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From: cate3@netcom.com (Henry Cate)
Message-Id: [199409081406.HAA24481@netcom2.netcom.com]
To: JWry.dl@netcom.com
Subject: Life B.Q
Reply-to: cate3@netcom.com
Status: R
---------------
Date: 14 Jan 94 16:15:37 PST (Friday)
Subject: Life B.Q
All the following are the pardo mailing list
Run by: "Jim Paradis" [pardo@meitner.cs.washington.edu]
----------------------------------------------------
[Information Week: October 10, 1993: Executive Summary]
A WordPerfect lawsuit to prevent Microsoft's use of term such as "most
popular" and "best selling" in advertising its word processor,
Microsoft Word, has been settled. WordPerfect retains the right to use
"most popular" and "all-time best selling" for its word processor,
which has the larger installed base, but gives Microsoft the right to
use "best selling," because Word now outsells WordPerfect.
--------------------------
From: Greg Kuchta [gregku@brador.UCSD.EDU]
Bob Brubaker write:
] Desperately seeking bigger pot-holes
Have you tried Pennsylvania?
-A friend broke his car frame on I-81 (ok, it was rusted but it did
break when he hit a pot hole).
-Several reports of holes in bridges on the Schuylkill (Sure-Kill)
Expressway, but the holes were spotted by persons BELOW the
expressway bridge.
Had several civil engineer friends who confirmed the primary reason they
pave rodes in Pennsylvania is to put pot holes in them :-)
--------------------------
Their address sums up their attitude: One Microsoft Way.
--------------------------
[Forwards deleted for some reason. -psl]
There are 240 million people in America.
But 100 million are over 65.
And 90 million are under 21.
That leaves 50 million to do the work.
But 18 million are in the armed forces.
That leaves 32 million to do the work.
But 6 million are on welfare.
That leaves 26 million to do the work.
But 15 million work for the government.
That leaves 11 million to do the work.
But 10 million are in school.
That leaves 1 million to do the work.
But 750,000 are sick or disabled.
That leaves 250,000 to do the work.
But last week 249,998 people were in jail.
That leaves 2 people to do all the work,
and you don't do that much.
No wonder I'm so tired!
--------------------------
From: Edupage [edupage@IVORY.EDUCOM.EDU]
ELECTRONIC ROSARY. No more beads -- devout Catholics can now rely on the
electronic rosary, a device much like a hand-held video game that responds
to the push of a button with instructions on how to pray the rosary, which
prayers to say when, and also plays musical versions of some of the
prayers. The gadget was invented by an Italian priest and retails for about
$42. (St. Petersburg Times 11/13/93 RSV)
--------------------------
From: deanb@microsoft.com (Dean Ballard)
You're called upon for an opinion of a friend who is extremely lazy. You
don't want to lie --- but you also don't want to risk losing even a lazy
friend.
Try this line: ``In my opinion,'' you say as sincerely as you can manage,
``you will be very fortunate to get this person to work for you.''
This gem of double meaning is the creation of Robert Thornton, a professor
of economics at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, PA.
Thornton was frustrated about an occupational hazard for teachers, having
to write letters of recommendation for people with dubious qualifications,
so he put together an arsenal of statements that can be read two ways.
He calls his collection the Lexicon of Inconspicuously Ambiguous
Recommendations. Or ``LIAR'', for short.
``[LIAR] may be used to offer a negative opinion of the personal qualities,
work habits or motivation of the candidate while allowing the candidate to
believe that it is high praise,'' Thornton explained last week.
Some examples from LIAR:
To describe a person who is totally inept: ``I most enthusiastically
recommend this candidate with no qualifications whatsoever.''
To describe an ex-employee who had problems getting along with fellow
workers: ``I am pleased to say that this candidate is a former colleague of
mine.''
To describe a candidate who is so unproductive that the job would be better
left unfilled: ``I can assure you that no person would be better for the
job.''
To describe a job applicant who is not worth further consideration: ``I
would urge you to waste no time in making this candidate an offer of
employment.''
To describe a person with lackluster credentials: ``All in all, I cannot
say enough good things about this candidate or recommend him too highly.''
Thornton pointed out that LIAR is not only useful in preserving friendships,
but it also can help avoid serious legal trouble in a time when laws have
eroded the confidentiality of letters of recommendation.
In most states, he noted, job applicants have the right to read the letters
of recommendations and can even file suit against the writer if the contents
are negative.
When the writer uses LIAR, however, ``whether perceived correctly or not by
the candidate, the phrases are virtually litigation-proof,'' Thornton said.
--------------------------
]From the New York Times, Friday November 12, 1993 (page B20):
At the Bar. David Margolick. "Court asks a lawyer, if a computer is doing
most of the work, why the big fee?"
[Abstracted and excerpted] Craig Collins, a lawyer in San Mateo California,
used the West CD-ROM library, a system that contains every court opinion
published in California in the last 33 years on three compact disks, to
research a parental rights case. Under penalty of perjury, he swore that he
had devoted 22 hours, ten of them over the Fourth of July weekend, to writing
several memorandums concerning the rights of step-parents in custody cases.
"At his normal rate of $225 an hour, that worked out to $4,950, part of his
total tab of $9,591.50. The money was to come from the stepfather, who lost
the case, provided it was approved by Judge Roderic Duncan of the Alameda
County Superior Court."
"That was not quite what happened. Indeed, after deconstructing the
mechanics of modern computer research, Judge Duncan not only balked,
but handed Mr. Collins to the disciplinary enforcement section of
the State Bar of California."
As it turned out, large portions of Mr. Collins memorandums were copied
directly from the court opinions, without attribution. Collins explained
that he had quoted the courts at length because "their language ``was
better written than I would have composed it myself.''" The court, however,
found that 22 hours was rather extreme for cutting and pasting since Mr.
Collins was an experienced lawyer. At the hearing, William P. Eppes II, a
representative of the West Publishing Company testified that Mr. Collins
had used the system for a total of of 9 hours and 33 minutes since he
had purchased it. The witness, who was also a lawyer, testified that it
seemed entirely plausible that Mr. Collins had put in the time he claimed.
The judge was impressed by the witness' reasoning and withdrew his claim
that Mr. Collins had not worked as long as he did. "All those hours at
the computer, the judge seemed to say, reflected inefficiency rather than
dishonesty."
Although disciplinary proceedings were dropped, Mr. Collins is still
displeased with a judge who, in an interview, he described as "a ``cavalier''
judicial ``maveric'' whose ill-considered opinions had periodically been
criticized by the California courts of appeal. How did he know? He consulted
his trusty CD-ROM, and plugged in the words ``Duncan'' and ``reversal.''"
["Quotes" are directly from the article. ``Quotes'' are quoted material
in the original article. ]
--------------------------
[It could have happened: My housemate told me a laxitive-or-something
company discovered non-hazardous traces of arsenic in their product,
had a press release and promptly got a class-action lawsuit that
yielded $25,000 for the principal defendant, $7 for each co-defendent,
and several million divided among the lawyers.]
-----
From: Dave Van Horn [davevh@microsoft.com]
| I advise all that it is foolish to post stories about
| wild law suits without verifying their truth and source.
Fair enough, here's one that I have personally verified: Derby Cycles
(parent of Raleigh) was sued in New Jersey for not warning a purchaser
that you shouldn't ride a bicycle at night without lights. (Never mind
that is already illegal in New Jersey.) The judgement was $7 million.
Derby plans to appeal. (I called the company and they read me their
press release.)
I should mention, though, that most of the outrageous awards you hear
about are reversed or drastically cut on appeal, which of course you
don't hear about. But it takes years of litigation, with the attendant
costs and uncertainty, before then.
--------------------------
12:27 Tue 12/07/93 From SERIALS CATALOGING S [CN.KAS]:
Mind Games Department.
The universe, as everyone knows, is composed of chatter and
anti-chatter, two substances which cannot be at close proximity
without mutual annihilation. My area of the Copy Cataloging Section
is composed exclusively of chatter. As an experiment, I have
maintained absolute silence in the section for the past two days,
just to see what would happen. It's driving everyone around me
crazy, but no explosions as of yet. Updates will follow if anything
interesting happens. --BPK, PH day, 1993.
--------------------------
From: Peter Langston [pud!psl@bellcore.bellcore.com]
Instead of the usual expression of the speed of light in as
186,000 miles per second, I've seen it expressed in units of
furlongs per fortnight and cubits per century.
1 furlong == 220 yards.
1 fortnight == "four[teen] night[s]" == 14 days.
1 cubit == based on the length of the forearm from the
elbow to the tip of the middle finger and usually
equal to about 18 inches.
I leave the exact values of the speed of light in these units
as an exercise for the student.
Another story (probably false): a firm sent a sample to a lab to get
its density. The lab sent back an answer in grams per cubic centimeter.
The firm sent back a very stuffy letter saying that they used the
English system of measurement and would the lab send back IMMEDIATELY
the equivalent value. (As if the firm didn't have a calculator).
The lab sent back its answer in stones per royal firkin.
[Note for Unix users: the "units" program (/usr/bin/units) makes these
calculations quite easy... viz.
pud -=59=- units
465 units; 3574 bytes
you have: c
you want: cubits / century
* 2.069232e+18
/ 4.832710e-19
you have: c
you want: furlongs / fortnight
* 1.802618e+12
/ 5.547488e-13
In other words, the speed of light (c) = 2,069,232,000,000,000,000 cubits per
century (or so) and also 1,802,618,000,000 furlongs per fortnight.
For that matter:
you have: gm/cm3
you want: stone/firkin
* 5.364903e+00
/ 1.863967e-01
--------------------------
"An ascetic is a hedonist of self-denial" -- Robert Anton Wilson
"What do you get if you cross a masochist with a hedonist?
somebody who wants to suffer -- *right now*! -- Anon
--------------------------
A while back -- like, a couple of years ago -- Marvin Minsky gave a
talk here. I recently found my notes, here's a few things I wrote down
during the lecture; probably not exact quotes, but maybe close.
;-D on ( Consider it noted ) Pardo
"The more famous you are, the harder the audience laughs."
"... and if you think about it, which you're not allowed to do, ..."
"You learn you're not allowed to tell certain kinds of lies. Even more
important, you learn you're not allowed to tell certain kinds of
truths."
--------------------------
[A while ago I forwarded a story about the "fish tank channel";
This is a great follow-on. Thanks, Dennis!]
------- Forwarded Message
From: Dennis Gentry [dennis@phoenix.cs.washington.edu]
From: Christian_Molick (Christian Molick)
(from Harper's, 1/94)
The Vaster Wasteland: excerpts from a Well discussion on what to
fill the first 500 channels of broadcast interactive television with.
The Airport Luggage Inspection Channel: Direct video feeds from
baggage x-rays around the world.
The Patty Duke Channel: with archival footage of her wedding to
John Astin shown in-between episodes.
The Laundry Channel: 24 hrs. of the window of an industrial washing machine.
A 24 hr. White House channel: Enough with the odd press briefing
and Rose Garden chat; I want to see who's walking the halls. I want
to see them shampoo the carpets at 4 am. I want to see the chef
fixing a state dinner. I want an interview with the guy or gal
who mows the lawn. I want to know what kind of homework Chelsea
has today.
The Supermarket-Aisle Channel: Long tracking shots of carefully
stacked cans of potted meat. What's New in Vienna Cocktail Franks.
Interviews with stock clerks. Box Cutting: "How Not to Slice the
Cereal Boxes Open." Checkers Corner: "What's the Item Cutoff in
the Express Line?"
CNN Minus 365: Last year's complete CNN feed.
The Just-Like-Me Channel: 24 hrs. of people on sofas, remote control
in hand, watching TV.
Channel Destructo: 24 hrs. of very big things being blown apart,
crashed into rivers, or being shot at with large weapons.
A channel-surfing-channel that will show me whatever it is that
various celebrities are watching at that moment.
The Counter Channel: Every time another viewer flips to it, a big
counter increases by one. Sometimes everyone would tune in just to
watch the numbers tally really fast.
The Endoscopic Surgery Channel: Coronary arteries. Urethras. The
brain stem. They can see it, why not you?
Abyssal Submarine TV: Live from the depths of the Mariana Trench.
Sunday's feature: 24 soothing hours of the sulfur-sucking tubeworms
of the East Pacific Rise.
...drue
--------------------------
[From a recent posting here...]
Each year, Xerox Palo Alto and Webster research centers (PARC and
WRC) offer a wide variety of paid summer research positions. They are
not inviting highly qualified graduate students to apply to the 1994
Summer Intern Program.
(A followup says it is supposed to be "*now*" inviting...)
--------------------------
From: Peter Langston [pud!psl@bellcore.bellcore.com]
[Do you run screaming from the room when your egghead friends start having
conversations like the following?
"Was it a rat I saw?"
"Step on no pets."
"Too bad - I hid a boot."
"Rats live on no evil star."
"Deliver no evil; live on reviled."
"Won't lovers revolt now?"
"No, I save on final perusal, a sure plan if no evasion.
"Poor Dan is in a droop."
"Egad! A base tone denotes a bad age."
-psl]
From: Robert.Reynolds@reed.edu (Robert Reynolds)
aibohphobia: an irrational fear of palindromes
Date: Thu, 13 Jan 94 23:12:18 -0800
From: Peter Langston [pud!psl@bellcore.bellcore.com]
Subject: aibohphobia
From: crandall@reed.edu (Richard E Crandall)
So what is, on the other hand, a rational fear of palindromes?
I was thinking: a/bohphob\a
[I feel like a straight man for the Reed College Physics Department... -psl]
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