False Positives

From the Latin “in chambers”, a legal term meaning “in secret”. Ironicaly something “In Camera” is not done with the camera’s on.

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In today’s New York Times is a great travel piece about hiking in Hong Kong’s, not something that first comes to mind we someone thinks of Hong Kong, in Green Trails Along a Chinese Frontier, which also introduces Danish Michael Hansen and his website Hansens Hikes for many beautiful images as well a info on the hiking excursions he runs.

Wired Magazine (Issue 14.04 | April 2006) has a article on “The Mandarin Offensive” (Inside Beijing’s global campaign to make Chinese the number one language in the world) (Not online yet now online), and the LA times has a story Cantonese Is Losing Its Voice from January 3rd, about the underside of the story.

Both the New York and LA Times story hint at the expressive richness of expression of Cantonese. For more look over BWG’s Hong Kong Terms

Ai yah , such a dilemma! Improve my (poor, below 3 year old level) Cantonese - the better to catch dinner table gossip; Mandarin - the better take the orders of (and Kowtow to) our new overlords; our the improve my skills at the latest object oriented Meta programming language; the better to stay gainfully employed (and stay the “Golden Chicken”)?

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Sping : a spam ping that is a fake or bogus notifications that a blog has been updated; in some cases, these spings can amount to a denial-of-service attack, as coined(does anyone have a earlier usage?) by Technorati CEO David Sifry’s in his February 2006 State of the Blogosphere address, also posted on the technorati blog

If a Spam blog or Splog causes a wave of pings, is that a sping?

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I miss-spelled Tiramisu, but in doing so became the top link in Google for Taramissu. (french spelling?) Such are the dangers of spelling by search engine!

Also known as Tuscan Trifle or Zuppa Inglese, Tiramisu’ means “pick-me-up” in Italian, the literal translation of “tirami-su” due to the strong espresso coffee.

I was recently introduced (Thanks Nadya!) to a lighter Summer Tiramisu, with berries. yum yum.

Checkout the Wikipedia and it’s external links for more.

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Boycott : A boycott is a refusal to buy, sell, or otherwise trade with an individual or business who is generally believed by the participants in the boycott to be doing something morally wrong. It may sometimes be labelled as an “embargo” by its proponents.

Ok, I knew this word, but watching Jeopardy I learned something new: the origin of the word (confirmed via Wikipedia) :

Captain Charles Cunningham Boycott (1823-1897) was born in Norfolk, England, in 1823. He came to Ireland to work as a land agent for Lord Erne, the local landowner in the Lough Mask area of County Mayo in the western part of Ireland.

In 1880, as part of its campaign for the 3Fs (fair rent, fixity of tenure and free sale) to protect tenants from exploitation, the Irish Land League under Michael Davitt withdrew the local labour required to save the harvest on Lord Erne’s estate. When Boycott tried to undermine the campaign the League launched a campaign of isolation against him in the local community. Neighbours would not talk to him. Shops would not serve him. People in church would not talk to him or sit near him. His physical safety was also threatened.

Boycott left Ireland soon after. His name however became immortalised by the creation of the verb to boycott, meaning ‘to ostracise’.

Oh the power of words, good TV, and the wikipedia.

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Splogs : short for blog spam, “automated” blogs that point to other blogs with the goal of driving up search engine results, or as they call it, “search engine optimization” (SEO). Also Blogs which do not add value, and exist for no other reason than making cash from click thur web adversiting like Adsense. They reduce the value of hyperlinks and search results, but the costs of adverisiting on the web.

Found via :Rex Hammock: The anti-splog manifesto, Doc Seals : How to Save the Web from Splogonoma , and Mark Cuban: A splog here, a splog there, pretty soon it ads up… and we all lose. update: and Phil Windley: Splogs and Paid Content

Already in wikipedia (darn, I must be slowing down). Goes hand in hand with referral spam (sperral?), tag spam (spag?), comment spam (I got nothing), and trackback spam (spack?), and spam spam

see earlier Spim, or other Found Words

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ExoCortex : From Greek “exō” for outside; and from Latin “cortex” for bark, the cortex is the outermost layer of the brain. My ExoCortex is my Brain outside my Brain. Hardware or Software. Clear? Early examples include 6,620 B.C.E. and 2,700 B.C.E., slide rulers, and HP and TI pocket calculators (see also social bookmarks (like Del.icio.us) links and Blogs).

Spotted via 0xDECAFBAD: Suffered a Stroke in my Exocortex and though out Charles Stross’s Accelerando novel :

Manfred used to be a flock of pigeons literally, his exocortex dispersed among a passel of bird brains, pecking at brightly colored facts, shitting semidigested conclusions

Update based on comments: I like Ben Houston’s definition :

exocortex (eks’o kor’teks) an organ that resides outside of the brain that aids in high level thinking.

and he should certainly get credit for it’s modern re-coining. (and credit to Charlie for it’s popularization). I also liked L.M Orchard’s (Mr 0xDECAFBAD) turn of phrase.

further: Ben has created a wikipedia entry on Exocortex, with Whuffie. back to here and L.M.Ochard usage.

del.icio.us Tags: words CharlesStross ; Technorati Tags: words CharlesStross

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apophenia: the spontaneous perception of connections and meaningfulness of unrelated phenomena. The term was coined by K. Conrad in 1958 (Brugger). Or to take the subtitle of this blog “making connections where none previously existed”. Spotted in The Intimate Planet

Category:Words

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Systempunkt: evolved from the german “schwerpunkt”, “Systempunk” is the point in a system (infrastructure or market) where a swarm of small insults will cause a cascade of collapse (phsyical or psychology) in system. One of those asymmetrical warfare things I hope never comes common(er). Via : Global Guerrillas

category:words

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Via the BBC: Doctor slang is a dying art. And you thought geek slang was insulting! Here are a few choice terms:

CTD - Circling the Drain (A patient expected to die soon)

GLM - Good looking Mum

GPO - Good for Parts Only

TEETH - Tried Everything Else, Try Homeopathy

UBI - Unexplained Beer Injury

TTFO - an expletive expression roughly translated as “Told To Go Away”

LOBNH (Lights On But Nobody Home),

CNS-QNS (Central Nervous System - Quantity Not Sufficient),

Pumpkin Positive - which refers to the implication that a penlight shone into the patient’s mouth would encounter a brain so small that the whole head would light up.

Digging for Worms - varicose vein surgery

Departure lounge - geriatric ward

Handbag positive - confused patient (usually elderly lady) lying on hospital bed clutching handbag

Woolworth’s Test - Anaesthetic term (if you can imagine patient shopping in Woolies, it’s safe to give a general anaesthetic)

Freud Squad” are psychiatrists, and “Gassers” and “Slashers” are anaesthetists and general surgeons respectively.

Category”Humour

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