There’s something rather meta-humorous about reading this Onion article and thinking, “damn, I gotta blog about this.”

SAN FRANCISCO—Tired of being bombarded with constant requests to share content on social media, bestow ratings, leave comments, and generally “join in on the discussion,” the nation’s Internet users demanded substantially less interactivity this week.

Excellent article by Marco Tabini on Macworld about how Apple controls the pricing of its products.

With so many laws regulating competition among retailers, how does Apple pull off this amazing feat? It turns out that the company uses a fairly straightforward strategy, known as price maintenance, that takes advantage of the popularity of its products and exploits a quirk in the way retailers are allowed to advertise their merchandise.

I’m reminded of the old joke:

Two old men are sitting on a park bench. One says:

Ecch. I spent 40 years building the best boats in the state. But do they call me Arnie the boatbuilder? Noooo!

For all my life, I’ve given to charities, but do they call me Arnie the philanthropist? Noooo!

But you suck one cock…

Excellent article at The Verge on the history of pinball and video arcades.

Authenticity is a hard nut to crack, but there are a few hallmarks of the video game arcade of days gone by: first, they have video games. Lots and lots of video games, and (usually) pinball machines. They’re dark (so that you can see the screens better), and they don’t sell food or booze.

I’ve been a curmudgeon for years about how, back in my day, I had to learn BASIC and DOS to do anything with a computer… which in turn is why I think I learned a hell of a lot about how they work. While I’m all in favor of iPads, it’s just not the same when new users can bypass all of that programming stuff.

Never actually occurred to me that you can just sit a kid in front of a UNIX prompt.

Two years ago, my son Jacob (then 3) and I built his first computer together. I installed Debian on it, but never put a GUI on the thing. It’s command-line, and has provided lots of enjoyment off and on over the last couple of years. The looks of shock I get from people when I explain, as if it’s perfectly natural, that my child has been able to log in by himself to a Linux shell since age 3, are amusing and astounding. Especially considering that it is really not that hard. Instead of learning how to run an Xbox, he’s learned how to run bash.

I predict a highly caffeinated stay. Why wasn’t this here when I was writing my book here? (Oh yeah, it was 1995.)

Report: 96% Of Nation’s Smut Consumed By Filthiest 1%

The onion thinks they’re joking, but this is actually pretty close to true. We had one guy who rented 12 tapes a day. Every day.

When the fiscal cliff deal was signed, it included a provision killing off loans to nonprofit health providers:

When Congress struck a deal to avert the fiscal cliff, it also dealt a quiet blow to President Obama’s health overhaul: The new law killed a multibillion-dollar program meant to boost health insurance competition by funding nonprofit health plans.

The decision to end funding for the Consumer Operated and Oriented Plans has left as many as 40 start-ups vying for federal dollars in limbo. Some are considering legal action against the Obama administration, after many spent upwards of $100,000 preparing their applications.

I love how this is framed as being bad for competition. More to the point, nonprofit providers have far less overhead, so this was also likely to reduce long term costs, just as single payer would.

I’m a bit confused by this article concerning controversy over a star that has been dated at 13.9 billion years, making it 200 million years than the actual universe that houses it.

However, buried in graf 5 we learn that the margin of error is 700 million years. At this point, the problem is solved:

1. The dating technique for the star comes up with 13.9 billion years, but the technique itself has known margins of error.
2. Since in this case, ages greater that 13.7 billion can be thrown out (barring extraordinary evidence to the contrary), we can safely date the star as between 13.2 and 13.7 billion years—or actually, 13.65, since IIRC that’s when the universe cooled off enough to allow the first stars to form.
3. Ergo, no mystery and no story. Unless, of course, it’s a story that sometimes science comes up with ranges of answers and has to self-correct.

For example, let’s say that my contempt for Kevin Lee’s reporting is 102%, plus or minus 7%. Since it’s not possible to hold someone in more contempt than my theoretical maximum, we can safely assume that I regard this article as between 95-100% contemptible, even though there’s a “mathematical” answer of 109% possible.

View from off Strip is much better.

This is a great feature:

Zero Dark Thirty: Why It’s So Important to Rebut Claims That Torture Works

Trained interrogators, in fact, argue that if some detainees did know about the courier who ultimately led the CIA to bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader could have been caught much earlier had those detainees been interrogated properly — not eight years later.

The accomplished Air Force interrogator who goes by the pseudonym Matthew Alexander told me in 2011 that, subjected to physical and psychological brutality, detainees “gave us the bare minimum amount of information they could get away with to get the pain to stop, or to mislead us.”

In a more perfect world, the Obama administration would earn 30-40 approval points from online replies like these:

This Isn’t the Petition Response You’re Looking For

The Administration shares your desire for job creation and a strong national defense, but a Death Star isn’t on the horizon. Here are a few reasons:

• The construction of the Death Star has been estimated to cost more than $850,000,000,000,000,000. We’re working hard to reduce the deficit, not expand it.
• The Administration does not support blowing up planets.
• Why would we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?

Years ago, I read about an overnight bag that Casanova packed, which he claimed had the bare essentials for every gentleman upon waking up. This included a few rolls for breakfast, silver for spreading marmalade on the rolls, and various other accoutrements of 18th-century living that seem ridiculous now. Unfortunately, my Google-fu is unable to bring up the quote.

Was just reminded of this by Mat Honan’s coffee setup. Scroll down to “CES Hacks”.

Me, I’ll settle for the 24-hour Starbucks.

Update: Michael Weinmayr informs me that this is from a footnote in Good Omens, which is probably a far more reliable reference than most things I’ve read that I half-remember.

Apparently, I was pretty damn busy in transit over the last 24 hours. The scary thing: my CES schedule looks ridiculously overbooked in my calendar even at itty-bitty thumbnail size.

Two very interesting reads on the Atlantic about online dating sites and their putative effects on relationships. This is from the reply article:

Narratively, the story focuses on Jacob, an overgrown manchild jackass who can’t figure out what it takes to have a real relationship. The problem, however, is not him, and his desire for a “low-maintenance” woman who is hot, young, interested in him, and doesn’t mind that he is callow and doesn’t care very much about her. No, the problem is online dating, which has shown Jacob that he can have a steady stream of mediocre dates, some of whom will have sex with him.

Courtesy of Michael Weinmayr, as if that really needed to be said.