Spotty Internet Access the Scourge of Trips

The on-again, off-again status of wireless Internet this week, coming on the heels of Thanksgiving's near Web outage at San Simeon, has marred what would otherwise be a great holiday experience. For the second consecutive trip, my wife and I were misled by hotel owners that we would be provided consistent high-speed wireless Internet access, only to find the reality to be much different - a constant struggle to gain speeds similar to that of dialup modems from yesteryear, if anything at all.

As I've said many times here, high-speed Internet access in today's world is as essential as any other metric. If you expect lodging to have TV or phone access, Internet is just as necessary - whether you are visiting for work or for pleasure. And when I'm asked to pay anything from $6.95 to $14.95 a day for the potential of access, only to see a complete lack of success, it doubles down on my frustration.

Some might say the goal of a trip is to "get away", and by my being unconnected, this helps. But it doesn't. The Internet is more than a way to get real-time sports scores and trade e-mail. It's also the most convenient way to get weather updates, to order event tickets, and check flight status. Everything is made easier with Web access. I'm frankly tired of the bait and switch. Either get me a place that has reliable access, or I'll put myself in charge of the reservations and make that a requirement. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. I won't get fooled again.

Listening to ''Walking In My Shoes (Random Carpet Mix)'', by Depeche Mode (Play Count: 9)

A 3.7 Earthquake? Call Me When You Hit 5.0.

One of the side benefits of living in the San Francisco Bay Area is the occasional rumble - a typically gentle bumping and shaking that reminds you the ground below isn't exactly made of reinforced steel and concrete. Though the region has escaped drama for nearly 20 years, ever since the 1989 Loma Prieta quake, we still have shakes every now and again from the 3 to 5 range that have us jumping on USGS online to see just how high we tickled the Richter scale.

Tonight, we felt one. Here in Sunnyvale, on the 4th floor of our condo, we noticed the shaking, and figured it wasn't anyone on the roof or running in the hallway. Instead, it was the Hayward fault, in the East Bay, doing what it does best - slipping. Not much, mind you, but enough to make us aware of it. The quake, if you can call it that, registered at 3.7, and didn't cause any damage.

Though we don't get warning of quakes, I'd trade that uncertainty for the yearly battles with tornadoes and hurricanes other regions face. And, honestly, we actually like them. They're fun. They're different. But we're not impressed by anything in the 3's. Let's get this place and shake it up a bit.

(Previous: Earthquake Shakes Things Up)

Site Traffic Jumps: The Digg Effect

Last night, I wrote my first story for The Apple Blog, focused on Kavasoft's iTunes Catalog. The story has been promoted on Digg, and reached the front page around midnight. Since then, a significant amount of traffic has come through to peruse my iTunes Music Library, created by iTunes Catalog.

You can see this below or via SiteMeter.

The Ultimate Invention: The Time-Stopper

Seeing the movie "Click" yesterday reminded me of the childhood fantasy of the "time stopper", a theoretical device that could, as its name implies, stop time, for any reason, yet retain the flexibility needed to act on situations as the holder of said time stopper preferred. In my mind, the time stopper could be used for putting the world on snooze while catching extra sleep, while finishing uncompleted homework, or for snaking the cookies on the counter, and nobody finding out it was you who had done it. In fact, the time stopper I had mentally developed as a youth would have been much better utilized than Adam Sandler's foray into fourth dimension manipulation in the film.

In "Click", Sandler, frustrated by a litany of remotes dedicated to a single task, goes "Beyond" in a nearby Bed Bath and Beyond, looking for a universal remote, and finds a doozy, thanks to the inventiveness of Christopher Walken. The remote enables him to fast-forward through boring dinners, spousal fights, and to pause time, as in the often-shown preview where he manipulated the annoying neighbor's son into getting hit in the face by a thrown baseball, from his own son. But while many of the movie's central frustrations were around completing work-related tasks at the expense of family obligations, Sandler acted like a complete novice with this amazing tool.

In two instances in the film, Sandler shows he is able to manipulate others or surroundings while the remote has paused the rest of the world. The first, with his son tossing a ball at the neighbor kid, and the second, when he pauses time to slap his ungrateful boss silly. When unpaused, the boss has a massive headache, resulting from Sandler's assault. Yet, he doesn't use those tools when it comes time to work on his architecture plans, instead, sleepwalking through his family life, and hoping his "autopilot" self did a good job. While his drone does, why not simply pause time, take the attention and effort needed on the documents, and then unpause, with work done, to enjoy the family? When tired, why not pause time and take a nap? When he gains weight, why not pause time, go exercise and drop the extra poundage? He certainly didn't use his universal remote to the best of its ability.

As children, we were much more inventive, and likely better prepared for the advent of the time stopper than was Sandler. While we didn't ask for the fast forward and rewind buttons common on most remotes, all we really needed was the ability to stop time - though I admit a great deal of the activities we had imagined during paused time were either immoral or illegal.

With a time stopper, you could shoplift at will and never be caught on camera, you could sleep as long as you needed, or procrastinate as long as possible before writing papers and doing assignments in "no time". You could manipulate (or assault) others without concern of retribution. The concept that you would be rushed would go away. Demands of work vs. home would be greatly diminished, and if you were aching for a promotion at the office, you could accomplish more than anybody else, in less time. You would be the dream employee.

So where Adam Sandler struggled as a father and eventually lost his wife thanks to his universal remote, he deserved to - not so much because he was a bad guy, but because he didn't properly use this amazing gift available.

Are the Beagle and the Roomba Conspiring?

When talking heads traditionally yammer about artificial intelligence, the common themes center around finding ways for robots to feel emotion, or to out-maneuver the latest chess grandmaster, not to complete relatively simple tasks, like vacuuming. But ever since getting our Roomba last Sunday, we're seeing the little guy act independently, not just doing those direct missions that we had instructed, but acting out on its own.

Today, after leaving the house for a few hours, we returned home to see the gate to the kitchen (to keep our beagle out, of course) knocked over, the throw rugs wrinkled, and familiar spiral-like tracks in the carpet, showing that the Roomba had gone out on its own, answering the call of duty to clean. But the Roomba was nonchalantly sitting in its cradle, charging, and wouldn't talk. I checked the auto-scheduler to see if the Roomba had been given a mission, but there was nothing on its docket that said to give it a run today.

So what could possibly have happened? Did we imagine that those spiral markings were not there before we had left? Did the Roomba look around, realizing nobody was home, and went out for a spin?

Best as we can guess, the dog was likely searching for food, or trying to step on the Roomba as a stool to gain access to the table or kitchen counter, always trying to get an extra inch for the occasional morsel. In her quest for crumbs, she likely stepped on the Roomba's power button and set it on Clean, launching it ahead to defeat dirt. I wish I had been there to see the beagle jump with alarm as the Roomba whirred up and set off to get her, and again, to see the dog's reaction when the Roomba later slammed into the gate and knocked it askew.

While we may never know what actually took place this afternoon, we know this: you can't trust the beagle and the Roomba home alone. Those two, while they won't talk, are up to little good.

Listening to ''Totally Fascinated'', by M.I.K.E. presents Fascinated (Play Count: 1)

Free Oreo Cookies or an Ethical Dilemma?

This evening, my wife came home from Safeway after a quick stop, and upon unpacking the groceries, she was surprised to find a carton of chocolate-covered mint Oreo cookies. But she didn't remember paying for them, and our guess is that they probably were purchased by the shopper who had been ahead of her in line, but somehow put in her bag by one of the store clerks. Looking at the receipt confirms she wasn't charged.

So - the question is, should we return the box to the store? Do the cookies belong to us? Did she inadvertently shoplift without knowing? Should I feel guilty that I already ate one?

Yummy!

Listening to ''The Darkest Star'', by Depeche Mode (Play Count: 13)

Today's World Relies on Transparency

Robert Scoble, famed ex-Microsoftee and pro blogger, has long mandated that one of the best things you can do to deliver a human element on your blog is to make yourself easily contactable - whether through e-mail, or even better, by posting your cell phone number, so readers can contact you any time.

Today, that literally "rang" true for me, as the father of one of the A's players called me, asking for printed copies of The ANtics comics. We talked quite a bit this morning, and again this evening, about their content, and he will soon be receiving a booklet of the last two years' comics, to share with his son.

Our calls today were a big highlight for me. I'm not easily star-struck, but I greatly enjoyed talking with this easy-going, sharp man who loves his son and loves baseball. Had I avoided the transparency, and not posted my cell phone on the blog, we never would have talked.

Rather than hide from personal directories and expect anonymity, I strongly believe we should identify with who we are and what we say on the Web. Use real e-mails that identify with your name. Use URLs that include your name. And post your cell phone number. It makes you real.

(Previously: "Privacy on the Web Is Gone")

So... About that No Pornography Clause...

As blogs go, this one is hardly controversial. Our adulation for sports and general geekery doesn't ruffle too many feathers, and the most eyebrow-raising we'll get might be in response to a rant against our current political situations. But don't let that fool you - there are people on the Web who have found louisgray.com when looking for a lot more than the latest insight into Apple or Google or how the Oakland A's are planning their off-season.

For instance, around noon today, I was startled to find a visitor from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia had stumbled upon the site in a quest for "live sex webcam sites saudi arabia". (See here for that site visit) I don't generally associate the religiously strict country to be one that panders to live, streaming, fornication, but it appears there is a market after all.

So why louisgray.com for live sex webcam sites from Saudi Arabia? My thoughts exactly. Well, if you do a search on Alta Vista (and when was the last time anybody used that instead of Google?), louisgray.com is the 7th highest response. (See here)

It turns out that Alta Vista still relies too heavily on words in the page, rather than their logical strings. On that page, from May 2006, I managed to mention the word "sex" twice - once in a song title from iTunes, and once in a joke, the term "Saudi Arabia" once in a note on Jeb Bush, the term "Webcam" in relation to an Apple store opening where a geek proposed to his fiancee, and the words "live" and "site" appear several times.

Did the words "live sex" or "sex webcam" show up paired anywhere? No. That would have given you a better search result... and those search engines that use better rules don't inaccurately say that my site is the place to get your porn fix. In fact, searching for the same string, "live sex webcam sites saudi arabia", doesn't put louisgray.com in the top ten pages (100 results) in Google at all. There just might be something to this need for accuracy in search results.

Listening to ''Assorted Progression Volume 4'', by Nyman (Play Count: 2)

Morning Notes: October 24, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

This morning, Apple quietly upgraded their new MacBook Pro laptops, claiming the machines are up to forty percent faster than the previous version. While in previous years, the mere mention of a potential product release would have had the Macosphere abuzz, this is taken in stride. My PowerBook G4 is doing great at home, and I haven't pushed for an upgrade at the office yet...

As expected, the greater amount of buzz around Apple is instead around their digital devices. Wired has a great, in depth look at the iPod's birth and how it was initially perceived, including a first-person look at how Bill Gates took in the device the day after its debut. Forbes also chimes in on "Why Apple Won". Meanwhile, MacNN is looking forward to how the much-anticipated iPhone and iTV are going to further accelerate Mac growth.

But Apple's resurgence isn't the only concern Microsoft has to face right now. As applications become more Web browser-centric, led by Web 2.0 pioneers and Google, the Redmond monolith is losing its grip on the consumer. On Malik, contributing to Business 2.0, despite going independent, says that while you've heard this story before, it's really happening.

Speaking of online apps, the one making the most buzz this morning, is of course, Google. Google released a new custom search engine through Google Coop, where webmasters can host Google search engine code on their own sites, and drive search results internally, without buying expensive custom hosted software. We're definitely going to give it a look here and at the office, to see if it can save us a few grand a year.

An Everyday Loyal Customer or Borderline Autistic?

Near our offices, you have a handful of available lunch spots in walking distance, and wider variety the further you drive. One of those reliable stops is Carl's Jr. Nothing fancy, but the fast food joint offers enough variety to make it interesting, and it's worth stopping ever couple weeks or so. Given that the Cal Bears football team has a "buy one, get one free" offer on every game ticket, we're finding our trips to Carl's Jr. are coming with a fair regularity - following Saturday football.

But while we have been to the restaurant a fair number of times in the five-plus years at the company, and I can recognize some of the staffers by face, there are clearly others who have made Carl's Jr. an every day experience. One gentleman, quite heavy by any standards, can be counted on to have his lunch there every single day we show up. His routine, without fail, is to get his lunch at Carl's Jr, and then retreat to a corner table with his back to the front entrance. While in previous years, he tended to bring reading material from home, he's been reading the newspaper every time I've seen him in 2006.

His being at the restaurant is as much of interest as any of the menu items. Our first glance upon entering the restaurant is over our shoulder to see if he's there, in his regular spot. Today, arriving a bit earlier than usual, we were surprised to not see him there. Instead, two men (not regulars that I know of) were eating their own meals, likely not knowing the spot "belonged" to someone else. Yet, halfway through our meal, my colleague pointed out that the regular was back, and I looked back to see him wedging behind the table - in the one directly adjacent next to his usual spot, even though there were many more convenient open tables in the restaurant. That he even had to make the adjustment over from one table to that next to it seemed to pain him, as he looked uncomfortable in his new surroundings.

While having a routine is not uncommon, we've all heard about those with Tourette's Syndrome or Asperger's Syndrome who have to have things a certain way, often to the point of exactness, before they are comfortable. As I've never sat with Carl's Jr.'s favorite patron, I've never learned what makes him the way he is. I've never seen anybody sit with him, and I've never studied what he orders, to see if he eats the same meal every day. It wouldn't surprise me if he did, even as his weight has ballooned, even in the time I've seen him.

Other than the obsession with Carl's Jr., and the preoccupation with sitting in the same seat, day after day, there's nothing overly odd about this man. His clothes are tidy, his demeanor quiet, and his hygiene is clean. As far as I know, this could be his only vice, or his only escape from whatever other pressures move him to and fro. But he certainly makes me wonder. All I know is that the next time we go back to Carl's Jr., I'm sure he'll be there, furthering the mystery.

Listening to ''Trilogy'', by ATB (Play Count: 36)

Never Assume Rationality

The minor to medium changes continue to take place on this blog, as I work to make it more navigable, search engine friendly, etc, or to better represent what people can find when they do drop by. Most clearly, the site now has a title identifying it as a "Silicon Valley Blog" with a focus on technology, sports and politics. Many blogs are successful through niching themselves in a segment that is underserved, while others largely cater to friends and immediate family. This one, so far, is in between. It's not heavily marketed, but people should know what they have found.

Another addition is a slogan (for now) that says to "Never Assume Rationality". It derives from a conversation I had with a coworker nearly five years ago, where the two of us were debating internal strategy and how we could pitch a concept to those at higher management levels. When I questioned how it possibly could be turned down, and wondered aloud as to one individual's reaction, I was told that my big mistake was in "assuming rationality." If I came in with the fundamental expectation that those around us were rational, I could be blindsided. Instead, the new approach was to make the case and withstand all potential objections, be they rational or not.

We don't live in a Mr. Spock world of black and white, logical or illogical. Much of what we do requires the input and/or approval of others who may have widely different viewpoints, goals or expectations, and though we may both be trying to act rationally, our own actions can seem way off the mark to others.

Additionally, on a more fun note, it's not entirely rational to devote so much energy and value to non-essential things such as sports, or technological gadgets. One's "fandom" for the Oakland A's, for Apple Computer, or for one political party over the other can sometimes border on the irrational. And here, at least, that's okay. As a blogger, I'm not a journalist. I don't need to be impartial, and I don't need to be rational. So don't assume I will be all of the time.

Listening to ''Cherry Pie'', by Underworld (Play Count: 4)

Enough With the Echo Chamber, Already

One of the most-common themes you will see in the blogging world is the story of the echo chamber, where it's believed a blogger truly has an audience of one: themselves, or that an echo chamber exists - where they continue to post despite a lack of interaction, and even where there are occasional comments, they are from a small group who keeps to themselves. As a result, the blog, like a black hole, collapses onto itself, signifying nothing.

While some would argue a blog's success should not be counted in number of page views, or visitors or comment count, those blogs considered the most successful very often have a vibrant of community of people sharing ideas, and bouncing their commentary off experts. Otherwise, you may as well just be posting your diary online for everybody to read, and quite honestly, very few people really care what you had for breakfast.

Louisgray.com was started as a natural metamorphosis from a static Web site to one updated more frequently, to share experiences, and offer a new take on news, sports and technology. It has no budget, and I have a real full-time job, so it's not as if I expected to retire on Google AdSense revenue any time soon (I haven't even looked into the possibility). But while I've continued to post, with more than 500 entries since the beginning of the year, the lack of comments at time seemed surprising. I felt the topics we were discussing were of interest and timely, and the ANtics never failed to get responses elsewhere. So why the silence here? Was it truly because this blog signifies nothing?

Turns out the answer is likely somewhere between the two. While making a follow-on comment to last night's post on how my iPod was trying to commit suicide, I noted the comment didn't immediately appear on the front page. It turns out, of all things, that every single comment that has been posted to louisgray.com since the end of March has been pending moderation, and I hadn't gone through and approved them. Oops. To make a long story short, I went into Haloscan and approved them all last night, meaning the "Comments RSS" link isn't empty, and if you had anything to share, we're finally listening.

And - one last thing... yes, I hate it when stuff like that happens. Makes me feel like a tech newbie.

Morning Notes: October 4, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

It's been an extremely busy start to the week, so I apologize for the light posting thus far. We've had a surprising confluence of events taking time away from the blog.

With that said, it's always a good idea to start with the top of the alphabet, with the A's. In the team's first playoff game against the Minnesota Twins, Frank Thomas hit two home runs and Barry Zito pitched masterfully in a 3-2 victory at the Metrodome yesterday, giving the team a 1-0 lead in the series, which continues today. The Twins were said to have needed a win in yesterday's game to win the series, and they didn't get there. Now the A's have picked up home field advantage. Of course, Athletics Nation was completely nutty for the day game, with nearly a thread an inning, and 3,000 comments. We were in meetings all morning and didn't see a single inning live, thanks to the ridiculous schedule.

Interestingly, the world of blogging has added a new wrinkle, as Zito himself has a blog he's keeping up in the post-season. After yesterday's victory, he sat down and wrote how he was feeling - both in preparation for the game, and as it progressed. Unlike many in sports, Zito has always come across as more on the analytical side, as you can see. (An Awesome Day In Minnesota)

Working down the alphabet, to Apple (and Microsoft), after the dust has settled, critics and potential customers alike are finding themselves wholly underwhelmed with Microsoft's release of Zune, their iPod-copycat music player. Wired writes that "Zune Won't Kill the IPod", while in an amusing slant, Roughly Drafted illustrates 10 reasons that Zune isn't the iPod challenger some would have you think it was. One reason? It's just not cool. I mean, brown? We don't have to work for UPS, so why would brown all of a sudden be hip? It's like HP and Dell trying to convince us beige is in this year.

I have to admit I've tried to stay above the fray and ignore much of the scandals in Washington of late. It seems if you give the GOP enough rope, they'll hang themselves, and they are well on their way. With Mark Foley's indiscretions being well-discussed, Electoral-Vote.com says that the Senate races show a near dead-heat for both parties, and a virtual tie in the House as well. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that in a jaw-dropping move, the Republican-led budget tucked away $20 million for a big celebration of our successes in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, to be held in Washington DC. Mission accomplished, anyone?

Routine Maintenance Never Fits My Schedule

You know how it seems that regardless of the situation, or the market or the product, there is always a car analogy waiting in the wings to annoy you? Why is it that every example is expected to be made more easy to understand because you can relate it to a brand of car, how well they are kept up, or horsepower and engines? It seems like the English language ran out of nouns and adjectives to adequately describe most incidents, but we've all managed to imbibe Kelly's Blue Book and your automobile owner's manual.

Recently, I mentioned how my lack of routine maintenance on my teeth turned into a litany of dental visits, to the tune of four in four days (some kind of record, to be sure). While at the dentist, I was given the standard lectures on how to take better care of myself, and the old, reliable analogies were thrown out there. "You know, fillings/gums/etc. are like your car. If you don't rotate the tires/change the oil/etc. every few thousand miles, you will have problems."

Well, thank you very much, Dr. Einstein, D.D.S. But you don't realize who you're talking to.

Instead of a maniacal auto-obsessed gearhead who changes the oil in his driveway and can analyze every ping with a simple pop of the hood, you're talking to somebody who very recently managed not to get the oil changed in his 1998 Mercury Tracer for more than 6,700 miles, more than double what is advised. In fact, as I had the oil changed on New Year's Eve in 2005, I went a full nine months between Jiffy Lube visits, before somewhat reluctantly taking care of it yesterday.

So, when somebody says I should have the same level of "routine maintenance" for me or anything else, they're in trouble. I'm sure part of the issue resides with my ego telling me the rules don't apply.

Want me to pay that bill within 30 days? Why? Because it's convenient for you? Well, send me another notice, and I'll think about it. Want me to see the dentist every six months? Why, because some bureaucrat decided that was the new rule? Want me to update my driver's license to show where I really live instead of somewhere I used to? What's the point? Heck, even my bank checks still say I live in Belmont, and I haven't been there since 2002. What do I care - the money still comes out of the account...

So long as the lights stay on, the water keeps running, and my belongings don't get repossessed, it really doesn't bug me if you get paid within 10 days or 90 days. I have a primary care physician, but I bet you he doesn't know me, and I certainly haven't seen him this year. And if my car starts to slow down for whatever reason, I'll keep driving it until it simply stops. Then I'll get a new one. But don't tell me I should have rotated the tires and gotten the air pressure to 32 pounds per square inch. Those rules are for other people.

Listening to ''Better Off Alone'', by Alice Deejay (Play Count: 5)

Evening Notes: September 27, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Fresh off of their division-title clinching win, the A's put up a laugher of a lineup, so that their supposedly hung-over stars can rest up for the playoffs ahead. Yet somehow, early on, they are maintaining a 3-1 lead over the same Mariners, despite the B-squad acting as fill-ins.

We're also playing the role of B-squad fill-ins at Athletics Nation, running the threads tonight. In other self-centered blogosphere news, we noted on Sactown Royalty that free agent Bonzi Wells could be days away from heading out of town. All signs are pointing to Houston, Texas as his next stop.

Another day, another Apple rumor. Or is that the denial of one? New York Times columnist David Pogue says not to expect the long-rumored iPhone any time soon. As he says, "I think cellphones are as ripe for a radical rethink as the online music store was when Apple set up iTunes. But let’s not go all wiggy every time someone passes around an iPhone rumor on the Web."

In other tech news, HP's recently-departed chairwoman Patricia Dunn is now arguing that she was unaware of the pretexting and other aggressive investigative methods used at the company to root out leaks. Given all the hubbub around the company and her role, she comes off as believable as the tobacco and oil executives. I hear Enron and Worldcom are hiring...

Meanwhile, Om Malik speculates that with Rupert Murdoch's tremendous purchase of MySpace, the next logical step is to migrate the power of the blogosphere to traditional media. As papers like the New York Times, Chicago Tribune and others are trying to find a place for themselves in a Web-connected world, he argues a shakeup is needed, and Murdoch just may be the guy to kick it off.

Listening to ''Are You Ready'', by Ferry Corsten (Play Count: 6)

Afternoon Notes: September 22, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

As HP's pretexting scandal continues to grow with new news every single day, the company's chairwoman, Patricia Dunn, gave her immediate resignation today, amid rumors that CEO Mark Hurd was aware of or even endorsed the aggressive policies the company engaged in to root out leakers.

Even had HP been acting within the law, you simply can't win the war of public relations when you're doing unsavory activities that target the very reporters who are there to cover you. It's a recipe for disaster. As a colleague said, they now have their "pound of flesh" in Dunn, and she may not be the last to fall. Hurd has now acknowledged he was aware of the inquiries.

Following an annual internal company meeting at Microsoft, the anonymous blogger, Mini-Microsoft, says that the software being used to power Zune is still "under construction", and that CEO Steve Ballmer stubbornly refuses to back down when the company is losing a market share battle, and will not fold. More on Mini's always-interesting blog.

Closer to home, TiVo is rumored to be working with Amazon to bring the company's Unbox service to its DVR customers. As Unbox has gotten horrible reviews since its unveiling, it's unlikely that we would be interested, but its good to see two innovative companies trying to find new ways to entertain customers by combining forces.

Discussion: (GMSV: http://blogs.siliconvalley.com/gmsv/2006/09/well_this_ought.html and MacRumors: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=236399)

And we simply couldn't have a single day without more Apple rumors, right?

AppleInsider says that the company is timing their entry into the cell phone market, rather than forcing their hand. Meanwhile, the New York Times' David Pogue turns back the clock a decade to "When Apple Hit Bottom".

Listening to ''Dance 4 Life (12" Mix)'', by Tiësto feat. Maxi Jazz (Play Count: 4)

Radio Show Callers Should Get to the Point

Often, while in the car to and from work, or when driving home from A's games or Cal football, we have our radio dialed in to local sports talk stations, hoping to gain some insight on the just-concluded game, or hear how other fans are speculating the team will do in the next contest. Yet, annoyingly, it seems that very few of them understand how to act on the air once they get there. Quite invariably, the vast majority of callers, seemingly almost all men, would rather appear "cool" than get the point, preferring to make small talk with the hosts, who themselves sound quite fatigued by the practice.

For example, on your typical radio call-in show, the host will "go to the phones" to "Bill in Alameda". Bill, upon being introduced, will say, "So, how's it going?" or "Hey guys, what's up?" and the host, who has already been talking for the better part of an hour or more on exactly just "what is up" has to quickly go, "Hey Bill, how's it going?", to which he responds, "I'm good. Now, I wanted to talk about the (fill in team name or player or situation here)."

It's not as if the caller really has no idea "what's up" or "how it's going" with the sportscasters. After all, even in the odd chance they weren't listening to the show to begin with, they probably had to listen on the phone when they were on hold, and have some idea. So for all of us listening for some tidbit of info or helpful discussion, we have to wade through the forged pleasantries - and start the routine again with the next brain-dead caller. It's almost enough to put in a CD or flip to the FM dial rather than listen. Just thought I'd mention it.

Listening to ''Know You Can (Rick Pier Vs Dav'', by Whatever Girl (Play Count: 7)

Evening Notes: September 15, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

We're on the verge of kicking off a sports-filled weekend, with the Oakland A's back in town to take on the World Champion White Sox, and the Cal Bears also home to take on Division I-AA quasi-power Portland State. Being good season ticket holders, I'm going to aim to be at all three games this evening and tomorrow, but there is certainly some overlap on Saturday that could make things dicey, especially if the A's haven't blown out the Sox by the early innings...

On the technology side of things, It still seems to be all about Apple all the time. Apple's iTV announcement and enhancements to the iTunes Store to include videos continues to make waves. Interestingly, one of the quieter announcements was that Apple's moved to reduce the 30 gigabyte iPod to a pricepoint of $249. This apparently has hurt Microsoft's big rollout of Zune this week. While unveiling the music players, Microsoft did not announce a price at all - which some are saying is a direct result of Apple's price cut. Fun to have the Redmond giant on the wrong side of volume discounts. In addition, TechCrunch reports Amazon is the next giant expected to deliver feature film downloads, which explains their frustration with studios that have sided with iTunes.

And even though Apple just held a big media event, everybody seems to be yearning for the next big thing from Cupertino. ThinkSecret now says the long-awaited Apple iPhone will hit in the first quarter of 2007, and a contributor to GigaOM claims that Apple will enable consumers to run Windows Vista in a virtual desktop as part of the company's Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard rollout. Also in the same vein, Storage Mojo is very intrigued on Apple's future plans to help consumers store and backup their downloaded feature films, which could take gigabytes apiece.

Stepping away from Apple for a second, it's said that the pretexting scandal at HP is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. The company's chairman, Patricia Dunn, has been summoned before Congress, where she will no doubt be harangued by politicos who love to see themselves on C-Span making non-enforceable threats, shaking heads and wagging fingers. Or maybe I'm just cynical?

Listening to ''Until You Love Me'', by 4 Strings (Play Count: 11)

Is That a Prius Lane?

Each of the last two days, I had the "pleasure" of driving between Sunnyvale and Burlingame and spending way too much time on Highway 101 on the San Francisco Peninsula - a trip that according to Google Maps and Yahoo! should take only 30-plus minutes but in actuality ranges between an hour or an hour and a half. Spending so much time in a car over the last two days - there and back, there and back, made me think a lot about the quality of life, and whether I'd be best off just sitting on my rear and telecommuting everywhere.

But another thing struck me - to my left, in the carpool/commuter lane, I wasn't passed by a series of partnered businesspeople looking to save gas and time, or a family's minivan, but instead by Toyota Prius after Toyota Prius, with the occasional Honda Civic Hybrid thrown in for variety. As these high gas mileage hybrid cars have the option to drive in the carpool lane, I was continually mocked for continuing to drive my boring old 118,000+ mile 1998 Mercury Tracer, which gets a cool 25 or so miles a gallon itself. As I sat, admiring the dirt on my windshield and debated whether my back speakers were blown out or just falling apart, on my left, I would see Prius, Prius, Civic, Van, Prius, Van, Prius, Civic, Prius. And I'm jealous.

The only question is, if I were to plunk down $25,000 that I don't have on a car I don't yet need, how long would it take to make up the money on saved gas and saved time? It's time to break out the calculators - or I'll never know.

Listening to ''That's Right'', by Blank & Jones (Play Count: 5)

Late Night Notes for September 11, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Unfortunately for me, I'll be away from the computer for most of tomorrow (but of course latched to corporate e-mail like I should be via Blackberry). This means that while every other techno-geek, media reporter, and computer nerd is finding out all they can about Steve Jobs' plan to extend world domination to online video downloads and quite possibly much more, I won't be participating. Sad story, huh?

Well, don't let that ruin your fun. While Mac rumor prognostication used to be carried on by a select, and unwashed, few, it's now a role everyone else is eager to take on. Now even the mainstream bloggers, including TechCrunch and GigaOm are on the Apple rumor bandwagon.

The current expectations for the special event on the 12th include iTunes 7.0 (with movie downloads), updated iPods and iPod Nanos, and what some are calling a "TubePort", which will enable wireless transmission of videos from your computer to the TV. MacRumors weighs in by saying "Movies will be available as either a smaller iPod-format (which will cost $9.99 per movie), or as a larger, streamed movie to be streamed to your TV via TubePort. This cost $14.99 per movie. To purchase an iPod-formatted movie and a streamed version of the same movie, it will cost you $19.99."

As always, I'm more inclined to say it's not something I'll jump to, but we'll see. I usually tend to get fairly suckered in after watching all the glitzy demos.

On a completely other note, you haven't lived until you've consumed the original "Numa, Numa" featuring Gary Brolsma, an overweight teenager from New Jersey who rocketed to Internet fame when his lip-synching and chair-dancing to a little-known Romanian group went viral. After years of hiding out in relative obscurity, he's back with a vengeance, ready to capitalize on his fame, with the "New Numa". The official site is at http://www.newnuma.com, of course, or you can watch on YouTube. I guess if you can't beat them, join them...

If you're still not ready to dance around to some goofy kid, a much more serious video that helped us revisit a darker time from five years ago was unveiled today - as a woman living a few blocks from the World Trade Center for the first time introduced her documentarian chronicling of that day without analysis or soundtrack - just raw video, emotion and genuine fear. You can try and watch it on their site or download the full thing. It's 134 Megabytes and runs for more than 20 minutes. Humbling.

Revver.com: September 11: What We Saw

Listening to ''Live at Aria Montreal (11-06)'', by DJ Tiesto (Play Count: 4)

Scandals Raising Ire On All Sides

It'd be hard to completely ignore a few of the biggest scandals out there right now.

The first deals with HP's chairman of the board hiring private investigators to use less than ethical methods to spy on reporters and gain access to their phone records in an attempt to ferret out leaks. This Bush-like breach of privacy is the first of its kind in Silicon Valley and has got the worlds of technology and media alike on edge. Some publications are calling for the director's head on a platter, and reporters are more than justified in their exasperation over this breach of confidence.

The second is on a planned "documentary" by ABC on the events around 9/11, and their cause. The show inaccurately portrays the Clinton administration in a light that directly contradicts the 9/11 commission's report, and even as its airing nears, it's said that edits are continuing to be made to bring the piece further in line with accuracy - although disclaimers have been added to say it is not intended to be fully factual, but more in line with a historical drama. Unfortunately, it's been shown that we have a lot more people in the country who are plenty comfortable with watching TV, but not focused enough to read a congressional report, and they'll remember the one they saw when holding the remote and sitting in a recliner. Lawyers for former President Clinton have gone so far as to recommend ABC cancel it altogether.

On that note, with the 9/11 anniversary coming up soon, the Washington Post has said we were on the heels of capturing Bin Laden at the end of 2001, but the trail went cold, and military strength was subsequently redirected toward efforts in Iraq rather than on capturing the initiators of the terror strikes. Oddly, this falls completely in line with what Senator Kerry argued over with Bush during the 2004 debates, and was so roundly denied. Not that anybody can align the administration with the side of truth these days...

Listening to ''Underwater Love'', by Smoke City (Play Count: 8)

Asypta: Acela - Amtrak Speeds Ahead

Not just companies get the honor of joining the Asypta fold. Sometimes, the most ordinary-looking and most ordinary-sounding firms will debut products or subsidiaries that follow the Asypta guidelines, as Amtrak did in 1999 when they debuted their new line of high-speed trains, dubbed nothing else but... "Acela". Though clearly derived from the root word "Accel", Amtrak followed the mantra many companies do during the process of naming, throwing an "A" at the end for good measure. And try as they might, Amtrak made an attempt to explain just what "Acela" stood for anyway.

From the March 9, 1999 announcement:

"Acela is more than just a name for Amtrak's new high speed trains, Acela is a brand representing a whole new way of doing business," according to Amtrak President George D. Warrington. "A combination of acceleration and excellence, Acela means high speed and high quality - we are changing the journey for every customer on every train with faster trip times, comfortable amenities and highly personalized service."

In an era of commuter jets, carpool lanes, and telecommuting, it's no wonder that Amtrak had to do something to juice passenger statistics on trains - more-commonly associated with the 19th century than the 20th or today. While other countries have lapped the US in their ability to roll out highest-speed transportation, including "bullet trains", Amtrak and its new Acela line has seen very limited success. As Wikipedia states, "Technical difficulties have led to a joke about Acela standing for "Amtrak Customers Extremely Late Again" trains."

Now there's a fantastic acronym we can get behind.

It's always interesting to see when a company does such a poor job of naming itself and identifying the name with the brand that consumers go out of their way to apply their own definitions. Acela clearly falls in that category.

For going through the process of announcing a new name that fully meets the Asypta criteria, and introducing confusion into the marketplace, Acela is the second entry to the hall of fame!

Overall Asypta-Meter Score: 10.0

Listening to ''Miami Sunset 2005'', by DJ Irish (Play Count: 1)

Asypta: Altria is a Smoking Gun

The Asypta model is somewhat flexible. If you look at Altria, you have a slight variation - extending to A consonant, vowel, A, but the phonetics of the word are the same, as the "ria" sounds like "riya", which maintains the Asypta rule verbatim.

With that said, Philip Morris' choice to rebrand as Altria in January 2003 is a classic example of selecting a name without any meaning and plugging into what I term the Asypta name generator. As widely reported, the company, which owns a wide variety of cigarette brands, ranging from Marlboro to Benson & Hedges and Virginia Slims, was looking to divorce itself from its life-long relationship with tobacco, and instead, highlight a healthier, more anomalous self.

From the press release on January 27, 2003, the company opted to change its name to Altria Group, Inc. As they said in the release, "The Altria name and logo powerfully express these enduring qualities: its drive toward excellence, its companies' focus on building brands, its passion for success, its openness to innovation, its commitment to its communities and societies, and its focus on its people."

And just how do they do that? If you look at the Altria logo, It's a 5 by 5 pixelated square made of many colors. A 25-grid square, symbolizing nothing. The word Altria doesn't demonstrate quality or excellence or success or innovation, unless you believe it does. Just like when the tobacco companies had you believe that "Nicotine is not addictive", this too has to be taken at face value, when there is in fact, no value.

More about Altria can be found on the company's "Who We Are" page, where they say "By changing its name, Altria Group has clarified its identity as what it is: a parent company to both tobacco and food companies that manage some of the world’s most successful brands." Gotcha.

For fitting the criteria set out in the rules of Asypta, and further befuddling corporate identity, we give Altria a near-perfect score. They just miss the hall of fame, due to a lacking consonant before the second A. Sorry, guys.

Overall Asypta-Meter Score: 9.5

Listening to ''Silent Words - Chiller Twists'', by Jan Johnston (Play Count: 25)

Avaya Receives 10 on Asypta-Meter

Avaya is a classic example of a company built out of the "Asypta" school of naming. A, consonant, vowel, consonant, A. Avaya was spun off from Lucent at the end of 2000, and during the era of dot-com frenzy, the company didn't define exactly what it did very well.

From the company's spin-off press release in June of 2000, Lucent's president and CEO, Don Peterson said, ""We chose a name that would set us apart and capture what we're doing with the company - focusing on communications solutions for business customers. Avaya sounds open and fluid-reflecting a company that's open-minded and that provides seamless, effortless interconnections among people and businesses."

Source: Lucent

But what does that mean? Open, Fluid? Open-Minded? Sounds like some nice words to explain "Don't Know Exactly".

The Daily Telegraph, in a piece from December of 2005, ties into that very issue - company names that don't really stand for squat. They partially blamed Landor Associates, a San Francisco design group, for the name, and many others like it.

"If you ever wondered where those bizarre unpronounceable company names come from, look to the Landor crew. Avolar, Midea, Avaya, Spherion, Onity, Lucent. And Lucent's rival, Agilient. You know, like Lucent - but agile! Nice. Soon lots of big branding companies were picking up briefs and now our world is littered with Arrivas, Aptivas, Achievas and Avandas."

Source: Igor International

For fitting the stern criteria set out in the rules of Asypta, Avaya scores a 10.0 and is the first inductee to the Asypta hall of fame!

Evening Notes: August 24, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

It's odd how even in what could be considered a small wave of bad publicity, some companies wait out the storm and somehow come out unscathed. After yesterday's $100 million lawsuit settlement with Creative Technologies, Apple followed on today with news that they - like Dell - have issued a recall for more than 1 million laptop batteries which may catch fire. It's highly possible the PowerBook I've got is in the listed serial numbers eligible for replacement... but even with both of those announcements, Apple stock didn't take any kind of hit. In fact, Apple (AAPL) rose less than one percent on the day, even with the news. For what it's worth, my most-recent investment in Apple is doing fairly well, up 24 percent. I had sold some of my holdings for a loss, because I could use it to drag down my total income at tax time by the end of the year.

Of interest to those who follow Apple closely, as I do, an unlikely foe has beaten them to the punch for an online movie store - AOL. The would-be owners of Time Warner (oops!) announced today that for  a mere $10 to $20, customers could download full-length films, with no option to rent. Sounds steep.

Earlier this month, I mentioned how Topix.net's newly-introduced one year news archive search tool could bring huge benefits to companies and PR agencies. Apparently, my feelings are not just mine alone. Steve Rubel, who works for Edelman PR, said Topix "doesn't get the attention it probably deserves", and delves further into the site, to help track companies or individuals and use advanced search features.

The A's have an off day this evening, which means activity on Athletics Nation should be significantly lower than normal - as I, as well as many others, are probably taking the day off as well. For a good fix on AL West baseball, you can check out the LA Angels site at Halos Heaven or the much funnier Seattle Mariners blog at Lookout Landing. Also, be sure to catch Blez' input on why ESPN has lost all relevance for him and many west coast sports fans. The worldwide sports leader is a mockery of its old self these days.

Listening to ''Forever Today'', by DJ Tiesto (Play Count: 14)

Morning Notes: August 18, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

In politics, some of the biggest news surrounded the court's call for an immediate halt to the illegal NSA-sponsored domestic wiretapping that Bush and his right-wing cronies have been saying is an integral part of our security against terrorists at home or abroad. Interestingly, in the judge's summation, she wrote, "There are no hereditary Kings in America and no power not created by the Constitution. So all "inherent power" must derive from that Constitution." Her comment on hereditary kings sounded particularly apt when one looks at this administration, and that of the 1988-elected George Bush Sr., a man who towers over his son in intellect and scruples, Iran-Contra aside.

Vanity Fair's James Wolcott piles on in a piece called "Turd on the Run", where he asks, "Is Bush an idiot? Is water wet?"

In technology, gadgets reign supreme. The Web is abuzz over the first leaked photos on Gizmodo of Microsoft's wannabe-iPod killer, Zune. The pictures don't show the device on, or even its true color, in an effort to mask the leaker. But that didn't stop a wealth of discussion on iLounge, Engadget, Slashdot and CrunchGear.

In other news, this morning, a judge ordered that EchoStar has to stop selling its digital video recorders, and must pay TiVo approximately $90 million for patent infringement. It's good to see a company have the opportunity to successfully defend its intellectual property. (Tivo's response)

And finally, in sports, the A's play a rare doubleheader against the lowly Kansas City Royals, after a rainstorm thankfully interrupted a would-be A's loss earlier in the season, forcing a makeup game. The green and gold take on the AL Central's cellar dwellers starting at 2:10 p.m. Pacific. Until then, check out Athletics Nation's interview with A's pitching legend Dave Stewart.

Listening to ''Play For Today'', by The Cure (Play Count: 6)

Dog-Gone Hot

It's no secret that this summer is one of the hottest ever recorded across the Northern Hemisphere. After 100+ temperatures for more than a week, we saw the mercury lessen to the 90s range here in the Bay Area, unfortunately coinciding with our trip to Boston, where upon our arrival, the East Coast chimed in with their own version of a sticky heat overload. With temperatures pushing 100 outside, I did my part to stay indoors at the convention hall, keeping my external wandering to a minimal level. But the heat was certainly noticed by many outside. Even every Conan O'Brien monologue that week started out with a lame joke about the heat...

Now that we're back in the Bay Area, we're finding things a bit warm again. Not oppressively so, but enough that our fourth-floor condominium with cathedral ceilings, facing the sun, is storing more than its share of heat. And to make things worse, our housebound beagle, playing the part of a latchkey dog while we've been away at the office during the day, has been panting her way through the eight or so hours, without respite.

Yesterday evening, after arriving home from the A's game, the indoors temperature was a balmy 88, so I of course started up the fans and air conditioner in a feeble attempt to knock down the thermometer a few points. Hours later, we were still at 85, and we didn't seem to be getting anywhere. To my chagrin, I then noticed the air nozzle aimed to push hot air out of the house had detached from the window, and instead of cooling us off, we had started a circle of heat pouring right back into the room we were trying to chill. Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Needless to say, we reattached it, and immediately saw a drop - never perfect, mind you, but a slip from 85 to 82, to 80, and just over 75 by midnight or so. The dog, patient through all this, lifted her eyebrows at me as if she had known, but in all seriousness, if she saw something, she could have told me, rather than keeping it to herself.

Today's been a bit better - but not great. As of 7 this evening, we're at 80 indoors, down from 85 when we started, and as seen in An Inconvenient Truth, this will become more normal as time goes on if we don't make changes in our activity to thwart the gradual warming of the planet. Our dog may not be around to see it, but we will be.

Listening to ''No Reason", by Chumi DJ (Play Count: 5)

Bay Area Traffic Can be the Worst

In the dot-com heyday, it wasn't uncommon to expect commute times of over an hour, just to go ten to twenty miles or so up and down the San Francisco Peninsula. Traveling highways 101 or 280 between San Francisco or San Jose in either direction could be a life-halting event, as, in what seemed to be a good thing, there was a vast surplus of jobs and people with automobiles needing to get from one side to the other, more than the highways had been built to handle. When that was coupled with skyrocketing housing prices, commuters were often compromising on their distance to travel to work in order to save a few hundred thousand dollars.

When the stock market bubble burst, hundreds of thousands of jobs were seemingly erased overnight, and some of these commuters similarly disappeared. Traffic got better, even as the economy was getting worse. So there was an upside. And while the economy showed signs of revival and has picked up again, we haven't seen the out of control hiring and resulting traffic to make up the difference - which makes today's experience especially frustrating.

With a 9 a.m. meeting in San Francisco, the plan was to take Highway 101 to catch BART, the Bay Area's Rapid Transit system, and coast into the big city in time to make the appointment. But it was not to be. The freeway system in the Bay Area is built without room for error - meaning a single accident anywhere on 101 can dramatically stop the traffic flow - and leave its remnants for hours afterward, even if the glass has since been cleared and the cars dragged off to that great big scrap heap in the sky. And without warning, I found myself in this mess today, as only two or three exits north of home, I found nothing but brake lights as far as the eye could see - without police or fire engines anywhere in sight.

I watched the minutes creep by, and even told my appointment that things looked VERY bad. Since my car wasn't moving anyway, I could punch out a coherent message via Blackberry and take phone calls without any concern that I was making the problem worse. Half an hour went by and I hadn't moved. And even after we started to creep along, it was no picnic. After having "enjoyed" this for about an hour, we found a cohesive collection of glass in the middle of the road - where some traffic architect genius had conspired to have five lanes merge to three. Undoubtedly, some more-aggressive drivers had decided to share a lane with another vehicle only to learn about the physics behind what happens when one object in motion attempts to stay in motion, but is brought to a stop.

Brilliant.

Needless to say, the schedule has been blown to shreds. I didn't even make it onto BART until 15 or so minutes after I was already supposed to be in San Francisco, and we'll need to be creative on how we now put our heads together.

I'm not one to lobby for any kind of economic downturn, or wish ill will on those who are creating the traffic surplus, but if the Bay Area expects to grow further, and expects to be a world-class city (or group of cities), as we keep hearing when the San Francisco mayor makes bids to host upcoming Olympic games, the basic essentials of providing people a reliable system of getting to and from destinations on time has to be achieved. I for one can't trust that I'll get anywhere outside of a 5-mile radius in a given time. There are simply too many variables and not enough trust in the system. And I really, really would like my morning back.

Listening to ''Animal'', by The Neanderthal (Play Count: 3)

Evening Tech Notes: August 2, 2006

In a surprising move, Lycos (remember those guys?) is now offering a larger mail repository than Google's famed GMail. Instead of 2 Gigabytes, which GMail offers, LycosMail promises that users can save as many as 3 Gigabytes, effectively raising the bar again for e-mail storage. You may remember that when Google first announced GMail in April of 2004, Yahoo!, Hotmail and others limited users to a mere 50 Megabytes.

TechCrunch writes that Lycos has a number of strikes against it, not to mention the strength of Google's brand name, saying, "Whether Lycos can offer search and spam filtering as good as Gmail’s remains to be seen. It also stands at a disadvantage via Gmail’s integration with the rest of Google’s offerings."

As mentioned this morning, the tumult over Microsoft Windows Vista's delays continues. As Good Morning Silicon Valley writes, not even the bugs are stable yet. It's now rumored Vista won't show up until February.

Continuing on the Microsoft bent, it looks like the failed MSN brand will go away, in favor of the new moniker, Live. With MSN always running a distant second, third or worse, in basically every category, it's time to knife the baby.

Lest you think we've switched over to loving Redmond, don't be alarmed. There's plenty interesting going on in Cupertino as well. With WWDC rapidly approaching, the rumors are flying thick on just what Steve Jobs will pull from his sleeves. Think Secret says that the second generation of iWeb will simplify the use of external site data - outside of the typical .Mac services, and integration of Google's AdSense. Being a RapidWeaver user, we're not affected, but will still watch with curiosity. Additionally, a MacRumors source anticipates Xeon-powered XServes, New Mac Pro desktops, and a preview of the new operating system, Leopard, which will no doubt debut before the much-maligned Vista.

Listening to ''Seven Ways (Star Ways)'', by Paul Van Dyk (Play Count: 7)

Why Snail Mail (and the USPS) Stinks

Not too long ago, I wrote that Amazon.com's best times had come and gone, that the online retailer didn't offer too much value in a world where iTunes and others offered immediate satisfaction. With recent rumors that Apple is looking to provide eBook support in iTunes and on iPod going forward, that could eliminate yet another media where Amazon has traditionally had the lead.

But even beyond Amazon, the entire concept of the US Postal Service at times seems to defy the space-time continuum.

On July 21st, I broke my 'No Amazon' policy, ordering a few titles on business, PR and marketing for the office. For some reason, I wasn't alerted until July 25th that the shipment had been configured and released to USPS. The next day, July 26th, it was said that my shipment had left the USPS facility in Richmond, CA on its way to our San Jose, CA office. Should be a snap, right? I could drive that in less than an hour.

But the shipment didn't arrive Wednesday. And the shipment didn't arrive Thursday either. In fact, checking on the USPS site simply reminds me that the shipment left Richmond two days ago, without any progress. You mean to tell me it hasn't been assigned to somebody to just pick up and take down to the South Bay? That makes no sense.

In dramatic contrast, UPS and FedEx tell you exactly where your shipments are, and you know when you'll get them. With the US Postal Service, it's one great mystery in the sky.

Listening to ''Cyborg'', by M83 (Play Count: 5)

San Francisco Bay Area Is Sweltering

Growing up in "extreme Northern California", it wasn't too uncommon to see the thermometer break triple digits in the summer. Chico and Redding especially offered up 110 degree days a few times a year. But since starting school at Berkeley in 1995, I've had 11 years to get used to a much more temperate climate in the Bay Area, one that makes you feel that 55 is chilly, and 85 is absurdly warm.

Our condo tends to exacerbate that problem. On the fourth and top floor of our complex, with high ceilings, our home easily traps the heat, and the sun's movement through the sky parallels our glass windows, cooking everything inside. Just yesterday, after coming home from the office, our stand-alone air conditioner reported the inside heat was a blistering 87, making us just that much more sluggish. Our beagle, though cute, pants all day with her pink tongue hanging out. And when possible, she lays directly in front of the fan (where she is now).

After a night of hoping everything would cool off, we were already at 79 indoors by 10 this morning, and it should continue to rise, regardless of our efforts, and will stay hot for days afterwards, if weather forecasts are to be believed. The Chronicle reports "no relief is in sight", while wire services show that California utilized a record amount of electricity, without fear of rolling blackouts, thanks to an avoidance of manipulation, commonly seen in the time of Enron.

We're not moving, and maybe someday we'll have a better solution to staying cool inside, but the next few weeks should be steamy.

Previous posts on this topic: 2006 Is Hottest Year on Record in the US, The Climate Crisis

Listening to ''Dido'', by DJ Tiesto (Play Count: 6)

2006 Is Hottest Year On Record In the US

Global warming has graduated from the realm of theory to the level of full-blown, well documented phenomenon. While some in the US media tend to act impartial, straddling the fence on the issue, as if there is still some debate over reality, the heat continues to build, and once again, we see thermometers warning us that we may be beyond the point of no return, especially if people's actions do not change dramatically.

Reuters issued a story this evening that shows the first six months of 2006 were the hottest ever recorded, dating back to 1895. Just this week, the nation experienced 100-plus degree temperatures from California (trust me, we know) to South Dakota and Kansas.

Anybody who hasn't seen An Inconvenient Truth or continues to believe that our actions aren't having serious, potentially irreversible impact on this planet, is fooling themselves. We have got to get more vocal as a society in pushing for change and electing leaders who are willing to take a stand for truth and reason instead of fear and ignorance - or we're toast.

Listening to ''The Love Thieves'', by Depeche Mode (Play Count: 5)

A Week of Silence

My apologies - as this blog has hardly been updated at all this week - and I don't have any amazing stories of trips or excitement to blame it on either. It was simply a combination of spending too many hours at work, combined with evening activities nearly every day, and as you know, the evening is when the overwhelming majority of posts to the site take place, largely due to my "no blogging from the office" policy.

So here's a quick rundown on what you missed (you'll see it's not overwhelming)...

On Saturday, we attended "Chez Nico II", the twice-annual get-together of local Athletics Nation fans to watch a baseball game together at one of the site editor's homes. Though the group managed to cheer on Esteban Loaiza to a win against the rival Giants in the previous visit, this week's celebration was well.... less celebratory, as the A's flubbed their way to a 7-0 loss at the hands of the Red Sox, in a game that saw their leading hitter plunked by one of the most-hated men in all of professional baseball, Curt Schilling. On a more positive note, the team did take the other three games in the series, and are now a game ahead of Texas in the AL West standings.

On Friday, we had a fun evening at home while three friends came over for chatting and a good home-cooked meal (something my wife excels at). I, of course, monopolized the couple's eight-month old baby, and was only semi-joking when I said they could leave him behind when they needed to go. Sadly, they chose to take him with them. Friends from church, the pair were married only two days before we were, and they briefly interrupted their honeymoon to be at our ceremony. Good friends will do that.

Wednesday, however, was ridiculous. Under what I thought was a tight deadline at work, I hunkered down and spent several extra hours completing a project, not leaving until after 10 p.m., well beyond what anyone else had done, as I found myself in an empty building, and with my car being the only one in the parking lot. Though I had been told we had to finish up last week, my boss turned around and got a one-week extension, so the rushing just may have been in vain. Though buoyed by a routine of Diet Coke and PowerBars, by the time I had gotten home, and we had walked the dog, I was just ready for bed, waking up the next morning only to start the routine again.

This upcoming week should be a little better. There's always plenty to do, but I should make time for the blog. And we will.

Listening to ''Sombre Detune'', by Röyksopp (Play Count: 7)

Early Morning Notes: July 10, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Guy Kawasaki debuts a 10-question interview with David Sifry, founder and CEO of Technorati, the world's largest blog search engine, which stands head and shoulders above the competition, including Google. However, as I commented on Guy's site, I think the major thing that would stand in their way is scalability. We've all seen search times on Technorati lag, especially on peak hours, and even weekends. The company needs to stay on top of its hardware infrastructure while still maintaining its leading Web interface. Let's hope they do so.

Mini Microsoft's rumored demise seems to be exaggerated, as the site continues to be updated, most recently with a discussion on how online anonymity can be maintained, but only through cooperation from others. We've all seen the story of how you trust one or two people with a secret, and then they trust one or two people, and so on. Could be trouble. In their case, anonymity is a requirement. The site has provided tremendous insight into Microsoft's ongoing activity, with concerns about the future, if the software behemoth doesn't reduce expenses and increase focus.

In the category of copycat technology cronyism, Fortune has an extensive piece on AOL trying to become the new Yahoo!. Amusingly, Valleywag seizes on that, and notes that everybody wants to be somebody else. Is Google the new Microsoft, for instance? Or is it Google who is the new Yahoo!?

And, I've chronicled the benefits of Apple's .Mac service on here a few times - including cross-computer synchronization and Webmail, but Om Malik of GigaOm properly breaks down the service and says it simply hasn't kept pace with... Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft for features, while maintaining a high price tag. The only catch is, if I ever did want to switch, I'd have to ditch my mac.com e-mail address, and that'd be a serious pain.

Listening to ''Jaded'', by The Crystal Method (Play Count: 2)

Morning Notes: July 4, 2006

Yes, it's the 230th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, and in this era, when patriotism has been waved high, and flags flown in the name of imperialism and cultural superiority, or simply to submit that you are opposed to the idea of terror, I'm sure that we all can rest more easily knowing that the CIA has closed the unit focused on capturing Osama Bin Laden, head of Al Qaeda. We must have caught him! Right? (Kos Comments)

In less head-shaking news, it turns out that the reason we haven't seen exceptional click-through rates on any of our electronic marketing campaigns is that we left out a very important topic - pornography! While it's always been true that sex sells, recent statistics show that more than 5% of all porn-related spam is clicked on. Those are outstanding numbers!  In comparison, spam related to pharmaceuticals only gains a click-through rate of 0.02%, according to the same survey.

On the technology side of the house, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer features a great interview with Blake Ross, one of the wunderkids who took on Microsoft's Internet Explorer with Firefox. Firefox of course is my default browser on Windows (when necessary), and serves as a strong backup to Safari on Mac OS X. While not making money by taking the non-profit public, Ross expresses his frustration with Microsoft who trolled out IE just to defeat Netscape and then discontinued innovating. He says, "The truth is I think Microsoft is very directly responsible for spyware and adware and the pop-up ads in general that proliferated across the Web after they abandoned their product."

Listening to ''I Don't Owe You Anything'', by The Smiths (Play Count: 4)

Evening Notes: June 14, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

So George Bush goes to Iraq... of course it's a "surprise visit", because if he or any of his henchmen told the Iraqi people they were going to come in advance, it could get kind of ugly. I'll be more impressed if he goes over there for an announced, scheduled visit, and nothing happens. Of course, the Republican spin machine is saying how this is an amazing move for Bush, prompting one of the wire services to issue a story on how "Democrats are in Disarray as Bush Basks In Glow of Iraq Trip." Somehow I doubt they're really in any kind of turmoil. The only question is, how come Bush's "tour" wasn't extended 3 or 4 times the way our enlisted men are forced to do? That would be something.

Hot off all of the press resulting from his announcing that he was to be leaving Microsoft, Robert Scoble analyzes why he thinks Wall Street knows Steve Ballmer is full of it. He argues that in contrast to Google and Apple, Microsoft didn't win over the hearts and minds of the people who matter in the grassroots. He says that Microsoft also doesn't get blogging and is leaning too heavily on traditional PR. May be something to that after all.

As mentioned earlier, Digg is looking to cover more than technology. Valleywag happens to be the first to unveil screenshots of the new site. Check it out.

Internet Outsider scoffs at eBay's new interaction with Skype, sarcastically saying that eBay should now buy FedEx and Verizon as well, to better increase communication between buyers and sellers. For $4 Billion, one should hope eBay gets more than just what we've seen so far.

And you've no doubt seen the Macintosh vs. PC commercials that are getting serious airtime. Not only has Apple issued three new commercials, which you can see here, but it looks like Microsoft is aiming to address the company's historically poor stability issues through finally evaluating third-party drivers, in part due to feedback from Crash Reports. Ars Technica has more.

Listening to ''When You're One (Friday Night'', by Soraya (Play Count: 6)

Evening Notes: June 11, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Everyone and their mom has had to note that Robert Scoble, famed Microsoft blogger, is leaving the software monolith, and joining a Silicon Valley startup, PodTech, focused on podcasting. His notes previous to leaving were another good way to gain insight into the sometimes undecipherable mechanics of the Redmond company, and with the slowdown at Mini-Microsoft of late, the transparency just got a little darker.

Similar to the work done over at TechMeme, it now looks like Digg is going to jump from being 100% technology focused to also offering more vertical sites, for politics and other fare. TechMeme actually started as memeorandum.com for politics, before its technology site took off. The site also offers parallel pages for baseball and entertainment/gossip news.

And, not to pick on Microsoft too much, but The UK-based Inquirer suggests that the Origami themed ultramobile PCs (UMPCs) have been a market disaster and a technology flop. Just wait until Apple evolves and eats their lunch.

Listening to ''Feed Your Mind (Club Mix)'', by Oakenfold (Play Count: 1)

Morning Notes: June 6, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

I got a note from Joe Trippi on behalf of Steve Westly, who is running for the Democratic representative for governor to take down Arnold. Joe wrote that Westly had a 3 minute video on YouTube with a strong message. Surprisingly, I was so turned off by the unprofessionalism in the video that it had me thinking twice about voting his way. In fact, the YouTube link offered more commercials for Angiledes, which upon viewing, had more credibility in my opinion. That's one e-mail blast that backfired...

FYI, We've been running our Apple Mail in three panes for about a week now, and it's strong. I wouldn't say it's so outstanding that I need a widescreen PowerBook, as Om Malik does, but it's good nonetheless... GigaOm: Apple Mail & The Three Pane Magic

More on Google Spreadsheet, now available here... from Internet Outsider who comments on Google's Microsoft Obsession

Stephen Colbert offers the commencement address for Knox College, saying "I have two last pieces of advice. First, being pre-approved for a credit card does not mean you have to apply for it. And lastly, the best career advice I can give you is to get your own TV show. It pays well, the hours are good, and you are famous. And eventually some very nice people will give you a doctorate in fine arts for doing jack squat."

And June 6th is more than the launch date for The Omen or the California primary, but it's also draft day for major league baseball. For a look on how the Oakland A's may approach this very-interesting day, check out the Athletics Nation Draft Q&A With John Sickels

Listening to ''Arcadia'', by Gabriel & Dresden (Play Count: 5)

Sleep Is a Waste Of Time

I don't know what the real reason is, but for the last few weeks, or months, I guess, there just hasn't been any real interest in hitting a consistent sleep pattern. If I can find any excuse to stay up later, I'll do it.

Having always been a night owl, throughout high school (in the summers) and college, I frequently held jobs that had me up when the rest of the world was in slumber. Whether I was acting as a caretaker for developmentally disabled adults at age 17, or editing the college newspaper Web site at age 20, it wasn't too uncommon to be heading to work in the dark and coming home in the dark. In fact, the first column I ever wrote for the Daily Californian at Berkeley was about just that. Titled "Night Sights", the piece simply chronicled the walk home from work to the dorms. While looking back on it, the writing wasn't that great, it was a start.

Now with something resembling a normal work schedule where I get in the office around 8 and leave after 6, I can't exactly sleepwalk to work. But even if my alarm is set for 6-something the next morning, I'm not exactly pushing myself to be in bed at any kind of good time the night before. We've traditionally had midnight as the goal, but of late have extended it to 1, and recently 2 or 3 hasn't been that out of the ordinary, whether it's useless Web surfing, book-reading, Tivo consuming or anything else, it's just not becoming a priority.

For a day like today, where I got up earlier than usual due to an early start at work, the "grown-up" thing to do would have been to cut out the caffeine and work toward being rested, but we never got there. It seems to me that sleeping is simply a waste of time, where we could be more productive. If I could find a way to eliminate it altogether, I'd be the first test subject. We've got to find better things to do.

Listening to ''Walking In My Shoes (Random Carpet Mix)'', by Depeche Mode (Play Count: 7)

Morning Notes: May 28, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

If you were a monster monolith company and found yourself in 3rd place in a major market, what would you do? Cheat to get to the top? What if that's already been done, and you were fined billions of dollars? Turns out the next step is to kiss up to the market leaders or try to buy them. After last month's discussion that Microsoft tried to partner with Yahoo! against Google, the latest rumors have Microsoft trying to buy eBay and make eBay part of the MSN experience. Yikes. I am sure that eBay would see a flood of buyers and sellers elsewhere rather than share their money with Bill Gates, or see beta software impact their auctions, Microsoft style.

Speaking of market leader search engines, Google is now turning the corner on visual design if the latest news is to be believed. Rather than priding themselves on minimalism forever, it looks like the company is recognizing that applications need more visual care than simple Web sites. As a result, they've just taken on a new hire as a "visual design lead", who will bring flair to all things Google.

Guy Kawasaki continues his "Lies" thread, today introducing the Top Sixteen Lies of CEOs. After slamming engineering, marketing, VCs and others, I'm sure he'll get around to the top ten lies of the maintenance crew shortly.

And if you've ever wondered just why the Apple iPod has dominated the music scene since its introduction, The Observer (UK) discusses the unique alignment of the customer experience with a single slick device. I can't remember the last time I looked forward to walking into a warehouse-like record store only to put down $15 to $18 for a CD album. iTunes has made the music buying experience a relative pleasure rather than a seeming chore.

Listening to ''Push Upstairs - Roger S Blue P'', by Underworld (Play Count: 5)

Late-Night Notes: May 27th, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Apple lost its case against the anonymous folks who leaked information about an as of yet unreleased product. The computer/iPod company had argued that product leakers and their activities with bloggers were not protected by first amendment, but the courts have disagreed. Maybe now Apple will see the range of leakery that reigned in the times of MacWeek.

A side called "Advertising for Peanuts" clearly explains a big issue in the marketing/PR/advertising world, where we note the war between the creative side and those who own the product, who think you have to cram all sorts of niddly details in a piece, when simplicity is much more of a sure thing. They say, simply, "This usually results in a crappy commercial." Duh. Now if only those who are the problem would ever see the solution...

NBC News anchorman Brian Williams sits down with Apple CEO Steve Jobs following the company's unveiling of a new Apple store in New York City, and peers into his mind, calling him an iconoclast and salesman in one. Jobs argues that innovation needs to ever continue, and that you can't be satisfied with your latest success.

Meanwhile, in Microsoft land, Mini-Microsoft reports that the rumored reductions in force (RIF) are beginning in some areas, a move applauded, yet echoes concern that those cutting jobs are the ones who need to be leaving themselves. Of course, in a Dilbert-run world, that's how it is and always will be, especially in the largest of large companies. While Mini can hope, reality is just that those who have the money and power will continue to do so.

Listening to ''LSI (Love Sex Intelligence)'', by Shamen (Play Count: 11)

Advanced Math Problem

This struck me as a challenging equation this morning, so I just had to do it. The answer has already been determined, but I'd be eager to learn how you would address it.

Problem Set

With my birthdate being April 8, 1977, and I've worked at the same company since January 24, 2001, and today's date being May 25, 2006, this means that I've been employed at the company for 1,947 days, of my total 10,639 days alive on this planet, good for an 18.3% mark.

A colleague of mine, born on April 24, 1982, joined the company on October 18, 2004, and has worked at the company for 584 days of her total 8,797 days alive on the planet, giving her a 6.6% mark.

Assumptions

Both of us will continue working at the same company, uninterrupted.

Question

On what day will my colleague have been working at the company a higher percentage of her life than I have?

To be answered tomorrow...

Listening to ''The Nightfly (Short Cut)'', by Blank & Jones (Play Count: 4)

Morning Notes: May 22, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

In what has to continue one of the most-serious challenges to the field of journalism and the idea of free speech that we've ever seen, it now looks like the attorney general's office is going to prosecute reporters for publishing stories covering national security - even though the stories themselves have proven to be true. Additionally, as part of the government's increased activity around data collection, an AP story reports that the reporters' call records will be investigated, in an attempt to root out sources. This action is far more severe than any other previous administration has undertaken, even the notoriously paranoid Nixon, and threatens the media's ability to accurately report on the White House, while also further clouding the administration's activities from those people who elected them in the first place.

Guy Kawasaki continues to astound in his series of lists around business. In his latest salvo, "After the Honeymoon", he steps out of the venture capital phase and discusses some major issues that can impact companies taking the next step toward launching and shipping products in volume. The issues themselves are well known to Silicon Valley history buffs, but are well chronicled here.

Listening to ''iio - Rapture'', by Paul Van Dyk (Play Count: 9)

Morning Notes: May 20, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Thought Google was eating Yahoo! and MSN's lunch everywhere? Apparently, besides their significant lead in search, the company's coattails haven't resulted in dominant shares for their GMail or Google Maps properties so far. Though considered the most technologically innovative so far, the company continues to lead in search and ads, while Yahoo! and MSN, more traditional portals, continue to lead where they always have.
(More here: Hitwise: Google, Yahoo! and MSN: Property Size-up)

Speaking of Microsoft, the company had a big pow-wow on Thursday, discussing the company's competitive positioning, employee incentives, and addressing productivity in light of overwhelming pressures from their detractors, seen and unseen. Mini-Microsoft, as always, has their take on what the company got right and wrong, and whether these are steps in the right direction for the company - who continues to be recognized for how much money they've made and how big they are, and much less so for the quality of their products and innovation. Robert Scoble also noted the meeting in a report on his widely-read blog.

And... I have to admit, it's totally irrational, but I'm very much smitten by the new black MacBooks from Apple. I've never been much intrigued by the black line of iPod Nanos, or even colored iBooks, but the new black MacBook option introduced by Apple earlier this week is quite striking. Unfortunately for me, I just sunk $1k into my PowerBook G4 to fix the logic board, and I don't have enough good excuses to "upgrade", theoretically dropping myself from the professional line of laptops to the consumer line, and from PowerPC to Intel in a single bound. Still, it's black. Isn't that professional enough?

Listening to ''Sound of Machines (Short Cut)'', by Blank & Jones (Play Count: 1)

Morning Notes: May 19, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

We're back on the West Coast, where we belong... just in time to see Barroid and the Giants take on the A's at the Coliseum this weekend. Should be fun!

Speaking of which, the A's, one quarter of the season through, have amassed a bevy of statistics, some good some bad. Blez from Athletics Nation passes out first quarter grades. Add your own, or read up to gain insight.

Al Gore may graduate from having been a recent losing presidential candidate (to Bush, no less) to being the star of one of the most-important films this summer - An Inconvenient Truth, focused on the greenhouse effect, what's happening to our planet because of it, and what we can do about it. The trailer alone makes it a must-see.

The United Nations struck against the US today, saying we should close Guantanamo Bay, due to rampant reports of torture and prisoner abuse. What's one of the major disappointments in this administration's rule is the idea that we don't have to pay heed to the UN, and can act unilaterally. I don't expect that Bush and Co. are going to listen this time either.

Listening to ''Realizer'', by The Crystal Method (Play Count: 34)

The Windy (And Rainy) City

Since the fall of 2004, I've made it to Chicago four separate times, including this week. Three times, it was for the same trade show, and a fourth time, we were forced to stay over one night, as our plane had been delayed leaving San Francisco, and we missed our connection to Baltimore...

But this week, the forecast is that it will be raining throughout the week we are there (through Thursday), and if memory serves, that would make it three out of four times I've visited the Windy City, only to encounter rain. In 2005, during our visit, an entrepreneurial salesman made good business out of selling umbrellas for $5 a pop, immediately in front of the revolving doors to our hotel. As we've already got enough umbrellas at home, I'm hoping we don't have to repeat that fate.

On the one trip we got away rain-free, we managed to stop at Wrigley Field to catch a Cubs game. With that "crossed off the list", we're not planning on heading back to the ivy-covered ballpark in this trip, and though we looked, and hoped in vain, the White Sox are actually out of town, so we won't get to see the less-historic US Cellular Field (seriously, that's almost as bad as McAfee Coliseum!)

Hopefully we do find something entertaining in this trip, and manage to get out of the hotel and off the show floor for a bit, but since that's not our main goal, work will come first.

Listening to ''Live at Amnesia From Ibiza'', by DJ Tiesto (Play Count: 2)

Evening Notes: May 14, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

The A's are still suffering from a confluence of injuries, despite their win at the Yankees earlier today. Among the most banged up is the team's bullpen. To help satiate this problem, they've acquired left-hander Steve Karsay from the Cleveland Indians, in exchange for an undisclosed amount of cash. Trivial note - Karsay went 3-12 for the A's in 1997 with a 5.77 ERA, as a starter. Yet somehow, he was unstoppable for me in MLB 98 for the Playstation. Simply put, the A's sucked back then, and he's all I could use.

Microsoft investors are unhappy that the company seems so unfocused, and they fear they will never see a return on the company's investment, as the software giant is now looking to take Google head-on. Instead, they'd prefer to get a share of Microsoft's $60 billion cash horde. Of course, who wouldn't?

Guy Kawasaki extends his "Top Ten Lies" series, taking it beyond mere engineers and marketers, and to corporate partners. Having recently interviewed a few candidates for a business development position at the office, their own take on what makes a good partnership and what doesn't has been interesting.

You've heard a lot about Web 2.0, and some are now saying all the talk is overdone. Well-read RedEyeVC and GigaOM are claiming that some of the newest companies are simply clones of other pre-existing services, or could become extensions to already-successful products.

Listening to ''Tyrantanic'', by Sasha & John Digweed (Play Count: 3)

Morning Notes: May 11, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Apple rumors used to be the realm of sites like MacRumors, AppleInsider and Think Secret, and Apple has notoriously had an adversarial relationship with such sites, claiming they don't have the right to leak unannounced product plans, prices or photography. But this morning, respected Wall Street Journal reporter Walt Mossberg does just that, claiming that Apple, in the "Post-PC Era", is working on a media cell phone, as well as a media center for the living room.

Steve Rubel, after a morning alone with his computer, announces the Top 25 things he's learned so far with Google Trends, including the fact that Democrats are more frequently searched for than Republicans and other insights.

With veteran catcher Jason Kendall out four games with a league-mandated suspension, his backup, Adam Melhuse, has produced, with two home runs in two games so far in Kendall's absence. Despite this, the A's faltered against the Blue Jays yesterday, falling by a score of 9-7. Somehow, the team is in first place in the early AL West race, leading Texas by percentage points.

Oh yeah... and to no surprise for us, it turns out the government is keeping phone records for tens of millions of Americans, even for just domestic calls that don't involve foreign participants. The NSA has solicited and obtained the cooperation of AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth to fork over customer detail. The NSA claims no eavesdropping or recording is happening, but at this point, can you trust them?

Listening to ''Float Away (Rivera Mix)'', by Robbie Rivera (Play Count: 1)

Morning Notes: May 1, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

"The Colbert Report"'s Stephen Colbert played host to the annual White House Correspondents' dinner, and he made headlines in savaging Bush, who started out by chuckling, and ended the performance stone-faced, according to reports, as Colbert slammed him on Iraq, NSA wiretapping, low poll numbers and much more. (New York Times, Editor & Publisher, Crooks and Liars)

What's even more incredible is the news that Bush has declared himself above the law, selecting to circumvent more than 750 laws, according to a thorough report from the Boston Globe. When the laws are inconvenient, he goes around Congress, despite the fact it's Congress' job to determine the laws, and the President's role (traditionally) to enact them. (Boston Globe)

The Sacramento Kings defeated the San Antonio Spurs in game 4 of their first-round series, tying it at two games apiece. Though I don't mention the Kings here nearly as much as I do the A's, I have followed the team for decades, and remember tuning in to their radio broadcasts when the team could muster up 27 or 29 wins a year. Now, they are perennially playoff bound. (ESPN, Sactown Royalty)

Guy Kawasaki follows on the top ten lies of engineers with an equally astute piece on the "Top Ten Lies of Marketers". While amusing, not all match my personal history, likely because he's more focused on markets where I've not had experience.

Much noise is being made about Yahoo! possibly taking on CNET in the technology news and product review space. I'm not exactly overwhelmed by their initial entry, finding it to be a big shell for ads, but it's getting good press thus far. (TechCrunch, GigaOM, New York Times)

Listening to ''Revolt - Freighttrain'', by Bedrock Rec. (Play Count: 3)

Half a Dozen Top Announcements

While focused in Las Vegas, and without my trusty PowerBook, there were a number of announcements that warrant mentioning.

1. We've seen Bush make a lot of noise around breaking with his "oil man" background, and calling for lower gas prices amidst dramatic energy company profits and record lows in popularity. Guess what? The two are linked. As Business 2.0 notes, the president's popularity is inversely proportional to the price of gas. And here I thought spending $34.00 at the pump was patriotic.

2. Google released Sketchup, a new 3D modeling tool. While it's Windows-only for now, a Mac version is in the works.

3. Which brings us to Guy Kawasaki's excellent post on "The Top Ten Lies of Engineers". Number 6 is that the Macintosh version will be done just after the Windows version ships.

4. Microsoft continues plummeting. The company's stock got trashed to the tune of more than 10% Friday after announcing disappointing earnings projections. Meanwhile, Google is now showing ads for Firefox on the company's front page, when visited by Windows users running Internet Explorer.

5. BMW is planning on releasing an environmentally friendly car, expected to run up to 100 miles per gallon. I haven't seen it, but I probably want one.

6. You Tube continues to grow dramatically. According to Forbes, the video site is spending more than $1 million in bandwidth costs a month.

Listening to ''Dark Heart Dawning'', by BT (Play Count: 2)

Blog Vacation Through Friday

Just a heads up that this site will remain "stable" in its current state through at least Friday, April 28th. I will be in Las Vegas, Nevada for a trade show through Friday. In the meantime, my laptop is getting special care from Apple for the week, for a pretty good chunk of change. Turns out much of my power issues were related to damage to the logic board, impacting the DC connector. We knew that, but were in denial, of course.

See you then.

Morning Notes: April 20, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

Apple (AAPL) stock is up more than 5% in early market trading, following its earnings report yesterday. The company had the second-strongest quarter financially in its history, behind only the preceding quarter - encompassing the holiday season. iPod revenue was half of the total, and now pushes Apple to play well in the fourth quarter of the calendar year, rather than its peak around MacWorld San Francisco, the traditional launching point for new products.

In other Apple news, the company is still trying to unveil just who leaked product detail to a few Mac-focused Web sites. It's a free speech discussion, but Apple doesn't think the Web sites' dissemination of the rumor was in the public interest at large.

The A's stunk last night against the Tigers, losing 11-4. It's a good thing I went to Tuesday's game and saw them win, rather than going last night. Having season tickets will be a kick as I learn the nooks and crannies of the A's park. We attended games on Friday, Saturday, Tuesday, and are signed up for tomorrow and Saturday this weekend as well. Good stuff.

In other interesting news, AOL allegedly is going to try and "kill" MySpace, with a new social network offering. For some reason, I don't think today's teens, who use the site, will really want to associate with AOL. On the flip side, they all use AIM, so what am I talking about?

Listening to ''Waiting for the Night (Bare)'', by Depeche Mode (Play Count: 14)

Morning Notes: April 18, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

On the heels of TiVo's lawsuit victory against EchoStar, it's suggested that the company makes a terrific acquisition candidate... while in the political realm, one author notes that those pushing for a war against Iran have channeled conflicts 70 years old, dredging up Hitler and Churchill and Chamberlain, not updating their rhetoric for a much more modern world.

Meanwhile, in the self-affirmation category, I keep running into new places where people (from Athletics Nation is my guess) have taken the ANtics and repurposed them elsewhere. Some great examples are here and here and here. My favorite part is where one poster claims he doesn't like "Bobby Crosby Wellness Clinic 101", saying "It's interesting...I'm a Crosby fan, so I didn't like them slamming him, but I like the concept.", which results in his friend explaining, "the comic is not slamming him. It is having fun with the fact that he gets injuried and the gist is that A's fans do not want him to be hurt." My feeling? Any comic that needs explanation and proof it's satire, needs work. Time to be less subtle!

Listening to ''Paradise Garage'', by Jam and Spoon (Play Count: 11)

I Don't Know How Farmers Do It

Anybody who routinely gets up before the literal crack of dawn should either be given a medal, a raise, or have their head examined. In a quid pro quo deal, I had offered my mother in law a ride to the airport this morning, for a flight set to depart at 7:00 a.m. from San Jose. She routinely plays shuttle service for my trips, including last week, so I obliged despite the idea I would have to take her at 5:45 in the morning, and get up at 5 to be ready.

But the joke was on me. After working on PowerPoint through 1 a.m., I turned right around and got up at 5 to get ready for what will be a long day. However, when her call came in at 5:45, it wasn't because she was downstairs in the parking lot, but instead to inform me I could "go back to bed" as she had another ride to the airport. As if I could just turn around and immediately find the world of slumber - it's never been a skill I hold. So now, my schedule is off by a few hours, and I'll surely be ready to nap by mid-day, just when it wouldn't make any sense to do so.

Up until two I can handle. Up at five? Not my cup of tea.

Listening to ''Second Day'', by Jose Amnesia Vs. Serp (Play Count: 4)

Empowering a World of Shut-Ins

A lot of the technology advances in the last decade have been focused on increasing consumer access to information - at the home. Broadband to the home has delivered top of line Internet speeds that rival business access, while cable providers, combined with services like NetFlix, bring Hollywood videos to the home without your having to deal with sticky floors and chatty neighbors. Best of all, you can stay in your own comfortable furniture and pause the darn thing when you want to. And after the first wave of Internet fiascos, like WebVan and MyLackey came and went, retailers like Safeway offer the ability to purchase everything you need to live comfortably and have it delivered to your door. As you can pay for nearly everything by credit cards online as well, there's really no great reason to leave home if you don't want to.

I know for our family, we haven't gone to the movie theater for quite some time, thanks to Netflix and TiVo - and we've reduced our trips to the grocery store, realizing that our time may be worth more than the $9.99 it costs to get somebody else to pick out your groceries, lug them to your home, and deliver them to your door. And the only times I ever write checks are if my wife needs cash, or to pay tithing at church. For some reason, church hasn't yet set up direct deposit - but I've been told the practice of writing it out yourself is supposed to remind of you of the sacrifice you're making.

I'm not advocating we hole ourselves in our musty homes, but the excuses we have to never leave are mounting. If I can convince the office that I'll be telecommuting and using iChat for videoconferencing, you may not ever see me again. But I'll be sure to gain even more weight. Then you wouldn't want to see me anyway.

Listening to ''Carry On'', by Wellenrausch (Play Count: 1)

911 Call Hits Automated Machine Response

After the A's game this afternoon, we were headed down south I-880, when a short distance ahead of me I saw glass and metal fly in a quasi-explosion, cars spun out of control coming to a rest diagonally, and directly in front of us, a van stopped, covering our lane, and multiple cars were leaking gas. One car, in the furthest right lane, had its front half completely totaled. As we edged our car around the stopped van, I got on the cell phone and dialed 911, expecting to reach an operator and give them an update to the where and when, as others helped the accident victims. Yet, when I called, after several rings, I was told I had reached the highway patrol, and "if this is an emergency, press any key." So, I hit a key, and was transfered to the emergency line, where after several more rings, I hit an automated response saying "all emergency operators are currently busy assisting other callers."

After a few cycles of this, I hung up. I had to hope that any of the other several dozen drivers who had cell phones and saw the accident occur had made a call. Heck - for all I knew, it was using a cell phone while driving that had caused the accident in the first place. But it wasn't a very reassuring feeling that all the emergency operators were busy when I called 911. What if I had been the only person to call? What if I had needed help? It's not as easy as they make it look on television.

Listening to ''Super Falling Star'', by Stereolab (Play Count: 5)

April Fools 2006: Best Stories

The Web is a great medium for April Fools Day jokes and posts, and the practice of trying to dupe visitors is so widespread that even the Apple rumor sites, known for being susceptible already, warn their visitors not to be gullible on this day. Starting late last night, as it became April 1st in the UK and then on the East coast of the United States, there have been some amusing trends in the Web related to this day.

By far, one of the best was for geek news site Slashdot to revise their page style from techie green to bright pink in an effort to enhance their demographics. The site, now bubble gum pink screams of OMG!!! PONIES!!!, reviews of the OC, emoticons and LOL! As they wrote, "Our marketing department has done extensive research over the last 3 quarters and discovered that our audience is strangely disproportionately skewed towards males. Like, 98.3% males to be precise."

Appropriately, they've featured stories from The Register, who said that China had put in a bid to purchase all of Google's Class B shares. The site also wrote that in a more serious matter, that Bush and his cronies had devised a plan to extend his presidency beyond 2008. Google kept up their tradition of mischief themselves, debuting a faux service called Google Romance, which involves contextual text advertising and help from highly paid relationship consultants.

Wired gets into the act through displaying the Top Ten Internet Spoofs of all time, and offers a chaser with a gallery of Apple's most rabid fans. Both fun.

Update: News.com has summarized some of the stories that got them laughing as well.

Listening to ''Fascinated (Martin Eyeyer Remi'', by Raven Maize (Play Count: 14)

Entering a Startup On the Ground Floor

I've never not worked for "a startup". Since the beginning of my senior year at UC Berkeley, I have been toiling away in the Silicon Valley working for private companies with amazing ideas and strong technology. But I know I made some of the worst career mistakes at the very beginning, when I went into the initial interview with the company's founder, not having known what I should ask for on the salary side, expecting him to make the first offer, and having less than zero clue as to what to expect in terms of stock options for this "Pre-IPO" company.

Back then, in the fall of 1998, everybody was either public, or Pre-IPO. By 1999, some companies were filing to go public on the same day they were announced, even if they didn't yet have a shipping product, or customers - so I knew that getting in as the third or fourth employee at this company was a big deal, especially as I hadn't yet completed my degree. This inexperience led to my floundering through the interview and completely low-balling my salary request. I left knowing I'd possibly earned myself the position, but likely on the basis of how little I had asked for as much as how well I had represented my talents.

As I wrote in an e-mail to my parents at 2 a.m. that night (October 14, 1998):

"I also had to say how much money I expected to pull. Gulp -- I had no idea. I tried to have him tell me what I should say, asking where the money was coming from, and if the company was profitable yet. The answers -- primary investors and no. The eventual plan is to put together a working product, find secondary investors as a result of the product, and then go public. He threw words at me like "stock holdings", "venture stock and capital", "initial public offering" and said that I was early enough to be on "the ground floor" although obviously not a co-founder, therefore as every Silicon Valley startup dreams of, we could "go Netscape", and there is already an established product."

Long story short, I was offered the position at the low-low price of $1,200 a month for what was expected to be 20 hours a week in Silicon Valley and 15 hours a week or so from home in Berkeley, where I was wrapping up my degree in Political Science, having completed the degree in Mass Communications my junior year. And there was no stock. Another colleague and I were told we would be given shares of the founder's stock in time - whenever that would be. Needless to say, the company didn't take off. I worked hard, and put in the hours, and eventually, the company saw it was time to raise my pay to match the effort I had been putting in - to $2000 a month and then to $2333 and maybe up to $2500 a month by the time it folded the next year. I wasn't getting rich, but felt a lot better about things than many of my starving student friends.

But how could I have known what to ask for, being as naive as I was? In another insightful piece, Guy Kawasaki says there are "Nine Questions To Ask a Startup". By my third job in the Valley, I felt I had a better handle on the salary side, but still was on the low-end to start, my past underpayments still having impact years later. Had I had Guy's instructions in my back pocket, not only would I possibly have been paid better, I may have selected more successful companies from 1998 to 2001 and made some cash rather than watching so many other people get rich when all I got was tired.

Voyeuristic A's Fans

It's been said one of the key elements to any successful product is to know your market and to tailor your offerings in such a way that the market will respond. Contributing factors can be a number of things, ranging from a first-mover advantage, an enhanced feature set or simply better packaging.

Such was the case with yesterday's announcement that I had received my A's 2006 season tickets. While that yearly rite of passage may seem uneventful, especially given that I paid good money for those tickets, and should expect to get them anyway, it was something I had been looking forward to, and for some reason, I just so happened to receive my shipment a day or more before anybody else I know has. With some quick camera work, I summarized this year's seasonal ticket book, and posted the photos to the site - using yet another untapped feature of RapidWeaver - the software behind this blog.

As mentioned yesterday, I posted the images and a quick intro to the Athletics Nation site, but the response has been more than ridiculous. Prior to this week, site traffic to louisgray.com had plugged along around 20 visits a day - topped by Monday's 130 or so spike. While today's traffic so far has seen "only" 120 unique visits, the number of pages viewed by each visitor has increased significantly, with some viewing 16 to 18 pages, literally clicking through every photo to see every picture in slideshow mode. As such, we've seen 315 page views from midnight through 8:00 p.m., with the previous record being Monday with just over 130.

Meanwhile, over at Athletics Nation, my post turned into a sounding board for all those looking to receive their tickets, some with real-time updates on where their FedEx shipments were. 82 comments later, the post has far outstripped any level of attention the ANtics comics regularly receive. Now that's comical...

The TrackBack Effect

The Web was built for linking. One page is not the final destination, and should always provide multiple links for pages on the site itself, and if relevant, links to third-party sites. But with recent advancements in the blogging world, this has been taken a step further, with a feature called TrackBacks, which, simply put, add a link and summary of your comments to a third-party site, if you link to them. It's a modern quid-pro-quo.

On Monday, two things of interest happened here at louisgray.com. I wrote a piece called "Newspapers a Dying Breed", discussing the potential fate of the San Jose Mercury News, now up for sale, and later that morning, the very same Mercury News scooped the technology media world by announcing Microsoft's work on a next generation game and music handheld, which I covered in "Microsoft Not Giving Up Despite Failures". In both cases, the links I provided issued TrackBacks to the original site.

Later that day, while at the office, I received a Google News alert saying that the blog had been quoted on media watchdog Editor & Publisher, in a piece covering CNET's blog site Blogma, and titled "CNet Forum: Web Guru Gilmor Wants Yahoo to Buy 'Mercury News'", a comment I had made was included. This happened thanks to TrackBacks, as CNet had found my post and included it in their morning news roundup. Additionally, in parallel, the link I had made to the Mercury News itself started driving significant traffic to the site, as the Microsoft rumor grew legs and got incredible exposure. The traffic swarm to Mercury News led some to click through and see my reaction, leading to six times the normal site volume Monday, and significant traffic from Redmond, Washington, home of Microsoft.

TrackBacks provide news seekers an opportunity to gain access to third-party commentary instantly, even if they may never have visited the site otherwise, and as the technology gains in adoption, you may see it further impact the process you take to gain information - as you rely less on established media and more on gaining the full picture from multiple viewpoints.

Sunday Night News: Big and Small

Believe it or not, there's a lot more going on this weekend than the NCAA tournament, the World Baseball Classic, and continued spring training. I hate to admit that at times, there's a lot more to life than sports.

As widely reported, today marked the third anniversary of the Iraq War (II). The Bush Administration took the occasion to celebrate the progress they've seen, and again argue that the insurgents are losing and that the US will be remembered well in the history books. On the other side of the aisle, people are questioning the reasons behind a recent air offensive there, and continue in their frustrations as we see the many trillions of dollars and thousands of lives that have been erased in this conflict.

In the blogosphere, Guy Kawasaki emphasizes how important it is to be nice to those who can best help you, the little people, while the Redeye VC warns that as with other investment cycles, the bubble may soon burst on Web 2.0 companies, just as they got started. Meanwhile, Silicon Valley Sleuth updates us by saying the Google/Sun rumormonger is now backtracking. By the way, those three sites? Bookmark them all.

Morning Notes: March 9, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series...

This morning, TiVo shares jumped more than 4 percent, so I'm done with that play. In 7 days of holding the stock, it was up more than 7%, so that's all I was really looking for. I've made bigger money on TiVo before, but don't see that the bump from earnings (err... losses) is going to be sustained. I had purchased at 5.68 and sold at 5.99 - small potatoes, but I don't want to get greedy.

In other news, Apple looks more and more like they are going to mimic TiVo and offer season passes of TV shows through the iTunes Music Store. On their iTunes Video site, they say you can "buy the entire season of a TV show at a discount". Given that their full seasons for shows are running in the $35 to $40 range, I'm hoping we see some decrease. For me, this would only be interesting for a premium channel show, like HBO and Showtime, as we don't subscribe. Everything else, we'll let the TiVo run with. Additionally, Apple's added Law and Order: SVU to their lineup, and if Rush Limbaugh is to be believed, the company will soon be offering paid podcasts - his excellency included.

Also - Google can't seem to stay out of the news this week. They settled a case on click fraud yesterday by paying out $90 million. Not backbreaking for the search giant, but still a dent. Henry Blodget can't believe Google announced this on their blog of all places, saying "Google needs some new PR people and it needs them now." Also, Google is prepping a calendar service to work with GMail. TechCrunch has the screenshots. Rumor has it that Yahoo! employees leaked the screenshots to TechCrunch.

Morning Notes: March 8, 2006

More in an irregularly occurring series when there's news to discuss and not the time to do it.

This morning, Apple added Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" to the iTunes Music Store, and in a unique twist, set up a subscription process, where customers can pay $9.99 now, and not only receive the most recent show, but the next fifteen, as they air and become available. Effectively, that brings each episode to you for the low, low price of 66 cents each - contrasted with $1.99 being the typical fare for a 30-minute or 60-minute broadcast. It sets the stage for additional subscription-based services, a break from its buy and own model.

Yesterday, Microsoft revamped its search engine... again... in an attempt to take on Google for the world's most thorough Internet archive and index. Moving from MSN.com to its new Live.com, quasi-Web 2.0 site, the new search engine closely mimics Google's personal homepage service for customization and saved searches. However, in my attempts to use the site on Mac OS X, with both Safari and Firefox, results have been less than outstanding.

Additionally, Google's premature announcement of GDrive also included some presentation notes discussing forward looking financials, which forced the company to further disclose the data, according to SEC regulations. Due to their mistakes, their stock is getting hammered to the tune of $10 a share, and the media says after a series of financial missteps, "this one takes the cake" for the young, fast-moving company.

Schadenfreude

Courtesy of the Simpsons: "When Flanders Failed"

Lisa: Dad, do you know what Schadenfreude is?
Homer: (sarcastically) No, I do not know what Schadenfreude is. Please tell me, because I'm dying to know!
Lisa: It's a German term for 'shameful joy', taking pleasure in the suffering of others.
Homer: Oh, come on Lisa. I'm just glad to see him fall flat on his butt!

There's something about reading of the misfortunes and failures of others that is so enjoyable and amusing - and the media seems to eat this up. Two of my favorite recurring features in the business press are dedicated to the mistakes made by public figures and company executives.

The first is TheStreet.com's "The Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street This Week", which looks at the week's headlines, picks five blunders, and assigns them a numerical score on the "Dumb-O-Meter" from 1 to 100. This week, Google chimes in with a 93 over their CFO's reports of slowing growth, while CBS and Cisco also make the list.

The second is Business 2.0's annual feature "101 Dumbest Moments In Business", which does TheStreet.com 20 times better, and always astounds me with how they quickly find amusing screw-ups and summarize them in a paragraph apiece. If you haven't read through this year's list, make sure you do. After all, if the best part of reading others' mistakes is to avoid your own, there are more than 100 things you can learn NOT to do.

A Look at Brand Loyalty

It's one thing to have preferences, and quite another to show loyalty to a brand over all others - regardless of price, features (in most cases) or how long it takes to acquire the product. And at times, it's not clear where the said brand "earned" the customer loyalty - was it through a past positive experience, or through successful advertising and celebrity endorsement? How do we form brand loyalties, and stick to our guns when generic or alternative offerings may perform adequately?

I've often told my wife that "in our house, we don't purchase generics", or "we don't shop at CostCo". Sure, we probably would save a few bucks if I wasn't such an elitist twit, but given that's not going to change, it's interesting to see how we let brands express who we are. I have a favorite brand for almost everything - it's ridiculous. Some of the most obvious brand loyalties are very common. For jeans, I prefer Levis, and simply won't purchase any other brand. I prefer Diet Coke over Diet Pepsi... but somewhere along the way, I also decided that Cascade was my preferred dish detergent, Cheer is the laundry detergent, and when given my druthers, I'd bring home Coast bath soap. I don't get it. But if given a shopping list that said simply "laundry detergent, dish soap and bath soap", that's what I would come home with 9 out of 10 times, unless of course a competitor was offering a mean deal where I could buy one get one free... and to pick it up, I'd much rather go to Safeway than Albertson's.

In technology, Apple has been my brand for as long as I can seem to recall. It was a shock to me to enter college and realize that 9 out of 10 computers ran Windows, and not the other way around. This year, I became visibly upset when a co-worker of mine purchased some off-brand MP3 player, and not an iPod, which to me was a completely obvious choice. I even offered to help her trade it in... and she now knows better than to bring it up. When I was younger, I wouldn't purchase any running shoes unless they were from Nike, and to this day I don't like buying clothes from anywhere except Macy's - or Men's Wearhouse if I need to get dressed up. The worst thing you can do to my budget is leave me alone for 30 minutes in Macy's - because I'm sure I can find an Alfani brand something that I just don't happen to have that shade of already.

On the Web, brand is somewhat blurred. I don't visit MSNBC - period, because of that MS in the front. Microsoft may as well stand for Multiple Sclerosis for as much as I want to do with it. I don't visit MSN, and won't ever get a Hotmail account. I used to be the same way about Yahoo! - and for years avoided getting a Yahoo! account because it was 1) started by Stanford students, and 2) the generic link aggregation site that everybody and their dog had a logo for on their cheesy Web site. While I have preferred sites and plenty of bookmarks, articles are not more reputable because of their brand - they simply may be written more clearly or with an angle I like over another.

If I align myself with a brand that I take pride in, I want people to know that I've done so, as that brand represents a choice I've made. On my car, I have three logo stickers for the A's, Apple and TiVo. I will actively market those brands because I believe in what they do. I can talk to anybody who asks about those brands and what they stand for. But, somehow, I don't think you'll see logos for Cascade and Coast going up soon. That's probably another discussion for another post.

Power Shortage

It's one thing to live in a modern society and have access to the finest things - reliable transportation, high-speed Internet, comfortable housing, cable TV... I'm sure your list is different than mine... but with the Internet dominating our communications tools, and near exclusive 24 by 7 reliance on the power, telephone and cable wires into our homes, any interruption is, needless to say, very annoying and undesired.

We got home late this evening to find all our digital clocks flashing "12:00", and the cable Internet out. We then checked the cable TV and found it too was on the blink. We managed to watch an archived TiVo show of Jon Stewart before everything came back to normal, just in time for my wife to be surprised by the lady's figure skating results - hours and hours after the rest of the world had learned of the outcome. Just after the competition had concluded around midnight, everything went dark and we lost power again. More than halfway through an online submission form for the office, I knew that effort had been in vain, and I shut the laptop, while my wife got out candles and the flashlight so we could stumble around and hope power came on before we were to wake up.

Obviously, it did. We were out for only 30 minutes... this time.

Our leaders hem and holler and worry about outside risks to our infrastructure or massive disasters, but all you need are some teenagers, some booze, and a well-placed telephone pole to knock us off the grid, and that's ridiculous.

Should Presidents' Day Be Canceled?

There are some holidays that are huge events steeped in centuries of history and tradition - Christmas and Halloween being obvious choices, with the 4th of July and Thanksgiving making a run for it here in the US. Others are more like Hallmark holidays - you're aware of them, and have some obligation to fill, such as St. Patricks Day, Valentines Day, and Memorial Day.

But Presidents' Day is such a hodgepodge. It used to be two distinct holidays commemorating Abraham Lincoln and George Washington's birthday. When I was in elementary school, we got both of the days off, so February was a relatively easy month. Now, with it consolidated and falling on the most convenient Monday available, neither Lincoln or Washington get their due - after all, we will be working on Washington's birthday, and Lincoln's birthday was on a Sunday - where's the fun in that? And now that we're actually out of elementary school, it's not as if anybody celebrates what those two leaders did for us anyway. All it means is that the stock markets are canceled, schools get a day off, and most people don't have to go to the office. But I don't think you've given Lincoln and Washington more than a cursory thought today.

Let's scrap the idea. Either celebrate both men's birthdays individually, two weeks apart, or kill the idea, and make room for other days to be celebrated. I know I could always take my birthday off, or my wife's. That would make more sense.

Sacramento: Guaranteed to Flood

According to flood experts, St. Louis and Sacramento are the two most-likely metropolitan areas in the U.S. to see flooding disasters, mostly due to increased development in regions flooded by ten feet or more of water in the last century, surrounded by insufficient levees. In fact, according to one UC Davis professor, there stands a better than 2 in 3 chance that in the next 50 years, there will be a "catastrophic levee failure" in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

He says, "In California we know we have two kinds of levees -- those that have failed and those that will fail. We are reinventing Katrina all over again."

In addition to over-crowding and under-planning, the Sacramento region is particularly vulnerable due to seismic activity native to California, and increased warming, which is promising heavier storms coming in from the Pacific Ocean.

The story: St. Louis, Sacramento face flood danger: experts

Insomnia - I Can't Get No Sleep

It's not that I can't sleep - it's that I don't want to. Sleep is such a waste of time, after all. There's plenty to do, but in theory it's too late to do it. Even worse, I still have to wake up at the same time, whether I go to bed now, or in an hour, so what's the point? Might as well stay up, catch up on things that haven't been getting done, and reduce the sleep element. There's no real good reason to lay stationary and inert for such a significant time anyway - how horribly inefficient!

Speaking of "Insomnia", the very best song ever with the word Insomnia as the title has to be from Faithless.

Download it now on iTunes

Sample lyrics:

Deep in the bosom of the gentle night
Is when I search for the light
Pick up my pen and start to write
I struggle, fight dark forces
In the clear moon light
Without fear... insomnia
I can't get no sleep

The full lyrics here.

I Hate Stanford

I attended college at the University of California at Berkeley, and in my four years there, I learned many things - some of which that ended up helping me in the job world, and a great many things that had no impact. One thing I learned there that I will never forget, even if was never on any midterm, was the clear and unquestioned truth that Stanford sucks. The school openly panders to affluent families willing to overpay for their children's education - and over-grading is rampant. Students are capable of dropping classes even after having taken the final, if they think it would poorly impact their A- average. Their campus is like open farmland with no personality, the surrounding city has no history, their sports teams are mediocre with the worst band in the history of the universe, and - in contrast to Cal, they have no named elements on the periodic table - that's a big one.

Why do I bring this up?

Cal and Stanford (Stanfurd) play tonight in Men's basketball at Berkeley. The two teams are battling for the second position in the Pac-10 conference, and how well they play each other could have significant impact on which team makes the tournament, and which makes the NIT - and it's no guarantee both will make it, with so many other good teams out there - especially on the East Coast.

Cal won the Big Game this year, handily, but it'd be great to double down on those Cards and take them out tonight too. Go Bears!

Miss a Week, Miss a Lot

The blog has had to become a background project for now - with presentations and meetings consuming the last several days, and plenty more work is left to do. But the Super Bowl looms tomorrow, and it should be a fun weekend. My father in law and I have a side bet on the Big Game - $5 a question, more than 140 questions. Last year we played, and I ended up owing him all of five bucks. But we'll see. Should be fun. More later.

Seven of Nine and The Click Five

Site referrals can often deliver good insight into what a visitor is looking for, and how they happened to stumble upon your place in the World Wide Web. But they can often be confusing rather than helpful, as well - especially when a visitor is looking for something that either was never mentioned on your site, or through some odd coincidence, has seen a rise through the search engines - presenting a false positive.

The latter has certainly been the case with louisgray.com. As you already know, this last year, I started authoring a weekly comic strip for Athletics Nation, called "The ANtics", highlighting the A's players, and trying to deliver a new form of amusement, while leveraging some fantastic software. After amassing about ten or so of these episodes, I created a dedicated page on the site as a comics archive, and listed them out from one through ten and beyond. But my simple writing out of these numbers has done wonders for pushing louisgray.com forward in Google's image hierarchy - for terms that have nothing to do with the site.

For example - "Seven of Nine", from Star Trek: Voyager... there is an immense following on the Web of folks looking for her picture (I don't even want to know why) from around the world. My site statistics from SiteMeter show visitors looking for seven of nine from The Netherlands, Virginia and Seattle, Washington, just for starters. I'm sure they're very disappointed to see I am not a Trekkie - or ever will be. Another example is the band "The Click Five". The combination of the word five, and a simple "Click Here" message has similarly promoted the ANtics comics through Google's image directory - and I have NO IDEA what those guys play, so again, the wrong place - but again, I have visitors from Denmark, Baltimore, Maryland, and The Netherlands (again), looking for news on the band.

You can see the offending Google image results here: (Seven Of Nine) and (The Click Five). Very amusing.

Asypta: Simple, Yet Pointless

Nearly six years ago now, while working at 3Cube, we were putting together collateral and Web page templates for a new product roll-out, and as is common, one of the tasks was to create faux persons and companies, as placeholders. Rather than go with the standard "John Smith" from "ABC Company" or "Acme Inc.", I tried to dress it up with more real sounding names, while staying generic. I believe "Linda Johnson" from GoodFiles Inc. was one of the chief participants in our FAQs...

During one of these meetings, I presented an example which included a company by the name of "Asypta". It didn't mean anything, but it sure sounded good, especially at a time when companies would rebrand themselves, or spin off subsidiaries with neat-sounding names that added no real value. For some reason, I got all sorts of questions about "Asypta". It sounded real enough that my colleagues wanted to know if I had an in on the ground floor of a top-secret pre-IPO start-up or something... but I kept using the example and sounding mysterious.

I stumbled on the idea of "Asypta" as companies often can be found with an A at the beginning, consonant, vowel, consonant, A. Think about how many you can name... for example... Avaya, Asigra, Altera, Atipa, Asera, Altria, Ariba, Aceva, Acterna, Acteva, Adexa, Azanda... and I'm sure there are many more. At one point in 2001, I had registered the domain name Asypta.com, with the dual intent of acting as if it were a fake company, or secondly, to "grade" company names by their "Asypta factor". Ariba would be a 10 on the scale. Avaya another 10. Something like Alhambra... not so much. Asypta eventually came to stand for "A simple, yet pointless, technical acronym." It's worth noting that almost none of these Asypta companies explain their corporate name on the Web site. Simple, yet pointless.

New York, New York

Our two-day jaunt in Boston is complete - we had nine meetings with about 25 people in total, and have three more to wrap up the trip tomorrow, just not in Boston, as we've landed in New York, and get to spend one odd night (for $279) here, with it 27 degrees outside, before doing our work in the morning and flying back cross-country to make it back to the West Coast late tomorrow.

Aside from being surrounded by East Coast snow this week, and walking duck-footed to avoid slipping on icy driveways and sidewalks, we've enjoyed the other East Coast tradition - of wearing suits and ties, and topcoats, to each of our stops. Often, we're expected to look like laid-back West Coasters with a casual dress and attitude, but have put our hosts to shame. It's not quite "Project Runway" on the WB, but the team cuts quite the pose. In preparation for the trip, I bought a new pinstripe suit at the Men's Wearhouse, the first one I've bought myself, and the first one I've purchased to match my increasing waistline, which is now officially more round than my legs are tall. I preferred being a 32 by 32 "square", but it was not meant to last. Days of being out on the road, eating out for every meal, and jamming back into cars or planes aren't helping either...

One problem with these quick stops in New York is there is zero time to "see the sights". I've been here three times in the last two years, and still haven't even glimpsed the Statue of Liberty or anything. Don't know which way to look out of the plane... someday maybe I'll come on a more-relaxed pace and stay for fun.

Too Early At the Airport - Again

You know, just when you think you have it all figured out... the schedule gods go and muck everything up. With a flight to the East Coast set at 1:45, we thought it made good sense to have plenty of time to check in, go through security (with baggage including two laptops), and still have some clearance for catching my breath before the flight. But I didn't expect it would go so quickly! There was no line to check in, I whipped through security (only 3 ahead of me), and made it to the flight gate by 12:05, a full hour-plus before they begin boarding! I guess being too early is much preferred over being too late, but this is clearly not an exact science.

One upside to getting in early is finding a remote chair with easy access to power. That's a good thing. Let's hope that this kind of luck continues, in the unexpected chance one could find power plugs below the seat during the flight... but that's probably too much to ask for.

Cable Internet Annoyances

One of the first things I do every morning is pop open the laptop, check e-mail and catch up on news and anything I may have missed in the six or so hours I was asleep. I'm not as rigid as to have a set order of sites or time allotted to each, but the routine is fairly... routine. That's why when I woke up this morning and opened the laptop, only to learn there was no Web access, that was a little over the threshold for annoying.

Was it the Airport base station? Was it the cable modem? Was it the Comcast service itself causing the issue? Too many choices! Of course, I reset the base station. Nothing. I unplugged the cable from the base station and connected directly to the laptop. Nothing. I reset the cable modem. Nothing. I unplugged each and let sit for a while, and then plugged back in. Nothing. Grrr...

So I set back to my original spot and connected the laptop to power. I tried to ping Yahoo!. Nothing. A bit later I tried to ping Google... and after some delay it came through... slowly. But then it was as if everything else fired to life. Mail reported I had messages. WeatherPop kindly informed me it was 36 in Boston, where I'll be headed later. No good reason for the Internet being down, and no good reason for it coming back up. I hate that.

Morning Notes: Jan 23, 2006

What's the difference between an occasional feature and a regular feature? Consistency. So here's the first of what I expect will be an irregularly occasional feature - Morning Notes, when things are too interesting to ignore, but time is limited.

Last night was the first night the NBA's made a good fight to stay relevant in the face of playoff football, and baseball's Hot Stove League. If I wasn't a half-hearted Sacramento Kings fan, one would hardly know the season was on, if we didn't have news of players entering the stands or demanding trades... but last night, rapist turned ballplayer Kobe Bryant put on a show, scoring 81 points, the second most in league history, behind only Wilt Chamberlain. On the same night, the Phoenix Suns and Seattle Supersonics combined for more than 300 points in a 152-149 double overtime thriller, capped by a 30-foot buzzer beater at the end of second overtime.

In non-sports news, rumors are still flying fast and thick about Disney buying Pixar, or was that Steve Jobs buying Disney? It's all so confusing! Oh yeah, and the Republicans keep proving themselves incapable of avoiding scandal. (here, here and here).

Enjoy!