JL Escobedo :: José Luis Escobedo´s Blog

GOOD Magazine: La revista GOOD hace pequeños videos sobre diferentes temas y los sube a YouTube. Esta vez le tocó a la pornografía en internet, representada en este caso por Kelle Marie. ¿1%? Algo así como 12% para ser más exactos, y un 89% proviene de los Estados Unidos.

What a day for Apple investors. The stock started off strong today on a lot of pre-market buying, despite news that Amazon will finally start competing on sales of DRM-free music.

Then, whoops, at 11:49 AM EST Engadget posted saying that the iPhone and Leopard operating system launches would be seriously delayed. They based the story on an internal Apple email that was forwarded to them. The original post:

This one doesn’t bode well for Mac fans and the iPhone-hopeful: we have it on authority that as of today, the iPhone launch is being pushed back from June to… October (!), and Leopard is again seeing a delay, this time being pushed all the way back to January. Of 2008. The latest WWDC Leopard beta will still be handed out, but it looks like Apple-quality takes time, and we’re sure Jobs would remind everyone that it’s not always about “writing a check”, but just how much time are these two products really going to take?

Apple’s stock promptly tanked on massive selling, going from $107.89 to $103.42 in six minutes (11:56 – 12:02). This wiped just over $4 billion off of Apple’s market capitalization. A lot of people lost a lot of money very quickly.

Well, it turns out that the email was a hoax. In an update, Engadget said that the email was in fact sent from Apple’s internal email system, but that it was not accurate. Apple quickly notified Engadget of the error, saying “This communication is fake and did not come from Apple. Apple is on track to ship iPhone in late June and Mac OS X Leopard in October.”

By 12:22 Apple stock had mostly recovered and it ended the day down just $1.40/share, or $1.25 billion in market cap.

Let the lawsuits and criminal investigations commence (although to be clear, I do not believe Engadget will have any liability here. Apple may, if the email did originate from its servers).

1. Curiosity

I’ve written previously on the topic of curiosity because I’m convinced that it is an essential skill to build as a blogger. Learning to ask ‘why’, ‘what if’ and ‘I wonder…’ are great questions t build into your life if you want to be a more creative person.

2. Seeing Problems as Interesting and Acceptable

One of the problems of the Western mindset is that we often see problems or obstacles in life as unacceptable parts of life. We avoid pain or suppress it when it comes and in doing so don’t often see and feel symptoms that are there to tell us something important. Creative people see problems as a natural and normal part of life – in fact they often have a fascination with problems and are drawn to them.

3. Confronting Challenge

Many of the most creative ideas through out history have come from people facing a challenge or crisis and rather than running from it asking ‘how can I overcome this’?

4. Constructive Discontent

Creative people often have an acute awareness of what’s wrong with the world around them – however they are constructive about this awareness and won’t allow themselves to get bogged down in grumbling about it – they take their discontent and let it be a motivation to doing something constructive.

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When we measure the creativity of young children, virtually all of them will record as being ‘highly creative’. However, only a small percentage of adults register as being ‘highly creative’.

What happened?

Schools have crushed creativity. We were told to color within the lines. We were taught to follow instructions. The goal in
school is to get the “right” answer. Unfortunately, if you’re afraid to be wrong, you’ll never be creative or original.

The job of education is to produce employees who follow instructions. And to this endeavor, they are doing a
very good job. However, in terms of creativity, they are falling terribly short.

This is one of the most unfortunate realities in our current education system.

To undo this, we must continuallyexercise our creative juices. That’s why I have put together 6 tips for expanding your creativity.

1. Keep a Notebook and Pencil on hand at all times.

Ideas are like in-laws, you never know when they’re coming over to visit. By keeping a notebook around, you will always
be able to capture your ideas at any time of the day.

Leonardo da Vinci was well known for keeping a journal of his ideas. His notebooks are now prized possessions that hold
the many creative and genius thoughts of this master thinker, painter, and inventor.

His notebooks were filled with plans for flying machines, a parachute, a helicopter, the extendable ladder, the bicycle,
folding furniture, and a number of automated tools for increasing productivity.

Yes, I am happy to say that Leonardo da Vinci was a productivity junkie.

A blank page is an open invitation for the creative and curious mind. The simple act of writing gets you into a
creative flow that can last for hours.

The free-flowing, exploratory practice of keeping a journal encourages freedom of thought and expanded perspectives.
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What exactly is this man doing?  Communicating with his neighbors using his new Toilet Phone?  Blowing up his Inflatable Toilet?  Or is he simple blowing bubbles?  Well the correct answer is None of the Above.  This guy is using the new breath easy, Toilet Snorkel, formulated to provide a fresh air source during fires in high rise buildings.

In most fires, it’s the smoke that will get you, and a source of fresh air can be a life saver.  So our inventor designed a way to snake a snorkel through the zigs and zags of your toilet, so you can breath sewer air instead of smoke.  Here’s our question… couldn’t he have, just as easily, invented the Faucet Snorkel instead?

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¿Alguna vez se habían imaginado algo como ésto?. El hombre de la figura no está enfermo ni se ha vuelto loco; no está haciendo burbujas con el agua del retrete ni mucho menos. De hecho, éste es un invento que ha sido registrado ante la oficina de patentes de Estados Unidos, en el año de 1982. Éste snorkel para sanitarios tiene una función más importante de lo que parece. El invento fue diseñado para que el extremo de la manguera (27) siga hasta el compartimiento (25) a través de los clásicos zig-zag del retrete.

El objetivo de ésto, es obtener aire fresco en caso de un incendio en un edificio alto, en donde el humo es altamente tóxico y puede causar la muerte. Ojalá que alguna persona con malestar estomacal no haya usado el baño antes de que intentes tomar una bocanada de aire fresco con ésto.

Via: bitperbit & Totally Absurd

Seeking Alpha shows off this Compete.com chart showing how Google Checkout usage has fallen dramatically since December:

What happened after December? Well, Google stopped giving almost every Google Checkout user twenty dollars just for shopping. Like I said before, if you have to pay users to use your service, then it doesn’t deserve to succeed, and shoppers are agreeing. I don’t understand why Google Checkout needs to exist on websites like Buy.com, that have no problem processing credit card orders normally, and Google needs to find an excuse for their system. At least PayPal has a bank account.

Via: Inside Google