07 Jun 2004
Is Microsoft Money Crushing Microsoft?

This is an interesting, if somewhat long-winded, article on the problems that can plague a company with $56 billion in cash on hand ...

The latest Seattle Weekly has an article by a former Microsoft project manager titled Microsoft's Sacred Cash Cow. It argues that Microsoft, addicted to its Windows and Office revenue, is stifling innovation within the company: 'new, better ideas that would take business away from Windows or Office don't really have a chance at Microsoft.' Apple, in contrast, has embraced Open Source and is delivering a better consumer experience.

(link) [Slashdot]

00:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

The Riddle of Epicurus

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?

Then he is not omnipotent.

Is he able, but not willing?

Then he is malevolent.

Is he both able and willing?

Then whence cometh evil?

Is he neither able nor willing?

Then why call him God?

I had a long and interesting conversation last evening with an old friend, touching upon several interesting subjects. One of which was classical philosophy - and it struck me that this particular bit of philosophy has no real bearing in a polythiestic faith: we'll take the first out, and gladly admit that our gods (plural) are not omnipotent. But I can see where a monotheistic faith could rapidly reach the poof point with this riddle...

00:00 /Asatru | 0 comments | permanent link

Some New Buttons and Links

Well, I've finally started making some changes to the 'look and feel' of the blog: I added a link to my Technorati Profile: I was going to put up the nifty little button they offer to gather links to here, but I got tired of the blog taking so long to load ... even locally.

I removed the Blogarama button, as I don't seem to be listed there anymore, and I really don't feel like taking the time to resubmit. Blog directories are pretty useless, in my not-so-humble opinion.

I also changed the FreeBSD button to a more managable size - the one I had was from the front page of our family site, and was just too big to work in the column I've got running here. And it didn't scale too well, either.

I finally added a donation button, via PayPal. Given the fact that I've been unemployed since last November, the farm is still being built and collections from my consulting business are getting really annoying (average time from non-farm invoice to payment is 60 days - at least farm sales return immediate cash), I figured I'd better go ahead and beg a bit. If you like what you read here, by all means feel free to support my favorite charity: me!

00:00 /Home | 0 comments | permanent link

Study: Humans weren't made to multitask

My wife, merely from observing me, could've saved these researchers a whole lotta trouble in reaching this conclusion.

It's readily apparent that handling two things at once is much harder than handling one thing at a time. Spend too much time trying to juggle more than one objective and you'll end up wanting to get rid of all your goals besides sleeping. The question is, though, what makes it so hard to process two things at once? Two theories try to explain this phenomenon: ''passive queuing'' and ''active monitoring.'' The former says that information has to line up for a chance at being processed at some focal point of the brain, while the latter suggests that the brain can process two things at once -- it just needs to use a complicated mechanism to keep the two processes separate. Recent research from MIT points to the former as an explanation.

(link) [Science Blog - Science News Stories]

00:00 /Home | 0 comments | permanent link

Manchester honours Alan Turing

A true genius - done in by his own society. How far along would computer science be right now, had Alan Turning been treated like a human being instead of a piece of dirt?

Computer pioneer died 50 years ago today

(link) [The Register]

00:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

Texas Republicans

This is an appalling little story on the Texas Republican Convention, including some details of the platform that emerged. Here's a sample of the goings-on:

Religious fervor got an early start Friday, when thousands of GOP delegates gathered at 7 a.m. in the main hall of the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center for prayer and song.

Hands lifted, sometimes dropping to their knees, the delegates prayed for the nation, its troops and officials, including President Bush.

Beto Garza, a San Antonio doctor, was greeted with enthusiasm when he asked "that God is brought back into the school system." The Rev. C.L. Jackson of Pleasant Grove Missionary Baptist Church, a prominent black pastor, also was received warmly when he mentioned his widely noted conversion to the GOP two years ago.

Pastor Charles Butchett of First Baptist Church in Kirbyville asked for militancy on the part of Christians, saying, "Give us Christians in America who are more wholehearted, more committed and more militant for you and your kingdom than any fanatical Islamic terrorists are for death and destruction. I want to be one of those Christians."

The Republican Party (and Texas is only the representative here: I'm sure that the Indiana platform will look much the same) has left the legacy of Lincoln, TR and Reagan, and has become a basketfull of religious wingnuts. Heathens, atheists and other free-thinkers beware: four more years of this and I'm sure that the President will claim the authority to burn witches: and to him, we're all witches!

Texas Republican delegates on Friday adopted an ultraconservative party platform that attacks a wide range of targets -- from taxes and homosexuality to abortion and the United Nations -- and gives a mixed review to Gov. Rick Perry's priorities.

(link) [Houston Chronicle] via tacitus and Andrew Sullivan

00:00 /Politics | 1 comment | permanent link

Ban on Subway Photography Prompts Underground Protest

Sometimes an antedote says it all:

Mr. Anastasio went on to tell the story of a friend who took his wife's picture near the Whitestone Bridge, only to be called in for questioning by the police. He told another of a man caught snapping pictures at a Metro-North station who was interrogated for nearly two hours by authorities at the scene.

"The paranoia," he said, "has gone a little too far."

Indeed it has ...

About 100 photographers expressed their outrage at a proposed ban on taking pictures in the New York subway system.

(link) [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

00:00 /Politics | 0 comments | permanent link

US 'not bound by torture laws'

Un-fucking believeable! This bozo has got to go ... else who knows where we'll end up? Somebody needs to remind him that the end does not justify the means, despite what Lenin may have said. This kind of thinking has characterized every rise of totalitarian government in history - is this to be the legacy of the so-called "Patriot Act"?

Government lawyers argued President Bush was not bound by laws banning torture, a US newspaper reports.

(link) [BBC News | World | UK Edition]

00:00 /Politics | 0 comments | permanent link