I love sitting 6 inches from a window when I'm at my computer this year; it's almost like going...

I love sitting 6 inches from a window when I'm at my computer this year; it's almost like going outdoors without all the tedious hassle of being even momentarily out of link with the Internet. At the moment (1.30 in the morning... I'm working, honestly!) it's raining, and the ducks of Claycroft are frolicking on the lawn, quacking happily as they snap up worms coming up for air. No kind-hearted girls to save you this time, wormies! These birds are really early, and you know what that means.

And in case the thoughts of nature were making you think pleasant, peaceful thoughts, don't worry: the US Army now has laser cannons. Doesn't that make you feel safer?

I was mid-way through a mini backlog of links for this update, including a rant about how good Phoenix is, especially its useful feature of being able to drag-and-drop bookmarks into textboxes (like the one I'm using to type this update) and they turn into URLs. However, I then discovered another feature of Phoenix's bookmarks pane: the "open in tabs" feature, which opens every link in your root bookmarks folder at the same time. This being my messy bookmarks folder, that was a hell of a lot of tabs. Not so useful. But it didn't crash, even when it opened like 50 browser windows at the same time, which is impressive. So, a more abbreviated version of that backlog:

  • A bunch of quotes from Velvet Goldmine, which I still haven't seen.
  • A very interesting article on the ever-biased Register which compares Microsoft to IBM in their behaviour following an antitrust trial. Currently, Microsoft appears to be doing exactly what IBM did: acting as if it still controls the market, when mounting evidence suggests that it actually owns a large slice of a diminishing portion of the market, as PCs drop in price and mobile devices multiply.
  • For my very few readers on the Warwick University local network interested in lightning-fast, searchable file-sharing fun, I point you to Duefo. I of course in no way condone or recommend this practice, especially not for downloading high-quality DVD rips in half the time of Piazza. Because that would be irresponsible.
  • Nokia has come up with a line of new phones which are clever if a trifle garish at times.
  • A new Harry Potter movie and book are on the way. Great quote from JK on how Daniel Radcliffe (who plays Harry) has coped with the fame of the movie:
    'I thought we were going to find a child whose life we were going to ruin, but he's coped amazingly,'
  • Surreal story of the week: Victoria Beckham kidnap plot. I love the multiple "Spice Girl kidnap" headlines, despite the fact that she's supposed to have been a solo artist for like half a decade now, and the press-release quote, officially from Beckham: "The first role of a father and husband is to keep his family safe," which is too many syllables strung together to actually be something DB would say, in my opinion.
  • Now you can have a skateboard for your AIBO! Because how else but accessories can you can compete with other Aibo owners when you all own identical dogs?
  • Finally, for the moment, ShouldExist.Org fills the market gap left by the departure of Dilbert's lazy entrepreneur site by providing a place for people with good ideas but no drive to develop them to post their ideas, so that others can violate their intellectual property quickly and easily.