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Linux 多线程应用中如何编写安全的信号处理函数

Practice Makes Perfect
If you all need help walking in super tall heels, the please read this article, Guide to Walking in High Heels Without Pain, that appeared in today's San Francisco Chronicle. I've seen plenty of women who should heed the tips...

If you all need help walking in super tall heels, the please read this article, Guide to Walking in High Heels Without Pain, that appeared in today's San Francisco Chronicle. I've seen plenty of women who should heed the tips in this story or should not be wearing high heels, because it ain't pretty or appealing.

My recommendation is simple: if you're going to wear four inch heels or above, then please make the investment in a pair that are well made, regardless of the brand or price. You're only placing you and your health at risk by wearing cheaply made high heels.

How big do koi grow? Koi - Going for growth. Large koi fish
How big do koi grow? Koi - Going for growth. Large koi fishKoi. Going for Growth. I remember at school, when asked to write A simple rule when going for maximum growth is that the stocking rate can never be too low. If growing large koi was Source: www.pond-doctor.co.uk Yishun Koi HouseMany [...]

How big do koi grow? Koi - Going for growth. Large koi fish
Koi. Going for Growth. I remember at school, when asked to write A simple rule when going for maximum growth is that the stocking rate can never be too low. If growing large koi was
Source: www.pond-doctor.co.uk

Yishun Koi House
Many Koi hobbists who practice constant Dripping will be able to testify that they experience much better growth rate than without using constant dripping.
Source: www.nskoi.com

Koi Growth Comparison
Photographs of Koi over time show the Development of Conformation, Color, and Pattern you notice when a fish has spent time in a well managed mud pond is the extreme growth rate.
Source: www.lonestarkoi.com

Ea koi Food - Nexus Eazy
Once Koi are mature, their growth rate slows considerably; in sexually mature fish, most of the food eaten is utilized in producing eggs or sperm in preparation for breeding
Source: www.nexuseazy.com

Koi Growth
Graph B shows length of Koi divided by age which is a rough gauge of growth rate. Graph C is of a Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1938) growth equation that shows length in centimeters and
Source: www.coloradokoi.com

Tags: pet, gold fish, animals, pets, fish

YouTube - Koi Wa Nandarou
Koi Wa Nandarou! (I Don’t Know If The Lyrics Are Right But Forgive Me If They Arent :S) Lyrics: Kiite mune no hajikete tobichiru nandarou Furete mune no chiisaku moeteru atsui
Source: www.youtube.com

Koi.com - Fall Harvest 2007
September 14, 2008 Washington Koi Show 2008; September 11, 2008 New Arrivals - Hanjuro Showa; September 11, 2008 New Arrival - Hanjuro Showa; September 6, 2008 2008 WK&WGS Koi Show
Source: www.carey.koi.com

AnimeGround - Boku wa imouto ni koi wo suru
Animeground offer Boku wa imouto ni koi wo suru for direct download on http and ftp
Source: www.animeground.com

Koi wa Tatakai - DramaWiki
Details . Title: ! Title (romaji): Koi wa Tatakai! Also known as: Love is a Battlefield / Love and Fight / Love & Fight / Love is a Fight
Source: wiki.d-addicts.com

Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru - Movie - Crunchyroll Library
Find the latest news, discussion, and photos of Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru - Movie online now. Yori and Iku love each other despite being twin siblings Based on Aoki Kotomi’s
Source: www.crunchyroll.com

KOI USA Magazine
Washington Koi and Water Garden Society Koi Show While not generally featured here at the website in each issue of KOI USA there are reports about ACKA shows and others too with
Source: www.koiusa.com

Koi wa a la mode mp3
To whom to sell the koi wa a la mode mp3? Write on mine e-mail or call.
Source: www.coltech.vnu.edu.vn

The World in Your Backyard Koi Pond
The World in Your Backyard Koi Pond by B.K. Davis. Every day we react to stresses in our jobs and on the highways. We read in newspapers and see on television the ravages of
Source: www.jadedragon.com

“Koi Bowl, Grand Prize WA Koi and Water Garden Society 2008″ by
Works of art by Allison Moore Detail View of “Koi Bowl, Grand Prize WA Koi and Water Garden Society 2008″
Source: amoore.aftosawebhosting.com

Tags: fishes, pet, animals, pets, fish

INEX: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (Yukie Nakama)
Uso Koi (2001) Trick 2 (2002) Gokusen (2002) Night Hospital byouki wa nemuranai (2002) Mushashi (2003) Gokusen
Source: infao5501.ag5.mpi-sb.mpg.de

Manga Fox: Koibana Vol.01 Ch.004: Uso to Koi no Hajimari Online Manga
Read Koibana Vol.01 Ch.004: Uso to Koi no Hajimari manga chapters online for free. No download or registration required.
Source: www.mangafox.com

Baka-Updates Manga - Oakla Shuppan
Uso to Coffee to Amai Kiss: Usotsuki na Kimi no Toriko: Wagamama dakedo Itoshii Hito Koi to Uso to Pride to: Koisuru Kimochi wa Zettai Fukujuu!? Koisuru Ossan: Kokkyou no Chou
Source: www.mangaupdates.com

YouTube - Koi Koi Seven OP
todas las imagenes, videos, canciones y AMV`s son propiedad de sus creadores, autores e interpretes. Y son usados en esta pagina con uso informativo sin fin de lucro ni veneficio
Source: www.youtube.com

Yukie Nakama - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Uso Koi (2001) Trick 2 (2002) Gokusen (2002) Night Hospital byouki wa nemuranai (2002) Musashi (2003) Gokusen Special Sayonara 3-nen D-gumi Yankumi namida no sotsugyoshiki (2003)
Source: en.wikipedia.org

Yukie Nakama - Wikip dia
Uso Koi (2001) Trick 2 (2002) Gokusen (2002) Night Hospital byouki wa nemuranai (2002) Musashi (2003) Gokusen Special Sayonara 3-nen D-gumi Yankumi namida no sotsugyoshiki (2003)
Source: fr.wikipedia.org

Actors - Yukie Nakama
Nisennen no koi / Love 2000 (2000) Trick (2000) FACE: Mishiranu koibito (2001) Ashita ga arusa (2001) Uso Koi (2001)
Source: listing-index.ebay.com

Koi Wa Nandarou - Asumi Nakata | Listen music - Demo Music
Atashi kitto koi shitsudzukeru kono KOKORO naninokamo ageru Hashiridashitara tomaranai aishitarinai uso ja nai Sorasanai hanarenai ima wa hitori ni narenai
Source: music.yeucahat.com

Tags: fish, koi, animal, gold fish, animals

Gaara of the Sand, a Naruto fanfic - FanFiction.Net
Baki-sensei will punish us if we do not represent the village properly.” He spoke only to Temari; both of them knew there was no question of Gaara’s success.
Source: www.fanfiction.net

Baki | MyLoversWish.com
Tag Archive | “baki” Zarurat hi nhi alfaz ki pyaar to cheez hai bus ehsaas ki Lootey Koi Mann Ka Nagar; Ek Shaqs; Making of Dance Pe Chance
Source: www.myloverswish.com

Isle Of Ely Koi
ISLE OF ELY KOI has been trading since September 2002. Whether visiting us at our All Lifetech Flow pumps have a very high flow but no real pressure so are ideal for Baki
Source: www.isleofelykoi.co.uk

Urduseek.com - Chat | English - Urdu Dictionary
marey hasband 2 din pahley hi NIJAIYA sai aye hai waha bhi mosalmanoo ka bohat bora hal daikh kar aye hai INSA ALLAH moka howa to bataongi lakin ais mai bhi koi sak nahi kai baki
Source: urduseek.com

some best shayaris
Koi aas nahi baki, Lekin bata do etna .. Maine chaha bas tumhi ko, Kya ye meri bhool thi .—–Ai Khuda, apne chand pe itna
Source: www.funonthenet.in

Sawf : i need ur help plz
hai ki mere pass paise nahi hai kul mila kar kar main ek sam ki fees to jama kar sakta hu lekin baki ke paise nahi hai mere pass is liye main aap ke help chahta hu agar mere koi
Source: www.sawf.org

Tags: koi, animals, fish, pets, animal

KOI PASSION - Chauffage Bassin ELECRO
Koi Passion site d di la passion du bassin et des carpes koi. Sp cialiste du jardin aquatique et des kois en Alsace. Forum , boutique en ligne , galerie photos , une
Source: www.koipassion.com

aqua-center-trading’’s Store - Maison, Jardin, Bricolage’
10 kilos d’aliments pour poissons bassin koi stick pro: Buy Now! EUR68.00; 10 kilos d’aliments poissons bassin stick couleur pro: Buy Now! EUR68.00
Source: store.auctiva.com

chateau des Allues : the orchard
As central decoration sits a vast bassin with multicolourd Ko carp and a fountain. This is Grandma s favourite place. In the summer months one can pick flowers, fruit
Source: www.chateaudesallues.com

Photos bassin aquatique, poissons, plantes - D cor Aquatique
Poissons de bassin Poissons de bassin, Carpe Ko , Carpes Ko Japonaise, Carpes Ko Europ enne, Shubunkins, Poissons rouges, Esturgeons 113 photos
Source: www.decor-aquatique.com

Passionpond :: koi pond, Japanese gardens, top japanese koi, koi show
The Japanese koi, sturgeons and other ornamental fish are not forgotten. I propose to discover a wonderful natural pond made by Specker Paysage. Arts et Bassin
Source: www.passionpond.com

bassin, carpe ,koi,bassin de jardin,
tout sur le bassin de jardin,pour carpes koi Ce guide pratique de la p che en eau douce, enti rement illustr de photographies et de dessins
Source: www.bassinkoi.fr

Boutique Bassin KOI PASSION
Bienvenue visiteur! Voulez vous ouvrir une session? Ou pr f rez vous cr er un compte? Bienvenue dans notre E-boutique en ligne KOI PASSION sp cialiste du bassin et des carpes
Source: www.koipassion.fr

Spierings Vis - Siervis kwekerij: Koi
KOI. Spierings vis heeft koi in 7 kwaliteiten: Grote koi in het show bassin, Koi uit Japan, Koi select, Koi A, Koi B, Koi broed en Koi
Source: www.spieringsvis.nl

Tags: fish, pets, animals, pet, koi

Newsletter December 2006
According to Taba, after the Japanese saw the Hawaii Goldfish and Carp Association in operation they went back and started their own koi organization in Japan.
Source: koicluboftheair.org

KCMT Home Page
Koi Carp and Fish Ponds Information: A beginner’s guide to keeping Koi fish in a backyard recirculated freshwater pond. Tennessee Aquaculture Association
Source: www.kcmt.net

Current knowledge on koi herpesvirus (KHV): a review
Schlotfeldt H.F. (2004): Severe losses of common carp in Germany due to koi herpesvirus (KHV). Bulletin of the European Association of Fish Pathologists, 24, 216-217.
Source: www.vri.cz

Leroy Taba on the Hawaii Goldfish and Carp Association - Koi Forum
Did Leroy Get it right about them being the oldest? (I’ll repost responses that are not profane) Leroy Taba, representing the Hawaii Goldfish and Carp
Source: www.koi-bito.com

Koi Anatomy
Southwest Koi and Pond Association (SKAPA) CELEBRATING OUR THIRTEENTH YEAR! 1996-2009 Watt, Ronnie; de Kock, Servaas Delta Books, Johannesburg, S.A. Koi Carp
Source: www.skapa.org

Carp - ninemsn Encarta
CARP - A New Vision of Aging for Canada. Canada’s Association for the 50Plus, a New Vision of Aging for Canada. broader European koi as Cyprinus carpio variety koi. The grass carp is
Source: au.encarta.msn.com

KoiToTheWorld.com - Top quality Imported Japanese Koi, Koi Food, Koi
Middle Georgia Koi Society - Norbun Watson E Mail; Hawaii. Hawaii GF & Carp Association - Leroy Taba E Mail Web Site; Idaho. Idaho Water Garden Society - Sue Boydstun E Mail
Source: www.koitotheworld.com

What’s new at Rain Garden
NOTE: The Ohana Koi and Goldfish Show is coming up on June 21, 2008 at Kalani High School, Honolulu, Hawaii. Until the Hawaii Goldfish and Carp Association web site
Source: www.raingarden.us

AQFI - Goodwin Presentations
during koi shows. (poster) Biennial Meeting of the European Association of Fish Pathologists. Dublin, Ireland; A Novel Herpesvirus Affecting Koi Carp.
Source: www.uaex.edu

Home
The Society also runs THE WORLD KOI CARP CLASSIC, this is run on an annual basis where bowhunters from around New Zealand and abroad come together to bowfish Koi Carp
Source: www.nzbowhunters.co.nz

Tags: animal, pet, fishes, animals, koi

Aquatic Life Suppliers Information | Business.com
Breeder, exporter, importer and wholesale dealers of fresh water live aquarium fishes. Also includes everything for the Koi pond and water garden enthusiast
Source: www.business.com

Koi Health
Articles; Events; Calendar; Join Our Mailing List; Policies; Wholesale; Contact Us Reputable retail Koi dealers will quarantine, heat and ’scope’ their incoming fish
Source: www.pskoi.com

Bronze Custom Sculptures Dealers, Resellers and Wholesale
Two Koi Fish Fountain Dealers, Resellers & Wholesale. Dealers Information. ALL CLASSICS has the largest
Source: www.allclassics.com

koi, Home Garden, Clothing, Shoes Accessories items on eBay.com
Buy koi, Home Garden items on eBay. Find a huge Art from Dealers & Resellers (72) Wholesale Lots (3)
Source: shop.ebay.com

Ordering / Info / SC-KOI.COM - Sing Chang Koi Farm - The Original from
As most of our international customers are wholesale Koi dealers and/or enthusiasts we usualy do business with them on a very sophisticated level where every customer is treated
Source: www.sc-koi.com

Koi.com - Sales
Use this form to contact Pan Intercorp regarding wholesale issues. We welcome new dealers and distributors Thank you for your interest in our koi. All of our koi are imported
Source: www.koi.com

Koi in Irvine, CA 92602 - cbs2.com
Find the best Irvine Koi. Get phone numbers, ratings Aquariums Supplies, Aquariums & Aquarium Supplies Dealers Tags: Wholesale Seafood, Fish & Seafood Wholesale
Source: mojo.cbs2.com

Pacific Coast Distribution - Wholesale Koi and Water Garden Prooducts
Wholesale Koi Supplies ship to your customers, and only sell to qualified dealers in the pond and garden, or related, industries.
Source: www.pacific-coast-distribution.com

TagTooga : agriculture / koi pond
koi, koi for sale, koi fish sales, koi fish wholesale, koi fish, japanese koi fish UK based koi carp dealers, supplying a wide range of Japanese Koi. Filtration systems
Source: www.tagtooga.com

Tags: animals, fish, fishes, pets, animal

hopoe | MySpace.com
koi goddess:. heitiare TRIXIE “KA’BOOM” FIREC StaceofBase Devon; Kristie P.K. kristie piquet *Soo Baby* India Soo Didn’t you see my birthday pics?” I did, and you are the
Source: www.myspace.com

cricket hattrick - cricket india match pakistan s v - cricket cellular
beaded cricket pattern - cricket kyocera koi - cricket cellular phones - cricket phones chicago - cricket world cup squads 2007 - devon cricket, jamaican cricket team, cricket pics
Source: eigersaints.com

Slideshow of some pictures.
Posted by: chippewacat Devon UK (My Page) on Wed, Apr 27, 05 I would post some pics in the gallery here if it was did lose four about a month ago (replaced with 2 koi and 2
Source: www.uk.gardenweb.com

Pond Life: Forums: Sturgeon, koi, pond fish, fish health, water
We are Mags & Martyn from Devon. Martyn built our above Truth be told we would love to have a Koi but are still on Ordinance survey Maps. Look forward to seeing your pics
Source: www.pond-life.me.uk

UK Aquatic Plant Society Forum View topic - Loz’s Pond - lot’s of
Loz’s Pond - lot’s of pics. by Lozbug Sat Oct 20, 2007 1:40 Posts: 104 Joined: Sun Oct 14, 2007 9:03 pm Location: Devon approx, running a ‘’home made'’ filter set up. mostly koi
Source: ukaps.org

Persian Kitty ’s Adult Links !
Sweet Devon KOI’S BED & BREAKFAST - 25 pix, stories, sex tutorials AMATEUR LOCALS FREE PICS - 250 pix, thumbnails ASIAN THUMBS
Source: www.persiankitty.com

10 of the most ugliest fish you may see! : Fishing venues - Fishing
in Devon fishing in Devon fishing pole fishing shelter fishing tackle fish stocks fly fishing fly fishing reel force 8 bivvy Gordon Ramsay holiday cottages in Devon hooked on bass KHV Koi
Source: www.fishing-hotspot.co.uk

Rio 180 From September- April+kids Tank - Tropical Fish Forums
Group: Members Posts: 2995 Joined: 22-September 08 From: Devon - UK Member No.: 44980 think i might post pics of the other tanks just got to get round to it Take care Sarah xx
Source: www.fishforums.net

Tags: pets, pet, gold fish, fish, animals

Angelfish - Koi (Pterophyllum scalare)
Angelfish - Koi. By Shirlie Sharpe, About.com Social: Peaceful, but will eat small fish Lifespan: 10+ years pH: 6.8-7.2 Hardness: 6-9 dGH Temperature: 75-82 F (24-28 C)
Source: freshaquarium.about.com

All About Koi Fish and Ponds
In my FREE Minicourse, All About Koi Fish and Ponds, you ll learn If you keep the water temperature in between 61-75 degree Fahrenheit, Koi fish will have the maximum appetite.
Source: allaboutkoifishandponds.com

Kaytee Koi’s Choice Premium Fish Food at PETCO
Kaytee Koi’s Choice Premium Fish Food 15.5 oz. SKU: 994189. Feeding Instructions Feeding frequency varies with water temperature and the amount of growth that is desired.
Source: www.petco.com

Koi pond water temperature etc? - Yahoo! Answers
Koi fish do like warm weather, but what many people don’t know is that they are in Minnesota - and during the winter the temps go down to -20 degrees F air temperature. And my Koi
Source: answers.yahoo.com

Koi Carp Fish Can you have a Koi Carp Fish Pond?
Koi fish must be kept at a certain temperature, therefore cannot be subject to low temperates due to frost levels during the winter months. Additionally ensure that you are able to
Source: koicarpfish.info

Tags: animal, pet, fish, fishes, gold fish

Seven habits of effective text editing
I am not sure how I have never read this. Gotta read it…

I am not sure how I have never read this. Gotta read it…

I was first introduced to Pikchur while at Barcamp Miami, I met a couple of developers and talked to them about the project.

Pikchur is a multi-platform mobile photo sharing platform. Think of twitpics on steroids with a good design and some awesomeness sprinkled in for good measure. It is really the simplest way to share pictures on the go (yes, that is from the front page).

I signed up for a Pikchur account - grabbed the name aaron (to add to my flickr and linkedin collection) but since my trusty Blackberry 8700 (aka “The Calculator”) did not have a camera, I did not have any need for a mobile photo sharing platform.

Skip ahead a month - I just got the new Blackberry 8900 which has a fantastic 3.2 megapixel camera. I was playing with Twitter, Twitpix and a couple other tools when I pulled up Pikchur again.

I’ve been playing with Pikchur now for a couple of days and love it.

At its core, Pikchur gives you the ability to upload images from a mobile device, this can either be done through a web, email or mms interface. Once your picture (or pikchur) has been uploaded, there is a lot that happens.

Integration with other platforms.

Pikchur is integration at its finest. In fact the integration with other platforms is so seamlessly integrated into Pikchur that you don’t even need to have a Pikchur ID, but can log in using the credentials of any of the sites that Pikchur integrates with. Each connection is done through the individual platform API which makes the integration simple (and secure).

As soon as I logged in, I added my Twitter, FriendFeed, Facebook and Flickr accounts to Pikchur. I then sent a picture from my phone to the Pikchur email address and it was sent to all the platforms.

That was pretty impressive, but the Pikchur team took it one step further. Any comments that are made by pikchur users are also posted to the other platforms. This means that if I comment on an image in pikchur, then my flickr identity will also comment on the picture in flickr and if I’ve chosen to link up my Twitter account, an @reply will be sent as well. VERY cool.

Other Goodies
Now you’re probably wondering if it’s really that great an idea to automatically send all your pictures to all your different social networking platforms. The Pikchur team thought of that and came up with a simple yet effective way to turn off posting specific images to platforms.

If I am sending an email update and I want Pikchur to post an image to Twitter but not facebook then I will attach the image, add my subject line and then add the following tag to my email body.

+tw+ -fb-

Using the same “trigger” concept you can post an images into a “PikBoxes” tagged as “fun” using this format:

+fun+

Geotagging

By default Pikchur will read the geo data from your image and tag the images with the information. The homepage will show a google map with call-outs from locations where images are being taken in real time.

If your mobile device does not have GPS capability, you can manually add your data by appending the address to the subject line like this example:

Palm beach boat show * royal park bridge, 33401 *

There is still a lot of work to do

Despite my gushing over the sweet platform that is Pikchur, it is still very much a geeky toy and does not feel like it has received the UI attention that a powerful platform like this needs.

The social networking aspects of this platform are nice, however you can’t do something as simple as viewing the most recent photos of all your friends. You can’t flip back and forth between images in a photo set. This is my BIGGEST issue and there is a lot of pageviews which they are not getting because a user has no easy way to browse a photostream.

Also I would love to be able to do simple things like rotating an image after I uploaded it.

In the facebook integration, I would like to be able to have the option to change my status to the subject of the image with a link to the Pikchur page. Maybe as a “premium feature” I’d like to be able to post the full sized image to to Facebook (I’ll pay for that).

I think there is an issue when you combine triggers and email sigs. I’ll test that out later.

Conclusion

Having said all that I am LOVING Pikchur and I encourage as many people as possible to sign up to Pikchur and of course view my incredibly awesome photostream

Random Diversions on Shuffling Cards
I’ve been thinking a lot about the idea of practicing programming lately, after reading Steve Yegge’s “rant” on the subject. His claim is that programming is a lot like playing guitar – just doing a lot of it doesn’t make you any better; you have to specifically do things that will improve them. Dave Thomas [...]

I’ve been thinking a lot about the idea of practicing programming lately, after reading Steve Yegge’s “rant” on the subject. His claim is that programming is a lot like playing guitar – just doing a lot of it doesn’t make you any better; you have to specifically do things that will improve them.

Dave Thomas suggests in his Code Kata post that one way of practicing programming is by solving small-but-complex algorithmic problems, and he has a list of suggestions.

In the shower this morning, I was thinking about a problem that would fit nicely in that list. I’m writing a complicated bit of code that takes the triangles in a triangular mesh and loads them into a data structure. It would be nice to test it by taking a given mesh and loading the triangles in various random orders, and that immediately leads to the classic card-shuffling problem: given a list of objects, how does one efficiently sort them into a random order?

With cards, this is relatively easy at first glance: Put the cards in a stack (i.e., a linked list). Pick a random card from the current stack, and use it to start a new stack. Pick another random card, and put it on the stack. Repeat until the original stack is empty.

In practice, this doesn’t work so well: people aren’t very good at picking really random cards. Or anything else random; this is why random play doesn’t win rock-scissors-paper contests. But that’s a digression; we’ll assume that we have a “good enough” random number generator to use, just like a computer would.

Having a random number generator doesn’t solve the problem, though. It picks numbers, not cards. There’s still the problem of mapping the number to the card.

The trivial solution is to number the cards in the stack from 1 to 52 (thereby making it an indexed array), get a random number from 1 to 52, and pull out the corresponding card. That works nicely for the first card, but then we’ve got a stack of cards that are numbered from 1 to 52, but one of them’s missing. Now what?

We could renumber the cards after the one we pulled out, reducing each one’s number by one so that the deck is numbered from 1 to 51, but that’s still a lot of work – for the whole deck, it’s O(n²).

(Now that I’m writing this out, I see an obvious solution here that I didn’t see earlier. I’ll get to that later.)

Alternately, we could give up on renumbering the cards, and just leave them in a linked list. Then, when the random number generator gives us a number, we count down that many cards from the top of the deck. Again, for the whole deck, we end up counting O(n²) cards.

So, consider an alternate approach: Take the top card off the stack, and put it in a random place in the new stack. This looks like the same problem – how is locating a random place easier than locating a random card – but there’s a twist. Because we’re doing this in a computer, we can keep the cards in two orders at once. We can store them in one order that makes them easy to find, and simultaneously in another order that’s randomized.

First, consider the new deck as a linked list; we pick a card randomly, and insert the new card after it. On a pointer level, this means that the new card points to what the old card had pointed to, and the old card now points at the new card. The trick is that, when picking a random card, we don’t have any reason to care what order they’re in in the linked list. So, if we’re actually storing the cards in an indexed array, and putting each new card on the end of the array, then all we need to do is pick a random index and go straight to that card. Once all the cards are in the new deck, then we can traverse the linked list and pull them out in the shuffled order.

There’s a bit of nice optimization, too; we could pull cards off the bottom of the old deck just as easily as off the top, and since we’re putting them on the top of the new deck (insofar as actual storage location), there’s no need to actually move the cards at all; everything below the current index is the new deck, and above it is the old deck. If the cards are just numbers, there’s no need to even store the cards at all; we just store the pointers.

So, how does that actually get implemented? Start at the beginning of an indexed array of pointers (which are really just numbers). Increment the index. Pick a random bin below the current index. Take the number from the random bin and put it in the bin corresponding to the current index. Put the current index as a pointer in the random bin. Repeat until done.

…

So, back to that parenthetical note from earlier. There’s really no need to renumber all the cards, because they don’t have to stay in the same order. We could just take last card on the deck, and renumber it to fit in the gap, and be done. So, we take a random card out of the deck, put it at the first spot of the new deck, and then move the last card from the deck into the hole that got left. Or, to do this in the same space, we could just pick a card, set it aside, take the first card from the deck and set it in the hole, and put the picked card in the now-empty first spot. Now, the “new deck” is the first card, and the “old deck” is the rest, and so forth as we go along.

How does that get implemented?

Start at the beginning of an indexed array of card numbers (which are essentially pointers). Increment the index. Pick a random bin above the current index. Take the number from the random bin and put it in the bin corresponding to the current index (i.e., the end of the new deck). Take the current index (i.e., the card from the end of the old deck) and put it in the random bin.

An interesting similarity, isn’t it?

Mike Zafirovski.’s Nortel Legacy: Fail
With Nortel deciding the only course of action is a fire-sale of all assets, Mike Zafirovski’s reign as CEO is about to conclude. Without being too harsh, it’s fair to say Mike Z.’s initial - and perhaps last - stab as a CEO was a colossal failure. Sure, he dealt with some pesky accounting issues and [...]

With Nortel deciding the only course of action is a fire-sale of all assets, Mike Zafirovski’s reign as CEO is about to conclude. Without being too harsh, it’s fair to say Mike Z.’s initial - and perhaps last - stab as a CEO was a colossal failure.

Sure, he dealt with some pesky accounting issues and reduced costs by laying off thousands of employees, outsourcing jobs to low-cost places, and selling a few assets. But the bold moves that Nortel needed to survive and thrive in a volatile and competitive marketplace never materialized.

A perfect example is how Nortel’s lack of M&A activity, especially given Mike Z. hired George Riedl, an M&A wizard, away from Juniper. When your biggest acquisition is Tasman Networks for $99-million, it’s obvious you’re not in the game.

In hindsight, Nortel had nothing to lose by playing it safe and conservative. With cash in the bank and a stock price that, at one point, rebounded to nearly $20, Mike Z. had lots of options to do something dramatic and game-changing. Instead, he stuck to a game-plan he knew from General Electric.

To solely blame MIke Z. would be unfair. If people are looking for scapegoats, Nortel’s board is the perfect candidate. Over the past decade, the board has been a huge disaster.

Here are some of the lowlights:

- It let ex-CEO John Roth go a multi-billion dollar spending spree, many of which were mistakes that Nortel wrote off or sold

- Dismissing Gary Daichendt and Gary Kunis’ aggressive corporate makeover

- The hiring Frank Roth and Bill Owens as CEO, who were unsuited for the job.

- Letting Mike Z. do nothing as Rome (aka Nortel) burned.

Truth be told, Nortel could have been saved if the right moves had been made. When Mike Z. took over, it was a $10-billion that needed strategic focus and a new, bold direction. Mike Z. was handed a huge opportunity to make his mark.

Unfortunately, he dropped the ball and, as a result, Canada’s flagship high-tech company is going to disappear.

For more, check out James Bagnall’s story in the Ottawa Citizen.

Technorati Tags: mike zafirovski, nortel

With summer officially kicking off on Sunday, there’s still another two days to do some spring cleaning where it’s out with the old and in with the new.

To “monetize” spring cleaning, I’ve been using Cralgslist on a pretty regular basis over the past few weeks. Everything I’ve posted has attracted a healthy number of buyers, which has been pleasantly surprising. You always wonder whether anyone would be interested in buying your stuff so every time something’s sold, it’s a happy day.

At the same time, I’ve been using Craigslist to make a few purchases - a $200 refrigerator and a $200 stove, which have been major upgrades.

The best thing about buying and selling things on Craigslist is how it’s a win-win proposition. Sellers are happy to get a few bucks for selling things they don’t want/need, while buyers are happy to make purchases at reasonable/bargain prices.

It’s reminds me of the old days of eBay when deals where plentiful before it became a marketplace as opposed to people buying other peoples’ stuff.

Long live, Craigslist!!

Technorati Tags: craigslist

Opera is the little browser that could.

For years, Opera has been pushing out innovative features - it was the first browser to offer tabs, for example. Yet, it has struggled to gain much of the spotlight, especially in North America.

That said, Opera has been thriving. A case in point is the mobile market where Opera has more than 50% market share - something I didn’t realize until seeing a slide at the Canadian Telecom Summit earlier this week.

In an excellent analysis, Chris Messina starts by taking the blogosphere to take by not doing a good job in tackling Opera’s newest initiative, Unite, which is an attempt by Opera to include a “personal server” in a browser so you can easily share music, documents, movies and photographs with family and friends.

It’s an ambitious project but it shows the kind of innovation the various browser makers need to provide.

While Unite has huge potential, the reason it didn’t get as much attention as it probably deserved has a lot to do with Opera’s modest profile. Many people have never used the Opera browser, especially if you don’t live in Europe, so when United was announced, it was quickly dismissed as uninteresting.

As well, Unite was swamped by another round of Twitter news - this time how Twitter postponed scheduled maintenance to keep the lines of communications.

For anyone who dismissed Unite, it may be time to take another look.

Technorati Tags: browsers, opera, twitter

As some of you may know, there’s 30,000 city workers in Toronto are on strike, which has shut down garbage collection, day cares, community centres and other services.

Like a good citizen, I fired off an e-mail to my councillor, Joe Pantalone, who also happens to be the deputy mayor, in which I outlined my concerns and criticisms. Shortly afterward, I got this automated response:

“Thank you very much for taking the time to write and share your thoughts. I appreciate that and will include them with comments from others in the community. Thanks again,

To be honest, it seems strange to receive an automated response given the world of social media where “conversations” are happening on an increasingly basis between companies and consumers. And it seem odd to get this kind of response given how Obama Barack used social media so effectively during the U.S. presidential elections.

Yes, I know Mr. Pantalone is a reall busy guy these days with not enough hours in the day to personally respond to every e-mail he receives but there’s got to be a better way to talk with his constituents about what’s happening.

It would be great if Mr. Pantalone was using social media tools to have “conversations” but his Web site suggests he’s not using Facebook, Twitter, a blog, Flickr or YouTube. You can e-mail him but there’s no way to have a “conversation”.

We’re living in a world of two-way communications, and I want to see my local politicians get involved. Heck, Toronto Mayor, David Miller, is a Twitter addict (in a good way!) so maybe he should tell his deputy mayor to get on the social media bandwagon.

As the protests over the controversial presidential elections in Iran continue to maintain their traction, a question attracting more attention is whether Twitter has changed this week after the U.S. State Department asked it to postpone schedule maintenance to keep lines of communications open.

If Twitter is now deemed to be an essential communications medium, will that change how it’s regarded by the mainstream? In other words, will Twitter’s role within the Iranian political ecosystem cause people to no longer see it as a place where people talk about inane topics such as having coffee or tending to sick pets?

In some respects, this week could be seen as a juncture in time when Twitter took an important step forward to becoming an established digital communications tool, along with e-mail and instant messaging.

Twitter’s role in Iran could also be the turning point that could prompt even more traction for growth, which Compete.com suggested plateaued last month compared with April after a huge growth during the first four months of 2009.

For Twitter, its new status offers opportunities and challenges. Being seen as a mainstream communications tool could attractions millions of user names and, as important, respect as an essential service. On the other hand, it could also put more pressure on Twitter’s infrastructure at a time when Twitter appears to have got things under control.

And it wouldn’t be a proper discussion of Twitter if its business model wasn’t brought into the mix. What impact, if any, could Iran having on Twitter as a business? If Twitter is regarded as a must-have communications tool, does it also mean some people would be willing to pay for Twitter to have better QoS, etc.

For more thoughts on Twitter, check out CNet, which wonders if Twitter has become a critical application.

(Note: This blog post was cross-posted on Twitterrati)

Technorati Tags: politics, iran

One of the more frustrating things about the high-tech industry is the concept of the upgrade.

For developers, upgrades mean the opportunity to add more bells and whistles. If an application was great before, the upgrade is their way of making it even better based on the assumption that more is better.

The problem is more is often not better. In fact, more can be worse if it makes the software/application more difficult to use and unnecessarily complicated.

Case in point is Ecto, which makes a blog publishing tool for the Mac. Ecto 2.4.2 is solid, albeit lacking in frills and the add-ons that many of users like to use to pimp our software these days.

Unfortunately Ecto 3.0 is a different beast. It has a slicker user interface and an easier way to add blogs. Unfortunately, it’s really a downgrade when it comes to usability. It’s more difficult, for example, to add photographs and images, and inserting a URL now features an option to add a name/description, which is unnecessary.

Not to pick on Ecto - okay, I’m picking on Ecto - but it’s a perfect illustration of how you should really avoid upgrading to a “new” version if you’re happy with what you’ve got.

Technorati Tags: blogs, ecto

Find Your Most Popular Web Pages on Twitter with Google Docs
Learn how to discover and track the most popular pages of your website on Twitter using Google Docs. You can measure the Twitter success of your RSS feed or the entire site in one go.

If you were to measure the popularity of your website content on Twitter, the most effective way would be that you count the number of tweets (and re-tweets) that are linking to your web pages.

For instance, I can go to backtweets.com and it will instantly show me a list of twitter messages (and their total count) that mention any of my blog articles.

Which articles from your site are getting popular on Twitter?

The web interface of backtweets is pretty awesome for tracking popularity of web pages on Twitter one-by-one but imagine if you could use the same service to measure popularity of dozens of web pages or even your entire site in one go?

Well, here’s a Google Docs spreadsheet [*] that does exactly the same thing. It consists of two sheets - one for tracking RSS feeds and other for tracking multiple URLs.

[*] If you have trouble viewing the sheet, please open this read-only HTML version of the Google sheet. And here’s a video demo:

The text in the video will be more readable if you watch it in full-screen mode.

Here’s how you get started - just type the URL of any RSS feed in cell B1 and Google Docs will automatically compute the tweet count of all articles that are syndicated via that feed.

If you like to measure the same data but for your entire site, open the sheet titled "Web Pages" and copy-paste the list of all your URLs in column A. The tweet count will be reflected in the adjacent column and you can then sort by this column to find web pages that are most popular on Twitter.

And this computation happens in real-time so the Twitter numbers on your Google Docs will change if more people tweet that URL or if you some new content gets added to your RSS feed.

The Technical Details

You don’t need to read this for using the spreadsheet but if you are really curious to know how Google Docs could get the Twitter numbers for your blog feed, here’s what happens behind the scenes.

Cell B1 is the place where you type the web URL of an RSS feed.

Column A grabs the title of the 15 latest stories from the RSS feed using this formula:

=importfeed(B1, "Items Title" , , 15)

Column B displays the URL of these 15 stories using this formula:

=importfeed(B1, "Items URL" , , 15)

Now that we have the URL of your pages, we can use the BackTweets API to calculate the number of incoming links on Twitter for those web pages. BackTweets sends the data in an XML format so we use another Google Docs formula to extract the relevant information.

=importxml(http://backtweets.com/search.xml?key=XYZ&q="           &B3, "//totalresults")

You need to replace the string XYZ with your own unique API key and that can be requested at this page. It’s free for non-commercial use and you can make 1000 requests per day.

See the tutorial on Tracking Web Pages with Google Docs for a more detailed explanation of the ImportXML function.

Find Your Most Popular Web Pages on Twitter with Google Docs - Published at Digital Inspiration (RSS)

We have a new member in our family - a baby boy!

It’s such a joyous moment and blogging / twittering will stay light for a few days.

Thanks for all your good wishes.

A New Member In Our Family - Published at Digital Inspiration (RSS)

You may find this technique useful even if you are not a very tech-savvy user.

Before getting into the actual process, let’s look at a couple of real-world situations that explain why you may want to turn your home computer into a web server.

Situation #1. Say you have music MP3s, documents and other important files on the hard drive of your home computer. If you turn this home computer into a web server, you will be able to access all these files from office or any other Internet connected machine including your mobile phone.

Situation #2. You have some personal photographs that you want to share with other family members. You can either upload these pictures online to a site like Flickr or better still, just convert the computer into a web server. Now you can connect the camera to the computer, transfer the digital pictures to some designated folder and they’ll instantly become available to your friends and family anywhere in the world.

Situation #3. You want to host a website on the internet but the web hosting jargon like FTP, DNS, etc. is way too complex for you. The workaround therefore is that you setup a web server on your home computer (it’s easy) and then host a website in seconds without spending a single penny on external web hosting services.

Now if any of the above reasons look convincing enough, here’s how you can convert your Windows, Mac or Linux PC into a web server in less than two minutes - no technical knowledge required.

Go to labs.opera.com, download the Opera Unite software and install it. Congratulations, you are now running a web server on your machine and just need another minute to configure local file folders that you want to share with others over the internet.

Here’s an illustrated screenshot of the configuration panel - nothing technical here again.

Start the Opera Web browser (yes, that’s also you web server now) and enable the Opera Unite service from the lower left corner. Now double click the File Sharing link and select the folder whose content you want to share on the web. Any file or folder inside this folder can now be accessed over the internet - you can either use a public URL or specify a password for private sharing.

The following screencast video has more detailed instructions on how to get started with Opera Unite or you may refer to the User Guide if you get stuck somewhere.

Opera Unite looks pretty useful but there are other services around that can also do pretty similar stuff. For instance, both PurpleNova and Dekoh Dekstop enable users share content on the Internet directly from the hard drive without having to upload it anywhere.

Update: It’s important to note that your computer must be in running state and also connected to the Internet for others to download files and web pages since Opera Unite streams content directly from your machine - it doesn’t upload or caches anything to its own servers. Give it a shot. [flickr]

Turn Your Home Computer into a Web Server in 2 Minutes - Published at Digital Inspiration (RSS)

Tech Talk: SearchScanning With Yahoo and McAfee [del.icio.us]


Tech Talk: In Pictures Now Apparently All Free [del.icio.us]


Tech Talk: Send Your Name to the Moon! [del.icio.us]


Washington State’s WWI Records Now Searchable Online
The state of Washington’s World War I service statement cards are now available online. There are about 48,000 cards that cover Washington soldiers who served between 1917-1919. They’re available at http://www.digitalarchives.wa.gov/TitleInfo.aspx?TID=640. If you’ve ever searched WWI cards before this collection is pretty straightforward; search by first, middle, or last name. My search for John Smith [...]

6 Tricks to Help You Remember Names
Image via Wikipedia I’m not very good at remembering people’s names. I often start poorly by not learning a person’s name. Then, sometime in the future, I’m embarrassed when someone greets me by name and I can’t remember their name. I envy people who remember your name from the first time they hear it. The ability to remember [...]

I’m not very good at remembering people’s names. I often start poorly by not learning a person’s name. Then, sometime in the future, I’m embarrassed when someone greets me by name and I can’t remember their name.

I envy people who remember your name from the first time they hear it. The ability to remember and use names is a big boost to building strong relationships.

Here are 6 tricks I use to help imprint that new name in my memory:

1. Show interest in the other person – Your initial frame of mind makes a big difference in name retention. I have lost countless names because I was thinking about the impression I was making and not listening to the person I was meeting. There’s an irony about making a bad impression because you’re too focussed on making a good impression.
2. As soon as possible, repeat the name – It’s easy to confirm what you heard by saying something like, “Nice to meet you, Joan.” If the person’s name is a little unusual, you can repeat it to make sure you’re pronouncing it correctly. If you’re unclear about a name given via telephone, ask for the spelling. Saying the name immediately helps lock it in the memory.
3. Use it often – When you’re speaking with someone you’ve just met, use their name throughout your conversation. End your conversation with their name.
4. Write it on their forehead – Not literally! Picture the name you’ve just learned on the person’s forehead. Visualizing this incongruous image reinforces the name.
5. Use word association – Dora the Explorer is easy to remember because of the rhyme pattern. Mike Holmes is easy to remember by playing off his last name; Holmes on Homes. Come up with some sort of word association on a person’s name.
6. Write it down – The best thing I can do to learn a new name is to write it down. The minute I walk away from the person, I pull out my pocket pad and write the name. 90% of the time, that’s all it takes to seal the name in my mind. The other 10%, I can pull out the pad and refresh my memory.

Our names are important to us. We appreciate those people who take the effort to learn and remember our names. If you want to make a strong impression on someone you meet, remember their name.

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After chatting with Loic today of Seesmic, we discussed what brands may want from Twitter.  It’s true, I’m getting more client calls from the world’s top brands about how to use tools like Twitter as a collective team. Based upon my discussions with them, here’s what I see are some key needs in:

Listening:

• Ability to quickly scan what is being said about the brand, products, services, employees and competitors. Although difficult expect sentiment tools to appear that help brands with thousands of mentions manage the discussion.
• Ability to understand who is saying what, and understand their influence.

Management:

• Manage multiple accounts (Dell has about 35 seperate accounts) from a central team.
• Enable employees to tweet from their account: BestBuy created a custom CMS systems that allows approved employees to tweet to the main BestBuy account with a specific hashtag

Workflow:

• Triage incoming requests and topics to the appropriate teams for followup, much like a CRM system
• Tag and flag these requests, denote and track who responded to what, when and what are the end results.

Integration:

• These point solutions should integrate with other system such as brand monitoring, CRM systems
• The savvy companies will aggregate the discussion in Twitter about their products on their corporate website, making them more relevant.  Zappos was an early adopter, yet Skittles went too far.

Conversing:

• Enable multiple employees to post to single Twitter accounts (like a CMS system) some may have approval systems.
• Keep track of which employee tweeted and when, build in workflow as global teams will need to work together to respond to customers.
• Update: A few folks in the comments have requested a publishing timer, where folks could preschedule tweets.

Reporting:

• Brands must be accountable of corporate resources, every resource is an investment and reports about time-to response, number of followers, number of mentions and sentiment will matter.
• Be able to benchmark all of the above and deliver time based reports.

 Want more business case studies, I’ve read the proof of Twiterville by Shel Israel, it’s loaded with business case studies and written in a great story telling format, it’s going to be a desktop reference for me once it publishes. 

Although it’s Sunday, I’m on way up to San Francisco to the Twtrcon conference on the closing debate panel, where I’ll be arguing a contrarian position in Kara Swisher’s panel, I’ll make the case that Twitter doesn’t matter: instead we should focus on trends, and that Twitter is overhyped, I said the same thing at my 140TC keynote last week, Joe has the details.  Should be fun. 

Are you managing a corporate Twitter account? Leave a comment
Enough from me, what features to corporations want in Twitter clients, please leave your thoughts and needs below.

If this post was helpful, please copy and paste this into Twitter:

What Brands Want From A Twitter Client http://bit.ly/FWd7T

I’m wrapping up my report on “How companies should organize for social media” in a few weeks, and collaborating on a report with Zach Hofer-Shall (a digital device aficionado) on a “Comprehensive community checklist” and am going to start work on a research report exploring the social behaviors of Generation X, and how brands are reaching them using social media. (see my body of research)

I’m probably the youngest of the Gen X generation (people define the age groups differently, but the behavioral traits and beliefs are perhaps the most telling) and we’ve a unique way of growing up with Transformers, GIJoe, My Little Pony, Reading Rainbow, Regan’s Just Say No, and of course Michael Jackson (when he was black). We also grew up with technology: Nintendo games and “↑ ↑ ↓ ↓ ← → ← → B A”, boomboxes, Sony Walkmen and of course MTV and VH1 –or, at least that’s all that comes to my mind during my growing up experience.

Fast forward to 2009, we’re establishing ourselves in the workplace, becoming the successful professionals as we enter the early or mid-career phase of our lives. Yet with maturity comes the big “R” of responsibility: family, kids, the access to disposable income. As this generation, my generation, moves into the prime light, brands are also recognizing the importance to reach us, so I’m seeking your help to submit information.

Seeking Case Studies of How Brands Reach Gen X Using Social Media
I’m seeking examples from brands or agencies that have case studies of how brands have reached Generation X (my Generation) by using social media. This doesn’t have to be a formal PDF, but it’s most helpful if you include URLs or screenshots, a problem definition, a goal, and then measurable quantitative results. I’m seeking these within the next two weeks so by June 15th will be the last day to email me at jowyang at forrester.com.

For Discussion: How Would Gen X Behave If We Grew Up With Social Media
Oh, and to kick off a conversation, how would Gen Xers behave if we had the internet when we grew up, rather than in just the last decade and half? From turntables, cable tv, to compact discs, we mainly grew up as consumers of technology and media –not creators. We grew up with technology as consumer products, yet in many cases, these devices were not connected, not networked, and not tied together through the internet or wireless technology (we were often ‘nodes’ not networked). Do you think Gen Xers would use it differently than Gen Y? Would we be as willing to share all parts of our personal and social lives as some of our younger counterparts? You can learn more about how different generations around the globe access social technologies using our social technographics profile tool, love to hear your thoughts.

Nick Morgan has published a manifesto at ChangeThis, “Before You Open Your Mouth: The Keys to Great Public Speaking”. He starts off by calling most public speaking a “near-death experience.”

He asks, “Why is most public speaking so awful?”

His answer, “Beyond soulless venues and Death by Power Point, speakers make the same four mistakes over and over again, continuing the sorry state of the art.”

If you speak publically or give presentations, you need to read this manifesto. If you think you’re already doing a good job in front of an audience, check yourself against these four mistakes. If cover these keys in your preparation and presentation, fine. If not, none of these mistakes are difficult to correct.

Make the effort to change. Your audience will thank you for it.

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I’ve been watching this space for a few years now, and I’ve started to notice that the people (often those that we think of that are at the upper echelons) are not able to scale, as a result here’s what they’re doing to compensate:

Many social media bloggers don’t even manage their own accounts, they often hire virtual assistants to do their Facebook and Twitter follows and replies.

Quite of few of those top social media bloggers don’t even answer their own emails, they have a virtual assistant that reviews them, sorts them, and sometimes responds on their behalf.

Many of the top social media news blogs are on a race to see who can publish the fastest, why? whoever gets the earliest time stamp often gets the credit and links from other blogs, and will risest fastest on the techmeme tower or google news gauge. As a result, many of these blogs will publish the headline, then adjust, edit, format, punctuate, and add links to the post in real time.

A few authors that have published one of the thousands of social media books outsource their content to ghost writers who create the majority of the content. Although it’s the headlining author’s name that drives book sales, in many cases they don’t actually write the content.

Many of the top celebrities or top social media names don’t even write their own blog posts and tweets, they may outsource it to others.

So what does this mean? It means the social media space is starting to look like just about every other industry that starts to get mainstream. Social media is often the premise built on 1:1 relationships, and even with technology, that clearly doesn’t scale, and I can relate.

What about me? I’m asked every few days “How do you do it all” my answer is “I don’t, the wheels are falling off” Well you’ve probably noticed I’ve not been blogging much, nor tweeting lately, I’ve been under heavy travel and projects (that I’m behind on). Every blog post and tweet that you see is me, including all the errors and typos that come along with them. I will admit that sometimes, I even updated blog posts after they publish, to polish it up. I skim all my emails, read many, but if I answer, I promise you that’s always me. I may not be good at scaling my social efforts, but I assure you, I’m authentic, warts and all.

I can relate to those who don’t scale well. If you’ve ever met me at an event this last year, you may have noticed dark circles under my eyes, and somewhat of a flustered appearance. I recently had a long talk with a good friend yesterday, when I’m tired from traveling nearly every week, you may notice that I actually draw my strength from within or being online, not always from others. So if I’ve ever came across as a bit messy and sapped, I certainly don’t intend to, I’m just stretched to the limit at times. 

So what happened to transparency and authenticity?  Maybe it’s the econony, with less resources, and more pressure, we’re all being stretched to the limits.  Or maybe, this is the evoluation of every industry, music, art, and film started out simple and pure, then became institutionalized. Or maybe, I just never bothered to look  close enough.

Update: Chris Saad, who inspired me to write this, has responsed from his own blog. Paid content highlights the challenges. This post has generated a lot of discussion from my friends as I meet them in person, interesting.

Left: To watch this 5 minute video, click on image, then click on “Video” tab then the “Watch” icon.

This week, Facebook raised $200 million injection of capital from a relatively unknown Russian investor Digital Sky Technologies (DST), which has a few related properties. This investment is an exchange for preferred stock, representing a 1.96 percent equity stake at a $10 billion valuation, according to a Facebook press release.

I often get asked how Facebook could monetize, my take is that they are first focused on global growth they have aprox 200 million registered users (keep in mind that’s not the same as active) and need to perhaps double that amount to reach the population of larger websites (stats here).

I went to the SF Bloomberg TV studios for a live 5:45am pacific broadcast to accommodate the east coast market, to discuss my take, which you can watch. To watch the video, click to this page (or on the image above), then go to “Video” tab then the “Watch” icon.

Although I’ve been on many video podcast, this was my first interview on life TV, and as you can tell, I’m a bit awkward and very nervous. Being in a TV studio is so different than doing an in person interview as there’s no one in the room, I can hear the anchor via a small earpiece, there’s a very slight delay, I can’t read her body language, I didn’t know what she looked like till I saw the replay at home, and the only thing I can see is a little red dot engulfed by bright white lights. To overcome my nervousness, I wrote down my talking points the night before and rehearsed many times, a few awkward sentence here and there, but hey, it was a good experience, and I hope to do it again.

Back to the topic: Facebook’s future. I’d love to hear from you, what do you think they’ll do with this new funding, and how do you think Facebook will ultimately monetize?

Audiences place more value information that requires effort to absorb. Make them work to understand what you are talking about and why it’s important.

Don’t waste time planning and organizing your speech. Assume your speech will seem fresh and spontaneous, even if it wanders, includes irrelevant material and doesn’t have a conclusion.

If that approach makes you nervous, write out your speech and read it verbatim. This works particularly well if you have a PowerPoint presentation with the full text you are reading.

Speaking of presentations: the points of your slides shouldn’t be too obvious. Try and get as much text as possible on each slide. Include at least one ‘I know you can’t read this, but…’ slide.

Try to use a different color scheme on each slide. Look for combinations of text/background colors that are invisible to color-blind viewers, or lurid enough to cause physical pain.

Face the screen and read from your slides. Avoid looking at your audience.

Assume it’s the sheer volume of data that impresses your audience. Include tables with plenty of rows and columns to show how much work you did.

Flip through a series of information-dense slides faster than they can be read and comprehended.

Don’t make ideas more important that the data. You can’t argue with facts.

Try to avoid conclusions or speculating about why the facts are significant.

You are ’speaking’, so use language to your best advantage.

Speak just loudly enough to be heard under ideal conditions. You want the audience on the edge of their seats. Make them strain to hear.

Try and avoid eye contact. If you must make eye contact, stare at one person in the front row.

Demonstrate your vocal variety by starting each sentence loud, then getting softer to the end of the sentence.

The the most of verbal pauses such as, ‘um’ or ‘you know’, ’so’ or ‘and’.

Don’t leave time for questions. This just implies you did not do an adequate job of covering the material.

Never practice your speech ahead of time. You are confident in your ability to communicate, so practice would just waste your valuable time.

Stick to these guidelines and your audience -at least those who remain- will be quiet and non-disruptive. Also, your coffee break won’t be disrupted by people wanting to discuss your speech.

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• Presentation Lessons You Didn’t Learn in B-School (businessweek.com)

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Book Review: Ignore Everybody
I get a lot of books across my desk. Very few I get the chance to read, and very few I think are wonderful.   I was smiling ear to ear on a recent plane trip when reading a book written by cartoonish Hugh MacLeod, someone I’ve met several times and enjoyed reading his sometimes [...]

I get a lot of books across my desk. Very few I get the chance to read, and very few I think are wonderful.  

I was smiling ear to ear on a recent plane trip when reading a book written by cartoonish Hugh MacLeod, someone I’ve met several times and enjoyed reading his sometimes odd –yet insightful blog for many years.  

You see, his book Ignore Everybody, really isn’t a book.  

Instead, you should think of it as as that friend in high school who never followed the rules, but achieved his goals took you out for a beer 20 years later and shakes your shoulders and wakes you up.

Hugh’s book is about creativity and inspiration, how you should draw this energy from within –not from group think, or cubicles, or existing standards.    Like those having a beer –or two– with an inspirational old friend, his book is easy to read on a short flight, and contains his irreverant cartoons.

If you’re reading my blog, you’re likely pushing the limits of creativity of the digital space within your career (just as I like to do too) and this should be a book to grab and keep close to the heart.  I give Ignore Everybody 4.5 stars out of 5 stars, which matches it’s soaring amazon ranke of #38 in just three days.

Or, in the spirit of the book, “F-that”, don’t listen to me, go buy it and tell me what you think, and write your own review.

Submissions for On the Move have reduced since the global recession. I’ve started this series (see archives) to recognize and congratulate folks who get promoted or accept new exciting positions. Please help me congratulate the following folks:

Bob Pearson who used to head Dell’s social media activities joins President, Blog Council & SVP, Communities at GasPedal, becomes a Partner at Common Sense Media Group.

I spoke to Adam Weinroth former Marketing head at Pluck, who has relocated from Austin and is now in L.A. heading marketing for parent company Demand Media. Find Adam on Twitter

Clint Schaff is now the New Media Director at Roll International after working in it’s in-house advertising agency Fire Station Agency, you can find Clint on Twitter.

John Yamasaki joined Seesmic team as a Community Evangelist, in San Francisco, you can find him on Twitter.

Matt Miller has been named the Social Media Manager for Mpix.com, a division of Miller’s, Inc. Miller’s is a print lab in the United States.

Fred Alberti has been promoted to Director of Social Media for Salem Web Network.

Submit an announcement
If you know folks that are moving up in the social media industry, leave a comment below, or if you’re feeling shy (it’s cool to self-nominate) send me an email. Please include a link to your announcement, and ensure you’re really living and breathing in the social media world –this is not a small aspect of your role.

Seeking Social Media Professionals?
If you’re seeking to connect with community advocates and community managers there are few resources

List of Enterprise Social Media Professionals
This list, which started with just 8 names continues to grow as folks submit to it. List of Social Computing Strategists and Community Managers for Enterprise Corporations 2008 –Social Media Professionals.

See Web Strategy Jobs powered by Job o Matic (Post a job there and be seen by these blog readers, these affiliate fees pay for my hosting)

Read Write Web also has job announcements in Jobwire, although at a broader scope than my announcements

Connect with others in the community manager group in Facebook

Jake McKee’s community portal for jobs

Chris Heuer’s Social Media Jobs

SimplyHired aggregates job listings, as does Indeed

ForumOne Jobs for Social Media and Community

Teresa has a few jobs, some around community

New Media hire has an extensive job database

Social Media Headhunter

Social media jobs

Jobs in social media

Altimeter Group’s list of social media consultants and agencies

Hiring? Leave a comment
If you’re seeking candidates in the social media industry, many of them are within arms reach, feel free to leave a link to a job description (but not the whole job description, or I’ll delete it)

I’m seeking folks that are related to full time hands on social media strategy and community managers, to be on this list, so let me know if you see these folks, and please submit them –try to include links to announcements on blogs or on the wire. Also, I probably will not include executive management changes on this list at social media companies, as the list would go on and on, but you can feel free to express yourself in the comments!

Having too many stakeholders on your website results in forcing your users to trudge through a confusing experience, where each laborious step results in frustration then abandonment. Like poor Jack N on the left, you have frozen your own users, your website is SNOWED.

Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen Result in Mush
I’m sure you’ve seen it, websites where there’s such a jumbled mess of content on a webpage, you know it’s a battle from internal stakeholders. Typically, you see this jumble of information on large corporate websites, in particular, large tech companies with HW and SW products. (I know this as I used to do it)

Being SNOWED is far worse than Avinash’s acronym of HiPPO (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion). At least with a HiPPO there will be at least some direction where the website is headed.

What’s worse is having too many masters too serve, resulting in serving none. I created this little acronym which I encourage you to share with your stakeholders, hopefully your website won’t be SNOWED in either.

Case Study: American Airlines Website Afflicted by 200 Stakeholders
Take for example the American Airlines website, which was so frustrating to users that designer Dustin Curtis decided to mock up an improvement and write this open letter. One of the designers from AA responded, saying there were over 200 stakeholders involved in the final output of the product, resulting in the jumbled mess of a corporate webpage. Reminds me of this self-created video from Microsoft showing what would happen if they designed the iPod package.

Solution: Have an Empowered Web Strategist
Yes, we know that putting the needs of your users is key to a successful webpage, but it should also be coupled with the needs of the business. This is where the Web Strategist comes into play, who balances this with technology to deliver the right experience. This diagram of the three spheres of web strategy should come in handy, a great diagram to print out and put on the desk.

After being with Dreamhost since I launched this blog, I realized it was time to move on after my site would be down at least once a week, nor could it handle a large influx of Twitter users at a single time. To Dreamhosts credit they were very responsive to my support tickets, but I really never saw things improve as far as uptime goes, and that’s what matters.

Mitch Canter, my web designer is handling the migration as I move over to Media Temple, but there’s a few recent blog posts that are missing, but we’ll get it ironed out in short order. It’s interesting that Robert Scoble called me as soon as he noticed my site was down last week, reminding me that he works at Rackspace, but I’ve already started the migration plan.

Looking forward to good experience at Media Temple, I’ll keep this post updated as I learn more about the service.

Update: Some of my blog posts in the last few days are still being migrated, and I may have lost some of the comments, we’re working on retrieving those now. Hang tight till we get this all sorted out.

Things are moving very quickly now, in fact I was pleased to learn about these contextual ads from my new friend Cory O’Brien in SF yesterday.

In my latest report “The Future of the Social Web” we pointed that in the near future we’ll start to see web pages dynamically created based on user profile ID in social networks. Essentially, your corporate, media, or ecommerce site could provide contextual media, content, and advertisement based on users’ info before they login.

Here’s an early example of a contextualized advertising campaign from VW (by agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky, read more about the modernist campaign) that’s intended to help prospects find the right model based on their preferences. Please note this isn’t yet the full entry into the era of social functionality as users have to manually submit their login info or user name (like this Twitter example below) and just examines recent tweets. When the era of social context matures, it will look beyond just profile info, but also behavioral data, friend data, location, and content analysis of explicit and implicit data.

Above image: Facebook recommended these products to me on the VW fan page

Facebook, Twitter, have a tremendous amount of explicit and more importantly, implicit data that could serve up information about users, yet we should expect years of refinement for these engines to truly be accurate. Interestingly, the Twitter ad suggested I’d like the Jetta, yet the Facebook app suggested a Rabbit and Beetle, which I find funny as I’d never drive a Beetle, that’s really not me at all.

In the future, these ads, media, or recommendations should be more intelligent and also find friends with similar cars, or people with similar traits to me that I don’t know and suggest products. As user ID start to federate and connect with other such as Open ID and Facebook Connect, we should expect a higher degree of accuracy.

Then, users may choose to opt-in to expose parts of their identity as they surf the web on trusted sites to receive a contextual experience. For example, I may trust Amazon, eBay and Google search to expose my identity in exchange for a more personalized experience.

We should also expect a rash of privacy concerns and user backlashes to happen, even if they opt in, we’re just scratching the surface here. I have so much more to write on the topic of social context, but it’s 3am and I need to go back to bed, so I’ll save it for a future blog post.

The above ads are simple experiments of how context can be served up through social data

Expect this contextual content not to be limited to just ads, but also on media sites, ecommerce, corporate sites, and TV

Expect digital content to be contextual –even without express content of the users

During the early years, expect privacy concerns to overwhelm brands, causing them to rethink this approach

Although it will take years to perfect, expect context to increase CTR, and therefore the cost of ads

What did the Twitter ad and Facebook page recommend to you? Were they accurate recommendations?

I’ve been watching this space for a few years now, and I’ve started to notice that the people (often those that we think of that are at the upper echelons) are not able to scale, as a result here’s what they’re doing to compensate:

Many social media bloggers don’t even manage their own accounts, they often hire virtual assistants to do their Facebook and Twitter follows and replies.

Quite of few of those top social media bloggers don’t even answer their own emails, they have a virtual assistant that reviews them, sorts them, and sometimes responds on their behalf.

Many of the top social media news blogs are on a race to see who can publish the fastest, why? whoever gets the earliest time stamp often gets the credit and links from other blogs, and will risest fastest on the techmeme tower or google news gauge. As a result, many of these blogs will publish the headline, then adjust, edit, format, punctuate, and add links to the post in real time.

A few authors that have published one of the thousands of social media books outsource their content to ghost writers who create the majority of the content. Although it’s the headlining author’s name that drives book sales, in many cases they don’t actually write the content.

Many of the top celebrities or top social media names don’t even write their own blog posts and tweets, they may outsource it to others.

So what does this mean? It means the social media space is starting to look like just about every other industry that starts to get mainstream. Social media is often the premise built on 1:1 relationships, and even with technology, that clearly doesn’t scale, and I can relate.

What about me? I’m asked every few days “How do you do it all” my answer is “I don’t, the wheels are falling off” Well you’ve probably noticed I’ve not been blogging much, nor tweeting lately, I’ve been under heavy travel and projects (that I’m behind on). Every blog post and tweet that you see is me, including all the errors and typos that come along with them. I will admit that sometimes, I even updated blog posts after they publish, to polish it up. I skim all my emails, read many, but if I answer, I promise you that’s always me. I may not be good at scaling my social efforts, but I assure you, I’m authentic, warts and all.

I can relate to those who don’t scale well. If you’ve ever met me at an event this last year, you may have noticed dark circles under my eyes, and somewhat of a flustered appearance. I recently had a long talk with a good friend yesterday, when I’m tired from traveling nearly every week, you may notice that I actually draw my strength from within or being online, not always from others. So if I’ve ever came across as a bit messy and sapped, I certainly don’t intend to, I’m just stretched to the limit at times. 

So what happened to transparency and authenticity?  Maybe it’s the econony, with less resources, and more pressure, we’re all being stretched to the limits.  Or maybe, this is the evoluation of every industry, music, art, and film started out simple and pure, then became institutionalized. Or maybe, I just never bothered to look  close enough.

Update: Chris Saad, who inspired me to write this, has responsed from his own blog. Paid content highlights the challenges. This post has generated a lot of discussion from my friends as I meet them in person, interesting.

Left: This screenshot, provided by Digg shows how an EA Sims ad is embedded in main body editorial as sponsored, as well as in upper right bug.

Digg Launches Community Voted Advertising: “Digg Ads”
Digg, who was formerly partnered with Microsoft for advertising, announced that they will be launching a new type of advertising unit that allows Digg members to vote up (digg) or down (bury) ads that appear in the editorial stream. As a result, the ads that are voted up will cost less to the advertiser.  Nodding to the power of the community isn’t new for Digg, in the past the Digg community actually has more control than the management team, so turning over the advertising power to them strategically makes sense.   After engaging in a discussion on Twitter last night about this, I gave it a good night’s think, here’s my take:

Social Ads Not New:

• Interactive Ads aren’t new, Facebook launched ‘Engagement Ads’ (analysis) nearly a year ago, and community vendor Pluck and agency Razorfish followed suit, in similiar vein community platform Kickapps launched WidgeADs. 
• Pricing based on ad performance isn’t anything new, we’ve seen this with demand and supply of ads for years with cost per action.

Requirements for Success:

• Homogeneous : Community ranked ads will likely work better in homogeneous communities where there’s a common interest or demographic, rather than a large broad community where consensus won’t be found.  In the case of Digg, I’d make a guess from watching the community that it’s a lot of Gen X and Y males that are technology optimistic, and liberal.  Having spent time at the live Diggnation event (the super fanboys, photo by Brian Solis) it could be a representative sample.
• Engaged: Community ranked ads make sense for the Digg community as they are already highly engaged in voting for stories, as well as the very active comment (over 100 comments is norm per article on front page).  
• Transparency: Dislcosing in the editorial stream that the ad is sponsored.

Risks:

• Gaming: Expect gaming of the site, not from marketers, but from fan boys, perhaps those that love Apple products will bury Microsoft ads.  Since you must have a registered ID to vote on items in Digg, the chances of the advertiser influencing the ad price will be limited.
• Unusual engagement: Expect that most users are more likely to bury ads, not engage with them and promote them.  However, if a user buries an ad they don’t like, this cost per action is still an engagement, which is higher than not paying attention to them at all.

Forward Thinking:

• If this works, Digg or it’s partners could replicate this product and extend to other sites.   Interactive advertisers like Federated Media would do well to open discussions with Pluck and Kickapps, who have a strong media focus.
• For brands and advertisers this is a great way to find out why an ad may not work for a particular community, rather than make guesses based on CTR performance.  Advertisers that analyze or even engage in the dialog may benefit their next generation effort.
• In the most ideal sense, community preferred ads become information and content –not invasive content.

Takeaway: If Anyone Can Pull This Off, It Will Be The Digg Community 
Digg is a very unique case study, and if these ads work here, it will be hard to replicate on other communities, a unique mix of a very engaged community that is somewhat homogeneous will be required to make this work.  Let’s see how it unfold.

cheap bastards
Just got back from dinner for Matt, Ron's best friend's birthday dinner. For 12 people, the bill came out to $700. Ron paid $270. Unreal. I can't believe some people. I'm more upset than Ron is because he's a good guy. But seriously, $270 for one person? Ridiculous!

Dinner was really fun though, so... I guess it was worth it?

Rosebud…!

Ala’s Things You Should Know: Tijerina
If you know anything about Mexican American History, you should know Tijerina. If Ceasar Chavez is the Mexican American version of Martin Luther King Jr, than Reies Tijerina is the Mexican American version of Malcolm X. (except more mother fucking crazy). Tijerina, started his own relgious cult and community by buying property and digging holes and living [...]

If you know anything about Mexican American History, you should know Tijerina.

If Ceasar Chavez is the Mexican American version of Martin Luther King Jr, than Reies Tijerina is the Mexican American version of Malcolm X. (except more mother fucking crazy).

Tijerina, started his own relgious cult and community by buying property and digging holes and living under car hoods in the desert.

During his religious separation, his people and community suffered a malay of “random” attacks, floods, plane crashes, violence, and destruction.

Thanks to a vision, Tijerina refocused his efforts on Mexican Land Grants, and regaining rights after the Mexican-American war.

While the man was determined, again he was attacked by a variety of mysterious events, out right attacks, and destruction.

Tijerina was so crazy, he took over a National Park, arrested the rangers, and claimed it as part of his people’s land.  His people also staged an attacked on a county courthouse.  This was not the wild west friends, this was in 1967.

This man was actually deported OUT OF MEXICO.

Please read the Wikipedia entry.  His autobiography is enough to make you believe in government conspiracies and the evil power of the man! Plus it is wildly entertaining.

-Ala

This is just brilliant … check out this ad for Microsoft Office for mac.

As I speak to my friends or read the news, many people have expressed this concern:

“Really, what is the difference between the two?  It does not matter who I vote for.”

It does matter.  Republicans hate Hilary.  THEY REALLY HATE Hilary.

Who is going to win against McCain?  Who has a better chance?

The answer is Obama.

Dont believe me?  Read this article.

-Ala

So back in 1994 Denso Wave invented the QR codes. In 2008, Microsoft launches Microsoft Tag, their version of exactly the same thing.

Do we really need two competing standards for exactly the same thing. As consumers here we go again, it’s VHS vs. Beta, DVD-R vs. DVD+R and Blueray vs HD-DVD, and ethernet vs. token ring all over again.

Sigh.

Man, I always wondered why Americans hated/bad-mouthed Canadians so much….now I see its the same old shit, hating Black people. Yes people, ‘Canadian’ is now a substitute word for ‘Nigger’….

Another point to this argument is: Does crucifying racists in our society (i.e. an Imus or a Michael Richardson) and over reacting to these remarks only drive true racists further underground? Does this not have the effect of continuing ignorant beliefs by driving them further underground, rather than confronting them and educating them? Wouldn’t solving the problem of racism by examining the factors that create it be more effective? It was a classic debate I remember having as a tenth grader….

Don’t believe me, read it yourself…

Source 1

Source 2

Source 3

Next Monday will be interesting, as I am presenting at the SDC Open day alongside Devtest CEO, Sarah Richey.

Here’s the blurb from the Microsoft site.

In challenging economic times, software development projects that are critical enablers to achieving business goals, will be looked at favorably and expected to deliver the results with a high degree of certainty. At the SDC open day, Microsoft’s own software development arm the Solutions Development Center (SDC) will present and share with you its formula to achieving certainty and success in project delivery.

You will hear from the SDC project teams on how they apply agile planning and development processes to deliver the right solution. How metrics-driven project management is used to keep the project on track. How daily builds and deployments help to maintain the project “heart-beat”, and how the SDC incorporates unit testing and automated testing into the process to ensure ongoing quality. .

You will also learn how Microsoft development tools and technologies are put to use throughout the software development lifecycle to enhance individual and team productivity.

Finally, you’ll have the opportunity to step inside the SDC facility and learn how the workspace is used to promote innovation, team collaboration and knowledge sharing.

I only have 10 minutes so it will be a “short and sweet” session, and attendance has closed, but there will be ~130 people in attendance.

My presentation at the Microsoft SDC open day alongside Devtest CEO Sarah Richey is now up on Microsoft’s site.

http://www.microsoft.com/australia/services/microsoftservices/sdc_openday.mspx

For my presentation you need to open the “How we do: Testing” video and I am in the last half following Sarah.

I saw this today whilst analysing automation failures, and it made me laugh.

Assert.AreEqual failed. Expected:<10904.73>, Actual:<10904.73>.

So this is what happens when you compare two different types of double precision numbers …

I just wanted to post this story from the Guardian in the UK because someone asked me the other day if I knew what was going on with some battle on scientologists….

Here ya go….

New Internet Marketing Series.
Shalom, I am getting ready to start posting a new marketing series of articles written by "Yanik Silver" which will teach a lot of information about everything from product creation to your distribution actions. I have been studying these articles for a while now and I have learned a lot from them. Most of the problems people have with marketing is...

The Little Known Marketing Secret Weapon That’s Free For The Taking
Shalom Everyone, This will be the sixth post in the series of articles I am posting over the next couple of months which will deal with many areas of Internet Marketing. These articles were written by Yanik Silver for the purpose of teaching you how to become a successful Internet Marketer.

How to get 48,280 followers on Twitter
Check this out... Derrick VanDyke just released this amazing software that will automatically add 1,000s of new followers to your Twitter account... And it's 100% FREE!

When Is Your Independence Day?
Shalom Everyone, This will be the fifth post of a new series of articles I am posting over the next couple of months which will deal with many areas of Internet Marketing. These articles were written by Yanik Silver for the purpose of teaching you how to become a successful Internet Marketer.

How to Sell High Priced Products Online and Offline
Shalom Everyone, This will be the forth post of a new series of articles I am posting over the next couple of months which will deal with many areas of Internet Marketing. These articles were written by Yanik Silver for the purpose of teaching you how to become a successful Internet Marketer. They will each be posted approximately every two (2) days except when one of the day would land on a Sabbath or a High Holy Sabbath, as the case may be. Without further ado I will begin the series...

Great Resources for Everyone Who Uses WordPress®
Product Review of: MaxBlogPress's WordPress® Plugins I have been putting off writing this post, for some time. Not because I dreaded doing it but quite the opposite. I have been looking forward to writing it but I wanted to be able to do it justice & allow enough time to write a great Product Review for these WordPress® plugins from MaxBlogPress. The thing is that I never seem to find enough time to set aside for just this purpose so i decided that I would just make the time and here I am.

Three Inner Secrets of Internet Success
Shalom Everyone, This will be the first post of a new series of articles I will be posting over the next couple of months which will deal with most areas of Internet Marketing. These articles were written by Yanik Silver for the purpose of teaching you how to become a successful Internet Marketer. They will each be posted aproximately every two (2) days except when one of the day would land on a Sabbath or a High Holy Sabbath, as the case may be. Without further ado I will begin the series...

Are You Carrying Buckets?
Shalom Everyone, This will be the third post of a new series of articles I will be posting over the next couple of months which will deal with most areas of Internet Marketing. These articles were written by Yanik Silver for the purpose of teaching you how to become a successful Internet Marketer. They will each be posted aproximately every two (2) days except when one of the day would land on a Sabbath or a High Holy Sabbath, as the case may be. Without further ado I will begin the series...

3 Overlooked Profit Opportunities on Your Site
3 Overlooked Profit Opportunities on Your Site By Yanik Silver www.SurefireMarketing.com/ ======================== If you're already selling anything online this article is going to show you how to add extra revenue you didn't even know you had "hiding" in your site without getting any more visitors.

Fairfax fails on disclosure, editorial/ advertising line
I was on The Age website today reading an unrelated matter, and I saw an internal site promo for iPhone pricing details (note is was in a group of content related internal ads, and isn’t an ad for an external site) So I clicked through, and ended up on this page which reports on price drops [...]

I was on The Age website today reading an unrelated matter, and I saw an internal site promo for iPhone pricing details (note is was in a group of content related internal ads, and isn’t an ad for an external site)

So I clicked through, and ended up on this page which reports on price drops by Optus and Virgin (note Virgin is a fully owned subsidiary of Singtel Optus.)

Then I scrolled down the page….and I found this

Note the circled bit. The first three results are for Optus iPhones, the 4th is a Virgin Mobile deal, and the 5th is a Telstra iPhone (after that point it seems to switch between the three in the top 20.)

But look at the Telstra mobile result (circled bit)

No telephone number… but the Optus result does.

Clicking through the link takes you to a more detailed page about the phone.

Here’s the contact details on the Telstra iPhone pages

Yet here’s the similar page for an Optus iPhone

But it’s not a one off: all the Singtel companies get a full sales spiel, Telstra doesn’t. Here’s the Virgin spiel:

Now I don’t disagree that Optus phones offer better value; Telstra’s deals are blue murder, and I’m surprised they even featured once in the top five. But there’s also clearly a commercial relationship between the editorial and Singtel, because the Optus/ Virgin phones get extra details, and I’m sure Fairfax hasn’t offered that out of the goodness of their heart.

But here’s where it gets dodgy, because out of the full top 20 list (or out to 22 in an extended view) the number of Vodaphone iPhone deals mentioned is 0.

If this was actually fair consumer advice, there would absolutely have to be a Vodafone iPhone listed there somewhere, and although I’m not a Vodafone customer (I’m with Optus) I’ve seen their plans and they’re competitive with Optus, and leave Telstra’s plans for dead.

So why have they been excluded? Could Telstra have been included sans contact details because they are an occasional Fairfax advertiser (the Bigpond page takeovers a couple of months back come to mind) and Vodafone isn’t?

Either way: this would appear to be advertising content masquerading as editorial consumer advice with zero disclosure from Fairfax.

Update: just noticed that although Vodafone’s logo is offered as an option in “filter mobile plans by carrier” you get this result

The hail was so persistent for so long it woke me up at about 4:30am. These pictures taken after first light at 7:30am so it had started to melt; at 5am though everything was covered in a thick blanket

I’m betting it’s probably a bug, although we’ve jumped around before a few hundred spots at a time. Last time I checked we were in the top 300, out from about 170.

Follow up to this Apple fail post: Leopard 10.5.7 causes freezing, overheating issues

I haven’t completely stopped my Macbook Pro from freezing, but I have all but (least it has happened only once since I worked out what might be happening.)

Write this on all over the Apple forums: it was Safari that did it.

Well, I fib a bit, because I suspect that it’s not Safari alone but multitasking full stop, but it’s clear that Safari causes the most issues.

If I have Firefox and Safari open at the same time (which I usually do), the computer freezes. If I have Safari open alone the computer freezes (but not as quickly), if I have Firefox open alone….nothing happens (although it did freeze once in maybe 2-3 hours.

The key indicator is that when Safari is open, the computer starts to heat up, and by that I mean from 38 to over 60 C in the space of minutes (and with fans at various settings, I’ve tried them all.) Firefox doesn’t cause the heat spike.

Go figure. Either way: Apple, please hurry up and fix this.

How Gen-Xers became has-beens

Let me start by saying I’m not having a go at News.com.au here, but the “job seeker” Michael Gowers who wrote the article.

Lets look beyond the intellectual snobbery this guy offers first, because there’s two really weird quotes in the article (well, there’s more, but these one stands out.)

Along with many of my friends, I never paid much mind to the idea that one day I might be unemployed. For my generation, who are used to a permanently strong economy, it was just never going to happen.

For myself and the rest of the Generation Xers who grew up in a time where work was plentiful, this experience is one that crushes one’s sense of self-worth and leads to an every day battle to maintain hope and keep up the momentum of searching for work.

Now I’m a member of Gen X, and I fit the definition of a young Gen Xer as well because I was born towards the end of the accepted time frame for Gen X (depending on the source, Gen X is anywhere from 1965 through to 1980, although some put the end date earlier at 1975, the year I was born).

Here’s the thing: I didn’t grow up in a time where work was always plentiful. Indeed, when I finished high school in 1993, it was so hard to get a job that entry marks into Universities hit record highs. But maybe my memory is faulty, so lets get some figures.

According to the ABS, unemployment in Australia in August 1993 was 10.7%, but significantly higher again in states like Victoria and Tasmania. It peaked that year at 10.9% after several years above 10%. Although things did turn, by 1997 the figure was only down to 8.7%. Notable is that “youth unemployment” has always been significantly higher than the general rate.

The quotes from Michael Gowers are bullshit. We’ve had a good run from maybe the turn of the century, but the 90’s weren’t a cake walk. What I can’t work out is why use the lines: they aren’t lines that make him a sympathetic character, but an entitled one. As some of the comments note, boo-ho.

Here’s another line that made me laugh:

That is my reality in 2009 now that I am a fulltime unemployed professional jobseeker.

note the “professional jobseeker” part. That’s not meant to imply that he’s a professional at seeking jobs, but he’s looking for a professional job. And here in lies the problem, he’s a job snob.

Don’t get me wrong. Australia has a fantastic system that provides benefits and assistance to those in need. It is not, however, designed to cope with highly qualified individuals who have found themselves out of work

So what he means is that he’s somehow better than others who are unemployed but don’t have three degrees? give me a break.

Everyday I continue with my full-time job of looking for a job, a process that just keeps reminding me of our economic conditions. I am unable to get some jobs because I am now over-qualified and employers feel that I’d simply be taking a job just to have one and would leave as soon as the market picks up.

So how is it that given 5-10 minutes I could find this guy work in a supermarket stacking shelves or at a shop delivering pizzas then, because the local Woolworths still has a sign out saying they are looking for people…oh, and the unemployment rate today is 5.7%.

It does suck to have to go back to doing base work when you’ve had high ranking positions, but society doesn’t owe you a living. As recently as 3 years ago I worked part time in a bottle shop to help pay the bills despite my whoopdy-do degree, and previous roles in marketing and management, some somewhat senior, because that’s what I had to do (that, and b5media wasn’t making money at the time.)

Michael Gowers: get off your fat, lazy, entitled arse and go and take any job you can get.

Starting From Scratch
Well, it was finally time to erase the old spam-filled blog database and start from scratch.  I’m 99% sure there weren’t any real blogs from any real live people in there, so the only people that should have been inconvenienced by the reboot would be the spammers and myself.  And the spammers won’t even notice, [...]

Well, it was finally time to erase the old spam-filled blog database and start from scratch.  I’m 99% sure there weren’t any real blogs from any real live people in there, so the only people that should have been inconvenienced by the reboot would be the spammers and myself.  And the spammers won’t even notice, I’m sure.

I didn’t think about saving a copy of the themes directory.  Oops.  I should grab a copy of that from backups while I can.  I lost track of how many themes I had nicely re-edited to work with the site, so that all those spam blogs would look interesting.  Of course, the spammers never thanked me for all that hard work.  Jerks.

UPDATE: Themes have been restored from backups.  Hooray for themes!

The New High Line in NYC gets a very favorable review
Nicolai Ouroussoff reviews the much talked about High Line park in New York City. Opening for the park was June 9, 2009. Ouroussoff's review makes me want to hop a train into the city, right now!

Why I boycotted television news for 5 months
I love Anderson Cooper. I think Larry King has exceptional interviews. I watched CNN twice a day. I read a variety of news sources each day and read several news related magazines and online resources. For the last 5 months I have boycotted television news. I ended my boycott on June 1, 2009. Anderson...it's good to see you again. I made the decision to boycott TV news on several levels: I am angered by American news to only report on American interests. There are news worthy events going on all over the world. Our news broadcasts should be broader and more globally expansive. The news became less about facts and more about opinions. September - December of 2008, I was appauled by the news media exasperating and exciting an already fearful environment... Even the CNN weather became "extreme weather." My...

Remaking Paris by Nicolai Ouroussoff
Nicolai Ouroussoff is one of my favorite NYT writers. Here in the architecture issue of The Magazine, Ouroussoff writes about President Sarkozy's urban development plans for a 21st century Paris. At a time when “infrastructure” has become a catchword of politicians around the world, these plans offer a glimpse of what a sustainable, more egalitarian city might look like and the role government might play in shaping one. Image below provides an audio slideshow of Paris is Building. NICE!

Why I love Tmobile - it’s customer service!
I’ve been a Tmobile customer for about 6 years. While many of us complain about phone providers, I’m pretty satisfied with Tmobile (even more so now) and I thought I should write about what’s good. As some of you know, I had an extreme dislike of my Blackberry. That device didn’t work for me at all and I hated that I had to hack and alter my routines to suit Blackberry technology. Additionally, my heart was set on a Nokia. The Nokia E75, in fact. So in preparation for my new purchase I called Tmobile to ensure that the Nokia would be fully functional on their network. In doing so, I was prompted by their latest promotion for a “Mobile Makeover.” Goodness, how could I refuse? I like saving money. Customer service was exceptional on Tmobile’s part. My first representative,...

The Vender Client Relationship
Made me giggle. Found via Design Observer:

Book Review: Jackie Battenfield's The Artist's Guide
Jackie Battenfield's new book, The Artist's Guide - How To Make a Living Doing What You Love, is an excellent resource for visual artists at any stage of their career. Battenfield writes in a professional and yet easy manner and provides invaluable information, inspiration and resources on making a successful career in the art world. Battenfield's words do more than just dictate the "how to" and "why for" of the business end of art. She speaks from the heart and addresses such topics as knowing when you are ready to circulate your art (the difference between nurturing your artistic soul and preparing for business), how to take charge of your professional life, your marketing kit, creating your own opportunities, Introducing your work, building relationships and maintaining your practice. This former gallery director, artist and teacher has supported herself for over...

Starting From Scratch
Well, it was finally time to erase the old spam-filled blog database and start from scratch.  I’m 99% sure there weren’t any real blogs from any real live people in there, so the only people that should have been inconvenienced by the reboot would be the spammers and myself.  And the spammers won’t even notice, [...]

Well, it was finally time to erase the old spam-filled blog database and start from scratch.  I’m 99% sure there weren’t any real blogs from any real live people in there, so the only people that should have been inconvenienced by the reboot would be the spammers and myself.  And the spammers won’t even notice, I’m sure.

I didn’t think about saving a copy of the themes directory.  Oops.  I should grab a copy of that from backups while I can.  I lost track of how many themes I had nicely re-edited to work with the site, so that all those spam blogs would look interesting.  Of course, the spammers never thanked me for all that hard work.  Jerks.

UPDATE: Themes have been restored from backups.  Hooray for themes!

Don’t Want To Sell Your House? Do These Things
We bought our first and only home four years ago, about a year away from the peak of the market in our area, and we saw some atrocious houses along the way. It was a hot housing market back then, so perhaps some of the horribleness we saw is excusable, but with the market today [...]

Don’t Want To Sell Your House? Do These Things

We bought our first and only home four years ago, about a year away from the peak of the market in our area, and we saw some atrocious houses along the way. It was a hot housing market back then, so perhaps some of the horribleness we saw is excusable, but with the market today there’s no excuse for being lazy.

Bankrate lists ten things you should focus on if you want to entice a homebuyer looking to take advantage of the $8,000 first-time homebuyer credit.

1. Dirt – Dirty = bad
2. Odors – Stinky is not good either.
3. Old fixtures
4. Wallpaper – They recommend removing it all.
5. Popcorn acoustic ceilings – They badly date your house, we have them and we hate it.
6. Too many personal items – It’s hard for someone to envision themselves living in your house if all your stuff is still there.
7. Snoopy sellers – Please don’t be there.
8. Misrepresenting your home
9. Poor curb appeal
10. Clutter

If you don’t want me to buy your home, there’s one very simple thing you can do: be there. (which is a mix of #6 and #7)

On several occasions, we would walk into a home and the owners would be there watching television. When I am looking at a house, I want to peek in the closets, I want to turn on the showers, and I want to look in every nook to see the house for what it is. When there are a ton of personal items there, I feel like I’m snooping and I’m violating someone’s personal space. When they’re actually downstairs watching TV, I feel like I’m really violating their personal space.

So, don’t do any of the ten things Bankrate recommends you avoid and please don’t be there.

(Photo: thetruthabout)

Don’t Want To Sell Your House? Do These Things

Fortune’s Top 25 Top-Paying Companies (2009)

I always enjoy looking at these lists because they give a little glimpse into some of our nation’s most storied firms. I think these are more for entertainment purposes, much like the top paying undergraduate degrees, because the average total pay isn’t something you’ll get right out of the gate.

It’s fun to read are the various perks employees get because often times the companies that compensate the best tend to have great benefits as well. A popular company to talk about when you list slick benefits is always Google’s plethora of employee benefits.

Top Ten List

Here were the top 10 paying companies (from their top 25 list):

1. Bingham McCutchen – $256,312
2. Lehigh Valley Hospital & Health Network – $244,605
3. Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe – $240,955
4. Alston & Bird – $203,655
5. Perkins Coie – $190,126
6. Devon Energy – $185,882
7. Salesforce.com – $172,303
8. Arnold & Porter – $172,192
9. Adobe Systems – $165,947
10. EOG Resources – $158,302

Four Lawyers and a Doctor walk into a bar… Four of the top five were law firms, with the only non-law employer was Lehigh Valley Hospital & Health Network which, surprise surprise, paid their physicians very well. Of the next five, you started to see a few engineers in software and energy companies. Of course, yet another law firm poked its head up at #8 with Arnold & Porter.

Highest Financial Services Company: #11 marked the first appearance of a financial services company, Goldman Sachs with the average total pay of $144,994.

Highest on the Best Companies List: Cisco was 15th, average total pay of $131,703 for a software engineer IV and they scored the highest on the “Best Companies” list at #6.

Biggest Surprise of the List: Finally, 25th on the list was a surprise for me, Nugget Market, a family owned California grocery chain where store directors pull in $116,444 plus 100% coverage of health insurance premiums and they sport a 9% turnover rate each year (that’s low for a supermarket!).

Coolest Perks

Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants (#13) offers a cool perk only they can offer, you can stay at any Kimpton property for $50 a night, a pretty awesome deal, plus subsidized health insurance and a decent 401(k). eBay (#16) lets employees take a four week sabbatical with full pay every five years!

Probably the nicest benefit? Several companies on the list pay 100% of health insurance premiums… that beats all the gyms and hotel stays any day!

(Photo: chicanerii)

Fortune’s Top 25 Top-Paying Companies (2009)

Credit Report Card

In the past I’ve joked about how your FICO credit score has become the new report card for your life. Instead of letter grades, we now get a three digit grade in the form of a credit score. As much as you may hate it, that’s how life works and your credit score has become just that, a grade.

I don’t know if Credit Karma heard me or it’s just a strange coincidence, but they put out a credit report card tool that takes your TransUnion data (all of Credit Karma’s information is based on TransUnion data) and gives you grades on a litany of factors (seven to be exact):

• Credit Card Utilization
• Percent of On-Time Payments
• Average Age of Open Credit Lines
• Total Accounts
• Credit Inquiries
• Total Debt
• Debt to Income Ratio

If you’re curious what it looks like, here’s a demo report card for “DemoGuy.” You don’t need to sign up for a free account or anything, you can test drive it there.

This is great for anyone curious about the factors that go into your credit score and where they stand relative to other users of Credit Karma.

(click to enlarge)

(click to enlarge)

To the left is a snapshot of the card itself. It lists the seven categories, your performance (if you’re logged in), as well as your relative performance to other Credit Karma users. This part isn’t as useful as the next part, when you click on More Info. The right snapshot is what you’ll see when you click on More Info and it shows your performance in that factor, as well as your history. So for credit card utilization, you can see that your current utilization is 8%, which puts you in good shape (at least an A!). You can also see that your utilization has increased in the last few months and how you rank versus your peers.

I think it’s the history that has the most value. You can see trends you otherwise may not have noticed. Are you slowly increasing your utilization? have you begun to lean on your cards more heavily? It’s good to see that trend, especially if you aren’t aware of it otherwise.

For an absolutely free service, powered by their partnerships and advertising (who knows what else), Credit Karma really offers some fantastic tools.

Credit Report Card

BVC #15: Repair or Replace Rule of Thumb

Don’t you hate it when something breaks before it’s “supposed” to? You spent hours researching the best product for the job, the one with the best features, the longest life, and it has the nerve to break down before it’s supposed to? Well, it happens to us all and the hardest decision to make is whether it’s worth fixing or whether you should just pitch it.

What’s the rule of thumb you usually use in determining whether you should repair or replace something that’s broken before its expected “useful” life?

BVC #15: Repair or Replace Rule of Thumb

Ally Bank’s No Penalty CD Rate Arbitrage

If you look at Ally Bank’s current rates, there appears to be a discrepancy in the way they’ve structured their rates. I tweeted about this last week and it appears the difference in rates has persisted through a recent rate drop, making it doubly curious. Let me explain what I mean.

As of today (June 22, 2009), here are the current rates of several of their products:

• Traditional 9-month CD: 1.75% APY
• No-Penalty 9-month CD: 2.15% APY
• Online Savings Account: 2.00% APY

Two things surprise me:

1. A traditional CD should never have a lower yield than a no-penalty CD of the same maturity. With a no-penalty CD, you have the right to close the CD before the maturity period without penalty. The bank can’t close it. You should be paying, through a discount on the interest rate, for that flexibility. When the no-penalty CD first debuted, its interest rate was a tenth of a percent lower than the traditional CD’s rate.
2. The no-penalty 9-month CD with a higher yield than the online savings account represents an opportunity. We’re in a period when rates on savings accounts and CDs are dropping. However, should rates ever make a turn and start rising, being locked into a CD might be bad news. However, with a no-penalty CD, I can close at anytime so the risk is minimal! There is no reason why someone should keep their funds in an online savings account when the same exact bank is offering a no-penalty CD option with a higher interest rate.

This morning I transferred all my funds from my Ally Bank online savings account into the 9-month no-penalty CD to get that extra 0.15% APY. If the two accounts weren’t at the same bank, I wouldn’t have done it because the transfer time would’ve cost me interest. However, anytime someone is willing to give me a $2 bill in return for a $1, I take it.

Is there something I’m missing?

Ally Bank’s No Penalty CD Rate Arbitrage

Review: The Options Playbook

Stock options is something that has always both intrigued me and confused me.

Fortunately, I’ve become friends with some people over at TradeKing and one of them sent me a copy of The Option’s Playbook, written by their Senior Options Analyst Brian Overby . It’s a print version of their entire options education center, available to registered users of TradeKing (sign up for free by clicking here).

The playbook contains everything you need to know about options along with thirty different “plays” you can make using options, all in a conversational and humorous style. It’s a really non-threatening way to learn about them and the charts really help.

Play One: Long Call

When I said they started with the basics, I meant it. Play One is the “long call,” where you get the right to buy the underlying stock at a Strike Price A. It explains the strategy, how it’s “setup,” who should be running it including warnings for rookies, as well as other important bits of information like maximum profit, loss, sweet spots, etc. There’s even a pretty chart explaining when you’re profitable and when you’re a loser. The only difference with the book is in the layout – the chart, setup, and when you should run it are on one page, everything else is on the opposite page.

(click to enlarge)

Play Twenty-One: Iron Butterfly Spread

So the Long Call isn’t all that cool looking right? It’s got a boring name, it’s got a boring chart, and it’s all around pretty boring. Well, how about a play with a sexy name, a cool chart, and some excitement? That’s the Iron Butterfly Spread? This play involves trading four different options and you profit when the stock doesn’t leave a tight window. Here’s what the chart looks like:

Cool huh?

Don’t Buy It

The information in the book is fantastic if you have ever been curious about options and didn’t know where to start. However, I wouldn’t buy the book because all the information is freely available to TradeKing users. It’s a $25 book, that’s the equivalent of five stock or options trades on TradeKing, so save your money and read it online.

Review: The Options Playbook

How Much House Can $10,000 Buy?

Bankrate recently looked at what $400,000 can buy today in the real estate market. I poked around, checking out a 3 bedroom, 2/5 bath 1,730 sq. ft. home in San Diego, CA, that seemed to be directly on top of the home next door, and a monster of a brand-spanking new home in Houston, TX that had nearly 2,500 square feet.

But I didn’t think that was realistic. Doesn’t Bankrate know we’re in a recession!? I wanted to know what $10,000 can get you.

Baltimore, MD

Baltimore, home of one of my favorite shows, The Wire, has plenty of homes available for a cool $5,000. Located on idyllic Miles Ave, this two bedroom, one bath gem sits on a 0.02 acre lot. Built in 1912, this rowhome located in the Hampden subdivision of Baltimore City has an estimated property tax of sixty-eight bones. If you want to view it, you must sign and return a waiver prior to showing, which occurs at your own risk. For five thousand bucks, this baby is yours (you may want to install windows and doors though so you’ll probably want to have some extra cash saved).

Trenton, NJ

If you fancy living in the Wilbur area of Mercer County, New Jersey, have $7,000 (plus closing costs), then you have yourself a three bedroom, one bath room built in 1934. The style is your classic DoubleWide (not a trailer, it’s a double, where two units share one physical building) and only one side is for sale. The honest listing says it’s a “gut rehab project” with the owner looking for an investor willing to foot the estimated $35,000 it would take give this baby its groove back.

Las Vegas, NV

Vegas baby, Vegas! If you want to live in the Sin City and have ten grand, you can see your dreams come true. Three bedrooms, one bath and 1,160 square feet to stretch out and call it home. The lot itself is a sizable 0.18 acres. If you aren’t a fan of mowing the lawn, no worries, based on the pictures you will have to mow exactly five square feet of the 7800. It’s a single story unit with central air conditioning, so you can get a cool respite from the hot Nevada sun. Located in Clark, this single family property is a steal at twice the price!

Miami, FL

My first reaction to this home was to laugh, this house looks like they filmed a movie here and had meant to blow the whole thing up… but they didn’t. It’s corporate owned and sold only for its land value, which isn’t surprising if you click through and look at the pictures. I could tell you that it was built in 1935, that it has three bedrooms, two full baths, and beautiful hardwood floors… but the the dang thing is burned out. This listing is absolutely hilarious to read. Oh, and parking features… wait for it… Street.

Detroit, MI

Last but not least, I turned to Detroit, MI to see what $10,000 could get you in a city decimated by the recession. With four listings in jest, I went to Detroit because I had heard stories about people buying homes for a pittance because the economy is so battered there (unemployment is around 20%). What I found was a $9,000 home that is walk-in livable right now. Three bedrooms, one bath, a 818 sq. ft. home that is a story and a half. This is 100% livable right now, from how it’s described, and it’s not any different than a lot of searches of the Detroit region. I’m not saying it’s the perfect home, or even a good to great home, but it’s a fair home for less than ten thousand bucks.

So there you have it, the anti-Bankrate listing of homes you can get for under $10,000 in five different markets. (here’s a post at Suburban Dollar listing what $10k can get in various areas of TN!)

What can $10,000 buy in your neighborhood?

How Much House Can $10,000 Buy?

Days of darkness

Dreamer writes about the time he spent at Sri Ramana Maharishi Academy of Blind.

And as our classes got over I walked out fresh… The three hours of non-stop noise by JAWS software seemed to be music now. And as I started…

Dreamer writes about the time he spent at Sri Ramana Maharishi Academy of Blind.

And as our classes got over I walked out fresh… The three hours of non-stop noise by JAWS software seemed to be music now. And as I started walking out, Chetan ran out through the zigzag corridor dodging the walls, straight into the playground. I stopped… this couldnot have been for real. I closed my eyes and started walking only to crashed over a stone. I had hurt myself. The shock was still on. As I walked outside the school premises, I took deep breath.

See Also: India-related Tweets: Use #india tag to add your tweets

© Nikhil for DesiPundit, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Post tags: blind, Education

This note is dedicated to tomorrow’s children… Read the comments on this post…

.

See Also: India-related Tweets: Use #india tag to add your tweets

© The Scientific Indian for DesiPundit, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Post tags:

Those of you who attended the MarketingProfs B2B Forum this week got a chance to see Steven Berlin Johnson's Monday keynote. As it turns out, it was amazing timing, since Steven's cover story on Time magazine debuted only a few days prior.

The cover featured a tweet Steven posted on Twitter about the cover story he wrote for Time, about Twitter. (Got that?) Anyway, you can read the whole piece ("How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live") online.

At the MarketingProfs event, Steven sat down with our own Kyla Cullinane to chat about Twitter, what it means for businesses, and why he thinks Twitter shouldn't be dismissed.

See the video here:

California Foreclosure Prevention Act

As a former long-time city dweller I resisted purchasing a home for many years, instead renting in various parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn despite many entreaties by friends and family such as "Why wouldn't you buy instead of throwing your money away on rent?"  I told myself and them that I didn't want to be "tied down" to any one place, I wanted mobility... and then remained in NYC for 15 years.

Of course, had I purchased a home during that time, even a small co-op apartment, I likely would have had substantial equity to help me make my eventual move out of New York less challenging financially. But one of the main reasons I never bought was the memory of watching friends and colleagues in the late '80's who had great difficulty selling their apartments when job, love or life in general called them elsewhere. Many of these people struggled with trying to "unload" their first home and it sometimes interfered with their career plans and relocation.

During subsequent years I ignored the real estate market and preferred to fixate on my memory of the "bad investment choices" made by my friends. Although the market changed my opinion of it did not.

When I finally decided it was time for me to leave the Big Apple it was 1999 and I was certain of only two things: I wanted to live near the water, preferably the ocean, and have a space to garden.  I was now in my 30's and not feeling the need to be so mobile anymore.  I wanted a lifestyle and some creature comforts that apartment living was unable to provide.  It was a challenge to leave my familiar surroundings and I was entirely unfamiliar with the process, requirements and frustrations of buying a home but I did it.

I have looked back many times over the past ten years, very grateful for having bought a home in Highlands, NJ, with my partner when we did.  I am quite sure that had I waited, perhaps only a year or two, I probably would not have moved because of the drastic shift in house prices.  I'd probably still be in a rental apartment in Prospect Heights instead of living in our much beloved 1917 Craftsman ("Home Sweet Money Pit") that's just down the hill from the Twin Lights lighthouse and a short walk to the Atlantic Ocean. Although I sometimes miss the energy and convenience of city life, I know I would not trade it for the enjoyment of hosting dinner parties on our front porch on a summer night, or dancing with friends at the summer beach concerts at Sandy Hook. It's a different life, to be sure, but a wonderful one.

So, what's my point?  If the above description at all sounds familiar to your situation, I strongly recommend looking for your first home starting now.  Why?  Let me count the ways....

1. Affordability: Recently I saw a report that said affordability on a national level was at 66% which means that 66% of the people can afford a house at the median-price for their area.  They give that stat an A+ rating! As the affordability rate rises, so will demand which means fewer homes to choose from and prices on the rise.
2. Tax Incentives: First home buyer tax credit for a home purchased in 2009 is worth $8000 and does not have to be paid back (unlike the $7500 rebate for homes purchase in 2008).
3. Low Mortgage Interest Rates: rates are great... below 5.5% and sometimes even below 5% with the right loan program.
4. Low Downpayment: FHA loans are requiring as little as 3.5% down! 
5. Inventory: Lots to choose from here in the resale inventory as well as short sales and foreclosures.
6. Negotiability: Many homesellers are fatigued. They want to be done with the process of selling and move on with their lives. They also want to take advantage of the good deals out there but cannot because they have to sell first.  While many are not looking to fire-sale it, they are willing to listen to a reasonable offer and probably have already reduced their price or priced it according to the market.

It's time!  Let me know if you would like to start your search... I'd be glad to help!

THE FUTURE IS VIDEO ...
News from the much-blogged Changing Media Summit ... words from Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger that signal his belief that the world will go increasingly digital and that user generated content will become more important than ever ... Guardian editor Alan...

News from the much-blogged Changing Media Summit ... words from Guardian editor, Alan Rusbridger that signal his belief that the world will go increasingly digital and that user generated content will become more important than ever ...

Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger told this afternoon's Changing Media Summit that it is "impossible to predict on what technology platform journalism will be delivered in five year's time or even a year."

But he predicted that more and more of that content will be provided by the readers themselves – as opposed to journalists.

He said: "We are grappling with this balance of what goes on to the website and what goes in the paper. A great part of that web [content] will be generated by users in time."

Rusbridger, a man who is clearly making the safe bet in this world of change - more digital, more user-involvement? Staggering predictions to be making ... and so unexpected. Hmm ...

More interesting was the Guardian's deputy commercial director Adam Freeman, who announced that the paper's future was more-than likely in video, asserting that the business is first-and-foremost a news organisation and that ...

"today that means giving them 2,000 words on a piece of paper but in the future it will probably be in video. It's about changing our outlook to meet our consumers‚ needs.”

Now that is slightly more interesting - particularly when you look at the Daily Telegraph's dabbling with online business TV, C4 and the BBC's clear commitment to delivering TV on the internet.

The future, it would appear, could well be in internet TV. And if that is the case, watch this space ... given the combatants, the fight in that market is likely to be fierce.

The consumer backlash takes to the internet. Skewering the airbrushed, varnished ads for fast food, a site that presents the ads vs. pictures of the real meal deal. A classic piece of consumerism that is getting plenty of traction on the web and across the blogosphere. See it HERE.

Co-founder of St Lukes and now a leading freelance planner, thinker and author, John Grant gave an interview to blog, Life In the Middle. Some cracking thoughts from an altogether nice man. Check the post HERE (links to the 'casts at the bottom of the post).

Here’s the sermon I’m preaching tomorrow.  This is the 2nd in an 8-part series titled, “Seven Cultural Challenges Every Church Faces.”  This week we’re dealing with the challenge of pluralism — a culture of many faiths. I hope your Sunday is wonderful!

Seven Cultural Challenges Every Church Faces:
#2. Pluralism — Why Doesn’t Everyone Believe What We Do?

Acts 17:16-34

The old joke was told like this:  “A Catholic priest, a Jewish rabbi, and a Baptist preacher were together in a boat fishing…”

The joke was pretty funny, but that’s not my point today.  Today if you were to tell that joke, you’d have to add to the priest, rabbi, and preacher, a Buddhist monk, a Muslim imam, an Indian guru, a New Age spiritualist, a Wiccan witch, a Native American elder, a Mongolian shaman, an African witch doctor, a Haitian voodoo practitioner, and an aggressive atheist.  And maybe a partridge in a pear tree.

Then, not only would the joke be too long, the boat wouldn’t be big enough either.  My point, of course, is that we live in an age when we are aware of and exposed to many faith traditions, but it hasn’t always been that way in America.  When I was growing up, my buddy Charles Norris lived in the house behind ours.  We went to the same school, climbed over our backyard fence so often that we broke it down, and got into trouble several times together.  Once we set the backyard on fire, which was quite a show.  Another time we shot out the neighbor’s storm door with our BB guns.  But mostly we did 11-year old boy things together.  We built model cars, camped out in the backyard (which is how we set it on fire), rode our bikes all over Columbus, Georgia, and generally hung out 6-days a week.

We hung out 6-days a week, but not on Sunday, because Charles and his family were Catholics; we, of course, were Baptists.  Charles ate fish on Friday, I didn’t — mostly because I didn’t like the fish sticks the school cafeteria tried to pass off as fish.  Charles had to do some weird stuff like go to confession occasionally.  He’d tell me what he told the priest, and what the priest said to him.  Mostly, Charles had to say a lot of “Hail, Marys” — and I had no idea what that meant.

I asked my parents what the difference was in Baptists and Catholics, and got more information than I needed. Among other things they told me that Catholics prayed to saints and to Mary.  The Pope was the head of the Catholic church.  While we were living in Columbus, John F. Kennedy ran against Richard Nixon for the presidency.  Of course, we were voting for Nixon because Kennedy was a Catholic.  One day when I got home from school, my mother said, “Want to hear a joke?”  My mother seldom told jokes, mostly because she was too busy keeping up with my brother and me, so I said, “Sure.”

She said, “Do you know what phone number Kennedy will call for instructions everyday if he’s elected president?”  I had no idea, and really didn’t think this joke was going to be very funny at this point, so I said, “No, who?”

“Whom,” my mother corrected me, which she did a lot.  Then she said, “3909.”  She wrote the numbers on a piece of paper, and then turned the paper over and held it up to the light shining through the kitchen window.  The reversed numbers now looked like letters which spelled, “P-O-P-E.”

“Pretty funny, Mom,” I said.  It actually wasn’t that funny, but I was trying to be nice to mom.

Catholics were my introduction to folks who don’t believe like we do.  Of course, as I got older, I learned even more things about Catholics, mostly from Baptists, and most of it not complimentary to the Roman Catholic Church.  I grew up in the era when Southern Baptists believed, if we didn’t out-right say so, that we were the ones with the real truth about being Christians.  And, of course, when we talked about who was going to heaven, Catholics weren’t because they worshipped Mary, and hadn’t been baptized properly.  I am thankful to say that both my parents and I became much more tolerant and open-minded about Catholics and other faiths as the years moved on.

The Challenge of a Pluralistic Culture

Of course, now we have to deal with not just one, but many different faith traditions.  The events of 9/11 shocked us into a new awareness that the ugly face of religious fundamentalism is not just a Western face, but is also a Middle Eastern face.  Before 9/11 most of us, myself included, knew little of the Muslim faith, and thought it had little to do with our daily lives.  On that morning of September 11, 2001, we realized how much the strongly held religious views of one group can impact another group.  We as Americans became very much aware of the pluralistic culture in which we lived that tragic September day.

Twenty-five years ago, unless you lived in one of America’s largest cities — New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and a few others — you had to travel internationally to encounter a significant number of people of another faith tradition.

I think I have told you about our first trip to Taiwan and Hong Kong together in 1989.  When we landed in Taiwan, I made the mistake of telling our host that I would like to see some temples.  For the next three days we looked at temple after temple.  I did discover that there were Buddhist temples, Confucian temples, and temples devoted to local ancestors and local gods.  We saw lots of temples, and it was a fascinating experience.

Temple worship was not like worship in a Baptist church back home.  The temples were mostly open-air, with people coming and going.  The monks sold josh sticks, and the josh sticks were burned as prayers for their departed loved ones, and also as prayers for prosperity, health, and other requests.  The temples were noisy, they smelled of burning incense, the monks were more like gift shop attendants than religious figures, and I was intrigued by the whole thing.

One of last year’s best-selling books, Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, chronicled her travels to Italy where she ate; India where she stayed at an ashram and prayed; and Bali where she fell in love.  Her book has sold millions of copies because it is the story of one woman’s search for meaning.  But she found meaning in a multi-cultural, international, exotic cultural experience where the Christian faith played no part.

The challenge for those of us who are Christian, is how do we live in a pluralistic world as followers of Christ?  Paul’s encounter with the men of Athens holds some lessons for us.

Three Typical Approaches to Pluralism

Over the centuries, Christianity has struggled with how to address the world that did not embrace its beliefs.  Christianity, after all, was born in a multi-cultural, pluralistic society.  Even though the Roman Empire held the civilized world together with is Pax Romana, the world was filled with Jews who worshipped the One True God; with worshippers of the Greek and Roman pantheon of gods; with oracles and those who spoke ecstatically; with the demon-possessed; philosophers; and, those who simply wanted to debate intellectually the idea of gods and their role in the world of men.  These are the men whom Paul addressed in Athens, men who were religious, and interested in debating about religious ideas.

So, Christianity is not new to a pluralistic world, but we are.  How do we as 21st century Christians relate to other religious traditions, and how does that shape our own faith.

Typically, there have been three approaches by Christians to other faiths.

The first approach is the “we’re right, you’re wrong” approach. That was the approach I grew up with.  Baptists were right, Catholics were wrong.  As a matter of fact, everybody else was wrong.  Which presented a problem when we went to see my mother’s side of the family, most of whom were Methodists.  My mother explained to me that Methodists and Baptists were really pretty much alike, except Methodists sprinkled when they baptized people, but you could be immersed as a Methodist if you wanted to.  Having that option made Methodists not quite so suspect in my opinion.  At least some of them could get it right, I thought.

The “we’re right, you’re wrong” approach is known in theological circles as exclusivism.  In other words, everybody but us is excluded from salvation.  That doesn’t sound too kind or appealing today, but in the 1950s Baptists were pretty much exclusivists.  Some still are.  I remember reading a newspaper published by John R. Rice, Tennessee’s fundamentalist twin to Bob Jones down in South Carolina.  John R. Rice wrote in his paper, The Sword of the Lord, that Billy Graham wasn’t a Christian because when Billy Graham held a crusade, and people got saved, the Graham organization told them to find a local church, any church.   And, if they were Catholics, the Billy Graham team did not tell them to leave the Catholic Church.  John R. Rice thought that was blasphemy, and apostacy, if I remember his words correctly.  Personally, I thought John R. Rice was a bit intolerant, and I threw my free copy of The Sword of the Lord in the trash.

But there is an aspect of Christianity that is exclusive.  In John 14:6 — “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.”  So, there is the sense in which we as followers of Jesus are followers because we believe Jesus is what he said he is — the way to God.  There is a exclusivism to that statement and to our belief, because by saying Jesus is the only way, we are also saying Buddha is not the way, Mohamed is not the way, and without Jesus there is no way.

Paul, however, preaches the gospel message without saying, “I’m right, you’re wrong.”  Rather, he lays out the “good news about Jesus and the resurrection.”  Paul doesn’t have to dismantle their faith to speak of his.

The second approach is the “as long as you’re sincere” approach. That approach was the polar opposite of exclusivism, and is called universalism.  In other words, everybody is going to be saved.  And, it doesn’t really matter what you believe as long as you’re sincere.  That line of thought emerged as America became a more educated and sophisticated society. Religious intolerance seemed so out of fashion, so why shouldn’t everyone who believed anything go to heaven, too.  Of course, the old Baptist line for this was, ‘if you sincerely drink poison thinking it’s medicine, you’re not going to get well, you’re going to die.’  I heard that illustration more than once, and it has some truth to it.

The other problem with the “as long as you’re sincere” approach is that no other religion believes that to be true.  Each religious tradition presents its own truth claims as definitive.  So, this approach, while it sounds like a very tolerant embrace of all faiths, really leads us nowhere. And, while Paul compliments the Athenians on their religious practice by saying, “Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious,” he does not let them off the hook because of their sincerity.

A third approach is the “we think we’re right, but there may be other possibilities.” This is the inclusivist approach.  We’re all included regardless of our religion, as long as we’re seeking God.  The inclusivist approach humbly admits that we may not have it right, and there may be other possibilities for salvation, but we leave all that to God.  It’s a kind of uncertain certainty, if you will.

Granted, I am painting each one of these positions with a broad brush and not doing justice to the nuances of difference between them.  But, the problem with each of these approaches is that WE are the center of conversation.  Each one of these approaches is about what we think, about what we believe to be true or rational or tolerant or palatable.  And that is the problem.  It’s not about us.  It’s about God.

A More Faithful and Humble Approach To Life In a Pluralistic Society

At the center of the Christian faith we find Jesus Christ, not ourselves.  Christ is the expression of God in human form, and his followers were called “Christians” — “the little Christs” — because they lived like Jesus.  So, how do we deal with the challenge of a pluralistic society, a society in which many religions present their claims to absolute truth, in which many cultures have found new pride for their traditions in the world community, and in which Christianity itself is often seen as a less tolerant, less open, less gracious Western religion.

First, we as followers of Christ should not give up our faith practices just because we live in a pluralistic culture.

Christians follow Christ, there is no way around that.  Without Christ, there is no Christianity.  And, without Christ as the centerpiece of our faith, we are not Christians.  So, we can’t roll over when the culture asks us to pray in God’s name, but leave off the name of Jesus as we have seen in recent controversies.  We can’t dumb-down our faith so that Jesus is not offensive to others.  Of course, we don’t have to act obnoxiously either, which is what we Christians have often done.

Here’s a personal story — For many years, I was ambivalent about offering prayer for a meal in a public restaurant.  Does it look too pious to others?  Is it necessary?  Will others think I’m “holier than thou?”  But, then I saw Muslim men on TV one day, kneeling on prayer mats outside their place of business, not once but three times a day.  I thought, “If they have that much conviction and are faithful to the practice of their faith, then I should be also.” So, Debbie and I pray before each meal whether at home, which we always did, or in public.  It is a way I express my faith publicly.  Of course, I will ask others dining with us if I might offer thanks for our meal before we eat.  I am courteous to others, but not apologetic about my practice.

Paul is completely unapologetic as he talks about Jesus, and his place in God’s plan.  Luke says in Acts 17:18 — “What is this babbler trying to say?” Others remarked, “He seems to be advocating foreign gods.  They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection.”  Paul did not change his message because some disagreed with him.

Secondly, we should be humble about our faith.

The exclusivistic approach — “we’re right, you’re wrong” — has led to family fights, hurt feelings, the Crusades of the 11th century, and the Spanish Inquisition, among others.  Explorers to the New World often decided that if the local natives would not become Christians, then they would have to be killed in order to save them — a religious version of the 1950s “better dead than Red” motto.  Exclusivism is arrogant, unloving, and presumes we know as much as God does about the soul of the person or persons who are the object of our wrath.

Humility in living our faith does not mean apologizing for our faith.  Rather, humility acknowledges that God knows things we don’t, like who’s going to be saved and who isn’t.  Humility about our faith acknowledges that the Holy Spirit is, as Leonardo Boff says, the first evangelist.  In other words, God is at work in the hearts and lives of people that we don’t know anything about.  The Bible contains stories like that of Lydia who was a God-fearer, and to whom Paul brought the gospel message.  Lydia responded to Paul’s message, because God had already prepared her heart.  The Ethiopian eunuch is another example — an African official who was reading a sacred scroll, possibly the scroll of Isaiah, and already had the desire in his heart to know God.

We must be humble, because arrogance and triumphalism is unbecoming to the gospel message and the love of God.

Paul compliments the Athenians on their religious practice, and does not seek to discredit the gods they serve, or even the monument to the Unknown God the Athenians have erected.  Rather, Paul reinterprets the history of the universe with God as creator, sustainer, and eventually judge.  Paul is both humble, and candid, courageously presenting a new way of looking at the history of the world.

Finally, we just have to tell the story.

We do not have to make the story debate-proof.  We do not have to have an answer for every objection.  We do not have to discover Noah’s ark, an original copy of the Gospel of John, or any other archaeological artifacts to prove our faith.  We do not have to apologize for the story of God sending his son Jesus, to live, die, and rise from the grave.  We do not have to be embarrassed at this 2,000 year old story because it is the same story the apostles told on the day of Pentecost.  It is the same story Stephen told before he was stoned.  It is the same story that Paul told as he carried the message of Christ from Jerusalem, to Judea, and to the uttermost part of the world.  The writer of Acts tells us that some believed Paul, and some didn’t.  Others said they would like to hear some more about Paul’s story.  And then Paul moved on to another place to tell his story, again.

Like the stories of our childhood, the story of Jesus is our story.  It is our story because we have found ourselves in it when God saved us.  It does not matter if it contradicts the story of Islam, or the story of Buddhism, or the story of Judaism.  We do not have to apologize, or change our story, we simply have to tell it.

Our reluctance to tell our faith story is more in our own heads than in the responses of others.  I have visited hundreds, if not thousands of people in hospitals in my 30-years in ministry.  Only once was I turned down when I offered to pray with a concerned family member.  I have travelled to China, governed by a system that is opposed to both American capitalism and Christianity.  But I have also had Chinese men ask me about being a “priest” (they don’t know the difference in priest and pastor), and about church, and about Christianity.  I did not have to apologize, or change my story, I just had to tell it.

Since moving here, I have heard from the Chinese man who works for the company in Nantong, China with which I did business for several years.  About three years ago, after we moved here, I got an email from Mr. Wang, stating that Mr. Chen and Mr. Zhu were coming to the U. S. and would like to see us, again.  They wanted to come to our church where I was a “priest,” so that (these are his words) “they could hear me pray.”  Mr. Wang closed his email by saying, “We are all lost sheep.”

Their plans changed and they did not come to Virginia, but I thought that was an interesting admission from a Chinese man who knows little of the Christian faith.  God is at work in his heart, too.  And he is right, we are all lost sheep.  The difference in our lives is that we know the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

Posted in Acts, culture, Missional Church, multi-ethnic, sermon, Sermon Illustrations, Sermons, The Story, trends, Worship

You might not get it first time out. Why would Abercrombie & Fitch, the US menswear retailer that has just opened its first UK store off Savile Row, stuck a load of semi-naked men in its windows?

They have a male clientele, what is semi-naked men going to do to for them? Shouldn't it be a load of semi-naked women?

What is interesting is that the story was picked up most clearly and in largest scale by the broadsheets - the very titles that the fashion-literate, better-off male is more likely to be reading. The naked men story was picked up in the Independent and The Times amongst others.

For brands that want stunt-based stories that will break out of the tabs and mid-markets, maybe naked men is the answer ...?

Salvador Dali on

Salvador Dali on

Viral Learning Center

Last-Minute Gift

Look out Nalts may be a shooting viral star in the making

SHITDISCO –

Doll Face

ONE NOT TO BE MISSED

Rest of “The Long Tail”
Anderson begins the second half of “The Long Tail” with an explanation about the 80/20 Rule, which is now closer to the 80/10 rule and the confusing remaining 10 percent of percentages for differentthings (which is why they don’t need to add up to 100). Anderson argues that 10 percent of products account for 80 percent [...]

Anderson begins the second half of “The Long Tail” with an explanation about the 80/20 Rule, which is now closer to the 80/10 rule and the confusing remaining 10 percent of percentages for differentthings (which is why they don’t need to add up to 100). Anderson argues that 10 percent of products account for 80 percent of sales. Now, thanks to the utilization of the long tail, the 80/10 rule can be put to rest. I really like the idea that its the small niches of clientele that can make up the whole of your sales. Anderson describes how Netflix would only carry a few of the ‘top of the chart’ items because they are expensive to hold in their product line, but instead would invest MORE into many of the non-top of the chart items. Of course I don’t think this would work as well in a physical store as it does with online shopping, which has a search feature and options are laid out very conveniently for viewing. (Although it seems that Walmart is trying to become the Long Tail brick and motor outlet for those who want to do the physical shopping). Since the zero-sum theory(that scarcity will ultimately prevail over abundance) is not exactly fitting in the United States, where abundance has always been the driving force in our economic growth and change, will that change the way in which our economy looks? Anderson states that it is our own capital that is of scarcity, including our attention and hours in the day.

I found comfort in Andersons assertion that hits are here to stay, that physical brick and mortar stores shall continue to exist, and that people still want to do things together. Although e-commerce is excellent, especially when it comes to finding things for cheaper and for exchanging of ideas, I would like to think that people still want to live in the physical world.

Anderson talks about the challenges of shelf-space on how their are limits to what stores can offer, even ones like Wal-mart. He makes a good point about searching and how we categorize things. For example, would his book fall under technology? culture? business? It could apply to one or all and the way the store deems it fit to be shelved is where it will go. Anderson argues that eCommerce helps the consumer make their choices in a world of abundant varieties. The consumer can find out comparative prices, content, make, etc , information that only store owners usually have. Anderson points out that this is the secret to creating the consumer paradise. Make everything available and help me find it!

BVC #14: Net Worth Isn’t About Money
This latest Bargaineering.com video features some intro music (yay! probably won’t keep it for too long but I wanted to experiment a little with it) and a discussion on net worth. I briefly discuss how I calculate our net worth, how often we track it, and the true value in doing the exercise. As you [...]

BVC #14: Net Worth Isn’t About Money

This latest Bargaineering.com video features some intro music (yay! probably won’t keep it for too long but I wanted to experiment a little with it) and a discussion on net worth. I briefly discuss how I calculate our net worth, how often we track it, and the true value in doing the exercise. As you probably expected, based on the title, the value isn’t in the number you get.

Please let me know what you think! (especially about the music and if you have any alternatives, podcast safe please, you think would work well)

BVC #14: Net Worth Isn’t About Money

10 Smart Student Credit Rules

I applied for my first credit card as a freshman in college, it was an AT&T branded Citi card that gave me free long distance phone minutes and a few rewards points. I was fortunate to have started building up my credit at the age of eighteen, which would prove to be crucial later on. I was even more fortunate never to have fallen down the credit card debt hole so many college students slip into, in part because I know my mom would’ve been furious.

To help all the rising freshmen, or perhaps the parents of rising freshmen, I offer up these ten rules for smart credit. Some of these are credit card rules and some are simply credit rules, hopefully all of them are helpful. Here are ten tips for students looking to build credit but not credit card debt:

10 Credit Rules for Students

1. Check your credit reports: The Fair Credit Reporting Act gives you the right to review your credit reports and specialty reports once a year, take advantage and review it for errors. Your credit history is often used whenever you apply for jobs or try to find an apartment.
2. Get a credit card early: I recommend applying for one of the best student credit cards and using it for small purchases each month. The sooner you can establish your credit, the better. When you graduate, a lot of things will depend on your credit so establishing it early is crucial.

People will argue that you shouldn’t give a student a credit card ever. I think that’s a mistake, it’s like never letting a teenager drive. You want them to learn how to use something responsibly, not shield them from it until some magical clock says they’re suddenly responsible enough to drive or use credit.

3. Don’t spend it unless you will pay it off: If you’re paying 18.90% APY interest on your credit card, it will take you over two years to pay off a $100 purchase if you pay the minimum of $5 a month. Over the two years, you’ll be paying $21 in interest for absolutely no reason whatsoever. Don’t spend the money unless you have it and can pay it off after the grace period.
4. Set reminders for yourself EVERYWHERE: Always pay on time and set yourself up for success by putting reminders everywhere so you never pay late.
5. Set up electronic bill pay: Set up an online account with the credit card company you have a card for and then link a bank account so you can pay with a click of a button. By lowering the barriers to payment, it’s easier for you to pay on time. You also save yourself a stamp and a rushed trip to the post office because you’re trying to get the check out on time.
6. Keep a master card list: There will come a day when you will lose your wallet or purse, with every credit card along with it. Keep a master list of your credit cards and their customer service numbers so that you know who to call in case you ever lose your wallet.
7. Never ever take a cash advance. Cash advances hit you with a fee when you make a withdrawal and then crush you with interest. There is always a better alternative to a cash advance, you just have to look around for options. You should never ever take a cash advance.
8. Keep your identity safe. Don’t leave your cards lying around, don’t leave your statements lying around (in fact, go the paperless finances route), and treat the credit card as you would cash.
9. Review your statements. When you get a statement, review ever charge on the list and make sure it’s legitimate. You won’t be liable for much if you catch the fraud early, so review everything.
10. Don’t let anyone “borrow” your credit card. You should treat your credit card the same way you treat your driver’s license. It’s yours and only you should be using it. Never lend it out to anyone because if they do something wrong with it, you get to take responsibility of it.

I limited myself to listing ten tips but if you have one that’s not on the list, please let me know!

10 Smart Student Credit Rules

I’ve put an end to late night jaunts under the pretex of needing coffee. I’d rather blog. And gleefully. My vitriol, afterall, is all over the web.

Today his brother and sister in law called to chat. I was polite. They were polite. It was short because I had to go back to sleep. Later he called to check if I had played nice. ‘Played nice’!

For the sake of the baby I have to stop fighting. I have to get his people out of my head. I have to enjoy the baby. I have to enjoy my time with him. He is, afterall, the sweetest man sometimes.

And it would devastate him to find this blog. So…

My vitriol
On the Web
Gleefully

Credit Report Card

In the past I’ve joked about how your FICO credit score has become the new report card for your life. Instead of letter grades, we now get a three digit grade in the form of a credit score. As much as you may hate it, that’s how life works and your credit score has become just that, a grade.

I don’t know if Credit Karma heard me or it’s just a strange coincidence, but they put out a credit report card tool that takes your TransUnion data (all of Credit Karma’s information is based on TransUnion data) and gives you grades on a litany of factors (seven to be exact):

• Credit Card Utilization
• Percent of On-Time Payments
• Average Age of Open Credit Lines
• Total Accounts
• Credit Inquiries
• Total Debt
• Debt to Income Ratio

If you’re curious what it looks like, here’s a demo report card for “DemoGuy.” You don’t need to sign up for a free account or anything, you can test drive it there.

This is great for anyone curious about the factors that go into your credit score and where they stand relative to other users of Credit Karma.

(click to enlarge)

(click to enlarge)

To the left is a snapshot of the card itself. It lists the seven categories, your performance (if you’re logged in), as well as your relative performance to other Credit Karma users. This part isn’t as useful as the next part, when you click on More Info. The right snapshot is what you’ll see when you click on More Info and it shows your performance in that factor, as well as your history. So for credit card utilization, you can see that your current utilization is 8%, which puts you in good shape (at least an A!). You can also see that your utilization has increased in the last few months and how you rank versus your peers.

I think it’s the history that has the most value. You can see trends you otherwise may not have noticed. Are you slowly increasing your utilization? have you begun to lean on your cards more heavily? It’s good to see that trend, especially if you aren’t aware of it otherwise.

For an absolutely free service, powered by their partnerships and advertising (who knows what else), Credit Karma really offers some fantastic tools.

Credit Report Card

Don’t Want To Sell Your House? Do These Things

We bought our first and only home four years ago, about a year away from the peak of the market in our area, and we saw some atrocious houses along the way. It was a hot housing market back then, so perhaps some of the horribleness we saw is excusable, but with the market today there’s no excuse for being lazy.

Bankrate lists ten things you should focus on if you want to entice a homebuyer looking to take advantage of the $8,000 first-time homebuyer credit.

1. Dirt - Dirty = bad
2. Odors - Stinky is not good either.
3. Old fixtures
4. Wallpaper - They recommend removing it all.
5. Popcorn acoustic ceilings - They badly date your house, we have them and we hate it.
6. Too many personal items - It’s hard for someone to envision themselves living in your house if all your stuff is still there.
7. Snoopy sellers - Please don’t be there.
8. Misrepresenting your home
9. Poor curb appeal
10. Clutter

If you don’t want me to buy your home, there’s one very simple thing you can do: be there. (which is a mix of #6 and #7)

On several occasions, we would walk into a home and the owners would be there watching television. When I am looking at a house, I want to peek in the closets, I want to turn on the showers, and I want to look in every nook to see the house for what it is. When there are a ton of personal items there, I feel like I’m snooping and I’m violating someone’s personal space. When they’re actually downstairs watching TV, I feel like I’m really violating their personal space.

So, don’t do any of the ten things Bankrate recommends you avoid and please don’t be there.

(Photo: thetruthabout)

Don’t Want To Sell Your House? Do These Things

Eddie Bauer makes it official, files for bankruptcy
Filed under: Bad news Eddie Bauer Holdings Inc. has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States Bankruptcy Court of the District of Delaware. Reports have private equity firm CCMP Capital Advisors as the likely buyer of the company. A flailing brand image and lousy consumer spending combined with the company’s $426.7 million debt load [...]

Filed under: Bad news

Eddie Bauer Holdings Inc. has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the United States Bankruptcy Court of the District of Delaware.

Reports have private equity firm CCMP Capital Advisors as the likely buyer of the company. A flailing brand image and lousy consumer spending combined with the company’s $426.7 million debt load helped to drag the company into insolvency. In the first quarter of 2009, the company lost $44.5 million.

Continue reading Eddie Bauer makes it official, files for bankruptcy

Eddie Bauer makes it official, files for bankruptcy originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 17 Jun 2009 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The state of California is imposing a 90-day moratorium on all foreclosures as part of the new California Foreclosure Prevention Act that goes into effect tomorrow.  The law requires that lenders prove they tried to modify a borrower’s loan before initiating foreclosure proceedings.

From the San Jose Mercury News:

The law is expected to make lenders try harder to keep borrowers in their homes. Loan companies must prove they tried to modify the delinquent loans before they can begin foreclosing.

But supporters acknowledge the California Foreclosure Prevention Act won’t stop thousands of foreclosures from eventually happening. There have been more than 365,000 foreclosures in California since early 2007, with many more already scheduled.

The highlights of the law are (from California Assembly Member Ted Lieu’s site):

1. Imposes a 90 day foreclosure moratorium to allow distressed homeowners time to work out loan modifications with their lenders.

2. Allows lenders to avoid the moratorium if they have a comprehensive loan modification program based, in part, on criteria set forth by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Loans may be modified several ways, including interest rate reductions, extension of the loan term, or principal reduction.

3. Provides oversight and accountability by requiring regular reports to the legislature on loan modifications and foreclosure reductions, and coordination with appropriate state regulators.

We have some real rocket scientists up in our state legislature.  At least I’m not the only one who thinks this is completely idiotic. From Mish:

This bill is no more likely to work than a bill declaring poverty to be illegal or the sky to be green.

Source [blownmortgage]

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Great visualization of the average student loan debt carried by students coming out of college across the country.  Amazing that most states’ averages are more than $15,000 per student.  It’s tough to bash people for not saving enough when going to school automatically puts you in the hole as you enter the workforce.

It will be interesting to see how the secondary education bubble deflates over the next few years as students can’t turn to parents’ home equity loans and 401k’s etc. to fund overpriced college tuitions.

Image and h/t Brazen Careerist:

Source [blownmortgage]

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Filed under: Options, E*TRADE (ETFC), Financial Crisis

The shares of E*Trade Financial Corp. (NASDAQ: ETFC) took a dive this morning after the online brokerage house announced plans to boost its balance sheet. The company will sell $400 million in common stock, and launch a debt exchange worth more than $1 billion. In a statement, E*Trade said its capital-raising initiatives “will significantly reduce the company’s debt service burden.”

Back in April, the cash-strapped brokerage was instructed by the Office of Thrift Supervision to quickly raise new capital and reduce its leverage. Today’s newly announced share offering and debt swap are expected to bring in at least $1.2 billion, although the transactions are expected to dilute the investments of current ETFC shareholders by about 40%.

Continue reading E*Trade Financial plummets on capital-raising plans

E*Trade Financial plummets on capital-raising plans originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Forecasts, Good news, Interviews, Money and Finance Today, Canada, Financial Crisis

After interviewing 10 US-based financiers in this post and here, I decided to cross the border and ask our neighboring Canadian investors for their insight on the current market conditions and forecast for the year to come.

Danielle Park is President and Portfolio Manager of Venable Park Investment Counsel Inc. She is author of the best selling book “Juggling Dynamite: an insider’s wisdom on money management, markets and wealth that lasts” as well as a popular financial blog JugglingDynamite.com. Having become more optimistic near 12 year lows in February 2009, recently Ms. Park has been voicing concern again about the likelihood of another down leg ahead.

Continue reading Canadian views on the US stock market

Canadian views on the US stock market originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: MasterCard Inc’A’ (MA), CA Inc (CA), Stocks to Buy, NASDAQ

This post was written by Minyanville contributor Quint Tatro

Afternoon trading playbook originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 18 Jun 2009 15:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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One of the biggest bankruptcies in history occurred on June 1st yet you would not know this by looking at the stock market.  In fact, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) shot up by 220 points.  If we look at total assets, this is the fourth largest bankruptcy in history.  The Dow is made up […]

One of the biggest bankruptcies in history occurred on June 1^st yet you would not know this by looking at the stock market.  In fact, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) shot up by 220 points.  If we look at total assets, this is the fourth largest bankruptcy in history.  The Dow is made up of 30 companies that show a supposedly wide cross section of the American economy.  The company that filed for bankruptcy was General Motors and was actually one of the 30 components.  A company that dates back to 1908 and survived the Great Depression.  So how can it be that a company that employs 250,000 filing for bankruptcy is actually good for the stock market and makes the DJIA rally so strongly?  The easy answer is the stock market no longer reflects the economic reality on main street.

The U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve have created an artificial system and the stock market is reacting to these new conditions.  These conditions now assume rock bottom low rates and financial institutions being continuously bailed out.  Yet this paradigm is not helping the American public that now has 25,000,000 unemployed or underemployed family, friends, or colleagues.  Think of the implication of the GM bankruptcy.  Right when the announcement was made there were details of laying off thousands of workers and closing numerous dealers.  The market rallies and unemployment this Friday will shoot up by another 500,000.  This disconnect is so obvious and shows the priorities of those pushing legislation.

Before we get ahead of ourselves, why would a bankruptcy of GM, a DJIA component lead to a strong rally?  First, let us look at the weighting of each of the 30 components:

The above is a reason I take very little stock with the DJIA but it is still widely regarded in the mainstream media as an accurate reflection of the overall stock market performance.  A better measure would be the Wilshire 5000 but how many times have you heard that market index in the media?  Let us focus on the above list I compiled a little further.  You notice that GM and Citigroup are all the way at the bottom?  That is why even if GM and Citigroup went straight to zero (GM practically did) it had very little impact on the DJIA.  Yet in reality, the bankruptcy impact is gigantic in the real world since it means tens of thousands more Americans out of work and a giant of American manufacturing giant was unable to stand on its own two feet.  So what do we hear on June 1^st?

“(CNN Money) According to a statement released Monday, General Motors, which filed for bankruptcy on Monday, will be replaced by Cisco Systems (CSCO, Fortune 500); Citigroup (C, Fortune 500) will be replaced by The Travelers Companies (TRV, Fortune 500).”

How convenient.  Of course, we have already experienced this with the removal of AIG and having it replaced with Kraft.  A government cheese recipient taken out by a true cheese maker.  The DJIA is a horrible indicator of longer term prosperity.  During the boom times bubbly stocks are put in, keep in mind the index is maintained by humans and as we have now found out, humans make all kind of errors including missing peaks and troughs.  Don’t believe me?  Let us take a look at some grand timing:

Microsoft added on November 1999

Intel added on November 1999

AT&T added on November 1999

Bank of America added on February 2008

Chevron added on February 2008

These are just a few examples.  First, you’ll notice that Microsoft and Intel (big companies no doubt) where added at a bubble point for technology stocks.  So when the tech bubble burst, the index took a much bigger hit because of these additions.  Next, we have the timely addition of Bank of America on February 2008!  When Bank of America was added it was trading around $45 per share.  Now it is trading at $11.37 and this is thanks to the crony banking system bailout.  Chevron was added right before our massive oil bubble.  So as you can see, the addition of companies to the DJIA is not exactly a good reflection of the economy.  In fact, some of the additions are indicators of bubbles and late party arrivals.

Now let us examine the list again.  First, the recent stock market crash was the deepest and widest since the Great Depression.  If we look at the DJIA, you will see why this is true.  First, 2 of the top 3 companies on the list were oil companies.  Well logically when the oil bubble burst these would get hammered as they did.  Next, there are many financial services companies on the list.  This during the boom distorted the market and made the DJIA bubble up over 14,000 yet this mark was a reflection of the bubble.  Now with the banking industry having Uncle Sam as number 1 on its Fave 5 menu, of course the DJIA tanked because it was heavily weighted on bubble industries.  Bank of America?  JP Morgan?  American Express?  Citigroup?  This list starts reading like the TARP recipient list.

It should be abundantly clear that the DJIA is not a good indicator of what is occurring on main street.  Yet it is something that is always referenced so it is important to understand what is truly reflected here.  Let us refer to the list again.  If you look at the top 10, three of these companies (Wal-Mart, McDonalds, and Coca-Cola) reflect the massive consumption economy that is the U.S.  Where are the major manufacturing companies?  In a way, seeing GM literally fall off the list is a testament to what our economy has become.  An almost completely consumption based economy.  Is it any wonder that Chinese students laughed openly when Timothy Geithner stated:  “Chinese assets are very safe,” referring to debt with the U.S. in a recent talk?  Politics aside, I’d laugh too.  Ben Bernanke and Geithner are busy selling off the U.S. to keep their banking cronies alive.  Where are the Pecora Investigations?  Why not demand the same stringent requirements of Bank of America, Goldman Sach, JP Morgan, and Citigroup as we do of Chrysler and GM?  Because those that operate the levers of power are either bought out or believe the banking oligarchy.

When you look at the Dow, it starts becoming abundantly clear what the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve think the country should look like.  And before you say that these places are independently operated, just look at former employers of our recent U.S. Treasuries.  They like the bubble era.  They want Americans to go back and buy cars on a yearly basis, purchase homes over and over, eat fast food, and purchase goods to numb the need to focus on reality.  That reality is for nearly 40 years we have spent more than we have earned.  Just look at this chart showing personal income growth and household debt:

From the 1950s to the 1970s, growth in income tagged along with growth in debt.  Yet this completely became disconnected in the 1970s.  From that point on, taking on debt at higher levels seemed okay.  In the last few years in this bubble, we just took it to the extreme logical conclusion.  Just think for a second how irresponsible it was to give someone making $30,000 a year a $50,000 luxury car simply because they can make the monthly payment for 7 years?  Or what about giving the person making $40,000 a year a $500,000 mortgage?  Not only did this happen, but it occurred so many times that we are now years later left to deal with the fallout.  Yet the notion that we will go back to this world is absurd and that is what the stock market is betting on.  Our lives are changed forever.  The fact that we have students in China laughing at our U.S. Treasury is one of the many indications that the gig is up.  Our biggest lender is laughing.  This is not a good sign.

When I look at the Dow, I don’t see a reflection of the U.S. economy but more of a horse race ticket for the gambling casino.  AIG doesn’t make sense anymore?  Remove it since it is now owned by the U.S. government.  Don’t like GM or Citigroup?  Out they go.  It is a list of convenience.  We would be better off tracking the Wilshire 5000 or at a minimum, the S&P 500 but even that list has taken an unusually heavy love to financials.  But in this case, you can’t blame the actual index.  It is merely reflecting a country that became obsessed with financial services and tossed manufacturing to the wayside:

The chart above is rather telling.  It is somewhat ironic that on the same day, it is announced that both GM and Citigroup will be removed from the DJIA.  With manufacturing already gone and financial services slimming down, you tell me what emerging field is going to get us out of this recession?  Maybe Travelers Companies and Cisco are closer reflections to what is a stable Dow component.  Too bad it took this long to realize which companies were simply running on cheap money.

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Stock Market Dissonance: Why the Stock Market no Longer Reflects Main Street Economics. The Dow Jones Industrial Average.

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Filed under: Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A), Bank of America (BAC), Carnival Corp (CCL), SLM Corp (SLM), SanDisk Corp (SNDK)

Today was one of those low news flow days where you never had any real solid feel for where the market would close until the very end of the session. We have seen too many rallies dashed by closing imbalances at the end of the day when there was thin volume.

Some Philly Fed data helped hold the market, and that was on the heels of the largest drop in continuing jobless claims since 2001. Some of the agriculture stocks staged a small comeback after yesterday’s huge losses.

Here were the unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 8,554.77 +57.59 (0.68%)
S&P 500 918.34 +7.63 (0.84%)
Nasdaq 1,807.72 -0.34 (-0.02%)

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Continue reading Closing Bell: A win that felt too quiet (BRK-A, BAC, CCL, SNDK, SLM, WLP)

Closing Bell: A win that felt too quiet (BRK-A, BAC, CCL, SNDK, SLM, WLP) originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There are many reasons why California finds itself at the financial edge.  We are a state that heavily depends on personal income and sales taxes that fluctuate wildly during good and bad times.  California also finds itself grappling with the reality that there may be no other bubble to save itself from the current harsh […]

There are many reasons why California finds itself at the financial edge.  We are a state that heavily depends on personal income and sales taxes that fluctuate wildly during good and bad times.  California also finds itself grappling with the reality that there may be no other bubble to save itself from the current harsh reality.  During the 1990s, we had massive wealth gains with the technology bubble with areas such as Silicon Valley.  After the bust, state revenues dropped quickly but without skipping a beat, we had the real estate bubble to pick up right where it had left off.  Two decades of massive bubbles.  There may be no other big bubble in the near future to get us out of this mess easily.

Let us set aside the Alt-A and Pay Option ARM tsunami that will depress housing prices further late in 2009 and will hit full force in 2010.  How can state representatives miss so badly on the budget for the wealthiest state in the nation?  First, it is important to look at the state like a household balance sheet.  Let us first take a look at the last 30 years for revenues:

Source: Legislative Analyst’s Office

The first thing you will obviously notice is the incredible jump in personal income taxes during the tech era.  That bubble burst and brought income tax revenues lower.  As would logically follow, sales taxes also fell after that burst.  But do you notice something else?  Local property taxes kept on moving up during the tech bust!  In fact, starting right about the time the tech bubble burst we had a major jump in local property tax collections.  We transitioned with one bubble to another.  This is why California is in a deeper mess than other states.  For the past 20 years, we have drawn a large portion of our revenues from a bubble economy.  Now this leads us to our next chart that was presented back in January of 2009.  This chart comes from the Department of Finance and ironically is called, “How Did We Get Into This Mess” while giving us another reason why we are in the mess, overly optimistic projections:

Now if you recall, at the time we were trying to plug a $41.6 billion budget deficit.  Now if you carefully look at the chart, you will realize that the major deficit is reflected by a drop in revenues yet somehow revenues miraculously go up for the next budget.  You will also realize that expenditures do not move together with revenues.  This again is because of our dependence on personal income tax and sales tax.  What is fascinating from the chart of course is that much of the revenue produced in the last 20 years largely relied on bubble economics.  Now with the real estate bubble bursting there may be no other bubble to pick us up.  You will see that the state has had no problem spending more and more.  This is problematic in normal times but realizing you are spending money from an income stream that is built on a bubble is troubling.  Bernard Madoff made money in an elaborate Ponzi scheme in which he paid investors money with money that was coming in.  Everyone was happy until the scam was uncovered.  We are now realizing with the real estate bubble bursting that a large amount of revenues were simply a function of the bubble.

A simple way to think of this is to take into account the income of banks, mortgage brokers, or real estate agents.  Each home that sold produced a commission, fees, and higher property taxes for the state.  It was a win-win-win to infinity.  And homes were selling over and over churning fees and money for all involved:

You go from having 600,000+ sales per year in California to 300,000+ sales per year. So even in 2007 when sales drastically slowed down the state should have started adjusting to this new reality but of course it did not.  What did this translate to?  Half the work was needed.  Half the income was being produced.  Yet the state kept on spending as if nothing had changed.  Its number one source of growth for the decade housing was cut in half and it kept on going forward as if everything was the same!

37,967 homes sold in the state in April 2009.

36,215 in March

29,225 in February

29,458 in January

This puts us in a target range of 450,000 to 550,000 for the year given that spring and summer are the strongest selling months.  Yet here is the new problem.  The median price for a home sold in the state has fallen by half.  So even though sales may be moving up prices are cut in half.  This does very little for revenues especially when over half the homes that sell are foreclosure resales.

The new budget gap came only a few weeks after the $42 billion hole was patched up.  The January chart should give you a few reasons why.  Expectations where much too optimistic. In fact, in a September 2008 report the peak unemployment rate was put out at 9.4 percent for the state which would be reached in 2010.  We are up to 11 percent already.  Also, we are now blowing through the unemployment insurance fund:

We have been in the red for some time now.  Of course, the reason to this is logical.  Unemployment insurance is paid by working people and with such a high unemployment rate, less is collected while more people collect.  You would think that the state would understand basic arithmetic but that is not the case:

“(SF Gate) Starting in 2002, the Democratic-controlled state Legislature enacted benefit increases that raised the maximum weekly payment from $230 to $450 - which they were able to do by a majority vote.

But Democrats lacked the two-thirds margin to change the 1985 formula under which employers are taxed on only the first $7,000 of each employee’s wages. Schwarzenegger’s proposal calls for taxing the first $10,500 in wages.

Marc Burgat, chief policy advocate for the California Chamber of Commerce, said the shortfall is the consequence of increasing benefits without increasing funding. He said California should study how other states handle unemployment and consider tightening up “some of the broadest criteria for eligibility” of any state.”

During boom times, many economic ills are hidden simply by the flood of money.  No one goes thirsty.  For two decades, California has had the luxury of two historic bubbles with unprecedented windfalls in revenues.  The problem with unemployment insurance sinking into the red is a good litmus test of how things are done here.  We nearly doubled benefits yet collected money into the fund at the same rate.  Of course, it sounds nice to have bigger unemployment checks.  Who doesn’t want that?  But how are you going to pay for it?  Therein lies the rub.  All it took was a recession this deep to expose the semi-Ponzi scheme of the system.  So much money is going out of the fund to 853,000 Californians that we will be $17.8 billion in the hole by the end of 2010.

The voting down of the propositions was a stand many took in the state.  Yet many are now stunned of the deep cuts coming.  Most Californians have never faced such a deep economic crisis.  As I have discussed many times the only way for California to fix the situation is either gather more revenue or cut spending.  With the propositions voted down (more revenue) the only option left was to cut.

Remember the state revenue chart by the LAO above?  Last week we had a new update for revenue projections:

Welcome to a lost decade of income. We are now back into 1990s territory in regards to how much revenue the state is pulling in.  This should not be a surprise given the housing bubble was simply a bunch of smoke and mirrors fueled by toxic mortgages, many like the Alt-A and Pay Option ARM that are going to kick the mid to upper range of the housing market a few notches lower.  That is why expecting a loss decade in housing prices isn’t out of reach.  We’ve already reached that with the lower range and the mid range will be next.

The above should be reason enough to believe there will be no housing bottom for a few more years.  And many of the pundits fail to ask the next logical question.  What happens after the bottom?  Do prices shoot up again?  Do they move sideways?  I doubt we’ll see another bubble anytime soon in real estate.  And when you look at what jobs are holding up in the state the picture does not get any better:

So what we have are good bubble paying jobs disappearing while lower paying jobs take their place.  This is another reason for lower housing prices.  Who is going to buy all those over priced homes in so-called “prime” areas?  That is why in some California cities we are seeing a handful of sales while at the lower end, sales are moving along briskly.  50 to 60 percent discounts are working but not 15 to 20 percent in more prime areas.  The Alt-A and Pay Option ARM debacle will move up the food chain later this year and into 2010.

Now people are asking why doesn’t the Federal government simply step in and bailout the state?  Well for one thing, states are part of the country.  Shocker, I know.  This is like a snake eating its own tail.  Also, if California receives assistance this sets up a precedent for all other states to follow.  Either way, even if we were to receive a massive bailout this doesn’t remedy the balance sheet because those revenue streams from the bubble are long gone and will dry up after the first bailout.  Unless, someone can find another bubble to give us another decade of so-called prosperity?    

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California Budget Recalled: The $24.3 Billion Budget Deficit. Missed Economic Projections and Financially Betting on a Recovery that Never Showed Up. 20 Years of Bubbles. From Tech to Real Estate.

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The Times They Are A-Changin’
This week, I announced that I was resigning from the Frankfort Village Board. It was an extraordinary tough decision - one which I grappled with for some time. Work, School, a huge life change - marriage - is a lot to handle. Something had to give. Unfortunately, at this point, it [...]

This week, I announced that I was resigning from the Frankfort Village Board. It was an extraordinary tough decision - one which I grappled with for some time. Work, School, a huge life change - marriage - is a lot to handle. Something had to give. Unfortunately, at this point, it was public service. A more in-depth discussion of why I’m leaving is here. I’ve invested a lot of time and energy in to Frankfort and I’m proud of what we’ve been able to accomplish these past 5 years. As I wrote in my letter to the Mayor:

It is with a heavy heart and much emotion that I submit my resignation from the Frankfort Village Board of Trustees effective Friday, April 4, 2008.

Our country’s democracy was founded on the premise of “citizen democracy” and service. Leaders were elected, worked for their constituents and when their time was up, they went home. Increasingly today, we’ve moved away from that model to one of career politicians. I admire our Founding Fathers and their contributions to our country not only for what they did, but how they served their country and then went on with their lives. With that notion in my mind, it is time for me to step away from Village government.

With additional responsibilities at work during the day including an increasing amount of travel, coupled with the upcoming nuptials to my wonderful fiancé Natalie, my ability to focus on Village of Frankfort matters is not where it needs to be. Stepping away from the Board at this time is the right thing to do for the residents of Frankfort. Their interests are at the top of my mind.

The past five years have been a wonderful experience and I relish the time spent with you and the entire Village Board as well as past Clerk Tom Bartkus, current Clerk Kate Romani and former Mayor Ray Rossi. I’ve learned a lot from all of you. I appreciate your patience with me and your support on my many initiatives including the Hybrid Vehicle Tax Waiver, impact fee increases, ethics ordinances, and downtown wi-fi.

We’ve accomplished quite a bit in the five years since I’ve joined the Board, but there is more work to be done. With the steady hand of Administrator Jerry Ducay and your leadership, I’m certain that I’m leaving the residents of Frankfort in very capable hands. The Board will continue to lead Frankfort forward in both economic and quality of life issues.

Frankfort is such a special place and the Board is entrusted to ensure that it remains that way for future generations. I wish you and the Board much success. Don’t forget to keep growth in check and continue to uphold extraordinarily high standards for development. Also, don’t forget to consider the people of Frankfort in all of your decisions – they’re what make Frankfort a truly special place.

Thank you, mostly, to the residents of Frankfort who have twice voted to allow me to represent their interests on the Board. It has been an honor to do their work.

I couldn’t have gotten this far without help from my family and friends - most notably my Dad. With his hard work, he propelled me to office. I’ve met some incredible people throughout this process. Greg Griffin will be a lifetime friend. I appreciate his efforts on my behalf. During my time in office, I’ve lost one good friend - Dan Hattan - someone who guided me and provided counsel in tough times. For that, I will be forever grateful.

I’ll give my time on the board a more thorough post-mortem another time. For now, all I can say is “Thanks and I’ll see you guys around town.”

7th grade April 30, 2009
Guidelines for writing a fable Download Fable

Guidelines for writing a fable

Download Fable

Download Joy 2009

Test on invertebrates on Wed May 13th

Study your folder for the essay questions

Final on Monday

Practice on the website

www.georgiaoas.org/

Work on constellations, sunspots, and stars

Stars for a few days

Energy next

final test on Thursday May 21st

One additional test next week on stars

Our test on stars and galaxies will be Thursday May 14th

Here is the study guide. It would be good to know this information. Ms s

Download Stars and Galaxies Study Guide 

Test Thursday on Stars

Complete the study guide

Test next week over the last semester- Study guide to follow

keep working on your energy independent study

You can do great! MS s

Energy Independent study due at the end of the day on Tuesday the 19th

UK: Towards plain packaging?
UK is considering plan packaging. The Tobacco industry is worried. Source: The Observer 'Plain packets' law to strip cigarettes of their glamour - The Observer September 22, 2008 Denis Campbell Government plans that would force tobacco firms to sell cigarettes...

UK is considering plan packaging. The Tobacco industry is worried.
Source: The Observer

From the MPower Report, the WHO Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2008 (p.54/56) (pdf format)
Warning people about the harms of tobacco use is essential and can be achieved in many ways.
This initial report on the global tobacco epidemic reviews countries' requirements for size and characteristics of health warnings on tobacco packs, which disseminate health information at no cost to government except for enforcement.

Government action to prevent deceptive and misleading terms (such as "light" and "low tar") was also reviewed. Future reports will assess a wider range of public education measures, including public education campaigns.

Pack warnings should cover at least half of packaging display areas and feature rotating, pictorial warnings. Widespread use of effective warning labels would provide important knowledge about tobacco's health threat and counter false information spread by the tobacco industry.

Weak health warnings on tobacco packs -or no warnings at all- continue to be the global norm. As a result, the least expensive way to convey the health risks of tobacco consumption to users and potential users is largely unused.

Of the 176 countries that provided information on pack warnings, only 15 countries, covering 6% of the world's population, require pictorial warnings (covering at least 30% of the principal surface area) on packs of cigarettes and other tobacco products, and only five countries, representing 4% of the world's population, meet all criteria for pack warnings.

These countries, which are in different regions and have diverse social characteristics and income levels, show what can and should be done.

Of the countries that provided information, 77 do not mandate any warnings at all.

There are 25 countries that require pack warnings covering less than 30% of the main display areas; most of these warnings are very small.

Another 45 countries have warnings that cover 30% of the main display areas, and only 29% have warnings larger than 30% of the main display areas.

Warnings are often weakly worded, vaguely stating that tobacco is bad for health but without mentioning specific diseases that it causes.

Only 66 countries have laws that ban the use of deceptive tobacco industry marketing terms, such as "light" and "low tar", from tobacco packaging.

More than 40% of the world's population lives in countries that do not prevent the tobacco industry from using these and other misleading and deceptive terms.

Some countries have implemented effective pack warnings. Thailand requires that each pack of cigarettes include a pictorial health warning that covers at least 50% of both sides of the package.

These startling pictorial warnings, which feature images of rotting teeth, blackened lungs and babies breathing tobacco smoke, were mandated by the government despite threats of legal action from a tobacco company.

Countries can easily improve their policies by increasing warning sizes, strengthening the wording of warnings and including pictures.

Countries that do not mandate effective pack warnings and do not prohibit deceptive and  misleading terms fail to provide their populations with the most basic form of protection from a serious health threat - accurate information and protection from deception by the tobacco industry.

Graphic health warnings need to cover almost the entire surface of cigarette packages if they are to become more effective in convincing smokers to kick the deadly habit, new Health Canada research found. (here the report in pdf format).
"Findings suggest that increasing the current size of warnings of cigarette packages is not very effective to negatively affect image of smokers or perception of cigarette product attributes, unless health warning messages occupy the entire front panel," the study states.

Source: Canwest News Service

Cigarette packs need to have horrific graphics to deter teens: research - Canwest News Service
September 5, 2008

Sarah Schmidt

[Photo cutline]: Graphic health warnings on cigarette packages need to cover almost the entire surface of smoke packs if they are to become more effective in convincing smokers to kick the deadly habit, new Health Canada research found.

Graphic health warnings need to cover almost the entire surface of cigarette packages if they are to become more effective in convincing smokers to kick the deadly habit, new Health Canada research found.

The department set out to find out whether increasing the warning size from the current level - 50 per cent of the panel's surface - to 75, 90 or 100 per cent of cigarette packages would have a greater effect on smokers.

The research, conducted by Montreal-based polling firm Createc on behalf of Health Canada, found that increasing the size of health warning to cover 75 per cent of cigarette packages would only have a "small impact" and over time would unlikely remain more effective than the current coverage of 50 per cent.

After interviewing 730 adult smokers, 306 teen smokers and 440 teens who are likely to start smoking, the firm found that warnings need to cover at least 90 per cent of the package for the negative messages about smoking to achieve "substantial" and "significant" effects on most indicators.

These indicators include perceived communication impact, personal persuasiveness, smoker image, product image, emotional impact and packaging attractiveness.

These results build on research released earlier this year, conducted by Environics on behalf of Health Canada, which found that the current graphic health warnings on cigarette packages covering half the pack are failing to encourage the majority of smokers to quit. More than half of smokers - 57 per cent - said they are unmoved by these graphic warnings, up five points from five years earlier.

According to the new research, when it came to smoker image and product image among the teens surveyed, these image indicators had to cover the entire cigarette package to make a substantial difference; 90 per cent coverage was not enough.

"Findings suggest that increasing the current size of warnings of cigarette packages is not very effective to negatively affect image of smokers or perception of cigarette product attributes, unless health warning messages occupy the entire front panel," the study states.

Among adult and teen smokers, each percentage point of surface increase from 90 to 100 delivered more impact than each point increase from 50 to 75 per cent coverage.

Melodie Tilson, an expert in tobacco packaging and the director of policy for the Non-Smokers' Rights Association, said this is the most important finding.

"What really stood out is going from 90 per cent to 100 per cent made a huge difference," said Tilson, characterizing the move to plain packaging and "eliminating the ability of the industry to promote smoking" as the "logical next step in tobacco control."

Health Minister Tony Clement is poised to make a tobacco-control announcement to further curb smoking in Canada.

The announcement, originally scheduled for Wednesday, was postponed due to a scheduling conflict. Clement's office would not say whether the details will be unveiled before an expected federal election call.

Speaking last month at the annual meeting of the Canadian Medical Association, Clement warned the tobacco industry to expect new anti-tobacco controls.

Anti-tobacco activists expect it's likely that he will announce a plan to curb youth consumption of cigarillos.

The little cigars, sold in flavours that mimic those of candy, fruit or ice cream, are particularly popular among teens; recently released Health Canada data show that cigarillo sales increased by over 300 per cent per year between 2001 and 2006, from fewer than 50,000 units to over 80 million.

Meanwhile Revenue Minister Gordon O'Connor will unveil details Thursday about the government's fight against contraband and counterfeit tobacco.

Source: Canwest News Service

Source: Index Mundi

Also a World Map

According to an international expert on respiratory diseases, all cigarettes sold must have graphic images showing the side effects of smoking.
Dr. Antonio Anzueto, a professor at the University of Texas Health Center, cited the rising number of smokers in the Asia-Pacific.
Scary antismoking images could dissuade people from lighting up, said Anzueto during a press conference in Singapore.

Show smoking’s effects on packs’-- expert
By Julie M. Aurelio
Inquirer
Last updated 02:18am (Mla time) 12/02/2007
SINGAPORE -- According to an international expert on respiratory diseases, all cigarettes sold must have graphic images showing the side effects of smoking.

Dr. Antonio Anzueto, a professor at the University of Texas Health Center, cited the rising number of smokers in the Asia-Pacific.

Scary antismoking images could dissuade people from lighting up, said Anzueto during a press conference in Singapore.

Anzueto, along with other doctors, presented a study on chronic bronchitis and other smoking-related illnesses at a briefing sponsored by Bayer.

He said he was aware of proposals in the Philippines for a law that would require cigarette companies to include picture-based warnings on packages.

Philippine Health Undersecretary Alexander Padilla has been pushing for such a law.

New tack timely

Anzueto said graphic warnings, such as photographs of severely damaged lungs or a malnourished baby, would drive home the point against cigarette smoking.

“It has been done in Europe, Venezuela, Italy, Thailand and other countries. The number of sold packs went down by at least 25 percent in the first month alone,” he said.

Anzueto said that in Europe, doctors are more conscious of smoking-related diseases and are more keen in identifying chronic bronchitis and other similar illnesses.

“Europeans are smoking less now because they are more aware of the effects of smoking,” he said.

Anzueto added that the new tack against cigarette smoking was timely, especially with the upward trend in smoking among Asian men and women.

Starting From Scratch
Well, it was finally time to erase the old spam-filled blog database and start from scratch.  I’m 99% sure there weren’t any real blogs from any real live people in there, so the only people that should have been inconvenienced by the reboot would be the spammers and myself.  And the spammers won’t even notice, [...]

Well, it was finally time to erase the old spam-filled blog database and start from scratch.  I’m 99% sure there weren’t any real blogs from any real live people in there, so the only people that should have been inconvenienced by the reboot would be the spammers and myself.  And the spammers won’t even notice, I’m sure.

I didn’t think about saving a copy of the themes directory.  Oops.  I should grab a copy of that from backups while I can.  I lost track of how many themes I had nicely re-edited to work with the site, so that all those spam blogs would look interesting.  Of course, the spammers never thanked me for all that hard work.  Jerks.

UPDATE: Themes have been restored from backups.  Hooray for themes!

Cross’ Pushing Suburban Strategy: Right Move in Illinois
The Editorial Board of the Chicago Tribune laid the defeat of the bloated, ineffective transit bill at the feet of Tom Cross and the House Republicans. They argue that Cross and his Caucus are holding out for more funding for their constituents in exchange for their votes to eliminate any cuts to the CTA. [...]

The Editorial Board of the Chicago Tribune laid the defeat of the bloated, ineffective transit bill at the feet of Tom Cross and the House Republicans. They argue that Cross and his Caucus are holding out for more funding for their constituents in exchange for their votes to eliminate any cuts to the CTA. The Tribune folks further argue that Cross is hurting the exact folks that he’s trying to help: suburban voters. Their logic is flawed. Sure…there are plenty of folks who are using mass transit who potentially may be hurt by the cuts proposed by the Chicago Democrats and the bloated CTA, but there’s more to the story.

Let’s talk about strategy and why I believe the Tom Cross and the House Republicans made a great move. As a side note, I think Ron Huberman, who inherited this mess at the CTA is a good man, but he needs to bring the focus of his scapel internally before he starts crying externally. Cut some middle management out of the budget before you start cutting routes. I won’t delve into that subject (as it’s just a side note!) in this post, but just stick to the political implications of this standoff.

Let’s fast forward a few years to 2010. There will be a Governor’s race between Lisa Madigan and the GOP nominee. Now…let’s just say that the nominee was Tom Cross - the House Republican Leader. Let’s say that he’s taking a page from Congressman Mark Kirk and his “Suburban Agenda“. Where’s Cross going to get his votes? Mostly from outside the City of Chicago, right? Is Lisa going to use this against him in the City with commuters? Sure she will. But, he’ll be able to counter much of that with the discussion about transit not being a one-and-done issue. It requires a regional approach and the region needs road money as much as it needs mass transit money.

Cross will further be able to buttress his work for Chicago by pointing to his successes with both O’Hare and Midway Airports. Of course, Tom Cross recognizes that Chicago is THE economic engine for the State of Illinois and it needs to be supported. The O’Hare Airport expansion couldn’t have happened without HGOP votes, and Cross ensured that the future of air transportation stays strong with a healthy and expanded O’Hare Airport. Transit isn’t the only issue that’s facing folks in Chicago. What about jobs? I know Tom Cross and his policy staff are thinking about job related issues like keeping the technology scene moving along in Chicago. That’s a subject near and dear to my heart. They are working on ways to keep folks from who are interested in technology from fleeing to the West Coast. The Illinois Math and Science Academy is in Cross’ district. He knows what a gem of an institution it is. He also knows that the University of Illinois in Urbana produces some of the smartest engineering minds in the land (including my very own brother-in-law Equation Boy/Man). He’s going to develop policies to keep these kids in Chicago and working in the field that they love: technology. Do that, and we’ll all come out ahead.

Getting back to the CTA, I know Tom Cross a bit and I know that he actually rides the CTA. Not in the Mayor Bloomberg way for show, but actually to get somewhere. When he takes his son, an avid Cubs fan to Wrigley, he rides up there from the loop on the Red Line. He attends countless dinners, meetings, and events in the great city. He isn’t an ideologue who hates the city and thinks Chicago doesn’t deserve the funding for mass transit, he just understands that fixing just one part of the problem is the proper solution. Doing what’s right for the region is what’s right for Chicago and he’s going to try to ensure that the solution is comprehensive.

In the end, blocking the CTA’s money grab while protecting the suburbs was a wise political move for the future for House Republican Leader Tom Cross or for any GOP leader. When he needs to, he’ll have every Mayor and suburban leader championing his cause - saying he stuck up for the area’s roads in the face of the Chicago Democratic Corruption Machine. His work isn’t done, because he’ll still loose if he gets whitewashed in the City. But…turning some of those young commuters his way is doable. By pointing to the GOP’s success in Chicago with an expanded O’Hare and the votes to lead to a Midway Lease by Mayor Daley, coming up with some solid policies to keep the tech industry humming along in the city, along with a smart press, political and web strategy, he’ll have it licked.

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite days of the year. In fact, I think I like it better than Christmas. It’s a perfect combination of wonderful things. I have a ton of things to be thankful for and they all seem to come together on Thanksgiving. From my annual “night out” with my crew last night, to spending the day strapping on the ole’ feedbag with my entire family both in Frankfort and in Naperville - I get to spend lots of time with the people that matter most to me.

The other part of Thanksgiving that I like is the traditions. From the family, to the food, to the weekend cutting down of the Christmas Tree - it’s all fantastic fun. While all of those traditions were started without me and I’m simply a participant, there’s one tradition that I’ve started that makes me enjoy Thanksgiving morning. While most Americans are tuning into Matt Lauer and Al Roker to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, at my place we’re watching The Last Waltz - and watching it LOUD!

I’d tell you that you should be doing the same, but I’ve already done that in years past!
2004
2005
2006

Today, I got called out on my conspicuous consumption of bebe clothes by a coworker. She told me that she and another coworker took a field trip to bebe after work to check out my new threads--and the prices. Suffice it to say that I got a good roasting this morning and not in a good way. I was outed for my excessive spending on new bebe clothes and accessories, including the fact that I purchased all three colors of the bebe 'Ali' pumps (fortunately, the heat wave that we have been having in the Bay Area the past few days caused me to change-up my wardrobe. I chose not to wear bebe today, but instead opt for my Sunhee Moon shirt dress in apple green with my Gucci espadrille wedges).

Yes, I admit to my numerous purchases at bebe, but I have taken advantage of the promotional coupons such as the $100-off the purchase of $300 (which I have used more than once).

I suppose the stars are aligned in terms of delivering me to a twelve-step program and placing me in recovery for my shopaholic behavior--I told my coworker on Friday that I had an addiction to buying clothes, but she just shrugged it off. Now, she knows.

It's funny, however. Not a week earlier, I had went to the Yves Saint Laurent retrospective at the de Young Museum (a must-see for anyone on the west coast or visiting San Francisco) with another co-worker who I learned was a fashion enthusiast, but with a more demure, less conspicuous approach than I.

I had commented to her that more exclusive, and not necessarily more expensive, or less well known brands tend to fly under the radar than those with gigantic advertising budgets.

Let's take my brand bebe for example.

bebe is home-town brand much like Levi's, The Gap, Banana Republic, Old Navy, Georgiou, The Sak and others. As a result, the company buys a lot of advertisting in local San Francisco Bay Area publications, bus stop shelter signs and has the Bay Area fairly well covered with stores in areas that serves it demographic (for example, there is a bebe in Walnut Creek and San Mateo, but not in Berkeley).

As a result, the Bay Area is well saturated with the bebe brand. Anyone who shops for clothes in the malls or in chic, chic areas from Union Street in San Francisco to Valley Fair mall in San Jose to the bebe outlet at the Great Mall in Milpitas is aware of bebe even if they haven't shopped there themselves.

Like the Louis Vuitton monogram logo that I have ranted about in the past, the mainstream public can identify with bebe in the clothing brand ecosystem: sexy, young women-oriented--and expensive. Many women I interact with from the woman who does my manicures and pedicures to others say that bebe is expensive. And, it is.

However, more exclusive brands that are less well known and which (in my case), may be more expensive (read: Cesare Paciotti) tend to be largely ignored among the great populous (at least in the Bay Area in which I have commented numerous times).

This is exactly the strategy of my other coworker (who I went to the YSL exhibit).  She wears designs that are beautifully made and stylish, but are, to be blunt, nondescript to those not in the know. Only other fashionistas, or those exposed to fashion, would be aware of her fine, sartorial threads.

In other words, my coworker is hiding in plain sight.

I, on the other hand, intentionally draw the attention of others to myself (tt's my narcissism and vanity at work). In other cases, people are just as oblivious as to what I'm wearing. Take my outfit today. I did receive several compliments from other women in the office, but no one called me out on my espadrilles being from Gucci, let alone from Gucci's spring 2006 cruise collection.

It comes down to consumption communities.  A term I learned of from James B. Twitchell's 2003 book, Living it Up: America's Love Affair with Luxury. According to Twitchell, a person's consumption community is the price point of products that a person is exposed to by herself and those around her. If you're zip code is in Pacific Heights or Hillsborough or Atherton, it's a pretty good chance that you would have first-hand knowledge of brands such as Piaget or Hermes.

For many, including myself, it is the work of the media and celebrity that has democratized fashion and fashion brands--particularly luxury brands. Louboutin is wildly popular primarily due to the many celebrity women who wear his shoes and his saturation of the retail channel ( I believe his shoes are too available. Exclusivity by price is not the sole determinant of a luxury brand). Brand extension has also played a factor, which Twitchell writes about. Brand extension is where luxury brands create "entry-level" or lower-priced products to reach more customers. Mercedes Benz is a good example. The C230 series, particularly the company's latest itineration, is very popular. However, brand extension can work in reverse. Witness Toyota's Lexus division winning numerous J.D. Power and Associates awards for customer satisfaction over the company's European rivals.

I have once again rambled into territory that I have addressed before. I'll closely saying that I while the weather remains to be unseasonably warm, I'll take it as an opportunity to wear my less consipicuous brands.

My favorite fashion reporter/photographer is Bill Cunningham's On The Street in which he has been chronicling what New Yorker's have been wearing for years--and yes, decades. However, I am big fan of the new web format of On The Street that takes advantage of the Internet's unique capabilities, namely Cunningham's audio commentary with the slide show.

It's much more illuminating to hear him discuss the week's photos and hear him describe what New Yorker's are wearing and why. I find it much more interesting to have both the visual and audio--particularly to hear the voice of the photographer after decades of photo montages that have appeared in the Sunday New York Times. A print montage that I swear I recall, yet have not found in the Times' online archives is collection of photos from circa mid-to-late 1990's of the Antique high-heel Mary Janes produced by Prada that were all the rage one fall season.

As a shoe fiend, I have certainly enjoyed Cunningham's recent stories on shoes being the focus of the outfit than the handbag.

In this week's photo essay entitled The Modern Woman and what they are wearing, I found one photo of a woman whose outfit is super cute with a very feminine full mini skirt, black jacket, black hobo and of course, the clearly visible red-soled trademark of Christian Louboutin black s