Akkam’s Razor

All excerpts are quoted from the respective link(s).

• Welcome to COMICS WITH PROBLEMS –
• iPhone 4.0 OS: event based modes, intellingent and scheduled communications » Unwired View – Now that with 3.0 OS iPhone has basically caught up with the traditional smartphones in functionality, it may be time to look how Apple can make the next generation devices even smarter.

  We’ve already seen some of the things, like integration between Mapping and Calendar app in recent Apple patent filings. Some new patent applications from Apple reveal even more.

All excerpts are quoted from the respective link(s).

• Schneier on Security: Security, Group Size, and the Human Brain – The smallest, three to five, is a "clique": the number of people from whom you would seek help in times of severe emotional distress. The twelve to 20 group is the "sympathy group": people with which you have special ties. After that, 30 to 50 is the typical size of hunter-gatherer overnight camps, generally drawn from the same pool of 150 people. No matter what size company you work for, there are only about 150 people you consider to be "co-workers." (In small companies, Alice and Bob handle accounting. In larger companies, it's the accounting department — and maybe you know someone there personally.) The 500-person group is the "megaband," and the 1,500-person group is the "tribe." Fifteen hundred is roughly the number of faces we can put names to, and the typical size of a hunter-gatherer society.

All excerpts are quoted from the respective link(s).

• How Jim Fulton Saved the Space Shuttle | SpaceRef – Your Space Reference – Near a shaded street that winds through Mount Lebanon Cemetery in Pittsburg lay the grave of an Allegheny County native. More than a century ago, on March 1, 1903, James Grove Fulton was born in Allegheny County. Mr. Fulton distinguished himself as a fourteen-term member of the U.S. House of Representatives, winning his first election while still in the Naval Reserve, in 1944. A lawyer by training, Mr. Fulton came to be intrigued by science, and in particular manned spaceflight. While in Congress, he also served in the U.S. delegation to the United Nations from 1960 to 1969 as an advisor on space.

  Across his nearly 30 years in the Congress, Jim Fulton was a member of the Republican minority, but still passed many laws and was a popular member of the Pennsylvania delegation. But among his many achievements is one you might not remember.

  Because, you see, James Grove Fulton saved the Space Shuttle. And therein lies a story of politics and compromise.