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The 7-Minute Body > The 4-Hour Body

Fri, 10 May 2013 17:11:00 -0400

"Teach yourself just enough of the grammar and the logic of computer languages to be able to see the..."

Fri, 10 May 2013 13:08:57 -0400

“Teach yourself just enough of the grammar and the logic of computer languages to be able to see the big picture. Get acquainted with APIs. Dabble in a bit of Python. For most employers, that would be more than enough. Once you can claim familiarity with at least two programming languages, start sending out those resumes.”

bzcohen: Front-page story in the Journal today about the...

Fri, 10 May 2013 10:13:39 -0400

bzcohen:

Front-page story in the Journal today about the Nintendo version of The Great Gatsby. A real thing! With video and a podcast interview and a dot drawing of an 8-bit Nick Carraway. (F. Scott Fitzgerald’s estate declined to comment about the game. I didn’t ask about the dot drawing.)

8-bit A-hed Nick Carraway FTW!

Time save pro-tip: Changing your Mac OS X default screenshot save location to Dropbox

Wed, 08 May 2013 18:09:00 -0400

Assuming you aren’t using a fancy screenshot tool, changing the default location for screenshots is easy:

Open up Terminal¹
Type: defaults write com.apple.screencapture location ~/Dropbox/Screenshots
Type: killall SystemUIServer

Now all of your screenshots will be in a Dropbox folder called Screenshots. Feel free to replace that with whatever folder name you want.

Now you’ll have access to any screenshot you take on you Mac anywhere you use Dropbox.

¹If you don’t know what Terminal is, open up Spotlight and type in Terminal

"Throwing is hard. In order to deliver a baseball to a batter, a pitcher has to release the ball at..."

Wed, 08 May 2013 16:20:40 -0400

“

Throwing is hard. In order to deliver a baseball to a batter, a pitcher has to release the ball at exactly the right point in the throw. A timing error of half a millisecond in either direction is enough to cause the ball to miss the strike zone.

To put that in perspective, it takes about five milliseconds for the fastest nerve impulse to travel the length of the arm. That means that when your arm is still rotating toward the correct position, the signal to release the ball is already at your wrist. In terms of timing, this is like a drummer dropping a drumstick from the 10th story and hitting a drum on the ground on the correct beat.

”

- High Throw from Randall Munroe’s What If

At this point, if I had to choose between XKCD and What If, I’d go with What If. It’s really a terrific blog.

A couple of recent gems:

Longest Sunset

Twitter

FedEx Bandwidth

"The last time Apple sold debt was in 1996, when the Internet was in its infancy and sales of Apple’s..."

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 18:28:59 -0400

“The last time Apple sold debt was in 1996, when the Internet was in its infancy and sales of Apple’s niche computers were struggling. Facing an uncertain future and struggling with a weak balance sheet, Apple had a junk credit rating and was paying 6.5 percent on its debt.”

A conversation I recently had at a “good”...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 16:20:54 -0400

A conversation I recently had at a “good” restaurant:

“Can I interest you in some water?”

“Sure.”

“Sparkling or still?”

“I’ll have tap water. Thanks.”

“I am not sure if we have that, but I can check.”

Ron Conway, Tech Investor, Turns Focus to Hometown

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 21:00:00 -0400

Ron Conway, Tech Investor, Turns Focus to Hometown:

Ron Conway has in two short years become one of San Francisco’s power brokers, using his wealth and contacts to pursue his vision of the city.

If by two “two short years”, you mean 15 years investing and 40 years working in Silicon Valley, then, yeah, he’s suddenly become a power broker.

"Oh my God,” you will say. “It was amazing. We ate at the most incredible local fish place. Seriously..."

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 16:55:27 -0400

““Oh my God,” you will say. “It was amazing. We ate at the most incredible local fish place. Seriously the best fish I’ve ever had in my life. Taipei was so fun.””

- Memo to The New York Times: What Actually Happens During “36 Hours in…” a Foreign Country by Juli Weiner

I would buy a coffee table book of these—to sit next to my other coffee table book.

Photo

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 11:03:18 -0400

"The only thing that matters when picking a job is fast growth—if you’re offered a seat on a..."

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 18:32:10 -0400

“The only thing that matters when picking a job is fast growth—if you’re offered a seat on a rocketship, you don’t ask what seat.”

- Sheryl Sandberg on the best career advice she’s ever received

Photo

Fri, 29 Mar 2013 13:04:29 -0400

The last 5 months of my life.

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 14:41:20 -0400

The last 5 months of my life.

AngelList tag of the day: "bridging online and offline"

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 11:09:46 -0400

AngelList tag of the day: "bridging online and offline":

Lots of interesting startups on here.

Converting an old minor league baseball stadium into condos in...

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 10:19:00 -0400

Converting an old minor league baseball stadium into condos in Indianapolis

Steve Ballmer: “This is a prototype of a coming HP Slate...

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 10:22:00 -0400

Steve Ballmer: “This is a prototype of a coming HP Slate PC that will be here this year.”

Meanwhile:

Lee had no comment on what features the watch may have, how much it would cost and when it would go on sale.

(NYT, 2010; Bloomberg, 2013) Same old tech media song and...

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 10:05:00 -0400

(NYT, 2010; Bloomberg, 2013)

Same old tech media song and dance.

And if you remember, 3 months later, Microsoft killed it before ever launching it.

Samsung’s original product

Sun, 17 Mar 2013 15:37:00 -0400

Samsung’s original product

Apple’s original product

Sun, 17 Mar 2013 15:36:00 -0400

Apple’s original product

But I would rather have a bottle of Ballantine Ale than any...

Sun, 17 Mar 2013 09:38:00 -0400

But I would rather have a bottle of Ballantine Ale than any other drink after fighting a really big fish.

Ernest Hemingway advertisement for Ballantine Ale, 1951 (via How Writers Build the Brand)