One MacBook with a Thinkpad keyboard please (or OS X running on Windows, when hell freezes over) by ZDNet's David Berlind -- Just because almost everybody is doing it, does that mean it’s a good idea? Or does that mean that we’ve somehow been hoodwinked into thinking this makes sense. I’m talking about touchpads. Somehow, users have been convinced that these kissin-cousins to the digitizing tablets that graphics artists use (where the technology benefits productivity) make [...]

Is this guy on crack or something?  Sure, I agree with him about trackpads.  Who really uses the trackpad on their mac laptops anyway?  I'm a macfreak but I avoid using the trackpad on my powerbook as much as possible.  I'm also a productivity freak so I use keyboard shortcuts as much as possible.  But pointing sticks?  Please, that's so 90's.

My only brief experience with a  pointing stick was when I had to help a friend with his Toshiba back in the 90's.  My only hope was that I could get the job done as soon as possible so I wouldn't have to use that stupid, little pointing stick anymore.

Sure, it was fast.  Too fast.  Speed went up and accuracy plummeted.  The fact that it may be harder for manufacturers to make or maintain is not the real reason why it has never caught on.  People don't like them.

Want speed and accuracy?  Use a mouse.  Want productivity?  Keep your fingers on the keyboard as much as possible and use shortcuts.  That is unless you get paid by the hour, of course.  In that case, feel free to use whatever outdated, outmoded technology you wish to use.

Technorati Tags: productivity, trackpads, pointing-sticks

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Stupid Danish Robbery Caught on Tape!

Danish baby laughing. [EDIT: The film starts with some language I assume to be Danish, so the baby must be Danish. My logic is IMPECCABLE!]

Atkins Diet Recipes Mock Danish

Shocking Turn of Events: The accordion is the city of San Francisco's official musical instrument.

According to Accordionists Tom Torriglia and Gary Sredzienski, it was the Beatles that ruined the accordion's popularity.

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National Accordion Awareness Month
Facts one and two: Mr. Smarty Pants Accordion Facts
Fact three: Accordion
and four: Accordion cut
Squeezebox field guide - Squeezebox - a Wikia wiki

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The article begins like this:

Today biologists are beginning to understand the origins of life's complexity—the exquisite optical mechanism of the eye, the masterly engineering of the arm, the architecture of a flower or a feather, the choreography that allows trillions of cells to cooperate in a single organism.

The fundamental answer is clear: In one way or another, all these wonders evolved.

Ignoring the circular logic in the last sentence, notice the use of terms such as "engineering", "architecture", and "choreography". Words that seemingly would be more appropriate coming from a Creationist or someone in the Intelligent Design community. The author is usurping words commonly used in the Creationist community and apparently attributing them to naturalistic processes.

It continues by explaining that nearly 150 years after Darwin first introduced these ideas, they can still be hard to accept. And then explains briefly some of the objections that Creationists have to these ideas. I guess I fall squarely in this category.

The interesting part, though, that I wanted to mention was an analogy by Sean Carrol, a biologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She likens the body-building genes briefly introduced in the previous paragraphs - which the article is about - to construction workers.

"If you walked past a construction site at 6 p.m. every day, you'd say, Wow, it's a miracle—the building is building itself. But if you sat there all day and saw the workers and the tools, you'd understand how it was put together. We can now see the workers and the machinery. And the same machinery and workers can build any structure."

A limb, a feather, or a flower is a marvel, but not a miracle.

Again, the author - in this case quoting someone else - is taking an example that could easily have been used by a Creationist. What puzzles me, though is the logic behind it. It seems to me that evolution is basically saying that the building is building itself. If you believe in evolution, a limb, feather or a flower are miracles because they just "happened" by random processes.

It seems to me as though the author by his usage of wording and analogies is trying to assimilate Creationism into evolution. The "engineer" of the arm, the "architect" of the flower and the "choreographer" of the cells is none other than evolution itself. Evolution is being put forward - albeit subtly - as the "Intelligent Designer" behind all living things.

So what about the digital signal, you ask? Well, the last word was, that the tuners were all sold out, and the provider, KPN, couldn't even guarantee that the signal would be available in all areas yet.

Oh yes, and then there's the IPTV offering, also from KPN. I'm talking about true IPTV. To set the record straight, all those podcasts and videocasts, like dl.tv, twit.tv, etc., as great as they are, are not IPTV. IPTV is where your ISP gives you a "tuner" (also a misnomer, but so is "dsl modem") and you plug it into your internet connection and you can "tune" in a whole offering of stations as if you were receiving a signal from the air or from your cable.

Well, I'm also too far out into the boonies to get this. You need to qualify for a 4mbps internet connection before you can even think about signing up for IPTV. Currently I'm at 1500kbps, which is not shabby compared to most American households. Because, after all, in The Netherlands out in the boonies is never really out in the boonies. You could get "lost" here in the "wilderness" and the biggest hazard would be that you accidentally stumbled onto a busy freeway and get killed in the traffic.

Then there's the satellite option, which is the most viable option for me, but also the most expensive up-front. That'll set you back about € 250 whereas the digital (DVB-T) tuners run only about € 90.

"Sigh". Oh well, at least I still have my dvds and iTunes tv downloads. After all, it is almost Christmas, and in the words of the classic Christmas song, "Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!"

There was no new "Video iPod", rumours of which had been floating around the internet for months now, but the present iPod did get a bump in capacity, the larger model going from 60GB to 80GB.

The Nano also got a facelift. Check them out here:

And the Shuffle is smaller, now being touted as the smallest mp3 player on the market:

Other noteworthy news, is that you can now buy and download full-length movies via the iTunes Music Store. For instance:

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

iTunes also got an update moving up to version 7, from version 6:

iTunes 7

(If you click on the links and buy something, you also help support this website.)

Studio Daily | Cellular Visions: The Inner Life of a Cell

After seeing this, could anyone still believe that it all evolved?

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