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: December October 13-19, 2014

Summary of this week:

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

Monday October 13, 2014

Google is testing a service that lets you chat with a real MD when searching for symptoms of what ails you.

Apple (Beats) settles its patent suit with Bose regarding noise cancellation. Maybe now NFL players can wear their Beats while on the job.

Western civilization is about to collapse: Dairy Queen has been hacked.

This must be an important story because it was ll over the Internet last week and continues into this week. The Snowden documentary called CitizenFour.

And now we have a nurse in Dallas with Ebola. When will CNN start yelling, "Go North!"

3.8million Raspberry Pi computers have now been sold. I continue to recommend the creators for a Nobel Prize. This is the most successful education project in the history of man.

In extensive tests, Google's voice recognition system beats that of Apple and Microsoft.

This is terrible: police burst into a house and beat a teen boy in his own house. It was all a mistake, see, you understand, right?

It seems that homework for K-12 doesn't help kids learn.

I love this phrase: Resume-Driven Development. I've been unemployed 20 months and been blocked by RDD.

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Tuesday October 14, 2014

A review of Intel's 10-core processor.

Google is already running ads for its new 6" and 9" tablets before they've officially announced them.

In a first, our government has removed the names of 7 citizens from its double secret top secret no fly list.

Hackers steal 7million DropBox user names and passwords. DropBox says someone else was hacked in this case. And of course that government health care site we all know is absolutely secure.

The Flight Attendants union is suing the FAA over allowing use of electronic devices at all times.

A million people have joined the testing of Microsoft's Windows 10.

More amazing advances in controlling artificial limbs with the mind.

Microsoft has moved into election forecasting. I suppose there are less worthwhile things to do.

The Irish may change their tax laws that have helped Apple all these years. Proceed with caution folks. You may not like the result. This is a complex situation and it is doubtful that they are considering all the unintended consequences.

A flaw in MS Windows allowed Russians to hack into NATO computers. Of course no one connected to Health Care dot Gov uses MS Windows-driven computers and, er, uh, oh, wait a minute...

The Anonabox: it will "anonamyze" everything you do on the Internet for $45. It is only a Kickstarter campaign now, but it seems destined to become a real product.

Law enforcement is getting "gifts" from foundations to surveil citizens. This keeps the acquisitions secret.

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Wednesday October 15, 2014

And now we have a second health care worker in Dallas with ebola. So when do hospital workers flee the hospital when someone walks in the door? Then the public panics, and then all those zombie apocolypse shows become survival documentaries instead of Sci-Fi horror shows.

The smart home media device? Computers are easier to use.

One mother's jubilation at actually having money to buy her kids clothes for the school year. The American eonomy is still in terrible condition. Unemployment is so bad that the unemployment calculation is broken—showing much better numbers than exist.

Here are a set of charts that show the terrible condition of the American economy. Frozen wages, high unemployment, higher productivity.

The MacWorld Expo is finished, probably never to return. This happens at a time that Macs are more popular as a computer than ever.

Google has found errors in the Secure Socket Layer (SSL). ooops, I guess that means that Health Care dot Gov...no, it already was, well, you know.

Anonabox hoped to raise $7,500 in 30 days. It raised $300,000 in 2 days.

Mark Zuckerburg and wife donate $25million to fight the spread of ebola. Let's hope someone with brains gets the money and knows how to use it. There are already reports about how a few people will make a fortune $$$ on this current crisis.

This story is everywhere, so it must be important, though many doubt the veracity of its claims. Researchers report a new li-ion battery that recharges in two minutes and will last 20 years.

Why do they record your phone conversation? They are building a database of voice prints.

A quarter of millennials watch TV without watching TV. Hence, the TV ratings are lower than they actually are. If that is not confusing, you are probably one of the millennials.

Qualcomm buys chip maker CSR for $2.5billion. That's a lot of money.

The story behind the guy behind the blog 9to5Mac.

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Thursday October 16, 2014

A two-legged chair: silly, uncomfortable, but good for you.

The NYSE fell 450 points after more Ebola buffoonery at the CDC. The market and the public have lost confidence in our Federal government again.

The race is not always won by the smart, or something like that: Nobel prize winner flops in business.

HBO will have its own Internet-only service like Netflix. They are chasing the cord-cutters and running away from cable TV.

Netflix stock crashes. Coincidence?

Google introduces the Nexus 6 and 9. The Nexus 6 has the biggest phablet screen on the market.

Apple "accidently" leaks the new iPads before today's big event.

It appears that we did find WMD chemical weapons in Iraq.

Google tosses Google TV and tries again with Android TV.

Google announces Android 5.0 and calls it Lollipop. I guess there is a reason for the silly name.

Google Play apps have a bigger market than Apple's, but make less money.

At long last, Google Fiber to open in Austin in December.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announces a new diversity plan with pay adjustments at Microsoft.

Facebook announces Safety Check—a feature to tell only your friends that you are safe after a disaster.

Welcome to the Age of Loneliness.

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Friday October 17, 2014

No Internet viewing today.

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Saturday October 18, 2014

Apple had yet another big event. Some highlights:
A 27" screen iMac that is 5K or retina or something awe inspiring never before seen.
Thinner iPads.
OS X Yosemite 10.10 is available for free download.

Bad news for tablets as smartphones are becoming the only personally owned computer. People use real computers at work, and their employer owns those.

The telecommuting concepts keeps going up and down, in and out. Here are excellent reasons why it should be in.

Seth Godin on how to avoid "bleeding from their ears in boredom" in meetings.

A smart walker for the elderly. Excellent.

Here is a news flash: if you take the best practices from different software development methods, you get better software.

It seems the Anonabox made a lot of false claims. Kickstarter removed it from its site.

Apple may have changed everything with its "Apple SIM card."

Ultimate Frisbee is one of the more popular sports in Silicon Valley. Good for them. It is a lot of fun and great exercise and a kill game, not a brute strength game.

Our President nominates a former Google lawyer to head the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Google is about to start testing millimeter wave technology. That might provide unprecedented wireless, high-speed broadband.

Here is a two-ounce, $125 PC from Intel that looks like a thumb drive.

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Sunday October 19, 2014

One mother's story of her autistic son and his relationship with technology, notably Siri.

Disney's new movie "Big Hero 6" was made on a 55,000-core supercomputer. We have reached the age of n-core where n is between 1 and infinity.

Google moves managers to bring Android and Chrome closer together.

Google has a good video about voice recognition technology.

People are moving to OS X 10.10 faster than they moved to 10.9.

Now that OS X Yosemite is here, so is iCloud.

Looking at Apple's new 5K display on the updated iMac.

Writing a memoir and getting the facts straight—or do we really care?

Some worthwhile things for a writer to do when there are no paying jobs. #1: write.

Shut up and write. Brutal, blunt, and true.

Finding creativity here and there—a big one is to listen to other people chat in public places.

Freelancing is a real job, but you may never convince anyone of that.

Some writing hacks. This post claims that flipping the page of a notepad (not a notebook) helps writing as it moves the prior writing out of sight. I find the opposite works for me. I need to see what I have written so I can keep things straight in my mind.

Excellent ideas about writing and writing novels.

If you don't feel like writing, here are some practicial, useful ideas to bring back the feeling. This list is far above the average I what I have seen.

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