Computers are like houses     Friday, March 30, 2001
Dan Bricklin suggests that we should not expect computers to do everything for us, because learning to do complex but worthwhile tasks is part of human life. The whole essay is provoking but what caught my eye was section four, where Bricklin compares computers to that other general purpose device: the house. Both are extremely flexible and complex to maintain. Cherry-pick those three paragraphs if you're not interested in the whole piece.

Ulysses for Dummies pokes fun at IDG     Wednesday, March 28, 2001
It's a subgenre peculiar to the web: responses to over-zealous lawyers. There should be an anthology. I found this amusing 1998 link on my main referrer, Boing Boing, so if you're coming from there, pop back and send them quality new links for me to pilfer.

Joel on Philip     Monday, March 26, 2001
Joel Spolsky, one of favourite Internet figures, eulogizes Philip Greenspun, one of my other favourites. Greenspun is still alive, but he's left ArsDigita, the organization he founded. If you're not interested in that, try Joel's essay on masquerading junk mail or the shrinking size of bloatware. (Question though -- if bloat isn't a problem, why do I have to wait through 30 seconds of hard drive churning to open a jpeg in Photoshop?)

Clue strategy for robots     Monday, March 26, 2001
I admit that this is a really smart way to play Clue, but since I got my copy free with my Honey Nut Cheerios, I just can't take the game this seriously. I will have to live with the fact that this page author no longer respects me. The Cheerios CD, called Murder at Boddy Mansion, was released commercially before it became a cereal prize. It is one of a staggering number of Clue spin-offs available, including Clue for the SuperNES!

Death to the Minotaur     Monday, March 26, 2001
A strange insider account of how Wizards of the Coast (the people who made Magic: The Gathering) changed from a free-love geek enclave to a corporate overmind that ate buzzwords, and in so doing, became as rich as gods. A retelling of the oldest fan story of them all: the sell-out. But this version has trading cards in it.

Dino Diaries shelved     Friday, March 23, 2001
Sid Meier and Firaxis have set aside Dino Diaries for now saying that they haven't found the magic combination of ingredients to make it fun. However, they've turned their attention to Civ3 instead, so I'm not crying. Dino Diaries I'd be interested in, but Civ3 I will buy the day of its release.

Fritz's last day     Thursday, March 22, 2001
Of all the news stories about Mir, this is my favourite. A small software company's chess program travelled with a cosmonaut to Mir. The cosmonauts have all come home, but the chess program remains there, above the Earth, for a few hours more.

Courtney Love calls for a union     Wednesday, March 21, 2001
An open letter from Courtney Love to other recording artists, calling for a musician's union comparable to the Screen Actor's Guild. Solidarity!

Phone Butler     Tuesday, March 20, 2001
The Phone Butler is a prerecorded message you play to politely hang up on telemarketers. It's aimed at people, particularly seniors, who aren't comfortable hanging up on people cold. I'd heard about the butler on the CBC ages ago, but this site lets you hear the Butler's scrupulously correct voice. "Pardon me, this is the phone butler..."

Bandwidth charges     Monday, March 19, 2001
Holy moly. A voyeur web site paid half a million US dollars in bandwidth charges for one month. It receives up to 1.5 million visitors per day! Mooselessness has not reached that level of traffic yet, despite the shockingly naked moose.
        No nudity at the above link, but it's still not a link you want to appear in the access logs for your cubicle. So use your neighbour's cubicle. His password is benaffleckisgod. Found at Flutterby.

Earthquake rose     Monday, March 19, 2001
A sand pendulum in Seattle made a lovely rose when the recent earthquake disrupted its swing. (Another quickie stolen from Metafilter.)

Fired for maps of Arctic     Monday, March 19, 2001
A U.S. government worker was fired for posting maps of the Arctic which showed that caribou calved in an area that Bush may open for oil drilling. I can't tell from this article whether the maps were seriously flawed or not. I wonder if it would matter.

Tom Toles cartoon     Sunday, March 18, 2001
Couldn't think of a title that wouldn't take the surprise away, but here's a promise: it's not about politics.

Stevia     Thursday, March 15, 2001
I know! Mooselessness hasn't updated in over a week and you are tormented, not knowing where to get your news about herbs that are three hundred times sweeter than sugar. Here, baby. Or possibly GirlHacker where I stole this link from. But she doesn't have a little picture of a moose on her page, so keep coming here instead.

Copying Music is Legal in Canada     Monday, March 5, 2001
Holy cow. Given my pet causes, I definitely should have known this. It's legal in Canada to copy music you do not own, so long as it's for your own personal use. The link goes to the relevant section of the Copyright Act. When the blank-media levies came into the effect, the Copyright Board confirmed that this interpretation was correct too.

Forwarding e-mail illegal in Australia     Sunday, March 4, 2001
So says the country's Attorney-General. I would be writing the AG's office so fast -- with questions about roads, health care, and public pools. Lucky thing my mom didn't get that job she wanted in Australia. She would be doing hard time for sure.
       Update (and you knew there'd be one): The AG says that personal mail isn't covered, because that would be ridiculous. Forwarding a joke probably isn't covered either. I suspect this will end up in court someday, despite the AG's assurances. If someone has forwarded a letter you preferred to keep secret, the temptation to claim it was an original work would be strong. (Um, don't read those linked e-mails if you're my mom.)

There's no way like the American Way     Friday, March 2, 2001
A classic 1937 Life photograph.

Prepare for a B.C. earthquake     Thursday, March 1, 2001
A government pamphlet on what to do during an earthquake. They advise against standing in doorways. The same agency has this page about tsunamis. Victoria is sheltered from the open Pacific, so this is mainly a concern for those trips to the west side of the island.

Books that bite back     Thursday, March 1, 2001
Speaking of Arts and Letters Daily, the 56-year-old philosophy professor who runs the site also runs an e-book publishing service for out-of-print academic books. Unlike other such publishers, he's not trying to encrypt the files. You can download them in HTML or PDF. I think that's very shrewd, but his price seems high: USD $13 per book. I would generally pay half that for a book that I had to read on-screen or print myself. He estimates that he needs 120 sales per book to profit.
        Perhaps I'm misjudging the audience, as I'm not an academic myself (a pedant maybe). If these books are hard to find in libraries and would cost $30 were they in print, then $13 could be a fair price after all. I would probably want to see a preview chapter though, which wasn't available on the first book I checked.
        Update: Jeez, I forgot to explain the significance of the title. The books will be updated much more quickly than print editions, giving authors a chance to respond to criticisms they feel are unfair (or any other criticisms, for that matter).

Irrational economics     Thursday, March 1, 2001
Richard Thaler is an economist who collects "anomalies," which are situations where people don't behave like the rational decision makers economics assume they are. If you mow your lawn to save $10, why won't you mow your neighbour's lawn to earn $10? Why will we pay more to not be ripped off?
        The fact that emotional considerations are often "abstracted out" in economics was one of my main complaints about the game theory book I just finished. Money (or victory in a game) aren't the only things we value, and those other factors like fairness or respect have to be accounted in the win-loss columns too, or the theory is just a toy. The author of the game theory book recognized the problem, but didn't seem to see it as a fundamental flaw.
        Found this story on Arts and Letters Daily.

Bring Back the Shamrock Shake!     Wednesday, February 28, 2001
Oh dear me, yes! I miss these green treats. I went on a quest in Vancouver once to find Shamrock Shakes on St. Patrick's Day, only to discover the hard truth that they had been discontinued. You can cry now, if you need to.

Guess your Gender?     Saturday, February 24, 2001
Ah, that old carnival favourite. This quiz of about 100 questions will guess your gender based on your answers. It will also learn from past patterns to improve its guesses. The quiz is funny too, and it guessed me right. There's an anti-Canada question though, the bastards. Answer while sneering sarcastically.

Ugly Web Page     Thursday, February 22, 2001
Every time I look at this crazy-busy page, I see something new. I love the Second Level Navigation frame with options like "View all the nouns in our site."

Freaking out the moose     Friday, February 16, 2001
How many jobs let you and a partner disguise yourself as a moose, throw urine-scented snowballs and make wolf howls? Three or four, tops.

All Your Base Are Belong to Us     Friday, February 16, 2001
I know, I know. You knew about this slogan a hundred moons ago and now everyone's linking to it. It's like your favourite band has been added to the soundtrack for Friends, right? Before long, people on Ally McBeal will be saying "All Your Base Are Belong to Us" and you may as well be dead. That's underground culture for you. Sorry.
        Update: I had to replace the original link. This one requires you to press the link marked "video" to see what I was talking about. Got it? Press "video." By the way, it's Shockwave and noisy, so save it for home viewing.
        This version just shows the game clip, but it's got voiceovers. Watch the one linked above first.

Electron Band Structure In Germanium, My Ass     Tuesday, February 13, 2001
Lab reports from the World of Honesty.

Lynne Cheney's memory     Tuesday, February 13, 2001
Oh, that's sad. The U.S. vice-president's wife, Lynne Cheney, pretends that she can't remember the plot of her own novel, which has a lesbian relationship in it. Lynne's daughter Mary is a lesbian.

Resisting Grade Inflation     Friday, February 9, 2001
A Harvard professor begins giving two grades: the grade for the transcript and the grade the student deserves. I applauded at first, but honestly, do I want more work? Then again, where I work ain't Harvard. The prof traces grade inflation to race, which is goofy. Also, does it really count as "battling the system" if you give them what they want?

Is the Left Nuts? (Or is it Michael Moore)     Friday, February 9, 2001
A 1997 Michael Moore essay that takes the left to task for worrying about Mumia and Chomsky more than they worry about the millions of working people who are increasingly exploited. "Christ, can you even name a single Cleveland Indian?" (Okay, but you're a real progressive, Grum.)

Airplane in front of the sun     Friday, February 9, 2001
The immensity of the sun is what strikes me in this photo. Another stunning Astronomy Picture of the Day. Found on The Other Side, where the game night stories bring me back every week.

Minister Lali resigns!     Thursday, February 8, 2001
My boss just resigned over grizzly bears! He's Minister of Transportation and Highways. Personally, I think if bears pass the test, they should be able to drive. But I can see why some would disagree.

A Canadian PalPay     Thursday, February 8, 2001
After my disappointment with PayPal's expensive international service, I resumed hoping for a Canadian PayPal. The banks are allying with CertaPay. Hurry! I don't even care that your name is lame. Hurry!

Linux calls it a day     Thursday, February 8, 2001
A quote: Chastened Linux executives pledged to stop their "crazy dreaming" and disband their efforts after an executive from Microsoft proclaimed Linux was doomed.
        P.S. I know I've been updating Mooselessness like a hibernating bear lately. The cruel overlords at work are actually making me do stuff rather than letting me surf the web and update the weblog. Madness!

Schwarzenegger considers governorship     Tuesday, February 6, 2001
Heh. Arnold is considering running for California's leadership, financed by his own immense piles of gold, which he would have to give up swimming in. They say that he could never be president, but what's a constitutional amendment between friends?

Ginger on Amazon     Wednesday, January 31, 2001
Those crazy folks at Amazon are taking pre-orders for Ginger. Keen logo. Reminds me of a sixties album cover.

Number Seven     Friday, January 26, 2001
This strange search engine returns Mooselessness as the seventh hit for the terms "naked and nude." It's a filtered engine, which is why some other obvious candidates were beat out. My new slogan for the weblog: "Mooselessness. Just smutty enough."

Trespasser     Friday, January 26, 2001
At this year's inauguration, a man who claims to have the power to pass undetected slips past federal agents with orders to stop him and shakes the hand of President Bush. What's more, he did the same thing at President Clinton's inauguration in 1997. This is so X-Files. Shown to me by Grum.

Trees on Skyscrapers     Thursday, January 25, 2001
For aesthetic and environmental reasons, Toyko is requiring new buildings to incorporate rooftop gardens. A lovely idea.

End of the Ewoks     Thursday, January 25, 2001
A Star Wars fan observes that the destruction of the Death Star at the end of Return of the Jedi would have caused extinction-level impacts on Endor. He then proceeds to take it way too seriously. Found on Boing Boing.

ChristianInformation.org on Dinosaurs     Tuesday, January 23, 2001
While trying to find out where the first dinosaur fossils were discovered, I found this useful site which reconciles the Bible with fossils by explaining that dinosaurs were fire-breathing vegetarians who rode on the ark with Noah, but were wiped out by ecological changes after the flood in 3000 BC.
        Bonus detail about Dean William Buckland, the first person to scientifically describe a dinosaur: he kept bears and jackals in his house.

Rush Limbaugh debates Reality     Tuesday, January 23, 2001
I thought Limbaugh was a has-been, because I never hear about him any more, but apparently people still quote his fictional rants as fact. This article debunks some of his dumber claims. Found on Slashdot.

Zot Online: Hearts and Minds     Sunday, January 21, 2001
I was surprised to find that Scott McLeod's story has the same seed as my current screenplay: a girl has a life both in this world and a heroic world. It's not a problem -- the stories are very different. I loved this story and its villain in particular. I also loved the feeling of in media res but I gather that's because this online comic picks up from a popular print comic. Whatever the reason, the story seems more inventive and fantastic as a result. ("Oh, her brother's a monkey. I see.")

Florida's Katherine Harris belle of Republican ball     Sunday, January 21, 2001
Dreadful: "In France it was Joan of Arc; in the Crimea it was Florence Nightingale; in the deep south there was Rosa Parks; in India there was Mother Teresa and in Florida there was Katherine Harris," said singer Larry Gatlin as he introduced Harris to an adoring crowd of Florida Republicans.

Dan Bricklin's wireless home network     Friday, January 19, 2001
Dan Bricklin seems very pleased with his Wi-Fi home network. Hopefully, I've made my last wired LAN.

Butter versus Margarine versus Godzilla     Friday, January 19, 2001
Like a dizzy useless prole, I never could figure out whether butter was better or worse for you than margarine. And I'm not talking about settling the issue myself in the private orbiting Tim Lab (as opposed to the public orbiting lab, which is really just an excuse to sell tee-shirts) -- I could never even figure out what the current medical consensus was. Recently, I've been buying both and just sort of hedging my bets as the mood takes me.
        I was interested in the article linked above because it put the whole butter versus margazine debate into a shadowy conspiracy story. I was quite taken with it until I went up a few levels and found other articles in the same publication titled "Reverse-Engineering UFO Technology," "Mind Control Slavery & The New World Order" and "The Evidence For Ancient Atomic Warfare."
        I went to find some other points of view. The media savvy spoilsports at the Centre for Science in the Public Interest say to avoid McDonald's (okay), doughnuts (not okay), and stick to soft low-fat margarine (okay). HeartInfo.org suggests olive oil on dark grains, which sounds yummy, but doesn't scale well. They also say not to laugh at the idea, which says something sad about their expected audience. Finally, a number of sites recommended whipped butter, which is like learning about an all-Belgian-Waffle diet. I love whipped butter! It will feel weird to pay more for the privilege of buying air, but I'll just pretend this is a Robert Heinlein novel and my house is the moon. By the way, check the URL in that last link. How many fingers in that pudding?
        Mmmm, pudding.

Previously on Mooselessness     Friday, January 19, 2001
The last entry was about how to help someone use a computer. You can also view the full archives.