That’s a Flight of the Conchords reference (NSFW!).

First, a couple of lengthy jokes:

• Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: AudioQuest K2 Terminated Speaker Cable – UST 2.44 m Plugs 8′ Pair – This is a $14,000 set of audio cables. The reviews had me laughing all day.
• Amazon.com: Hutzler 571 Banana Slicer: Kitchen & Dining – Another marvelous instance of reviews matching the seriousness of the product on Amazon. I'm really impressed at Hutzler not blasting away all these joke reviews.

Then some psychology:
Keep reading >>

I may have caved to an Online Reading Syndrome. I’m finding it increasingly hard to read some books, while I have no trouble reading various articles, blagoposts, stories, and graphical matter on the internet.

Now, in my defense, I’m reading non-fiction, and that’s never been my strong suit, no matter how much the concept of the subject matter appeals.

But still.

I find myself feeling the flaws of books more acutely than I would in an online piece. For instance, Amartya Sen’s Identity and Violence. Excellent concept for a book:
Keep reading >>

Upon reading “The Biggest Stock Scams of All Time” (an ambitious title, perhaps), I decided to update my non-existent knowledge of these scams and failures—including the 2008 business failures.

Holy crap.

I know, I’m so late to the party. I get the housing market failure. As Elf says, it’s not rocket science.

But when Enron occurred (2001), I was a junior in high school, immersed in the IB program, and only cared about grades and college, not about the business/financial world. Reading up on Enron and WorldCom/MCI (who blatantly put expenses on the books as income) was only the start. (MCI was taken down by a little team of auditors working in secret at night who uncovered the $3.8 billion USD in fraud. Seriously.)

Then came Arthur Andersen, the auditing company that participated in the fraud of Enron. They exist online now as a single-page presence, created in Visual Studio 6.0 with no tracking code. They don’t even care who visits. Or about lower-casing their HTML tags.

According to Wikipedia:

From a high of 28,000 employees in the US and 85,000 worldwide, the firm is now down to around 200 based primarily in Chicago. Most of their attention is on handling the lawsuits and presiding over the orderly dissolution of the company.

Keep reading >>

This week’s internet cruising, in which I was evidently trying to make up for lost time.

• A Vegan No More | Voracious – This woman went through a struggle to find her health as a vegan… and found that she needed to go back to eating meat. Her journey is well-documented and heart-breaking, although I found her dogmatism rather creepy. She believed very strongly in veganism, and now believes very strongly in omnivorism.
• Vegan Defector Talks Back | Voracious – Part 2 of the no-longer vegan story.
• To Teach Your Kids Money Management, Start Your Own Bank – A cute take on teaching kids how to save. I'm still divided on the whole "give an allowance for nothing (chores are a family duty)" or "give compensation for chores" debate, but the bank idea is cool.

Keep reading >>

Just a few:

• Passive voice is killing your design documents – " I would argue that if the goal is to communicate clearly, actually stating and explaining the uncertainties is going to be much more helpful to readers."
• The Size Of Our World – Bad graphical quality, but cool comparison.
• 6174 (number) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia – Who comes up with stuff like this? Who sits around adding and subtracting numbers to find patterns?
• Ta Prohm temple at Angkor, Cambodia – Absolutely gorgeous.
• 8.4 Million New Yorkers Suddenly Realize New York City A Horrible Place To Live – I don't normally read the Onion (maybe I should!), but this struck me as a brilliantly-written article. For instance: "'This is no place to raise a kid, that's for sure,' said 32-year-old Brandon Rushing, a lifelong New Yorker. 'I grew up here and I turned into a giant asshole. Why would I want that for my son?'"
• Java Programmers are the Erotic Furries of Programming " Some Guy Ranting – A Programmer Hierarchy. As a budding Python programmer, I have no idea what he's talking about with regards to Python folks thinking they're better than PHP folks. …No idea at all.
• What fuels my passion for technology & writing code – Highlight: "I began having difficulty finding people to discuss ideas and thoughts with. When I did find someone who I could brainstorm and bounce ideas off of it was a very surreal feeling. I loved every minute of it and did not want to stop. Even today I have very few of these conversations but cherish the people I can have these conversations with. I enjoy my ideas being challenged. I enjoy being challenged, period. My level of excitement in these conversations are off the hook."
• A Showcase of Single Page Websites – I like pretty things. And creative things.
• Reader Story: How I Save Tons of Money by Grocery Shopping Once Every … – This sounds really, really awesome. If I were to implement it, it would take some changes in food style–Greg likes meat and I'm lazy about lunches–but it would probably be change for the better.

Keep reading >>