Tag: General nonsense

I’m fascinated by the phenomenon of manipulating our environment to extend our brains. I suppose it all started with early humans carving on cave walls as a way to store historical data. Now we have ebooks, computers, and cell phones to store our memories. And we have schools to program…

My Google Alert recently picked up a lot of chatter on the Internet about a rumored Dilbert movie in the works. The rumor is ahead of the reality, as the project hasn’t been funded, and there isn’t yet a director, writer, or actor signed on. But I was fascinated by…

I’m fascinated by BP’s attempts to stop the oil leak, especially today with the Top Kill operation underway. I’ve had multiple nerdgasms following the story. I mean, seriously, I’m sitting in my home office in California and watching an oil leak a mile below the surface, on a live submarine…

Investing is scary because the world of finance is the ultimate confusopoly. There are so many options from which to choose that many people are willing to pay perhaps 1% of their portfolios per year for experts to manage their money. And those experts might invest your money in managed…

Two questions I am often asked: Today I will indirectly answer both questions by talking about something else entirely. I assume you’ve all been following the story of the Apple engineer who left a prototype 4G iPhone at a beer garden. I found this story too delicious to resist, but…

Today we will consider a model for replacing our current form of government with an insurance-based model. In step one of this hypothetical future, the government of the United States buys every insurance company in the country at estimated current values. In this imagined future, the government becomes the insurance…

Suppose humans were born with magical buttons on their foreheads. When someone else pushes your button, it makes you very happy. But like tickling, it only works when someone else presses it. Imagine it’s easy to use. You just reach over, press it once, and the other person becomes wildly…

You’re reading this blog, and that means there’s a good chance that people ask you to help them solve computer problems. There are three types of users who ask for help: Runners, Watchers, and Squatters. Runners are all too happy to abandon their workstations for as long as it takes…

CBSSports.com contacted me last week. I assume they thought of me because I’m so sporty. They have a web service that lets you watch live college basketball games, on demand, during March Madness. The web page wisely includes a Boss Button that allows viewers to switch to a business-looking screen…

I decided to not delete all of the crazy Canadian stalker comments coming in today so you could see what I have been dealing with for about seven years. Just sit back and watch. It’s fascinating in its own way. Her comments are on the strip page as well as…

I got a strong reaction when I criticized Gmail’s interface. A few people mentioned that you can activate hot keys so you can just press the r key to reply. Fair enough. I burrowed into the Settings and activated the hot key feature. It was a good idea, but nothing…

Today I went on a scavenger hunt. Specifically I was trying to find the “reply” button on my Gmail interface. The damn thing keeps moving, depending on the length of the message. And it’s pretty well hidden in a forest of 40-some buttons sprinkled around the page that do all…

Today United Media announced it might try to sell the licensing rights for Dilbert, Peanuts, and the rest of its licensing properties. http://www.cnbc.com/id/35536849 [no longer available] United Media has been handling syndication and licensing for Dilbert for over 20 years. They plan to keep the syndication part, which involves selling…

I’ve written before about the fact that a person’s name can influence his choices. Studies show that people named Dennis become dentists at a higher rate than you would expect. People also prefer to live in places that sound like their own names. Names matter. http://www.stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/stuff_for_blog/susie.pdf I was thinking about…