Word of the day. Misologist. Hatred of reason, argument, or enlightenment. In clearer terms, a person who wants to win an argument more than learn the truth. I deal with these people regularly. [Paul Thurrott’s Internet Nexus]
I deal with too many of these people myself. All the more reason to appreciate AKMA and the quest for truth that drives his work. While misologists generate quite a bit of heat and noise, you can find those who seek truth if you look.
Today s my second blogiversary, and all day friends have been virtually wandering through, helping themselves to drinks at one of the bars (there s an ample supply of juices and sodas in one of the rooms, for friends who don t drink), making pizzas for themselves and eating other people s pizzas, gobbling up lots of fruit and vegetables, and especially having lots of chips with one of Margaret s spectacular dips (she makes superb pesto, luscious hummus, and excellent guacamole). Wireless all over the place. Interested employers in casual, but animated, conversation with opportunity-seeking blog-neighbors. A stealthy philanthropist and an alert VC listen intently to impassioned descriptions of projects, visions, plans, and ventures. Every now and then, raucous laughter erupts. Furious arguments flare with conflicting certainties, then dissipate in respectful acknowledgment of deeply-felt, well-thought-out divergent convictions. Children of all sorts of ages run among our legs,, and I look out for Si to make sure everyone s having a good time.
The party s so big that not everyone would get along well if they had to hang out in the same close quarters, but that s one of the beauties of digital media: no one has to cross anyone s path if they don t want to. There s plenty of invigorating conversation where you want to find it, and you can just not go where you don t want.
…
Thank you all so very much. Stay as long as you like. It s a privilege to have a chance to visit with you.
Congratulations to AKMA on his second blogiversary.
A wonderful soul who makes the blogosphere a better place and the quintessential example of the wonderful serendipity that the net makes possible. AKMA and I crossed paths initially by way of one of my rude comments which he answered in his characteristically gracious way. Today I count among the many fascinating people I’ve come to know through the net.
100 Years of Flight: A Lesson about Learning Curves
Kevin Kelly excerpts from Bayles' and Orland's Art and Fear:
The ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups. All those on the left side of the studio, he said, would be graded solely on the quantity of work they produced, all those on the right solely on its quality. His procedure was simple: on the final day of class he would bring in his bathroom scales and weigh the work of the “quantity” group: fifty pound of pots rated an “A”, forty pounds a “B”, and so on. Those being graded on “quality”, however, needed to produce only one pot -albeit a perfect one – to get an “A”. Well, came grading time and a curious fact emerged: the works of highest quality were all produced by the group being graded for quantity. It seems that while the “quantity” group was busily churning out piles of work – and learning from their mistakes – the “quality” group had sat theorizing about perfection, and in the end had little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay.
Remarkable that the law of learning (experience) curves should appear in art just as it does in semiconductors, and should in space vehicles. Something to keep in mind on this 100th anniversary of practical powered flight: We didn't get to 747s and F-22s by building one – or four- vehicles n 1903 and perpetually refitting them. Thousands of early experimental aircraft were built, run, wrecked, obsoleted, scrapped. If we want to have a similar oucome in space one hundred years hence, it's time to get onto the 'quantity' curve. And apparently only the private sector has the stomach for that trip.
Update: I didn't know this test was scheduled when I wrote the post, but it makes the point admirably.
Hat tip to Ole Eichhorn. [Due Diligence]
Sound advice regardless of what you're working with or learning about. Fail early and fail often.
I had expected to post a bit more than I have over the last few days, but I have limited connectivity and bandwidth. The good news in that is that I do have snow and in the spirit of learning curves I've been adding more miles to my snowboarding experience. I expect to be back to regular posting in a few days.
To all of you, a healthy and happy New Year.
Hard for me to believe, but this marks the two year anniversary of my first blog post. Starting a blog was a direct result of a phone conversation with John Robb, and in the past two years I’ve had the pleasure of meeting some remarkable people.
To those who continue to read, comment and share, thank you.
By rick@rklau.com (Rick Klau). [tins ::: Rick Klau's weblog]
Congratulations to Rick on hitting the two-year milestone for his excellent blog. Certianly, Rick is one of those remarkable people that you get to meet courtesy of blogging. Looking forward to seeing your thinking somehwhere.
Take 10 Seconds to Get Soup to the Needy. Take 10 Seconds to Get Soup to the Needy — Here is an easy way to make a difference this holiday season. Campbell's is donating a can of soup to the needy for every person that goes to their site and votes for their favorite NFL team. Their goal is 5,000,000 cans. Go here to vote. It will only take a few seconds of your time to fill some empty tummies with warm soup this winter.
Like Zach Lynch, on whose Brain Waves blog I found this bit of charity (and from whom I appropriated this text word for word), I'm not a big football fan, but this is a no brainer. [Frank Patrick's Focused Performance Blog]
Even if the TV commercials are stupid.
I’m curious too. Cristian Vidmar: I’m curious: how many channels do *you* aggregate? [Paolo Valdemarin: Paolo’s Weblog]
Here are my numbers:
214 Feeds in Radio
44 Feeds in NewsGator
plus
5 Cartoon feeds
1 comment feed from my blog
1 trackback feed from my blog
3 of my own RSS feeds to monitor them
Looking at the stats, some of those feeds look to have gone dormant long enough to warrant weeding them out. You can see my Radio subscriptions here.
Meet the new team at UserLand. Scott Young is CEO. [Scripting News]
Good news at Userland. Let’s hope this gets some more resources behind some great technology.
What's your Google Number?. (SOURCE:Don Park's Daily Habit)- My google number is 45, 800. What's yours?
QUOTE
Latest Google fad seems to be calculating Google Number (via Elliotte Rusty Harold). A person's Google Number is the number of results return by Google when queried with the person's name in double quotes like “Don Park”. Bill Gates and Michael Jackson are both around 2,900,000. Dave Winer is 194,000 and Don Box is 127,000. My google number is 83,700 which seems too high.
UNQUOTE
18,900 for me.
UPDATE: I found some more background on this in an interview with Valdis Krebs in the Star Tribune. Using the common variations on my name that I use pushes the number up over 25,000 although that's a bit high because there are a number of other Jim/James McGee's out there on the web. Still not a bad return on two years of blogging.
2nd Email. I get a lot of email. I post it very infrequently. This is a keeper.
As I’ve Matured…
I’ve learned that you cannot make someone love you. All you can do is stalk them and hope they panic and give in.
I’ve learned that one good turn gets most of the blankets.
I’ve learned that no matter how much I care, some people are just jack
asses.I’ve learned that whatever hits the fan will not be evenly distributed.
I’ve learned that you shouldn’t compare yourself to others – they are more
screwed up than you think.I’ve learned that depression is merely anger without enthusiasm.
I’ve learned that it is not what you wear, it is how you take it off.
I’ve learned that you can keep vomiting long after you think you’re
finished.I’ve learned to not sweat the petty things, and not pet the sweaty things.
I’ve learned that ex’s are like fungus, and keep coming back.
I’ve learned age is a very high price to pay for maturity.
I’ve learned that I don’t suffer from insanity, I enjoy it.
I’ve learned that we are responsible for what we do, unless we are
celebrities.I’ve learned that artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.
I’ve learned that 99% of the time when something isn’t working in your
house, one of your kids did it.I’ve learned that there is a fine line between genius and insanity.
I’ve learned that the people you care most about in life are taken from you
too soon and all the less important ones just never go away. And the real pains in the ass are permanent.Pass this along to 5 friends…trust me, they’ll appreciate it. Who knows,
maybe something good will happen.If not…tough.
As Always … Keep grinning …. it makes people wonder what you are up to
Since I talk about learning from time to time this seemed worth keeping and passing along.
It’s late. I should be in bed. But this simply cracked me up> EDS: Running with the Squirrels. Things have apparently changed since the days when Ross Perot was calling the shots. Perhaps I’m easily amused this evening, but this quote from Michael Schrage also… [Internet Time Blog]
A little amusement for a Saturday afternoon.