December 2008
52 posts
Delays had better end now.
Vietnam Imposes New Blogging Restrictions →
GMAW is one of many to mention that the Vietnam government has approved a new set of regulations aimed at bloggers. The new restrictions ban bloggers from discussing certain subjects that the…
Death of Rove's IT Genius Births New Conspiracy... →
A Christmas gift for lovers of political intrigue: Was the death in a plane crash of Mitch Connell, Karl Rove’s technology guru, really an accident? And why aren’t all the Rove-hating…
John Hodgman on Rick Warren and Etcetera →
John Hodgman: I have confidence that, in no short order, Prop 8 will be repealed, and the gay marriage debate will look as absurd at the miscegenation debates of the 20th century do now. I have…
Home in Howland for the Holidays. That’s alliteration, bitches.
Props to ANA for having a lounge that is actually comfortable at Narita. And showers.
Credit Suisse Bankers to Eat Toxic Cake They Baked... →
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This is the kind of innovation we need!
Justice so sweet, you can taste it: Instead of cash or stock, bankers at Credit Suisse will get their bonuses in the form of the…
Listen to what the government tells its people →
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Just wow.
This video clip was supposedly shot in Shenyang, in October, 2008. According to the description, the residents in the area had been listening to government…
Boeing Gives Offer Congress Can't Refuse →
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Why buy just one when you can get two for twice the price?
In an age of weapon systems that never get less expensive, Boeing gives us a reason to believe inexpensive, yet…
YouTube Bike-Shove Cop Indicted [Bad Cops] →
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The beginning of a victory! Next stop, conviction!
Good news! The cop who shoved the guy off his bike in Times Square then arrested the cyclist and filed a false report…
Second consecutive brown-air Monday in the Jing. Anyone got a spare re-breather?
Why Robert Peston is wrong :: Richard Spencer →
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This is an excellent, well-written explanation of the lending relationship between the United States and China. I’m reposting this; it was originally included by the WSJ in their…
Why Loews Corp. Didn't Get Drunk On Leverage →
A money manager friend of ours recently told us that in doing some research into cash-rich companies, he was struck by how many of the good ones have a history of being family run. Unlike…
"Things Are So Bad That..." →
Some random anecdotal evidence of the grim turn things are taking in China and how quickly it has happened.
Exapts are leaving: rentals in apaprtment buildings popular with foreigners in Beijing…
The Week Athens Stood Still [Pic Of The Day] →
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Laser beams. Wow.
[Rioters in Athens, who are protesting the police shooting of a 15-year-old boy, use lasers in their clashes with cops; image via AP.]
Joie De Vivre: The Europeans Are Out To Lunch →
I write this from a hotel room at Newark airport in New Jersey. I’m half way home from a wonderful week in Paris at the Le Web conference where I mingled with 1,700 or so attendees. My mood:…
Peking duck in Peking!
I am not original. “Commutard” apparently turned up well before I could possibly have coined it. This saddens me.
Stephen Fry on the State of the Mobile Industry →
Stephen Fry, in a wonderfully rambling essay: Apple have shown that there is a huge demand for exciting, innovative, lovable and imaginative consumer devices. All the rivals have to do is to … is…
Time For A Gas Tax →
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Yes. Yes. Yes. Best idea I’ve heard in a long time. (Blodget is not the first person from which I’ve heard it.)
As Washington bickers about whether to save Detroit, the WSJ…
Google’s Top Ten Lists for China →
Google is getting into the year-end spirit with its annual rankings of the “most searched,” “fastest rising,” and other “hot” terms for 2008. For China, as elsewhere, the general list of…
Hurt Feelings? Blame Deng Xiaoping →
Reading the People’s Daily is a bit like recess in elementary school. Someone always gets their feelings hurt. And more often than not, that someone is the “Chinese people.” For reasons that have…
TV Has License to Kill Movies at iTunes, Netflix →
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Gruber’s got the comment on this one covered.
This is the sort of stupidity that drives even those who want to be honest customers toward bootlegging.
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Chevy SUV Kicks Chinese Tow Truck's Ass... →
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This is straight-up, emm-effing awesome. Damn the man.
Don’t like what the tow company’s telling you? Try your luck at towing the tow truck, like this Shangainese…
A pleasant breakfast consisting of a desserted office, vanilla latte, and quiet apprehension.
A Bold Media Move on the Psychiatric Detention of... →
China has a long tradition of citizens going to petition higher levels of authority for the redress of grievances that cannot be resolved at the local level. But as more and more Chinese have…
Wonder if this will talk nice with my MBP.
Dear MSFT: Why does pasting a range (2936 rows, 10 columns) from one workbook to another in Excel:mac 2008 take a full minute? Crippleware?
Sinatra's Humiliating *Godfather* Tell-Off,... →
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Definitely worth being re-hashed.
Photographer Steve Schapiro needs a hook to sell his $700 special edition book about the Godfather movie. The behind-the-scenes…
Cold Sore Virus May Be Alzheimer's Smoking Gun →
Science Daily is reporting that the virus behind cold sores has been found to be a major cause of the insoluble protein plaques found in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease sufferers. Researchers…
Europe-China Relations: From Bad to Worse →
So President Sarkozy of France (currently occupying the rotating presidency of the EU) met as expected with the Dalai Lama over the weekend. Beijing had already cancelled a China-Europe summit…
SecDef's Vision Of The Road Ahead →
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I like Gates a lot.
Secretary Gates has laid out his vision of the road ahead in Foreign Affairs and there aren’t too many surprises. As expected, it is a more measured and less…
The awesome thing about PEK is that even with the new terminal, you taxi for 30 min after landing, and don’t get a jetway when it’s below 0.
As Only Barney Could Put It →
Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA): “[Obama’s] going to have to be more assertive than he’s been. At a time of great crisis with mortgage foreclosures and autos, he says we only have one president at a…
Friends →
Workaround for a Ducking iPhone Annoyance →
Works like a fucking charm. Great tip.
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This taxi smells like the elephant house at the National Zoo.
Nose to the grindstone.
Amazon Mobile for iPhone →
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You know people are going to take photos of their junk just so that some poor mechanical turk worker will have to look at them.
Official Amazon iPhone app, available now as a free…
Russian Spies: Will Pay Cash or in Fajitas →
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I used to drink at Cactus! Ha! Silly Russians!
Want a real life lesson about job choices? Robert Hanssen, the FBI agent who spied for the Russians, was paid $1.4…
.Tel Is Just A Featureless Social Network That... →
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Couldn’t agree more. The NYTimes had an article about this consisting of little more than cribbing from press releases and “interviewing” people who stand to benefit from .tel’s…
Anyone out there have any advice on the best digital photo frames out there?
Mario Calcedo's Columbian junkbots →
Mario Caicedo makes some very gnarly jinkbot sculptures in his Bogotán workshop down in Columbia. For some reason, every time I watch Blade Runner, I always think of the vermin of J.F….
How the Air Force Lost Control of the Skies... →
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AF needs to face reality and pick up some F-15s.
Congress and the Pentagon are locked in a tug-of-war over the future of the F-22 Raptor stealth fighter. The likely…
Sorting Fact From Fiction in Mumbai Attacks →
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The original article by Schneier linked in this blurb is brief and good.
Bruce Schneier is making sense, as usual. First, he draws some early lessons from the…
Magic/Replace →
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This is good stuff.
Very impressive spreadsheet “data cleanup” tool. Check out the demo to see just how cool it is. (Via Andy Baio.)
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Note to Self, You: Don’t Roam Internationally on... →
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AT&T is the devil. I just went two rounds with them. Guess who won. (Hint: It wasn’t AT&T.)
I’m not a vindictive man. I believe in sweetness and light. But I would encourage…
Apple Quietly Recommends Antivirus Software For... →
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Dude, I don’t even use antivirus on Windows. As long as you breathe through your own damn nose, you’re fine. Just don’t be stupid about the inter-tubes. Duh.
Barence writes “After…
Ford CEO Forced To Learn How To Drive [Publicity... →
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Money line: “cost of snacks: $25 billion.”
Ford Motor Co. CEO Alan Mulally is a Ford-drivin’ man. The humble CEO, who is forced to feed his family on a mere $1/ year…
'Buy NATO' Campaign for Boozehounds →
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Buy NATO.
A new Cold War has begun in Washington. Or at least it has at Potomac Wines & Spirits in Georgetown. Earlier this month, the shop co-sponsored a “Help…