links: May 2010 Archives

In a pre-emptive blast before the banks launch their own lobbying effort on June 10, Stephen Cecchetti, chief economic adviser to the Bank for International Settlements, said the banks’ “doomsday scenarios” were based on their assuming “the maximum impact of the maximum change with the minimum behavioural change”. EDITOR’S CHOICE Lex: European bank levy - May-26 G20 urged to make investors pay for failures - May-24 US Senate approves financial reform bill - May-21 Opinion: Senate bill merits two cheers - May-23 “They are assuming they’re not adjusting their business at all to the regulatory reforms and that the result for the economy will be the worst possible,” said Mr Cecchetti.

No. 8 and 9 in the series of mock propaganda posters based on 1980s arcade games. This round has an "apparition" theme. The first is arguably the most popular arcade game, while the second is said to be one of the most difficult.

No. 7 in the series of mock propaganda posters based on 1980s arcade games.

Banham believes a whole list of colourful eccentric and gifted people should have their moment of fame as someone glances down to read their plaque. For example, E. R. Belilios, the foremost opium trader in the former British colony used to commute on a camel from Mid-Levels to Central, until his camel jumped off a cliff.

One of my favorite hacks at last weekend’s Music Hack Day is Tristan’s Swinger. The Swinger is a bit of python code that takes any song and makes it swing. It does this be taking each beat and time-stretching the first half of each beat while time-shrinking the second half. It has quite a magical effect.

"That Spartan management style was successful in past decades and was widely adopted by early Hong Kong and Taiwanese manufacturers who operate factories in Guangdong," he said. "But it has gradually come to be regarded as an outdated and unsustainable management style for dealing with young people born after the 1980s."

Although careful not to advise his Irish audience not to use SEO consultants – a valuable source of advertising dollars for Google – Cutts was clear he would prefer if webmasters felt they could get to grips with the issues themselves. “A lot of SEO is simply common sense. A good rule of thumb is to ask yourself how would a regular user see this.” The SEO business is also one that has attracted more than its fair share of shysters and snake oil salesmen. Sites abound on the web selling software and services that guarantee to get a site into Google’s top 10 listings for their favoured search term for as little as €100. In reality they are little more than a scam to get the credit card details of the unsuspecting.

Nicola Marzovilla runs a business, so when a client at his Gramercy Park restaurant, I Trulli, asks for a children’s menu, he does not say what he really thinks. What he says is, “I’m sure we can find something on the menu your child will like.” What he thinks is, “Children’s menus are the death of civilization.”

The doctor who first suggested a link between MMR vaccinations and autism is to be struck off the medical register. The General Medical Council found Dr Andrew Wakefield guilty of serious professional misconduct over the way he carried out his controversial research.

The Facts In The Case Of Dr. Andrew Wakefield A fifteen page story about the MMR vaccination controversy. As ever, I'm sure a few spelling errors have slipped past me. Feel free to point any out so I can correct them.

This timeline goes over all the major events and plot points of the saga, from before Half-Life 1 to the end of Half-Life 2. The HL1 manual indicates that the Black Mesa incident occurred on May 5, 200-, implying by the "-" that the incident could take place during any year during the decade. For simplicity's sake, I assumed it happened in the year 2000 and went from there.

Basically, US postwar economic history falls into two parts: an era of high taxes on the rich and extensive regulation, during which living standards experienced extraordinary growth; and an era of low taxes on the rich and deregulation, during which living standards for most Americans rose fitfully at best.

Once again, it's NOT the battery at fault. The first thing to try before getting an iPod replacement battery is re-calibrating the meter. This will not magically produce a meter so accurate that you can tell at a glance the difference between two hours left and three hours left -- the system just isn't designed for that. But it may fix the early shutdown problem. To re-calibrate, run the iPod until it shuts down. Recharge fully, using the AC power (mains) adapter, not a USB or Firewire port (see below). Do not recharge until the iPod shuts down due to low battery again. This does not mean you have to leave it running for hours; use it normally, but hold off on any "top-off" small recharges.

let the dough rise overnight. It’s not a new idea. Anthony Mangieri redefined New York’s artisanal scene when he opened Una Pizza Napoletana in 2004 (now living in San Francisco, he will reopen his pizzeria there later this summer). He learned to let dough rise for 24 hours in Naples. Pizzeria Mozza in Los Angeles, Pizzeria Delfina in San Francisco and Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix all have overnight rises; at Lucali’s in Brooklyn, the dough rises for about 36 hours; and at Saraghina, also in Brooklyn, it goes for as long as 72 hours.

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) says it has found the biggest ever "suckers" list of potential targets for share fraudsters. The regulator is writing to more than 38,000 people whose names, addresses and telephone numbers are on the list. They are being warned that their details are still being passed around, so they could be contacted at any time. The information is bought and sold by "boiler rooms", teams of bogus dealers who try to sell worthless shares.

"Gunning not just for personal triumph for yourself but for durable achievement to be proud of for life is the difference between winning things and leadership. It is the difference between nationalism and patriotism. It is the difference between running for office and devoting yourself to public service. It's agreeing that you are part of something, taking as your baseline that you will not seek to reach your own goals by stepping on the neck of your community."

“Try not to obsess over implementation until you really understand the problem,”

3. Private Address Space The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) has reserved the following three blocks of the IP address space for private internets: 10.0.0.0 - 10.255.255.255 (10/8 prefix) 172.16.0.0 - 172.31.255.255 (172.16/12 prefix) 192.168.0.0 - 192.168.255.255 (192.168/16 prefix)

I wonder if I can do this to my Seagull?

A taxi driver who drove his vehicle after taking the drug ketamine received an 18-month jail sentence in the District Court on Thursday. Chan Hon-hoi, 29, had earlier pleaded guilty to two counts of driving under the influence of drugs and two counts of possession of dangerous drugs in the District Court.

HTML5 & CSS3 Readiness (dave: definitely read the stylesheet.)

The hope is that you should soon be able to carry around your first-generation iPhone or iPhone 3G running Android and use it just as normally as you would any other Android phone.

When the Central Bank discovered that the Ansbacher Bank was breaking the law by running a major tax evasion scam for the benefit of a small group of individuals (which included Charles Haughey, a longtime Irish prime minister noted both for his personal vindictiveness and his lavish lifestyle), it declined to discipline the bank for abusing its license, or indeed to inform the taxation authorities. This minimalist approach to oversight was later to wreak havoc, as the bank turned a deliberate blind eye to the problematic accounting practices of well-connected banks.

The point of terrorism is not to "destroy." It is to terrify. And for eight and a half years now, the dominant federal government response to terrorist threats and attacks has been to magnify their harm by increasing a mood of fear and intimidation. That is the real case against the ludicrous "orange threat level" announcements we hear every three minutes at the airport. It's not just that they're pointless, uninformative, and insulting to our collective intelligence; it's that their larger effect is to make people feel frightened rather than brave.

"Don't let the guy with the broom decide how many elephants are going to be in the parade." * - Merlin Mann