Book Of Norm

this is just damn cool - it is autonomous, so it is making this decisions itself (not that anyone could really do that with a remote control anyway), obviously mostly important to the military more than civilian use. An army of these for urban scouts, big dogs for supply, MQ-9 Reapers in the air, and autonomous DARPA style tanks, trucks, and ... yeah... its coming..

What people may or may not know is that Obama wants to reshape the American economy into something more eco-friendly. His preferred way of doing this, shockingly, is spending lots of money. Specifically giving out loan guarantees to companies that have absolutely no right to the quantity of government money being thrown at them. I have railed on before about Fisker Automotive and Tesla - two electric car start-ups which were both given over $500 million loans which we will likely never see back. But this might be worse. In the growing area of thin-film solar (basically next generation photovoltaics) there are a number of companies, First Solar being the biggest. However, the Obama administration (and it really is directly the administration - one of Obama's friends is the Czar in charge of assigning these loans) decided that Solyndra needed $535 million. On Wednesday morning Obama took a tour around the factory, and all the TV outlets talked about how the factory was a model ...

Most cars are pretty much what they seem. You do your research, you talk to the sales guy, you talk to your friends, you watch your car commercials and you decide what you want to buy. In the end, you probably end up with what you wanted to end up with buying a new car. But sometimes, things are not as they seem. You see, people tend to think about cars in terms of model years and features. And that's all that dealers talk about: "Oh yes, this is the new for 2010 Camcord, it comes with the V6 and performance package" etc etc. But its not how car companies think about cars. They think in terms of two big things: platforms and generations. A platform is the basic underpinning of the car. They are generally shared between different cars, especially these days. An all-new platform is a huge investment (up to hundreds of millions of dollars) and so does not come around all that often. Cars and platforms go through generations. Often a new platform comes out, and then over a ...

Ok, so this is a status message from a guy - kind of a tool - that I know: "I own zero winter gear... yet three days before a 19,000 foot climb in Peru I end up with $500 worth. I love my friends (special props to Macasek for letting me borrow... everything). " Well now, if you climbed 19,000 feet from any point on earth, you would end up... in the sky. (not counting many week treks here - I am talking about from the base of the mountain up). You see the thing is we talk about mountains in terms of total elevation. Climbing a 14er in Colorado is much more impressive than climbing anything the old, worn down, Appalachians. But Katahdin has a vertical rise of 4,292 feet - more than many of those 14ers. Scafell Pike, the tallest mountain in England, rises to only 3,200ft, but 3,000 of that is vertical rise. Its one of the best hikes I have done, and the Lake District of England (where you would find it) is one of the most beautiful and rugged mountain regions on earth. You se...

So.. turns out that BP ignored all kinds of signs that their well was about to pull a mentos-in-the-soda-bottle. It does seem as though this was a very much preventable accident, and something which could have easily been avoided. Why BP? Why? I support the oil industry. For gods sake I work in the oil industry. This is just stupid. BP had worked so hard for the last 5 years trying to fix "big oil's" reputation, and try and make BP a cleaner more environmentally friendly company. And then with a lack of intelligence and a string of bad decisions, not only is that corporate image blown to hell, there is even more widespread hatred of the oil companies. Deservedly. Of course, what this will lead to is more government regulation and less offshore drilling, which is in fact a bad thing (though I will say that this spill pisses me off - we do need offshore drilling in this country). Maybe they should just pull a Comcast and rename themselves, to something like Xplosiv... no no...

It could in fact happen... but I am betting on a steaming pile of crap for the third (and hopefully last?) installment of the series. Like the Matrix and Pirates of the Caribbean I am going to go ahead and call this one pretty much a write-off. What you have is the same Michael Bay, the same Shia LeBouf, and a new girl. Because Meagan Fox has spent too much of the last few years calling Michael Bay nasty names and a creepy dude (I think that much is a given) she got booted from the movie. To replace her obvious acting talent (cough cough) they replaced her with a Victorias Secret model who.... has never acted before. Ever. At anything. Yeah... its going to be terrible. Which is really too bad, given how good the first one was. Tragedy really. Ok back to the real news..

This is the article which prompted my post on Islam, well worth the read: Jonah Goldberg About | Archive | E-mail | Latest | Follow on Twitter May 19, 2010 12:00 A.M. Sticking to the Script Liberals crave a comfortable plot, and they’ll alter the facts of a story to make it fit one. W e are taught to believe that ideology is the enemy of free thought. But that’s not right. Ideology is a mere checklist of prin...

The current favorable and Hollywood-acceptable logic (why the hell anyone would think that celebrities were people to guide public discourse I have no damn idea - most of them are not exactly flying a full set of sails) is that the western world is at fault in our relations with Islam. In addition to this, Islam is a misunderstood religion that is characterized as aggressive and intolerant by the right-wing etc, but those more intellectually enlightened know that Islam is simply a different and equal way of viewing the world. Morally speaking, we are the aggressive and intolerant ones, invading their lands, interfering with their affairs, and trying to manipulate the middle east in particular in our unending crack-addict need for oil. Of course if you look a little more closely, or really, look at all, this is a load of bullshit. First of all, morality is not relative. It is not acceptable that women are treated as property under Islamic law - no matter what their book says or what the...

There is a big difference between driving fast, and driving safely. Many slow drivers are exceedingly unsafe - they make decisions randomly, stay in the wrong lanes, don't pay close attention to their driving, and generally approach driving as a rather distasteful activity foisted on them by the necessities of life. They are also usually the people who think that driving fast is driving badly, and complain about fast drivers all the time. Possibly at the same time as they rear-end someone in stop and go traffic, sit in the left lane while getting passed on the right (you should only be getting passed on the right under extenuating circumstances - you see a car faster than you in your passenger window, you are in the wrong lane my friend), or almost cause multiple accidents at an on-ramp or merge because their general approach is to go slow and hope for the best (its just too scary to look or use the accelerator - and unsafe). Overwhelmingly, they think of themselves as safe drivers...

Yup. GM wants to buy back the auto-lending branch of Ally Bank - which used to be GMAC. This would let GM dealers offer financing again and feel all grown up. It turns out that subprime buyers are 16% of the new car market. You see the thing is, sub-prime buyers should never, ever, be financing a new car purchase. It does not make a damn bit of sense. Buy a reliable cheap used car and call it good. Honestly - you can get an older Toyota or Honda or especially SUV for $2-$5k, wtf are you doing buying a new car? That is unless you are paying cash. Back in the good 'ol days when American car companies were not owned by the government, but made crap cars (actually - Chrysler still makes crap cars, the big irony is that it was right when GM finally started making great cars that it went under), the US car companies lost money on every car they sold... sorta. You see, they lost money on the car (they made money selling SUVs, but not cars), but they made money on the financing. Financing ...

I remember a few years ago when a DIY guy took a 1960's satellite spy camera and re-purposed it to take pictures here on earth, taking the then highest-resolution pictures. Now, a company called gigapan makes a relatively cheap mount for your dSLR or compact camera and automatically takes a range of pictures of a set field. You then use their software to stich them all together. I have done this by hand, putting together about 5-6 photos to create 50+megaixel images. A pro working for Gigapan just took a 45 gigapixel photo of Dubai, and its pretty damn cool: http://www.gigapan.org/gigapans/48492/ This is the kind of thing digital photography was really meant for - breaking the boundaries of what used to be possible. The first generation of just replacing film and doing the same things is just about over, I welcome the coming of the second generation of digital photography, where it really breaks new ground.

"I would not say that this announcement is the equivalent of seeing the face of God, but it might turn out to be the toe of God." What the hell are scientists doing poking around the toes of the almighty? I think there might be some Olympian podophilia going on here. But really, it's scientists making a bit of a joke. "God" refers to the principle that something created the universe. And in this case, the principle that since we are all here, something in the Standard Model has to be wrong. Because according to the Standard Model's Book of The Start of Things: First God made matter & antimatter. 2 The universe was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was writing up complex equations to keep things in balance and stop it all going wrong like it did the last time, ugly business that. 3 And God said, "Let there be light"; and, after he fumbled for the particle smasher for a while, cursed the old ...

The Air Force has stated that it wants a reusable launch platform, and hopes to cut costs about 50%. First the bad news: Yeah, it has not worked out before. A big reason we built the Space Shuttle in the first place was for the Air Force, but when payloads got too expensive, the Air Force stopped using it. Now they want their own, automated version. http://news.discovery.com/space/air-force-reusable-rockets.html I would love it if this works out - I just have to caution that we have been down this road before. Personally - I would like to see other options - like a giant gun for shooting satellites into space. I'm not kidding, more to come later.

"What is the best v6 Sports Car?" "Luxury Convertible Shootout" "We Pick From 8 Mostly Indistinguishable Midsized Sedans" I love car comparison tests. But they are seriously flawed. The issue is this: when car magazines and websites do a test, they get hold of a type of car, and find the best one. Compacts, sports coupes, near-luxury, floaty old boat Florida luxury (though mercifully that one is rare other than the AARP auto column). But that's not how we, as human beings with certain levels of income, buy cars. Or at least not how most of us buy cars. Most of us have a price point, something we go in thinking "I really want this car, but I have to see if I can get it at the right price." We probably have a few cars in mind, and possibly a few sets of options as well - heated seats, navigation, 4wd/AWD, tall seating position, stick-shift (there's still a few of us), v6 vs. 4-banger. But the number one thing will always come down to price....

Robin Hood - which as far as I can tell seems to be the unofficial sequel to Gladiator - is getting roundly panned by critics today. It has more or less been called unhappy, dirty, mucky, boring, dull, and not actually Robin Hood. All of these are possibly true, and I was just about ready to give up and say I would not bother seeing this one in theaters, and then I read this in the NYT: "You may have heard that Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave to the poor, but that was just liberal media propaganda. This Robin is no socialist bandit practicing freelance wealth redistribution, but rather a manly libertarian rebel striking out against high taxes and a big government scheme to trample the ancient liberties of property owners and provincial nobles. Don’t tread on him!" Hmmm... sounds kind of good actually... And then it goes on to spend a lot of time talking about how the movie makes fun of French surrender monkeys... which is even better. So granted it is meant to be a lu...

I have had a number of people ask me this one. They dont advertise. They dont sell you anything The dont screw you like a sneaky ass weasel in the way ebay does (always has "sales" on the posting fees - which are almost nothing, but few people pay attention to the final value fee or the paypal fee - also owned by ebay - which ends up being 7-10%) They have huge costs due to the massive traffic they generate (though not due to payments to web designers..) So where the hell does all the money come from? One source, and one source alone: job listings. It costs about $20 to list a job on craigslist, depending on the city/state/country you are posting in. This alone is where craigslist derives its income, to the best of my knowledge. And long may it stay that way. In cities such as Boston where I live, craigslist has become deeply ingrained into the way of life, as the default method for finding/offering jobs, furniture, and apartments, but also just as a way of cyclical community...

How would you feel about paying $200,000 to get into space? Because, though no-one has actually flown yet, that for the last year or so has been the price of a ticket, courtesy of Richard Branson, Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites, all wrapped up into a badass package known as Virgin Galatic. And, to top it off, their ship is called the V.S.S. Enterprise. But what if I told you there was a second option, for only $100,000? Space Adventures (who set up all kinds of things, including some of the Russian MIR and ISS trips) is looking to book you on a flight with Armadillo Aerospace for only $100,000. Sweet deal! Or not... The thing is, Scaled Composites is the only NewSpace company to you know, actually make it into space with a human on board. Armadillo is well respected, and has won some X-Prize lunar lander challenges (on earth) etc, but it has not sent anyone or anything into space yet. Let along bring them back alive. Which is why, to me, space tourism falls into that category of good...

Seriously excited..

No, quite literally. Turns out that the office chair and your comfy couch when you get home from work to unwind are conspiring to turn you into a fat and unhealthy blob destined for an early death. Credit goes to James over at The Four Part Land for tracking this one down. Here are a couple excerpts: "If you're reading this article sitting down—the position we all hold more than any other, for an average of 8.9 hours a day—stop and take stock of how your body feels. Is there an ache in your lower back? A light numbness in your rear and lower thigh? Are you feeling a little down? These symptoms are all normal, and they're not good. They may well be caused by doing precisely what you're doing—sitting. New research in the diverse fields of epidemiology, molecular biology, biomechanics, and physiology is converging toward a startling conclusion: Sitting is a public-health risk. And exercising doesn't offset it. "People need to understand that the qualitative me...

If you want to check an interesting representation of the slow destruction of Facebook privacy, check out the link below. Basically, the default setting is now that everything you have on your page, including your interests etc, it public. This is totally screwed up, and one of the reasons I liked Facebook more than MySpace back in the day - it was private and felt more secure. I honestly hope facebook dies and something new comes along to take its place, possibly something with a modicum of user control and a desire to leave people alone. http://mattmckeon.com/facebook-privacy/

I have had many bad experiences on Delta. I once stood in a long line for customer service (as in over an hour line), while there were three people behind the counter. One of them was texting constantly, and literally hiding under the counter, a second was sort of slowly talking to a woman, but really was obviously just stalling for time, and kept asking the third if he could take a break yet. The third, a nice but completely exasperated girl, was trying to handle all of the customer issues, all at the same time. This being Delta, there were a lot of customer issues. I doubt she lasted more than 3months with Delta. Honestly, the approach of every Delta employee seems to be that you are an annoying POS just for showing up and flying with them. Well fuck you Delta and cheers to your long decline. This, to me, typifies Delta: Short URL: http://con.st/10005463 | Add to Favorites | complaints Entire Dog Lost,...

No one has actually driven the Fisker Karma, and so I am going to throw my imaginary review into the mix. It sucks. For those unaware of the Karma, it is a hybrid sports car which the Obama administration saw fit to back with a $500 million loan, even though only 6 prototypes have been created. First, and lets get this out of the way, it looks great: And if you read the current issue of Pop Sci (a great magazine, but with a tendency for over-enthusiasm), you will see many pages of gushing review about the car, the man, the story and the future of Fisker and Detroit (tied, in their eyes, irrevocably together). But you need to keep reading because somewhere after the story jumps from the middle of the magazine to the advertising section in the back, where they tell you it is on page 92 but there are no goddamn page numbers because its all just ads for car shelters and pheromones and you hunt for 5 friggin minutes before you find the last part of the story. And that last part of the stor...

I am currently looking for an inexpensive summer convertible, after selling my 300zx due to it needing too much work. What that means is looking at craigslist a lot for cheaper convertibles. What that means is dredging up a lot of crap. This one, I promise, I have changed nothing: http://nh.craigslist.org/cto/1731810803.html new hampshire craigslist > for sale / wanted > cars & trucks - by owner please flag with care: miscategorized prohibited spam/overpost best of craigslist Avoid scams and fraud by dealing locally! Beware any deal involving Western Union, Moneygram, wire transfer, cashier check, money order, shipping, escrow, or any promise of transaction protection/certification/guarantee. More info 65 Malibu Chevelle SS Convertible - $2500 Date: 2010-05-09, 7:52AM EDT Reply to: sale-rdnyu-1731810803@craigslist.org [ Errors when replying to ads? ] 65 malibu chevelle ss con...

Britain took the quiz Who Would You Rather Have as Prime Minister? David Beckham 45% Amy Winehouse 15% Prince Harry 10% Wallace 10% Gromit 20% Gordon Brown 0%

Some selections from craigslist: Totally AWESOME Kimball Organ Date: 2010-02-23, 5:49PM MST Dude, this thing is sick . You need this organ. Find out why this does not turn on and then you will be ready to rock out, or play some hymns at your local church! Make an offer, any offer! Any trades considered! Would love to trade for a cute puppy like this: Check out this video of what you could be doing in just a few short weeks of practice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BE8Mv5ww4BM&feature=related Here is a picture of the glorious beast. There is a good chance that it stopped working because we brought it out in the snow to play while we snowboarded in our front yard.. Come get it before this weekend and I'll throw in a free high five! Yeah dude! You aren't looking for them, but I found your two dogs. Date: 2010-02-18, 4:42PM EST Sigh. No one is looking for these guys. And I see why. They hump everything in sight, try to dominate our old doggies, try to eat...