World War Three

In 1983, World War 3 almost happened and it fell down to one man from the former Soviet Union to stop it. He was the man in charge of pushing the button to start the Soviet's automated nuclear retaliation program, and on that faithful day say on his terminal that five nuclear warheads were headed towards Russia. He was able to hold off from starting the program and singlehandly prevented world War III.

Credit Card Signatures Prank Part 2

When people purchase something with their credit cards, merchants are supposed to verify that their signature matches the one on the card. Unsurprisingly most of the cashiers who are being paid minimum wage don't bother to do this and you can get away with drawing pictures on your credit card signature.

Gullible Is No Longer In The Dictionary

Snopes is a well known website on the Internet which debunks or confirms crazy rumors. They get email all the time from people wondering if certain things they hear are in fact true. Some emails from people to Snopes are incredulous; don't people have any common sense?

Duct Tape Wallet

Duct tape is geeky cool for reasons no one knows. Anyways, you can get lots of duct tape stuff and you can even build a 3M sanctioned duct tape wallet (3M is the maker of duct tape).

Some Superstars Are Better Than Others

The NBA is filled with me-first superstars, and coincidently these don't necessarily help teams win. At least that's what you would think. Of course, all it takes is a little study to see who in fact are the best players in the NBA based on how valuable they are for their team. Funny that Vince Carter would rate so high.

Return of the (not Big) Mac

It's been happening for awhile, but now it's very cool for geeks to get Macs. You wonder why Apple can get so popular with the hip and geeky crowd but have so much difficulty breaking into the mainstream. The iPod is a good push, but I think they'll need something else along with it.

Paul Shirley's Roadtrip Blog

Paul Shirley, a virtual unknown in the NBA has an official NBA blog where he goes behind the scenes and tells how it is for basketball players on a road trip. Aside from the fact that he makes millions in the NBA, it sounds like every other blog out there; half cynical, half an attempt at humor, and drab diary-like details.

Why Is Apple Successful?

Business Week posits that the reason Apple is so successful is because they care about design. Gee, really? I would never have thought that Apple cared about design. Anyways, they go on to say that Apple is also lucky because they control the software that uses their hardware (i.e. iTunes).

Google's Technology

From a consumer side, you hardly ever think about how Google works. It is infact a very complicated structure since it has to support a large number of queries around the world very quickly.

The Right Brain

It's great that a lot of people have decent math and science skills, but did you know that the workplace environment doesn't really need these skills but skills from the right brain? That is empathy, and other emotional skills. If you've spent your life building up logic skills in your left brain, well, you're screwed.

MPAA Finds a Criminal in Shanghai

The Wall Street Journal (hope the link lasts) tells a story of a criminal hiding out in a penthouse of a Shanghai building selling of all nefarious things, pirated DVDs. Yes the MPAA tracked him all the way to his humble home and are very proud of it.

Toilet Paper Algorithms

I would never have thought, or put much thought into toilet paper algorithms than this person has. I am just glad that there are janitors who refill the toilet paper dispensers (well aside from home where I am the janitor).

The New Ring Tone: Master Tones

Today, digial music is popular but the record industries are already eyeing ring tones as the next step in their monopoly. Why are ring tones so popular and how did they get that way? Have you heard about master tones? It's going to be a whole new world in a couple of years.

The Evolution of Batman Logos

Since 1940, Batman has seen changes to his logo to fit the social times and increase its coolness factor. Check out how the Batman logo has evolved.

AIDS Lowers Lifespan in Africa

There's an AIDS epidemic in Africa, and it has made a profound impact on the lifespan of Africans. The life span of an average South African has dropped by almost 20 years in the last 10 years!

Why Are Movie Prices All The Same?

When you goto a movie theatre, you don't expect to pay additional for popular movies like Star Wars or The Matrix. Did you ever why that is? Well there are several economical reasons why movies are priced the same.

Hooking Up To Music

While Apple stores have been popular for dating, iTunes has also been helping the music literate meet othe trendy music people. Here's anecdotal evidence of flirting thru iTunes.