Monthly Archives: August 2002

remember the Beethoven beetle?

Programming tool makes bugs sing. (Link from GirlHacker.) Interesting if it works. There’s a similar idea in Bruce Sterling’s early novel Schismatrix: the control panel of the ship Red Consensus makes a sonic pattern designed to fade from conscious perception … Continue reading

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tall buildings

James Lileks says several right things about the WTC. It’s not cowardice to suggest that there might be difficulty renting the upper floors of two 110 story towers; I can imagine myself as someone looking for office space, standing in … Continue reading

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alternate casting

In Time Bandits, in the scene introducing Agamemnon, the script read: Helmet comes off to reveal Sean Connery (or an actor of equal but cheaper stature). Imagine, if you will, that the casting director hired Roger Moore. Later: I learned … Continue reading

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till somebody we like can be elected

Over at Little Green Footballs, chins are pulled: For all the talk about bringing democracy to the Arab world, this problem seems nearly intractable. If the uneducated, highly propagandized people of the Arab world are given freedom of choice, many … Continue reading

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do as I suggest, not as I am constrained

Steven den Beste, in “An act of faith”, puts words in the mouth of an anonymous blogger: . . . I, myself, do not admit to holding those opinions to those around me because I’m afraid of the consequences. But I believe … Continue reading

Posted in blogdom, economics | 1 Comment

central control ≠ safety

Homeland Insecurity by Charles C. Mann in The Atlantic, September 2002: Indeed, Schneier says, Kerckhoffs’s principle applies beyond codes and ciphers to security systems in general: every secret creates a potential failure point. Secrecy, in other words, is a prime … Continue reading

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sad

The lonely death of Robert Burnham Jr, author of the Celestial Handbooks. (Cited by Ron Campbell.)

Posted in astronomy | Leave a comment