Reminded why we watch almost no current sitcoms last night: In a promo for two different shows, the "laughter" throughout was so incredibly similar that I'd swear it was coming from the same machine in all cases.
walt crawford
Mostly retired library person/researcher/writer/speaker. All original FF contributions CC0 (public domain).
I'm beginning to get a sense of how much effort it's worth spending to spell arΧiv that way rather than just arXiv, and "nobody notices or gives a damn about the difference" starts to look like a winner.
John Dupuis
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Back to just Joe
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Ha!
- Meg VMeg
I wonder whether there are other Unicode typefaces with larger differences; as far as I can tell, the only difference in Palatino is a slight difference of thickness in one of the two diagonal strokes. And it's slight: at 12pt. or less, it's pretty nearly invisible.
- walt crawford
A tiny little post to test visual discrimination--in the course of preparing which I discovered a "friendly" aspect of WordPress' editor--it autotranslates certain glyphs based on visual similarity no matter how you enter them. http://walt.lishost.org/2015...
Now *that*'s strange: Just happened to look at the sidebar of my blog and find that I wrote more posts in 2013 than in any other year. This comes as a surprise...
Gotta admit, I'm getting royally sick of "Because X BIG MORAL CRISIS therefore x little moral issue shouldn't even be mentioned" false equations. (Not here, but most definitely on FB and Twitter.) I should look up the particular logic error that is.
Jennifer Dittrich
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CW
liked this
And yes, for this week at least I am thinking of a non-Fox TV "news" anchor who seems to have memory problems. (The scare quotes are because I think pretty much all TV "news" deserves scare quotes, *possibly* excluding PBS. Possibly.)
- walt crawford
They have a nice list at http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki.... I use it to try to figure out why various arguments fail when discussing OA. I'm sure other fallacies can be found scattered around the site.
- Back to just Joe
On a forum which shall go unnamed (where I had no choice but to read, to do something else, but couldn't write), one of the big minds involved offered their spelling of a particular seafood stew that originated in San Francisco: "chippino."
Starmama
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John Dupuis
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Omit needless syllables. I'm sure that's the theory there.
- laura x
Didn't realize they'd moved Carroll to their paysite. Probably part of making SFGate less useful so people will cough up the $5/month (or whatever). I read in in the Chronicle itself--er, the $6/month Kindle version.
- walt crawford
In case it doesn't repost: Just announced the availability of Cites & Insights 15:3 (March 2015)...which includes the availability of anonymized datasets (on figshare) for the DOAJ and Beall subsets of my State of OA project. http://walt.lishost.org/2015...
Back to just Joe
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John Dupuis
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...and, after reviewing comments from one of the reviewers of my LTR ms. revised the DOAJ dataset to move 580 journals from "B" to new "A$"--that is, the only issue with those journals is the $1,000-and-up APC. Won't revise C&I for that change; will revise the LTR ms. (only affects one chapter).
- walt crawford
And, thanks to figshare tweeting about it, more than 100 views of the DOAJ dataset...but only two downloads so far.
- walt crawford
I just added two OA journal spreadsheets to figshare. Could one or two of you take a quick look at these to make sure that other people can actually see them and that they're at least plausibly sensible? URLs in the next two comments.
The DOAJ subset: http://dx.doi.org/10...
- walt crawford
Thanks; that's really all I needed to know. The links work and public means public.
- walt crawford
Am I being paranoid in thinking it's sensible to convert anonymized xslx spreadsheets of OA stuff to .csv (comma-separated-values) to assure that erased/personal info is *really* not there? (No formulas, and .csv is more compact, so doing it anyway, but...)
Ell Bee, See?
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Kirsten loves you
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it's also good practice re: long term data storage, sharing in non-proprietary formats too :)
- Hedgehog
Followup: Looks like I'll wind up uploading in .xslx form so that I can include a data_key sheet for coded values--but the data's already made a roundtrip to .csv, and Excel actually has a set of inspection features that allow you to delete all metadata. I anticipate uploading these to figshare tomorrow.
- walt crawford
Checked our house on Zillow.com (which I do maybe once a year). Supposedly worth 25% more than we paid for it 5.5 years ago--and that sounds about right. (The dip in housing prices pretty much corrected itself over the past 5 years.) The good news: Our friend who moved to Livermore at the peak is now finally above water and can refinance.
The weird news: Also looked at Trulia. Which says our house is worth nearly 20% more than Zillow says it is. To which, looking at actual recent sales in the neighborhood (which pretty much match the Zillow price), I say the folks at Trulia must have their hands on some seriously good stuff to be that messed up.
- walt crawford
Noting that this is all a little abstract, other than pretty much assuring that our property taxes will keep going up the maximum 2% a year; we both hope to stay in this house until we're carried out on the way to the crematorium.
- walt crawford
I wonder whether any bakery or pizzeria plans to have a special sale on March 14, starting at 9:26 a.m., selling little pies for 54 cents each. And with that, it must be time to sign off for the day...
I'm either not geeky or not mathy enough to get this. all i get is the 3/14 part. clearly I need help.
- ellbeecee
The little pies for 54 cents is still a great idea.
- Back to just Joe
For those who don't follow John Scalzi on Twitter and know anything about, well, let's call it Golden Gate just to stay out of trouble: https://twitter.com/scalzi...
Today's SFChronicle has several letters on the measles situation, most of them decrying the anti-vaxxers. But one stands out, saying that it's a LIE that people die from measles, that it's a LIE that vaccines work, that herd immunity is a LIE...and gives us The Answer. You can guess the answer once you see the signature: the writer's a chiropractor
Yep: That's his solution to measles and pretty much everything else: have your chiropractor fix it all.
- walt crawford
Gotta admit, as I sit out here praying for a little precipitation, it's...amusing?...to read messages from all the people (in the eastern half of the U.S.) who seem terribly disappointed that the latest Snowpocalypse isn't entirely paralyzing the eastern half of the U.S.
Yeah, I know: Praying to Gaia. Does that help? Which is just as likely to respond as any other entity.
- walt crawford
We saw Les Miserables yesterday (local repertory company production in Livermore's wonderful 500-seat theater). Three hours 20 minutes (including 15-minute intermission). Long...but good, other than too-loud orchestra at times. But, as a "sung-through musical" (never any spoken dialogue) where almost all the major characters die...
...it raises a question: What's the difference between an opera and a sung-through musical? "It's in English" is not an answer. Anybody?
- walt crawford
(So I suddenly find myself thinking of opera singers who are also great belters and pop singers, but never mind... )
- walt crawford
I'm not a parent, but I sometimes wonder whether things get too protective (in many areas). Odd example, in a recent Magazine of F&SF: a short story where the about-the-author paragraph ends "Adults might want to vet this one before sharing it with younger readers." Not for violence--I never see that notice above stories with violence, torture, etc
AFAICT, it must be for one of two passages. The first: "It's about actual sex, real sex, between real people, not circus freaks playing to the camera. Sex is different from porn. Usually. If you're lucky." The second in the next comment.
- walt crawford
Seems like the writing wouldn't attract those too young to read it?<maybe would have better if I left the autocorrect
- Christina Pikas
Those of you who've been to ALA in San Francisco may or may not know that there's a huge LED video screen that's *supposed* to travel back and forth along one side of the outside with various images--it's a public art project. Except that, in the 16 years since it was installed, it's only worked for one month. So now the city's taking it down...
bentley
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...and architecture newsletters and the like are suggesting that SF's full of philistines and isn't a proper city because they're failing to appreciate, I dunno, the value of a big black hunk of metal and plastic stuck to the side of a building. That's worked one month out of 16 years--but it's by a local starchitecture firm.
- walt crawford
Delighted to say that John King, the "Places" columnist (like an architecture critic, but not really) for the San Francisco Chronicle, basically called bullshit on this response today, suggesting that architecture has to actually *work*, not just look good. (Need we mention FLW and the virtues of glass joins in places where it ever rains, and wholly non-reconfigurable spaces?)
- walt crawford
Interesting difference in email cultures: I have a Yahoo Mail account only so I can be in a Freecycle group. Checked the account today, including spam. Apparently "bigger Johnsons" are a big thing on Yahoo Mail--but not on Gmail (AFAIK). I dunno, I thought LBJ was as big a Johnson as we needed.
I sometimes wonder whether folks realize *what* they're being interviewed for...or just don't care. As in, Fortune--read by hundreds of thousands of people, many of whom aren't "whatever will make the most money I'll buy, regardless of what it is" investors--hosted a group of investment fund managers to offer 2015 insights. And...
...Rajiv Jain (Vontobel Asset Management) had this to say on where he's putting money right now: "We love tobacco. We have a lot of tobacco because the companies have tremendous pricing power..." Yeah, addiction will do that for you.
- walt crawford
(I might expect that in Forbes or some hot investment newsletter, maybe even at WSJ. Not so much at Fortune. Of course, it was Jain's opinion, not Fortune's.)
- walt crawford
Let's try this again: Just got an email invitation to review a book, and the book looked interesting. But then...well, here's my (redacted) response:
I looked at the first book's site...but then I decided to read one or
two book reviews at [journal], to get a sense of whether I could provide an
appropriate review.
Imagine my surprise in finding that [journal] is not an open-access
journal--that I needed to provide membership or subscription
information in order to read a book review.
That makes my decision easy: At this point, I do not write reviews for
non-open-access journals.
- walt crawford
[That wasn't all one paragraph, but it's not worth the time to get FF to recognize that...] Anyway: too bad I won't get the free book, but principles have to enter in at some point. "If I can't read it, I won't review for it"--seems pretty straightforward in 2015.
- walt crawford
Come to think of it, it's the first time in a couple of years that anybody's *asked* me to review a book. Which probably says something...
- walt crawford
Bizarro message of the day, from LinkedIn: "Steve Dalton congratulated you on your work anniversary!
"Walt, Linked-In tells me that you have now been self-employed for 31 years. Wow! I hope you like your boss. Congratulations! Steve"
Rochelle *boom* Hartman
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Um. I've been semi-retired for not quite five years, "self-employed" never unless you count writing income. I suppose I should visit my LinkedIn profile and see what triggered this, but...why bother? (Something that happened on January 16, 1984? Seems unlikely...)
- walt crawford
Fun time: Called Kindle support (or, rather, they called me--that's how Amazon does it) because I wanted to know what we do when our Fire HD 8.9's battery stops charging altogether (it's losing charge somewhat faster than it used to, even after we deleted the battery-sucking Washington Post, and it's 25 months old, so not under warranty).
but, of course, what "Judy" (probably in India, based on accent) did was go through half an hour of checking and changing settings... and, eventually said all they could do was offer a discount on a new Kindle, since the battery's not user-replaceable and they don't repair Kindles. My wife *hates* throwaway devices with a passion; this may be a problem.
- walt crawford
ellbee: I think if you delete the *app* for WaPo, the daily will just show up on your Newsstand, not actually get downloaded. First day's experience with wifi off except to download: both of us read the paper (probably 1.5-2 hours total) and the battery's at 80%. So this is reasonably promising. (And it took, oh, 90 seconds to turn on wifi, get the network, go to the newsstand and get today's paper, and complete the download. Sunday will probably take a little longer.)
- walt crawford
Pleasant surprise (and truly a surprise) this morning, when verifying Marquis Who's Who changes in my bio (back from the days I was listed, since you stay in the online version): I'm back in Who's Who in America for 2014 (and in Who's Who in the West 2011-2014). Not sure why, after 10+ years absence, but I'm delighted.
Before someone asks: Yes, I do know which Who's Whos are legit, thus the "Marquis" in the message. I got the invitation for changes a while back, and added a couple of books--change invites seem to happen every year or two.
- walt crawford
SO TEMPTED to respond to a comment on a FB post that essentially said "freedom of religion does not imply freedom from religion." Well, yes, it really does: If freedom from religion is not an option, then there is no true freedom of religion. [Why, yes, I am a member of Americans United.]
Some of y'all may find this amusing--and I see that several commenters share my opinion that MP&THG is probably a far more accurate depiction of medieval times than any Arthurian retelling. http://whatever.scalzi.com/2015...
Sigh. Just read an OA-related piece that uses "we know for a fact" for something I'm pretty sure we "know" only if we accept Beall at face value--and, given that it's another piece that regards my work in the area as nonexistent, I'm not going to bother arguing with it. Feeling old and invisible; not a new feeling.
Not helped by the double whammy of Joe E. at Skitch writing a partly-useful piece on OA and societies--but one that (a) praises Beall and says we all should do so and (b) yammers on about OA article counts within subjects and, of course, doesn't recognize the existence of a major study of such counts. (Really? PLOS as the source of article counts in general?) Not a good Monday morning.
- walt crawford
The only saving grace: I am starting on the ms. of the Formally Published Therefore Actually Exists publication that will see at least a few hundred libraries get some fact-based info about the state of gold OA in 2011-2014. (Well, it's not peer-reviewed, so maybe it's still imaginary...)
- walt crawford
You are not invisible.
- Back to just Joe
The February 2015 Cites & Insights is now available. Some folks may appreciate the fact that there's only half a page of OA-related text in this 24- (or 46-)page issue. More info: http://walt.lishost.org/2015...
John Dupuis
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Back to just Joe
liked this
Nit-pick, but this lead--"Would you like paper or plasma? That's the question book lovers face now that e-reading has gone mainstream."--tries too hard for alliteration. Chances of you or anybody else owning a plasma ereader or tablet are, essentially, zero: unless you read your books on a big-screen TV, you're almost certainly not using plasma.
But it's alliterative, and about what I'd expect for The Takeaway. Geez, I miss Talk of the Nation, which used to air at the time The Takeaway and another hour of NPR HappyTalk now air. (Here and Now? Is that the name? I call it "Chirpy public radio.")
- walt crawford
And, thinking on it, "Would like paper or pixels?" would have been equally alliterative and not, you know, dead wrong.
- walt crawford
Yeah, but they probably thought "paper or pixels" was overdone. I used it in a story in 2000 about literary magazines online.
- laura x
I can almost hear the thought process at The Takeaway: "Paper or plasma is just wrong. How about paper or pixels?" "Nahh. NewRambler used that in 2000." "OK, then paper or plasma it is."
- walt crawford
Starting the new year: Our traditional anniversary brunch (at Porter's, a good golf-course restaurant, although I'm not a golfer); last evening, excellent "leftovers" and Schramsberg Blanc de Blancs; followed by Frozen. A good way to celebrate 37 years (otherwise known as "a good start").
We started having our anniversary lunch at Porter's because it was one of very few restaurants in Livermore open for lunch on January 1--as are most golf course restaurants, I guess. Also, pretty good food at not-unreasonable prices.
- walt crawford
Has anybody else been finding that Facebook frequently just goes into Permaspin mode, never going anywhere (but, fortunately, not freezing the browser)? For me, it means spending even less time on FB than I would otherwise (after 30-45 seconds I give up and go elsewhere), but there may also be negative consequences.
In the past, I explicitly called myself a feminist. Recently, some folks (mostly women) have in essence said men really can't be feminists and should just shut up and go away. So I stopped. But that's bullshit, as John Scalzi points out in the link. So: yes, I'm a feminist, and have been for as long as I can remember....
In case the link didn't work: http://whatever.scalzi.com/2014...
- walt crawford
And if you want a clear example of why I stopped calling myself a feminist for a while, I give you this comment on Scalzi's post (which a number of women quickly disagreed with): http://whatever.scalzi.com/2014...
- walt crawford
Women who say men can't be feminists are unclear on the concept, in my opinion.
- Spidra Webster
In that stream of comments, she was a minority of one.
- walt crawford
Just encountered on FB (no, I'm not going to link): "Anything worthwhile will get an article on Mashable. " Sigh... the bar just keeps getting lower.