Here are some disparate items that have caught my eye of late:
- Does the Brain Like E-Books? [New York Times]
Is there a difference in the way the brain takes in or absorbs information when it is presented electronically versus on paper? Does the reading experience change, from retention to comprehension, depending on the medium?
- Living in a ghost town [Bangkok Post]
Thousands of civil servants had to move from Rangoon to Naypyidaw when General Than Shwe announced the transfer of the capital in 2005. Almost four years later, this soulless city still lacks the amenities that one would expect to find in a capital. And this is unlikely to change soon
- Asia Gets No Love [Wall Street Journal]
Why the Top Pros of Tennis Give the Region a Miss
- Got a #tip? Gawker Media opens tag pages to masses, expecting “chaos” [Nieman Journalism Lab]
Gawker Media is unveiling an innovative and unruly twist on traditional reader forums this morning. The new feature, part of an otherwise modest redesign across the company’s nine blogs, could transform tag pages, typically little more than archives of old posts, into commenter free-for-alls and transparent tip lines.
- Cutting edge [The Guardian]
Just what is it about adding blades that makes a razor better? Thomas Jones speaks to the scientists and technicians behind the latest five-bladed device and asks what next for the serious business of shaving
- Saturn at equinox [The Big Picture] ((Via Snarkmarket.))
Checking in with NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, our current emissary to Saturn, some 1.5 billion kilometers (932 million miles) distant from Earth, we find it recently gathering images of the Saturnian system at equinox. During the equinox, the sunlight casts long shadows across Saturn’s rings, highlighting previously known phenomena and revealing a few never-before seen images.
- How Peru is netting water supplies [BBC NEWS]
They look like huge abandoned volleyball nets facing west towards the Pacific Ocean on one of the many hillsides in the Peruvian capital, Lima.
They started as an experiment two years ago and now they are giving a lifeline to some of Lima’s poorest residents.
The Peruvian capital gets an average of just over 40mm (1.5 inches) of rainfall a year but what it does not get in showers, it makes up for in fog.
- ThereIFixedIt.com ((Thanks to WH for the tip!))
“Kludge – An ill-assorted collection of poorly matching parts, forming a distressing whole.”
-Jackson Granholm
Datamation Magazine February 1962There are as many sources for the word Kludge as there are jury-rigged mailboxes in the mobile home parks of America. Whether the source of the word is Gaelic, German, or Naval Acronym, we know them when we see them, and on this web site, we celebrate these iconic images of mankind’s eternal struggle to hammer square pegs into round holes (with duct tape.)