Month: January 2008
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A lawsuit sure to have no negative consequences
[A hotel owner is suing a hurricane expert for predicting hurricanes in Florida](http://www.overlawyered.com/2007/11/hotel_owner_might_sue_over_glo.html). Dr Gray may not be the best weather forecaster in the world, but I’m pretty sure that this kind of lawsuit would be pretty destructive to anyone who makes a forecast.
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Nerf warfare
[The Nerf Longshot CS-6](http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/weapons/nerf-sniper-rifle-is-three-feet-of-fun-324753.php). Only shoots 35 feet or so, so the quest for true foam tipped arrow accuracy continues.
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Rational Markets
What was the reaction of the stock market to the initial announcement that Steve Jobs, now regarded as one of the most valuable CEOs in the world, was becoming CEO of Apple? [The stock price fell 7.3 per cent](http://keynoteindexfund.com/).
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Explaining financial markets
[John Bird and John Fortune explain the subprime crisis](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJ_qK4g6ntM). A useful guide, especially if you imagine financial markets make any sense…
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Have you looked behind the couch?
A particularly annoying species of headline writer has been out and about lately. That’s the one who likes to write headlines like: > Stock market loses $10 billion. Grrr! It’s silly, lazy journalism. The economy hasn’t ‘lost’ any money. Any losses are either purely theoretical (gains that were never realised), or are offset by the…
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The fastest toaster on earth
[The Bugatti toaster](http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/branding/if-you-cant-afford-a-bugatti-car-maybe-you-can-afford-their-toaster-299162.php). I’d rather have the [Veryon](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bugatti_Veyron), of course.
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Summer fun from Sweden
[How to play the Swedish beach game *Kubb*](http://www.dyers.org/blog/archives/2007/09/10/make-your-own-kubb-set-for-dirt-cheap/). Bit of DIY involved to get the bits, but it looks like a good fun game to play.
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Great moments in regulation
[A New Zealand farmer was ordered to consult a worm psychologist to see if his composting worms were traumatised](http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/12/16/2120077.htm). At no possible point during this story could the government official have been thinking clearly.
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Not for the entomophobic
[What would happen if a watch mated with a scorpion](http://watchismo.blogspot.com/2007/12/buggin-out-more-arthropoidal-watchworks.html). Beautiful stuff (in a certain way), and reasonably priced too…
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Cloverfield makes $US41m opening weekend
[And tops the box office](http://www.imdb.com/news/sb/2008-01-21/film/1). This is turning out to be a love it or hate it film so far. But I have to say that (to date) no one whose opinion I respect has seen the film and not liked it *unless* they suffer from motion sickness problems from the shaky-cam.