New site

My wife and I have a new website. Check it out, it defaults right to the blog page, but I'll make an index page soon. Here is the link: www.goughclub.com

This post is sponsered by the letter "W"

This post, thanks to emily, is sponsered by the letter "W"

1. Wicked cool, Which this entery is not.
2. W is for Westview High School where I graduated from highschool
3. Warm, We turned the air off so it was quiet to Watch Star Wars.
4. W is for Why not! If you can find a valid answer to this, than do it!
5. Where are my parents right now (enroute from Hawaii).
6. W is for White, the color of the walls of my new office!
7. Wow! this Was harder than I thought.
8. W is for Wonderful Wife who gave me this stupid assignment.
9. W is for "Wreck" the state of our apartment before We started cleaning this morning.
10. Well I think it is time for me to go to bed. I won't make you, but if you want a letter, comment and i'll give you one.

Star Trek Technology is Slowly Becoming a Reality

Most of you already know about my recent acquisition of the new Macbook. If you have not had a chance to try out Mac OS X Tiger, then you’re missing out. It’s the most powerful operating system yet with the most features, and it works! Now that I'm done with my marketing on with the topic at hand.

When I was a kid, like many other boys of the 80's and 90's, I was fascinated about Star Trek, the technology that was available was too cool and the concept of a star ship "Seeking out new civilizations and to boldly go where no man (or woman I suppose : ) has gone before" was one that captured my attention as a boy. TOS reruns still showed technology that was beyond our capabilities and beyond our comprehension. Yet, 3o years later we are using "Star Trek Communicators" to talk to our friends, family, and coworkers. The flip phone like device that Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock carried would no longer wow viewers. When "The Next Generation" began they had to come up with something new to capture the imagination of viewers. The sleek Starfleet badge that doubled as a communicator was the coolest new way Starfleet communicated. Trekkies were wowed again. Here we are more that 5 years after the next generation ended its series and the newest and coolest telecommunication technology is VOIP or voice over IP. (That’s transmitting phone communication over data or internet lines rather than the usual 2 pin phone line.) Many VOIP phones look like normal phones, but a few institutions including Dartmouth are experimenting with wireless VOIP. Essentially they have small (smaller than cell phones) star trek badge type communicators to communicate as if they were using a phone. They could program voice recognition for certain phone numbers and push the little button and say who they wanted to call. Unfortunately it would only work on their campus, but it is one step closer to the star trek method of communication and was most likely inspired by Star Trek.

I wasn't feeling to well last night. I have had a bad cold and slept most of the evening away. When I'm on and off sleeping it can be tough to tell what was a dream and what was real, but I remember talking to my new computer (Macbook) in a similar way that Mr. Scott did in Star Trek IV when he was talking to the primitive computer in 1980s San Francisco, except in this case my computer was listening and doing the commands. Sounds absurd, but just like Captain Picard, I was able to give commands to the computer and it executed them. Now I've talked to computers before, so Emily didn't think anything of it, but this time it listened and actually talked back! When can we expect a personality out our computer? This morning I realized that it was not a dream. The speech recognizer tool on my new macbook indeed listens and executes my orders!

Obviously their are a few things that we may never be able to match with Star Trek. For one thing we seem to be going backwards with our space program, and we are no closer to beaming people up than we were when TOS was running. However, we must be creative and dream of what could be in order to develop something new and great that integrates into society like the cell phone. We are certainly going where no man (or woman) has gone before each an every day! What will be next?

Converted! well sort of

My Macbook came today! It totally rocks. Its really fast with 2.0 gighz dual core processor and a gig of RAM. The best part is the glossy screen! So, now I don't have to mess around with windows and get frustrated. No more IE 6. Well that's about all I have to say right now. I'm back to playing with my new toy. I might add more to this post later, check back again soon.

Down Internet Explorer, ok maybe Microsoft too

Its been a long time since my last blog. I had intended to write about the first ever time change in Indiana, but unfortunately I was too busy, which is nice for a change. But now that summer is beginning I imagine I will have more time on my hands for procrastination tools such as blogging. I spent a good hour writing about how WWIII is about to erupt and had a few interesting references. Then I went to spell check it using the bloodspot spell checker and then I realized i was using Microsoft Internet Explorer and the popup was blocked, so I manually allowed it. Then poof their went an hours worth of thoughtful work. (Why didn't I use Firefox?!?) This is the last straw for me. I'm buying a MAC.

Reasons for buying a MAC.

1. Microsoft has become a careless giant of a corporation. they are big, they are everywhere, and they have every incentive to "not care" about the user. 90 % of us use their product, why do they have to try to make it better than another option, they are "Microsoft." they have no competition (except for maybe apple and wouldn't an Linux build that could compete be wonderful?).

2. Every reason here after is really a sub-reason of # 1. Microsoft's Internet Explorer, the staple browser used by nearly everyone, just plain sucks, they should just leave the browsers business all together. Especially now that you have to click to activate any cool little flash effect. They love to change things out from under you without notice (e.g. that damn little bar to drops down to tell you you have file you can install) Why didn't you tell me that would happen when you let me auto update my computer? So now web-developers have to write special work around scripts.

3. Microsoft cared not about the time change in Indiana because they are so big. Many of us Hoosiers use their software Outlook to manage our lives, and when we changed times the first time ever, we had to move every appointment manually back an hour because Microsoft couldn't fix a time zone bug in Outlook because it only effected the entire state of Indiana and not all of the world.

4. Microsoft is so large and extensively used that it has become the world's largest bull's eye for hackers who are looking to steal your information. Since every Windows XP system is virtually the same, crack one safe, and you've cracked everybody’s safe. To make up for that, Microsoft adds several needed security features that essential slow your computer down. Anybody wonder why the XP computer you bought doesn't seem that much faster than the one you had running windows 98. This is one reason contributing to that, as well as the scam of selling computers with lots of CPU speed and little RAM but thats another topic.

5. Microsoft is a horrible environment to try to do any digital video editing. Several products are out there, but none of them I have used work half as consistently and universally as the entry level software that comes free on a mac, iMovie. This is because there are so many codecs out there and they all seem to get messed up and interfere with each other, this an directx and all those hardware accelerators seem to screw things up even more. It might work one day, change a setting and you can forget about DV for a while. Macs are made to only run the software made by mac when it comes to DV so you don't have to worry about third party software interacting.

6. Registry.....(do Macs have a registry, god I hope not.)

Perhaps Goliath will fall, and the continuous delays of their precious Vista operating system seems to be one vulnerable spot. Look for companies like Google, and Adobe/Macromedia start to compete, and lookout those people are smart. If I ever need to run software that only runs on windows, I can boot camp my mac and dual boot, but I'm not giving windows too much of my precious hard drive space.

Why Toll Roads should not be Privatized

I will admit, the Indiana Toll road 80-90 does go through my county of residence and I of course am not fond of paying skyrocketing tolls for the next 10 years every time I travel. However, this is not a personal whine about paying tolls, this is about the truth of what will inevitably become of the toll road if Mitch Daniels' proposal to privatize the toll road passes.

One of the biggest arguments for not privatizing the toll road stems from simple economics. The precedent of what goods and services should be handled by the state and which should be left to capitalism was first discussed by classical economists such as Adam Smith and David Ricardo. They set the bare minimum of what economic aspects the government should control and we have been revising it ever since. Yet even the classical economist believed in government regulations of such things as defense of the country and of course toll roads.

Here is the classical argument for government control of toll roads. If a toll road was left to private enterprise, that private entity has incentive to try to maximize profit, otherwise there is no point in investing. In order to do that the firm is going to lower their costs to a minimum. Also, in the case of a road, the firm has essentially a monopoly since there are few other roads one could take that would get them to their destination without significantly increasing the time of travel. Enough people are willing to pay more to take the faster route that the firm can afford a reduction in toll road users since the higher price paid by the remaining users will more than make up for it. Since the private firm has incentive to maximize profits and they practically have a monopoly, they will also raise prices (tolls) in order to maximize profits.

Now you should be able to see what would happen next. First, the firm minimizes costs. So they neglect to maintain the road until it is absolutely necessary. Second, tolls will increase significantly as the firm tries to maximize profit which is its natural course of action. Most of the 80-90 toll road in Indiana is in decent condition; if we were to “sell” it out for 10 years, few repairs or maintenance will result in a bumpy and potentially unsafe road. Also, tolls will increase so much that people will go out of their way to avoid driving through Indiana taking potential business along with it. Thus, privatizing the toll road is essentially a slap in the face to the counties in northern Indiana. Gov. Mitch Daniels understands this, and is why he is trying to allow his plan to benefit those counties more. So at best, with Daniels plan, we break even and deal with high tolls and a bumpy road.

Tolls are going to increase, we know that, but what is not obvious is that every time another firm is outbid on the toll road the worse the fate of the road will be. The more it costs a firm to run the road, the more they will neglect the road and raise tolls to try to cover the cost of such a high bid.

Since I live near the toll road, I use it much more frequently than most of Indiana’s residents. Naturally I do not want to pay more tolls and have to worry about my car’s suspension wearing out. But the rest of Indiana probably does not care too much about a highway that cuts through farm country and is essentially within spitting distance of Michigan in certain places. Those people can surely agree with the following alternative:

If a private firm can run a toll road at such a low cost and skyrocket tolls in order to cover their high bid, why can’t the state of Indiana do it themselves and keep all of the earnings and use it to fund other programs or lower taxes. Everyone can agree to one or both of those things regardless of where in the state you live. Hopefully you will see, as I have, the folly that is Daniel’s plan to auction off the toll road.

MLK Day and its Purpose

My wife, despite her knowledge actually inspired me to make this topic my next topic for updating my blog. I apologize that it is a day late; I was on my way back from visiting my brother-and-law and his wife over the long weekend. Thank you Dr. King for giving half of America the day off. The other half, sorry, maybe you'll get president's day.

At first, when MLK day was upon us I thought it is unfortunate that one of the most influential men in America had to be shot in order to give us another long weekend. I wonder if this is how he would want us to celebrate his life. But then after reading how several communities across America were reflecting the civil rights movement and the move to equality, it dawned on me what exactly the day is for. It is about embracing diversity, all kinds not just the color of you skin. Martin Luther King Jr.'s most famous quote "I have a dream....That one day my children will live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." Dr. King's message was one of race, but we should not fall into the pitfall of thinking that he was referring to only blacks and whites. The civil rights movement was obviously about black and whites, but I have to believe that if Dr. King would have lived to see the improvements we have made, he would have extended his efforts to the many minorities that are often overlooked. The Hispanics, Asians and most defiantly Muslims for example are easily ignored. But I do not want to put words in Dr. King's mouth. Ray Nagin, Mayor of New Orleans certainly had a point when he said that there was too much crime between blacks in his city. However, he took two steps to far. 1. He claimed that God was punishing the black community during Katrina. 2. He singled out just black people. This is the sort of thing that keeps discrimination going. He literally discriminated against all other people of other races who were victimized by Katrina's wrath. We still have a long way to go, and the war is certainly no help to the Muslims especially of Arabian descent. Many say that the problem will never go away since we all tend to label and categorize people. This might be true, especially since the human brain is by default a labeler. We tend to categorize the world around us in order to make sense of it. In fact, it might even be a psycho-evolutionary trait, if you believe in such things. For example, if you were a prehistoric man, and you witnessed something like a saber tooth tiger eat your friend (assuming man and saber tooth tigers coexisted), primitive man would have no doubt been scared to death of the next meeting with a saber tooth tiger. He would have labeled it as a threat, and would never think about shaking hands with anything resembling a saber-toothed tiger. If he did, he would most likely die and his contribution to the gene pool is reduced or made null. Thus categorizing threats was no doubt a trait that improved survival. This is my belief for why labeling and stereotyping occur, and in today’s less threatening society we have had a hard time growing out of those tendencies. It kept people from being eating back then, and it falsely causes stereotypes now. I know that this was an extreme example, but you can fill in the continuum. There is, however, a place for labeling. This example comes from my wife's education classes. They are learning about diversity in the classroom, and how they have to be aware of it. One of her deadbeat classmates (deadbeat because he is going to college just to party and was willing to admit this) said, just by talking about it we are continuing to discriminate. Here is where I disagree. Humans, as I most definitely pointed out earlier are natural labelers. We can, however, do well with our labels. When we see someone who is of another race, culture, or nationality in the classroom, or other workplace, we can use the labeling system in place to associate that difference with tolerance and respect, rather than discrimination. Understanding the difference and discuss them appropriately is how we must use our labels. I often teased Emily in fun about Earlham College, (where Emily went) for being a bunch of hippies. However, to their credit, they are one of the few communities in the world that embraces differences and even celebrates them. Even I was a small culprit of stereotyping and discrimination. The next civil rights movement will take place not necessarily on race, religion, gender or even nationality. It will be on culture, both in the macro and micro sense. If we as humans can learn that our way is not the only and maybe not even the best way, we can begin to take the step toward tolerance and maybe even one more step toward embracing differences as they are trying to do at Earlham.

This is nice and brings about a wonderful result, but it does not remove the one enemy we can discriminate against, and that is evil. Evil comes in all races, nationalities and even religions, though we tend to push that label only on a select few that are the most distant to us. Evil is why the method above has taken so long to come to being, and is why it exists almost only in theory. It is why we may never actually find world peace.

So on today, or rather yesterday, I know now what Martin Luther King Day means to me. It means changing the way we look at our labels, and putting the energy once put towards discrimination against race, cultures, and religions, and pointing it towards all things evil that stand in the way of our progress.