GirlHacker's Random Log

I had fun perusing the list of all the things that have been sold in vending machines. According to this, the very first vending machine in 215 B.C. dispensed holy water. (via Yahoo's Weekly Picks)
5/31/2000 11:48:29 AM - name='285637'

I finally made it to IKEA yesterday. Seems there's a lot of that going around; I've seen many other web loggers mention IKEA recently. I've been wanting to go since opening day, but decided that the massive crowds would not add to my enjoyment. So I contented myself with the catalog until a weekday opportunity arose. There were people there but not a big crush of them, so it was very manageable. The most amusing thing I bought was a plastic box full of bendy drinking straws. Everything at IKEA has an amusing Swedish name (well, maybe it's not funny if you know Swedish) and these straws were labeled "GROGGY". All the prop books in the display rooms are in Swedish. My boyfriend described IKEA twice during our excursion. First he said "This is like Costco but with lots more furniture." Later he said "This is like a giant Swedish Crate & Barrel." I'm not sure how I would describe it because, well, IKEA is...IKEA.
5/31/2000 11:41:10 AM - name='285623'

If you can't make it there yourself (I'm hoping to soon), ArchitectureWeek has a description of what it's like to visit The Rose Center for Earth and Space, the striking glass cube addition to New York's American Museum of Natural History. A suitable structure for a venerable topic.
5/30/2000 12:40:53 AM - name='280100'

I've just started reading McDonald's Behind the Arches by John F. Love, a well-written history of the business of the ubiquitous hamburger franchise. Therefore, an item in the paper piqued my interest; Boston Chicken, the parent company of Boston Market restaurants, is being acquired by McDonald's Corp. Boston Chicken filed for bankruptcy in 1998. That was about the time I stopped eating there (no, it wasn't my fault!). From what I've already learned about McDonald's business practices, they seem well-suited to whip the lagging restaurant chain into shape. As of January 2000 there were 858 Boston Market restaurants. In December 1997 there were 1166.
5/30/2000 12:28:48 AM - name='280086'

Monday, May 29, 2000

PBS' American Experience tells us about The Fly Girls:
"During WWII, more than a thousand women signed up to fly with the U.S. military. Wives, mothers, actresses and debutantes who joined the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPS) test-piloted aircraft, ferried planes and logged 60 million miles in the air. Thirty-eight women died in service. But the opportunity to play a critical role in the war effort was abruptly canceled by politics and resentment, and it would be 30 years before women would again break the sex barrier in the skies."
5/29/2000 11:44:27 AM - name='278121'

Since her breakthrough design of the Vietnam Memorial while still an undergraduate at Yale, Maya Lin has continued to create beautiful, thought provoking works of art. She was also selected to create the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama. Her versatility goes beyond stone monuments; she has designed a beautiful wave landscape of soil and grass for the François-Xavier Bagnoud Building at the University of Michigan College of Engineering. Her creation at the Wexner Center for the Arts is "a landscape of mounds of shattered glass slightly varying in size." She's been a member of the Presidio Advisory Council and was the subject of an Academy Award-winning documentary, Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision.
5/29/2000 11:38:57 AM - name='278100'

Sunday, May 28, 2000

Exceptionally detailed: How to Write Telegrams Properly. "If the telegram is packed full of unnecessary words, words which might be omitted without impairing the sense of the message, the sender has been guilty of economic waste." Tsk tsk tsk! There is a section on the correct way to send telegrams to someone on a train. Wow. Getting a message delivered to a train! That's cool! (via memepool)
5/28/2000 11:48:18 AM - name='274888'

While Americans are remembering those fallen in combat tomorrow, people in Gloucester, England will be chasing an eight-pound wheel of Double Gloucester cheese down a very steep hill. In recent years, this has proven to be a dangerous event with eighteen people injured in 1997, including an innocent bystander who unsuccessfully tried to dodge a bouncing cheese. The race was cancelled in 1998 and revived in 1999 with crash barriers and a noon starting time (so participants would not have had as much to drink). So why chase the cheese down the hill? It's a 200 year old celebration of commoners rights to the land, according to this article.
5/28/2000 11:44:39 AM - name='274875'

Saturday, May 27, 2000

Negativland is playing in Palo Alto, CA on Sunday at Cubberly. In keeping with their attitudes about copying, I will now lift from their web site a topically amusing story:

Note: The track "Michael Jackson" from this Fatboy Slim CD samples from the Negativland track "Michael Jackson" from our 1987 release "Escape From Noise" on SST Records. Stupidly, Fatboy Slim went to SST Records to get permission to use this sample. SST charged him $1000, which they are keeping all for themselves, of course. Besides the fact that Fatboy could have kept his $1000 and taken the sample from us without permission and we wouldn't have cared, the Negativland sample he used was itself appropriated by us without permission from a religious flexi-disc originally issued in 1966. (In fact, a Negativland member LITERALLY stole this record from the basement of a church in Concord CA.) The Fatboy Slim track has now been licensed by Fatboy to be used in a Coca-Cola commercial!!! So Negativland now finds itself to actually be in a REAL cola commercial and Coca-Cola unwittingly engages in copyright infringement ( or is it a fair use?).....too bad it wasn't Pepsi.......
5/27/2000 10:44:13 AM - name='272042'

I've been penciling in all the local festivals going on this summer into my planning calendar. Along the way, I found the California Festivals web site, which lists a bunch of 'em all over the state. The dates haven't been updated for 2000, but many of the listings include links to active web sites. The cutest one I found was the LambTown Festival held in Dixon every July. They have "sheep dog trials, spinners and weavers, a mutton busting contest, (where kids actually get to ride the sheep), and a shearing competition." And, of course, a lamb cook-off (I think the people cook, not the lambs).
5/27/2000 10:36:22 AM - name='272024'

Friday, May 26, 2000

Is this giant duck story for real? "A 15 foot giant bird-beast, closely related to the modern duck, may have ruled the Earth after dinosaurs died out, scientists believe." I'm picturing a Jurassic Park-like movie with computer renderings of giant duckies. "Quack! Quack!" they squeal as a scared geek girl in front of a monitor says "I know this! It's like the Linux penguin!"
5/26/2000 10:08:01 AM - name='268858'

Recurring computer nightmares:

• I follow a link to a web page which is supposed to contain some piece of information I've been looking for. The page is infinitely long and I start searching for key words while it is loading, they are never there and the page keeps loading and loading and loading....
• I fix a bug in some code, compile, and run. The bug is not fixed. I go back to the code and the fix I made has disappeared. I fix it again, compile, and run. The bug is not fixed... [repeat ad infinitum]
• I keep breaking and buying an infinite number of ethernet/modem dongles on the laptop.

5/26/2000 10:05:38 AM - name='268846'

Smith Corona has voluntarily filed for bankruptcy to facilitate a buyout by Carolina Wholesale Office Machine Company, a wholesale distributor of office equipment and supplies. Carolina Wholesale plans to "organize Smith Corona as a separate operating entity with a strong focus on the core typewriter and supplies products". So the name will live on, and it does have brand impact, so it should. The press release includes interesting historical information about Smith Corona's bumpy ride along the typewriter obsolescence trail. Smith Corona had previously filed Chapter 11 in 1995 and came out of it in 1997, having successfully reorganized from a manufacturing company to sales and marketing, obtaining all products from third party sources. But that success was short-lived. This past April they were delisted from Nasdaq because they no longer satisfied the financial requirements. The stock is at $0.34, with 3,220,180 shares outstanding among 450 holders. For more nostalgia, I found this page full of typewriter links, including a 1996 Popular Mechanics article on their 130 year history.
5/25/2000 12:40:49 AM - name='263639'

Wednesday, May 24, 2000

Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping looks to be a fascinating read. The author, Paco Underhill, and his team have conducted field research at malls, department stores, drugstores, etc., observing shoppers interacting with their consumer habitats. Their research and recommendations often result in increased sales for their clients. Now I know why I sometimes have that "I'm being watched" feeling when I'm shopping. Maybe I am. I know I'm being subtly manipulated.
5/24/2000 11:31:55 AM - name='261324'

It's always nice to see environmentally responsible actions being taken by a huge corporation (or one of any size, actually). 3M is phasing out production of many of its Scotchguard products. The perfluorooctanyl chemistry used in the production of these repellents has stuck around in the environment. This "persistent compound, like other materials in the environment, can be detected broadly at extremely low levels in the enviroment and in people." While they claim there is no current risk, continued production of these products would certainly raise the amount of this compound in the environment. They are working on a sustainable replacement.
5/24/2000 11:24:52 AM - name='261300'

Tuesday, May 23, 2000

Before I had my own weblog, I ran across the Traffic Cone Preservation Society website which had me laughing so hard that I emailed the link to tons o' friends. Today, I ran across the Orange Cones of Washington D.C. on the browse0tron. Yes, the random spirit of the web is alive and kicking.
5/23/2000 12:31:11 AM - name='255097'

Flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal died over the weekend. I saw him perform on his gold flute in the late 1980s in Stamford, Connecticut. I also have a vague recollection of him as a guest on the Muppet Show, but it is so vague it may have just been a Sesame Street sketch (the Muppet Show episode guide reveals he was on in 1980). Perhaps this will give me the kickstart to spend some money to see solo artists whom I've always figured I would get around to eventually. Some of them may not be around much longer.
5/23/2000 12:28:37 AM - name='255090'

Monday, May 22, 2000

I very much appreciate when a news article about a scientific study takes the time to link to the study itself. Of course that happens most frequently at primarily online media. And those tend to be the articles that don't distill the truth of the study into some eye-grabbing or sound-bite-worthy nutshell.
5/22/2000 12:35:14 AM - name='250791'

This study, covered by Wired, concluded that the proportion of women earning bachelor's degrees in computer science at universities with Ph.D. degrees in computing should increase slightly in the next few years, but will continue to lag behind the male number. Women are earning scientific degrees in greater numbers, but not in the CS discipline. The Wired article discusses high school programs designed to encourage girls to learn coding. Some of them focus on training the teachers, which is an excellent root cause solution. Unfortunately what keeps many girls away from programming is negative cultural perceptions and those can take a long time to shift. I disliked my initial exposures to programming because it was taught as part of our math curriculum, and I do not enjoy math. So when my first computer assignments involved creating mathematical equations in lines of BASIC, I was completely turned off. To hit the broadest range of potential coders, you've got to show them the vast range of what programming can allow you to do. I've used mathematical formulas (more complex than simple arithmetic) directly only a few times in my career (for graphics calculations mostly). Coding is an art and a pleasure for me, not a mathematical chore. But I almost missed out completely.
5/22/2000 12:34:59 AM - name='250790'

Sunday, May 21, 2000

I finally saw Dogma last night on DVD. Funny. Not as rip-roaring funny as Clerks because it actually made me use my brain a lot, but very clever. The behind-the-scenes images from the website are fun, especially since they were taken by Kevin Smith himself (you know what happens when someone gets a digital camera for the first time).
5/21/2000 10:07:29 AM - name='248424'

"Lehrer agrees to interviews only when he has a product to sell." And since he's got a new box set from Rhino out on Tuesday ("The Remains of Tom Lehrer"), Tom Lehrer granted David L. Beck of the Mercury News an interview at a Santa Cruz coffee shop. The resulting article does the genius of Lehrer justice, describing what he's been up to with his other career teaching college students about math and musicals. This 1997 chat transcript off of the Rhino site, wherein Lehrer claims co-inventorship of the Jell-o vodka shot, is also very amusing.
5/21/2000 9:55:34 AM - name='248399'

Saturday, May 20, 2000

I watched the 1975 movie Rollerball last weekend and was told afterwards that there was a lot of brouhaha about its violence when it was released. I suddenly realized how jaded I have become to movie violence. It's not that I enjoy or sit calmly through the violence, but nowadays I expect it to be there and either prepare myself to endure it or avoid movies that depend on it. Since Rollerball is a tale of the entertainment of the future, I suppose it could be taken as a warning against complacency towards violence. We shall see where the scheduled remake falls in the horror scale.
5/20/2000 9:05:43 AM - name='245523'

GirlHacker's checklist for quitting work:

• DSL ordered (through provider willing to first try ADSL at 13,000+ feet)
• ergonomically correct chair ordered
• internal networking strategy research begun (Intel's Anypoint wireless does not yet support W2K or NT. Hmph.)
• 8 inches of hair chopped off (ummm well, it seems relevant somehow) (don't worry, it's still long)
• inline skates tuned up, ABEC-5 bearings drooled over at sporting goods store

5/20/2000 8:50:25 AM - name='245495'

Friday, May 19, 2000

I've been meaning to write about the unique garden.com "living" billboard on 101 for a while. Luckily, Salon just did a short piece on their marketing tactics so I have more trivia to pass along. The billboard is white with tubing in the shape of "garden.com". Creeping fig vines are wrapped around the tubing. I watched the progress of its construction each morning, wondering what the heck they were up to, and when the tubing went up, I thought it was going to be a neon sign. I was impressed when the greenery went up, even more so when I realized, as it wilted and was reworked, that it was alive. Garden.com also has seasonal business cards and stationery, and "employees drink out of mugs in the shape of flower pots."
5/19/2000 9:32:41 AM - name='242302'

Of course Jim Romenesko has done a wonderful job rounding up the choiciest articles on Helen Thomas' departure from UPI. International Editor Lee Katz also resigned with the change in ownership, and he had no qualms about pinning his departure on the ultra-conservative affiliation. One of my favorite media sites, the Online Journalism Review, has a wonderful article on UPI's ongoing demise. "The shabby remains of United Press are now in the hands of the Moonies, and nobody who claims to be a journalist will come anywhere near it." It closes with this wonderful plea: "Helen, I hope you're on the phone with the big papers right now, because if that damned Dubya wins the White House, we need you there to give him hell." (I'm not decided on the pres. election yet, but I liked this quote. Heck, substitute in whatever candidate you want and it's still great!) An article in NewsForChange says it best: "A classy broad steps down".
5/19/2000 9:23:31 AM - name='242268'

Thursday, May 18, 2000

Bob Blumer, better known as The Surreal Gourmet, has released a new cookbook called Off the Eaten Path. And he's going on a 3 month, 30 city tour in "an Airstream trailer, customized with a $35,000 industrial kitchen, and topped with 2 giant slices of toast." (yum, toast!) He fills his books with wonderfully punny artwork that he does himself. Some of his recipes are equally off the wall, such as his method for poaching salmon in the dishwasher.
5/18/2000 1:00:46 AM - name='237002'

Helen Thomas, the most senior correspondent covering the White House, is resigning from UPI after 57 years. UPI was just sold to News World Communications Inc., which was founded by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, leader of the Unification Church. Like the consummate professional that she is, Thomas did not state any reasons for her departure, and wished the new management of UPI well. Her seniority entitles her to be first for questions at news conferences, so you may have often heard Presidents saying "Helen?" right after finishing statements to the press. She also closes conferences with a "Thank you, Mr. President." She may be back on the White House beat if she chooses to find similar work, but I'm wondering who is next on the seniority list? And will that person take over voicing the now traditional thanks to the President?
5/18/2000 12:52:37 AM - name='236984'

Wednesday, May 17, 2000

My favorite part of the Aimee Mann & Michael Penn show (probably because they didn't do it last time I saw them) was their mini-rendition of "I've Got You Babe". Michael does a clever Sonny Bono impression. Aimee claims to not do any impressions, but she did do her own parody of Michael. They're back in Saratoga in August (yes, we already have tickets).
5/17/2000 10:15:50 AM - name='234284'

Those spammers have such clever subject headings. In addition to the usual porn and money headlines, I'm now getting stuff like "Why did you say that about me??" (uhhh, sorry. How did you know I was going to curse you for sending me unsolicited email?)
5/17/2000 10:10:39 AM - name='234267'

The subconscious can be a wonderfully helpful thing, but I wish mine were more eloquent. All my dreams last night were about people breaking into my place. This morning, I couldn't find my keys. Turns out I had left them in the door -- overnight. Whoops.
5/17/2000 10:08:25 AM - name='234255'

Researchers have posed various theories about the causes of left-handedness. Various statistics, such as identical twins with different handedness, have blown most genetic theories. Some theorized that differences in development in the womb was a factor. This NY Times article describes Dr. Amar J. S. Klar's hypothesis that there is a specific dominant gene that causes right-handedness. If that gene is not present, a person has a 50-50 chance of being right or left-handed. William H. Calvin has a wonderful essay that presents the natural selection-based theory that females carrying infants next to their hearts and throwing stones at small animals led to right-handedness predominance.
5/16/2000 1:41:16 AM - name='228989'

As you may remember, I had not yet gotten a new dollar coin, lamented that other loggers had, and requested that those people who are hoarding them please release them into the wild so I could hoard one of my own. Well, I joked with Seth that it would be sadly amusing if he saw one of these coins before I did. This was a joke because he's currently a grad student in Scotland. But, thanks to the miracle of transatlantic travel, he just acquired one upon his arrival in NYC "courtesy of the NYC Metro Card vending machine". So he wins. Not by much, though. This morning, a coin-collecting-co-worker handed me my very own Sacagawea dollar. It's a "P", since he had just been vacationing on the east coast. So, I'm better than my fellow west coasters who just have "D"s. I suppose Seth has a "P" too. But that's OK, 'cause I've got every version of the released state quarters (yes, even Maryland). So there! :-)
5/16/2000 1:27:09 AM - name='228974'

Monday, May 15, 2000

Here's a nifty name distribution mapper based on US Census data. (via Bird on a Wire)
5/15/2000 1:31:47 AM - name='225272'

I saw a commercial today for a, I think, "it's not delivery, it's DiGiorno", pizza which comes in half pepperoni, half cheese. Why didn't somebody think of this before? Neat.
5/15/2000 1:29:52 AM - name='225269'

Ahhh...there will be a third Myst game. Presto is taking on the challenge of creating Myst III scheduled to ship early next year, while Cyan, the original developers (Rand Miller is still CEO there), works on "a state-of-the-art real-time 3D graphics engine to present the original Myst saga as it was originally intended", scheduled for this year. (thanks for the tip BrainLog)
5/15/2000 1:26:16 AM - name='225265'

Sunday, May 14, 2000

(I just had to say this.) Aimee Mann is playing at Bimbo's 365 Club 'til Tuesday. (go ahead, kick me.)
5/14/2000 2:43:16 AM - name='222725'

I enjoyed reading about the adventures and tribulations of a family with twelve kids in Cheaper By The Dozen, but it wasn't until much later when I discovered what the parents of those kids did for a living. Frank and Lillian Gilbreth were pioneers in the use of motion study to improve the efficiency of physical tasks. I once saw photos of their motion-capture techniques, where they put tiny flashlights on people's wrists to capture their actions with a long exposure. They were often able to greatly reduce the number of actions performed by the worker. Only recently when a Gilbreth web site popped up on Yahoo's picks did I discover that Lillian Gilbreth was much more than just an assistant to her husband. She had a Ph.D. from Brown and continued running their business long after his death, gaining recognition as one of the world's great industrial and management engineers. Plus there were the twelve kids to raise. It may be easier when you know how to be efficient, but it's still mighty impressive.
5/14/2000 2:31:05 AM - name='222715'

Saturday, May 13, 2000

I thought I had seen every cow and Holstein-patterned item imaginable, because of my friend Lisa, a cow-lunatic . Apparently not. Billy-Joe offers a collection of bathroom stoppers and kitchen strainers, some featuring a cute moo-cow.
5/13/2000 10:58:36 AM - name='221100'

I developed a dislike of DeBeers, the diamond company, a few years back when I saw a Frontline program that described the great myth about the scarcity of diamonds. The New York Times has done a series on "Africa's Diamond Wars" which reveals how diamonds are fueling African wars and "are agents of terror". It also describes the power De Beers holds over this sparkly industry. "De Beers created its cartel 110 years ago when the company's founder, Cecil Rhodes, realized that the sheer abundance of diamonds in southern Africa would make them virtually worthless. By carefully manipulating scarcity, De Beers prospered as perhaps the most powerful cartel in the annals of modern commerce." To their credit, DeBeers is now guaranteeing that none of its diamonds came from African rebels. Regardless of their manufactured rarity, diamonds are beautiful objects, inspiringly indestructible, and I'll ooo and ahh over anyone's carats. But the same consumers who demand truth in advertising and avoid sweatshop goods should take a close look at this industry and make their own decision about how romantic these gems really are.
5/13/2000 10:50:57 AM - name='221086'

Friday, May 12, 2000

Here's an interesting Boston Review article about Stephen Jay Gould's attacks on human sociobiology. It is also informative about the various scientific approaches for studying evolution. As the author notes, Gould's criticisms of the adaptationist or selectionist approach in evolutionary biology may have little effect on scientific progress as researchers are forging on ahead with adaptationist theories. But because Stephen Jay Gould's essays, such as those in Natural History, are widely read by the public, his views may influence popular opinion away from sociobiological perspectives on human behavior. This debate reminds me somewhat of the rather antagonist view we had of behaviorists in my cognitive science seminars. My professor would rip on Skinner like there was no tomorrow and we would wonder how Skinner's wife felt knowing that he believed his love for her was just a set of behavorial responses with no internal mental states. (article via Feed)
5/12/2000 12:55:02 AM - name='217317'

Thursday, May 11, 2000

The entire Rhino Records catalog is on sale at Tower right now. Rhino is an excellent label, with something for everyone from Tom Lehrer to Space Ghost to The Monkees to The Cars and everything in between and around (no, I'm not gaining anything from this plug besides spreading the joy of wonderful back catalogs of recent music history).
5/11/2000 12:21:25 AM - name='214038'

A while back, brig wrote: "i really despise company functions. more than likely because i'm an introvert, but i just really dislike being forced to have fun and socialize. especially since it's all the extroverts who think it's a good time and want to force you into attending." It reminded me of thoughts I've had on the culture of software companies, especially the typical, conflicting (ideally with positive results) relationship between marketing and engineering.

Once at a previous company, we software engineers had been working intense, long hours on a major release. We were all tired and cranky, grumpily plowing through our bug lists. Some marketing types came in after normal office hours to decorate the office for a Halloween party. They put on loud music and had a loud, giggly time stringing up streamers and cobwebs, as we tried to concentrate on our code. We complained that they were being loud and they turned down the music. And then the next day we were pretty much forced to participate in silly Halloween activities (they were probably fun, not just silly, and, yeah we probably needed a break, but we were pissy about it anyway).

Well, the marketing people were very upset by our attitude because, in their minds, they were trying to create some fun for us, and they did not understand why the last thing we wanted to do was dress up in costumes and carouse with the entire company. Well, the only thing I wanted to do at that point of the release was crawl into a comfy little hole and sleep for a few months. It's tough creating a comfortable environment for everyone. A mix of personality types creates the best software. But how do you create a productive social atmosphere for everyone? Be understanding of everyone's needs and don't make people feel bad if their idea of relaxation doesn't match yours.
5/11/2000 12:07:02 AM - name='214023'

Wednesday, May 10, 2000

The Craft of Adventure: Five articles on the design of adventure games. It includes a Bill of Player’s Rights, such as the right to "Not to need to do boring things for the sake of it" and (since my links are all Canadian today) "Not to need to be American". There's some great stuff in this set of essays and it took me back to some long hours plowing through Zork on my Commodore 64, and to my CS101 final project, which was a zany game wherein you chased toothpaste thieves through Disney World (luckily, my professor had a good sense of humor). (via Bovine Inversus)
5/10/2000 9:57:38 AM - name='211559'

I read about the Canadian post office offering personalized stamps (I think this is the Canada Post web page about it) and remembered that I once had this strange thought sequence about customized stamps. When services like E-Stamp were launching, I thought that it would be cool if you could print your own stamp designs. My next thought was that perhaps there could be free postage paid for by having the stamp be an ad. Then I realized that the impressions for an ad on something sent through the mail was pretty low so that was a stupid idea. Then I thought, well, discounted stamps or not, there could be specially licensed stamps with the latest fashionable logo (Tommy Hilfiger, Pokemon, Nike, etc) so people could "brand" their letters. But then I realized that the people in that target market probably just send email these days, so that wouldn't go over so well. Maybe there's something viable in that train of thoughts. People still send wedding invitations, thank you notes (I hope!), birth announcements, etc.
5/10/2000 9:49:10 AM - name='211530'

Tuesday, May 9, 2000

In the ongoing theme of digital vs physical, Wired has an article called "Who Can Dig Digital Books?" For the next five years, University of Pennsylvania Library will make all the history works produced by Oxford University Press available electronically. They hope to find out how digital texts are used, whether they take the place of or supplement books. As you know, five years is a lot in Internet time, and I wonder how vast the evolution could be over five years. One breakthrough in affordable, highly readable screens could cause a revolution. Of course the evolving use of books with the availability of electronic text may be a slow transition, and I assume the study will be designed to record the evolution, not just figure out how to deal with it. The study has a limited range of books, and it may not be able to reflect what could happen if electronic books catch on for the mass market. But I suppose readers will find less benefit in dynamically searching Danielle Steele than a more scholarly title. Then again, some people may like skipping forward to the good parts of fluff novels. Someone could write a search algorithm for the effective perusal of romance novels (you know what I mean).
5/9/2000 2:32:09 AM - name='207581'

Monday, May 8, 2000

I sent my dad the link to the squirrel-zapping bird feeder and he replied that he also needs a crow-proof and deer-proof bird feeder. Great.
5/8/2000 1:41:47 AM - name='204541'

I'm currently reading Buzz: The Science and Lore of Alcohol and Caffeine. It updates or outright debunks quite a few "facts" which I learned in school, those many years ago. It made me realize that scientific knowledge continues to be gathered and sometimes disproven, and I shouldn't assume that theories I learned in school are still considered true. It must be both fascinating and frustrating to be a medical doctor and have to keep up with all the research and new evidence that may be against accepted practices. I've had a few run-ins with doctors who refuse to listen to new information I bring to them (I always do my own research). One MD told me: "That study isn't worth the paper it's printed on!" But I digress. Buzz is well-written, well-researched, and may significantly update your understanding of these substances. Now that I've learned all about why it's not completely true that alcohol is a depressant (but that's what they told me in school!), I'm moving onto the caffeine portion. The author, Stephen Braun, has a new book out which also looks fascinating: The Science of Happiness: Unlocking the Mysteries of Mood.
5/8/2000 1:31:09 AM - name='204523'

Sunday, May 7, 2000

I was surfing around Inconspicuous Consumption and suddenly recognized something I own. It's an MP 4000 Postal Scale. Now I know the official name for my little postal scale. I've always loved how elegantly simple it is, and it is perfectly accurate. Hmmm, you know, Restoration Hardware should really sell these -- maybe they already do. As our gadgets become more digital and electronic, items like these become more firmly ensconced under the heading of "quaint". There must be devices that electronics will not replace, but I can think of electronic replacements for many things. Even plain old toothbrushes are being superseded by fancy gizmos. I'll hang onto my whistling teakettle. One day maybe those will have configurable "whistles". "Tea for Two" would be my pick.
5/7/2000 10:12:40 AM - name='202786'

Saturday, May 6, 2000

It's about time. Thanks to Steve and twernt for the news that Peter Gabriel is about to release a new album. The music is from the Millenium Dome show he helped create. Did you know that Tuesday is the day to hit the record store for new releases?
5/6/2000 10:56:14 AM - name='200833'

My parents put a birdfeeder outside every winter. A wonderful array of birds used to stop by for birdseed. The most striking were the bright red cardinals. And when the season started to turn, we'd keep an eye out for the red-breasted robin, the harbinger of spring. There seems to be less of a variety of species now, but the cute chickadees still come by, picking their way through the seeds to get to their favorite sunflower seeds. My dad has a constant battle with the squirrels. They'd always come by, scare away the birds and have their fill. My dad started altering the cylindrical bird feeder to discourage them. But those rascally creatures are smart and agile. They could clamber across the horizontal wire the feeder was hung from and eat their meal upside down. When he changed the hanging method, they would take flying leaps from nearby trees and land on the feeder (most of the time). He put a narrow, metal cone on top of the cylinder so they would slip off when they tried to grasp it. They were stymied for a little while, but soon learned to deal with that too. I kept telling my dad that he was just breeding smarter squirrels. He's given up, mostly. But I still think he may be secretly plotting his next move. I almost don't want to send him a pointer to this feeder that zaps squirrel visitors (found on memepool).
5/6/2000 10:43:55 AM - name='200812'

Friday, May 5, 2000

I should know better than to tell people "don't ask". It just makes 'em even more curious. But it is comforting to know that many of you would like to ask. So thanks for asking (or not!). As you may have surmised from yesterday's resignation letters links, I gave notice this week. I am not on the job market yet so call off the referral hounds. I'm going to relax for a while. And I'm taking this Cheney cartoon, which a former boss who shall remain nameless sent to me, to heart (apologies if the f-word offends you). But I'll still be posting here, of course.
5/5/2000 12:37:26 AM - name='197420'

In reading the Wired article about the online news readers study and the web site of the study itself, I was annoyed by the generalizations the article makes. This reporting "style" is typical of the news media and makes me always question headlines and distilled reports of scientific studies. The Wired article repeatedly says things like "22 percent of online readers look at graphics" and "online readers read, on average, 75 percent of each article they click on." It sounds so legitimate. But when you look at the details of the study, you find that they studied only 67 people. Here are their demographics. The FAQ states that this was a study of a certain subset of people, and "this study is not statistically valid as would be a survey". The results need to be interpreted with their known conditions. But the media tends to forget little details like this, opting instead for juicy general statistics. They don't seem to enjoy qualifying their facts. It's unfortunate that we can not depend on the media to accurately present information to their readers. Besides cutting down on hype, it would save me all the time I spend tracking down the reality myself!
5/5/2000 12:17:43 AM - name='197395'

Thursday, May 4, 2000

It's been a tough week already (you may get an inkling why a little further down), but, hey, at least I'm not Bill Gates. He and his lawyers are so preoccupied they forgot to counter-"cease & desist" the Digital Divas for using a term Microsoft obviously invented all by their lonesomes.
5/4/2000 1:31:04 AM - name='194610'

Who could forget Eloise, the girl who lived (lives!) at the Plaza? My mom recognized her subversive behavior immediately and requested that I stop filling my brain with her exploits. Thanks for the memories, Eric.
5/4/2000 1:23:42 AM - name='194602'

Here are some resources for writing a resignation letter (don't ask): keeping it simple with just one sentence, being more verbose, but positively, and remembering not to burn any bridges. Also for your inspiration here is a scan of Richard Nixon's to the point resignation letter, accepted and initialed by Henry Kissinger, and, from the other side, Nixon's acceptance of the Commissioner of Social Security's resignation. And, just for kicks, a resignation from adulthood.
5/4/2000 1:20:40 AM - name='194597'

Wednesday, May 3, 2000

I can't believe Simon & Schuster is publishing PANTY RAIDER: FROM HERE TO IMMATURITY. "Gamers will Seek Out Supermodels to Strip Them Down to Their Bra and Panties." I was trying to be open minded and see the humor in it, but I'd rather repeat that mantra to myself: "if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." sigh.
5/3/2000 9:26:57 AM - name='192504'

The Post and Courier newspaper in Charleston, South Carolina now has bar codes to take readers to web sites relevant to stories (oh, and ads of course!). Hmm. This provides a solid way to track traffic driven to sites via the printed paper. Think of the marketing possibilities: the first 100 people to swipe this ad get free shipping on their order! or perhaps: swipe here if you're planning to vote for Al Gore or here for Bush Jr. or perhaps if the laser pen software is also providing personal data (which I'm sure won't fly for many consumers), swipe here and a salesman will call to show you our wonderful new set of encyclopedias on CD-ROM. Of course, how many people will be reading their newspaper next to their computer? Will this make everyone want to have Internet access in their breakfast nooks?
5/3/2000 9:23:42 AM - name='192496'

Tuesday, May 2, 2000

Here's an informative and amusing interview with Onion head writer, Todd Hanson. It provides some insight into how The Onion comes up with those wacky, wacky stories. And don't you want to write for The Onion? "I guess pretty much everybody who works at The Onion, almost everyone, is really unstable and apparently they need to process their psychological instability through doing that sort of humour. I don't know whether someone who is completely mentally healthy could do the same thing." Amen!
5/2/2000 7:16:37 AM - name='189094'

There's an exhibition about The Art of Food for Festivals at the Getty Research Institute. "Ornate edible architecture and sculptures were often created for celebrations in the cities and courts of early modern Europe." Yum! Nowadays we often see ice sculptures (which are, strictly speaking, edible) at significant "feasts". And I've seen some spun sugar concoctions, and glorious wedding cakes that most definitely are works of art. But grandiose food sculptings are not as common as they were back in other times. I found an interesting fact amongst the exhibit listings. Sugar was first sold with drugs and herbs at apothecary shops and was used as a medicine in addition to being a sweetener as we know it. Someone once told me that if sugar was discovered today it would be treated as a controlled substance! I'm not sure how true that is, but it makes some sense. (via Yahoo's Weekly Picks)
5/2/2000 7:14:26 AM - name='189086'

Monday, May 1, 2000

Disney pulling ABC off Time-Warner cable just seems...odd. Sadly I don't really watch ABC that much anymore. Wouldn't it just be ironic if no one cared?? I'm sure a lot of people will or they wouldn't have done it. Here's a link to the NY Times article about it. Remember also that AOL and Time-Warner are merging. Negotiation hijinks in the new media economy: good or bad for us consumers?
5/1/2000 10:05:44 AM - name='186564'

Blue Man Group, which I heard about from Seth years ago, has opened a production in Las Vegas at the Luxor (that's the neato pyramid one). I saw them in Boston a year ago (coincidentally on the same day I saw the little blue penguins from New Zealand at the aquarium :-). It is a very difficult show to describe; I just tell people to go see it when I know they will be near it. It is part performance art, part percussive music, part art criticism, and definitely hilarious. There is audience participation and an energizing finale. I love the fake ads they ran. They are edging ever closer to the west coast -- I hope the Bay Area will be next on their expansion list. If you have the chance, go see them.
5/1/2000 9:59:45 AM - name='186548'