Smug Alert!

after watching the southpark episode about hybrid cars i realized that biomass promoters also feel smug about what they do at the end of that episode kyle says something like use hybrid cars but don't be so smug about it and people of southpark goes "the technology is not there yet" :)
so yeah... i guess we have to say the same about biomass as well... we can't promote biomass and not be smug!!!

smug
|sməg|
adjective (smugger, smuggest)
having or showing an excessive pride in oneself or one's achievements : he was feeling smug after his win.

he was feeling smug after his win self-satisfied, self-congratulatory, complacent, superior, pleased with oneself, self-approving.

A.L.I.C.E

A.L.I.C.E. - Artificial Linguistic Internet Computer Entity
Wikipedia article on ALICE
alicebot
Talk to Alice

here is a small conversation i had with alice ;)

Human: i caught the flu
ALICE: I hope it is not contagious. Also I hope you get well soon.
Human: you wanna get high
ALICE: OK, I will get high.
Human: apple or pc?
ALICE: apple.
Human: do you like microsoft
ALICE: I want to replace Windows with Artificial Intelligence.
Human: do you like bill gates
ALICE: I would like to replace Microsoft.
Human: do you like steve jobs
ALICE: Yeah that guy is pretty cool.
Human: what languages do you speak
ALICE: C, Java, Lisp, SETL and English.
Human: do you watch southpark
ALICE: My favorite show is STAR TREK VOYAGER.

An Alignment of Stars and Planets

"Something remarkable is about to happen in the evening sky. Three planets and a star cluster are converging for a close encounter you won't want to miss.
The action begins at sundown on Wednesday, May 31st, when the crescent Moon glides by Saturn: sky map. You can see them side-by-side about halfway up the western sky, shining through the glow of sunset--very pretty."
more details....

Ozone layer - recovering!

• The ozone layer is that part of the atmosphere which contains relatively high concentrations of ozone (O₃)


• The ozone layer was discovered in 1913 by the French physicists Charles Fabry and Henri Buisson


• Ozone in the earth's stratosphere is created by ultraviolet light striking oxygen molecules


• The ozone layer can be depleted by free radical catalysts (such as nitric oxide (NO), hydroxyl (OH), and atomic chlorine and bromine)


• There are natural sources (such as sulfurous gases emitted by some volcanoes) for all of these compounds


• Concentrations of Cl and Br have increased in past 30 years due to organohalogen compounds (such as CFCs)


• Ozone levels, over the northern hemisphere, have been dropping by 4% per decade and over 5% over the polar regions


• In 1976, based on a report by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences which showed scientific evidence on the ozone depletion hypothesis, a few countries, including the United States, Canada, Sweden, and Norway, moved to eliminate the use of CFC's in aerosol spray cans


• In 1985 20 nations, including most of the major CFC producers, signed the Vienna Convention which established a framework for negotiating international regulations on ozone-depleting substances


• Later that year, a reduction of about 70% in the ozone layer (the ozone hole) was discovery over Antarctica


• Governments quickly enacted an international treaty, called the Montreal Protocol, to ban ozone-destroying gases such as CFCs then found in aerosol cans and air conditioners.


• In 1987, 43 nations signed the Montreal Protocol - agreeing to freeze production of CFCs at 1986 levels and to reduce production by 50% by 1999


• Sri Lanka has signed all these protocols


• The ozone hole over Antarctica has not improved


• Ozone layer around the rest of the planet has stopped depleting


• Wikipedia Article about Ozone Depletion


• Wikipedia Article about the Ozone Layer


• Wikipedia Article about the Montreal Protocol


• List of countries who signed the Montreal Protocol and subsequent protocols


• NASA Article about the Ozone layer recovering


• UNDP Sri Lanka Web Site: Montreal Protocol


• National compliance action plan for Sri Lanka

m$ introduces an alternative to jpeg

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/xps/wmphoto.mspx

m$ claims it’ll be have better compression than jpeg

sick

been sick the last week
not good at all!
twisted my ankle - its still swollen
and i caught the flu

this weekend - ate like $h1+!!

IE7 - M$ vs Google

Few extracts from the itwire article:

Google has complained to both the US Justice Department and the European Commission (EC) over Microsoft making MSN Search the default search engine in the new version of its dominant Internet Explorer browser, IE7.

Representatives from both Microsoft and Yahoo have publicly said that Google is being hypocritical. They say Google has deals with companies like Mozilla, which makes the second most popular browser Firefox and PC maker Dell, where Google is the default search window in the browsers.

In the case of Google, it pays hard cash to Mozilla and Dell to get the right to have its search engine placed as the default in the browsers. This is fair use of marketing capital. In addition, neither the Mozilla Firefox browser, which has 11% market share, nor Dell PCs have a near monopoly of the market.

By contrast, Microsoft has a browser, Internet Explorer, with 85% market share and it also owns a search engine with 11% market share. Microsoft does not need to pay one cent to place its search engine in the lead position on its browser, which sits on the vast majority of PCs in the world. What that amounts to is using a near monopoly position to stifle competition.

Today, about 95% of computer owners are locked into using expensive proprietary software running on an expensive operating system that is so insecure it has spawned an entire industry devoted to protecting users from hackers.

I'm a Mac user. And life is so much better.