ndmckinney|net

Yes. Yes I can.

Okay, I can’t. But the people over at Pandora can. Pandora is an online radio station that allows you to build a base radio station. Simply give Pandora the name of a song or artist and watch as it tries to find similar music based upon the properties of the song(s). You can refine the music, helping to narrow the scope. I’m still playing with it, but so far it seems to be working for me.

I’ve posted version 0.4 of my Sudoku Solver applet. I’ve added keyboard navigation to it, so it should be much easier to update. You can access the site

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I’m not sure why, but I’m in a really good mood this morning. Perhaps it’s because I only have three days of class left in the semester (and, more importantly, I don’t have to get up at 0-Dark-30 this week.) Perhaps it’s because the weather is still nice enough that I can go running without freezing. Whatever it is, I’m just feeling great this morning. Just thought I’d share.

For fun, I’m including a link to one of my favorite research projects, PaPeRo, a personal robot under development at NEC. I’d love to get my hands on one of these, but it doesn’t look like they’re quite ready yet. I’d even go so far as to try and learn more Japanese to have one.

I saw this story on CBS’s “60 Minutes” last night. I heard a similar story on NPR this summer, so I’ve included the link. Apparently, houses aren’t big enough for the nuclear family anymore. Everyone needs their own 1,000+ square feet of space. For comparison, my wife, my cat, and I share ~500 sq. ft.

In essence, the people in suburban Washington, as well as elsewhere in the country, have too much money on their hands. According to CBS it is, thankfully, not the average person. Incomes in the top income brackets have risen far faster than all the other brackets. With the money burning a hole in their pocket, the people have decided to build bigger and better than their neighbors. As the CBS piece shows, people are actually buying old, perfectly good houses only to tear them down and build these leviathans.

Can anyone say “conspicuous consumption?” Read the rest of this entry »

From an article in the New York Times, former college cheerleaders are becoming drug sales reps. If you ask me, this is rather a disgusting turn for a trade that is looking for new ways to avoid regulation.

I’m not saying that a cheerleader cannot be a good drug sales rep. Nor do I claim to know what makes a good drug rep. However, I would assume that knowledge of the product is important. The problem with the hiring practice is that they don’t look at what the cheerleader was doing in college. If you were a cheerleader, you’re in. The federal government does not allow discrimination on the basis of gender, but an employer is free to make hiring decisions based upon appearance.

This is a more subtle way to sell drugs. Rather than the excessive spending on golf trips and five-star dinners, pharmaceuticals can spend their money where they would spend their money anyway — their employees. Besides, the government cannot regulate who a pharmaceutical company sends, just what the company is spending on the doctors.

As always, it will take a clever lawyer to file a lawsuit over this. I doubt the Congress will make changes anytime soon — sex sells in Washington more than anywhere else.