The Cunning Realist

The Cunning Realist is a Blog that is not to be missed.

Very interesting perspective especially on Social Security.

Bono - Providing Awareness to Something that is embarrassing

I've been trying to watch this interview of Bono from the TED awards. I only got through the first bit due to some technical problems. Hopefully it works for you.

I appreciate his comments about race. That we (Americans and Europeans) have written off Africa and if the things that were going on in Africa were happening in Paris or New York the response would be totally different. I agree. Agreeing with this challenges me to look at my own thoughts and opinions about Africa. I don't like all of what I have to confront in my thinking. I can see how I fit into the "written off Africa" group think and it's not so nice a thing to become aware of.

10 reasons to write your own blog

There has been a fair amount of press about people that have gotten fired because of the things that they have written or posted in their blog. I know that I've talked about this in the past and have cautioned people about thinking about this before posting in their blog. I'm not saying that I'm changing my mind on that but I think this post from Tim Bray - Ten Reasons Why Blogging is Good For Your Career provides a list of great reasons why blogging is good for you and your career.

Swimming Clips

I haven't had too many posts on this blog about triathlon but for any of you that are interested in swimming these little video clips are interesting to watch. These are some of the best swimmers in the world and the camera angles are quite good. If you've ever seen a video clip of yourself swimming you may be impressed by the power and grace on display in these clips.

If you've ever done a triathlon or are thinking about one check out the Clif Bar clip/ad about training for the swim leg. I don't really think it's an accurate depiction of what race day is like but it's pretty funny.

Blogs for all!

One of my friends just started her own blog. Check it out here.

J, I hope you don't mind the reference!

One of the coolest things I've seen on the web in a long time!

I don't know a lot about John Coltrane but this little video is so cool! I love how it builds and then comes to conclusion with the song. Make sure you have your sound turned on and enjoy.

Tim Bray is the person that pointed me to this video. I like his comments about the video "Watching it, I feel like someone installed a window in the side of Coltrane’s head and I’m looking in."

If America Is Richer, Why Are Its Families So Much Less Secure?

This series of articles by the LA Times about the financial realities (meaning risk) that individuals and families are facing in the 21st century is very long (and repetitive in places) but I think is well worth a read. It's amazing how quickly financial situations can change for people and this is appropriate reading as the President and congress are in the middle of the Social Security muddle (I can't call it a debate).

http://www.latimes.com/business/specials/la-newdeal-cover.special

Quote: The World is an Enigma

Umberto Eco

"I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth."

When I read this I had the sense of a memory of some movie or book that tries to make this same claim. I think imagining this possibility is a useful mental exercise to help us see beyond our current circumstances. It's very easy to create all sorts of meaning and "underlying truth" that is simply a fictional design of our own mind.

Quote: Our Own Mistakes

Donald Foster

"No one who cannot rejoice in the discovery of his own mistakes deserves to be called a scholar."

This is a little nugget that is so very easy to forget.

The Long Tail

In the Wired Magazine Article "The Long Tail" the author explores the shifting nature of the entertainment industry that is coming about due to on-line businesses that are able to provide a much larger selection of media including books, movies, music. I'm a big fan of this shift although I have to admit that I'm just really beginning to explore the depths of these new services. I still haven't downloaded my first song or signed up for Netflix but it's just a matter of time before I do. This is the same reason that I'm entertaining the idea of digital radio and look forward to getting my DVR setup. I want to explore and consume what I want when I want it. Now the tools are there to do just that.

Take a look at the whole article or read the highlighted quotes I pulled out below. I'd be interested to hear what others think about the Long Tail and if any of you have done a deep dive and discovered some treasures.

"Forget squeezing millions from a few megahits at the top of the charts. The future of entertainment is in the millions of niche markets at the shallow end of the bitstream."

"Ultimately selection is revealing truths about what consumers want and how they want to get it in service after service, from DVDs at Netflix to music videos on Yahoo! Launch to songs in the iTunes Music Store and Rhapsody. People are going deep into the catalog, down the long, long list of available titles, far past what's available at Blockbuster Video, Tower Records, and Barnes & Noble. And the more they find, the more they like. As they wader further from the beaten path, they discover their taste is not as mainstream as they thought (or as they had been led to believe by marketing, a lock of alternatives, and a hit-driven culture)."

"Many of our assumptions about popular taste are actually artifacts of poor supply-and-demand matching - a market response to inefficient distribution."

"In the tyranny of physical space, an audience too thinly spread is the same as no audience at all."

"But most of us want more than just hits. Everyone's taste departs from the mainstream somewhere, and the more we explore alternatives, the more we're drawn to them."

"This is the power of the Long Tail. The companies at the vanguard of it are showing the way with three big lessons. Call them the new rules for the new entertainment economy. Rule 1 - Make Everything Available. Rule 2 - Cut the Price in Half. Now Lower It. Rule 3 - Help Me Find It."

2/26/05 Update: I thought I'd update this post with a couple of additional references that I've seen to the Long Tail concept. First is the Wikipedia entry about The long Tail. This entry provides a nice summary of the concept and some good refernces.

The second site I wanted to point out is Tim Bray's comments on Organizing the Long Tail. He provides a different, and I think unique perspective on this idea.

Sad Statistics

Angry Bear is a blog that focuses on "Slightly left of center comments on news, politics, and economics from an economist." It's a good blog and this post, Who is to Blame?, highlights some sad statistics about what the American public believes about 9/11 and Saddam Hussein. Take a look.

Evolution Takes a Back Seat in U.S. Classes

There is a hugh debate and scrap going on (somewhat quietly) in the world of science education that has potential to dramatically shape the view of future generations. This article gives a nice introduction to this topic and for anyone that cares about the issue of science education I'd suggest taking the time to read it. It's a long article so I'm not going to include all of the text here but the link below should take you to the NYTimes archive to see it. Please let me know if the link doesn't work.

February 1, 2005

Evolution Takes a Back Seat in U.S. Classes

By CORNELIA DEAN

How Wikipedia Works

For any of you that have heard of the Wikipedia but had a hard time understanding what people were talking about this little article might be helpful for you.

How Wiki Works

Published: February 8, 2005

I'd heard of the Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org/), but I'd never quite understood it. It's supposed to be a free online encyclopedia, written and edited by EVERYBODY. A collaborative worldwide effort, in other words, with 469,700 articles so far.

It sounds like a cool idea, but I just never understood how it could work. In this age of viruses, spyware and other rampant software vandalism, how could such a thing survive? What would stop antisocial jerks from sabotaging the good work of everyone else?

I finally got a clue when I saw this (http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/gems/umlaut.html). It's a movie, narrated by Infoworld blogger Jon Udell, that tracks the life cycle of one particular Wikipedia entry. It's fairy long, but it gives a dazzling time-lapse view of how the whole Wiki thing works.

(It turns out that there are, in fact, administrators who alone wield ultimate editing power. Too bad; for one fleeting minute there, I actually thought I'd found an example of an online community building something worthwhile simply by working toward the greater good.)

Important infor about the history of slavery

When I started reading this short article in the NYTimes I had no idea what to expect. By the time I'd finished reading it I throught it deserved to be read by more people. That's why I'm posting it here. I have to say that I didn't learn any of this stuff in my history classes in high school or college.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/31/opinion/31mon3.html?ex=1264914000&en=26a17020da562d75&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland

January 31, 2005

EDITORIAL

An Update on Corporate Slavery

Investors who visit the J. P. Morgan Chase Web site these days are finding more than the usual corporate news. The bank has posted a letter of apology and the results of an eye-opening research project, which found that two of its predecessor banks had participated in the slave trade, accepting about 13,000 enslaved people as collateral for loans issued in Louisiana in the mid-19th century. When the borrowers defaulted on their loans, the banks took ownership of some slaves and presumably sold them.

J. P. Morgan, which in addition to apologizing set up a scholarship fund for African-Americans in Louisiana, carried out this research to comply with a Chicago ordinance that requires companies doing business with the city government to divulge any links to slavery. A similar statute covers insurance companies operating in California, where several of the country's largest insurers have divulged links to slavery. These disclosures are exposing 18th- and 19th-century Northern businesses that sought to profit from the slave trade even after slavery had been outlawed in the North.

The disclosure laws grew out of an early attempt to seek damages from present-day companies for the misdeeds of their historical predecessors. The courts never took the reparations argument seriously, but the revelations of Northern corporate involvement were timely in the civic sense. They coincided with a revival of interest in slavery in the North, where many Americans had grown up believing that slavery had been confined to the cotton fields of the South.

When the new business disclosures are discussed publicly and integrated into the historical record, Americans will have been made aware that the tendrils of slavery spanned the length of the country and extended into the Northern financial elite. The inclusion of records of long-buried slave transactions on corporate Web sites shows that the process of reappraisal is well under way.

2004 Koufax Award Winners

This is the first year that I've heard of the Koufax Awards and I like what I've found. Here is the description of what the Koufax Awards are all about. "The Koufax Awards are intended to help forge a sense of community among lefty bloggers and their readership. We hope make introductions of bloggers to each other and to readers. We also hope to create a sense that we all live in the same virtual neighborhood and that it is a very nice neighborhood indeed."

I would suggest taking a look through the 2004 winners. The format of the site isn't great but it's worth digging through.

I didn't read all of the winner's blogs and posts but here are two that really stood out.

Poker with Dick Cheney

If America were Iraq, What would it be Like?

Surprises of Travel: The Farting Evangelist

A friend of mine is spending some time (I think 6 months) traveling in New Zealand. She has created a blog to document her travels and I'm a regular reader. This post about her experience with a Farting Kiwi Evangelist is really worth reading. If you're interested in traveling to New Zealand I'd suggest becoming a regular reader of this blog as she packs in a lot of info and fun stories.

Senators in Logoed jump suits - One of the best ideas in years!

Just like race car drivers! Take a look at the Foaming Rant from 2/18/2005.

Quote: Patience and Cowardice

George Jackson

"Patience has its limits. Take it too far, and it's cowardice."

I don't know who George Jackson is but I think this quote rings a lot of truth - at least for me.

A Leader Born of Budget Decadence

I don't usually agree with David Brooks but in this case I think he is on to something. I don't agree with everything he says but I think his general premise about a moral aproach to spending control coming out of the current situation is accurate. I disagree with him about the types of events that will bring about that moral outrage.

Still worth a read.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/19/opinion/19brooks.html?ex=1266555600&en=34d5805c651692fd&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland

2/22/2005 update: See these comments from Mark Schmitt on the same article.

"Google" for Statistics

http://markschmitt.typepad.com/decembrist/2005/02/the_state_of_wo.html

I wanted to point out the suggestion that Mark Schmitt makes about something like a "Google" for statistics. I think that would be very handy! See this blog entry listed above for more info.