Category Archives: Science & Nature & Technology

Yahoo Will Switch To Bing Search Engine – Lifehacker.com

Granted, apparently Bing is actually useful and a decent search engine. I wouldn’t really know as my history with Microsoft search has been awful. And no, I’m not a knee-jerk Microsoft basher; I’ve just been burned repeatedly to give such reviews much creedence.

So, basically, I use either Google or Yahoo for searching stuff. At least, I used to. Apparently, since Yahoo has some bills to pay off, they are joining forces with M$ and will soon be using the Bing search engine instead of their own useful one.

I guess this only leaves me using Yahoo for email and fantasy sports playing. Boo!

Forty Years After Space Race, What’s Next? : NPR

NPR has been running a series tied to the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing. A couple of high points have been an interview with Buzz Aldrin and a story on the hopefully accidental erasure of the original Apollo 11 tapes.

Also of interest is a backup speech that Nixon would have used if the landing had befallen some form of disaster. Pretty chilling but good that even Tricky Dick had a backup plan, something we haven’t seen in a president for the majority of this decade.

Wired had a rollup of related Apollo 11 news, some of it new to most of us.

The Moon Landings: Fact, Not Fiction | GeekDad

I love GeekDad. Basically, it’s a Wired blog for the parental set.

One of today’s entries dealt with how to correct the misinformation regarding the moon landings. Namely, how to show your kids that, yes, they did happen.

This is pretty easily proved, but there are so many things out there that either well-meaning Luddites or evil Talibangelicals try to debunk using flawed logic. The same nitwits that refute the Theory of Evolution have no issues with the Theory of Relativity because they want a nuke plant in every ghetto and a MIRV hitting every country populated by brown people.

Just saying. Keep it up GeekDad!

How-to: E-mail

For some reason, I read random how-to articles. I’ve got a couple email related ones to share with you today.

For your consideration, here is one related to better email etiquette, which you have to admit is probably something we ALL need a refresher on.

The other is strictly tied to Google Mail, which I use a lot, and comes in a series of tips at increasing levels of difficulty.

Give them a look. You’ll probably learn a few things you can put to use right away.

Arizona is 6000 years old? | Discover Magazine

Recently I brought up a couple stupid legal moves in Arizona. Now I know why this happens there.

Some numskull Republican mentions – twice – that the Earth is 6,000 years old. Look, believe whatever you want to, but please do not develop public policy when your belief system flies in the face of proven science.

As pointed out in the article, the irony is that the legislator is arguing in favor of uranium mining. You know, uranium, the element used to prove the Earth is billions of years old? Maybe she wants it all mined so that we lose the proof of our science? I don’t know.

Creationists and politics should not mix. Much like creationism and education should not mix. Or apparently Republican politicians and ethics and morality.

Here’s the video.

Ten Grand is Buried Here | Microsoft Australia (Prepared to be bribed)

Apparently I just found out how much Firefox is worth to me.

Ten thousand Australian dollars.

Microsoft has put out some bizarre kind of search contest where you can “find” AU$10,000 on the internet. Go here if interested.

It won’t let you use Firefox (and presumably not Opera or Chrome, etc.) to perform the search.

Granted, I don’t have the spare time to play the game. Nor do I use IE for much more than some work sites I need to use it for.

However, I really don’t see where Microsoft thinks it’s viable strategy is to insult a rival’s better product while trying to bribe tech savvy customers to come back to it’s flawed product.

Not to mention that Microsoft search has always sucked (though the new stuff apparently is *pretty*).

Lifehacker – Say Goodbye to Analog Broadcasts: Your Last Minute Guide – HDTV

It won’t help you today, but for nothing more than historical reference, a guide to the digital changeover.

If nothing else, it is a passing of an age for a lot of us. I was about ten or eleven when we got some form of cable and was pretty adapt in the manipulation of rabbit ears and whatever else you needed to get a signal. Living in Galva and being cable-less was always a trick, especially since our nearest signals were over 40 miles away – in opposite directions. You could get two NBCs and ABCs – or none at all.

Just a couple weeks ago we lost the cable for the better part of a day and whipped out the rabbit ears. Now, we won’t have the option unless we go buy one of the new boxes I guess.

And so this passes, along with rotary phones, playing in the streets until dark without fear of pedophile rapists, and high beams you click on with your feet.

I guess I’m getting old or something.