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Jeff was one of the best tech guys I’ve ever known, and he was also the most diplomatic. More than once, after he had diagnosed and solved a computer problem for me, I would ask him what the glitch was. With a gentle smile, he would answer quietly, “It was located between the chair and…

Nineteen year old Pete Cashmore’s parents had no idea what he did with his time, except that he was sickly, kept weird hours, and spent all his waking hours onscreen. Then one day there was a knock at the door. It wasn’t the police, it was a tech reporter. “We’d like to talk to Peter…

Go into an otherwise silent room full of guitars and pluck the A string on one of them. You will soon hear all the other guitars sounding back at you! Their respective A strings will have picked up and responded to the sound wave you created. They just couldn’t help themselves. We call this effect…

Well, perhaps he was. We’re certain that Patrick was not Irish-born, but Wales, Scotland and England all claim to be his birthplace. Wales seems to have the better evidence, although even that is scanty and ancient. What we know for certain is that Patrick was of ancient Briton stock and likely from a wealthy family….

A lot of communication these days is said to be “frank”, “from the gut”, and “telling it like it is”. While I’ll be the last one to impeach anyone’s language for honesty, a good deal of what passes for honest expression is nothing of the sort, it’s just trash talk. Channeling your inner talk-show host…

I think our family is fairly typically divided into two camps regarding the use of the “F word”– some find it a useful device to add colour and precision to private conversation, while others consider it rude and in bad taste in every circumstance. There’s not much middle ground. In truth, the “F word” is…