It has been over 18 months, since I started this post. As a result, it has gone through some (though not really extensive) internal reviews and modifications. I have no doubts there will be more comebacks and reviews and edits to this topic.

On Sunday, the 10th of December, 2006, the grandmother of my wife died – almost three days after she had a cardiac infarction.

She was a kind, calm, warm-hearted old woman. She was just a little bit over 79 years old.

What did she leave behind?

She had brought up and educated her children and grandchildren to be People. None of her offspring went the way of crimes, or even disrespect towards others. The likes of her children could form a quasi-ideal ethical society, with no exaggeration – given she would be able to teach and bring up all of them.

She served the society well, working as a psychotherapist at a hospital. She helped people regain peace of mind, she cured mental diseases in the best way she could. She happened to meet her old-time patients in the street from time to time, and they expressed gratitude for her help.

She left a memory of a good, reliable, helpful person. This memory lives with all the people who were lucky to know her.

———

Death is the final evaluation for the person’s deeds during life.

What are the measures for this evaluation? What is really important? What matters after death?

First, it appeared to me that human memories are what matters. Memories of good deeds, memories of helping others, memories of being valuable for the society and mankind. “To put the mark on history” and “to be placed on record” are the expressions of the desire to have people remember someone even after death.
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Ukraine is the most dangerous country in Europe. That is, in terms of road safety and driving culture (or, to be more precise, the lack of both).

In 2007 in Ukraine, there were over 62 000 road accidents with over 9 000 killed and 77 000 injured.
This is 20% increase comparing to 2006.
And this is also almost two people dead from road accidents per 10000 of population, and 16(!) people injured per 10000 of population.
Based on these numbers, every Ukrainian is (on average) at 0.16% risk of being injured and at 0.02% risk of being killed in a road accident.

(An increase in the number of new cars sold in 2007 relative to 2006 was 46.1%: from 371000 sold in 2006, up by 171000 to 542000 new cars sold in 2007.)

On average, road kill accidents take 3-8 times more lives in Ukraine, then in other European countries.

If you visit Ukraine – watch out for reckless, drunken, stupid, blind, ignorant drivers and violating, unpredictable, dummy pedestrians.

The further from the Kyiv’s downtown you are – the more watchful you should be.

This post used the numbers from this press-release (in Ukrainian).

Warmest greetings to ladies!

A lot was said about Google becoming the Big Brother of the internet. A lot was said about the quantity of personal information, available to Google via it’s numerous services. It was even discussed (elsewhere), that the history of someone’s Google searches might be used (or even is already used) to identify candidate’s fitness for the position in question (e.g., if you were once searching for child porn, then it automatically marks your “Google search profile” as illegal; the same goes for the searches like how to make a nuclear bomb, idiot’s guide to making biological weapons, terrorism how-to for dummies, how to join Al-Qaeda, and even smuggling a gun in and out the aircraft ).

What I’m taking you to: Google sends out PIN codes to AdSense account holders, to verify that the postal address is correct. As you already understood, this binds your postal address to your Google account (with all it’s services), and if police decides to check your search history, and finds some nasty query, they will already know where to go and get you.

So, if you are one of those how-to: nuclear bomb searchers, and you accumulate money for that bomb using AdSense – then either use “on demand” postal address (which is slightly more secure – but you’ll have to hire bodyguard services, when checking mail), or move regularly

Or, ask everyone you know to search for the linked phrases from the post above . In this case, the “noise” may just well overcome the “signal”, to render “Google search profile” verification practically useless.

Also, you can just use filtering alternatives like scroogle.

I know it’s kind of old now, but check this image out:

Via webplanet.ru – reddit.com.

Found this one very informative: 6 steps to stop content theft.

Also: 5 content theft myths, and why they are false.

And more links:

• free internet fax
• anti-spam email 1 (recommended)
• anti-spam email 2
• create on-demand snapshot (archive) of the cited web-page

My expectations were half-satisfied: Socialists didn’t make it into the parliament! Great lesson for them, and a new example of political death in Ukraine. (Though I do think that Socialists have resources to return in 5 years, when new elections are due.)

On the other hand, Lytvyn’s block did jump the 3% barrier. By the way, if we take the absolute number of votes Lytvyn had in 2006 elections (619 905 votes), and the number he had at the 2007 snap elections (924 538), the difference is only 304633 votes. When multiplied by 20$, it gives 6 million USD – which isn’t too high a price for getting into the parliament, isn’t it?

Overall, I’m satisfied with these elections. Politicians this time were wise enough to avoid prolonged court trials over the miserable, non-differentiating numbers of votes in distinct voting districts. It saved both time and money. It’s also good to hear that immediately after the official results announcement, the Our Ukraine – Self Defence block and the Block of Yulia Tymoshenko agreed upon the coalition treaty. It’s not yet evident if the treaty will hold, or if it won’t be beaten by the PR – Lytvyn – Communists probable political block – but that is still a good sign of political agility, unseen since the end of 2004 between the two political forces.

I’m also glad that society intelligently handled these elections, which were unfavoured by many. Everything went overall smooth and with no troubles.

The only thing, which is not directly elections-related, is the fighting over the status and interpretation of the OUN-URA (Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists – Ukrainian Rebel Army) during the World War II. But I hope that in part with the help and actions by the President, this issue will be settled and finally resolved as soon as possible (I expect this to happen within 10 years from now).