end of poll coming!
Just a quick reminder that the poll will close and the results announced tommorow! Name this theme is wrapping up.
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in the newspaper
The humble cupcake is humble no more. Read this slightly humourous article to find the scoop- read about “12 over-the-counter limits” and more!
[the Age] It’s life, but not as we know it
Could Air Traffic control be improved if we adopted the flocking techniques of birds? Would pedestrians and crowds be easier to manage if they were more like ants? An interesting article.
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busyness…
sorry about the slowness of the blog posting- I’ve been swamped with work to do. And late night rat sightings- but that’s for another post.
However, in the news is that firefox 1.5 is live! not just the beta! yay!
enough exclamation marks, let’s move on…
Only 4 days to go till there will be a new version of LQ! (ooh.. another exclamation mark.) Very exciting.
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compensation for geek skills
A while ago I mentioned an Life Hacker article about fixing mum and dad’s computer, and Ray mused about compensation for geek skills. Here are my thoughts on the issue:
- Food especially around holiday times when you are visiting and happen to fix their computer, you have their fridge and pantry close at hand. If you get caught, you can always say I was hungry- I can’t think/fix computers when I’m hungry.
- Gift Hints since we are coming up to holiday time, you can drop large hints, such as I wish I had a… and What we really need right now is… and also you know, what I’d like for Christmas/birthday/etc is…
- Rides if you have to get a part so you can solve the computer problems, work out what else is in the region (ie, shopping) and get them to drive you there, and you can say Oh! fancy that! I need to buy this 50kilo bag of dog food, and I won’t have to lug it home on the bus!
- Computer Parts if they are upgrading (needlessly) you get to take home the old parts since you’re throwing it away anyway…
- Flat out ask for cash
Thoughts? More tips? Drop a comment in the box.
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embed google video
[Paul Stamatiou] how to quickie: embed google video
very quick, but easy to understand. Hower, I would have liked to see the code between <textarea> </textarea> tags.
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feeling sore
My shoulder hurts, and my fingers are burnt, my throat is dry and my eyes feel awful. Yes, that’s right, I’ve been soldering.
I’m working for a make-a-bus-a-home project, and I need to make the not power drawing lights, which are arrays of 12 leds. Each led has a resistor. It’s all attached to the breadboard “stuff”.
Right now I’m a bit under half way finished.
This has meant I haven’t been able to post today, I also had to fill in for a teacher who was traveling. It’s revenge for all the US bloggers passed out from turkey… 
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tiny alarm
For Mac users, a handy little tool that lets you set an alarm for sometime in the near future. Designed for people surfing gaming etc who need to be reminded to stop.
http://www.pixelatedsoftware.com/products/tinyalarm/
It’s free to use- however it doesn’t look like it’s GPL, which is sad. I would have liked to mod it so that you could easily execute the 10min2min*5 hack (where you work for ten minutes, break for two then repeat for the hour).
What are your favourite tools like this? What do you use to remind yourself?
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green- and cheap!
Written from an economist’s point of view, this article discusses green alternatives for energy production, and also how to be economic while being green.
It’s common sense, turning of a light when you leave the room will cut your electricity bill and also cut CO2 emissions.
Air-conditioning is another problem- the more we use CO2 emitting electricity plants to supply the power for air con units, the hotter the earth will get, and the more we use air con and so on. What about using fans, or even an evaporative cooler, which is much cheaper than an air-conditioning unit.
An Australian specific article, it talks about the various state and federal rebates you can get for solar panels and solar hot-water heaters.
A good read, even though it’s five pages. What I like about it is that it doesn’t advocate militant environmentalism, but sensible cost cutting green friendly ideas.
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think about it- an obvious solution to terror.
While the link between poverty and terrorism is contentious, there is a symbiotic relationship. While those who commit terrorist offences may often be the more educated and reliable of a pool of recruits, networks require poverty and disorder in which to hide and grow.
Tim Costello is the brother of Liberal Party heir apparent and Treasurer, Peter Costello.
He talks about the new Australian anti-terror legistlation, and also about how defeating poverty will go a long way to defeating terror.
We have a budget surplus, how will it be spent?
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poll!
I intend to run this for a week.
This poll was made using a freewebs acount. You can get your own free website at freewebs
there- now it’s properly acknowledged.