Disqus - Latest Comments for Giordano

Re: Road Trains: Autopilot Driving System Cuts Fuel Consumption, Travel Time

Giordano — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:23:53 -0000

Blowouts are pretty predictable in that they happen as well.

Stopping distance = reaction time + braking distance

The reaction time had better be pretty good.

Re: Terrorism behind bars?

Giordano — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 12:32:23 -0000

read up on "Jihad" Ruby. You'll get your explanation as to why there are so many Muslims in prison.

Re: Terrorism behind bars?

Giordano — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 11:50:15 -0000

Putting these AL Qaeda terrorists up against a wall and shooting them for high treason will solve this "hardening" problem.

Oh wait - we're in the EU , so we can't reintroduce the death penalty.

Re: The Science of Telepathy

Giordano — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 04:59:57 -0000

Empathy != Telepathy

Re: Japan Space Solar Plans: Of Laser Beams and Solar Streams

Giordano — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 15:26:32 -0000

I would bet dollars to donuts that the cost benefit analysis of this heavily sways an earth based system, even without going over budget and schedule the space based system will likely incur.

Re: China's New Disneyland Will Force 5,000 Families of Farmers Out of Their Homes

Giordano — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:26:57 -0000

Odd question, why would farmers relocate to a more expensive city? Seems like they would relocate to another rural area.

Property rights in China lag far behind what we are used to in the US, even with imminent domain here.

Re: Postgame Avs-Coyotes – where were you tonight?

Giordano — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:21:33 -0000

The Nuggets had 3000-4000 unsold tickets on Sunday and probably 6000 empty seats. This is a team coming off a western conference finals. That should be a bigger story. And that's with way cheaper tickets too!

Re: Hand-Held Printer Only Needs You to Wave It Over The Paper (Video)

Giordano — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:48:51 -0000

I could see hardcore business people and travelers loving this device.

Lots of legal documents require actual signatures, and some of those end up signed outside of offices and might need a last minute edit or correction and can't always be printed ahead of time.

It's one more gadget, but maybe it will reduce printing by not having people print things off ahead of time just in case it's needed.

Re: Another One Bites The Dust: Walter Gropius Buildings Being Torn Down in Chicago

Giordano — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:45:19 -0000

I hate to say this as it always bothers me a bit to see great old architecture torn down, but in a dense city tearing down an old building an replacing with a more modern and larger building can limit the city sprawl.

I know most of the sprawl occurs in the suburbs, but this should at least limit it.

Re: Okay, so it’s not a Tee…

Giordano — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:27:36 -0000

Me and my room mates just got our hats in this weekend. The packaging they come in is freakin' stellar! Good fits, good material. Lovin' it.

Re: Recycling Bowling Alleys Isn't Easy

Giordano — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:27:55 -0000

If they are just nailed and not glued, it should be relatively easy to take them apart and reassemble using glue and dowels or biscuits.

As thick as they look you could probably rip them in two while they are apart and get twice the surface out of them.

Re: Hypermiling Plane Gets 45 MPG at 207 MPH, Capable of 100 MPG

Giordano — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 10:24:38 -0000

Yes, I can do basic math.

My point was that even a typical plane gets better mileage relative to most cars. A slight take off from the article title.

Re: UnTreeHugger: Paris Hilton's $325,000 Dog Mansion

Giordano — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:09:17 -0000

Is it an excess or an investment in her name?

$325,000 just bought her advertising on at least one website, and I'm sure many more.

Re: Hypermiling Plane Gets 45 MPG at 207 MPH, Capable of 100 MPG

Giordano — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 14:07:38 -0000

Even a typical light plane will get 30+mpg at above highway speeds.

However, auto buyers aren't willing to deal with the limited cargo room and tight quarters in a plane. Go look at how narrow some of those cockpits are, they leave some elbow room to be desired.

We built a solar car in university, and based the design off of a glider minus the wings.

Re: All Aluminum House Has Green Roof, Solar Power

Giordano — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:44:00 -0000

A dome would be quite easy to make, perhaps even using one of monolithicdomes air forms, but wouldn't make full use of a composites abilities.

Complex shapes and compound curves are what composites do best, otherwise it ends up being "black aluminum"

Re: All Aluminum House Has Green Roof, Solar Power

Giordano — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:42:35 -0000

I can't speak for this house or aluminum, but steel framed houses typically are more energy efficient since the significantly larger stud spacing results in less bridging losses. They also tend to be thicker walls than typical 2x4 construction. Steel roof or siding doesn't transmit heat into or out of the house necessarily.

Re: Unblock and Access YouTube From China

Giordano — Sun, 10 May 2009 03:11:09 -0000

There's also freedur.com

Re: Move to Braddock, PA And Afford the Life You Always Wanted, Or Why Small Towns Are Best

Giordano — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 10:59:21 -0000

The premise of opening a storefront to service 3000 people seems more fantasy than reality. What product or service are you going to offer to such a small customer base to make a living? (I mean one that isn't already offered)

What jobs are in this location already? A search on Monster.com shows up more jobs than my much larger city does.

I don't see how this sort of thing helps overall, unless people move from overcrowded areas to places like this. People have to move from somewhere, and were obviously living in a house, apt, or room that will now be vacant. Who will fill the now empty house or apt?

Re: EXCLUSIVE: Lucasfilm Gearing Up Another Star Wars Trilogy In 3D?!?!!

Giordano — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 09:19:18 -0000

Much could be done in the right hands, with such a rich and vibrant setting. There are so many possibilities left to explore in the characters, the Jedi, the galaxy and the eternal struggle of dark vs light.

Episode 6 leaves the galaxy at a hanging point. With the leash of the empire broken, what happens next, has been on the lips of fans for decades.

Will we one day see the answer to that question? I for one, hope that the story gets the one last creative brush of brilliance it deserves.

Re: Tesla Rear-Ended by Prius in Denmark, Pushed Under SUV

Giordano — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:29:37 -0000

I have no clue to whether the SUV is drivable or not, but I have seen many trucks and SUV's end up with issues from minor wrecks. The suspensions can only take so much damage, and might not immediately break, or can be only bent and result in bad handling and tire wear.

Drivable doesn't mean undamaged. Definitely worth having checked out if you end up in a crash, even one far less severe than this.

Re: Power Socket SWITCH Would Cut 11% Off Electric Bills

Giordano — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:29:31 -0000

No idea what country uses plugs like that, but it is definitely not a US based plug.

Re: Power Socket SWITCH Would Cut 11% Off Electric Bills

Giordano — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:28:49 -0000

This is obviously not a US plug.

The automatic switching electronics would consume power....

A switch by the door seems like the best compromise solution I have seen, but this is pretty clever and simple.

Re: Volvo Makes A Car That Stops for Pedestrians, and Next, For Bikes

Giordano — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:35:35 -0000

I could see this being useful, but the biggest danger is people stepping out from between cars where they can't be seen, either by eyeballs or camera.

FLIR is far more useful in cars IMHO.

Also, can the system brake on non people like objects? It sounds like it won't, so deer and other wildlife will be a big issue in parts of the world.

Re: Jimmy Carter’s son running for Senate

Giordano — Sun, 26 Feb 2006 04:26:17 -0000

"The singular difference between the junior senator and me is he works for the Bush administration and I want to work for Nevada."

This is polspeak, not a substantive statement of what distinguishes him from the candidate he was asked about.

Re: Trend Watch: Pot Growing In Abandoned McMansions

Giordano — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 15:20:49 -0000

Why would anyone pay tax for something as easy to grow as tobacco?

That was a serious question, why don't people grown their own tobacco?

Re: Postgame Avs-Red Wings, It’s all about Andy

Giordano — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 12:58:06 -0000

Ok, I admit it. I'm a Wings fan who is just frustrated over losing to your Avs AGAIN. That's the reason for my last long irrational post. I'll shut up now.

Re: Postgame Avs-Red Wings, It’s all about Andy

Giordano — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 12:43:39 -0000

Sorry about the multiple posts -- I'm not used to how this new interface works yet! :-)

Re: Postgame Avs-Red Wings, It’s all about Andy

Giordano — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 12:41:53 -0000

Adrian, this team is so unbelievable right now. What is it going to take to get your editors to start making the Avs a prominent feature of the front page on a regular basis?? They're freaking 8-1-2 and leading the league! Anderson has been beyond incredible, and the kids are hard to believe. These guys deserve major front-page space!

Re: Postgame Avs-Red Wings, It’s all about Andy

Giordano — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 12:41:42 -0000

Re: Postgame Avs-Red Wings, It’s all about Andy

Giordano — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 12:41:34 -0000

Re: Game developers need exercise too - Part II

Giordano — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 05:32:04 -0000

Why is that guy wearing full padding but no helmet? His brain is his money-maker, he ought to be protecting it better.

Re: Announcing the Disqus API

Giordano — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 23:27:36 -0000

Awesome work! :)

Re: Announcing the Disqus API

Giordano — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 01:27:36 -0000

Awesome work! :)

Re: Why I Am A Fan Of Sequoia Capital

Giordano — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 18:56:00 -0000

Fred,

what do you think of thefunded.com? I find it very useful and, while the information has to be verified case by case, it´s a good starting point to evaluate a VC firm.

Btw, you score very highly there :)

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: I Don't Want To Consume Media That I Can't Interact With

Giordano — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 04:32:17 -0000

Hi Fred,

I would agree for most media, but a book is a book. I normally don´t want to "tag it, post it, reply to it, comment on it, favorite it, share it, gift it, quote it". I want to be absorbed in it, get lost in it, forget about everyone else while I´m reading it.

For me, a book is the only example of "anti-social media". When I´m reading a good book, I want everyone else to disappear.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: I Don't Want To Consume Media That I Can't Interact With

Giordano — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 07:10:59 -0000

On the other hand, books make for one very powerful social denominator, much more than music.

Match me with someone who likes Daft Punk, Underworld, Kraftwerk and Miles Davis, and I will probably have a good night out and a fun conversation with that person.

Match me with someone who likes Salinger, Hemingway, Stephenson, Dave Eggers and Jonathan Safran Foer (et al), and I will have found someone who probably has a similar outlook on life.

Bottom line: Amazon has a oh-so-big opportunity in the social networking space.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: I Don't Want To Consume Media That I Can't Interact With

Giordano — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 07:12:07 -0000

Not to mention dating! Amazon Dating would work very well

Re: The Open Mobile Network

Giordano — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 23:19:18 -0000

Hi Fred,

I work in the industry and (as anyone who´s been dealing with carriers for years) I´m suspect of bias, since if you work with them you end up hating them. And that speaks figures on how they behave. Anyway, my two cents...

I think it´s mostly a move to counter Google wireless spectrum bidding plans. By announcing the opening of their network, they deflate most of the claims made by Google in Washington in the last months. Plus, they reduce Google incetive to bid high in the upcoming auction, since they say that any third party app or phone (even an Android-powered CDMA phone) will work on their network.

As for the opportunity to have any handset working on their network, it´s not a big deal: if you live in the US, you can only get CDMA handsets from Verizon or Sprint Nextel, with a 2 years contract. And US consumers are used to subsidized handsets, so I don´t foresee a rush to third-party stores, if vendors decide to go direct. You could import an handset from Korea, in theory, but few will do that.

The big deal is on the applications: apparently, they are not going to certify beyond network compliance. Billing is the issue: will they make billing integration very easy, like it happened in the UK a few months ago? Let´s hope so. Qualcomm´s BREW could be hit, if they open to more Java-supporting devices

Will the other follow suit? Probably, but I don´t see them rushing to it... it will take in my opinion at least 4-5 years to have completely open networks in the US.

Anyway, in my view is a strategic move to fend off Google, more than a willingness to transition to an open system.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Facebook and The Privacy Backlash

Giordano — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 07:48:21 -0000

Hi,

the real issue is that pretty much everyone is saying that Facebook should not give users an option to opt-out, but require them to opt-in to take part in Beacon, and have the feature switched off as a default.

I agree with that. I´m happy to share my activities with my circle of friends, but I want to be able to decide exactly how, first generally and then case-by-case (you don´t want your Facebook friends to know everything you´re doing on the Net, after all...). If this condition is met, I think it has the potential to be of great service.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Off To Australia

Giordano — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 01:27:29 -0000

I'll be there in the second half of January... it's always great to be in Australia. In Melbourne, try a restaurant on Docklands, called Livebait. Really nice and great seafood.

I'll be spending NYE in Tokyo, which I love, and right now I'm writing from Napa Valley (first time here!). Can life get any better? :)

Happy holidays!

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Melbourne Is A Very Cool Town

Giordano — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 09:34:42 -0000

Cookie... so many fond memories :)

I'm going there in a week!

Re: Zynga Game Network

Giordano — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 00:33:30 -0000

Hi Fred,

I didn't know you were a casual gamer! Smart move, lots of movement in the space, and 2008 is going to be interesting.

Have you tried our games?

www.popcap.com

I recommend Peggle. But be careful, is addictive (Wired defined it "chocolate-covered crack cocaine")!

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: How Yahoo! Can Get Out Of The Microsoft Bear Hug

Giordano — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 02:06:28 -0000

Why spin-off Alibaba and Yahoo JP? Those are the only Yahoo units with a leadership position in their market (Yahoo JP), and sustained growth perspective in the next decade. (Alibaba). Yahoo should look at increasing its stake in them, not letting them go. The same with mobile... Yahoo has a leadership position in most of Asia.

Maybe one solution would be shifting perspective and letting go of the US-centric view, and focus on the markets where Yahoo is and can be leader.

Re: How Yahoo! Can Get Out Of The Microsoft Bear Hug

Giordano — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 04:05:05 -0000

Or, Microsoft can huge its huge cash reserves to buy a majority stake in them, and catapult itsself to a leadership position on the Internet in Asia, which is a very valuable position to be in.

Re: Friends

Giordano — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 20:15:07 -0000

Hi Fred,

it is a wonderful thing. For me, it started more than 15 years ago, when I started browsing around BBS, and then opening my own. That was before anyone had heard of the Internet, and the concept of a virtual friend was completely unkwnown. I was a teenager at the time, and we my parents heard that I was meeting people I never met in real life, they grew very worried. Some of those friendships are still alive, and I met many more people through the Net since then. I have to say, though, that when the relationship translated to real life was because there was a shared interest, personal or business. Online, it's much easier to start an interaction, but it's not so common to have a meaningful one.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Obama's Tribal Garb Photo

Giordano — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 09:53:37 -0000

As a foreigner, I have a comment on this: what the heck?

Can you explain to me why a picture of Obama in ethnic garb can be a piece of news in any way? Every politician wears them when travelling abroad. There are scores of pics of Bush and Clinton dressed with traditional costumes from everywhere in the world. It's just protocol.

And even if it wasn't, how is this relevant in any way? I'm seriously baffled about this.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Self Destruction

Giordano — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 12:18:44 -0000

I disagree with the idea that he was "earnest and committed to public service": While he went after some bad actors, he spent much of his time going after people who built legitimate businesses on technicalities. There are people--like entrepreneurs--who spend their lives trying to create value for other people. Spitzer spent his life tearing down that value to build his own personal power.

One of the things I've learned over time is that people like that, be it Craig or Spitzer, are usually trying to cover their own failings. While I feel sad for his family, I only wish he had fallen before ruining so many people's lives.

Re: Self Destruction

Giordano — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 23:08:17 -0000

I don't get the cause of all this indignation. Maybe it's because in Italy, where I'm from, when a politician gets caught with prostitutes it's not a big deal, or often people actually give him the thumbs-up, or because I believe the personal sphere should be separated by the public, or because (having worked in Asia and Brazil for years), I found out that about... oh, 95%, of men on a business trip actually will go with prostitutes if they have a chance to, but why this should ruin his career?

it's a matter between him and his wife. Going with a prostitute is not a crime, organized prostitution is. He was just a client, so this should be kept in the personal sphere.

Re: Working On Vacation

Giordano — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 03:16:20 -0000

I'm on a long week-end in Penang, Malaysia (absolutely recommend it, it's fab and the Shangri-La resort is heavenly), and I spent last night getting up every 2 hours to check on some urgent stuff in the US, and providing feedback. My girlfriend slept through it, fortunately

Please spare a thought for all of us working for US companies in different time zones, and with different holidays. We need to adapt, naturally, not viceversa... and the fun never stops :)

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Thinking About Christmas

Giordano — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 23:59:34 -0000

Yes, you must. And Shanghai too. And call me beforehand :)

I had Christmas back home in Italy, even though we're all atheists, because since I left several years ago I only get to see my family and friends a couple of times a year. As my parents get older, it's very evident how spending some time with them become more important.

Now back in Shanghai, off to HK for NYE. And at the end of January, a whole week off, spent on the beach in Boracay, in the Philippines. Being an expat in Asia has several perks, double-holidaying one of them :)

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Thinking About Christmas

Giordano — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 03:42:36 -0000

Understood, but still I think visiting Asia will be very enlightening and interesting, and add some perspective to the way you see things. It happens to pretty much everyone. Also, I say "Asia" but really there isn't such a thing... every country is so different, and different places in the same country too. The ideal trip would be at least a month, and would include China (cities, rural, historical sites), Japan, Korea, India, Hong Kong and South East Asia (SIngapore for city life, Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand for beaches and sigths, Vietnam for sights). If you lack time, a 10 day trip to China can be enough to get a sense of the country, then you could go to Japan for a week for the next vacation, and then a further trip to S-E Asia, and one to India. I know it's a lot of stuff, but the area is really so big, and so diverse, that everyone would be hard pressed to point to a single country or area to visit. Naturally, when the time comes, feel free to ping me: in the last couple of years most of my time was spent traveling around the region (mostly on business, but still...), so I can give you some pointers.

Also, maybe talking with some people investing here in China could be interesting for you, even if you don't plan to do it directly, to get a different perspective and a feeling of the market here.

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Inaugurapalooza

Giordano — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 11:28:39 -0000

I'm watching this from Singapore and I have to say that, as an atheist and a firm believer of the separation of church and state, I would be happier if there were less churches, pastors and religious paraphernalia involved. That's really spoiling it for me.

Re: One Thing You Don't Need To Be An Entrepreneur: A College Degree

Giordano — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 21:21:36 -0000

Hi,

I started college just at the start of the dotcom boom and, like lots of other people, I launched a start-up at the same time, soon dropping out to follow it full time. Just before the crash, I sold the start-up to a larger company, earning a nice payout (for my age... I was 21), and joining the ranks of that company. I was very happy about my decision to drop out from college, and though I'd never regret it.

1 year afterward, the crash had happened and the company was bankrupt. I was jobless, in a pretty bad market, and considering whether to go back to college or look for a job. I went looking for a job, since I had experienced the thrill of starting up a company, and going back to school had no appeal to me. The next 2-3 years weren't easy, since I had to make do with a lower-level job (and much lower salary), and climb back from there. Boy, I wish I had finished college. But I learned a lot in those years

Finally, I was sent abroad by my company, and 6 years later, here I am, with a job I love in the videogames industry, with lots of responsibility and a commensurate salary, working on the cutting edge of multiplayer/social gaming, living on the other side of the world, traveling all the time and accumulating experience.

I'm now happy with the decisions I made back then, and think that having been to college would not add much to who I am now: 10+ years of experience working in digital media, from start-ups to large org, pretty much teach you everything you need to know. Eventually, I will think about starting my own thing again, whenever a great idea strikes me, and I feel I haven't anything much more to learn by working in a company.

Sure, I had to learn and teach myself the hard way a lot of stuff, from finance to HR-related issues, and made several mistakes along the way. However, when I stopped thinking that I knew everything, and started learning from more experienced people (and even less experienced people) around me, that became part of my daily routine, and I didn't really felt I was at a disadvantage.

Bottom line: without college, unless you are lucky with your first try, expect a few years of very hard slog, of doubting about yourself and your skills, of having to eat humble pie. However, once you're through that phase, don't think for a second that not having a degree penalizes you in any way, because you have demonstrated over time what you are worth.

I would say that probably the most important thing college/biz school/MBA can give you is access to a network of people, which is clearly one of the most useful things to have, but that can be built over time to.

Re: One Thing You Don't Need To Be An Entrepreneur: A College Degree

Giordano — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 21:34:28 -0000

We have a lunch appointment in May in New York, do you remember? Dorsey set it up :)

I was thinking the same thing... I was still living in Italy when I first commented, so we're talking about 5-6 years ago at least. It's weird how, from Italy to Brazil to Singapore to China, I always considered this blog a constant feature of my days. Can you have a friendship with a blog, or is that considered creepy?

Re: The Shamus’ Back To College Edition!

Giordano — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 12:52:48 -0000

Best college admissions interview:

Risky Business (1983). The Princeton interviewer (Richard Masur) wanders into Joel's (Tom Cruise) whore-fest. Joel gets accepted.

Re: Lost Lust

Giordano — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 16:49:08 -0000

Well, after punishing ABC for The Path to 9/11 for a season, and finding that it made not one whit of difference, I'm back with Lost. I watched what I guess was the Annotated Final Episode from Last Season last night and found that I'd missed almost nothing being away. Aside from not being sure who Juliet and Naomi are, I'm ready to roll.

Love the idea of Lost translated into LOLCatspeak. You guys did a great job. Funny as hell.

Re: TaskPaper on Windows and over the Web

Giordano — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 07:00:11 -0000

I cannot wait to see this. I love Taskpaper, but it's lack of a windows client is causing me frustration. Any chance of a beta invite, Jordan? or even a release date? :)

Re: Welcome KW Magazine & CKWR FM Listeners

Giordano — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 05:02:27 -0000

Love it. Thnks for the great resource list

Re: BrothersJudd Blog: THE STAFF LASSOES THE UNICORN RIDER:

Giordano — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 20:59:52 -0000

You fools. We hacked into Mr. Obama's teleprompter months ago. Did you really think he came up with such drivel on his own?

Re: out of office - Digging in a Habari sandpit

Giordano — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 17:08:27 -0000

Aha Hahaha! "Straightforward and Trivial".

I wonder how many times I've said that in the days!

Re: Hard Lessons For Entrepreneurs

Giordano — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 21:22:09 -0000

Totally agreed.

The only think I'd say is that there are a lot of people who will try anything, so when I'm making investments, I look for metrics that indicate a) user growth and b) long-term user engagement. 10,000 active users easily beats 50,000 registered users for me.

Re: 32 Sci-Fi Novels You Should Read

Giordano — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 08:44:56 -0000

Considering Stross's Accelerando, I'd like to point out that it has been released under creative commons as free ebook.

Check this site

Re: Jake And Amir Dot Com - Jake, Amir, Pat, Sarah, Sam and the rest of the CH...

Giordano — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 12:08:46 -0000

Ouch Streeter, Ricky, Jeff, and Dan

Re: Inside the iPad: Why a $100 Apple Laptop Is Probably Inevitable

Giordano — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 18:40:55 -0000

The iPad is the iPhone Pro:
The full power of Leopard in your pocket.
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/gal...mage_med...
http://www.ilounge.com/gallery/iphon...iphonePr...

FULL Mac OS X, Firewire and Ethernet ports and we will purchase thousands for our University.

Re: Inside the iPad: Why a $100 Apple Laptop Is Probably Inevitable

Giordano — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 18:43:31 -0000

Oops! Full links below -- sorry!

http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/gallery/image_...
http://www.ilounge.com/gallery/iphone_concept/i...

Re: Inside the iPad: Why a $100 Apple Laptop Is Probably Inevitable

Giordano — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 11:13:21 -0000

Whatever, but we need the FULL Mac OS X (no just OS X) inside to make sure it runs NATIVE Keynote and PowerPoint presentations (wired and wireless).

The Mac Book Air is too large and heavy for us. We need it in our pockets and about 500 g or so (screen of 5 to 7-inches or so like the OQO model e2):

http://www.oqo.com

Re: Inside the iPad: Why a $100 Apple Laptop Is Probably Inevitable

Giordano — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 03:38:12 -0000

Amazing videos say it all:

Apple "MacBook Touch" New MultiTouch Tablet Concept
http://superglide.posterous.com/apple-macbook-t...

What is Apple's New Secret Product
http://superglide.posterous.com/what-is-apples-...

Re: Tips to avoid CO2 poisoning

Giordano — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 01:35:17 -0000

CO is what you mean in your headline. CO2 carbon dioxide.

Re: How do I increase conversion on Internet leads?

Giordano — Sat, 12 Aug 2006 22:47:49 -0000

I have found a direct correlation between response time and increased conversion rate. I receive leads through email and LeadAlarm.com has helped me respond to the lead quickly. As soon as I receive the email lead from one of my lead vendors, LeadAlarm calls my cell phone and reads the lead out loud, and then all I have to do is click 1 on my phone to call that lead.

Re: Did Romney Score With The Speech?

Giordano — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 12:06:04 -0000

Good speech but I think people are already set in their opinions and not apt to listen.

I am against Mormonism, it goes too far away from the bounds of legitimate christianity.
But I respect Mormon lifestyle, morality, and people individually.

That said, I think Romney is the best candidate among the pack.
I wouldn't hesitate to vote for him over huckabee, giuliani, etc..

Re: Old Mister Withers Speaks

Giordano — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 09:56:08 -0000

Ethical "principals"? When I was in HS my principal spent half the day at the local bar getting soused. He wasn't very ethical.

Re: A California Emergency Means Grab Your Wallets

Giordano — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 13:41:04 -0000

Basic problem is that the legislative districts are drawn so as to eliminate competition in the general election. IIRC, only one district (out of 120-odd) has changed party hands in the last two elections. This means that the only competition is in the primary, between rabid and more-rabid partisans. This means that no one in the legislature, once elected, has any motivation to compromise, look ahead, or do anything for the good of the state.

To his credit, Ah-nold pushed a redistricting reform initiative a couple of years ago. Unfortunately, it was only one of four initiatives he was pushing at the same time, and a couple of the others made the establishment/unions very angry. So they pushed back, and all four went down. And Ah-nold, after that, capitulated and started building up his own personal popularity again by abandoning fiscal discipline.

California has a steeply "progressive" income tax, which means that a small percentage of the people are paying most of the taxes. This makes the revenue stream very bumpy and unpredictable. It also means that the people who pay the taxes are far outnumbered by the people who consume them. This is a "positive feedback" loop that ends, one way or another, in disaster.

My ex is a native and will never leave. To be part of my kids' lives, I have to stay close to them. If it weren't for them, I'd already be gone.

Re: Estrich: Who'd Have Thought The Party Of Identity Politics Has Racists?

Giordano — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 17:56:56 -0000

Frankly this election is all about identity politics on both sides.
Not so much ideology and policy.
Hope you write more about the topic.

Re: Make your site faster and cheaper to operate in one easy step

Giordano — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 07:53:47 -0000

Interesting stuff, thanks

Re: The Canadian copyfight debate continues

Giordano — Sun, 15 Jan 2006 10:07:15 -0000

Two corrections:

1) the fundrasier has not yet happened. It will hapen on Jan 19.

2) this fundraiser will not simply be attended by these lobbyists. It is being HOSTED by those lobbyists, which makes the whole thing stink even worse. And the reason it is happening four days before the election is because Bulte had already maxed out her allowed contributions for 2005.

Re: Will Jobs let Mac OS run on Intel boxes?

Giordano — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 11:38:09 -0000

Is that possible. I thought to run a full featured Mac OS X you had to have the physical Apple ROM. At least that seems to be the case for Mac OS 9. That is the main reason why Mac OS 9 does not run on Mac OS X, even with hackers tryinng it to work.

Check out SheepShaver:

http://gwenole.beauchesne.info/projects/sheepsh...

SheepShaver is an Open Source PowerPC MacOS run-time environment. That is, it enables you to run PowerPC Classic MacOS software on your computer, even if you are using a different operating system. However, you still need a copy of MacOS and a PowerMacintosh ROM image to use this program. SheepShaver is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL).

Re: Why Apple might be better off without Steve

Giordano — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 15:38:18 -0000

The Apple Way is the Steve Jobs Way. The company is so thoroughly steeped in the values that Jobs preached and lived that the company can keep going without the man being present.

One thing I like about him is his toughness in making the unpopular decision. He held fast to the one-button mouse as the standard for a very long time. It forced developers to consider that basic users would only work with the single button and write their software with that in mind. All power users would go out and get multi-button mice, so developers would consign advanced features to the right button.

Also, he made people wait for months until third-party apps could be loaded on the iPhone. This showed people how great the quality of the iPhone was. When they finally got to add third-party apps, people could see that crashes, etc. are rightly due to the apps and not the phone itself.

Before I could say that the company would be better off without him or not, I'd have to see some of the ideas he rejected and projects he killed to see whether he was wise or foolish.

Re: The Harvard Crimson :: Opinion :: But is it Good for the Jews?

Giordano — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 08:03:10 -0000

Speaking with the leader of another nation is how the president delivers conditions to that leader in a way more likely to get those leaders to take them seriously. Demanding the conditions *before* the conversation is backwards.

Re: The Harvard Crimson :: Opinion :: What’s in a Concentration?

Giordano — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:48:10 -0000

"Truly distinct fields of study satisfy both of these criteria, and only truly distinct fields of study should be adopted as concentrations. Most undergraduates have specialized interests within their fields of study—some physics concentrators might otherwise elect to 'concentrate' in nuclear energy, for example, and some English concentrators might otherwise elect to 'concentrate' in twentieth-century Irish literature."

Isn't human developmental and regenerative biology (HDRB) a specialized interested within biology as much as nuclear energy is a specialized interest within physics? Why aren't the physics and chemistry concentrations being disbanded into several specialized interests each the way the biology concentration is?

Re: The Harvard Crimson :: Opinion :: I Did Not Vote

Giordano — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:51:30 -0000

"'Are you going in to vote?' the woman asked me. I told her I wasn’t American as I rushed past."

Next time, just say yes. After all, you're going to vote in your country's general election.

Re: The Harvard Crimson :: News :: Harvard Professor Arrested for Assault and Battery with Hot Coffee, Thermos

Giordano — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:37:17 -0000

Oh my heavens! Was that hollow-point coffee?

I think being handcuffed was all the lesson needed. The guy blocking the driveway might have contributed something here as well. Stand'm before the judge, then let'm go. It's only a cup of coffee!

Re: The Harvard Crimson :: News :: Renowned Af-Am Professor Gates Arrested for Disorderly Conduct

Giordano — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 12:48:33 -0000

"Loud and tumultous behaviour".

In his own house.

I'd hate to be Joe Average Shmuck in Cambridge. He'd get arrested for "indecent thoughts" or "insufficient PBA contributions".

Re: http://skeetonmischa.tumblr.com/post/62646004

Giordano — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 13:47:50 -0000

they look odd...

Re: The blog is still alive!

Giordano — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 05:34:00 -0000

Yeah agree with spacebar about the homepage icons. I can't see myself needing any of these options very often so it would feel like a bit of an unecessary page. Agree that either being able to customize those links or set a different default starting page would be useful.

The rest looks great though.

Re: Who Killed Chandra Leavy? -- Political Wire

Giordano — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 09:16:56 -0000

She interned at the Federal Bureau of Prisons, not for a member of Congress.

Re: Twitter is Testing Search Saved Searches on Twitter.com

Giordano — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 02:53:12 -0000

Fantastic, I suggested that to friendfeed team a few weeks ago ;)

When you do a "search", there should be a checkbox (checked by default) "save this query"
This will add a shortcut on the right hand side for example....

Great !

Re: We are going to blow your mind next week

Giordano — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 15:09:49 -0000

Yes, and Nokia already made phones. Your point?

Re: Ballmer: I'm completely out of ideas

Giordano — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 15:05:26 -0000

Yeah, Dick, Apple's strategy is just ridiculous: http://is.gd/14g

Re: Gail Collins declares her stupidity

Giordano — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 10:46:26 -0000

That 4 grand was for an hour. So for a whole night the price could be much higher than 20 grand.....

Re: Dear John Lilly of Mozilla: You are a craven, hypocritical vagina, and I hope you get crabs.

Giordano — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 13:14:12 -0000

That's alittle hars dude, I don't wish crabs on anybody. Except maybe UBL.

Re: The Dalai Lama is bugging the shit out of me lately, begging me to help him.

Giordano — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:00:11 -0000

People in Tibet being brutally murdered by the Chinese, no not at all funny. But the thought of the Lama going to ask Steve Jobs for help at PR? Not that is funny. Sorry Krokkel, you need to start reading between the lines.

Re: The Dalai Lama is bugging the shit out of me lately, begging me to help him.

Giordano — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:01:20 -0000

Ack. That was supposed read "NOW that is funny". Sorry

Re: Attention Jon Rubinstein: Stop trying to poach my engineers, goddammit

Giordano — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:53:14 -0000

Isn't Fred Anderson under indictment or something?

Re: Aziz is Bored

Giordano — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 22:30:04 -0000

Well, like it says buried at the end, you can blow your nose, just do it one nostril at a time.

Re: equal opportunity goodness

Giordano — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 18:49:02 -0000

I'm a strong believer in affirmative action and appreciate that it can be a complicated issue (well, it's really not that complicated if you look at the alarming numbers.) Anyway, I've basically approached a place of zero tolerance for crappy coverage of the issue so I appreciate recommendations for good articles. Will check it out. Thanks, Sam.

Re: Properly bundling .frameworks in your application package

Giordano — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 20:13:55 -0000

I was bashing my head about this... but then I found your explanation :)

Thank you very much!!!

Re: Fluxtumblr

Giordano — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 16:55:17 -0000

I kind of agree, but I also think that there's something to be taken from judging the music on it's own merits, and ignoring all the press material. Still, if it's in they lyrics, it does seem like he wasn't trying too hard...

Re: Fluxtumblr

Giordano — Mon, 12 May 2008 11:16:57 -0000

Have you seen "The Bridge"? I wonder what the percentage is for San Francisco.

Re: Fluxtumblr

Giordano — Mon, 12 May 2008 18:46:14 -0000

Ya got Trouble with a capital T, that rhymes with P, that stands for people singing Patsy Cline songs.

Re: Nick McGlynn

Giordano — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 16:34:04 -0000

You are an inbred cretin.

Re: Why I (Still) Code

Giordano — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 18:36:34 -0000

I'm a partner at a VC firm that still writes code on the side for many of the same reasons you describe (started on an Apple ][, learned LISP from Paul Graham's book, find the immediate gratification feedback loops of coding refreshing when compared to the 5+ year feedback loops in VC, etc). Glad to hear I'm not the only one...

Re: Take a Hike

Giordano — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 15:46:17 -0000

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=WQ-OBrw3I9Y

Re: Meet the newest member of the AMERICAblog team

Giordano — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 20:49:49 -0000

All together now!

Awwwwwwww......

He's really cute. I'm so glad you got another one, Joe. I'm like you in that when I lose a pet, I have to get another one. I think it's wonderful that pets allow us to truly experience the "one door closes and another opens" doctrine of life. There is no better way to pay tribute to one's love for a pet than to want to share it with another onel.

Re: It's Black Friday

Giordano — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 12:53:03 -0000

I'm cutting back even though I don't really need to. I was laid off in August and was lucky enough to get another job quickly, with no cut in pay. But there seems something unseemly about doing something like replacing a perfectly good CRT television in the bedroom that rarely gets watched with a flatscreen. And it seems a jinx to trade in our seven-year-old Civic for a new Fit (hence the two grand I'm putting into Big Maintenance Items today). So I think we will buy a Garmin GPS for me to use when the highways I take to and from work are impassable, and I will bake cookies to send to family members. I will donate to my local food pantry, I donated coats to the coat drive already and bought gifts for a needy familly through the tag tree at my workplace. And I'll put any money left into my local well-run community bank that doesn't need bailout money -- for when I get laid off next time.

Re: Chambliss: Palin makes Republicans "explode"

Giordano — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 20:59:25 -0000

Ew. Just "ew." The splooge imagery that Republican males use to describe her effect on them is truly revolting.

Re: Harry Reid says Dems. have the votes to pass stimulus. Also acknowledges bipartisanship "isn't working"

Giordano — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 06:48:34 -0000

You are a moron if you think this stimulus package is any good.

Re: Maureen Dowd hearts Michelle. David Brooks not so much.

Giordano — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 21:56:50 -0000

And yet it was perfectly OK for Rich Lowry to get "starbursts" from watching Sarah Palin and for Republicans to be quite open about wanting a MILF to have the nuclear launch codes. Michelle Obama is gorgeous. She isn't sexy because her arms are bare, she's sexy because she's fit and confident. You could put her in one of those Texas polygamy cult prairie dresses and she'd be sexy. So what would you do, put her in a burqa for four years?

Re: Madoff's worth over $823 million in 2008

Giordano — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 15:26:05 -0000

Cheap bastards sure didn't pay their housekeeper very well. How big is the place she had to keep clean again?

Re: Lisbon

Giordano — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 19:24:54 -0000

Chris, I'm like you and I tend to gravitate towards friendly cats when I'm out of the country too. But one time I did that the cat turned out to be a "stimulation biter" and I got nipped -- and had to go through the whole rabies rigamarole when I got home because I had no way of knowing if the cat would have rabies or not. Just an advisement to be a little careful.

Re: Best. Soundtrack. Ever

Giordano — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 07:08:43 -0000

What I always loved about Jimmy Cliff in this movie is that he plays this troubled, angry man and then he opens his mouth to sing and this glorious, joyful tenor voice comes out. 100% agreed on this, if not at the top of the list, certainly up there.

Re: Mom kills son, then self at shooting range

Giordano — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 20:55:22 -0000

As someone who endured the high-profile murder of a friend and her family in 1971 by a father who thought he was dispatching his family to heaven, I'm always heartsick when I hear about yet another one. It isn't just about our society today; this kind of nut has been around for a long, long time. Perhaps we ought to start looking at the notion of "heaven as cop-out" and at the role Christianity as practiced in our country has in making these people think that somehow killing their family is a virtue.

Re: Rachel Maddow, you're in trouble...

Giordano — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 09:40:37 -0000

I'm lucky....my mother (age 82) reads my blog, and I just put in a link to the Urban slang dictionary so she can find out what it is without being embarrassed.

Re: Rachel Maddow, you're in trouble...

Giordano — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 09:43:14 -0000

One more funny anecdote. A number of years ago, an article in the New York Times referred to the elderly people clogging up the lap pool lanes at a swim club as being "like so many tea bags, steeping." My husband thought that was a funny saying, and decided that just hanging out in a pool without swimming was "teabagging." He referred to this practice in this context in the hot tub at a Caribbean resort once, and was responded to with a tub full of bright red faces, and not from sunburn either.

Re: Jury finds man guilty of spreading HIV

Giordano — Fri, 29 May 2009 20:21:07 -0000

Hell to the yeah is he guilty. If he knows he is positive, he owes every partner the choice of doing it with or without a condom.

I hope his dick falls off. And his kidneys fail.

Re: Streeter Seidell

Giordano — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 19:45:51 -0000

I like how you go all-in for your characters.

Re: Streeter Seidell

Giordano — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:25:33 -0000

When I first saw that I lost my shit and watched it like 8 times in a row on my DVR. If you've ever spent much time around people like that who take themselves seriously, it's an amazing video.

Re: TED TALK: A Non-Reusable Syringe Could Save 1.3 Million Lives

Giordano — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:17:11 -0000

Drug use could be considered one more reason to make a one time use syringe, it would be harder for people to take drugs if they had to constantly find a supply of syringes, but I suppose those two would end up smuggled into the country as well.

Re: Royal Mail – Industrial relations from another era

Giordano — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:44:46 -0000

Zoning: It probably needs to be kept pretty simple. How about:
* One post rate for mainland England and Wales
* Another for mainland Scotland
* Different ones for the smaller islands (Wight, Man, Shetlands, etc)

Re: Question for Discussion: How Much Can You Spend Without Telling?

Giordano — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 11:40:52 -0000

I wonder if total household income levels play into this at all? That is, does a household with $50K in annual income tend to have a lower threshold than one with $150K?

Re: W-4 and Your Working Spouse

Giordano — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 11:29:15 -0000

I could be wrong but I think the core W-4 issue with two working spouses filling jointly is that your marginal rate probably goes up due to the two (or more) incomes together but the W-4 doesn't account for this.

Re: Higher Health Insurance Premiums for Overweight: Discrimination?

Giordano — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 09:29:49 -0000

I agree with the first comment. I don't want to see discrimination against genetic or other things that one cannot control. However, for smoking and obesity I am all for charging those folks more for insurance. I'm getting really tired of the "it's not my fault" whine.

Re: 10 Tips for Buying a Residential Rental Property, Part 1: Buy at the Right Price

Giordano — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 17:54:35 -0000

Would you be willing to post some info about your rentals? What percentage off "fair market value" are you buying at and what percentage of FMV are you renting at? $500 profit/mo per is very good -- you must either be buying fairly expensive properties or the percentage of FMV you're renting at above 1%. Also, in the $500 profit cutoff are you counting any tax advantages? Thanks!

Re: Planning and Goal Setting Week: Flexo’s 2007 Goals

Giordano — Sun, 31 Dec 2006 10:00:17 -0000

You guys who spend $100/mo/person or less are impressive. My home of 2 spends around $350/total a month for groceries. We don't eat "fancy" (like steak), but I guess we also don't eat "college-style" (like pasta and sauce every night).

Flexo, $40K/year extra is impressive. Is this mainly/solely from blogging income? Where do you expect most of your increase from?

Re: New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine is Saving Consumers $20M a Day

Giordano — Wed, 05 Jul 2006 16:23:50 -0000

the state's also losing out on the tax revenue generated from that 20mil/day. . . so, the money likely won't find its way into savings account, or the coffers of New Jersey (where it's probably spent in a fashion similiar to gambling anyways) ^_^

Re: Zinc-Air Battery Could Hold 300% More Energy Than Lithium-Ion

Giordano — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:49:16 -0000

Hearing aid batterys are also a major pain for many people to replace, especially those with failing eyesight.

To many people avoiding inconvenience is worth a certain price.

I have a stash of AA and AAA rechargeable, and they are already expensive enough that I have to take them out of stuff to use them in something else.

Re: There is a Garden Climbing the Stairs in Bilbao's Public Space!

Giordano — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:44:38 -0000

I love it, but the small spike on the left could create quite the bottle neck for people coming down the stairs in a crowd.

Re: Budaj in goal at San Jose?

Giordano — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:35:58 -0000

Actually, I'm just a disgruntled Wings fan who is upset about losing to you guys twice. I'll take shots at your players wherever I can. Pathetic? Yes, I know. But I can see the end coming for my Wings.

Re: Zinc-Air Battery Could Hold 300% More Energy Than Lithium-Ion

Giordano — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 21:49:54 -0000

Some people like full use of their trunks, and looking at many offerings of EV's, volume does matter to an extent.

Re: Play it again…BLAM!

Giordano — Mon, 26 May 2008 18:02:58 -0000

Hey Sidin,

Nachna Odne Nei has become very popular again thanks to this dance on Britain's got talent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXUge-0zLjw

Re: Thoughts on the rollout

Giordano — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 07:44:45 -0000

Buddy: I really LIKED "Barack America" once I got over the shock that Biden flubbed that. I think Biden ought to adopt that and pop it into his speeches every now and then. Because "Obama" isn't the kind of name that just rolls off the tongue of the average American idiot, "Barack America" could turn into the kind of meme that wins elections. USE it. Turn it into a meme like "Straight Talk Express" (and I think they ought to appropriate that one and wrest it from McCain as well).

Re: This Is How You Stick It To Lying Republican Hacks

Giordano — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:26:01 -0000

I would say that the McCain ad is as equally as misleading as Democrats saying McCain voted with Bush 90% of the time. Which is ALWAYS repeated ad nausem, and is patently false. Bush does not vote in the Senate. Period. If the Obama campaign wants to spread lies like that, McCain is simply firing back with something as equally misleading and damaging (although less believable lol).
I am disappointed in both campaigns.

Re: The company that Fox Interactive acquired: Newroo

Giordano — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 09:18:49 -0000

A minor detail, but IIRC, Newroo is two guys, one woman, and some contractors.

Re: Solar power start-ups taking more cash, time

Giordano — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 13:29:33 -0000

Check out this introduction article on solar power:
http://www.articleworld.org/Solar_power
Contents
1.Methods of harnessing the sun's energy
* 1.1 Direct solar power
* 1.2 Indirect solar power
2.Forms of solar power - either passive or active

Re: Retrevo offers gadget search engine; raises less than $1M

Giordano — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 21:08:41 -0000

eCoustics.com aggregates more than 1 million electronics reviews.

Re: Is Apple working on an iPhone with a physical keyboard? I hope not.

Giordano — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 16:57:54 -0000

I totally disagree. I bought an iPhone, and after a week was almost up to 1/3 of my old typing speed. So, I returned it.

I know a bunch of other folks who also stay with their blackberries (and treos) becuase of the keyboard issue.

To me, the iPhone is a beautiful, fun toy. But it's useless as a business device without a keyboard. If they add a keyboard, I'll buy one in a heartbeat.

Re: Defcon: EFF defends MIT students’ right to talk; federal court stops speech

Giordano — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 19:23:02 -0000

Pretty impressive that Judge Woodlock made it through law school without having heard of the first amendment.

Re: Apple’s “brick” manufacturing process to yield a $800 MacBook?

Giordano — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 11:51:07 -0000

As this:

Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

THAT WILL BE A REVOLUTION!

Re: Pocket PC maker OQO shopping for buyers

Giordano — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 15:57:06 -0000

Apple should buy it with the engineers and make the ultimate pocketable Mac!

Re: Thoughts On An Apple Tablet: Full OS X, Please

Giordano — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 14:25:45 -0000

Make it with the full Mac OS X (not just OS X like the iPhone and iPod touch) and we are sold. For full blown Apple Keynote and Microsoft PowerPoint presentations. About 300 g and 5-inch screen. Pocketable. We need thousands for our University. Like the OQO, but a true Mac OS X tablet.

Re: Forget The iPhone Pro. Give Me A MacBook Mini

Giordano — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 14:30:56 -0000

Re: Letter: Maybe NSMT should ask Disney for bailout

Giordano — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 20:16:22 -0000

I want to cry hearing this. I first went to a NSMT show only last year. Les Miserables... it was VERY good. This year, I had a bit of a windfall--and for the first time ever I was able to buy season tickets. Something I've always hoped to be able to do--but could never afford before for any theater. I bought 5--one for each member of my family. Are they closing? Are they not? I don't know. I just got a letter from them asking me to donate the money for the subscriptions. It sounds as if they're saying "sorry we can't give you any shows... or refunds... give us money anyway." Am I just out the money? So much to lose. I love the theater, majored in it in school... but this is just... so disenheartening.

Re: Council OKs cops' 9/11 pay

Giordano — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 12:58:14 -0000

If you look on the Peabody Police Department's website, there is a directory. Listed as an officer is one David Bonfanti. Coincidence?

Re: From an email fwd my dad sent me :) / Taylor McKnight

Giordano — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 03:02:12 -0000

Except it's not always true. It's a great social engineering trick, because some of the time it appears to be true, but I've found a number of cars which it isn't, leading me to believe it's mostly co-incidence.

Re: Install Windows XP on a Mini-Note (USB stick method)

Giordano — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 07:44:01 -0000

I get a "FormatEx Error[11] when the format process finishes on Windows XP, using a TDK 16GB TRANS-IT USB Flash Drive. Any idea? I want it to boot as Windows on MSI Wind U100 to install Mac OS X 10.5 on it (actually, I have installed it, but now Windows does not boot and I must repair it without external DVD drive).

Thanks.

Re: Install Windows XP on a Mini-Note (USB stick method)

Giordano — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:58:53 -0000

I get this error at the end of step 4:

Failed to open file 'tempimage.img".
The system cannot find the file specified.
Input correct patch:

Note: I am using Windows XP Pro over VMWare Fusion 2.0.2 over Mac OS X 10.5.6.

Any idea how to fix it? Thanks.

Re: 1 HP Mini 1000 – 1 keyboard = HP Mini tablet

Giordano — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 07:15:10 -0000

Which main board is smaller, the one of the MacBook Air or the one of the Mac mini? I guess the smaller one could be used to build the ultimate light (400 g or so) and small (pocketable) full Mac, much as the Axiotron ModBook, but as light and small (pocketable) as the OQO model 2+:

http://www.axiotron.com
http://www.oqo.com

Is that possible with video-out and USB2 port? That would be awesome for Keynote and PowerPoint presentations, because even the MacBook Air is too heavy and too large. So, you make the presentation on the larger Mac, and then use the pocketable one for the classroom, meeting, home, etc for the video presentation.

Thanks.

Re: 1 HP Mini 1000 – 1 keyboard = HP Mini tablet

Giordano — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:55:01 -0000

Thanks. The Dell Mini 9/Vostro A90 seems the best hackintosh:

http://gadgets.boingboing.net/2008/12/17/osx-ne...

But I was not asking about it because those netbooks are too heavy and too large. I was asking about the possibility of using the MacBook Air main board to make a brand new pocketable hackintosh that is both light (400 g or so) and pocketable with much smaller screen (as small as the OQO or so). Thanks.

Re: 1 HP Mini 1000 – 1 keyboard = HP Mini tablet

Giordano — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 17:13:17 -0000

Thanks. I do not want exactly the same OQO form factor; it was just an example. I mean a Mac with the main board of the MacBook air, but much lighter and smaller, without hard disk, keyboard (being a tablet), etc.

I need true Mac OS X. The PowerPoint presentations on Mac get destroyed on Windows, and vice versa (I mean, broken backgrounds, tables, fonts, colors, etc -- just horrible).

Re: Contact

Giordano — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 12:04:44 -0000

Hi,

This site is great. Suggestion: to include a table comparing computer specifications, that can be sorted, for instance by weight. I am looking for a computer as light as possible, as small as possible, yet having video-out and USB. Something like the OQO to put Mac OS X inside. Purpose: Keynote and PowerPoint presentations from a light and if possible pocketable computer. Thanks.

Re: 1 HP Mini 1000 – 1 keyboard = HP Mini tablet

Giordano — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 17:49:40 -0000

Thanks. The problem is that I need such transitions and animations. Exporting as movie is not convenient either because it is hard to control as a slide presentation.

Re: Need out of your iPhone contract? $1100 please

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:40:10 -0000

There is a very simple and effective way to get out of any cell phone contract, even more so in Canada. Pick any community north of the 48th paralell (most are not serviced by carriers) and decide that you're moving there in a month. Since they can't service you there, they are in breach of contract and must abolish it. Of course no law prevents you from changing your mind on moving there once the contract has been abolished ;)

Re: Nokia N95 firmware update: 12.0.013

Giordano — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 16:21:00 -0000

wat ik lees is dat v12.0.013 nogal wat bugs heeft. heeft iemand ook last van problemen?

mvg,

sal
http://sal-one.com/

Re: How to Create a Thumbnail Blogroll, a 20-minute hack

Giordano — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 17:34:56 -0000

This method creates a static thumbshot for each website. Is there anyway that you could use the dynamic image address provided by webshotspro to have this image updated. For example, the dynamic thumbnail for this blog is below

http://thumbs.webshotspro.com/url/http://cavitate.net/flashpoint

Re: Which Linux Distributions Are Dying?

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 17:50:44 -0000

Your graphs are interesting but your conclusion made me LMAO. You assume that because people are searching for the term Ubuntu then that means that Ubuntu has been successful in developing a user friendly distro of Linux. Really? Did you stop to think why people do a Google search which includes the term Ubuntu? I normally search using my distros name because I have some type of PROBLEM!!! Which I'm guessing is the main reason why people are searching for the term Ubuntu, they are having PROBLEMS. I've run Ubuntu on a test machine for about two years and every new version seems to get buggier and more problematic. But when you look at the other distros which you have provided graphs for (which I also run on test machines) they seem to have improved and are less problematic, hence fewer people searching for problems. So basically your graphs show that Ubuntu really is getting worse. Not a good sign if you ask me.

Re: "An Inadequate Black Male"

Giordano — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 22:35:54 -0000

Without getting into the rest of it all, would someone please tell me what voting for McCain accomplishes for feminists (or anyone else, for that matter)? It strikes me as a grand case of cutting off one's nose to spite one's face. I have been holding my nose and voting for candidates I'm not crazy about since I started voting. But what the hell choice is there? What was I going to do, vote for Ford? Reagan? Bush I? Bush II?

Re: A Stroll Down WTF Lane

Giordano — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 15:09:55 -0000

Referring to Crist as a "merkin" was also quite revolting.

Re: Actual Headline

Giordano — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 16:58:24 -0000

You could save the outrage if you actually read the article. Rape and carjackings are included in violent crimes, except they are a small percentage of all violent crime. There were 3688 violent crimes, a decrease of 8% or 320 fewer crimes. There were 105 rapes compared to 85 in the previous year, an increase of 20%. The increase of 20 rapes is overshadowed by the decrease of 340 other violent crimes. The headline was accurate and not misleading. The very first paragraph explains clearly what at first glance seems to be a paradox.

"Homicides and overall violent crime are down in Prince George's County this year, despite an increase in rapes and carjackings."

Re: Actual Headline

Giordano — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 18:50:44 -0000

I'm simply pointing out that Melissa's original premise, that the WaPo has a different definition of "violent crime," is incorrect. She is implying that the WaPo does not consider rape and carjacking to be violent crimes, but she is wrong. Those are sub-categories of violent crime. That is all. She made a simple mistake. The outrage is misdirected. It's not a big deal. Everyone can make a mistake once in a while.

Re: Edwards

Giordano — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 17:08:49 -0000

My support of Edwards was always a leap of faith -- what he was saying vs. what his record was. But as someone who worked for Gary Hart's insurgent campaign in 1984 and was asll prepared to do it again in 1988 until he dared reporters to follow him around and then they did, thus leading to the Donna Rice Fracas, I'm really starting to doubt my instincts where presidential candidates are concerned.

It's both the affair and the lying. When one has a woman as awesome as Elizabeth at home, why on earth would one want a ditzy party girl like this one? I know that when you're a good Southern Baptist boy, having a blonde city girl tell you that you have an old soul and doing your horoscope must be heady stuff, but shit....every last one of us has experienced that fork in the road where we can do the wrong thing or the right thing. And even though choosing the right thing is harder to do, we know what's right and what's wrong.

Narcissism my ass. Narcissism is a DSM-IV classification, and if you want to see narcissism, look at George W. Bush. What John Edwards did, both the affair, the lying, and the hubris in thinking that in this political environment no one would find out, means he's just another douchebag.

What I can't understand is what made ELIZABETH think he wouldn't be found out .

Re: How Good Was Obama's Speech Last Night?

Giordano — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 15:18:36 -0000

You know, I am 53 years old. I've lost my job because NIH funding has pretty much dried up. I'm a 53-year-old female web developer looking for a job in a recession. I don't give a flying fuck about the gender of the next president. What I give a fuck about is that we do something about the state this country is in. Last night, for about 46 minutes, I was able to forget my fear for my own future and have some hope for the future of this country. I was too young for the Camelot Craze, but my sister had a mad crush on Jackie Kennedy, and now I understand why.

Barack Obama is not going to be a progressive dream as a president. And neither would Hillary Clinton have been. And anyone who thinks they're striking a blow for women by voting John the Misogynist and his lightweight runningmate deserves the country we're going to get with these two. I only wish the rest of us didn't have to go along for the ride.

Barack and Michelle Obama are the most impressive couple I've seen in my life. But that Sasha is going to be a handful. It only took her four days to realize a) the entire country thinks she's cute; and b) where the cameras are. She's adorable, and Malia is the image of her mother -- tall, cool, smart, elegant. I lurve them all.

Re: Remember

Giordano — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:27:01 -0000

Thanks for remembering us down here, Melissa! Gustav Complicates Katrina Claims

Re: Kanye West’s VMA Outburst Breaks Records at MTV.com

Giordano — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 20:26:28 -0000

Thats funny I watched it on youtube.

Re: Google Reader for Google Apps for Your Domain

Giordano — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 16:01:12 -0000

It works for me using the "better gmail" add-on in Firefox.
Still I have no idea why full integration of Google Reader into Google Apps is not complete yet...

Re: U.S. Border Patrol conceding buying 10 Ford F-150 SVT Raptors

Giordano — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 15:05:59 -0000

Let's see: For *you*, a 3 cylinder Prius. For the government, a 6.2 V8 hot-rod truck. After all, you don't *need* .....
anything the government doesn't decide you do.

Re: Push Play

Giordano — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 22:14:39 -0000

the dares will steal the show!!!!

Re: 52 Stunning iPhone Wallpapers That Can Be Saved Directly to Your iPhone

Giordano — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 00:45:12 -0000

Thanks for adding my wallpaper to this illustrious collection - I'm flattered to be part of this group!

Re: EXCLUSIVE: Apple to launch $800 laptop

Giordano — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 11:49:57 -0000

As this:

Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

THAT WILL BE A REVOLUTION!

Re: American Media Inc Facing Bankruptcy, Liquidation: Already Defaulted on $413m

Giordano — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 08:34:45 -0000

Where are all the inquiring minds?

If your business model includes "First, cut down a tree."

You are not going to last much longer.

Re: Tales of a Twentysomething - Yelle Translation, French to English

Giordano — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 02:55:25 -0000

Oh! She made him a green card with the scanner. None of the other translations I've seen explain the scanner at all.

Re: baratunde.com - Blog - Please backup your hard drive now... twice!

Giordano — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 06:39:55 -0000

You might want to try sticking the drive in the freezer next time, the clicking is often cause by warping and putting a drive in the freezer can help. Keep it in a plastic bag though.

The clicking is normally a mechanical failure, technically it should be possible to remove the platters and put them in another drive of the same type.

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Re: Donate To The Baratunde Got Jacked Recovery & Reinvestment Fund

Giordano — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 11:31:51 -0000

Bummer dude. If only you had followed me back on Twitter I'd be in your crew and more likely to consider this request. Oh and btw, I need $4K for those items too. Lost my macbook in a wildfire that took out 2,000 homes in So. California. If I give you $5 will help me raise the $4K I need for the same purpose to repurchase a macbook pro and camera?

Good luck with this experiment. I hope it works for you.

Re: Google Chrome Is Available Now!

Giordano — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 22:38:58 -0000

Meh, looks like firefox, only not as tested. I'll pass.

Re: Sony Ericsson K850i 5Mpx Cybershot is finally here

Giordano — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:00:04 -0000

Unless it has Symbian or some other smartphone OS then it isn't worth spending that kind of money.

Re: Class, Education, and Meaning Manufacture

Giordano — Fri, 21 Apr 2006 16:52:12 -0000

Jason: "the workplace of the future will only offer more opportunities for innovation and creativity, opportunities that we in 2006 cannot imagine anymore than someone in 1986 could imagine the demand for webmasters and folks with Dreamweaver skills."

I agree, with the proviso however that skills mean little.

In a few years one can go from never having heard of X to creating a world-leading X company worth $billions. The key: knowing how to learn, how to communicate, how to assess (and take) risk, how to work with others, how to listen, how to negotiate, how to bounce back from failure, etc. All teachable to some degree.

Dreamweaver comes and Dreamweaver goes, but these meta-skills are valuable regardless.

Re: Idiot Teachers fool with the Interweb

Giordano — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 16:55:50 -0000

FOW sounds like a self-important w*nker who clearly has no sense of perspective.

Bad things might possibly happen, somewhere sometime? So?

Is this a Labour blog?

Re: Idiot Teachers fool with the Interweb

Giordano — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 18:52:07 -0000

Actually, I'm libertarian-leaning, self-made, wealthy, and the missus is fine, thanks.

Aren't you're in danger of jumping the shark when you start advocating wrap-em-up-in-cotton-wool Labour-stylee paternalism?

Re: Labour's Benny Sting explodes in their face

Giordano — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 17:56:16 -0000

Two, actually:

http://www.trademe.co.nz/Community/MessageBoard...

TheHappyHocker is Natasha

Re: Labour's Benny Sting explodes in their face

Giordano — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 18:03:38 -0000

See many health issues here?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GMxf6jfz-w&feat...

Hearing, perhaps....

Re: Breaking News: Teri Rhodes Sentenced

Giordano — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 08:15:24 -0000

@ DannyZ: I agree but that should say something about Foulk and whether he should remain district attorney. In my opinion he has no concern for protecting the most vulnerable in our society which even Cunningham pointed out in court. If he can't protect the most vulnerable, then how can we expect him to protect the rest of us? I think it's time someone stepped up and challenged Folk and the kingdom he's created for himself. The sentence was fair for the circumstances (despite the previous deficient plea bargain) and everyone gets that except for Foulk who is supposed to represent the community and uphold justice.

Re: And these signs shall follow them that believe… - ExChristian.Net - Articles

Giordano — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 08:38:57 -0000

If he did have one, it was certainly lost in the "intellectual calbre" of the recipients.

Re: The Ghost of CBGB & OMFUG | Laughing Squid

Giordano — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 03:18:49 -0000

The closing of CBGB's is sad. People do need to know their cultural history, that's for certain.

What I want to know is where the next "CBGB's" is going to be and what's going to happen there.

Re: Photos of Yuri’s Night Bay Area 2007, A Giant Party at NASA | Laughing Squid

Giordano — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 16:20:30 -0000

@randy:

perhaps you missed something. It was called the "Ansari X-Prize." She (or her family) put up (most of) the money for it in the first place.

Re: Lightening Strikes Woman As She Is Shooting Video

Giordano — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 14:37:15 -0000

lol. zing!

Re: Giant Touchscreen Election Map on SNL’s Weekend Update

Giordano — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 19:34:24 -0000

Video can only be viewed by the centre of the universe. Er, the USA!

Re: Two steps forward...

Giordano — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 08:39:39 -0000

Any update on the iPod Touch 2G jailbreak? Will we be able to jailbreak the 2G iPod Touch without having to open it up?

Re: Two steps forward...

Giordano — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 08:40:14 -0000

Any update on the iPod Touch 2G jailbreak? Will we be able to jailbreak the 2G iPod Touch without having to open it up?

Re: Nuts and bolts

Giordano — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 17:18:16 -0000

Any word of when the iPod Touch 2G jailbreak comes out? (I'm sure you get that one a lot) :D

Re: The Verizon FiOS TV 1.6 Update

Giordano — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 12:29:08 -0000

As a Verizon customer with two HD DVRs, One HD, and Four 2500s I wish I could select which DVR I pull a recorded show. But the possibility of streaming HD Content is a good one.

Re: The Verizon FiOS TV 1.6 Update

Giordano — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 13:23:35 -0000

I wish that they would add mac support for streaming.

Re: OS X Vaio P

Giordano — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 12:43:25 -0000

Wow! Where is the link of the hack page? I want Mac OS X on the Sony Vaio P Series!!!

Thanks.

Re: Verizon HTC Ozone - Verizon Announces HTC Ozone

Giordano — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 12:21:16 -0000

Oooooh another Qwerty keyboard (non touch) WinMo device... how exciting!
Come on Verizon this is the 21st century!
I think I'll pass...

Re: Lucky Number 9

Giordano — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 02:43:58 -0000

It would be okay but the female vocalist is tone deaf. :( Add more echo maybe?

Re: False Truths in Print Media: The Credibility of Wine Blogs as a Publishing Tool Among the Circle of Wine Writers

Giordano — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 05:01:37 -0000

"Over the course of evolution, man has found newer, and at times, better ways of accomplishing a goal. Through logic, creativity and community, we have excelled past old ways of thinking and doing, by embracing change, growth and innovation."

Man technologically progresses upon the achievements of those that came before. But the man of today is evolutionarily identical to the man using stone tools and smoke signals. Or, it is the technology that has evolved, not humankind.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution

Re: Hackintosh: Install a Mac Leopard OS X Retail DVD on a PC

Giordano — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 15:50:28 -0000

How to install Mac OS X 10.5.6 on these brand new pocketables?

OQO model 2+
Intel Atom inside
http://www.oqo.com

Sony Vaio P Series Lifestyle PC
Intel Atom inside
http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores/serv...

Thanks.

Re: Mercy for the Terrorist: Death to Terri Schiavo

Giordano — Tue, 19 May 2009 16:21:52 -0000

"Put her on Morphine"?

Which you mean to imply she was treated with morphine for pain relief?

Treated with morphine for pain relief in the way that is usual and customary for hospice (palliative care) patients?

As in you are wanting to imply that Terri Schiavo was treated with morphine in the same way terminal cancer patients treated with morphine to control pain?

According to the autopsy report she received morphine only TWICE and both of these doses were via suppository.

Not by injection. Not orally. Not with a pump.

TWO doses.

Each was 5mg.

Given 7 days apart (per the autopsy the doses were given on march 19 and then march 26)

Whether these doses were given at the discretion of a nurse based on standing orders from the primary physician isn't made clear. What is clear is that this doesn't even come close to typical or usual.

Assuming the purpose was pain relief a typical dose peaks approx 1 hour after administration and has a duration specified as <6hours. In other words it is just plain misleading to claim "she was put on morphine" for pain relief since two doses spaced seven days apart would have provided little or no pain relief and hospice personal are VERY familiar with morphine and what is required in the way of PROPER dosages for pain control.

http://www6.miami.edu/ethics/schiavo/pdf_files/...

The info on morphine administration by the hospice is on page 35 of the Adobe .pdf file version of the autopsy report.

Re: Dog-pile Effect and How to Avoid it with Ruby on Rails memcache-client Patch

Giordano — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 10:29:47 -0000

You can do this easily without doubling every lookup (and without using more memcached space):

http://www.socialtext.net/memcached/index.cgi?f...

Re: Challenged

Giordano — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 06:07:59 -0000

Look. They are VERY different markets. To take your first example:

1-They do not need graphical access.
2-The software is upgraded veery rarely.
3-They are very very specialised systems so they often need to make some changes here or there.

In other words, it's not Microsoft market. Sure, maybe in the future they'll try to go there (they always do) but that's not the point. Nobody is arguing that Microsoft is good for those systems, what LH is saying is that Linux is crap on the desktop, or for not computer savvy people.

Re: Vista RTM is fine on the Mac Mini

Giordano — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 01:12:40 -0000

If anyone knows of working audio drivers for the Intel-based Mac Minis that work with Vista RTM, please let me know via my website (www.kinyonsoftware.com) Thank you.

Re: Multi-Touch Brings The Tablet PC To The Mainstream

Giordano — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 05:03:01 -0000

Yet, why wait?

Obviously, you do NOT get it. It is the interface. It is the Mac!

Re: I had a dream about an Apple Tablet

Giordano — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 08:44:24 -0000

Here it is:

Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

ROCKING!

Re: After brief respite beastly botnets are "back with a vengeance"

Giordano — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 11:11:13 -0000

Just a thought, but Hormel doesn't take kindly to websites using images of their Spam brand when referring to unsolicited email:

http://news.google.com/news?imgefp=RUArkSRuDYwJ...

Re: Using Facebook for fun and business - a newbie's guide

Giordano — Sat, 30 May 2009 01:13:19 -0000

Are there no editorial standards left anywhere in the world?

Re: New York-M/A-COM impact promises to reverberate throughout industry

Giordano — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:50:36 -0000

The LMR world has a history of selling vapor, building systems, getting paid and then pointing the finger at the customer when things did not work. The next step is often to convince the customer that the identified "problems" are really "features" that were not specified in the RFP and suck more money out of the customer for "upgrades" to get the system to work the way the customer thought they specified in the RFP.
The customer already has millions invested so what's a few dollars more?

You can't balme New York for writing a contract that made it harder to be "taken for a ride". M/A-COM stepped up - now they need to deliver or walk away. The bottom line is that the State expects the system to work. It is up to the vendor - not the customer to get the product working.

Re: marinelli's miscellany

Giordano — Tue, 05 May 2009 12:00:28 -0000

Your kitteh told me to tell you that she's going to make you pay for letting that googie to harass her that way. ;)

Re: Frank McKenna watch

Giordano — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 04:09:19 -0000

Ain't gonna be Frank. He went off the reservation on abortion. Remember how he didn't want to let Morgentaler into N.B.? You think Liberal women from T.O. would support him? No chance. Not even if he personally did an abortion in Rogers Centre with Morgentaler supervising. As for Frank''s French, it's basically nonexistent. Think John Diefenbaker. Frank is a pretty good guy by Liberal standards, but he is not going to be leader. He's probably smart enough to know it and not to want it.

Re: Install OS X from DMG File | Apple Mac | Tech-Recipes

Giordano — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 17:23:59 -0000

Thank you very much... ehm It's true: nobody think to the simplest things! :-)

Re: Windows XP: How To Delete A User Profile | Windows networking | Tech-Recipes

Giordano — Thu, 21 May 2009 00:28:46 -0000

Thanks! Worked great.

Re: OhGizmo! » Archive » WowWee Roboquad On Preorder, Roboboa In The Works

Giordano — Tue, 29 May 2007 22:17:39 -0000

hmm... I dunno it was all very orchestrated. Notice that he never really lets them move too far foward, because the way they walk looks horrible.

In short... never trust a man with an "indiana jones" hat on.

Re: OhGizmo! » Archive » Metro Roll-Up Lighting

Giordano — Mon, 06 Aug 2007 06:05:48 -0000

I think you're thinking of "slap bracelets" . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slap_bracelet

Re: OhGizmo! » Archive » Arse Elektronika: Electric Orifice Orchestra

Giordano — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:31:38 -0000

Just proves that nowhere on the net is safe from sex fetishes anymore. Even ohGizmo ...sadly. :(

Re: Are TEC already non-Covenant compliant?

Giordano — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 15:23:29 -0000

As I posted on SF, I think it would read more clearly as follows:

6. We acknowledge that in circumstances where member churches choose not to fulfil the substance of the covenant, as that substance is understood by the Councils of the Instruments of Communion, we will consider, by simple majority decision of the primates, that such churches will have relinquished for themselves the force and meaning of the covenant’s purpose, and a process of restoration and renewal will be required by the primates to re-establish their covenant relationship with other member churches.

Re: האם המחשב מנגן מוזיקה סתמית?

Giordano — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 03:33:34 -0000

למי שבכל זאת רוצה את "המוסיקה הכי טובה באינטרנט"

www.wfmu.org
www.kfjc.org

השני קצת יותר אוונגרדי, הראשון נגיש.

Re: Even More Norwegian Neutrality News

Giordano — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 06:33:54 -0000

You say that NextGenTel is not a monopolist or former monopolist but a start-up, "purchased earlier this year by a firm called TeliaSonera".

You should be aware that TeliaSonera is the incumbent operator in Sweden and Finland, and a major player in the Baltic region.

Re: DRM on 9/11 Commission Report

Giordano — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 06:11:14 -0000

Fortunately with the power of opensource xpdf has patches to remove the DRM.

Re: The Technology Liberation Front » Archive » French Carterphone may halt L’iPhone

Giordano — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 13:54:59 -0000

"To me it’s clear that forced access laws limit innovation."

Really, what about Carterphone? Do you really think the explosion of devices for phone lines--from **affordable** direct connect answering machines, fax machines, 56k modems, cordless phones and DLS would have occurred without Carterphone? I think not.

Re: The Technology Liberation Front » Archive » French Carterphone may halt L’iPhone

Giordano — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 19:21:16 -0000

"sccarper- As we've explained before on this blog, the Carterfone decision made sense when it was handed down because there was government-protected monopoly for telecommunications. There are no longer any protected monopolies in this marketplace. See http://www.techliberation.com/archives/042060.php"

Thank you for the link. However, your statement in the OP was unqualified, so I feel justified in questioning it.

Re: Copyright as Intellectual Property Privilege

Giordano — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 13:19:44 -0000

"Intellectual Privilege" doesn't work for me as a way to reframe the debate. While it is a clever attempt to retain the initials "IP," the connotation of "intellectual" is changed by the substitution of privilege for property. In the new context sounds like "intellectual" refers to a smart person rather than ideas or expressions of ideas.

This is not to say that using the term "privilege" can't work but I don't think it works in "Intellectual privilege."

We used "author's monopoly" for decades. I think people can viscerally agree that monopolies should be limited.

Re: Did a lack of standardization kill high-def audio?

Giordano — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 14:41:21 -0000

The reason Hi Def audio failed was that there was no compelling reason to buy it. Redbook CD audio has more dynamic range and frequency response than most people can hear. Hi Def audio was DRM'd, cost more, limited in releases, incompatible with rivals, and only slightly audibly different--and only then if you had the right sound system.

In other words, Hi Def audio was a solution for a non-existent problem--not that necessarily stops marketers from trying to convince us there is a problem. (Scented deodorant comes to mind, "If only my pits smelled like flowers! Then I'd be popular!".)

Re: Did a lack of standardization kill high-def audio?

Giordano — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 16:30:21 -0000

"Maybe, maybe not. Consider this:"

I qualified my statement "most people." Second, I specifically acknowledged that there is some difference but noted that Hi Def "only slightly audibly different."

The report you cite comes from that bastion of audiophool nonsense, Stereophile, which has waxed poetic about such nonsense as demagnetizers for **vinyl LPs**.

http://www.randi.org/jr/2006-11/111706rampa.htm...

and who famously lost a blind test of Carver amps. Stereophile used to bash Carver amps and drone on and on about the purity and response of their favorite super amps that were so much better. Carver said they weren't "better" only sonically **colored** and proceeded to duplicate the sound of their fav uber expensive amp on his "cheap" amp without even being given access to the guts of the one he was duplicating. Stereophile couldn't tell the difference in a blind test.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Carver#Amplifi...

I won't dismiss the citation entirely just because those idiots at stereophile reported it but stereophile is a bastion of credulous nonsense so neither will I assign it any automatic credibility.

Re: The Comcast Kerfuffle: What About Corporate Ethics?

Giordano — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 14:08:23 -0000

Corporate Ethics? Surly you jest! Corporations are inherently amoral. Corporate ethics are tools to establish a cost benefit ratio to determine what rules the corporation should follow and what rules and laws it can ignore based on the chance of being caught, likelyhood of being fined or prosecuted, cost of defense, cost of fines, and cost to good will. "Stealing" from your customer is merely an entry in a balance sheet.

Re: Wikipedia’s Notability Requirement

Giordano — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 20:36:54 -0000

I would think the notability rule helps keep the number of faux entries lower. If the rule is that someone needs to be notable it is far more likely that others can knowledgeably edit the entry. If people who are not notable are allowed in the number of vanity pages and faux entries will go up and it will be harder to ascertain their accuracy.

Re: The Technology Liberation Front » Archive » Why hasn’t violent media turned us into a nation of killers?

Giordano — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 23:05:29 -0000

Well, maybe it has. We have the highest incarceration rate of any industrialized nation and we have a huge violent crime rate. I think you picked a faulty premise for your headline, i.e. that we are not more of a nation of killers than comparable nations.

That being said I think the evidence for the effect of movies and video games on behavior is less than overwhelming.

Re: The Technology Liberation Front » Archive » Why hasn’t violent media turned us into a nation of killers?

Giordano — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 02:54:18 -0000

I wonder if 40 million abortions have done more than anything to desensitize the nation,

No, but they seem to have adversely affected your cognitive abilities.

Re: Moglen’s Socialist Revolution

Giordano — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 15:51:23 -0000

"And happily for libertarians, it’s a utopia that’s being built without a shot being fired, or a tax dollar being spent."

Indeed, more power to his elbow...(doh!)

Re: Bandwagon du jour

Giordano — Sun, 12 Jan 2003 10:59:44 -0000

"For years, the mother and aunt of Octavious Williams tried to get Grant to recognize and then do right by his son, Octavious. They even went to city agencies for help but got nowhere. It wasn't until the family filed a paternity suit against him that Grant paid attention."

Nice try BUT the first two words sum up Mr. Grants position quite nicely. Since he avoided his responsibility for "years" and then had to be brought to court just to have the test makes it clear what his thoughts were about paying support for his child. Of course the fact that this is the second time this has happened with Mr. Grant also speaks volumes about his character.

I wonder which city agency was not helpful in pursuing this matter and if Mr. Grant was a factor in it's reluctance??

Re: World Oil Supply

Giordano — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 20:50:52 -0000

Well, there are some more pessimistic opinions on this.

The wise man will hope for the best while preparing for the worst.

Re: Sony unveils the VAIO P Series Lifestyle PC @ CES 2009

Giordano — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 13:48:22 -0000

Any chance of Mac OS X on it?

Re: Say No To Snap Preview Anywhere

Giordano — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 05:16:54 -0000

"You can get Snap Preview turned off by going to the Snap.com website and doing so. "

theres no need to do that. just add snap.com to your hosts file

127.0.0.1 spa.snap.com

that'll stop ALL snap previews on your local machine.

Re: Global Warming: Fact, fiction or fascism [part IV]

Giordano — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 07:12:22 -0000

To the guys putting stock in that list of “scientists” who signed the petition, I hate to burst your bubble.

90% of the “scientists” on there are not even in a field related to climatology or any complementary studies. Most of them are in completely unrelated subjects, and do not have experience or recent education in the subject of climate change/global warming.

I don't go to a Mathemetician to try my case in court. I go to an Attorney.
I don’t go to an Economist to remove my tumor. I go to a Surgeon.
I don’t go to an Anthropologist to manage my stock portfolio. I go to a licensed Financial Advisor.
And I don’t go to a Mechanical Engineer who designs air conditioning systems for my house, to educate me about climate change.

There may be some climatologists or related scientists who have signed this bogus petition, but who would know because the list has been so fluffed up with air, to make it look bigger than it is.

If these guys were truly credible, they wouldn’t take just any old person who has a degree. It makes the whole thing look shady.

Not to mention the organizers include people like Ian Clark, Lindzen, and Tim Patterson. Anyone who has spent hours and hours reading about this very complicated topic has already come across tons of material that discredits these quacks.

PS - meteorologists are weathermen.

Re: noodad » 5 Reasons Why The Transformers Are Better Than the GoBots

Giordano — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 16:50:07 -0000

1/ Transformers DID have die-cast metal in ALL of their first wave releases. Most G1 toys also had some metal parts.

2/ It\'s \"STARSCEAM\", not \"Skyscream\".

3/ Gobots outsold TFs when they first came out as the TV show and the toys came out BEFORE the TFs. I think TFs won due to the old \"Betamax\" problem of supply and demand.

4/ The Gobots liscence, but not the toy designs are now owned by Hasbro.Takara-Tomy. In fact, Hasbro has started to USE Gobot names, such \"gobot\", \"Leader-1\" etc as names for TRANSFORMERS.

Takara also released a collection of repainted minibots, such as Bumblebee (not a great TF name when you think about it) as gobots, complete with similar colours to their gobot inspiration. The renegades became decepticreeps and the goodguys became autobots. The idea was that in the TF universe, the gobots are distant \"cousins\" to the tfs.

Re: Dynamo Helps Redeem MLS Reputation in Mexico City

Giordano — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 12:43:33 -0000

Both teams rested about half their starters. Maybe that helped the Dynamo as guys like Ashe, Kamara, and Cameron were motivated to make a statement for increased minutes.

Re: DC United: Something Smells at RFK Stadium

Giordano — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 15:57:26 -0000

DC had obviously already given up on CCL. Both MSL and FMF teams were mostly reserve sides. It tells you what the coaches/front offices of those teams think about this tournament.

Re: Fixture Congestion be Damned: Impact Impress Again

Giordano — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 15:59:29 -0000

USL is a Friday/Sunday league. That's not very professional but it does prepare teams for this sort of congestion.

Roberto Brown was out of shape and isn't missed in Colorado. They're happy with Conor Casey.

Re: Fixture Congestion be Damned: Impact Impress Again

Giordano — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 16:35:08 -0000

Funny how noone ever responds with substance.

USL has shown well. The players have taken advantage of this exposure. But I couldn't help to point out that playing off of one or two days rest is nothing new for these teams. Something virtually no other fully professional league does on a regular basis. Any win on the road is impressive (ask Panathinaikos and Chelsea) and these Central American teams can be dangerous, but I'd bet Montreal has a higher payroll, something few here seem to have in perspective.

I don't know where you think I'm getting this stuff. Maybe MSL should pay me to give them talking points? :)

Re: Fixture Congestion be Damned: Impact Impress Again

Giordano — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 16:48:47 -0000

I know USL does it to save money. I still don't like it. In NCAA either.

It's rare in Europe to not have 2 off days. Usually games are rescheduled or managers put out reserves for 1 of the games.

MLS needs an excuse only if you think this tournament is worth the effort. I'm still not convinced that its time has come. For some teams to win it will take something like 14 games (assuming the elimination rounds are 2-legged). That's half a pro season right there. When exactly did MLS redefine its business model to account for that? The games draw squat and don't pay for themselves. Mexican teams are putting out reserves too. The market just isn't anywhere close to justifying such a prolonged event. And it's not going make any difference in the next MLS player going to Europe (Edu, Altidore, Guzan did just fine without this "showcase").

Someone tell Seattle the're going to the wrong league already ...

Re: MLS Impact on US Team Fading

Giordano — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 11:49:39 -0000

You're missing the biggest story, Joe Public won at Atlante. The T&T league is the best in the hemisphere.

Re: Is MLS Really Competitive

Giordano — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:26:21 -0000

and 3 of the 4 "franchises" are below average this year. Listing 5 cities with historically strong teams in a 14 team league means the league isn't competitive? No, it just means it's not random. mini-dynasties can result from good front office work.

places 6-8 in the playoffs see 6 teams between 33 and 35 points with 3 matches to play

bewildering. let's check a dictionary and find out what "competitive" really means.

Re: USL-1 Final on Deck

Giordano — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 17:19:28 -0000

so a USMNT fan is worried about a game between Puerto Rico and Vancouver and considers MLS a waste of time?

It might be in fun, but at some point it's just idiotic.

Re: USL Gets Humiliated on Matchday Four in CONCACAF

Giordano — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 19:24:08 -0000

they could, but more often than not they wouldn't. If the game actually mattered (e.g. the US Open Cup all but 1 year of MLS's existence)

Bori427, it's not that hard to find me. Try reading the username more closely. If it says "undrafted" it's me. If it says something else, it's not.

Re: Americanizing Soccer for the U.S. Sports Fan pt. 4

Giordano — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 23:03:39 -0000

FIFA won't approve of a league that makes such changes. American fans will really enjoy when FIFA bans all players who play in the unapproved league.

Re: Sentimental Favorite St Louis Launches MLS Bid

Giordano — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 17:27:20 -0000

Well Jeff, NYC2 will have to pull off some extra magic to be part of the done deal, since they aren't bidding this round.

St. Louis would be great, but I'm not sold on their ownership yet. KC's ownership prevents a move unless they're stadium falls through.

MLS isn't stopping at 20. It's not an issue for at least 5 years but ultimately MLS will creep towards 30 teams just the "big 4".

Re: Is Canada’s Club Football Brighter than in the US?

Giordano — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 23:43:25 -0000

MLS probably still loses a bit of money. I'm not sure how that's "greed".

Re: Sunday MLS Thoughts

Giordano — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 01:12:49 -0000

Unfair it may be, but I don't see how a team could rest its starters two weeks in a row and then expect them to be in top form the next week. The way I see it, if you're struggling to make the playoffs the last week, you've missed your chance to truly earn a spot - tough luck.

Greg Vanney's time has past, but I'd show him a bit more respect as he's blazed some trails in France and always seemed a model professional. I cringed at times during his USMNT days, but it's not like we had much better. Unfortunately he was a slow player who was lost out there after losing a step in his 30s.

Re: MLS TV Ratings Worrying

Giordano — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 19:49:03 -0000

It's not completely an "either or" situation. Why bother with MLS? For starters, tickets are expensive to fly to Europe to watch games in person. And European leagues aren't exactly overflowing with US players. Some good young US players spend years in MLS.

The TV ratings would be worrying if they had ever been good to start with. It's not like they're falling. TV money is not yet an important part of funding MLS. That's why the salary cap is so low. Considering that the league has recently signed deals with ESPN, Fox, HDNET, and Telemundo, it seems the broadcasters are willing to be patient.

It's certainly an issue. And worth considering a problem. But there's little need to worry just yet. MLS on TV isn't going to be as good as the EPL on TV anytime soon. MLS knows it. ESPN knows it.

There might not have been 5k at New England's game, but I wouldn't call it "dishonest" since all they ever have and probably ever will report is "tickets distributed" not "viewers present". On one weeks notice and given the conditions, people with tickets in hand decided not to go. Few sporting events report turnstyle numbers. It'd be nice to know, but tough luck. 1st week playoff attendance is and has been horrible. It's something MLS needs to work on. I've yet to hear a good alternative.

Re: USL Needs to Compete Directly against MLS

Giordano — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:13:14 -0000

all generalities, no specifcs. What players? Which investors?

of the top 56 draft picks into MLS (the SuperDraft), from a quick look, I can't find a single one that turned down MLS for USL1. The only one contracted to USL is pick #23 Yomby William (after signed and cut by KC midseason). I can't even find any clear defections from the supplemental picks. An undrafted player from 2007, Martin Nunez was a nice find for Carolina (after passing up a developmental deal from NY). And Jay Needham was a high profile defection - still a rarity.

Now if you're talking about players bolting for USL after 1 year in MLS, that seems to be happening. But it's guys who MLS opts not to elevate to senior contracts since they're not yet meriting playing time.

I'll have to ask, what 2008 draft picks were raided by USL?

Is Rob Clark more soccer savy than Oscar de la Hoya?

Re: USL Needs to Compete Directly against MLS

Giordano — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 18:52:32 -0000

MLS has LA, Chicago, Toronto, Philly, Houston, & Seattle locked up. The Red Bulls' new stadium opens next year on spot easily accesible by public transportation. MLS has longstanding presence in New England, Denver, and Dallas. USL failed miserably in San Francisco, while the MLS fanbase in San Jose is decent. MLS has SSS's in Columbus, Salt Lake, and soon Kansas City.

USL doesn't have the markets to compete with MLS long-term. MLS has kept salaries as low as possible. So a USL team who double their salary budget could start stealing away some MLS starters. MLS has a new CBA due soon, after which salaries will likely rise.

I agree with USL investing a little more in top markets, while requiring the weakers ones to come up to standards or get out. They can push MLS. But I don't see how they have the right footing in the right markets to try a direct competition that'll force a merger.

Re: Would you pay $40 million for a minor league franchise?

Giordano — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 14:05:46 -0000

Somehow I don't think you or many of us reading this will ever have to worry about this q uestion. The fact is that faced with a 40-50 million dollar fee, 7 groups have applied, at least a couple with their checkbooks already open.

Your selective portrayal of the facts leaves this column with little credibility. Salt Lake, Toronto, and Houston get great local coverage. Next year there will be 2 or 3 teams playing on football lines (New England, Houston, and maybe Seattle), at most for half their season. That's out of 15 teams.

If you manage to get a SSS, you'll probably make money in a new market (Toronto, Salt Lake). At the least losses are minimal compared to the appreciation in team value (Toronto bought in for less than $15 million, Salt Lake & Chivas USA for $10 million, any of them could sell to Atlanta today for $40 million). Who knows if there'll be a big take off, but with soccer-ignorant generations passing on and huge latino immigration, there's reason to be optimistic. Not everyone can afford an NFL team.

Watch the news about USL this week. $40 million into MLS is a much better investment than $750 thousand into USL.

Re: Would you pay $40 million for a minor league franchise?

Giordano — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 14:58:56 -0000

MLS mattered to the development of Tim Howard, DaMarucs Beasley, Clint Dempsey, Carlos Bocanegra, Ryan Nelsen, Jozy Altidore, Brad Guzan, Michael Parkhurst, Mauric Edu, Pablo Mastroeni, and Sacha Kljestan. Arguments can be made that MLS has mattered to Landon Donovan, Kenny Cooper, Brian McBride, Stuart Holden, Marvell Wynne, Michael Bradley, and Chad Marshall. And I'll barely touch on the next tier of guys like Ricardo Clark, Frankie Hejduk, Jonathan Bornstein, etc.

Maybe you can argue some of these guys have been "damaged" or "held back" by playing in MLS. But I'd argue that many of them would have gotten lost in the lower ranks of European clubs and not given a proper chance to play first team minutes at crucial stages in their careers.

MLS may not matter to Harris, but it does to many American players and to most USMNT fans. Why not hop over and tell French, Turkish, Japanese, and Russian fans that their leagues don't matter.

Re: Would you pay $40 million for a minor league franchise?

Giordano — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 17:57:43 -0000

Pro/rel isn't the key to success. The big 4 here in the US aren't considering it. It's fascinating and I love it, but it's a quick way to slash franchise values. You'll see the end of pro/rel in Europe before you'd see the start of it here.

Re: Don Garber Speaks: Thoughts

Giordano — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 15:46:05 -0000

Here's my take on the reasoning behind the demise of the reserve league. It was clear that MLS teams didn't have sufficient depth in proven players. Expanding the senior roster by 2 spots is a long overdue move. But that comes at some cost. With an upcoming CBA renegotiation next year and an incredibly tough sponsorship market, Garber wasn't getting any approval to suddenly up player expenses. The reserve league is nice in theory, but in reality it was full of guest players that wouldn't start at a good NCAA program. MLS was getting bad press for paying guys 12k/yr, even though they were glorified trialists, most of whom wouldn't get higher pay playing elsewhere. It's still to be seen if MLS axed the 12k/yr spots or the 17k/yr spots, but regardless they funded better proven depth by axing marginal 23 year old talent. Guys that 95% of the time are never going to be good MLS players. The cost of this move was the reserve league. MLS teams are starting to invest in youth programs (14-18 year olds). It'd be great to fund both but MLS decided it had to make a choice. Now the development of marginal college grads fall to the USL, their likely permanent home.

Let's hope for more loans to USL, more PDL clubs, and deliverance on the promises of real youth programs.

Do you have that original MLS promise in writing? And why did they make it way back at the inception of North America? :)

Re: Don Garber Speaks: Thoughts

Giordano — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 16:58:51 -0000

I agree the reserve league is a step back, but not much of one since MLS wasn't anywhere close to getting the reserve league right. It wasn't full of real prospects. And it wasn't in the pyramid.

I wouldn't count on MLS obersving all FIFA dates. Hopefully they'll be able to observe some. Given how tough it is to draw fans midweek or play in most markets before mid-March, there's only so much MLS can do. I'd suggest a rule that they suspend for any date when the USMNT plays a competitive match, during the Gold Cup, and during the World Cup. I think it's self-defeating to play through those. Next year 11 of 15 teams will play in stadiums controlled by someone with a stake in MLS. It's time to start making some changes, but of course they'll probably blame the economy for keeping the status quo. I'll get over it as long as they make clear they recognize the ultimate goal of bette recognizing international dates.

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 13:48:04 -0000

Houston crowds:

Superliga:
07/12 - Saturday Atlante 13,105
07/15 - Tuesday CD Guadalajara 28,723
07/29 - Tuesday Pachuca 16,679

MLS playoffs:
11/9 - Sunday York Red Bulls 30,053

CCC:
10/07 - Tuesday San Francisco FC 4,178
10/22 - Wednesday Pumas UNAM 8,741
11/26 - Wednesday CD Luis Angel Firpo 14,142

clearly Houston fans appreciated the importance of the 08/09 CCC

just because you and Jack Warner say it was the most important event on the MLS calander doesn't make it so. FIFA has rules and MLS pretty much must oblige in sending its top teams. This hastily scheduled event overlapped with the better moneymaker in SuperLiga. A sensible solution as been reached that might turn the 09/10 event into less of a joke. But Jack Warner still doesn't dictate the economic model of MLS and noone will convince overnight the bulk of casual MLS fans that this event really matters. MLS will try and play along next year. So now maybe you should focus your attention on convincing MFL teams that they should be glad to participate next year.

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 16:33:25 -0000

Do you have any proof for "Every other league in the world respects thier confederation tournament with equal or even more reverance than their league titles."

And by the way the best SuperLiga crowd was a Tuesday.

Go ask Pumas, Santos, or Atlante if they'd rather win the Apertura or the CCL. Better yet ask their fans. The European CL represents the best of the best. The CCL is the best of the mediocre. It has potential but not the prestige for Garber to quickly hand over any sort of league control to Jack Warner.

So did Milan enjoy their Club World Cup win more than their UEFA CL win? I'm not going to pretend to know enough about the J-League but I doubt you do either to say that Urawa Red Diamonds or Gamba Osaka prefer winning the Asian CL instead of the J-League. And how intimidated do you think most any European club is of a team that wins the CONCACAF CL? Probably as much as we'd be of the OFC Champions League winner. Your claim "fails" without proof.

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 21:18:29 -0000

The CCC wasn't a 13 game commitment with 6-8 games during the middle of the MLS season. Don't me wrong, CCL would be nice to win, but sacrificing a MLS season for the liklihood of losing to a Mexican team in the semis is a bad gamble. It's not about taking it seriously, it's about priorities and rationing limited resources.

I've said it before, if MLS wants to give me a check, I'll take it.

With typical 2-3 million dollar payrolls, MLS can't play a large part on the world stage. That's the transfer fee of a borderline starter for an EPL team. MLS isn't winning over the eurosnobs without spending ten times as much on players. Why make major sacrifices now (like throwing away a MLS season to make the CCL semis) to avoid temporary hits in popluarity in that community? I'd like to see a doubling of the salary cap, but I don't pretend to know if doing so would pay for itself. If spending $5 million on players for footballing reasons is a viable business plan, I hope some USL clubs go for it. If some think $10 million is reasonable, convince someone to go for it. I find it odd the crap spewed at owners willing to lose some money on soccer to build the sport for impatient, immature fans that seem so prevalent.

Re: MLS Cup Ratings Fall: A Call to Action

Giordano — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 13:40:36 -0000

It is important to support local efforts - the only way to build the sport.

The question is, how much would it cost to put on a game near the level of the Euro 2008 final? Matt S, how much more do you think MLS needs to spend to bring the product to your standards? The soccer market here is significant and has potential, but it's not in position to compete with Europe. The MLS of 1996-2000 came within a hair of going under. Donadoni left the Metrostars after 1997, Matthaeus arrived in 2000 so I think the above examples are a stretch. Right now MLS has as many stars as it's had since 1996. And the price of good to top footballers has skyrocketed over the last 10 years. At the end of this season, MLS had 11 players that were age 35+. Valderrama turned 35 during his first MLS season. How much of a retirement league do we want? MLS has a dependable 0.7-0.8 rating base but little chance of exceeding that without something special like Beckham in the final.

MLS faces a huge mountain to climb to get huge TV money. Modern technology means MLS has to deal with every match of note played across the globe. I can't imagine MLS achieving higher ratings without an incredible increase in spending. Right now I think that'd mean NASL 2.0 with the same ultimate fate. The priorities should be buildilng stadiums and developing youth programs. Higher TV ratings aren't in the near future.

Re: European Football vs American Soccer

Giordano — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:55:16 -0000

"I’ve seen a dip in quality in the league"

debatable, the depth in the 90s was horrible and very few expensive imports were brought in around the time of contraction in 2002. I think expansion to 14 has caused some regression since the 10 team league of 2004 but it's a tough call. Guys like Burciaga, Nick Garcia, and Jim Curtin have seen MLS progress beyond their talent. Midfielders (but for DM's) have generally regressed in quailty the last 5 years. The strikers are a better at the top end but overall about the same. The GK's were building up a strong pool until the recent mass exodus (Pickens, Perkins, Guzan). I tend to measure quality of play by the weakest links on the field and those are generally better now than those from 1996-2002.

"and fewer and fewer good young American players being developed in MLS."

I can't imagine this is true. Please provide some examples (in some sort of quantifiable list).

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 00:48:40 -0000

Check your history, MLS teams won the 98 and 2000 Champions' Cups. DC won the Copa Interamericana in 1998. I've refrained from pretending that those wins prove much of anything. Only UEFA and CONMEBOL sides have reached the CWC final. So MLS would be basically looking to go for a quarterfinal or semifinal paycheck. Games that almost noone in Europe would watch (much less care about as long as the UEFA side reached the final). They might as well still call in the Intercontinental Cup. Pachuca got knocked about by who last year? Étoile du Sahel of Tunisia. Millions outside of Japan must remember that one?

The Club World Cup is basically an unecessary strain on the UEFA CL winner. They have to pay and coerce for the European side to take the event half-way seriously. I'd much rather the event someday naturally evolve into existence and importance than have FIFA use it as a cash-grab. Which did Milan want to win more last year, the CL final or the CWC final? If you answered CL, doesn't that make the CWC a rather odd event? Kind of like the Confederations Cup. It's like soccer's version of the NFL Pro Bowl. A couple years ago I watched every game. Now its barely worth 10 minutes of fast-forwarding through.

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 17:39:45 -0000

So because FIFA says it's important, we must obey and worship it. Or else we're not "really fans of the sport". Watching UEFA CL, EPL, La Liga, Bundesliga, MLS, and NCAA games isn't enough? Add in UEFA Cup, Boca/River & some MFL matches, and heck even USL and some CONCACAF CL games. The World Cup, the Euros, the Gold Cup, Copa America, every USMNT game (adult and youth), the Olympics, FIFA u20s, and FIFA u17s. One can follow all that, but if the CWC is something of a joke event until its final, you can't really be a fan of the sport? I think you have the definition of sports and entertainment mixed up. Sports involves something actually being contested.

I'd love nothing more than one day the winners of the Copa Liberatores and UEFA CL decide to have a true "Super Bowl". Much like the AFC/NFC did. One that they invest in and their fans demand. Maybe over time it'd adapt to let the rest of the world have a chance.

But what we have now is not market driven. It's FIFA mandated. FIFA standardizes the game. It organizes the World Cup. But it has no place dictating what club matches are and are not important. Why let cronies like Jack Warner plunder the investments made by club founders? I suppose the Confederations Cup is just about on the level of the World Cup?

There are "millions" of Pachuca fans who know about Étoile du Sahel? Sure. I don't much care if foreign fans turn their noses. But actually more than you think do that to the CWC. I'm not saying the event is worthless. Just that it has little to with why we should have domestic league. That our club owners shouldn't lose money on account of its sake. And that money lost isn't worth whatever short-term ding there is in prestige. I'll spend 30 minutes each year scanning through the semis and final. Occasionally someone like Hasebe from Urawa or Aboutrika fro Al-Ahly will get me to watch a few minutes more. But as listed above, there's much more soccer to choose from. Forgive me if skip over watching every minute of Sepahan vs Waitakere United.

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 23:38:51 -0000

It's only meaningful if all the clubs in it are 100% committed. In the hearts of European club players, is the CWC at the same level as the UEFA CL? Their domestic title? I doubt it. No matter what some might kindly suggest. The truth is that FIFA strong-arms the clubs into showing that they care.

I don't prefer the SuperLiga. But I don't go around telling MLS to dump it and the associated revenues to write a check to Jack Warner. For me it's about on the level of the ACC-Big 10 challenge in college basketball.

I'm not saying I want a UEFA/Libertadores only final. What I'd like is for the day to come where the honor of winning such a contest is something both sides consider paramount. But right now 90% of top tier players are playing weekly in Europe. So any sort of 2 week event making the winner of the UEFA CL play a limited number of games against other confed champs doesn't really determine a true world champion. It's a stretch, but it's something like saying the NBA champion should play 1 game (or best of 3) against the Euroleague champ. Now say the TV ratings are so-so in the US and the prize money is $5 million to the winning team. And the winner of that is the best team in the world? Should everyone immediately consider it predominant to the NBA championship? Should the European teams mortgage their financial future on a slim shot of winning a game?

Reaching the Club World Cup is nice. Performing well there may earn a team some lasting respect. But I'm trying to put it all in perspective. MLS is a young league and I don't think trying to get a slim chance at reaching the CWC where they'd have a slim chance of doing anything ($2-5m payrolls vs $100m payrolls) is worth teams sacrificing a chance at winning MLS Cup or breaking even. Not for a while at least.

Re: Dyanamo Show How it is done: Join Impact and Islanders in CONCACAF Quarters.

Giordano — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 12:07:44 -0000

I occasionally listen to the show "Cronometro" on ESPN Deportes. SuperLiga is noticed though Mexican-Americans seem split on whether or not it's meaningful. For me it's not an either/or situation with CONCACAF CL. SuperLiga doesn't have to be that important. Mexican teams have a need for preseason contests. Having them in the US makes both sides money. Having them against US sides give MLS exposure. Add sufficient prize money and it becomes clear both sides are trying. For 2009 MLS has had time to adapt to the presence of the CONCACAF CL and there won't be an overlap in participants. So I don't see why it needs to be a debate from here on out.

Eventually MLS will grow into a league that will value CONCACAF CL accomplishments more. The "real" part of MLS rosters will be 20 not 18 players next year. Hopefully scheduling and financial issues will be worked out soon enough. I still think there are too many games (11-13 for the finalists) and too little fan interest. The Mexian teams competiting in Libertadores brings in to question which event they value more. International and intercontinental club play has potential but I still think it's overrated on this site right now.

Re: News and Notes

Giordano — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 12:14:33 -0000

I'm not sure Convey still has the energy/quickness/agility he once had. Sad story.

SJ are idiots for letting Cannon go. They must really think he wants to stay home.

I don't think MLS will schedule games the exact same time as the USMNT anymore. It's a shame they can't take the week off, but it is the 2nd week of the season - a bad time for a week off. Let's see what changes are made this year. I'm hoping for movement toward a month off in the summer.

Re: Portland should be a “slam dunk” for MLS

Giordano — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 12:49:04 -0000

Portland will eventually be in MLS. Fix up PGE Park first. Give them a team and the owner loses all leverage. See Houston Dynamo.

Re: Oliver Luck: Wheeling and Dealing

Giordano — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:09:26 -0000

Good column. Houston seems set for a shakeup. Don't be surprised if Wade Barrett is considered for a move out. Chabala looks promising and a slow player like Barrett is a risk as he slows in his 30s.

Mullan is an underrated career pro in MLS. But he depends on quickness as his edge and might have some trouble in the next couple of years. I think he's good for at least 2009 and good cap value. Davis saw his playing time decrease late this year (I'm not sure how much was due to injury?). Ashe is demanding more time and it's tough to bulid a team around both being on the field together ...

Spot on that Holden is ready to step up. Cameron has progressed over 2008 into a nice squad player but I'm not convinced yet he'll take that next step. Most likely a Sasha Victorine-like career.

I hope the real Eddie Robinson is back for 2009. Despite his occasional antics, I can't help but like the guy.

DeRo disappointed a bit in 2008. I wouldn't write him off yet but this might turn out to be a wise cap move, plus it's good for the league (and surely DeRo) to have him in Toronto. James has top-end upside and improved during 2008. I'm not fully sold on him, but I'm getting there.

Re: College Cup: Carolina Shocks Wake & Maryland beats St John’s

Giordano — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 17:21:14 -0000

Marcus Tracy may be a standout goal scorer at the college level, but he's not Wake's leader. (I know "led by" probably wasn't used so literally in the above column). The failure of the Wake strikers to step up is why UNC's advancing actually isn't earth-shattering. Wake were the best team in 2008 but squads like Maryland and UNC are also stocked full of talent. Both Wake & UNC had at least 3 outstanding defenders. Bone and Schuler are both top-tier talents as US attackers. Shriver outperforming Tracy was the difference. That was a surprise. Wake had their big advantage in the midfield, but giving up the early goal allowed UNC to rely on some promising defenders to frustrate Wake's limited top-end finishing ability.

Re: Vetting?

Giordano — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:54:54 -0000

Who are you Laura McGann. No one here as ever heard of you or from you. We would like more information about who you are and who you talked to. What you've posted here, that no one until today requested this information, is completely false.

Re: Vetting?

Giordano — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:57:33 -0000

Hi Doug. This is strange. I guess this is proof that someone can claim anything on the Internet. No one here in the records and web division (both of us) has ever heard of Laura McGann.

Re: Battling Obama by ‘Going Galt’

Giordano — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 02:26:50 -0000

This is absolutely false. Taxes are on the total, not scaled in increments.

When I still worked for someone else, there were times I would call off because the extra hours put me into a higher bracket and ended up paying more in taxes. I could actually work less hours and take home more. I also remember one year that I made $75 that put me into the next bracket, and instead of receiving a $200 refund I was forced to write out a check for another $500.

Re: Designing and Testing an Ad Product: 5 lessons learned form imeem’s audio ads (Guest Post)

Giordano — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 16:02:10 -0000

Very intersting post.

Re: Menachem Begin Transformed

Giordano — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 03:12:58 -0000

I came across your blog a half hour ago and I've been reading it ever since. I'm currently majoring in history and am party to a course in "Modern Jewish History" where there's been some emphasis on the creation of the Jewish State. There has not however been a great deal of focus on Menachem Begin and the Irgun. I learnt about Menachem Begin from my Jewish studies teacher in High School, Rabbi Rudner, and he was quite taken by Menachem Begin. I understand that the matter is somewhat debated, but his view was that Menachem Begin was one of the most important people responsible for the ultimate creation of the state of Israel. (Menachem Begin hadn't been the one who "declared" the creation of the state but Rabbi Rudner taught that Menachem Begin was one of the only Jewish leaders in Israel during World War II who believed that an autonomous Jewish State was possible and who therefore fought for it and kept the issue before the world's attention.)

I've been a student of history my whole life but only since that Jewish History course in my sophomore year of High School have I realized how rich and textured our own history is. I appreciate this site that you've put up and on my next trip to Israel I would definitely like to visit your museum.

Re: Redbox Ready to Entertain Air Travelers with The King?

Giordano — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 16:07:27 -0000

I flew out of Nashville's Airport yesterday and saw one of the RedBox kiosks (it's just past security in Terminal C). I think it's a good idea they're putting these in airports, especially considering that the other airport shops there sell DVDs for $10+.

Re: ETI-PI - Monday, December 15, 2008

Giordano — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 00:41:30 -0000

I got a "warning, site may contain malware" warning from the Safari browser when I accessed this site. You may want to check into that.

Re: Ping.fm / Uploaded Image from benmorrison.org

Giordano — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 22:41:30 -0000

You should try shopping at the $.99 cent store. Lots of healthy food and even pre launch sampling goes on there. Lots of the top brands sample new products. I saw G there yesterday.

Re: Everything You Wanted to Know About Becoming a Vegetarian (But Were Afraid to Ask)

Giordano — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 18:11:58 -0000

A Vegetarian doesn't eat any animal products only products from plant matter. Ideally this includes no gelatin, rennet, or other things made from animal flesh or bone that are often hidden in margarine, jello, jelly, cake mixes, yoghurt, and other weird places. Basically we don't eat anything with a face. This includes fish. They are an animal yes? No vegetarians eat fish.

A Pescetarian is someone who excludes land animals and birds, but includes fish, mollusks, and crustaceans in addition to fruits, vegetables, plants, legumes, nuts, and grains. Eggs and dairy may or may not be present in the pescetarian's diet.

Please don't mix the two. This is how vegetarians get served fish at dinners or restaurants. We don't want to be served fish. If we did, we wouldn't be vegetarians.

It is strictly my view, although it matches scientific reports, that the oceans are being overfished. Many fish are actually endangered. Reefs are endangered. It is best to leave the fish alone in the sea, and if you must eat them then please get your meat from a sustainable fish farm. This will help the environment. That was the point of this topic yes? The environment? Then please if you eat meat eat only from sustainable fish farmed sources and free range meats.

And remember, vegetarians don't eat meat, which includes fish!

Thank you

Re: Google Chrome: Why I’m Not Excited

Giordano — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 20:26:06 -0000

> When V8 interprets Javascript, it transitions directly from Javascript source code to machine code. There is no intermediate bytecode format! This means that Chrome is designed around Javascript as the be-all end-all language.

Hmm... I'm not sure how you're coming to this conclusion. Anyway, I'm sorry to break it to you but Javascript has pretty much been the de facto standard for client side scripting since the days of Netscape. Chrome has no effect on that one way or the other. It simply makes it faster.

>In my ideal world, the next generation web-browser will have a generic, standardized bytecode format to which Javascript is compiled, but also such that it will leave the option open for compilers for other languages– a la the good old JVM.

Great idea! Really! That would be really cool. But how do you suppose this would work? Let's say you have a VM in the browser that runs bytecode. You still need a compiler to create that bytecode. You can't just decide on a whim that you want to code client side Ruby or something to run in this VM. You need a compiler first and if it's going to be on the client side it means it needs to be part of the browser. Which languages do you create a compiler for? See? We're back to square one.

I suppose you could generate the bytecode server side and the browser just runs that. I'm not sure how I feel about that. It seems less open than what we have now.

Re: Diversity Training Backfires

Giordano — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 02:32:34 -0000

Good comments all, but people don't seem to get that companies are just doing this for lawsuit protection. If there was no harassment of businesses by the EEOC and similar state agencies then corporate legal departments wouldn't be recommending these things. That's why generally nobody cares if you walk out early on these sessions, as one commenter says she did; they're just going through the motions to inoculate themselves against discrimination lawsuits. I work regularly in both Canada and the USA; although Canada is crawling with political correctness, "diversity training" is very rare. Why? Because there is no EEOC in Canada, no class-action discrimination lawsuits, no Briggs v. Duke, et cetera.

Re: You’re Still A Racist, Obama Advisor Says

Giordano — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 18:29:09 -0000

Grrrreat. Ogletree will set race relations back 50 years. Bringing back racism - what the right wing wingnuts couldn't accomplish a leftover racist leftist will. Obama is not dumb enough or a rigid ideologue enough to keep this guy -- right?
Equality, it's good. Call me a racist bc I'm white, get lost!!

Re: Maple Valley Fire and Life Safety firefighters feel budget pinch - Covington Reporter

Giordano — Thu, 21 May 2009 02:59:53 -0000

Value of houses went up which mean the property taxes went up, which meant the fire taxes went up.

NOTHING went down, stop spreading lies.

Re: Deputy saves jumper - Whidbey News Times

Giordano — Thu, 21 May 2009 03:07:26 -0000

Unless this person gets medical help, he will be back jumping off something in the future.
If that's what he wants to do, why stop him?

Re: 590 KLBJ Podcasts

Giordano — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 12:10:32 -0000

How about podcasting John Dromgoole's Sunday show? I want to hear that oak arborist again.

Re: The Problem With Django

Giordano — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 08:05:00 -0000

I suspect that once TG2 is out, I'll switch from Django to TG. I'm pretty regularly running into the edges of Django (granted, I'm trying to do some weird stuff).

Re: Batteries 4800 mAh : plus de peur que de mal ? - By Pierre Lecourt - - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 04:07:44 -0000

Monsieur Pierre sur France Info pour parler de l'ipécé...

Attention, a star is born.

Re: Un EeePC 900 pour regarder vos anime ? - By Pierre Lecourt - 900, asus - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Sun, 04 May 2008 16:23:47 -0000

Dommage, elle à dut arrêter la vidéo à 30 secondes, la batterie était déjà à plat.

^^

Re: XP Live acceptera les Atom N270 et les VIA Isaiah. - By Pierre Lecourt - atom, ECS G10IL, isaiah, licence, live, ultraportable, xp - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 13 May 2008 18:14:58 -0000

la guerre est ouverte ^^

Re: Dissection d’un HP 2133 Mini Note. - By Pierre Lecourt - 2133, dissection, hp mini, via c7-M - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Sat, 24 May 2008 16:25:34 -0000

docteur house de l'ordi ^^

Re: ASUSTeK confirme : le EeePC 900 sera distribué avec des batteries 4400 mAh en Europe. - By Pierre Lecourt - 4400, asus, batterie, eeepc 900 - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Mon, 26 May 2008 11:51:51 -0000

Ce 900 a tout pour pas me plaire ^^ j'attendrai mieux pour remplacer mon 701.

Conso gourmande et petite batterie, quoi de mieux pour un portable ?

Re: Asus Italie dément : le EeePC 900 continuera à coexister avec le 901. Le 901 aura 7 heures d’autonomie ! - By Pierre Lecourt - 900, 901, asus, autonomie, eeepc - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Fri, 30 May 2008 19:31:43 -0000

7 heures d autonomie surement sans wifi, luminosité a 1 sans son etc... :p

Re: Le Gigabyte M912 se dévoile au Computex. - By Pierre Lecourt - atom, gigabyte, m912, n270, tablet, umpc - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 01:40:47 -0000

j'aime pas ^^

Re: Blogeee.net a un an ! - By Pierre Lecourt - 3615 mylife, blogeee, cnet - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 21:51:06 -0000

sympa cette histoire :)

Re: Le EeePC 901 sera vendu 399€ - By Pierre Lecourt - 901, atom, disponibilité, eeepc, prix - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 05:15:23 -0000

cool ^^

Re: EXCLU : ASUSTeK présente le EeePC 903 ! - By Pierre Lecourt - 903, asus, atom, eeepc, images, info, photos - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 00:59:21 -0000

trop de choix tue le choix

Re: ASUSTeK présente le EeePC 904. - By Pierre Lecourt - 904, asus, asustek, eeepc, images, Informations, infos, photos, pictures - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 01:00:09 -0000

au suivant !

Re: MSI WIND U100 disponible aux Philippines. - By Pierre Lecourt - dispo, disponibilité, msi, wind - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 12:19:52 -0000

sympa !

Re: Les EeePC 904 et 905 présents dans le manuel du EeePC 1000 - By Pierre Lecourt - 904, 905, asus, eeepc - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 12:47:36 -0000

Ils deviennent compliqué chez asus avec tout ces modèles.

Re: ASUSTeK EeeMonitor ! - By Pierre Lecourt - asus, eee, EeeMonitor, eeepc, images, Informations, monitor, photos, pictures - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 16:12:44 -0000

combien de pouces ?

Re: Les photos trash de l’Acer Aspire One… - By Pierre Lecourt - - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 02:33:13 -0000

j'aime pas ^^

Re: Le nouveau forum Blogeee.net est arrivé ! - By Pierre Lecourt - blogeee, forum, netbook - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 15:36:30 -0000

yeah !

Re: Sondage : EeePC 900 Linux 20Go ou Windows 12 Go ? - By Pierre Lecourt - microsoft, sondage, xandros, xp - Blogeee.net

Giordano — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 12:24:36 -0000

Dommage que les gens prennent du Linux pour formater ensuite.
C'est comme acheter une voiture qui roule nickel pour ensuite mettre un moteur rouillé.

Essayez au moins un Linux (Objectivement, ca veut dire en laissant votre confort de savoir que le bouton intitulé "démarrer" sert aussi à arrêter), et puis faite le choix de formater... ou d'accepter que Linux tourne super bien, meme pour un newbie !!! :)

Re: Use Your Phone As a Flash Disk - SymSMB v1.0 | SymbianV3.com

Giordano — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 05:01:09 -0000

I like it big time! Really cool program.\par
Was looking for such stuff for months and looks like it is the only one available today for Series 60 phones. \par
Great job! \par
But you guys on SymbianV3.com are little bit on a slow side. \par
I've checked developers website to find out that SymSMB v.1.10 was a news 4 months ago! \par
Right now they do have in beta testing v.2 with added options for access in different direction, so one can get access from phone to files located on computer as well as from computer to files located on phone. Isn't it cool? \par
\par
Nokia got a new slogan for their phones, now they call it "mobile network computers". \par
How come? Is it a joke or what? \par
\par
"Network" - without file sharing? \par
"Computers" - without file access? \par
"Mobile" - without being wireless, without using existing wireless Wi-Fi ability for file access? \par
\par
Nokia, you must be joking, right? \par
Slogan should be changed to "Nokia calls them Mobile network computer, Telexy makes them one in reality." \par
Nokia, can you hear me? \par
... Unless in someone's books "USB cable connection without real network file access can be called as mobile network computing". Give me a brake! \par
\par
Nokia instead, have own software called PC Suite with "mass storage mode" which turns off phone functionality! How nice and convenient?! With this mode you cant answer a call and you cant dial on your phone! That brilliant idea comes from phone Nokia, the phone manufacturer, can you believe it? Its like having car radio that can play only if car isn't moving.

Re: Valencia 1 - 5 Real Madrid

Giordano — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 20:18:49 -0000

GOOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLL!

That commentator is really annoying.

Re: Sheffield United 0-3 Arsenal

Giordano — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 21:43:28 -0000

I thought this site was called footytube, not footytext&pics; /:)

Re: Sheffield United 0-3 Arsenal

Giordano — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 21:52:03 -0000

Great, thanks!

Re: Chelsea 4-3 Leicester

Giordano — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 02:21:32 -0000

The crowd were up and down like a yoyo at the end there...great game.

Re: Worst Miss Ever?

Giordano — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 06:33:24 -0000

Looks fake.

Re: Certainly not by my mother

Giordano — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 22:53:43 -0000

Amazing how wide the gap is between "I will fuck you" and "I will fuck you up." Methinks the latter is more what this mom meant, heh.

Re: Happy 30th Anniversary! Miracle at the Meadowlands

Giordano — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 15:06:48 -0000

This was a classic NFL Films clip. We named a field we played football on after Pisarchik. Thanks for posting this one,

Re: Happy 30th Anniversary! Miracle at the Meadowlands

Giordano — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 16:22:50 -0000

Let me amend my previous comment. I am most familiar with this through NFL films (with Merril Reese play-by-play), though the video is from CBS.

Re: What to Watch This Weekend: College Football

Giordano — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 15:33:07 -0000

"Elsewhere in the college football world Harvard is also playing Yale in "The Game"

You got the order wrong, but at least you acknowledged it. ;)

Re: What to Watch This Weekend: College Football

Giordano — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 19:58:44 -0000

I could have it a few things happened, but Harvard's cheating was more blatant than normal this year, so Yale did not win.

Re: White Out the Rose Bowl!

Giordano — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 13:56:22 -0000

D'oh! I was hoping for blue.

Re: 2009 NFC Championship - Friday

Giordano — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 12:24:49 -0000

I find it interesting that the Eagles wore white at home.

Re: Proposed Rule Changes for College Football

Giordano — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 08:12:37 -0000

I like the colored jerseys rule, the punting one is not needed and the taunting one is just stupid. Perhaps giving the taunted team the option of backing up the PAT or the kickoff would be a good way to handle it.

Re: Phillies Will Be Golden on Opening Day

Giordano — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 08:44:40 -0000

Meh, the Nats have been wearing gold trim for years. :)

Re: Rutgers Confirmed for Future Schedule

Giordano — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:27:08 -0000

I went to the '95 game, didn't hear about the altercation until the next day. I miss those days when Penn State played at the Meadowlands all the time. I think they had 10 games there between 1981 - 2000. I think Rutgers will take a stand though.

Re: Free Marketeer to Head E.U.

Giordano — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:03:32 -0000

Klaus indeed is a much needed dissenting voice in today's EU but he has his flaws. After all - he's just a politician. He knows Mises (which is a rarity among our intellectually bankrupt elites) but I'm not sure he understood what the great Ludwig had to say:) Here's an article where two prominent Czech libertarians criticize Klaus thoroughly: http://mises.org/journals/jls/14_2/14_2_2.pdf

That said, I'd be happy if he managed to change something but I'm losing hope. Precisely because the EU has turned into such a Leviathan...

BTW a group of EU MEPs visited Klaus a few days ago and argued with him about the Lisbon Treaty, among other things. A transcript can be found at http://www.nationalplatform.org/wordpress/?p=103
Quote: "Brian Crowley MEP: With all respect, Mr. President, you will not tell me what the Irish think. As an Irishman, I know it best." This is the eurocrats' way of thinking...

Of course the Czech media who hate Klaus happily quoted the MEPs as saying Klaus behaved madly during the meeting. You only got to hear what the exchange was about after the president's office released the transcript a few hours later.

Re: Hinedo - 輕鬆聽 Hinet Radio - 免費資源網路社群

Giordano — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 13:31:39 -0000

Website down now?

Re: FRENCH BICYCLE HAS SMALL FRONT WHEEL

Giordano — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 12:07:09 -0000

Most people who are injured or killed on a bicycle are thrown over the handlebars. By sitting erect like this, we can save a lot of lives in accidents.

There are modern versions of this avalible, but since most people don't get in bike accidents, the more expensive version is not very popular.

Re: Twelve Foot Muzzle Loading Gun Recalls Days of ‘49

Giordano — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 06:56:04 -0000

Looks like an 80 year old April Fool's joke to me, but that doesn't mean it's not real.

Re: Hinedo - 輕鬆聽 Hinet Radio - 免費資源網路社群

Giordano — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 13:31:39 -0000

Website down now?

Re: Choosing a theme…

Giordano — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 22:30:56 -0000

Scott - on this theme, you haven't defined a background color (it defaults to the color I have set in my browser)

Figured you'd want to know

Re: Choosing a theme…

Giordano — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 23:17:50 -0000

Looks good!

Re: New SEO Plugin for WordPress: Internal Link Building

Giordano — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 21:40:28 -0000

Actually, the way this one is working is not offensive. The ones I've seen in the past jump up and out at you when you move down the page.

Re: NIN tickets awarded - lucky redditor only 2 followers off

Giordano — Tue, 19 May 2009 15:33:19 -0000

Uh, you are WAY off. I was tracking the followers every minute and the count at midnight was closer to 526,640. And it was only increasing by about 3 followers / minute. There's no way it was at 526,786.

Re: Hidden Skype Emoticons, Smileys

Giordano — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 23:36:56 -0000

(boy)
(girl)
(oitai)
(tujas)
These don't work!

Re: More Problems for Parisian Bike-Sharing Vélib

Giordano — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:16:20 -0000

"which cost $3,500 each"

This is insanity. They would have been better off to have bought 10 times as many bikes for $350, and just given them away.

Heck,even $350 is a pretty nice bike.

Jyabr,
The system does track who checked the bike out, but vandalism doesn't require the bike to be "undocked" and a lot of the thefts are due to people using them and leaving them at other bike racks, using a different locking system or no lock at all.

GPS tracking is a good idea, but adds cost to an already expensive bike.

Re: Do Networks Ignore Sci Fi Fans?

Giordano — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 06:27:11 -0000

Joel Fagan Reality tv is awful just the idea that these people know a camera is on them destroys the idea of the word reality.I don't watch none of them.Yes the sci fi channel and mythbusters rule on my tv.So I must be one of those minorities the nelson ratings ignore.I loved Journeyman project and was disappointed when it was canceled.If they keep bringing on very stupid showslike the oxymoron "REALITY TV" on tv such as "dancing with the stars"(I would rather have my teeth pulled than watch that crap)or "amucking race",or "big brother" I will just quit watching tv all together.

Re: Ford Not Sold on Battery-Swapping for Electric Cars

Giordano — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:14:13 -0000

What makes more sense, building a large number of battery swapping stations to deal with the small percentage of drivers needs that can't be met by an EV, or making more series hybrids?

Re: Upgrading Your Twitter Experience With Greasemonkey

Giordano — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 09:38:45 -0000

My favorite is Endless Tweets: http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/24398

It loads the next page as you scroll down, marks your last read tweet, "in reply to" tweets are loaded inline when you click, among other things.

Re: “Devil” in the Details

Giordano — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 05:47:12 -0000

Nabcy

You hit the nail right on the head. Your people donâ€™t listen. You are arrogant beyond belief. You are brainwashed from birth to death to believe that your way of life is the only one that counts. That all others are inferior. And you act like it. You strut around like peacocks trying to show the rest of the world how wrong they are. You know nothing about the cultures you come in contact with and donâ€™t make any attempt to learn. You insult other nations and cultures constantly and couldnâ€™t care less. You act like slavers, and you are. You see the rest of the world as yours for the stealing. Who cares if the people of other nations are oppressed and murdered so long as you can stay fat and lazy â€“ living off blood of people you know nothing about. When told what you do, your eyes glaze over and you yap about everyone being anti american. Its your catch all for not thinking. For not learning. For not listening.

We outside america couldnâ€™t care less about if you think us anti american. We couldnâ€™t care less about your way of life. We donâ€™t see you as the best of the best. We see you as murderers, opressors, destroyers of our cultures, our way of life, our resources. Destroyers of our childrenâ€™s futures. Like the spoiled brats and bully on the block you are you get violent when you donâ€™t get your way. More die. Do you think we forget our relatives and friends and neighbors being killed ? Do you think we donâ€™t know who is responsible ? Your lack of understanding, your lack of education, and your complete lack of even attempting to change this is your undoing. Do you think weâ€™re going to care when you get slapped back into the gutter you came from ? Why should we ? What have you done for us ? You brought pain and misery and death. You treated us with contempt. You did your best to destroy our way of life and replace it with your own failed culture. You sat on your lazy fat asses and did nothing about it, because the average american couldnâ€™t care less till its happening to them. Like Cindy Sheehan. She couldnâ€™t care less about Iraq. Till her own soldier boy didnâ€™t come home. Then she woke up.

Your country is in a mess from your own making. Donâ€™t just blame bush. Blame yourselves too. Its called apathy. Its rampant in your country. Wake up now, or watch all of your illusions die right before your eye. The dream of america was always just that. A dream. Its over now. Time to wake up. Time to rebuild. For the first time in your history perhaps you can try to live up to the propaganda and lies you tell yourselves. America was founded by the largest act of genocide ever perpetrated in the history of mankind. 168 million people died. It was called the Indian Wars. Ever since then you have been a nation of warmongers and destroyers. Its time to wake up. Or you can live in the filth of your own making.

I'm not an american. I donâ€™t care about you. As far as I'm concerned the faster you sink beneath the waves the better for the rest of us. Does this make you angry ? Does it make you afraid ? I honestly donâ€™t care. So flame away. I wont be back to read any responses. You opinions mean nothing to me. You country means nothing to meâ€¦

Re: Pure, agonizing terror. Wait, no. - diamonds-n-rubies: bahhhahhah yes

Giordano — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 19:58:27 -0000

This is hilarious! It applies to a helluva lot of other bad habits, too!

Re: I should be ashamed of this....I'm not. - The 50 Worst Artists in Music History

Giordano — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:08:19 -0000

Is it bad that I know almost all of these and like a good number of them?

Re: I should be ashamed of this....I'm not. - I can’t stand Angelina and all her babies. Maddox...

Giordano — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 19:47:11 -0000

I thought you meant the other Maddox. This one:
http://maddox.xmission.com/

He's way better than bradgelina and their kids.

Re: 2007/04/03/myspace-presidential-primaries/

Giordano — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 10:51:31 -0000

News Corp is not explicitly conservative. One of the companies they own, Fox News, is. Rupert Murdoch is not the conservative nut that people caricature him as. He found an underserved niche: all news networks were liberal so Roger Ailes created a conservative network. Sort of like how Dogster realized that all social networks were for humans, so it created one for dogs.

Fox Interactive is a separate company from Fox News even though News Corp owns both.

MySpace's goal is to get people to communicate. If they communicate about politics, that's great.

I don't have inside knowledge, but the impression I get from MySpace folks is that Roger Ailes doesn't tell Tom how to run his site and that Tom doesn't tell Roger what to put on TV.

Re: 2007/07/13/facebook-100m/

Giordano — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 21:58:43 -0000

Valleywag clarified this immensely: They said that much of the $100M comes from the guaranteed minimum from Microsoft.

Thus, these are temporary earnings (the deal ends in 2009), making it much harder to justify and acquisition or IPO...

Re: 2008/04/13/mibbit/

Giordano — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 14:20:30 -0000

Try searchirc.com

Re: Fireworks in Midtown from Brooklyn 2009

Giordano — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 11:48:19 -0000

Great photo

Re: 2008/12/02/ask-ads/

Giordano — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 00:19:16 -0000

who did they hire to write there scripts... my 4 year old daughter can do write a better commercial

Re: Try Facebook for Windows Mobile

Giordano — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 09:25:10 -0000

This app looks really good and upon first use it actually does seem to be a winner but one feature I see missing is the ability to comment on friend's status updates. That would be awesome.

Re: “Harrass a Booth Babe”: A Twitter Contest Too Far?

Giordano — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 21:06:49 -0000

"The girls have CHOSEN to stand their in their bikinis, and WILL have been briefed fully on what was happening."

Not the ones hired by other companies. The contest rules don't specify only EA employees

Re: APPLE TABLET: Ultimate Gallery of Concept Designs and Prototypes

Giordano — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 09:49:59 -0000

Here it is.

First picture of:
Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

iNetbook rerendered
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fotoboer/3226244527

WE NEED THOUSANDS FOR OUR UNIVERSITY!

Re: Apple Tablet Comes to Life. Pity It’s Unofficial [Pics]

Giordano — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:10:46 -0000

Weight. The key is no more than 400 g or so and pocketable (like the OQO), with Mac inside, video-out and USB2 ports for videopresentations.

Re: Watching the Georgia Bulldogs in a Virtualbox VM running on Ubuntu | VM /ETC

Giordano — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 04:12:09 -0000

hi - I did the same thing - xp in virtualbox on ubuntu, for the same reason (go dawgs!). I had a pretty annoying problem though, I couldn't get the full screen of the espn360 player to work. I was using IE7, and the picture was clear and the stream was good, but the 'go fullscreen' button did nothing. I spent forever on chat with the tech support, but apparently the only thing they know how to do is read from a scripted list of things to do, so they were of no help.

Did the full screen of the player work for you? I am thinking maybe somehow it has to do with the window manager (in ubuntu) i am using (dwm), but still I am not sure.

Thanks for any help!

Re: Watching the Georgia Bulldogs in a Virtualbox VM running on Ubuntu | VM /ETC

Giordano — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 03:37:52 -0000

Hi Rich, Thanks for the replay - I meant to reply back quicker but got caught up in some work.

I was using virtual box in full screen (not seamless). One issue here may be I am in europe, and so using the european version of espn360 -- the player looks a bit different than your screen shot, and I'm not sure what you mean by mosaic mode. I am not sure if it was a video card problem or not for me.

Basically when I start the stream, I waited a minute then the game starts playing. There are rewind/pause/forward and volume controls on the player, then under the player two buttons 'back to menu' and 'go fullscreen'. Everything worked except 'go fullscreen' -- the cursor recognized it was a button (changed symbols) but clicking just didn't do anything.

Unfortunately, I can't preform any tests until I have another live stream, so not until this weekend. I have reinstalled xp on virtual box and will try that, and also using another window manager. If neither of those two ideas work I am really at a loss as to what to try next...

Re: Watching the Georgia Bulldogs in a Virtualbox VM running on Ubuntu | VM /ETC

Giordano — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 16:23:17 -0000

Hi Rich,

Thanks for the screen shots. The european player is definitely different from the US version. The european version now also has archived games, so I have done a few test - I have reinstalled a different version of XP, and tried a different window manager. In both cases I get the same problem. I think the problem is something to do with both flash and how VirtualBox is interacting with IE. At this point I am thinking there is not much I can do about this problem, and I will have to make do as is, but below I give you a little walk through to show you what I am dealing with, in case you have
any ideas.

XP running in VirtualBox inside ubuntu (not fullscreen) with the espn360 european start page:

stashbox.org/203995/1_startpage.png

Now I go in fullscreen mode, and press 'Launch Player'. This is what I see:

stashbox.org/203996/2_playerstart.png

I don't know why this message pops up, nor why it says I need to upgrade flash player -- I have the latest version. Another thing to note is that the IE window that pops-up is unresizeable. Once I click 'Yes', I get sent
on to the main espn360 page:

stashbox.org/203997/3_playermatrixview.png

This is the default page, which I think is similar to the 'matrix mode' of the US player. To watch live (or replayed) games I go to 'NCAA Football' and the archive tab, and where the flash window is in the above screen gets replaced by a 'press here to watch' button for the selected game. After pressing it this is what I see:

stashbox.org/203998/4_live_starting.png

After a minute or so the player starts playing:

stashbox.org/203999/5_live_playing.png

Notice the controls on the screen. Rewind, Pause, Forward. Then on the right side a volume option. At the bottom the 'Back to Player' button exits to the
matrix-like view. And the 'Go Fullscreen' button - this is the problem - does nothing. When I scroll over it the cursor changes shape (recognizing its clickable), but clicking it does nothing.

Now, I have found at least two ways to 'break' the player at this point. First, if I right-click down by the 'back to player' and 'go fullscreen' buttons, the flash options menu comes up. If I choose the flash 'settings' option, the settings menu does _not_ come up, and the mouse loses control of the buttons on the video player. Once I do this I can not go back to player/pause or do
anything - the playback continues but the controls are gone, and the only way to exit is to force the window closed.

The second way to 'break' the player is if I toggle the fullscreen mode of Virtual box (on my computer its 'Right-control--f' after doing this once to get out, and once more to get back it, the player window looks like this:

stashbox.org/204001/6_live_after_fs_toggle.png

Note that the two bottom buttons are now gone. The player is now also again unresponsive to the mouse. Note again that this IE window is unresizeable,
so I'm basically stuck.

So - because of how I can 'break' the player, I'm thinking the problem behind the lack of fullscreen is to do with the interplay of flash-IE-virtualbox.
But honestly I am at a lose as to what to try next, if anything. I also am not too impressed with the european implementation of espn360's player -- I think
some of the issues my be its fault as well.

Anyway, sorry for the long post, but I figured I would give you the whole picture in case you have any ideas, cause I am about out!

Thanks for any help!

Re: Watching the Georgia Bulldogs in a Virtualbox VM running on Ubuntu | VM /ETC

Giordano — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 16:26:50 -0000

p.s. I would have posted the above post earlier, but I had the full (http) address of the screen shots there and your spam bot was rejecting the posts - I just figured out this is what was happening. When I originally tried to post this (yesterday I believe) I gave up and forwarded a copy to your email listed above, because I at first thought it was a problem with the length of the post. I don't know if you got the email, but sorry for any inconvenience. -adam.

Re: Watching the Georgia Bulldogs in a Virtualbox VM running on Ubuntu | VM /ETC

Giordano — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 10:08:17 -0000

Rich,

Yes agree, being able to watch the game in the first place is a good thing. This morning I also figured out that I can get around the fixed size of the pop-up by cutting and pasting its URL into a tab, and then using IE's zoom/full screen to blow up the image to a decent approximation to full screen, the scroll bars are still there, however.

The most frustrating thing is that what should be simple (click a button for full screen) turned into a big pain...oh well.

Anyway - looking forward to the game this afternoon!

Re: Mashable on Tumblr - Ketchum’s James Andrews Memphis left a regrettable...

Giordano — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 16:21:05 -0000

Lame! Just cuz you do business in a city, doesn't mean you have to like it! Twitter should be seen as comments made by humans. Humans don't have to like every town. He didn't even specifically call out the city. Some people are too sensitive!

Re: Give Sam Seder a Daily Show!

Giordano — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 16:10:12 -0000

My e-mail is in, and I am ready to cancel my Air America premium subscription immediately if Sam Seder doesn't get this 5-day-a-week show. I've been with AAR since the beginning. I put up with the shabby way they treated Marc Maron. I put up with the WWRL disaster here in New York. I put up with Mark Green bumping Sam to Sundays for the unlistenable Lionel show.

Everything that succeeding generations of Air America management has done has eroded the product further. Now I'm giving Air America an ultimatum: Give Sam this timeslot or cancel my subscription. I've been a premium subscriber since they first became available, but this will be the last straw.

It's now up to you.

Re: Sam Seder Petition Delivered!

Giordano — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 09:07:22 -0000

Thank you, Robin! We can only hope now that the suits at AAR do the right thing.

Re: Why The 2009 Camaro Is Doomed

Giordano — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 14:05:06 -0000

I'm going to keep this in mind next election. This time around I voted Democratic, but if they want to shove us all into tin cans like last time ('80s CAFE standards), we can shove them back into the minority party.

20-30 actual mpg in highway driving is pretty good in my book; the 4 cylinder sh*t boxes I've had typically got 22-25 in actual commuting. V8s by contrast were more relaxing to drive and got maybe 4mpg less. A typical city/metro bus line averages about that, with noisy polluting buses clogging the roads and not showing up when you need them. Compared to that, an SRT8 far better transportation.

Re: Why The 2009 Camaro Is Doomed

Giordano — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 14:17:17 -0000

My next car will be a rusty '78 Suburban. It's going to get 100 mpg/passenger with Peters and dozen more greenie-facists chained to the rear bumper during during my commute. Hey, don't trip and fall under the cement mixer my buddy's driving!

Re: African Cultural Center bldg. construction - StimulusWatch.org

Giordano — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 06:04:21 -0000

While you're all at it, get some white sheets and crosses burning. For frig's sake it's a $1,000,000 project for a community center. They already have a white cultural center built, it's called Clarence. Your ignorant comments become a reflection of the area and let me be the first to say, most people in Buffalo *don't* think like these people.

Re: Little Cove Road and Little Cove Greenway - StimulusWatch.org

Giordano — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 20:21:58 -0000

This is the worst possible greenway to expand. This area already has more greenways than any other part of Huntsville, and they don't really go anywhere useful. Any number of the other greenway projects on Huntsville plan would be a better choice because they would make it easier and safer for walkers and bikers to shop or go to work. Say, Big Spring, or Dallas or Pinhook, or the Huntsville Spring Branch...

Re: Flint River Greenway Phase II - StimulusWatch.org

Giordano — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 20:23:17 -0000

More greenways in a part of town that already has more than anywhere else? What a waste.

Re: 3 Parking Garages - StimulusWatch.org

Giordano — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 20:30:58 -0000

There's plenty of safe, well-lit parking downtown already, and downtown is never going to be a destination for many commuters. I'm all for supporting our fun little downtown area, but 3 new parking garages are totally unnecessary. The only time parking is scarce is during the few major events per year held down there.

Re: Siliconera » Battle of the console exclusives

Giordano — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 23:35:03 -0000

"The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion is on the 360, and extra content in the PS3 version will be available for download on the 360/PC. F.E.A.R. is also on the PC/360. "

Ok...hence, they stole the exclusivity from Microsoft. Note: that means those games aren't exclusive anymore.

Re: Siliconera » Battle of the console exclusives

Giordano — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 23:35:03 -0000

Re: On netbooks, TouchBook, Mac tablet, Macbook Mini, and a Mac user switching to Windows (for the netbook only)

Giordano — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 14:13:28 -0000

Re: Lip-locked lust

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 02:22:10 -0000

Hey Ben--I have been where you are, felt like you did, almost did what you plan and can just say: learn to follow the Spirit and your heart in these things.

Sixline-meet someone who regrets not kissing earlier. If you have deep feelings for someone and want to express them, there is sometimes simply no better way to do so. . . and it can be a strengthening, blessing experience for both.

Re: Die Königstochter

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 02:27:27 -0000

Learning German by reading Grimm's is like learning English by reading Shakespeare. Just a warning . . .

Re: A dilemma

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 02:38:26 -0000

How many people are working on this project? Would it make you feel better or worse if more people were working on this project? How could you get others to work on this project, if you would like more?

Re: One in 365

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 02:41:59 -0000

Ben--I love your "unfettered by cultural or societal constraints" attitude about birthdays and holidays! Way to go for you!

Re: The creative child

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 03:04:39 -0000

Let me recommend an article about this topic for you, Ben, from and LDS perspective:

Brigham Young Magazine, Summer 1997, A. Legrand Richards "That You May Be Instructed More Perfectly".

Public education (he who pays the piper, calls the tune), is built basically to create subjects who effectively serve the state or the corporations which through their finances control the state.

The *last* thing that these schools would do is help to assist people to develop the creativity and drive necessary to compete with those who own the larger enterprises of the nation.

Re: The trail behind

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 03:08:36 -0000

Look at what you have done--and what you are leaving! You will yet leave many things on this earth, I am sure, that are seen as very valuable for future generations . . .

Re: The kettle black

Giordano — Sun, 30 Jul 2006 05:37:31 -0000

I must agree with Shaun here. Our particular political system is set up (regardless of how the BoM peoples set up theirs) so that neither the majority can silence and oppress the minority nor can a minority (even if the minority are in office!) use violence or guilt to silence the majority. In a pure democracy, whatever > 50% of the people say is law, regardless of whether they decide "All Jews shall be murdered" or "No one may eat cold-cuts on even numbered Tuesdays". The Founders thus set up a constitutional republic.

Amendment the First
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

I am always frustrated, whether in spiritual or in legal issues, about the fact that we seldom go to the sources to decide what is correct and why. The spiritual source for answers to this discussion would be, for instance, Doctrine and Covenants 121:46-end.

Re: OnePlayBook.com - Online Sports Software | Visit oneplaybook

Giordano — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 09:51:00 -0000

www.watchgamefilm.com is the way to go. Simple, easy to use, handles video, exchange, sharing, recruiting, commenting and more!

Re: ilovebacon.com - dumb but fun

Giordano — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 19:40:30 -0000

Previous boning experience essential.

Funny, that was on the last job posting I applied too, as well.

Hmmmm.......

Re: ilovebacon.com - dumb but fun

Giordano — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 15:22:16 -0000

This video screen is in Downtown Las Vegas. I swear they hired a stripper or porn star to (very suggestively) eat the twinkie. I get sick and oddly turned on everytime I pass by this sign.

Re: Ny B&O fladsk� til 800.000 kroner - Business break

Giordano — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:49:33 -0000

Er jeg den eneste der morer mig hver gang en plasma tosse fører sig frem. Jeg tror de har sniffet lidt for meget af de gasser, der er i TV'et.

Om folk har et plasma eller lcd er deres egen sag. Og hverken LCD eller Plasma er alligevel fremtidens TV.

Re: Din mening: Hvordan skal Lars L�f�ucces? - Debat

Giordano — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 06:49:50 -0000

Han skal droppe det tætte samarbejde med DF. De er dog nogle mennesker med decideret ulækre holdninger og metoder.

Nyrup havde, om ikke andet, ret i det punkt.

Stuerene det bliver de aldrig.

At Fogh valgte at arbejde tæt sammen med dem alligevel si´ger jo så bare lidt om ham.

Re: Din mening: Skal Tyrkiet med i EU? - Debat

Giordano — Thu, 07 May 2009 02:03:31 -0000

Ja selvfølgelig skal Tyrkiet da være med i EU. Udover at de vil være en broforbindelse mellem vesten og de muslimske lande, vil de også kunne berige samarbejdet ved at bringe anden kultur, synspunkter og erfaringsgrundlag til samarbejdet.

Desuden var de jo de eneste der i sagen om Nato's generalseklretær viste bare en smule ansvarlighed ved at opponere mod Fogh's kandidatur.

Re: Din Mening: Skal man kunne gifte sig til konge-titlen? - Debat

Giordano — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 03:22:08 -0000

Stemningen her indikerer klart at man ikke vil kalde Henrik for konge.

Hvis man så virkelig går ind for ligestilling i kongehuset er denn logiske følge jo så at prinsesse Mary fortsat vil have titlen prinsesse når Frederik overtager.

Hvad er holdningen til det?

Re: 2010 Tesla Roadster to get full BlackBerry control due to WiFi capabilities

Giordano — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 21:31:19 -0000

As a Tesla owner with a Bold, I was thinking about this. However, there's no real point in a remote starter in an electric car...

Maybe if you could just turn on the heat or AC remotely.

Re: http://www.aeropause.com/2006/09/rent-a-center-is-hiding-ps3aos-lol/

Giordano — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 16:14:48 -0000

10 bucks he's into boys...

"Yeah I've got in the back..."

Of course, most young gamers would beg "to see it"

Re: http://www.aeropause.com/2007/09/lair-development-team-plays-the-blame-game/

Giordano — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 13:38:10 -0000

If it's not a PC game it sucks automatically.Comparing consoles (to damn expensive) to gaming computer is like comparing a 13'B/W tv that cost $500, to a HDTV that cost $700.PC's will always rule.

Re: An Open Letter to Milo Yiannopoulos

Giordano — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 03:32:58 -0000

His editor, who should know better as a seasoned journo, was also laying the guilt on rather thick in his appeals for deletions. Milo is learning the Butcher ways, and it ain't a good thing.

Re: Blogs and the Job Search

Giordano — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 11:41:17 -0000

Very interesting. Great staff.
Thanks for pointing out some of these resources. I will check them out...

Re: Everything a Startup Needs to Know About Raising Funds - Daniel Gould Interview

Giordano — Fri, 16 May 2008 21:56:05 -0000

Thanks Andrew.

Sorry to everyone if I went on and on. I wrote down some notes before the call and only made it about 2/3 way through them. So, maybe we'll have to do a follow-up on the pitch, VC deal terms, negotiation, manging your investors, and the rest sometime...

Dan

Re: Hola nassal

Giordano — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 06:47:24 -0000

ieeeeeee que passa tios!

per fi tenim bloc! a veure quantes tonteries som capassos de pujar entre tots plegats ;)

salut i força a la titola!

Re: Avui sobre l’islam.

Giordano — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 10:14:01 -0000

ostres bona dada, i una reflexió curiosa!

ja ho havia llegit alguna vegada això, però no ho havia reflexionat mai així.

vinga fins ara hamichs! :*

Re: Unleash Your Inner Steve McQueen

Giordano — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:17:01 -0000

my wife would kill me if I signed up for this.

Re: Nokia N95 EURO Product Codes and Language Packs

Giordano — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 15:22:23 -0000

i hope there will be an update of firmware version 12.0.013 soon..

regards,

sal
http://sal-one.com/

Re: Is A Case Of Quant Trading Industrial Sabotage About To Destroy Goldman Sachs?

Giordano — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:13:55 -0000

You're on the money! The infrastructure required to run 32mb of code likely not all source btw (lots of libs, linked binaries, etc. and other Open Source stuff) would make it virtually useless to most anyone. From the sounds of things they just wanted to ensure this guy didn't take what they owned to a competitor.

One thing they likely were very concerned about would be any passwords or access credentials embedded in the code with IPs and host names that could compromise the security of their trading systems.

Re: Council warns staff to steer clear of the cannibalism website - Birmingham Post

Giordano — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 06:14:42 -0000

How did "atheistic views" slip in next to Satanism and the like? So it seems that the website of a cigarette-smoking atheist would be equivalent to Satanistic amputee cannibal-sex, in the eyes of the Council's diktat?

Re: Ever Tried Searching “Why Is Windows So Expensive?” @Bing

Giordano — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:51:25 -0000

My first result actually is: Amazon: Mac OS X 10.6 sells faster than Windows 7

I think people see what they want to see. At that, the result page I get on Bing from "Why is Windows So Expensive" has mostly pro-Mac articles or articles unrelated to OS.

Re: http://thelaunchpad.xprize.org/2009/04/fantasy-novels-for-complete-newbie.html

Giordano — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 12:32:29 -0000

Interesting. Ender's Game is one of my favorite novels ever. I've never considered it fantasy, always science fiction. I can see how someone might classify it as such, tho. I will continue to classify it as SF, I'm not that convinced it's fantasy!! :-)

Re: ‘Human spammers’ at the market

Giordano — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:35:46 -0000

we had people come to our door (after dark)
in the evenings leading up to recent election. ignoring our "no soliciting" sign & asking for money, claiming to be from the dnc.

for sure these people were not authorized to
collect money for "obama" as they put it.
they are con artists. be very careful who you let
inside your home.

Re: Ferris calls for University in Tralee | Sinn Féin

Giordano — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 16:06:45 -0000

In Tralee there is already the Institute of Technology. There are too many Universities in the Republic already.

Re: tamnation - ps: I did find which Magic card name would suit a...

Giordano — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 18:24:39 -0000

What would be the power/toughness and what abilities if any?
Dont forget the casting cost

Re: tamnation - ps: I did find which Magic card name would suit a...

Giordano — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 17:29:58 -0000

Since there is no answer... My guess is:

UBWGR
Love Elemental
0/1 Haste

When Love Elemental comes into play gain control of target creature target opponent controls. Repeat this process during each player upkeep in clockwise order.

Love Elemental gains Power/Toughness equal to the creature taken this way.

Love Elemental cannot be countered or enchanted, if Love Elemental would change controller, return it under his owner control instead.

When Love Elemental would leave play return it on top of it's owner library instead.

Re: Premium Eerie Theme For BlackBerry By Elecite

Giordano — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 23:29:21 -0000

Does it work with OS .151 for Storm?

Re: Animoto Makes Video Marketing a Breeze

Giordano — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 15:51:33 -0000

I think he's referring to the "videos licensed for commercial use" language which is found beneath the $249 option. So it does seem that to be in compliance with their TOS, I can't create videos using the $30 option and then blast them all over the net to promote my sites. But then again, I could be mistaken. Hope someone can prove demonstrate otherwise.

Re: Windows Mobile Devices with no Hardware Buttons

Giordano — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 20:16:27 -0000

Folks at Microsoft will have to come to grips with the fact a vast majority of people (consumers or business) prefer "finger friendly" designs over whipping out a stylus on their minimalist layouts. Besides, long lists are nothing up or down page swipes can't cure. MS just needs to get their fingers out of their behinds ;)

Re: fixing wordpress — editor removing div tags

Giordano — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 12:46:36 -0000

Just delete the p/-div[*] from the list then the will not be replaced by the tag. Worked here!

Re: Rails Jetpack

Giordano — Fri, 22 May 2009 12:15:50 -0000

I'm really excited to use Jetpack. It looks way easier than Greasemonkey to use. Very, very cool. Keep up the good work!

Re: T-shirt

Giordano — Wed, 27 Oct 2004 18:07:32 -0000

Another idea I was thinking about before seeing these, something to the extent of:

My Bible is the true bible because I read it from left to right, unlike those who read theirs from right to left.

What I was thinking was that the Islam and Christian bibles say the same thing (I'm not very well-read on this, but that's what it seems like to me) and their is no substantial difference between the two religions...

Re: Halloween in Vegas? Vegoose!

Giordano — Wed, 22 Jun 2005 15:28:35 -0000

Here's more info on vegoose.

Re: The Chicks Of Coachella

Giordano — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 15:04:00 -0000

Uh, the Brazilian Girls are a woman and three guys...

Re: AOL gets its own “Mini-Microsoft”

Giordano — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 13:46:38 -0000

The blog is an improvement, but the content so far is boring. Let's start threads about the real issues, like MS shills spreading FUD about OpenDocument on fox news!

http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/...

Re: AOL gets its own “Mini-Microsoft”

Giordano — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 18:25:31 -0000

Kreider;

>When you try to make a political statement and use a link pointing to a Slashdot site, you’re committing electronic suicide.

Next time read the link, and not the URL. I wasn't making a "political statement".

Re: AOL gets its own “Mini-Microsoft”

Giordano — Fri, 14 Oct 2005 08:54:11 -0000

Kreider;

> Regardless, the URL says it all…

Not it doesn't, you have to actually read it. Your excuse to stay ignorant is amusing though.

Re: John Dvorak gives interesting reason for MSFT’s bad press

Giordano — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 22:22:56 -0000

Call me when there's a cable channel called "AppleNBC"

Re: Three VPs on Channel 9

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 11:47:25 -0000

Any chance you can blog on this story? I'm interested in your point of view ...

http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticl...

Re: Three VPs on Channel 9

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 14:52:29 -0000

> Why does MS need to integrate CVS and Subversion?

Because other tool (like Eclipse, Netbeans, etc) come with CVS support right out of the box. With VS you get support for ... wait for it ... only another MS product! Is this an ad or a tool for building apps?

Re: http://scobleizer.com/2005/10/21/32/

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 14:53:27 -0000

The screenshot of the tool screams "usability nightmare, don't touch me!"

Re: Game helps kids learn to program

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 14:54:29 -0000

Cool, but one wonders if good old Logo is not better for having fun and learning programming?

Re: http://scobleizer.com/2005/10/21/32/

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 16:46:17 -0000

> I guess you guys have no idea what you are talking about.

They're doing eye tracking! Yeah, like this is something new and hasn't been done before.

This is not a good component for people to use outside of "Vista" ... it doesn't conform to the UI standards of

Re: Homepages combines maps and houses for sale

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 16:51:37 -0000

It doesn't matter that it's not AJAX, it's just a crappy implementation in Flash.

Don't know why it has to be pointed out if it's AJAX or not, that just seems kinda weird ...

Re: Cool new search engine

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 16:54:32 -0000

This thing "jitters" (page sometimes resizes up and down in a loop) in my Firefox version and it has no scrollbars for the results!

Re: Cool new search engine

Giordano — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 16:56:58 -0000

The results for HDTV are not great, the google results at least give you links that tell you what HDTV means.

For the thumbnail previews, you can already do this with google and firefox with this extension;

http://ackroyd.de/googlepreview/

Re: Woz’s math puzzle

Giordano — Sun, 23 Oct 2005 13:55:08 -0000

Wow Culter you shound bitter! Did Woz steal your lunch money or something?

Re: Why I’ll always support open and cheap public education

Giordano — Sun, 23 Oct 2005 19:46:20 -0000

"open developer program"?

What does that mean?

Does it compare to any open source license at all?

Is this a mechanism were companies (even competitors of MS) can introduce API specs, reference implementations and an open review process that everybody can participate in?

I hope it doesn't mean developers "blogging about stuff". That's not enough at all.

Re: Ruby on Rails author doesn’t like Google’s Web Accelerator

Giordano — Mon, 24 Oct 2005 21:16:16 -0000

He doesn't really say what's his problem with the accelerator. Is it the fact that it screws up badly designed sites and web apps?

Re: Visit to Monster Cable

Giordano — Mon, 24 Oct 2005 21:37:52 -0000

You do know they could by an ad in google for that search term right?

Re: Ruby on Rails author doesn’t like Google’s Web Accelerator

Giordano — Tue, 25 Oct 2005 00:40:33 -0000

Well that's what happens when people don't read the specs :-)

Re: Sam Ramji opens SaaS program at Microsoft

Giordano — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 14:39:22 -0000

Sam: I don't want to open a new account just to comment on your blog

This is great news for me.
I used to work all MS stuff at my company, but now that I'm oppening my own mISV, it will be easier if I can use SQL server, etc (all the stuff I already know).

Dody: I like to use my own server, so I can do all kind of strange stuff (like running demons, beta software, etc), so I can't go with hosted enviroments (not to add that really pro services are expensive.

Re: Sam Ramji opens SaaS program at Microsoft

Giordano — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 15:17:32 -0000

I will. Thanks Dody!

Re: Microsoft’s real competition: Stormhoek

Giordano — Sat, 12 Nov 2005 10:36:52 -0000

I friend of mine, who has a travel agency, says that his real competition is home appliances.

Re: Anina told to stop blogging (I’m not using wifi)

Giordano — Sun, 29 Jan 2006 21:11:43 -0000

http://www.comics.com/comics/pearls/archive/ima...

Re: Monad gets renamed to PowerShell

Giordano — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 14:27:58 -0000

I think the new name is horrible. "Power" sounds incredibly cheese, certainly not like a product geard towards tech professionals. Why the added "Windows"?!?

The new abbrevation "PS" is terrible for searches. It is used already by Postscript. "MSH" was great, as it always narrowed down searches very well.

"Monad" and "MSH" was a GREAT combination. Short, everyone liked it, and none of that nonse "Microsoft" or "Windows" attached.

Not happy.

Re: Monad gets renamed to PowerShell

Giordano — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 14:31:30 -0000

Oh, and Robert: Do you like the new name?!? You write kudos to the marketing people that the name is short, which indicates that that is the only thing you like about it ;)

Re: Monad gets renamed to PowerShell

Giordano — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 14:37:25 -0000

Can't stop right now. Didn't you say just a couple of days ago that marketers should explain their product naming? Why not start right away: Please try to track down the person that was in charge of this one and make him/her explain it.

Re: Monad gets renamed to PowerShell

Giordano — Tue, 25 Apr 2006 16:30:17 -0000

Excellent! Will be interesting to hear why he came up with that... I think it also is important to keep in mind that MSH could have been kept if the thing would have been called Microsoft Command Shell, or something like that. The more I think about, the more I see the non searchability of "PS" as a problem. Tech pros so rely on being able to quickly search for things on their technology...

Re: The suits vs. the geeks

Giordano — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 16:36:21 -0000

What a narrow mindset. I wear a suit everyday to work not only because I have to, but because I like to. I could get away with being suitless most of the time, but I dont want to. I have more than 500 ties, and like to wear them.

And... I´m in a creative role.

So? Do you judge people by what they wear?

Re: What if I sold ads here?

Giordano — Sun, 29 Oct 2006 22:45:36 -0000

Attention has a cost too: Adding ads is asking users to devote it. If you want the money, you certainly deserve it. OTOH, there is also something to be said for the purity of sites that are done for the love. It'll be a tough choice.

Re: The iPhone reality distortion field

Giordano — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 16:22:49 -0000

Robert,

Battery life in audio is 16 hrs. Battery life in video/phone is 5 hrs. Please see the official specs again. Standby is unknown, though one can logically deduce that it must exceed 16 hrs by a large margin.

Re: Microsoft “rebooted the Web” yesterday

Giordano — Tue, 01 May 2007 22:25:34 -0000

This is a new day, and a new way for MS. Get used to it or get run over by it.

IE was released on Mac during its first few versions. So was Windows Media Player. Where are they now?

You're awfully gullible if you think this is "a new day, and a new way for MS."

Re: Google to Yahoo and Microsoft: the $1.65 billion was worth it

Giordano — Thu, 17 May 2007 13:47:51 -0000

Microsoft still treats each team as something that must make money.

XBox and Zune don't make money. Arguably the biggest (fixable) problem right now at MSFT is that too many teams are allowed to lose money. As long as cross-subsidization of money-losing products is allowed, the teams that produce them don't have the same set of incentives that their competitors do to produce a great product.

If the products were forced to stand on their own, those that could be improved to the point at which they could compete well in the marketplace would be, and those that were unredeemable failures would be dropped. Both outcomes would be good.

Now, there may be some case to be made for cross-subsidization of products with zero marginal cost (e.g., giving away software like WMP or Adobe Reader, or your YouTube example). But having teams that build hardware (XBox, Zune, etc.) lose money year after year doesn't make any business sense at all - it's just a sign of a bloated, lazy company that is desperately trying to maintain share in too many markets.

Re: Microsoft postpones PDC

Giordano — Fri, 25 May 2007 18:35:13 -0000

Are you kidding me? how could that hurt,OSX may be a nice OS, but fast isn’t something that comes to mind.

Wake-up call: it's 2007 now. We're talking versus Vista, not XP.

I've run OS X on an old G3 with 512 MB of RAM. It's certainly not fast, but it's actually usable (for basic stuff - e-mail, web browsing, Office, etc.). I dare you to try using Vista on a Pentium II/366 with 512 MB of RAM and an old ATI Rage card. Even just using IE or Office would be an incredibly painful and slow experience (ignoring the fact that you probably wouldn't even be able to get it to install or boot).

Re: Microsoft evangelist says “call anytime”

Giordano — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 07:30:00 -0000

Well, I guess that was the good MS. But the evil one is coming back again as well, just have a look at http://weblogs.asp.net/nunitaddin/ and see what they are doing to the developer of one of the most popular dev tools. Crazy, crazy, crazy. There you have a discussion already going on whether alpha programmers are leaving the MS platform (google for Fowler's latest blog, or Sam Gentile) and then they engage in crap like that. Hard to believe, but apparently true. Even if they are legally right (which I don't actually think, these EULA's have a very dubios status in some countries), this is just terrible business behavior, i.e. essentially only a monopolist can act like that.

Re: Welcome to the blurry, but fast, browser…

Giordano — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 19:09:35 -0000

Finally a browser for Windows that doesn't render text to look like it was printed on a dot-matrix printer! I can't believe how bad text looks in IE/FF for Windows.

Re: Welcome to the blurry, but fast, browser…

Giordano — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 19:01:46 -0000

@Suzy:

All three (Safari/FF/IE) are perfectly readable. That's not the point (unless your vision impaired, in which case accessibility options should be turned on). The point is which looks most pleasing to the eye.

Those of us who like smoothly rendered text, like on a printed page, prefer Safari's font smoothing. But if you like thinner but more jagged text (more similar to a dot-matrix printer), then obviously you prefer IE font rendering.

@Scott:

On a P4/2.26 running XP, I get 64 fps in Safari Windows and 36 fps in IE 6.

Re: Welcome to the blurry, but fast, browser…

Giordano — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 19:13:51 -0000

@Scott:

Interestingly, the Flex performance delta is even greater: 64 fps in IE (cached) vs. 139 fps in Safari Windows (cached). Silverlight in IE gets similar performance to Flex (50-60 fps...not sure whether it can be installed in Safari Windows).

The inescapable conclusion is that IE (and to a lesser degree FF) are just plain slow for Web 2.0 stuff. Ironically, users stuck running web apps in IE will now find themselves just like Apple Powerbook G4 users did a couple years ago - running things at 50-70% of the speed of alternative environments (e.g., Pentium M). But at least the Powerbook users (or at least the ones not in denial) could argue that they were sacrificing speed for a completely different platform environment. The IE holdouts will be reduced to arguing about how important it is to have lighter, more jaggy fonts.

Re: Welcome to the blurry, but fast, browser…

Giordano — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 20:25:33 -0000

Robert,

If it's just a garbage collector fix that hasn't been installed yet, then why does FF display similar performance to IE (both in the benchmarks and the actual pages I've looked at)? Seems like it would be a strange coincidence.

Incidentally, for a non-fanboy discussion of the font rendering that has by far the best analysis I have yet seen, go to this link:

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/06/12....

Mike

Re: I’m a phone freak

Giordano — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 12:19:17 -0000

Yeah, tell us which phones you pay for and which ones are given to you by the manufacturer. I'm willing to bet cash you didn't buy your own N95 or N82.

Re: Tips for Real Time Web working on new friendfeed

Giordano — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:42:04 -0000

Nice recap Robert !

Re: Dell's new Z: I am throwing away my Mac when this comes out:

Giordano — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 04:20:05 -0000

Battery lasts forever ;)

Re: Oh, FriendFeed is now Facebook’s “official” R&D department!

Giordano — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 17:48:15 -0000

Search in Facebook was so complex that I guess it was easier for FB to deal with Friendfeed...

Re: Virgin Mobile Canada Releases 8130 Pearl with OS 4.5.0.56

Giordano — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 05:28:11 -0000

Virgin Mobile in the US needs to offer the kinds of phones that they do in the Canadian and UK markets. The ones in the US suck.

Re: Campaign to Reduce Wikipedia’s PageRank to Zero

Giordano — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 19:35:26 -0000

Cry more, spammer.

Re: Campaign to Reduce Wikipedia’s PageRank to Zero

Giordano — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 19:37:31 -0000

wikipedia wikipedia wikipedia !!!

Re: Campaign to Reduce Wikipedia’s PageRank to Zero

Giordano — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 19:57:02 -0000

My mistake - I assumed that you were just disreputable, didn't realise you were hypcritical too, Andy.

Explain to us again why it's a bad thing for Wikipedia not to give free Google rankings to any random spammer who cares to add a link, but a good thing for your blog to do exactly the same thing?

Re: How You Can Help End the Problem of Blogs With Great Content and No Readers

Giordano — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 01:01:39 -0000

While I'm tinkering with reality(doing Augmented Reality for mobile phones) I'm always thinking - 1. where is not enough interesting news to read at the morning 2.no one reading me. So lest make it 1000 :)
blog
main site with staff

Re: Phoenix has Found Something More Compelling than Water: President Bush Informed

Giordano — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 17:43:59 -0000

Well if they told Bush first, then maybe they found oil.

I think then they would actually get enough funding to go to Mars, although it would probably be with the intent to blow it up.

In reality if it is life/bacteria or whatever, will we ever be told? It would have some massive religious implications, the government might order it to be kept quiet.

We could get a huge number of religious fanatics calming its a hoax and attacking science as a whole (such as creationists are now), others embracing Panspermia and calming that Mars is the remains of the garden of Eden, some saying we are not allowed to go there because god kicked us out and others saying we should as its ok since its destroyed.

And in the overall scheme of things it means there is a good chance that life exists just about everywhere in the universe. If its happened in out solar system twice (at least) then its likely happened else where. Although if it is Panspermia then it only needed to have happened once and moved.

Re: New VAIO P Coming?

Giordano — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 21:32:53 -0000

The Sony Vaio P Series would rock if it had Mac OS X inside!

Re: Tongues, Healing and Gifts of the Spirit

Giordano — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 21:34:01 -0000

Hi Daniel and Sicarii,

Actually, I just started a blog at http://john-bunyan.blogspot.com/. Have been procrastinating for a long time, but I finally got down to it -- just to pen my thoughts. I'll probably only get a chance to update it once a week though, because my job consists of long working hours. =/

Hello Sidharth,

Just a few observations for now...

- The verses you cited are the most commonly used proof-texts for a private prayer language. I will address your points in upcoming blog posts, because I simply don't have the time right now. In the meantime, if you are interested, please read up on the conservative interpretations of these verses. Many godly Christian leaders far more competent than I, have written books and articles about this topic.

On a side note, I noticed that you classified John Macarthur as a heretic in another comment. While I don't agree with all of Macarthur's views, I am quite certain that he is not a heretic. Many Christians like me are thankful that God has raised leaders like Johnny Mac to preach the Word in season and out of season. Your comment alone implicitly tells me a lot about your skills as a Bible teacher. While I understand that you are trying to contend for the faith, I hope you will read up more on the other viewpoints and carefully think through these issues before hastily pronouncing judgment on others.

Re: Tongues, Healing and Gifts of the Spirit

Giordano — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 06:35:46 -0000

Hello Sidharth,

I don't know if you'll be reading this post. For now, I'd prefer to blog about this than correspond over IM. Blogging publicly will allow me to share my views with others and to learn from them as well. This is especially important if I am indeed guilty of preaching false doctrine or quenching the Spirit. You're most welcome to drop by and comment there.

Re: You Might Be a Baha’i

Giordano — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 20:27:38 -0000

Hey Baquia,

Put some comics up from Baha'i Comics - www.kdkfactory.com/fm/

Re: http://immaculatetelegraphy.tumblr.com/post/124013768

Giordano — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 21:44:47 -0000

When making a fire with a bow / stick, don't forget to make a notch in the base. I forgot that and spent a long time with no luck, getting annoyed.

Re: http://immaculatetelegraphy.tumblr.com/post/127249097

Giordano — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 22:33:27 -0000

So you seem to be doing it in one shot from zero. Commendable, but it seems to be the hardest way to approach this task. If you did each task separately (ie: using modern tools to accomplish the pre-requisites) and then only once you had worked them out, string them all together, it may be easier and less frustrating. Also, your nylon rope would not be a failure. (I suspect you will feel a desire to go and redo this step at some point anyway, when you know more).

BTW, a whole historical village in a recreation in the UK only just succeeded in what you are trying, to make iron. All the more reason to try, but it is hard.

Re: http://immaculatetelegraphy.tumblr.com/post/130405672

Giordano — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 13:19:36 -0000

Good work. Some suggestions (feel free to ignore them):
- Get a helper. You can't easily pump bellows for 3 hours on your own.
- Research African smelting techniques, eg: Koande, Yeke, Ndungu, Luba and others in central Africa.
- Build a taller furnace with a chimney. It is essential in drawing the fire.
- Not sure if you have access to malachite, but if so, you may want to use that - it melts at 200C, and does not contain iron like chalcopyrite does. You may be hard pressed to get the chalcopyrite hot enough (I don't know the melting point, but am guessing it's higher). Watch for a change in flame color.
- Your goal is just to get impure copper. Refining comes later with another furnace (as I am sure you already know).

Re: Mike Holmes Ride

Giordano — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 19:19:18 -0000

Long time fan Jeff!
Great to see you back "On The Air"
Looking forward to seeing more ...

Re: Zelaya’s Plane Redirected to El Salvador – Disaster Averted

Giordano — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 10:02:33 -0000

" I don't know why they would fake any of this."

You're kidding right?

You can't imagine any reason whatsoever for the protesters and their collaborators in the "news media" to fake blood / death?

Re: The Goonies 2 and Gremlins 3 go Direct to DVD?

Giordano — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 14:57:35 -0000

This would really make me angry as well. They would be complete idiots to release goonies or Gremlins to Dvd. Do they NOT want a HUGE blockbuster? What about loss in merchandising sales?
I want my Gremlins done right!!!

If its direct to DVD I'll pirate a copy (can't give them money for such a travesty) and mail it to WB with a big F and a big U on the front.

Re: First Look: Morgan Spurlockâ€™s Where In The World is Osama Bin Laden?

Giordano — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 19:53:42 -0000

Kola Boof, the self-professed ex-mistress of bin Ladin, has claimed that she was interrogated at the Pentagon about her supposed former lover, and that she passed along the tip -- from "the Arab grapevine" -- that he was in south Waziristan. She revealed this to the public, however, only after John Lehman of the 9-11 commission had said the same thing.

For an eye-opening insight into the veracity of this would-be bin Ladin hanger-on, see http://kolaspoof.blogspot.com.

Re: Question: How Has the PG-13 Rating Changed Over The Years (if at all)?

Giordano — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 11:39:07 -0000

The ratings are pretty much useless nowadays, especially in the PG-13 realm. Best bet -- use a site like Screen It (http://www.screenit.com) that details everything you need to know (far more than any other site/service), w/o passing judgment on whether the stuff is good or bad.

Re: Question: How Has the PG-13 Rating Changed Over The Years (if at all)?

Giordano — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 11:42:02 -0000

That's a flawed site -- No one can say what's appropriate or not for a child of a certain age without personally knowing that kid. Some 13-year-olds can handle material a 15-year-old can't, etc. Anyone giving a specific age recommendation is doing a disservice to parents.

Re: Login | Shanzai.com Analyzing Wacky Asian Shanzhai Gadgets | Username, Password, Forgot, Register, Log

Giordano — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 04:40:22 -0000

The Apple Tablet or Apple Netbook should have these features:

- First of all, light. 400 g or less would be great.
- As small as possible. Pocketable would be great.
- Video out to connect to videoprojectors.
- USB to connect remote control.

And last but not least, Mac inside, because we need it for full-blown presentations from NATIVE Keynote (.key) and NATIVE PowerPoint (.ppt) files.

We need thousands for out University.

Re: Login | Shanzai - Shanzhai Phone, Shanzhai Netbook | Password, Forgot, Username, Log, Remember

Giordano — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 02:39:26 -0000

As light as possible (400 g or less would be great).
As small as possible (pocketable, if possible).
Video-out port to connect to videoprojector.
USB port for remote control.
Mac inside to run full-blown presentations (transitions, animations, etc) from NATIVE Keynote (.key) and NATIVE PowerPoint (.ppt) files.

Here is an order of thousands for our University.

Re: Sony Already Passing Playstation Motion Controller Kits Out To Developers

Giordano — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 12:20:34 -0000

Sony's large internal studios will be crucial here - just like it's the Nintendo games that drive the Wii. Whereas MS are going to have to rely heavily on 3rd parties to ensure the tech is a success, Sony will be able to get things going with 1st party games.

Another advantage is that being similar to the Wii it will be easier for the developers to get their head around - for example a PS3 version of Ubisofts ever popular "Rabbid Rabbits" games would be relatively easy to port over.

With Microsofts Natal concept it's a case of going back to the drawing board with game design. I also worry that it won't see the light of day until 2011 and worry that when it does the camera will be extremely expensive because of the tech that is in it.

Also using mocked up concept trailers instead of sicking to stage demos like Sony did leave MS open to a big backlash when the 'real' retail version turns out to be not quite as good as they implied - just look at the original E3 concept of the twin-HDMI PS3 or the 2005 Killzone 2 CG trailer.

Re: Ubisoft Reckons The PS3 Faces An “Uphill Struggle” In The UK

Giordano — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 06:47:38 -0000

I stopped reading at "the former Microsoft employee of six years"

Fact is Sony launched in Europe a full 16 months after the 360 and now they are virtually identical in terms of hardware sales. Adjust global hardware figures to assume a joint launch and the PS3 has sold 3-4 million more than the 360.

That alone makes his comment nul and void. Seems those six years at the big M left an impression on him...

Let's just break that down a bit more - 360 launches as the only next gen console with no competition, is relatively cheap for the basic setup, has quite a few launch games, has MS's big pot of advertising money, has the press and blogsphere eating out of their hands. PS3 launches up against and established Wii and 360 competitors, is relatively expensive, is critised for lack of launch games, doesn't have the money to advertise, and is subject to a torrent of negative press. Yet despite all these factors the PS3 is still OUTSELLING the 360.

Look forward 12 months in which time we'll have events like Uncharted 2, MAG, Heavy Rain, God of War III, possibly GT5 launching, the motion controller launching, and crucially the 3rd year price cut (possibly with redesigned hardware) and I think you'll be looking at a different picture.

I don't expect them to catch the Wii (unless their motion controller really really takes off) but I'm pretty certain the Microsoft will finish in last place again - the only reason they aren't last now is the fact they rushed to market (at the expense of hardware quality) in order to buld up an artificial lead.

Re: A new look for Lijit

Giordano — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 12:09:28 -0000

I created an account and list of resources on Lijit this weekend, but can't bear to add the widget to my blog as the colors would kill my design. I need color and CSS choice from Lijit before I'll consider placing the widget.

I'm just saying.

Re: Productivity Today

Giordano — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 09:35:08 -0000

According to the clock in the background, the Internet went down and came back up immediately. No time elapsed. =)

Re: Is silver money better than paper money?

Giordano — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 13:16:15 -0000

Your math is a bit off. If you had $1000 worth of silver quarters, today they would be worth $12,000, not $3,000 (since each is worth $3, and there are 4 quarters in a dollar).

Just keeping it real :)

Re: The Ultimate Apple Tablet Mockup Guide

Giordano — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 08:18:56 -0000

First picture of:

Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

iNetbook rerendered:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fotoboer/3226244527

AWESOME!!!

Re: Гласувания в Music Idol

Giordano — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 13:40:45 -0000

Ами нали е на живо. Какъв е проблема? В България го гледаме по наше време от 20 часа, а македонците от 19.

Re: Microsoft grapples with netbooks

Giordano — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 08:33:00 -0000

The crapware you find on an OEM laptop is there becuase of the OEM, not Microsoft.

For Windows 95 Microsoft tried to restrict that desktop and keep it clean but the OEMs complained to the DOJ; this desktop issue became part of the antitrust consent decree. Microsoft had to open it up. OEMs then put the crapware on there because they are greedy and used the Microsoft Windows desktop as a revenue stream, not realizing they were ultimately hurting themselves and Microsoft.

Despite this, Windows PCs outsell Apple about 30 to 1. And netbooks are a non-problem for Microsoft; Windows 7 will be pre-loaded on most of them for Christmas and it will be fast and lean.

The Windows 7 desktop should be a different story; OEMs will play ball because they see how the crapware hurts their rep.

Re: Confirmed: Paul Allen's Vulcan lays off 50 workers

Giordano — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 09:24:00 -0000

I use to work at Vulcan and met uncle Paul a few times but soon understood that like other comments is that he is a bad judge of those he could trust; there are so many greedy parasites in his company. His sister tries her best to weed out wasteful projects but too often amongst those weeds are some benificial golden geese. Those with good morals and ethics really like Paul and feel sorry for him and his family; he just does not know who to trust. I hope that he and his family stay healthy and that some day he finds the right people to surround himself with.

- Previous Employee

Re: Deb Markham

Giordano — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 12:05:34 -0000

Awesome link. Too bad everyone isn't reading it.

Re: The John O’Donoghue files (Part 9 – Turin)

Giordano — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 03:59:01 -0000

Bock - entirely correct. i've also looked through the Turin files and you are dead right. they did absolutely nothing.

at all.

not a bit. nothing. nada.

Re: 78 Photography Rules for Complete Idiots

Giordano — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 12:30:52 -0000

1 Web Design Rule for Complete Idiots:

Don't unnecessarily embed text in images. Talk about a hack.

Re: Getting Kicked In the Nuts

Giordano — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 14:48:38 -0000

As a woman who has given vaginal birth without pain relievers (with exception of for the episiotomies of which one wore off soon and stitches were finished without, in addition to also ripping still), I'd much rather be a man to be kicked! WHY?? Because overall, that only lasts minutes and they usually don't puke though they may feel nauseaus. Can't say that for labor!!!!! And how long labor/delivery lasts.. more than a few minutes. And yes, complications can occur with both.. kicks or childbirth, so that's even!! (Though I bet there's hardly been a man who was killed from a kick!)
P.S. I wanted some pain killer with my second, but it was tooooo late in the labor part....

Re: Police Beat-up Pastor on Camera

Giordano — Wed, 13 May 2009 18:47:34 -0000

How dare this guy actually ask the cop to tell him what law he was breaking? Doesn’t he know the cops can do what they want because they want? I mean WTF does guy think is in the USA? P.S. If you get your ass kicked for using your right, then you don’t really have them !!

Re: When Crazy Isn’t Crazy Anymore: Life Balance and Insanity

Giordano — Mon, 26 May 2008 12:24:00 -0000

You're so right. And the quote is very appropriate. Nice post :)

Re: Reinstall Windows XP without product activation

Giordano — Thu, 06 May 2004 02:54:32 -0000

Hello!

I have Windows XP PRO legally installed on my laptop (bought it withought any OS pre-installed). However this laptop turned out to be a complete disaster and I'm giving it back to the place I bought from, to get a completely different machine. How can I install and re-activate my Windows XP PRO version into a different machine?

Re: What will the new Apple Tablet look like?

Giordano — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 03:25:23 -0000

iNetbook rerendered:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fotoboer/3226244527

Re: What will the new Apple Tablet look like?

Giordano — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 03:26:11 -0000

Mac OS X inside and video-out port on a 300 to 600 g small device tablet. That is all needed for success. The iPod touch is too limited with its crippled OS inside.

The MacBook Air is too heavy and large, besides being port-limited.

Or bring a MacBook Air mini at 1/4 the MacBook Air size, no more than 600 g and with real independent ports: video-out, Ethernet, Firewire, USB2, SD card.

Or bring them all: iPod TABLET, Mac TABLET and MacBook TABLET. This is certainly the best approach, for anyone to get any of them.

Re: Leaked shot of Apple’s Website showing Macbook Touch?

Giordano — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:02:00 -0000

We are sold as long as it runs Apple Keynote and Microsoft PowerPoint NATIVE presentation files, has video out to connect to videoprojector, has USB to connect the presentation remote, is has light as possible (400 g or so would be great) and is as small as possible (pocketable would be great).

It is not to work on it, but for the keynote and PowerPoint presentations. Because even the MacBook Air is too heavy, too large and too port-limited.

We need thousands for our University.

Re: Some Social Capital

Giordano — Sun, 11 Dec 2005 21:47:29 -0000

There is a Kroger nearby with self-checkout that weights the product you are scanning and then weighs it again once you put it in the bag, no doubt to prevent customers from bagging items that they did not scan.

Re: Adam Smith: Yokel

Giordano — Fri, 23 Dec 2005 16:46:06 -0000

Krugman doesn't dispute the Laffer curve. In fact, in article Prof. Boudreux links to, Krugman wrote:

The starting point of supply-side economics is an assertion that no economist would dispute: taxes reduce the incentive to work, save and invest. A businessman who knows that 70 cents of every extra dollar he makes will go to the I.R.S. is less willing to make the effort to earn that extra dollar than if he knows that the I.R.S. will take only 35 cents. So reducing tax rates will, other things being the same, spur the economy.

What Krugman disputes is the political proposition of "supply side economics" -- the claim that we are beyond peak of the Laffer curve, and thus tax rates and tax revenues are *always* inversely related. Hard-core supply-siders predicted that Clinton's tax increases would cause economic disaster. They were encouraging their followers to divest from the stock market in the 90's, and didn't apologize for being badly wrong.

Krugman has attacked both right-wing supply-siders and left-wing protectionists. His attacks on the left are in his earlier Fortune articles, his Slate article "In Praise of Cheap Labor" http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html, and his book "The Age of Diminished Articles". Since he began writing for the New York Times, he has become a shrill, polemical, sometimes unfair, critic of the Bush Administration. However, Krugman's economic claims have been far more honest those of the Administration. Bush has claimed to support free trade while raising steel tarrifs and continuing massive agricultural subsidies. Bush has claimed that most of his tax cuts go to the middle class when this is not so. Bush has pretended to be fiscally conservative without vetoing a single spending bill. Krugman has correctly noted this.

So who is more dangerous? -- An economist who likes free trade and capitalism generally, but who also supports single-payer health care (read socialized medicine); or a president who pretends to be a fiscally-conservative free-trader but actually inflates the deficit to sky-high levels by spending billions of dollars on agricultural subsidies, pension and airline bailouts, Medicare expansion, Homeland Security pork, Hurricane Katrina pork, Iraq War no-bid contracting, and highway bill pork. Democrats dispensed plenty of pork when they controlled Congress, but, as I recall from a WSJ article, there have been far more pork add-ons under Republican rule. Who is more reckless, Krugman or Bush?

Re: Adam Smith: Yokel

Giordano — Fri, 23 Dec 2005 16:51:37 -0000

The Krugman quote I cited is from "Tax Cut Con" published in the New York Times on 9.14.03.

Re: When Does Inequality Matter?

Giordano — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 19:42:31 -0000

"Let's face the reality of human nature that people DO care about their place in society and they DO care about what the top 1% or doing, and nothing is going to change that."

Lots of things we thought were basic human nature to care about turned out not to be so. In the 1950s, white southerners firmly believed it was better for the races to be segregated. That didn't make it natural, or moral, or a decent basis for public policy. Nor is it, in my opinion, moral to base policy preferences on what is greed for what your neighbor has.

Now, don't misunderstand me, I'm not saying that redistribution is equal to segregation or some such. But what I am saying is that the leap from "well, that's what people preferences are" to public policy programs is a stretch. Maybe people's preferences OUGHT to be disregarded.

Re: Please, No Politicians In My Family

Giordano — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 07:55:09 -0000

Muirgeo, money is not only definitely speech; it's the most reliable kind of speech. The less a message costs, the less discrimnating people are when deciding to back that message.

Re: Please, No Politicians In My Family

Giordano — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 19:32:08 -0000

But to most, money in politics is all about bribery, influence peddling and coercion.

Bill Gates has just has much right to e-mail, write, call or talk directly to politicians as I do and no more.

What "most" believe has no bearing on what it actually is. You're right about you and Gates. You both have, ideally at least, an unrestricted right to do so. Yours is just more limited by your means than his. There's nothing Orwellian about recognizing that spending conveys a message, and a more reliable one than mere words, at that. Ever tell anyone to put his money where his mouth is?

Have you figured out yet how giving more power to government is going to cure corruption in government?

Re: Exodus to the virtual world

Giordano — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 16:13:23 -0000

Randy, you can also back up just a little bit, rather than starting over completely, and undo what might have seemed at the time like a good decision, like playing nice with Montezuma, axe-rushing Mansa Musa, or not destroying the Romans before they could get that iron deposit hooked up. Not that I'd encourage that, of course.

Agree on the second part, too. In all the incarnations I've bought, my total spent is well upwards of $39.95, but I can't think of anywhere that I've gotten more for my entertainment dollar than the Civ franchise.

Re: Ode to the Patriots

Giordano — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 15:06:19 -0000

Excellent ode!

Re: Trade and National Defense

Giordano — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 06:19:55 -0000

If I knew what minimal was, I'd have been more specific ;-). In this case, I think we can make the lag time due specifically to your concerns zero, but that involves a bit of speculation on my part. Namely, I speculate that those people whose job it is to ensure our military readiness recognize the same concerns and the fairly obvious steps that can be taken now to avoid possible calamity later. Those steps include establishing our capability to replicate what might be cut off, stockpiling those parts before the danger of being cut off materializes, making sure we have enough counterleverage to make such cutting off as unlikely as possible, and keeping maintenance up to speed to ensure that fleet reduction due to a need for parts is minimized, just to name a few. The delay in getting a piece returned to the field may still be too long for a given catastrophe, but it would be the same delay as in a "100% homegrown" system. The marginal delay due to the foreign source is the only thing I'm speaking of in this thread.

I'm not saying anything can't happen, just that this particular danger in this particular case can be planned for and very much mitigated. Failure to do that planning would make it very real, indeed, but that failure's in our hands, not France's. In other words, we obviously have to think about leg protection before we enter the desert, but we haven't entered the desert just by awarding this contract.

Re: Trade and National Defense

Giordano — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 13:09:54 -0000

Bear in mind that the ambiguous language is coming from me, an observer, rather than those making the contracts. I'm not arranging your air support. I'm not negotiating or drafting the contract. I'm just thinking in print about a somewhat vague supply chain hypothetical with plenty of undefined parameters. My answers, such as they are, can't be any more precise than the question they're addressing.

Accepting the impasse, I would like to clarify a couple of things.

First, France owns about 15% of EADS. Combine that fact with the various avenues of leverage the U.S. may have independent of this contract, and the French government's ability to unilaterally rescind or renege is somewhat less than unconstrained.

Second, I'd be shocked to find out any facet of the military is free of political pressure. The mere fact of it doesn't say much, though, since that pressure can flow any different direction. I know that given EADS' participation and the 2004 shenanigans regarding the same fleet replacement the USAF took special care that all its bases were covered, in light of anticipated political blowback. This leads me to believe that the most stringent pressure coming down the line on this issue would be in the direction of making sure we could replace needed parts on our own.

Third, I'm not sure I understand your use of feel good political correctness here. Awarding the contract to a firm so tightly associated with Europe in general and specifically France was bound to be politically unpopular. So either the USAF decided to accept the superior proposal, despite its political incorrectness, or they decided to accept an inferior and politically unpopular proposal. I can't see sufficient incentive to do the latter, so I suspect the former is the case. The politically correct thing to do would have been accepting the American firm's proposal, inferior or not, and trumpet the American jobs created.

As always, I appreciate the exchange.

Re: Better

Giordano — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 11:20:57 -0000

Clearly such a blasé statement can only be given by someone who does not believe there are any real pollution dangers around.

No, it could also be given by someone who believes the existent pollution dangers, regardless of their extent, are less than they were at some other time or in some other place (given the chart, I'd guess Prof. Roberts is going for the temporal comparison).

Re: The Course of Human Labor in Markets

Giordano — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 09:28:34 -0000

Chris:

Those are either more expensive than strawberries you could have bought were it not for the barrier, or they're cheaper (or roughly the same price). In the first case, the rest of the neighborhood is made worse off in order to benefit the 20 strawberry growers, since they have less left over after buying strawberries than they would without the barrier. In the second case, the incentives for those 20 people to grow strawberries are there without the barrier, since they can do so competitively and efficiently. Now, in the second case, introduction of the barrier removes some of those incentives, because they now have a captive market and are only subject to competition from one another, rather than strawberry growers across the world. This ultimately moves the second case into the first, where strawberries in your neighborhood are more expensive because of the barrier erected.

You may argue that having 20 fewer people idle during the day is a benefit to the neighborhood, but the barrier isn't necessary for this. If those 20 people idle are imposing such a cost on the neighborhood that putting them to work, even non-productively, is a net benefit, then nothing is keeping the neighbors from creating make-work projects for them. In other words, even if they can't grow strawberries competitively, put them to work growing strawberries, just to keep them busy. The cost you bear from buying their overpriced strawberries is, in this case, less than the cost you bear from having them out of work. As above, if they can grow strawberries competitively, nothing in the barrier-free neighborhood is keeping them from doing that. The barrier also locks up those 20 people (or some other group of resources), regardless of what need may arise tomorrow.

No matter what the case, efficient or inefficient strawberry growing, idle workers being an economic drag or simply not contributing positively, the barrier does nothing to help the situation. It only appears to when (a) the behavior it's supposed to encourage would have happened anyway, or (b) seen benefits (strawberries in the market, 20 people working) are paired with unseen costs (higher strawberry prices, opportunity costs).

Re: The Course of Human Labor in Markets

Giordano — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 12:34:24 -0000

Chris,

You're absolutely right that such action by the neighbors is a barrier in its own right, and carries with it the problems you mention. However, the case where the cost of 20 idlers is greater than the cost of supporting 20 unneeded, inefficient strawberry growers is the only case in which the neighborhood is better off putting the idlers to work unproductively growing strawberries. My point with that comment was simply that the same effects could be achieved even in that limited case without the barrier being imposed, which may be a distinction with no difference.

I think the "real answer" is that the idlers go find a neighborhood with a shortage of capacity, but I didn't read that possibility into the hypothetical. Similarly, I assume that your stipulation of idle capacity means that no matter how free and innovative, the neighbors simply can't find a productive use for these people, which I don't think will typically be the case. Those two constraints gave rise to the comment you object to now.

In paying more for the strawberries under these conditions, the neighbors are basically buying more than strawberries. They're also buying protection from petty crime and reducing whatever other costs are associated with the idlers. They're still each determining, though, how much all of that extra benefit is worth, rather than having a worth determined for them and the price imposed (and sale forced) on them from above. Because of that, I still think the neighborhood is better off in this case than with the imposed barrier in place, even if only slightly.

Re: The Camel In the Tent

Giordano — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 11:12:56 -0000

Ernesto and DAVE, did you not know? Paulson summoned the CEOs of the top nine banks, and the CEOs were told that they had to sign the document before they left. Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo didn't need any bailouts, but they still had to agree to sell preferred shares to the feds.

They couldn't leave. What if they had tried? Well, they simply couldn't.

"Luca Brasi held a gun to his head, and my father assured him that either his brains or his signature would be on the contract."

Can you think of a more blatant display of government force in recent years? I have to go back to Ruby Ridge and the siege of the Branch Davidians: "You do what we want, or else."

Of course, Jamie Dimon (JPM's CEO) didn't mind the bailout funds. He serves on the board of directors of the New York Fed and can thus already engineer sweetheart loans for JPM, but TARP? TARP is tens of billions of virtually free taxpayer money, as far as he's concerned.

Re: Jim Crow Was a Product of Government

Giordano — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 11:04:21 -0000

"Robert Smith points out that slavery is as old as civilization."

I should have clarified: slavery cannot continue to exist if there's no government. It's true that slavery is as simple as controlling another person's life by the threat and/or use of force. But we're talking about it as an institution.

My point is that if there's no government to sanction slavery, then the slaves can rise up against their masters; it becomes a matter of who is the strongest.

When owners do not have enough force themselves to keep all slaves in line, and when they want others to be compelled to help recover runaway slaves or at least be afraid to help runaways, then a government is needed. Whether it's the antebellum south or ancient Mesopotamia, it's about some sort of a police force to recover runaway slaves, and the same police would use the authority of "the law" to punish those who aided escaped slaves. This takes care of the occasional runaway or small group of runaways. To be effective, a great many slaves would need to rise up simultaneously, like Spartacus' revolt.

Re: MySpace News “Stealing” My Content?

Giordano — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 01:14:15 -0000

Heh. Techcrunch is just trying to whip up a frenzy. But, it's the same thing About, Netscape, and all those do. They're embarassing themselves more than MySpace.

Re: Impatica ShowMate Reviewed

Giordano — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:21:07 -0000

Anybody knows if the Impatica ShowMate works with the new iPhone 3G or the new iPod touch wih new firmware to be released on 11th July 2008? Thanks!

Re: Impatica ShowMate rereviewed

Giordano — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 15:36:34 -0000

Anybody knows if the Impatica ShowMate works with the new iPhone 3G or the new iPod touch wih new firmware to be released on 11th July 2008? Thanks!

Re: Dragon Ball Kai – 100 episodios en HD

Giordano — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 06:39:36 -0000

amigo donde veo el episodio donde esta el link para descargar?

Re: Unusual Paintings of Obama Naked with Unicorns

Giordano — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 11:28:52 -0000

This artist needs some major therapy

Re: East Meets West 115

Giordano — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:42:46 -0000

I'm sorry to say that I stopped listening to this episode about 12 minutes into it. Irene's a nice woman (maybe even charming), but she's just not a good fit for this show. I don't know what was worse, her attempts to bring the conversation down to her level, or you guys pandering to her to make her fit into the show.

Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying Irene is dumb or inarticulate. But you have a sophisticated level of discourse that not everyone can participate in - I know that if I were in a room with your two, I'd barely speak a word. Though I sure would learn a lot, which is why I listen.

I guess my point is please, please, please, pick your guests carefully, pick guests that can "keep up" with you. Or, if you can't do that, keep the conversation at a level that the guest can comprehend.

Thanks for reading my rant.

Re: Video de McAffe sobre spywares

Giordano — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 20:04:43 -0000

a mi tampoco me parece paranóico, sino todo lo contrario. hace un par de años vi un video muy similar, pero más desconcertante, en el que sólo con entrar a un sitio todo windows terminaba jodiéndose en menos de 5 minutos.
incluso usando firefox me han "juackeado" el navegador, tan sólo por visitar un sitio de un casino en línea. tal sitio se había vuelto mi homepage por defecto!
un saludo

Re: Windows 7 Readyboost Really Boosts

Giordano — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 07:24:22 -0000

ReadyBoost on Vista only made a difference (how big is up to debate) with machines with very low RAM. Is this no longer the case? I have 3Gb and am wondering if it's still worth doing it.

Re: Windows 7 And Its Running Processes

Giordano — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 05:13:50 -0000

I'm unsure in Windows 7 but in Vista, disabling the Windows Search service still allows searching for Start Menu items. I never search for files using the Start Menu as it's completely impractical.

I had it turned off for about a year but decided to turn it back on and cannot notice any difference in speed. Why? Because it's very good at only running when your PC isn't in use. I do rarely actually use it though and if I'm honest I tend to search in Non-Indexed areas, making it a bit pointless. I know where my Documents are.
I turned off:
* Windows Time - Completely pointless outside of the Server world
* Windows Defender - A bit pointless when it only offers Anti-Spyware and not Anti-Virus/Rootkits/Trojans.
* Security Center - Only because I set UAC to Silent mode and enabled Security Center complains it's turned off
* Smart Card - Why this is ever enabled by default is beyond me
* Help and Support - I have the Internet

Re: Finding Files Faster with Windows 7 Search

Giordano — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 10:57:37 -0000

I'm not sure about point 5 but all the other tips also already work in Vista.

Re: Five Things I Hate About Django.

Giordano — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 04:19:04 -0000

While it's very new, I'd be interested to see what you think of TurboGears2.

Re: An idea a day – Recomendation system based ad network

Giordano — Sun, 11 May 2008 15:29:45 -0000

A good idea, through there are about three-dozen companies I know of competing over the space from slightly different angles. There are ad-network optimizers (Rubicon Project, YieldBuild, PubMatic), product recommendation systems (Chitika, plus a few dozen similar ones as well as Amazon's on-page boxes), then cross-site recommenders (Aggregate Knowledge, CleverSet) and the like.

Likewise, for your bid-management idea, there are many (Efficient Frontier, Clickable, etc.)

I tend not to worry too much about competition, but several of these are done by top-notch founders.

Re: Video: Absinthe Shot

Giordano — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 04:28:59 -0000

You drank it neat! :mrgreen: Alfred Jarry did as well.. but usually it is taken with a 1:4 ratio absinthe to chilled water. The idea is to release the herbal oils and the thujone contained in Grande Wormwood. Some folks also add sugar to the water via an absinthe spoon.

Beware! Many fake absinthes in the USA have no thujone at all and therefore no effect :sad: The US will not allow thujone due to some dumb law dating back to Prohibition. Such is life...

The big boys of absinthe have 100mg thujone - one is called Century Absinthe 100 and there are a few others as well. These you can only get these real absinthes online from Europe.

The basic rule is NO THUJONE = NO EFFECT. Enjoy your travels :grin:

Re: How to protect your Mac OS X from first ever Mac OS X Botnet

Giordano — Thu, 21 May 2009 22:05:52 -0000

The first part of the so-called "bot-net" symptoms was due to DNS cache poisoning. You can check against your ISP's DNS servers by opening up Terminal (/Applications/Utilities/Terminal) and typing the following:
cat /etc/hosts
This is mainly evident in Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, but not 10.5 Leopard; as Leopard lists any and all DNS servers in System Preferences -> Network -> [Network Service] -> DNS, whereas you can hide certain DNS servers from Tiger.

@dude (and whomever else this concerns),
Macs are kind of a different breed, where when systems are compromised, it is usually because the user was tricked into entering their password, or because the user was doing something out of a typical moral scope (i.e. downloading commercial software from P2P sites, etc).

Windows users (please notice I don't use the term "PC" to describe Windows) can be subject to the same thing or by the same methods, except most Windows systems out there still practice old and insecure policies; and/or people are too lazy to keep their systems updated and well protected. Windows, by default, has exponentially more security flaws than any other modern day operating system. It's not that Mac users are snooty. It's that they are so grateful not to have to fight their operating system, or have to know a Windows genius to configure their system properly.

In any case, both parties are generally ill-informed about modern day computing and the basic concepts of how the internet works. Case-in-point, the author of this article Salman Ul Haq seems to think that 90-100% of processor usage equates a possible virus infection. How are people like this posing as viable authorities to the general computing public?

The internet: Taken with a grain of salt.

@Edward,
The whole "Just works" thing is really old. Lern2troll better.

Re: Source Code of Several Atari 7800 Games Released!

Giordano — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 17:31:19 -0000

7800 PAL OS is a 404

Re: Denver’s season ends in overtime

Giordano — Sun, 31 Dec 2006 21:55:19 -0000

Shanny and Lynch are
Bush backers? Reggie Bush or the Idiot-in-Chief?

If the latter, they're clearly idiots themselves and today's loss suddenly makes sense.

Re: http://blog.inc.com/archives/2004/12/the_apprentice_15.html

Giordano — Fri, 17 Dec 2004 15:29:32 -0000

Kreplach: You confused my post (Kevin S.) with that written by someone else. If you read my post, you see that I favored Jenn.

Re: http://blog.inc.com/archives/2004/04/the_donaldfinal.html

Giordano — Thu, 22 Apr 2004 11:32:24 -0000

For those still tuning in, you might wish to read Mark Cuban's remarks directed at Trump. His comments are given on his blog located here:
http://www.blogmaverick.com/entry/8277407862895830/

Interestingly enough, Kwame will be working for Cuban.

Re: http://blog.inc.com/archives/2005/07/the_cost_of_cos.html

Giordano — Fri, 22 Jul 2005 11:04:55 -0000

I have a family of 4 (2 adults and 2 young boys). Costco saves me a lot of money. I don't buy things I don't need. If I can't find things in Costco, then I usually get them from Whole Foods. (BTW, I don't compare the organic version with the non-organic version since Costco does not really carry organic food.) A box of salad of the exact same brand cost the same in Costco as a bag (1/5 of size) in Whole Foods. 2-3 lbs of samll tomato costs the same as a small box of tomato in regular supermarket. The list goes on. I don't buy more than I need. I compare the unit prices AND the total prices (for the same brands or equivalent). If the selection is more (or bigger) than I would need, I decide if the throwing away the unused would still save me money (in unit and total cost) compared buying from the alternative location for the samller size. Only then do I buy the Costco size.

If you still don't know why people love Costco, most likely you don't have a family. As a single, depending of your shopping habit, you may not save enough for the $45 membership.

Re: SteampunkWallpaper.com Wants Your Ideas!

Giordano — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 02:52:13 -0000

A couple of wallpapers on Flickr...

http://www.flickr.com/search/?w=52067454@N00&am...

Re: Why Apple’s Tablet Will Eat Kindle’s Lunch

Giordano — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 13:09:55 -0000

The Mac Tablet must be:

- Light (400 g or less).
- Small (as pocketable as possible).
- With video-out and USB for Keynote and PowerPoint presentations. That means Mac inside.

We need thousands for our University.

Re: DreamScreen: HP Beats Apple to the Punch With Sleek Tablet

Giordano — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 02:51:45 -0000

The last thing we will do is to buy an HP product. HP, you cheated us once. Not again!

Concerning the comparison with the Apple Tablet, there is no comparison. The Apple Tablet will blow this crap away.

Re: Apple’s Snow Leopard is a Smash Hit

Giordano — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 12:01:53 -0000

You say that iMovie HD 6 (iMovie 06) works with 10.6. Have you tried using stills in iMovie 06 with 10.6

Please tell us more.

Re: New York Subway Boss Wants Fares To Be Like Cell Phone Calls

Giordano — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 10:54:09 -0000

FWIW, I think the London tube has day passes that block out the rush hour times, encouraging lower fares to reduce the peak demand.

Re: J1772 Standard for Charging Electric Cars Should be Adopted Soon

Giordano — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 11:00:32 -0000

None of those are designed for automotive environments, and require special fixtures to be used outdoors anyways.

Not sure if the communication over power line would work on a normal plug, but in theory it could.

Re: Citrix to fully open source XenServer | virtualization.info

Giordano — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 18:57:37 -0000

If you own VMware stock dump it. This is further commoditization of virtualization as just a feature for all. The money is made in managing the enviroment. Who pays for DHCP or DNS services anymore? You don't, you buy tools that manage these services. VMware is failing to tear its own business model down before its competitiors do.

Re: If I Came to Your Town, Would You Come See Me?

Giordano — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 18:27:52 -0000

Another vote for Philadelphia!

Re: Is My Electric Bicycle Lame?

Giordano — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 15:51:20 -0000

My wife and I rented electric bikes to do a 700 meter climb to Creux du Van in Switzerland. Link (in German):

http://www.rentabike.ch/dynasite.cfm?dsmid=78629&Search=&CatSelect=&RegionenSelect=&SchwierigkeitSelect=&action=viewdet&ID=13&page=0

We had lots of fun and it was the first time in 15 years she and I could bike together. We definitely want to do something like that again.

Re: [update] Apple’s Secret Product is a MacBook Touch?

Giordano — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 18:15:11 -0000

Here it is:

Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

ROCKING!

Re: Macbook Touch? Think Again. Completely Re-vamped Notebook Line Instead?

Giordano — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 18:40:37 -0000

Check this out:

iPhone Pro:
The full power of Leopard in your pocket.
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/gallery/image_...
http://www.ilounge.com/gallery/iphone_concept/i...

We need thousands for our University if they come with the FULL Mac OS X inside, Firewire and Ethernet ports.

Re: Apple COO Tim Cook Comments on Netbook, iPhone Pricing Changes

Giordano — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 17:40:53 -0000

Here it is:

Next Apple moves will be Books and Games…
http://spidouz.wordpress.com/2008/09/03/next-ap...

Re: Mikey’s Hookup Coming to Front Street in Dumbo

Giordano — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 10:38:26 -0000

great news. when do you open?

Re: Municipal Art Society Party for Preservation 7/15

Giordano — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 10:14:52 -0000

How was the party? Anybody got any pics of the inside of galapagos? What's the layout?

Re: Choice Market to Occupy J Condo Location

Giordano — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:20:06 -0000

Great news! They should do well with all the foot traffic in and out of the subway. Welcome guys.

Re: Choice Market to Occupy J Condo Location

Giordano — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 16:18:11 -0000

Breaking News: Lovable Dumbo Couple to Adjust Begging Strategy.

Cracky and partner announced today that they would adjust their begging strategy by splitting their workday between Peas & Pickles and the upcoming Choice Market. They hope to capitalize on the lucrative spare change from morning coffee and muffin consumers heading to the F train. The couple plans to experiment with having someone posted at each location simultaneously, and doing the full press at on location at a time. Cracky and partner are already planning to purchase larger rocks, and are hoping the increased income will fund better crack-smoking equipment.

The couple have also requested that the L Magazine reposition their magazine dispenser closer to Choice to better facilitate leaning while begging. Cracky added: "God bless you sweetie - got some change?"

Re: Signs of Dumbo Gentrification

Giordano — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 15:39:16 -0000

Speaking of Smokey... He was spotted on Water street between Washington and Main, peeking into a broken car window. Cracky must have seen me coming with her bulging cracked-out eyes, and took off back to her perch on Front St. Guess it was a slow night in front of Peas n Pickles, and had to go out looking for "work". He looked startled when he spotted me, and gave me a glare as he moved on. I think I interrupted his business.

Re: Signs of Dumbo Gentrification

Giordano — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 16:00:29 -0000

Oh no, here we go again with the P&P panhandlers. I can't believe we're still talking about this? Who is giving these people money, anyways?

Re: Signs of Dumbo Gentrification

Giordano — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 10:26:55 -0000

Anyone notice the crackheads have been MIA the past couple of days? With all that money you keep giving them, they took a vacation to the beach! Ha ha! You guys are suckers for supporting them.

Re: Signs of Dumbo Gentrification

Giordano — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 11:47:57 -0000

What happened to those signs posted that said "Please don't feed the crackheads" They need to put those back up.

Re: Signs of Dumbo Gentrification

Giordano — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 13:20:10 -0000

What can we do to stop this? I googled dumbo panhandlers online and turned up a few posts online from Aug 07 and Nov 07. It seems that going to the police did not work - even after documented harrassment. It would be great to see some fun artisitic response to "Cracky + Smokey" from our more art-inclined neighbors. Here are some fun ideas:

1. Recreate those "Please don't feed the crackheads" signs and repost them on the sign posts (or Peas n Pickles stairs?) Make the signs look official.

2. Paint "Official Crack-money begging area" in paint on the sidewalk. To keep them confined to one area.

3. Film a documentary, telling their true story. The documentary would reveal how much $ they beg everyday, and their real income, as well as display where & how they live, plus how many crack rocks the money you give them buys. Follow them as they vandalize the neighborhood, and harass locals.

4. Set up a homeless-relief donation booth at the corner to compete with them.

5. Any more ideas... ?

Re: Signs of Dumbo Gentrification

Giordano — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 10:02:01 -0000

Last night, the guy in the wheelchair was begging in front of PnP, and sensing competition, Dumbo's Dynamic Duo took off. I'd rather have that guy out there anyday - he really needs help.

Re: NY Times Visits Fulton Ferry, Dumbo, and Vinegar Hill

Giordano — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 10:16:06 -0000

The author of dumbonyc.com buys his coke off of cracky, and will therefore never do a real posting about the Dynamic Duo. The author will take this comment down real fast. Watch!

Re: How You Can Help Stop Crime in Dumbo/Vinegar Hill

Giordano — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 16:21:41 -0000

Suzanne, I don't think Smokey and Cracky are going to stab any children with needles - that kind of response (What about the Children!?!?!? hysteria) from residents probably just ends up supporting those misguided ghetto preservationists that think the two panhandlers are "charming" or "an integral part of the neighborhood."

If we're going to put an end these dirtbags' behavior, we're going to have to be honest, non-alarmist, and civil. We are also going to need to take action.

I would rather see for these 2008 NYTimes articles:
"Entrepreneurial panhandlers befriend Dumbo hipsters, annoy residents, and threaten citizens" and

"Dumbo neighbors organize, reclaim street corner from thuggish scam artists" (www.nytimes.com)

Re: Car Break-in Get Some Media Attention

Giordano — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 14:25:13 -0000

Fred: Many, many, many residents and local workers agree with you. The Smokey problem is real. It's much more than a have-not fighting against the newly-arrived haves. It is about a thug acting as an aggressive and threatening presence in our neighborhood. The irritating couple do, in fact, live here in the neighborhood, and sustain themselves through begging. They have been in Dumbo for longer than most of us, and they view their struggle as a fight against a white-washing of their home by big-money condo invaders, and enjoy intimidating anyone that doesn't represent "old dumbo" (ie 1975-1998).

With more and more foot traffic here, these home-owning bums will continue to scam dollars from tourists and the hipsters who think its edgy to be "friends" with them.

Reasonable residents expect or want DUMBO to become a sterile environment, but nobody wants to be threatened by a thug while walking in their own neighborhood. Most people who dislike the derelict duo would tolerate them if they toned down. Their cocky and threatening demeanor goes against the traditional humility of asking others for help.

The 86th precinct has decided not to control the thugs, and the Dumbo business owners and property owners have dropped the ball so far.

Action is needed now. Simply ignoring cracky and smokey will not work. We need leadership, and a real plan.

I'm not advocating vigilatism or force - but some smart advocacy, and partnership between neighbors, businesses and police will go a long way to making Dumbo a better place free of this trash. Who will step up?

Re: Dumbo/VH CSA Food Photos (week of Aug 19)

Giordano — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:07:41 -0000

DB: I have spoken with NYPD officers on two occasions, both times in person. Both times the officer brushed me off - either laughed in my face, or accused me of buying drugs off of Smokey. I understand it isn't a life-threatening problem, but nobody should feel threatened while walking through their neighborhood.

I put the responsibility of removing these two warts in the hands of the property owners and business owners at Front and Washington Streets. Until they do, I no longer buy anything from the businesses that allow them to loiter.

Same goes for Bridge Apothecary - who paid cracky to distribute fliers / place on car windshields (litter). Anyone who supports these thugs is hurting the neighborhood.

Re: NYPD Sky Watch Deployed at Farragut Homes

Giordano — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 20:23:58 -0000

Cracky and Smokey have also disappeared... Did they finally get arrested? Anyone know what happened?

Re: Promenade Car Service Moves to 151 Front St.

Giordano — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 14:42:29 -0000

Promenade only charges $25 to get to Tribeca, and $35 to West Village. What a bargain! Unfortunately dry cleaning my suit for cigarette smoke and middle eastern food is not included in those prices :-(

Re: Art Installation Removed at Empire Stores

Giordano — Thu, 14 May 2009 06:33:58 -0000

wow. a great example of how painfully dumb bureaucracy ruins a good thing... thank you to the organizers who worked hard to make this happen, it was wonderful while it lasted.

Re: New Water Street Mural Sends Positive Message

Giordano — Wed, 27 May 2009 14:12:59 -0000

Beautiful. Can't wait to check it out in person.

Re: City Council to Vote on Dock Street Dumbo Today (UPDATE: Approved)

Giordano — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 15:22:51 -0000

It is increasingly evident that this project was going to happen (in some form or another) no matter what...

I'm a dumbo resident - and certainly not anti-development - but I'm always disappointed when the short-term benefits to the developer and the long-term benefits to the neighborhood are at odds. It doesn't have to be this way.

Re: Friday Reader Rants Mailbag

Giordano — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 12:39:23 -0000

Nice one. What is it about neighborhood blogs that bring out all the cranks and crazies???

Nothing to complain about, except maybe this weather ;-)

I used to complain about cracky and smokey on the corner, but the 84th increased presence seems to have moved him along to another spot (see link below).

You are correct, though... gotta take the good with the bad. I love living here, and for the most part my neighbors are great. Plus we have an awesome new icecream shop.

http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/categor...

Re: Dumbo Then and Now: N Side of Front St at Dock St

Giordano — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 10:57:32 -0000

I love your "then and now" series. please post more.

Re: Dumbo General Store New Signage

Giordano — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 14:34:35 -0000

Who cares about the sign, really? same (good) place for margaritas

Re: Dumbo Links Week of 19Jul09

Giordano — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 15:34:59 -0000

This video looks like it was filmed from roof of 133 Water St @ Adams, no?

@dumbostreets: The MTA doesn't have enough money to keep trains running, let alone *quieter*

Re: Dumbo Rezoning Passed City Council Vote

Giordano — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 14:33:15 -0000

Good news for the neighborhood, and great news for the property owners and developers north of Manhattan Br to Vinegar Hill. Here comes the gold rush.

Re: Front St Mural Taken Down

Giordano — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 10:22:21 -0000

Nonsensical bureaucratic bullshit! Why did this come down????

@ eva: Right on!

Re: Guerrilla Marketing in Dumbo

Giordano — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 13:39:42 -0000

@huh?

so happy, I need to go get me some blow for this weekend. Too bad Smokey's is 90% stepped on.

Re: One Main PH Set at $25M

Giordano — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 16:09:51 -0000

Spectacular! Not huge sq ft, but WOW factor!!!!

Re: Thursday Events in Dumbo (Aug 27, 2009)

Giordano — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 11:08:05 -0000

1) It was on the cover of the New Yorker, which surely raised significant awareness.

2) More and more people - especially Manhattanites - are discovering Dumbo every week. Each time I have friends over to my apartment, they are amazed at how cool our neighborhood is, how pleasant our waterfront is, how amazing the views are. I always tell my visiting friends "don't tell anyone!"

I'm looking forward to the summer ending and cold weather returning, so we can have our neighborhood back from day-trippers.

Re: Hecho en Dumbo Moving to Bowery

Giordano — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 09:34:17 -0000

Sad to see them go, especially with so many vacant storefronts and so few dinner options in the neighborhood. Hecho in Dumbo has good food and great atmosphere, they will be missed. Let's hope Dumbo residents and our real estate developer overlords can lure equally good restauranteurs to the area.

Re: Dumbo Then and Now: Front Street East Garrison St

Giordano — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 23:43:46 -0000

Awesome! more please.

Re: That’s why hockey rules the NBA

Giordano — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 13:44:29 -0000

Hey, Mike Jansen. No one said the NBA didn't get higher US ratings in the playoffs. The point is: we don't care. Those of us who are smart enough to recognize the greatness of playoff hockey are enjoying the heck out of it. And that includes the SIX MILLION people who watched last night. If you want to be a sheep and watch the NBA just because "more people in the US watch it," then be our guest. Hockey is being thoroughly enjoyed by a ton of people in this series, and especially here in Colorado, which has one of the highest viewership rates for hockey in the US.

Re: Blackhawks my new favorite for the Cup

Giordano — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 10:20:42 -0000

Luc Dufor, that is quite the ignorant comment that shows you know nothing of Chicago Hockey. Way to regurgitate unsubstantiated rumors for Eukland as fact.

Re: Leopold to Flames

Giordano — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:44:53 -0000

What did you guys expect for a UFA? (and one who hadn't even played that well) A 2nd rounder is pretty fair return for Leo. It's the 2nd rounder that matters here. Wake up people.

Re: Are the Avs tanking it? Some people think so

Giordano — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 15:45:44 -0000

The most excitement we could get right now would be the signing of Bozak. Please get him, FG!

Re: Man Builds 100 MPG Lotus Replica that Runs on Homebrewed Biodiesel

Giordano — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 09:54:09 -0000

Despite the small frontal area, the coefficient of drag is horrible on a Lotus 7 (replica) so his plans for aerodynamic improvements could have significant improvements in mpg.

Re: thredUP: Like Netflix, But With Clothes

Giordano — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 09:57:18 -0000

Would be interesting to see if they will do this for suits.

Many job seekers pretty much have to wear a suit to get a job, despite the fact that they will never wear a suit on the job.

Prefect candidate to rent, but you usually can only rent tuxes not suits

Re: The L Prize: A New Look at an Old Bulb

Giordano — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 10:01:02 -0000

"must meet the same amount and color as a normal 60-watt"

This isn't necessarily ideal to me. The downside of many LED lights is the bright white light that many consider harsh.

The upside is that there are many choices from warm white to daylight white and pretty much anything in between.

If we did a study, what would be the ideal spectrum for indoor lighting? Would it really be the spectrum of a incandescent light? Or could we do better? With LED's we could pretty much to do any spectrum we wanted.

Re: Lightbulb 2.0: Double the Life, Halve the Materials

Giordano — Tue, 15 Feb 2005 03:16:37 -0000

Are you guys stupid.

Normal light bulb socket

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

Adaptor socket sold with the lightbulb

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV

New bulb with 2 filiments or three.

Then just have the option to buy the lightbulb with or without an adaptor.

ROFL at throwing out all the current sockets.

Re: Here There Designs

Giordano — Tue, 08 Mar 2005 09:13:10 -0000

Whatever... if sustainability products are to make any kind of real impact, they need to be available for a whole lot less than twelve hundred bucks.

These lamps may be beautiful and all, but they're available to such a small market that their sustainability almost doesn't matter. To me, they look like conscience-cleansers for rich people.

Re: Disappearing Plastic Bags - New Plastic Magazine Mailer Dissolves in Hot Water

Giordano — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 16:19:07 -0000

"While I don't really understand why magazines are often packaged in plastic in the first place"

Often they do this to prevent CD's, DVD's, posters or other "freebies" with the magazine from being pilfered or lost before purchase.

Re: Woman happy living in 84 Square Foot Home

Giordano — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 14:28:33 -0000

How different do you expect two minimalist homes to be?

The thing about some ideas is that there's a time where the stage is set for them, and while lots of people will 'borrow' the idea, and idea whose time has come typically gets invented by multiple people. If one looks at science around the dawn of the Industrial era, one will see numerous inventions and discoveries that are attributed to multiple people, working in isolation in different countries or even on different continents.

Besides, it's a human interest piece. Maybe she'd heard of tumbleweed, maybe she hadn't. Either way, the TV station probably would have dropped those bits just to make it fit into a short time slot.

(One thing I didn't see in there was a shower. Presumably she has one? With the composting stove, I suspect she can just dump the greywater into some sort of system under or behind the house. She'd have to do a little landscaping to make it work properly, but despite her house being built on a trailer frame, I don't get the impression that she intends to use that mobility all that often).

Re: 10 Steps to Dispose of a Broken Light Bulb

Giordano — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 06:30:02 -0000

This is for shattered lightbulbs, not simply broken (as in nonfunctional, burned out). How many actual shattered regular lightbulbs have you had to deal with? Possibly 1 or 2?

Dealing with normal shattered bulbs is somewhat dangerous anyway, maybe not chemically but you need to dispose of a lot of glass that can have gone quite far or be in a carpet etc...

CFLs are quite a lot stronger than incandescent bulbs, firstly the glass is thicker, and they are smaller thicker tubes giving them more structural stability not largish thin glass bubbles like incandescents

I remember finding a fluorescent tube thrown away way back in primary school and of course there was that crazy kid who had to smash it, it took quite a lot of punishment before it did shatter he tried kicking it a few times (wearing boots), in the end he had to pick it up and club it against some concrete (and even that took a few hits).

Chances are you will never encounter a CFL shattering, especially when you consider that LEDs will probably overtake them within a few years thanks to Haitz's Law

Re: \"Hammer & Nails\" Style Solar Roof Tiles By SRS Energy

Giordano — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 02:33:04 -0000

"Approvals"?! Most municipalities engage in a sophisticated shakedown scheme to steal citizens money. The shakedown is called 'approvals", "materials testing" etc.

What they do is they pass a code forbidding all building materials unless "approved". Manufacturers have to pay thousands of dollars in extortion fees each year for the same product to cities so cities will 'approve" the materials.

As an example, the city of Los Angeles requires a little over $1000 per product for their materials testing division to approve a product. Each follow-up up year the shakedown is a little under $1000. But the City of LA testing lab doesn't actually test your product, they tell you to send your product to a real testing lab and then send them the test results. That way all they do is take your $ for testing they don't even do.

So lets say you import faucets, and you have a 4" center set faucet with 6 different handle options. You guessed it, the city of LA requires a bribe for each handle version of the same faucet. So if you have 5 different handle combinations, expect to pay $5000 a year for "approval" of one goddamnded faucet.

In corrupt Third World Countries, that is called shake down or an extortion racket. In the U.S., it is called "material approvals" and the bribe requirement is much bigger.

Re: Why Eco-Activists Still Have Children

Giordano — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 03:47:20 -0000

I believe that to enter the green age, we will need children who deeply understand the history, economics, and technology of the agricultural, industrial, and information age so that they can bring together all of that knowledge to form solutions that help the world transition. I don't feel guilty about teaching my son about Newton's laws of motion or airfoils and Bernoulli's principle, he is fascinated with robots and is always coming up with new ideas for what they could do. That type of imagination coupled with a grounding in agriculture, science, physics, engineering, chemistry, etc. may be an essential part of being able to come up with the solutions we need to actually solve some of the open problems we have. I believe we can invent new technologies that help free the planet from things like our deadly addiction to oil, and while I won't live long enough to see it all in my lifetime, I believe my children could actually be a part of that if they're raised properly.

Re: "Major Breakthrough" in Hydrogen Production: Video Interview with Daniel Nocera

Giordano — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 12:51:17 -0000

I would like to know more about the mysterious 'catalyst', for starters do you need to replace it continuously and how often or is it basically permanent? And if so how much does it cost to replace, apparently its "cobalt-phosphorous" for the oxygen and a 2nd that 'needs more work' is used to make the hydrogen.

I love how a large university which is supposedly dedicated to advancing knowledge, develops some technology that will apparently revolutionise the planet then turns around and patents is straight away, lets hope it doesn't end up like though GM electric car batteries that are now owned by big oil and aren't allowed to be put into cars that are all electric (hybrids only). Luckily the patent on that end in 2015 which is when car companies are claiming they will go all electric and likely the reason.

Maybe they will make it fairly easy to licence the technology but they can only do that so fast and then you need to take into account getting the technology to other countries. Plus 3rd world countries could really do with a system like this where the government sucks, people are spread thing and/or there is little or no infrastructure. Like how mobile phones are more popular than landlines in many places.

This kind of thing is something that could really do with a DIY solution, couple it with a DIY wind turbine and you will end up like that guy in Kenya that made his own windmill to power irrigation.

Re: Is My Electric Bicycle Lame?

Giordano — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 12:51:20 -0000

My wife and I rented electric bikes to do a 700 meter climb to Creux du Van in Switzerland. Link (in German):

http://www.rentabike.ch/dynasite.cfm?dsmid=78629&Search=&CatSelect=&RegionenSelect=&SchwierigkeitSelect=&action=viewdet&ID=13&page=0

We had lots of fun and it was the first time in 15 years she and I could bike together. We definitely want to do something like that again.

Re: Sky Sail and Helicopter in 'Near Miss': A Danger to Aircraft?

Giordano — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 15:54:07 -0000

Not very likely to be a threat to the helicopter pilots livelihood. Equipment and supply are sent by boat, since it's far cheaper than by helicopter.

Only employees are sent by helicopter, due to the time sensitive part of it.

Re: Sky Sail and Helicopter in 'Near Miss': A Danger to Aircraft?

Giordano — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 15:57:12 -0000

Aluminum foil chaff was good enough to be picked up on radar during WWII, so maybe a lightweight foil (like Mylar emergency blankets) would be sufficient to make the kite radar visible.

The line is a big issue and harder to see and harder to make it visible on radar. Aircraft hit power lines and antenna guy wires on occasion.

Re: Linkbait at any Cost?

Giordano — Fri, 30 May 2008 22:33:30 -0000

Funny, but I don't remember all this outcry over the fake Blair Witch story of those college students missing in action out in the woods and that was a lot bigger than this. Didn't most just buy their ticket to see the film, found out the story was a hoax, and still have at least a little admiration of the filmmakers for their clever marketing?

Was that different from this scenario because that was marketing a movie and not a website as in this case? (But then again, their movie was mostly marketed BY their faux website--which was getting lots of links--so that can't be it. Hmmm...

Re: Futuristic Tractor Designed to Make Farming Sexy Again

Giordano — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 18:29:17 -0000

An electric tractor might be really impractical. They often operate for very long periods of time, and in fact combines can run for ever 24 hours straight with multiple drivers.

I would think a big advancement in tractors might be remotely operated or even robotic.

Re: Physically Separated Center-Median Bi-Directional Bike Paths Rules!

Giordano — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 18:31:12 -0000

I like it and the effort, but the noise and pollution leaves some to be desired.

I bet drivers hate it though, it looks wide enough to be a HOV lane. (the kind that switch directions depending on the traffic load direction)

Re: What now?

Giordano — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 14:28:10 -0000

Scottish funk! Excellent choice of video, love Pick Up the Pieces.

Re: Red Mercury Singer Sewing Machine

Giordano — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 01:45:13 -0000

Hey, anything that separates those dirty ragheads from their undeserved wealth is A+ lulz in my book.

Re: Toyota Recalls 3.8 Million Vehicles, Including Prius Hybrids

Giordano — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:33:22 -0000

Many of the media reports are stating that despite the latch, many owners are buying aftermarket floor mats and simply placing the new mats directly on top of the old mats. The new mat is free to slide all over despite the mat below being held in place.

It's insanity to think an accident because people panicked resulted in a recall.

In the time it took to call 911, they could have safely stopped.

All of the above solutions require you to remain calm and not panic.

Re: Smart Appliances are Coming: Whirlpool to Produce 1 Million Grid Connected \"Smart\" Clothes Dryer in 2011

Giordano — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:42:21 -0000

The chart seems a little deceptive.

I use my dishwasher far more than my clothes washer, in terms of hours per month. I also use my lights way more than my microwave.

I refuse to use the oven in the summertime, too much heat dumped in the house for the AC to overcome.

Perhaps a chart that showed typical kw/hour usage per month would have made more sense than peak usage?

Re: Howard Dean Solitaire

Giordano — Tue, 16 Sep 2003 04:22:24 -0000

The Dean campaign is addictive enough, but this is practically snorting it… Thanks!

Re: Knight Rider NOT canceled says Gary Scott Thompson

Giordano — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 16:56:06 -0000

A second season pickup would be great, so would assigning a creative producer and writing team that actually knows how to write.

I mean COMMON, you buildup the the KARR story arc only to resolve it in a battle lasting all of 15 seconds. Do you all remember the battles in the original series. It took a lot out of Michael and out of Kitt. It was drawn out for a reason.

And perhaps, gee I don't know, stop making sexual references every 20.5 seconds. We get it!!!! Seriously we all get it. We got it the first 200 times. Perhaps but a little more work into writing stories and a little less into that for starters.

Huge fan here but seriously, new writer needed because if you can't agree that this show could be so much more than it is, then that is just sad guys.

Re: Radical Green Groups Attack Al Gore and the Climate Bill

Giordano — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:28:23 -0000

" I wonder, then, what those critics would call the green groups attacking Al Gore for not doing enough. I guess their heads would just explode."

If Gore's critics heads are going to explode, it'll probably be from laughing too hard. Brian Merchant seems to be projecting again.

What could be more humorous than this latest kabuki theatre in the ongoing Global Warming cult?

Re: luca era gay?

Giordano — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 03:29:37 -0000

Ancora un Natale contrassegnato dalla millenaria ingerenza cattotalebana, fatta di intromissione violenta nella società laica e civile, e il cui precipuo obiettivo è il solito; colpire i più deboli, la donna i buoi, i piccioni, gli asinelli, , i gay.
La canzone di Povia è l’ennesima unghiata dell’artiglio vaticano nella carne di quell’italia laica libertaria e animalista che però non cederà mai al ricatto delle gerarchie, e col culo degli altri continuerà a lottare per i diritti civili senza per questo voler rinunciare alla sua sacrosanta doppia porzione di piccione arrosto.
La chiesa offende, ma si moltiplicano le iniziative per la libertà. Mentre prosegue in tutti gli stadi la raccolta di firme per la depenalizzazione del fallo da dietro, in molte città italiane continua ” PresepeRvativo” , la contro rappresentazione laica dove invece di un qualsiasi bambinello, ( magari neanche geneticamente selezionato), pecore clonate e pastori gay si inchinano di fronte a un maestoso profilattico illuminato. Il tutto nel silenzio assordante dell’informazione che pur di non attaccare il Vaticano preferisce strombazzare su presunte crisi epocali….

Re: Free Electricity for EVs Might One Day Become Common

Giordano — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 17:02:56 -0000

It seems that since a 2-4 hour recharge is so inexpensive and charging stations few and far between, it seems that charging money for the recharge would be bearable by the consumer.

Why give something away for free if you can charge? There is more to the cost than the electricity, so maybe the maintenance could come from recharging fees?

Are there free options to these charging stations? Probably not many!

Re: OpenOffice.org 1.1.1 for OS X 10.3.x (Panther) Technology Preview Release

Giordano — Fri, 02 Apr 2004 20:58:22 -0000

Installed 1.1.1 - This is a much better installation than the 1.1 version. It even comes with a configured copy of StartOpenOffice in the installation directory. I had previously installed a copy of NeoOfficeJ. The latter is painfully slow. It is based on the 1.03 version of OpenOffice, but it seems to include many of the features in 1.1.1 that I had not previous seen in 1.1.

In any case, this is a good package. One suggestion. The GZ includes ONLY the installer package. General comfort calls for a readme along side. For example, the readme that says that you can install the 1.1.1 package in parallel is not available until AFTER you have installed the package.

Re: When Crazy Isn’t Crazy Anymore: Life Balance and Insanity

Giordano — Mon, 26 May 2008 12:24:00 -0000

You're so right. And the quote is very appropriate. Nice post :)

Re: Interesting If True

Giordano — Mon, 17 May 2004 08:06:15 -0000

14 tax forms and an accountant's fee later, I'm ready for a flat tax. It'll never happen since the more complicated the tax code becomes, the more employment there is for accountants, tax lawyers, and their lobbyists.

Re: Reason Why I Love America #6578

Giordano — Wed, 26 May 2004 08:05:51 -0000

Registered gum users??
Brings to mind Blazing Saddles, only with a guy holding a pack of Chicklets to the old lady's head!

Re: Happy Birthday To Me

Giordano — Thu, 03 Jun 2004 10:06:53 -0000

Happy birthday!

Re: Weekly Caption Contest

Giordano — Thu, 10 Jun 2004 08:07:06 -0000

(Kerry, playing the air guitar, singing George Benson's lyrics)
THEY SAY THAT I WON'T LAST TOO LONG ON BROADWAY
I'LL CATCH A GREY HOUND BUS FOR HOME THEY ALL SAY
BUT THEY'RE DEAD WRONG I KNOW THEY ARE
'CAUSE I CAN PLAY THIS HERE GUITAR
AND I WON'T QUIT TILL I'M A STAR ON BROADWAY

Re: Yokels

Giordano — Fri, 11 Jun 2004 07:06:47 -0000

I'm so tired of the "rubes for Reagan" meme I've finally outed myself as being dumb, and proud of it.

Re: They're Just Two Men Who Enjoy Each Other's Company

Giordano — Sat, 10 Jul 2004 07:07:53 -0000

Can't wait for the kiss, at the Convention!

Re: I've Just Become A Cycling Fan

Giordano — Thu, 22 Jul 2004 10:07:38 -0000

He just won the 17th stage

Re: More On Jessica Cutler

Giordano — Fri, 14 Oct 2005 12:10:51 -0000

[...]           Saturday, June 11, 2005   This internetweb thingie really does throw up some opportunities does it not? Try reading this biography of an internet entrepreneur. Stirring stuff and probably a huge amount of money made veryquickly. - Celebblog, 6:23 AM   Jessica Cutler, who you may remember as Washingtonienne, was an intern on Capital Hill who started up a blog detailing her experiences. These seemed to include having sex for money with a number of people who worked on the Hill.This, not unnaturally, got her a lot of attention after her blog was featured by Wonkette. A few days later she was unmasked, fired, and that was, we thought, the last we would hear of the matter. However, fame in America doesn't seem to work that way. First she got a book deal (with a rumoured $350,000 advance) and then she was asked to pose for photos for Playboy.If you want to see what she looks like, are interested in what politicians will pay money to have sex with, why not take a look at the photos from Playboy? They're here, no subscription or registration necessary. - Celebblog, 6:07 AM             var site="s21doobie" Archives         Home  |  Archives     [...]

Re: Capitalist Pigs Funding Communist Memorial

Giordano — Sat, 28 Aug 2004 09:08:37 -0000

A few years ago Forbes Magazine had an article on how Marx's grave is in good condition because it's maintained by private funds, while Adam Smith's grave is decaying in a public cemetery.

Re: Comparing The Candidates

Giordano — Wed, 06 Oct 2004 13:11:12 -0000

Actually, I kind of like it.
After all, in a battle, wouldn't you rather be raising all kinds of hell from the Deathstar than trying to fly off with Tinkerbell to Neverland.
And may the force be with us :-)

Re: Was Bush Wired?

Giordano — Thu, 14 Oct 2004 09:11:27 -0000

It's called a spine, which of course the Dems won't be able to recognize

Re: Cat Blogging

Giordano — Thu, 28 Oct 2004 10:11:13 -0000

Me, I'm happy to do some giraffe blogging.

Re: Been Looking For A New Diet?

Giordano — Mon, 08 Nov 2004 09:12:05 -0000

back in the olden days it was rumored that Maria Callas had swallowed a tapeworm to lose weight, since Onasis liked her thin.

Re: Darth Tater

Giordano — Thu, 20 Jan 2005 08:01:27 -0000

I want one!

Re: Nobel Prize For Iraqis?

Giordano — Fri, 11 Feb 2005 08:03:19 -0000

Cat Stevens! But then, why I am surprised at that?

Re: Woman Gets Mad At Cop With Banana

Giordano — Mon, 14 Feb 2005 08:03:16 -0000

Reminds me of the Monty Python skit, "first, you grab the banana, thus disarming him"!

Re: Caption Contest

Giordano — Sat, 12 Mar 2005 14:04:25 -0000

"OH! A hole in one!"

Re: One Confusing Constitution

Giordano — Thu, 16 Jun 2005 08:06:44 -0000

On France2 news Giscard compared saving the constitution to Saving Private Ryan -- no matter what, Ryan got saved in the end.
Logic, a la ValÃ©ry!

Re: Bush Called For New Orleans Evacuation

Giordano — Tue, 06 Sep 2005 21:10:09 -0000

Folks, get you facts straight - the national guard is under the control of the Governor unless and until they have been federalized. If the NG were not called up in time, it is the fault of the Governor. General Honore, who has done much good over the past few days reports to the Governor - not the president.

And you must understand that disaster planning and response in the US is the responsibility of the hundreds of thousands of state and local government people as managed by governors, staff managers, and mayors and their staff managers. Not FEMA's 2600 employees nationwide.

State and local is people and stuff and mangement, FEMA is money and more stuff and coordination with federal resources from 'on high'. But clearlly with onlyl 2600 people they are not going to be doing much on the ground in terms of getting the grunt work done of saving lives and restoring property. That is why it is the state and local authorities resposibility.

State and local is responsible for pre-event, during the event, and immediately after the event execution of plans. If they become overwhelmed they (through their governor) ask for federal help through FEMA. (That is not the same as Bush's declaration of emergency on (I believe) the 26th. That was a formality such that if and when the governor(s) asked FEMA for help, the 'skids' of government would be pre-greased if you will).

The Louisiana State Emergency Operations Plan spells it all out. Here is a direct quote:

"During an emergency or disaster, the State will take immediate and appropriate action to determine, direct, mobilize, and coordinate resource needs. The State Government will suspend or cancel normal operations and redirect resources to save lives, relieve human suffering, sustain survivors, protect property, and repair essential facilities.

Further from their site regarding their responsibility vis-a-vis FEMA: "As much as we try to prepare for catastrophic disasters and to reduce our risk from their devastation, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and other disasters still happen.
When they do, local and state officials are the first to respond. If the loss of life and property overwhelms this response, the federal government ... including FEMA ... is called upon to help."

FEMA, when "called upon to help" makes it clear that their response will begin happening 72 to 96 hours from when they are "called upon to help". That is how it works, whether you or I like it or not.

Re: Farrakhan Claims To Have Been Beamed Up By Aliens

Giordano — Sun, 16 Oct 2005 20:10:41 -0000

Didn't Farrakhan admit his being guilty of treason in that interview? If he truly believed he knew that America was going to attack Libya, and warned his buddy Mr. Q about it, that's treason.

Re: Brazil Movil To Buy TIM From Telecom Italia For 8.0 Billion Euros: Report

Giordano — Mon, 27 Nov 2006 09:40:33 -0000

Hi,

the Globo article was full of imprecision, and has been denied by TIM. They are talking of 8 billions, and of a "foothold in Europe", but 8 billions would likely be the price only for TIM Brasil... the whole group would cost a lot more (they say about 25 billions).

Apparently there are some big funds bidding to buy TIM too.

Re: DC Mixer On Nov 15: Registration NOW Open

Giordano — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 13:54:04 -0000

Any plan for an Asia Mixer? Singapore or Shanghai would do well.

Re: Pluck on The Block; Sale Could Fetch Around $75 Million

Giordano — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 02:13:55 -0000

$75M for Pluck? Really? They seem like nice people, but where's the big value-add?

Re: Reader Survey Results: The Who and Why Of You

Giordano — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 06:52:44 -0000

Hi,

only 3% of readers from US/Canada? That´s a surprise!

So maybe now we´ll start seeing a less US-centric MocoNews? :)

Cheers,
Giordano

Re: Earnings Preview: What To Look For From Disney, Time Warner, Warner Music, EA

Giordano — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 14:50:15 -0000

"EA’s lack of blockbuster hits (it is largely a mid-tier player) doesn’t make it the best benchmark for the gaming industry since its market share is relatively small"

Are you drunk? EA's been the largest game company by revenue in the word until last year, when it was surpassed by the newly merged Activision Blizzard. It's still the second largest game company in the world. How it's its market share "relatively small"?

Re: NYTimes.com Blocked In China As Government Returns To Selective News Access

Giordano — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 06:14:27 -0000

Uhm... I'm in Shanghai, and I just accessed the site without problems.

Re: Wal-Mart Sued Over Contraceptives

Giordano — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 19:41:48 -0000

"Goodness. You make it sound like they're not stocking heart medication. We're talking about chemical abortion here. People "NEED" chemical abortions?"

I completely agree. Just because some idiot liberal went to med school for five years, then did residency for another four, my political beliefs should impede his or her experienced medical judgement. After all, those recently pregnant girls, who must be careless sluts because condoms never break and women never get raped, can order their emergency meds online to be shipped to them in a timely fashion.

Those darn liberals want health departments too to monitor the sanitary conditions of restaurants and food stores. Let me tell you, the free market will keep the chef at your local McDonald's from washing his hands before returning to work, because after getting sick people won't eat there anymore. And the free market should definitely control who actually is a doctor or not. I mean, let a doctor's reputation and prices dictate whether we go see him or her. We don't need a government board stealing our tax dollars to tell who can be doctors and who can't be, and what those said doctors can do to patients. And come to think of it, we don't need the already too big liberal government forcing pharmacies, licensed by the state, to provide the products that they have to provide under their license.

And tell me for one second that if the situation was reversed in that there was a drug that would prevent miscarriages, and a pharmacist in that sinful town of San Francisco refused to provide them because he liked dead babies, you wouldn't be completely on his case. I know I would, because I'm not a hypocrite.

Re: Outsource Everything

Giordano — Sun, 05 Mar 2006 16:31:17 -0000

"My hero GWB says education is the answer. I’m not sure. I think it’s the problem. I am not being sarcastic about privatizing all k-12 education with vouchers. Let’s get the next generation on an even keel with the rest of the world. We aren’t now. "

Just try improving education in the US. The elitest academics, administrators, and teachers unions will have none of it - and they are in control. Our education system is not really about teaching math, English, science, and social studies, etc. anymore, it is about job security for those in control of the system and how they can wring every cent out of the tax payers and parents to go into their pockets.

Yes, there are good, even great, teachers, principals, and professors. But they are the exception, not the rule. Look at the mess that used to be Harvard; the inner city schools in LA, Phoenix, and Atlanta; look at Detroit's declining public school system enrollment...

There are positive counter-examples out there, but they are too few and far-between and essentially meaningless in the bigger picture.

The system won't allow students to fail due to the perception that predominately students of protected classes fail in disproportionately high rates compared to students of the non-protected classes (asians and whites). So, the entire system is dumbed down adusted in great part to accomodate the political sensibilities of those running the system and who have the say in how the system operates.

Re: Interview: Mike Volpi: Broadcasters' Own VOD Plans Killed Joost

Giordano — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 20:14:29 -0000

Mike Volpi was the CEO, it's not like he was the receptionist at Joost... so surely if one is responsible for the bad decisions and execution of the company it is him, otherwise what was his role there ?

Re: Qana Bombing Victims Staged By Hezbollah?

Giordano — Mon, 31 Jul 2006 04:24:34 -0000

Milking it

seems like the photographs coming out of Qana were staged for maximum propaganda value

Re: What Waterboarding Looks Like, Part Two

Giordano — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 07:06:33 -0000

Frankly, it utterly disgusts me. He suffered no real permanent mental trauma from it because he could "tap" out, he didn't have to worry about it happening anytime and for hours on end, he didn't have it done to him dozens of times for hours on end. I don't find that acceptable, psychological trauma is just as dehabilitating as physical trauma. The ends do not justify the means ever. Having a good ending means nothing if you become the monsters you fought against. Sickening.

Re: The Mysterious Wikipedia Entries About The Chris Benoit Family's Murder/Suicide

Giordano — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 20:15:10 -0000

Actually I noticed the same thing with some of the Youtube tribute videos. Although I figured it must be some person in another country due to the time difference.

Re: TreeHugger Deals (NOT!): FEMA Trailers For Sale

Giordano — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 15:18:03 -0000

I tried typing a response earlier and got timed out.

Here goes: FWIW, these travel trailers are usually built on a quite sturdy steel frame, and can be relatively easily converted to a strong flatbed trailer by removing the damaged upper portion and installing a new deck. Obviously one would only want to do this to a travel trailer that is damaged beyond repair, but there are probably a few with severe accident damage or sever water infiltration issues.

Would be one way to recycle most of the trailer for reuse

Re: Big Steps In Building: Design Buildings Like Letters Again

Giordano — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 15:23:38 -0000

Well said, but one comment reminds me of something I've always wondered.

"Highly insulated windows (above R-20) simply don't exist at any price."

Double and triple pane windows typically have significantly higher R values (or U values), so what would placing a pair of triple pane windows back to back in one window opening have on the R value? double it? not quite double it? not much better than one triple pane window?

Re: Big Steps In Building: Design Buildings Like Letters Again

Giordano — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 22:22:01 -0000

Thanks, makes perfect sense that a bridging loss would be significant in a "well" insulated window.

Re: Mac Performance (April 2008)

Giordano — Thu, 01 May 2008 19:44:17 -0000

Thanks for the graphs. Much, much, much better and quicker to see than the awkward tables that some other Mac sites display in this World. If you know what I mean. How can things be done so badly and for so many years by them is beyond my understanding. A picture is worth a thousand words. And here a picture is a plot-graph.

Re: iMac and Mac mini Benchmarks (Early 2009)

Giordano — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:39:19 -0000

The new machines will rock with Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) which uses the 16 nVidia GPU cores as CPU!!! That will make a shocking difference on a machine with 2+16 = 18 cores!!!

Re: Is It Time To Start Blocking Firefox Users?

Giordano — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 16:48:05 -0000

Michael, I understand your desire to get money for what you're doing, but if you're really adding value, I don't think you'd have to be here begging. You've the right to believe that there's a moral or legal compulsion to leave your page looking the way you want it to look, but if you do believe that you'd better turn off your RSS feed and start blocking the 50 or so bots that are scraping your page for various reasons other than your page showing up in search results. You'll want to tell Skyfire to not index your site and tell Google not to have you show up in mobile search results. I can give you a bunch of IP addresses for your robots.txt file, if you like. You might also want to start having a fit about sidewiki now, too, since anyone can leave a nasty comment on your page that shows up for all other sidewiki users, and there's nothing you can do about that. Sidewiki isn't even the first or only project of its kind, so you'll want to block all the stumbleupon and digg and ow.ly traffic you get as well. Then you'll want to do something to detect the use of greasemonkey and stylish, which can be used in all major browsers now.

There, I made a sensible argument without personal attacks and with as little sarcasm as I could possibly manage to hold back. It's worth noting, however, that not all ideas are created equal and if people aren't giving your ideas the respect you feel they deserve, well, sometimes there's a reason for that.

Re: Brad Pitt's Make It Right Foundation Unveils Floating House

Giordano — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 15:51:57 -0000

Considering that water storage tanks have been made out of concrete, one would think that a hollow shell would work for both slab and flotation, without using any foam at all. Working around all of the pipes and wiring may be an issue, but certainly seems possible. If it sprung a leak however, having foam would be a good backup plan

Hopefully the floating house won't encourage people to avoid evacuating and placing themselves in harms way. Even if the house floats and is safe, you would likely have no electricity and certainly no water or sewer service.

Re: louisgray.com: Twitter's Search Engine Is Very, Very, Broken

Giordano — Fri, 22 May 2009 05:13:39 -0000

I agree with you Louis. Also, Twitter Search is so slow comparing to Friendfeed....
But I guess Twitter team is working on it and should release a new version pretty soon ;)

Re: BMW Revives C1 As Electric Motorcycle

Giordano — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 22:21:09 -0000

Is this safe because BMW said so, or safe because there is data to back up that claim?

There are lots of potential injuries with this.

Re: How To Fix ‘Cannot Delete Folder/File’, ‘Access Is Denied’ or ‘File In Use’ errors in Windows Using Unlocker

Giordano — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 18:25:38 -0000

Unlocker doesn't delete file names longer than 255 characters on windows XP.This I know for fact the only way I have found to remove veryfrakkenlongFilenames is to copy everything I want to keep from file then delete the whole file.I know sometimes that sucks but I wish I had a better way.

Re: From Smart Grid to Big Brother?

Giordano — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 23:38:09 -0000

I remember when all of the grocery stores came out with the loyalty card programs, and all of the grand things they were going to do with the information.

In the end, they ended up with more information than they knew what to do with, and mostly information they already knew.

I think the smart grid will end up being somewhat the same. People use power when they use it because that is when they need it. Sure we could put off when we charge our phones and few other things, but many things need to be on when they are on.

Unless A/C is replaced with chilled water systems, you can't turn off the A/C and run it at night. Same with heat.

Re: From Smart Grid to Big Brother?

Giordano — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:25:30 -0000

Unfortunately an off grid solar setup is considerably more expensive than a grid tie setup.

But I agree with the sentiment!

Re: Carnage on Oklahoma Turnpike

Giordano — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 00:52:55 -0000

This is a good point. A block of traffic stopped cold on a highway IS a serious hazard. Highways were not desighned for that, and having vehicles up to 80,000 lbs along with cars/personal trucks of 2500-6000 just doesn't match. Even a Suburban is a fly when hit by the largest rigs at full load. Even a more typical semi, weighing ??? perhaps 40,000 is not compatible with car traffic.

This is a challenging situation even for a driver with enough rest and not mesmerized by highway boredom or other distractions. This driver obviously blew it; he could at least have started braking 100 yards back and perhaps gotten around the stopped traffic. But there will ALWAYS be human error; we gotta change the way our roads work so that ONE error does not have such large consequences.

Railroads could carry the trailers for long trips, but the railroads charge too much, lose loads and take too long, so shippers stay with individual trucks. We gotta find a better way.

Re: Ethical “White Hat” SEO Spam

Giordano — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 01:25:54 -0000

I get SO sick of these emails! On all my plain html sites I put an extra blank on the contact us form.. it says "Is this spam?".. it has eliminated all the automated spam. But these SEO idiots actually put "no" in the blank. I would NEVER hire anyone for SEO who doesn't know what spam is (or that they are doing it!). I ended up putting filters in all my cpanels that bounce anything with the term "white hat" haha.

Re: Ethical “White Hat” SEO Spam

Giordano — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 01:27:23 -0000

Oh by the way.. that first comment was posted by someone selling SEO services, haha.

Re: Tiny Robot Trash Harvesters to Clean Streets of the Future

Giordano — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:05:08 -0000

Absent video of it actually operating in a real world environment, I will assume it works as well as any other robotic operated vehicle.

Which is to say, not well enough for use, yet.

Re: UK Zero Waste Policy Might Mean Waaaaay Too Many Sort Bins

Giordano — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:06:59 -0000

Any countries have no recycling bins and sort the trash at the dump?

Aluminum, steel, and plastic could in theory all go in one bin, and be separated by machinery.

Re: California to Ban Power-Sucking Big Screen TVs Next Month

Giordano — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:13:24 -0000

What will prevent somebody from buying an energy sucking TV out of state and bringing it back to CA?

Make the laws to restrictive or too expensive and people will have monetary incentive to skirt the laws.

Lots of old cars in CA that aren't required to have emissions tested, far more so than in other states. The weather and lack of need for A/C probably helps this to some extent, but many people drive these old cars to avoid emissions testing.

Re: From Smart Grid to Big Brother?

Giordano — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:16:41 -0000

Thanks, very interesting article.

The difficult question is does the highly targeted marketing work better than targeted marketing. It's kind of hard to prove or disprove, but sounds like they are convinced it works.

Knowing I buy automotive magazines might help them target adds to me, but knowing I buy automotive magazines that feature Ford products might not give them any leg up.

Re: Dead Bunny Rabbits Burned for Bioenergy in Sweden

Giordano — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:19:23 -0000

This isn't an energy solution so much as a solution to what to do with large amounts of rabbits killed for population control reasons.

What happened to the rabbits natural predators?

Re: Where the Streets Have Names: Learning from Bono’s Facebook Dilemma

Giordano — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 08:55:17 -0000

"wouldn't it be cool if we all put our real selves out there and moved the bar forward a bit to who we really are instead of just placating the status quo and watching our asses? publishing what we actually do, how much money we have, how much sex we have, what kind of sex we have. i'd much rather live in a transparent society, wouldn't you? "

I'd much rather live in a society where voyeurs like you don't get to know intimate details about me like how much sex I have or don't have.

Re: Three Wheelers Approved for Funding from Dept. of Energy

Giordano — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 10:33:57 -0000

You are a bit off on aerodynamics and three wheel vehicle stability.

It's entirely possible to have a four wheeled vehicle with a cd of lower than 0.15

You do realize that the third wheel on a three wheeler is creating it's own turbulence and not riding in a slipstream? The rear wheels are essentially drafting the front in a four wheel vehicle.

You can flip a three wheel vehicle, and the handling is often different than from a four wheeled vehicle. They also tend to spin out more easily. IMHO, this is one of the issues of putting them into the general public's hand without some knowledge of the handling characteristics.

Yes, I have actually built and driven three wheeled vehicles.

The Aptera is safer than a motorcycle, but it is because they have taken the time and money to ensure good handling, and to make a vehicle that provides crash protection even if it is not required by law.

Re: Three Wheelers Approved for Funding from Dept. of Energy

Giordano — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 10:39:14 -0000

forgot to add this link, four wheel car with cd of 0.14
concept car, but not that radical of a body design
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiat_Turbina

Re: Erlang Doesn’t Fit The JVM

Giordano — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 03:46:45 -0000

@Neal -- Not so. Kilim brings true microthread to Java, while relaxing Erlang's wasteful immutability demands. Check it out: http://www.malhar.net/sriram/kilim/

The original points are all weak.

- poor distributed programming, Erlang actor model.

Scala implements the Erlang actor model on the JVM.

Kilim implements something superior to the Erlang actor model: the actor model with concurrency safe mutable messages.

- no credible support for distributed data

Do you actually believe your own crap? eBay runs on java. Which are they not: "credible" or "distributed"?

You refute your own argument when you note that things like files and socket should not be serialized. How exactly can I know whether or not the an entity I'm considering moving over the wire includes a reachable element that can't travel? The only viable solution is to have the programmer explicitly answer this question.

The fact is that Java has tons of distributed data management solutions. Terracotta is one, but simpler things like the dozens of 2nd level persistence caches work just fine. Hell, XML marshalling works just fine (and is cross platform). Spring remoting works fine. GWT distributes java objects to and from browsers that don't even run a JVM. Look at all the grid, clustering, and map reduce tools in java. GridGain, Oracle Coherence, Hadoop, ZooKeeper, JGroups, many DHT implementations, etc...

- The JVM doesn't support closures.

Groovy. JRuby. Scala.

You mean "Java" doesn't support closures with language syntax. Except that anonymous inner classes are functionally equivalent. The only objection is they aren't "nice" syntax. But you are advocating Erlang, so you shouldn't throw stones because of the lack of "nice" syntax.

- no tail recursion

Of your points, this is the only one with any basis in fact, as it is true that the JVM does not support the tail recursion optimization. This is fundamentally a performance issue, and here too, Erlang is not on solid ground to criticize Java for performance. Java's much faster for most things, and Erlang imposing immutability is a far greater negative performance impact (too much copying) than the JVM not supporting tail recursion optimization in the runtime.

I'd like it if the JVM added tail recursion optimizations, but it doesn't have too as they can also be addressed at compile time by generating a while loop instead of using recursion. I think compile time optimization is the approach both scala and groovy will take.

-----------

I give Erlang it's credit. It's innovations are the actor model and runtime managed microthreads. Both have been very influential on the trends to concurrent programming. But I respectfully submit that the ideas in Kilim and X10 http://x10.codehaus.org/ are the state of the art here, and Erlang will be to concurrency what smalltalk was to object orientation. It's simply easier for the JVM to be enhanced to add improvements to Erlang's innovations than vice versa.

Re: Ask Pablo: Do Solar Panels Actually Contribute To Climate Change?

Giordano — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 21:02:46 -0000

This is all rather academic since, in actual fact, the Earth has been cooling for the past eleven years.

Re: Ultracapacitor Buses Work... As Long as You have Lots of Quick-Charge Stations

Giordano — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 23:47:43 -0000

FWIW, we have a bus transfer station downtown, and the stops there are often longer than at other stops on a route, and in addition there are many small short routes from the transfer station. Many of the short routes loop through downtown or nearby neighborhoods and travel at slow speeds, which seems like the perfect application of this technology, even if just for a test bed.

Several routes that are short and slow speed, and all return to a central point for recharging. Nothing preventing a parallel battery pack to up the range, or even a series hybrid setup

Re: We're going to have news tomorrow

Giordano — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 03:37:53 -0000

MUCH needed:

- Much lighter (and smaller) Mac. 400 to 600 g or so (as light as possible). 5 to 7-inch screen or so. Call it a netbook, tablet or whatever. Video-out and USB2 ports for presentations.

- Headless small Mac. Call it miniTOWER, Mac mini on steroids or whatever. Intel Quad core inside and at least two Firewire 800 ports.

- Matte (not glossy) displays, iMac and laptops. Eye health and productivity is first!

What is Apple waiting? They will sell millions.

Re: Know Your Energy: The 5 States That Supply 73% of US Coal

Giordano — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 17:59:57 -0000

You could get a decent guess at this by looking at grid map interconnections.

Electricity is mostly used where generated. at least where I live (I previously researched this for my state in regards to wind generation)

Re: Ultracapacitor Buses Work... As Long as You have Lots of Quick-Charge Stations

Giordano — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 18:07:43 -0000

There actually are aero improvements versus 20-50 year old designs, they are just subtle. Those mirrors are one example, they rest are minor body mods.

The real issue is the constraints that are placed on the vehicle (which is also the case with passenger cars). Anything that changes the front end cannot hinder driver visibility, a short blunt front end offers the best view and prevents small children from walking in front of the bus unseen. (granted, a camera system could improve this in any design) Any effort to reduce the aero drag in the rear can't add much length as there are practical and legal limits to vehicle length, and it also can't limit passenger space and carrying capacity.

All designs are compromises working within the constraints placed upon it.

Re: Making Windows 7 Search Work Better

Giordano — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:02:29 -0000

Great news! Search works! They've gone back to the XP interface! yippee!

This is good, I so hate Vista's inability to specify find in files, and completely hate that search is pre searching everything just in case you might want it.

It's going to be good to have a search that DOES ABSOLUTELY nothing unless I ask it to, and finds in files, explicitly, and finds not in files, also explicitly, oh, and searches all files, not just some.

I wonder if Windows 7 also has removed DRM while they're at it, as well as the pointless expensive indexer.

Oh! I dreamed it, it isn't fixed at all, I've just read it again and it seems someone who only ever searches for word documents during presentations and programmes by description has designed it.

Thank god there's a "I'm a professional who doesn't want an iphone" button which removes all the new stuff, and instantly goes back to the XP interface with the tiled coffee bean that you can relax your eyes on by focussing on infinity, and when you move your mouse over a network connection it just tells you your ip address, subnet mask etc, instead of having some ludicrous go at stopping you finding out where you are with a complicated gui.