Bagels and Half-TWiTs

From the Blogger's Desk:

Sitting here in front of my Linux machine, editing this Blog with Gedit. To my left a cup of coffee from my Expresso machine and a big fat Bagel with philly cream cheese.

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Half-TWiT notes:
I usually start the week off with an earfull of Leo Laporte's TWiT (This Week in Tech) podcast, which he records on Sunday (late) and I catch Monday morning.

This week was the start of his fourth year of Twitting, and for the occasion he invited the old gang from TechTV. He had John C. Dvorak (http://www.dvorak.org/blog/), Kevin Rose (digg.com) and Patrick Norton (http://revision3.com/tekzilla/).

None of the women from the old TechTV days made it, which included Sumi Das, TechLive's Michaela Pereira (2001-2004) now on KTLA channel 5 Morning Edition, and Erica Hill who is now a News Anchor for CNN.

A few of the other women of TechTV are now part of Revision3 or TWiT.TV other podcasts, just to keep you posted.

Leo, John, Kevin and Patrick were at their usual Cranky-Geekness, and all vented on the Windows bid to acquire Yahoo!.

Big news since even my latest magazine of Linux User & Developer had a lead article of Microsoft & Yahoo: A Window of Opportunity for Open Source?

What is your Take on the Bid/Take-over attempt by Microsoft???

Here's Mary Jo Foley's "Take" on the story, in her Blog at ZDnet.

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John C. Dvorak Link: http://www.dvorak.org/blog/
Erica Hill Link: http://www.cnn.com/CNN/anchors_reporters/hill.erica.html
TWiT (This Week In Tech) Link: http://twit.tv/twit
Kevin Rose Link: http://kevinrose.com/
(bump up Kevin's numbers...)
Patrick Norton Tekzilla: http://revision3.com/tekzilla/
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Wingman Out.
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Open Source Software: What's it All About?

Some time ago, an Indian, Siddhi in India, posted a video on a website.

Yesterday, Thursday 04/24/2008 , I watched as he explained in 20 minutes, How a Newbie could create a Wiki, with a free program called Django. A very good computer assisted lesson on working with a program from someone I never heard of before. That, in a nutshell, is a part of what Open Source is all about: Sharing information.

When my interest in Linux began almost a decade ago, there were a little over a 150 Linux Distributions in the wild. Yesterday, a Linux Magzine, Linux User and Developer, told me there were over 550 Linux Distros. That too, in a nutshell, is part of what Open Source is all about: Choice.

And What can be said about Distros can also be said about software, the programs the computer runs. There are multiple programs in just about every category and the great majority of them are free, as in Open Source. Even Java, a program from Sun Microsystems that someone called their Crown Jewels, is being released as Open Source. Sun is also the company that gave us Linux Users, Open Office, the Word Processor, Spreadsheet, Presentation bundle that is a worthy replacement for Microsoft Office. Oh, and it's Free.

Need a Database? there's MySQL, Postgresql, Sqlite2 and many others, again Choice.

Programming Languages? Every Software Development Language is available in some form in Linux, there's even an Open Source version of Microsoft's C## and Dot.Net called Mono, created by the same guy that gave us Gnome, my favorite Desktop environment.

More to come...

A Funny Thing Happened on ...

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Staples Center

The Denver Nuggets Team Bus Caught Fire.


And 2-Hours Plus Later, in the Third Quarter, so did the Lakers.

Particularly Pau Gasol who single-handedly torched them with a playoff career high of 36 points, 16 rebounds and 8 assists.

Call it a Very Good Start for the Lakers...

The OC Resgister had this to say about the incident.
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/pau-gasol-lakers-2022398-kobe-bryant

Going To The Cleaners

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Going To The Cleaners
or
Hangers from China
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Story report from The Post and Courier at Charleston.net
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Many of the country's 30,000 or so dry cleaners are paying twice as much for hangers than they did at the beginning of the year, and they are ticking up prices to cover the mounting expenses.

In January, East Bay Cleaners was paying about 6 cents per wire hanger, or $15.50 for a box of 250. This week it shelled out almost 14 cents apiece, according to owner Kenny Yu. For a business that goes through 800 to 1,000 hangers a day, that's an extra $1,900 to $2,400 a month.

Where are the bulk of dry cleaner hangers coming from?

You guessed it: China.

A good line from Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest (1981) could go here.

A Big Pizza PIE!

Boston (eCanadaNow) - 43-year old Chris Clark has hit it big, selling the domain name Pizza.com for $2.6 million. He purchased the domain for just $20.

14-years ago, Clark purchased Pizza.com for just $20, and has had it renewed yearly ever since.

It's Good To Be #1

(picture from ESPN.com, webpage)

Yeah it is.

Just ask Google or iTunes or even the 4 teams playing in the Final Four.

None of that computer dyslexia they have for the BCS (which should mean: Bad Computer System) not Bowl Championship Series.

This is the Real Deal!

Among the teams in the hunt is our own SoCal local team from UCLA, maybe you've heard of them, they've been there before. Won like maybe 12 Championships over the years, and looking to return to the Glory they still call: "The Wooden Years".

I would be remiss if I didn't mention the "other" 3: Kansas, North Carolina and Memphis (who plays against UCLA on Saturday at: 3:00 pm).

Because of the magnamitity of CBS, the telecast will be PODCAST over the internet too. It seems the early rounds of March Madness (also podcast) was a Big Hit on cubicles that didn't have a tv handy. Estimates say the "Boss Button", a button that switches from the "games" to an innocuous business-like spreadsheet, was clicked: More than 2.4 million times in the first two rounds.

The Final Four Podcast will be available on CBSSports.com, ESPN.com, SI.com and even Facebook.com.

What did Michael Douglas say in "Wallstreet" ?

Oh yeah: "Greed Is Good."

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The Chidren's Crusade Part 2

Filed under: Hard to Believe
(picture from same source cited below)
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Third Graders "Plot" to hurt teacher in Georgia.

Link to AP report:
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http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5g84E-NqKavdkNfL6nv-ixkYQFiSgD8VPBR8G2
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What the heck is going on???

What is hard to figure out is the planning they went through to gather the "tools" (picture above), and each student assigned a specific "job" (like lookout).

At first Look, one would say "video games", but that could only be part (if any) of the story here.

This is almost like the "Lord of The Flies", which I can safely guess they never saw or read.
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Wingman.

The Chidren's Crusade???

According to an RSS Feed from the BBC today, 25% of the children in the UK between the ages of 8-11 has a profile on a social network.

This is a Bad Trend, here's the link to the story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/2/hi/technology/7325019.stm

I'm in my 60's and I've been in computers since the early 1980's and only recently have I grudgingly joined the ranks of Social Networks Facebook, MySpace and Yes even Twitter (the global tiny-IM messenger and ultra mini-blog).

The recent warning from security experts, say the fancy gadgets that members put on their "space", mainly with javascript, is highly vulnerable to out side attacks. An the popularity of the sites makes it prime real estate for hackers.

My Credo is: Things are Never as safe as we think and hope they are.

That's my Dime.
Wingman

Time to Really Get Social

On the Twitter Line as BIGBOPPER.
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Followers can link Here:
http://twitter.com/bigbopper
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What Does Open Social Mean (Yahoo Joins Google's Effort).

analysis forthcoming...

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Online Bookmarks

My Online Bookmarks:

http://del.icio.us/theWingman

Verizon, AT&T Win 700 mhz

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http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2008/03/20/verizon-att-big-winners-in-700-mhz-auction-verizon-wins-much-discussed-c-block-no-spectrum-for-google/

barronsblogs_link:

===================================================================================== March 20, 2008, 3:33 pm
Verizon, AT&T Big Winners In 700 MHz Auction; Verizon Wins Much-Discussed C Block; No Spectrum For Google
Posted by Eric Savitz

Verizon (VZ) and AT&T (T) are the big winners in the FCC’s 700 MHz spectrum auction, the commission disclosed today.

Verizon, as many had expected, was the biggest spender. The company won the rights to the much-discussed C block, which could be used to create a nationwide broadband network. A quick analysis of the bidding by Tech Trader Daily of the 1091 blocks that were auctioned off finds Verizon spent a total of $9.4 billion in the auction, buying parts of the A and B spectrum blocks as well as the C block.

AT&T spent $6.6 billion in the auction, all of it in the B spectrum block.

Other big spenders:

* CentruyTel (CTL): $149 million
* Cox: $304.6 million
* Frontier Wireless, which is related to EchoStar (DISH): $711.8 million. Frontier spent all of its cash on the E block, which was expected to be used for a mobile television service.
* King Street Wireless, an affiliate of U.S. Cellular (USM): $300.5 million
* Qualcomm (QCOM): $558.1 million. (The company also had the high bid on the D block at $472 million; but that failed to meet the reserve price, and that block will be re-bid.)
* Vulcan Spectrum (owned by Paul Allen): $112.8 million.

Google (GOOG) did not win any of the auctions.

All winning bids combined totaled $19.12 billion; the FCC says net dollars raised in the auction after some credits is $18.96 billion.


Update: Here are some additional companies that were substantial players in the auction:

* Cavalier Wireless: $46.4 million
* Cellular South Licenses: $191.5 million
* Continuum 700: $66.1 million
* Puerto Rico Telephone: $31.4 million
* Triad 700: $17 million
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Site Location listed above:

Charlie Rose: To Err (AIR) is Human...

MacBook Err?

Tuned into Charlie Rose today on KVCR and saw the vernerable host looking like a Geraldo want-to-be, with a nice shiner and bandage on his face.

What gives?


The Full story consists of Charlie, his brand new MacBook Air and a New York City Pothole. The Pothole and MacBook are fine, the "Rose" is black and blue.

Story at Wired Magagine:

The "FITS" of Telling the NEWS

Remember when the News was about the News?

Now the News (broadcast) is about possibilities.
Now the news is about asking inane questions from unqualified but Slanted "pundits".
Today, you can go to the News for questions but why bother?

They Don't have the answers. Probably a never had it, never will, kind of thing.
- - -
What about the WEB?
There's a lot of "Stuff" out there.

Some of it Might be News

The 100 top newspaper sites are here:
http://refdesk.com/top100pap.html

You know, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal.
Some are still viable despite their owner's "news pedigree".

And what about RSS feeds?

That's how I get the BBC Podcasts (for a different perspective about what's happening in the states).

I listen on my PSP, I don't use an iPod, but it works too. Pretty much any portable MP3 player will work, and there you have it, the BBC telling you the News of the Day.

The BBC has a whole slew of BBC RSS FEEDS you can subscribe to with just a click of a button.
Click here for FEEDS to choose from:


If you look hard enough, beyond the broadcast "Sound and Fury", you can find "some" viable news sources.

***
A cliche phrase from my Philosophy Logic Days was: "Consider the Source."

Good Idea, that.
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Here's a snippet of current news posted at refdesk.com: (My Fav Kid Safe reference web site!)
((webpage Slices is coming...))
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IN THE NEWS:
• Favre Could Be Scarce in Retirement - Mar 09 12:41 PM US/Eastern
• Tar Heels Hold Off Duke to Win ACC Crown - Mar 09 12:38 PM US/Eastern
• AP Probe Finds Drugs in Drinking Water - Mar 09 12:33 PM US/Eastern
• Obama's Black Support Shows Its Limits - Mar 09 11:47 AM US/Eastern
• AP: Water Makes US Troops in Iraq Sick - Mar 09 11:38 AM US/Eastern
• Democrats Criticize Bush's CIA-Bill Veto - Mar 09 11:31 AM US/Eastern
• Obama Wins in Wyoming, Adds 7 Delegates - Mar 09 11:07 AM US/Eastern
• Woman Earns Silver Star in Afghan War - Mar 09 10:32 AM US/Eastern
• Iran Ready to Talk Nuclear With Europe - Mar 09 10:14 AM US/Eastern
• China: Terrorists Targeted Olympics - Mar 09 8:38 AM US/Eastern
(from the REFDESK.COM page.)
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Some Blogs and Stuff LINKS
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A Youtube Video Worth Watching...
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How Much Does the War in Iraq Cost?:
http://www.afsc.org/cost/?gclid=CMOLqd-xgJICFSEaawodhjHI9w
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Barack OBAMA Blog:
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http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/hqblog/
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John McCAIN Blog:
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http://www.johnmccain.com/Blog/Read.aspx?guid=ace5005c-939b-4282-b19d-f95396ecbcd6
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Hillary CLINTON Blog:
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http://blog.hillaryclinton.com/
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Check Out DIGG for NEWS
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http://digg.com/news
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Found this on DIGG News.
The Check's Are Coming
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http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/03/08/tax.letter.ap/index.html?iref=24hours
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One Last BLOG to lighten the Load.
One of the 100 Newspapers posted above contains the Chicago Sun-Times which is the home of Ebert's "At The Movies" column. Here's the LINK:
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/

Yeah, he thinks "No Country For Old Men" was Pefect too...
Wingman, out.
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For The Loss of A Buckley...

The Theater loss the reason seasoned thoughts of intellectuals many years ago with the loss of the Great Actor/Orators like Spencer Tracy, Henry Fonda, Gregory Peck, Peter O'Toole, Sidney Poitier and Katharine Hepburn.

Some might say, me included, that the loss of persistent intellectuals may have faded from the American conscience with the loss of William F. Buckley Jr.

For 50 plus years he prodded and probed the political systems with glib and evanescent inquiry. His aloof delivery and slow meanderings, sprinkled with ten dollar words made you strain for understanding. What is He talking about? What does he mean?

I took from him: Question everything, and Question Everyone. Particularly politicians, whose words are too often filtered by think tanks and spin doctors. Too often they try to tell us what "they" think we want to hear.

One of my frequently quoted phrases from Marshall McLuan is "The Message is the Massage", which to me means: the means of the transmission is equally as important as what is being transmitted.

That was what Buckley was, an intelligent transmission.

That Voice and Transmission is what we lost last week.

The world has become a darker, quieter place because of it.

CNN and the Cool "Minority Report Effect"

Always on the cutting edge tech wise if not news reporting, CNN showed off it's neato Minority Report Like Effect last night.

Like Tom Cruise did in the Steven Spielberg movie "Minority Report"' minus the headset.
IMDB Link Here:

I guess that would have been "Too Techy".

Link to my report of the Windows Table Top system that MS sells for 10,000 a pop.

Link to a way to "duplicate" the effect for home movies using Blender 3D software.

RSS, Podcasts and New Media

Dave Winer on Leo's TWiT podcast argued that the RSS enclosure was not being use fully. That it was capable of doing "so much more...", but no one was taking advantage of its potential.

I iclude a link to the Podcast Here

TWIT episode 134

March 3rd, 2008

TWiT 134: Pave the Cow Paths

RSS evolves, Twitter vs. Pownce, Wikileaks, powdered hard disks, and more...

Just a simple cut and paste here to include Leo's Link.

80th Academy Awards

The Book

The Motion Picture.

The Movie of The YEAR
2007

Best Adapted Screenplay

Best Directors

Best Supporting Actor

Best Movie of The Year.

Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes.

This Link is to Amazon.com and their review of NCFOM.

BLOG: A Pocket Full of Miracles-MP3 Players

I purchased for My Wife for Valentine's Day an MP3 player.

The Creative 2GB Zen Stone Plus pictured here. About the size of a fat thumb. I installed 150 of her favorite songs and the audiobook "Pillars of the Earth". (40 plus hours of listening for the book).

Long time readers of my posts, on my many Blogs, have often heard me criticize the Apple iPod.

I have repeated said: "No One needs to carry around with him 15, 000 of his or her 'favorite' songs."

Okay, the Great Composers maybe, but for us ordinary music lovers that ability is simply overkill.

Especially at .99 cents each that would cost "roughly" 15,000 dollars! (The sound you hear is Apple smiling with lots of coin jingling in their pockets, all the way to the Bank).

On that pointy point of accounting I remain steadfast.

But recently a deluge of moderately priced mp3 players have hit the market that Apple created.

An iPod is really just an MP3 Player, that Apple has cleverly marketed as "A Simply Delicious Fanboy must have". But now low-price changes the "playing field" (pun intended).

And Add to this must-take-along mix, audio books by audible.com and a new form MEDIA player takes shape.

Remember the often forgotten tenet of the WWW is "Content is King".

And yes, the latest iPods are still doing nicely, an advertised Sale on Frys Friday AD boast a mind-boggling 160 GB (hard drive) of storage, enough to hold 40,000 songs. I dare say some of your least favorite songs might be able to sneak in there. It sells for $349.00 on sale!

The lower priced mp3 players, (read: Non-Apple and well under $100), of 1 to 8 GB of flash memory storage work quite nicely than you.

The 2 GB Creative Zen Stone player pictured above, holds over 200 mp3 songs and two audio books, with room for a third to be added shortly, (most likely the recent Best Seller: Einstein).

That really IS a pocketful of miracles.

Bush says: Shoot Down The Bird

Filed Under: Let's give it a Shot!

The Spy Satellite crashing back to Earth, that I mentioned here a while back has become More of An Issue. It seems the Electronics-On-Board are just too Top Secret to get into the Wrong Hands (China, Russia).

So we, being a gun-ho society of late, are going to shoot it down. Never mind that we haven't ever Done-That-Before. We don't want the pieces to be put on Ebay and start a Bidding War.

This Idea has raised eyebrows.

2 1/2 back in 4 1/2

Well the 100 day War is over and things are getting back to "normal" in tinsel town.
The Writers get a piece of the internet too, like they deserve, which should have been a no-brainer. But Hollywood loves to shoot itself in the foot, and hobble around, bleeding.

I don't have the numbers on hand, but rentals of videos went through the roof December and January.

And Online Fare (are you listening Hollywood?), is getting easier and better all the time.

Here are the returning shows posted on E! online. Link Here:

It's Showtime for Heroes, Office, CSI
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NBC Out First with a new Saturday Night Live slated to air Feb. 23.
6 to 8 new episodes between now and MAY.
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The Office will squeeze in 6 new episodes--first show on April 10.
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5 new shows for 30 Rock also returns April 10 and same for Scrubs and ER.
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My Name is Earl is shooting for April 3 return.
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit returns April 15.
Original Law and Order will return April 23.
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But Heroes, Chuck and Life will not return UNTIL THE FALL.
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CBS Return Line-up for 14 prime time shows, including Two and a Half Men, How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory should return March 17, each with 9 new episodes to end the season.
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CSI:Miami is set for March 24 return with 8 new episodes and Cold Case on March 30 with maybe 5 episodes.
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April brings a few more, with Criminal Minds and CSI:NY back on April 2, with 7 new shows, and CSI and Without a Trace due back April 3, with 6 new episodes each. Ghost Whisperer and Numb3rs returns April 4 with 6 episodes each.
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NCIS, back on April 8 with 7 new episodes, and Moonlight, back on April 11 with 4 new episodes. Rules of Engagement returns on April 14, with 6 episodes.
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FOX has not announce it's schedule, except for lots and lots of American Idol.

And it did confirm that 24, originally set to count-down its seventh season last month, won't be back on the air until January 2009.
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