Archive for July, 2009

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Why I Won’t Be Buying Chris Anderson’s Free Book

[ 2 Comments ]Posted on July 11, 2009 by admin in Popular Media

Saturday, July 11th, 2009

Why you should steal Chris Anderson’s $26.99 book Free: The Future of a Radical Price. And what do Seth Godin, Malcolm Gladwell, Chris Anderson, and Mark Cuban have in common? They all have opinions.


Buy Chris Anderson’s
FREE BOOK On Amazon
For Only $26.99!

As I type this, I’m listening to the free audio book version (285MB, .zip format) of Chris Anderson’s Free: The Future of a Radical Price. Ironically, that second link is to the only text version you can actually own, which costs over $16.00. Sure, he’s made the book available for free on Scribd, but if you’ve ever used Scribd, you know that very few people would read a 288 page book sitting at a computer. My first thought on the book’s online release date was “Hmmm. I wonder how long before a torrent will be available?” To amuse myself, I timed myself as I did a few screen grabs of the book and OCR’d them, and determined it would take me about 70 minutes to have the entire book in a simple text file, which could then be ported to virtually any format. I also figured I could use Dragon NaturallySpeaking to convert the audio book to which I’m listening right now. But you know what? I’ll neither read the whole book, nor buy it. To add additional irony to Anderson’s not-free free book, the rather simple principle of the book is so thoroughly explained by both its critics and supporters – partly  because he plagiarized entire passages from Wikipedia (there is indeed free lunch, if you do enough cutting and pasting) – that there’s really nothing left to read. And adding yet one more layer of irony is the fact that Malcolm Gladwell, king of expanding 10-page ideas into 8-chapter books, is one of the harshest critics, suggesting the book is a story woven around an anecdote presenting itself as a fact. Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t that how Gladwell earns a living? What all the hoopla surrounding this book has highlighted for me is the fact that I should go ahead and pursue my plans to become a media guru. If guys like Chris Anderson, Seth Godin, Malcolm Gladwell, and Mark Cuban are all experts, and none of them agree on a simple marketing concept, then clearly they’re all doing nothing but offering opinion. And that’s something I’m pretty sure I can do.

Is It Barack Obama’s Fault You’re Broke?

[ 1 Comment ]Posted on July 10, 2009 by admin in Politics

Friday, July 10th, 2009

We’re a little overdue for more irrational finger-pointing about the economy. Maybe Obama did it.


This image has little to do with the article.
We just thought it might get your attention.

I think it’s obvious if you take a quick look at the Politics section here on Dissociated Press that I’m no political science expert. But I do think I’m a little more aware than the average Bible-thumping Palin supporter, or all-bark-no-bite liberal intellectual. Which is why, although I feel comfortable in saying that politicians by and large are a bunch of money hungry, morally decrepit philanderers, I can still take a broader view and realize that although the media is already trying to link Obama administration policy to the economy, that this is patently absurd. So who’s to blame for the economic situation? Well, Time Magazine has 25 suggestions. But maybe it’s testosterone, or a glitch in our brains. Or maybe mathematics is to blame. Personally, I think it’s all at once both a little simpler, and a little more complex than all of this. I think it’s greed, and a long-term crisis of values. At least with Enron, there was a feeling that someone was going after the bad guys. And as a result, Enron no longer exists. In the case of the recent massive financial industry failures though, we’ve mostly sat back as citizens and coughed up the loot while the responsible parties move through the magic revolving door of business and government. This Vanity Fair piece about Joseph Cassano is one of the few in-depth looks at the real people behind this catastrophe that I’ve seen, and Cassano is just one of dozens of his type. I don’t know about you, but I’m broke, a little angry, and a little confused. Part of me wants to make an updated Leave Barack Alone video, and part of me wants to join Jon Stewart in saying “That’s great. Now fix the economy!” What do you think?

Who Needs The Jackson 5 When There’s The Finger 5?

[ 2 Comments ]Posted on July 9, 2009 by admin in Music

Thursday, July 9th, 2009

Don’t try to figure out the name. Just sing Din din dih-din, din din dih-din din, din din dih-din din dih-diddy-din din


We don’t usually customize embedded
YouTube clips, but this one seemed to
just cry out for a red border somehow

We thought the Michael Jackson fans amongst you might need a little cheering up after the recent trauma you’ve endured, especially finding out that your idol was buried without a brain in his head. That’s why we’re staging a Finger Five revival. Granted, it’s a little difficult to stage a revival of something that no-one’s ever heard of, but we’ll give it a go. Finger 5 was Okinawa’s answer (not that anyone had asked the question) to the Jackson Five. Copping their style more from the Osmond Family than the Jackson family, they still had some smooth flair-bottomed 70′s moves, and made enough of an impact in their day that they’re still being covered by J-Pop girl bands like Morning Musume. Check out Morning Musume’s version of Finger 5′s biggest hit “Koi No Dial 6700″ (featured in the clip at left). Although we haven’t actually checked it out, the best collection of Finger 5′s hits seems to be Finger 5 Best 10. In spite of Finger Five’s somehow almost disturbing name, it seems to be based on the fact that they also covered Jackson Five songs. Check out the audio clip below of their cover of “I Want You Back”. It might help erase the insidiously catchy “Din din dih-din, din din dih-din din, din din dih-din din dih-diddy-din din” from the clip featured here…

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Facing Reality

[ 1 Comment ]Posted on July 8, 2009 by admin in Lifestyle & Culture

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

Given our tendency to see faces where there are none, how can we be sure we’re really people? And by the way, I can hear your aura, but I have no idea who you are…

I recall vividly from my childhood a recurring thought that my dad somehow looked a lot like his ’66 Imperial, much like people resemble their pets. I think it was something about his toothy grin and his wire-rimmed glasses, but it also had to do with a weird perceptual phenomena that plagues me which I rarely discuss with people, lest they catch on to the fact that really am insane, rather than thinking I’m someone who just talks like they’re insane. I experience things with an odd and subtle combination of Synesthesia and Prosopagnosia. Among other things, I hear some things that I see, and I have difficulty recognizing faces of people I know. I’m otherwise probably more perceptive than most people, because I’m forced to assemble different input into useful information. Which is why, back in the ’90s, I was drawn to the book Turn Signals Are The Facial Expressions Of Automobiles, which addressed a lot of issues surrounding our relationship with technology and interface design in a very engaging and readable style. I was reminded of all of this yesterday when I ran across research being done by Viennese scientists which they presented in a paper called Face to Face – The Perception of Automotive Designs (full text here). This tendency to see human faces everywhere – whether it’s some form of Pareidolia that makes us see faces on Mars, or in the mountains of Alberta, Canada – has me a bit concerned. How can we be sure when we look at each other that we’re not just imagining human faces where there are none? I mean we’re so hell bent on seeing faces in automobiles in particular that Japanese car designers have secured patents for this purpose, and we collectively spend millions of dollars on movies about it. C’mon. Come clean with me. You’re a ‘51 Hudson Hornet. Aren’t you. But seriously, whether referring to concepts like Apophenia, Synchronicity, or even the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, this is a fascinating topic that colors our lives constantly, yet is almost impossible to study scientifically. In the words of Klaus Conrad, who coined the term Apophenia: “It is fraught with problems of subjective bias in the observer.” Have you seen anything where it wasn’t lately?

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Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Solves Peak Oil Problem

[ 1 Comment ]Posted on July 7, 2009 by admin in Clean & Green, Technology

Tuesday, July 7th, 2009

It’s nice to know that while Detroit automakers go bankrupt, there’s still a market for $2.1 million cars

Let’s see. Buy a house? Or buy a car? If you happen to have $2.1 million laying around, the Bugatti Veyron 16.4 might actually make this a difficult decision. I generally think of combustion engine vehicles as rather Luddite, but the inevitability of peak oil makes me feel like just funneling all the remaining petrol in the world into the 1001HP, 16-cylinder engine of this thing and burning it all up. With a 7-speed transmission and 4 turbochargers to get enough fuel and air into its monstrous 8.0 liter power-plant to keep it happy, the Veyron 16.4 has a top end of 253mph. But don’t get too excited about the idea that you can travel 253 miles away in an hour, because at its rate of fuel consumption at top speed, you’d theoretically have to refuel every 12 minutes. At least you’d look cool doing it though, partly because the car lowers to just 3.5 inches above the ground and automatically extends a rear spoiler, and partly because, well, c’mon. This thing is simply amazing to look at. In fact, I’d say more, but I keep drooling all over my keyboard. Check out this Wired.com piece for more photos and a description of what it’s like to drive the new Veyron; Bugatti didn’t offer us a test drive or a press tour for some reason. You can also configure your own with Bugatti’s configurator page. I was kind of partial to violet; the green option just didn’t look right somehow.

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