The MemeStreams bookmarklets now fully support Safari. You can select text in a window, hit the recommend bookmarklet, and that text will be quoted in your Meme!

In order for this to work you have to upgrade your bookmarklet. You'll find the latest bookmarklets by clicking on "help" in the navigation menu.

Now that I can actually use Safari with my website, I'm going to cut over to it for a while and see what I think. I hope the anti-aliasing doesn't give me headaches.

Now a short rant:

There is one correct way to implement text selections in JavaScript: document.getSelection. Thats how everyone does it. Thats the STANDARD. Everyone, that is, but Microsoft, who decided to implement a text selection object instead of a method. Very annoying. I have no idea why they did this; as far as I can tell there is no technical benefit. Then you've got Apple, who decided to make getSelection a method of windows instead of documents. So now there are three ways to do this.

I understand what Apple was thinking. By putting this under window you don't run into problems with frames.

Then again, I don't understand what Apple was thinking. Safari is not the only browser on the planet! I still have to support the other methods for other browers, I still have to do step through all the frames on a page, so you really haven't helped me at all. My code is more complex, not less complex. More importantly, almost nobody who uses this stuff knows how to make this work effectively. The result is that bloggers can't, and in general, don't use your browser.

In general, and in particular on the internet, being standards compliant is better then being more efficient. It doesn't matter how well your stuff works if no one can use it!

This bill would make it illegal to distribute p2p file trading software to a minor without obtaining parent's permission. Of course, the people who are writing this law can't figure out how to define p2p software, so they skip it by saying that another law has to be passed within a year that defines the term, but that the term ought to include software that allows a user to send and receive files. Then they go on to say:

enable the user of one such computer to designate files or data available for transmission to another such computer, but which definition excludes, to the extent otherwise included, software products legitimately marketed and distributed primarily for the operation of business of home networks, the networks of Internet access providers, or the Internet itself.

Obviously they are trying to say that NBT is ok but Kazaa is not. They are going to have a real hard time crafting that definition, if you ask me.

I wonder what happens if you pass a law that bans X, but doesn't define it. Then X is later found to be impossible to define?

P2P companies may face new scrutiny | CNET News.com

] Concerned that information about your file-sharing
] username may have been subpoenaed by the RIAA? Check here
] to see if your username is on one of the subpoenas filed
] with the D.C. District Court.

EFF: RIAA Subpoena Database

] "When Iraq broadcast photos of dead American soldiers,
] the U.S. considered that against human rights," Jordanian
] political analyst Sahar al-Qassem said. "So, why are they
] violating that now by showing such inhumane pictures?"

I strongly agree with this position. Although I am sympathetic to the position that hiding the public from the realities of war has as much to do with desensitizing them as it does with respecting the families of the dead, if we are to take the position that it is morally inappropriate to show pictures like this, and we absolutely have taken this position, then to turn around and do so is an abomination. We are obviously violating our own moral platitudes. I am extremely disappointed.

Don't be fooled by explanations that there are "strategic" reasons for this; that people in Iraq need evidence that the "tyrants have been deposed." The Iraqi military had "strategic" reasons for showing the pictures that they showed: that people in Iraq need evidence that American soldiers can be defeated. The POINT of a moral platitude is that it overshadows strategic interests.

If they wanted to prove that these men were dead they could have found another way. Publish the dental xrays. It would be just as open to scepticism as these pictures have been.

Yesterday, if speaking honestly, I'd have told you I was on the fence about the administration. I don't like the way they've been going about things, but I understand the strategy, and it does appear to be working, and you have to give them credit for that.

However, this kind of blatent moral hyprocracy is beyond the pale. If you don't stand behind your own moral platitudes, then what IS it that separates you from the terrorists? Nothing at all.

I'm going to vote for the most promising opposing candidate in the election.

U.S. violates is own moral platitude

] When I mentioned in last week's column that I would this
] week be writing about a legal way to do a successful
] music downloading business -- a business that would
] threaten the Recording Industry Association of America
] and its hegemony -- dozens of readers wrote to me trying
] to predict what I would write. Some readers came at the
] problem from a purely technical perspective, ignoring the
] fact that the real issues here aren't technical but
] legal. Some readers took a legal approach, but they
] tended to ignore the business model. Some were looking
] solely for the business model. Interestingly, nobody
] even came close to my idea, which makes me either a total
] loon or a diabolical genius. Truth be told, I'm probably
] more of a diabolical loon.
]
]
] The reason I am even writing this column is two-fold.
] The biggest reason is simply because I would like people
] to consider lateral solutions to problems. I am pushing
] the concept of problem solving in a new way. There is no
] particular methodology here, just the underlying concept
] that if things aren't working the way you like, think of
] something different. Too often, people restrict their
] thinking or they somehow expect the world to change just
] for them, which it won't. But taking a lateral approach
] often yields interesting results. And once you've found
] an approach, maybe it can be applied to a different
] problem. What I am abo

Cringely's crazy idea

] In reviewing your question, and many that follow, it
] appears that some Slashdot readers feel that the
] Department of Justice only protects the IP rights of big
] corporations. That simply isn t the case. There is no
] doubt that large multi-national corporations are often
] victimized by piracy due in some measure to the
] popularity and pervasiveness of their products. But at
] the same time, there are also many others who are
] victimized, such as small mom and pop operations, and
] young developers trying to break into a crowded and
] competitive market.

Very interesting...

Slashdot | Questions for DoJ IP Attorneys Asked and Answered

A really good nanotech blog from the guy who does this stuff for forbes. Just click it.

Forbes Wolfe

] "MIT recently received a subpoena from the Recording
] Industry Association of America that was issued under the
] terms of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The
] subpoena requests the name and address of the individual
] whose computer was, according to the RIAA, sending out
] copyrighted songs on the Internet.
]
] "A different federal law, the Family Education Rights and
] Privacy Act, prohibits colleges and universities from
] disclosing information about students except in certain
] situations.

MIT responds to RIAA subpoena

] MADRID, Spain, July 22 %u2014 For a glimpse of
] Europe%u2019s young generation on the move and the future
] of the borderless continent, head to the late-partying
] Spanish capital, drink a strong shot of coffee and try to
] keep up with Stina Lunden, a 25-year-old Swedish
] transplant.

A generation on the move in Europe

] "You can get crackerjack Java programmers in India right
] out of college for $5,000 a year versus $60,000 here,"
] said Stephanie Moore, vice president for outsourcing at
] Forrester Research. "The technology is such, why be in
] New York City when you can be 9,000 miles away with far
] less expense?"

This is a better article then the one I previous recommended, simply because the comments are, well, raw and uncut, and often quite arrogant. My favorite:

] "It's not about one shore or another shore," an I.B.M.
] spokeswoman, Kendra R. Collins, said. "It's about investing
] around the world, including the United States, to build
] capability and deliver value as defined by our customers."

Um, yes Kendra, we understand your motives. We're not dumb. However, Its ABOUT the macroeconomic impact of your strategy, something you ought to be thinking about. For example, drinking bottles of lye is a bad idea even IF you are helping your customers dispose of the lye, and therefore delivering value as they define it.

The last time I posted on this, Jeremy responded as follows:

] ] "He won't be able to have a career designing and building
] ] stuff because all those jobs have moved to India."
]
] So move to India already.
]
] Seriously, choosing one 'thing' and doing it repeatedly
] for decades on end. What's the term I'm looking for ...?
]
] Industrial age! That's it!
]
] Actually, that approach still applies, as long as your
] 'thing' happens to be learning.

Oh, if only things were so simple. There are several problems:

First: After studying computer engineering for 5 years at Georgia Tech, I'm honestly quite dismayed that my degree appears to have been useful for about 2 years after graduation. It is now extremely difficult to get good jobs in my chosen profession, and it looks as if that situation may never improve.

I might be exaggerating. 400,000 jobs overseas is far less then the margin between the estimated future growth in the need for computer professionals and estimated growth in the availability of computer professionals. However, I don't think the estimates that people still seem to be operating on take in to account the events of the last few years. I've seen people looking at the supply in horror (college admissions for said professions are way down), but not really adjusting their demand estimates. Basically, it remains to be seen.

Retrain? Should I go back to school for 5 more years, so that I can practice biology for another 2? Surely if people india can do CS they can do biology.

There are more problems...

The HR industry is set up to hire people who have degrees in particular professional fields. Our educational systems and dominate ideas about corporate management are simply not set up to support people engaged in continuous learning. So it may be extremely diff... [ Read More (0.2k in body) ]

I.B.M. Explores Shift of White-Collar Jobs Overseas