Tuesday, 20 December 2011

Just Add Salt

It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes.
 — Douglas Adams

Sunday, 18 December 2011

Nevertheless

He may be an athlete, but he's quite bright.
 — Will Parker on Fritz Eger in Tripods

Friday, 16 December 2011

Reverse Nonlinearity

Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple.
 — Dr. Seuss

Wednesday, 14 December 2011

Tuesday, 13 December 2011

Time Heals

ZEAL, n. A certain nervous disorder afflicting the young and inexperienced. A passion that goeth before a sprawl.
 — Ambrose Bierce

Sunday, 11 December 2011

A Nation Of Customers

To found a great empire for the sole purpose of raising up a people of customers may at first sight appear a project fit only for a nation of shopkeepers. It is, however, a project altogether unfit for a nation of shopkeepers; but extremely fit for a nation whose government is influenced by shopkeepers.
 —Adam Smith 'The Wealth of Nations'

Wednesday, 7 December 2011

Sage Advice

Do not let a flattering woman coax and wheedle you and deceive you; she is after your barn.
 — Hesiod

Tuesday, 6 December 2011

No Matter What

You know Tom Paine wrote the first best-seller at a dark time in the Revolution when we were losing and all the soldiers were deserting. Giving up. And the book was called Common Sense and it was really just a long list of questions. And one of the questions was: Does it make common sense for an island to rule a continent? And everybody kind of went hmmm and they signed back up.
And today you could ask: Does it make common sense for a country to rule the world? But no matter what your answer, no matter what you think, no matter what you vote for–

We just keep calling em up, calling em, calling em up. No matter what.
We just keep calling em up, calling em, calling em up. No matter what.

 — Laurie Anderson 'Dark Time In The Revolution'

Monday, 5 December 2011

Consumerism

Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.
 — HL Mencken

Wednesday, 30 November 2011

Brave, Brave James Hardie

Brave, Brave James Hardie
When lawsuits raised their ugly head, 
they bravely changed their name and fled
Brave, Brave, Brave, Brave James Hardie

Tuesday, 29 November 2011

Mysterious Ways

God for you is where you sweep away all the mysteries of the world, all the challenges to our intelligence.
You simply turn your mind off and say God did it.
 — Carl Sagan

Monday, 28 November 2011

Clairvoyants

I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.
 — Thomas Watson, Chairman of IBM, in 1943

640K ought to be enough for anybody.
 — Bill Gates, in 1981

Sunday, 27 November 2011

Faithless

Faith: not wanting to know what is true.
 — Friedrich Nietzsche

Saturday, 26 November 2011

Shoaling

I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.
 — Mark Twain

Friday, 25 November 2011

Corporate Intelligence

There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.
 — Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corporation, 1977

Thursday, 24 November 2011

The Way Out

We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.
 — Decca Recording Company, rejecting the Beatles, in 1962

Wednesday, 23 November 2011

The Evolution Of Error

Science is the record of dead religions.
 — Oscar Wilde

Tuesday, 22 November 2011

Slight

The slightest acquaintance with history shows that powerful republics are the most warlike and unscrupulous of nations. 
 — Ambrose Bierce

Monday, 21 November 2011

Variation And Selection

Any man who afflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood.
 — HL Mencken