Comments on: Links I liked

By: Scarlett Lion - of photographers and soldiers in drc, redux

Scarlett Lion - of photographers and soldiers in drc, redux — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 13:35:12 +0000

[...] I posted three similar photos of soldiers in DRC a few different people responded that journalists shouldn’t travel in packs. While I generally agree, in a situation [...]

By: Andrew

Andrew — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 22:02:57 +0000

This one smokes the other two you got:

“My daughter is a good and hard-working student but just outside the top 10% of her small class in a well-respected private school. Sheâ€™s the president of the schoolâ€™s community service club and is the captain of the field hockey team. Does she have any chance of getting into Harvard?

How about if I donate $50 million?”

â€” Marshall

By: Leslie

Leslie — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 20:03:06 +0000

Google voice is great, I use the free text message feature all the time (including to foreign cell phones, which in theory is not supposed to work but does, to most but not all international cell phones). The service will become amazing if they can ever get number portability (i.e. let you use your existing cell phone number as your google voice number)

By: Scarlett Lion

Scarlett Lion — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 19:51:11 +0000

Just want to point out that sometimes it’s necessary for photographers to work together in terms of security and cost – especially as newspapers and magazines pay fewer and fewer expenses – my point is just that none of this work is all that “new” and that I wish the visual vocabulary were a bit more, well, expanded.

By: Michel S.

Michel S. — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 18:28:39 +0000

I wrote a longer reply on my blog, but to summarize, while yes, in a way the OLPC project is clearly a failure, it is the kind of failure that paves the way to a revolutionary shake-up in computing: cheap netbooks, better screens, and an interesting experiment in user interface, Sugar, that is outliving the project that spawned it (what remains of OLPC is, sadly, turning into a cheap Windows netbook).

By: Michel S.

Michel S. — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:58:37 +0000

Indeed; left (or left-appearing) authocracies tend to disavow ranks above colonel (one of the first act of the charade that is the failed Indonesian Communist putch of ‘65 is to abolish ranks above colonel), while on the other hand, right-authocracies tend to go star-heavy. Generalissimo Chiang, anyone?

By: Alanna

Alanna — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:49:28 +0000

Gansler,

I am consulting right now – I’ve got several different gigs – and since I get paid to blog, it’s work for me. Important to note: I don’t currently work for the USG. I haven’t since January. Also, my dad has Alzheimer’s and doesn’t sleep well, so I spend a lot of time awake late at night reading on the web and keeping an eye on him.

And I always read Chris’s blog, not just when he mentions to me! He’s one of my inspirations.

By: Gansler

Gansler — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:43:22 +0000

….I mean, it’s not *just* that you blog all over, but you *respond* to comments on your blogs, or to comments on *mentions* of your blogs, in less than 60 minutes.

By: Gansler

Gansler — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:41:47 +0000

Hey Shaikh, so how *do* you get work done and blog all over, on everything? Or is the USG job so cushie over there in Tajikistan? Or is it that *any* USG job is so hard to get relieved from over non-performance that it allows folks to spend all day everyday to blog?

By: Alanna

Alanna — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 17:34:23 +0000

Adam,

I don’t think that you can call spawning competing laptops a success for OLPC. Well, it’s a success, but not a major one. But when you consider the time, money, and human energy that went into this effort, this is not enough of a success to justify it.