Jordan’s Moment: Amazing article by David Halberstam in the New Yorker on Michael Jordan's final NBA game, in the 1998 finals:

"That was, he said later, the moment for him. The moment, he explained, was what all Phil Jackson’s Zen Buddhism stuff, as he called it, was about: how to focus and concentrate and be ready for that critical point in a game, so that when it arrived you knew exactly what you wanted to do and how to do it, as if you had already lived through it. When it happened, you were supposed to be in control, use the moment, and not panic and let the moment use you. Jackson liked the analogy of a cat waiting for a mouse, patiently biding its time, until the mouse, utterly unaware, finally came forth."

The whole thing is great, and well worth a read. (via Justin Blanton)

Unions and Airlines: Fantastic article from Philip Greenspun, who concludes:

"Union agreements and seniority-based schedule assignments lead to reduced safety for passengers, as the least experienced workers are pushed the hardest and get the least amount of rest. Despite the sometimes exhausted crews, the airline industry remains safe due to the disciplined use of checklists and the fact that two pilots are employed to do a job that, in the absence of a serious equipment failure (very rare), could be done by one person."

If you fly, definitely worth a read.

What Will Apple Buy With Its $51 Billion?: I've increasingly been thinking that Apple is going to get into the Flash memory business. Almost all of their hardware is built around it, and aside from writing large checks to lock up supply, they have little control. I can't see that standing forever.

How Apple Almost Got Microsoft’s Kinect Game Controller: Interesting story, if true.