Things I Think About Things I See.
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Monday, December 31, 2001
William Safire does a very good job ofsumming up my concerns of a National ID card. It's just too easy for it to become so much of a hassle dealing with folks that I'd like to do business with but really don't see a need for them to collect all the personal information that they want to collect to enter into a business relationship with. As Mr. Safire so astutely points out:
I have enough problems dealing with Radio Shack on a cash basis and their demanding my name address and phone number. I've even had the local water utility demanding my social security number in order for me to buy water from them, this after already having a 15 year long relationship with them. (They didn't get it, by the way, and they are supplying me with water)
Hospitals would say: How about a chip providing a complete medical history in case of emergencies? Merchants would add a chip for credit rating, bank accounts and product preferences, while divorced spouses would lobby for a rundown of net assets and yearly expenditures. Politicians would like to know voting records and political affiliation. Cops, of course, would insist on a record of arrests, speeding tickets, E-Z pass auto movements and links to suspicious Web sites and associates.
It is hard enough to maintain personal information private with people having to ask you for the information, think how impossible it will be to control access when all the information resides in your "smart" National ID card. There will be legitimate reasons for others to require being shown your card without having legitimate reasons to have access to all the information that it contains. Sure, it will be possible to limit what access they do have but it won't be you or me that has control over what is limited and what isn't.
Perhaps I just worry too much. What do you think? Posted by 11:41:18 AM | Permalink for Entry 8298756.
Friday, December 28, 2001
Now you can get your pr0n fast at 30,000 feet. Sure, there are other uses for broadband connections on airline flights but we all know that it will mainly be used as an escape mechanism.
Posted by 10:00:20 PM | Permalink for Entry 8244741.Tuesday, December 25, 2001
It's Christmas day and my mother died just a few hours ago. I'm still in sort of a state of denial at this point because I can't believe that the woman that gave me life and that I had just talked to this morning is now dead. I've never seen my father in so much pain.
She got up this morning and she and dad had breakfast and exchanged a few Merry Christmases with family and friends. She then went into the living room for a short nap while dad went out to the den for his short midmorning nap. Mom never woke back up.
Their preacher came by to comfort Dad, my brother and me while we were waiting for the funeral home to come pick up her body. "She's gone to be with Jesus", he told us. I didn't bother to tell him that Mom had been with Jesus every day of her life since I could remember. She was that kind of a woman. Always available to serve anyone who needed her help. Never passing judgement on anyone. That was Momma.
She taught me about Kingdom Living through the way she lived, not by telling me what I needed to be doing. What? You say you've never heard of Kingdom Living?
Kingdom living is the Christian equivilent of the Buddhist Nirvana. It's living in a morally and ethically rightous state without standing in judgement of others or even being aware that this lifestyle or behavior is anything other than normal. There is a special happiness that comes with this state of being. Some folks may look at someone who is "Kingdom Living" and see a stoic. It's just possible that they may be correct.
Momma, I'm going to miss you.
Monday, December 24, 2001
Surgically implanting microchips under the skin for ID purposes is really nothing new. We've been doing this with livestock and pets for sometime now. I can see where it would have its benefits in implanting them in humans, as long as it is done voluntarily and with full understanding that these things can "leak" personal information. The only part that really scares me is that most people don't think before they make decisions on things like this.
Posted by 08:18:39 AM | Permalink for Entry 8162827.Sunday, December 23, 2001
I've just added a PDA version of Justin's Journal that appears to work well with Avantgo.
Posted by 12:43:47 PM | Permalink for Entry 8145473.Saturday, December 22, 2001
A dying 15 year old boy in Australia had a last request, to lose his virginity before he died. Well, would you try to arrange to have the last request honored? Remember, the lad is a minor and there's a risk of the woman being charged with sexual abuse wether the act is consensual or not. I would really be interested to see some comments on this one.
Posted by 03:55:53 PM | Permalink for Entry 8129064.Shelley gives an explanation of what set her off on WaSP. She makes a compelling argument for her case but also asks this question:
Shelley, we waited two years. Your complaint is that standards compliance, or compliance for the latest standards, shouldn't come at the cost of innovation but what about innovation on the part of web developers? Without user agents that comply to current standards the web designer is going to be too busy building workarounds to have time to work on innovative designs.
Couldn't we have waited a year or two for that? Couldn't we have used HTML tables for layout just one more year? What would be the harm in waiting? The Mozilla folks (and the Netscape people on the Mozilla project) are working on standards support, but it takes time. And open source projects, unfortunately, usually take more time than commercial ventures. That's a business fact of life. Couldn't we have been patient?
See, Shelley, we are all in this thing together. If one of us fails in delivering the technology the rest of us needs then the rest of us will also fail in our part of the equation. IE and Opera were out the door and delivering browsers that were compliant with CSS 2 and XHTML 1 browsers. Netscape was late but now they have delivered a browser that is compliant with these standards. Even the latest release of Konqurer and Galleon, especially Galleon, appear to meet these standards. But was two years too long of a wait? Yes. Posted by 07:41:29 AM | Permalink for Entry 8122088.
Friday, December 21, 2001
I just picked up a copy of blogBuddy and I'm giving it a try. I let ya'll know what I think of it in a few days.
Posted by 03:43:51 PM | Permalink for Entry 8108099.I'm going to agree with Dave's opinion on why XP isn't jumping off the shelves. The reason that I haven't upgraded to XP is not because of the cost to purchase or the hassle to upgrade or even the uncertainty of full compatability with my current software and work habits. The reason I haven't upgraded is because of uncertainty as to how this new license registration is going to work out. I don't like having to call or or otherwise contact people for support. I have this fear that if I load XP at the worst possible moment I'm going to add some piece of hardware to my computer and it won't boot because of the licensing thingy built into XP.
At some point in the future IP owners are going to have to recognize that its the money they stand to make that is what is important, not whether or not every copy of their product is properly licensed. When you give up sales to protect yourself from IP theft you are only going backwards. Pirates will not buy so why be so overly concerned with them that you lose sales?
Elves are Finnish? The Finnish Epic Behind Tolkien's Lord of the Rings:
I loved the books but I'm going to have to see that movie before year end. Posted by 06:55:25 AM | Permalink for Entry 8097614.
The Finnish language that so delighted the young student became the inspiration for the lyrical tongue of Middle-earth's elves. Tolkien taught himself the ancient and newly codified Finnish to develop his elfin language, and so that he could read the Kalevala in its original Finnish. This extraordinary achievement opened the door to many further influences from Finnish mythology. Parallels abound between the Kalevala and Tolkien's own saga, in terms of both the characters themselves and the idea of the hero's journey.
Ha, where else but MIT? One Ring To Rule The Dome. On a snowy morning during Fall finals, at the beginning of the week that the first Lord Of The Rings movie was to be released, a "gold" ring with red Elvish script appeared around the Great Dome. The elvish script translates to:
"One Ring to rule them all,Posted by 06:47:03 AM | Permalink for Entry 8097512.
One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all,
and in the darkness bind them."
If you are running Windows XP on a computer that you connect to the internet you really need to read this.
Microsoft has a fix available but it makes me wonder what will be found next. Posted by 06:34:28 AM | Permalink for Entry 8097342.
Microsoft Corp. is urging customers to quickly install a patch to repair serious flaws in the newest version of Windows, which was marketed as the most secure ever.
The problems allow hackers to steal or destroy a user's data files across the Internet or implant rogue computer software.
Thursday, December 20, 2001
I'm trying hard to find exactly what it was about WaSP that suddenly set Shelly, at Burningbird, off. Okay, the group did/does have its own bit of arrogance to them but what did they do lately and why this rant now? Also, I believe she is giving way too much credit to WaSP for Netscape's problems with the release of their 6.0 browser. Yes it was released too soon but I don't think that WaSP is the primary reason for that. The primary reason was that Netscape 4.x crashed hard on CSS and JavaScript that was being used on more and more and more sites. A fix had to be released.
Posted by 04:55:37 PM | Permalink for Entry 8082893.Well, after three months, the Ground Zero fires are finally out. The smoke and smell are finally gone so hopefully this will help New Yorkers in the job of getting on with their lives. Sitting here in Chattanooga every thing has pretty much gotten back to normal and there have been several days that I haven't thought about the 9-11 attack. The constant haze hanging over New York from the fire along with the plume of acrid smoke arising from Ground Zero has been a constant reminder of what happened to them. It has prevented them from the reprieve that I've managed to enjoy sitting several hundred miles away. Maybe they too can forget occassionally now.
Posted by 07:43:24 AM | Permalink for Entry 8070675.Wednesday, December 19, 2001
Yeah, I can see the concern. Especially after the recent anthrax attack through the USPS. I still have a problem with requiring an ID before purchasing stamps. There is something just inherently wrong with that.
Posted by 03:25:30 PM | Permalink for Entry 8052407.Tuesday, December 18, 2001
I will agree that the egos of a lot of the major tech companies' CEOs have hurt their brand but a lot of this report sounds like sourgrapes.
Huh? Because the CEOs didn't discourage the high valuation of their companies' stocks by investors they are somehow to blame for the depressed valuation of those stocks now? Right. How long would the board of directors of these companies allowed the CEOs to remain the CEOs had they tried to hold down their stock prices? Posted by 04:45:02 PM | Permalink for Entry 8027064.
"Perhaps had the industry done more to temper the rampant, often unrealistic, enthusiasm of a bull market, the current downturn in brand confidence and value would have been less severe," the survey report said.
Bummer, AdCritic.com has bitten the dust. I really enjoyed watching these ads, especially the spec ads. This is one site I'm sorely going to miss.
Posted by 04:35:12 PM | Permalink for Entry 8026793.It's times like this that make me glad I'm a loyal reader of Flutterby. It appears that we maybe should eat, drink and make merry so that tomorrow we might not die.
Posted by 02:04:24 PM | Permalink for Entry 8023062.Here's a little example of incrementalism. I may have just made that word up but its a way to explain how unacceptable laws come into being in spite of strong opposition to them in the beginning. Take a national gun registration law for an example. This is an unpassable law because of the strength of the NRA and the overall reluctance of the general population to infringe on 2nd ammendment rights. There is an overall acceptance for the national instant background check system, though, because it can help keep guns out of the hands of folks that are banned from owning them due to a criminal record or a history of mental/emotional instability, it allows a law abiding, emotionally stable individual to purchase a gun and, due to the fact that records of legal gun purchases are to be destroyed within 24 hours of approval of the purchase and kept confidential during that time, it doesn't cause any concern over it becoming a national gun register.
Now consider all the anti-terrorist campaigns going on since 9-11. Surely no one can object to holding on to that data for 90 days instead of just 24 hours to check out possible terrorists. Can they? And no one can object to allowing local and state law enforcement agencies access to that data during that time to aid in investigations of possible terrorist. Can they?
Well, Senator Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) doesn't think so either. The problem is that once the data is out of the hands of the NICS it doesn't matter whether the NICS destroys it or not. At that point it is a part of a file that isn't covered by the law requiring that information to be destroyed. At that point we are only one or two increments away from a National Register of Gun Owners.
Now, I understand that to some of you this is a good thing, while to others it is a bad thing and then there are those of you to who this is just a thing. Whether or not a National Register of Gun Owners ever becomes a reality is not the point of this rant. The point of this rant is that this is a very dishonest way of advancing an agenda.
After reading A List Apart: To Hell With Bad Browsers several months ago I decided to attempt to implement what I had learned across this entire site. In doing so I borrowed heavily from examples presented in the article and as a result I now have a mess to clean up in order to implement a design that is more my own.
The problem I have is that I used too many of the class and ID names that were in ALA's style sheet to create my style sheet. Some of these names were very descriptive of the style of the element they were describing instead of the function of the element. While there is nothing wrong with that, I've got a different design criteria now than I had then and that naming scheme is inappropriate for what I want to do.
Basically what I have planned is using three different style sheets and allow you to pick which one best suits you. I'll set a cookie in your browser to maintain your selection from visit to visit. What I would like to hear from you is your opinion on what those styles should look like.
Well, now, isn't this a kick in the tail. The music industry now wants you to pay for music based on what you listen to it on. The direction it is going, if I buy a CD I can listen to it at home on my home stereo system, take it with me to listen to it in my car but when I get to work and want to continue listening to it on my office computers CD-ROM I'm going to have to purchase a subscription.
I guess fear of ticking off the consumer cutting into retail sales isn't a concern of theirs anymore. Posted by 07:23:19 AM | Permalink for Entry 8014482.
Fear of piracy cutting into retail sales is the major record labels' justification for adding digital rights management that restricts how people can listen to the music they buy. The goal is to keep people from turning individual songs into the MP3 format.
The RIAA has put the consumer electronics industry on notice either come up with a security standard or our politicians will come up with one for you. The wording of Hollings' bill really scares me
Basically this is a license to steal for anyone holding patents on any of these technologies. A consumer electronics company will have to pay a tribute to those companies on every device sold that contains their patented technology. Do you think that is going to be good for the consumer? Posted by 06:50:29 AM | Permalink for Entry 8014044.
The SSSCA draft says that it is unlawful to create, sell or distribute "any interactive digital device that does not include and utilize certified security technologies" that are approved by the U.S. Commerce Department. An interactive digital device is defined as any hardware or software capable of "storing, retrieving, processing, performing, transmitting, receiving or copying information in digital form."
Monday, December 17, 2001
This almost seems to strange for even the government to undertake, but a ban is going into effect on certain snack foods containing trace amounts of THC. I'm not real sure what the point is but if hempseed oil is used in the processing of a food product that food product will contain trace amounts of THC and will, therefore, be illegal. This appears to be taking laws way too far. I'm not sure why this ruling would not also make poppy seed muffins illegal. Evidently the DEA feels that marijuana is a much larger problem than opiates.
Posted by 07:15:12 PM | Permalink for Entry 8001002.Dave's having problems with a bad back and being inundated with spam while Cam is on a rant over keeping email addresses unpublished to avoid this problem. I can understand Dave's reluctance to keep his email address private. He requires feedback from his readers and others in order to comply with their needs. He can't get that feedback unless folks can email him. To get in touch with Cam you have to do it through a feedback form on his website, not an entirely friendly way of doing things.
I'm suffering that dilemma with a website I'm developing right now. This is a youth athletic association that is being formed to promote youth hockey in my area. I've got a group of people that need interested people to contact them and a coach that wants people to contact him with technical questions about the game. The simplest thing to do would be to publish their email addresses but we all get enough spam as it is and I know there are spiders out there just harvesting email addresses off of websites. Going the webform route seems the most appropriate choice for this site but it also requires people to visit the site to send the email. That can be inconvenient.
The New Yorker looks at the S.A.T. and gives us some background on the man who may have killed it. The University of California system is backing away from using the S.A.T. I as a basis of college entrance and turning more toward a holistic admissions system. The focus is moving away from a student's potential and looking more at a student's proven abilities.
Had this system been in place when I first entered college, I wouldn't have been accepted. It would have been a good thing, too. I was a horrible student my first couple of years which lead me to dropping out and getting a taste of the real world. Some people shouldn't go to college right out of high school, I was one of them. I had mediocre grades in high school but very high ACT scores. My first attempt at college proved to be a miserable failure and a waste of a bunch of money.
After a couple of years of learning about life and employment opportunities without a degree I went back to school for another try, this time with a determination to excel. I graduated magna cum laude. There is a lesson for my children in there somewhere but they are enough like me that they will probably need to learn it on their own.
There is a new release of PHP available. PHP 4.1.0 sports these key improvements:
- A new input interface for improved security (read below)
- Highly improved performance in general
- Revolutionary performance and stability improvements under Windows. The multithreaded server modules under Windows (ISAPI, Apache, etc.) perform as much as 30 times faster under load! We want to thank Brett Brewer and his team in Microsoft for working with us to improve PHP for Windows.
- Versioning support for extensions. Right now it's barely being used, but the infrastructure was put in place to support separate version numbers for different extensions. The negative side effect is that loading extensions that were built against old versions of PHP will now result in a crash, instead of in a nice clear message. Make sure you only use extensions built with PHP 4.1.0.
- Turn-key output compression support
- LOTS of fixes and new functions
Posted by 06:22:28 AM | Permalink for Entry 7984143.
Sunday, December 16, 2001
Via Flutterby, the story of a little irony, Pedestrian flag fails to prevent accident / Woman in Berkeley struck in crosswalk. While it is very easy to use this incident to paint the city of Berkeley's attempt at traffic safety as a lame-brain solution, the truth is that it will actually take a years worth of data to prove whether or not this is a successful piece of legislation. I can't help but wonder, though, what the usage rate of these orange flags will be a year from now.
Posted by 08:52:07 AM | Permalink for Entry 7968318.New Networks Institue surveyed the nations ISPs and found out that the nation's ISPs are not overly fond of the local Bells. I really can't say that I'm surprised.
Posted by 01:37:10 AM | Permalink for Entry 7964077.Friday, December 14, 2001
This journal is now running off XML. XML-RSS files are available of the current journal entries for syndication. If you notice something that I broke in the conversion, please let me know.
Posted by 05:04:56 PM | Permalink for Entry 7935475.Yesterday my wife and I went to Birmingham, Alabama for a Luther Vandross concert. I'm not a huge fan of his but my wife is and when she's happy, I'm happy. We thoroughly enjoyed the concert. We booked a room at the Tutwiler Hotel in downtown Birmingham and drove back this morning.
While staying at the Tutwiler I learned that some people in the service industry still understand what the term "service" means. Every member of their staff that I had any interaction with treated me couteously, with a smile and a determination to see that my needs were served. This is a place where you enjoy tipping the staff.
Wednesday, December 12, 2001
There is a thread going on over on Flutterby about building tools for working with websites like this journal and weblogs. Part of this is to enhance collaboration between the site owner, its users and other sites but I also see it as method of encouraging the journaler, or 'blogger, to journal or 'blog more frequently.
One tool I would love to see built would enable me to jot down notes in my PDA and those notes be sent to this journal whenever I synced to my PC. Another tool, which would have to work at the server level, might link similar threads across sites.
And while I'm on this "wish list" of tools, I always thought the glossary Dan had/has working on Flutterby was very cool. I'd like to see that glossary available to work across sites. In other words, items added to the glossary would be available both on Flutterby and here or anyother site that wished to participate in that type of collaboration.
Just what we needed, a Partnership For an Idiot-free Internet. This comes via Dori and I thank her for bringing this to my attention. It will make a wonderful reference for some of my relatives.
Posted by 11:37:03 AM | Permalink for Entry 7868919.Tuesday, December 11, 2001
I don't think I could punish this fellow very severly over this.
Certainly this is a fellow that can be trusted. lol Posted by 04:47:02 PM | Permalink for Entry 7845678.
A Vermont jail inmate who broke out of the facility to go on a beer run was caught when he tried to sneak back in.
Okay, I don't like smoking. I wish everyone could kick the habit. I especially hate seeing children smoking. About the only thing I hate worse is lawmakers attempting to close every loophole they can find with over reaching regulations. Make it illegal for children to buy cigarettes and leave it at that.
Posted by 04:30:55 PM | Permalink for Entry 7845197.It appears that a lot of foreign governments are choosing Linux as their operating system.
That makes an awful lot of sense to me. Security comes into play in a lot of things. One big security issue that governments face is what if the company that is supplying a mission critical component to some aspect of governance is located in a country that suddenly becomes your enemy? Posted by 03:53:10 PM | Permalink for Entry 7844141.
"A lot of countries feel uncomfortable having the fate of their computer infrastructure in the hands of a large American software company," said Eric Raymond of the Open Source Initiative, an advocacy group.
Monday, December 10, 2001
I'll probably be quite here for the next couple of days unless something comes up that I've just got to comment on. I'm working on getting this site running on XML . Between that, the upcoming holidays and work that actually makes me money I'm not real sure how much time I'm going to have for journaling. I will return in a few days, though, so please continue to check back.
Friday, December 7, 2001
I write control equipment software for a living. That's the software that operates manufactureing processes. Controlling the equipment is always the easy part, building the interface that allows an operator to operate the process is significantly harder. Unfortunately, the user interface is always the part that's just left up to the designer, me. Now, I've gotten pretty good at it over the years but I still hate having to come up with all the ideas on my own for operating a process I may have three weeks experience in and that based completely on just reading the functional description. I'm also the one that usually ends up with the job of writing this functional description, at times for a process I've never seen before.
Now before this turns into a rant (I know, too late) let me get to what I wanted to point out. I'm making this NYTimes article required reading for all my customers. A successful project not only requires understanding the process and the equipment, understanding the user, or operator, is just as important as knowing when to ramp up temperatures or pressures and knowing the operating limits of the equipment.
I'm playing with Dave Winer's nice little blogging tool Radio Userland and I put up a test blog called Justin Thyme's Radio Journal. There are things I like about it and things that are irritating about it right now. I don't think it is going to usurp Blogger as my method of keeping this journal but it is fun to play with.
Posted by 07:31:16 AM | Permalink for Entry 7724772.Thursday, December 6, 2001
Well, the battle of the dumbasses continues. It has elevated to threats of slander charges. There is an old axiom that goes something like "don't get into a battle of words with someone who buys ink by the gallons." I would think the county commissioners would understand that this can be stretched to include people who are paid to stand in front of a microphone.
For some reason I'm getting several hits a day on people searching Google for Annika Irmler who I mentioned in this entry of Justin's Journal. I just thought that was interesting.
Posted by 01:45:11 PM | Permalink for Entry 7702543.Apparently KPMG has taken offense to people linking to their website without signing some agreement with them. A lot of folks have complained about websites doing this, WTVC, NewsChannel9 here in my hometown of Chattanooga, TN being one of them. Judge Harry Hupp says it's okay, though. No agreement needs to be signed.
Posted by 12:06:16 PM | Permalink for Entry 7699971.Just going from memory, we have lost six soldiers in our fighting with the Taliban and al-Qaeda over the 9-11 incident. Two soldiers died in an accidental helicopter crash, one CIA operative was killed by revolting Taliban prisoners and, yesterday, three were killed by an errent bomb dropped by one of our B-52s. While the total number of casualties suffered by US is suprisingly low, it really bothers me that half is attributable to friendly fire.
I guess what bothers me so much about this is that this occurred by us dropping a bomb from a B-52 flying at, at least, 20,000'. I know we have smart bombs that can accurately hit targets from that high but you are really running a huge risk dropping these things on targets that close to our own people. If friendly fire incidents are truely unacceptable then we shouldn't do what we did here. Posted by 07:38:27 AM | Permalink for Entry 7694128.
"Any friendly fire incident is unacceptable, it'll be looked into and it's not something that's taken lightly and it's not something that we accept as part of combat," Lowell said. "It does take place. We do everything possible to avoid that taking place."
Okay, I wasn't real crazy about the fact that George W. Bush became the president but, as I noted earlier I have accepted that he is the president. I guess now, Tom will have to change his tune also. From the New York Times Online (registration required) Study of Disputed Florida Ballots Finds Justices Did Not Cast the Deciding Vote. I don't like the fact that the SC stepped in on this, but I have to accept what they did because I can't do a thing about it. Aside from that, though, the evidence has mounted to show that the duly elected candidate is now the Commander in Chief but no rabid Democrat will accept any of this evidence. Perhaps now they will:
Now can't we please let this thing pass? Posted by 07:14:27 AM | Permalink for Entry 7693754.
Contrary to what many partisans of former Vice President Al Gore have charged, the United States Supreme Court did not award an election to Mr. Bush that otherwise would have been won by Mr. Gore. A close examination of the ballots found that Mr. Bush would have retained a slender margin over Mr. Gore if the Florida court's order to recount more than 43,000 ballots had not been reversed by the United States Supreme Court.
Wednesday, December 5, 2001
I guess I'll never stop being surprised at what comes out of Harold Coker's mouth. We've got a county commission chairman, Bill Hullander, here in Hamilton County that has said some things that I think are dumb. He wants to put the Ten Commandments up in the County Courthouse, even though putting them there won't change one damn thing in this community, and put the county at risk of a lawsuit that will require my tax dollars to defend. Jeff Styles called him a dumbass on the air while criticizing the county commission over this. So suddenly, Commissioner Coker, in my opinion one of the biggest dumbasses on the commission decides he needs to be in on this:
My answer? They both are but Jeff Styles isn't running the county commission and spending my county tax dollars. Commissioner Coker you are also a dumbass, in my opinion, for even thinking that Mr. Styles on air antics or his being caught with a marijuana pipe is anything that needs to be discussed at a county commission meeting. Posted by 02:38:57 PM | Permalink for Entry 7671845.
Commissioner Coker said, "This is pretty serious stuff. A very popular and noted disc jockey - I'll just call his name - Jeff Styles - called our chairman a dumb ass - on the air."
Commissioner Coker said, "In the morning paper it is alleged that Mr. Styles was stopped by police, that he had marijuana in his car, and that he ran a red light. He was cited to court.
"My question to you is 'Who's dumb?'"
New Scientist is reporting that Gound Zero's fires are still burning. Yeap, after 12 weeks there is still one fire burning at the site of the collapsed WTC. The interesting part of this story, however, is about the foaming agent they used to get the fire put out to the point it is now . . . or maybe not. I guess it just depends on your interests. ;-)
Posted by 11:51:44 AM | Permalink for Entry 7667590.Tuesday, December 4, 2001
This story bothered me. A public library in Boulder had an art exhibit to benefit a battered women's shelter. That part is all well and good. I support a battered women's shelter here at home. I think they are a needed resource in the battle against domestic violence. The part that bothers me is that this art exhibit had on specific exhibit which contained 21 ceramic penises hung on a clothesline. The exhibit was titled "Hanging Them Out to Dry". For some reason advocating the mutilation of men does not seem an appropriate response to domestic violence.
It didn't seem appropriate to Mr. Rowan, either. He stole the penises in front of several witnesses and then called the police to confess what he had done. It seems he felt the same way I do about the exhibit. It was sending the wrong message to his five year old daughter.
To me this article gives evidence that David Coursey is in need of a life, . . . and a few less cups of coffee. The internet may truely be in need of regulation. I won't argue the point on that but @Home's bankruptcy hardly is indication of that. I guess what really got me was this:
First, there never was a "new economy". He really needs to understand that if he is going to be an industry pundit. Business may be all about growth but that growth has to be stimulated by profits, not the exuberance of investors.
If the Internet really matters--if it's that essential to whatever remains of the "new economy"--then it needs to be regulated to prevent precisely what happened: A messy legal situation in which customer needs were forgotten, as giant corporations feud over their self-interests, not ours.
Second, if the life of my business relied on never being without an interrruption in my internet feed I'm not going to have only one feed. I know my needs are going to be forgotten by any vendor that is fighting for its very life. Heck, I even have a contingency plan for my home machine, I go back to using a modem with an ISP I maintain a relationship with. If that fails, I spend time with my wife and kids. One's life should not revolve around connectivity.
Third, and this is something that he admits to but it still just went right over his head, regulation did not prevent Northpoint's customers from going dark. When the money dries up there ain't no amount of regulations going to keep the lights on. That's a fact of life Mr. Coursey seems to have not learned.
Actually, the @Home's bankruptcy may be the best thing that could possibly happen to the future of broadband connectivity. AT&T is going to operate their own nationwide broadband network, as is Comcast and Cox Communications. Deregulation is going to open up the cable market to multiple vendors in an area and all of them are going to offer broadband services at some point, building their own regional networks. With all this bandwidth available along with all the competition, prices are going to have to fall. I can only view all of this as a good thing.
David Corsey needs to learn to look on the bright side but he'll never be able to do that as long as he wears his blinders. Posted by 01:01:39 PM | Permalink for Entry 7638475.
Monday, December 3, 2001
Okay, appears that not everyone is positively impressed by Dean Kamen's new baby. Robin (Roblimo) Miller of Slashdot fame sees it's primary uses as a getaway vehicle for drug dealers, pickpockets and purse snatchers, while others just don't see the point.
With me I guess I'm just intrigued by the technology. Also, I keep thinking, "There's more to it than what was shown."
I was a little late getting to work this morning because I hung around the house to watch IT being unveiled on Good Morning America. While Stychen was unimpressed by it I was. No, it really didn't live up to its hype but this thing is truely a technological marvel.
I don't think I'll be using this thing to commute back and forth from work but I can see using it to get back and forth from the community swimming pool during the summer, even in the extremely hilly community I live in. Posted by 11:12:59 AM | Permalink for Entry 7604649.
The transporter, which can go up to 12 miles an hour, looks more like a lawn mower than a scooter and has no brakes. It is designed to mimic the human body's ability to maintain its balance; riders control the speed and direction of the device simply by shifting their weight and using a manual turning mechanism on one of the handlebars.
Okay, if I get a ticket in D.C. I'm just going to plead guilty and pay it. If these guys aren't going to be given a break then there is no hope for me.
In emergency situations I'll forgive them and I think the courts should to but this implies that not all are given in emergency situations and in that, I applaud the D.C. traffic courts. Posted by 10:40:55 AM | Permalink for Entry 7603929.
Some officers have paid so many tickets that they are no longer speeding or running red lights to get to their dispatched calls even in emergency situations, Sgt. Neill said.
I had to put a long time pet to sleep Saturday. My dog had fallen off of 40 foot bluff about 10 months ago and never completely recovered. She seemed to be doing better but between age and a couple of other health problems it was time to put her down. It was something that had to be done and I'm not one to feel comfortable giving that job to a stranger. So, with shotgun in hand I took care of the job myself and it took a toil. After completing the task of burying her and cleaning up I found myself shaking. I knew I needed to write something but at the time I didn't want it in this journal. I want to take a second here to thank Rebecca for giving me that place.
Rebecca and her husband, Ron, do a wonderful job of giving some teens and young adults who don't quite fit in with the plastic "in" crowd a place to talk and express themselves. Caring guidance is offered without being preachy and the kids seem to respond well to it. This weekend it also helped this middle aged old man through a rough moment.
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