5/27/2003

Nvidia Plus Booze Plus Women Equals Nekkidness

Filed under: Weird News — Tim @ 10:27 am

Just to show you that guys will be guys no matter what the profession, Nvidia employees are underfire from its shareholders for behavior unbecoming of a United States Marine… err, a highly elite team of educated and mature engineers. What started as an “innocent” downing of a few long-necks ended in blistfulness, tom-foolery and big smile for many ageek.

Below is evidence that The Inquirer (the British information technology ezine) reported earlier today regarding the appearance of a “pornographic actress” at a recent E3 Expo party:

Catalina

No cleavage was harmed in the making of this blog (yea, this is a family-friendly blog so I had to censor some particular details).

Invading Iraq: An Innovative Solution to Everyday Problems

Filed under: Highly Comical — Tim @ 6:02 am

When Benjamin Genard’s wife of 12 years left him in early March, he didn’t quite know where to turn.

nat016invadingiraq.jpg

Argh, all of my friends are getting in on the action. Is there a PostNuke Doctor in the house?

Texas DA to Subpoena God

Filed under: Highly Comical — Tim @ 5:46 am

God’s lawyers have yet to respond to request

Argh, I need to start writing again!

‘Oldest sculpture’ found in Morocco

Filed under: Culture — Tim @ 3:35 am

From BBC:

A 400,000-year-old stone object unearthed in Morocco could be the world’s oldest attempt at sculpture.

Ahh, and what does this masterpiece look like?

figurine.jpg

I think my satire amigo put it best:

oh come on, i’ve seen potato chips that look more like humans than that

well, maybe not that old, but ones that have been under the couch for a long time

Of course, I really can’t say much. My artistic capabilities were shelved with my violin back in high school. At least, that’s what I tell the chicks and you know what they dig.

Expat Exclusion Eliminated - Expats Must Pay U.S. And Foreign Taxes

Filed under: Economics — Tim @ 3:25 am

Damn:

The Committee believes that the exclusion under IRC Sec. 911 may result in an unfair advantage for individuals who have moved to lower-tax foreign countries, in that such individuals are taxed at a lower global effective rate than similarly situated individuals living and working in the United States. The Committee believes that U.S. citizens living and working abroad still receive the benefits of U.S. citizenship and thus should pay U.S. tax on their foreign income, subject to normally applicable foreign tax credit rules. Sec. 350 of the Bill.

I’d like to see that long list of “benefits” the Committee is speaking of. Oh, and to the gallows with all those that want to keep their monies, scoundrels and evil doers, the whole lot of ‘em!

Dan Gillmor and Phil Wolff on the Future of Blogs

Filed under: Blogging — Tim @ 2:47 am

I was reading some random posts at David Weinberger’s blog that he posted a few days ago while summing up the BlogTalk Conference.

A couple that caught my eye were by blogger and information technology pundit, Dan Gillmor (I recommend his Open Spectrum-esque article).

Mr. Weinberger states:

H says he’s tired of the debate about whether blogs are journalism. It’s endless and pointless. Some are and some aren’t. They are their own form and they complement real-world journalism. As Doc Searls says, everyone now is a “stringer,” i.e., a freelancer who occasionally feeds stories to newspapers and magazines.

If you any of you are in contact with The Register’s Andrew Orlowski, send him that quote por favor. Continuing:

What about trust? Falsehoods travel faster than truths, Dan says. But, as Ken Layne said (Dan says), “We can fact-check your ass.”

Very true, though some people still refuse to do their homework or even bother to use Google (what is so hard or evil about finding resources to defend assertions, maybe getting a liberal arts degree isn’t such a waste, intimidated by research mayhaps?).

Mr. Weinberger also summed up several points expressed by klogger Phil Wolff:

1. “Blogs will merge with other media.” It’s already happening. Blogs and wikis and who knows what.

Many of the news and commentary sites I visit are either developing or have deployed a collaborative blog for their columnists to post on. I’d have to agree with Mr. Wolff’s analysis and think this will become the rule rather than the exception (though, I doubt you’ll see blog.cnn.com anytime soon).

2. “We’ll have bloggers that aren’t people.” He points to Tivo’s recording history: a reverse chronological log of the system’s activities. He expects more apps to do this, including factory lathes and cars.

That is an interesting prediction, however do not fear, something similar is here! News aggregators are similar to that idea (in that they are automated and in reverse chronological order), news.google.com already exist. Another one that I was first introduced to several months ago was the Harry Potter Automatic News Aggregator.

In fact, Photoshop has that built into the “History menu.” Sure Adobe doesn’t include an RSS feed with it, but it does keep track of each widget/tool/item you use - Journaling File Systems (JFS) also do that. I can see how that could be beneficial in cars as well.

3. “We’ll start blogging things that aren’t bloggable today.” Blogging tools will offer “pools of richer expression,” new community services, etc.

Hehe, I sure hope that this isn’t the end of tools and utilities. I really enjoy Trackback and consider it nearly as important as RSS, I’d like to see more features like that (to get an idea of what the “future” holds, visit the forums at MovableType, Cafelog, Pivot, Nucleus, etc., that is where some of the new bleeding-edge hacks are discussed).

He also predicts there will be a backlash against blogs once it goes mainstream.

This is a perfect spot to refer to Dr. Jenkins’ post regarding media outlets and plagiarism. I wouldn’t doubt seeing the various writers guilds and unions complaining, their jobs are on the line (some will completely miss the fact that they can start a blog or ask their employer to start a collaborative one).

I broke my Magic 8 ball a few weeks back, but I do believe these two gentlemen have some great insights on where things will go. Does the outlook look good? What do your sources say? Are you going to tell me now? [/magic8ball]