Dwayne Phillips ' Day Book

Items I happen to view each day. Science, Techonology, Management, Culture, and of course Writing

This is my day book for this week. I have modeled this after science fiction and computer writer Jerry Pournelle's view, or as he calls it, his Day Book. I encourage you to see Jerry Pournelle's site and subscribe to his services.

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This week: March 25-31, 2013

Summary of this week:


Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday - Thursday - Friday - Saturday - Sunday


Monday March 25, 2013

Fallout from Google killing its Reader. This has become a bigger story than I expected. I guess I am not the only disappointed person out here.

It seems that Google didn't want the expense of lawyers and such to protect privacy in Reader.

More rumors that the FAA may let us use our electronic devices during takeoff and landing.

Apple's iTunes was projected to operate at zero profit-zero loss. It is probably earning tens of millions in profits.

Kids in Vietnam are learning computer science far in advance of other places.

Forget corn, sugar beets are the best source of ethanol. Of course, it is a stupid idea to burn food for fuel when you can pull it out of the ground, but since we are on this silly path.

One young woman's experiences with the daily insults of working in the computer sciences.

It appears that Windows Blue is a major revision of Windows 8. I guess they didn't want to call it 9 or 8 1/2?

China's newest tallest building is stuck on the ground with bad concrete.

Apple may sell a plastic iPhone this summer at about half the price of the current high end models.

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Tuesday March 26, 2013

Chevrolet begins a new ad campaign to show how it has put Apple's Siri voice command in the Sonic.

Google is running a test program in South Africa on using the white spaces to provide broadband service to schools.

Even today, the Federal government is still subsidizing cell phones. You would think that with hundreds of millions of them sold the government would say, "Well, that technology is solid. Let's move on." Not.

You can now use an animated GIF as your profile picture on Google+.

ooops, it is easy to hack into those nice new cameras that have WiFi built in. Is everyone ready for national electronic health records?

Want to lose weight? Sleep more.

Here is a VERY long list of government agencies who will see your data under the CISPA. Yes, they will all request all the data. That is how they justify their budgets.

Moleskine is about to have an IPO. And all they make are little blank books.

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Wednesday March 27, 2013

The government of North Korea stopped 3G data service for its subjects one month after it started.

The iPad is usable by blind students. This program is teaching teachers how to teach the blind.

Coming soon for driver-less cars - cars that park themselves in public parking garages.

Qualcomm is a big player in the processor field, but no one knows about it. They will spend money to boost their public image. Why?

The world has changed. More people will buy tablet computers this year than desktop computers. Next year, tablets will outsell laptop computers. One simple reason is that a tablet costs less than those other computers. It does less, but it does enough.

Tales of how Java leaks are letting hackers break into software. It is a simple matter really, and all the speeches by poticians won't change it. Is everyone ready for national electronic health records?

It seems that Apple's iCloud doesn't just work for developers.

The FBI has set a priority of monitoring Gmail and the like in real time. Yes, they want to watch citizens more closely.

Flipboard for the iPad has a new version that is supposed to be better in every way.

Tumblr now hosts over 100 million blogs.

Arduino, Bluetooth, System on a chip and all that allow these little robotics controllers. Small and inexpensive and controllable from your smartphone, these may rule the home one day.

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Thursday March 28, 2013

No Internet viewing today as it was a travel day.

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Friday March 29, 2013

Trying to catch up.

Facebook may unveil its own operating system next week.

Amazon buys social networking reading site GoodReads.

It appears that the FBI has been using phoney cell phone towers, without Judge approval, in implicating citizens in crimes.

Enterprise-class 3D printers are predicted to drop under $2,000 by 2016.

A 4-wheel "robotic" vehicle with electric motor. Looks neat, can do some real work, cost?

In other robotics news, Virginia Tech builds an underwater vehicle that mimics a jellyfish's motion.

A new study (how many times do you start a post with that line?) shows that adults text more than teenagers.

For better or worse, Google is entering the same-day home delivery market.

A giant panoramic image of Mars. Now NASA can explain why the thing that looks like a person is just a rock with a funny shadow. Another stunt from our space program.

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Saturday March 30, 2013

A demo video of what can be done today in gaming and other graphics.

iRadio is coming from Apple, possibly this summer.

Two years after the tsunami, photos of a Japanese ghost town.

Microsoft may build a mini tablet like everyone else. Reduce the price and people will buy it. Why does it take so long for some people to get it?

Marissa Mayer tells why she took the job at Yahoo even though she was pregnant and looking towards maternity leave.

Thoughts on why the attrition at Red Hat is incredibly low.

All about the Internet of things. I hope they build in some privacy and security there.

Microsoft makes $25million a year renting office space. Wow.

Burn calories by drinking COLD water.

The demand for supercomputers is up.

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Sunday March 31, 2013

If you could turn off all the lights in a big city, this is how it would appear. Neat.

The winners of the Google Glass contest are all already famous. So, yes, this was just a publicity stunt by Google.

How to become a viral Internet Star. This is writing. Sometimes the silliest of things make it big in the market. That is the business of writing.

Perhaps Google and Microsoft can enter and revive the PC marketplace.

It appears that Blackberry will try the tablet market again.

How one person became a full-time writer.

Have a pending task that you hate? Think of another task that you hate even more.

Excellent thoughts on writing speed. In my experience, most writers doom themselves to writing slow, much slower than possible. Note, this "writing" is what most call drafting. There is much revision to be done afterwards.

Write about what scares you. That is not much fun, but the result is often much, much better.

Thoughts on reframing your writing situation so that problems can be strengths.

One person's path to writing a book, publishing it, and selling 10,000 copies.

Thoughts on evolving as a freelance writer.

Change of habit - use forecast.io to look at the weather instead of weather.com .

Seven ways to write bad copy. This is a good exercise for writers. Write it as bad as you can. You will learn a few things.

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