Saturday, February 2, 2002
Message in a sound bite
No one ever called Osama bin Laden subtle. After all, there's nothing diplomatic about slamming airliners into buildings. And yet, in his interview with Al-Jazeera, the Al Qaeda leader chose his words carefully. [ ... ] George W. Bush needs to learn that his increasingly belligerent war of words is not making the nation's War on Terror any easier.
MBTA asks court for freedom to disapprove ads
There are lots of great places to debate American drug laws, or promote alternative churches, or discourage binge drinking. But the MBTA doesn't think its subway cars, trains, or buses are the proper forum for political discussion and embarked yesterday on its latest legal fight over advertisements it deems offensive.
Banned in Boston
A transit authority censors drug war dissenters
U.S. investigates deadly commando raid
The U.S. Central Command has opened a high-level investigation into whether U.S. forces killed friendly Afghans during a January 24 raid on a suspected terrorist compound north of Kandahar
Happy Groundhog Day!
Punxsutawney Phil.com
Punxsutawney will be welcoming Survivor II contestant Amber Brkich to town for the festivities!
Of course, today is also a good day to watch Groundhog Day, one of the funniest movies of all time.
Basilan battles rage
At least five Muslim guerrillas have been killed in a battle with Philippine troops on Basilan island, where two Americans and a Filipino nurse are being held hostage.
No Sir, Yasser
Prepare to break relations with Arafat. [ ... ] A year ago, the Palestinians were closer than they have ever been to achieving their hopes and dreams. Today, they are farther away than at any time since the beginning of the Oslo process.
Reformers All, in Enron's Wake
Except for a brief period after the company's troubles became known last October, its employees were free to sell the vast majority of their company shares in their 401(k)'s, but still chose to keep two- thirds of their retirement assets tied up in the stock. Such a lack of prudent diversification is all too common in 401(k) plans.
Starting at Ground Zero
The news that the developer Larry Silverstein is gearing up to break ground on a new 7 World Trade Center should be a warning bell for all New Yorkers concerned with the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan.
Weblogs.Com On the Desktop
Dave Winer
Do you use the Weblogs.Com interface that's built into Radio? If not, please check it out.
I generally use the weblogs.com interface that's part of the desktop website, but if I'm in heavy refresh
mode, I like to go directly to weblogs.com because it shows the updates sorted down to the minute! (OK, I guess that's kind of pathetic...)
AppleScript on Mac OS X
[AppleScript Studio] allows you to develop great-looking Aqua interfaces for an AppleScript application.
I just wish that Apple hadn't tried to make the language so natural
looking.
Metaphors-R-Us
A New Book Explains How Math Is Rooted in Metaphors, Not Divine Inspiration
John Allen Paulos comments on the new book, Where Mathematics Comes From, by linguist George Lakoff and psychologist Rafael Nunez.
An exhaustive study has revealed 62.381527% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Ultrawideband companies gear up for FCC ruling
On the brink of this month's expected FCC ruling on ultrawideband technology, a growing number of startups and established players are aiming their development efforts at leveraging UWB for streaming-multimedia applications in wireless home networking.
Cringely had an article about this recently. Also check out UWB Facts and Fictions.
Space Elevator Gets Lift
NASA began considering the concept in June 1999 at the Advanced Space Infrastructure Workshop onGeostationary Orbiting Tether 'Space Elevator' Conceptsheld at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
Another great idea from Arthur C. Clarke. (Well, OK, maybe he didn't come up with it first, but he certainly popularized the idea.)
I like the NIAC motto - Don't let your preoccupation with reality stifle your imagination.
Discussion at Slashdot.
