Oh, sweet sweet negligence…
My Palm issues with the half screen persist. While the device works most of the time, the “big gob of Kleenex” solution seems to have motion issues, resulting in the need for an occasional spanking. Let me see if I can get this right: I have problems with my Palm that involves alternation between spanking and Kleenex, and I’m sometimes half blind. Archaeologists of the future, please take note: this site is indeed a cry for help.
I’ve made some forays into eBay for a replacement, but, what can I say, I’m cheap. I just can’t see myself paying more than I would pay for a new model for a “vintage” piece of electronics. This isn’t an Altair we’re talking about here. Anyway, my last two bids were easily beaten, and the surplus stores around here haven’t been any help. I’m doing some work upgrades soon, so maybe I’ll be able to swing a machine that can actually use USB. Who knows.
I’ve mentioned in the past that I work near a major convention centre, which means I get to see lots of policemen on days when some “controversial” group is meeting. Canada is big on freedom of expression, but we’re equally big on photographing you for our police files. Anyway, the barricades were up and the police were there, but the convention centre web site only listed two events. Based on that info, the police were either there to model for a workshop by some Eastern Canada news photographers, or they were there because of an Autism society, which seemed equally weird. It turns out they were there because of the AGM for the political party in power in this province, which I think is a ringing endorsement for re-election. Hint to convention centre people: if you’re trying to keep a “controversial” event low-key, it pretty much goes to hell if you install a huge police presence. Anyway, I never saw any protesters, which doesn’t mean that there weren’t any, but I’m glad my tax dollars are being so well used.
Speaking of civil disobedience, Microsoft was getting in to the graffiti game yesterday for the MSN 8 launch. Here in Toronto we just had some big stands with big butterflies hanging on them, but when I walked by last night the butterfly was gone. There were some pretty high winds, so it’s anybody’s guess if they were removed for profit, removed for safety, or removed by nature. Back to New York, here’s the relevant quote from the article:
“It’s illegal,” [Vanessa Gruen, director of special projects for the Municipal Art Society] said, “and they’re going to get a lot of publicity for it.”
That may have been the point. “It’s a tremendous opportunity,” [MS authorized PR goon] Ms. Lacter said, “for us to build brand awareness.”
Am I the only one who thinks that people (or corporations with the rights of people) shouldn’t be able to profit from illegal activities? It would be sweet if a judge could pass down some kind of sentence to address this. I’m not talking about money, I want my damned quid pro quo (whatever that is, it sounds cool when Anthony Hopkins says it). Billboards that say “Hi, we’re from Microsoft, and we suck ass. Sorry about the mess”, or something.
It’s not that I’m slamming Microsoft especially here. In fact, I ordered some books on their technology yesterday. Note to Heather Riesman, CEO of Indigo and Chapters: instead of spending all your time and money whining about how Amazon.ca shouldn’t be allowed to even be here to do to you what you’ve done to small booksellers across the country, why not, I don’t know, make your website actually work? In the time it took to look up one of the books I wanted on your site, I found three books on Amazon, signed up as a customer, dropped one book from the order, and hit the big submit button. Again, that’s all in the time it took for one search on your site. And that search was just for a keyword; it would be longer still to find the book I actually wanted. Incidentally, for those of you who’ve forgotten an earlier rant, Chapters is the only bookstore to throw me out twice in the same day. Some experiences shouldn’t be translated over to the online world.
So yeah, the books will be here next week and I’ll be on my way to learning about the wild world of .Net. Don’t get me wrong, I like open source and Mac stuff, but my company still uses NT 4.0, so if I can use any remotely recent technology for my job, yeah, I’m gonna go for the option that makes me stop clawing my eyes out.
And that’s a fraction of where I’ve been lately.