New Lost iPod Service - LostiPods.com

New Lost iPod Service | iPoding | What's that in your pocket?

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The service allows one to register an iPod by serial number.

I liked the suggestion of using one's email address as the iPod name!

I do follow the other suggestion, I have a "note" with my personal information on the iPod.

Center for Cooperative Research: Generating history as it happens

Center for Cooperative Research

The Center for Cooperative Research seeks to encourage grassroots participation and collaboration in the documentation of the public historical record using an open-content model. New technology developed during the last decade has changed the nature of information production and distribution in two very important ways which are both fundamental to the Center's objectives.

Firstly, new technology has decentralized the processes of information production and distribution, allowing the public to exert greater influence over the content and direction of the published historical record. Control of the production and distribution of information has slipped from the exclusive grip of large media conglomerates and is being appropriated at an increasingly fast pace by people at the grassroots level, whose previous lack of access to the means of information production and distribution prevented their ideas and knowledge from reaching the masses. This historically significant restructuring of the relationship between the producers and consumers of information is due to the fact that the dissemination of information to a large audience no longer requires large amounts of capital investment. Consequently, this process can no longer be easily monopolized, controlled, or filtered by a small elite group.

Secondly, Internet technology has created an environment where public collaboration in the production of information can take place at a level of efficiency comparable—if not superior—to that of the capital-intensive efforts of hierarchically-structured, private enterprises. This collaborative “open-content” model is politically and economically significant because it enables grassroot efforts to compete on a near equal footing with private industry while contributing to and enriching the intellectual commons.

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I came across this site while pursuing an Agonist thread on the Feith/Franklin/Iran/Israel/Pentagon/Rumsfeld scandal. This site made an interesting contribution.

So there's something here.

Fascinating. Another emergent phenomena.

Rhythmic Gymnastics

RG - Information

Dave Barry mentioned something about an olympic sport that involves waving a ribbon on a stick.

I thought he was joking.

He's not.

And I though skijoring was exotic.

Beach volleyball and inline skating are utterly traditional by comparison.

A bug in Microsoft word: history and consequences

Anatomy of a Software Bug

The story of this problem begins with a basic design decision made when Richard Brodie was Word’s primary software architect. Brodie came to Microsoft along with Charles Simonyi after working at the Xerox PARC where he’d worked on Bravo—their version of the GUI word processor. A number of the ideas used in Word came from that early effort. Brodie joined Microsoft in 1981, began work on Word in the summer of 1982, and finished version 1.0 in October of 1983. You can read about much of the story in Microsoft First Generation by Cheryl Tsang.

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A fantastic essay. I'm subscribing to this guy's blog.

Word is about 22 years old. It has followed the usual path of software, reaching its apex of power and elegance by age 10 (1993) and then descending into senescence and beastliness. Even unto old age, however, it inherits the consequences of decisions made in its earliest days.

A fascinating discussion of mind mapping and productivity software

ResultManager - the GTD mind mapping tool

I have a longtime love of this type of software, but I look at file formats first. I don't like closed source file formats for data management.

Tricks of the Trade - for all trades

The Morning News - Tricks of the Trade

Juggler

With any routine under seven minutes (which is almost all of them), you only really need one thing: a good closer. And there are only two things you really need to know about a great closer. First, it needs to be impressive. That sounds obvious, but most beginning jugglers think “difficult” and “impressive” are synonymous. Your closer must look hard, but there’s no real reason it has to be hard. Secondly, you should intentionally blow your closer on the first two tries. If you get it on the first try it looks too easy, but if you “miss” it a few times it looks harder and builds tension.

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A few of these tricks are very specific to unusual trades, but most of them are either obviously useful (use a potato to remove the base of a broken bulb) or contain broader lessons -- such as the juggling example. Well worth studying!

The Elder Geek on Windows XP

The Elder Geek on Windows XP

One of a bazillion of reference sites. This one has useful entries such as this services guide.