March 4th, 2011
The Truth About Cars had an item the other day about the Lexus SC430, which just hit a milestone: It has eliminated the tape-deck option.
The SC430 was the last car available in America that even had the option of a tape deck, so this is one more instance of the cassette vanishing from the tech landscape. (Sony put out its last cassette Walkman last year.)
0 commentsKen Jennings: Funnier than he is smart?
March 4th, 2011
There was a hint of how much funny Ken Jennings has in his Slate piece about losing to Watson. (“Watson has lots in common with a top-ranked human Jeopardy! player: It’s very smart, very fast, speaks in an uneven monotone, and has never known the touch of a woman.”)
But Galley Friend R.S. sends along this hilarious Reddit Q&A with Jennings (his handle is “WatsonsBitch”–because “I tried to register on Reddit today as TurdFerguson,” but it was taken) that’s even better:
WatsonsBitch: There once was a host named Trebek…
Whoa. More:
Finally, Jennings says that he heard a rumor that the IBM team considered asking Darrell Hammond (as Sean Connery) to be the voice of Watson. The awesomest thing in the history of awesome.
0 commentsJVL Elsewhere
March 4th, 2011
Over at the Standard, I’ve got a longish riff on the new Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf sales numbers. If you had to guess, how many units these two cars sold in February, what would you pick?
Whatever you’ve got in your head, you’ll be blown (away) by the answer.
Also at the Standard I’ve got a piece on the theory of “induced demand” in traffic engineering. It’s less boring than you think!
1 commentDress-Up Time
March 4th, 2011
I hinted at this the other day, but nothing prepared me for the madness Galley Friend J.S. sent along with this video from local Chicago news.
I think these guys were on an episode of Bones once. And the Captain Jack Sparrow bit is actually pretty good.
2 commentsMore Books from Friends
March 2nd, 2011
Big week for Galley Friends publishing. Andrew Ferguson’s Crazy U just hit stores and now G.F. Joseph Bottum’s new book of poems, The Second Spring
While waiting for Second Spring, you might want to dip back to Jody’s “When the Swallows Come Back to Capistrano,” which is, for my money, one of the best essays of the last ten years. It’s breathtaking stuff.
1 commentAnd now, let’s show Tina what she’s won!
March 2nd, 2011
There you go, Daily Beast/Newsweek. Enjoy your beautiful new life!
PS: They might need to dial it up a bit if they’re going to out-compete AOL/Huffington Post for page views without using SEO sorcery. The Diller money will run out eventually and you can only afford to employ multiple TNR editors for so long.
PPS: Even if Fournier had to give up two first-rounders, a third, a pile of cash, and a player to be named later, this was still a fantastic deal. The Atlantic’s long nightmare is finally over.
2 commentsKathleen Parker: That was fast
March 1st, 2011
One of the dirty secrets of TV is that “co-hosts” are often desperate to crush their on-screen colleagues and get them fired. Even so, that fight was over awfully fast.
0 commentsBig News
March 1st, 2011
Galley Demi-God Hero Friend Andrew Ferguson has a new book out today, Crazy U: One Dad’s Crash Course in Getting His Kid Into College
