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How some software manages to get on to the market is a puzzle to me. For the last 3-4 days I have been struggling to download the Nokia Maps which, if I could download them, would allow me to use Nokia’s navigation software with our new mobile phones without having to buy a . . . → Read More: Dodgy maths (Update: Not) Downside 1: When the cheapest source in Germany for two CDs by Gianmaria Testa (an Italian singer) ships the CDs from New Zealand (with a packing slip printed with an address in New Jersey, USA). Downside 2: The demand for cheap meat results in keeping chickens in overcrowded, insanitary conditions. Free-range birds cost . . . → Read More: Downsides of too much capitalism? The US lobby group for the music industry, the RIAA, has excelled itself this time in its heavy-handed dealing with a customer. They are suing a customer who bought 2000 tracks on CDs and copied them to his computer for his own use. He didn’t upload them to the internet, just listened to them . . . → Read More: How (not) to treat your customers This calendar is currently at position 539 in the Amazon books best seller list. We got given a block calendar with 365 quotes from GWB last year and enjoyed his muddled quotes so much that we have ordered the countdown calendar for 2008. Wishing you a great . . . → Read More: The Bush Countdown Calendar It’s been cold here for the last week or so. Around -6°C to 0°C. And dry and sunny. A nice change, after having had torrential rain for 2 weeks before that. The picture is of a local stream that we went past yesterday, when we went for a walk around the . . . → Read More: Cold here Slovakia, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and the Czech Republic all join the Schengen Zone tonight. That is the part of the EU where the member countries trust each other enough to abolish the visa- and border controls (But beware! At airports, the new members won’t benefit from the abolition of . . . → Read More: The fog clears in Europe Picture from Arborsmith Studios website (click picture to visit)Axel Erlandson an American arborsculptor opened an exhibition in 1947 featuring trees which he had shaped by pruning, bending and grafting. The original exhibition, called The Tree Circus had a chequered history, only bringing in a little over $300 in a good year (1955). Eventually 12 . . . → Read More: The tree circus If you are a software developer who likes knitting, you need to take a look at documenting your knitting patterns in XML. (via Boing Boing) Merriam-Webster has named the word of the year for 2007: w00t! If you need an explanation of the meaning, they are kind enough to provide one here. The Economist has its regular table showing how property prices world wide have developed: Graph from this week’s Economist As you’d expect, given the US sub-prime crisis, the US prices have dropped by around 5% in the last 12 months. More surprisingly, the UK prices, despite the concern in the British press about their . . . → Read More: The latest global house price trends |
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