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The Insomniac Coder is Pedro Alberto Vera, a lead web applications developer (both Microsoft-centric and LAMP) stuck somewhere outside of the Washington, D.C. beltway. He is also an avid reader, photographer and aspiring novelist. He likes to write about web programming, politics, geek toys, autism awareness, movies and all other things that geeks find interesting.
Report: Meat Now America’s No. 2 Condiment | The Onion - America’s Finest News Source
Yes, that’s a cheeseburger garnished with a pork chop. And yes, I am sure I posted this years ago when it was originally published, but I can tell you right now that it made me feel FAMISHED.
The chickens have come home to roost.
One of the things that I am still furious more than a decade after I finished my bachelors degree, plus the year I spent in MBA school, is that the cost of college textbooks is absolutely out of fucking control.
It is just abusive and predatory, and it keeps happening because we let them get away with it.
Why is it that a publishing house can afford to sell a three-inch thick hardcover novel for $20 and still make a profit, yet they feel that a three-inch college textbook, which is nothing more than text and maybe a few black and white pictures, has to sell for a $100 or worse?
Even worse, they change the fucking book every other year, and they shuffle the problem numbers to force the student to buy the new copy.
This is not new, it has been going on for decades.
I really hope that between Amazon and their Kindle DX, and companies like Chegg, they make these old-fashioned highway robbers that run college textbook sales to lose a LOT of sleep.
I also want to see more open sourced college textbooks. Many schools in the country are open sourcing their course materials, so there is no need to blow $100+ on a textbook that you are going to use for just one semester.
By the way, those $100+ college textbooks, do you really think that the author sees a better royalty than what your run-of-the-mill bestseller novel author is getting? Of course not! I am all for capitalism, but this is not capitalism, this is just a brutal, and so far sanctioned, abuse of our next wave of educated professionals in training.
Meh, how long before people actually realize that AOL shut itself down too and is no more than a collection of web properties with none of the original community elements?
“The sport of choice for the urban poor is basketball. The sport of choice for maintenance level employees is bowling. The sport of choice for front-line workers is football. The sport of choice for supervisors is baseball. The sport of choice for middle management is tennis. The sport of choice for corporate officers is golf. Conclusion: The higher you are in the corporate structure, the smaller your balls become.”
Almost ALL “collector” achievements suck. This one is even more annoying than the ingots in Fallout 3: The Pitt because the Gargoyles talk nonstop and they never cease to be annoying. Many thanks to Unlimited Gamer and ThatMarksGuides for their help in getting this one.
This is exactly what I would expect PJ to do. I can’t even visualize myself peeking at that balcony from within the building.
There, I Fixed It. » And People Ask Why I’m Scared To Fly?
True story:
Back in my US Army enlistment days (early to mid 90’s) I learned that we didn’t have silver duct tape. What we had was green duct tape, universally called “100 miles an hour tape.”
It was used on everything, and it worked every damn time. I bet that plane didn’t have trouble with that piece of tape until it was eventually fixed, or maybe they just painted over it and it is still around.
This was less than five minutes worth of work, not complicated at all.
I am sad to learn that Paquito Cordero, a pioneer of Puerto Rican television, died today. He was 77. He was a cultural treasure to the Commonwealth, a genuinely funny guy that had a 50+ year career both acting in, and producing television shows that were watched by pretty much everyone in the island.
