Shadow Footprints

Organic food

NewsRoom - Otago Researchers Find No Conclusive Evidence That Organic Produce More Nutritious

Claims that organically produced food has superior nutritional benefits do not appear to be supported by the available evidence, according to a recent University of Otago study which is the first critical review of research comparing organic and conventional foods to be published by a leading international science journal.

- shadowfoot,

Smart cards

At last there is progress towards multi-app smart cards. I will welcome it when it arrives, just having one layalty card for shops and the like will be a big boon to the bulge in my wallet.

- shadowfoot,

Clean start

Wiped everything on my home PC and reinstalled on the weekend. Didn't intend to, but FIPS didn't like how something was set up. As I'd backed up everything I was okay. I had intended to installed windows in a new partition, so after FDISKing I did so. It's flying now. I assumed that it was slow because it was old and I was used to a faster machine at work.

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Blogs as a marketing feedback tool

The coming of the blogs - Tech News - CNET.com
Seems to make sense. As an avid usenetter I have to acknowledge with regret that usenet popularity is declining, still useful though.

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Musicians supporting file sharing

Salon.com Technology | Musician to Napster judge: Let my music go

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The web is big, really big

Journey to the Internet's Unknown Regions

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Copy Protection

Hollywood vs. High-Tech is a good article about the copy protection stuff. Somehow I think Hollings' bill is one sided. At least Vadasz and his comment "innovation would come to a screeching halt. Investment would suffer. It would create irreparable damage to a vital industry." might wake some people up.

- shadowfoot,

Shopping Online?

Is this why I buy from Amazon? According to
The Register:

Almost half of people who shop online do so because they don't want to go out and talk to anyone.

This anti-social, if wholly understandable, finding comes courtesy of Barclays Bank which revealed that four out of ten people believe the best thing about online shopping is not having to speak to anyone if they don't want to.

And here I thought it was because I couldn't buy some stuff here.

Having thought about it, I'd have to agree that I fit into that group. I hate having to try to describe something to a shop assistant, convince them to order it in, hope that it is the correct one, and wait.

- shadowfoot,

Online payments

Seems PayPal isn't necessarily a smart way of selling software, according to this article "Name Your Own Price on PayPal" on Wired's news site.
I was thinking of setting up an account with them, but just to make payments for things so I guess I'm not at risk. They are one of the few who can work with New Zealand accounts. My preferred way would be to just charge an amount to my credit card and treat them like an online bank. I doubt I would sell anything to build up a credit balance.

- shadowfoot,

Amazon Associate

Finally got connected as an amazon's associate. my id is shadowfoot-20. This link http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect-home/shadowfoot-20 will redirect anyone there.

How tacky can I get? Here's the best sellers list.
[snipped for being too slow to open the page]

And here's the fantasy list.
[snipped for being too slow to open the page]

- shadowfoot,

Addiction

Spent too much time last night playing around with formats for the webpage. Was still awake at 3am. The life of a computer addict.
Still have a few more things to achieve.

- shadowfoot,

Bookmarklets

Found John Eklund's amazon relinker, while looking for bookmarklets. It's a most useful bookmarklet for donating to charity when buying through amazon.
Tried to set myself up as an associate but I keep getting the following message:

Amazon.com Timeout

Something about your request to Amazon.com caused our server to take a long time ... longer than we would like. So, we automatically stopped the program. Please try again.

- shadowfoot,

Saturday - Day off?

Went into work earlier than usual but managed to isolate the problem I've been working on. Bookmarked a few blogs to review later and decide if they are once I want to persue. That was half the day gone.

Went rollerblading, not much eye candy now that it is getting colder. There one one shirtless hunk with a nipple ring, but as he was with a woman and kids it is unlikely he bats for my team.

- shadowfoot,

Roses

Some beautiful red roses arrived for me when I got back to work after lunch. Totally unexpected. He is so sweet.

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Hot Water Pastry

Must try this Hot Water Pastry Recipe and see how good it is, it looks so easy.

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Cycling Home

One of the things that pisses me off about cyclists are those that do not obey road rules. By going through red lighs and the like, because it's safe for them is what is going to get some other cyclist killed. Staying alive involves being predictable. I don't want to get killed because a driver ignores cyclists assuming that laws don't apply to them. I want to exercise my right of way when it is my right, not have a driver see cyclists as something on the road that does whatebver they like as long as they keep out of the way of drivers.

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Innocence Shattered

I just found out that Puff the Magic Dragon isn't about drugs. Another urban myth shattered, a bit more of my innocence lost (in a very appropriate way).

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Ethics

I must be aware of the Blogging Code of Ethics yet at the same time I feel it is unethical to comment about my work.

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Foggy Bike Ride

It was foggy this morning. It's been a long time since I've biked in the cold like that, and back then I would have worn more than a t-shirt and bike shorts. I need to look into getting some long bike pants. The first place where I coast downhill is where I notice the cold. By the time I get to the next place where gravity helps me go fast I've had to struggle up New North Road and I'm warm by then.

- shadowfoot,

Changing the blog

Added to the link to mad world but had to remove the code replacing the time, something funny about the script and how I placed it. I'll look at it again and decide if I need to do it.

Looked at comments too, but as netcomments is not accepting anyone while it moves servers I'll have to come back later.

Am I a novice journalist? The jury is still out but it seems I am not. Oh well, c'est la vie.

- shadowfoot,

Others footprints

Mad World is an interesting blog, I should add it to the links section. It is the source of the javascript which changes the time to a statement.

Interesting Taglines found tonight.

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Toolbars

Got the toolbar problem fixed. It needed me to unlock the toolbars before they could be used. I've got them locked again with the blogger bar active and things look okay.

Now I just need to work out how to add a comments section and see if anyone stumbles across this blog.

- shadowfoot,

Speed

Managed to hit 74km/h on my bike last night. It was after choir so I went a shorter way home. One heavy bike and one steep hill later... Pity about the climb on the other side. At least the traffic was light, wouldn't dare do that during rush hour.

Choir was okay, missing camp was to my detriment. I need practise more.

- shadowfoot,

Let them eat cake

I had a chocolate cake yesterday that was really nice. No eggs, butter or milk. I'm beginning to think I'm giving up my aversion to chocolate flavoured things.

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UK cop

Commander Brian Paddick does look cute, hope things are resolved quickly.

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Let's close our minds

Checked out ContentWatch. What a waste of time.

- shadowfoot,

Early start

Early start today. Woke early, dreamed about En a lot. I miss him but I need to be strong and move on.

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Final of Voyager

I just saw final episode of ST Voyager. I enjoyed it. A. fell asleep in my lap.

- shadowfoot,

After dark

Just finishing work. One thing that makes up for working late is knowing someone is going to be cooking for me tonight. I still have to bike home in the dark though, guess I can't go as fast as I usually do.

- shadowfoot,

Minor success

Okay, managed to figure out how the date thing works on this.

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Dates

It would be nice if I could have the date set up properly for me. Why do americans put the date in medium/small/large mode?

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The beginning

Finally making the effort to see what all this is about. Need to be more focused in doing things but this will be a good distraction to avoid that.

- shadowfoot,