he suburban dream began, arguably, at the New York World’s Fair of 1939 and ’40. “Highways and Horizons,” better known as “Futurama,” was overwhelmingly the fair’s most popular exhibit; perhaps 10 percent of the American population saw it. At the heart of the exhibit was a scale model, covering an area about the size of a football field, that showed what American cities and towns might look like in 1960. Visitors watched matchbox-sized cars zip down wide highways. Gone were the crowded tenements of the time; 1960s Americans would live in stand-alone houses with spacious yards and attached garages. The exhibit would not impress us today, but at the time, it inspired wonder. E. B. White wrote in Harper’s, “A ride on the Futurama … induces approximately the same emotional response as a trip through the Cathedral of St. John the Divine … I didn’t want to wake up.”

The suburban transformation that began in 1946, as GIs returned home, took almost half a century to complete, as first people, then retail, then jobs moved out of cities and into new subdivisions, malls, and office parks. As families decamped for the suburbs, they left behind out-of-fashion real estate, a poorer residential base, and rising crime. Once-thriving central-city retail districts were killed off by the combination of regional suburban malls and the 1960s riots. By the end of the 1970s, people seeking safety and good schools generally had little alternative but to move to the suburbs. In 1981, Escape From New York, starring Kurt Russell, depicted a near future in which Manhattan had been abandoned, fenced off, and turned into an unsupervised penitentiary.

The Next Slum?

This is how most Americans (perhaps 10% saw the ride) were introduced to their great white flight to suburbia.

Futurama - 1939 New York World's Fair

So for those who are not sure what to believe, here is our round-up of the 26 most common climate myths and misconceptions.

Climate change: A guide for the perplexed - earth - 16 May 2007 - New Scientist Environment

Camel POOP

Most people are not aware of the fact that Perl has support for object-oriented programming. If you've used another object-oriented programming language such as Java or C or been exposed to object-orientation, then object oriented programming in Perl is nothing like that. To do real useful object-oriented programming in Perl, you only need to use three simple rules as put forth by Larry Wall in Object Oriented Perl.

CodeProject: Perl Object Oriented Programming. Free source code and programming help

Perl Design Patterns

or, Chicken Bones for the Voodoo Programmer Soul

Perl Design Patterns is a free on-line book and forum. For information about this project and links to download the entire book, see Home Page. Downloading is highly recommended unless you're contributing to the project. Wget users - fetch TinyCGI:download.cgi or TinyCGI:perldesignpatterns.zip instead, and see Home Page for more info. Novices, intermediate programmers: "Object Nuts and Bolts" is for you. Scroll down.

Perl Design Patterns at Perl Design Patterns Wiki

Is Your Neighborhood Making You Fat?

By Freakonomics
Parkside MarketParkside Market in Astoria, New York.

The neighborhood grocery store is becoming an endangered species in many parts of the country, from New York to Seattle. Now, U.C.L.A. researchers have uncovered a link between the grocery gap and rising obesity, the Los Angeles Times reports.

The study found that neighborhoods with dramatically more fast-food restaurants and convenience stores than supermarkets also have significantly elevated rates of obesity and diabetes.

The relationship holds true across demographic lines and income levels.

But what’s driving grocery stores to close their doors?

Is Your Neighborhood Making You Fat? - Freakonomics - Opinion - New York Times Blog

use IO::All;

# Let the madness begin...
# Some of the many ways to read a whole file into a scalar
io('file.txt') > $contents;

# Overloaded "arrow"
$contents < io 'file.txt';

# Flipped but same operation
$io = io 'file.txt';

# Create a new IO::All object
$contents = $$io;

# Overloaded scalar dereference $contents =
$io->all;

# A method to read everything
$contents = $io->slurp;

# Another method for that
$contents = join '', $io->getlines;

# Join the separate lines
$contents = join '', map "$_\n", @$io;

# Same. Overloaded array deref
$io->tie;

# Tie the object as a handle
$contents = join '', <$io>;

# And use it in builtins # and the list goes on ...

Super neat lib.

IO::All - IO::All of it to Graham and Damian! - search.cpan.org

What is Jungle Disk?

Jungle Disk is an application that lets you store files and backup data securely to Amazon.com's S3 ™ Storage Service.

* Store an unlimited amount of data for only 15¢ per gigabyte
* No monthly subscription fee, no startup fee, no commitment
* Your data is fully encrypted at all times
* Data is stored at multiple Amazon.com datacenters around the country for high availability
* Access files directly from Windows Explorer, Mac OSX Finder, and Linux
* Automatically backup your important files quickly and easily

Unlike other services, with Amazon S3 ™ there is no minimum and no maximum amount of data you can store. You pay only for the actual amount of storage you are using.
Compare example Amazon S3 ™ pricing with other online storage services:

JungleDisk - Reliable online storage powered by Amazon S3 ™ - Jungle Disk

Each month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics gathers 84,000 prices in about 200 categories — like gasoline, bananas, dresses and garbage collection — to form the Consumer Price Index, one measure of inflation.

It’s among the statistics that the Federal Reserve considered when it cut interest rates on Wednesday. The categories are weighted according to an estimate of what the average American spends, as shown below.

All of Inflation’s Little Parts - The New York Times

The Exceptional Performance team has identified a number of best practices for making web pages fast. The list includes 34 best practices divided into 7 categories.
Filter rules by category:

* content
* server
* cookie
* css
* javascript
* images
* mobile
* all

1. Make Fewer HTTP Requests
2. Reduce DNS Lookups
3. Avoid Redirects
4. Make Ajax Cacheable
5. Post-load Components
6. Preload Components
7. Reduce the Number of DOM Elements
8. Split Components Across Domains
9. Minimize the Number of iframes
10. No 404s

Best Practices for Speeding Up Your Web Site