Three part message, not at all encoded in MIME.
Firstly, nice one to Michael Moore for wining an Oscar for best documentary. And I should say nice one. Apparently he made a funky scene when he accepted it, hopefully it will get to NZ news, if not I still have video of his post acceptance news interview. (located at previous link) If you have fat cable I suggest viewing it, as it is pretty cool. He gets a bit preachy near the end, but hey it was his time to speak whilst more than normal media attention was focused on him, so he can say what he likes. I would. (well probably not actually, I'm only in it for the money)
The New York Times has (and now slashdot has noticed) a funky funky funky article that everyone should read. Oh yeah, I used three funky, that is how funky this is. It is a good long article, but even if you can't be bothered reading the whole thing, try to read some of it.
Norris is demonstrating something called HyperSonic Sound (HSS). The aluminium plate is connected to a CD player and an odd amplifier -- actually, a very odd and very new amplifier -- that directs sound much as a laser beam directs light... the sound waves are actually made audible not at the surface of the metal plate but at the listener's ears... ''That's why it's so clear. Feels like it's inside your skull..."
This means that no one that isn't targeted by the device hears a thing, like a red laser dot, the beam is soundless (the laser is invisible) and can only be heard (seen) at the termination. This is super cool. And has any number of uses (see the end of the article for military munt you over uses). While I'm pretty excited by it, I must say I fear a) the voice of a coke machine telling me to buy coke every time I walk past the machine, and b) the voice, the voices, the voices in my head.
However many people seem to hear them already, so perhaps it is nothing to fear.
Competition!
What is Information?
I don't mean "it is knowledge, or ideas" etc, but rather what is it? Is it a concept, it seems to be more than that... Is it an idea, again it seems more concept than that, and yet not as solid as say an object, for surely information is not an object. So wtf is it? It is not a verb, or an adjective, but a noun, so what is something that is encompassed by information, and is nothing outside of that. What is it? It has characteristics, and yet doesn't exist in some ways.... MUH
Leading contender for now is "thing" which is really lame, and will stand out as such in my thesis when I talk about the characteristics of this thing information, and how it has several features unique to it amongst all other... err things?
Entries via comments, best entry gets the love and admiration of the people of me. And maybe a chocolate bar.
In other news, in a moment of grammatical indignation (Ben wasn't here, so I took it upon myself) I sent an email to the Pacific Liaison Officer suggesting that the word "night" should be spelt as such, rather than "nite." I'm no grammar master, in fact if at all possible I prefer to split my infinitives, and I seriously give "passive sentences" the big sticky finger, but when it comes time to be serious and or get paid to do something, I try significantly harder... She was found wanting by the "is this stupid" sub committee, and sentenced to be told. So I told her. Oh, she was advertising a "Pizza Nite"...
She replied, like so:
Thank you for your observation Luther,
I know how to spell 'night'......thank you very much!
I spelt 'night' as 'nite' to characterise a fun and social event.
It may not be grammatically correct in a formal sentence but it is used and spelt that way in special circumstances, such as this. Nite is accepted depending on the context and situation it is used in. I'm surprised you have never seen it used before.
I have seen it hundreds of times, even by advertising companies. The young seem to understand it.
Ah, right, sorry, my mistake. The young seem to understand it, and indeed, I'm well old. Silly me. Apparently it gets worse, she knows how to spell night correctly, but choose not to, so as to indicate something. I assumed she wished to indicate that she could not spell properly, but she claims it was actually to "characterise a fun and social event." And in honesty, I can see how spelling it nite does indeed carry out this purpose admirably. No I can't, I can't see that at all.
"It may not be grammatically correct in a formal sentence" It is not, not may not. (as adjudged by me if anyone is wondering about the technicalities of my claim) "Nite is accepted depending on the context and situation it is used in." While this may be true, I choose to assert that it was unacceptable give its use, context and situation.
She for some reasons suggests that I may not have seen night spelt this way, I'm not sure what led to this presumption. Presumably if I had not seen it I would be confused rather than annoyed.
I am well aware that nite is a variant on night, but I am also aware that it is the "can't spell" variant, and not appropriate in a university, unless used for the purpose of social comment, review, criticism or comedy and the such. It was not used as such, and therefore the Liaison Department receives a c-.
I wonder if I should set up an email section? Don't really get enough suitable emails to warrant one, but maybe it would provoke more?
PS. Chain Hoist City by the way appears to operational and trading away. Has yet to collapse under the weight of its name. I suggest stopping by and checking it out. It is fab, and of course it is an entire city devoted to your love and mine chain hoists!
Mmmm Heidi is winning with "Conceptual Object"
Posted by: Luther on March 25, 2003 11:21 AM