So what’s up with the little grey button at the bottom of this site? It is my official Invalidation Badge. It’s mere presence on every page of this site renders my entire domain XHTML 1.0 Non-Compliant. Invalid. Erroneous. Whatever you want to call it. Here are the various crimes this one line of code commits:
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By invalidating my entire site with this one line of code, I ensure that I am made aware the instant it matters. The instant this stuff starts to break anything in the real world, I will know. If I only had a few small errors on a few random pages around my site, I could easily miss the day when “the big switchover” happens and wind up with broken pages I don’t know about. And since this code is in the form of a server-side include, I can freely remove it with a few clicks.

It’s kind of like carrying a canary down a mine shaft with you. As long as the canary is alive and chirping, you know you’re okay for air. Actually, I guess it’s not really like that.

Clever.

Mike Davidson: March to Your Own Standard

Newsvine combines the best features of a number of companies and products like Digg and Google News with great features like chat and blogging-style comments. The result is a perfect news site (note that new competitors, like spotback (mentioned here) are aiming to overthrow Newsvine already, however).

The result is a really wonderful social news experience.

Memestreams sinks lower...

TechCrunch � Newsvine is Perfect

"If a healthy person murmurs to himself, he knows that he is hearing his own voice," Flanagan said. "Now imagine that the person has a deficit in the predictive mechanism. He murmurs and then suddenly hears murmuring but cannot label it as himself. As he tries to make sense of the alien voice, the explanation for it could be quite bizarre, such as thinking it is coming from a wall or the pavement."

He is not certain whether some schizophrenics can tickle themselves, but since their falsely alien sensations often are accompanied by feelings of fear and paranoia, it is likely that the experience would not be pleasurable.

Discovery Channel :: News :: Study Shows Why We Can't Tickle Ourselves

Unlike the record companies who go after their customers in court, I doubt the VC’s will sue the startups for not taking their money, but I wonder if they’ll actively try to fight the changes being brought on by lower startup costs, a limited set of exist strategies and lower overall ROI investments.

I’m CEO of a startup that’s about10 months old and about 6 or so months into development with a product that’s in beta and about to go 1.0. I’ve been talking to VC’s, but I haven’t been really pursuing it. We run cheap. Our monthly burn rate is 4 figures (yea.. four). Co-lo charges for our servers and enough to pay rent for some of our younger/less solvent guys is all it really takes to keep the doors open, at least for now.

The main reason we’re looking at potential VC money is because there are bunch of guys behind us who, with big cash infusions from VC’s, could leapfrog us.

We’re not sure we want VC money, but we’re reasonably sure we’re going to need it.

Why?

Because of the threat of VC money in other people’s (competitors) hands. Kinda circular isn’t it?

Fixing the VC Industry: An Industry Ready to be Disrupted at Disruptive Thoughts

I've yet to write the apparently obligatory 'Top 10' list for VCs or entrepreneurs. My one abortive attempt in that direction did yield a slogan that seems apropos here. Let's call it Tim's Tautology:

"If you can get venture capital, you'd better take it."

Like all slogans, it's oversimplified. It tries to capture one essential issue: If you're creating a business in a market that fits the VC model, one of your competitors will take the money. And use it against you.

Due Diligence: VC Disruption? Part Two.

1. What is the T-Mobile HotSpot Free Weekends promotion?

The Free Weekends promotion allows T-Mobile USA mobile phone customers the ability to access T-Mobile HotSpot Wi-Fi Internet service on the weekends for no charge. In order to participate in the Free Weekends promotion, T-Mobile phone customers must have an active post-paid or pre-paid voice or data account with SMS capabilities. This is a limited time promotion and provides participating customers with unlimited Wi-Fi access between 12 am EST Saturday to 3 am EST Monday at all U.S. T-Mobile HotSpot locations.

Fun! Not that I often end up at non-free WiFi locations... but sometimes. And I can imagine how to share the love...

Wireless Internet Access - T-Mobile HotSpots

Gladwell: This is actually a question I'm obsessed with: Why don't people work hard when it's in their best interest to do so? Why does Eddy Curry come to camp every year overweight?

The (short) answer is that it's really risky to work hard, because then if you fail you can no longer say that you failed because you didn't work hard. It's a form of self-protection. I swear that's why Mickelson has that almost absurdly calm demeanor. If he loses, he can always say: Well, I could have practiced more, and maybe next year I will and I'll win then. When Tiger loses, what does he tell himself? He worked as hard as he possibly could. He prepared like no one else in the game and he still lost. That has to be devastating, and dealing with that kind of conclusion takes a very special and rare kind of resilience. Most of the psychological research on this is focused on why some kids don't study for tests -- which is a much more serious version of the same problem. If you get drunk the night before an exam instead of studying and you fail, then the problem is that you got drunk. If you do study and you fail, the problem is that you're stupid -- and stupid, for a student, is a death sentence. The point is that it is far more psychologically dangerous and difficult to prepare for a task than not to prepare. People think that Tiger is tougher than Mickelson because he works harder. Wrong: Tiger is tougher than Mickelson and because of that he works harder.

To me, this is what Peyton Manning's problem is. He has the work habits and dedication and obsessiveness of Jordan and Tiger Woods. But he can't deal with the accompanying preparation anxiety. The Manning face is the look of someone who has just faced up to a sobering fact: I am in complete control of this offense. I prepare for games like no other quarterback in the NFL. I am in the best shape of my life. I have done everything I can to succeed -- and I'm losing. Ohmigod. I'm not that good. (Under the same circumstances, Ben Roethlisberger is thinking: maybe next time I stop after five beers). I don't know if I've ever felt sorrier for someone than I did for Manning at the end of that Pittsburgh playoff game.

ESPN.com: Page 2 : Curious Guy: Malcolm Gladwell

Marc Levinson explains why the shipping container, along with the microchip, should be considered one of the great inventions of the second half of the twentieth century.

Sounds like a great book; shipping containers have been a recent source of fascination for me, starting upon my visit to the Panama Canal. I kind of want an excuse to play with some, like build a second home.

800-CEO-READ Blog: Jack Covert Selects -- The Box

Okay so that's a wise-ass title, but it's from the heart. 37Signals impressed me with 43Things, and can claim a string of successes in RubyOnRails, BaseCamp, and Internet Marketing in general. Now they are spilling the beans on how they achieve rapid success in the market with an inspirational how-to-succeed-developing-software ebook.

37Signals reveals the Secrets of How and Why they disappoint me.. for $19.99 | Threadwatch.org

Below is an example of the Pad Thai recipe (pretty close) to the way it appears in the book. Look closely at the recipe, it reflects the way all the recipes in this book are written - short-hand instructions, grams and litres - the combination of the two could be enough to discourage some of you newbie cooks.

101 Cookbooks - Dylan Pad Thai