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expralitemonk's comments

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: Do We Really Want to Live Without the Post Office?

A post office near me was slated for closure, but the citizens who would have been affected by this closure raised a stink and it was rescinded. This particular community is composed of fairly wealthy people who felt that it was a hardship to drive an extra 3 miles to the nearest post office, but interestingly, don't think it's a hardship to drive 10 miles to get groceries. (This town has no grocery stores.) As long as the post office leadership is overridden by whiners and their congressmen, no progress will be made.

The postal system was devised back when it was a major, all day hassle to visit the closest village. Now it takes 5 minutes and you can pick up a coffee on the way.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: Douglas Adams' 61st birthday doodle by Google

I met him at a book signing at the Boulder Book Store in the mid 90's. He walked to the front of the audience, and said "I'm feeling a bit wobbly today. I was recently in Texas and asked my friend: What do you do for fun in Texas?"

At this point I thought he was going to say, "And we got really drunk." But he said "So we went shopping for cowboy boots." And he proudly showed us his boots.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: A Day in the Life of a Freelance Journalist

Maybe journalists need to be rebranded into "intelligence gatherers." Not many people will pay for stories. They will pay for useful intel that isn't shared with a wide audience. "They" being governments, corporations, investors.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: The Shape of History

Interesting fellow. Earlier in his life he was a heavy-metal guitarist: in 1979 he sent a demo tape to the group Iron Maiden. (He wasn't hired...) Later he wrote a history book fortelling the decline of the West and the rise of the East, and the CIA asked him to conduct a seminar on his studies.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: Recession, tech kill middle-class jobs

In 1890, 43% of the US population were farmers. Because of technology (fossil fuels, internal combustion engines), most of those jobs are gone for good. We're going through a massive change and some people's livelihoods will go away permanently. They're not entitled to make a living at an obsolete job, but I think we owe it to them to provide a comprehensive safety net so they can survive and retrain.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: End Daylight Savings

How many people are killed or injured due to accidents caused by having to wake up an hour earlier? What does this cost our economy?

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: Al Jazeera acquires Current TV

I watched the Al Jazeera "Counting the Cost" episode discussing alternative currencies. Very interesting. People with ideas discussing said ideas instead of taking potshots at each other.

The U.S. media can take a lesson from Al Jazeera: really high quality productions with interesting graphics. It makes American news shows look like video games.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: US majority says ‘Do Not Mail’

I spend two minutes a day collecting junk mail from my mail box and throwing it into the recycle bin. That's 624 minutes a year. One government employee puts trash into my mail box and another government employee takes it away. Any useful mail I receive can be either delivered by electronic methods or UPS/FedEx.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

I went online shopping this weekend for a laptop for Mrs. expralitemonk. With an open heart we considered Windows or Mac. On the Macbook web page I found: specs for each model, estimated battery life, and the price. On one page! For all models! http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_mac/family/macboo... Every Windows site I went to required multiple clicks just to get rudimentary information. If you want my money, please make buying your product easy.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: I Don't Have Time

A famous writer was asked to give a speech at a conference for people who were trying to get published. He agreed. On the appointed day he walked to the front of the auditorium, stood at the podium, and asked "Why aren't all of you home writing?" and sat down.

expralitemonk | 13 years ago | on: Ask HN: Django or Flask as first web framework?

I started learning Django as my first web framework. If I had to do it over I would have spent a month with Flask, and then moved to Django. Django is a big app, and I found it difficult to build a mental model of its workings. Maybe starting with a smaller framework would have made it easier.
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