23 Apr 2006
RFID 'Til the Cows Come Home

A tech magazine joins the drumbeat against this stupidity. Note that the USDA officials quoted keep changing the parameters of the plan: USA Today reported

that the government will not include the age of animals, despite the key role age has played in mad cow disease investigations. So what's the point of this whole exercise? Somebody's lying somewhere - and unless we find out who and where small livestock operations will permanently disappear from the American agricultural landscape when this insanity is finally mandated.

Critics lambast plan to tag most U.S. farm animals by 2008 as a giant boondoggle for the tech industry. Audrey Hudson reports from Washington, D.C.

(link) [Wired News: Top Stories]

23:00 /Agriculture | 0 comments | permanent link

Advertiser Counts on Sheep to Pull Eyes Over the Wool

Sheep Advertising

Living as we do along a rather heavily travelled highway may have advantages I'd never considered. This advertiser wants motorists to count sheep! And as the article points out, they create such a buzz that many drivers make ewe-turns...

The latest low-technology billboards along highways in the Netherlands are walking, woolly flocks of bleating sheep.

(link) [NYT > Home Page]

23:00 /Agriculture | 0 comments | permanent link

Say what? A look back at McNealy zingers

Today marks the true end of the Internet Bubble. Sun may soon join Commodore, Compaq and Apollo on the ash heap of computing history, but McNeely will be always be remembered for barbs like these. My favorite: "Open source is free like a puppy is free."

The list of "McNealy-isms" is legendary within the tech industry. Here's a sampling of his jabs.

(link) [CNET News.com]

23:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

How Lara Croft Steals Hearts

What an interesting idea ...

Conventional wisdom says Tomb Raider is a smash success because its cynical blend of prurience and violence plays perfectly to the base instincts of teenage boys. But the reasons for its success may be a whole lot stranger. Commentary by Clive Thompson.

(link) [Wired News: Top Stories]

23:00 /Technology | 0 comments | permanent link

Bush's approval rating hits new low

In downtown Lebanon, at the intersection of state roads 32 and 39, stands Boone's Pub. It's the oldest local watering hole by a long shot. In the thirty odd years I've been passing it by on an almost daily basis, I've never seen a national political sentiment posted on the lighted sign in it's window, although it will sometimes comment on local politics. Today, however, that sign reads: "Hey W - your ship is sinking!"

It has certainly been quite the buzz around town - I think the last time Boone County failed to support the Republican Party in a national election was before the Republican Party was founded in 1856. That record may fall after 150 years, mostly due to the war in Iraq and the shenanigans of Mitch Daniels (our carpetbagging Guv, formerly Bush's director of the OMB).

Are we ready for a Democratic Congress this fall? Unless things change dramatically between now and November, we'd best be getting ready...

Reuters - President George W. Bush's public approval rating has fallen to 32 percent, a new low for his presidency, a CNN poll showed on Monday.

(link) [Yahoo! News: Top Stories]

23:00 /Politics | 2 comments | permanent link