Here Come The Clouds; Send In The Clouds

OK - the title is a bit sensational but the article does a good job of explaining what underlies all this cloud-computing hype.

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/is_the_relational_database_doomed.php

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Swine Flu

You can't escape the swine flu stories today.

I just don't see how anyone is surprised about it; considering all the pork coming from the federal government lately...

taking up less space after a major upgrade

I love it when a huge upgrade actually decreases the size of your OS. Also fun when programming to get some nifty functionality added and actually remove more lines of code than are added. If only the govment could function that way.


pubuntu@pubuntu:~$ sudo apt-get upgrade
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following packages have been kept back:
bind9-host dnsutils libbind9-30 libdns35 libisccc30 libisccfg30
The following packages will be upgraded:
acpid alacarte app-install-data-commercial apt apt-utils avahi-autoipd avahi-daemon base-files bsdutils console-setup cpp-4.2
cupsys cupsys-bsd cupsys-client cupsys-common dash dbus dbus-x11 evince evolution-data-server evolution-data-server-common firefox
firefox-3.0 firefox-3.0-gnome-support firefox-gnome-support flashplugin-nonfree gcc-4.2 gcc-4.2-base gdb gedit gedit-common
ghostscript ghostscript-x gksu gnome-power-manager gstreamer0.10-plugins-good gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines-pixbuf
guidance-backends gvfs gvfs-backends gvfs-fuse hal-info icedtea-gcjwebplugin icedtea-java7-plugin initramfs-tools initscripts
jockey-common jockey-gtk language-pack-en language-pack-en-base language-pack-gnome-en language-pack-gnome-en-base
libavahi-client3 libavahi-common-data libavahi-common3 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavahi-glib1 libavahi-ui0 libc6
libc6-i686 libcamel1.2-11 libcupsimage2 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libcurl3-gnutls libdbus-1-3 libebook1.2-9 libecal1.2-7
libedata-book1.2-2 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libedataserverui1.2-8 libegroupwise1.2-13 libexchange-storage1.2-3
libexif12 libffi4 libfreetype6 libgadu3 libgcc1 libgdata-google1.2-1 libgdata1.2-1 libglib2.0-0 libgnutls13 libgomp1 libgphoto2-2
libgphoto2-port0 libgs8 libgstreamer0.10-0 libgtk2.0-0 libgtk2.0-bin libgtk2.0-common libgvfscommon0 libicu38 libjasper1 liblcms1
libldap-2.4-2 liblwres30 libnautilus-extension1 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libnss3-1d libntfs-3g23 libperl5.8 libpng12-0 libpurple0
libsmbclient libsndfile1 libsnmp-base libsnmp15 libssl0.9.8 libstdc++6 libvorbis0a libvorbisenc2 libvorbisfile3 libxml2
libxml2-utils login logrotate module-init-tools mount nautilus nautilus-data ntfs-3g ntpdate openjdk-6-jre openjdk-6-jre-headless
openjdk-6-jre-lib openssl passwd pciutils perl perl-base perl-modules pidgin pidgin-data python-apt python-gobject python-gtkhtml2
python-libxml2 rdesktop readahead rhino samba-common smbclient sudo sysv-rc sysvutils totem totem-common totem-gstreamer
totem-mozilla totem-plugins ttf-opensymbol tzdata ubuntu-docs ufw update-manager update-manager-core update-notifier
update-notifier-common util-linux util-linux-locales vim-common vim-tiny vinagre xkb-data xulrunner-1.9
xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support
170 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 6 not upgraded.
Need to get 123MB of archives.
After this operation, 1286kB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]?

If you're reading this in English, you can thank nuclear weapons.

I've really got to put some effort into writing something new.

But for now I'll just pass along links to other short postings that are already just comments on links to other news articles.

For some reason the word simulacra comes to mind.

Any way - start clicking here.

And even though I know sod all about fashion this quote seems apropos today:

“My God, don’t they know? This stuff is simulacra of simulacra of simulacra. A diluted tincture of Ralph Lauren, who had himself diluted the glory days of Brooks Brothers, who themselves had stepped on the product of Jermyn Street and Savile Row, flavoring their ready-to-wear with liberal lashings of polo kit and regimental stripes. But Tommy surely is the null point, the black hole. There must be some Tommy Hilfiger event horizon, beyond which it is impossible to be more derivative, more removed from the source, more devoid of soul.”

—William Gibson, Pattern Recognition

PR is a great story btw.

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Jeff

Now that is progress!

Just google-ing (sp?) a bit to see what the current state of reactionary political information is in the flotsam and jetsam of the interwebs.

At this point it looks like UR is really the gold-standard. However this little article from 2005 has a nice chart. I like their headings of Reactionary, NeoCon, Progressive, Fascist.

I can't read the word "Fascist" anymore without thinking about the exchange between Simon Pegg and the inn keeper in Hot Fuzz.