Llais Ifanc Reloaded

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Now He Belongs To The Ages, Part 5

Boris Yel'tsin died yesterday. For those not in the know, Yelt'sin was thr first President of a free Russia who brought in political and economic reforms to Russia (for more about Yel'tsin, go here). While Yel'tsin was not perfect, he lead Russia though a time when leadership was needed. An example is his economic reforms of 1991-92. While they were tough on Russian society, it is what Russi needed at the time. Yel'tsin made some mistakes as well, such the long war in Chechnya and his support of Yugoslavia during NATO's innervation in Kosovo. Overall, Yelt'sin was a complex man that shined despite the pressures fate handed him.

Sadly, it appears that Mr. Putin is hell-bent on destroying Yel'tsin's good work. That is sad.

In any case, he will be missed.

The best book on Yel'tsin is Boris Yeltsin: From Bolshevik to Democrat by John Morrison. I read this book a few years ago.

Thursday, April 12, 2007

100M iPods!

Recently Apple announced that they had sold 100M iPods.

I'm proud of them achieving this feat. In my mind the iPod has changed the way people view music. I can relate to this. Before I got my iPod, I had a Creative NOMAD II. To use that player, one would launch the software and upload files to use. On the player, there were no playlists - just a list of songs. In short, the Creative player was not as elegant or classy as the iPod. Besides the Creative player, I had your average portable CD player in a bulky case with an even more bulky booklet of CDs. The only real control I had was play/plause, shuffle, and back/forward.

The iPod mini I have has eliminated these problems. It's less bulky than a CD player and more classy and functional than my old Creative NOMAD II.

Size, class, functionally. These are the reasons Apple has sold 100M iPods and the reason I brought mine.

Here's to Apple selling 100M more.