Interesting Links for 17-5-2011

[andrewducker]

• Sharing Information Corrupts The Wisdom of Crowds
  (tags: psychology science social knowledge information)
• Using the Amazon Appstore from outside the US
  (tags: usa amazon android)
• How Windows knows it has an internet connection
  (tags: internet microsoft windows)
• If Eurovision used FPTP
  (tags: voting funny eurovision)
• Sitting is killing you (the truth about sitting down)
  (tags: health sitting)
• Cow coincidences culminate in cowshed conflagration
  (tags: cows funny)
• The Art of Endless Upgrades
  (tags: software technology infrastructure inspiration)
• Stem cells cure man of HIV
  (tags: aids hiv stem_cells)
• My Rapist Friended Me on Facebook (and All I Got Was This Lousy Article)
  (tags: facebook rape assault sex)
• When you use "he" to include women you ostracize women
  (tags: science feminism gender language society)
• The future of the library
  (tags: books future ebooks library)
• Telescopic Text - I often felt factual articles should be written like this
  (tags: writing design language)
• Should Steve Ballmer be ejected from Microsoft?
  (tags: business apple microsoft management investment technology)
• Stephen Hawking: 'There is no heaven; it's a fairy story' (and apparently this is news)
  (tags: science religion StephenHawking)

Comments

[momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com]

Sharing Information Corrupts The Wisdom of Crowds -- so basically, Asimov was spot on. We have to be ignorant of the Second Foundation's existence and purpose!

[andrewducker]

a) You are such a geek.
b) Yes :->

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

What she describes isn't really FPTP, it's more of an electoral college system. FPTP would be if every Eurovision voter had one vote that was equally valid in the voting for the winner. (Under the current system of course, the vote of someone in San Marino is vastly more valuable than the vote of a German or Russian or French or British or etc voter.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

Friday on Facebook.

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

I'm probably buying a standing desk pretty soon. I will update with how well that goes.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

Well, she's essentially counting it as 'one country, one vote' rather than 'one person, one vote'. Which given that the current system is country-by-country, doesn't seem to in any way invalidate her point.

It's not to say that your point regarding the vote of someone in San Marino vs that of someone in Germany isn't absolutely true. It's just not relevant to this particular mental exercise.

[channelpenguin.livejournal.com]

I have a standing desk at home. Fantastic. Now when I do the once-a-fortnight day in the office and sit down, I get hamstring cramp in my right leg by lunchtime - but at least that's once every coupla weeks not multiple times a day...

[andrewducker]

What kind do you have?

[andrewducker]

Please do! More posts please!

[marrog.livejournal.com]

The sitting infographic was good, but some of the language used hinted at an underlying attitude that I didn't much like (ie: it implicitly used 'fat' as a synonym of 'healthy' in a couple of places - I am not one of those people who deny the correlation, but without qualification it makes me twitch).

Tangential and not necessarily interesting aside: As a flat footed person standing is way, way worse for me than sitting. Despite having excellent posture and none of the back problems that nearly everyone else I know who works at a desk suffers from, if I have to stand for long periods I get first lower back pain, then my shins begin to hurt (it feels like the bones themselves are coming through the soles of my feet and pressing to the floor) and my feet themselves will eventually go completely numb.

Walking is fine, but for me standing is the killer - this is why when I was working dead-end retail jobs I always went for the stock room positions that kept me running all over the place instead of the cashier positions.

It's an interesting point about the angle you sit at being important, though. I sit pretty straight at my desk, but at home I recline at an angle, preferably with my feet up and my laptop slanted upwards on my lifted knees so that my neck isn't bent over. I had always assumed that that was a bad position for me to be in, my one posture-failing, as it were. Perhaps it's actually my saving grace.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

God that sounds like my 9th level of hell.

[andrewducker]

I assume you mean "antonym"? In any case I agree that the simplification makes me twitch too.

And I sometimes get the same thing if I stand still for long periods. I actually had problems with the leafletting for AV outside the polling office because I was standing still for a couple of hours.

And yes, I slouch with the laptop at home (and at my desk right now), and I think it is actually better for you, from my cursory reading.

[marrog.livejournal.com]

Woops, yes, well, I meant to say 'unhealthy' rather than 'healthy' but same difference as 'twere.

When I was flyering I kept an eye out for where the 'main drag' was (there were people coming from both directions outside the station I was at) and trotted between the two. The reps outside commented on how young and energetic I seemed so it was probably a good thing.

[andrewducker]

I was able to stand by the only path that led to it, so I wasn't moving a lot - and couldn't go far because people were arriving at that path from both directions, sadly.

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

The pictures about sitting are pretty misleading. The way they suggest standing is amazing, except then have a graph showing it's not actually much better than sitting compared to, say, exercises which you can't often do at desk job.

Also, it seems to try to equate sitting all day and not exercising with sitting all day and getting exercise, which are very different things and the latter means that you are less likely to be sitting there with your "body going into meltdown." That said, "exercise" can mean a lot of things, and some of the things that are pushed as exercise are really very far from it unless you are completely sedentary.

The HIV article...

[zornhau.livejournal.com]

...is very heartening indeed. However, the comments thread below the article... oh dear.

[lpetrazickis.livejournal.com]

Huh. I'm way ahead of them on the 135* angle of sitting thing. I've been lounging with my feet up on my office desk for years. Good to know that it's a good habit, not a bad one.

Not keen on standing, though. Hurts my knees.