BBC - Reith Lectures 2004

BBC - Radio 4 - Reith Lectures 2004 - Climate of Fear

BBC invites an annual speaker to talk about any topic they want. The 2004 speaker is Wole Soyinka, his lecture is: The Man Died: The Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka.

Nobel Laureate, playwright, poet and political activist, was born on July 13, 1934, in Abeokuta, Western Nigeria, and lived with his family in the Aké quarter of the city. At that time, his homeland was still a British dependency. His father was the headmaster of an Anglican primary school, and his mother, whose nickname was "Wild Christian," was a shop owner and teacher. In 1981, Soyinka published Aké, a memoir about his youth, which James Olney of the New York Times described as "a classic of childhood memoirs wherever and whenever produced."

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Catalog

Prints and Photographs Online Catalog (Prints and Photographs Reading Room, Library of Congress)

While I'm on a tear, I want to bookmark this for future reference. This is an online catalog for the Library of Congress. I didn't do an exhaustive set of lookups, but I was impressed with the photos I found (Civil War Negro troop photos).

The girls may find this useful for school projects.

National Geographic MapMachine

Maps Online -- MapMachine -- atlas, street maps (National Geographic)

This is a very neat site. The maps are pretty fuzzy when you look at them in detail, but it gives you a very good idea of what is available and you can order high resolution maps online.

I was interested in topographic maps of our neighborhood. Your directed to another site and you can order by neighborhood, or by grid coordinates. The 19" x 26" map for Moorestown, NJ is $9.95.

Technology Review: Columns

Technology Review: Columns

I read Technology Review in the Mt. Laurel Library yesterday. An article by Simson Garfinkel caught my eye. He does two colums for Technology Review: Putting Technology to Work for You and The Net Effect.

I installed a server at home just after we moved to New Jersey. Garfinkel has a very coherent description of why everyone needs a server in "Home is Where the Server Is"

Many of us are concerned about

100 Words every student should know entering high school

Found this list in the Sunday NYT. I'm willing to bet lots of people don't know these words. What a shame.


accentuate, alliteration, analogy, antibody, aspire, bamboozle, bizarre, boisterous, boycott, camouflage, chronology, commemorate, cower, decorum, deduction, deign, despondent, dialogue, divulge, eclectic, ellipse, embargo, enthusiastic, exponent, exult, fallacy, flourish, formidable, gargoyle, guerrilla, guru, heritage, hieroglyphic, hologram, hypocrisy, immune, impertinent, inference, introspection, jaunty, jovial, kilometer, labyrinth, laconic, lichen, light-year, marsupial, maneuver, metaphor, mosaic, mutation, nebula, nocturnal, nuisance, omnivore, outrageous, ozone, parasite, participle, phloem, plateau, polygon, protagonist, pulverize, quandary, quarantine, quota, rainforest, random, recede, renaissance, renegade, repose, sacrifice, silhouette, solstice, spectrum, stereotype, strategy, suffrage, symbiosis, tariff, technique, tempo, toxin, tranquility, tumult, tundra, ultraviolet, unanimous, undulate, vaccine, vacillate, vertebrate, virtuoso, voracious, wretched, xylem, yacht, zoology.

Babblefish - Online language translation software

Online language translation software

Babblefish - just used it to translate a page from Spanish to English to help Katie with a class paper. Great job, fast and easy to use. I plugged the URL and translation (in this case Spanish to English) and it rendered the entire page, including graphics, into English.

We discovered that Emilia Pardo Bazan died of complications from diabetes!

KURT VONNEGUT: NY Times Review of Slaughterhouse Five

KURT VONNEGUT: NY Times Review of Slaughterhouse Five

This is the 1969 review of Slaughterhouse Five. I think its one of the top 100 books ever written. Since I spend so much time reading technical material, and with Sarah headed to college, I have been reflecting on enriching myself and reading (or re-reading) books on various 'top 100' lists.

Miracle Method bathtub refinishing

215-638-9800 Mike Girard miracle method - tub refinisher

They did a great job on our tub. We bought my parents house. I had five brothers. It looked like one (or more) of them degreased an engine (or equivalent) in the tub. The bottom was stained, but the tub was structurally sound.

Miracle Method was cost effective and the local franchise was competent, polite and professional. We are very pleased.

SmartWrap

SmartWrap

SmartWrap - a neat way to manage the tiny cords for the various headsets we all seem to carry.

TV Turnoff Network

Welcome to TV Turnoff Network

No TV Week. This is the tenth anniversary of the movement. They did this in our local elementary schools several years ago and I thought it was a great idea.

We will participate as a family this week (but we may cheat by recording on Tivo and ReplayTV).

The weather is nice, and its light longer, so we can do stuff outside and read more.

Duncan Home Page

Duncan Home Page

Megan got a yo-yo from her grandparents for Easter. I had some fun with it and wondered if I could get an old Duncan yo-yo and a spin top.

Yeah! They are for sale on the web!

I think the Vintage Assortment is a neat set of four yo-yo's for $20

Reinventing the Yo-Yo:

Reinventing the Yo-Yo: Science News Online, April 17, 2004

I really like yo-yo's, but I would not spend more than a few bucks for one. I have to see where I can get a new Duncan yo-yo locally...

And a Duncan wooden top...

Most Unwired College Campuses Survey

Intel� Products: MMost Unwired College Campuses Survey

Georgia Tech is 100 (not sure why its so far down on the list).
Drexel University is #22.

Note to Sarah - don't pick a college based on wireless access...

Engineering Challenges of hte Hydrogen Economy

An arguement that hydrogen will never live up to its promise as a panacea for our dependence on oil.

TinyURL.com - where tiny is better!

TinyURL.com - where tiny is better!

Neat site - turns long URL's into tiny ones, hence the name.

Forbes.com: The Top Ten Nanotech Products Of 2003

Forbes.com: The Top Ten Nanotech Products Of 2003: "The Top Ten Nanotech Products Of 2003 "

Peep Research

Peep Research

This is the season for Peeps. This is an interesting web site about Peep 'product testing'. Maybe the basis for a high school chemistry or physics lab?

Copy protection plan squeezes home users

EE Times -Copy protection plan squeezes home users

People ask me why I'm so paranoid about government intervention in our lives. Here is a result of how our rights are being abused.

Basically, the current Congress, Senate and Administration have sold us down the river. Disney and others lobbied to extend copyrights an addition 70 years and they are all but eliminating the concept of fair use.

What is fair use? Its our RIGHT to use copyrighted material in whatever fashion we choose. This includes the following:

Making copies (MP3, tape, etc) for private use.
Time shifting TV shows
Making copies of TV shows for viewing on something other than TV.
Use of a computer as a Media device

Friday Five - one day late

1. What do you do for a living?

Systems Engineer for Continental Resources, Inc.. What's a Systems Engineer? For me, its typically e-mail systems and server infrastructure (DNS, directory services (AD/LDAP), IIS, File, Print, Applications).

2. What do you like most about your job?

Constant change - I get to do lots of different things for a wide range of clients in the region (well, North East US).

3. What do you like least about your job?

Constant change - I'm getting weary of the pace of change in the compter field. The half life of knowledge workers in IT is measured in months. I spend 500+ hours a year keeping my skills current.

4. When you have a bad day at work it's usually because _____...

Someone did something stupid and I have to clean it up.

5. What other career(s) are you interested in?

Teaching Science/Math/Physics at the high school (AP) or college level.

Plaxo Opt-Out

Plaxo Opt-Out

I just don't want my e-mail address registered at any online contact, peer-to-peer, friendship, degrees-of-separation site.

Testimony of Jack Valenti, Chief RIAA Moron

Testimony of Jack Valenti
Motion Picture Association of America
Before the Senate Commerce Committee
April 1, 2004


Mister Chairman,

Last year I appeared before this committee to urge your support for the broadcast flag, a harmless technical standard necessary to stem the gruesome tide of piracy that is sapping the very lifeblood of America’s most important industry. It is with shock and sadness – and deep concern for the fate of our great democracy – that I must reveal to you today an even more disturbing threat to our way of life.

Recently, Israeli scientists demonstrated a new form of wireless networking, a so-called pigeon-to-pigeon, or "P2P", technology based on ultra-high-density memory cards transported by carrier pigeons. The so-called scientists, with utter disregard for all standards of content protection and human decency, proved that their technology offers twice as much bandwidth to the home as existing broadband solutions such as DSL, allowing pirates to download twice as many movies.

Let me be blunt, Mister Chairman. This technology is a vehicle for pornography. Nothing prevents its use to transport the most vile and hateful filth. Indeed – and I hesitate to say this in an open hearing room, but you must know the truth – the carriers themselves have been known to engage in acts of procreation.

Even today, deployment of this destructive technology proceeds. A technical standard for its use, known as RFC 1149, has already been issued, and P2P carriers have begun assembling in parks throughout our great nation – the very same parks frequented by drug dealers.

We cannot – we must not – allow this to stand. Faced with the threat of DSL, our nation rose to the occasion by adopting the broadcast flag. We must rise again, to defy this newest and greatest threat to our liberty, by instituting a program of Direct Reproductive Management, or "DRM," requiring mandatory contraception for every pigeon in America.

Our experts assure us, as they did with the broadcast flag, that this plan is simple, inexpensive, and risk-free. This initiative is of utmost importance to the MPAA. Therefore, it should be implemented by the U.S. Department of Justice, so as not to impede our industry’s work on the nation’s behalf.

Mister Chairman, I cannot overstate the importance of this issue. Our industry, our nation, indeed our civilization itself, depends on your action.


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