This N&O article says that college kids these days are more optimistic, selfless and tolerant than ever before. Sounds like they’re sheep to me. There’s “Generation X,” and after that comes “Generation Rx:” kids too doped up on happy pills to notice the cracks in the thing we call a country.

I’m hoping they’re not too blind to put that optimism and selflessness to good use. In other words, I hope they’re not as jaded and cynical as I am. If you can’t be good, be a bad example. 🙂

I just finished ordering a Voice over IP phone from Packet8. They have a residential deal that provides all the custom calling features that Bellsouth charges an arm and a leg for, but with Packet8, you get everything for $20. A VoIP phone works over your DSL or cable modem connection and plugs right into your regular telephone.

Callers to your VoIP phone never know their call is going over the Internet. In fact, you can take it with you on trips. Wherever you have a broadband connection, you can receive your phone calls.

Now that I’ve ordered my phone (risk free, thankfully), I found this in the Triangle Business Journal which talks states are considering regulating VoIP companies as telephone companies. I don’t think VoIP companies should be considered telephone companies. They have not strung any cable, are not benefitting from the public right-of-way, nor are they guaranteed a profit from cushy tariffs. It’s just a ploy from the scared-shitless local phone companies to stave off their inevitable deaths.

Time Warner Cable is also planning to offer VoIP services, according to the article. Unlike other VoIP firms, TWC actually did file as a phone company. That’s probably because they DO benefit from public rights of way. Whatever you think of the cable company, having more phone competition can only be a good thing.

During my recent trip to Birmingham, I was talking with someone about the funny slang that doctors use to describe patients. Fark linked to just such a story today.

A patient who is “giving the O-sign” is very sick, lying with his mouth open. This is followed by the “Q-sign” — when the tongue hangs out of the mouth — when the patient becomes terminal.

General practitioners may use LOBNH (“Lights On But Nobody Home”) or the impressively bogus Oligoneuronal to mean someone who is thick.

But they also have a somewhat poetic option: “Pumpkin positive”, referring to the idea that the person’s brain is so tiny that a penlight shone into his mouth will make his empty head gleam like a Halloween pumpkin.

Here’s another story on Dr. Fox from the Beeb and one from Ananova. A horribly-formatted page of slang terms is here.

Researchers have made progress in discovering why songs get stuck in your head:

Research has helped define, but not explain, the experience. A recent study by the University of Cincinnati looked at the affliction, which the author, James Kellaris, calls earworms from the German word ohrwurm. The ear part is obvious, but the worm part isn’t incidental. Kellaris, a consumer psychologist, says it conveys the parasitic nature of the travel of songs into their listeners’ ears, only to then get lodged and played on mental continuum.

He found that some 98 per cent of listeners will at one time or another be bothered by a tune that won’t leave their heads. The study also found some common offenders, including the Kit-Kat jingle (“Gimme a break”), “Who Let the Dogs Out,” Queen’s “We Will Rock You,” the “Mission: Impossible” theme, “YMCA,” “Whoomp, There It Is,” “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” and “It’s A Small World After All.”

The study also showed that musicians and those with compulsive tendencies are the most afflicted. The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive, though the act of repetition — in popular songs on the radio and on the rehearsal floor for musicians — plays a role.

Bonus! The article quotes Neil Diamond as being a victim of this effect:

“If I wasn’t in the business of songwriting, I’d probably be seeing a doctor,” Diamond said. “I’ve tried everything from cold showers to listening to other people’s music, but nothing helps.”

I guarantee you that one of these songs listed above is already lodged in your head. If I could charge rent to song and jingle writers for every song taking up brain cells in my head, I could retire early!

A comment on Slashdot hit the nail on the head for a product/service I want to create:

Where *are* all the wonderful ‘independent’ movies and documentaries and such on the Internet these days? Back in the early 90’s, we predicted there’d be simply scads of new and entertaining film content available on the ‘net for perusal, but it seems like its either ‘movieflix’ or sites like silversow.com and demandmedia.net, none of which truly satisfies my urge to surf/download and watch good quality film media I got from the Internet.

Technology is coming together to allow for content distribution entirely via the Internet. Think of it as “Tivo over Ethernet.” It will be the next wave of media, and I hope to to position my surfboard on the sweet spot of this wave and have the ride of my life.

The tools are there. The demand is building. It’s only a matter of time.

I just looked out my window to the office parking lot and counted at least three dragonflies perched on the radio antennas of the cars parked there. Almost every day, I’ll walk out to my car to find a dragonfly attempting to mate with my car’s radio antenna. While they usually fly away when I walk up, I HAVE considered what would happen if I cranked out 60 watts of RF while they’re sitting there. 🙂

I wonder what the attraction is…

An article in the Independent suggests clouds may be public transportation for viruses and bacteria.

Makes sense to me. I’ve often wondered the same thing.

There is, they say, growing evidence that bacteria, fungal spores and viruses may spend large amounts of time – even their entire lives – in the air, riding clouds across the planet. And they don’t just inhabit the clouds – they may also be creating them. Certainly, many of the clouds’ newly discovered inhabitants are exquisitely designed to create the maximum number of ice crystals, the basic building-blocks of clouds. Some Darwinian biologists even argue that the bugs may have evolved for that very job.

I’ve put some pictures up from N.C. State’s Open Pratice from last Sunday. This is one roll of at least two that I took. More will be on the way soon, and the URL will change once I settle on a new gallery script.

For now, you can see the pictures here.

I used to think Michael Powell was doing a fine thing by shaking up the moribund Federal Communications Commission. Now I think he’s just a tool for the monopolistic telecommunications companies intent on owning all the media.

Powell was instrumental in the FCC’s controversial decision to relax media ownership rules (like we need more monopolies), and did this in spite of the vocal opposition of many people from all political persuasions. Seeing how the voice of the little guy was getting drowned by the flood of dollars pouring in from the big networks, Congress took matters into its own hands, drawing up legislation to repeal any FCC rulings relaxing ownership rules. This legislation has a good chance of passing both houses and heading to the President, who may have a hard time vetoing it.

Now that Powell sees the forces lining up against him, he has suddenly got religion and now wants to explore localism. This is the same guy who said “we don’t need local forums” when the other commissioners sought public input on the ownership rules. Only when Powell is about to have his ass handed to him by Congress does he get a clue.

I’m hoping this whole incident raises public awareness about how our airwaves are being mismanaged.

Find out how to make your voice heard by heading over to the Center for Digital Democracy.