Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Celebs followers on Twitter

Here is a list of some of the celebs I'm following on Twitter and how many followers they have as of Tuesday 4/28/2009 7:30 pm PST.

3,674 - Sylvester Stallone
5,297 - Steve Wozniak
17,771 - Andy Dick
22,896 - Will Smith
24,183 - JJ Abrams
25,182 - Jessica Alba
30,201 - Steve Buscemi
53,254 - Kristen Stewart
60,079 - William Shatner
92,524 - Richard Branson
151,216 - John Cleese
152,519 - Kevin Spacey
194,048 - Nicole Richie
277,360 - Al Yankovic
307,592 - Brent Spiner
335,350 - Tina Fey
354,917 - Fred Durst
437,703 - Kevin Smith
404,114 - Trent Reznor
470,206 - Penn Jillette
502,782 - Wil Wheaton
516,828 - Dr. Drew
529,721 - Tony Hawk
551,636 - Rainn Wilson
565,506 - Kevin Rose
682,318 - Oprah
688,610 - Al Gore
733,244 - Lance Armstrong
774,296 - Demi Moore
832,050 - Shaq
847,569 - Jimmy Falon
1,014,764 - Barack Obama
1,223,110 - Britney Spears
1,492,967 - Ashton Kutcher

Thursday, April 2, 2009

Next

Ever notice how the word "next" is ambiguous?

I signed up for the gym yesterday (April 1) and the woman said "Your next payment will be March 1.  I assumed she meant that my first payment was at the end of month.  Should she have said "your next payment is today"?  I intepretted the word "next" as "first".  So does "next" mean "first" or "the one after"?

Another Example

Today is Monday and I say "I'll see you next Friday".  Do I mean this coming Friday or the one after?

Most people would say it means "this coming Friday".

Today is Thursday and I say "I'll see you next Friday".  Do I mean this coming Friday or the one after?

Most people would say it means "the Friday after this coming Friday".

Aha!  There it is!  Ambiguity based on proximity and a common mis-usage of English.

Dictionary.com defines "next" as "nearest or adjacent in place or position" so it never means the one after.

So if it is Friday and I say "I'll see next Friday", it actually means "I'll see you today" since today is the nearest in time position.

The American Sign Language sign for "next" implies "the one after".


You leap-frog one hand over the other to indicate you're skipping the up-coming thing for the one after.  That sign gives the wrong idea about the meaning of the word "next".

The sign should actually closer to the sign for "near".


Your two hands move toward and away but in a close proximity but they don't touch.  So in my mind, the right sign for "next" would be to have the front hand stationary and the back hand move toward the front hand and touch.  Unfortunately that is the sign for "arrive".


So even sign language perpetuates the ambiguity of next.