senatorhung's pad
ramblings of an information troubleshooter
ramblings of an information troubleshooter
maintaining stocks
permalink Sunday, 14MAY2006:between sniffles and a headache likely brought on by caffeine withdrawl, i had to skip out on a brainstorming session to map out some skits for the june arts festival. even the temptation of banana splits could not drag me away from my bed.
- link of the day: using maps
to note the
geographic
availability of books.
The book icons are color coded to show the probability of finding the book ... Our sales rep in France has already used the map to encourage bookstores to maintain appropriate stock.
do us a favour ... ?
permalink Monday, 15MAY2006:stayed home from work for most of the day to ensure that my co-workers didn't succumb to whatever hit me over the weekend. by the afternoon, tho, i was feeling much better, so i went in to sort out some of the mail that had arrived during my absence.
this week's radio show was based on a mix that i made up last december called 'running out of rainchecks (the dayplanner blues) since i didn't have time to make a brand new mix post-conference. the mix adapted pretty smoothly into the setlist that follows. the show can be downloaded here.
Aur.Oral Exposures radio show setlist for 15may2006:
- Rainy Days and Mondays - Cracker
- ride on time - black box featuring loleatta holloway
- Seem So Tired - Jack Drag
- Tired of it Anyway - Treble Charger
- Rhythm of the Rain - Jr. Gone Wild
- Today Tomorrow Sometime Never - echobelly
- Maybe Someday - The Cure
- If Not Now ... - Tracy Chapman
- Wait for Me (radio edit) - The Northern Pikes
- Home Soon (The Cherry Song) - Oh Susanna
- Rainbow Connection - Jim Henson
- runaway train - Soul Asylum
- Missing - Everything But the Girl
- better part of an hour - The Guthries
- On a Bad Day - Kasey Chambers
- I'm Not Okay (I Promise) - My Chemical Romance
- Martha - Tom Waits
- Runnin' Out of Fools - Neko Case
- Say You Miss Me - Wilco
- what do i do now ? - sleeper
- After the Rain - Blue Rodeo
- link of the day: willing to help someone out ? post a note to favorville !
fighting off the fever
permalink Saturday, 20MAY2006:uggh. it's been pretty quiet around these parts as i've been tucked in under the sheets for most of the week. turns out my minor bout with the sniffles early in the week was just a preamble to a double dose of fever. i was already groggy when i showed up to work on wednesday morning, but by the time the noon bell rang, i could barely stand on my feet. i called it a day and stumbled back home into bed, every joint in my body creaking and crying.
i spent most of the next 2 days sleeping, with only a few breaks to rehydrate before baking it all back out again. my head was pounding so hard my eyeballs felt like they were being pressed out of their sockets from the backside.
and my dreams. holey cow ! i must have re-hashed every fearsome bully encounter from my high school daze, this time tho, finding some way to make them feel the pain that i felt at the time. i can only hope that my psychological victories cheered on my immune system in its own feverish battle.
by the time friday evening came around, only the throbbing headache remained and that was alleviated somewhat by getting some eats. however, i passed on all social engagements, including the re-do of a brainstorming session for some skits, a last-minute call for a card game and another call inviting me out to the legion for a reunion with some returnees to the city. instead, i just stayed in and finished watching my set of 'northern exposure: season 3' dvd's, hoping that my flu recovery would stick this time.
i find it interesting to note the distinct difference in writing styles between the wikipedia entries for 'fever' and 'influenza'. the fever article is way technical and doesn't give much practical advice, while the flu article is much more oriented to laypersons, giving links to suggested treatments and a broader overview. even in a 'free' resource, qualitative measures can still be assigned to determine whether it is better than some other resource, given a particular audience or purpose.
other interesting links encountered in between sleeps:
- the u.s. dollar is
going
down
The bad news: "the system can withstand a moderate economic crisis (like those that occurred post-1993) but not a major one (like 1974)." Bridgewater estimates that losses with the current hedge fund regime would have been $80-$100 billion in the post-1993 crises, $300-$350 billion in 1974 (and $500-$600 billion in 1929). And then there's the REALLY bad news: Bridgewater also expects a major international system crunch exactly like the collapse of the fixed exchange rate Bretton Woods system, which lead directly to the inflationary crisis of 1974. Wednesday morning, Bridgewater's Daily Letter was headlined, "The Tremors Before the Big One" and concluded: "We believe the odds of a dollar / U.S. debt crisis in the next twelve months are elevated (say 50 percent)."
- charlie angus (ndp heritage
critic) takes another
stab
at copyright
Canada is in a unique position to develop legislation that will make it possible for the digital revolution to continue to grow. For example, last year, the Honourable Laurier Lapierre, the Chairman of the National Advisory Board of Canadian Culture Online, released his report, A Charter for the Cultural Citizen Online. ... Lapierre treats the users of digital culture, not as consumers (or thieves) but as citizens. Each citizen has a claim on the 'public commons' of the Internet.
- kevin kelly (wired guru) explains
the
future
implications of the various book
scanning projects
As copies have been dethroned, the economic model built on them is collapsing. In a regime of superabundant free copies, copies lose value. They are no longer the basis of wealth. Now relationships, links, connection and sharing are. Value has shifted away from a copy toward the many ways to recall, annotate, personalize, edit, authenticate, display, mark, transfer and engage a work. Authors and artists can make (and have made) their livings selling aspects of their works other than inexpensive copies of them. They can sell performances, access to the creator, personalization, add-on information, the scarcity of attention (via ads), sponsorship, periodic subscriptions — in short, all the many values that cannot be copied. The cheap copy becomes the 'discovery tool' that markets these other intangible valuables.
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