Quality And The Art Of Purpose Maintenance

New article of mine:
Quality And The Art Of Purpose Maintenance

It has been a while since I wrote anything like this, so I'd be interested in hearing if you find it helpful.

Google Local

Have you ever used Google Local to find something in your own neighborhood?

I don't know how the heck they have collected and organized all that data!
If you select 'View Larger Map', you get a map as big as your window and screen can handle (which is big in the case of my Apple 30-inch screen), and if you zoom in to max, you'll be amazed at the detail. I almost expect that if I put in a new flower bed in the garden, it will be on the map tomorrow.
Not to mention of course that they can find all the local businesses somehow.

I don't know which countries they have covered so far, but it works fine for UK, you just replace .com with .co.uk

Taboos

I am told that in Mormon areas like Salt Lake City, the teenagers don't have sex much. This is generally because they don't believe that oral sex is "sex". (Clinton is not alone.) They are quite serious about this. Probably even anal sex is not "sex". Of course they have a lot of "non-sex".

Whereas where I grew up, in Denmark in the seventies, none of us, practically, had any sex, oral or otherwise. And Denmark is perhaps the most liberal and permissive country in the world.

Does this give anybody pause for thought? That perhaps the more rules and suppression there is about something, the more it flourishes?

Not to mention: if it has to be hidden, then kids don't know anything about protecting themselves from pregnancies and sexually transmitted deceases.

About parties

"You have to go out," people tell me occasionally.
"Why?" I say. "'Out' is just like 'in', only without the comfort and the things I need."

What I don't get it that by "out" or "fun", people generally mean clubs and pubs and parties. In other words, noisy, crowded places where you can't hear each other talk, so you have to ingest alcohol or other drugs to pass the time. Big woop. Sure, that's how I want to spend my time and money. Not.

Alice in Wonderland

The British Library has posted an extraordinary online version of the original hand-written and self-illustrated manuscript for Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carrol, a.k.a. Charles Dodgson.

Please note the 'enlarge' feature, it allows you to really enjoy Dodgson's drawings, which I find very talented. Not smoothly skilled like a professional artist's, but they have a lot of graphic power.

Battlestar Galactica

"It is not enough to live; you have to have something to live for."
-- Commander Adama, Battlestar Galactica

I am an SF fan since four decades, and Battlestar Galactica (2003) is the first SF TV series I have really liked.
You could say a lot about it, but basically it is the first SF TV series I have seen where the acting is top notch, and the physics are not highly doubtful. Not to mention the plot is gripping, and the special effects are very convincing. In short it is a quantum leap forward in realism.
The pathos of it is extraordinary too. This is not your father's television, get ready for some trauma.
So, if you have ever liked the literature of SF, but found Star Trek to be just embarrassing, then give this a shot.
Start with the mini series (which is what I've seen so far), it seems it sets up the whole thing.

iMac Tangerine

I bought an old iMac from 1999, the tangerine one, almost the same as my third Mac.
I did it mostly for fun and nostalgia and aesthetics, I loved those "gumdrop" iMacs so much.
But I don't have a good space for it, and to be frank and to my surprise, I think that time has actually already run from that colored/translucent design which was so revolutionary at the time. (It was imitated by absolutely everybody -- and not just in the computer business, I saw hair care products imitating it!)

"Content"

Have you ever considered the oddity of the term "content" for web sites?
It is like a publisher planning a book, making the covers and the pages, planning the ad campaign, and then at the last moment saying: "oh yes, and we also need some content for the thing, better canvas some writers."
Thoughts and creations have become afterthoughts to networks and media. How "Microsoft" can you get?

The state

"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." -- Voltaire

... It does not make sense to me that the state is allowed to do things that individuals may not. The state is just the collective will of the people. But apparently this collective will, having the ultimate power, decides that it is above the usual rules guiding men. It can imprison men and call it "justice". It can steal and call it "taxes". It can murder and call it "war".

People say that people who take the law in their own hands are vigilantes and criminals. Only the state may handle justice. But there is nothing holy about the state, it is just a large group mind. It is just a five hundred million pound gorilla. ("Where does a five hundred pound gorilla sit in a bus? - Wherever it wants.")

Brotherly advice

The best -- and the only -- life advice ever given to me by my older brother, who died when I was fifteen, was "take good care of your teeth, kiddo," offered as a sincere advice about the one thing you must be sure to do in this life, in his view.
It is perhaps not profound, but on the other hand it is a lot better and more constructive than a lot of the bullshit you may hear from some people. Like "live fast, die young." Or "you can't trust anybody but yourself." Or "don't stick your head above the crowd." Or any of the endless anti-life equations that the older generations will use to try and keep the younger ones from overtaking them, or whatever their subconscious rational may be.

Smells like Victory

I have this odd feeling.
Like a big warm wind of victory.
Like the Universe in general, and humanity specifically, has all led up to this point in Time and Space.
Like this is it. And we have really won. We just don't know it yet.

iPod Nano and David Pogue

If you have not seen David Pogue's videos on technology for NYT, do so now. Please. [You need to register, but it is worth it.] David, who also writes columns and books about technology and music, is one of the funniest and most informative writers in the world. I would say he is in a league of his own, but maybe there is some guy sitting in Bombay and doing it as well, what do I know?

I just got my own iPod Nano today. Apple is also in a league of their own. I would not have imagined they could top the iPod, but they did. In David's words: Rock on, dude.