Federer lost to Volandri

BREAKING NEWS: The Greatest Sportsman of The Decade, aka Federer, lost to local Italian Filippo Volandri at the Rome AMS tourney today.

ATP article, & Steve Tignor live blog commentary.

This makes 4 consecutive tourneys that Fed has entered yet hasn't won, which has not happened since Fed took the #1 spot in early 2004. The tourneys are all AMS tourneys
Indian Wells (loss to Canas)
Miami (Canas)
Monte Carlo (Nadal)
Rome (Volandri)

I haven't seen any of the Rome matches, & am not following tennis too closely currently. However, this is NOT good momentum for Fed going into Roland Garros. I doubt Fed will be able to turn it around & win Roland Garros. Nadal is too sick on clay.

Recall last year Fed lost only 5 matches, now in May he's already lost 4 matches.

Maybe Fed is experiencing some mental burn-out from 3 years of utter brilliance from early 04 until now. It's not natural to lose 5 matches per year. I hope Fed can turn it around & win Roland Garros. Otherwise even if he retires with 20 non-RG slam titles, "haters" will say he can't possibly be the GOAT having never won RG.

2000 Years of World Economic History

Good blog article on 2000 Years of World Economic History. It compares GDP, Population, & GDP/Population ratio, by Region of the World.

2000 years ago in JC's era, China & India were leaders in GDP. In the 21st Century, it looks like these guys will make a comeback.

Alan Binder article on offshoring

A PhD economist article on offshoring, with an actually intelligent perspective, not a PhDee.

Seattle Times opinion article on outsourcing & H1-B

Seattle Times opinion article on outsourcing & H1-B visa.

Nation article on H Clinton's ties to Corporate America

Nation article on H Clinton's ties to Corporate America

An Offshore Outsourcing ELE: IBM to layoff 150K American workers

IBM Global Services plans to lay off half its US workforce by year end, which could be 150K employees. Simultaneously, they're hiring in China & India.

I hate that I was prophetic about offshore outsourcing. In 2003 I wondered about the damage of a huge American employer outsourcing a big bulk of their jobs. Many people I talked to thought I was overstating the problem. Unfortunately, I was Nostradamus-like on this one.

I can't wait to see the "free trade" PhDees (eg academic dee dee dees) try to defend this action as "benefiting the US economy".

I should start a firm which outsources "free trade" PhDee apologists. My staff would not have PhDs, or wouldn't be as bereft of common sense & real-life experience as PhDees, but could do the work at 10% of the cost of existing PhDees

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Check out this insightful comment someone posted (anonymous | May 04, 2007 | 7:40PM). Real effed up, but I can't say that for many US companies that this is not true:

The crazy thing is, when a corporation cuts way back on employment, the top-level people think they are getting rid of the fat and retaining the lean, but it always turns out just the opposite.

This is why. Most employees fall into one of two classes. The first is competetent, hard working techies. The second is political types who don't really know how to perform their job, and spend their time plotting and scheming, and tricking the higher-ups.

When a corporation sets on a course of massive layoffs, the competent techies set about trying to do their jobs better, and also looking for jobs elsewhere. On the other hand, the imcompetent political types organize together in a giant scheme to trick the higher-ups to fire the techies and keep the political types on their jobs. One way they do this by persuading them that the competent techies are actually incompetent, while they themselves are competent.

This is sort of trickery is what the political types are good at, so they succeed, and the result is the average employee competence level drops precipitiously. Believe me, I have seen this happen in one case after another.

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edup | May 10, 2007 | 12:19AM

The CEO Creed:

I pledge allegiance, to the DOLLAR,
and all the perks for which it stands:
1 vision, which makes me God,
Untouchable, with liberty and justice for nobody but ME.

I think they start each board meeting with this prayer. Since they ARE deeply religious people, followers of the worlds third major religion.
1) Chrisianity
2) Islam
3) Money

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Fora

This site Fora has on-demand free video of speeches made by experts on different current events or academic topics.

Healthcare Maine

Folks in Maine have a grass-roots effort to advocate universal health care coverage in their state. Interesting.

Kim Clijsters retires

The Belgian homegirl Kim Clijsters retires from tennis at age 23. WTF?

Apple pushing music industry to eliminate DRM protection

Apple pushing music industry to eliminate DRM protection.

I haven't ever bought music online, due to prinicple of this DRM protection. I get DRM-free mp3 files via ripping mp3s from the physical CD, or "by other means".

It would be great if the music industry standardizes on eliminating DRM. For most new release albums, it's possible to get the album "by other methods" anyways. I think the industry would actually increase sales by eliminating DRM.

MV Game, Wk 2007-Apr-30

Another horrible performance in the MV Game, 43rd/51 players. I'm having a hard time on these clay courts! 1 journeyman German dude Kohlschreiber had over half my 66 pts LOL. This next week is a Masters Series tourney in Rome.

My 2007-Apr-30 team

Name Player	Old Value	New Value	Points	Budg.win	Surface	In?
Canas	1217	1217	0	0	Clay
Del Potro	601	608	3	7	Clay
Kohlschreiber	740	875	35	135	Clay
Martin	457	472	4	15	Clay
Massu	615	615	3	0	Clay
Melzer	935	900	8	-35	Clay
Querrey	552	557	3	5	Clay
Russell	562	545	0	-17	Clay
Spadea	524	564	10	40	Clay
Stepanek	995	995	0	0	Clay
Tourney Budget:	7000		66	Points
Money Gained:	301		1016	Old Total
Amount to Spend:	7301		1082	New Total
Total Spent:	7198	7348
Budget Unused:	103
Money Gained Now:		150
Gross New Budget:		451
Interest:		64
New Total Money Gained:		387
Tourney Budget Next Week:		11000
To Spend Next Week:		11387

How-to compress/zip files & share on the internet

Here's how you can compress a group of files & share them on the internet. Note: there is more than 1 way to do this, but this way is simple & works well.

Note - steps 1-3 you only do initially
1 Go to http://www.7-zip.org/ Note - 7Zip is a free open-source app that is free & works better than WinZip. A no-brainer to use this app
2 Download the application .exe (vers 4.42 is good)
3 When the download finishes, double click the .exe file to install 7Zip to your PC. If there are options, just pick the default options

Note steps 4-13 you do each time you want to share a group of files
4 Group all the files you want to share in one folder (eg copy/paste all the files into 1 common folder). Note - to use sendspace, your set of files must be less than 300MB. This is usually not a problem, but if it is, split your files into multiple groups, each group being under 300MB
5 Right-click on the folder, pick 7Zip>Add to Archive
6 Pick the settings
Archive format = Zip
Compression Level = Ultra
Compression Method = Deflate
7 Click "OK" to make the zip file
8 Go to sendspace.com
9 For the "Select file", browse to your .zip file you want to share
10 In "Your E-mail", put your e-mail address. This way you'll get a msg when your file has finished uploading to sendspace
11 Click "Upload File" to upload your .zip file over the internet to sendspace
12 After the file uploads, you'll get an e-mail from sendspace indicating the URL where the file is located at
13 Share this URL with the person(s) you want to receive a copy of the file

Linkin Park & Fort Minor playlist

My Linkin Park & Fort Minor playlist. A strong shot of audio caffeine.

Family Research Council blasts H Clinton for fundraising with Timbaland

Fundy Xian Group Family Research Council (FRC) blasts Sen. Hillary Clinton. FRC says its hypocritical for H Clinton to support Don Imus getting fired, then get 800K from a fundraiser led by Timbaland, who says uses "hoes" in his songs. If you recall, Imus got fired for saying "nappy headed hoes" on his show when referring to the Rutgers basketball team.

Hey I'm no friend of the FRC. These are type of right-wingnut Fundy Xian douchebags that claim that fundamental realities don't exist, such as the separation of church & state in the US Constitution, global warming, or biological evolution.

But fair is fair, FRC is correct to point out this H Clinton hypocrisy here IMHO.

A Victory for the Rule of Law: Paris Hilton incarcerated

A Victory for the Rule of Law: Paris Hilton incarcerated for 45 days. In this era of Gee Dubbz violating the Constitution, ignoring the rule of law with impunity, it's great to see an example that American law is respected, despite the celebrity & high-priced lawyers involved.

"Nowhere To Hide" editorial on American suburban life

Straight Bangin has a great editorial about American suburban life, & how the show "The Sopranos" does a great job of illustrating it.

Calle 13 "Residente O Visitante" album

The new Calle 13 album "Residente O Visitante" has dropped, you can "cop that" here