Eubie's notes

NY Times — You There, at the Computer: Pay Attention. All those cool things to do with a computer, check email, surf a site, IM a friend make concentration difficult. Computer scientists are trying now to decide if the computers themselves could not do a better job of knowing when to interrupt the user or remain still.

NY Times — For Drivers, a Traffic Jam of Distraction. Laws requiring hands-free cellphone use while driving are expanding, but more research shows its not the use of the hands that causes the distraction, but the conversations. And now the distractions are growing with iPods, wireless hand-held devices and one of the classics, eating in the car.

From Michael Trujillo, an early promoter of hands-free-only cellphone laws while driving, now thinks the bans should be lifted. “If you have hands free, not only are you able to do something else, but you are able to do three different tasks at the same time.”

MarketWatch: Why the bloggers frighten me (a little) — Commentary: I still can’t trust them to be accurate or fair.

The danger is that bloggers are going to embrace the worst aspects of tabloids. That means, as the saying goes, they’ll throw their content against a wall, and if it sticks, they’ll publish it, no matter how wild or trivial it might be.

and

Ultimately, the best of the bloggers are as legitimate as their print counterparts at newspapers and magazines – and they’re performing a public service by beating their peers to big stories. They can offer just about as much immediacy as radio and television news outlets, and that keeps traditional media on their toes.

Current:

“The Motley Fool Investment Guide” by David and Tom Gardner

“A New Song” by Jan Karon

Finished:

“Citizen Girl” by Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus

“Caddie Woodlawn” by Carol Ryrie Brink, A Newberry winner

“The Last Juror” by John Grishman

Wall Street Meat: My Narrow Escapefrom the Stock Market Grinder” by And Kessler

“Pattern Recognition” by William Gibson

Audio Books

Current:

“Alexander Hamilton” by Ron Chernow

Finished:

“7 money mantras for a richer life [how to live well with the money you have]” by Michelle by Singletary.

“The essential 55 [an award-winning educator’s rules for discovering the successful student in every child]” by Ron Clark

“A short history of nearly everything” by Bill Bryson

Atlanta Business Chronicle — Not the first time for ChoicePoint: Company has faced at least 11 lawsuits

Business First of Buffalo — Women run the show at most credit unions

Cincinnati Business Courier — Procter/Gillette merger leaked? Investors reaped profits on options trading just before announcement

The Denver Business Journal — Hidden danger: Air cargo security remains elusive in United States

Kansas City Business Journal — Misplaced trust often plays a big role in embezzlements

San Francisco Business Times — Gap trying on new sizes: Rollout of ‘Petite’ stores, ‘Plus’ line an attempt to better fit customers

Wired — Whither The Wall Street Journal? and PressThink — A Little Detail in the Sale of About.com to the New York Times both touch on the view that because neither of the WSJ or NY Times show up high onsearch engines, they are losing their standing in the evolving media world.

Adam Penenberg in Wired: “Since most people refuse to pay for WSJ stories, most bloggers are reluctant to link to them. It also has an impact on anyone who uses the web for research — and there are a lot of us. As importantly, the next generation of readers is growing up by accessing news over the internet, and one place they are not surfing to is WSJ.com. With their habits being formed now, there is little chance the Journal will become part of their lives, either now or in the future.”

Jay Rosen in PressThink: ‘More and more, we hear about a big battle that is either here or coming inside the Times over whether to charge users for online access, as the Wall Street Journal currently does. If that happens and the Washington Post remains free, the paths of those two great news organizations will, I believe, diverge.”

Related piece in Forbes — Stopping The Presses. “The Internet has changed the economics of the publishing industry in a way commercial television never did. The price of news and information has irrevocably been pushed way down the supply/demand curve. The Web has also destroyed the functional monopoly of the local daily newspaper with the very high barriers to technical entry. Anyone can be a publisher, and, it seems, these days, most anyone is.”

NY Times — Images Suggest ‘Recent’ Ice on Mars Sea. Ancient sea boosts confidence that bacteria may still live on planet. Also Space.com — Ice Packs and Methane on Mars Suggest Present Life Possible, European Team Says

How hardy are bacteria? LiveScience — Creatures Frozen for 32,000 Years Still Alive

The New Yorker — Battle Lessons: What the generals don’t know. Using email and web sites, U.S. Army officers are swapping information quickly, improving their ability to resolve issues and learn. Much of this has occurred without direct approval of higher officers. “Instead of looking up to the Army for instructions, they are teaching themselves how to fight the war. The Army, to its credit, stays out of their way.” Tip: edcone.com

Washington Post — Why Stevie Can’t Spell:
After more than three decades of mangling words, a mortified writer sets out to get some answers

Being humiliated by spell-check is pretty much a daily occurrence for me

It isn’t confusing just for bad spellers when there are at least a dozen ways to spell the long e sound: peel, key, tea, phoebe, tangerine, protein, fiend, she, people, ski, debris and quay. The bizarro spelling makes English incredibly difficult to learn, particularly for adults studying it as a second language, and acts as a drag chute on efforts to boost literacy. Ever since a 13th-century monk named Orm, no doubt tugging his halo of hair in frustration at the unholy mess he was forced to transcribe, became the first evangelist for spelling reform, men of letters have called for some serious tidying up of the English lexicon. They’ve included Mark Twain, Teddy Roosevelt, the editors of the Chicago Tribune and George Bernard Shaw, who famously pointed out that “ghoti” could logically be pronounced fish using familiar English letter combinations (the g-h from rough, o from women and t-i from motion).

Also he discusses recent studies showing poor spellers could have a form of dyslexia.

Good tips on having a successful blog from Dave Briggs at The Closed Circle. I especially liked suggestions Keep notes on everything and Make sure your presentation is good.