Apparently the military is facing a shortage of a critical defense resource: bandwidth. It seems that, even though forces in the field have access to orders of magnitude more wired and wireless bandwidth than they did ten years ago, the brass’ desire for whiz-bang features like streaming video from Predator drones is causing other requests […]

How far would you go to stand on principle? Would you sacrifice an hour’s pay? A day’s? A week’s? Would you actually turn down a job opportunity, if you were unemployed, if the job was counter to your principles? (Be honest now!) Well, Shelley Powers did just that — and after being unemployed for a […]

Is anybody else out there as tired of the Great IT Depression as I am? For those of you outside the computer field, this may feel like a recession. To those of us in the tech biz, I’ll be frank — it’s not a recession, it’s a depression. A real, honest-to-god, holy-schnikies depression like the […]

If you were in the mood to, you could waste hours reading I S O M E T R I C… Not that I’ve wasted hours on it myself… I’m just sayin’ 😉

It’s official: here is the world’s best classified ad.

Now, this is interesting. For as long as anyone can remember, the trend with computers has been to get faster and cheaper, but the size has always remained relatively constant. Today, though, now that just about any computer is fast enough for most people, vendors need a new way to differentiate themselves, and many have […]

In her State of the Union address, Burningbird (aka Shelley Powers) says it all.

Got doubts about war in Iraq? You’re not alone — Norman Schwarzkopf wants to give peace a chance.

Did you know that Dave Barry has a blog? Neither did I.

Best part of this year’s otherwise anemic Super Bowl? “Terry Tate: Office Linebacker“, hands down.

From Scripting News: I asked what [my prescription] would cost if I didn’t have insurance. $400 per month. And that’s just one drug. How do people pay for this? How does the government justify going to war in Iraq. Where are the priorities. If Bush had to pay $400 per month for one drug, out […]

Anil Dash has a great essay up on his blog about diamonds and the incredible contempt for the public that goes into their marketing. Definitely worth your time.

Who knew the lives and loves of paper products were so complicated? Apparently, the Japanese did. Go figure.

You think we’ve got it bad, civil liberties-wise, here in the States? You should try living in the UK. As if being constantly monitored by video cameras wasn’t bad enough, now they’re in the final stages of evaluating whether to mandate that all British subjects obtain a national identity card. The government over there, moreover, […]

Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo has busted the Bush Administration for hypocrisy on the issue of race. It turns out that the White House had a little tradition, started by Woodrow Wilson almost 100 years ago, of sending a wreath on Memorial Day to decorate the Confederate Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery. The reason? […]

Been listening to the newest album from Morcheeba lately. It’s called “Charango” and it’s fantastic; each track has its own unique style, ranging from earnest soul to creamy lounge music to wry hip-hop, but they’re all tied together by a singular sensibility. Give it a listen, you won’t be disappointed. (Want a sample? You can […]

Boy, if we were gonna identify the one brutal dictator in the world who seems most likely to be the next Hitler, I’m sure glad we picked the right one! (sigh)

From Larry Lessig’s blog: “The Supreme Court has rejected our challenge to the Sonny Bono Law.” Well, looks like the copyright cartels have won the right to fence off the intellectual commons to whatever degree they can buy support in Congress for. If we ever see another publication hit the public domain in our lifetimes, […]

You’ve probably heard by now that Steve Case is leaving AOL/Time Warner. Naturally AOLTW shareholders are cheering, as they’re tired of watching their stock deflate, and they pin the blame on Case and his management of the merger. This is 100% wrong. Seeing Steve Case leave AOL should be a sad moment for anybody who […]

Looks like the Chinese government has recently blocked access for its citizens to several major blog services hosted outside that country, including BlogSpot. Naturally, bloggers are up in arms. In a way, this isn’t too surprising; China has spent the last few years building a network of firewalls for precisely the purpose of controlling the […]

From an excellent article in today’s New York Times covering Microsoft’s new product announcements: Microsoft has built a new national wireless data network, based on the data broadcasting ability of FM radio stations. The company says that compared with traditional paging systems, this network makes it cheaper both to broadcast data and build receivers. Does […]

You’ve heard of Save Karyn, right? The site where the woman asked the world to send in contributions so she could pay off her credit cards? Unbelievable, right? Wrong. Karyn raised every penny of the $20,000 she was looking for. And now, a girl named Michel has taken the concept to a whole new level […]

Saw this on Bartleby.com and thought it was insightful enough to be worth passing along: “Loss of freedom seldom happens overnight. Oppression doesn’t stand on the doorstep with toothbrush moustache and swastika armband-it creeps up insidiously … step by step, and all of a sudden the unfortunate citizen realises that it is gone.” — Baron […]

After my little run-in with stupidity the other day, I found myself needing to buy a new car to replace my faithful Escort. After some looking around, I finally have purchased a new set of wheels: a brand new silver 2003 Subaru Impreza WRX. How is it? It’s a blast! The WRX is a street-legal […]