I’ve changed a setting. I tried showing off my messy desk last time. This time here’s a picture of one of the Townsville weirs (Aplins Weir) from this week.
Month: February 2009
Dear subscribers
I’m moving my feed over to feedburner. This appears to have broken the old feed.
But here’s a nice little link for you to use to update your feeds.
Not a subscriber? Maybe you should be, try Google Reader. It’s awesome.
Thanks for your patience.
White noise
There’s an odd white space appearing at the top of my blog at the moment. Can anyone else see it, or is it just me. Seem’s it’s working ok in Explorer. It’s just a Firefox thing.
Fixed. Hooray. Now all I need to do is figure out the Livewriter issue.
Now coming to you from Windows, Live
Nope, didn’t work. Let’s try again.
I am Robot
Admit it. You’ve always looked at Dr Evil with envy because of Mini Me. I know I have. A little me running around doing my bidding would be awesome. Especially if the “mini me” was every bit as funny as I am. And if they looked, and sounded, like me that would be extra awesome.
Well, your own army of robot minions is no longer an unattainable dream. Little Island, A Japanese company, is producing them upon request. No idea what it costs though. But here are the specs:
Features:
We produce the Look a Like Doll with the hand making.
The Look a Like Doll is able to make a speech in the person’s voice.
It is possible to talk over from the remote place to
the person who exists completely in front of the Look a Like Doll,
and to monitor it.
It is possible to use it as only LAN cable is connected with
the power cable, and the setting doesn’t exist.
The operation only turns on the power on/off switch and is OK.
Please call when you end, “Shutdown”. ”
Function
Voice recognition
It is possible to operate the Look a Like Doll using Voice recognition.
Voice synthesis
The Look a Like Doll synthesize the person’s voice, and it talks using the voice.
Remote Control
It talks from the destination with the person who exists completely in front of
the Look a Like Doll.
The appearance in the room etc. can be seen.
RSS reading out
The Look a Like Doll will tell you Today’s weather and fortune-telling, etc.
Specifications
☆ Shape
We will make Look a Like Dall for the customer’s hoped design.
The height is about 40cm.
☆ CPU
LX800（500MHz)(AMD Geode)
512MB DDR SDRAM
80GB Solid State Disk
10/100Base-TX Ethernet
☆ Software
WindowsXP（Ｍｉｃｒｏｓｏｆｔ）
ＡｌｉｆｅＥｎｇｉｎｅ
☆ Power Supply
ＡＣ１００－２４０Ｖ １．２Ａ
☆ Others
Camera：0.1M pixel CMOS sensor
Speaker：1W(0.5W+0.5W)(200Hz-20kHz)
World Wide Web
Hate spiders? Don’t go here. Otherwise check out this cool flash demonstration.
Awkward return
Imagine workplace “water cooler” conversations today at this Townsville workplace…
“so, used toilet paper lately?”
Background: this guy was originally sacked because his toilet hygiene was considered inappropriate. He used bottled water rather than paper for his ablutions. He’s back at work today after the company backed down.
When will she go away?
“Former US Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin is still mad at media coverage of her candidacy, particularly “anonymous, pathetic bloggers” who she says spread falsehoods about her.”
Guilty as charged. Although I’m not anonymous. And I don’t think anything I said was false. From the SMH.
“”If I were giving advice to myself back on the day my candidacy was announced, I’d say, ‘Tell the campaign that you’ll be callin’ some of the shots. Don’t just assume that they know you well enough to make all your decisions for ya,” Palin said.”
That would have been a real difference maker. She can’t open her mouth without sounding like an illiterate yokel.
“When I was in high school, my desire was to be a sportscaster,” she said. “Until I learned that you’d have to move to Bristol, Connecticut. It was far away. So instead, I had a daughter and named her Bristol.””
The best bits – February 6, 2009
Here's what has excited me from the blogosphere today.
- Once Again, The AP Tries To Redefine Fair Use; Goes After Shepard Fairey For Obama Poster
- Have You Ever Wondered How Much It Would Cost To Build Your Own Death Star? Hint: I Didn#39;t Even Know That Was A Real Number
- Emoticon from 1862?
- DIY IKEA Lack Lounge Room PC
- Authorities Warn Against Road Sign Hacking on Radio
- Hopside Down Glass Will Really Confuse You After a Few Beers
- A class on The Wire
- Cornify Lets You Add Rainbows and Unicorns to Any Site
- Running out of whys
- Handling Criticism: 6 Options to Get Through It
- The 5 Hardest Games in the Whole Wide World
- Use Butter To Keep Cheese Soft And Unspoiled
- Bus Wars: God Totally Exists, Say Christians To Atheists
- What where they thinking !
- Electronic Frontiers Australia spokesman receives death threat for opposing the Great Firewall of Australia
There are a couple of questions that spring to mind when I read a story like this. One, who knows the kind of facts used in this sentence:br(The Death Star has) a volume of 17.16 quadrillion cubic meters. At 1/10 volume, we’ll need 1.71 Quadrillion cubic meters of steel, weighing in at 134 quadrillion tonnes. In 2008 steel products, from wire to ingots were selling for an average of $962 per tonne, so our cost of steel alone is $12.95 quintillion.brTwo, who cares enough to research this bit:br(The Death Star has) a volume of 17.16 quadrillion cubic meters. At 1/10 volume, we’ll need 1.71 Quadrillion cubic meters of steel, weighing in at 134 quadrillion tonnes. In 2008 steel products, from wire to ingots were selling for an average of $962 per tonne, so our cost of steel alone is $12.95 quintillion.
Table PC – a good idea.
I’m very much looking forward to watching the Wire when my order from JB Hifi arrives. They were (and I’m not sure if they still are) selling them for $15.98 a season.
My brother-in-law Hilton asks a pertinent question regarding Bigpond. brI have to agree. Their page is hideous.
More stimulating discussion
“By contrast, new converts to Keynesianism, such as Rudd and Barack Obama, believe in a positive multiplier. They believe extra government spending, like handouts to those most likely to spend it, creates new income on top of the governmental spend, as the unemployed are put to work.
This process is brilliantly satirised by Norman Lindsay’s magic pudding, which freely recreates itself the more that is eaten. The magic pudding perfectly captures the unmet promises of Australian politicians.”
UNSW Professor of Finance Peter Swan in the SMH.
I probably tend to think this policy is a bad idea. But I want to have my cake and eat it too. How’s that for a mixed metaphor.
I would like the government to give me $950. It’s only fair after they taxed me to give all that money to other people.
But I think it’s a bad idea for them to give other people money. I suspect a large amount will be whacked into paying off debt or savings accounts. Which is a positive cultural turn.
Treasury secretary Ken Henry says the stimulus will work – and interest rates will still need to be lowered. At least I think that’s what I heard on the Today Show this morning. If we weren’t planning to become students again at some point in the future now would be a great time to buy. Although I think there’s more hurt for home prices to come.
Cruel to be kind
This guy decided to film his son David coming out of dental surgery. Is this cruelty? You decide. I can’t imagine this kid thanking his dad for exposing him to the world like this. But it’s pretty funny.
“Will this be forever?”
Cafe economics
Hands up if you’ve ever thought “opening a cafe would be fun”. This little article was just about enough for me to put my hand down to that question. Here’s a failed cafe owner elaborating on the costs of pursuing your cafe dream.
“A place that seats 25 will have to employ at least two people for every shift: someone to work the front and someone for the kitchen (assuming you find a guy who will both uncomplainingly wash dishes and reliably whip up pretty crepes; if you’ve found that guy, you’re already in better shape than most NYC restaurateurs. You’re also, most likely, already in trouble with immigration services). Budgeting $15 for the payroll for every hour your charming cafe is open (let’s say 10 hours a day) relieves you of $4,500 a month. That gives you another $4,500 a month for rent and $6,300 to stock up on product. It also means that to come up with the total needed $18K of revenue per month, you will need to sell that product at an average of a 300 percent markup.”
“Coffee was a different story—thanks to the trail blazed by Starbucks, the world of coffee retail is now a rogue’s playground of jaw-dropping markups. An espresso that required about 18 cents worth of beans (and we used very good beans) was sold for $2.50 with nary an eyebrow raised on either side of the counter. A dab of milk froth or a splash of hot water transformed the drink into a macchiato or an Americano, respectively, and raised the price to $3. The house brew too cold to be sold for $1 a cup was chilled further and reborn at $2.50 a cup as iced coffee, a drink whose appeal I do not even pretend to grasp.”
“But how much of it could we sell? Discarding food as a self-canceling expense at best, the coffee needed to account for all of our profit. We needed to sell roughly $500 of it a day. This kind of money is only achievable through solid foot traffic, but, of course, our cafe was too cozy and charming to pop in for a cup to go. The average coffee-to-stay customer nursed his mocha (i.e., his $5 ticket) for upward of 30 minutes. Don’t get me started on people with laptops.”
It seems the real cost was almost to the couple’s marriage – which the writer said was saved by a “well timed bankruptcy.
Today’s linkage February 6th
Best of the interweb
- Coffee – My coffee page.
- Tarzan Turnbull swings into a jungle full of trouble – Annabel Crabb on Turnbull#039;s fiscal stimulus opposition:
quot;Swinging through the trees, Tarzan Turnbull alighted before the dispatch box and, giving his chest a vigorous, if figurative thump, performed his most dazzling feat of machismo yet.quot;quot;His colleagues quickly caught the crazy-brave spirit.
quot;When somebody holds a gun to your head, maybe it#039;s a bit silly, but I say – #039;Well mate, pull the trigger#039;,quot; offered Joe Hockey, always a man for frankness in a crisis.
The Prime Minister won#039;t hesitate to pull the trigger, either.
The genius of his $42 billion gambit is that it is a sophisticated quot;Vote Yes, Or The Puppy Gets Itquot; device.
Anyone voting against it will need to explain to forlorn local kiddies why they don#039;t get a school library, or to sad-eyed single parents why $950 won#039;t be coming their way after all.quot;
Bandaid solution
Bandaids, on the whole, are pretty disgusting. I can’t think of anything grosser than going for a swim in a public pool and coming up with someone’s grotty second hand bandaid stuck somewhere to my body.
You’ll be happy to know then, that there’s a company out there taking bandaids to a whole new level of disgustingness (it’s now a word).
Scabs Bandages claim to have the world’s grossest bandaids. I can’t see anyone out there trying to claim that title.
Green cloud has silver lining
Roof insulation companies around the country are rejoicing. Proving once and for all that the best way to come out of climate change ahead is to invest wisely in companies seeking to mitigate the effects of rising temperatures and hysteria.
These Brisbane insulators say they’ll make millions after K-Rudd included free installation of insulation in the stimulus package.
The silver lining at the moment is for green businesses – but I reckon at the end of the day it’ll be the people producing air conditioners, freezers, icecream and cold drinks that will really reap the rewards of climate change.