This post reviews and highlights my ten favorite posts or threads from the past month. There’s nothing like a genuine antenna controversy to brighten the day of an antenna blogger. Apple’s iPhone antenna problems and aftermath filled ÆtherCzar with material in July. The month began with “Apple Hiring Antenna Engineers.” […]
Monthly Archives: July 2010
59 posts
So says Shikha Dalmia in Forbes. And kudos to the hard working Anthony Watt’s whose “Watt’s Up With That?” blog just celebrated 50,000,000 hits. His mix of polite, respectful, and insightful climate blogging draws a crowd. Only 49,995,000 more to go here to match his record!
By the 1920’s direction finding was well-advanced, and DF techniques began to see everyday use in both marine and aerial navigation. [1] The Figure shows a DF array from around 1930 deployed at Croyden Aerodrome in the UK [2]. Another good example of a sophisticated and relatively simple to use […]
The 313th Regiment moved to the area of Nicolle yesterday 28 July, 1944, then was ordered to follow the 6th armored toward Avranches. The bridges have been blown by retreating German troops. This is slowing the advance. Meanwhile the Germans lines have broken. Harassed by superior Allied airpower and unable […]
Mathew Lasar writing over at Ars Technica has an update on San Fransisco’s new cell phone law requiring cell phone vendors to post Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) data for all models. The SAR is rate at which a phone can dissipate power as heat in the head of a user. […]
The *real* story behind Steve “Darth” Jobs and the iPhone incident, from this (Chinese?) animation (with English subtitles). The funniest aspect of this over-the-top animated “documentary” is that some of the anti-Apple ranting sounds just like this.
Leonard Read’s classic economics essay “I, Pencil“ tells the story of a simple pencil. By tracing the far flung and complex origins of this seemingly trivial device, Read’s parable teaches a powerful lesson: that the unfettered, distributed wisdom of the market trumps the abilities of any centralized controller or regulator. […]
Lenore Skenazy also has a great article on students who aren’t allowed to touch rocks and other examples of overzealous safety nannies run amok.
Free range kids advocate Lenore Skenazy points out that telling children “don’t talk to strangers” can be dangerous advice. Sometimes kids find themselves in situations where they need help – they get lost, for instance. Skenazy’s advice: Teach your children they can talk to strangers, they just cannot go off […]
At 19:45 today, 26 July 1944, the 313th Regiment was alerted to prepare to move across the Ay River tomorrow, following the 314th. Operation Cobra is achieving deep penetrations behind German lines. Soon the 313th and the rest of the 79th Division will be advancing to maintain pressure on the […]
Here’s a great discussion on using Amateur Radio in the back country for back-up communications. The conversation has expanded into a free-wheeling examination of what people do with their licenses and the value of amateur radio for everything from emergency communications to a love of radio technology. Worth checking out… […]
I made an off-hand comment a while back to my Facebook friends that I wondered how it was the “Mata Hari of the 21st century” had been working for years to infiltrate American social circles for her Russian spymasters and somehow ended up with less than 200 Facebook friends. Anna […]
Glenn Reynolds has a Popular Mechanics piece on the prevalence of police, security guards, and other officials who falsely think taking pictures of them is a crime. An excerpt: Here’s how bad it has gotten: Not long ago, an Amtrak representative did an interview with local TV station Fox 5 […]
[iframe: src=”http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?lt1=_blank&bc1=000000&IS2=1&bg1=FFFFFF&fc1=000000&lc1=0000FF&t=uwbantennacom-20&o=1&p=8&l=as1&m=amazon&f=ifr&md=10FE9736YVPPT7A0FBG2&asins=B001M5UDGS” frameborder=”0″ width=”120px” height=”240px” scrolling=”no”] Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog (2008) Comedy-Musical-Sci-Fi 42 min. Dir: Joss Whedon Stars: Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion, Felicia Day Blurb: An aspiring young mad scientist with a Ph.D. in horribleness, Dr. Horrible (Harris), must overcome his arch-nemesis, Captain Hammer (Fillian), to win their mutual […]
A few additional updates on the ScienceBlogs debacle (sounds way better than “Pepsi-Gate”): Angry weighs in on the ScienceBlogs debacle with a web comic summary. A recently updated scorecard of who’s in and who’s out at ScienceBlogs from Skulls in the Stars. The “strike” has apparently been resolved. Luboš Motl […]
ÆtherCzar has been following the 1099 Mandate for a while now. This provision, slipped into the Health Care Bill, targets small businesses and independent contractors by requiring them to file a 1099 form with the IRS for the cumulative purchases they’ve made from any other individual or business with whom […]
Some good news from my one-time home town of Pocatello, Idaho. The Princess Theater, “birthplace” of Judy Garland in the 1954 movie, “A Star is Born,” has been renovated and restored.
Apple has been justly criticized for not responding promptly to the iPhone’s antenna problems, and for problems in the way they handled the crisis. But with so many piling on Apple for their iPhone antenna problems, I’d like to reiterate and expand on what I said Monday: The antenna design […]
ScienceBlogs is a science oriented blog network and community. Among the prominent bloggers affiliated with Science Blogs are P.Z. Myers (Pharyngula) a prominent atheist/evolution/skeptic/biology blogger and Orac (Respectful Insolence), a leading medical news and information blogger. Earlier this month, Seed Media, owners of ScienceBlogs, added a new blog to their […]
Apple’s competitors were not happy with Steve Job’s attempt to paint the iPhone’s antenna problems as similar to those faced by other smart phones. This Wireless Week piece presents feedback from Samsung, RIM, HTC, Motorola, and Nokia. An industry source I contacted declined to comment, saying his company’s testing was […]
In 2003, Barbra Streisand objected to aerial images of her Malibu mansion being included in a project to provide a photographic survey of the California coastline. Lawyers filed a $50M lawsuit on her behalf. The resulting publicity greatly enhanced public awareness of Streisand’s property far beyond what would have happened […]
With the battle for Normandy threatening to become static warfare reminiscent of the First World War, the Allies have decided on a bold plan to break the stalemate. Called Operation COBRA, the plan (shown below) envisions an intense aerial bombardment on German positions, an infantry breakthrough to secure the breach, […]
Simon, posting at Classical Values offers a preview of a book Modern Physics is Rotting. The author, Prof. Johan F. Prins, has developed some interesting theories on superconductivity that are having difficulty breaking through peer review. I’m not sufficiently competent in solid sate physics to assess his scientific claims. However, […]
Under optimal conditions during daylight hours, direction finding (DF) accuracy could be as good as one to two degrees (300m at 10km range). [[1]] At night, however, the ionosphere reflects distant signals from over the horizon. The resulting “skywave” signals have a mix of vertical and horizontal polarization components that […]