The National Park Service has posted their draft dog management plan for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. The plan is open for public comments until April 14, 2011.
For my comments and response see Response to GGNRA Draft Dog Management Plan on my main blog (I Thought He Came With You).
2/5
P.J. O'Rourke is hilarious when given something to react against. His Driving Like Crazy anthology last year was superb. Sadly this latest tome is closer to the dire CEO of the Sofa... It's just conservative talking points and cheap shots at the lefties. Not even funny cheap shots or it would be worth reading. Ironically in one chapter O'Rourke reviews recent left and right wing books and chides them for the same mindless behavior. Disappointing.
5/5
Back to a classic, grand-scale Culture novel and I think one of the best yet. Banks manages to zoom from funny to tragic, from space opera to personal vendetta. It makes me want to go back and read all the Culture novels again to freshen up the various references. Must read if you like Banks or SciFi.
- Microsoft warns on IE browser bug from BBC News - Home (Microsoft recommends using the 'Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit 2.0' ... I'd suggest switching to Chrome.).
- Local Cartographer Creates “Islands of San Francisco” Map from Bernalwood (Handy).
- Microsoft Allen's case dismissed from BBC News - Home (It's a temporary win, but please patent terrorists everywhere fuck off and find something productive to do with your life.).
- Dirk Gently BBC trailer from Boing Boing (Yes, please BBC America!).
4/5
A first person account of a procrastinating poet who just can't get the introduction to an anthology started. It's filled with fascinating nuggets of information like a Bill Bryson book, a lesson in poetry and a manifesto for a return to poems that rhyme. Short, sweet and beautifully written.
4/5
Some science fiction takes you to the future through new ideas or technology. Peter F. Hamilton physically drags you there through actual time. I started reading him last century and have just surfaced from the conclusion of the Void trilogy in actual honest to goodness 2010. I hope he takes some time off. I could use couple of years to catch up on some other books.
The Void trilogy is set in the same universe as his Commonwealth Saga and Misspent Youth, set over a millennium later although there are many recurring characters. We finally discover the true nature of the mysterious void at the heart of the universe introduced in The Dreaming Void, several thousand pages ago.
It's epic space opera combined with a thread of fantasy that eventually resolve into a single story. His dialog is often leaden but the plot and scope of the story more than make up for it. If you like this sort of thing then you're going to love it.
- Guest Week: Zach Weiner (SMBC) from xkcd.com (Interactive guest XKCD goodness).
- Vitamin D from Information Is Beautiful (Need more sunshine!).
- Palin says she could beat Obama from BBC News - Home (McCain, your legacy is thoroughly fucked.).
- Obama vows to improve Muslim ties from BBC News - Home (Tip: stop killing Muslims).
- Flash vs. Batteries from Boing Boing (Because it has to check for updates every five seconds?).
- Electric current 'boosts maths' from BBC News - Home (Yes, every time you answer incorrectly...).
Take a moment to watch Brian Kilmeade and Janet Jackson below.
Brian Kilmeade
Janet Jackson
The wardrobe ‘malfunction’ resulted in the FCC attempting to impose a $550,000 fine (eventually overturned on appeal). Kilmeade’s “Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslims”, a genuine obscenity, resulted in a half hearted apology.
We’ve learned very painfully that throwing out Glass-Steagall was a horrible mistake. We need to learn a similar lesson about the Fairness Doctrine.
The current political climate is driven by unbalanced vitriol from both the left and the right. The Fairness Doctrine was eviscerated because of a belief that there was sufficient competition in broadcast media so that all sides of an issue could get fair time. But when you watch a news network that matches your political affiliation this just isn’t the case. If you’re in the news business then there should be some standards, including fairly presenting both sides of an issue and at the very least not repeating lies and insinuations with the authority of mass media.
24-hour news stations are especially bad because most days there just isn’t that much news. This leaves a choice between repeating the news that exists which is boring, or making stuff up which is a lot more fun. Unfortunately It’s also corrosive.
The FCC should be empowered and required to levy substantial fines where news outlets engage in factually incorrect reporting, where a reasonable amount of due diligence (or the slightest familiarity with terrorism) could have a prevented the error. This would reign in some of the worst, and also benefit from generating its own news coverage. We also need to consider brining back the Fairness Doctrine for any news outlet above a threshold audience size – print, television, radio or online.
(Published to the Fediverse as: We can’t fix politics without fixing 24-hour news #politics #politicalreform #briankilmeade #janetjackson #fairnessdoctrine Why the 24 hour news cycle is destroying politics and how to fix it. )
The current pushback on the nasty choice between nude backscatter photos vs. ‘enhanced’ TSA groping got me thinking.
If I really wanted to blow up a plane (which I don’t) I wouldn’t mess around with printer cartridges or shoe bombs. I’d combine some explosive containing breast implants with a trigger disguised as a pacemaker. Some terrorist cell somewhere must be working on this or something like it.
How would the TSA respond? Would we need an MRI before boarding?
I think the radiation scare is overblown – far lower than the risk from hanging around at 30,000 feet. But it’s not ridiculous to refuse and getting to third base with the TSA doesn’t seem like it’s making us much safer.
(Published to the Fediverse as: Boob Bombs #etc #tsa #mri Would it be possible to build a bomb out of breast implants and a pacemaker? How would the TSA react? )
The US political system is like daisyworld.
Daisyworld is a simplified model of the Gaia (Earth as organism) Hypothesis. A planet is populated by black daisies which absorb more solar radiation and white daisies which reflect it. Over time the temperature of the planet is regulated because the white daisies thrive when it’s warm. If it’s too hot the white population booms, increases the albedo of the planet and cools it down again. The black population then surges as the planet cools down and causes lower albedo and thus another round of warming.
This isn’t (directly) a post about global warming or race.
Replace the daisies with Democrats and Republicans. When Democrats are in power Republican voters are driven to the polls and vice versa. Homeostasis is guaranteed. Like daisyworld or the two-body problem it’s a toy system. It’s just never going to produce interesting results.
I think it’s time to break up the big parties (like the big parties should have broken up the big banks). Each party that achieves more than 20% of the popular vote is forced to split into two smaller parties. We have more than daisies. We have the three-body problem.
In addition to introducing some much needed chaos this could also turn the national political climate from us-vs-them to something more nuanced. Yes, there would still be left leaning and right leaning parties but they’d be forced to differentiate themselves through more than name calling and head stomping. We might have a political marketplace of ideas rather than affiliations.
Anything would be better than daisies.
(Published to the Fediverse as: Republicans and Democrats: Too big to succeed #politics #gaia #daisyworld #republicans #democrats #politicalreform A bad way to force a multi-party system. A better way would be ranked choice voting. )
I (used to) use Facebook for people I know well, LinkedIn for weaker ties and Twitter mostly for people I don’t know at all.
Over time though I’ve created identities on pretty much every network. With the increased interconnectedness of such sites when I stop using them I don’t stop posting…
I just discovered (in a spam filter) that someone was having a one sided conversation with me on Plaxo Pulse. I’m also actively posting (but not paying attention) on Buzz and goodness know how many other networks. I’m sure this inflates their active user count admirably but I’m now worried that undead me is being rude.
The social graph needs to work better in the other direction. Everything I post and comment on syndicates out like crazy but keeping track of responses just isn’t working.
(Published to the Fediverse as: Zombie Robs #etc #facebook #linkedin #twitter #plaxopulse #buzz #socialgraph Zombie Robs (how not to follow one - you can reach me on LinkedIn, Twitter, or preferably just here). )
5/5
Stonking. It tells the tale of a Dutch clerk (de Zoet) at a trading post with the xenophobic Japan of 1799. It has the swashbuckling panache and anal research of Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle with just a dash of 'Big Trouble in Little China'. I hoped it was going to end with a 'to be continued...' but alas, Mitchell managed to wrap it up. Loved it.
- David Mitchell: You can't blame the rich for paying as little tax as possible. I do the same from Global: David Mitchell | guardian.co.uk (Brilliant - on 38 degrees, and on eviscerating the BBC.).
- Natural genes can't be patented says U.S. government from Boing Boing (Good decision :)).
- Everest climbers get 3G network from BBC News - Home (Coming soon: escalators).
- Dream recording device 'is possible' from BBC News - Home (Life channels 'Until the End of the World').
- Pope urges migrants to integrate from BBC News - Home (How about getting priests to respect the laws of host countries and then start worrying about immigrants.).
- R2D2, the bathing-suit edition from Boing Boing (Excellent.).
- How Google understands language like a 10-year-old from San Francisco Bay Area News — — SFGate (Statistical analysis is Searle's Chineese Room, not AI.).
- The world according to San Francisco from Boing Boing (:)).
- Malcolm Gladwell is wrong about the revolution from All Salon (He's completely right. I joined a group to help the monks in Burma and they're still totally screwed.).
- Man used hosepipe to punish son from BBC News - Home (That's not what I was expecting the hosepipe to be used for. I think the son got off lightly and the father is lucky not to be facing a hosepipe ban related death sentence.).
Don’t tell me to think before printing your email.
Firstly, it’s not that special. You’re lucky if I’m reading it at all. Do you really think I want a copy for posterity? Am I going to have it framed? Let’s face it, your target audience is pre-Internet execs who have their secretaries print their emails out so they can dictate a reply back later.
Secondly, do you think your sanctimonious footer comes at no cost? Using the power of randomly Googling facts each bit takes 4.6µJ and 2.8 million emails are sent every second. Assuming a 60 character nag if everyone indulged that’s over 12kW of smugness. For approximately no pages of paper saved.
And don’t get me started on lawyers. We could probably stop global warming if they’d just skip the fifteen page footer explaining how it’s somehow your fault if they send their emails to the wrong address.
(Published to the Fediverse as: Think before you print? #etc #globalwarming #email Do you really imagine that I might care enough about your email to print it? )
4/5
I'm a big fan of Bronson and I became a father last Thursday, finishing this book the day after. NurtureShock is packed full of the latest research on child development from infants (I can't believe how happy I am that Baby Einstein doesn't work) to teenagers. If you're unwilling to vaccinate you can probably skip this, otherwise I'd say a must read for parents. But do check back - will update this review in eighteen years or so...
3/5
WAR consists of Junger embedding with infantry trying to hold a valley in Afghanistan. He visits several times over the course of their deployment and gets caught up in a frightening amount of action. It's as much a book about dealing with this personally as it is about the soldiers he's there to cover. There's very little context about why the valley might be important, or about the war in general, just an account of the hard pointy end of warfare and the psychology of the troops before, during and after.
3/5
It's a passionate manifesto for focusing on new media for marketing and PR, and a reasonable guide as to how to go about it. I found repeated chapters on the same topic to be a bit grating but if you're completely new to blogging I guess it could be helpful. Readers would be better served by including more on SEO basics and less on Second Life. Worth a read if you're not even blogging yet, probably a pass otherwise.
- Lucas to release Star Wars in 3D from BBC News - Home (Bastard.).
- Star Trek pizza cutter from Boing Boing (Need this!).
- Blacklisted books from BBC News - Home (No).
- The coming BlackBerry row from BBC - American Frei (Those who don't remember the Clipper Chip are doomed to repeat it...).
- David Miliband: This is Ed's day from BBC News - Home (And it will probably make for a really crappy Miliband Christmas.).
- S.F. Mayor Newsom vetoes fee on alcohol from SFGate: Top News Stories (Cheers Gav!).
- Timelapse Footage of San Francisco and its Fog at Night from Spots Unknown (Often the fog here looks like a time lapse.).
- Ewan McGregor in a Spitfire from BBC News - Home (A Spitfire 'jet', really?).
- Pope aide in 'Third World' jibe from BBC News - Home (Criticizing Heathrow and BA is hardly the same as criticizing the UK. Also, he's right.).
- New way to curb binge drinking from BBC News - Home (Is it Pernod?).
- Clinton endorses Jerry Brown for Calif. governor from SFGate: Top News Stories (Wow. Probably says more about Meg than Brown.).
- Young 'exposed to unsuitable TV' from BBC News - Home (Right, so send them to bed early so they can watch porn on their laptops...).
- Call for homeopathy cash pull-out from BBC News - Home (Does it have a Homeopathic ER (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMGIbOGu8q0)?).
- Why do so many people like toast? from BBC News - Home (of toast?).
- Turtles Eating Things from Boing Boing (Except... they're tortoises! One might expect Blade Runner savvy BB to spot the difference. Sigh.).
- Why patent lawsuits and hot tubs don't mix from All Salon (From the headlines you never thought you'd read department...).
- WTF stamp from Boing Boing (Want).
- Top Gear's 'The Stig': Revealed? from BBC News - Home (It's all a decoy to prevent the real identity from leaking out (Julian Assange)).
Download a Sharepoint File with GraphServiceClient (Microsoft Graph API)
Accessing Printer Press ESC to cancel
Export Google Fit Daily Steps, Weight and Distance to a Google Sheet
Monitor page index status with Google Sheets, Apps Script and the Google Search Console API
International Date Line Longitude, Latitude Coordinates
Scanning from the ADF using WIA in C#
Sending email via GMail in C#/.NET using SmtpClient
Is it safe to open securedoc.html (Cisco Registered Envelope)?
