December 2007: Canaries in the Digital Age Modern day Luddite, ecological activist, writer and lecturer Stephanie Mills believes her role in today’s high–tech culture is to critically assess the totality of technology which might mean limiting our pursuit of certain kinds of knowledge.
Download podcast MP3 (6MB, 17:20) | Transcript
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Subverting The Present - Imagining The Future: Insurrection, Movement, Commons...”
– Subverting The Present - Imagining The Future: Insurrection, Movement, Commons :: AK Press
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Verso Autumn 2007 List
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– Verso Autumn 2007 List
I wish I could co-author a book with Jesus Christ!
Top 5 T.O. Tunes of 2007: Pop/Rock Edition →
>OH, the hipsters!
Letterman, Ferguson talk shows back on air... →
Leaner and Meaner Still →
“An old boss of mine once explained that it is always cheaper to get people to quit than to lay them off. Layoffs involve severance payments, retraining, and placement assistance, while quitting requires only accepting an ID badge and locking the door behind the departing employee. More employees have quit IBM this year than have been laid off. And it is not hard to see why. The work...
PlayboyU: All Tease and No Action →
“I was skeptical when Playboy launched its exclusive social network for college students in August called PlayboyU, mostly because Hef’s adult entertainment empire had chosen merely to brand a standard Ningwebsite. While it’s questionable to me whether a corporate brand can ever sustain a large and active social network, it just didn’t seem like the company was trying very hard to leverage...
Apple Stores Demonstrate That Retail Still Lives →
WheezyJoe writes “Maybe OS X Leopard has its problems, but the New York Times seems to think Apple has designed the ideal techie retail store. A policy that encourages lingering, with dozens of fully functioning computers, iPods and iPhones for visitors to try, even for hours on end (one patron wrote a manuscript entirely at the store) has ‘given some stores, especially those in urban...
WatchLast week’s episode of Diggnation.
The year in Canadian tech law, A to Z
→
“F is for Facebook, the popular social media site that boasts 8 million Canadian users. The site played a pivotal role in fostering a grassroots movement against U.S.-style copyright reforms.”
French cafes set to ban smoking →
“France is poised to extend its smoking ban to bars, cafes, restaurants and discos, but the measure will not be enforced fully until 2 January.
The health ministry said smokers would be allowed a 24-hour “grace” period for the New Year festivities.”
How To Read and Understand a Histogram →
“So a histogram is a useful tool for helping you analyze, at a glance, how the information and exposure data in a photograph is distributed. It shows the luminosity range of the image along with how it is distributed.”
Feature: Supercharge Your Scheduling with GCal →
ods and Macs have an easy solution in iCal, which can subscribe to Google Calendars and sync through iTunes. Windows users with older iPods—the kind that still have “Enable Disk Use” as an option in iTunes—can sync through Outlook or t
Warner Music Group ditches DRM, on Amazon MP3 only →
TV Decoder Blog: TV Decoder: ‘TMZ’ on TV Finds Its... →
TV Decoder: ‘TMZ’ on TV Finds Its Footing →
Free contents in NEJM →
“The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) is a top-ranked medical journal with an impact factor of 44 (2005 data, see this FAQ). Registered users have free access to research articles that are six months old or older. However, the tables of contents of each issue (such as the issues for 2007) of the NEJM indicate that the free full text is available immediately, without registration, for a...
How High Can Apple Go? $600 a Share? →
Beta Beat: Perian 1.1 hits beta →
Inside Apple Stores, a Certain Aura Enchants the... →