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They call this FAIL? They should have been to the public bathrooms in China. Those are WORLD WONDERS.

這就叫做「失敗」？老美未免也太大驚小怪了，有空應該到中國大陸的公廁去參觀一下，那個才叫做「奇觀」。:P

各國都有徵兵海報，沒什麼稀奇，不過會看門道的人就可以從裡頭看到很多東西。舉個簡單的例子，裡頭的武器（尤其值得注意的是單兵武器）都是新的：新型的、剛貼過開箱文的。另外，不同的文化和建軍風格也會有不同的展現方式。最簡單的道理：能刊出來的設計，都是大頭們看過點頭的。

原文刊出的一系列中國徵兵海報，雖然構圖、色彩、攝影都稍微比較現代化了，但基本上仍然不脫蘇聯式大艦巨砲、人海戰術的格局。

不過這張海報就有趣了。一票看起來都是女性的飛行員，後面一排看起來應該是「殲8」的戰鬥機，中間一位跳起來做出好像日本卡通片中的萌動作。我相信這個畫面拍了很多次才成功抓到那個瞬間，不過一來沒什麼意義、二來實在是太超現實了一點。

Every country has its variations of recruitment poster for armed forces, no big deal. But if you're into military stuff, you might be able to read between the "lines". For instance, the weapons (especially individual gears) are mostly brand new in terms of model and cleanliness.

The design and appealing angle also demonstrate the country's cultural and attitude toward the military force. Simply put, the posters must have been approved by the high-rank stars.

The image, color and photography of the Chinese posters in the original article are relatively modern, however they are still showing strong influence from the traditional Soviet style of big guns, goose steps and "it's an honor to repay our motherland".

The photo above is the most interesting one to me: a group of seemingly female pilots in front of a line of fighter jets (look like J-8), but the one in the middle makes a Japanese anime-style hop to show her energy and cuteness. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me, and that's quite surreal.

Translators are Volunteers

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I have nothing against utilizing the community or volunteer effort for product localization; I am just wondering how it benefits the software maker, the volunteers and the software users. Are they well balanced? How would the overall quality be? Will this approach benefit the industry?

這是某個軟體公司徵求志工，為旗下產品進行介面翻譯的部分啟事內容。現在似乎利用這種方式「省錢」的廠商越來越多了；只要召募得到夠水準的志工，這樣做可以節省成本、提昇相關社群的向心力、造福外語程度不足的使用者。

然而，這樣的手法之下，廠商、志工、以及使用者各能有多少獲益呢？這三者之間的獲益是否能夠均衡呢？廠商本身用在管理專案和品質控制方面的努力，會不會其實高過找傳統的專業翻譯廠商呢？如果這種手法廣泛使用，對於軟體業、以及所謂「軟體本地化」產業又會有什麼影響呢？我很好奇。

"Hasta la vista, school."

Elementary school notebook parody.

Today the search giant released Go, an open-source development language that Google believes will combine performance with speed, and one that the company probably hopes will reshape the development and software industries in its favor.

Go is based on the C programming family, one of the most widely used programming language trees in the world. However, the twist is that incorporates elements of Python (a preferred development language within Google) and the Pascal/Modula/Oberon family to make faster and more dynamic programs.

用自己的程式語言，一方面可以最佳化自己的開發環境、一方面可以綁程式設計師和軟體規格，是個聰明的作法；當然，沒有相當雄厚的資金和經濟規模是做不到的。

It's smart to develop a "private" programming language (well, in fact it's open-source), since this optimizes Google's own development environment as well as encompasses future app specs and even programmers' direction. Smart.

Of course, this takes a deep pocket and economic scale to do so, which Google has them all.

Has the lost army of Cambyses II been found? The Persian army of 50,000 soldiers supposedly perished in a sandstorm in ancient Egypt 2500 years ago. Researchers have located a valley of bones they think may belong to the fabled army.

失蹤了兩千年的波斯大軍遺骸在非洲沙漠中被發現了。不過我更好奇的是中國戰國時代（時期與波斯大軍約略相同）的秦趙長平之戰中，被秦軍屠殺的四十多萬趙國兵士遺骸後來都到哪裡去了。雖說是「坑殺」（亦有一說是殺俘後集體掩埋），但四十多萬具屍體仍然不是小數目啊。

A fascinating finding. It was a 50,000-men army, but I am more interested in where did the 450,000 killed soldiers go in the Qin-Zhao war that took place in ancient China 2,300 years ago.

最近看到媒體大肆討論「雲端計算」，我這個土包子不知道何謂雲端科技，所以就查了一下雜誌，發現所謂雲端科技，無非就是將所有的資料都送到網路去處理。我鬆了一口氣，知道我不但不是土包子，而且是一個先知先覺者，因為在民國九十一年就已經將資料一概都儲存到位在遠處的電腦裡。

李家同教授關於「雲端運算」（Cloud Computing，我不喜歡這個譯名，但這是後話）的這篇文章，在網路上引起不少人的訕笑，不過我對他的說法倒是有幾分同意。

如果您曾經經歷「傻瓜終端機」的年代，就會知道那時候的電腦也都將資料送到遠端主機去計算、交換、儲存。純就概念來說，所謂雲端運算其實大致並不脫這個範圍。

然而，現在當然有很多新的東西是那時候沒有的，而新的技術、軟硬體、以及合作運算方式也確實需要有個名字來概括。20年前有終端機、遠端主機、網路的概念與實踐，但沒有今天「雲端」所不可或缺的普及Internet連線、行動運算、網頁技術等等，所以做不到現在的很多事情；然而就像「非洲賣鞋」的老笑話到「藍海」的新名詞一樣，「雲端」的東西可以做、該做，不過不必像發現新大陸一樣，光看到名稱就一頭熱。

很多人也許有資格笑李教授過氣，我自己也不盡然同意他的每一個看法；但有些事情如果曾經走過那一段，也許看法就會有所不同了。

Dr. Lee: Cloud Computing is not new.

In fact, I am kind of agreeing with Dr. Lee's view about Cloud Computing, since I've also been through the age that dumb terminals could do nothing but sending data to the mainframe for computation, exchange and archiving; the so called "Cloud" is conceptually not much more than that.

However indeed it calls for a new name and new concept to contain the new technology, hardware/software and collaboration methods. Some of the "Cloud" stuff were just unavailable 20 years ago, mainly the pervasive Internet, mobile computing and Web technology, but the idea was really not new.

Well, we can laugh at Dr. Lee and said he's a passé; but if you've been there, done that, you wouldn't wonder why he said that.

With the market for electronic book readers set to take off, things are looking up for a little-known Taiwanese company that will probably supply most of the “e-paper” they use.

The company, Prime View International, said this summer that it would pay about $215 million to acquire E-Ink, which owns the technology for displaying text in the most popular readers, including Amazon’s Kindle and Sony’s Reader.

...

DisplaySearch, a market researcher based in Austin, Texas, forecasts the global market for e-paper, including e-paper used in e-books, to hit $5.9 billion by 2015, from $400 million this year.

...

It was also a good fit considering Prime View’s pedigree. The company is a subsidiary of Yuen Foong Yu Group, a Taiwanese paper and pulp company. The group started making toilet paper and paperboard as early as 1939 and began producing coated paper in the 1950s with Japanese technology, according to its Web site.

While eBooks in the future may not be in the form we've imagined, however e-paper that only consumes power when switching colors (only black/white for now) will eventually take off to replace a certain share of "permanent" paper usage. PVI may not be the last standing, but its mother company indeed has the money and the position to give it a try. I am giving it an optimistic eye.

也許將來的電子書不一定是我們現在看到或想像的樣子（類似平板電腦的造型），但只在轉換顏色（目前僅有黑白）時才耗電的電子紙（e-paper或e-ink）遲早會起飛，取代今天部分紙張長時間、高價值顯示的用途。

在電子紙的發展和競爭過程中，元太科技（PVI）不一定是最後的贏家，因為其他廠商的技術、資金等門檻相對不算太高，但它的母公司永豐餘應該算是比較有錢、而且也比較順利成章的來涉足這個領域。

撇開資金、併購、政治這些「非產品」、「非技術」的面向不談，我對電子紙這個產業的遠景和產值是樂觀的；過一陣子再來看我想的對不對。:)

In today's Observer Business column, John Naughton discusses what a ripoff it is for ebook vendors to "sell" you books with abusive, multi-thousand word "license agreements," pretending that because you bought your book over the network, it wasn't a sale, and so you don't get to own it. These "licenses" aren't about upholding copyright (if they were, you could replace thousands of words of lawyerese with four simple words: "Don't violate copyright law"). They're about overriding copyright -- which has all kinds of guarantees for the rights of book-owners -- with a private law that gives every advantage to the publisher or retailer, converting you from a noble reader to a wormy, contemptible licensor who doesn't deserve to own books.

Anyone reads EULA today? I do. But I don't have a kindle and I don't even trust it as a model of the next-generation of "books". The debates, confrontations and conflicts of the rights among eBook writers, publishers, distributors and customers still have a long way to go.

電子書的所謂版權和所有權等等問題，到現在還是沒有公認的標準，而是先訂標準、先有產品的人就贏；這也是為什麼各家廠商搶著插頭香的原因之一。在電子書的市場性方面，我並不看好Kindle、也不認為它會是個往後必當遵循的典範。

這類權利衝突的好戲，這陣子還有得看。

China recently announced its GDP grew by more than 7.1% in the first half of this year, putting the country on course to displace Japan as the world’s second-largest economy by year’s end. But it’s not time to break out the maotai just yet. Peasants and migrant workers, who compose more than 65% of China’s 1.3 billion people, aren’t benefiting much from this growth.

Much of it is hoarded by the central government. Last year, Beijing collected taxation and other levies of more than six trillion yuan ($878 billion), an eye-popping four trillion yuan more than five years ago. Since the turn of this century, funds flowing into the Beijing treasury have increased by around 22% a year, more than double the average 10% GDP growth for the past two decades.

It could be real, but definitely not for me. However look at the design of accordions; human should have no problem handling bottons twice the number. :P

果真如此的話，我覺得一次攻頂到36顆比較直接。從手風琴的設計看來，人類是可以搞得過那麼多按鈕的。

Orvieto, Italy, November 6, 2009: In partnership with the OpenOffice.org community, WarMouse announced the release of the OpenOfficeMouse, the first multi-button application mouse designed for the world's leading open-source office productivity suite. With a revolutionary and patented design featuring 18 buttons, an analog joystick, and support for as many as 52 key commands, the OpenOfficeMouse is intended to provide a faster and more efficient user interface for OpenOffice.org applications such as Writer and Calc than the conventional icons, pull-down menus, and hotkeys presently permit.

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MakeUseOf.com are known for their exceptional PDF manuals on everything from BitTorrent to Photoshop. Here is a great round up of fifteen free tech guides they’ve released that are extremely useful. Did I mention they’re free?

All the tech news you can handle.

That's also my personal history from early '80s to today. Thanks to @4F.

サンコーのレアモノあったかグッズの中でもダントツで「レア」な商品ができました！その名も「USBバストビューティーパッド」の誕生です★なぜ、「Beauty？」かというと、何処から聞いた話かは知りませんがバストを暖めるとバストアップの効果があるんだとか、ないんだとか！？真相は定かではありませんが、そんな効果があったらいいな〜と思って命名したわけであります。巷では「男性ブラ」なんてものも出現し、そんなものが流行りそうなこのご時世に、これこそ正にレアモノをどうぞお試しくださいませ。（男性ブラを愛用の方も是非！）

USB-powered breast heating pads. Men are also invited to give it a try. So what if, say, I'm walking away from my computer for a restroom visit?

It doesn’t matter how religiously you diet. It doesn’t matter how intensely you exercise. And even if you try to make the smartest choices, pick the healthiest foods, and watch what you eat at every meal, all it takes to sabotage your weight loss goals is one simple mistake. That’s why we’re here to help you – a little bit of awareness can make those mistakes never happen.
 
Today’s food marketers have loaded many of their offerings with so much fat, sugar, and sodium that any single food in this slideshow can destroy all your hard work and best intentions. Welcome any one of these nutritional neutron bombs into your diet just once a month, and you could add nearly 7 pounds of flab to your frame in the coming year. Luckily, Eat This Not That has rounded up equally delicious alternatives at much lower caloric cost. Make these monster swaps each time you eat out, and you could lose 10, 20, or even 30 pounds in a year!

 

再見了，牛仔褲爺爺~

annpo | 4 November,2009 22:03

每當談到李維史陀，我總會叫他「牛仔褲爺爺」，因為這個法國人類學家的名字並不好記，不知者看到他的名字Lévi-Strauss，總會將他和知名牛仔褲聯想在一起 (不信你google看看，會跑出一堆牛仔褲) 。雖然學社會科學的人多半認識這個名字，但對大多數人來說，他可能只是個服飾品牌，又或者，只是一個書寫得讓人看不懂的某人。

 所以，他去世的消息，歐美紛紛報導，但在台灣，沒有一點漣漪。別說比不上錢學森、季羨林的版面，連一個字都沒有。悲哀。

Claude Lévi-Strauss 生於1908年11月28日，去年11月他剛渡過第一百歲生日。東海社會所的朋友笑說，這個結構人類學家，連死亡都這麼結構。更炫的是，牛仔褲爺爺活得比人類學歷史還長，人類學出現至今還不到百年耶。而他也是近代僅存的法國社會科學大師，他的逝去，也為一個蓬勃的社會科學世代畫下句點。

 而他也是我經驗過的，第二位離世的人類學大師。因為媒體冷漠，徒子徒孫們只好自己說。

Dropbox is a great service: it allows users to keep everything (yes, everything) in sync between multiple devices. I daily use Dropbox in my workflow to backup my Yojimbo library and share stuff with my friends and co-workers, and I’m very satisfied. If you’re new to Dropbox, you can signup with this referrall link and, besides testing the service, you’ll make me earn 250 extra MB. (and I will thank you in one way or another)

MakeUseOf.com is proud to present The Unofficial Guide to the iPhone to you, written by Stefan Neagu from Tux Geek.

Read about the basic user interface and a ton of incredible iPhone features you would’ve otherwise missed. Stefan explains in detail how to perform both the very simple and the most tedious tasks. Find out how to get your hands on fresh applications, how to keep your device synchronized and even how to jailbreak your iPhone!

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