The First Linux Cellphone

Haier N60 Linux Smartphone
This Linux-powered Smartphone features a 400MHz processor, 1.3-megapixel camera, MP3/MPEG4 player, 59MB internal memory, SDIO expansion card, and a 320 x 240 touchscreen display. It measures 48 x 25 x 94 mm and weighs 131g. Pricing and availability have not yet been announced.

Rare Muslim-Jewish student group thrives

Proof that mature discussions rather than hate speech and propaganda can lead to tolerance and friendship. Muslims and Jews sitting down together and talking? Even becoming friends? Sound like a fantasy? Well, it's not. Read more ...

ALPHA-LIPOIC ACID

Drink ALA and live forever.

"Textcasting," Anyone?

For the last several weeks, Slate editors have been inserting the full text of "The Explainer" into each day's "Explainer" audio podcast. They asked listeners to try reading the text on their iPods and report back to them on how it works. Scores of people wrote in, and a large majority reported a good experience.
Read more ...

Got to find what you love ...

I just finished reading Steve Jobs' Stanford commencement speech. It's good stuff.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Cyberpolitics

Newsweek says in "Levy: when the Net Goes From Free to Fee":

...the big telecom and cable companies -- which provide almost all the high-speed Internet to consumers -- will abandon the principle of "Net neutrality," where every bit is treated equally and start-ups compete with giants on a level playing field. Instead, they may offer, for a fee, favored status to bit hogs like AOL, Google and CBS. Consumers would essentially be getting two kinds of Internet. One version would be free, as everything is now. The other would be the digital equivalent of HOV lanes on highways, only instead of having three occupants to qualify for the speed slot, sites and services would have to pony up huge tolls.

It continues:

These fears have led several legislators to explore ways to stop the broadband gang from splitting the Internet into first class and steerage. "I want to make sure that equal content gets equal treatment," says Sen. Ron Wyden (Democrat of Oregon), who is preparing a bill to lock in that principle. Considering the lobbying power of the telecom and cable industry, legislation like that is no shoo-in. But if something isn't done to preserve neutrality, we may find the future of the Internet stuck in traffic.

I can see a bright future for America once again. A day that people only vote for those representatives that can understand what is happening in the cyberworld and even the patriotoholic ones talk about defending the country against cyberattacks and cyberterrorism. And no matter what party they are in, one thing is obvious: They will talk my language, not Billy Bob "Bubba" Johnson's.

If you can't fight spam, at least don't feed the spammers

Today I received an email about a "deadly computer virus around" from one of my friends. Of course I was not the only recipient on that email; the email actually asked the person receiving it to pass the news on. Unfortunately what I hoped that wouldn't happen, just did. My valuable spam-free Gmail address was included in a viral email spreading around the globe. Well, I thought it might be a good idea to start a viral email myself, but this time to educate people how to handle a viral email! I thought it might be a good idea to put it here so you can read my email too.

Hello,

I'm sending you this email because you just received an email about a deadly virus from my good friend Ali. I hope this email gets to your mailbox before you actually send out that warning email to everyone in your address book.

In internet security one of the rules of thumb is "DO NOT FORWARD ANY EMAIL TO EVERYONE IN YOUR ADDRESS BOOK" no matter what the email is. Wondering where the spammers can find your email address? They initiate a chain letter by sending out an email about something that sounds important, funny, or simply stupid and ask you to forward this email to as many people as you can. And you know what, many of us actually do it and when trying to forward, we usually put everybody in the TO section of the email rather than the BCC (Blind Carbon Copy). This way we have permanently exposed out friends' email address to anyone who receives this email. Just look at how many addresses are on the previous email. Well, you might not be interested but there are MANY people out there who would love to sit down and extract all these addresses from these viral emails and sell them on the internet as a package to the spammers!

Believe me, if it's a deadly virus spreading and the person specifically asks you to forward this email to everyone, 99.99 percent of the time there is no deadly virus involved; the email itself is acting like a deadly virus by collecting all this information and spreading exponentially. No matter what you see in an email, if it's foreseeing your fortune, if AOL is paying a poor family with an ill daughter, if it's a spiritual message, or if it's a good joke, remember to be skeptical when the email actually asks you to send it to everyone. And even if you think something is important for others to know (I doubt it), ALWAYS PUT THEIR EMAIL ADDRESSES IN THE BCC FIELD NOT THE TO FIELD!

You can practice this by sending out this email to everyone that you have forwarded Ali's email to. Remember to put everyone's names in the BCC field to protect their identity and email address. Hopefully we can educate more people and stop these chain letters that collect our valuable information, and fight spammers.

-Bahram

Happy Birthday to me!

Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that the people who have the most live the longest.

Pro-life or Pro-choice?

Washington Post in an article titled "S.D. Abortion Bill Takes Aim At 'Roe'" says:

South Dakota lawmakers yesterday approved the nation's most far-reaching ban on abortion, setting the stage for new legal challenges that its supporters say they hope lead to an overturning of Roe v. Wade .

I don't understand why the pro-abortionists call themselves pro-choice and anti-abortionists call themselves pro-life?! Some people might be pro-life and also pro-abortion! Also some pro-choice people could easily "choose" to be anti-abortion! It perfectly makes sense, just think about it. The idea of being pro-choice covers those who are pro-abortion as well as those who are anti-abortion. But the irony comes in when you are anti-pro-choice-and-not-willing-to-abort. Then you are just a stupid confused fat %#$% who doesn't know there are billions of more important issues than this one.

Got localized seasonal red itching dots?

I'm not a doctor but sometimes what normal people have experienced might solve a problem better that experts' advice. If you have seasonal skin rashes or small red dots that terribly itch, and you have tried every medication for "eczema (excema)" and "dry skin" and they didn't work, try Claritin (loratadine) for a couple of weeks. It worked for me so I'm passing the information on.

Hello, my name is Bahram and I'm a Claritinoholic!

Snow for the King

It snowed quite heavily (based on Southern standards) in Memphis last weekend. It was fun to have an excuse not to attend our Friday seminar!

W O R D S

A husband read an article to his wife about how many words women use a day...30,000 to a man's 15,000.

The wife replied, "The reason has to be because we have to repeat everything to men...

The husband then turned to his wife and asked, "What?"

Are women really from Mars?

Friendship Between Women:
A woman didn't come home one night. The next day she told her husband that she had slept over at a girlfriend's house. The man called his wife's 10 best friends. None of them knew anything about it.

Friendship Between Men:
A man didn't come home one night. The next day he told hiswife that he had slept over at a buddy's house. The woman called her husband's 10 best friends. Eight of them confirmed that he had slept over, and two claimed that he was still there!

The Secret Cause of Flame Wars

People often think the tone or emotion in their messages is obvious because they 'hear' the tone they intend in their head as they write.

At the same time, those reading messages unconsciously interpret them based on their current mood, stereotypes and expectations. Despite this, the research subjects thought they accurately interpreted the messages nine out of 10 times. Read more ...

This corresponds with research re. non-verbal communication; one's facial expression conveys more/makes a bigger impression than one's actual words. People remember what your face looks like when you speak, more than what you actually say.

February 14

I really don't understand why people continue to do their love-related stuff on February 14th of each year. I hate it when I see something is so commercialized. They constantly keep telling you that "she needs this box of chocolate or she dies" and "buy her sexy, buy her Victoria's Secret, or you won't get lucky tonight". If you want to go to a good restaurant, you have to stay in line for a couple of hours even if you have reserved your seats already. Then they put a menu in front of you that is twice as expensive as the original menu. In the end, you go home and have sex. This is the most freaking expensive sex ever during the year.

I propose that we keep the Valentine's sex part on Feb 14, and move other stuff to Feb 16: You can buy three boxes of chocolate for the price of one; you can go to your favorite restaurant and have twice as much food; then you go home and have sex again 'cause it feels like another Valentine's day!