This article scared me. Apparently, companies are planning many consumer devices which could obey remote orders (and also phone home). I'm afraid I was ignorant of the OnStar system in many GM vehicles which, upon the driver pressing a panic button, gathers gps and vehicle data and contacts OnStar headquarters with it. The intent is safety (being ( Read more... )

Nerdy, but not as nerdy or incomprehensible as my last nerdy entry ( Read more... )

Some dialogue from the book I was reading (Passage by Lois McMaster Bujold) that I liked ( Read more... )

Warning: this post contains material intended for CS nerds and programmers, the vast majority of you would do well to ignore it and thus have no reason to accuse me of rotting your brains out ( Read more... )

Is anyone else annoyed by the fact that google seems to have changed their favicon? I'm used to at a glance being able to recognize which of my open tabs are google searches, and it's going to take me a while to adjust to the new icon ( Read more... )

note to self: drink 3+ cups of tea a day not just 2, otherwise you start feeling drowsy around 8:30 and still have lots of work to do but don't dare drink more at that hour for fear of sleeplessness later

While I'm on the subject of stupid things being done by superpowers and me not sleeping even though I should be either sleeping or baking at the moment, some of you may be interested in noting that Microsoft is shutting down its PlaysForSure (yeah, a nice oxymoron, kina like Microsoft Works) DRM servers. This won't instantly stop all PlaysForSure ( Read more... )

David has brought to my attention this nytime article detailing the administration's efforts to dupe the public about the war by encouraging many "military analysts" to appear in the news supporting the administration's policies and providing a favourable outlook ( Read more... )

A nice quote from (of all places) a slashdot comment (by one Omestes ( Read more... )

I just discovered that at least some British calendars start the week with Monday instead of Sunday. How eminently sensible.

I discovered this by going to http://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/ to check a date. I have my system language set to English (GB) instead of Englush(US) just for the heck of it, and JavaScript is able to get this information ( Read more... )