And you thought your cell phone was thin

Rivaling the Razr in dimensions, a new Intel laptop is nearly half-an-inch thick and weighs less than three pounds. It's not sacrificing any of the niceties either with Wi-Fi and WiMax built in and a 14 hour battery life.

I want one!

Link:
Gizmodo

Costco Recalls Dirty Underwear Punching Bags

It seems Costco's been selling punching bags that were made not with cotton stuffing, but dirty underwear as filler. Once discovered, Costco sent pre-paid mailers to all of their customers who purchased the bags so they could be returned. I'm trying to be happy that Costco is taking such immediate and appropriate action, but I keep tripping over the source of the punching bag's filler. (No pun intended.)

Eeeeeew.

Link:
The Consumerist
Costco Recall

President Bush promotes seat belts... by not wearing his?

President Bush recently lent himself to helping promote a federal seatbelt ad campaign called 'Click It or Ticket'. Only, the press corp has pointed out that he doesn't wear his seatbelt. So much for setting a good example.

Links:
USAToday.com article
Click It or Ticket campaign

Green energy blows!

Our utility company is offering 'green' electricity. For a premium of $6 a month, 50% of our electricity will come from renewable sources, wind in our case. They also offer 25% and 100% levels for $3 and $12 respectively but I'm not ready to pay $240 a year in addition to my standard electric bill.

The good news is, I've found a way to offset the $6 a month I'm paying. The average 32" television in consumes as much energy in a 24 hour period as a television that is on for 1 hour. By plugging our television(s) in to our stereo receiver I'm effectively unplugging our TV when the receiver is off. This allow me to maintain my sedentary lifestyle while dramatically reducing the amount of electricity the television consumes. After one month of this (and after replacing most of our incandescent light bulbs with fluorescent bulbs), our electric bill was half what it had been the previous month!

Links:
GreenUp!
TV (& VCR) energy consumption

The Wayback Machine

Much like Google's 'cached' version of search results, the Wayback Machine allows you to put in a website's address, and they'll show you what that site looked like over the years. They've been collecting pages since 1996 so there's a lot to view.

The Wayback Machine

Some of my favorites:
Rochestertoday.com
http://web.archive.org/web/19980613185101/http://www.rochestertoday.com/

Yahoo!
http://web.archive.org/web/19961017235908/http://www2.yahoo.com/

Harris Kid Zone
http://web.archive.org/web/20000620014847/www.harriszone.com/voting/default.asp

The purpose of a lock is not to keep people out

The purpose of a lock is to make it just hard enough that you deter 99% of those people that might want to break in. Having a lock in no way guarantees you'll keep people out of your house, car, safe... If someone wants to get in to your house badly enough, they'll just bring a crowbar. Can't pry open a door? Smash in a window!

People don't do this because it brings enough attention that they can't easily get away quickly so a lock, while not difficult to get past, does effectively keep out most people.

So what would happen if someone discovered a technique that allowed them to get past 90% of the locks in this country in under 15 seconds? What if that technique were so easy, a 12 year-old could be taught how to do it in under 5 minutes? What if it required no force and was undetectable after used on any lock?

This is MacGyver at his best, pure physics elegantly bypassing security. Beautiful, but damn scary.

http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/07/bump-keying-1-keys-open-any-lock/

Apparently the video of an 11 year-old was taken down, then put back up. Here's a very brief video that shows how this works followed by the video of the girl who just learned how to break in to your house.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQDR-DBQRfI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5fLgxqWvJQ

Skip the iPhone and go to the oPhone!

Apple is getting an incredible amount of press over the release of the iPhone. The thing is, the phone still isn't out and won't be for over a month. So why wait!?

Skip the iPhone and get a Microsoft oPhone!

Link:
Engadget

Reducing Junk Mail in Seattle!

I recently bought my first home. It's been a great experience except for all of the junk mail. It seems the US Postal Service thinks adding all change of address listings to a national database they sell to marketers is helpful. So after asking to have our mail forwarded for three months, with no luck, we were rewarded with a wave of unwanted junk mail.

In trying to get off these lists I found several sites that had plenty of tips on how to stop junk mail but none of them focused on Seattle-specific mail so I thought I'd throw together the resources I used to cut back.

In order of offensiveness:

Credit card offers (I'm pre-approved!)
This won't stop all of the offers, companies you've dealt with in the past can still contact you, but this will prevent the majority of the credit card offers:
https://www.optoutprescreen.com/

The Savings Source (Seattle Times)
Call their automated line and ask to be removed:
206-652-6587


Shop Wise (ADVO)
I find this particularly despicable... they mail you junk along with a missing childrens' 'Have you seen me?' flyer.
Use their online form:
http://www.advo.com/consumersupport.html


ValPack
Use their online form to be removed:
http://www.coxtarget.com/mailsuppression/s/DisplayMailSuppressionForm



Here are some great sites offering more help including some information on the ultimate nuclear junk mail weapon, USPS form 1500, a form that lets residents define junk mail as 'obscene' and legally restricts a company from mailing them ever again.

Ecocycle: http://www.ecocycle.org/junkmail/index.cfm
- Step-by-step tips on how to get off mailing lists and how much waste is generated by junk mail

Direct Marketing Association: https://www.the-dma.org/consumers/dmasponsorship.html
- The self-policing arm of the junk mail industry

Junkbusters: http://www.junkbusters.com/optout.html
- Links to company specific information and sample letters to get off mailing lists

Junkbusters: http://www.junkbusters.com/dmlaws.html
- Information on your postal rights, why you can't stop mail addressed to 'resident', and form 1500