by Christopher Paul on January 16, 2013 A good portion of the population is spreading the flu and its miserable symptoms. But there is more than one illness to watch out for. Jennifer Cain at The Kicker breaks down what the flu, cold, strep, and whooping cough are and how to identify and treat each one.
There are four big telltale signs that can help you distinguish among a cold, the flu, and whooping cough:
Fever equals flu. You might get a slight temperature from a cold, but if you’re really heating up, it’s probably the flu.
Colds are mild and long lasting. Colds usually start with a sore throat, then progress to symptoms like a runny nose and congestion, followed by a cough that won’t go away. And they don’t usually cause fevers. Sometimes it can take up to 3 weeks to get rid of a cold entirely. The flu, though, tends to come on quickly all at once and be more intense, but it doesn’t linger. If you’re running a fever and your body aches and you can’t get out of bed and don’t feel like eating anything, it’s flu time.
Pink swollen tonsils are the strep red flag. Strep throat also comes on quickly and starts with a sore throat and headache. So how do you know what’s what? Tonsils that look red or inflamed (sometimes with white yellow patches of pus on them – ugh), with an absolutely killer sore throat, separates strep – a bacteria that usually takes antibiotics to cure – from flu (against which antibiotics are useless). Show a doctor if you think it’s strep. No Instagram photos please.
Diarrhea can be a sign of norovirus or whooping cough. Whooping cough, or pertussis, a strong cough that ends with a “whoop” noise, takes effect 10-12 days after a common cold sets in. It’s caused by bacteria and can be fatal for infants. You might also experience stomach issues from what’s called the stomach flu but is a totally different thing from the seasonal flu. This year norovirus is the stomach flu variety that’s sweeping the country.
Best advice for those who are sick:
Stay home.
You’ll get the rest you need and help prevent things from spreading further.
via Kottke
by Christopher Paul on January 15, 2013 Nice little video of the New York skyline.
via Swissmiss
by Christopher Paul on January 15, 2013 If you follow the news a lot – especially if you follow the tech sector – you’ve heard that Aaron Swartz, a uniquely talented young man, took his own life at 26. Many believe an over zealous prosecutor and the threat of jail drove his depression deeper pushing him over the edge; there are calls to reform the law and the prosecutor to be punished in some way for their seemingly unfair actions. The whole tech world is still in mourning.
Swartz is credited with working closely on the RSS 1.0 spec, and was the sole beta tester for Markdown which high performing writers use to code and easily format text (like the code I’m using in Poster to write this piece). He started Demand Progress and was active in all sorts of causes promoting internet freedoms and free access to information. He started this career at 13 or 14. He was brilliant in a way that many fear will never be seen again.
Because of his death, many people have shared their memories and impressions of Aaron. Because I never met him, I couldn’t comment on him other than to agree that, after reading so many tributes, he was loved, will be missed, and his contributions to humanity won’t end with his legacy. However, John Gruber posted a quote of Aaron’s I really like. It speaks to not just who he was but who we should all strive to be: curious.
If you watch little kids, they are intensely curious, always exploring and trying to figure out how things work. The problem is that school drives all that curiosity out. Instead of letting you explore things for yourself, it tells you that you have to read these particular books and answer these particular questions. And if you try to do something else instead, you’ll get in trouble. Very few people’s curiosity can survive that. But, due to some accident, mine did. I kept being curious and just followed my curiosity.
Let’s take his advice:
Be curious and follow it.
via DF and Dave Winer
by Christopher Paul on January 15, 2013 Marco Tabini tries to explain, in part, how Apple sets its prices. The title is a little inaccurate, in my opinion. It’s not so much to ask how does Apple set its prices but how does it maintain a consistent price across retailers. Harder to put in a title, I suppose, but still important to understand. I’ll Marco’s explanation on how this is done but it isn’t a surprise to me (and other Apple fans) nor is it uncommon. But the 3rd and 2nd to last paragraphs (respectively) are what I’d want to call attention to:
The cumulative effect of Apple’s pricing policy on consumers is hard to nail down. On one hand, we’re deprived of the positive effects that price competition normally produces in a free market. The familiar phenomenon that Apple products tend to be more expensive than their competitors in the same market space doesn’t just happen: You can easily find an inexpensive laptop, but it’s much harder to come across an inexpensive Apple laptop.
On the other hand, it’s also hard to come across an inferior Apple laptop—and this is true of every other product that leaves the company’s manufacturing facilities: Generous profit margins and a tight control over its distribution channels have enabled Cupertino to produce higher-quality goods at prices that only modestly exceed those of rival products. Thus, arguably, consumers enjoy a better overall experience, dollar for dollar, in the long term.
Consistent prices helps maintain higher than average margins. Those margins allow Apple better to build quality products. That quality translates to higher value. That value keeps prices and, therefore, margins high. And the cycle repeats itself.
via The Loop
by Christopher Paul on January 15, 2013 Poster, one of my all time favorite iOS apps, was updated to 2.0 over the night. I’ve raved about Poster before and have gone to use it so much that I almost don’t use any other Markdown app for iOS. There are too many improvements to list so check out the app’s homepage and take a look at it on the App Store for a bulleted list of changes.
The app is an absolute bargain for $3.99 and when some blogging apps go for $9.99 or more without Markdown support and certainly don’t look or work as well as Poster. Even some regular Markdown editors go for more.
I’ve emailed Tom on occasion offering my appreciation for his work and offered some feedback to consider. He seems like a great guy and I’m happy to support his fantastic work.