Sean Kelly

"Before, Widenius was a gifted programmer, a trusted figure to hundreds of thousands of MySQL users and pure of heart in his respect for the code, whether it was being handled by an independent MySQL AB or inside of Sun. Now he has a significant share of Sun's $1 billion check in his pocket, which only makes him more dangerous, from Oracle's point of view." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

If only you already had the upgrade - you could use the Tethering function to download the upgrade... - Cliff Wilding

"One reason why the Federal Reserve did not act to limit the decline of the money supply was regulation. At that time the amount of credit the Federal Reserve could issue was limited by laws which required partial gold backing of that credit. By the late 1920s the Federal Reserve had almost hit the limit of allowable credit that could be backed by the gold in its possession. This credit was in the form of Federal Reserve demand notes. Since a "promise of gold" is not as good as "gold in the hand", during the bank panics a portion of those demand notes were redeemed for Federal Reserve gold. Since the Federal Reserve had hit its limit on allowable credit, any reduction in gold in its vaults had to be accompanied by a greater reduction in credit. On April 5 1933 President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 6102 making the private ownership of gold certificates, coins and bullion illegal, reducing the pressure on Federal Reserve gold.[20]" - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"AUSTRALIA'S economy expanded in the March quarter while the rest of the developed world slumped, figures showed yesterday, unleashing a wave of confidence across financial markets." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"March quarter GDP figures to be released today will reveal whether Australia has joined much of the developed world in recession. In a stunning about-face on the eve of the figures, three of Australia's top four banks late yesterday switched their predictions for the quarter from negative to positive." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"A judge has sentenced Phil Spector to 19 years to life in prison for the 2003 murder of actress Lana Clarkson." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"The ACTU has a clear choice when it meets next week. It can seek an increase in the power of its officials by calling for a return to a world where union leaders led industry-wide strikes, sometimes for more money, regardless of individual employers' capacity to pay, sometimes in pursuit of ideological objectives and sometimes to settle turf wars with competing comrades. Or it can embrace the core Labor mission - to improve opportunities for ordinary Australians. Like Ms Gillard, Small Business Minister Craig Emerson understands this. He set out a reforming agenda for the Left in The Australian on Thursday when he wrote about the need for regulatory reform and for more of the innovation, education and productivity improvements that accompany an open economy. The challenge for union leaders is to help create more and better paying jobs for their members by urging the Rudd Government to match the great reforms of the Hawke and Keating years. But on the basis of what we heard this week,... more... - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"The survey plots minimum retention rates for varying sizes of Internet audiences and concludes that a user retention rate of 40% will limit a site’s growth to about 10%, and observes that Facebook and MySpace had new member retention rates of 80% while they were in similar boom phases. Now, they both hover around 70%." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"Because of industrialization and modernization of the trade and industry, and the rise of powerful nation-states that could directly issue patent and copyright protections — often revealing the trade secrets — the guilds' power faded. After the French Revolution they fell in most European nations through the 1800s, as the guild system was disbanded and replaced by free trade laws. By that time, many former handicraft workers had been forced to seek employment in the emerging manufacturing industries, using not closely guarded techniques but standardized methods controlled by corporations." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"-The Black Saturday fires generated enough energy to power Victoria for a year, the equivalent of 1500 Hiroshima bombs; it spotted 35km ahead of the main front, a record for Victoria; it created winds of 120 km/h, and cumulonimbus clouds from liquid evaporated from burning vegetation. It travelled at an average of 8 km/h, eight times faster than an average fire." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"NEW YORK (Reuters) - Noted venture capitalist Tim Draper is teaming up with investors to fund a private exchange for institutional investors to trade shares of start-up companies, calling it a "springboard" to an IPO." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"3. The unstructured data deluge creates the next great information leaders — Ann Winblad, Partner, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners Enterprise data growth will be huge in five years, and 80 percent of that will be unstructured, says Winblad. Some argued that this idea isn’t particularly new — but most agreed that the time is indeed right for this. The crowd mostly agreed with this trend." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"Kopelman thinks the problems in venture capital go beyond the recession. He says many old-line firms have gotten too big and unwieldy to build innovative companies the way they used to, and many angels, individuals who invest in startups, don't have enough money to back most high-tech ideas. Kopelman and a band of up-and-comers are championing a different tack. They want to reinvigorate venture capital by taking it back to its roots, when firms were smaller, more nimble, and more likely to help startups get off the ground. "I don't think a lot of people have been entrepreneurial about venture capital," says Kopelman." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"And this is how total tax revenue actually ran over the final four years of the Howard Government: 2003-04: $175 billion 2004-05: $194 billion (up $19 billion or 10.85%) 2005-06: $206.8 billion (up $12.8 billion or 6.6%) 2006-07: $221.3 billion (up $14.5 billion or 7%)" - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"Many people on Twitter ask for recommendations for a good online project management solution. There are many such web-based applications out there, and it really depends upon your needs and intended project approach - are you "agile", do you want to use "scrum" or "kanban", or are you PMI all the way. Do you want it SaaS, or self-hosted? Do you need time tracking? Should a wiki be integrated? The list goes on. My requirements to make it through the "first cut" were:" - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"Mr. Henry took issue with our assertion that Australia would have had a fiscal surplus were it not for the Labor government's spending free-for-all. But his budget explains the economics. Treasury estimates annually the "effects of policy decisions" versus "effects of parameter and other variations" on the budget. The former is controlled by policy makers; the latter is not. The government started last year with a A$23.1 billion surplus projection. "Policy decisions" accounted for A$34.7 billion in revenue losses, while A$21.3 billion of losses were due to outside forces. You do the math." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"But what is a critical mass in the Australian context? Let’s start with some facts. VC investment in Australia is 0.05% of GDP, less than half the OECD average of 0.12%. Australian VC’s have around A$2.5 billion under management, compared to about $270 billion in the US (100 times larger, yet GDP is only 17 times larger) and about A$16 billion in Israel (6.4 times larger, yet GDP is 25% of Australian GDP). Australian Innovation is strong, ranking fifth highest out of OECD countries in terms of the number of domestic patents granted per capita. Australian IT talent is ranked fourth globally behind the US, Singapore and the UK." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"GOOGLE IS notoriously secretive about its business dealings but observers are tipping that the online search monster will be the first internet company in Australia to crack $1 billion in revenue - probably this year. That would make Google bigger than the entire commercial radio sector and bigger than the total magazine and outdoor advertising markets." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"When a fatal airline crash occurs, the Aviation Disaster Family Assistance Act requires airlines to return passenger possessions to passengers' families. Because no one died aboard Flight 1549, the law didn't apply." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"Mr Stevens said there was a chance Australia could recover far more quickly than expected because many businesses here had merely put expansion plans on hold rather than axing them "to see how things turn out"." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet

"David Attenborough, the renowned British naturalist and broadcaster, said the "little creature is going to show us our connection with all the rest of the mammals". "The link they would have said until now is missing... it is no longer missing," he said." - Sean Kelly via Bookmarklet