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May 31, 2005
May 30, 2005
British Columbia election roundup
The Liberals will form the next government after this month's
provincial election (2005 May 17) in British Columbia. Exactly who
will be sitting in the House isn't certain yet in at least two
ridings after initial counts ended in razor-thin margins.
Roundup:
Right: Fraser Institute
The Liberals have almost nothing to gain by placating the demands of
union leaders. They may further recognize that introducing flexible
and balanced labour laws would result in a better functioning labour
market for B.C. workers, one characterized by higher rates of job
creation, lower unemployment, and higher wages. Finally, they may also
realize that, by introducing measures of flexibility into the
province’s labour laws, they will indirectly weaken the powers
afforded union leaders.
Contrary to the posturing of many union leaders, B.C. still maintains
relatively rigid and biased labour laws. A recent evaluation of
provincial and state labour relations laws found that B.C. ranked 57th
out of the 60 jurisdictions in terms of flexibility and balance.
Left:
Even bear604 is no fan of Jenny Kwan
The churlish and over the top (but union made) BC Liberals bad for BC
May 29, 2005
alllooksame: 20 headshots, CJK
All Look Same's classification exercise for 20 stock photos:
test yourself.
May 28, 2005
Verity Stob
Humor columnist Verity Stob, of the former EXE magazine, has brought
her witty, merciless view of software development to Dr. Dobb's Online.
May 27, 2005
Hedge fund history
Conceived in 1949 by Alfred Winslow Jones, then an editor at Fortune
magazine, a hedge fund hedged its bets by taking "long" positions on
undervalued stock and "short" positions on overvalued stocks. The idea
was to be smart and nimble and bold, and to make oversized returns.
In the last decade, however, hedge fund companies have started to
resemble mutual fund companies: big, plodding institutions for
pensioners. Fewer and fewer hedge funds are now making impressive
returns for their investors. In the 10 years through April 1995,
according to the HFRI Fund Weighted Composite Index, the typical
hedge fund has only just managed to beat the S.& P. 500 Index, with
an average annual return of 11.97 percent compared with 10.26 percent
for the S.& P. 500. In other words, the Wild West has become a
suburban community, where managers ride golf carts instead of bucking
broncos.
What happened? For one thing, the amount of money invested in hedge
funds has doubled in the last five years, to $1 trillion. It's hard to
find creative places to park that much money. Besides, no special
skills are needed to create a hedge fund - that's why everyone and his
uncle know somebody who's starting one. Investors are partly to blame.
They love the glamour of investing in hedge funds, but, at the same
time, they can't tolerate risk. Most investors can't tolerate even a
month of losses.
The real problem with hedge funds may be the managers themselves:
they're earning too much money. It's almost vulgar. In the past, hedge
funds were paid 1 percent of assets under management, plus 20 percent
of that year's return. Recently, even as their performance has sagged,
more and more hedge funds have increased their fees to 2 percent of
assets under management - plus 20 percent of returns. To make big
money for themselves, hedge fund managers don't have to make big
returns; they just need to hold on to their pool of clients.
[via Nina Munk]
May 26, 2005
xiaxue / Wendy Cheng
Why do you worship the ground I blog on or the geekery ?
Xiaxue won an asian bloggie award, topped the defunct Gweilo Diaries.
Definately a cannonical example of chatty look-at-me writing,
from Singapore. It's raining men! And the shopping ! Now that's
Sassy!
Press clippings folder.
Endorsers: Zapped, Google Blogoscoped.
Detractors: C(h)ristine, antistereotype (Auntie Stereotype?) 1, 2.
tags: Xia Xue
May 25, 2005
No Facts in Common
The Web is a festering cesspool of lunacy and emotion: Free Republic,
Daily Kos, Little Green Footballs, Atrios, Instapundit, on and on
and on. Facts only enter the picture when they're favorable.
Emotion rules. There is no common ground, nor a desire for any.
-- Greg Knauss
May 24, 2005
Union City intermodal station
Union City, CA intermodal station will connect BART, Dumbarton Rail,
Capitol Corridor, and ACE Rail.
May 23, 2005
The Washington Note
The Washington Note: opposition viewpoint from close up on Capitol Hill,
by Steve Clemons.
May 22, 2005
dan bricklin
Dan Bricklin: a graybeard of personal computing annotates
conferences and ponders Open Source.
May 21, 2005
baddesigns
baddesigns captures some (what else ?) bad designs.
Mostly consumer products, evaluated more from a usability than
an esthetic perspective.
Example: one tube is shampoo, one is hand lotion. Which one
would you grab as you hurry off to the gym ?
May 20, 2005
Ask Bjoern Hansen
Ask Bjoern Hansen and his notes.
Perl coverage and recent detailed reviews of Mac OS Tiger qualifies
him for my alpha geek blogroll.
May 19, 2005
Hudson galleries
Uptick's arctic trek gallery.
Ross Trusler's Arctic MINI and Dave Rose' DuctTape.
May 18, 2005
financialbulls
financialbulls by JW O'Brien looks at financial engineering
and risk management in real life.
May 17, 2005
Inmann
Inmann, mortgage blogger, is barkerishly spammy.
Useful listing of mortgage headlines; links are to pay-per-view versions
of what can was distributed by wire services.
May 16, 2005
NYC MINI
Peter 'Uptick' Wan' s photo galleries include NYC MINI.
May 15, 2005
Mortgage business complements auto business
May 14, 2005
A bear in the city
A bear in the city, artful San Francisco-based culture snippets.
May 13, 2005
Hudson trip gallery
Peter E (nakedpillowfight) 's gallery.
May 12, 2005
canadiansintheus
Sonia Arrison's infrequent Canadians in the US updates.
May 11, 2005
nemini thread
NE (New England / North East) MINI thread on Hudson trip.
May 10, 2005
Risk Glossary by Glyn Holton
Glyn Holton's Risk Glossary explains common terms such as capital asset
pricing model (CAPM).
May 9, 2005
May 8, 2005
Shiller speaks
Robert Shiller speaks about Real Estate and 'Irrational Exuberance' on NPR.
More and more home owners are refinancing, and a full quarter of
homes sold last year went to investors instead of live-in homeowners.
How long can this hot market last, and when it ends, are we looking at
a minor chill, or a full-blown ice age?
May 7, 2005
google personal seach history
Google Blog-o-scoped reviews Google's new search history retention
and recall.
May 6, 2005
Ben Hammersley
Ben Hammersley, web-centric technology coverage, presentented with
excellent minimalist page layout.
May 5, 2005
Man Date
Dinner with a friend has not always been so fraught. Before women
were considered men's equals, some gender historians say, men routinely
confided in and sought advice from one another in ways they did not
do with women, even their wives. Then, these scholars say, two
things changed during the last century: an increased public awareness
of homosexuality created a stigma around male intimacy, and at the
same time women began encroaching on traditionally male spheres,
causing men to become more defensive about notions of masculinity.
-- 8.
And so, man date joins the lexicon.
[NYT]
May 4, 2005
Jon Udell
Jon Udell offers pragmatic computer technology reviews with
can-do examples. A favourite writer since Byte magazine.
At O'Reilly, InforWorld index.
Example recorded actual product demos like this Oxygen XML
editor kill vapourware angst of Dan Bricklin's slideshows.
May 3, 2005
Kalman filter with Mathematica
Kalman filter (An algorithm in control theory introduced by R. Kalman in 1960 and
refined by Kalman and R. Bucy. It is an algorithm which makes optimal use of imprecise
data on a linear (or nearly linear) system with Gaussian errors to continuously update
the best estimate of the system's current state.)
As a times series function (example); as an estimator for linear
(time series and panel) models with time-varying coefficients.
See also Control System Professional: Kalman Filter, Igor Bakshee, Wolfram Research, Inc.
May 2, 2005
misc us highway photos and roadgeeking
Misc. highway photography and roadgeek forum by
Carl Rodgers.
Example: I-880/CA-262 Interchange in Fremont, CA
May 1, 2005
Lockhart Steele
Lockhart Steele, Gawker manager, masters the NYC scene.