Lee Dunbar

Aug

23

The Round-Up

August 23, 2008

From the, ‘They aren’t buying what you are selling’ department, ComputerWorld is reporting that a full third of PC buyers are downgrading to Windows XP. Even when stripping Vista down to core components to make it as close in functionality to XP as possible, Vista was 40% slower, Barth claimed, citing recent tests Devil Mountain has performed. “Vista’s performance had been an ongoing problem, and the only thing that’s saving Microsoft’s bacon is the faster processors and more RAM on today’s PCs,” he said. “Moore’s Law is always on their side.” I have to admit that since I do a lot of video and photo editing, that a downgrade to XP would be the option I would go for as well.

I guess this is kind of old news, but Ottawa’s 20Q has a Disney version of their 20 questions game, a very addictive game I would add. Think of a place, thing or character that has something to do with Disney and see if you can stump the application.

Speaking of Disney, if you visit their webs site, you can now create your own Disney page. On a side note, when are they going to get rid of the failed go.com part of the URL?

I’m a big fan of Michael Geist. CTV reports, “Critics of the Harper government’s proposed changes to the Copyright Act have launched a cyber crusade to fight the controversial bill. They’re using everything from Facebook to YouTube to Wikipedia to blogs to get their message out. They want the government to either scrap or make serious amendments to Bill C-61 when Parliament resumes next month. At the helm of the digital movement is Michael Geist, a professor at the University of Ottawa who specializes in Internet and e-commerce law. In addition to his own blog, Geist runs a Facebook group called Fair Copyright for Canada that boasts 90,000 members.” I am also a big believer in the effectiveness of social media tools, so I will be interested to see how effective this campaign is.

The Daily Show and Colbert Report are two of my favs. The American Political Science Association has posted an article about what is coined, the “Colbert Bump“. Democratic politicians receive a 40% increase in contributions in the 30 days after appearing on the comedy cable show The Colbert Report.  In contrast, their Republican counterparts essentially gain nothing.  These findings appear to validate anecdotal evidence regarding the political impact of the program, such as the assertions by host Stephen Colbert that appearing on his program provides candidates with a “Colbert bump” or a rise in support for their election campaigns.

Tags: Design Stuff, Marketing Stuff, Neat Stuff, Sports Stuff, Technology Stuff, Web Stuff
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Aug

23

The Olympics in Lego

August 23, 2008

The Hong Kong Lego User Group has built representations of Olympic buildings and events …

here’s the Water Cube …




swimming competitions …




and the Bird’s Nest …



Tags: Uncategorized
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Aug

17

Wii Fit

August 17, 2008



Tags: Funny Stuff
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Aug

14

I came across this on Slashdot. “Viewing the 2008 Olympics opening ceremony online at NBC’s Olympics website, you can see that the order in which the countries were presented was very different from the actual order of the countries in the ceremony, as listed at Wikipedia. NBC skipped roughly 100 countries ahead, then jumped back and forth, apparently delaying the appearance of the United States in its home market until later in the broadcast.” So is this a case of unreality TV?

Oh well, I guess that they might as well fake the order to increase ratings as some of the fireworks we saw on the TV broadcast of the Olympic’s opening ceremony were actually computer generated.

While it’s normal for such a large event to have performers lip-synch their own songs and it was quite evident that all the performers at the opening ceremonies of the Olymics were, China went all Milli Vanilli on us and substituted the little girl who sang the Olympic theme song with a pretty young lady straight out of Disney’s It’s a Small World because she wasn’t cute enough for International TV audiences.

It also seems that the Chinese Government faked an agreement to allow people to protest and grant journalists to have open access as a number of would-be protesters are either jailed or missing and as many as 4 journalists have been roughed-up.

We also have fake birth certificates. The latest evidence came when Associated Press uncovered a November story from Xinhua, the Chinese government news agency, reporting that gymnist He Kexin was 13, and not 16 as the Chinese are claiming, which would make her ineligible for the Games. AP found the report on Xinhua’s Web site on Thursday morning; by the afternoon it was no longer accessible.

At least the athletes are real.

Doh!

Tags: Just Stuff
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Aug

12

The Round-Up

August 12, 2008

“Honey I’m headed over to Sams Club, back in a few minutes.”
“Don’t forget to pick up some solar panels, I hear there is a coupon!”
All facitiousness aside, retailers and other businesses are starting to pick up on consumers’ desire for clean, sustainable energies. An article in CNET gives an overview of some of the green projects being developed and products being made available.

On that note — could solar power be reaching the magical $1 per watt?

I’m a fan of the Indiana Jones series, and after watching the last installment I thought that there was a possibility that the torch could be passed onto the next generation. This was recently dismissed by none other than Lucas himself. “George Lucas says he’s already identified the one person who can keep the “Indiana Jones” franchise going: Harrison Ford. The filmmaker scoffed at the possibility of passing the famed fedora from Ford to Shia LaBeouf, the 22-year-old actor who played Indy’s son Mutt Williams in this summer’s “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.”

Tags: Community Stuff, Retail Stuff, Sports Stuff, Technology Stuff
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Aug

9

It’s old news now, but a new search engine was launched in the last few weeks. I have just recently had time to play with Cuil and have to admit, I am a little cuil on the new entry. Propped by stories about the search engine being designed by people from Google and IBM, and claims that it was better than Google I went in with pretty high expectations. Claims made in stories were that Cuil searched more sites than Google and did things in a different way. In reality, while the new engine just might search and index more pages, and might be different than Google, we all know that different does not mean better. And this is the case with Cuil. I did a number of tests — searches that I conduct on a regular basis. Product searches, trouble-shooting a problem with a computer, general information searches and travel searches. I was really disappointed in the results. Pretty much unusable.

Another promising green technology, a U.S. scientist has developed a new way of powering fuel cells that could make it practical for home owners to store solar energy and produce electricity to run lights and appliances at night.

No Beer Pong for the Wii.

Last month, construction was completed on a pilot project that ran fiber optic cables to 400 homes in Ottawa. Stringing fiber optic cables isn’t a big deal by itself—Verizon has been running fiber to millions of homes in the US—but the Ottawa project comes with a twist: rather than providing Internet access for a monthly fee, the company plans to sell the fiber strands outright to individual homeowners. This isn’t how we’re used to doing telecommunications infrastructure. Traditionally, a “last mile” copper loop, coax cable, or fiber strand has been owned by an incumbent telephone or cable company, and the customer has paid a monthly fee for telecom services. But, if the Ottawa experiment is a success, that could change.

Here is some Olympic folly courtesy of a restaurant in China that while preparing for English-speaking visitors, ran its name through an online translator. They then created a large sign displaying the English version of their name: “Translate Server Error.”

 

Tags: Community Stuff, Technology Stuff, Web Stuff
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Aug

9

In a post I wrote about a month ago, I outlined my frustration with changes made at the concession stand of a drive-in my family frequents. I shared that we have given up on the concession stand and were now bringing our own snacks and drinks. It seems we are not alone, and the owners may very well have noticed a decline in overall sales, as the drive-in in question has added a few lines to their website:

“We ask that you kindly refrain from outside food and beverage … “

Hot, fresh, spend half an hour in sweltering heat lining up to get it. No thanks!

Tags: Brand Experience Stuff, Business Stuff, Customer Service Stuff, Design Stuff, Experience Design Stuff, Retail Stuff
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Aug

1

The Soup: iPhone 3G

August 1, 2008

This is great!



Tags: Funny Stuff, Web Stuff
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