Links of the Week (Week #11, 2006)
Published Saturday, March 18th, 2006 at 11:01 am
- BBC – Radio 4 – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – The Adventure Game – Classic text based H2G2 adventure game in a Flash GUI.
- Google Mars – Just in case anyone missed it.. check out Google Mars.
- LEGO(c) Building Instructions and Catalogs – When I was little I loved LEGOs. The problem was all I had was a two or three boxes of the small sets (12 pieces or so). I was frustrated that I couldn’t build what I wanted to because I had so few pieces. One Christmas I decided that all I wanted was LEGOs and nothing else. When anyone would ask me what I wanted for Christmas I said LEGOs and refuse to give alternatives. I thought for sure I was going to get a few of the big LEGO sets. Well, I was only half disappointed. I did get LEGOs but instead of a few big sets I received dozens of tiny sets. Ok fine, I can deal with that. I ripped open all the boxes and placed all the pieces in a bucket for easy access. Before I realized what had happened my parents had through away all the “discarded boxes”. Unfortunately along with them were all the instructions. So I finally had all the pieces I could ever want and I couldn’t build a single thing “by the book”. From then on if I needed a simple car I would make it by looking at the picture in the LEGO catalog and inferring the design. Not very easy. If this site were around then it would have relieved some of my childhood trauma.
- Airbus A380 takes off to mark 1,000h of flight test programme-10/03/2006-London-Flight International – Time lapse video of a Airbus A380 being assembled. Very cool.
- Red Rain Proof of Extraterrestrial Life? – I believe with absolutely no doubt there is extraterrestrial life somewhere. I’m less certain of the idea that they have ever visited here or if they are even close enough for us to ever communicate in any way. There are many people that really want to prove that there is extraterrestrial life so much so that I think they find “evidence” where it doesn’t exist. This site (and the linked scientific paper) have pictures of what is reported to be biological cells found in the rain from the red rain phenomenon Kerala, India. From what I read the only clues they have to justify claiming these cells to be biological is that they look like cells and they are made of carbon. I’m sorry but that is not enough for me. The cells don’t appear to have any type of nucleus and test for DNA found no traces. The only way that these particles looks like cells is that have an oval shaped and has a hard “cell wall” (crust). It looks like a tiny exotic type of carbon based geode to me. Given that the appear source of these particles was a meteoroid it doesn’t seam that implausible. I could be wrong. I’m not the expert looking at all the data but it does look like a little wishful thinking to me.
- Ten Obscure Factoids Concerning Albert Einstein – I often see people try to latch on to how they are similar to famous people; especially Einstein. They are employing a logical fallacy although it is unspoken and inferred. I’m a horrible speller. But you know what… so was Einstein. The inferred statement is that I am a genius like Einstein. Well, in my case it may be true but in general I’m sure most bad spellers are not geniuses. Well, Einstein also smoked and hated Science Fiction so I guess I’m not a genius.
- The Torn-Up Credit Card Application – I’m so incredibly sick of receiving credit card applications. I receive the same application over and over again. No, I don’t want that stupid Disney card with that “low, low rate” of 30% APR. Most annoying is that I know if you just throw the application away you are inviting identity fraud. I have to take the time to tear up or shred the application. Well, this guy showed that tearing up the application is not enough. The credit card company will issue a card even if the application is torn up, taped together, and completed with a different address and phone number. Ridiculous.
- Web Pages That Suck learn usability and good Web design by looking at bad Web design – Darn, I still haven’t made it to the list of worst pages that suck. Maybe next year.
* Disclosure: The links presented here are links I recorded during my
web surfing sessions. Often times these links were found on other
sites and are presented here without credit. Those sites include,
but are not limited to, digg.com, Slashdot, Drudge Report, and BoingBoing. *