b.cognosco
Where leaping to conclusions is my primary form of forward motion.
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- Historical Yearly Average Gasoline Prices
- Outlook 2003 Message-ID Insanity
- Real-time Sand Animations
- Adobe Acrobat 7
- Adobe Announces Name Change and New Product
- Largest Technology Boondoggle in Public Education History
- Yahoo! Buys del.icio.us
- Skype - Disruptive, Not Compelling
- Aluminum Christmas Tree Museum
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2005 Top Ten
Cool Origami Bookmarks From Your Laser Printer
scanR - Mobile Scan, Copy, Fax
Thursday, February 9, 2006
Got A Tattoo? You May Get to Have Natural Childbirth
All you hip, hot young things getting those spiffy tattoos on the top of your ass cheeks may be in for a surprise. Seems doctors are leery of poking a needle through tattooed skin and pushing it into your spinal column – the procedure used to numb your lower body during childbirth. I’m ambivalent about this and, honestly, find small tattoos in that area kinda sexy. But it is something to think about. Your doctor may not be as reasonable as the one quoted below. [via Waking Up Costs]
Are Lower Back Tattoos A Contraindication To Labor Epidurals?
My Google News section on 'epidurals' came up with an interesting hit: Lower-back tattoos are popular with women, but do they make having epidurals during childbirth more dangerous?. It's a very good question because, at least in my practice, lower back tattoos are extremely common in laboring women. So common, in fact, that Saturday Night Live has a commercial parody for a product called Turlington's Lower Back Tattoo Remover (quicktime | windows media).
I was taught to avoid putting an epidural needle through tattooed skin and have gone to great lengths to do so. For example, one patient had a very large tattoo of what appeared to be the face of the devil on her lower back. On closer inspection, I noticed that the devil's right nares (which was free of tattoo ink) was right over her L3-4 interspace. I wished I'd taken a picture of that epidural catheter snaking out of the devil's nose.
I can't seem to find much science on the subject save for one abstract which makes a very reasonable suggestion to avoid coring out tattooed skin by making a small incision, if necessary. This may sound like a lot of trouble, but all it takes is a 16 gauge (or similarly large) hypodermic needle inserted into the skin first, then the epidural needle through that 'incision'.
Antergy
What’s the opposite of Synergy? It’s Antergy. Oligopoly Watch coins a new term for the cyclic stupidity of the corporate world. And, as is always the case, CxOs and consultants make beaucoup bucks on both ends – buying up things that don’t work together under the pretense of synergy, later selling them off on the pretense of releasing value. One metaphor for this is the human body. The body takes in various foodstuffs, holds onto them for a while, strips out the valuable components, and excretes the remainder. Somewhere in the process energy is created and we, the owners of the body, benefit from the process with health and life. So it is with corporations, except the CxOs and consultants are the ones who absorb all the energy in the form of bonuses and fees. The customers, employees, and shareholders often get only the excrement that comes out at the end.
Time-Warner sells book unit
One day after we note the frantic rush by the media oligopolies to spin off non-core assets then it happens once again. Time-Warner, under heavy pressure from a small group of determined investors, announced it has sold off its book division, to France's Lagardere, in a $538 million deal.
This is no big surprise. Time-Warner shopped around the book division three years ago, but has not until now found a buyer at an agreeable price. Reports are that the book division had a record year in 2005. Imprints owned by Time-Warner include Warner Books; Little, Brown & Co.; Arcade; Back Bay; and Bulfinch Press
Time-Warner was a second-tier player, #5 in the US publishing industry, considerably smaller than Bertelsmann (Random House) and Pearson (Penguin). That industry shows little added growth, making opportunities for growth without acquisitions unlikely.
Lagardere is best known for publishing magazine like Elle, Car & Driver, and Paris Match through its Hachette Filipacci division and books through its French-based Hachette division. The company has some online and newspaper interests as well. It also has minority holdings in such unrelated industries as aerospace and cable TV. It will become the #3 book publisher worldwide after the deal. Lagardere bought British publisher Hodder Headline in 2004.
For Time Warner it's yet another sell-off of a division. The company has sold off the Warner Music Group, its share of Comedy Central TV station, and some sports teams. It entered into an alliance over AOL with Google, and rumors are always strong that it will sell off the whole AOL division (if it can find a buyer). In addition, it recently combined its WB network with Universal's UPN in a 50/50 split.
The Time-Warner proxy rebels led by Carl Icahn have announced they want the company split even further, into four new firms, namely Time-Warner Cable, motion pictures and TV networks, magazine publishing, and AOL. As with Viacom, the idea is to "release" a lot of pent-up value, the very opposite of synergy, namely antergy.
Terry Frazier at 12:34 PM
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Monday, January 2, 2006
2005 Top Ten
It's a new year and you're supposed to say something profound, or at least reflective and optimistic. But when you're not quite in the mood you can always fall back on the past and recap - not an altogether useless exercise. So here are the Top Ten (by page-request count) b.cognosco posts for 2005:- Historical Yearly Average Gasoline Prices
- Outlook 2003 Message-ID Insanity
- Real-time Sand Animations
- Adobe Acrobat 7
- Adobe Announces Name Change and New Product
- Largest Technology Boondoggle in Public Education History
- Yahoo! Buys del.icio.us
- Skype - Disruptive, Not Compelling
- Aluminum Christmas Tree Museum
- Network Printing Hell and windoze XP
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Cool Origami Bookmarks From Your Laser Printer
First we had PocketMod, the pocket organizer made from folding a single sheet of paper. Now Italian artist Fabio Sirna brings us colorful, non-destructive bookmarks right from your laser printer. [via Marc Orchant]DIY - Paper Bookmarks
First of all: thanks to all the people for comments, feedback and suggestion. I've update the Paper Bookmarks, and now there are two versions. Both are on A4 size paper, but I design it to fit also the Letter size. If you have trouble, please explain me, because I don't have letter size paper here. I think that if you scale the print of about 95-98% it works well also on letter size paper. [...]
scanR - Mobile Scan, Copy, Fax
More on the paperless office. scanR let's you capture documents and/or whiteboard shots with your camera phone, and then returns them to you as PDF files via e-mail or as a fax image. The company's before/after photos are impressive. You need a 1 megapixel camera to play. [via Rob May]scanR - Mobile Scan, Copy, Fax
scanR helps you capture and share documents and whiteboards. scanR uses advanced imaging technologies to convert pictures into readable PDF files and faxes. Good camera phones can take decent photos of babies, pets and sunsets, but are not designed for scanning. scanR is an innovative service that turns your camera phone into a scanner, copier and fax.
Terry Frazier at 10:58 AM
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