Interesting, Cool and Useful – Jan 29 07
Interesting:
- Trying to Arbitrage Second Life - A thoughtful analysis done by several arbitrageurs that ultimately determined the Second Life Economy is really a Ponzi Scheme. The key takeaway is that there is no way to take money out of Second Life without severely impacting the exchange rate.
- Fluid Dynamics Model saves Lives at Hajj - It seems that every year hundreds get trampled to death at Hajj. This year the Saudi government made changes to Jamarat Bridge based on recommendations derived from fluid dynamics. Dirk Helbing and Anders Johansson looked at surveillance imagery from the 2006 trampling incident as if every person was a particle in fluid-dynamical flow. The stampedes, they reasoned, happen when laminar flow smooth transitions to stop and go and turbulent.
- Black Google page would save 3000 Megawatts annually. A simplified look at the energy that might be saved if Google changed their homepage from white to black.
Cool:
- A display at a Jeep store where 2-story falling water is jetted out in patterns to create the coolest billboard I’ve ever seen.
- I love mechanical wonders. This absurdly priced watch is pretty cool. Make sure you check out the video of the watch movement.
Useful:
- Gaim. I’ve used Trillian for years and finally switched to the open source Gaim for my management of my multiple IM accounts. Trillian didn’t handle reconnection all that well. Plus, Gaim just feels less bloated.
- Opt out. A great post on lifehacker summarizing a few easy ways to unsubscribe from and opt out of various solicitations. I’d highly recommend opting out of credit card offers - these offers are frequently used in identity theft and there are far better ways to pick your credit cards than through mail solicitations.
- Building a Digg Funnel. How to build a website such that it funnels traffic to stories you are hoping to get Dugg.
- 7 tips for linkbait success. A few good pointers on making linkbait successful.
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[…] has a series of great posts on his blog about things that are “Interesting, Cool and Useful” The posts themselves are informative and entertaining – always a killer combination. Highly […]
I thought the fireworks were to celebrate the Pats’ win! Oh wait, they lost. Must have been for the Vista launch then.