Support Details | Tech support anger management
A really neat interface to get useful system stats and browser set-up info from your users. Lots of useful applications for diagnosing support requests. (via [David Emery](https://twitter.com/DavidEmery/status/5254190568).)
Meme of the week.
Designed for humans first, and superheroes second.
Lots of citizens ask questions about microformats on Twitter. So in an attempt to be coordinated and useful, I’ve assembled a small [league of superheroes](http://microformats.org/wiki/microformateers) to stand up for truth, justice and structured data, sporadically answering your questions, fixing your code or helping you find the right reference.
So… it’s the microformats customer service desk, then.
Millions spent by lobbyists fighting Obama health reforms – guardian.co.uk
The Guardian (and sister paper The Observer) provide as good or better summary coverage of the United States than the US media does. A few key details generalised here (like the specifics of which Senate committee is involved), but still excellent. The comments seem to be rather more intelligent too.
Will California become America’s first failed state? – The Observer
Outstanding article in The Observer about the present and future of California.
Typedia: Blog: Machine Tags for Type
> We’ve defined a set of machine tags that will specify a good chunk of the information about the type in an image. Even if the minimum you feel comfortable tagging a photo with is the “face” machine tag, it will go a long way towards making Typedia more useful. Here’s the syntax for tagging a typeface, style, foundry, and designer:
[David Thompson](http://fatbusinessman.com) took my various [loved item feeds](http://blog.benward.me/post/189974327) and merged them together using Yahoo Pipes.
It’s a streaming pipe of love.
Hot.
“Meet the man who changed Glenn Beck’s life” – Salon.com
Fascinating write up around W. Cleon Skousen and his books of revisionist history, and their effect on today’s neo-conservative movements.
9.12 DC Tea Party – Interviews
At the less (but still a bit) snarky end of 9/12 coverage comes this 10 minute set of interviews. It’s a guy wandering through the crowds in DC, filming the various batshit aspects of the protesters and their sloganeering, but also engaging them. And not ‘engaging’ in a shouting-across-the-street, taking the piss way. Engaging in an actual calm, intelligent way.
He asks direct questions that should be very simple for a protester aligned with these values to answer, and when the responses are confused and wrong, he _talks to them about it_. Challenges them with facts. Quiet, contemplative, slightly bewildered reactions are common.
Maybe this he got through to some people. Reminded them to think. Maybe they carried on to the rally and came out freshly indoctrinated toward this faux uprising. I don’t like writing people off; I hope they left with their independent thought intact.
Imported from Tumblr 