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...describes how something can go horribly wrong in a cave dive (in this case, Bushman's Hole, one of the deepest freshwater caves in the world) even with the best planning efforts of experts in the field. It's a long, but incredibly sad, read. If you want to read something really haunting, Dave Shaw's website is still online. The video is out there too (aired on ABC in 2005). I leave the video links as an exercise to the reader. It's not something I really want to dig up again.

I can't help but feel that a lot of the Gates Foundation's efforts are misguided feel good fixes.

"Save the children" rather than fixing some of the underlying problems. For example, Iodine deficiency is perhaps the most cost effective human capital fix there is. Yet the Gates foundation has only given a few million to that cause as far as I can tell. Vaccines are sexy, saving children is sexy, makes your altruism feel good. Iodine in salt - not so sexy, no discernible results for 20+ years, no great feel good effect.

Oh awesome - Nikolas Kristof wrote about it : here

Unfortunately, the most cost-effective aid interventions tend to be the kind that are incremental and save only a small proportion of lives—and are thus least satisfying to the giver. For instance, my wife, Sheryl WuDunn, and I have recently published a new book, Half the Sky, arguing that educating and empowering women is the most effective way to fight global poverty and extremism. In the book we call on the U.S. government to adopt a program to help poor countries iodize their salt. Right now, about one-third of families in poor countries don't get enough iodine, and the result is not so much goiters as diminished intellectual capacity. Iodine is essential to brain formation for a fetus in the first trimester, and if a mother lacks iodine her child may end up mentally retarded. More commonly, children in such areas lose 10 to 15 IQ points, with girls particularly affected for reasons that aren't fully understood. This is a lifelong intelligence deficit and a significant burden on poor countries, and it can be resolved very cheaply; iodizing salt costs a couple of pennies per person per year.

Studies have suggested that iodizing salt brings real economic returns of nine times the cost—and yet we don't do it. The reason is, I think, that the results are statistical, not visible. You can never look at a child afterwards and say, "This girl would have been retarded if it weren't for iodized salt." All you can do is note that retardation rates fall and that, a decade later, school performance improves significantly.

I hope I'd do something half as cool as what's Greg Carr's up to. He made his millions selling voicemail services to the baby bells right after the big bell was broken up. Now, he's more or less leased 1,500 square miles of Mozambique's largest wild area, Gorongosa National Park. It was once arguably the most magnificent game park in southern Africa, but has been decimated by years of civil war on Mozambique, and when Carr's foundation took over a few years ago, was nearly devoid of wildlife. His deal with the government is that he has 20 years to try and rehabilitate the park, bring back the animals, stop poaching and bring back tourists. Then he'll turn it back over to Mozambique, hopefully in something like it's former glory.

That's the kind of "work" I dream of doing after I somehow become a billionaire. Hell, why wait? I should email the Carr foundation right now and see if they have any need for a copywriter who's deathly afraid of snakes. I don't see how they could get by without that incredibly useful skillset.

Holy shit:

http://outside.away.com/outside/magazine/1095/10f_deth.html

You know, much as it would happen here.

You really have to love government humility and responsibility.

Well ... Blowout Taking down a dam used to require an act of Congress-or terror. Now it's just good business. No comment - just relevant.

1) Marketing
2) People like names not to change

http://gorp.away.com/gorp/location/europe/greenlan/greenlan.htm

"1,200m so far" is counting from Everest base camp, which is already at 5200 meters.

This reminds me of the amazing (and sobering) story of Dave Shaw, who perished in a deep freshwater cavern trying to recover the body of a fellow diver. Quite a read, if you have 20 minutes.

> only applies to those that own a press.

Go out and buy a press then.

But on a serious note, publishing these days is so cheap that "owning a press" is kind of a dumb concept. Go register a domain and stop a blog to bitch about how you hate things. You'd have to be pretty nuts to actually say something on there that would result in any act of censorship... and then things would get real fun, real fast.

I have seen startling statistics on the quantity of used cooking oil put in landfills, however, I figured not everybody is doing that. Now that I'm thinking about it, I probably only saw those statistics on websites about WVO and biodiesel. Indeed, a little googling provides an article that at least implies that it's done both ways: http://www.allbusiness.com/accommodation-food-serv ices/food-services-drinking-places/326115-1.html

Here's a pretty cool bit about a biodiesel manufacturer making it out of local waste oils and using landfill gas to power their operations: http://outside.away.com/outside/news/20061129_1.ht ml

From http://www.hawaii-county.com/weeklynewsletter/arch ives/2004/090304.htm - "Cooking Oil: Nearly 64,000 gallons of used cooking oil from local businesses were diverted from landfills for use as biodiesel under diversion grants awarded by Hawai`i County."
I guess that they weren't recycling it there, before.

Okay, fun fact: it's not toaster hot, but the current (?) sauna sitting record is 16 1/4 minutes at 110 C. Yeah, that's above the boiling point of water. Oh, just to make sure it's not a dry heat: "with half a liter of water thrown on the stove every 30 seconds to increase the steaming heat effect."

http://www.scandinavica.com/culture/sports/sauna.h tm
http://outside.away.com/outside/features/200503/fi nland-sauna-world-championships_1.html

Amazing what people will volunteer to do, isn't it?!

"'We were hit by a hurricane that we're were powerless to prevent'
Which caused the city to be flooded which could have easily been prevented."

Which engineering school did you graduate from because most experts on the subject say that to have prevented that flood would have had to have started 20 years ago and would cost billions of dollars.

"'New Orleans exists where it does for a lot of practical reasons, and those reasons are very important to the economic workings of this country.'
The extreme majority of the population had nothing to do with shipping, fishing, oil, etc."

What economics school did you graduate from because most experts say that New Orleans is a major shipping port and supplies much of the country's seafood, petrolium and natural gas products. You are right, a large part of the population were not involved with shipping, fishing or oil production but who the hell do you expect to run the restaurats, build the houses, Provide power, water, roads, Sell cars, boats, appliances, fix cars, boats, appliances, teach the children...? As you can see, it takes a lot more than oil workers to run an oil town. The practical reason for where it exists has nothing to do with that, though. It was settled there because it was the first place going up the river that wasn't a swamp. It was, and still is, the hub for everything going up and down the river and out into the gulf.

"Yall just sat your asses down and waited for the federal government to come help you."

Yea, they sat on their asses all right, on the few dry areas of the city, without communication, food, water, dealing with hundreds of thousands of desperate people trying to save as many as they can while waiting for FEMA who sat on their asses in Washington or ate at fancy restaurants in Baton Rogue. The Local authorities did the best they could and more than you could ask them to given the situation. The buses you refer to dont drive themselves and were not under the authority of the city. It was FEMA who was suppose to coordinate the use of transportation with outside communities because they were well aware that communications would be the first thing to go in NO. I'm sure the mayor would have authorized commandeering them had he had the drivers but he didn't. New Orleans had the 5 day's worth of supplies for the people they expected at the superdome. They were quickly overwhelmed because they didn't get the help to evacuate people that they depended on. They also didn't get the supplies brought in that they expected to get.

"Like, oh, say... Texas? We did a pretty good job of hauling our asses outta there when we heard a hurricane was coming through."

Perhaps you didn't notice but texans did not get "outta there." They were stuck on highways and are lucky it turned and didn't hit them. If you want a model of evacuation, look a little east to New Orleans. Last year when they had a scare from Ivan, it was taking over 8 hours just to get out of the city. Then there were long traffic jams and cars out of gas once on the highway, much like around Houston. They revised the plans and opened up new routes and started contraflow earlier so that it only took a 2 hour wait to get out on the city. They also enlisted the help of tow trucks and fuel trucks along the evacuation route to help keep traffic flowing. Their remaining problem was that a large segment of the population didn't or couldn't leave.

"Just another example of relying on other, non-local, groups. Did you never think that maybe yall should handle it yourselves? Also, it was publicly known that it could only handle a category 3 storm, and guess what? A category 4 storm broke it. What a surprise."

Did you think if yall Texans handled things yourselves, the Army Corps of Engineers would have had the resources to strengthen the levee system?

http://gorp.away.com/gorp/resource/us_nra/ace/tx.h tm

I think The New Orleans

Perhaps these guys touched live wires ^^

Off-topic, but an interesting read :)

The two companies have virtually nothing to do with each other.

Sand dunes are not snow, and they behave differently.

You're right about the friction bit, and that going easy is a good idea. But sand does not melt and polish into ice, which gives you another option (and set of rules) to fall back on. In particular if we are talking about deep, loose sand on a slope... it may be your only option. Not all vehicles are equipped or capable, which is why you don't see them putting around on sand dunes.

With properly designed tread (paddles and similar designs) and sufficient wheelspeed, you CAN spin right out of sand. A change in weight distribution is also helpful, if possible. Of course, it is a risky proposition... lack of sufficient wheelspeed (or too slow of a transition from rest to full speed) will do exactly what you describe... dig you in deeper.

Basically you have to grip sand and throw it backward fast enough to push yourself forward. Sort of like a propeller, but not quite. You have to do it hard and fast enough so that you don't run out of propellent (sand) before you've gained enough momentum to keep from sinking into the sand. (If you've dug down to the floor of the vehicle, your wheels are left spinning in empty space, intead of throwing sand.)

Of course this is totally irrelevant in the case of the rover. Even with the right tread and motor capability they could not afford the power drain it'd take to do it.

And the other poster talking about air pressure is absolutely correct. You let just enough air out to increase the surface area, decreasing the pressure on the sand, enabling you to "float" on it a little better. It doesn't matter if you go slightly convex, either. (In fact it helps... the sand in the concave compresses and holds you up just a tad better.) There is no danger of this compression turning the sand into a slick solid with a wet surface, like there is with snow.

It sounds like you deal with snow a lot. I don't. But I grew up next to one of the best patches of dunes in the US, and used to play out there (in many different types of vehicles as well as on foot) on a regular basis. Not just weekends or special occasions, either. (Heading out for an hour or two after school was common.)

http://gorp.away.com/gorp/resource/us_nra/or_dunes .htm

In the early 1990's, I visited a concrete replica of Stonehenge built by Sam Hill (yes, the Sam Hill) on the remains of the Maryhill townsite on the north shore of the Columbia River in Washington, about three miles away from the Sam Hill Museum. It was probably the first monument for those who died in World War I.

Perhaps I've missed it, but has there been a spike of athletes at the prime of their careers in other sports suddenly dropping dead of heart failure? Seven elite athletes, ages 16-35, dying in one year (eight if you count Marco Pantani, whose death, unlike those of the others, is linked to cocaine abuse) is a lot.

I was thinking the same thing. There's an outstanding $250,000 award for the first person to surf a 100-foot wave. The current record is a 70-foot wave. At these heights, the waves are so fast that they have to get towed in to get onto the waves. Most of the waves in the 50+ foot range have apparently been about 100 miles west of California. The guys that surf them are pretty experienced surfers.

It's the Festina Affair of 1998

Yes, welcome, Linus!!!

If you need some help in getting oriented or someone to show you around, send me an email.

Living in Portland is far better than in NoCal. NoCal has too many cars and bad smog.

Here's useful info:

Portland has the largest bookstore in the world.

Portland borders on the confluence of the Willamette River and the Columbia River, one of the largest rivers in the world.

One of the 7 WindSurfing Wonders of the World is in the Columbia River Gorge, on the eastern edge of the Portland metropolitan area.

Portland has one of the largest and most successful dealers in contemporary art in the world. The gallery has a funny name, but shows the work of over 1,100 artists.

Portland has the largest park inside a city in the world. The park has over 74 miles of wilderness hiking trails and 5,124 acres.

Portland is the home of Pink Martini, a band that writes multi-cultural songs. One of Pink Martini's songs was once one of the most popular songs in France. You can listen to the music video.

It's a 55 minute drive from downtown Portland to the ski areas. "World Class Skiing in Your Own Backyard."

The K-12 Linux Project, in Portland, is one of the more successful projects for giving Linux to average users, who in this case are students.

On the other hand: Q. Why do hippies come to Portland? A. Because there are no jobs.

Many people don't like the months of rain every year. They say Portland is the perfect place for slugs and ducks. (However, the rain cleans the air.) Those with the correct philosophical orientation call it Liquid Sunshine.

Wenger does offer one with a laser pointer built in. For a comparison of the two companies, see http://outside.away.com/magazine/200007/200007disp 3.html.

there is a spider that acts like a wheel
Closely related to the dancing white ladies are the Namib wheeling spiders (Carparachne spp. ), which have a peculiar mechanism when threatened. In an attempt to evade its predators, this spider forms itself into a tight ball and rolls rapidly down a dune slope. from here

I couldn't believe I read this, so I did a Google on DDT and eggshell and came up with the research group that did a study on DDT and eggshells!

They fed DDT to a control group of ducks and compared to an untreated group of ducks otherwise fed and raised identically, and found eggshell thinning on DDT fed ducks. They were thus armed with a biological model of the DDT-eggshell relationship and went out to look at Peregrine falcon eggs and saw the same relationship: And that the more DDT were found in the egg, the thinner the eggshell.

And it's well known, if you do more research/search that DDT is an artificial environmental estrogen, in that it mimics and interferes with estrogen in humans; and very likely as an estrogen like compound in most animals. Why is this important?

Estrogen and estrogen replacement therapy is used in humans to treat osteoperosis, or bone loss. It's not difficult to understand why then DDT would thin eggshells.

Article on Patuxent, and article on the DDT research at Patuxent.

The amusing thing is that you reference Silent Spring, which is a book that references Patuxent's relevant research into DDT, eggshells, and Peregrine falcons.

Look at openACS. Its a fast evolving toolkit, with a lot of features out of the box. The current project website is not the best looking, but the toolkit has been used to develop a lot of interesting sites.

Methodology
If I were you, I would stay away from the Vignettes and other off-the-shelf CMSs. To paraphrase Phil Greenspun, these guys pricing works along the lines of ... shake the customer by his feet and see how much money falls out, then charge another $50 000k for support.

I would also not be in a rush to implement a totally custom solution. Building from scratch is usually a dumb idea(tm). No point in reinventing the wheel. Having said that there is a slight difference between a Michelin-clad Ferrari wheel and a 0BC Roman chariot's wheel...

I agree with you, do not go for the slashdot look. That virtually rules out most of the nukes (phpnuke, postnuke, drupal, slashcode etc). It is

so boring

so overused

suitable for weblogs and news sites but not for more mainstream content sites.

oss is good
The beauty of using OSS toolkits is that you get a head start. If any consultant (read salesman) tells you that their product fits your needs perfectly, then a. shoot them, b. chop them into little pieces c.feed them to the snakes d. shoot the snake ..... just for good measure.

The best that you can hope for is to have a basic and solid foundation that you can build on.

decisions
Some of the things to look for include the following:

• ability to handle workflow.
• ability to deal with permissions
• ability to deal with authentication
• ability to handle more than just plain text
• ability to version ... rollbacks ... track changes
• ability to handle templates, ... proper templates, not just color changes.
• level of developer support
• level of developer competence
• pace of changes

For each toolkit, look at sites that have implemented it. If they *all* look the same, steer clear. Its a sure sign that templating was poorly implemented, or that the toolkit is difficult to customise.

Post a couple of questions on the boards. If the tone is friendly, then you know that if you did pay these guys to do work for you, the service would be great.

If you are building a proper CMS, its going to be painful.

and you win an all expenses paid tour of some of the sites built using openACS and its cousin ACS classic.

• Grand Expeditions
• Wine Access
• photo.net
• Stirling Engines
• Online Ireland and more here
• Away
• Sherman power sports
• Net effect