Here’s a quote from a recent “WSJ article”:1 that quotes from Adam Smith’s “The Theory of Moral Sentiments”:

bq.. Adam Smith in his “The Theory of Moral Sentiments” (1759) saw the subtle truth that consumption by the rich has little effect on the welfare of the poor. That’s because the income of the rich is largely invested in the tools and knowledge of production, which provide future long-term value for everyone: “The rich only select from the heap what is most precious and agreeable . . . though they mean only their own conveniency . . . [and] . . . the gratification of their own vain and insatiable desires, they divide with the poor the produce of all their improvements.”

p.. The quote from “The Theory of Moral Sentiments” is located on page 264.

Text of the full quote is:

bq.. The rich only select from the heap what is most precious and agreeable. They consume little more than the poor; and in spite of their natural selfishness and rapacity, though they mean only their own conveniency, though the sole end which they propose from the labours of all the thousands whom they employ be the gratification of their own vain and insatiable desires, they divide with the poor the produce of all their improvements.

p.. Which is… shall we say… more nuanced when read in full.

Here’s a link to “page 264″:2 found using “Google Book Search”:3.

[1(WSJ Article - The Clinton Housing Bubble)]http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119794091743935595.html?mod=todays_us_opinion
[2(Location of quote using Google Book Search)]http://books.google.com/books?id=FbYCAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=The+Theory+of+Moral+Sentiments&ei=M2J1R720NIv8sQPetLmeBw#PPA264,M1
[3(Google Book Search Home PageL)]http://books.google.com/

Paid my tariff today. Gladly.

I was reading the “Flickr Blog”:http://blog.flickr.com/flickrblog/ today and came across this “post”:http://blog.flickr.com/flickrblog/2005/04/memory_maps.html about “memory maps.” The idea is that you post a screen shot of an area you are familiar with (from a service like Google “Maps”:http://maps.google.com), and annotate the screen shot with your memories. Wild!

Here’s part of a picture from the Memory Maps Flickr group showing an example of the annotations.
!http://www.zoinger.com/img/flickr_memory_maps.png!

Just make sure you have a browser that has Flash enabled so you can view the annotations.

This is probably not news to anyone but me, but I just noticed that Google Maps now has a “satellite” view. This displays an aerial photo of the area you are looking at.

However, if you’re looking to zoom in further than Google allows, it’s worth checking Microsoft’s “TerraServer”:http://terraserver.microsoft.com/. For areas that they have recently updated (such as Palo Alto, CA), you can zoom in much further than Google. In addition, the TerraServer offers older aerial shots and topo map overlays.

Here’s a screen shot of 500 University in Palo Alto, CA from Google at maximum zoom:
!http://www.zoinger.com/img/maps_google.png!
Read the rest of this entry »

By “good” I mean would I actually click on one, and is the click-on result relevant to the content.

In my “post”:http://www.zoinger.com/archives/2005/04/06/19.35.57/ on why RSS ads are important, I wrote about how this “article”:http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3439321 discussing “MobileTracker.net’s”:http://www.MobileTracker.net use of Feedburner’s feed-serving technology. This allows Feedburner to serve ads within MobileTracker’s RSS feed.

To try some RSS ads out, I used “Bloglines”:http://www.bloglines.com to set up a RSS feed from Mobile.net. The first ad within the feed was attached to a post entitled “_Virgin Mobile launches K10 Royale_”:http://www.mobiletracker.net/archives/2005/04/06/kyocera-k10-royale . The ad was for _Ring Tones and Wallpapers from Jamster_ which points to “here”:http://jamster.com/generated/jiw/html/affiliate/index_static_en_US.html?zanpid=1776277C224235522S262522. Here’s a screenshot this post and ad.

!http://www.zoinger.com/img/feedburner_ad1.png!

Ok, I might not be their target, but I could see people clicking on that.

The second ad was for _Liquid Lense - $13.95_ which points “here”:http://www.tvproducts2000.net/examples/item144.html. It’s a little off topic from the post’s content, but you can see the “match.” Heck, they might even sell some of the stuff. Liquid Lense, that is. Liquid Lense “_Repairs Scratched & Cloudy Glasses_”… oh, and for the quality seal of approval… “_As Seen on TV_”.

!http://www.zoinger.com/img/feedburner_ad2.png!

And finally, this one.

!http://www.zoinger.com/img/feedburner_ad3.png!

Which leads to YourMobileDesk.com’s “page”:http://www.yourmobiledesk.com/products/subcategory.cfm?catID=108&mfrID=189&shmsg=1&list=all&subcatID=278&mfrall=1&OVRAW=zip%20linq&OVKEY=zip%20linq&OVMTC=content offering all times of retractable-cable products (like a mini travel mouse). Pretty good.

Man, these are all better than the old days on the GlobalHyperMegaNet with endless ads for “ImGonnaFailRealSoon.bomb”:http://www.fuckedcompany.com.