Blog Posts

February 2007

• 2007-02-22

  [SEMI-GEEK] Are activation emails needed – and if so – how do we convince you they aren’t spam?

  Here’s an odd but important problem, at least for us here at BlogBridge. When you sign up for a BlogBridge account, we, like many other sites, send you a confirmation email to verify that your email is for real.

  Truthfully from a security point of view, I am not even exactly sure what it proves. That at one moment in time the person creating the account also was able to receive emails at an arbitrary email address. So what? It’s so easy to get a temporary free email account, that I am not sure what it does.

  So that’s question one: does an activation email really provide any benefit to anyone? Any comments?

  Now a question that has come to our attention is that in many cases a person’s ...

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• 2007-02-21

  Amazing flash film

  I got this with an email claiming on a stack of bibles that it was real not faked, but I don’t believe it for a minute!

• 2007-02-19

  Interesting item about outsourcing to India…

  Check out this post from GigaOM: If you are an investor in one of the many U.S.-listed technology outsourcing giants such as Infosys, then I have some bad news for you: they are no longer the cherished destination for the brightest and the smartest in India.

  (from: Troubling Signs for Indian Tech Outsourcers)

  #business
• 2007-02-19

  [GEEK] Deploy your Rails app in subdirectory with Apache and Mongrel

  If you are a Ruby On Rails developer you might want to check out this post from dzone.com: latest front page: ** "Itâ_Ts not particularly hard to deploy your app in a subdirectory, but Iâ_Tve found that figuring out how to can be. So, I decided to put together this short little write-up."

  (from**: Deploy your Rails app in subdirectory with Apache and Mongrel)

  Â

  #ruby
• 2007-02-18

  The New York Times looks at the Chavez Royal family

  If you keep up with what’s going on in Venezuela, you might want to check out this post from The Devil’s Excrement: The New York Times looks at the Chavez Royal family

  #politics
• 2007-02-17

  Is desktop search over? 20 years late!

  People are really crowing about Vista’s new "instant serach" and how wonderful it is and better than the old Windows XP Search functionality. Yeah I can’t disagree, but it’s amazing how it’s 20 years on before that glaring-glaring-glaring hole in Windows was fixed. (And sure, Mac OS X has had Spotlight for a while now, but I am not in love with it. I have only a decent amount of disk space and a fast processor and a lot of memory, and I can’t say it’s fast. In fact when I want to search for an email I always go into my browser and use Google Mail’s search feature…Anyway… Check out this post from ...

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  #technology
• 2007-02-16

  A nice panoramic photo of Curacao

  This is the Seaquarium beach area. It’s very beautiful as you can see. Click on the photo if you dare. It’s huge but impressive.

  

  #curacao #travel
• 2007-02-14

  I fear for the gullible user

  I received this email from “Bank of America”. It obviously a phishing attack but it sounds so legitimate and straightforward that I can easily see lots of people (including some I know) to fall for it. Scary, look: even the URL looks real:

  Dear Customer:

  Recently there have been a large number computer terrorist attacks over our database server. In order to safeguard your account, we require that you update your ATM/Debit card PIN.

  This update is requested of you as a precautionary measure against fraud. Please note that we have no particular indications that your details have been compromised in any way.

  This process is mandatory, and if not completed within the nearest time your accoun...

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• 2007-02-13

  wis.dm now in beta – A social network of ideas

  

  A little while back I mentioned wis.dm, a site that I’ve been helping with for about the last year. Rafe Needleman refers to it as a “Social Network of Ideas”

  “This is a new web 2.0 business aiming to change the perceptions of social networking – how? – by encouraging original thinking, creative collaboration and innovative self promotion.” in ...

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  #business
• 2007-02-12

  LG Says Apple Copied the Prada Phone. Also, Apple’s Mother is Obese

  Actually the funniest part of this was the headline… “Also, Apple’s Mother is Obese”

  Check out this post from Gizmodo:

  “It seems that LG’s not taking all this “iPhone clone” talk lightly. LG’s Head of Mobile Handset R&D, Mr. Woo-Young Kwak, had this to say when the press uttered the painful phrase one too many times:

  We consider that Apple copycat Prada phone after the design was unveiled when it was presented in the iF Design Award and won the prize in September 2006.”

  (from: LG Says Apple Copied the Prada Phone. Also, Apple’s Mother is Obese)

  #apple
• 2007-02-12

  rethinking gladwell’s model of influence

  Check out this post from Influx Insights Weblog: rethinking gladwell’s model of influence. My first reaction was that indeed the paper referenced in fact refuted one of The Tipping Point’s key assertions, the importance of connectors. But I am not so sure it does now that I’ve had a little more time. Anyway, it’s worth taking a look.

  #books
• 2007-02-09

  Fun article for airplane buffs

  “Isn’t that cockpit a little drab? Perhaps a spider plant, or a simple lithograph, would liven it up!”

  Check out the article, it’s interesting, especially click on the links to the photographs, they are cool too.

• 2007-02-08

  Question to ponder…

  “How is it that many times we forget how to spell a word, so we write it down and then pick the spelling that seems to “look right”?

  Anyone out there know the answer or have a link to an answer?

• 2007-02-07

  Venezuela’s lost human capital

  Really interesting article about what is going on in Venezuela and the impact of Hugo Chavez’ policies…

  “Our gain is Venezuela’s loss. These newcomers represent the human capital of Venezuela, something that Chavez, grounded in Marxist materialism, can’t understand. He views these talented people as political pawns — traitors.” (from Investors Business Daily)

  Read the whole thing.

  #politics
• 2007-02-05

  I was away when Boston and Fox both embarassed themselves

  Check out this post from Bostonist:

  Attorney General Martha Coakley announced today that the Boston area cut a deal with Turner Broadcasting and Interference, Inc., the brains behind the marketing campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theatres that made life in Boston a little nutty last week.

  Boston will receive $2 million dollars for its trouble. In return, Turner Broadcasting and I...

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  #boston
• 2007-02-05

  Neat Bank of America site security feature doesn’t do anything !

  If you use the Bank of America online banking site you’ve seen what they call the ‘Site Identity’ feature that is supposed to save you from being phished:

  “… online banking customers are asked to select an image, like a dog or chess piece, that they will see every time they log in to their account.

  The idea is that if customers do not see their image, they could be at a fraudulent Web site, dummied up to look like their bank’s, and should not enter their passwords.” (from NYT)

  Well I use it (and, hmm, my image is a chess piece!) and it seemed like a reasonable idea. But not according to this study:

  “The premise is that sit...

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January 2007

• 2007-01-23

  Is Eclipse too “Windows-esque”?

  Check out this post from dzone.com: latest front page:

  The basic premise of most of the Eclipse-meshes-badly arguments was that Eclipse’s whole design and layout (directories used, startup, etc) is solely oriented toward Windows. An example that Alex cited was that until recently (Eclipse 3.3), Eclipse wasn’t even a properly dockable app in MacOS X

  » Visit DZone Jobs for great people and great opportunities.

  (from: Is Eclipse too "Windows-esque"?)

  #programming
• 2007-01-22

  Another fascinating post from Scott Adams

  I don’t know, maybe it’s because he’s a mini celebrity but I found the continuing story of Scott Adam’s voice problems just gripping. Check out this post from The Dilbert Blog:

  ...

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  #health
• 2007-01-22

  Salute to Dave Winer: 10 Year Anniversary of Scripting news

  Check out this post from Scripting News It’s Dave Winer’s 10th Anniversary writing Scripting News and Blogging.

  Hats off Dave!

• 2007-01-22

  Dreaming in code

  I heard about this book, “Dreaming in Code”… it looks really interesting but kind of depressing to read which is why I didn’t run out to buy it. Building software is just really really hard and for some reason no matter how smart and experienced we are, projects still can easily run themselves into the ground.

  I’ve often heard (and said) why can’t we build software the way we build bridges? People building bridges don’t have the kind of disasters that we have in software. (Note: Joel on Software’s blog’s logo is a bridge…)

  Anyway, you should check heck out this post from ...

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  #books #software-engineering