The Blog of Harald

A completely over-the-top review of a Bic pen:

Amazon.co.uk: M. Williams “Matt Wil…’s review of Bic Crystal ballpoint pen, medium point, b…

Some of the comments on this review are equally hilarious:

bq. I often use pencils to write notes on paper, but have been thinking about changing to a pen. Is this pen a good starting point for a novice?

and so on…

I’m not sure if this is irony or hypocrisy. The Carpenter’s Union is outsourcing its picket lines to random people off the street, paying them $1 above minimum wage ($8/hr) to protest … low wages.

Outsourcing the Picket Line – washingtonpost.com

Megan McArdle: Harry Potter: the economics

bq. The low opportunity cost attached to magic spills over into the thoroughly unbelievable wizard economy. Why are the Weasleys poor? Why would any wizard be? Anything they need, except scarce magical objects, can be obtained by ordering a house elf to do it, or casting a spell, or, in a pinch, making objects like dinner, or a house, assemble themselves. Yet the Weasleys are poor not just by wizard standards, but by ours: they lack things like new clothes and textbooks that should be easily obtainable with a few magic words. Why?

An interesting touch on the subject. It seems true that in the Potterverse, magic is free, something that never works very well for story telling. C.S. Friedman just published _Feast of Souls_, the first book in a trilogy based on the opposite extreme; the source (and cost) of magic is life force. in _The Magic Goes Away_, Larry Niven deals with magic as a finite resource, to interesting effect. There are lots of other examples in SF&F literature.

So why don’t we care about this inconsistency in Rowling’s work?

From Bruce Schneier’s security weblog:

bq. Here’s a “clip”:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs3SfNANtig from an Australian TV programme called “The Chaser”. A Trojan Horse (full of appropriately attired soldiers) finds its way past security everywhere except the Turkish consulate.

bq. At least they remember their history.

“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs3SfNANtig”:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xs3SfNANtig

This sounds familiar:

“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_attention_fatigue”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_attention_fatigue

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: Culture of Fear: Poetry Professor Becomes Terror Suspect

bq. Because of my recycling, the bomb squad came, then the state police. Because of my recycling, buildings were evacuated, classes were canceled, the campus was closed. No. Not because of my recycling. Because of my dark body. No. Not even that. Because of his fear. Because of the way he saw me. Because of the culture of fear, mistrust, hatred and suspicion that is carefully cultivated in the media, by the government, by people who claim to want to keep us “safe.”

“Bruce Schneier”:http://www.schneier.com/ has been collecting a bunch of these stories lately. His point is less about civil liberties, though. If police and emergency services are kept this busy chasing false alarms, it’s that much easier for the real criminals to slip past unnoticed…

I’ve linked to some of his recent entries:

* “A Rant From a Cop”:http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/04/a_rant_from_a_c.html
* “Stage Weapons Banned”:http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/04/stage_weapons_b.html
* “How Australian Authorities Respond to Potential Terrorists”:http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/04/how_australian.html
* “Another Boston Terrorism Overreaction”:http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/04/another_boston.html

As seen in the Pachelbels Canon – CollegeHumor video, it really is everywhere.

Maybe you have to be a bit of a music geek, but I laughed myself silly over this one…

The house of the future: complete computer control.

bq. The House of the Future: Complete Computer Control

bq. As Don Sheppard punches his special code into the electronic keypad at the entryway, a monotone computer voice says, “Welcome-home-Don-come-rightin.’ The front door then glides open.

This is from a 1983 issue of Creative Computing. It amuses me that the “House of the Future” articles haven’t changed all that much since then. The technology has improved (“Insteon”:http://www.insteon.net/ by “SmartLabs”:http://www.smartlabsinc.com/ is pretty cool) but it’s still to expensive (and too geeky) for the average home buyer. Because retrofits are so hard (and labour intensive == expensive), this stuff is best installed by the homebuilders, but there’s no demand…

Via “Ned Batchelder”:http://www.nedbatchelder.com/blog/200702.html, I am now reading indexed, a collection of tongue-in-cheek venn diagrams and charts by Jessica Hagy.

I laughed myself silly reading the first page, so I thought I’d share…

Why Career Planning Is Time Wasted

bq. One group has to choose which sandwiches they want for an entire week in advance. The other group gets to choose which they want each day. A fascinating thing happens. People who choose their favourite sandwich each day at lunchtime also often choose the same sandwich. This group turns out to be reasonably happy with its choice.

bq. Amazingly, though, people choosing in advance assume that what they’ll want for lunch next week is a variety. And so they choose a turkey sandwich Monday, tuna on Tuesday, egg on Wednesday and so on. It turn out that when next week rolls around they generally don’t like the variety they thought they would. In fact they are significantly less happy with their choices than the group who chose their sandwiches on the day.

you have nothing to lose but your germs!

‘Waving’ Goodbye to a Kitchen Hazard

bq. A team of University of Florida Engineering researchers have come to the conclusion that microwaving plastic scrubbers and kitchen sponges on full power can destroy practically 100% of the bacteria and viruses, parasites or spores collected on them.

(via “diane duane”:http://www.dianeduane.com/outofambit/)

An analysis of a large collection of passwords gathered in a Myspace phishing attack reveals that passwords are getting better, although:

bq. We used to quip that “password” is the most common password. Now it’s “password1.” Who said users haven’t learned anything about security?

Schneier on Security: Real-World Passwords

The map itself is cool, but so is the method used to create it; check it out!

xkcd – map of the internet

(boy, that title is going to make the spammers love me!)

Best Mashup Ever: Caffeinated Viagra Beer (by Jeremy Zawodny)

Schneier on Security: Tracking People by their Sneakers

Researchers at the University of Washington have demonstrated a surveillance system that automatically tracks people through the Nike iPod Sport Kit.

Smashing The Clock

Best Buy experiments with the new “results oriented work environment”.

Absinthetics – Employee Of The Month

bq. They call it protecting their investment; I call it a presumption of criminal intent masquerading as due diligence, and, no, I don’t particularly care for the implication.

from WWdN: In Exile: Seriously. What would Jesus do?

bq. if I were a Christian, I would be profoundly upset that this huge organization, with such a loud voice at the table and such a significant presence in public life, is declaring that stopping gay marriage and telling women whether or not they can make a deeply personal decision are more important issues — and more specifically more important Christian issues — than helping the people among us who have the least and need the most

I was talking on Thursday night about how the Internet is enabling “The Long Tail”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_tail. Disintermediation is allowing small, specialized producers to deal directly with their far-flung customers.

Today I tripped over a perfect example: Mr. McGroovy’s sells “box rivets”. These are small plastic fasteners designed to hold cardboard together in building projects. You know, fire trucks, castles, submarines, etc. for kids to play in :-).

Now this is a specialty market! But his website doesn’t just have the product; he has free plans, and details on how to easily get large cardboard boxes (and how to load them into your car!). Very well done, and an excellent example.

EO Newsroom: New Images – United States Population Density

This image also has Canadian population density information on it. It’s a very cool looking visualization; check it out.