Olyimpic stupidity

More than once now, have I found myself shaking my head at the morons otherwise known as "on-the-spot" TV journalists.

I can well imagine that an exhausted athlete, sweat pouring from their brow, could well do without being asked a question like "Do you think you tried as hard as you could have?!?"

Lets take a moment to consider the possible responses:

1) Why yes, yes I did!

2) No. For some reason, I just lacked the motivation to fully capitalize on the last 4 years of intense training that all led up to this single critical moment in my life. A moment I will probably relive in my dreams and nightmares for years to come. Nay, a moment I will in fact relive again and again on the couch of my mental health councillor while I fight to rediscover my own self-worth as a human being.

3) I really couldn't say for sure, what do you think?!?

And it's not like it was just one isolated incident. These idiot women who don't know the first thing about what it means to be an Athlete have been let loose on these poor unsuspecting souls, just like a truck-load of ankle biting Chiwawas. Only the chosen few are in the joyous position of not giving a flying sh!t how stupid the questions are, because you guessed it, they won a medal. The Sky could be falling in on their heads and they would probably still have a stupid grin on their faces.

But what was the alternative, Tony Vietch?

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I see New Zealand company Xero is engaging traditional PR for its UK launch.
 
They also try to appeal to the Apple fan base with this press release I found today:

Xero set to make Mac users passionate about online accounting software

Mac users are generally more likely to rave about their computers’ great graphical capability than the business software they can use, but a new online accounting package called Xero (http://www.xero.com/) is out to change all that.

Xero co-founder and UK MD Hamish Edwards says the business has committed Mac users on staff. So when it came to developing the software, making sure Xero worked on Safari was never going to be enough. Xero also had to deliver the intuitive, great looking experience Mac users are used to.

“We are big fans of the Mac experience so we realised there was huge scope to improve the experience small business owners were having inputting and analysing their financial information.”

Katie Lips, Mac-user and social media strategist and Director of Kisky Netmedia (http://www.xero.com/whosusingxero/kiskynetmedia.htm), says Xero has more than delivered.

“We’re always on the lookout for cool new web apps and I find it quite funny that I am so excited about one that does accounting – but I am!

“What I also like about Xero is that it looks good. Not something that you immediately think of as necessary when doing your accounts, but for me it’s so obvious the designers have thought about how people work and what they want to be able to look at. All the ‘headline’ data is there for me to see easily, which is quite often all I want to know.”

As well as presenting key financial data in dashboard format, Edwards says Xero is intuitive in other important ways. It’s as simple to use as a computer game, but also has enough sophistication to prepare a business’ end of year financials.

Says Lips “The best way I can think to describe how happy I am with Xero is I use it all the time. From not even looking at the accounts side of the business I am now using Xero all the time to run invoices, look at the bank statements and all sorts of accounting things I never wanted to know about before. And I am enjoying it.”

As well as running on Safari, Xero also runs on Internet Explorer and Firefox, making collaboration with people using PC-based systems hassle free.

Xero recently expanded its offerings to Apple users with the introduction of Xero for iPhone and iPod Touch. This enables customers to access their accounts information wherever and whenever they need to and it’s available free to all Xero users.

Xero provides small businesses and their advisers with one, up to date, easy to use, instantly accessible set of accounts and business information.

Learn more about how Xero can help you http://www.xero.com/overview/
Test drive Xero https://www.xero.com/signup/
Contact our media and marketing team ukpress@xero.com

While I haven't found this kind of press releases from Xero here in New Zealand, I understand the high profile of their executive team, plus the fact they are a New Zealand-based technology startup, and their proximity to the target user market made things easier - word of mouth spread quickly.

Starting something in another country is a different business though and the traditional PR machine still holds the keys to many doors.

But appealing to the Apple user base in its first reach? Is is a significant number of accountants and small companies using Apple products to run the business - in opposition to doing the business?

In any case, well done going there.

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On the Gizmodo web site there are now some more photos and full specs available about the upcoming Dell Mini Note. Officially, Dell calls this system the 'Dell Inspiron 910'. It comes with a 1.6 GHz Intel Atom processor, 1024x600 screen, built-in web... (more in the full post)

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From the Fedora announce list comes the information about unauthorised access to Fedora servers and the news that the unknown intruder was able to sign some packages related to Red Har Enterprise Linux 4.

"Last week we discovered that some Fedora servers were illegally accessed. The intrusion into the servers was quickly discovered, and the servers were taken offline.

Security specialists and administrators have been working since then to analyze the intrusion and the extent of the compromise as well as reinstall Fedora systems. We are using the requisite outages as an
opportunity to do other upgrades for the sake of functionality as well as security. Work is ongoing, so please be patient. Anyone with pertinent information relating to this event is asked to contact fedora-legal redhat com

One of the compromised Fedora servers was a system used for signing Fedora packages. However, based on our efforts, we have high confidence that the intruder was not able to capture the passphrase used to secure the Fedora package signing key. Based on our review to date, the passphrase was not used during the time of the intrusion on the system and the passphrase is not stored on any of the Fedora servers.

But then came an errata:

"In connection with the incident, the intruder was able to sign a small number of OpenSSH packages relating only to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 (i386 and x86_64 architectures only) and Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (x86_64 architecture only). As a precautionary measure, we are releasing an updated version of these packages, and have published a list of the tampered packages and how to detect them at http://www.redhat.com/security/data/openssh-blacklist.html

To reiterate, our processes and efforts to date indicate that packages obtained by Red Hat Enterprise Linux subscribers via Red Hat Network are not at risk. "

More information here and a commentary from the other side here.

If you are using Red Hat Enterprise Linux you should be reading through those notices. Now go and update your systems.

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I have (finally) just got my act together with Twitter.

Its something I avoided for a long time, treating it as a bit of a gimmick, but now, having used it for only a short time, I subscribe to the notion that its like a chat room, but inste... (more in the full post)

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Amazon has finally announced the general availability of persistent storage for EC2! This is long awaited news. Here is a also a writeup from Werner Vogels, the Amazon CTO.

Some background...

Amazon has offered a very nice cloud-com... (more in the full post)

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So it appears that the petition which was calling for a referendum on the "anti smacking bill" (which was very poorly named so by the media, if it has been called the "anti whacking kids so hard it causes injury bill" not many people would complain I'm sure) was verified as achieving the level required to trigger a referendum.  That's great and all, democracy in work, I don't need to agree with the premise to agree with your right to be heard.

BUT

Am I the only person to see the serious flaw.  Here's the question that the petition, and apparently the forthcoming referendum will  pose:

"Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?"

Seems innocuous enough you say.  But let's break it down...

If you say "Yes it should be illegal" to on the face of it indicate that you are "anti smacking" then by the terms of reference you are indicating that you think that "good parental correction" should be criminal. 

The question has asserted the answer it wants, it states that "a smack [is a] part of good parental correction" before it even gets to asking the question about that!

So it puts anybody with half a mind in a real quandry when this referendum (which appears will be a postal ballot next year) arrives, at least if you are opposed to phyical discipline.  I think I'll simply return the ballot voided to indicate that the question is invalid.

Now, I don't know the rules regarding referenda, but if the government is not bound to use the same question as was posed in the petition, then perhaps somebody in government could come up with a fairer question to ask,

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Here is what we command-line users have always wanted. Microsoft's assistant - Clippy - for VI.

I found this animated GIF via reddit on a site called houghi.org. But I have no idea who originally produced this image.

Good stuf... (more in the full post)

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I am sitting through Day 3 keynotes and now it's the Research and Development keynote session with Justin Rattner. Lots of pictures to load later, but I wanted to post this one because I think it's the big thing out here: wireless power transmission.

Unlike those "wireless power" gimmicks shown at CES, which require special connectors and devices actually touch the power source, this one transmits power over the air - we are talking about 60 watts power over two feet, at 75% power efficiency.

Based on principles proposed by MIT physicists, Intel researchers have been working on a Wireless Resonant Energy Link (WREL).

WREL promises to deliver wireless power safely and efficiently. The technology relies on strongly coupled resonators. Intel says that with this technology enabled in a laptop, for example, batteries could be recharged when the laptop gets within several feet of the transmit resonator. Many engineering challenges remain, but the company's researchers hope to find a way to cut the last cord in mobile devices and someday enable wireless power in Intel-based platforms.

Here are some pictures:

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