Richy's Random Ramblings

Ok, I know today (well, November 28th) is the American Thanksgiving Day Holiday, but that is no reason for Slashdot to have so many duplicate stories. They’ve had “When Personalization Runs Amuck” (posted at 7:25pm) which was a repeat of “When Profiling Goes Wrong” from 4:36pm on November 26 (both about the same article on the Wall Street Journal about how the personalisation profiling services as used by TiVo‘s and Amazon can sometimes suggest things that make you have a ‘double-take’). Before that, at 4.55pm they ran “Face Transplants On The Way” which was a repeat from November 27th’s 05:07pm story “Getting More Face Time” (both about the same BBC news article that facial transplants could take place in the next six to nine months).

The Slashdot editors then round it off by posting “Hark! I Hear a Dropped Packet” at 3:15am, which – you’ve guessed it – is a repeat again. But this time from the same day, okay at 1:47pm when “Using Sound To Test Internet Connections” was still on the front page (so even the Slashdot editors looking at their own site would have seen it). Ok, it didn’t have so much “lead information” about the article on New Scientist but still…

You’d think if Slashdot really wanted to get people subscribing to them (instead of relying on advertisement revenue), they’ll make at least a little effort to run things professionally wouldn’t you? [end rant]

At least a few readers managed to make a couple of comments which made me laugh….

As sort of mentioned in a previous entry, I was going to blog about Reindeer – and here it is 🙂

Now, if you wanted to count the number of inflatable reindeer you had, would you first inflate the vinyl critters, fill a hallway with them and then take a photo of them and have people on the internet count them for you?. Or do the intelligent thing and count them before you blow them up?

And do you know the names of all of Santa’s reindeer? Well, according to Clement Clarke Moore’s 1822 poem/story “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas/The Night Before Christmas”, the reindeer were called Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, and Blitzen. The “most famous reindeer of all”, Rudolph, didn’t get added to Santa’s listed until the 1939 song “Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer”.

Oh, if you wanted to write to Santa – the Royal Mail have helpfully provided his address as: Santa Claus, REINDEERLAND, SAN TA1.

It’s beginning to feel like Christmas is nearly here already!