Keyboards May Replace Cursive

This board has been slow for a bit, so I’m going to add something. I found this article online today at MSN. I remember learning cursive in 3rd grade. I remember slanting my paper… and lining up each letter and having it reach clear from the bottom to the top. I think David and I talked about this once. I remember being more meticulous in my practices… while he said he just didn’t really do the lessons and just sort of quickly wrote things out. Guess which one out of the two of us has better handwriting today? 😉

It’s so odd that many people don’t use cursive anymore because of computers and keyboards. The article goes on to add some quotes from an artist about how children don’t even know how to properly hold a pencil. This is so true! I can’t even tell you how often teachers in my drawing classes will actually explain how to hold the pencil because most individuals hold it completely incorrect. We are even encourage to practice basic strokes because it further develops your hand coordination, which many people don’t have.

The article later goes on to say that penmanship is a “part of your inner being, your core, your worth. …” I always thought it was really neat to see how people wrote. It certainly says a lot about someone and how much effort and care they are willing to put into something… something so small as your own handwriting. I still use cursive today… in fact I prefer it to regular handwriting. What about you? Do you still use cursive? Do you think children should still be taught cursive in today’s schools? Do you think you’re handwriting could be improved? I love cursive, yet I know very few people who are older that still use it regularly. I think if people really knew how much their own handwriting says about them… they would try and improve it.

Iraqi Holocaust

I found a NY Times article on the mass-graves uncovered recently in Iraq.

This article tells the stories of a handful of Iraqis who survived Hussein’s purges and mass-murders. So many people were tortured and slaughtered from 1979 on. When the first President Bush urged Iragis to rebel against Mr. Hussein after the Persian Gulf War, Hussein suppressed and destroyed the rebellion. He slaughtered towns and ethnic groups, all while US troops stood at the borders of his country and did nothing.

My guess is that Mr. Clinton had all the same information George W. Bush had about purges, chemical weapons, and terrorists. Mr. Clinton did nothing. Shame on him.

The Iragi people are becoming more and more upset as they uncover their past and discover the fate of their relatives and loved ones. Who does this article say they are upset at? Americans—and the rest of the world. We waited too long, Iraqis say.

Taxi Cabs—Advertising with Pinpoint Accuracy

At dinner tonight we were talking about taxi cabs, so I did a Google search to find a picture of one. I stumbled across a very interesting article in the New York Times and thought I would share it.

Hail A Cab, Read A Commercial

The article focuses on some new signs that are being installed on cabs in New York. The signs are controlled by global positioning satellite and cellular communication devices, and are remotely programmed to display specific ads in specific parts of town. This would make it possible for a store to advertise a sale only within six blocks of the store and only on the day of the sale. I think the most interesting line in the whole article is, “If advertisers wanted to communicate in Chinese in Chinatown or in Spanish in East Harlem, they could do that, too.”

Crazy! 

Ringtones? I'm Confused

Someone please explain this to me… 🤔

Livewire: Ringtone Market More Than Just Hot Air?

Apparently by 2005, sales will be somewhere around $400 million—for cellular phone ringtones?!? I guess some of the newest phones allow you to use ringtones that have mp3 quality, so the music industry is cashing in on royalties for short clips of popular songs. However, one of the highest selling ringtones actually sounds like a fart. Maybe I’m just jealous because I can’t download ringtones to my phone, but I really think this whole industry is absolutely ridiculous.

Listen to what Verizon had to say in defense of not allowing their customers to download from third party developers: “There have been many companies who have attempted to provide free downloads and we block our customers technologically from downloading them onto their devices because at that point we cannot protect against viruses or anything that would harm their services or phones.” What would they call that virus? The ringworm? C’mon. Who’s out there writing viruses for cell-phones? You’re just in it for the money, Verizon. Get over it. 

Palm Fried Itself

My Palm died a few days ago. It reset itself two or three times in the space of about ten minutes. It was extremely inconvenient, since I was in the middle of filling out a job application at the time. 😧

After it reset itself, it wouldn’t come back on, so I was trying to use the reset pin on the back to bring it up. At that point the screen started flickering wildly until it finally went entirely white. It has remained in that state for three days, although I’m pretty sure that the battery must be dead by now—the auto-off feature isn’t even working!

I have a 2 year extended warranty from Office Max, and I’ve used it a couple of times to have it replaced, but since Office Max no longer carries the model I have, they instructed me to call the 1-800 number listed in the warranty. They’re going to send out a prepaid shipping label so I can send it in for repairs. If they can’t repair it they’ll send me a check for the full price.

If anybody out there is thinking of buying a Palm, I would definitely recommend getting some kind of warranty. It has saved my butt enough times that I can safely say those were some of the best 40 bucks I’ve ever spent.