Spring forward, fall back

It's that time again, when we all have to reset our clocks - a useless, outdated practice that wastes more time (!) and energy than it saves. But, it got me to thinking about unusual clocks. I remember once purchasing a ballbearing clock (right) for about $30 - cheap enough - but dropped it on the way home. I ended up with 32 ballbearings and a pile of plastic pieces. I never bought another, although I would dearly love to own one (hint hint!). The action is mesmerizing - a bit like staring at an aquarium. Using it as a timepiece is secondary to the fun of seeing those balls dropping!

The 'net has an amazing array of fascinating clocks. For example, go to Google Images and search for [clock]. If you search for [clock ballbearing] you will find pictures of some truly incredible clocks, including the one at left which will write the time on a piece of paper for you! It costs a mere $350,000 - more info, plus a video demonstrating it in action, is here. Classic Rube Goldberg. Which reminds me - for a beautiful Rube Goldbergian device, take a look at this commercial. (It loads slowly, but be patient - it's worth the wait.)

The future - never certain

A good friend sent this to me recently, but its author is unknown. Enjoy - and let me have your thoughts too! (One thing does strike me right off the bat - this is a U.S.-centric view, and it doesn't really hold water when looked at in a global context. Like it or not, we do live in an ever-shrinking world, so I think it's important to bear that in mind while reading this.)

[Italicized notes in square brackets are my bafflegabbed, peanut gallery comments.]

----------------

British GPO logo

1. The Post Office. Get ready to imagine a world without the post office. They are so deeply in financial trouble that there is probably no way to sustain it long term. Email, FedEx, and UPS have just about wiped out the minimum revenue needed to keep the post office alive. Most of your mail every day is junk mail and bills. [Maybe true for the U.S., not necessarily so in other countries, particularly those where the Post Office is state-run, handles business other than delivering mail, and can run at a loss because it is subsidized. And, in the U.S., what about people who aren't online, including those who would love to be but cannot because they live in rural areas? Not even FedEx and UPS serve them - only the USPS does! Additionally, there are those who simply cannot afford to be online. Will the U.S. Gov't subsidize the rural and the poor? I think not...]

Check that purchased Alaska

2. The Check. Britain is already laying the groundwork to do away with checks by 2018. It costs the financial system billions of dollars a year to process checks. Plastic cards and online transactions will lead to the eventual demise of the check. This plays right into the death of the post office. If you never paid your bills by mail and never received them by mail, the post office would absolutely go out of business. [The payment system model is changing rapidly and radically - I think that even plastic will soon be history. But, as is often the case, this is a much larger topic that needs to be reserved for a different time. Update Nov. 2: Coincidentally, this appeared in Monday's edition of the S.F. Chronicle, discussing the problem of reluctance by banks in the U.S. to move to newer technology - again, giving me ammo for my view that this author was being very U.S.-centric in his/her essay.]

3. The Newspaper. The younger generation simply doesn't read the newspaper. They certainly don't subscribe to a daily delivered print edition. That may go the way of the milkman and the laundry man. As for reading the paper online, get ready to pay for it. The rise in mobile Internet devices and e-readers has caused all the newspaper and magazine publishers to form an alliance. They have met with Apple, Amazon, and the major cell phone companies to develop a model for paid subscription services. [I really don't think newspapers have much of a chance setting up paywalls at this stage of the game - that train left the station a long time ago. I despair for the future of decent journalism. Sure, the likes of the NYTimes will survive, but most of them, I fear, will be joining the horse-and-buggy set soon.]

Mmm ... paper!

4. The Book. You say you will never give up the physical book that you hold in your hand and turn the literal pages. I said the same thing about downloading music from iTunes. I wanted my hard copy CD. But I quickly changed my mind when I discovered that I could get albums for half the price without ever leaving home to get the latest music. The same thing will happen with books. You can browse a bookstore online and even read a preview chapter before you buy. And the price is less than half that of a real book. [Not true - in fact, there's a debate raging right now about the fact that the likes of Amazon are now charging more for e-books than their printed counterparts. This is being forced on e-booksellers by the publishers.] And think of the convenience! Once you start flicking your fingers on the screen instead of the book, you find that you are lost in the story, can't wait to see what happens next, and you forget that you're holding a gadget instead of a book. [This is a slightly naïve view - distribution and sale of content in all its forms is undergoing a sea-change. The primary issue in my mind is the lack of permanence when it comes to electronic storage; this, however, is an issue that goes way beyond the scope of this discussion.]

Who remembers how to use that
twirly thing on the front?!

5. The Land Line Telephone. Unless you have a large family and make a lot of local calls, you don't need it anymore. Most people keep it simply because they're [sic] always had it. But you are paying double charges for that extra service. All the cell phone companies will let you call customers using the same cell provider for no charge against your minutes. [In most countries, mobile phones are already way in the majority and, indeed, many developing countries have skipped landline technology and gone directly to mobile, giving them a huge advantage (no maintenance of an aging infrastructure is necessary). In some respects, there are connections here to my post a few days ago about centralized vs distributed organisms.]

6. Music. This is one of the saddest parts of the change story. The music industry is dying a slow death. Not just because of illegal downloading. It's the lack of innovative new music being given a chance to get to the people who would like to hear it. Greed and corruption is the problem. The record labels and the radio conglomerates simply self-destruction. [That's not a sentence - where's the verb?] Over 40% of the music purchased today is "catalog items," meaning traditional music that the public is familiar with. Older established artists. This is also true on the live concert circuit. To explore this fascinating and disturbing topic further, check out the book, "Appetite for Self-Destruction" by Steve Knopper, and the video documentary, "Before the Music Dies." [Here, I think I agree; I say "think" because the point is hard to discern. It goes back to the lack of permanence I mentioned in #4 above, as well as the DMCA takedown actions of late.]

7. Television. Revenues to the networks are down dramatically. Not just because of the economy. People are watching TV and movies streamed from their computers. And they're playing games and doing all lots of other things that take up the time that used to be spent watching TV. Prime time shows have degenerated down to lower than the lowest common denominator. Cable rates are skyrocketing and commercials run about every 4 minutes and 30 seconds. I say good riddance to most of it It's time for the cable companies to be put out of our misery. Let the people choose what they want to watch online and through Netflix. [This is a pipe dream - while I would dearly love to see more intelligent TV content in this country, it ain't gonna happen, because that's what pays the bills. And TV, quite simply, is not going to go away, at least not for a l-o-n-g time. Believe it or not, TV is a valuable cultural phenomenon elsewhere. See this post.]

Storm clouds!

8. The "Things" That You Own. Many of the very possessions that we used to own are still in our lives, but we may not actually own them in the future. They may simply reside in "the cloud." Today your computer has a hard drive and you store your pictures, music, movies, and documents. Your software is on a CD or DVD, and you can always re-install it if need be. But all of that is changing. Apple, Microsoft, and Google are all finishing up their latest "cloud services." That means that when you turn on a computer, the Internet will be built into the operating system. So, Windows, Google, and the Mac OS will be tied straight into the Internet. If you click an icon, it will open something in the Internet cloud. If you save something, it will be saved to the cloud. And you may pay a monthly subscription fee to the cloud provider. [Again, see here.]

In this virtual world, you can access your music or your books, or your whatever from any laptop or handheld device. That's the good news. But, will you actually own any of this "stuff" or will it all be able to disappear at any moment in a big "Poof?" Will most of the things in our lives be disposable and whimsical? It makes you want to run to the closet and pull out that photo album, grab a book from the shelf, or open up a CD case and pull out the insert.

[And there you have it - we do agree, after all! Why on earth did it take this long for the author to make his/her point?!]

Little brother is watching

9. Privacy. If there ever was a concept that we can look back on nostalgically, it would be privacy. That's gone. It's been gone for a long time anyway. There are cameras on the street, in most of the buildings, and even built into your computer and cell phone. But you can be sure that 24/7 "They" know who you are and where you are, right down to the GPS coordinates, and the Google Street View. If you buy something, your habit is put into a zillion profiles, and your ads will change to reflect those habits. And "They" will try to get you to buy something else. Again and again. [ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY!]

Oops

Centralized vs distributed organisms

This article from Techdirt contemplates the nature of centralized vs distributed organisms, in the context of Wikileak's recent exposures of the U.S. Government's behavior in Iraq. Regardless of one's opinion of this particular situation, it's worth reading because it provides food for thought about what our future may look like.

This is a topic that, through my life, I have thought about in different, specific, contexts - not least of which is how the pendulum has swung over the years with regard to the pros and cons of server- and client-side computing. Central came first with mainframes and dumb terminals. Then minicomputers came on the scene, reducing the cost - which led to "microcomputers" (who among us remembers that term?), aka PCs. And now the pendulum is swinging back, with all our data (and intelligence) in the "cloud."

Perhaps a good illustration of the way this works is the Microsoft/Google analogy. Microsoft built its empire on the notion of putting the smarts into PCs by having you buy their software, and then locking you into occasional "upgrades" - the distributed model. Google came along later, and realized that a centralized model made more sense. So now, Microsoft is in the sad position of having to release updates of its software (e.g. Outlook) on a periodic basis. Otoh, Google, by virtue of the fact that its software (e.g. Gmail) is in the cloud, is in the much happier position of being able to control updates centrally, as and when they want or need to. If you're a user of Google's products, you will notice how they "push" subtle changes to you on a regular basis. Microsoft wishes they had the ability to do this. But that's not really what this post is about, and I happily recognize that I've elided over many points that make the computing example much more complicated.

Back to centralized vs distributed organisms... Beyond computing, where else does this occur?

Well, there's the Cold War, where the enemies were easy to define: sovereign nations. With the Cold War behind us, we now have global terrorism to worry about. Now, the enemy is much harder to define, because instead of countries with clear boundaries, we find ourselves battling ideologies. Small cells of trouble can pop up anywhere, and vanish just as quickly. So: Cold War - centralized. Terrorism - distributed. Is it any wonder the coalition forces going up against the likes of Al Qa'ida are having so much difficulty? We still model our defense forces on the old, centralized model, yet we're fighting a distributed "war." It needs an entirely new approach, one that will not come easily or quickly.

Another example is that of governments. Why is China gaining ground on the U.S. in oh-so-many aspects, not least of which are their respective economies? China uses an autonomous, centralized model. The U.S. has a federal system, which devolves much of the power to individual states - a distributed model. When China wants to achieve something, they simply do it, declaring it as a fait accompli. In the U.S., however, it's a much more complex process - eternal wrangling over, for example, whether to spend or save. The consequence, of course, is that very little gets accomplished here with any alacrity.

So there you have three examples: computing, war, government. I'll leave it to you, dear reader, to decide which is preferable in each case: centralized or distributed organism? And to what other situations can we apply this? Comments, as always, welcome!

Quickies

Some good items in the Huffington Post today - worth linking to. Here goes:

• Carl Paladino fell apart in a gubernatorial debate with Andrew Cuomo.
• There's a dustup between Sarah Palin and NYTimes columnist Maureen Dowd.
• Larry Magid talks about how Facebook Groups can jeopardize privacy.
• And, on DADT, it appears that the judge is likely to defy the government.

Facebook does it again

Yet again, Facebook is in the news. It has come to light that, regardless of how stringently you set your so-called "privacy" settings in Facebook, there are a number of associated apps that ignore this, and divulge personally identifiable information about you to their "trusted partners." What's worse, not only about you, but also information about your Facebook "friends." One of these apps, Farmville, has almost 60 million users (yes, 60,000,000!), and it seems they are one of the worst offenders.

Here's what happens: Every user of Facebook has a unique ID. Anyone, you included, can look up an individual's profile using this ID, thus divulging (at least) the name, along with anything else the person may have chosen to include. Apps like Farmville use this ID - as well as those of your "friends" - to pass this info on to data mining companies. So, even if you, personally, have chosen not to get involved, there is a high likelihood that your "friends" have - and thus your personal info is being passed on! Nice, huh?

Now, I've written about Facebook a number of times (see here, here, and here), so none of this comes as a surprise to me. But I am amazed at the continued explosive growth of the site, given all the negative publicity they have been receiving; either people don't read or they're just incredibly stupid.

The Huffington Post had this to say about it, along with some informative links that you should look at (particularly the three things you can do on Facebook to help protect your privacy - not that it seems to have much effect!).

As I was looking into this story, I discovered a great website, SUSPACK. There is an excellent essay about Facebook, focusing on the good, the bad, and the ugly. If you only click through to one item, this is the one!

And, if you still feel a desperate urge to use a social networking service, take a look at these alternatives.

Of course, with the speed of change in this world, who knows how long it will be before the next phenomenon comes along that will overshadow Facebook ... only time will tell.

Battle to dominate your living room

It seems that marriage of TV and the 'net is becoming more a reality as each day goes by. If executed well, this could be an exciting innovation. Or, it could be a dud - after all, hooking one's 'puter to a TV is somewhat passé already, even though it does require at least a smidgen of technical knowledge. But if it really, honestly, absolutely, becomes "plug 'n play" (to resurrect an old term), then I think we may be on to something revolutionary. I've always dreamed of the potential of truly interactive TV, but there's no question it has to be as seamless as possible - almost like what the iPhone/iPad/iWhatever did to get phones and 'puters to wed.

Needless to say, Google (surprise!) is one of two major contenders in this arena, the other being Apple. It will be interesting to see who prevails - if at all! Time, as always, will tell.

Wind power - and this time, I'm not farting!

Here's an exciting prospect - an offshore wind farm on the Atlantic seaboard that would generate ~6Gw of power. That's equivalent to about five large nuclear power plants, and the windmills would be located in the ocean, away from populated areas. Even better, Google is one of two major investors!

This all sounds very promising. While expensive to deploy, the benefits, of course, accrue over time. I think this is exciting, and could well be the harbinger of things to come.

And, just for grins, on the left we have a picture of an old windmill on a farm in South Africa - I like it for nostalgic reasons, so why the hell not? (These were typically used to pump water from underground wells.)

This space intentionally left blank! (But is it? Really?!)

TV tech terminology

I've always wondered why the TV industry insists on confusing us with their bafflegabby (!) terminology. Take, for example, the popular "1080p" resolution. This is typically described as a mode characterized by "1080 lines of vertical resolution." (Emphasis mine.) Now, I dunno about you, but this leads me to think that each line is 1080 pixels high - iow, from top to bottom. That's what "vertical" means, n'est-ce pas? Nope, 1080p is the number of horizontal lines, stacked on top of each other. (The width of each line is 1920 pixels.) And, yes, I know it means that each line is, in fact, 1080 pixels high - but it still confuses the crap outta me!

In checking this out, I came across a rather illuminating, easy-to-understand depiction of all the different video resolutions out there. It's interesting to see how far we've come from the early days, and where we may be headed. I say that with reservations, because I think we've pretty much hit the point of diminishing returns. After all, why pump all those extra pixels down the line, eating up precious bandwidth, when the human eye really cannot discern much more than the current standard? Here's the pic in question; you can find a larger, easier-to-see version here. (Realize that HD 1080 is 3,801,600 pixels 30 times a second, while the highest resolution, QSXGA would be 5,242,880 pixels, 1.38x more!)

Google's browser, Chrome, shows its superiority - again

A couple of days ago, I told you about an evil new phenomenon - persistent cookies.

Well, I just read an item from PC Magazine that shows that Google's free browser, Chrome, pretty much decimates these things. If that's not a reason to use Chrome, I don't know what is. Get it here - you will love it, I promise.

I'm taking the liberty of quoting a significant chunk of the article from PC Magazine, mainly because I think this is so important:

"...But in Google Chrome you'll find a superior handling of the problem. Much to my surprise, and confirmed by Adobe, Chrome's cookie manager (Tools—Options—Under the Hood—Content Settings—Show cookies and other site data) integrates management of Flash cookies and almost all of the other items on Kamkar's list. Under the "samy.pl" domain the section "Local Storage" included both the HTML5 storage and Flash cookies. Deleting the domain deleted all of it.

"Better still, Chrome's "Incognito" (private) mode prevented any of them. The cookie manager can't stop the cached image Kamkar says he creates, but all the private modes should be flushing the cache anyway.

"Adobe says that they are working with other browser companies to integrate similar functionality for Flash local storage, but Google Chrome is the first."

FYI: To open an Incognito window in Chrome, press ctrl-shift-n. Oh, and if you're searching for the Tools menu item mentioned above, it's the cute little spanner at the top right, just under the close button!

Technology we take for granted

Scenario: For me, it was the middle of the day in California. For my friend, it was 3am in a Bangkok hotel room - I never know where he is from one day to the other. I emailed him, he saw my note on his phone. He responded, and mentioned that I should tune into CNN to watch a live feed of the Iranian idiot ranting at the United Nations - quite a scene. My friend and I discussed it.

Observation: It made me realize just how much we take instant (and almost free) connectivity for granted these days. California, Bangkok, New York. All in real time. 20 years ago, this was not something most of us envisioned.

Homework: Think about it - the social ramifications, the global "village," the technology, the convenience, and on and on. Drop a comment; share your thoughts.

Persistent cookies

Seems there's a new trick out there - cookies that regenerate themselves when you try to get rid of them. This is not good. I can see how it can be done - quite easily, in fact, and you gotta wonder why it hasn't happened before. Read about it here.

Everything old is new again

We think we're so damn clever with all our new technology. Well, check this out. You know how, these days, we are able to associate metadata with photos? Examples include date, place, technical details of the pic, etc. Read about it here.

Did you know that Kodak thought of this a hundred years ago, and actually made it happen? No need for fancy hard/software, just a pen. Take a look at these ads:

Yep - just open the little door, write down the info, expose, badda bing, badda boom - you're done!

Build your dream house, while sitting at your computer

I've always been excited about the potential for creating physical objects from a printer.

HUH? I hear you say. Well, bear with me. For some time now developers have been improving a technology using what are known as "3D printers." No, not 3D in the sense of wearing special goggles at the movies. We're talking physical creation - these so-called "printers" use different materials, from paper to plastic to metal and even to concrete, and build actual objects layer by layer. The objects range from prosthetic devices to models of buildings to lamps to doorknobs and even to - yes! - houses.

It truly is a matter of sending your computer-generated 3D model that you see on your screen to one of these machines, which then manufactures the thing - just like you were sending a document to a printer. They can even make things with moving parts. Pretty damn cool, no?

Think about the possibilities and implications. Custom-generated items that are unique - print once, delete the file. Remote creation of items. All done automatically, so no more manual handling. Prices are dropping dramatically, making it feasible even for small businesses to enter the fray.

Imagine actually building your house in California while sitting at your 'puter in Ohio!

Read about it here, courtesy of the NYTimes. The short demo video below is worth watching too!



[Btw, if you clicked the NYTimes link, you will notice that I directed you to their print page for the article. I'm going to do this wherever I can in future, because there are far fewer ads, and the page loads quicker.]

Dangers of social networking

Again, this is a post that I won't comment on - I'll let this article from the NYTimes speak for itself.

Briefly: It's about being careful what information you divulge on sites like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc. This is important, folks!!!

And please make sure that your account settings are set up in such a way that your privacy is under your control. Be safe!

A busy day

This is a jam-packed day, so I'm gonna resort to bullets and short comments (yay!).

• Burning the Qur'an: If, as this idiot "pastor" has threatened, the burning of 200 copies of the Qur'an goes ahead on Saturday, I think we will have descended to a new low in history - and, let's face it, that bar is already pretty damn low. This act would not only be disgusting, but it most definitely threatens our security. It's gonna piss off so many people. This horrible act of hate and bigotry may cause many of the soldiers who are protecting this asshole to be killed - that's pretty rich, ain't it? Imagine if Bibles or Torahs were being burned...? I'm speechless - that's rare. (Btw, I put the word "pastor" in quotes because he certainly is not acting the part. And, my dear, just varda her ugly eek!)
• And more from Google: Yes, Google has done it again, with Google Instant. They have modified their search capability such that it tries to predict what you are looking for with every single keypress. It's pretty damn cool - you can read about it here, and try it out from that link by pressing the big blue button. There's more info here too. You may want to try a search like [Quran burning] since that's topical now. (For my pedantic friends out there: I deliberately omitted the apostrophe in "Qur'an" because there's no need for punctuation in a search term.)
• Penis envy: Here's the largest penis in the world. And it's in St. Petersburg!!! (Cue Peter Griffin: giggle.)

Craigslist and censorship

So now Craigslist has finally bowed to the pressure it's been getting from the politicos. It has shut down its "Adult Services" section, and replaced the link to that area with a big, bold "CENSORED."

As this article points out, this is really dumb - all it's gonna do is move these ads to other sites. I quote from the article:

While some had threatened, no actual lawsuit had been filed against Craigslist for this section -- and for a damn good reason: Craigslist is, without a doubt, protected from liability due to Section 230. Furthermore, Craigslist seems to go out of its way to help law enforcement use the site as a tool to crack down on prostitution. Shutting that down won't stop the prostitution. It'll just drive it to sites that don't work as closely with law enforcement.

Section 230 is the law that shields websites that host user-generated content from being sued because of what their users post. But the Techdirt article I linked to above explains it much better than I can, so make sure you take a look; this is important stuff.

I guess this means we won't get to see "things" like this any more. (Sorry, couldn't resist! And, yes, he is of legal age. And he's not selling it - for that, see below.)

I don't think this picture was digitally modified - the juxtaposition of his fingers and dick looks genuine.

In the meantime, go here to find some interesting alternatives - that is, of course, if you're into actually paying for it. Eeew.

Yes - Google does it yet again!

Besides the unveiling two days ago of their integration of Gmail with a subset of the voice calling functionality found in Google Voice, Google has delivered another coup - this time by providing a separate search feature called Google Realtime.

Realtime delivers virtually instantaneous results from searches at sites that host continuously updated information, like posts from the Twits (oops) Twitterers. Read more about it here. And here.

They are currently rolling the service out, but it's available to all by going to this special page. It seems that this will be the actual page.

Google, as well as other search engines (e.g. Bing) have done this for awhile, but Google is the first to separate the feature from its main search page. You can read about the advantages of this approach in the "here" links I cite above. One more here! And hints on how to use it here.

One thing I really love is a timeline slider (which you can vaguely see above the search results in the pic at top), allowing you to see when stories on a particular topic ebb and peak, and which allows you to time-travel based on your choice of date/time.

Penis measuring device

Apparently rulers are a crude way to measure your penis. I found a patent for, yes, a "penile measuring device." I think the best way to describe this thing is to quote directly from the patent:

"A volumetric measuring device for measuring a body part. The device includes a fluid container filled with fluid. The fluid container has a body part opening for permitting the insertion of a body part and a displaced fluid opening for permitting the flow of fluid that has been displaced as the result of inserting the body part. A watertight barrier covers the body part opening and maintains a watertight seal over the body part opening while the body part is being inserted. The volumetric measurement is determined by measuring the amount of displaced fluid after the insertion of the body part through the body part opening. In a preferred embodiment, the body part being measured is an erect penis."

You can read the actual patent, #7147609, courtesy of Google Patents. The claims are fun to read, and you must look at the drawings, particularly Figs. 12-15. So there you go! Read more about it here and here - yes, that really is The Washington Post!

(No, that picture on the right is not the device in question - that's just a silly toy you can buy here for a mere £1.17. Yes, that's Pounds Sterling.)

Update: I took another look at this patent, and then tried Google's search mechanism for more of this sort of thing. You can do it too! Just go to the Google Patent page, and type [penis]* - or your favorite body part - into the search box. The first hit comes up with a patent that begins with the following startling claim:

"What is claimed is:
1. A penis erection assisting device comprising sealing means for sealingly accommodating a penis therein, said sealing means having an opening at one end thereof to insert the penis, extracting means connected to said sealing means for extracting air within said sealing means, an expandable circular bag member provided at the opening of said sealing means, and exhaling means for supplying extracted air by said extracting means into said circular bag member to expand said circular bag member..."

"Sealingly"? How many times is "sealing" used in that paragraph?

* Some time ago, Google tried to instil a new standard for quoting text that had to be inserted, for example, into a search box. This would replace the clumsy "xxx" (without the quotes) nonsense that we often see. The idea was to use square brackets to indicate that what is inside the brackets is what should be inserted, and not the brackets themselves. I kinda like this notion, so am using it here.

More on tracking cookies

Some of you may remember my post about tracking cookies. Yesterday, USA Today weighed in on the topic here, with an opposing viewpoint, here. Personally, I think the opposing view presents a very weak case, and my opinion of tracking cookies still stands.

By hosting advertising on this site, I am forced to allow third-party cookies in my browser, which is a bit hypocritical. Consequently, I have decided to remove advertising, and turn third-party cookies off. This will stop Google from making me one of the "bad guys" and, more importantly, prevent advertisers from tracking my web browsing behavior (it is, after all, a two-way street). My readers' privacy is important to me - in fact, everyone's privacy and anonymity on the 'net is important. Without it, we're all screwed.

If you look at my earlier post, you will see that I enumerate the number of tracking cookies that were on my machine at the time - 85. I removed all of them, and, a few minutes ago, just ran the same scan (using Spybot). I already have 36 new third-party cookies! (Remember, once they're there, they are often updated - which means the number of times they have refined their ability to track my interests is much higher than 36!)

The USA Today editorial explains why tracking cookies are not a good thing, and why it is important that you protect yourself from this sordid behavior. They also discuss the amazing accuracy and ingenuity of the trackers, and how this could be a "slippery slope" to uglier behavior. It is important to recognize that, even now, it is possible for these companies to identify you personally, which I find very scary. And detestable.

Safe ... ?

My earlier post, linked above, explains how to fix this - I strongly suggest that you take some time to add this level of prophylaxis to your computer. Call it "safe browsing," if you will!

And, for those of a more technical bent, this paper from Harvard is interesting.

Patent stupidity!

And yes, the title of this post is a deliberate pun! The issue in question is that of the ability to patent software and its associated ideas. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office hands these things out like candy, frequently forgetting that a patent is supposed to be an original idea, not just an implementation of one or more existing ideas.

This issue has been bubbling for some time now, and will continue to do so for a long time. Today, however, I discovered that a jury has struck a patent down - specifically, it's Patent #7139761, "Dynamic association of electronically stored information with iterative workflow changes." You don't even have to read the patent itself - thanks to Google Patents, you can read a summary of what is apparently "claimed." Fun stuff, especially for insomniacs. Try reading the "claim" section out loud - after a few seconds it starts to sound pretty hilarious. Pure bafflegab. Enjoy!

Oh, you want more? Not asleep yet? Let's try one unrelated to software - #6179088, "Interlinked watercourses for sushi boats." Yes, that's right - sushi boats!!!