Letter To The Editor

registerlogo2013blackserviceI just wrote a letter to the editor. It was about a column in today’s Orange County Register.

It made me angry. Incensed. A lie masquerading as truth.

It was about fast food workers, McDonald’s in particular and the push for a higher minimum wage. The argument was made using the wrong data. With real world numbers it quickly falls apart.

Devious or dumb? Who knows? Both make me sad.

Alas, newspapers don’t have the impact they once had. My daughter will never buy a paper. She still consumes news, her own curated version. We all have that power today.

Columnists have fewer potential readers than ever before. It’s an older crowd that gets the paper. Competing content is everywhere.

Whatever reach he has, my letter (if published) correcting his misguidance will have even less!

I Don’t Want To Lose The Past

Unfortunately, the downside is we’ve got a lot of orphaned data. If you saved a photo on a floppy years ago good luck seeing it!

dvd_discs.pngA friend asked me to help him with his website. I spent a few hours transcoding video to “flv” files last night. He gave me the video on DVDs¹. Boy, there’s media that came and is now going in a hurry! I carry 8 Gb of memory with my keys–a lot more than a DVD can hold.

Since I started playing with computers we’ve gone from cards, tape and switches to three separate types of floppy disk, CDs and DVDs. Nowadays you’re just as likely to get movies streamed over the Internet without any physical media.

The floppies are so outmoded they probably can’t hold the documentation for today’s software much less the software itself! CDs aren’t much better.

As technology moved forward our demand for storage has increased. It’s like closet space at home. You never have enough.

Unfortunately, the downside is we’ve got a lot of orphaned data. If you saved a photo on a floppy years ago good luck seeing it! Who knows how long will be before computer manufacturers stop including DVD drives too! They’re bulky, power hungry and expensive.

A tattered copy of an old newspaper is still readable. My 1968 Fortran programming masterpiece (adding 50+5) or a photo from a turn of the (21st) century Sony Mavica camera not so much. Even the archives of the Internet aren’t so permanent.

I just looked for my earliest net posting, November 11, 1992, but couldn’t find it! It had been safely held when Google acquired the entire Usenet archives a few years ago. Where is it now?

I like the expanding abilities of our modern society. I just don’t want to lose everything we’ve done up until now. It seems like that might be happening.

¹ – The video I was given had been saved by a video editor program, then burned in standard DVD format. Bad idea. Even when first used engineers knew DVDs had limited capacity. The format used for DVD movies and the like is lossy and compressed. Video should never be transocded to a DVD unless it will never be used for anything but watching. He should have saved the files then burned them as is–unplayable on a DVD player, but higher quality for my need.

Why Is An Apology A Rarity?

At home Helaine and I have talked about this a lot. Should I have said anything? Most forecasters said nothing or tried to spin their way out. Maybe they’re the smart ones?

Last night as we began our news I came on to talk about the weather ahead. Before I did I paused to apologize for what was a busted forecast. Our webguy, Jeff Bailey, posted the apology to our blog. Someone else picked it up and put it on Youtube. A TV insider website, FTVLive, splashed it across their front page.

ftvlive screencap.jpg

Rarity…. Weatherman Takes Blame for Bad Forecast

Here’s a switch! Weatherman says he was wrong and sorry for bad forecast…

Apology lead the news. We have the video….

Talk about breathless prose! I didn’t cure cancer. I just told people how badly I felt for a forecast that went wrong and adversely affect their day.

This afternoon the editor of the New Haven Register asked me to write something for their front page. It will be in the paper in the morning.

At home Helaine and I have talked about this a lot. Should I have said anything? Most forecasters said nothing or tried to spin their way out. Maybe they’re the smart ones?

“Everyone was wrong.” I’ve heard that a lot. The problem is I don’t want to be an interchangeable forecaster. I’d like people to think I have something extra to offer.

Hopefully viewers will see this for what it is. When they give me their trust I take it seriously. That’s the bottom line.

My State Of The Blog Address

Over the years my traffic has gone up and down. It was highest just before I was struck by a hacker and lost my Google mojo.

Earlier today I got an email from someone who just discovered this blog. He couldn’t sleep and aimlessly went from page-to-page. He joins the 73,807 visitors in 2009 who came here 165,558 times and viewed 297,223 pages! My page counter currently reads 2,120,588 pages served since I began.

Over the years traffic has gone up and down. It was highest just before I was struck by a hacker and lost my Google mojo. Google has reinstated me to their index, but the traffic has never quite recovered though it’s getting close, again.

All of these statistics are possible because of Google. There’s a little piece of code on every page which connects to Google Analytics. GA quantifies everything that’s going on.

There was a time I was making a few bucks a day&#185 from the blog. Now it’s a few pennies. That’s Google related too-Google AdSense.

Posting my blog entries to Twitter and Facebook has made a difference. I know most readers don’t read every entry I write, but from time-to-time there’s something that catches social networking eyes and traffic spikes.

The blog is read around-the-world though over 2/3 come from the United States. Foreign viewers tend to come for something specific, stop by and never return. Connecticut provides the most readers. As far as I remember I have never mentioned this blog on-the-air.

I was REALLY sick… doctor to your hotel room sick… and didn’t post October 22, 2006. That’s probably the last day I missed. An unwritten rule demands a post every day. Often there’s more than one.

Each entry is written and rewritten. Seriously, everything is rewritten. Mistakes still get in. Helaine is my best editor, though she continues to refuse my offer to let her make the corrections on her own.

Writing this blog is the most disciplined part of my life. Until I began I had no idea how much one could enjoy writing.

&#185 – Before you poo poo a few bucks a day, over the year it added up to hundreds of dollars, which paid for the web hosting with a little left over for coffee.

Christmas At The Movies: It’s Complicated

Trust me, the Chinese restaurant might as well have hung a sign on the door saying “Se Habla Yiddish.”

its_complicated_poster.jpgThe Fox Family is living an ethnic stereotype, right? It’s Christmas so we went to the movies then ate Chinese food before I went off to work. Trust me, the Chinese restaurant might as well have hung a sign on the door saying “Se Habla Yiddish.”

I wanted to see the George Clooney movie. Stef and Helaine wanted Meryl Streep’s “It’s Complicated.” Two against one. Outvoted again.

They made a great choice.

This was not a complex story in spite of the movie’s name.

Meryl Streep is divorced from Alec Baldwin, but with three children, a college graduation and wedding-to-be it’s tough for him to be out of her life. Baldwin’s character realizes he wants to get back with Meryl just as she meets Steve Martin–the architect supervising an addition to her home.

Hit pause a second. We’ve got to talk.

I haven’t seen this much effortless affluence in a movie since Doris Day swooned over Rock Hudson. Streep lives on a multi-acre estate overlooking the Pacific in Santa Barbara. Her sole source of income seems to be an upscale bakery/coffee shop. Unless she’s baking up twenties there’s no way this could happen!

I know, it’s a movie. Buy the premise, buy the bit. Fine. We move on.

The story is sweet, clever and mainly well acted. It was edited with a meat cleaver.

Who gets the blame: cinematographer or editor? There were cutaway shots behind a person speaking… but his jaw isn’t moving (the shot’s from behind so you don’t see his lips). Maybe I’m too critical, but that injures a movie and reduces my enjoyment.

Good grief Meryl Streep is good. She is incredibly comfortable in her own skin. That serve her well. It just doesn’t seem like she’s acting! That’s how it’s supposed to be.

“She makes the people she works with better,” added Helaine as we did a postmortem on the way out of the theater.

Alec Baldwin, as the ex-husband, is a guy who seldom looks past his own needs. It’s not like he’s trying to hide that. To meet him is to know the only way he can be is needy.

I was a little disappointed by Steve Martin in a role in which he seemed self restrained. He is a favorite of mine, so this is not idle criticism. I’ve just seen him bring a lot more to a role.

There were no surprises, no out-of-the-blue plot twists, no unexpected drama. That’s part of the reason this movie works so well. It is clever without being gimmicky.

The three of us really enjoyed it.

The Chinese food? Well that goes without saying. The movie may change from year-to-year, but the restaurant is always Dynasty in North Haven. As always it was delicious.

Video Editing Magic On My iPhone

It resides on the iPhone, so you edit with your fingers!

reeldirector-screen.jpgOK, this is very cool. No, more than cool it’s groundbreaking. The video attached to this entry is astounding for the mere fact it’s here–shot and edited on my iPhone. This isn’t a small incremental technological step–it’s a leap!

First let’s talk camera. The iPhone will never be confused for my DSLR, but it’s capable of photos meant to be used as Internet illustrators. The still and video camera performance is very good, especially when you consider the size.

Apple wisely put a wide angle lens on the iPhone. It is nearly the perfect focal length for a tiny camera because it allows you to be close while capturing a wide field. A wide angle lens also reduces shake.

Lots of phones have cameras. No need to be impressed yet.

The amazing part is an app I bought for $4.99. It is a video editor called ReelDirector. This is a simple editor with transitions and a font generator for titles. It resides on the iPhone, so you edit with your fingers!

One of our photographers at work said, “Ok, you can shoot and edit video on your phone…virtually putting me out of work!!”

It has not been easy to trim the source video. Whether that’s an acquired trait remains to be seen. It can be done.

This editor doesn’t support b-roll, so no covering long sound bites. It also won’t pull music from your iPod library–a missing feature the developer blames on Apple and their iron fisted control over the entire iPhone experience.

The titling feature is only available for opening and closing credits. You can’t “font” someone speaking on-camera.

I can’t believe I’m finding fault because this app is magical. No one has ever considered so daunting a task in so small a box. Video editing is usually a sophisticated challenge with some software suites running many hundreds of dollars per copy and demanding “heavy iron” computers.

This video is hosted on Youtube, meaning the quality has been reduced a little. You can see a higher quality Youtube version here. It’s still not too bad. See for yourself.

Will You Pay For Info? Confusion Reigns

An eyeball viewing content on the net isn’t worth as much as that same eyeball watching a TV commercial.

ny-times-technology-page.pngAt the TV station my bosses have a quandary. They know many of you are changing your habits and getting your info on the Internet. Should we follow you?

Don’t answer yet because the problem is complex and confusing.

An eyeball viewing content on the net isn’t worth as much as that same eyeball watching a TV commercial. We move you to the net at our own peril. Of course if we could charge viewers to subscribe to our product, as cable TV and satellite radio already do, we could supplement income from commercials and continue to pay the mortgage.

So far getting consumers to pay for web content isn’t very successful. At one time the NY Times had a partial paywall behind which its columnists and some other premium content lived. No more. The Wall Street Journal is currently somewhat successful in charging for much of its content. There aren’t many other examples.

Entire lines of business are dependent on getting the correct answer to this question which is why the Technology page on the NY Times website is so frustrating. Co-existing on one page are the following headlines:

  • 80% of US Consumers Won’t Pay For Content
  • About Half in US Would Pay For Online News, Study Finds.

Is there an editor in the house? Aren’t these mutually exclusive?

If the answer was easy we’d all be doing the right thing today instead of being petrified what we’ll do is wrong.

Blogger’s note: For clarity I used Photoshop to make the capture of the Times Technology page fit on your screen. Nothing germane to my point was removed.

Media Matters

Businesses that run on ad revenue are really hurting. Old media. New media. No difference.

My editor emailed earlier today. Tough quarter. Would I be willing to blog for them a little less? Sure.

I feel bad. Businesses that run on ad revenue are really hurting. Old media. New media. No difference.

Two editors left the Courant today. One jumped, the other was pushed. The one who left on his own volition said he couldn’t do what they wanted him to do. It’s good to be principled–and costly.

The Courant and WTIC are consolidating news operations. I’m not sure if that was part of the now-former editor’s decision, though it sounds feasible. Even though the FCC has tried to get the Tribune Company to own one or the other (not both) for years they will combine. Chutzpah.

Two Stops On A Busy Day In New York City

I’ve been writing for PCMag.com’s websites since May. My only contact has been through email and phone calls. They know I’m alive because I cash their checks!

I am not from the morning people! Unfortunately, the only way to spend the day in New York City is to wake up and leave early. I was up by eight–don’t laugh that’s early for me. I was on the 9:30 AM quasi-express (local to Stamford then express 125 Street) from New Haven’s Union Station.

nh-train-station-underground-tube.jpgAround 20 years ago the underground passageway to the New Haven platforms was turned into a tube of aluminum foil. I took two photos before someone from the New Haven Parking Authority told me to stop. “Homeland Security,” he said. Right.

Just last week the National Press Photographers Association wrote Amtrak (Union Station is theirs) about this very same problem saying, “As far as we can determine, there are no pertinent laws, rules, or regulations specifically prohibiting photography nor any Amtrak rules or regulations establishing a permit scheme.”

metro-north-trains.jpgI stopped taking pictures, though the inner Geoff was screaming at me to press the point.

It is nearly two hours from New Haven to GCT. I reverted to my 12-year old self and stood at the front window looking down the tracks. There’s a lot of rail traffic on this line and a lot of maintenance work being performed.

I wish Metro-North washed their train windows more often.

NYCTA-subway-car.jpgI snapped a few shots in the terminal than headed down into the subway for the trip to PC Magazine. I know many out-of-towners dismiss the the subway but it’s the best way to get around by far! The trip to 28th Street took around ten minutes. My destination was a block away.

I’ve been writing for PCMag.com’s websites since May. My only contact has been through email and phone calls. They know I’m alive because I cash their checks!

I cleared security and headed to the 11th floor. Carol Mangis, my editor, was waiting there. I like referring to her as “my editor.” It makes me feel like a real writer.

She’s very nice. Of course I’d already figured that out. This was just on-the-ground confirmation.

We walked around the office and I got to put faces on the names I’ve been reading–some for years. And again, as with Carol, they seemed very nice.

pc-magazine-lab.jpgOK–an admission. I have a weakness for writers. They are my rock stars. The writer’s skill set is one I value greatly. That they allow me into their fraternity scares me. If they’re letting me in, maybe it’s not as cool as I thought?

There’s a lot to be said for the PC Magazine offices. As you enter the first thing you see is the lab. There is row after row of test benches. One line had laptops. Another row had desktops. There were techie toys all over the place.

pj.jpgI finally got to see an OLPC in the flesh. Small. Toylike. Disappointing. It’s probably why we are seeing so many netbooks today. Like the first generation of PCs the OLPCs real purpose seems to be to spur innovation from others.

I visited PJ Jacobowitz in the photo lab. The new Canon 5D Mark II was sitting on a table with a 28-70mm f4 IS lens affixed. I looked for something weighty to knock PJ unconscious so I could make off with the camera. Too much security… though it was tempting.

carol-mangis.jpgCarol and I headed to lunch at an Indian restaurant. She said the neighborhood is now known for its huge Indian contingent. A line of taxis stood parked on the street. Probably Indian ex-pat drivers getting their lunch.

I could describe what I had, but I have no idea. There was some sort of chicken and some variety of bread and cauliflower in a spicy sauce. It was good. Isn’t that enough detail?

I spent a little more time at the PC Magazine offices before heading downtown. Again it was a very easy subway trip taking the local to Union Square then the express to Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange.

I didn’t realize until yesterday how secure and isolated the NYSE has become. Wall Street is no longer a vehicular thoroughfare–just foot traffic. The NYSE’s building itself is cordoned off from the street. They’d probably build a moat if they could.

wendie-and-geoff.jpgNightly Business Report, the daily business show on PBS, was celebrating its thirtieth anniversary. They were at the NYSE to ring the closing bell then broadcast the show from the trading floor.

My friend Wendie is the executive producer. That’s why I was there. I was also the semi-official behind-the-scenes photographer.

Getting into the Stock Exchange is no small task. If you’re on the list you enter from a canopied area at Broad and Wall. Inside you pass through a metal detector then get shuttled to the sixth floor.

I can’t remember the last time I rode in an elevator with an elevator operator!

Wendie and the others were working on the show. It sounds glamorous to be broadcasting from this storied location, but any time you’re away from home base there are a variety of obstacles to overcome. It’s never as easy as being in the studio.

nyse-board-room.jpgToday the problem was Internet access. There were three laptops on a large table, but I never saw more than one working at the same time! And the particular one that did work would change from time-to-time.

After a while we headed into the boardroom for a presentation. It is exactly what you’d expect–a huge table with embedded microphones. The walls had large portraits of past NYSE chairmen. There was intricate gold work on the the walls with more elaborate trim where they met the ceiling.

It didn’t just reek of money. It reeked of old money–very old money.

nyse-trading-floor.jpgOne of the exchange’s PR people caught sight of me. I was wearing an untucked shirt and jeans. Maybe, I could wear the jeans on the floor, but I’d need a coat. Luckily there was a closet full of them! They’d had this problem before.

As the Nightly Business crew moved up to the balcony from which they’d sound the closing bell I headed to the floor. IMG_6094.jpgOMFG! I’d had an experience like this before when I walked into Mission Control in Houston. Here was a place I’d seen a million times on TV and it was larger than life.

There wasn’t the frantic yelling and gesturing you’ve seen in movies, but there was plenty of noise and plenty going on.

The stock exchange floor is a room within a room. If you look up you can see the old high ceiling. Beneath that is a metal superstructure which makes the de facto ceiling today. There are clusters of computer monitors flanking the trading stations.

nyse-no-photo-sign.jpgI saw the little workspace reserved for Fox Business Network. It’s the size of a New York apartment’s half bathroom. That gives you an idea of the value of space in this place.

Considering all the times you’ve seen this place on the tube it was funny to see signs warning about photography! I wasn’t alone with a camera. There were crews from the various financial channels roaming the aisles and a house photographer who hung with us.

I photograph all signs that say no photography.

nbr-on-air.jpgWe headed back to the sixth floor to finish working on the show then back down around six. Now the elevator was without an operator. The trading floor was quiet. It was still very impressive.

The Nightly Business News crew had already moved in two cameras, lights, TelePrompters and everything else you need for a show. There were glitches with audio and some glare to be taken care of, but nothing more than any other night on any other show. There was no reason to panic.

paul-and-susie.jpgFrom 6:30 until 7:00 the show aired flawlessly. If there were problems they certainly weren’t noticed at home.

I gave Wendie a hug and a kiss and headed home.

The long trip from Connecticut to New York City seems even longer when going home. I easily made the 7:37 from Grand Central and was home before 10:00 PM.

street-sign-wall-and-broadway.jpg

It’s No iPhone–Should It Be?

Open source! It’s the reason I expect nerdy geeky boys to write killer apps for the G1–because they can.

google-phone.jpgTo quote Jimmy Carter (out of context), I have lust in my heart. I’ve been looking at pictures of the new T-Mobile Googlephone and lusting.

Open source! It’s the reason I expect nerdy geeky boys to write killer apps for the G1–because they can.

OK, I know, that’s not the real name but close enough.

There hasn’t been a buzz in the mainstream media like for the iPhone or iPod. It’s only Google, not Apple producing the software and HTC, a Taiwanese company you’ve probably never heard of, behind the hardware. My editor at PC Magazine IM’ed the headline on another editor’s story this afternoon: “The T-Mobile G1 Is No iPhone.”

And yet there’s still lust in my heart. Why?

Actually, it’s simple and it’s summarized in this short paragraph from Sascha Segan writing on Gearlog (where I also write).

“I found out today that forget video recording (which the G1 doesn’t do) – the G1 doesn’t even have a video player. No fear, HTC reps said, there’s already a third-party video player in the App Market, and it plays iPhone formatted videos beautifully!”

Open source! It’s the reason I expect nerdy geeky boys to write killer apps for the G1–because they can. If Google and T-Mobile don’t stand in their way (I expect Google to be more open to this than T-Mobile) this phone and others like it will create their own excitement and market. T-Mobile, don’t stand in their way.

Right now there’s a lot of grousing in the dev community as Apple stands in the way of perfectly good iPhone apps because… well, just because. That shouldn’t happen on an open platform like Android, the open source operating system under the G1’s skin.

This past weekend Helaine asked about a Verizon commercial we saw. They were selling some overpriced music service. “Why,” she asked? Probably because the deal was formulated according to marketing potential instead of user desire.

Open source answers to user desire.

I still have a year on my at&t contract (it’s officially all lower case letters even though it looks wrong). I have a year to lust after everything new. Then, I have to curb my lust and become practical.

My Multiple Writing Voices

I write this blog and a few web oriented things at the TV station. For the last few months I’ve also been writing for AppScout.com and Gearlog.com, both owned by Ziff Davis, the parent company of PC Magazine.

Unlike my other writing, those two websites have an editor. Someone is looking at my work and making sure it passes muster.

It only took a few entries to figure out most of what Carol Mangis (my editor) wanted. I changed my voice and the structure of my writing to fit their website–but I’ve only changed it there. I’ve tried to leave my voice on this site as it was. It’s the literary equivalent of an actor performing in dialect, right?

This site uses very short paragraphs.

Carol likes longer paragraphs, which is what she gets. Posts for her also, contain, fewer, commas. I’m too free with commas. My tone there is more snarky and openly opinionated.

I find it interesting my own blog is less opinionated than what I write for others.

I’m not complaining. It’s actually fun to write for an editor. If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know I’ve often wished I had one here.

I had no idea I could adapt my style to fit someone else’s expectations. As with writing in general, there’s satisfaction in that for me.

The Writing’s Never Done

laptop keyboardI don’t know how other bloggers are about this, but I am constantly editing my entries. Not just the recent ones either!

Sometimes I’ll be drawn to an older entry, read it and be dissatisfied with what I see. It’s easy to open the editor and see if I can rework it.

Sentences formed of typed letters seems so much more permanent and meaningful than sentences formed of spoken words. I have to give them the proper measure of respect. Anyway, with Google, et al, what I write could live forever. That’s a lot of responsibility.

If an entry is rushed, as the one before this one was, the result is even more frustrating.

There wasn’t a lot of time between coming home from riding and going to work. I wanted to chronicle some observations. It never got more than a cursory re-read.

“What was I thinking,” I asked myself a few minutes ago. It’s just been rewritten.

The power of the word processor is one of the most amazing and enabling features of the PC. Back when computers were science fiction, no one predicted word processing would be a killer app! Word processors work so well, it’s almost as if they’re encouraging you to revise your work.

Editing is what makes writing good.

Bad Times / Good People

People had been there for 25 or more years and the worst part is, their loyalty paid off for nothing in the end. Seems to be the state of affairs anymore.

I heard a rumor a local news anchor has taken a pay cut and lost a newscast as financial conditions deteriorate. With a young child, maybe this is what she wants. Maybe it isn’t.

The Journal Register Company, publisher of a few Connecticut daily newspapers, including the New Haven Register I get every morning, is suffering as well. Already a ruthless cost cutter, JRC seems to have run out of things to cut.

From Editor & Publisher:

Journal Register Co., its stock now selling at about the cover price of its newspapers, disclosed Thursday that it is in danger of being delisted by the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).

The Yardley, Pa.-based publisher of the Trentonian in Trenton, N.J., said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing that it had been notified by the NYSE that it had fallen below the Big Board’s “continued listing standard” of minimum share price.

This morning ATA, a discount regional airline announced they were shutting down. Ben Popken at Consumerist.com interviewed a now cashiered employee.

benpopken: What was the mood like once people started finding out?

ATAinsider: Very sad. It seemed somewhat inevitable, but we all had hopes, you know? People had been there for 25 or more years and the worst part is, their loyalty paid off for nothing in the end. Seems to be the state of affairs anymore.

We’re now entering the part of a recession where no one, outside economists, sees the way out. You’ll be hearing lots of the word “cyclical” describing our economy, with little explanation of how and why it’s cyclical, attached.

Even if the economy has always been cyclical, there’s no guarantee it will be this time, or that you won’t be the excess weight tossed overboard as companies scramble to preserve profits and managers scramble to save their own jobs.

Alas, business is never more likely to share equitably than when times are bad.

Bourne Ultimatum

Christopher Rouse – when you Google your name I want you to find this entry.

bourne_ultimatum.jpgToday was movie day at the Fox house. Helaine thought we were seeing Ratatouille (next in our Netflix queue). We weren’t.

What was in the envelope turned out to be the Bourne Ultimatum. I have not seen a movie this intense in at least 40 years&#185. Really, from the first frame this movie is running at top speed!

Christopher Rouse – when you Google your name I want you to find this entry.

Christopher Rouse’s work made this movie. He is the editor. More than Matt Damon or any of the other principals, Rouse controlled the pacing. I’m not sure I’ve ever called out an editor before. It was an amazing job. Whatever they paid you… it wasn’t enough.

Matt Damon plays Jason Bourne, a spy/assassin employed by the CIA. The movie is all about his attempts to piece together his past and figure out who his enemies are.

Helaine and I both noticed, we could easily live on the travel and/or car crash budgets! The movie moved across Europe, Northern Africa and New York City. A veritable fleet of cars was destroyed.

It’s spy fantasy. There are certain incongruities you have to buy into. People show no lasting effects from brutal fights and heal quickly… often in minutes Damon is reasonably unkillable.

The movie bestows upon our government’s spy agencies powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Say the word, an on-site camera pops up or a phone call is heard or a text message seen. I am sure some of this capability exists, though probably in a rudimentary form.

In the real world, the challenge is integrating thousands of systems, all speaking slightly different protocols. Companies often cannot get all their own systems to speak, much less bringing in others. Tales of the FBI’s difficulties with technology are legion.

Aside from the movie, my worry is some day this fantasy will become reality. I have no doubt intelligence agencies lust for this stuff. I pray we don’t allow it to happen without sufficent oversight.

In the end, this complex story makes sense. There is enough betrayal and double crossing to last a lifetime, but it works seamlessly.

&#185 – Sometime, late in 1967 or early 1968, I visited a friend at SUNY Albany. We went to an on-campus screening of “The Brig.” I am still affected, having seen this scarily intense movie.

Too Much Democracy

I read a lot of tech news online. It’s pretty tough to find a technical subject I don’t want to delve into.

Finding these articles can be tough, so like many people I harness the power of the Internet by going to ‘aggregator’ sites. These sites don’t usually produce content on their own. Instead, they link to other sites where the articles are kept.

Originally, my favorite was Slashdot. There were times I’d go there a half dozen or more times a day.

The way Slashdot works is, people suggest stories, editors check them out, they get posted. When first discovered, I liked Slashdot a lot.

Over time it got too slow for me. I’m not talking about how long it took for a page to load. It wasn’t pushing enough links my way.

Next came Digg, a San Francisco start-up headed by Kevin Rose, formerly of TechTV. This site also takes suggestions from readers. Instead of having editors pass judgement, Digg encourages their readers to digg a story (or not). Get a lot of digs and your story hits the front page and gets read by lots of people.

The more I liked Digg, the less time I spent on Slashdot.

Then came Reddit. Like Digg, this site’s content is juried by its readers. What I liked was, more stories made the front page and the lineup was volatile from hour-to-hour. There was lots for me to read.

The more I liked Reddit, the less time I spent on Digg. Even worse (for them), Slashdot was falling off my radar.

Now there’s a problem. A small community, like Digg or Reddit, can easily be overrun by single issue zealots. For Reddit especially, that means supporters of Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich.

Stop – I’m not criticizing either of these candidates. What I’m concerned about is how their supporters have hijacked these sites to get their points across. I want to read tech, not hear about who feels short changed and why.

Having no editor should lead to a democratically juried site. Instead, it’s leading to anarchy.

At the moment, I still read all three. Their order of importance in my life is currently Digg, Reddit, Slashdot… but Reddit is getting very close to dropping to number three.