April 20, 2007
SCIENCE NOTE TO BACARDI'S MARKETING FIRM, NOT THAT THEY'D CARE
If you're a company marketing your booze in a diet-conscious way, it would make sense that you're looking out for the best interest of the consumer. The thinner your customer looks the better theh bla blah blah . . . I'm sorry. I just got headbutted back to reality. Booze, dieting, and advertising really are a perfect storm of not making sense and, in fact, makes zero, or multiple-zeroes sense. Let's start with the graphic to the right: "0 Carbs 0 Sugar". It is from Bacardi, recommending mixing Bacardi rum with Diet Coke, because the resulting cocktail contains zero calories from carbs and zero calories from sugar. This is redundant, of course, because sugar is a carbohydrate. Sugars are certainly simpler molecules than complex carbohydrates, but when classifying food as either carb, fat, or protein, sugar goes in the carbohydrate column. The graphic to the right is the same as writing "0 Beatles 0 John Lennon".
The impression given by the Bacardi ads touting its zero-level qualities is that a Bacardi and Diet Coke cocktail is a godsend to the weight-conscious or Atkins-minded partygoers planning on drinking so often and in such quantities that the calorie content of their drinks will make a noticeable impact on their waistlines. Let me disabuse those people of that impression.
There's no fat or protein in a Bacardi and Diet Coke cocktail, so let's remove those from the equation. The Bacardi ad people double-emphasized the fact that there are zero calories from carbohydrates in that cocktail. The great unmentioned––and the presumable reason that people would be drinking a Bacardi and Diet Coke in the first place––is that the drink contains alcohol. Alcohol is a different type of molecule than fats, carbs, and protein. It gets a nutritional category all its own, and the alcohol molecule contains seven calories per gram.
The standard cocktail made with 1 1/2 ozs. of 80% proof liquor contains about 14 grams of alcohol equalling 97 calories. If you were to consume 35 Bacardi and Diet Cokes in an evening you would gain approximately one pound, althought that would be the least of your worries the next morning, presuming you wake up. The next time that you see one of these ads, remember that they are being cut off at the end, like an annoying repetitive drunk by a tired and annoyed bartender. After they tout zero calories from carbs and zero calories from sugar, they are forgetting to add 97 calories from alcohol.
Tagged: advertising, bacardi, caloriesPosted by Lexiphane at 12:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 9, 2007
FINGERING FAKES
The cropped site page above was taken from The New York Times' article regarding Antonella Barba, the "American Idol" contestant who gained quick notoriety less for her singing skill (or lack thereof) than for her affinity for Girls Gone Wild-type situations. Although the raunchiest alleged photos of Barbella were evenually uncovered as a hoax, the damage was done and the young woman from Jersey was none too pleased.
''These were photos of my personal life that got exploited without my consent,'' she said during a conference call Friday with reporters from across the country. ''I've learned to be careful who you trust.''
Yes. Welcome to the Internet. The reason I mention it is that the headline I cropped above isn't the one the Times printed. I threw that last adjective in there myself using Photoshop Elements. It took about 30 seconds. The ability to manipulate images believably is causing concern among some news organizations who would prefer not to unknowingly publish altered photos. Adobe, the company that developed Photoshop, is now working to undo some of the havoc its program unleashed.
A suite of photo-authentication tools under development by Adobe Systems could make it possible to match a digital photo to the camera that shot it, and to detect some improper manipulation of images, Wired News has learned.
Adobe plans to start rolling out the technology in a number of photo-authentication plug-ins for its Photoshop product beginning as early as 2008. The company is working with a leading digital forgery specialist at Dartmouth College, who met with the Associated Press last month.
The article links to some famous examples of doctored news photos.
Tagged: adobe, authentication, fakes, photosPosted by Lexiphane at 10:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 3, 2007
FIRST THEY CAME FOR THE HONEY, THEN THEY CAME FOR THE SYRUP . . .
Stifling heat waves that kill city residents by the scores; fierce hurricanes that wipe cities off the map; melting ice pack that will ironically usher in a new ice age. All of these things I had no real significant problem with. Worrying about global warming was for Chicken Little Losers who drove hybrid cars and loved Ralph Nader before they hated him. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case.
Hot on the heels of news that honey bees are disappearing from the southern United States comes news that sugary goodness may be vanishing from the north as well. According to today's New York Times, global warming may be interfering with the production of sticky, sweet, delicious maple syrup:
“You might be tempted to say, well that’s a bunch of baloney — global warming,” said Mr. Morse, drilling his first tap holes this season in mid-February, as snow hugged the maples and Vermont braced for a record snowfall. “But the way I feel, we get too much warm. How many winters are we going to go with Decembers turning into short-sleeve weather, before the maple trees say, ‘I don’t like it here any more?’ ”
There is no way to know for certain, but scientists are increasingly persuaded that human-caused global warming is changing climate conditions that affect sugaring.
While some farmers and other Vermonters suggest the recent warm years could be just a cyclical hiccup of nature or the result of El Niño, many maple researchers now say it seems more like a long-term trend. Since 1971, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data, winter temperatures in the Northeast have increased by 2.8 degrees.
If a flinty Vermont maple sugar farmer is convinced, then I'm on board too. Save our breakfasts Al Gore! You're our only hope!
NB: One has to love the Times for including a description of a farmer contemplating global warming "as snow hugged the maples and Vermont braced for a record snowfall."
NB II: I rarely expect hard science from the Times, especially in a discussion of global warming, but I think this sentence beautifully characterizes the scientific tenor of the conversation regarding climate change:
There is no way to know for certain, but scientists are increasingly persuaded that human-caused global warming is changing climate conditions that affect sugaring.
After admitting that there is no way to know for certain (i.e. "we have no actual proof of this"), scientists are "increasingly persuaded"? Really? Could one design a more vague phrase? Not "scientists have found" or "it's been proven that". It's been a while since I learned the four steps of the scientific method, but apparently they've shortened them recently. The above sentence holds about as much weight with me as "Some guy at the hardware store said . . ." And notice how it's no longer referred to as "global warming", but as "human-caused global warming." Not just a distinction anymore, but a scientific and rhetorical fait accompli apparently.
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February 24, 2007
MAN OVER MACHINE: LEXIPHANE.COM RETURNS
Sometime between 7th Grade and 8th Grade, Shop Class became Technology. In 7th Grade, I took Wood Shop and made a pen holder that was essentially a sanded block of wood with a piece of acrylic glued to it and a pen receptacle screwed on to the top. 8th Grade was supposed to be Metal Shop, but instead it was replaced with Technology. Our teacher that year had been teaching metal shop for approximately 30 years and seemed alternately bemused and resentful that after three decades of successfully keeping kids from maiming themselves with power tools and soldering guns, he was now supposed to teach a new curriculum: Technology.
"What is Technology?"
That is what he would ask over and over again, sitting at his desk and gesturing to the word on the chalkboard behind him without looking at it. Then he would lean back in his creaky chair and click-clack his dentures with half-closed eyes. At first, the class assumed that he was looking for some type of definitive answer. After about two weeks of the question repeated with vague assertions punctuated by long contemplative silences, we realized it was more of a rhetorical question: one posed to stimulate a Socratic exploration of the concept of tools and knowledge from the dawn of man and through the ages. Either that, or our teacher was simply marking time in 40 minute increments until he could retire at the end of the year without cracking his Technology class guidebook. I don't think we wound up making anything in Metal Shop--sorry, Technology class--that year.
That was about 20 years ago, but my old teacher's question came to mind recently, over and over again, as I wrestled with a crashed site, database corruption, platform upgrades, and a configuration labrynth that I was beginning to suspect had no actual exit. I now know what technology is though. Technology is a huge pain in my ass. I'm sure my somnolent metal shop teacher would agree.
Nonetheless it is here with us to stay. And this morning I made it my bitch. Sorry for the weeks offline. I hope regular readers will return to the site and continue to enjoy frequent updates to Lexiphane.com. I'd like to extend special thanks to my brother Tom for offering guidance and practical assistance throughout my tech travails.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 12:55 PM | Comments (0)
January 21, 2007
OUR ACHILLES HEEL?
China recently destroyed one of its own satellites with a ballistic missile in what must have been meant as a public demonstration that warfare of the future will include outerspace as a significant field of battle.
China successfully carried out its first test of an antisatellite weapon last week, signaling its resolve to play a major role in military space activities and bringing expressions of concern from Washington and other capitals, the Bush administration said yesterday.
Only two nations — the Soviet Union and the United States — have previously destroyed spacecraft in antisatellite tests, most recently the United States in the mid-1980s.
Arms control experts called the test, in which the weapon destroyed an aging Chinese weather satellite, a troubling development that could foreshadow an antisatellite arms race. Alternatively, however, some experts speculated that it could precede a diplomatic effort by China to prod the Bush administration into negotiations on a weapons ban.
“This is the first real escalation in the weaponization of space that we’ve seen in 20 years,” said Jonathan McDowell, a Harvard astronomer who tracks rocket launchings and space activity. “It ends a long period of restraint.”
That last paragraph is one of the most dubious assertions I've read in print for some time. Contrary to any notions of "restraint", the United States has been at the forefront of weaponizing space for the past three decades, and I'm not talking about any barely functioning missile defense system. Satellites have become the most significant military force multiplier since the invention of the aircraft. There is little aspect of the U.S. armed forces that is not dependant on space-based data transfer. From supply chain management, to intelligence gathering and weapons delivery, the 21st century U.S. military depends on satellites to keep its troops fed and drop bombs directly on the heads of specific individuals in a crowded urban environment.
And warfare is about more than dropping bombs. An army is only as strong as the economy behind it. Like the Allies' plan of bringing Germany to its knees during WWII by crippling its industrial base--destroying oil refineries and ball bearing factories--any opponent of the U.S. would have to see that disrupting its satellite-based information technology dependent economy would be massively damaging to its war-waging abilities.
Obviously, I don't want to overstate my case, but this small article in The New York Times may one day appear as portentious to the leveling of worldwide military power as the Soviets testing their first atom bomb.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 12:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 16, 2007
WI-FILCHING
With the proliferation of Wi-Fi HotSpots and personal wireless routers, Internet surfers in an urban environment can often turn on their computers and find a dozen different wireless networks available to get online. Astute and security-minded operators of wireless routers can restrict their networks to prevent access from unauthorized users, but I've found that few people do this. In Singapore, simply choosing a wireless network that isn't yours from your available networks list is enough to land one in jail. From a link found at one of The New York Sun's blogs, It Shines For All, there's this AP Report:
SINGAPORE (AP) -- A Singaporean teenager who illegally tapped into a neighbor's wireless Internet network - an offense the city-state deems punishable by jail - was placed on 18 months' probation by a district court Tuesday.
The court also ordered Garyl Tan Jia Luo, 17, to carry out 80 hours of community service after he admitted linking his computer to his neighbor's wireless router to access the Internet without permission.
Tan could have been jailed up to three years and fined 10,000 Singapore dollars (US$6,500).
The judge avoided meting out a jail sentence by noting mitigating circumstances, i.e., the kid is a loser:
Senior District Judge Bala Reddy cited a probation report as saying Tan had been addicted to Internet gaming at the time of the offense, adding the teenager had "few friends, if not none."
Reddy said Tan should seek "disciplined and structured psychiatric and psychological intervention" to cure his addiction.
Whatever he was using the Internet for, it seems strange to me--and probably most Americans who know what WiFi is--that one could land in jail for accessing a wireless network without first asking permission. I wonder if you could charge a neighbor with tresspassing for letting his network wander into your bedroom without permission?
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 10:40 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
January 13, 2007
THE TRAINS MAY NOT RUN ON TIME , BUT . . .
At least you'll know how long you have to wait before the next one rolls into the station. One of the most frustrating things about riding the subway is waiting an indeterminate amount of time for the next train to arrive. This causes stressful repetitive behavior among transit riders, namely the Lean-and-Peek, which involves a person steping to the edge of the platform, leaning out as far as is safe and often further, and gazing down the tunnel for any indication that a train might be coming. Repetitive Lean-and-Peak Syndrome is a malady I myself suffer from.
New overhead displays could cure this debilitating condition. The picture above is of a pilot program being deployed on the L Train line. Overhead displays communicate how long it will be before the next two trains arrive at your station. This is still in the evaluation stage, so we also get messages like this:
Interesting sentence structure there. I would have said " . . .times may not be accurate" or " . . .times may be inaccurate." " . . .be not accurate" sounds like something a non-native English speaker would write. Actually, this picture that I found linked to over at Gothamist displays a more tongue-friendly version of the same message. I would've thought the electronic messages would be uniform throughout the system, but maybe phraseology is one of the things the MTA is testing.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 4:16 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 19, 2006
JUST AN ALT-CLICK AND A JUMP
The New York Times is quietly advising online readers of an occasionlly useful new service. A small note at the bottom of an Internet article the other day notified me that further explanations of certain terms in NYTimes' pieces could be reached through the American Heritage Encyclopedia. The Times generally does a good job of hyperlinking terms in its articles where and when it seems appropriate, but readers can always use a little bit of extra help in deciphering the paper's less-than-obvious prose. Here's how it works:
Tips
To find reference information about the words used in this article, hold down the ALT key and click on any word, phrase or name. A new window will open with a dictionary definition or encyclopedia entry.
The service isn't perfect. Clicking on the actor Dan Duryea's name in a movie review gave me an encyclopedia entry on the biblical character Daniel. A Science section article on Pakistanis genetically incapable of experiencing pain, however, prompted me to highlight and then alt-click on "sympathetic nervous system." This is what came up:
Dictionary
sympathetic nervous system
n.
The part of the autonomic nervous system originating in the thoracic and lumbar regions of the spinal cord that in general inhibits or opposes the physiological effects of the parasympathetic nervous system, as in tending to reduce digestive secretions, speeding up the heart, and contracting blood vessels.
That definition may be more meaningful to some than to others, but it sure is a cool and useful feature to add into a news article. The Times may want to consider adding an atlas to this function. If an article references Abu Dhabi or Myanmar, it would be nice to be able to alt-click to a map of those countries' locations on a map.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 1:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 8, 2006
JOURNALISM, BLOGGING AND GOVERNMENT REPRESSION
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) yesterday released a report detailing various governments' crackdowns on journalists or individuals accused of criticizing their rule.
When Iranian journalist Mojtaba Saminejad was sentenced to two years in prison for insulting the country's supreme leader, it was not for an article that appeared in a newspaper. His offending story was posted on his personal Web blog.
Nearly one-third of journalists now serving time in prisons around the world published their work on the Internet, the second-largest category behind print journalists, the Committee to Protect Journalists said in an analysis released Thursday.
The bulk of Internet journalists in jail -- 49 in total -- shows that "authoritarian states are becoming more determined to control the Internet," said Joel Simon, the New York-based group's executive director.
What is alarming is that many of the so-called offending pieces that landed the jailed individuals in hot water weren't even published in their home countries, but through overseas outlets.
Tao, the jailed Chinese journalist, could have published his notes on state propaganda in the Chinese magazine in Hunan province where he worked as an editorial director. He chose instead to send an e-mail from his Yahoo! account to the U.S.-based editor of a Chinese language Web forum.
Of course, pieces could be filed under a pseudonym or anonymously to circumvent punishment of authors. Such tactics, however, dilute their authority and validity as an author's reputation for veracity and agenda cannot be properly evaluated by his or her audience.
The WNBC story about the CPJ report doesn't note whether or how the organization distinguishes between professional journalists or simply individuals self-publishing on the Internet. It is not an insignificant differentiation, as "the press" usually is afforded certain legal protections and precedents to secure its independence. In my mind, Internet self-publishers, of which bloggers are a subset, seem most historically reminiscent of pamphleteers. Thomas Paine's "Common Sense" was published and distributed in pamphlet form in 1776. The document argued for independence from England and the establishment of a constitutional republic. Incidentally, Paine would later be labeled an outlaw persona non grata in England for publishing anti-monarchist pamphlets supporting the French Revolution. The French themselves eventually threatened Paine with execution for his objection to the execution of King Louis XVI. The former escaped the country with the help of James Monroe, then serving as the U.S. Minister to France. Paine had no prior experience as a "professional journalist." He was a public intellectual. Opponents probably considered him a gadfly, governments an agitator. Attempting to make legal distinctions between the freedoms of ordinary citizens and an established press seems like a poor idea.
I'm not the only one who's given thought to the similarity of Internet self-publishers and Revolutionary-era pamphleteers.
CPJ's breakdown of jailed reporters by country with details concerning each case is available here.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 10:15 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 13, 2006
BIG RED AND BLUE, BUT I'M COLORBLIND
I'm an infant of IBM, no doubt. My parents met each other while they were IBM employees, married as IBM employees, and raised all four of their children under the umbrella of IBM healthcare.
My mom recently retired, after difficultly ceding her job to someone in China.
I.B.M., based in Armonk, N.Y., spends 30 percent of its $40 billion annual procurement in Asia, the company said in a statement yesterday, confirming the move to Shenzhen that was first announced to suppliers in May. This is the first time that I.B.M., the world’s biggest computer services company, has moved the headquarters of one of its largest divisions to China.
I was in Shenzen, China, where they relocated operations, a decade ago. Hookers and barbers seemed to be the primary industry and they weren't mutually exclusive. Kudos to China for making great strides, Shenzen in particular. IBM: I hope you know what you're doing.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 4:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 27, 2006
AW CRAP!
I was real happy to read this story on Gothamist this morning:
City officials are wondering why dead birds have been found in Queens outside the Steinway Piano Factory and in a lot on South 4th in Williamsburg. WCBS 2 reported that over the past few days, 20 birds have been found outside Steinway's Long Island City factory. Authorities eading authorities to wonder if they were killed from a pesticide, all died from West Nile, or had flown into the side of the building. The Audobon's hypothesis: "Migrant birds passing through the city are getting confused by the reflection of trees on the factory's windows, and are crashing straight into the building." Which may well be. But that doesn't explain the dead birds in Williamsburg. And according to the WCBS 2 report, residents called 311 to complain about the birds over the weekend, but the FDNY only responded yesterday.
If you haven't been keeping up with this site, I was handling the corpse of a dead bird that my friend asked me to get rid of after it flopped around in its death throes for a few hours on her patio. West Nile, here I come!
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 11:55 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
MAKING SCIENCE SIMPLETON
Gothamist had a brief mention of the release of a study that found testosterone is bad for you. Apparently it causes brain damage. Hah hah. Now that the ladies are finished laughing, let's get on with it.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Too much testosterone can kill brain cells, researchers said on Tuesday in a finding that may help explain why steroid abuse can cause behavior changes like aggressiveness and suicidal tendencies.
The veracity of this study could very well be true, but I can't think of dumber way to sum it up then this:
"Too little testosterone is bad, too much is bad but the right amount is perfect," said Barbara Ehrlich of Yale University in Connecticut, who led the study.
Wow. The Yalies are really cranking out the smart people these days, aren't they? The self-fulfilling obviousness of the above statement leads me to believe that its conclusions were drawn by Yogi Berra.
We have further genius to cull from God knows how many taxpayer dollars were spent on this study:
"Next time a muscle-bound guy in a sports car cuts you off on the highway, don't get mad -- just take a deep breath and realize that it might not be his fault," Ehrlich said in a statement.
If you can't hear me sighing exasperatedly over the Internet, you're just not listening hard enough.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 11:24 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 13, 2006
COMMENTS
For the last several months, readers have been unable to post comments at Lexiphane.com. That wasn't me trying to stifle debate or be an autodidact. The site was in danger of being swamped--and it was once, requiring a complete rebuild--by comment spam-bombing, where the the comment sections filled up with ads for penis-enlarging pills, weight loss drugs, and discount mortgage rates.
I'm happy to say that with the help of my brother and tech-support god Tom, we've got comments back online, hopefully without all the annoying spams. My penis feels bigger already! You may be prompted to register with TypeKey to verify you're a real person and not a spambot. I swear you'll only have to do that once and then you can comment at will.
So go ahead; let me have it.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 9:26 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
June 7, 2006
SECOND THOUGHTS
A few months ago, ["BE EVIL", 4/13/06] I wrote about how Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page were selling out their three-word founding mission statement "Don't Be Evil" by getting into bed with the Communist Chinese government and allowing state censorship and monitoring of the use of their search service by the government. It was a classic case of sell-out of ideals once innovators are filthy rich and billions more are on the line.
While a statement today seems equivocal, at least Brin and Page are acknowledging that they're making a deal with the devil and compromising their integrity. That's not to say they won't do it, but I'm encouraged to see that at least it makes them uncomfortable.
WASHINGTON - Google Inc. co-founder Sergey Brin acknowledged Tuesday the dominant Internet company has compromised its principles by accommodating Chinese censorship demands. He said Google is wrestling to make the deal work before deciding whether to reverse course.
Meeting with reporters near Capitol Hill, Brin said Google had agreed to the censorship demands only after Chinese authorities blocked its service in that country. Google's rivals accommodated the same demands — which Brin described as "a set of rules that we weren't comfortable with" — without international criticism, he said.
Brin and Lawrence famously structured their IPO so they would have final control over the fate of their company and wouldn't have to deal with the pressures of short-term profit making over principles. The final decision over what happens lays with them. That's a nice bed you've made for yourselves boys. Welcome to the real world. I hope you can sleep soundly, whatever you do. The buck stops at your pillows.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 2:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 29, 2006
TV "SCIENCE"
I recently saw a portion of a show called "Body Armor" on the Discovery Science Channel that examined the usefulness of modern body armor and its historical origins. In the first ten minutes, "Criminalist" Mary Jane Flowers (her parents were obviously hippies) of the San Diego Police Department examines the evidence in a shooting of a police officer where a bulletproof vest possibly saved his life.
I'm-guessing-not-Dr. Flowers holds the bullet she removed from the officer's vest up to the camera and compares it to an unfired 9mm round, explaining how the now-crushed bullet is maybe only 1/3 the size of what an original round looks like. Impressive! There's only one problem: that is fundamentally idiotic. Comparing the relative size of a crushed bullet and an unfired round is nonsensical in every sense of the word.
Here's a reasonable look at what modern rounds are and how they function. There are three main components: the bullet, the casing, and the rim. The bullet is the conical tip at the end of the round that exits a gun's barrel. The casing is the cylindrical part of the round in the middle that contains the propellant that propels the bullet to fantastic speed. The rim is the beveled end of the round that is struck by a gun's firing pin, activating the primer within and igniting the casing's propellant. Altogether, the bullet only accounts for about 40%-45% of an unfired round's profile. When a round is fired from a semi-automatic pistol--as was being discussed in the "Body Armor" show--the round's casing and rim are ejected as one piece through a side port while the bullet travels out of the barrel. You following me so far?
Comparing a crushed bullet to an unfired round, i.e. the bullet, casing, and rim all together, makes for a completely erroneous impression. It looks like the bullet has been compressed by body armor by two thirds, or 66%, but in reality the projectile has only flattened by about 20%. That's a mistake of presentation by a factor of more than three, or the difference between saying a baseball player hits .600 versus .200. This may seem like a totally ridiculous and unimportant thing to be writing about, but is representative of how the media--even scientifically identified shows--can badly misrepresent reality.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 10:10 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 26, 2006
SPAM FREE VERSE OF THE DAY
war and Your expertise, would be in a maximum security prison. He called you everything in the rotten black book and demanded that you reveal your real name-which you wouldnt do, couldnt do, because your first wifes Cambodian family would have been slaughtered. He tried to tie you in verbal knots, and, failing that, threatened the military court with exposing the whole bastard battalion, which it also couldnt allow. ...
Oooh, POW edition.
Spam Free Verse of the Day is a highlight of randomly selected words and prose inserted into spam e-mail eo evade electronic filters.
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April 24, 2006
SF STANDS FOR SCHADENFREUDE
("Ha ha!" says Will Booth of The WaPo)
William Booth of The Washington Post apparently has a bug up his ass about the city of San Francisco. In a news piece about the public attention to regional vulnerability to earthquakes--heightened due to the centennial anniversary of the quake of 1906--Booth adopts a somewhat glib, if not mocking tone.
SAN FRANCISCO -- This is a city obsessed with itself, and lately it has been really obsessing about the fact that a century ago, it was almost obliterated. And so, naturally, commemorations of the centennial of the April 18, 1906, earthquake have consumed the city, obsessively.
Organizers have staged earthquake film fests, ecumenical earthquake services and a ballet that "spotlights the advances in earthquake engineering technology." There was interpretive dance, performed to the sound of the Earth's magma. It seemed like there was a lecture on soil liquefaction every night. Tours of seismic retrofits were hot tickets. If there is a kid left in San Francisco who doesn't know the difference between a strike-slip and a dip-slip fault, he should get to the Exploratorium immediately for an exhibit called "San Francisco in Jell-O."
You couldn't turn around here without bumping into a banner showing sepia photographs of the city as a smoking ruin -- like, wow, once upon a time we were reduced to rubble. And on and on, in an endless loop, the PSAs reminding residents in one of the best-fed, highest-tech cities on the planet to store 72 hours' worth of water, food and D batteries. Why? For the Big One!
Uh, what the hell man? Did you go to San Fran for a vacation and have your wife leave you suddenly for a life of lesbian veganism? Everyone knows San Franciscans love the smell of their own farts, but the tone of this article is bordering on unhinged.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 3:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
SPAM FREE VERSE OF THE DAY
Everyone gets spam e-mail. One of the attempts at thwarting this e-mail plague is to scan messages for commercial content. As a countermeasure, spam generators started including randomly selected words that attempted to fool anti-spam software. Some of this content is positively Dada-esque. Today we inaugurate the Spam Free Verse Of The Day feature, that may or may not last more than a day. Today's entry:
Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded. When the wine is in, the wit is out
Lust not after her beauty in thine heart; neither let her take thee with her eyelids.
A lender nor borrower be.
Edwardian English footnotes lend a hint of anachronistic class to this gibberish.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 11:17 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
April 13, 2006
"BE EVIL"
"When Sergey and I founded Google, we hoped, but did not expect, it would reach its current size and influence," the letter said. "We also believed that searching and organizing the world's information was an unusually important task that should be carried out by a company that is trustworthy and interested in the public good. We believe a well-functioning society should have abundant, free and unbiased access to high quality information. Google therefore has a responsibility to the world."
That was two years ago, before Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page were filthy rich; well, maybe a day after they were filthy rich. Now that they're taking daily baths in room-temperature liquid gold, they've decided that the benighted rest of the world can go to hell.
Google's chief executive, Eric E. Schmidt, whose company has been sharply criticized for complying with Chinese censorship, said on Wednesday that the company had not lobbied to change the censorship laws and, for now, had no plans to do so."I think it's arrogant for us to walk into a country where we are just beginning operations and tell that country how to run itself," Mr. Schmidt told reporters from foreign news organizations.
Mr. Schmidt is visiting China this week to promote Google's new Chinese search engine and to meet with officials of government ministries. He announced the opening of a research and development center in Beijing's high-technology district and also introduced a Chinese-language brand name for the company's domestic search engine — Gu Ge, which roughly translates as "a harvesting song."
They may as well make that brand name "Gu Ge Go Fuck Yourself", because Google's Chinese service won't even let users know when their searches have been censored by their government.
Wait, the shit gets thicker and deeper:
Brin and Page, in their early 30s, will oversee the company in an unorthodox manner as "co-presidents" and may also invest its resources in unpredictable ways."We would fund projects that have a 10 percent chance of earning a billion dollars over the long term," the letter said. "Don't be surprised if we place smaller bets in areas that seem very speculative or even strange."
Danny Sullivan, editor of Search Engine Watch, said the letter struck some as being filled with hubris, while others sensed a refreshing message from a highly profitable company -- Google earned more than $100 million last year -- whose leaders have long said they want to do the right thing more than they want to make money.
Let's savor that for a moment shall we? ". . .they want to do the right thing more than they wan to make money."
Don't worry shareholders; that's just lip service. Google is following an example of good-hearted failure:
But Sullivan also said the letter reminded him a bit of Ben & Jerry's, the Vermont ice cream company that eventually stumbled after operating unconventionally for years. He said Google's "ivory tower" mentality means that it can stumble and seem out of touch, as it did recently with the introduction of Gmail, its free e-mail service with ads that was attacked by privacy advocates."They think nobody will have a problem since they think they are this lovely company out to do good," Sullivan said. "The real crunch will happen to them when the money is not rolling in."
I sat in on a lecture by a former chairman of Ben & Jerry's when I was in school and I actually pitied the poor bastard, who was made to mouth platitudes as he was required to run the company into the ground. He was fired the next year, although I hardly blame him.
Bear in mind that the founders of Google are the favored poster boys of anti-capitalist "humanitarians" around the world. When they chose to take the company public--and accept hundreds of millions of dollars of investors' money--they structured the deal to give shareholders no say in how the company was run. This supposedly was to prevent traders from influencing short-term company policy. Like many successful tech geek companies, there seems to be a very strong pro-authoritarian anti-democratic vibe thrumming throughout Google. And while I have no current recommendation on Google stock, the following language generally would lead me to advise investors to run in the opposite direction as quickly as possible:
The founders have an answer. They will retain voting control over all major decisions after the offering is completed, and warn potential investors to stay away unless they are willing to trust the founders and hold onto Google stock for the long term. The company, the letter said, won't pay attention to swings in quarterly earnings and has no intention of providing Wall Street with guidance about its financial outlook or business strategy.
Perhaps Brin and Page are off spending their billions, but their asinine pronouncements about corporate responsibility--the kind of moronic shit I had to endure for half a semester in undergrad b-school--has gone completely out the window. Others had a good idea where it was going two years ago:
Andy Beal, vice president of Websourced Inc. -- a firm that advises companies on how to advertise online -- said a quick survey of 100 customers revealed that 27 percent doubted Google could stick to the founders' principles after going public, while 20 percent thought they could. The rest were unsure.
"They are not prepared for the pressures of their shareholders and from Wall Street," Beal said. "At some point, the two sides are going to clash, and something has to give."
There's pressure from shareholders and then there's just being unprincipled billionaire pricks who can't differentiate between freedom and a murderous Communist dicatorship. I'm sure the latter's victims will eventually understand your position gentlemen.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 6:47 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
April 7, 2006
MACCA ON 59TH ST.
Apple is on the verge of opening a new retail location in NYC below the GM Building at 59th St. and 5th Ave. (the southeast corner of Central Park and across 5th Ave. from The Plaza). While the 25,000 square foot retail space will essentially be in the building's basement, the entrance will be marked by the construction of a large glass cube in the plaza in front of the GM Building that will serve as the Apple Store's entranceway. Pictures of the cube's construction are available at AppleInsider here.
Pictures found at Gothamist.com today show that perhaps Steve Jobs has taken inspiration from Apple fans' near-religious devotion to his company's products. The cube looks remarkably like the Ka'bah, the black-curtained struture that is the religious focal point of Mecca and the end of millions of Muslims' hajj (pilgrimage) every year. Time will only tell if macolytes start turning up by the thousands or millions every year to slowly encircle the new black Apple cube, chanting for ever-improved iPods and inveighing against the Great Satan Microsoft.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 12:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 22, 2006
LIBERTE, EGALITE, ET iPods
This is interesting.
French lawmakers approved copyright legislation on Tuesday with a novel approach to the idea of digital freedom of choice: requiring online music vendors to make songs available for use on any digital player.
The issue at the heart of this matter is that music downloaded from the iTunes website is in the AAC format, which plays on iPods, the format does not function on any other players that almost uniformly support the MP3 compression format. iPods do, however, play MP3 files. The advantage of the AAC format is that it provides higher sound quality and smaller file size; it is no doubt superior.
Nonetheless, I own an iPod I rip all of my CDs in the MP3 format and only download from sites that provide the same. I don't, and will likely never, download music from iTunes strictly because of its incompatibility issues. If I ever wanted to switch to a different platform, I would hate to have a lot of my music rendered unlistenable. Apple's decision to adopt a proprietary format is thus costing itself business. I'd rather buy CDs from Amazon for a few more dollars and rip them or download from an alternate site than hold myself captive to a proprietary format. That is my right as a customer; but also Apple's right as a business model.
There is no lack of customer choice in the marketplace. One can buy a plethora of digital music players that support a variety of formats--Sony also has a proprietary format that I'm betting will lead to its ultimate failure in the marketplace. Apple has the advantage of superb hardware and an excellent software user interface. It likely put a lot of money into designing both of these. Allowing the company to recoup some of its costs by making itself the vendor of choice for online music purchasers seems reasonable.
Only the French or the most annoying U.S. legislators would deem themselves worthy of screwing with the best thing that's happened to the music industry in years. The introduction of iPods has no doubt more people listening to more music that they want to hear as an alternative to the awful dreck pushed through radilao airwaves. I've got a word for French legislatures: "laissez faire". They should look it up if they're no doubt unfamiliar with it.
For a fuller explanation of what AAC (or MPEG-4) is, check out Wikipedia. MP4 files incoroporate digital rights management (DRM) code, which is what makes them so limited regarding interoperabiltity. MP4 is basically an anti-piracy format as much as it is a proprietary format. It also supports video files, that is an essential component to the recent introduction of Apple's iPod Video model. The outlawing of an MP4 format with its anti-sharing provisions would essentially render Apple's iTunes' downloading format completely unattractive to content providers and be a deathknell for the company's business model. Not to mention, a serious obstacle for the advancement of commercial online music distribution, versus ad hoc piracy.
An online examination of the limitations of MP4s versus MP3s is available here.
While I do recommend users of iTunes and other similar programs to "rip" their CDs in the MP3 format for maximum interoperability and legal or "friendly" sharing, I also recommend that they go into the Preferences Menu of iTunes and select the 192Kb/sec sampling rate for the highest possible audio quality. It takes up more storage room, but is worth it to anyone who wants the most out of their transferred music.
For some historical perspective, imagine if a government had required the continuation of musical production on 8-track tapes, casette tapes, LPs, or Edison-era wax cylinders. Audio format is an evolving situation of changing and improving formats. Legislation requiring mandated formats stretches the definition of idiocy and constrains innovation.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 2:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 17, 2006
FRIENDSTER AS A TONIC FOR CONSPIRACY-MINDED NUTS
One of the hallmarks of conspiracy theories is the trotting out of supposedly hidden but significant links between certain public figures that connote a web of intrigue. These can seem significant to people who are looking for connections where none exist in actuality.
Friendster is hopefully a psychological antidote to people who like to believe these types of things. The site is basically a networking service that allows people to profile themselves with the added benefit of seeing how closely they're personally related to others. It's also a good example of how stupid most conspiracy theories are.
My Friendster profile shows that I am only one degree of separation from actress Maggie Gyllenhaal--a conspicuously significant close link in conspiracy theories--because I happen to be friends with someone who is her friend from high school (school ties are also prominent in conspiracy theories.) Have I ever met Ms. Gyllenhaal? No. Would she probably even answer an email or accept a Friendster invitation from me, even given our one degree of separation through a mutual friend? No. On paper we seem to be closely linked, but in reality there is no connection whatsoever.
Here's another ridiculous connection. It would not be inconceivable for me to be linked by one degree of separation from The Strokes drummer Fabrizio Moretti, again through a mutual friend that he went to high school with. This is less ridiculous because I've actually met the man a few times and am friendly with some of his family members, but to say we had any significant connection is so far beyond a stretch it's hard to describe. Double bonus: since his girlfriend is Drew Barrymore, I'm only two degrees of separation from her.
Does this item seem like a vain exercsie in name dropping? Yes, it does! That is what conspiracy theories are. Fanciful theories coupled with meaningless name dropping. I lead a fairly limited life, yet still seem to be closely linked to some famous people. The next time you read about someone who's spent their entire middle-aged life networking with people and some apparent connection to a scandal turns up, take a second and think about what the real significance of that connection is.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 12:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 1, 2006
GOOGLE WILL GET YOU THERE
Google is obviously the pre-eminent search engine on the Internet, helping millions of people find the information or recondite pornography they're looking for. Over the past several months, however, the company has been helping people find their way in the Outernet, i.e. the real world. Google Mobile, or more accurately Google Mobile (SMS), is a beta program from the company that allows people to have addresses, numbers, and other information texted to their mobile phones. If the number of times I'm accosted on the streets of NYC by people asking directions to certain bars, restaurants, or other businesses is any indication, there is a strong demand for this service. Although perhaps I just give off a very sage-like vibe.
Here's how it works: say you're looking for the address or number of a restaurant (and I'm going to do this right now) named Barna, where you're supposed to meet your friends, but you've never been out of your neighborhood before and don't know Gramercy from Adam. Use the text messaging function on your phone and dial the number GOOGL (46645). In the message section of your text, enter the name of the location you're looking for and the zipcode. If you don't know the zipcode, just enter in any NYC (or your area) code and that tends to be close enough. Send the message and usually in under a minute (my response clocked in at exactly 15 seconds) you'll receive a text message with the name, number, and address of the locations you're looking for. Let's see what happened with my Barna experiment after entering "Barna 10017" (zipcode approx. 42nd St. on the East side):
Barna
365 Park Ave S
New York, NY 10016
212-532-3800
1.0 mi, SW
So not only do you get the address and number, but approximate distance and direction of the location. This is a free service and the information remains on your phone, so it beats the hell out of 411. Google Mobile (SMS) is available for all areas throughout the U.S. and works with all major cellular providers. For business travelers and tourists, I imagine it's an invaluable service. But even for native residents in a large city with unfamiliar neighborhoods, it's incredibly useful. The only suggestion I could give to Google would be to add the nearest cross street. Technically, I don't think that would be so difficult and it would improve the utility of the information ten-fold.
Tagged:Posted by Lexiphane at 3:47 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
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