BFI Modern Classics

E-paper

Jean Baudrillard

Book search on a materialist post-modernist.

Don't Hide the Banana

Google is the most popular search engine on the web today. Why? Because they concentrated on search when most other sites thought of it as an add-on, and because they weren't afraid to give eyeballs a rest with precious white space. Some results of a search for i love google:

• Google Wins by Not Hiding the Banana - Traffick.com
  
• Comments on the Banana story
  
• Time Magazine, April 2000
  
• ZDNet

Growing Organs -- this is how it's supposed to work.

Quackwatch

Funny article from the Guardian about Bush and Putin - I especially like the description of Putin, as a man "...who generally wears the air of a just-sacked football manager, remained poker-faced." And this paragraph:

The Russian contingent is being promised, or threatened with, a barbecue and country music. In return, Mr Putin invited the US president to St Petersburg in midwinter. It was unclear whether this was an example of bleak Russian humour.

21st Century Depression

The Man Who Wasn't There

Physicist'ss Slow Speed of Light

JILA Bose-Einstein Condensation

Good description of Bose-Einstein Condensate

Megan Goldin

Every once in awhile I pick on somebody. But then I remember, it must be hard to check your facts and edit your article when you have the pressure of deadlines... and I don't want to be like this guy.

Megan Goldin has many articles attributed to her. It looks like she's Reuter's Israel correspondant. She was a researcher in '98 on this TV program from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. And the earliest article I can find by her is this AP article from '95. So I'm guessing she's between 26-29 years old. That's old enough to be allowed to make mistakes... right?

A media conspiracy, or just bad writing?

The News Behind the News questions the motives behind Megan Goldin, a Reuters correspondant, who wrote an article about violence in Israel. In another article, Megan writes about how Israeli officials have not pulled back in their raids on Palestinian land. She quotes officials and uses parentheses instead of brackets to mark words implied but not spoken. I performed a search on her name to see if she made similar errors and much to my surprise, stumbled upon the conspiracy mentioned above.

The media always ends up reporting on itself...

RIAA: We'll smother song swappers - uh oh.

IKnowWhereBruceLeeLives

Inspired by this link from bizstone, I've decided to put blogdex on my sidebar... I go to it often enough...

Just convert my cube to a cage, feed me a banana-flavored food pellet, and I'll be happy...

It is hard to be optimistic when one of the greatest minds in Physics alive today says that we will not live another one thousand years unless we branch out into space and life on other planets.

Robo-cat

Handspring announced it's new Treo handheld/phone/web surfing device by handheld visionary Jeff Hawkins...

When they start taking things away, we will be rebellious at first. We'll yell and kick and scream and throw tantrums like children, but when we realize that none of that will bring it back, we will accept the new limitation, and forget about the freedoms we once had.

Cool Band Name: Funk Puddle

I've been addicted to Partygirl's website since Sept 12th.

New war-terms:

• targeting process error
  
• unintended casualties
  
• unintended damage
  

I'm Luke Skywalker...

Mighty Girl - because she's on blogdex... because she's funny... read the one about the taxi cab ride (scroll down to 9.26.01)

Janeane Garofalo

Giant storm shrouds Mars

More information on the upcoming new devices that will be launched Monday by Handspring.

Hogue Prophecy

Flying an L39 and a MiG29

low level bugs

Ken Thompson

Usenet is still a strange place

Dennis Ritchie Home Page

BTM

BTM

25 Leaders for a Dangerous Time

Suits against analyst Meeker thrown out - no penalties for giving bad advice.

The Sense and Significance of a Seven-Fold Multiverse

Curmudgeon - thanks for the credit.

The C Programming Language: Answers To Exercises

Ergonomics - Eyes and Vision (from Apple)

Monitor ergonomics

Foundation for a New Consciousness

Research on an old argument: Did Kurt Cobain write Hole's Live Through This

Soviet anthrax lying unguarded on test island

Dev C++

Meena

K-Pax - inspired by MAN FACING SOUTHEAST?

RAWA

The Dark Side of the Game : My Life in the NFL - Tim Green

Random Name Generator

What do I do with my 10-cent stock?

FinchNet

Pearl Harbor Attack
Timeline of the Attack

Grant Morrison is a comic book writer. He has since become a practicing magician, and claims to practice his magic by writing his comic books. I read a cached interview with him on Google, and noted the following things to check out:

• Marvel Boy
  
• Alan Moore's Birth Caul
  
• Chaos aesthetic
  
• destruction of the 20th century dualities
  
• The Ring O' Bells Myster by Enid Blyton
  
• Relationship between Alan Moore and Karen Berger
  
• Why Peter Milligan would be writing comics if above relationship never started
  
• Phil Jimenez
  
• Flex Mentallo, Man of Muscle Mystery
  
• Explain the following:
  

  
  Ed Mathews Grant, I think the opposite of good and evil is indifference. What say you?
  
  
  Grant Morrison Now join those 2 together and tell me what the new synthesis looks like and is it usable
  

  
  
• Magic cutting edge - Phil Hein & Nexus
  
• Very pertinent today:
  

  
  Shannon Smith What do you make of the whole Survivor and Big Brother phenomenon. It seems to play into your theories in the Invisibles about all of us being tv stars.
  
  
  Grant Morrison I think my quote was everyone will be famous 24 hrs a day and that's what's happening. More cameras means more chaos
  

  
  
• Scary: Whitley Streiber's website, Kathmandu, Brendan McCarthey
  
• VAT
  
• ego-modification exercises
  
• What???
  

  
  Leo_Zeygerman Are the beginning pages of volume 2, issue 1, just a play out of King Mob entering the super context ?
  
  
  Grant Morrison The entire series is a playout of you entering the super context
  
  
  Question So, I've been experimenting with writing fiction as a conscious magical act, and you're right: it works. So well it's scary, sometimes. But the all-over-the-place results make me think I need a banishing ritual that's specific to the form; drawing pentagrams in the air around my PC just seems too daft for words. So, do you use a banishing ritual when you write and if so, what sort? How does it work?
  
  
  Grant Morrison I've never used a banishing ritual in any form of magic
  

  
  

Cosmic Time Travel, RE-VISIONING MIDDLE PILLAR EXERCISE: The Torus/Twistor Model, THE SELF-AWARE UNIVERSE: A Synopsis of Amit Goswami's Theory of Physics & Psychic Phenomena

Google-cached live chat with Grant Morrison

What Is a Gnostic?

PopImage - Grant Morrison

Bedazzled (1967) - I saw the 2000 version. I wonder what the original is like.

Divine Horsemen : The Living Gods of Haiti

BARBELiTH: An Invisible(s) Website

We're All Policemen - interesting topic - information is a finite resource. I'd like to find out the formulas for calculating signal to noise, and how it relates to information.

Grant Morrison's Invisibles series:The Bomb

U.S. Vows To Defeat Whoever It Is We're At War With

American Life Turns Into Bad Jerry Bruckheimer Movie

When will the fed cuts work?

The Organization Kid

How investors can use the MONEY 100 list of mutual funds - Sep. 28, 2001

Emoticons, or Smileys

QuickPAD

The Market
Nasdaq suspends minimum bid requirement rule

prophecy made easy

Bermuda Triangle

On a lighter note, a sports game:NFL 2K Review

The Hijackers

Planning for Terror

Biological & Chemical Warfare

What is Islam?

A sobering point of view

We all need to learn how to deal with the stress that the Sept 11th tragedy brought into our lives...

The Number 11

A first person account of the rescue efforts in NY

How come we're not hearing much about the Pentagon?

After the tragedy, the intellectualizing begins...

Bin Laden comes home to roost - this article goes over how the CIA financed Osama bin Laden in the 80's.

Michael Moore's commentary puts some of the blame on the American government.

War is grey, and I think we entered into a war with some of the less fortunate people in the world a long time ago. The US has the highest standard of living in the world. I once read that if some were willing to give up their high standard of living, the entire world could live at a 1920's standard of living. Imagine that. Everyone with enough food on the table, a job to do, and the opportunity for the pursuit of happiness. At what price? Maybe you don't get to own a car and you have to wear your sneakers a little longer than usual.

One thing I've noticed about the continuous coverage about the World Trade Center and Pentagon terrorist attacks is that I have not seen one commercial on the major networks. I find it a refreshing break. Too bad it had to come after such terrible news...

Salon.com News | How to defeat bin Laden - article which proposes branding bin Laden as a criminal and seeking prosecution rather than war.

Somebody has to pay for this... and along with those responsible it will be those in Reinsurance

This paragraph is especially morbid:

Mr. Silverstein's company had planned a meeting yesterday morning on the 88th floor of one tower to discuss what to do in the event of a terrorist attack. The meeting was canceled Monday night because one participant could not attend.

The Fine Line - very descriptive blog post from a guy who was at the WTC subway stop when the event occurred.

Prophecies of Nostradamus: part 6/8, World War III - interesting interpretations of Nostradamus.

More eyewitness accounts: ctrl-alt-ego: reboot yourself

Eyewitness Accounts:

• A fire inside - this person lost family & friends.
  
• World ends... - good news site with links to coverage.
  
• Combustication - eyewitness account.
  

Blogger search page - search for World Trade Center or terrorist. There are many eyewitness accounts, from bloggers living or working in New York.

Tragedy in the US

At just before 9am today a commercial airline crashed into one of the World Trade Center buildings in New York. Another plane crashed again at 9am into the other tower. Both towers came down because of the damage at 10 and 10:30. During this time a plane crashed into the helicopter landing pad at the Pentagon. I've heard an unconfirmed report that another plane has crashed in Pittsburg.

The only news I can reach are Boston.com and The Nando Times. I tried to search daypop, but got only one eyewitness response that spoke about the crashes. I wouldn't call it awesome though.

As I watched one building come down, all I could think of was how many people had not evacuated yet. I thought of the people crammed into stairways trying to get out, panicking and pushing, afraid for their lives. As the building came down, I wondered how many people were left. As I watched rescue workers rush to the scene, and heard the announcer say that every rescue worker in the city was rushing to the scene, I wondered if there would be more. If this were just a precurser for more destruction.

E-paper - electronically charged pellets in flexible plastic sheets. I don't know -- sounds like 1984 to me.

Companies:

• Gyricon Media - already making signs out of their e-paper product.
  
• E-ink Corporation - They should call themselves oink instead.
  

Research sites on the hidden internet.

• The Invisible Web - Uncovering information sources the web can't see.
  
• LexiBot - Internet search engine, similar to Copernic.
  
• Nua Internet Surveys - Irish IT Media Company that compiles data on Internet trends and demographics.
  
• Librarians' Guide to the Internet
  
• ProFusion - search engine and directory that searches headlines and academic databases.
  

Nanotech future - the army may soon use microfabrics in their uniforms. Nano-Tex, subsidiary of Burlington Industries Inc. has developed a better cotton molecule to provide anti-wrinkle and anti-stain properties.

Hybrid Plastics in Fountain Valley, California is working on weatherproof circuit boards.

DuPont is working on fibers that conduct electricity & change at the wearer's commant.

Triton Systems, Inc. is developing a technology for helium-filled sneakers.

BlackBerry 957 review

Tips on saving money and a currency converter

The psychology of Hackers - as described by project.honeynet.org, a group designed to set up systems to be hacked.

Universe 'could condense into jelly' - enough to fill one big donut.

Booklists:

• Rail Against the System .com
  
• About Greedy Pigs, Vol. 2
  
• About Greedy Pigs, Vol. 3
  
• Current Events for the Uber-Hip
  
• Books for critics, rebels, and troublemakers.
  
• Every Vote Counts
  
• Recomended [sic] books for anarchists
  

Found some cool books I'd like to read on minor musings' reading log:

• Gödel's Proof by Ernest Nagel and James Newman
  
• Six Easy Pieces: Essentials of Physics Explained by Its Most Brilliant Teacher by Richard Feynman
  
• Coercion: Why We Listen to What 'They' Say by Douglas Rushkoff
  

Movies:

• Memento - the #1 DVD selling on Amazon - about a guy with no long term memory searching for his wife's killer -- the audience is put in his shoes by watching the movie in 10 minute increments from end to beginning.
  
• From Hell - Alan Moore's graphic novel about Jack the Ripper has reached the silver screen, starring Johnny Depp and Heather Graham.
  
• The Business of Strangers - Julie Stiles stars in this movie about a layover.
  
• The Believer - about a Jewish neo-Nazi.
  
• Other films can be found on the Toronto International Film Festival site
  

Does a cloned pig taste better than its original?

If I ever need storage, I'll know where to go.

Further example of the Microsoftization of the Net: Microsoft sabotages error messages by directing users to its MSN Search page instead.

Zope, an open-source Web application server.

• Zope Book
  

The origins of Ballmerfunk - watch as Steve Ballmer runs around the Microsoft stage looking like a World Wrestling Federation character at an Ozzy Osborne concert.

Starve yourself, live longer

from blogdex

Just added my blog to the following directories:

• eatonweb portal [new]
  

     - and - 

• Weblogs.com (which is really slow...)
  

Krispy Kreme overvalued? If the dough keeps rising...

• BusinessWeek Online -
  STREET WISE -- The Rise -- and Rise -- of Krispy Kreme
  
• BW Online | October 20, 2000 | How Far Have Net Stocks Fallen? The KREMEY Knows
  

Good place to keep up with the latest filings if you're buying stocks: EDGAR Current Events

.Com stocks reach bottom, go up

News of note

• Fry's might buy Outpost.com - on the news that Fry's might buy Outpost.com, the Web site with the COOL ticker symbol went up 55% according to yahoo finance.
  
• Cancelled Comic Cavalcade - Photocopies of the Cancelled Comic Cavalcade, a two-shot comic DC issued comprised of 18 comics cancelled in 1978. These comics never saw print except in the 35 issues of this Cavalcade, 34 of which were sent to the contributors, and the 35th sent to Bob Overstreet, "to
  show the world it actually happened." (At least, that's what the first issue intro says)...
  
  
  
  • From Memepool.com
    
  
  

Apparently Compaq's already got what I want

That's right! Compaq's iPAQ BlackBerry H1100, available now for only $750(?!?) at CDW looks very similar to Handspring's forthcoming Treo k180 (dubbed “The Manhattan”).

Forrester Research - Another research/consulting company to add to my list.

Wow. From the guy who invented Mathematica-- a new science of modeling the world using simple computer programs to create complex patterns. Might be useful in modeling nature and boosting the upcoming VR revolution. (found this link after searching for pages that link to google on blogdex using blogdexter's who's linked to me tool.)

• Here's his book, A New Kind of Science, out in October.
  
• His company, Wolfram Research, distributers of Mathematica.
  
• Mathematica store
  

Even stars are getting in on the Weblog craze. Check out the official Wil Wheaton IMDB blog (remember, Wesley Crusher from STTNG and Gordie from Stand By Me?). Funny site, too.

More blogger links:

• USA today article - on blogs. Gripes: Why do online articles these days have so few links? Anytime a company is mentioned it should have a link associated to it... makes it easier to review the references online. Also-- you should be able to set the default for links when you click them. I always open new windows, and it's getting time consuming to right-click and choose "Open In New Window" everytime.
  
  
  
  • Metafilter.com - Web discussions about the Web.
    
  • Blogdex - MIT Media Lab's amalgumation of newsblogs.
    
  • LiveJournal - Blogger competitor.
    

Having used this since October and still not listed in the directory, I should probably give a shout out to other bloggers in the hopes that somehow I'll get noticed. By the way, if you do read this, send me an e-mail. Otherwise I feel like I'm yelling in the ocean.

Blogs recently visited:

• caterina.net
  
• Syllog
  

College needs:

I went to school in the wrong era.

• Oregon Scientific Alarm Clock (also listed on weathertools.com | picture) - Clock that synchs with US Atomic clock via radio waves, displays weather and can project the time on the wall or ceiling... only one hundred bucks.
  
• George Foreman's Grille - George Foreman's site lists some of his grille in his gift shop, but but the links point to salton-maxim, which I assume is the company that really owns the product. Foreman's gift shop is "currently under development". This is the one page which should be functional above all others... you would think.
  
  
  
  • I looked up Salton, Inc. on Yahoo Finance. Apparently they are the ones behind the Foreman Grills, the Juiceman, Breadman, Maxim, Timex and a host of other products. This must be the company running all those informercials.
    
  
  
• Computerless e-mail - if it did IM it might be worth something...
  
• AT&T's Voice over IP phone
  

Aging Gen-Xer Doesn't Find Bad Movies Funny Anymore - funny end of irony story from the onion... when parody comes too close to reality...

There's not much news about it (a search on Google for "treo k180" turned up nothing), but Handspring's new wireless devices look pretty cool. This article says they'll be out on shelves by Christmas.

Looks like Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back got panned.

Some review quotes I liked:

"...disposable..." -Chicago Tribune

"...even the funniest of [the] brainily ludicrous jokes sputter halfheartedly." -Salon.com

"...shows virtually no sign of being made for an audience." -Village Voice

Two observations:

1. Contrary to what this man says, Apple stock will rise again. Demand will pick up when Apple's 25 new stores open in the US by the end of the year. People will buy what they see -- if it is demoed in front of them they are more likely to buy. There are still a lot of people who don't own computers, contrary to popular belief... and like televisions, soon people will own more than one.
   
2. Yesterday I would not know what he meant by "pikers", but I just happened to catch some of the movie Snatch last night, enough to know that pikers are gypsies.
   

Aaliyah, 8 Others Said Killed in Crash
Heard it on 97.7.
No News on Mtv or regular television, just AP and Reuters.
Its a sad day when young talent dies...

Ginger research:

Ginger... what happened?

• Patent
  
• Wired
  
• Dean Kamen
  

Exodus board members exit; AOL ripple effects on Net and Meeker gets slammed by lawsuits, and a whole lot of gobbledygook at the end.

Brand this!

Phoenix Editorial - ads

Wow. I have a strange craving for olives.
Other Matt Silverman effects.

Microsoft may control the net with its .Net strategy, at the heart of XP.

International Data Corporation - consulting company based in Framingham.

FactSet Research Solutions - tech/finance research/consulting company.

The US Stockmarket switch from fractions to decimals gives an edge to market specialists competing with institutional investors. If an institutional investor bids $50 for 100,000 shares of a company, a specialist can up the bid by a penny, prompting the large investor to move up a couple more cents. The specialist walks away with a profit from the spread. How will this affect the market? We will probably see a continuation of large jumps in stock prices, typical of our age. But is this good or bad?

Reference: Penny shake-up for US markets (BBC)

I don't think I've ever seen the Milky Way.

Listening to the BBC this morning, I heard about a discovery that the fine structure constant, one of the universal constants involved in how subatomic particles interacted in the distant past, may have increased over the course of time.

According to the report, this could open the door to new discoveries about different dimensions.

References:

• A Constant that Isn't Constant from Physical Review Focus
  
• BBC radio report which I can't find on their website

Doing some nutritional research:

• Protein in diet (WebMD/adam.com)
  
• USDA Food Guide Pyramid (WebMD/adam.com)
  
• Getting Nutrition Guidance (WebMD)
  
• Ethnic/Cultural and Special Audience Food Guide Pyramids
  

Three Men in a Boat : To Say Nothing of the Dog! - Looks like a funny book - I was searching the Hugo awards page when I came across Connie Willis' To Say Nothing of the Dog, a sci-fi book which won the award in 1999, and got its name from the subtitle for this book.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Won the Pulitzer Prize for 2001. A book about comics, the war, and escapism. Sounds good.

Books on the failure of LTCM:

• When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management (Adobe Acrobat Reader Version) - An amazon reviewer recommends the second book on this list as being a better history on the subject.
  
• Inventing Money
  

Global Business Network - research/consulting company modeling future business strategies through scenario planning (essentially creating stories of future outcome and playing out decisions in preparation for actual future events).

NPD INTELECT - research/consulting company for the Retail industry.

Giga Information Group - research and consulting for the IT industry.

Stephen Hawking

Joe Frank Program Details
Joe Frank is a radio artist I was first exposed to in Los Angeles. While flipping radio stations I came across his show on KCRW. His combination of musical riffs, phone conversations, buddhist teachings, and spoken word monologues hooked me from the start and continues to intrigue me. I saw his show at UCLA in '98, which was a retelling of some of his old material.

The University of Iowa Writers Workshop

Privacy tips from CNet to check out:

• Protect your identity as you surf
  
• Secure your financial transactions
  
• Self-defense against spam
  
• Risky e-mail behaviors
  

More books:

• Hooking Up - Tom Wolfe
  
• Screwjack and Other Stories - Hunter S. Thompson
  

Media Metrix - consulting company with Internet industry metrics.

Nielsen//NetRatings

Now if these guys MADE their own videos to sell, that would be cool...

• Yahoo! Store
  
• sneetch
  

Stumbled upon this screenwriter's resource while looking up reviews for Big Trouble, which looks like a forgetable film.

Went to Feedmag.com, clicked on Icebox, read about how they ran out of funding, clicked on Loop at the end of the article, clicked on layoff message, clicked on news about Gore.

Day by day, the web reveals itself to me as that bottomless pit they're going to throw the beast in when Revelation finally comes true... I spent 3 hours in Wordsworth in Harvard Square, as I arrived for what I thought would be a 10am show of Buckaroo Banzai IMDB at the Brattle, only to find out when I arrived that the show's at 10pm. It's annoying when they don't differentiate morning times from night times like that. Like I should have known...

So I browsed through the stacks for three hours, picking up various books, starting with F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Love of The Last Tycoon, his final, and unfinished novel about a movie mogul, based on Irving Thalberg. I got distracted tracking down books by Dover Publications, which has a whole line of cheap classics ("thrift" editions). I went through the entire fiction lineup looking for these books, which range in price from 90 cents to $1.80, including works like Dostoyevsky's Notes from the Underground, Mary Shelly's Frankenstein, Thomas Mann's Death in Venice, Herman Hesse's Siddhartha, and Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. About halfway through my search, I see that the store has collected the Dover paperbacks in a rotating display that I didn't notice until I just about bumped into it. I tried to convince myself that it was worth the trouble browsing the stacks, but I still have my doubts.

I was prepared to buy the Dover books, a collection of Hemingway's short stories, F. Scott's This Side of Paradise (Dover Thrift Edition), and Zadie Smith's White Teeth, of which I've heard so much about. But since I couldn't justify a $40 impulse buy, I dropped the Dover's except for F. Scott's, and bought the rest.

Spending three hours to browse the stacks was not a complete waste of time, as I had my Visor with me, on which I recorded a list of books I'd like to read. And the Last Tycoon's good. So far I've only read F. Scott's outline, and I'd like to learn more about Thalberg. He started running MGM at 25, and died at the age of 37.

Getting back to the bottomless pit of the Internet, curious about the fate of Scottie, the daughter of F. Scott and Zelda, I looked her up on the Internet, and the first link I find is for her gravestone. Her children are listed, so naturally, I search for them. This brings me to Princeton's memorial for Thomas Addison Lanahan (Timmy), who committed suicide in Hawaii on October 18, 1973. No mention is made of his famous grandparents. Next, I looked up Eleanor (Bobbie) Lanahan, the granddaughter of Zelda, who is now a writer, artist, and ardent promoter of her grandmother's work (incidentally, Bobbie was born in 1948, the same year her grandmother died). I didn't get a chance to find out about Samuel Jr. or Cecilia, Scottie's other children before I stumbled upon Jess Barron's Zelda page, which I instantly filed away as I checked out her root page, then followed links to her description of her meeting with Monica Lewinsky at the Lava Lounge in LA in 1999, pictures on her narcissism page, and numerous blog sites (f(r)iction, nostalgia for the present, and instant messages). Her multi-faceted page drew me in, causing me to abandon my prior search through F. Scott & Zelda's lineage. So I thought about blogging my train of thought, and wondered how long the links would stay current, which brings me to my next paragraph.

With the transient nature of the web, all these places I refer to can be gone tomorrow, or converted to pay sites, where you have to pay to view the content, or just as bad, register. Imagine if Amazon or IMDB did this -- you'd have to use your registered name before you could look anything up, thus invalidating all my links. Apple Computer has already done this with their knowledge base. A couple years ago, anyone could download software patches for their old emates, now you have to register and log on to do it. So my dilemna is, do I copy and host all web pages I refer to from now on? Or do I let this stand as a transient page, soon to be expired when all the links do? I'll leave the answer to when I have the time/motivation to do something about it. By the way, is anyone "backing up" the Internet? Wouldn't want to lose all of these beautiful connections.

Some final thoughts I couldn't include in the overlong blog above:

• You can probably can get many of the texts in the Dover Thrift Edition paperbacks from Project Gutenberg.
  
• Mary Shelley's middle name is Wollstonecraft.
  
• Frances "Scottie" Fitzgerald Lanahan attended Vassar, as did Jess Barron.
  

Bountyquest - search for patents online - make sure your patented ideas are not stolen.

Cool site

Google's getting more sophisticated. They now have a page that lists their Special Search Features.

"New Ritalin formula to be sold next quarter!"

I caught this on the Business Wire. What will they think of next?!?!

Fluoride in the lunchbox

Don Cheadle, who seemed to pop out of nowhere, and is starring in Steven Soderburg's upcoming blockbuster Ocean's 11, was actually on Hill Street Blues way back in '87. This got me thinking about how many people who are still working were in that show, and also got me thinking about that other famous TV drama, St. Elsewhere. I'd like to see the shows that inspired LA Law, ER, and NYPD Blue...

Episode Guides

If I can't see them, at least I can read about them.

• Hill Street Blues episode guide
  
• St. Elsewhere
  

Every once in awhile I want to buy a book, I find that if I write it down, I tend to forget about it and the urge passes, so here goes:

• Economics, 15th edition, used - $26
  
• Economics, 17th edition, used - $74
  
• Economics Study Guide - $31.95
  

I was reading the 14th edition of Economics by Paul A. Samuelson last night that I got from the library. Today I checked out Amazon and Copernic to see what the latest edition was. He's up to 17 now. I also found the 50th anniversary edition, and a critique about the author. The critique recommended reading Capitalism and Freedom by Milton Friedman or Understanding the Difference Between Democrats and Republicans (A Republican Perspective)
by Edward Baiamonte.

Book Crazy

I went book crazy on Amazon, searching for books by Derrida and came across a bunch of "...for beginner books" on Derrida, Foucault, Lacan, Saussure (a linguist), Structuralism and Poststructuralism, and Postmodernism. Following someone's Post-Modernism 101 list which included Structuralism and Poststructuralism for Beginners as one of it's recommended titles, I found some more obscure philosophy which attempts to provide a model for our time, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Two other books in the same realm, written by the same authors or translator popped up in the "Customers who bought this book also bought" section:

• Anti-Oedipus : Capitalism and Schizophrenia
  
• A User's Guide to Capitalism and Schizophrenia : Deviations from Deleuze and Guattari
  

One reviewer said the concepts are hard to follow, and not well explained.

Three titles had tables of contents I could peruse: Derrida for Beginners, Lacan for Beginners, and Postmodernism for Beginners

Jon Haddock's isometric screenshots - art created in the Sims style of computer gameplay, depicting tragic or controversial moments in history.

Reading this in the New York times led me to look up Michael Foucault's "What Is an Author?" essay on Google, which brought me to this link, which referred to Derrida, who I looked up on Google and found this bio.

How to Tell a Bad Movie From a Truly Bad Movie

How to Tell a Bad Movie From a Truly Bad Movie

99-Degree Heat Was the New York State of Mind

Donald Richie Offers a Collection of His Writings on Japan

Ontrack Data International Inc. - Datatrail division specializes in data recovery and forensic computer examinations.
from Data Permanently Erased From Florida Computers

Bill Clinton tells all

Code Red Alert

Discovered this series: NY Times columnist watches movies with directors:

• The Golden Stallion with Quentin Tarantino
  
• All the President's Men with Steven Soderbergh
  
• A man for All Seasons with Kevin Smith
  
• Rosemary's Baby with Julianne Moore
  

Don't you think Quentin Tarantino could play Mike Barnicle? Quentin Tarantino in the Mike Barnicle Story, detailing his rise and fall as a Boston Globe columnist, his television gigs, and the thing that hasn't happened yet that will propell him into superstardom/history.

Adding to below... why not draft a movie using a ton of underrated actors: Steve Buscemi, Parker Posey, Rob Schneider, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Don't know what it would be about, but it would be funny!

Write a movie starring Charles Martin Smith, Wallace Shawn, and Paul Giamatti, as brothers.

Inspired by article in the NY Times about Paul Giamatti.

He answers all his mail. Ankit Fadia

Fighting the good fight

Scared of Hackers? Indian Teenager Offers Help

• Post by Mr. Fadia about breaking into Linux.
  
• His mailing list
  

Another Amazon-inspired link:

Crime Novel anthologies made into film noir

Issued by the Library of America

• Crime Novels : American Noir of the 1930s and
  
• Crime Novels : American Noir of the 1950s
  

Amazon.com had Heavier than Heaven, Charles Cross' extensively researched book on Kurt Cobain, on their main page, and that lead me to researching Olympia, Washington and the Seattle music scene of the '90s.

LOSER, The Real Seattle Music Story

Detailing the history of punk rock in Seattle from the '50s to the '90s. Amazon link.

Other Nirvana/Cobain books:

• Come as you are - Michael Azerrad
  
• Kurt Cobain - Christopher Sandford
  
• Nevermind:Nirvana - Charles Cross
  

Some cool technology-related business numbers: Meeker Numbers. Buffet also made the comparison between the auto industry's beginning and the Internet industry's. I don't recall the reference doc, but in one meeting, he held up a list of names, rather long, of auto manufacturers who incorporated at the beginning of the last century. The list was pages long, and that was just the "A's." Now there are 3, and the profit margin is slim.

George Frost Kennan's Long Telegram (February 22, 1946)

When tasked to describe the Soviet Union's uncompromising position on the World Bank, George Kennan responded with an 8,000 word telegram which lead to the theory of containment of communism that remained US policy until the collapse of communism in 1989.

Evidence of the increasing power of corporations in America

Russian programmer is arrested when he gives a speech in America about the program he wrote to convert eBooks into Adobe Acrobat format.

Empire

The world is no longer arranged around the concept of city-states - governments are being taken over by corporations in the global economy.

Emmanuel Todd

French sociologist writes about his ideas on the family, and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

China Daily

A letter predicts the collapse of the US economy a month before the dot com bubble bursts.

Blood, Money, & Greed

Conspiracy theory book about how the wealthy control the world.

Arguements agains the auteur theory

Miles Copeland writes about how big record companies are not greedy in his guest column on the RIAA website. He mentions a few that have "been shuttered," A&M, Geffen, Chrysalis, IRS, etc.

But Geffen Records was sold to MCA, and the man behind the label went on to form Dreamworks SKG with Steven and Jeffrey.

I wouldn't consider a company that was successfully sold to another operating company a business failure, or indication that an industry's profit margins are shrinking.

There is a crisis going on, similar to when rock & roll first came out and was criticised for offensive and subjective lyrics. Today the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet met for 3 hours to discuss the entertainment industry's efforts to curb children's exposure to violent content. The movie and gaming industry were complemented for their advances in self-monitoring through ratings, but the music industry was lambasted for the failure of their ratings to be understandable to parents.

Hilary Rosen, president and CEO of the RIAA argued against enhancing the rating system for songs, noting that while the movie industry rates the 600 movies a year released in the US, the recording industry would have to rate the more than 370,000 songs released in a year. Along with the considerable work this would take, the subjective judgements which would have to be made would send the industry into an uproar, Ms. Rosen argued.

Her official response is posted on the RIAA website, which states that the industry will publicize the existing rating systems with more posters and PSAs.

The crisis begins with the FCC fining of a radio station in Colorado for playing the relatively mild Eminem song, The Real Slim Shady. Apparently this song is deemed indecent by the FCC. No wonder I haven't heard it lately on the radio.

With Napster out of commission and radio stations self-censoring because of the threats of fines from an increasingly conservative FCC, where will hip hop fans go to for new and old favorite releases?

Thin Is In For Itsy-Bitsy Wires

Scientists coat organic material, some 2000 times smaller than the human hair, with silicon atoms to act as a super-conducting "nanowire," used for electronics. Experiments are being conducted with Black Widow spiderwebs, cutting them down to 5% of their normal size.

Grim Prospect
Argument for allowing DVDs to be decrypted on Linux.

I've been doing so much research these days that I'm researching references for e-mails before I send them. Here's some interesting facts (albeit alittle cynical, please bear with me).

I'd like to read Naomi Klein's No Logo, even though the Picadorlogo on the front cover negates her argument against brand identity. Picador is an imprint created by Macmillan Publishers, LTD, one of the largest publishers in the world (Britannica reference).

In my defence, I didn't catch this. A reporter on NPR brought it up to Klein when he interviewed her. Her response was that she needed to reach the broadest possible audience. I guess that's reason enough to sacrifice your message.

David Siegel just won't go away!

He just keeps creating new websites. Take his old journal for example. Last updated April 30th, 1998, Siegel's amour propre shows no bounds as he describes his youthful indescretions and thoughts of the day. However, given the mutable nature of the Internet, the page reads like a 19th century historical novel, with just as much relevance to today.

Other sites include Verso, Mr. Siegel's (former?) employer and The Nine-Act Structure, Mr. Siegel's foray into the architecture of screenwriting. The author of Creating Killer Sites should read his own book or at least update it. His site is not easy to navigate (there's no site map), and it is steeped in the non-database driven pseudo-designer's method of shoving a multitude of images and colors in your face with the mistaken belief that overstimulation makes for good web design. The companion website to Creating Killer Sites lists Adobe Photoshop 4.0.1 (version 6 has been out since August, 2000), and Illustrator 7.0 (version 9 has been out since June, 2000) as image creation software. The links point to files no longer on Adobe's website.

Siegel wrote another book, Futurize Your Enterprise: Business Strategy in the Age of the E-customer (1999) in which he posits his new career as web consultant to big business. His message to them is to make the customer central to your business, an idea that has been a part of TQM since the '50s, and has been pushed by management theory luminary Peter Drucker for decades. Mr. Siegel attributes this groundbreaking new trend to startups.

Websites do require a nice design, but more important is how often they are updated. Websites differ from books in that they can be constantly changed. The Internet looks like it is heading towards more database-driven pages displaying current information and products. The layout of Yahoo Finance! and Amazon.com are some examples. The question now is where is David Siegel? His Futurizebooks website, the companion website to Futurize Your Business invites viewers to "Join us at FuturizeWest, April 19-22!" But scrolling down it becomes apparent that this event was scheduled for last year.

David Siegel is leaving bread crumbs in his outdated websites that litter the net. If he is intent on delighting his customers, how does he expect them to find him?

Reference for the history of TQM: Attractive quality: its importance and the points of remark, YOSHIO KONDO, Total Quality Management, July 2000 pS647.

David Siegel's latest virtual manifestation is at Siegel Vision.

Madonna and Bill Gates: The different faces of marketing.


Both of these characters have grown and changed their images and their companies for the last two decades. They've done it by succumbing to the cultural force of our times: change.

I'd like to make a movie about the story behind the Sony VAIO® R505 SuperSlim Pro™ Notebook Computer. I wonder if the rights are still available.

Review of Napster-like programs

The Lancet - medical journal

salesforce.com - Sales CRM

AMG All Music Guide

History of the United States Postal Service 1775-1993
Where was Richard Fairbanks' tavern?

ncshows - list of computer shows in the area.

Cool page featuringhistorical funstuffs!

Ever wonder what the longest word in the English language is? Wanna know what it means? It's defined here. If you don't want to catch pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis, stay away from volcanos. I don't remember what supercalifragilisticexpialidocious means. I think I'll eat some humuhumunukunukuapuaa tonight.

Mi got to get to Jamaica!
Jamaican Recipes

So far the only real money that has been made on the net and the only potential for more is for companies who connect people together, like Napster and ebay... like this peer to peer article states.

Linux Online - Opinion: Linux: Alive and well on my desktop!

Keir.net - Personal homepage with cool security links.

This "review" of A.I. gives away more than I'd like. I'll read it after the movie.

Another article explaining the unpublicized (until now) option of credit card companies selling your account histories to the highest bidders... Tossing out your privacy

Credit Cards not as safe as you think.. Newly Discovered Bug 'Skims' Credit Card Data

Instant Messaging has taken the Internet by storm. More instantaneous than e-mail and less intruding than a phone call, you can shout out to your friends or conduct business while sitting behind your computer doing work or surfing the net. Be be careful what you say, as one company CEO's ICQ logs were posted to the Internet (here they are)when his company experienced financial difficulties.

Maps

A little history:

• Clifford Stoll's Home page - Clifford Stoll takes a critical look at technology in his three books, Cuckoo's Egg, SIlicon Snake Oil, and High Tech Heretic (hear him on the connection).He also makes cool looking klein bottles.
  
• Neil Postman's The Disappearance of Childhood - discusses how with the advent of the internet and mass media, the distance between the information a child and an adult has access to is shrinking, therefore causing the difference between actual childhood and adulthood to shrink.
  
• Gates' Grand Design - Bill talks about Windows XP.
  
• PR Newswire
  

Karen L. Reidy investment star at Janus funds.

Story idea- Fund analysts are the rock stars of the '00s. They set business trends in America's culture of business. Driving around, spending money to make money, spending on savings, living off caffeine and adrenaline. Power-lifting and jogging until they drop. They are the trend setters, the cultural arbiters of our time, these neo-yuppies on their never-ending quest to economize and slim down both their companies and their bodies, until they are one and the same. Their image is their substance.

Steve Gibson explains the future dangers of Denial of Service with Windows XP.

Cool program - Alt. click on any word to get more information about it on the web. Like NBCi and Microsoft smart tags.
Flyswat

KurzweilAI.net - new way of describing the net. Check out the singularity and evolution's exponential growth rate.

Found the above on DC Denison's Weblog.

Old News:

Sexual harassment at Juno -- Internet companies, with 20-something managers fresh out of Ivy league schools, are not much different from mature companies (and possibly worse), when it comes to sexual power plays in the workplace. Well researched article.

File Under Javascript:

Redirect

Unix-related help sites

(research for work)

UNIX Reference desk from geek-girl.

Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing (FOLDOC)

X Windows

The WorldWideWeb Acronym and Abbreviation Server

The X consortium

UIArchive Site Map-- If you are interested in starting up your own Unix server. All the software you need...

I'm following some marketing campaigns and the companies behind them. Check this one out--Newsboy promo, by New York-basedThe Hired Guns.

This one started me out on this track: Harley promo by Umbrella Marketing (Mesa, AZ).

More on DoS

Study on the amount of Denial-of-Service attacks

This makes for a fascinating read, if you like Internet security. Even if you don't like it -- Steve Gibson takes a mysterious topic - the denial of service attacks we've been hearing about that shut down services such as ebay and Yahoo, and breaks it down into an easily digestible web page (albeit a very long web page. He describes and incident of attacks on grc.com. Check it out.

Somebody's got to say to Microsoft: "Back off, man."
Microsoft messaging tactics recall browser wars - Tech News - CNET.com

I wrote some notes, rather than blog them. They were kicking around the work computer and I wanted to get rid of them.

You saw the href="http://www.bitstream.com/categories/news/press/2001_bitstream/060601_thunderhawk.html">press
release, and the condensed press release in the href="http://www.gilbane.com/news.htm">Gilbane
Report, now CNet has written the first article on
Bitstream's new href="http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200-6217963.html?tag=mn_hd#">Thunderhawk
browser. Here comes the buzz...

My predictions after reading this article: href="http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200-6218717.html?tag=mn_hd">3Com
exits DSL/Cable Arena

The phone company will control all wire access, including
cable. AOL will buy AT&T next, to form AOLT&T.
Microsoft will buy Sprint and MCI, and the new
conglomeration will be called MCIMicroSprint. Cellular
One, Cingular, Verizon, Voicestream and the rest of
the baby bells will combine to form Cellularizonstreamular.

Why subscribe to the Gilbane Report when you can get the Business Wire for free? Most press releases I've seen are distributed by Business Wire. I guess some people like to be spoon-fed.

Funny how they don't include company information and financial results. In my opinion, that information adds value, even if it were one click away...

Ok. I've been getting all this info from Business Wire. Fineline Properties creates original cartoon characters -- for your marketing or website needs, I assume. A recent press release introduces their Kooties(TM) figures, which they hope kids (and adults, I assume), will be trading much like some other famous characters...

File under further complication of the net:

I wonder when a law will be passed requiring people and businesses to get permission from a site before being able to create a link to it. This link got me thinking, if copyrighted works require permission, why not links?

Transmeta Recognized By U.S. Environmental Protection Agency For Energy-Efficient Crusoe Microprocessor -- chipping away at the Intel/Microsoft duopoly.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) About Trademarks

Ethan Allen Announces Plans to Consolidate Three Manufacturing Plants -- Newspeak for layoffs...

eBrandedBooks.com is Now Aspatore Books, Big Brand Books & Publishville.com

Publishville.com -- Flash in the pan or another way to publish books? You decide.

Dot Com Death Trackers:

Webmergers.com

F*ckedcompany

digitalDIRT company list

News:

Handspring Trade-In Program -- Palm did this before, when Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky were in charge. I got $75 for trading in my first Palm.

Last night I watched the DVD commentary for Fight Club with David Fincher, Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, and Helena Bonham Carter. There are three commentaries on the disk -- another with Chuck Palahniuk and Jim Uhls, and the last with the digital effects guys. It was better than the commentary on The Matrix, which supposedly had Carrie-Anne Moss, the editor and the digital effect supervisor. But when I listened to it, it sounds like Carrie-Anne left after the first half-hour, and the editor sounds like a dolt. The only reason for listening is for the sardonic comments by the visual effects supervisor.

In Fight Club, the commentary was edited so that there is talking nonstop throughout the film. Helena was recorded seperately, but she's edited in so that it doesn't effect the commentary, except for one part in the project mayhem flashback scene, where the globe in the fountain is destroyed and rolls into the coffee shop. Helena is edited in, and when she's finished, the commentary reverts back to Edward Norton and Fincher talking, only I can't follow what they are talking about because I don't know what they are referring to.

There's one point, the bar scene with Tyler and Jack when they first meet, when Ed and Brad are talking about Rosie O'Donnell's reaction to the movie -- how it disturbed her and how it wasn't kind of her to give away the ending on national television. They talk about whether it's good or bad to be trashing her on the DVD. Ed says that anyone watching the commentary who has gotten this far is a true fan... anyone listening he assumes is cool. I like that.

Overall, I give the commentary an 8/10. Although I liked it, sometimes the stars talked over one another, and there wasn't a set plan of what they were going to talk about. They also were watching the movie with no sound -- I don't know if that affected what they were commenting about or not. But it was good, and I recommend listening to it.

Next is track 2, with the writers...

BusinessWeek Online

BusinessWeek Business Schools

Web Building - CNET.com -- Tricks of the trade for web authoring.

Global Business Network Book Club selections

I just added some moreover news links to the site. Here is the full list.

Like lemmings over a cliff -- Sounds like Long Term Capital Capital Management all over again.

Here's the book: Profit From the Core from Bain.

Scary: Bain & Company Study Finds That Less Than One in Ten Companies Are Growing Profitably

Do Analysts Eat Donuts?

Do analysts like to be negative about a good thing? I remember back in '94 when technology stocks were on the rise. I was buying and selling Iomega and Netscape almost daily. Stocks, which previously never went up more than a point or two a day, were suddenly shooting skyward 5-10 points a day. This overenthusiasm spread in the nineties until some stocks were rising 30-40 points a day. Now that small investors have taken Peter Lynch's advice to buy companies they know, analysts are eager to bring down Krispy Kreme from its sugar high(TheStreet.com: The Hole in the Krispy Kreme Craze).

The difference with KKR is that management is taking expansion slow enough that they're not going to become another Boston Market (Boston Market was a successful Massachussetts gourmet fast food restaurant that sold roasted chicken and sides. The food was good, and fast, but unfortunately, the stores expanded too quickly and the chain eventually went bankrupt and had to scale back.).

Krispy Kreme donuts have been popular since the store started selling them in 1937. This is not a recent fad that will blow out like an overstuffed jelly donut. Krispy Kreme will become the Starbucks of the '00s. I know I'll be eating at least one a day once they open up a store in my area.

Ever since I saw her in eXistenZ, I have been attracted to Jennifer Jason Leigh. I never thought she was anything to look at until I saw her in The Big Picture. She was cute in that, but she really developed into a sexy woman by purring her way through Cronenberg's eXistenZ. Now I have to see her in The King is Alive, even though it looks like a poorly shot, pretentious horror movie.

Apparently a bunch of teenagers are in a standoff with police. Their mother was arrested for abuse, after their father recently died. It could make a good movie.

Genetics -- online book explaining the consequences of this future science...

Keurig Coffee Systems - It seems like every office has one of these, and they are always serving Green Mountain Coffee. Is it because it's the cheapest? I've certainly had better.

I finished Choke. It was like Fight Club with sex instead of violence. "Derivative" isn't the word I'm looking for, but it's the first word that comes to mind. For a quick read, I liked it. It reminded me of J.G. Ballard's Crash, but only because the characters in that were also obsessed with sex.

As part of a secret project for work (secret because they don't know I'm doing it), I'm identifying some print industry and marketing magazines which I can potentially write articles to about our products.

Print Industry Magazines:

• Printing Impressions
  
• Printing News
  
• TRprint
  

Marketing Magazines:

• American Demographics
  
• Cahners
  
• epm communications, inc.
  
• Bank Investment Marketing
  
• International Journal of Bank Marketing - scholarly journal for Bank Marketing
  
• Bank Marketing
  
• Business Marketing Association
  
• B-to-B - Magazine for Marketing and E-Commerce Strategists - formerly Business Marketing magazine (no longer published)
  
• Chemical Market Reporter
  
• Direct Marketing - published by Hoke Communications, Inc. 224 Seventh Street, Garden City, NY 11530
  
• PR News
  
• American Marketing Association
  
• Marketing Click Network
  
• mad.co.uk
  
• Marketletter
  
• Sales & Marketing Management
  
• Spray Technology & Marketing
  

PC Magazines

• Laptop: Mobile Solutions for Business and Life
  
• Mobile Computing
  
• Business & Technology Wireless
  
• Pocket PC
  
• Internet Advisor
  
• Handheld Computing
  
• PC World
  
• PC Magazine
  
• Ziff-Davis Smart Business
  
• iSource
  
• Upside
  
• Web Technologies
  
• Technology Review
  
• Internet Works
  
• Online
  
• Linux Journal
  
• Maximum Linux
  

Infotrack - password is guest.

Here's proof that in Massachusetts, a landlord has to pay you interest on your Security Deposit.

How a bill, submitted by a Massachusetts citizen, can become a law.

Okay, I dug alittle deeper, and found that Mr. Rajotte is a retired selectman from Northbridge, who's hobby is taking advantage of a loophole in Massachusetts politics, which allows him to petition the legislature for just about any law he can think of. So many, he claims, that he's forgotten the details of some of them. See this article from SouthCoast Today for more info.

Rosaire J. Rajotte, who had a bridge named after him in 1998, apparently submitted a petition on behalf of the city of Northridge, MA, requiring that people be given two warnings after a $5 fine if they're caught driving without a seat belt. Now why is it that the state has to care whether I'm wearing a seat belt or not? I wear one all the time, but shouldn't this be my choice?

• Here's the bill, "Senate, 1239."
  
• Mr. Rajotte's name is associated with another bill involving property and liability insurance.
  
• The Massachussetts General Court homepage, where you can look up bills in the Massachussetts House and Senate.
  
• The Index of Massachussetts Legislators
  
• My representatives:
  
  
  
  • Senator Steven A. Tolman
    
  • Representative Peter J. Koutoujian
    
  
  

With Pearl Harbor in the theatres, I'm hearing a lot about the other movies which covered the same general time period, and perhaps did a little better. Here's a list of WWII movies and their adjusted box office gross...

Choke

I got a hold of Chuck Palahniuk's Choke. The book isn't as good as I thought it would be. I think I'd rather read Fight Club. I guess I was expecting more poetry in the fiction. The book reads very quickly, and the characters are drab. The topics seem recycled from Fight Club, at least from the movie. The main character's mother is an anarchist, there are scenes of her doing some of the same things Tyler Durden trained his Project Mayhem group to do. Victor Mancini is a sex addict who attends a support group for other sex addicts, so that he can regularly get laid. He works in a dead end job in Colonial Dunsboro, where it's always 1734. His life seems stuck in the same rut. His mother suffers from Alzheimer's, and every time he goes to see her, he's a different person. An then there's the Jesus thing. I won't get into that yet. So far I just want to finish it so I can move on to Time Travel in Einstein's Universe, by J. Richard Gott, or A Confederacy of Dunces. Here's a review I agree with.

It's always nice to see that one man still has the power to change the world.

I wonder if there will be any others.

I read an article which I can no longer find, about the dangers of chemicals found in your own home, including formaldehyde, used in floor finish, latex paints, particle board, and permanently pressed clothing. In searching for the original article, I discovered that there is a controversy as to whether exposure to formaldehyde causes cancer or not. Formaldehyde exposure comes in the form of a "gassing out," which occurs as the floor finish is drying, or soon after the permanently pressed article of clothing is exposed to air. This article mentions the dangers of formaldehyde in the home.¹ This article suggests using household plants to reduce the amounts of formaldehyde in your home.² According to the Association of Perioperative Registered Nurses (AORN) journal, exposure to formaldehyde carries the following risks:

Exposure to airborne concentrations above 0.1 parts per million (ppm) can cause irritation of the eyes and upper airway. A 30-minute exposure to 100 ppm can be fatal, and pulmonary edema has been diagnosed after exposures of 50 ppm. These levels can be generated by small formaldehyde spills of only one pint or less, even in ventilated areas.(15) Blindness can result from splashes in the eyes, and dermal contact causes various degrees of reactions, including sensitization.(16) For these reasons, formalin should be stored and dispensed carefully in a centralized location. Individual specimen containers can be filled under controlled conditions and stored at the central location, close to eye wash, cleanup, and decontamination facilities in the event of an accidental spill or injury.³

¹ Science News, Jan 9, 1999 v155 i2 p22(1)
² The University of California, Berkeley Wellness Letter, Oct 1994 v11 n1 p4(2)
³ AORN Journal, March 2000 v71 i3 p688

Research for a forthcoming article on the "does formaldehyde cause cancer" controversy.