Latest reviews

There's a tech-review here of a kitten.  It goes through the usual stuff (compatability, maintenance, storage, etc) and compares it to some alternative gratification options (babies, puppies and graphics cards).

Looks pretty neat, but I think I'll wait for the next version.

Pretty

Gaiman/McKean's MirrorMask trailer here (Windows Media Player format).

Right

That's the Telewest phone service cancelled.  I now just have VOIP.  Gosh, I feel so futuristic.

Management

It's interesting that so many people see management as unnecessary, useless, incompetent and generally pointless.

Many people wonder what their managers actually do to earn their (obviously) inflated salaries.  It's interesting to note that given half a chance managers do exactly the same about _their_ managers.  At all levels of society people assume it's obvious how much work they put in, and equally obvious that the next layer up are just playing golf all day.

In some ways management is like tech support - when everything's going well nobody even thinks about them.  When things are going badly, everyone wonders why they're so incompetent.  I mean, sure, there _are_ incompetent managers out there, but even the most competent ones make mistakes, and by and large it's only those mistakes that get remembered.  I mean, the rest of the time they just hand down orders and make graphs - how hard can it be?

(The answer, as far as I can tell, is "pretty darn hard")

Sigh

Bone collected one-volume edition is available for ordering this month.

Sadly, at £65 it's out of my price range.

Waah!