15.12.08

The Global Credit Crunch

The global pool of money is no longer so interested in underwriting lines of credit. A large but unknown amount of this pool of money has evaporated due to the loan defaults. How did we get here? Ira Glass's This American Life offers an explanation.

After listening to this episode why not learn where so much of this money comes from in the first place. Watch Paul Grignon's Money As Debt"

2.6.08

Enter The Panopticon

From the article: "Remember how we've always been told that free markets and free people go hand in hand? That was a lie. It turns out that the most efficient delivery system for capitalism is actually a communist-style police state, fortressed with American "homeland security" technologies, pumped up with "war on terror" rhetoric. And the global corporations currently earning superprofits from this social experiment are unlikely to be content if the lucrative new market remains confined to cities such a Shenzhen. Like everything else assembled in China with American parts, Police State 2.0 is ready for export to a neighborhood near you."

Fascism—It's the new black.

16.1.07

The following is also a post I made on the MacOS X Hints web board.

I think Apple is missing pushing the future, blinded to the potential for disruptive change, by making an open IP communication device with the phone as appurtenant. It should be an open platform that any professional to hobbyist can develop tools and applications for.

If the decision was made to sell the device as it is without carrier lock-in and only with the standard GSM support what would the customer lose? It would seem to me that the sacrifice would be the out-of-order voice mail which supposedly needs some smarts within the center of the network.

What would the customer gain? I would argue that he would be given greater value than his loss. A choice of carriers and data plans would be at his disposal, a wealth of freely available tools assembled piecemeal as needed, and a step into the wireless IP world where its potential is to do the same to traditional wireless voice providers what the Internet did to the networks and practices of Ma Bell.

If Apple chose this route they would have to sell the device beyond the shelves of the carriers. But any GSM customer from around the world could use the device upon its immediate availability. Cingular and T-Mobile customers could equally come to Apple's counter with hard cash in hand. I think they would gain more sales in shorter time even foregoing and passing on the cost to the customer of perhaps as much as 100% subsidy that Cingular is fronting on the device.

Would you buy an iPhone for $1000 if it were all that it is now as well as having no carrier lock-in and a growing wealth of professional and community developed software? I know I would.

And for the tripe of Jobs saying that it has to be a closed and/or centrally controlled platform to protect the fragility of the wireless network?! Does this "foreign attachment" argument have any legs at all?! Maybe all those dropped calls are because of the Treo owners sshing or whatever dastardly deeds they're up to with their contraband java apps.

The iPhone appears to be a great device cut off at the knees by a tragic lack of vision and perhaps the misguidance of myopic greed. It could be a new platform. But now it's only an expensive and nicely polished toy.

The only constant is change. Let's hope change is in the iPhone's favor.

20.5.06

Here is a positively amusing rendition of a typical John Hughes style teen comedy using footage from Charlton Heston's The Ten Commandments.

4.4.06

University of Chicago economists Matthew Gentzkow and Jesse M. Shapiro, present in their study a better take on understanding media bias. The position of the study assumes that firms selling news and opinion look to enhance demad for their products by strengthening their reputations as sources of accurate information.

25.3.06

"Make your guitar SCREAM!"

19.3.06

"It seems clear that nowadays you can get away with war crimes and genocide without even attracting much comment -- so long, at least, as the hand that performs the unspeakable acts can't be connected to the West."
Glenn Reynolds comments in the Guardian about the bloody conflict in Darfur.

Also of interest: Intellectual Property Run Amok
My favorite must be, "A FRENCH DIRECTOR had to pay $1,300 after a character in his film whistled the communist anthem, “The Internationale,” without permission."

28.2.06

This is amusing: "Toppled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein has ended his hunger strike on health grounds,"
- the Scotsman.

17.8.05

Gracious! That was a long time before I made a change here. I'm now living in Prague, Czech Republic and working as a UNIX admin. Great town.

26.6.04

Christopher Hitchens in a piece published by Slate writes, "Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of "dissenting" bravery." Well, that's Mike Moore. To take Moore seriously is to expose gross ignorance and perhaps even stupidity as far as I'm concerned.

1.6.04

I've been following the issue of "Peak Oil" and pointed out an article from the BBC and a website dedicated to the issue. But a new article has come out that I think should be read which will temper the issue. Some say it appears that the Earth constantly creates its oil naturally and not via decomposition of organic goodies from above. Crackpot? Without further ado I present to you the article on sustainable oil.

Once you read the piece above go on over to the GeoTimes webisite and read their counter. They maintain the idea that commercially exploited crude oil deposits are biotic in origin.

11.5.04

<shrug>Some opinion</shrug>.

"It is inhumane, in my opinion, to force people who have a genuine medical need for coffee to wait in line behind people who apparently view it as some kind of recreational activity. I bet this kind of thing does not happen to heroin addicts. I bet that when serious heroin addicts go to purchase their heroin, they do not tolerate waiting in line while some dilettante in front of them orders a hazelnut smack-a-cino with cinnamon sprinkles." Dave Barry?

19.4.04

Here is a BBC News report by Alex Kirby on the approaching arrival of "Peak Oil" which I brought to attention back in February.
"Just as certain as death and taxes is the knowledge that we shall one day be forced to learn to live without oil. Exactly when that day will dawn nobody knows, but people in middle age today can probably expect to be here for it."

12.4.04

I've just taken yet another "where do you stand in the political spectrum" test. This one seems to be very well put together with a quality range of well-worded questions. Take the test yourself. It's interesting.

For the record I'm placed as follows:
Economic Left/Right: 1.75
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.72
Which looks like this.

11.4.04

The facts of safety are expressed in the numbers. The numbers clearly convey that compact cars are necessarily more safe than S.U.V's. Compacts are safe because they make their drivers feel unsafe. S.U.V.s on the other hand are unsafe because they make their drivers feel safe. That feeling of safety isn't the solution; it's the problem. By insulating the driver from the environment in which the vehicle is traveling the tendency is to diminish the value of technical prowess the driver should display in navigating the vehicle through a hazardous environment. Read more about it.

Ich möchte diese Wahrscheinlichkeit nehmen, etwas auf Deutsch bekanntzugeben. Sie wird nicht nichts sagen. It's einfach eine Gelegenheit etwas, auf Deutsch zu schreiben zu üben. Erwarten Sie keine großartigen "teleological" Einblicke. Es gibt keine Einblicke hier. Aller, der hier besteht, ist Unsinn. Jedoch nehmen Sie nicht an, daß dieses bedeutet, daß alles Unsinn ist.

06.4.04

Allow me to put on briefly my American Apologists baseball cap (with the hand _not_ holding the hamburger).

Poor schooling and people proudly displaying their ignorance has always existed. It's a pandemic disease and you might like to think it's brought on by big entertainment media and fast food. At least now Americans, thrust into their citizenship by a cosmic roll of the dice no longer have to carry the stigma alone of not knowing where Jakarta is on the map or of having no knowledge of events past. We can now point at the British as being in as poor shape as us. They've now got the fine distinction of being considered not only worse tourists than Americans but also as ignorant. Making fun of American school kids has become so... passe.

Now I have no idea how this survey was conducted and how representative the sample group was but what difference does that make: silly surveys and twisted statistics against us and now the same against them. I'm just sick to death of hearing the charges levied against Americans as if we are some sort of anomaly; that we're a cultural cancer upon the Earth that Euro punks should feel free to mug and gang up on.

And anyway, it ususally seems pretty clear that the questions and answers are designed with the sole goal of finding out how stupid people are. Someone is just looking for some more funding.

One thing going for them is that they're on average getting a little taller while we Americans seem to be getting a little shorter. ...gotta break that addiction to junk food, refined calories, and unreasonable portions.

31.3.04

So I'm watching C-SPAN...

Mr. Chairman, considering your earlier statement that it isn't out of the ordinary and isn't any indication of the assumption of guilt to demand sworn testimony under penalty of perjury what would the commission's position be if space aliens came down and compelled Dr. Rice to lie regarding issues of interest to this commission's September 11th inquiry? And does the fact that members of the commission are potential running mates with Senator Kerry, further endorsed by space aliens, have any impact upon the impartiality of the commission in this inquiry?

19.2.04

Faithful Occasional Reader and random IIS attacking worm, I've been off-line for a little while now, even as I write this. It's been a long and painful 3 whole days. I make this entry to announce that I'm gurple and I'm an Internet addict. I am one among many and though I'm not sure it's a damaging addiction it most certainly is a real one. The management of my daily tasks and responsibilities are facilitated by the existence of this tool. Not having it is like being forced on an unwanted, unneeded, and disrupting vacation. In the words of an honest HeyBro, "Hey bro, without it I's crying. Ya heard me?" Oh, so true wise HeyBro.

11.2.04

Over there in the Notable Links bar to the right I've added link to a warning about life once peak oil production has been made. The claims sure are dire sounding. Could it really be this bad? Will most of the world's population really starve out without cheap oil to fuel all of our activities? Let's hope that a reasonable alternative can be found.

01.2.04

I've come across another great artist on the Magnatune label that I want to point out: Shiva In Exile. Give a good listening to the opening track, Odysseia, from the album Ethnic with the volume knob cranked to 11. I'll stop talking about Magnatune now and let you be the intrepid explorer.

So, um, how 'bout that Super Bowl?

30.1.04

We can't really have an effective or interesting little website if there isn't anything interesting or compelling to be had! So, let's get this party started.

First and foremost I'd like to start this entry with a few words encourging you to get your hands on a copy of Wade Williamson's A Few Things to Hear Before We All Blow Up. It's "instrumental electronic space pop" or as Pooky likes to call it "mood techno." If you enjoy music like Boards of Canada or Global Communication then I think you'll find a lot to like in Williamson's goodies. He's signed to distribute his music with Magnatune, a label which has espoused to treat their artists properly. Notice their corporate slogan: "We are not evil." Nice.
And while I'm on the subject of music I should also mention that Air's new album, Talkie Walkie, is quite nice too. It's not up to par with their debut album, Moon Safari, but it's quite nice, The Virgin Suicides soundtrack bringing up a close third. It continues to demonstrate that the French can create popular music that extends beyond the international borders if they weren't so obsessed with their own softcore nationalism.

Also of noteworthyness is an article by C|Net's Bruce Schneier titled Slouching toward Big Brother regarding the terrible errosion of civil liberties in the U.S. It's the standard argument. What we lose is always greater than what we gain when it come to the barter or theft of our freedom.

31.12.03

The following is a an interesting documentary on the actions and role of The Carlyle Group. It discusses its role in the manipulation and capitalization of governmants policy through the development of Ike's feared "Military-Industrial Complex." The documentary is in RealVideo format so you'll need the RealPlayer to view it. Watch it!

30.12.03

The slow process of rebuilding the site (now fortified with PHP goodness) starts now!

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