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I am such a fan of Science Blogs. Respectful Insolence and Pharyngula are two of my favorites. Occasionally I browse other blogs on the network and discovered A Blog Around the Clock.
This is now the second time I’m writing this particular post, kudos WP :P
I was reading the the suggested weekend articles when I came across one titled Five Key Reasons Why Newspapers Fail by Bill Wyman. I generally agreed with the points Mr.Wyman was making as his point of view is one of a 30 year veteran of the newspaper industry. The article is a two-parter, but well worth the read as Wyman shows the how and why the decline of print media.
I’ll post his suggestions on what must be done to ‘fix’ the problem, or at least start to reverse the trend.
1) Go hyper local; devote all resources, from reporting to front-page space, to local news. No one cares what the Pittsburgh Post-Dispatch has to say about Iraq.
2) Redesign the websites to present users with a single coherent stream of news stories and blog entries. Create simple filters to allow them to tailor the site to their preferences.
3) Tell the union you won’t be touching salaries, but that all work rules are being suspended, including seniority rights. Tell all reporters that they’re expected to post news if word of it reaches them in what used to be thought of as “after hours.”
4) Get out of the mindset of “nice” coverage. Tell the reporters to find the “talker” stories in town—development battles, corrupt pols, anything with a consumer bent. Monitor web traffic to find out what people are interested in. If a particular issue jumps, flood the zone. Make each paper the center of every local debate, no matter how trivial, and make finding and creating those debates the operation’s prime job. 
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Or as I was told, how to drive my piano instructor crazy. You see, apparently everyone and their dog wants….no needs to learn and play this piece.
The more popular name of course to this Bagatelle in A minor is Fur Elise. Looking over the score, one can see where the frustration lies when learning this. The main theme is really quite easy to learn and play, I can attest to that myself as with my limited skill I can get through it without it sounding horrible. However, the second part is interspersed with triplets and long runs that do require a great deal of practice to maintain the appropriate tempo throughout the piece.
Listen to the song and watch it on ytube here as this gentlemen does a wonderful job at conveying the beauty of Beethoven’s Music.
It may be because I am cheap or perhaps I have been burnt one too many times by the latest and greatest piece of gaming software (I’m looking at you MOO3) that turns out to be a complete dud. I’ve always been a fan of Dragons and when I heard rumors back in 2002 that a first person dragon game was coming out I was quite enthused about the entire project. The I of the Dragon came out sparkling new in 2004, for a whopping 59.00 retail. I was shell shocked after the MOO3 debacle and decided to wait for the price to drop before purchasing the game.
It is a fine line to walk as most experienced software consumers know, because if you wait too long, you miss the first run of the game and often there is not another. Plus, if you are not lucky and miss the title in the bargain bin you are often out of luck until the company decided to release a “gold edition” or “platinum pack” at full price again.
I missed I of the Dragon and could not get my hands on a copy until now. Let me tell you, the RPG Dragon-luv is good, spell-casting, monster munching, baddie-immolating has dominated my spare time as of late.
I’m tired of people saying that one cannot prove the non-existence of their god. Not only can one do it, but its already been done. I’m referring to the problem of evil. The fact that evil exists negates the possibility of an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent, and omnipresent deity. Those are very important qualifiers, the problem of evil does not disprove the existence of any deity that is not completely perfect or is lacking in someway. I admit that the existence of any deity lacking, even slightly, in any perfection, in any way, cannot be disproven. On the other hand, any such deity would then be in the category of leprechauns, the boogey man, the tooth fairy, and the large invisible pink bunny that “actually” created everything, but only reveals this to asylum patients. And while this category, filled with an infinite amount of characters limited only by our imagination, cannot be disproven, no rational person would ever believe in such entities, as there is no evidence to support their existence. Or, if you prefer, they all have equal evidence in their favor, so each has a 1 in infinity chance of being correct. Not exactly zero, but close enough for any one with the cognitive capabilities of a codfish.
Large Hadron Collider to restart in fall after 1-year hiatus
The magnet core of the world’s largest superconducting solenoid magnet, seen in 2007, is part of the Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator. Abnormally high resistances were found in the accelerator’s high-current superconducting electrical connections and have since been repaired. (Martial Trezzini/Keystone/Associated Press)The world’s largest particle accelerator is scheduled to gradually start up again in November after being shut down for more than a year.
The $9-billion project was shut down on Sept. 19, 2008, after just nine days of operation. The meltdown of a small electrical connection had caused the release of a large amount of liquid helium into the 27-kilometre long tunnel, near the Franco-Swiss border. Its restart date has been delayed several times since then.
Heuer said the machine is now “a much better understood machine than it was a year ago.” CERN expects to run the collider at 3.5 TeV for several weeks until a “significant data sample” has been collected, then gradually increase the energy to 5 TeV per beam. It expects to run a test with lead ions at the end of 2010 before shutting the machine down again in an effort to get it ready to move towards its maximum power.”
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I have always had an interest in physics. It is a shame that numbers and equations cause my brain to 404 faster than you can say ‘system error’. I hope that that once they fire up the LHC they can start earnestly looking for the elusive higgs-boson that so far has eluded them. It would be one of those fantastic cornerstone discoveries that has the potential to change the face of physics. Grab the original article from the CBC here.
Mystro often hounds me with little snips and clips he finds on the internet. I am reticent at best to view the assorted bits of tomfoolery he showcases. However, the Jumpsnap is an exception to the rule.
Quite simply, it is a skipping rope without the rope. As the informative video on the site says: “skipping rope is just too hard“. I really thought that this was satire, something Onion-esque. But no, sadly, it is not.
This is a electronic pair of handles that simulates a “thwapping” sound that will allow a person to keep time just as if they were skipping.
Is doing it the old fashioned way…that is skipping rope with well…a skipping rope beyond people today? Do we really need a rope-less skipping rope? It boggles the mind.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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