lifeasdaddy

Is there some knowledge falling off the back of the Google truck?

As Doc Searls has noted, bloggers searching for old blog entries on their own blogs are failing to find them via Google search.

Here's how it works.  I'm writing a blog post, and want to incorporate a link to something I previously wrote on my blog on the same topic, but can't remember where or precisely when I wrote it.  I used to be able to find it via a Google search, but not for the past few months.  Doc got around the problem by using Yahoo search.

As Doc says:

The fact that Google fails to find pages that have been sitting in plain sight of its crawlers for long periods of time, while Yahoo finds those same pages, is rather interesting data.

Getty Images' Moodstream: pictures, video and music as you like it.

I was interested to see what some of the world's best photographers caught from the Olympics opening ceremony last night, and day One of competition today so I stopped by at Getty Images to check on their stable's pics.  And I discovered something new and interesting.

They've set up this thing called Moodstream which provides an automated slideshow of photographs, video clips set to music mined from their enormous back catalogue and you can use sliders to choose the stuff displayed according to your mood.  Or the mood you want to create.  There's slidebars to adjust for Happy/Sad, Calm/Lively, Humorous/Serious, Nostalgic/Contemporary, Warm/Cool.

There's a button to select any one of the scenes shown to your own preset mood board - and of course, all images and video area vailable for instant purchase under rights managed provision.

Coolness factor is off the chart.

And the Olympics?  Well, for the latest stuff check out the Getty Images Sports blog here.  And the Getty Images Editorial Sports Events Feed here.

And the Getty Images standard Sports page here.

ADDED:

And from The Big Picture blog, the best of the best of pics about the Opening Ceremony.  Plenty of symmetry.  Perhaps the most charming is the last pic in the series, not even taken near the stadium.

Fun @ the Powerhouse Museum

Last week Edward asked to go to the Powerhouse Museum, which if I had to categorise it, I'd say is a museum of technology, science, decorative arts and design.  So today we made the trek to Ultimo and met up with Ben and Lauren and Edward's cousins Thomas and Eloise.

We especially got Ed excited about visiting the zero gravity simulator  which is part of the Space exhibition.

The Zero-G simulator is comprised of a stationary platform upon which the astronauts (kids) stand surrounded by a cylindrical shaped mockup of the inside of a space station.  The cylinder slowly rotates to simlulate a space like experience.  To the astronauts, nothing much seems to be happening, but when you walk out onto "earth" again, it is quite disorientating.  Thankfully there is a rest area, which I suggest you use.

On the way to the Zero-G experience, then kids also had the chance to be photographed looking like space travellers as they stuck their heads through the painted backdrop.  An oldie, but a goody.

Later the boys had the chance to dress up in astronaut costumes.  There were alien costumes too, but they didn't have the same attraction.

Apart from these obvious novelties, they had some great fun in the Experimentations area which displays pratical examples of some of the fundamental physics of electricity, light, and magnetism.  In this pic, Edward is using a hand cranked generator to power a toy electric train and send it around a small track in the enclosure.

I know that when Ed said last week that he wanted to go to the Powerhouse Museum, he had in his mind seeing the steam engines on display.  The museum includes on permanent display Locomotive No. 1, which was the first steam locomotive in Australia.  Made in England by the Stephenson works, it was transported to Australia by ship and put into use in 1855.  I see from the nameplate data, that it was in fact No. 958, as far as they were concerned.

There is also an engine built in 1882, Locomotive No. 1243 on display and Edward was able to stand on the footplate and operate a few controls.  the display is interactive, and as buttons are pressed the voice of a driver or fireman explain the workings.

There's a section called Zoe's House, which is a contruction and building activity for kids aged 3 - 6.  Ed, Thomas and Eloise all loved this.

The Powerhouse Museum is well set up to light the imagination of children, and as you can see has lots of things for them to do, see, and in which to be invovolved.

But there's also rareities to interest military historians like me.

This enigma machine is part of an exhibition, and was used to create coded messages by the German Army in World War II.

Breaking the codes made by these machines was a turning point of World War II.

There are two other known specimins of these machines in Australia.  One is held by the Australian War Memorial, and one held by the government information security (cryptological) agency Defence Signals Directorate; although both are owned by DSD.

To see inside an Enigma machine, you can check this series of photographs (not from the Powerhouse Museum)

The children all enjoyed taking a break in the courtyard cafe which has some state of the art play and climbing activites, including this giant climbing frame which can be enjoyed by kids of all ages, including this 40ish man who could not resist climbing to the top. 

I managed to control the climbing impulse.

Now, it wouldn't be a visit to a museum if we didn't manage to find an error in a curatorial plaque, and here's the result from today.

There's a display about the work of violin maker William Auchterlonie (perhaps part of the famous golfing family?) and the plaque says that," This page is open to 1924, the year the violin on display was made."

But it is clearly a page from 1934. 

He had been using a day-to-a-page diary from 1930, and the day for that page, Tuesday January 28th, 1930 is crossed out.  Auchterlonie's note begins, "Started in 1934 Beginning of November ..."

SUMMARY:

Edward asked to return to the Zero-gravity simulator, and the engine Locomotive No. 1243 - so I guess they must be the best things in the museum today.

Lonely Planet guide book writer admits he made it up.

I thought Lonely Planet guidebooks were over rated.  This could be one reason.

lifeasdaddy - Microsoft HealthVault: A way to preserve and share your medical records.

Frank Arrigo drew my attention to Microsoft's new health product, HealthVault.  It's a service to store your personal health information and medical records which may be input by you, your medical professionals, or partners in the HealthVault system such as 3rd party health service providers.

It's built on the principle that "... you should control your own health records."

Australia's outdated and outmoded medical infrastructure is such that sharing of a patient's medical records between a private hospital, a public hospital, a family physician, a treating specialist, a health para-professional and a pharmacist are impossible.  The New South Wales Health Department is piloting such a system called Healthelink but the recent troubles in the NSW health system may see wide scale introduction a long way off.  Even if it were introduced in NSW, what happens when you go interstate, or overseas? 

As is apparent from the current election-mode blame games being played between Federal and State politicians, it is very difficult to get national agreement on the implementation of health systems in Australia.  So, a privately run system like Microsoft's HealthVault could be the way to go.

If you want to try out HealthVault yourself, you will need to sign in using a Windows Live ID.  the current beta-mode HealthVault is only permitting use by United States residents, so if you are outside the USA, the workaround is to alter your home address in the Windows Live ID account profile to an address inside the USA.  As such, and because there are presently no partner sites outside the USA there is certainly limited usefulness for those outside the USA, but go have a look for yourself.

This week the ABC 7.30 Report current affairs programme aired a segment lamenting the lack of electronic accessibility to medical records.  Read the transcript here, with link through to vodcast.

Here's the New York Times story about HealthVault which also focuses on the competitiveness within the IT industry to get into the medical records space.

lifeasdaddy - Online reviews and ratings: Do they stack up?

There's a general lack of transparency about various sites which rank products and services online.  A lack of transparency about how the exact ranking is decided that is.

The Wall Street Journal's Numbers Guy runs his slide rule over the online rankings issue here.

There's lies, damned lies, and statistics.

lifeasdaddy - Kids wearing Crocs + escalator = danger!

Crocs near the side of escalator steps/treads can be very dangerous as the get stuck against the side  in a stationary position as the step continues to move.  Could result in amputated toes.

Check the Forbes article here.

And the addtional comment by Charles A. Buckman (escalator expert) here.

lifeasdaddy - If you are an Australian going to work in the USA you'll want to...

... read what Frank Arrigo had to say about his visa "interview".

Lots of security hoo haa and long queing for a very short interview.

lifeasdaddy - Making a campus safer. George Mason University's emergency alert system.

The official panel examining the Viginia Tech campus shootings of earlier this year has found that more lives would have been saved if an emergency alert had ben issued earlier.

From today's Washington Post story:

The panel appointed by the governor to investigate the massacre at Virginia Tech is critical of the university's response to the shootings and its treatment of Seung Hui Cho, concluding that some lives could have been saved if officials had issued an alert sooner that a gunman was on campus.

Here's the report of the Virginia Tech Review Panel from the Official site of the Governor of Virginia.

Today I was doing some research about George Mason University, which is also located in Virginia.  In a prominant position right there on the GMU home page is a tab with a link to "MASON ALERT EMERGENCY MESSAGING":

This system is administered by the Safety OfficeWelcome to Mason Alert

Mason Alert is an alert system that allows George Mason University to contact you during an emergency by sending text messages to your: Cell phone E-mail (school, personal, other) Pager BlackBerry/Treo When an emergency occurs, authorized senders will notify you using Mason Alert. Mason Alert is your personal connection to real-time updates, instructions on where to go, what to do, or what not to do, who to contact and other important information. What a fine idea.  Could save lives in the event of an emergency. Now let's check on the Viginia Tech home page and see if they've got something prominant and similar.  Nope.  Nothing like that there.

lifeasdaddy - Ed on the DVR miniature railway

Yesterday lifeasdaddy was on the road in Melbourne.  Edward wanted to see the Daimond Valley Railway which is a miniature railroad.  It's in Eltham Lower Park in Main Road, Eltham.

It runs almost every Sunday, and you can get the low-down here.

This shows Edward in a carriage being drawn by locomotive S301, painted in the traditional Victorian Railways blue and gold livery.

Other locomotives running yesterday were Milwaukee Road, NSW SRA 81 Class, and an honest to goodness steamie called Tom Thumb. All in miniature of course.

Children under 2 years are free, all other passengers pay $3.

This is a great way to spend an hour.