Chris Hardie's Blog

A few petitions and e-mail campaigns have been circulating that demand financial institutions waive their processing fees for the handling of donations to help relief efforts in Haiti, following the earthquake there last week.  Some of the requests that I've gotten have expressed irritation that fees are charged at all on charitable giving transactions of [...]

Jason Truitt at the Richmond Palladium-Item has requested input from the paper's readers on its current strategic planning conversations, saying "we want to do a better news operation in 2010."  As I've done in the past, I'd like to try to answer some of Jason's specific questions here, and while they're somewhat particular to our [...]

Republican Congressman Joe Wilson has already apologized for his lack of civility in last night's joint session of Congress, after shouting "you lie!" at President Barack Obama during Obama's speech about health care reform. Wilson is unsurprisingly being raked over the coals by fellow politicians, the media, and indignant bloggers and Twitter users, but [...]

When Henry Louis Gates Jr. was arrested on July 16th at his house in an apparently over-zealous and possibly racially charged police decision, everyone involved quickly fell into the usual pattern of conflict for these kinds of incidents.  Statements were released, lawyers were hired, accusations and implications were flung, and everyone prepared for to defend [...]

Richmond seems to be experiencing a rise in home invasions and robberies, including one early this morning that happened within shouting distance from where I've lived for 5 years.  It could be the case that the increase is just a matter of perception (because more are being reported and then covered by the media), but [...]

At some point, you've probably heard some version of the axiom that it's better to fail quickly and often, because then you learn a lot - about what not to do, and about what does work.  One thing I appreciate about working in the world of technology is that there are lots of opportunities to [...]

Things feel kind of in limbo right now, don't they?  What are you in between?  While you think about that, here are some links you might enjoy:

Have a young one or someone who gets overwhelmed by the language in standard Wikipedia articles?  Try Simple Wikipedia, which only uses simple English words and grammar.
Jim Hair posted [...]

The Palladium-Item reported last night and again today that Earlham College appears to have won an initial victory in getting a traffic signal placed at a critical crossing point on US-40, the 4-lane highway that runs in front of its campus here in Richmond.
The Quaker college has tried for decades to get a traffic signal [...]

Lest we not forget the times when using expensive proprietary hardware and software without exploring more open alternatives comes back around to bite us in the rear, I thought I'd highlight two issues currently being mentioned in the local press.
1) The Pal-Item reports on a meeting happening today about technology in schools:

I've got a few "real" blog posts in the works (instead of random stories about cables installers, ahem), but for now, here are some links of possible interest:

How DO you end parenthetical statements with emoticons? I'd really like to know.
Make your own handwriting font - I used to dream about this kind of tool when [...]