one of the more embarrassing US Presidents (1969-1974). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon (more)

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting.[7][8] It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement on August 6, 1965, and Congress later amended the Act five times to expand its protections.[7] Designed to enforce the voting rights guaranteed by the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, the Act sought to secure the right to vote for racial minorities throughout the country, especially in the South. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_Rights_Act_of_1965 (see related Civil Rights Act of 1964; undermined in 2013 by ShelbyCounty v Holder)

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Pub. L. 88–352, 78 Stat. 241, enacted July 2, 1964) is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex,[a] and national origin.[4] It prohibits unequal application of voter registration requirements, racial segregation in schools and public accommodations, and employment discrimination. The act "remains one of the most significant legislative achievements in American history". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964 (more)

I just discovered Bret Victor's Magic Ink essay from Mar'2006. The PDF is 73p long! The ubiquity of frustrating, unhelpful software interfaces has motivated decades of research into "Human-Computer Interaction." In this paper, I suggest that the long-standing focus on "interaction" may be misguided. For a majority subset of software, called "information software," I argue that interactivity is actually a curse for users and a crutch for designers, and users' goals can be better satisfied through other means. Information software design can be seen as the design of Context-sensitive information graphics (Mapping). I demonstrate the crucial role of information graphic design, and present three approaches to context-sensitivity, of which interactivity is the last resort (the other 2 being the environment and history)... Information software is for learning an internal model (Mental Model). Manipulation software is for creating an external model. Communication software is for communicating a shared model (Shared Language). Manipulation software design is hard, but most software is information software. (more)

Linus Lee: Towards a research community for better thinking tools (tools for thought). ..one area has stood out consistently as both personally exciting and more widely important: imagining and building better ways computers can help people do their best creative, thoughtful work (more)

Writing the text for advertising.

Miguel de Icaza (born November 23, 1972)[1] is a Mexican-American programmer, best known for starting the GNOME, Mono project, and Xamarin projects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miguel_de_Icaza (more)

Science fiction author. http://www.craphound.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Doctorow (more)

Václav Havel (Czech pronunciation: [ˈvaːtslav ˈɦavɛl] ⓘ; 5 October 1936 – 18 December 2011) was a Czech statesman, author, poet, playwright and dissident.[1][2] Havel served as the last president of Czechoslovakia from 1989 until 1992, prior to the dissolution of Czechoslovakia on 31 December, before he became the first president of the Czech Republic from 1993 to 2003. He was the first democratically elected president of either country after the fall of communism. As a writer of Czech literature, he is known for his plays, essays and memoirs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%A1clav_Havel (more)

Open Source Relational Data Base engine. Known for simplicity and speed. http://www.mysql.com/ (more)

Peter Kaminski is In Search of a Nice Team Wiki. Strongly considering Outline (GetOutline.com). It's open-source (TypeScript).

aka bird flu, scary variation of The Flu, spreading through animals 2020-2024.... (more)

Quincy Delight Jones Jr. (March 14, 1933 – November 3, 2024) was an American record producer, songwriter, composer, arranger, and producer.[1] His career spanned 70 years, with 28 Grammy Awards won out of 80 nominations,[2] and a Grammy Legend Award in 1992. Jones came to prominence in the 1950s as a jazz arranger and conductor before working on pop music and film scores. He moved easily between genres, producing pop hit records for Lesley Gore in the early 1960s (including "It's My Party") and serving as an arranger and conductor for several collaborations between the jazz artists Frank Sinatra and Count Basie. In 1968, Jones became the first African American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song for "The Eyes of Love" from the film Banning. Jones was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Score for his work on the 1967 film In Cold Blood, making him the first African American to be nominated twice in the same year. Jones produced three of the most successful albums by pop star Michael Jackson: Off the Wall (1979), Thriller (1982), and Bad (1987). In 1985, Jones produced and conducted the charity song "We Are the World", which raised funds for victims of famine in Ethiopia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quincy_Jones (more)

a statistical distribution often confused for a power law

Ross Mayfield on Clay Shirky's piece on the BlogWeb ecosystem exhibiting Power Law characteristics. (more)

Twisting the rules of building software: Bending Spoons (the team behind Evernote). You may not be familiar with Bending Spoons, but I guarantee you’ve encountered some of their well-known products, like Evernote and Meetup. In today’s episode of The Pragmatic Engineer, we sit down with three key figures from the Italy-based startup: cofounder and CEO Luca Ferrari, CTO Francesco Mancone, and Evernote product lead Federico Simionato (more)

George W Bush defeated Al Gore (more)

aka Carbon Emissions (more)

Peter Naur: Programming as Theory Building (more)

book by Mark Joyner: The Irresistible Offer: How to Sell Your Product or Service in 3 Seconds or Less (2005) ISBN: 0471738948 (more)