2010 has come and gone, and still no monolith. There’s no rotating space station, no psychotic computer, and Zarathustra hasn’t spoken up yet. I’m a tad disappointed, really.

AfC

Australians Nathan Wilmot and Malcolm Page won the gold medal sailing in the 470 class yesterday. Wilmot announced that he would be retiring (from racing that class, anyway).

When asked his immediate plans, the Sydney sailor replied “getting fat”

– as quoted by Alex Brown in “One pair just had to turn up, the other had to finish breakfast”, The Sydney Morning Herald, Tue, 19 Aug 08, Olympics section, page 1.

Maybe he should try the Michael Phelps diet.

AfC

After watching my copy of the Bourne Ultimatum the other day, I started wondering how a newspaper like The Guardian feels about being portrayed in such a film. Via one of the footnotes in the Wikipedia entry, I found my way to an article on their website on this very topic:

Obviously, I would have preferred to see this Guardian journalist do a little more ass-kicking, or indeed any ass-kicking … Nevertheless, he gets to show a fair bit of courage under fire. He and Bourne are shadowed by a creepy CIA surveillance spook who has already given a chilling order to “prepare rendition protocols”. Huh! Bring it on! Guardian journalists aren’t scared of Guantánamo.

The best part was the insight into the newspaper’s style guide:

They wind up in Waterloo station where they have to dodge bullets from a CIA sniper, that of course is the sort of thing which happens to us all the time. But there are inaccuracies. The Guardian stylebook clearly states that if you are under a hail of bullets in a public place from an assassin run by a deniable intelligence unit, you have to duck into the nearest internet cafe and start blogging about it to keep the readers informed.

The BBC’s website, by contrast, advises readers not to risk themselves when submitting comments from dangerous places like the scene of a protest being violently suppressed by the faceless state police, or when an earthquake is destroying the building they are in, or when walking down the streets of London. How can we possibly defend democracy in the face of such reticence?

:)

AfC

Comments have been disabled so that readers do not endanger themselves replying to this blog post.

:)

Co-ordinates and photo interpretation from an email by Scott Elcomb on the Toronto Linux User Group mailing list.

AfC

Srichand introduced me to PhD comics the other day. It’s always a blast when you find a new comic, and while he’s obviously well known in the academic community, I hadn’t known of this strip before. It’s a riot!

I will not, of course, admit how much time this week I spent reading it.

My two favourites:

and

Which not only describes academia, but also open source… and most of human history, come to think of it.

If you hadn’t come across PhD before, enjoy! [and, of course, buy his books for all your friends! :)]. It’s free to syndicate into student newspapers too, which is great marketing on his part.

AfC

I came across a satire piece today about what it would be like if the operating systems were airlines. It’s short and to the point but really very funny.

Some choice quotes: If Mac OS X where an airline…

> Every time you ask questions about details, you are gently > but firmly told that you don’t need to know, don’t want to know, and > everything will be done for you without your ever having to know, so just > shut up.

(I think they code-share flights with GNOME Airways –ed)

and the one for Windows XP:

> The aircraft will not take off until you have signed a contract. The inflight > entertainment promised turns out to be the same Mickey Mouse cartoon repeated > over and over again. … If you go to the toilet twice or more you get > charged for a new ticket.

:)

AfC

One day I joined the channel for the Sydney Linux Users Group and saw:

The topic for #slug is: ... | NO PLAID! PLAID WEARERS, GET OUT! | ...

After having tried to figure it out for a while, I finally gave in and asked. The conversation went like this:

> AfC: So I don’t pretend to be up on every single pop culture reference in my latest-country-of-refuge; can someone explain what the plaid thing in the topic is? It’s endured up there surprisingly long.

> purserj: It’s a kfish thing. Apparantly he was abused by a plaid wearing scotsman as a child

> AfC: purserj: so you’re saying we should all wear plaid to community events so we can contribute to further reinforcing the damage?

> ***purserj imagines a room full of plaid wearing geeks. I suppose it could be worse

> AfC: Not one of them would be colour co-ordinated, but the group as a whole would be a mighty gestalt of blazing fashion harmony.

> purserj: They might achieve critical mass though

> yama: a room full of mostly overweight geeks is critical mass without the fancy attire!

In honor of Conrad Parker‘s last day in Sydney before he heads off to do his doctorate in Kyoto, I hope there will be a big turnout at SLUG’s monthly meeting Friday night to wish kfish well (and, more to the point, to drink him under the table).

Make sure you wear plaid.

AfC