BadDoggie

There are some clear differences between US and EU bog roll (toilet paper). The stuff here in EUia seems to be stronger overall, but flatter and low-ply whereas the stuff in USia is generally softer, fluffier, more absorbant, and rarely less than 2-ply. Why? My friend who worked in a paper plant couldn't tell me because his plant didn't make that kind of paper.   I finally got my answer from an interesting documentary about papermaking I saw a few weeks ago. It turns out that there are some serious differences between the production methods. Why? According to the mill's representative, "Because Americans tend to bunch or wad their paper while Europeans tend to fold theirs." It explained a lot.   It's Friday. Vote. Choices are limited to the above because bidets aren't common in Germany, not even in Saarland. Vote your current method since some people start with one method but switch to the other.   woof.

Lenovo, the Chinese company which bought IBM's notebook computer division, just announced they won't be exhibiting at the next CeBIT show in March, 2007.   Other big names which won't be attending include Motorola, Nokia, and BenQ, though the latter is no surprise. Neither Dell nor HP have been showing there for a few years and Philips, Sony and E-Plus weren't there this year.   Attendance has been dropping steadily for the past five years, from 850,000 attendees in 2001 to anywhere from 200,000 to 450,000 this year, depending on whose numbers you accept.   The Systems trade fair here in Munich has been running steadily for years. This may be due to the fact that Systems is aimed squarely at industry people rather than trying to be something for everyone, something which brought CeBIT much attention in the earlier years but which is now hurting them since the displaying companies have trouble reaching their target markets. The general public isn't terribly welcome at the show going on this week at Messe Munich.   "CeBIT" stands for Centrum der Büro- und Informationstechnik (Centre for office and information technology). It was established as a sole technology and telecomms trade fair in 1986.   woof.