Archive for December, 2007

Visibly, in 2008, scammers and spammers start early: The sheer number of emailed wish cards seems to have increased to very high levels. Only one advice: If you receive a “best wishes” electronic card from somebody that you don’t know, don’t even spend time (and computer security) checking it. It’s most probably a mean to insert a worm, a Trojan horse or a virus in your computer.

And, keep your anti-virus software updated.

As the US dollar drops in Stock Markets, there are some unexpected victims. As many other companies whose customers pay in US dollars, many bloggers using advertising services are being paid in US dollars (or in Euros converted from US dollars). While the green bill currency was dropping through the floor, bloggers earnings dropped too because unit prices of ads did not climb as fast.

Some are said to have lost 20% compared to last year.

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Plumbeous Ibis (Theristicus caerulescens, Ibis plombé). Shot in Brazil, 2007.

BestPriceCameras.com on-line photo seller is trying to get some cheap money out of the rumours around the upcoming replacement for the Canon EOS 5D: They opened a product page for the Canon EOS 5D Mk II.

However, they appear to be one of the most despised shops on the web with low customer rating, plenty of horror stories (look in Google). The fact that the page is not even removed after publication probably means that this was fully intentional and they don’t want to loose an opportunity to grab money from gullible web photographers.

When looking for factual information about batteries, the journey of the Internet user is full of traps. Fortunately, I found a detailled, very readable and facts-based web site. It named BatteryUniversity.com. I like a lot the 3-part articles with a lot of details (and with German translations). You will know everything about all battery technologies, learn what the memory effect is and is not, about applications (including details about hybrid cars and plug-in hybrid cars).

Just check Part 2 of the associated book, to get information about how to prolong battery life. Worth bookmarking.

I found an old post on PhotoGraphyBay that is trying to describe the upcoming Canon EOS 450D (the supposed replacement for the current EOS 400D / Rebel XTi). I would say that this is pure speculation, but so many people are now expecting it to appear on the 24th of January, that I could not let if pass without mention.

Thanks to LifeHacker, and if you have the following, you will be able to use your iPhone to access Internet from your laptop.

• A computer with Wi-Fi capable of creating an ad-hoc computer-to-computer connection (yours is)
• A jailbroken iPhone (If you don’t know how to jailbreak your iPhone, the easiest way is to make sure you’re running 1.1.1 firmware and then start here.
• The OpenSSH iPhone application
• An SSH client on the computer you’re using. If you’re on a Mac or *nix machine, you should be fine. Windows users should check out how to install OpenSHH with Cygwin.

Source: LifeHacker “Use Your iPhone’s Internet Connection On Your Laptop [Feature]“.

 

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In my eyes, this is one of the nicest great herons, despite being very common in Brazil.

Cocoi heron (Ardea cocoi, héron cocoï).

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Whistling Heron (Syrigma sibilatrix, Héron flûte-du-soleil). Shot in Brazil, 2007.

LifeHacker published a series of articles about the basics of a Digital SLR (Single Lens Reflex) camera. It’s worth reading if you are not pro-photographer.

• Part 1 : Program mode
• Part 2 : Manual mode

It could be useful to quickly master your latest Christmas gift.

Wrong perspective, optical illusion, mistake of the drawing hand?

Along similar lines, more brillant, here is a cool graphical work from Daniel Martinez Lara and Kike Oliva.

And, finally, the engraving from Escher that inspired one optical illusion and draws from the other’s principles.

We all knew that the whale was actually a terrestrial mammal gone back to the sea a few million years ago (this is most visible in the presence of vestigial leg bones that are not associated to externally apparent legs or fins), but it was a bit difficult to say exactly what the ancestor looked like. It seems that this was more a kind of small deer than big dog (as previously thought). Now, we have the missing link:

Indohyus by Carl Buell

Sources:

• Greg Laden’s blog: A Whale of a Missing Link : Indohyus
• the loom: Whales: From So Humble A Beginning…
• Futura-Science : Le premier ancêtre nageur des cétacés était-il un daim miniature ?