• Behind the Scenes at the Bay Bridge Construction Site – I saw the construction going on a few times last year, but from a distance while driving past. Interesting to see what they’re doing in more detail.
• Hand-wringing About American Culture – Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge? – “Not only are citizens ignorant about essential scientific, civic and cultural knowledge, she said, but they also don’t think it matters.” The article concentrates on the US but I don’t think it’s limited to North America.
• America – more hassle than it’s worth? – Next week they’ll announce that all travelers need to wear orange overalls, the next that all flights go straight to Guantanamo… and then they’ll announce that it’s all an elaborate joke and that they just wanted to see how far we’d go before complainin

This is not the first time that I’ve had plans to go to Denmark. It was a bright and sunny Saturday morning in June 2002. The previous day had been my last working in the Norwegian capital city and I had a week of sight-seeing planned. First I would head west, to the fjords around Bergen and then I’d head back, through Oslo into Sweden, down the coast and cross the Oresund Bridge into Denmark.

The desert is so vast, stretching off as far as the eye can see in every direction, that from a human scale it appears to be infinite. Which is fortunate as that is this weeks PhotoFriday theme. This image was taken in Wadi Rum, Jordan.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “What is that?” I’m entry number 299.

• eBayer invites buyers to rip him off – It does seem that eBay has become a victim of its own success. Having said that, some of the ways that they’re trying to tackle fraudulent users are clearly bonkers.
• Japan MPs moot halt to executions – Hopefully this will move from “moot” to law, and then from temporary to permanent.
• Designing What’s Right for Consumers – Is it really so hard to design consumer electronics? The manufacturers say it is. Everyone else seems to disagree.
• WordPress 2.3.3 – I’ve upgraded to the current version of WordPress. As ever, if you spot anything amiss please let me know!

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “What is that?” Here is my entry.

The caption when you hover your mouse over the picture might be a bit of a give-away, but it’s not entirely obvious what it’s a picture of, so I think it fits the theme. It was taken in Cuba.

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “Misty.” I’m entry 196 (–> Stephen <–).

• Afghan Student Sentenced to Death After Downloading Report – Good to see that the invasion of Afghanistan has resulted in more freedom for the locals…
• Forget passports – teachers and kids are the new ID card targets – Despite the loss of personal data and despite the fact that they will not (and cannot) do what the Government says they will, the ID Card scheme is still not completely dead.
• The True Cost of SMS Messages – “How come technology, communication, and infrastructure is getting cheaper while the costs of SMS messages are increasing exponentially? My theory: SMS messages are transfered over air made of solid gold.”

So Microsoft is trying to buy Yahoo. I’ll leave the detailed analysis to people better qualified than myself but I thought that I could add a little perspective simply by looking back and remembering something that happened less than ten years ago.

As you can no doubt guess from the title, the event that springs to my mind is the merger of HP and Compaq. The main problem with HPaq at the time was that merging HP’s loss-making PC business with Compaq’s loss-making PC business just wasn’t a good idea. Fiorina pushed the whole MBA line of thinking: being the biggest player will allow greater economies of scale, lower prices and more profit. Unfortunately, two big losses merged tends to make a big loss also, albeit perhaps smaller than the old combined total¹.

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “Misty.” Here is my entry.

This picture was taken in Norway, just outside Oslo near the huge, scary ski jump. This is maybe more foggy than misty but you get the idea. Also, while this was taken on black and white film, there really wasn’t much more colour than this!

Please also vote for my entry in last weeks challenge, “The Machine.” I’m entry number 207.

• Fifty years of LEGO – Best. Toy. Ever. And still going strong.
• Polish IT worker calculates exact speed of snail mail – Apparently snail mail is actually slower than a snail.
• For those who thought that the MacBook Air had no use… – It’s odd that Steve Jobs didn’t mention any of these uses though.

This weeks PhotoFriday theme is “The Machine.” Here is my entry.

Clearly this is a bulldozer, a machine. What makes this the machine is that it was used in the battle of Santa Clara by Che Guevara’s victorious soldiers. Obviously this picture was taken in Cuba.