Ramblings & ephemera
From Nadya Labi’s “Want Your Kid to Disappear?” (Legal Affairs: July/August 2004):
RICK STRAWN IS AN EX-COP WHO STARTED HIS COMPANY in 1988 to help police officers find off-duty work guarding construction sites. Ten years later, he was asked by a member of his United Methodist church to transport the churchgoer’s son to Tranquility Bay in [...]
Posted on June 4th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: business, education, law | Comments Off
From Paul Graham’s “The Hardest Lessons for Startups to Learn“:
We take it for granted most of the time, but human life is fairly miraculous. It is also palpably short. You’re given this marvellous thing, and then poof, it’s taken away. You can see why people invent gods to explain it. But even to people who [...]
Posted on May 11th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: commonplace book | Comments Off
From Clay Shirky’s “File-sharing Goes Social“:
The RIAA has taken us on a tour of networking strategies in the last few years, by constantly changing the environment file-sharing systems operate in. In hostile environments, organisms often adapt to become less energetic but harder to kill, and so it is now. With the RIAA’s waves of legal [...]
Posted on May 9th, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Wash U: social software, Wash U: tech in changing society, business, law, technology | Comments Off
From Shelby Foote’s The Civil War: Fort Sumter to Perryville (261):
[On 9 March 1862, the world's first battle between ironclad warships took place. The smaller and nimbler Monitor was able to outmaneuver Virginia, but neither ship proved able to do significant damage to the other. Catesby Jones, commander of the Virginia] gave the Monitor everything [...]
Posted on April 23rd, 2006 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: history, language & literature, technology | Comments Off
From Bruce Schneier’s “REAL ID” in Crypto-Gram (15 May 2005):
REAL ID also prohibits states from issuing driver’s licenses to illegal aliens. This makes no sense, and will only result in these illegal aliens driving without licenses — which isn’t going to help anyone’s security. (This is an interesting insecurity, and is a direct result of [...]
Posted on December 12th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: security | Comments Off
From Edward Felten’s "DRM and the Regulatory Ratchet":
Regular readers know that one of my running themes is the harm caused when policy makers don’t engage with technical realities. One of the most striking examples of this has to do with DRM (or copy-restriction) technologies. Independent technical experts agree almost universally that DRM is utterly unable [...]
Posted on November 20th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: Wash U: tech in changing society, business, security, technology | Comments Off
From Lady Augusta Gregory’s "XVIII. The Only Son of Aoife", from Cúchullin of Muirthemne (1902).
THE time Cúchulainn came back from Alban, after he had learned the use of arms under Scathach, he left Aoife, the queen he had overcome in battle, with child.
And when he was leaving her, he [...]
Posted on September 30th, 2005 by Scott Granneman
Filed under: commonplace book | Comments Off
I wish Mother Nature would decide if she wants to snow or rain or what.
Added a product to their wishlist:
Good God a'mighty but that big man positively.WAILS on the geetar!
The amazingly loud & good Tony Campanella is just starting. This guy rocked the house last year.
On my way with Robin to the annual Stevie Ray Vaughan tribute show at the Pageant. $15 for a kickass 3 hour + show. Awesomeness!
Daniel Craig = best James Bond ever. Good flick. Amazing fight scene among ropes & flying scaffolding!
About to see Quantum of Solace. I'm just expecting a popcorn movie, so I'm gonna be happy.
Just signed up for Mint to track my finances. http://www.mint.com. So far, it seems great. Really slick interface &easy to use. And free!
Awesome way to search Google, Wikipedia, YouTube, &more: http://keyboardr.com. VERY impressed, I am.