Monthly Archives: October 2008

And to go with the day, here is David Bowie singing: Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) live

Amanda Jones is 109 years old. Her father was a slave.

This U.S. election, she gets to vote for Barack Obama for president.

She embodies alot of history, right up to this week. See: Daughter of slave votes for Obama

According to this, there has been a Coordinated Denial-of-Service Attacks on “No on 8” and “No on 2” (FLA) sites

My first response, on hearing someone say there has been a DoS attack on their site is: check again. Lots of problems could have occurred to affect your site. DoS is not usually the first probable cause.

However, when two sites like this are affected like this, the probability of it go way up. And the timing, just as No on 8 is pushing for a big fundraising drive, make it even more likely (and more serious).

I hope they catch who did it and the parties responsible go to jail for a signifigant period of time. DoS attacks may not be as dangerous as physical attacks on people or property, but what they are trying to achieve is the same. And what they are trying to achieve is removing people’s freedom of speech and association.

It’s time for lawmakers and law enforcement to get serious about computer crimes like this.

From the brilliant blog, indexed

It’s depressing how many of these alerts I get in my RSS feed reader. Alerts like this:

HEALTH HAZARD ALERT – DELI ROAST BEEF AND SANDWICHES SOLD AT CERTAIN STORES IN ATLANTIC CANADA MAY CONTAIN LISTERIA MONOCYTOGENES

Still, it is better to know than not.

One misconception people should also know about is that store sliced meats are not necessarily safer than packaged meats. It appears many of these alerts are for packaged meats, but this alert also warns about “clerk-served sliced roast beef”.

Caveat emptor.

Normally, patronage in the political arena is seen as a bad thing. Here’s a chance where it can be a good thing.

Ana Marie Cox is one of the bright lights of U.S. journalism currently. She could use your support.

It’s easy! Just click on her name and go from there. As they say on infomercials, act now! 🙂

I am hoping that she meets her funding challenge.

I also would like to request that she take a portion of my money and use it to buy Joe Klein a drink when this is all over. He deserves a drink because (a) he’s written some great posts lately at Time’s Swampland (b) he’s had to put up with alot of unfair abuse from other writers (c) no one can mock Bill Kristol with the finesse that Joe can (he deserves a drink for that alone).

hat’s right: Microsoft Word hits 25 this year. ITBusiness.ca has a good rundown on the history — good and bad — of this software giant. I used to use Word 5 on an old Mac SE 30 and I thought it was just perfect for what I wanted. (Bonus: no $#%&* Clippy!) But Word rolls on, and new features roll along with (and into) it.

Take a walk down memory lane here: Microsoft Word Turns 25

Awhile back, I explained Bernie’s Rule of Wearing Red. You may have thought it funny, but according to CNN.com, Wearing red may boost your sex appeal. At least, men find women who wear red more attractive and sexier than women who wear blue or green. The article tries to explain why.

I am guessing that men who wear red well will also get the attention of women. Regardless, more reasons to wear red (especially as the weather in this part of the world turns gray).

(Photo by MontyLov on Unsplash )

Penguin has always been a great publisher. But good books aren’t everything. You want to be able to talk about them, too. Why not talk to somewhere you can potentially hookup with? Wouldn’t that be great? Well, Penguin thought so, too! They decided to provide this. Now you can be smart and meet hot people, too! Life is good.

According to globeandmail.com there is a new source of X-rays: scotch tape!

Now, before you go and throw all your adhesive tape in the garbage, there is something to consider. For X rays to be produced from tape you need a vacuum. So while there is little to worry about, it is something to be interested in.

There are a number of sites mentioning that Alex Rivera, Photojournalist of Civil Rights Movement died today. Sadly, few of them do much more than edit and print the press release.

This is sad because he took some incredible photographs that are particularly relevant with the pending U.S. election.

Fortunately you can see an exhibit of them here and read about the exhibit here.

For example, in one, taken only 60 years ago, of Sallie Nixon and her family. It says her husband was taken from his jail cell by white men and lynched in 1948. His “crime” was that he had voted.

Go see the site and share it.

Normally, covering Marvin Gaye would be a way to show that you are…well, not Marvin Gaye.

Covering two of Marvin’s songs in this way should just be a way of showing you are….stupid.

But this is Robert Palmer. And while Palmer is always good, here he just digs into these classics and makes them his own. I like his cover of “Mercy Mercy Me”. But as he moves into “I Want You”, he soars.

Ok, I am miffed. I was writing about low cost wines well before Robert Parker, and now he is cutting in on my act! 🙂

Goofiness aside, he has a good article on Fifteen California Wines for Under $25 in BusinessWeek. For Parker, anything in the $20-$25 price range is low cost, and he mentions some here that go as low as $10 (U.S.).

If you can find any of them, I recommend you grab them and given them a try.

PS. If you live in Ontario, you can get the Château St. Jean Fumé Blanc for $20.95 (vs. $13 in the US!), the Kendall-Jackson Vintner’s Reserve Chardonnay for $19.95 (vs. $15 in the US), the Tablas Creek Côtes de Tablas for $25.75 (vs $22). If it is indeed the same wine, you can get the Beringer Chardonnay Napa for $27.95 (vs $16!! WTF?!)

A few years ago, this was a famous commercial.

Humourous. Stupid, but humourous.

Now we have this.

Humourous. Anything but stupid.

True

I previously showed a photograph of Barack Obama that showed his resoled shoes. It’s a telling photograph, and it was taken by Callie Shell. Click on that hyperlink: it will take you to many more great photographs of Obama on the campaign trail. Not only are the photographs great — TIME has had many great photographers working for them over the decades, including Shell — but the commentary and the context provided make them even more enjoyable.

I am sure Barrack Obama can afford more than one pair of shoes. Instead, he got them resoled. Someone took a photo of them.

In running for president, the details matter.

How to look sharp indeed.

Photo from andrewsullivan.com

Not all business news is bad news. (Ok, maybe it’s bad news for Wall St., but not Main St.) According to the reportonbusiness.com: Oil tumbles below $67.

Hard to believe that just a few short weeks ago that oil producers were worried about it slipping below $100. And in mid-July it was over $147.

For people heating their homes with oil, this will be welcome relief for the early winter.

By the incomparable Jessica Hagy and found on the Molt:n Digital Blog

I had promised I would not blog any more about Damien Hirst, but this faux news article,

NewsBiscuit: Damien Hirst sets new auction record with ‘Investment Banker in Formaldehyde’
made me laugh.

Here’s the “work” in question.

The article is good for a laugh.

And if you are Mr. Hirst, you are laughing all the way to the bank.

Really! That’s what it is. Lots and lots of BROKERS WITH HANDS ON THEIR FACES!

Like this guy:

Actually, this is a cross between hand ON his face and punching himself IN the face, but you get the idea. Go see!

It’s another fine use of one of my favourite sites, tumblr.

Remember the Milk is a great site to help you juggle all the tasks you have to do. You can and should Learn More about it: it’s packed with good features. Just some of those features I like are:

1. I can access it through iGoogle
2. I can email tasks to it
3. I can get an an RSS feed of my todo lists and
4. I can share my todo lists with others
5. even though there is a Pro version, the free version is really good
6. the shortcut keys make it fast to update tasks
7. I don’t use it much, but the offline feature is also good for those times when you want to keep uptodate but you are losing your network connection
8. It’s simple to use in the best sense

While endorsing Barack Obama today, Colin Powell spoke eloquently about this photograph. It is part of this article: Service: The New Yorker.

Update, here is the video of Colin Powell on Meet the Press.

I was reading about 100,000 people turning out in St. Louis today to see Barack Obama. For some reason, the song “People Get Ready” came to mind. When I went on YouTube, it seems that I am not the only one who associates this song with Obama: there were a number of photo montages of him with this song.

It’s a beautiful song, and there are many great versions of it on YouTube. Al Green, U2, Jeff Beck, Ziggy Marley…they all do it well. But this one, with an older Curtis Mayfield, backed up by Taylor Dane, is my favourite.

The U.S. Presidential election is coming soon. People get ready. There’s a train a coming.

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

The Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner is quite an event.  At this year’s event, both John McCain and Barrack Obama showed up for the white tie event (as opposed to black tie). While Obama was good, McCain was great.

If McCain was more like this during the campaign, he would be doing better:

What is the difference between white tie and black tie? For that, you should check out Whit Stilman’s Metropolitan, a little-seen-but-great-film.