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niet geschoten altijd mis

Coffee has two virutes; it is wet and it is warm.

Rest in peace, my grandfather. This cup’s for you.

I’m a huge fan of Firefox extensions; it’s high on the list of reasons to never stop using the browser. But there’s always a downside, and my paranoid side has found it.

I love the Greasemonkey extension; try it and you’ll find so many uses you’ll wonder how you can write your own. Greasemonkey has one weakness, however; it runs on Javascript.

After installing the NoScript extension, which blocks all Javascript on a page, I found this weakness. You can’t run Greasemonkey scripts on pages that you don’t allow Javascript to run on. I noticed it when I went to BoingBoing’s home page. There’s a Greasemonkey script that strips out all the non-content on BoingBoing. NoScript blocks it.

If there were a way to allow Greasemonkey scripts, that would be ideal. However, that requires two independent developers to collaborate and continue to work together as features change or are added, a likelihood that’s pretty low.

I’ll be getting rid of NoScript; it was an experiment anyway. It’s just disappointing to see good ideas step on each other.

Title says it all.

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In the continuing assault on your rights, SCOTUS ruled today that local governments can seize private land (read: your home) for private development.

I love this little tidbit.

Local officials, not federal judges, know best in deciding whether a development project will benefit the community, justices said.

The test was whether city officials know better than federal judges? What about community members? Where’s the input of the community?

This decision is just begging for abuse and puts the jack boot of self-serving local governments on the throat of anyone they deem a problem. Don’t like that a-hole who is causing an increase in calls from his neighbors for doing really annoying, but completely legal, activities (like having a workshop)? Just seize his land and put up anything else. Problem solved.

Or, in this case, when businesses throw enough money at a city government, they can tear down any neighborhood they want. I’m sure no money made its way into the city council members’ pockets in this case.

What a sick, shameful decision.

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This is an interesting dilemma. If I subscribed to the a magazine with an ethics column, I’d suggest this as a topic.

Joe Welinske (who, in full disclosure, I am not a big fan), has started a Yahoo! Group called Reform STC. The group is a place where STC members past and present can discuss how STC should reform itself to appeal to people better. Joe, as a member of STC, has an interest in seeing STC continue to succeed. STC is hemorrhaging members faster than the Titanic and they certainly could use the reform. In this light, I applaud Joe for giving a central location for people to come together for meaningful discussion (hopefully) about an organization many feel very passionately about. I was to be a President of one of their chapter less than a year ago, and now I’m no longer a member. Net effect to my career? Zero. Obviously, a discussion needs to happen.

However, there’s a little wrinkle. Joe is President of WritersUA, who’s highest profile income generators are their conferences. Given that the technical writing community is fairly small in number, and most writers don’t have funds they can use indiscriminately to attend any and all conferences they want, Joe has a vested interest in seeing STC falter or lessen, if not fail, in order for more people to attend his conference. The shadow of a conflict of interest starts to creep into the picture.

No one seems to have raised this on the list, and I’m loath to do it for nothing other than the flame war it would start on the list. But I know a few of you reading are STC members. What do you think?

Is Firefox the greatest browser or what? The extensions are the best part of the browser, making it a real tool, and an ever-adpatable one at that.

Take this extension for instance, ScrapBook. Highlight a section of a page, right-click and save the clipping locally. Never loose that snipet of information or the source. Very cool tool.

[via Lifehacker]

Despite my penchant for bad music, I do occasionally listen to good music and consider myself appreciative of music I may not listen to all the time. So, it’s always a good laugh when some magazine/newspaper/webzine/blog comes out with their Top $QUANTITY Albums of the Last $TIMESPAN.

Toady’s entry is SPIN magazine, who I thought had been relegated to the test grounds for the improvement of bird-poop targeting systems years ago. Apparently, I was wrong, and they managed to turn the tables on their would-be bombers by foisting this turd onto the world.

Their top album of the last 20 years? “OK Computer“, Radiohead. Uh, yeah.

Don’t get me wrong. I think some of Radiohead’s songs are really good; in fact, if SPIN had to choose a Radiohead album, I would have gone with The Bends. But that’s just me.

But the article also mentions that the top grouping consisted of the aforementioned OK Computer, as well as Nirvana‘s “Nervermind” and Public Enemy‘s “It Takes A Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.” Where the hell did that last one come from? Public Enemy compared to Radiohead? Come on. Thom York and co. may have inspired a thousands knock-offs (and thanks for that, by the way), but Public Enemy was on the very visible, very influential spearhead of a new and different form of music. It hardly compares to a band that has tweaked the standard rock/indie format into something slightly more profitable than their predecessors.

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Some days, I really, really want to hate someone over this.

If you use your debit card at a pump that does not require a PIN, the station regularly will block out an amount — often $50 or $75 — on your card.

From the great minds that brought you “Anyone who listens to music is stealing” and “If we Encrypt It, They Will Come”, comes the latest and greatest hit, “Every Fill Up Could Be a Drive away.”

I know they’re doing it, so it must have legal footing, but how in the world can this be legal? When the hell did this country go from “Innocent until Guilty” to “You’re a Filthy Theif, Consumer”?

Must be Monday… I always hated Mondays.

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So, J– and I are moving to Chelsea in a few weeks, depending on the affordability of certain moving companies or the availability of anyone we can scam of kind family members to help us.

In doing so, I hope to focus more on my new adopted hometown. Since I don’t have an original thought in my bones right now, I started a blog called (again, creatively) Chelsea Blog.

I’ve also been poking around looking for other people who blog about Chelsea, and found a link to the city manager’s blog, The Chelsea Report (damn, now that’s a much better title!). Mike Steklac has been blogging in Chelsea for a couple months, but he’s also in the city government, a very cool aspect to his posts. I notice no one in the Ann Arbor government blogs. Hmm.

Anyway, the focus of Chelsea Blog will be on local happenings in the Chelsea area and my impressions of living there. I may cross some of my experiences with Ann Arbor (as I still work here and have to come into Ann Arbor for some stores), but mostly, I want to cast Chelsea in as good a light as I can, unless the situation warrants some negative press. I hope you’ll check out Chelsea Blog as I start to ramp up the posting there.

Someone (warped23) posting on this story on Slashdot left a killer comment. The poster will probably get modded down since this thread has turned into a “my distro is better than your distro” and fact-checking free-for-all, but it sums up nicely what Linux maniacs are unwilling to acknowledge: Linux, to the average user, in inaccessible.

Hi folks, you say you want a new Linux car? Step right into our training room where we will go through our special course “How to buy and configure your new Linux car 101”, and we will have you out and ready to actually select and buy your new car in just a matter of hours! What? You think you want to purchase that Dodge Caravan at the dealer down the street? Hell no! You don’t want that!! Why, don’t you realize that our Linux vans can be configured with no less than 23 different kinds of seats? We will even give you a map to show you the way to the 23 different aftermarket Linux car parts shops that sell them! OK, enough talk of other inferior cars! Come on in, take a seat, get comfortable. Let’s go through the overview of what we will cover in the course..let’s see..frames..yep, we will go through the 12 different kinds of frames and what associated parts and components you can actually buy in install on each. Engines.. great module .. we go over the 9 different engines you can buy, and also the many differrent carberator, cooling, and air conditioning systems available for each engine option, just terrific stuff.. what? yes, questions? Oh, you say you’ve really no mechanic experience? Well, don’t worry! We provide a full set of Snap-On tools (of course, you could also choose Craftsman or one of our other 3 brands) and even let you borrow a car lift to make installation a breeze! Does that answer your question? Great! Now on to the next module, Suspension and Tire options…we’d better hurry if we are going to make it to the interior seating module by the end of day…can I get you folks some coffee?…hey! Where are you going?!? Come back! Don’t buy that Dodge, they only have 3 models..come on, they don’t give you the 38 differrent kinds of headlights that you can put into OUR babys! THEY EVEN FORCE YOU TO TAKE DELIVERY WITH THE STEREO SYSTEM ALREADY INSTALLED!! HEY, COME BACK!!!……

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Linux will never be a major player on the desktop until someone can bend the will of a lot of people to create a simple, easy to understand, user-friendly version of Linux that even my brother can learn to install and use.

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