dan collier

This is a cool game. My best time was 7.900 second (I was satisfied after my 4th try.)

Here are a bunch of great pictures: The Top Ten Astronomy Images of 2006

My personal favorite from Wired News 2006 Foot-in-Mouth Awards:

“Let’s face it. We’re not changing the world. We’re building a product that helps people buy more crap — and watch porn.”

– Bill Watkin, Seagate CEO
As quoted by Fortune magazine

Check out this high-resolution photo-compilation of Boston, with a Google Maps like interface. I can just about see my office (just to the left of Zakim-Bunker Bridge, the yellow building was Charles Street Jail, now the Liberty Hotel at MGH). via

Then on our darkest night, she brings shining light
As is the tradition in Sweden, we awoke this morning at dawn to a candlelit room and Naomi singing Sankta Lucia.

Lucia is a European holiday which originated in Italy, but has become thoroughly Swedish. It is a holiday to celebrate the return of the light (Lucia) in the season of darkness. I can’t think of a better reason for a holiday.

Today’s sunrise in Stockholm was 8:37 AM and sunset was 2:47 PM. So for obvious reasons, the celebration with glögg and lussebullar started around 10 AM.

Watch the official celebration on streaming Swedish public television (direct links: RealVideo | WMV). The show is an hour long, but you’ll see all you need to see in the first song. Here are the lyrics with English translation. As always, something is lost in translation.

I’ve often heard it said that the richest 1% of the world controls NN% of the global capital, with figures ranging from 50% to 90%. A new study by United Nations University study provides real numbers for that claim:

You’re in the top 10% if you have $61,000 in capital. I’m still reading the full study but so far my main criticism is that by defining “wealth” as assets minus debts the study underestimates effects of established wealth. While I’m probably in the top 10% of the population based on assets, I have access to borrowed capital that allows my household to live closer to the top 1%. But my assets minus debts results in a net negative wealth and I’d be counted in the bottom 50% of the global population. Likewise debt for an Ivy League student is far different than debt for an immigrant laborer. In a sense, some types of debt and access to debt is deferred capital to which the majority of the global population does not have access.

The Press Release and Study Abstract
The Full Study: The World Distribution of Household Wealth