Out of curiosity, I decided to see how much the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (which funds PBS and NPR) would cost if the federal budget were equal to average American worker’s salary. Get your pencil and paper ready! The results speak for themselves:

Don’t peak yet! If you’ve finished, scroll down some more.

As a tongue in cheek, I decided to do the same for total military spending:

Ready for more algebra? Hopefully you get the same results:

Sure, the extra credit question is an oversimplified generalization. However, the fact remains that Congress can certainly find other places to trim fat before taking the the hatchet to PBS and NPR.

Coupon Mountain: Merry Giveaways

That’s right! Coupon Mountain is giving away a Free Sony 3D TV (valued at $1999), 3D starter kit, and blu-ray DVD player. All you need to do is browse through the web site and check out the latest deals they are offering. After you find it, reply to the post I have linked below and include your name, e-mail address and which coupon you think is the most enticing!

I know what you’re thinking: could it be that easy? do I have to subscribe? what’s the catch? The truth is, there is absolutely NO catch! Coupon Mountain really is just that awesome. Not only are you browsing for great deals, but you’re also able to enter the contest just by doing so! Your e-mail will be protected and not used to fill your inbox up with junk, trust me.

So really, there is nothing to lose! You must enter the contest by November 28, 2010 at 11:59 pm. That’s only six more days left at the time of this post and it only takes minutes to do.

Here is a quick preview of some of the rules:

*Participants must be at least 18 years of age
*To win, you must be a legal resident of the United States
*This offer is void in New York and Florida and wherever prohibited, and is subject to federal, state, and local laws
*One entry per person. Entries that appear to be duplicates will not be valid.
*You can enter in more than one contest, but each winner can only win once in the contest series. If, by chance, your name is selected twice, we will select an alternate winner.
*We’re going to do our best to make sure that you receive your prize by Christmas Eve, but there are no guarantees.

• Official Rules: Read first

• Read the post: Enter now!

Michio Kaku

Professor Michio Kaku, one of the leading physicists currently engaged in defining the ‘Theory of Everything,’ (which seeks to unify the strong force, the weak force, gravity and electromagnetism) has been busy igniting imaginations with his radio program and now his recently debuted television series, Sci-Fi Science.

Kaku is the author of many textbooks and over 160 journal articles covering string theory and hadronic physics among other topics. He is also author of the wildly popular science books Hyperspace, Parallel Worlds, Visions and Physics of the Impossible. Physics of the Impossible, his most recent book, discusses the possibility of time travel, invisibility cloaks and other topics once thought of as only in the realm of science fiction. Now, Dr. Kaku is at it again with his upcoming Keynote Address the annual ESC conference at the McEnry Convention Center in San Jose, California. In his recently released interview, he highlights just a few of the many topics he will be discussing:

I was very unhappy when I heard that, in 2006, Google was going to stop boycotting the Chinese market. I remember feeling upset, thinking that capitalistic ideals had won out against the hope for a definitive change in the human rights policies of China. After all, Google was a long-time hold out before entering the Chinese market. However, Google left us with a glimmer of hope when it said:  “we will carefully monitor conditions in China, including new laws and other restrictions on our services. If we determine that we are unable to achieve the objectives outlined we will not hesitate to reconsider our approach to China.”

The thought was that, by cooperating with China, Google could slowly help crack open the iron doors and lead the way to a more democratic state of affairs. It has started to work elsewhere, even when internet access has been almost entirely shut down. Think of the massive onslaught of communication via Twitter, Facebook and various other clients when Iran was pressing down hard on it’s demonstrators in the wake of its’ latest election. They organized; they fought back through the internet.

But this is different. China has allegedly hired hackers to break into computers in the United States for the sole purpose of outing human rights activists. How has Google responded? It’s probably better if I let them speak for themselves:

We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.

That’s right! They are going to attempt to remove the filtering software that has long been placed on Google.cn, even if it results in Google having to exit the Chinese market. While this is not nearly as significant an event as removal of the Berlin Wall, it is, without a doubt, a step toward the best internet equivalent thus far.

Now before you get to talking about Godaddy hosting services, I must say that the number one reason I have stayed with them through the years is quite simply because they have fantastic customer service. I’ve chatted with their reps for hours on the phone (seriously) at all times of the day. They’ve often gone as far as to give me their personal e-mail address to address any additional questions I might have after the phone call. This isn’t the ‘wait 7 hours for a response’ address, but a real, live person’s e-mail address who, in my case, checked their inbox quite often.

In any case, it was from a simple call to them at 2:00 in the morning and a post on this blog that I found out this little fact about one of Godaddy’s WordPress issues. Needless to say, every hosting provider has issues and this is far from being a large one. What is disconcerting is that it was not very easy to find out why my new permalinked posts would not show up.

While it could be potentially disastrous for someone as they search frantically throughout the internet for a possible fix so they can update their existing permalinks or change the structure of their current permalinks, rest assured that all it takes in this case is a little time and patience along with some small changes inside your Hosting Control Center.

Simply goto Settings > 404 Error Behaviour > Select ‘Use Homepage’ instead of using the default Godaddy 404 page. In my case, it was instantly fixed, because I was not caching pages. If you are, you might need to delete the cache on your browser and/or purge any enabled caching inside your WordPress admin panel. The reason for this is apparently because using this setting will allow WordPress to intercept the 404 and use it’s own, built-in 404 page. Note that if you try to enable ‘Use custom page’ it will also not work.

Hope this helps!

My name is Adam and I am a 25 year old science major. I started using computers when I was 12 years old and started programming at age 13. Since then, I have built countless numbers of machines, programmed dozens of now-defunct applications and repaired, rebuilt and maintained countless more machines for friends, family and co-workers. Over the years, I have come across a multitude of problems and solutions regarding computer hardware, software, operating systems, products, services and a wealth of other topics.

Computers have always been a hobby of mine and something I, at one time, wanted to go to college for. However, my need to help others has led me to study medicine, where I feel I can make a real, tangible difference in peoples’ lives. It is also something I have been interested in since I was very young. Aside from medicine and technology, I am also interested in science, math, economics, and saving money (aren’t we all interested in that?).

It is with this blog that I hope to post information regarding computers, technology and, in the near future, full-fledged product reviews. I hope you will find the information found here valuable and look forward to your comments and suggestions!