Tag Archives: comic relief

Finnish squirrel steals Kinder eggs

Posted on by
Reply

I found this Reuters story quite unbelievable, until I saw it with my own eyes. It seems the Kinder egg stealing squirrel from Jyväskylä has a cousin in Espoo:

Squirrel steals Kinder eggs, by Late, egg by Gargaj: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:KinderEgg.jpg CC BY-SA 2.5

Funny how all these stories have a picture of a Eastern Grey Squirrel although the most common squirrel in Finland is the Red Squirrel. Perhaps the grey squirrel most resembles a global stereotype of a squirrel and is therefore better for a news story. Who cares what color squirrels are in Finland anyway?!?

In more disturbing wildlife news, a camel kills wild ass at Helsinki Zoo. Tempting, but I’m not going to photoshop that chain of events.

Microsoft spend $3.7 billion in China

Posted on by
Reply

Pirate. Public Domain.Amount of money Microsoft has committed to spending on technology and investment in China over the next 5 years: $3.7 billion

Height of the largest Windows Vista ad bought by Microsoft, projected on the side of the Jin Mao tower in Shanghai: 421 meters

Price for a basic, legal copy of Microsoft Vista in China: $295

Price of a pirated copy of Microsoft Vista on the street in China: $1.30 to $4.00

244 genuine copies of Microsoft Vista sold in China in the first two weeks after its launch: PRICELESS!

Source: FP Passport

Überhyperlinking

Posted on by
1

PageRank, An art draw drawn by Felipe Micaroni Lalli

I’ve written about hyperlinks before. I have argued that it is absolutely ludicrous that some websites want to prevent you from deep linking to content on their websites, or mandate special conditions for hyperlinking. I sent dozens of requests to such sites asking for permission to link to their sites. I was honored, but more than slightly amused, when I received a formal permission to link to the website of the government of Australia. Here it is again, a friggin government approved link!

Only one request was explicitly denied, the others never replied to my requests.

According to Tim Berners-Lee, on the web, to make reference without making a link is possible “but ineffective – like speaking but with a paper bag over your head.“

Linking is not only our fundamental right, it’s our duty. Not linking to relevant sources causes extreme frustration in most readers. I find it incredible that most online newspapers don’t link to external sites at all. Some, like engadget.com, even have a perverse habit of linking only to their own stories, whereas bloggers usually utilize a sane habit of linking.

I stumbled upon this article by John C. Dvorak. He argues (and quite rightly so) that overlinking is probably better than null-linking. He also discusses the concept of dimensional linking – the idea of different levels of links that can be turned on or off with the browser.

This would be a great idea for many sites, but no doubt difficult to implement without making it overly complex. Imagine a blog, where you could hide all unnecessary links with just one click, leaving only the really important links visible. Now wouldn’t that be awesome!