Strikes by country

Just to put one of my week-end’s debates to rest, and start the increasingly complicated process of rebuilding France’s brand as a decent country, the French are by far NOT the number one strikers in the world ;)

The stats above are from the OECD and show the “five-year average in days not worked per 1000 employees (1996-2000)”. I really feel for you if you live in Denmark, Iceland or Canada ;)

Link

Typing on your toilets (not the way you think)

Some computer keyboards harbour more harmful bacteria than a toilet seat, research has suggested.Consumer group Which? said tests at its London offices found equipment carrying bugs that could cause food poisoning. Out of 33 keyboards swabbed, four were regarded as a potential health hazard and one harboured five times more germs than one of the office’s toilet seats.BBC: Keyboards ‘dirtier than a toilet’

Eating in front of your computer leads to weight gain anyway…

Another mac bites the dust

Maybe it’s my lifestyle, maybe it’s bad luck, maybe it’s bad quality. Whatever it is the result is the same: 2 months after my last crash my mac went down again, losing one week of data and a day of work in the process.

I am now again faced with the decision to go with better hardware – like a ThinkPad – and realized one thing: I am locked into macs! Not only because I like the interface better, or because I think OSx is safer than XP. I am locked because I have Time Machine backups, and like iTunes files can be played only on iPods, Time Machine backups can only be restored on macs.

Buy a PC, lose all your data. Steve Jobs was – again – a step ahead of me. But now I am warned.

I lost my mobile phone…

…somewhere in Bangkok. So the probability of ever finding it again is very very close to the approval rating of George Bush. I have no mean of replacing it from where I am right now so if you try top reach me you will get a “number deactivated” message.

Sorry about that, and keep on emailing, still by far the best way to reach me!

Paix à son âme

Le disque dur de mon iBook vient de rendre l’âme après presque deux ans de bons et loyaux services, un passage sur trois continents, un nombre incalculable de chocs subis dans des sacs plus ou moins rembourrés, quelques centaines de passages de douane et de rayons X, et un espresso d’un cafétéria anonyme l’année dernière.

J’ai heureusement un backup assez récent (je n’ai perdu que deux jours de travail) mais je n’ai pas pu sauver mon calendrier. Donc si nous avons rendez-vous dans les prochains merci de m’envoyer un reminder par email ça sera plus sûr.

Je suis en train d’installer un nouveau disque dur (en suivant les magnifiques instructions de faqintosh) et tout devrait rentrer dans l’ordre au plus vite. Désolé :-)

Rest in peace

My iBook’s hard drive just died after a little bit less than two years of service, countless shocks in more or less protected bags, and trips to three continents.

I fortunately have a pretty recent backup (October 2, lucky me) but I have lost all my calendar data. I remember some of the meetings I have but please, if we are supposed to meet in the coming days or weeks, I’d appreciate if you could send me a reminder. Sorry about that, I should be back full speed with a new hard drive shortly.

PS: take a fascinating look inside iBooks G4 here

RSS feeds…

…seem to be down again. Sorry about that I’m working on it.