Right. An e-mail came around from my Faculty here at the University of Not-Bielefeld this past week that I still have no idea what to really make of. Apparently the question was raised at a recent faculty committee meeting as to what rights the teaching staff have to deal with “acute disruptions” during their classes.Continue reading “Acute advertising”
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Of paint, posts, and personholes
As I’ve mentioned before, my wife is Croatian and still lives and works in Zagreb, meaning that I spend a good portion of the year down there to be together with her. (And before all the usual civil-servant jokes start surfacing, I want to point out two things. First, as nice as Zagreb is, itContinue reading “Of paint, posts, and personholes”
BCD 12.09.2024
Important news coming out of the business world this week, with the stunning announcement that the Campbell’s Soup Company is changing its name after 155 years to simply the Campbell’s Company. It’s all still subject to stakeholder approval, but you can feel the tremors on Wall Street from here. But, let’s let the CEO ofContinue reading “BCD 12.09.2024”
BCD 06.09.2024
Right. Time to get a little more controversial than usual as well as to return this BCD subtext to its origins. I originally launched this subtext—bonehead comment of the day—to fill the then current lull in admin stupidity with quotes from people who should have known better. Although there have been a few of those,Continue reading “BCD 06.09.2024”
A first-class problem
Ah, the many, many existential problems of the airline industry post-pandemic. Over the weekend, news came in that Swiss International Air Lines (aka SWISS) is being forced to retrofit many of their aircraft as part of the process of modernizing their fleet. In this day and age, you’d hope that all this effort would beContinue reading “A first-class problem”
Un-vital signs 02.09.0224
A little something new that I want to try out here. The topic isn’t directly connected with admin but has many of the hallmarks of it insofar as it all might not be that necessary and just that little bit of thinking might have revealed the otherwise obvious problem. These new things are signs. NotContinue reading “Un-vital signs 02.09.0224”
BCD 21.08.2024
Ah, IT. Just gotta love ‘em. I recently signed up for a ride-hailing app for my smart phone. (Not really important which one because they’re all pretty much the same.) The reason it took so long is because these things are pretty much unknown in Germany. When Uber first came out with ride-hailing in GermanyContinue reading “BCD 21.08.2024”
BCD 13.08.2024
More boneheaded crap from those ever-inventive airlines … I was recently on a flight where we were reminded numerous times during boarding to sit in our assigned seats only, which had been allocated for reasons of weight and balance. Umm. How? Doing something like that properly would require that the airlines know how much eachContinue reading “BCD 13.08.2024”
The toll of obfuscation
I recently returned from a weekend trip to Bratislava in the Slovak Republic and, like many other countries in Europe (with a few notable exceptions), the Slovak Republic charges a toll to use its motorways. Whereas before one had to stick one of those little vignettes to the windshield of your car as proof ofContinue reading “The toll of obfuscation”
All in on AI
It should be obvious that, like many other amateur technoweenies, I’m fascinated by AI. Or, better said, I’m fascinated by what AI can finally do. Many of the components, tools, and algorithms current generative AI is based on have been around for a lot longer than most people realize. It’s only in the last fewContinue reading “All in on AI”
The Blog About Fog 