Posts from — January 2004

this could be handy for people working in this area.

Because I make him Laugh. Because I make him laugh, he says, I have added too many topics, too little time to my list of Blogs I like…. [Flailing in the Surf]

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this could be trouble…..

this is scary, really really scary:

the household card debt of those who carry balances is closer to $12,000.

“In the long run, it's a ticking time bomb,” Sohn said. “At some point when you get a sharp setback in the economy or a spike in interest rates, the high debt causes instability.”

Open source under the microscope. CNET has an interesting but short interview with Walt Scacchi of UC Irvine whose research into “phenomena like “community building” and cultural institutions alongside drier subjects like code and project design.” Sacchi's plan is to “use the data to design new development tools for big, multiorganization projects.”

CNET notes that Sancchi's “research has shown [. . .] that that the open-source approach can yield better software more quickly and for less money than traditional methods” even if a number of open source projects fail to get started. [Kairosnews - A Weblog for Discussing Rhetoric, Technology and Pedagogy]

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there are tons of interesting topics relating to open source software that are just waiting for someone to do research on, and scacchi's project is but one set of topics, but it is an interesting and worthwhile one to read and consider, and to some extent even critique… should that be appropriate.

Apparently, Virginia Tech, Virginia, and William and Mary are seeking to change to state chartered institutions instead of state supported institutions. Various reasons exist for this of course, the major one is that the state hardly gives them enough money to compete with their peer institutions. The article is in the richmond times-dispatch, and there is not much there in terms of info, but surely more will be forthcoming.

Arkansas Executes Mentally Ill Man. Charles Singleton was mentally ill. The courts declared him too unfit to be executed because he couldn't understand why he… [TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime]

What does it say about us that we forcibly drug a man so that we can then kill him. Was he sane when he committed the crimes? Was he only sane after we arrested him and forced medication on him? What a twisted story! We make a man sane just so we can kill him because we can not kill him if he is insane. Unbelieveable. If I were in a religious mood, I would say that these are the sorts of moral conundrums that God will judge us on. And, I believe, he will see we failed in this case. This is another reason why Arkansas is right up there with Texas as perfect demonstrations for why the death penalty is misused. [A Man with a Ph.D. - Richard Gayle's Weblog]

Live chat with Wesley Clark.

Provided that I can figure out the technology, I’m going to be participating in an online chat with Wesley Clark and a dozen or so bloggers tomorrow (Wednesday) at 5:00 Eastern time.

Watch it here…

or log in.

Public IRC Server: irc://irc.forclark.com
Read-Only Channel: #wireside

[Crooked Timber]

Are We Torturing Iraqi POW's?. CincyDemo asks: Is it true that Bush's occupation forces have tortured Iraqi POWs? Yes. Bush's occupation forces have tortured Iraqi… [TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime]

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i hope this isn't true…. once you've taken a person into your control you have a duty to care for their wellbeing, because you've taken their ability to do so for themself. if we are torturing people that we have captured in war, then we are commiting a war crime and worse a moral outrage.

BASIC TRAINING OVERHAUL. Army Times reports, The Army is overhauling its basic training to help recruits survive the particular dangers of missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. The changes… [OUTSIDE THE BELTWAY]

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sounds interesting, but traditionally sunday has been a day of rest and more importantly recuperation. lots of kids also went to church on sunday, i always stayed back and cleaned the barracks.

David & Goliath T-Shirt?!. Does anyone know where I can buy the T-Shirt version of THIS???!!!! (thanks to MW for showing it to me yesterday!)… [Flailing in the Surf]

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i dunno, but the sentiment represented made me laugh, i think it was the pink…