Brian Gongol
Show notes from the WHO Radio Wise Guys - July 12, 2008
Including bowling at the Olympics...the next-generation iPhone...and Fake Steve Jobs
Damage at Cedar Rapids WWTP "like going back 75 years in wastewater treatment history"
If it looks like a tornado, then that's enough reason to head for cover
Photo circulating on the Internet depicts what's at least a mesocyclone with a big, low wall cloud making its way into Orchard, in northern Iowa.
Almost-perfect sports seasons
Including the 1934 Chicago Bears, who lost to a team wearing sneakers
Fluoridation hits Nebraska ballots in November
Chris Berman: Drug smuggler
(Video) He gives a pretty funny account of how to get Canadian aspirin across the border to his stage crew during a break
China claims it's stopped five terrorist groups planning attacks on Olympics
The government claims that most of them are from groups seeking a breakup of China or independence for individual regions. Either way, the possibility of a fracturing of the Chinese state could be one of the most significant world issues in the coming decades, and one that virtually nobody seems to be thinking about. The economic and political consequences could be staggering -- but the military consequences could be even greater. China has already fought one civil war in the last century; another is far from implausible. It should not escape our attention that the Shanghai stock index has fallen by 50% this year. The Chinese stock bubble has been an obvious threat since at least June of last year. One can only imagine how angry the American public would be if the major indices fell 50% in six months here...and we're building on a centuries-old history of understanding risk and reward in the capital markets. China, on the other hand, only just recently started letting individuals put money into the stock market. Government-controlled media are towing the party line that the government will take "effective action" to keep them from losing money. Meanwhile, inflation there is high and staying high.
Next week marks 19 years since the crash of UAL 232
Flight 232 crashed at Sioux City after a catastrophic failure in one of its engines wiped out the hydraulic control systems. The failure itself was an example of how it's possible for even extremely unlikely events to occur -- and the crew's heroic response was an example of what skilled, quick-thinking people can do to save lives in an emergency.
Where your tax dollars go
Federal website lets the public search for contracts paid for by the government over the last few years. Different searches let the visitor see who the biggest Federal contractors are and how much is spent in any given state.
Would you get up at 2:00 am for $1 million a year?
Chicago's top-rated morning show host is going to retire in half a year when his contract runs out, partly because the hours are brutal
LA Times editorial calls for quick passage of stricter Clean Water Act
British Airways gives special safety medal to pilot who landed crippled plane in January
BA Flight 38 landed just shy of the runway at Heathrow after its engines gave out without warning or apparent reason. The pilots managed to get the plane down safely and nobody was killed. It would be nice, though, if someone could figure out why the crash happened in the first place.
ActiveX security hole makes Internet Explorer vulnerable to attack
There are already targeted attacks underway against the security flaw, mainly against business users. It's probably best to use Firefox or Opera until further notice.
EPA offers energy-management seminar for local water and wastewater plants
Russia threatens a military response if the US puts missile defenses in the Czech Republic
A preliminary deal to coordinate a US anti-missile systems with the Czechs has just been signed, and Russia claims that those defense systems are an affront to its security. The US counters that they're strictly intended to defend the free world against the threat of missiles from places like Iran. Iran is of particular concern, considering the threat it could pose if it used North Korean missiles.
Flooding contributes to an expected 9% drop in the 2008 corn crop
The Midwest has been dealt a brutal hand on weather this year, with flooding on a scale never seen before and a relentless series of severe storms that have damaged crops via wind and hail. And at a horrible time -- demand is already so high that corn prices are at record levels.
Landfill leachate creates a tricky problem
Flooding damaged some architectural treasures
Flashback to before the caucuses: Why so much anxiety about free trade?
The look of a modern cathedral
DHS doesn't want to talk to Congress about computer privacy
A set of government travel rules appears to allow Customs officials to view the contents of travelers' laptop computers if they suspect something is afoul. What, though, of trade secrets? Of legitimate personal secrets? Where is the line of reasonability drawn?
A bunch of reasons why the new top-level domain scheme is a bad idea
It's obviously a pretty shameless cash grab, and the level of conflict over who gets a TLD like ".hotels" is bound to get ugly -- Hotels.com? Hilton? The International Hotel and Restaurant Association? But more than any of the other reasons, it's just going to be too confusing for most users. Most people are going to assume that any URL they hear should end in ".com", or perhaps ".net" or ".org". They're not likely to accept ".hotels" or ".cars" with any understanding that those words are terminal to the address.
Notes from the Brian Gongol Show on WHO Radio - July 6, 2008
The Internet as a public utility: What kind of downtime?
Given how much reliance is placed upon Internet uptime (that is, on sites actually working when visitors try to go there), a new industry in tracking website reliability has taken root
Citigroup to slash 18,000 jobs worldwide
Groups sue to find out how Justice Department is using cell-phone data
How to digitize old magazines
20,000 firefighters now working on California fires
A total of half a million acres have burned, and Governor Schwarzenegger wants the people of his state to pay more into a disaster-preparedness fund since wildfires seem to be a non-stop event anymore.
