Posted by Bill McGonigle
Wed, 15 Oct 2008 21:47:00 GMT
A Federal Circuit Court of Appeals has found that the Canon license for Nano SED patents still exists. Canon had tried to form a partnership with Toshiba (SED, Inc.) which the court found violated the terms of the license, but then Nano claimed that this violation dissolved the license, which the Court found to be incorrect.
Canon has reportedly doubled its workforce in SED on this ruling, so these things may finally get into production. SED TV sets were expected to be on the market three years ago, but patent litigation has held it up, much to the LCD manufacturers' delight.
For those who are not AV geeks: SED TV's bring CRT-level picture quality to the flat-screen form factor at lower power and (theoretically) lower cost than LCD or plasma. However, since the benefits over LCD and plasma are quite dramatic SED is expected to be priced more highly than LCD or plasma for a while. Once all the videophiles throw huge piles of cash at the nicer sets, the next step will be to be priced marginally higher than LCD or plasma, since the average consumer will clearly see the benefit, then they can proceed to meet, then undercut the LCD and plasma market. That'll be the time to buy. Once LCD and plasma get beaten out of the market, the price will climb back up, and then LCD and plasma can come back in. So, long-term these will probably remain slightly more expensive than LCD and plasma, until the patents expire anyway (or OLED becomes competitive), then everybody will be making them and prices should fall through the floor. Mark June 14, 2024 on your calendar. It should be a good Independence Day sale!
Most municipal water fluoride is taken from the industrial smokestack scrubbers of fertilizer plants and as a byproduct of the aluminum industry. It's not purified, as radiation studies have shown. It can increase blood lead levels. Most of it is not consumed by humans, and the amount that is is barely on the teeth long enough to have oral effect. Modern studies show it doesn't even have a positive effect that can be separated from non-fluoride factors (correlation vs. causation).
Try instead a Xylitol toothpaste. Instead of perhaps having a positive benefit on remineralization of the tooth enamel after teeth have been decayed by plaque bacteria, Xylitol kills the plaque bacteria, because they can't digest it but 'think' they can, so they effectively starve. Long-term use is likely to reduce one's oral cavity infection of plaque bacteria significantly (this has been shown to be effective in treatments of chronic strep throat as well). Xylitol is a simple sugar made from either birch trees or corn, and is safe for diabetics and those with insulin resistance syndrome (or those just trying to eat healthily). It can be substituted in any recipe not using sugar for structure or fermentation. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, except in this case I'd love to eat an ounce of xylitol but a pound of fluoride would kill me.
Tom's of Maine has a good fluoride-free toothpaste line (Fennel is my favorite) and Spry has some available on Amazon. NOW has one with whitening, but we've had tooth pain in the family from prolonged use.
Posted by Bill McGonigle
Mon, 31 Mar 2008 17:29:00 GMT
I've used Zazzle for a number of years for custom printing and have been very satisfied with their products. A few years ago I ordered some stuff from Cafe Press and was very disappointed but I'd heard that they'd upgraded their quality recently, so I ordered some new Ron Paul stuff from them a few weeks ago. It's still complete junk. The bumper stickers were probably make from a Q=10 JPEG, the image is so bad and the sticker is quite thin. The 'large' coffee mug is average-sized, and the printing has fuzzy edges. The license plate frame is 'printed' with stickers, which aren't put on straight. If you have unique material to print, please use Zazzle or another high quality vendor.
Posted by Bill McGonigle
Wed, 09 Jan 2008 19:07:00 GMT
We're having a problem this year with our pantry being raided by field mice. After several attempts to exclude them, I headed off to Wal*Mart to get some mouse traps.
I'm not interested in poison, or even more cruel, the sticky kind which entrap them and let them starve or dehydrate to death, and the electrocution type are expensive. So I picked up a pack of the old-fashioned kill-em-quick snap traps and something else they had called a 'Mice Cube'. Note, it's really a 'Mouse Box', as it can neither hold more than one mouse nor is a cube. It's made of cheap plastic and has a hinged door on the front which can only open inwards and is just held in place by gravity. Simple, clever design.
First up was the old fashioned kind, with the brand 'Victor' on them. These were really poorly made, and I snapped my fingers twice trying to set the traps. I've used other brands of these in the distant past and had no such trouble. I loaded four of them up with peanut butter, placed them in a corner per directions, and came back in the morning to find three of the four snapped, no mice, and all four devoid of peanut butter.
Crummy traps, but I've learned my foes apparently like peanut butter.
Next up, the Mice Cube. I put some peanut butter on some leftover French cracker-ish-toast-ish-bread-ish things I had leftover from buying some Boursin Fig, Raisin, and Nut cheese (mmmm) at Stew Leonard's in CT last month which have the nice property of being heavy enough to drop in the cube, and easy to break.
First night: big fat field mouse. He's probably in charge of food gathering and eats while he works. He got dropped off in the woods a couple miles away where there are no houses nearby. To drop off a mouse, just turn the trap upside down, the door falls open, and the mouse scurries away.
Second night: nothing.
Third night: First female. She made quite a racket trying to get out of the trap in the middle of the night. She also made an awful mess of herself - for $1.42 these are definitely considered disposable.
Fourth night: Smaller male. Calm, not too messy, wanted to climb on the trap once he got out. Weird mouse.
The Mouse Cube is made by a company called Pied Piper in New Castle, NH. I don't see a website for them, but they seem to be located on a nice little spot of land over there on the seacoast.
Conclusion: Safe, easy, clean, humane, cheap mousetrap. A better mousetrap.
