Brad De Long has written a brief look at the progress of Project Gutenberg. The piece nicely illustrates how dramatically the Internet has shifted expectations into high gear. De Long writes, Thus Project Gutenberg has inched ahead at a snail’s pace. In its 32nd year of existence, the collection has only 6,267 etexts. Only 6,267…
January, 2003
-
-
Aside from watching all of the experts pick the Raiders (did they learn nothing from the Giants/Ravens matchup a few years ago?), the best moment in the hours of pre-Super Bowl coverage had to be Warren Moon’s explanation on ESPN that he would have had several Super Bowl rings if he hadn’t had so many…
-
Tom’s Hardware has an in-depth look at the first standalone DivX player. This sucker plays DVDs, CDs, and CD-R/RWs & DVD-RWs encoded with DivX, MP3, or even JPEG images. The KiSS DP-450 is manufactured in Denmark and currently available in many European countries. No word yet on availability in the United States (and this will…
-
Freedom Force broke the superhero computer game jinx and is one of the best computer games I’ve ever played. But despite good reviews and relatively good sales, Irrational, the game’s developers, ended up partnering with Crave Entertainment which seemed primarily interested in a quick take-the-immediate-profits and run maneuver. Despite an excellent fan base, Crave even…
-
No, I haven’t given up on weblogging. I’ve just been working 70-80 hours a week ever since two positions in my area of responsibility were eliminated and those duties were shifted to lucky old me! I’ve been training a couple part-timers to take over most of that, but in the meantime I haven’t had much…
-
I just don’t understand the reaction to the Bush administration’s decision to oppose the University of Michigan’s “affirmative action” admissions program. When Trent Lott makes a statement approving of government-enforced racial discrimination, he was criticized for such backward views by pretty much everybody. But when George W. Bush comes out against government-enforced racial discrimination, Tom…
-
Imagine if an entire school system of 46,000 students decided to set aside one day and have a pro-life teach in. You know, invite people in to talk about how having an abortion stops a beating heart, show kids pictures of fetuses that don’t look all that different from newborns babies, and bring in a…
-
New Scientist has a report about two researchers who apparently have become the first to directly measure the speed of gravity. The measurement confirms Einstein’s contention that gravity traveled at the speed of light. The scientists used an interesting method to measure the speed of gravity, [Fomalont] Kopeikin found another way. He reworked the equations…
-
When it comes to exploiting top athletes, some high schools are no better than colleges. The nonsense over high school hoops sensation LeBron James’ expensive ride is a good example of that. The idea that James should be punished for capitalizing on his fame is ludicrous — after all, everybody else in Ohio is getting…
-
Via Boing! Boing! comes a link to the coolest toy I’ve seen this month — Cuboro (here’s another page that outlines what these do)! Stackable wooden cubes that have a grooved track for making elaborate marble tracks. Excellent. And, of course, way too expensive for my budget.