Archive for 2004

Symantec Error in Line 1

Admittedly, I get a bad impression of Windows software because the only time I ever touch it is when it’s already causing problems for someone. But gag. The latest wonderful bit of nonsense is thanks to Symantec, in particular their “Norton Internet Security” product. Its wonderful new activation feature is broken on Windows XP, so […]

AppleMail and IMAP

Continuing my transition to Mac OS X as desktop of choice, I’ve been trying to get my email to work. Getting GPG working was happily easy — just a matter of downloading some stuff, and having AppleMail suddenly support signing email. It seems reasonable functional. Harder is dealing with the couple of hundred megs of […]

Skiing? Mmm, mmm!

Following the brilliant weekend at Mt Buller last year, we went back again in August this year to see if history wouldn’t mind repeating; this time bringing along my step-borther and his kids. Happily, things turned out even better: similar amounts of snow, even nicer accommodation, and way better weather. We tried rearranging our trip […]

My New iBook

* aj continues waiting impatiently for his ibook * Rukh continues waiting impatiently for Bush to be booted out <blender> rukh: a week to go <aj> Rukh: true, i suppose i could be happy that my wait will be a lot shorter than others’ <Rukh> heheh <Rukh> aj: so you’re getting your ibook in a […]

But Professor Utonium Accidentally Added an Extra Ingredient to the Concoction…

I was amused when Steve Langasek invoked the Powerpuff Girls in response to the US election, with a beautifully crafted reference to episode 1.10. But my amusement soon turned to something deeper when David found this rather profound analysis via OpinionJournal’s Best of the Web: Mojo Jojo speaks English with a Japanese accent. He has […]

Bloodshed Predicted

Another note for future reference on the Iraq situation. Today’s big ABC news story is Commit troops or delay Iraq election, Govt warned: The Federal Government is being warned against promoting a January election in Iraq unless it is willing to commit more troops. Australian National University Professor William Maley, who has just returned from […]

The Wisdom of Crowds

Hrmph. Since my laptop keeps dying on the other post I’m trying to make, I might blog about James Surowiecki’s The Wisdom of Crowds instead. Here’s a section from p187 about small group dynamics: Talkativeness may seem like a curious thing to worry about, but in fact talkativeness has a major impact on the kinds […]

Promoting Free Markets

Perhaps the most beautiful facet of capitalism is the way even its nominal opponents are forced into enhancing its effectiveness. Following in the footsteps of Mike Moore’s schlocumentary producing corporate empire, it’s my pleasure to introduce the first issue of Blender’s Consumer Reports: Centrecom sucks. (And don’t forget to read issue two, Centrecom sucks: I […]

YADFW

Unsurprisingly, Ubuntu’s release has generated some discussion in Debian. Odds on it won’t create much else. Anyway, Scott (a Canonical employee and dpkg hacker, among other things) writes: Release, release, my kingdom for a release! […] I think he’s missed something major there, and that something major is the reason I think Debian finds releasing […]

Darcs and Repositories

I think it’s reasonable to consider two sorts of “repository” when dealing with darcs — public repositories that are used to reflect a particular line of development, and private working directories that are used to actually do development. Unfortunately there’s some overlap here, pretty much taking the form of “copying your working directory around”. The […]

Carnival of the Capitalists

It’s a cracker Carnival this week, with a Catallarchy post on the link between competing replicators and gay amateur gang rape porn, a Truck and Barter post on how government makes us sick, and a Layman’s Logic post on home made speed cameras, for sale online.

That Liberal Media

You know, that double-entendre just keeps getting better. Anyway, a couple of days before the election, lefty blogger Robert Corr noted a Crikey mailout claiming the Age was forced to take a pro-Howard line in its editorial by their Editor-in-chief, supposedly on the basis that “backing Latham wasnt in the commercial interests of the company.” […]

Afghanistan Elections Marred By Peace

From Indian news site, NDTV: Boycott call dropped in Afghanistan So it wasn’t bomb threats by the Taliban, but allegations of mass irregularities that threatened to derail the three-year march towards democracy. Uh, moving your worries from “bomb threats” to “mass irregularities” is marching towards democracy. Is it really that unreasonable to expect the first […]

Bioweapons Labs, redux

Not long after I linked to the Yahoo story about confirmed bioweapons labs in Iraq last year, it disappeared. Let’s see if the same thing happens to this World Net Daily story that even includes pictures. These are almost certainly the trucks that the Duelfer report is talking about when it says: [The Iraq Survey […]

Bikini Babes for Bush

David writes, under the heading Supermodels for Kerry: Sure, I’m superficial and shallow — but you know you’re tempted too. Don’t get me wrong, I’d accept a bumper sticker from Rebecca Romijn too, but it’s not like being superficial and shallow is an either/or choice compared with being a right-wing death beast. As Australian-American Gabrielle […]