Bradley's Old Fashioned Weblog

Category: General Updates

Commentary on people, places, things, the news, current events, etc.

  • Sexism on the Internet?

    Sexism on the Internet?

    Every time I turn around someone is crying discrimination or sexism on the internet, even in situations where it’s blatantly obvious that the original writer’s intent was something else entirely.

    People nowadays can’t seem to distinguish between what true sexism is and what’s meant to be taken lightly or meant to be used as an example. At the merest hint of something that seems not completely “Politically Correct” people are up in arms and there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth, as though the world will end.

    Get over yourselves. Not everything is sexism and not everything is about you! Sometimes it’s just illustrating a point.

    What’s got me going is that a recent article on Mashable was talking about Internet Explorer 6 and the need for people to stop using a legacy browser, as it’s slowing down advances in internet technology.

    Here’s a quote from the article with the supposedly offensive text colored in red:

    “While it’s great to see companies taking a stand against the broken browser, we can’t help but wonder whether this type of campaign will make any impact, given that many users of IE6 are only using because of work/IT restrictions or are in underdeveloped countries. David, co-founder of Weebly, gave us his thoughts on the matter:

    “We think we can have a huge impact: For those users that are just unaware they are using an old browser (mothers, grandmothers), we’d like to encourage them to upgrade and have a better experience using our sites. For those users in corporate environments, we’d like to start putting pressure on the IT department to upgrade — the more users who complain about seeing the prompts (especially if coming from the top), the more pressure the IT department will have to either upgrade IE 6 or install FirefoxFirefox side-by-side with IE 6 for compatibility reasons.””

    The real kicker in this case is that actual statistics shows that this particular demographic, as well as corporate users, are in fact the highest demographic of people still using IE6.

    Right away though, someone jumped in with this comment:

    “It’s pretty dumb and sexist to label “mothers [and] grandmothers” as the people who are ignorant of technology, and to separate mothers and grandmothers from the corporate world. Mothers and grandmothers don’t work? Males don’t use IE6?”

    Are you serious? In the same way that IE6 is holding back the internet, this mode of thinking in which everything has to be politically correct is holding back the entire world in terms of self-expression.

    Should we go ahead and ban all of our classic literature, because it contains mentions of things that aren’t politically correct?

    Get real, and if you’re so damn sensitive that something as innocent as what was mentioned in that article offends you, then maybe the internet isn’t for you!

    Here are some amusing images to put this all in perspective:

    I’d just like to emphasize one more time that this mode of thinking is ass backwards. I’ve even seen people complain that a person is being sexist just because of their personal preference in women. What? Is a person not allowed to have a preference for what he considers attractive anymore?

    This insanity has got to stop.

  • The “Next Blog” Button is Worthless

    This is just a short break from the series I’m writing to say that the “Next Blog” button located on the Google Blogger toolbar is worthless.

    When clicking this thing, you should be taken to a random blog each and every time.  There are hundreds of thousands of blogs, if not more, on the Blogger system.  There’s no reason why I shouldn’t get an unique blog every time I click that “Next Blog” button.  Instead, I’m sent to the same 7 or 8 blogs over and over again.  Half aren’t in English, and the other half aren’t interesting or I wouldn’t keep “Next Blog”ing past them.

    I mean, seriously.  If I click “Next Blog” and the blog I see is something I don’t like, and is also a blog that doesn’t have the toolbar, I click the “back” button and then click the “Next Blog” button again.  Why is it that if I do this, I’m taken back to the same blog that I just navigated away from?  Then why does it happen 3 times in a row or more?

    Also, why is it that I’m taken to blogs whose written language is in something I couldn’t even guess at?  Blogger incorporates language settings, so why aren’t they being made use of?

    The “Next Blog” button has a lot of potential as a content discovery method, but only if the way it’s implemented is greatly improved.  Every few months I give it a whirl, hoping for some improvement, and every few months I’m disappointed.

    Google is a giant and the world leader when it comes to search and content discovery, so why are they failing at such a simple implementation of technology?  Is it really that hard to set this thing up so that you get a different blog every time you click it?

  • A Poor Example of Leadership

    A Poor Example of Leadership

    When I went through leadership training two of the basic principles we were taught is that you should never ask your subordinate to do something you weren’t willing to do yourself, and you should lead by example.

    So, here’s an example of a failure of both of those sound leadership principles.

    You ask your employees to work extra hours, without pay, to meet unrealistic goals.  You do this regularly, and your employees, having no choice but to comply for fear of losing their jobs, do it.  Rather than staying behind as well, to ensure that your personnel are getting the job done, and to show that you too are sacrificing for the good of the company, you leave on time every day.  As you go out the door on time every day your subordinates are still slaving away at their stations, becoming more and more filled with resentment at their mistreatment.

    The result is that you create a hostile work environment, where the employees resent their jobs and resent you for asking them to stay behind when you’re not willing to do it yourself.  These are major failures in leadership, as you undermine your own authority and cause your employees to stop caring about their work.  Employees will start performing to the minimum, rather than trying to excel, because they have no desire to impress you, as they don’t like you to start with.  Eventually that dislike spreads to dislike for the job and the company as a whole, and employees start biding their time until another opportunity comes along, rather than making plans to invest in their careers with the company.

    There are right ways to lead and manage people and they’ve been identified as the right ways to do things because they work.  I wonder at how some people attain managerial positions and yet these basic tenets of management and leadership seem beyond their grasp.

    (Image Source)

  • Damn Flying Pigs…

    Damn Flying Pigs…

    This past Friday I was excited about going to the mall to get something nice to eat and then shop around a bit.  My wife and I also had plans to go out and enjoy ourselves over the weekend.  Unfortunately, that didn’t happen.

    It was strange, really.  All day I felt fine.  Once I got to the mall though and walked inside I started to feel tired.  Then I realized my muscles all felt like they were aching.  So, I sat down and when I sat down I realized not only how tired I was, but that even my butt cheeks were aching.

    We wound up not staying at the mall for very long.  I didn’t eat much either.  My appetite was disappearing.  By the time I got home, I really felt like crap.  In a short two hours I went from feeling fine to feeling like I’d been hit by a bus.

    The next morning my wife took my temperature and I was running a fever at 38.4 C.  I wound up sleeping most of the day away.  In fact, I did a lot of sleeping from Friday evening through Monday afternoon.  On Saturday night my fever peaked at 39.4 and then started dropping.  By the end of Sunday it had fallen to 38.4 and then by Monday morning it was at 36.6.  It went up briefly to 38 again on Monday but it returned to normal in about an hour.

    It doesn’t sound like much when I put it that way, as just a chronological list of temperatures, but those were some rough days.  Those are the types of fever temperatures that make it hard to sleep and make you think those weird thoughts while you’re laying there. If you’ve ever had a fever and your mind started to wander I’m sure you know what I’m talking about.

    I never did go to the hospital.  I’ve always been a stubborn idiot like that when it comes to being sick.  I hate hospitals.  I remember one year I was sick and dizzy and was still doing physical training in the morning and going to work because I just had too much to do.  Weird right?  Well, I also didn’t want to be bothered with going to the hospital just to be told that I had a cold or flu or something and I should just rest in bed, drink fluids, and take something for the fever and then get a huge bill for being told something I already knew.  I didn’t really have any clue as to what I had.  I just thought I had a regular cold or flu.

    Anyhow, by Monday afternoon the fever was completely gone and I was fuzzy headed and exhausted but fine.  I wound up sleeping most of Monday away and didn’t get out of bed until 4pm.  After all that sleeping my brain was running on overdrive and I was catching up on internet stuff so I wasn’t able to sleep until 6 am or so and then I had to get up again at 9 am to make it to an appointment.  So, I wound up sleeping most of Teusday afternoon and evening away too.  It feels like the last 4 days just sort of slipped away from me.  I don’t even remember most of the days I was sick, since I had a fever or was sleeping the whole time.

    So, how did I actually find out it was H1N1?  Well, I passed it off to someone I live with.  They went to the doctor right away and the doctor confirmed what it was.  They complained of the exact same symptoms: sudden muscle ache and fatigue, followed by fever.

    Well, at least I don’t have to worry as much about H1N1 anymore.  I already have some antibodies ready for it for a while.  I’m still tired though.  I guess it’ll take a while for me to regain my strength.

    (Image source)

  • A Twitter Anniversary Card

    A Twitter Anniversary Card

    My wife and I recently had an anniversary and we got a card in the mail from my dad.  When I pulled it out of the envelope, the first thing I thought of was Twitter.  Maybe I’m using Twitter too much, but this card looks oddly similar to the Twitter bird, and to one of the default background designs you can choose for your Twitter home page.

    If you’re curious, the card is made by Hallmark, but I wasn’t able to find the design on the Hallmark website.

  • Kipling Bags

    Kipling Bags

    While my wife and I were out today, we had to pass through Vivocity Mall. The monorail going to Sentosa Island departs from there. Since we were there anyway, we decided to stop by the Kipling store to have a look at the bags. My wife has been talking about wanting a new Kipling bag for almost a year. The last one she had was ruined when battery acid got on it.

    So, we took a look inside, and, thankfully, almost everything was on sale. It’s the Great Singapore Sale right now! So, she found a bag she liked and while she was posing in the mirror I went ahead and browsed around a bit myself. I saw the one on the right and liked it and decided I should get one as well.

    In the end, my wife wound up paying for both of the bags, as a gift, since I was covering the costs of our outing to Sentosa.

    If you’re not familiar with Kipling, they’re a really good brand. Also, each bag comes with a monkey attached to it, like you can see in the photo. Each monkey has a tag on it with a name. My wife’s bag, on the left, has a monkey named Lorena (scary right?). My bag has a monkey named Clotilde on it. Sounds like some sort of heavily muscled Norse woman to me.

    Regardless, the bags are nice. They’re made of a good quality and should last us for quite a few years. I want more!

  • Remembering the Times, When I First Heard of Michael Jackson

    Remembering the Times, When I First Heard of Michael Jackson

    I’m not sure what happened to Michael Jackson as he aged, but what he became is nothing like what he was.  For the past few years the only thing people had to talk about when it came to Michael were comments about his child-abuse problem and the fact that he has undergone such an enormous amount of cosmetic surgery. In fact, I remember a few years ago there was a joke that his nose fell off.

    It’s true that he really sank low before he died, but the first time I saw Michael Jackson I thought it was the best thing ever.  I was about 8 or 9 years old at the time and living on Hahn Air Force Base in Germany.  In Germany we only had one television channel (in English) and every day at I think it was 2:50 PM, there would be a few short Warner Brothers cartoons and then from 3:00 to 3:30 there would be one long cartoon.  My brother and I would rush home from school to make sure we caught those cartoons because there weren’t any others to be had.  On trips to the US to visit family we would record Saturday morning cartoons to bring back with us, or our grandmother would record them and send them to us.

    Well, one day, instead of the usual short cartoons there were two music videos.  I don’t remember what the first one was, Thriller maybe, but the second one was Remember the Time.  It’s the first music video I clearly remember seeing.  I was fascinated.  The music was great.  The dancing was great.  The costumes were great!  My brother and I sat there, fascinated, half fearful that for some reason our parents would tell us to stop watching it, but they didn’t.  We went to church every Sunday and lived a pretty sheltered life on an Air Force Base in a foreign country, so something about the video seemed a little dangerous.  I loved the whole thing and when it was over I was disappointed.  Somehow the cartoons that day weren’t all that entertaining.

    Michael Jackson was my first exposure to mainstream American music and I loved it.  I also wonder if that video has anything to do with my interest in history?  If you’re not familiar with it, the video had an Egyptian theme.  It’s a shame that a man that was able to influence so many people around the world through his music is dead, but I get the feeling that he brought it on himself, so I can’t really feel too badly about it.  Regardless, R.I.P. Michael.  I hope you’re in a better place… and if you are… don’t chase the cherubs!

  • Moleskine Notebooks

    Moleskine Notebooks

    The first time I’d ever heard of a moleskine notebook was when I was reading a blog about a woman’s trip to Vietnam. She had taken a lot of notes in a moleskine and had scanned and embedded them as a slideshow into a blog post. I thought it was a really interesting idea, and a great way to record thoughts about a trip you take when you might not have a laptop handy. For example, if you’re on a hike through the hills you might not have time to whip out your laptop and jot down a few things. Despite the proliferation of digital media, there are still a lot of times when old fashioned notebooks are just the most practical and sensible thing to use.

    Moleskines are appealing because they have an interesting name and an interesting history. I know it’s silly to feel more prestigious just based on an item you might have, but moleskines are just that sort of thing. They even advertise it and market it that way. The cover wrapper (seen in green and orange on the ones in the photo) say: “The legendary notebook of Hemingway, Picasso, Chatwin.” I suppose it’s something like how Apple promotes their products.

    When you break open the plastic and flip it open, the first thing you’ll probably notice is a leaflet inside that details the history of moleskine notebooks. Apparently they fell out of production for a while, but some authors ordered a bulk of them because they were sad to see them go. Later, another manufacturer, in Milan I believe, picked up the production and they’re marketed world-wide again.

    Typically I wouldn’t fall for something like that, but I really enjoy writing, and writing is all about frame of mind. If you’re in the right frame of mind, you’ll write well. If not, what you produce is at best bland. So, having something that’s touted as a notebook used by famous figures is just the thing to set the mood, and it also pushes you to only write things in it that are meaningful.

    So, yesterday, my wife and I bought each other one each, as gifts. The one I got for my wife is an “Info Book” style Moleskine, with tabbed, labeled sections. She’s a fanatic for organizers and loved it. I got the plain, ruled paper moleskine. That’s appropriate for what I want to do with it, which is record thoughts that I have that I can later use for blog articles. I’m sure everyone has had a great thought or idea, only to realize later when they sit down they can’t quite grasp it again. This is my solution.

    We picked the pocket sized versions because that makes for easy portability. It’ll slip easily into a bag or pocket. The quality is really nice. Each one is hand made, and comes with a defect-free guarantee that’s easy to cash in on. If you find a defect, all you have to do is take a digital image and e-mail it to a provided address. They’ll ship you a new notebook right away. Quality and service are important to this company.

    So, if you’re looking for a quality notebook that you can shelf and cherish later on, this might be something you’ll want to look into. Just keep in mind that they’re a bit pricey since they’re premium items.

  • Using Swine Flu to Sell Your Product

    Using Swine Flu to Sell Your Product

    Swine Flu has to be the most covered and most talked about event in the last two years, and it’s not even that serious. From what I’ve read, the fatality rate is only 0.1%, which is less than the fatality rate of actual flu.

    It’s a new disease though, and it’s in the media limelight, so everyone’s heard of it, and the more people hear about it and ask about it, the more the media covers it. I think it’s past the point of informing people and bordering on propaganda. Sure, people should be informed, but hasn’t it gone on long enough? I even question the extra scanners that have been set up at airports and such, if the swine flu isn’t even as bad as a regular flu.

    Now, H1N1 is even being used to sell products! Dettol is a common cleaning agent company here, selling everything from hand soap to floor cleaner. The following pictures are from a can of disinfectant spray, similar to Lysol.

  • Twitter Social Games Are Annoying

    Twitter Social Games Are Annoying

    Recently I heard of a new social game called Spymaster.  Well, not so much heard of, as much as suffered from.  The game is currently in beta right now, and is something that has been cooked up for Twitter.  I can understand social games on Facebook.  They make sense, because they’re separate and they don’t interfere (too much) with other people’s home pages.  If someone’s updates are annoying you, you can hide the updates from that particular application, to keep your stream from being cluttered.

    Spymaster, on the other hand, seems to manage its notifications by posting everything a player does to their Twitter stream.  Yes, everything.  The problem with that is that on Twitter, you either follow someone or you don’t.  There’s no way to hide particular Tweets.  So, if you start putting out a lot of spam you give people two choices, put up with it or un-follow you.  I’m leaning towards the latter.  It’s hard enough to sort through all of the Tweets I get already, without having to scan through crap like “I just did damage to @XXXXX in an attempted assassination attempt!”

    Twitter is all about providing useful information to your friends, either in the form of status updates, witty sayings, links, images, video… well you get the picture.  In other words, no one is following you on Twitter to read your spam messages from a social game.  I mean, who really cares?  Other than yourself of course?

    I don’t see Twitter games that spam people’s streams becoming overly popular, but if they do, I hope to God that people are smart enough to create a separate account for it.  One last thing I’d like to say is, isn’t Twitter already suffering under the current load?  Is it really smart to try to build a social game that sends a lot of Tweets when the platform is already regularly overloaded?