Jul 30: Good BoingBoing day
I noticed three interesting items on BoingBoing that I thought I'd point out.
- Orwell's Diaries in Blog Form
Quote from the actual blog:
From 9th August 2008, you will be able to gather your own impression of Orwell’s face from reading his most strongly individual piece of writing: his diaries. The Orwell Prize is delighted to announce that, to mark the 70th anniversary of the diaries, each diary entry will be published on this blog exactly seventy years after it was written, allowing you to follow Orwell’s recuperation in Morocco, his return to the UK, and his opinions on the descent of Europe into war in real time. The diaries end in 1942, three years into the conflict.
- Mom, Dad, I'm into Steampunk: an imaginary monologue
Now, I'm not into steampunk (BoingBoing obviously is), but I read this anyway. The imaginary monologue is here at McSweeney's. My favorite part is quoted here:
This looks like a late-18th-century organette, correct? Look again. It hides the Dell laptop you got me when I went to college. This bronze hand crank turns it on, and I've hidden a miniature photo printer where the tune sheet is supposed to go. I even installed Linux.
- Gawker reports on "monster" washed ashore
What the?
Ok, it's probably a fake...but if not, yikes!
I noticed three interesting items on BoingBoing that I thought I'd point out.
- Orwell's Diaries in Blog Form
Quote from the actual blog:
From 9th August 2008, you will be able to gather your own impression of Orwell’s face from reading his most strongly individual piece of writing: his diaries. The Orwell Prize is delighted to announce that, to mark the 70th anniversary of the diaries, each diary entry will be published on this blog exactly seventy years after it was written, allowing you to follow Orwell’s recuperation in Morocco, his return to the UK, and his opinions on the descent of Europe into war in real time. The diaries end in 1942, three years into the conflict.
- Mom, Dad, I'm into Steampunk: an imaginary monologue
Now, I'm not into steampunk (BoingBoing obviously is), but I read this anyway. The imaginary monologue is here at McSweeney's. My favorite part is quoted here:
This looks like a late-18th-century organette, correct? Look again. It hides the Dell laptop you got me when I went to college. This bronze hand crank turns it on, and I've hidden a miniature photo printer where the tune sheet is supposed to go. I even installed Linux.
- Gawker reports on "monster" washed ashore
What the?
Ok, it's probably a fake...but if not, yikes!
Jul 15: Horrible Reminder
Just wanted to remind everyone that Act 1 of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is up today. Acts 2 & 3 will be up Thursday and Saturday. I just watched it; it's great.
Just wanted to remind everyone that Act 1 of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is up today. Acts 2 & 3 will be up Thursday and Saturday. I just watched it; it's great.
Jul 9: Who Killed the Electric Car?
Has anyone seen the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?"? We watched it last night, and I'm still all fired up.
It deals mainly with the GM EV-1, and all-electric car that came about because of the zero-emissions mandate enacted by California in the early 90's. It shows how they were fast (really fast!) and quiet, but doesn't shy away from their downsides, mainly their limited range (60 miles per charge at first, but 120 in the later models--newer lithium-ion batteries in an EV-1 could easily do 300).
They were much loved by the people leasing them, but then when the leases were up, GM wouldn't re-up the leases, collected all the cars and destroyed them. No official explanation was given, but several auto industry representatives said that no one wanted a car that could only go 120 miles per charge and required charging overnight (but could get an 85% charge in an hour). This was in spite of a huge waiting list due to the fact that they insisted on hand assembling the cars, which artificially drove up the price and increased production time.
Personally, I would LOVE a car that I could plug in overnight that would take me to work & back each day with some charge left over for some errands. To think that such a thing existed, was actually on the roads and was killed really turns my stomach, especially in light of the mess we're in right now with gas prices. Since they were taken off the roads, we could've had 6 more years of development and improvement on these cars, but instead we're wasting money and time on pie-in-the-sky ideas like hydrogen cars and half measures like hybrids, with a bright light being plug-in hybrids that should be here 'soon.'
I can only imagine how well these would sell these days. If only GM had stuck with it, they'd be raking in the money instead of losing billions on big gas-guzzling SUVs.
I highly recommend this movie. I can't recommend it enough.
This guy, however, disagrees. While there is some truth to some of the points he makes (specifically the list in #1), mostly he's having fun calling conjecture 'fact.' You can have your own fun by comparing his argument tactics to Wikipedia's list of logical fallacies. While you're at it, you may as well figure out which one I'm using in this paragraph 
On a side note, the movie also touches on how, in the mid 20th century, GM bought out a bunch of streetcar companies, dismantled the electric streetcars and replaced them with GM buses. More info here.
Has anyone seen the documentary "Who Killed the Electric Car?"? We watched it last night, and I'm still all fired up. It deals mainly with the GM EV-1, and all-electric car that came about because of the zero-emissions mandate enacted by California in the early 90's. It shows how they were fast (really fast!) and quiet, but doesn't shy away from their downsides, mainly their limited range (60 miles per charge at first, but 120 in the later models--newer lithium-ion batteries in an EV-1 could easily do 300).
They were much loved by the people leasing them, but then when the leases were up, GM wouldn't re-up the leases, collected all the cars and destroyed them. No official explanation was given, but several auto industry representatives said that no one wanted a car that could only go 120 miles per charge and required charging overnight (but could get an 85% charge in an hour). This was in spite of a huge waiting list due to the fact that they insisted on hand assembling the cars, which artificially drove up the price and increased production time.
Personally, I would LOVE a car that I could plug in overnight that would take me to work & back each day with some charge left over for some errands. To think that such a thing existed, was actually on the roads and was killed really turns my stomach, especially in light of the mess we're in right now with gas prices. Since they were taken off the roads, we could've had 6 more years of development and improvement on these cars, but instead we're wasting money and time on pie-in-the-sky ideas like hydrogen cars and half measures like hybrids, with a bright light being plug-in hybrids that should be here 'soon.'
I can only imagine how well these would sell these days. If only GM had stuck with it, they'd be raking in the money instead of losing billions on big gas-guzzling SUVs.
I highly recommend this movie. I can't recommend it enough.
This guy, however, disagrees. While there is some truth to some of the points he makes (specifically the list in #1), mostly he's having fun calling conjecture 'fact.' You can have your own fun by comparing his argument tactics to Wikipedia's list of logical fallacies. While you're at it, you may as well figure out which one I'm using in this paragraph
On a side note, the movie also touches on how, in the mid 20th century, GM bought out a bunch of streetcar companies, dismantled the electric streetcars and replaced them with GM buses. More info here.
