Monthly Archives: March 2009

Sometimes evil makes me laugh…

I have been reading Looking For Group for several months now. It is a webcomic from the same minds that bring us Least I Could Do, Ryan Sohmer and Lar deSouza, and is an ongoing saga involving some rather unusual fantasy characters. Initially, these characters were loosely based on races and professions found in games such as World of Warcraft, but the connection is rather tenuous. Mostly it is about the “good” guy, Cale’Anon, and his twirl-your-mustache evil friend, the undead Warlock Richard.

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Sci Fi channel renames itself SyFy, insults all current customers

The cable content provider formerly known as the Sci Fi channel has renamed itself “SyFy”. Here is their reasoning for this rather bizarre change:

The name Sci Fi has been associated with geeks and dysfunctional, antisocial boys in their basements with video games and stuff like that, as opposed to the general public and the female audience in particular. We spent a lot of time in the ’90s trying to distance the network from science fiction, which is largely why it’s called Sci Fi. It’s somewhat cooler and better than the name ‘Science Fiction.’ But even the name Sci Fi is limiting. … (Changing the name to Syfy) gives us a unique word and it gives us the opportunities to imbue it with the values and the perception that we want it to have.

So in one giant leap, the SyFy channel has both insulted their entire existing client base and devised a new name that sounds like a sexually transmitted disease. It also means nasty things in Polish, apparently.

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Timber!

As I mentioned previously, I’m working on improvements to my office space at home. The painting is all done, and I’ve booked installation of a hardwood floor for Monday. This means I have to (fairly quickly) remove everything from the floor of the room. That meant disassembling several computers, reorganizing wiring, and figuring out a way to keep my network switches/routers connected without anything actually resting on the floor. I thought I had it all worked out until disaster struck…

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MIT discovery could “supercharge” lithium ion batteries

One of the big problems with existing battery technologies is the charge and discharge rate. A battery that powers a device for several hours can take nearly the same amount of time to recharge, making it difficult to develop “continuous use” devices. There has been a lot of research into new technologies like super-capacitors, but production use of these approaches is years if not decades in the future. Thanks to the folks at MIT, however, we may soon have a simple alternative: quick-charge (and discharge) Lithium Ion batteries.

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In these difficult economic times, auto workers “cut to the bone” at $55 an hour

The North American auto industry is in dire straits. The economic situation is so difficult for them that they have been forced to go to their workers unions and ask for reductions in salary and benefits. In fact, these reductions are a condition of the U.S. federal government emergency loans. So it is with great relief that I have found in today’s news an update: Ford has managed to negotiate a reduction in the average hourly wage (including benefits) of their UAW employees down to the barely survivable level of $55 an hour.

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