Interesting Links for 28-01-2012
Jan. 28th, 2012 11:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andrewducker- UK sight-loss charity sues airline for failing to fix their non-compliant website
- Why Google is moving from showing links to providing answers
- Tom Watson reacts sensibly and graciously to having his intern play with his Twitter account when he was away.
- Pirate Bay irks Games Workshop by sharing 3D plans for its designs
- Batman and mental illness, a true story
- A majority support an elected House Of Lords
- Spotify boycotts 'alienate fans'. (I wouldn't say it alienated them - they just go and download the music elsewhere)
- The benefits cap policy is based on myths
- 25 Things I Learned From Opening a Bookstore
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no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 11:06 am (UTC)I've been getting increasingly fucked off by Google 'autocorrecting' searches and showing you results for what they *think* you meant to search for rather than what you actually searched for. It's bad enough when they say "Showing you results for X, did you mean Y?" so you have an extra link to click to get to the right results. But yesterday, I was trying to remember which TV show had a joke about someone who thought "poloponies" was a word, because they'd misread "polo ponies". So I Googled it. And got results for "polo ponies". With nothing to click on to say "Oi! Google! NO! I typed it as one sodding word because I wanted to search for it as one sodding word, you useless c- [NO CARRIER]
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 11:14 am (UTC)However, 99% of the time I get corrected it's because I've spelled something wrong, or Google has spotted a synonym that's what I want.
So if I search for "GAE Java OpenID" then the top hits all have "Google App Engine" in them, rather than "GAE" which is what I actually wanted.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 12:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 01:20 pm (UTC)What kinds of punctuation are you using?
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Date: 2012-01-28 03:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 03:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-29 01:35 pm (UTC)Huh, you're right, it really doesn't :( I was always happy with the autocorrect, as it was helpful (for me) a lot more often than it wasn't, but I hate the idea you _can't_ do an accurate search. It seems odd they don't cater for both possibilities, by letting people turn off the guessing, or by showing the top couple of results for both possibilities (did they used to do that?)
I was also surprised, because I vividly remember the poloponies misunderstanding from Steptoe and Son, but google gives an apparently more famous example from the Honeymooners, which I didn't know of.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-29 01:37 pm (UTC)They seem to do two kinds of autocorrect - one where they change the search criteria, one where they search for something different than what you've typed in. The latter is frequently useful when it broadens your search, but not so useful when the searches for the similar things swap the thing you wanted.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 11:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 03:04 pm (UTC)The games industry shifted massively when computers became powerful and affordable enough to run games of comparable quality, and there was a huge contraction in the miniatures end of it. GW survived because of their concentration on quality of manufacture, emphasis on community, and their pricing high enough to keep generating revenue... I too grumbled about their prices until I realised that everyone pricing less than them was up against bankruptcy every quarter.
GW's always faced piracy, though they've won out because it's hard to duplicate their models well in any kind of volume. If fabs do become routine, though, then I think GW's sunk unless it transforms completely.
-- Steve misses working in the miniatures industry, but doesn't miss the late (or short) paycheques.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 04:12 pm (UTC)I do agree with getting rid of some - if not all - hereditary peers, but rather a lot of the Life Peers are there specifically because they have vast amounts of real world experience that Commons politico's don't. In areas such as science and engineering.
having those people in place who don't have to worry about getting re-elected is in many ways a good thing.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 05:04 pm (UTC)In your opinion, possibly. But that's not how they were set up, or how large chunks of them are run at the moment.
And I don't want them re-elected. I want 20 year terms, with no possibility of re-election.
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 04:25 pm (UTC)well done, that man.
[I am also very fond of Caroline Lucas]
no subject
Date: 2012-01-28 11:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-01-29 01:45 pm (UTC)ROFL.
"Tom Watson reacts sensibly and graciously to having his intern play with his Twitter account when he was away."
Huh. What amazes me, is that other than the initial gaffs, everyone seems to have reacted sensibly and proportionately. When I googled for the story, it seemed the whole internet was saying "LOL. That was kind of dumb, I was somewhat amused, but ultimately no big deal, don't overreact." and the MP said "You're right, I've already taken care of it, please stop going on about it now." Where is the miscommunication? Where is the vitriol? Are we going to get more news headlines saying "massive twit-storm advocates measured and proportionate response, MP says 'yes, that's what I thought'"? :)
no subject
Date: 2012-02-01 06:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-01 06:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-01 09:13 pm (UTC)