Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/30/string-walks-in-to-a-bar/
A string walks in to a bar. Bartender says “we don’t serve your kind here.”
A while later, String comes back to the bar. Bartender says, “look, we do not serve strings here!”
(more…)
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/29/daily-show-uber-alles/
If you are a fan of Jon Stewart, then this is the best article ever. It turns out, according to an Annenberg survey, that viewers of the “Daily Show” are better-informed on election issues than people who read newspapers four days a week.
60 percent of “Daily Show” viewers answered all six questions correctly. Just 42 percent of those who read a newspaper four days a week aced the test. Only 40 percent of those who watch network news four days a week got every answer right.
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/21/soldiers-prefer-john-kerry/
A good read from The Christian Science Monitor:
“9 out of 10 of the people I talk to, it wouldn’t matter who ran against Bush – they’d vote for them,” said a US soldier in the southern city of Najaf, “people are so fed up with Iraq, and fed up with Bush.”
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/16/rnc-notes-nyc-detention/
2600 has posted Notes From the RNC – The 8/31 Experience, a long recounting of the thirty three hours that one journalist experienced in detention, after being penned in by the NYPD for standing on the wrong sidewalk at the wrong time. It is definately worth a read by any American. (Thanks, Mike!)
I’ve been lucky enough to talk to a few people, both online and in person, who were also swept off the streets during the convention. We shared stories and experiences and it became obvious that we really needed to do this. A tale of injustice, even one that is dwarfed by others, needs to be told.
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/06/chicagos-beaches/
From The Christian Science Monitor:
Quick, which city has the best beaches: New York, San Francisco, or Chicago? Forget the oceanside location of the first two, and the Windy City’s well-earned reputation for harsh weather. For at least three months of the year, give or take a cold snap or two, the broad-shouldered hog butcher and freight handler is also a beach town.
A gentle reminder that the third coast is the one with the most! (It is hard to get to a good beach in the San Francisco area, though I will admit that SoCal is so sweet!)
-d
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/05/humiliated-angry-ashamed-brown/
The tale of Ian Spiers, one brown American, trying to take a few photographs, in a time of fearful paranoia. Very much worth a read.
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/03/dell-microsoft-pawn/
The Register reports on allegations made by Lindows that Dell’s occasional efforts to sell Linux-based desktop systems are squashed because of special business relationships between Dell and Microsoft.
Although the Department of Justice has ruled that Microsoft must supply Windows licenses to top OEMs at the same price, there are other financial incentives that Microsoft can make, including Office licensing and promotions programs, that can add up to as much as $30 per PC, or about 25% of Dell’s profits. Very creepy reading.
A cursory visit to Dell’s web site reveals that Microsoft Windows is the only option to be had on an inexpensive PC. Caveat emptor!
Attempts to contact Dell for comment have not succeeded.
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/09/03/weird-gop-hatred/
A nice op-ed from Paul Krugman:
Barack Obama, who gave the Democratic keynote address, delivered a message of uplift and hope. Zell Miller, who gave the Republican keynote, declared that political opposition is treason: “Now, at the same time young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats’ manic obsession to bring down our commander in chief.” And the crowd roared its approval.
Roared Jon Stewart, “how dare they … field a candidate … and in an election year!” (more…)
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/08/18/bear-rainier-beer/
From Yahoo! News …
A black bear was found passed out in a campground, after having punctured and drunk 36 cans of Rainier Beer. The bear had tried Busch, but stopped after the first can. “He drank the Rainier and wouldn’t drink the Busch beer,” said campground bookkeeper Lisa Broxson. (more…)
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/08/04/lame-segway-adventure/
Best article lead I have read in a very long time:
Back in the good old days, strong men such as Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady and Ken Kesey went screaming across the great American highways with heads hopped full of sour mash and benzedrine. They performed lewd acts, taunted the police, harassed the stiffs and produced great art. These days we’re left with four twenty-something geeks traveling country roads at 10 mph with their Segways, iPods and blogs.
Okay, get this. A guy is going to journey across this great land of ours … on a Segway scooter.
That could be a respectible adventure in and of itself, but he’s going to be followed, at ten miles an hour, by three buddies in a “support car” holding 16 backup batteries, and a bunch of toys, merrily blogging their adventures the whole way through. The Register continues to pound out great copy:
Kesey and the Merry Pranksters were also said to have debated the use of text messaging on their trip across the US. In the end, however, they decided that a fridge full of acid-laced orange juice would be a more profound use of technology. For Kerouac, there was but a typewriter, gallons of red wine and meth.
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/07/15/usda-mad-cows/
Japan is a country lamentably deficient in delicious cows. And while they may console themselves with delicious morsels of raw fish on rice, there is a sizeable demand for beef, and they are willing to pay top yen for imports.
But for such money, the Japanese want to be damn certain they are importing beef that will not melt their brains. Since Mad Cow disease was detected in the USA’s cattle supply, they have required that any American imports be tested. Does this not seem prudent?
And so, in order to re-gain access to a valuable export market, Creekstone Farms, in the Red State of Kansas, built a laboratory next to their slaughterhouse, and trained employees to conduct tests.
You can read the story here, but the upshot is that the USDA will not allow Creekstone to test their beef. (more…)
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/07/09/ginmar-market-day/
Another awesome post from ginmar, serving in Iraq. This time, reflections on the concept of wealth, and some hopeful news:
There’s a noticeable difference in the police, in the Iraqi National Guard, in the people on the street. People are noticeably more effusive now; waving enthusiastically, blowing kisses. The biggest difference is in the police and the Iraqi National Guard … the ING is doing things I wouldn’t have imagined being possible, after the past four months. I saw them abandon their posts, and I could understand it, because they’re still poorly-armed, and they don’t have body armor. Some of them are still unarmed. But it sure makes a difference when it’s their own country they’re fighting for, and it shows. Before, the Mahdi Army would attack police stations and the police would run after token resistance. Now they’re fighting back and standing their ground.
There is plenty of dreary truth to temper this optimism — notably, crushing poverty — which ginmar has seen before in Russia, and the fact that the enemy targets civilians. That latter dark cloud seems to indicate a silver lining:
More and more, it’s civilians that the Sadrs and the Zarcawis are aiming at, and civilians don’t have body armor or helmets. Every soldier who dies here is accompanied in death by civilians who were deliberately targeted by either religious fanatics or cold-blooded opportunists who aren’t even Iraqi. And now the Iraqis are taking matters into their own hands.
But where’s the heavy-duty reconstruction? The roads, the bridges, the electricity, the jobs and ultimately the economic stability that helps a newly democratic government survive? She cites Abraham Lincoln in her conclusion, which makes me wonder if Iraq will be more like post-war Georgia and Alabama than post-war Germany and Japan. (Lincoln wanted to spend a great deal on reconstruction, to “bind the nation together” again, but this ambition died with his assassination.)
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/07/08/msn-imitates-google/
I must recommend this New York Times article about Microsoft’s attempt to develop a Google-class search engine. It pokes fun at Microsoft with dry wit. Some highlights:
The new look consists of an empty white screen that loads blissfully quickly, even over dial-up connections, and an empty, neatly centered text box where you’re supposed to type in what you’re looking for. The search page is ad-free and, except for the MSN logo, even devoid of graphics. (On July 4, however, MSN added a waving-flag graphic, an imitation of the way Google’s witty artists dress up its own logo on holidays.) In short, MSN Search couldn’t look more like Google if you photocopied it.
…
Unfortunately, Microsoft calls the separation of advertising an experiment, not a permanent change in policy. It seems to be trying on honesty in the mirror to see if people will find it attractive, rather than realizing that running a principled business is the way to win customers’ trust.
If you read the whole thing through, you’ll discover that Microsoft has a long way to go to achieve its search-engine dominancy.
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/03/25/innovation-lacking-when-regulators-regulate/
Okay, if you have any interest in Microsoft and/or European anti-trust regulation, check out this New York Times article. It gets good on page two.
The background is that Europe has told Microsoft that they will need to offer a version of Windows that does not include Media Player, so that computer vendors can sell a version of Windows with competing media playing software.
A colleague at Microsoft ranted yesterday that this was a massive imposition, because after removing Media Player, they would have to test Windows, which would take months of time and thousands of employees. This complaint seemed strange to me, as Microsoft is frequently making revisions to its operating system, and distributing these changes via Windows Update, so, it surely has some mechanism for testing Windows? And it is not like this need to change Windows is entirely unanticipated, as they’ve been working towards it for five years.
Anyway, to the first quote:
“Microsoft … said the commission’s ruling would stifle innovation and deprive consumers of choices.”
What charms me about Microsoft is that any threat of government regulation will always deprive them of the ability to innovate. (They don’t really seem to do much “innovation” themselves anyway, they mostly just copy or co-opt the innovations of others.) In this case, they are being compelled to innovate, by changing their software so as to offer consumers more choices.
I wonder if whomever issued their objection stopped to consider whether they needed a more innovative objection? If only there were other consumer software monopolies haunted by the specter of government regulation after which Microsoft could model innovative rebuttals to the specter of government regulation!
Oh, but it gets better. Next quote:
“Once regulators get their bit in their teeth and realize they can regulate, they may not stop with the bad actors,” said Paul Saffo, director of the Institute for the Future, a Silicon Valley research firm.
Yes … once regulators figure out that they can regulate, they might start regulating! The implications of this could be spectacularly regulatory!
Link: https://dannyman.toldme.com/2004/03/23/good-luck-michael-newdow/
I pledge allegiance, to the flag, of the United States of America, and to the republic, for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
Michael Newdow will be pleading his case before the Supreme Court on Wednesday, explaining why those two little words have no place in our nation’s “Pledge of Allegiance”. I hope his arguments prove convincing. We’ll see how our government works. You can read more about what’s up at the New York Times.
« Newer Stuff . . . Older Stuff »
Site Archive
Danny Howard is 100% responsible for the content on this site, except some of it is stolen. (Sorry about that.)
Intellectual property on this web site is reserved for re-use under the terms of the Creative Commons license. Derivative works may be created for non-commercial purposes, with proper attribution.
You can contact me via e-mail: dannyman@toldme.com
Most of //dannyman.toldme.com/ is powered by WordPress.
If you're hip to RSS and whatnot, you can subscribe to this site.
Mastodon