In the ’90s, I thought of Amazon as an online retailer. I bought the stock at $15, sold it at $40, and congratulated myself on my financial acumen. I believed in disintermediation. Cut out the middleman, take some margin, grow fast. I also thought there was a non-trivial chance … [Read more...]

Archaeologists have unearthed an ancient patent application, which was apparently rejected by a patent administrator named F. Flintstone. Title: Rotational Ground-Interface Device for Facilitating Low-Friction Translational Movement of Objects FIELD OF THE INVENTION The … [Read more...]

A colleague at the IBM Almaden Research Center once remarked that half of computer science is caching. He said it lightly, but it was one of those lines that stays with you because it’s both funny and true. Caching is the art of pretending the world is faster than it really is. … [Read more...]

A while back, I bought the MacGeek MADE84 keyboard, lured by its Hall Effect switches and Mac compatibility claims. Unfortunately, the keyboard didn’t live up to expectations on the Mac—quirky behavior, inconsistent key mapping, and general unreliability made it a non-starter. I … [Read more...]