Friday, April 22, 2005

Steal This Poem v1.2

This poem is copyleft,

you are free to distribute it, and diffuse it

dismantle it, and abuse it

reproduce it, and improve it

and use it

for your own ends

and with your own ending


http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/regions/oxford/2004/10/298739.html

Why I hate flash sites

Basically, because they're a poor cover-up for crap design.
I mean, Flash is cool. Flash is great, but I'm sick of seeing sites where someone thought they could get away with not bothering about functionality, usability or esthetics just by using flash.

So, for the benefit of those garage designers who can't afford to run a user survey, here's a few things I'd like to be able to do on your site:
  1. Copy your phone number into my contact management software.
  2. Bookmark or link to a specific bit of information I liked.
  3. Set my own font size (yes, I'm sure it looks great on 860x640. Get a life).
  4. See the name of the page I'm looking at in my title bar.
  5. Send you a link to a page with a typo and see you fix it in 5 minutes, without it costing a small nations GDP.
  6. Zoom in on a picture.
Get the idea?
Even my kid brother has a site.

Thursday, April 21, 2005

Guardian Unlimited | Online | The source of inspiration

The source of inspiration

Government has much to learn from the open source movement. It should
start by using open methods to encourage the spread of good ideas, says
a recent report. Michael Cross investigates

http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1464055,00.html

Wednesday, April 20, 2005

SCIgen - An Automatic CS Paper Generator

Generate your own CS paper.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Prank fools US science conference

Rooter: A Methodology for the Typical Unification of Access Points and
Redundancy
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4449651.stm

Monday, April 18, 2005

Dear Charlie Owen,

Please find attached, for your information:
- the responses from the spokespeaple of Haifa, Jerusalem, and Bar-Ilan universities.
- the joint response of the The Inter-Senate Committee of the Israeli Universities for the defence of Academic Freedom
- an opinion article by Douglas Davis, from the spectator

You may also find this article informative:
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1112668198058

Even before commenting on the content of the motions, I find several issues disturbing:
1. Item 55A.1 specifically moves AGAINST constructive dialogue. This does not carry the flavour of a peace seeking act. Even if the AUT votes for a boycott, it should have the decency to face Israeli academics and explain its position.
2. The proposers had not gone to the trouble of asking the accused parties for their response. I don't believe that this is the model of justice that the AUT wants to promote in the middle east.

As for the idea of the boycott, I suggest we take Afghanistan and Iraq as an examples. Boycotts enforced quite vigorously by institutions much more powerful than the AUT had the sole effect of harming the innocent, without the slightest effect on government policies in those countries.
I also find it quite odd that the boycott resurfaces in a period in which we witness first signs of reconciliation and reestablishment of Israeli - Palestinian dialogue.

If the AUT wants to contribute to peace and justice in the middle east, I suggest it does so by constructively supporting local initiatives, such as:
http://www.machsomwatch.org/
http://www.taayush.org/
http://www.ipcri.org/
http://www.m-e-e-t.org/

I would be more than happy to answer any questions you may have.

best,

- Yishay

Charlie Owen wrote:

-----Original Message-----
From: Yishay Mor Sent: 18 April 2005 03:56 PM
To: Charlie Owen
Subject: Re: AUT - European & international affairs

thank you. could you outline your position on these motions? are you aware of the responses made by the three accused universities?



My intention, on the basis of what I have read, is to vote for the
motions, although I shall of course listen to all the arguments for and
against at the council meeting.

I am not aware of any responses by the universities.

Charlie Owen.
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