by Brian on December 24, 2004
Since it’s the season for spreading good news stories, here’s a “delightful story about Pedro MartÃnez”:http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/23/sports/baseball/23pedro.html?ex=1261544400&en=734c78e5d89f0103&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland and the resources he’s put back into his home town of Manoguayabo. It’s easy to feel jealous (or worse) towards sports stars for all the money they earn, but these feelings are hard to maintain when the star does so much good with the money.
For years Pedro has been my favourite player on my favourite (non-Australian) sporting team, and it was rather sad when he left so he could get more money from the New York Mets. But it’s hard to feel bad about Pedro getting the extra $13 million or so the Mets were offering when so much of it will be returned to Manoguayabo.
by Chris Bertram on December 24, 2004
With it being Christmas, the Guardian has again published “the world’s more difficult quiz”:http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1379479,00.html as given to the pupils of King William’s College. A first scan leaves me with a single-figure score, but I bet Kieran would do much better….
UPDATE: Mark D. Lew has posted “an annotated list of answers”:http://home.earthlink.net/~markdlew/quiz/ (179/180).
by John Q on December 24, 2004
Since Christmas never changes (and a good thing too!) I’m reposting my Christmas Eve post from my blog last year. I did plan more work on it, but haven’t done any (story of my life). Merry Christmas to all who celebrate it, and a happy New Year to everyone (at least everyone who uses the Gregorian calendar).
[click to continue…]
by John Q on December 24, 2004
I’m just about to knock off for Christmas[1], but I have to get ready for a conference at Queensland Uni of Technology early in the New Year where Larry Lessig will be the main speaker. I’m giving a very short presentation, and struggling to improve my understanding of all this, in particular the relationship between the technology of the Internet and notions of social capital. I haven’t come up with anything earthshattering, but I have had some thoughts on which I’d welcome comments.
[click to continue…]