Two sides to Li Ao’s visit to China

Li Ao, a Taiwanese politician who favors unification (or reunification, depending on your political slant) with mainland China, is currently touring the mainland. China’s official Xinhua news agency proudly points out how Li has thanked the Chinese Communist Party for bringing prosperity and military power to China, adding, “Only the Communist Party of China is capable of doing this.”

Meanwhile, the New York Times focuses on Li Ao’s criticism of the Communists. It reports that Li Ao “chided China’s leaders for suppressing free speech, ridiculed the university administration’s fear of academic debate and advised students how to fight for freedom against official repression.”

The Taipei Times is just happy Li Ao can be his own, kooky self, provoking both Taiwan and China.

Craving hyphenated Chinese

At a new generation of Chinese restaurants in New York, you don’t have to worry about the food being Americanized. That’s because the Chinese food is via other countries, including Korea, India, Madagascar, Cuba, and Peru. One Chinese-Peruvian dish called lomo saltado — a stir fry of beef, onions and tomatoes seasoned with soy sauce and served over french fries or fried potatoes — isn’t even considered Chinese in Peru, much like how Americans don’t consider hot dogs and hamburgers to be German food.

Microsoft’s highs and lows

Last week, Microsoft had its semi-regular Professional Developers Conference. I was impressed by the amount of new material it put out, much of it unexpected, including:

And then that weekend, both Business Week and Forbes had cover stories on how Microsoft has become bloated, slow, and unresponsive, while Google poaches its best employees — which unintentionally became a great segway to Microsoft's reorganization announcement.

Microsoft’s new ergonomic keyboard

I was glad to see Microsoft announce a new ergonomic keyboard, the Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000, for a couple of reasons. For a while, it looked like they were deemphasizing their standalone ergonomic keyboards. Microsoft introduced a lot of wireless ergonomic keyboard/mouse sets in the past few years, but I’m only interested in wired keyboards. (The last thing I need to do is use more batteries.) This announcement renews their commitment to standalone ergonomic keyboards.

Also, almost all of Microsoft’s recent keyboards, such as the Natural MultiMedia Keyboard, have a strange layout for the keys above the inverted-T cursor keys, including Home and End. I used the Natural MultiMedia Keyboard when I was pair-programming with Scott, and it drove me nuts. Then I started getting used to it, which was worse, because it screwed me up on every other keyboard, including my own Natural Keyboard Pro. I started hoarding every Natural Keyboard Pro I could get my hands on, since Microsoft discontinued it. But now it looks like I don’t have to worry anymore.

Kepler’s Books suddenly closes

After celebrating its 50th anniversary just a few months ago, Kepler’s Books suddenly closed its doors yesterday. What a shock, and what a shame — it was one of the most prominent independent bookstores in the U.S., akin to City Lights in San Francisco, Vroman’s in Pasadena, or Powell’s in Portland. Situated in Menlo Park near Stanford, Kepler’s had a long storied history. It was another victim of the economic downturn and the spread of chain and online bookstores.

Google’s changing public perception

I find it fascinating how there is suddenly a bunch of articles talking about how the perception of Google is changing from a bunch of fun-loving hackers dedicated to helping the world to a bunch of fun-loving hackers hellbent on controlling and dominating the world. First, the New York Times, then USA Today, and finally and most hilariously, the Onion.

Catastrophe

As the scale of the enormous disaster in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama becomes clear, two things come to my mind:

  • Despite the mandatory evacuation orders, 20% of the population stayed behind to ride out the storm. Let’s just take the New Orleans metropolitan area, which has more than 1.3 million people. That means about 260,000 people did not evacuate. If 1% of them died, that’s 2600 people. And that’s just New Orleans.
  • Do I have enough food, clothing, and supplies to last a week without any assistance from the government, after a major earthquake? Do I have enough gas to drive long distances, just in case? Right now, I don’t. (I should have bought gasoline on Sunday…) Time to get an earthquake preparedness kit.