For a few dollars more!

This week, TIME magazine has published some interesting statistics on American people. Since money is all that I think about!, here the one with the money ...

How much time at work does it take to make $1,000?


Dr. Phil ......................... 2 min. 42 sec.
Brad Pitt ....................... 4 min. 48 sec.
Maria Sharapova ........... 6 min.
Chief Executive .............. 2 hr. 55 min.
High School Teacher ...... 43 hours
Farmer ........................... 57 hours

For more refer to TIME Magazine.

UC Berkeley courses at Google Video

Well, I have to confess that I have a weired feeling about this post, but who cares let's enjoy the material as somebody once said: It is the material that matters!
UC Berkeley is offering public a lot of videos including course videos on Google video for free. Here is the link, take a look and I am pretty sure you will find something out of it.

Good deed

Whenever you do a good deed, take a receipt. You may need it in Heaven, especially if it is something like IRS.

No comment ...

Writely - Online Word Processing

Last night I noticed that Writely.com is up and working. You can use your Google account to sign in. It is a word processing software similar to Microsoft Word but it is online and free. I played a little bit with its features and liked it a lot. It has many useful tools such as tables, variety of fonts and you can publish your blogs through it. A very useful feature is its real-time multi-collaborator capability. You can also share your document with others instantly. On the other hand, it is possible to upload your Word documents into it and edit them and save your files as a PDF file.

Headbutt phenomenon

I was playing with Google Trends and I searched for Zidane. As you may remeber, he headbutted Materazzi, Italian player, in the World Cup final match. Here is the search history for Zidane and Materazzi according to Google. I would like to call it Headbutt phenomenon.

Click to enlarge

Noble Prize in Medicine for 2006

" The Noble Assembly awarded the Noble Prize in Physiology or Medicine for 2006 to Andrew Fire , PhD, of Stanford University School of Medicine and Craig C. Mello, PhD, of the University of Massachusetts Medical School, for their discoveries related to RNA interference."

" Fire, 47, professor of pathology and of genetics at Stanford, is part of a team of researchers credited with recognizing that certain RNA molecules could be used to turn off specific genes in animal cells. The discovery marked the first time that biologists were able to selectively silence the voice of one gene in the cacophony of the tens of thousands that pilot a cell throughout its development and death. This development opened up previously impossible areas of research."

from Stanford University School of Medicine website, for more detail on this news follow this link .

Iranian Stand-up Comedian

I am in fact the only Iranian Comedian in the world, that's actually three more than Germany.

Omid Djalili

Recently, I watched some stand up comedies from Omid Djalili. Apparently I am little behind here because I didn't know him before. There are a couple of short clips in his website. You can also find many short ones in YouTube or Google Video. Here is the one that I liked a lot, although it is an old joke and I remember it since high school, but he tells it magnificently. In case you've watched "Over the Hedge", he is the voice of the Persian kitty.
By the way, I know there are other Iranian stand up comedians around such as Maz Jobrani, so don't blame me for the quote here.

Uncertainty

We are required to be maximally uncertain about what we do not know. This is the most honest thing to do!

Entropy Optimization Principles
with Applications
by Kapur and Kesavan

Rise and Fall

Our greatest glory is not in the never falling but in rising every time we fall

Confucius

No Comments ...

Browzar ...

Are you worried about leaving a trace of what you've browsed on the web when you're using a friend's computer? Browzar claims that it won't leave anything behind. Just simply download it and run it without installing anyting. The only catch is that if you're one of those people who are worried about leaving a trace, you probably know how to clean up your trace after using IE or Firefox. So, ignore this post and wait for the next one!

Memories ...

Sometimes, I think I am getting drowned in my memories, but I like it. At least I will die in a sweet thing. It is becoming a game more or less, to go down as far as I can, to remember things deep inside. The other day, I remembered the classical music played by Keyvan Saket with TAR which is a Persian music instrument. Believe me it is hard, more than you can imagine. I found some of his audio clips on the web. Here is the link ... Enjoy.

First Dell then Apple

Short after Dell recalled 4.1 million laptop batteries, Apple also recalled 1.8 million batteries. In both cases, the batteries were made by Sony Energy Devices Corp. of Japan. Both recalls are expected to cost Sony between $172 million and $278 million.
I am wondering what happens if God recalls human hearts for unexpected failure and catching fire!! Perhaps, whenever there is a war somewhere, it is basically a battery recall. The only difference is that there is no replacement.

The blue screen

Well, it is a bit of a technical note but is worth mentioning. Recently, I've seen two IBM laptops (T series) both of them having an exact same problem with their wireless driver causing the famous blue screen error. The strange thing was that the problem had come out of no where. My guess is that a windows update or an upgrade in a software had caused it. Anyway, new wireless drivers solved the issue and I have to confess that I was very lucky to pinpoint the source of the problem. So, here is an experience: If you have a T series IBM laptop and you are getting blue screen error, it may have something to do with the wireless drivers.

(The Image is a sample blue screen error, not related to the problem described above)

Microsoft Office 2007

Last week I did a brave thing and installed Microsoft Office 2007 (beta). I say a brave thing because I had a very bad experience with new Windows Media player 11 that eventually I un-installed it.
Anyway, it has a lot of good features that I may post later but one strange thing was that Microsoft Outlook kept crashing each time I opened one email. After searching around, it turned out to has something to do with Adobe Acrobat 6.0 add-in, although I have to say that I didn't find the solution in microsoft.com. Anyway, for those who are willing to test office 2007 (which I recommend) here is a good resource in case of any problems with Outlook.

The end ...

When memories exceed dreams, the end is near

One thing that tells me a company is in trouble is when they tell me how good they were in the past. Same with countries. You don't want to forget your identity. I am glad you were great in the fourteenth century, but that was then and this is now. When memories exceed dreams, the end is near.

Michael Hammer
from the book: The World is flat
by: Thomas Friedman

Wikimapia

Take a look at this Wikimapia web site. It has a high resolution satellite picture of the world with a lot of comments and information boxes on the map. Of course since it is a wiki you can also put your own comment boxes on the map. It is time to get global and let every body know where is your home and where you usually sit to watch TV!! It might be a little slow though. But it is fun after all. Here, I have zoomed on Sharif University and I am highlighting its soccer field.

Click to enlarge ...
(Picture: Screen snapshot from wikipedia.org)

No need for an apology!

Stand for nothing

Those who stand for nothing fall for anything.

Alexander Hamilton