Updated: 11/19/05; 12:28:13 PM

 Wednesday, February 2, 2005
A picture named bbautocomplete-icon.gifTHANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

The folks over at c-command.com have taken their fantastic BBEdit add-on BBAutoComplete to version 1.4. Did I mention it's Freeware? Michael Tsai, you rock.

10:18:26 PM    
Multimedia dreams
A picture named cinema1.jpgTo go to the cinema in your pajamas, strecth out your feet as much as you want and snuggle down into your pillow? That's not a vision with RUF-Cinema, the first multimedia bed of the furture, it's every evening's reality.

Looking good: a home cinema rack fited between the two headboard bolsters offers enough space for items such as a beamer, DVD player and games consoles. The lit frosted glass top with infraared touch sensor is an eye-catcher.A big flap and lots behind it: RUf-Cinema's foot section has an aluminum coloured cover that conceals the screen, which is easily assembled using the radio remote control.Simply practical: as soon as the film is over, all you have to do is touch a button on the remote control and the screen disappears inside the foot section. That's all it takes to turn your home cinema back into a bedroom.

The Ruf Cinema Bed, around $20,000, features a remote-controlled collapsible screen in the footboard, a shelf for a projector, cable conduit, and compartments for your A/V components. For the space age bachelor needing to upgrade from 80s-era black lacquer and videodiscs.

1:43:26 PM    
Politics-Oriented Software Development
A picture named softwaredev.jpgPolitics-Oriented Software Development

A brief guide to software development in the real world. Aimed mainly at new developers: experienced programmers already know most of this. This guide is for hands-on programmers, not managers.

1:14:05 PM    
MS licenses analog anti-rip technology
A picture named consumers.jpg Consumers? What consumers?

That the whole thing is pitched at the content industry is clear:

"For the entertainment industry to deliver premium on-demand entertainment in the home, rights must be protected to prevent revenue loss," M'n'M say. "Microsoft and Macrovision are working to provide a flexible rights solution that allows the entertainment industry to take full advantage of new usage models for today's digital home."

No mention there of the consumer, you'll note.Ditto the interoperability deal, which will sew Windows Media DRM systems adapted to "recognise" Macrovision's copy-protection signals embedded in analog content. So no more digitising your old VHS tapes via your Media Center PC, you hear?

1:08:50 PM    
The Wisdom of Warren Buffett
A picture named warrenb.jpg A very interesting read, full of some gems we could all benefit from.

The Wisdom of Warren Buffett

I spent 6 hours last week in Omaha with Warren Buffett. As I walked into the meeting I was pleasantly surprised to find Mr. Buffett dressed more like a scroungy sophomore chemistry student than the greatest investor of all time. It was an open Q&A session with some of my colleagues and me for about 3 hours.

Going into the meeting, I was thinking that I would receive a great deal of advice about investing and how to quantify intrinsic value. I figured he'd tell us all about 'Mr. Market' and how his favorite holding period is forever. Then I figured we'd get around to his bet on the Euro or his belief that the market is irrational and ineffecient. Or perhaps the second richest man in the world would, I don't know, talk about money?

12:53:20 PM    
Wired News and Scoble: Point/counterpoint on iPods at Microsoft
A picture named 5181876097686287.jpg Wired News is claiming in an article that Microsoft’s internal management have been wringing their hands anxiously at the droves of iPod users who work there—their source estimates somewhere in the range of 64% of all MSFT employees own one (which might explain why it’s been selling so well lately). So much so is Microsoft’s management distressing, Wired News claims, that it’s become impolitic and relatively tactless to take your iPod to work, apparently because it doesn’t use WMA, PlaysForSure, or work with the MSN Music store. Microsoft blogger Robert Scoble sez: no dice! He apparently hasn’t seen anything which scolds iPod use on campus or off—but it does sound like there are a few higher-ups in the Windows Media division who might be getting a little twitchy. We can understand the people charged with killing the iPod feeling put out, but for as much smack as people talk on Microsoft, we have a hard time believing that the boys at the long rosewood table are troubling themselves over something as silly as this. 

Slashdot disscussion | Scoble

11:52:18 AM