EleBlog

05 Sep, 2010

Solar vibrator helps women get off while getting off the grid -- that's an actual headline!'

How do you treat rabbit phobia?

New technology for tracking surgical instruments, sponges during surgery -- it's about using RFID to make sure that when they operate on you, they don't leave stuff INSIDE you!

While we're on the subject of RFID (this one isn't so weird) -- Use RFIDs to Control Your HVAC

And this one is NOT unexpected: California revokes record number of real estate licenses

25 Aug, 2010

From a New York Times story about the arrival of King Tut's Chariot in Manhattan:

"When New York traffic officials reviewed the papers required for the oversize truck that would transport the chariot into Manhattan, they saw that the cargo inside was classified as a vehicle, and demanded its Vehicle Identification Number."

From an exhibition official, who apparently relayed this story to the NYT reporter: "I'm totally serious. But we got it cleared up."

23 Aug, 2010

Did you know that San Francisco now has a law in place that requires retailers to display the facts about how much radiation an individual cell phone emits?

This is about, I think, the possibility that holding the things so close to your head can cause cancer in your brain.

EleBlog take: I don't know if I believe it or not. Fortunately, I hardly ever use the damn things.

But more importantly, a wireless association (CTIA) sued to block enforcement.

Why?

PC World wrote:

Here's the context: the FCC already regulates cell phone radiation, so no phones have a Specific Absorption Ratio of more than 1.6 watts per kilogram. There are other factors to consider, such as how the phone is held, whether a case is applied and how much time is spent on the phone. And when all is said and done, there's still no evidence that cell phone radiation causes cancer. There's certainly no evidence that a slightly lower Specific Absorption Ratio could be the difference between life and death.

Here's a semantic unraveling of this BS: "We don't think people can use this information. We don't want people to have this information."

As EleBlog doesn't know if the radiation law is necessary, what's CONVINCING in the way of evidence FOR the law -- at this moment -- are the CTIA lawsuits and PC World article AGAINST it.

17 Aug, 2010

I've heard people refer to the USGBC program, Leadership in Environmental and Energy Design, as "LEEDS."

I've actually heard it a lot.

Now, this week, I saw it in a headline in an industry magazine ("LEEDS Certification"). It wasn't a one-time error; the article referenced "LEEDS certification" in 4 places (and it was a relatively short sidebar, for Pete's sake).

Get this straight (it's easy enough).

LEEDS is a city "Live At Leeds" is the Who's first live album.

But the USGBC's green-building certification program is LEED.

12 Aug, 2010

. . . it's the hybrid from Toyota, the Prius, according to this Grist.org piece. 

11 Aug, 2010

... in Germany. At the World Championships. In the Age 35+ category.

He's 59!!!

Read about his exploits here.

Don't know who Mike Holt is? I can hardly believe it, but if so -- go to his site and find out.

06 Aug, 2010

This story is one year old, but still so weird that it was worth posting here:

Though living in a traditional western China cave dwelling in Ansai, an under-developed county of Shaanxi province, Kang Haifa's household is using the world's most advanced energy-saving lamps.

Philips Lighting China donated the lighting fixtures to Kang and thousands of other families in Ansai, allowing them to illuminate their cave dwellings with high-efficiency, low-electricity lamps.

See it here.

31 Jul, 2010

Bye-Bye Batteries (this is probably not-so-fringe, really)

Deep Space Camera Locates 'Host' Of Earths (more than 700 of 'em!)

High-Rise Bldgs. Will Use TOILETS To Generate Electricity

Use Cigarette Butts to Prevent Steel From Rusting

29 Jul, 2010

An article posted to The Oil Drum notes that while English recognizes electricity generation in TWO pieces -- base load and peak load -- some others see something else: A 3-part view -- Base, intermediate & peak load.

Does it matter? The contributor says indeed it does.

- - - - -

EleBlog take:

Interesting. Even if you can't embrace the idea here, it's wonderful to step outside of basic assumptions (and "knowledge") for a few minutes and "see" things differently.

This, I think, it what "thinking outside the box" might actually be like!!!

22 Jul, 2010

12,500

Boat made from 12,500 reclaimed plastic water bottles (this is the last item on page)

10

10 weird green news stories flying under your radar. My favorite is #7.

6

Six drinks to avoid slipping down your gullet.


5000 BC

Could Super Solar Flares Take Us Back to 5000 BC? NOTE: I originally found this one on HuffPost, but the site has since taken the item down (no explanation) . . . link takes you someplace else, where the item remains.

22 Jun, 2010

A few days ago The EleBlog contained a post -- a video with Matthew Simmons looking at the idea of a hurricane washing all kinds of spilled oil onto our shores.

Now The Energy Tribune, very much a pro-oil-industry site (in my reading of it), has an article -- An OiliCane? Here's an interesting paragraph from the thing:


Nightmare, anyone?

19 Jun, 2010

The headline that went with this picture (and a few others) was: "An electrician 350 miles above the Earth."

[not your everyday truck roll!]

17 Jun, 2010

I like to read stuff from the fringes (both right and left, but the left is generally more fun - for me, at least). The stuff that you and I might define as "fringe" in the year 1920 becomes mainstream not too long after (like, say, Social Security).

Here's some stuff you might want to read, with some comments I'll try to keep on the positive side of negative:

Kunstler -- this guy blogs every Monday. He sees the end of the world coming. He wrote a book on the subject, which I read (some of it was believable). And he's a liberal gloom-and-doomer to boot! NOTE: I take no responsibility if you are offended by the name he slapped on his blog, which is not going to appear here.

http://kunstler.com/blog/2010/06/fierce-urgency.html

 

Touchdown Jesus -- in ancient times, if lightning hit a statue of your God, he'd lose points (folks with swarm over to the next-best god on the block). This link goes to an atheist's take on the thing, which is not too kind.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/06/ohio_christians_defy_god.php

 

Baseball Codes -- I'm an avid baseball fan (I'm following the World Cup right now, a bit, but I generally give the rest of sports a wide berth). Yet this blog (about hidden or not-oft-discussed "codes" of the game) usually loses me. The current exemplar: Is it OK to bunt to break up a perfect game? Yes, if it’s in the 8^th inning. No, if it’s in the 9^th. Go figger!

http://thebaseballcodes.com/2010/06/15/bunt-it-like-beckham-chisox-infielder-tries-to-break-up-no-no-with-a-bunt/

 

Ancient Egyptians – they “cast” stone? That's what it says here. And it's posted to the Skeptic Blog, which is . . . well, skeptical!

http://skepticblog.org/2010/06/10/did-the-ancient-egyptians-cast-stone/

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11 Jun, 2010

Headline from a piece at DLC.org:

In 1980, there were 150 million European children.

Now, there are 110 million.

03 Jun, 2010

I don't know what to make of this, and no one paid for me to put it here. But here it is:


Here's the web site.

01 Jun, 2010

EleBlog is a few weeks late on this, but better late then never --


This is the most-certain human emotional response in the headlines. "Screw me? Oh yeah? Heck no -- SCREW YOU!"

Read about it here.

27 May, 2010

Actual headline from The New Scientist: "Pliable power pack will let gadgets feed on your body." A bit of the article (not the whole thing) is reproduced at that link. To read the full piece, you have to subscribe to the magazine; I do, but that doesn't help you. 

25 May, 2010

Really. You can't make this stuff up!

23 May, 2010

Railroads are just fine, but the idea of moving crude oil via railroad strikes me as  . . . well, archaic.

According to Oil & Gas Journal (4/26 issue), crude oil pulled out of the Bakken formation in ND/MT is being moved via rail (from ND to a terminal in St. James, La.). How much? Up to 10,000 barrels per day.

My only question, unanswered in the one-page piece, is -- are the barrels made of wood?
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18 May, 2010

I just got around to reading a 4/17/10 Economist supplement on innovation in emerging countries/economies. Get a load of this:


WHY?

03 May, 2010

Headline on a release (found on both the AIA + NEMA websites):

NEMA and AIA Renew Call on Congress to Extend Commercial Building Tax Deduction.

Release here.

Here's what I don't get: Does nagging the Congress produce results?

23 Apr, 2010

An article by Jason Knott, editor of CE Pro magazine, notes that Caption James Tiberius Kirk used a PADD (personal access display device) on the TV show "Star Trek" -- which began in 1967. Here's the article. 

23 Apr, 2010

In a video posted to Youtube (and explained on Gizmodo) -- apparently -- a free diver lost his camera to an octopus, chased the creature, and got it back. The octopus took a spear gun in trade for the camera. 

21 Apr, 2010

This is the name of a company. See the Solar Roadways website. According to a 4/13 squib posted to SmartGridNews.com, the company received a $100K small business grant from the U.S. DOT to build a solar road panel prototype. 

09 Apr, 2010

Switch printer fonts to save, according to this article -- use Century Gothic, don't use Arial --

http://www.environmentalleader.com/2010/04/07/save-thousands-by-switching-printer-fonts/

06 Apr, 2010

As you no doubt can tell, I recently googled myself. The link below will take you to a 2001 article written by someone else about some idiot who came down with Legionnaire's Disease and almost died in September 2000. The parts about me are at the very beginning and the very end of the thing.

http://physician-assistant.advanceweb.com/editorial/content/editorial.aspx?CC=2732

06 Apr, 2010

I was honored with a naming in the acknowledgment of a book, The Recycling Handbook, back in the early 1990s. Thanks to Google's fooling around with posting books online, it's now see-able.

See it here;

http://books.google.com/books?id=HZ2UDW8_c2gC&pg=PP7&lpg=PP7&dq=%22Joe+Salimando%22&source=bl&ots=_NjxHqkzCc&sig=lqZHhRGaCxRmhJgYezoZpX3YYbI&hl=en&ei=eni6S_XxH8KblgfRvcyuBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&ved=0CCEQ6AEwBzhG#v=onepage&q=%22Joe%20Salimando%22&f=false

05 Apr, 2010

Do you wonder how some of us live in a world in which the amount of energy consumed by Lighting is thought to be a problem, and others -- right now -- live in a world in which artificial light is some kind of aspiration?

I do. Read the story linked below, from the 3/21 Boston Globe, which starts as follows:

Where nightfall once meant only darkness in the tiny Tanzanian island of Tumbatu, now there are 200 points of light.

http://www.boston.com/news/science/articles/2010/03/21/retired_brandeis_professor_brings_clean_power_to_african_villages/

. . . it's happening with solar panels, by the way.

29 Mar, 2010

"how going green may make you mean" is the headline on a story out of the U.K.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/15/green-consumers-more-likely-steal

. . . OK, OK, I admit -- I'm becoming more skeptical of things green (thanks to research). But stuff like this makes me crazy:


No. Really?

20 Mar, 2010

Not in my house (as long as my wife makes these decisions) . . . but, apparently, in someone's.

[found via CE Pro]

05 Mar, 2010

FORTUNE magazine offers, annually, a list of its "Most Admired Companies." I ran into it (again) in a recent New Yorker magazine article on Angelo Mozilo, the moron (or thief?) who ran Countrywide Financial Corp. The article was about this guy, but it noted (in passing) that the company was on the 2005 FORTUNE "Most Admired" list.

I happen to remember that Enron was #7 on the same list in 2000, the year before it blew up.

Perhaps this list isn't worth doing?

25 Feb, 2010

This is a bit late, but back in mid-Jan the Wall Street Journal ran a feature (in the place they put the "quirky" stuff, bottom of the front page) on Nikola Tesla. It included a lot of stuff on the Edison-Tesla rivalry, including this:


No one is going to get on the good side of The EleBlog by doing harm to elephants!

12 Feb, 2010

I've heard the term Degree Day for much of my life. I've never known what it meant. The Alliance for Save Energy defines the term on its site. 

07 Feb, 2010

My friend Tom Lyga has gone out on his own (he worked for Pass & Seymour/Legrand for years, where he was always helpful) -- give EMarketMyBiz.com a look-see. 

31 Jan, 2010

So many contractors in the Wilmington NC area have raised cash by taking their tools to pawn shops there, that (the local newspaper reported) the pawn shops won't take any more tools. 

23 Jan, 2010

I recently saw an article -- I can't remember where -- about the customer NOT always being right. If I find it, I'll post it.

In the meantime, there's a blog from a magazine called Residential Design & Build which lists "pet peeves in the custom home market." A slice of it:


HEY -- if the customer KNEW about construction, he wouldn't need YOU. It would have been better if this blog had never seen the light. The title says it all:

Clients are annoying.

OH YEAH? How annoying are ZERO clients?

19 Jan, 2010

From IEEE Spectrum:

Plastic solar cells (integrated with batteries and LEDs) -- replacements for kerosene lamps in unlit villages? The "organic PVs" pictured below are "printed roll-to-roll." Think about this . . . no biggie to you, maybe, but a potential miracle for uncounted millions in Africa.


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19 Jan, 2010

It stands for "public-private partnerships." I was asked to write about 'em for the Nov/Dec issue of ENGINEERING INC., official publication of the American Council of Engineering Companies.

See the result here.

(yeah, I know this is off-topic -- but it DOES have something to do with construction)

18 Jan, 2010

EGG-Energy is said (by Earth2Tech.com) to be "the Netflix of batteries for the developing world."

What? It is


and


This might work!

14 Jan, 2010

Geothermal, widely regarded as an underutilized form of "clean" energy, causes earthquakes, apparently. Or can cause them. Or something.

I checked, and it's not April 1. I don't think this is a joke.

05 Jan, 2010

I'm not making this up -- although maybe the folks at Geek.com did. The report (which is now 16 months old) comes complete with a Video. 

28 Dec, 2009

John Crudele writes about economic/financial stuff for the NY Post. I hate the NY Post for a lot of reasons, but I think Crudele does a more than passable job. He points out economic trends and stats that many other commentators/reporters miss. And he does it in a tight word allocation each time, which (I happen to know for a fact) is not very easy.

His 12/24 column was outstanding. It was about Trinie Jestine, 28, who is from the Bronx, lived with 15 other people in a four-bedroom (one bathroom) apartment, and served in the U.S. military. He ended up in a shelter when he came back. NOW, he has a job.

Crudele picked Jestine -- a regular guy who has been somewhat unfortunate, but just now got lucky -- as his "man of the year." It beats all heck out of TIME's choice, Ben Bernanke.

Story: Real man of the year.

21 Dec, 2009

Worth your time to read: A release from Census about China's population. From the release (bolding is from EleBlog):

17 Dec, 2009

From Electronic House magazine: A ditty about a Wi-Fi-connected bathroom scale. "It records your body weight . . . to your Twitter account."

Welcome to the future.

15 Dec, 2009

From Barry Ritholtz's blog (which I read every week to keep up with a brilliant guy's thoughts on the financial situation, the economy, and the market): The Word of the Year for 2009 was "unfriend."

I kid you not.  

02 Dec, 2009

From NASA: Monster Waves on the Sun are Real.

. . . have you ever sat down and thought about how much we're STILL finding out about the real world, what's all around us? It's stunning. It makes you wonder (OK -- it makes me wonder) about how much we STILL do not know!

27 Nov, 2009

A fascinating Web "timne-lapse" graphic -- go to The Business Insider and look for click through and press "play" -- shows how unemployment went from underneath 5% to over 10% in the past few years. It's not an electrical or construction thing, per se . . . but it's pretty interesting to look at, even if you are NOT a human being, not a worker, and not living in the U.S. 

22 Nov, 2009

The Paint Quality Institute issued this Color Trends for 2010 report. I don't know what to make of stuff like this:

With consumers continued desire to create both warm and functional spaces the Good Morning palette consists of hues that are fresh, clean and comfortable.

Color Recommendations:
Honey-like hues such as tan or pale gold
Coral
Yellow
Mineral Grey

Apparently, there once was a time when "hues that are fresh, clean and comfortable" were not the norm. Apparently, that time came before 2010.

When was that?

28 Oct, 2009

Yes, I know the Japanese are different from the Americans. And I know cultural differences are to be prized (or at least understood) . . . not deplored or teased. And certainly, these differences don't lead you to become Hitler.

But this one has to make you laugh:


The report was relayed by EnvironmentalLeader.com, a site which I generally find to be reliable.

26 Oct, 2009

Lots of folks would tell you there is NOTHING but fiction in the New York Times. I'm not one of those, but my head is spinning from a re-reading of a 10/13 article:

The Collider, the Particle, and a Theory About Fate.

I would call this weird. The part which sends my head into 7-dimensional circles (think about that!) says that two NOT wild-and-crazy guys say . . . well, this is what the article says:


In other words, somehow the particle that the Large Hadron Collider is supposed to produce IS being produced. And it's traveling backward in time and sabotaging the collider.

Do you understand the meaning of those words? I'm not saying they are true (how the F would I know?).

I'm just reeling from the idea that a couple of really smart guys think it could be. I had to check the calendar (to see whether it was April Fool's Day).

06 Oct, 2009

Headline from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "Recession chips away at granite kitchen tops." Key claim: "Glass and concrete tops tend to get better with age."

21 Sep, 2009

I realized I was way behind on "social media" when I learned that the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem -- which is what's left of a demolition accomplished by the Romans some 1,940 years ago -- is available on TWITTER.

I need to catch up! I'm a lot younger than that . . . most of the time.

30 Jul, 2009

One of the thing I still have not gotten over, after 30 years in and around the electrical construction business (I started as Senior Editor with Electrical Contractor in May 1979), is how the great things that electrical components of a building CAN do are . . . routinely ignored.

Here's a case in point -- a feature from Builder magazine, "10 things you must put in your next home." Are any of them about energy efficiency, lighting, home networking, home automation, or such? How about an EnOcean wireless light switch? How about The Clapper?

No.

22 Jul, 2009

This is "off the pathen beat," but it seemed interesting to me -- the Census Bureau's fact sheet on Americans "with some level of disability."

41.2 million people with "some level." That equals 15% of the civilian noninstitutionalized population ("noninstitutionalized" means not in a medical facility or in a prison).


Of those 41.2M, 11 million "need personal assistance with everyday activiites." 3.3M age 15+ are in a wheelchair, with 10.2M needing to use "a cane, crutches, or walker" to get around.

Blind or "unable to see printed words at all" = 1.8 million of those age 15+

Deafness = 1.0 million of those 15+

- - - - -

16.1 million people "who have a mental or emotional illness that interferes with daily activities = 7% of the population 15+.

13.3 million people age 16-64 with a medical condition "that makes it difficult to find a job or remain employed."

46% of those 21-64 who said they had some type of disability worked in the past year anyway. That includes 31% of those classified as having a severe disability.

Poverty: 9% of those without a disability live below the poverty line. For those with a disability, it's 12%.

20 Jul, 2009

A 7/17 article in The Mirror, a British publication, notes that a handman "was paid pounds 500 of taxpayers' money for driving 300 miles just to change a loo seat."

500 pounds = more than $800. What's going on here? "The Home Office contracts work to a firm which has regional 'hubs' . . . " -- so a plumber goes from Birmingham to Norwich (and back) just to replace a toilet seat.

And for a cost of "at least pounds 250" ($400 or more), "an electrician drove 200 miles from Newmarket to Birmingham to mend a switch."

Why not use a local service? It's not part of the plan. According to the article, "window cleaners are also criss-crossing the country, staying overnight in hotels."

23 Jun, 2009

Yes, this has nothing to do with electrical work. But there's a fascinating online animation of why the curveball has been "voted Visual Illision of the Year by the U.S. Vision Sciences Society," according to New Scientist. 

08 Jun, 2009

Fast Company magazine ran an article in its February issue -- on wireless electricity. Seriously. Here's a slice of it:

01 May, 2009

Click here to see a YouTube video that explains that there's nothing whatsoever "wrong" with carbon dioxide.

14 Apr, 2009

Unfortunately, I can't wait for the Yankees' season to get better, as it has become notably horrible in the past few days. So here's an item I was sitting on: CODY RANSOM, who is the guy playing third base these days (while A-Rod rehabs from an operation), is the son of an electrical contractor.

His dad is Randy Ransom, owner/operator "for more than three decades" of Circle R Electric (Chandler, Ariz.), according to an article in The Star-Ledger (Newark, N.J.).

This would be a lot more glorious item were Randy not 2 for his last 24.
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10 Apr, 2009

Folks get sicker in hospitals. Why? One reason might be this:

25 Mar, 2009

Wireless waves penetrate, unless they are stopped (and they are, of course, all around us!). BUT, according to an item from CSE magazine, Japanese researchers

23 Mar, 2009

You can't make this stuff up -- this is a Plug-In Dinner Plate. More here.

21 Mar, 2009

A crosswalk in Seattle illuminated at night ("Crosswalk 2.0, says TreeHugger). 

15 Mar, 2009

A 2/19 article on the NY Times site is headlined "low-tech fixes for high-tech problems." Here's one of them, which completely knocked me out:

Suppose your remote car door opener does not have the range to reach your car across the parking lot. Hold the metal key part of your key fob against your chin, then push the unlock button. The trick turns your head into an antenna, says Tim Pozar, a Silicon Valley radio engineer.

Mr. Pozar explains, “You are capacitively coupling the fob to your head. With all the fluids in your head it ends up being a nice conductor. Not a great one, but it works.” Using your head can extend the key’s wireless range by a few car lengths.

10 Mar, 2009

From an article in the Asheville Citizen-Times (2/8/09), one more thing I didn't know:

"Porch ceilings in the 19th century were traditionally painted sky blue, which supposedly discourages flying insects from nesting and keeps away evil spirits."

05 Mar, 2009

Two items on Bathrooms recently caught my eye:

1. a 2/27 op-ed piece in The New York Times (yes, that paper). Here's a link; I'm not sure it will work. Here are the first paragraphs:


2. Ike Casey, who is the executive director of a plumbing contractors' group (NAPHCC), once worked in the electrical industry. He once was the top staffer at the IEC, the non-union contractors association. I know and like him. I once gave him a hard time (in an e-mail) about the fact that he hardly ever blogs -- he's posted all of 7 items on the site since 2/07.

But the latest was worth the wait, on waterless urinals. Ike's not making a joke here. And what he had to say was interesting to me, because I've been trying (in my mind) to figure out why you'd want one of these things. See his post here.  The first words of the post are priceless, and reminded me a bit of reading Mark Twain:

06 Feb, 2009

Yes, I know this is the EleBlog, but I couldn't resist this item. According to something I read (in Consumer Reports on Health, a newsletter), under the headline Heart benefits of a hearty laugh, I read the following facts:

28 Jan, 2009

As this seems to be getting more attention lately, it might be worth your time to see this piece in the March/April 2008 issue of Technology Review (which comes from MIT). I'm not sure how practical this is going to be in the next 20 years (i.e., before I die!).




CAPTION FOR ABOVE GRAPHIC FROM TECHNOLOGY REVIEW:

Marin Soljačić and colleagues used magnetic resonance coupling to power a 60-watt light bulb. Tuned to the same frequency, two 60-centimeter copper coils can transmit electricity over a distance of two meters, through the air and around an obstacle.

1. Resonant copper coil attached to frequency converter and plugged into outlet
2. Wall outlet
3. Obstacle
4. Resonant copper coil attached to light bulb

Credit: Bryan Christie Design

- - - - -

What I really liked about the piece (besides the graphic above with explanation) is that Nikola Tesla figures prominently in the lead. Anyone who has spent time in the electrical industry knows enough to worship at the feet of Tesla!!!

19 Jan, 2009

It's going on in China. 

15 Jan, 2009

Here's a story that says Energizer is working with another company "to enable contactless power delivery and charging solutions." Whoooo!!!

12 Jan, 2009

Every month, www.kitco.com posts (for free) the Fortis Metals Monthly, an analysis of the market for copper (!!!), zinc, aluminum, gold, silver, and other stuff. The November issue (50p PDF) -- start on page 6 and go on to pages 7 & 8 -- included an article headlined, Landfill: a new metal resource? Here's a key phrase:


75% of this "waste" metal (unrecycled and thrown out with the trash) is steel, Fortis says, with another 20% being aluminum. Fortis's verdict on landfill mining: Not now, but someday.

08 Jan, 2009

32,213 miles on four continents, in a 17-month-plus road trip traversing nearly 40 countries. It is said to be the "first world tour without using a single drop of oil." 

05 Jan, 2009

An article (found here) with the headline "Seeing Double -- Seeing Green" -- provides food for thought.

It's about using 2 monitors. This is "green" because it saves paper, the article says (you don't have to print out as much). It's smart business, because it increases productivity.

Productivity gains from this kind of set-up are estimated at 20% to 50%. That's impressive! From where do the productivity gains come? Here's a bulleted (aimed at accountants):

• Comparative analysis between documents like tax returns or financial statements
  
• Report creation, reserving one screen for resource materials while typing the report on the other
  
• Monitoring e-mail on one screen while working on the other
  
• Researching complex issues while working on a document or tax return

NOW WAIT: The article goes on about this, provides details on how to do it ("you will need a video card...." blahblahblah). But it doesn't tell me the basic facts about whether or not this really IS green.

Facts I would need to know:


I'll bet a detailed analysis might show the two-screen idea IS greener than printing out paper. But without that kind of thinking behind the article, what you had here is a CLAIM, not proof.

Beyond all of that green stuff, if you really get a 20% productivity advantage (or better) from using 2 screens, then it might be worth pursuing even if you DO use more energy. First, business is business. Second, if you have an office of 10 heavy computer users and increase productivity by 20%, in theory you could reduce the workforce down to 8 (via attrition?).

You're going to save a lot of energy (and be greener!) when those 2 people aren't driving to work, turning lights on in their offices, etc. and etc.

TO SUM UP: I can make a good case that this idea IS GREEN. But the article really did not.

31 Dec, 2008

New excuse (I must be fat for SOME reason not having to do with my own personal weaknesses, right?). "Can Electrical Pollution Make Kits Fat? A press release on a book.

I kid you not!

16 Dec, 2008

. . . well, don't you?

This news item (complete with a photo) talks about a Japanese company that is so determined to fight Carbon Dioxide emissions that it has (I kid you not -- unless this is an April Fool's item come six months late?) . . .


According to another item (here), the company is requiring these folks to work on the roof 90 days a year.

14 Dec, 2008

Headline from the 12/8 New York Times: "Back at Junk Value, Recyclables Are Piling Up." The lead:


Why this is relevant: I've written previously that the "green" movement engenders in me certain "I've seen all this before" feelings. That includes certain specifics, including the plummeting of prices for recyclables. Back in the mid-1990s, $ paid for recyclables plummeted. The newspaper I had founded in 1987 at the National Solid Wastes Management Association, Recycling Times, went out of business in 1997 as a result.

So I take this personally. I also know that when recyclables can't be sold off by recyclers, the incentive to collect them goes Out The Window. If the rotten price scenario is sustained (which it might well be, at least for a while) . . . we're going to suddenly be LESS GREEN.

30 Nov, 2008

For $4.85 billion in cash, Berkshire Hathaway (run by Warren Buffett) sold naked puts on the world's equity markets. It was a 20-year naked put; there are 14 years to go. According to Jon Markman, a very good market watcher, Buffett has already had "to mark down a $6.7B loss on the trade." This is an item worth reading.

Does anyone know what happens in 14 years? NO. But a new possibility (new info to me) is that Berkshire Hathaway will have to pony up $37B in 14 years due to the sale of a naked put . . . which I would call the ulitimate standard stupid derivative.

The logic is as follow:

28 Nov, 2008

A place called The Green Microgym (Portland, Ore). pays members when they workout (they generate electricity as they do it!). From the site:

25 Nov, 2008

I was browsing Saving Electricity In A Hurry, a report from the International Energy Agency on "dealing with temporary shortfalls in electricity supplies." I came across a poster from New Zealand, apparently an advertisement used during a 2003 shortfall:

"If you sing in the shower, choose shorter songs."

14 Nov, 2008

It's not a club you can "join" -- it's a physical location (a club) in London. A TIME magazine article in July wrote it up:

07 Nov, 2008

Electric West has announced that Ed Begley Jr., the actor, is doing the keynote at the March 2009 show. For what it's worth, the Nov/Dec issue of "E" magazine says Begler is #1 on its list of the Top 10 Eco Celebs.

01 Nov, 2008

Check the calendar -- it's not April 1. This is the real deal!

28 Oct, 2008

This is (as the label says) -- Off The Pathen Beat. But I circled this when reading the 9/6/08 issue of New Scientist, and I just can't get it out of my head.

Earth's population right now is estimated at 6.5 billion. That's 6,500,000,000.

What was it just 6,000 years ago? If a generation = roughly 20 years, that's 300 generations ago.

. . . ????

Here's the answer, according to New Scientist: "by around 6,000 years ago there were only about 12 million people on Earth."

Wow!

10 Sep, 2008

I was away recently for a while (obviously -- no posts here), and I caught up on reading. Among many things, I read a single-page article from the 5/10 issue of The Economist, Liberty in America is not quite as revered as its leaders pretend.

I'm going to cut to the chase -- these sentences:

• This includes 1.4 million blacks, or 14% of the black male population.

10 Sep, 2008

From an article in the current issue of Strategy + Business (The Rise of the New Blue Chips):

09 Aug, 2008

I found this in an Economist magazine special section, circled it, tore it out, and put it aside. It's from the 3/1/08 issue. It's not exactly timely, but it's damn interesting, I think:

"Figures from John Bogle of Vanguard . . . neatly illustrate the point. Over the 25 years from 1980 to 2005, the S&P 500 index returned an average of 12.3% a year.

"Over the same period, the average equity mutual fund returned 10% and the average mutual-fund investor (thanks to his regrettable tendency to buy the hottest funds at the top of the market) earned just 7.3%, five percentage points below the index."

Now, a 7.3% annual return over a 25-year period is FAR from pathetic! BUT: It seems that the average guy/gal/family underperformed his/her/their own investments, basically, thanks to:


This is why people tout "buy and hold" as an investing strategy (as well as diversification). I happen to think they are, BOTH OF THEM, lousy rotten ways to manage money. But if you can't become actively involved in managing your money -- and doing it well -- "buy and hold" is the best of all possible worlds.

01 Aug, 2008

I'm not sure whether you have this problem: You need liquid when you fly on an airplane. I definitely do. I am a diabetic, so I supposed there could be a medical reason for it; but I always had been thirsty when flying, for perhaps two decades before I took on that disease.

Here's a blog entry from The Wall Street Journal (the blog is called "The Middle Seat Terminal" -- it's about travel). I read this 8/1 entry once earlier today . .  .and found it Astounding. Then I just went to the blog again to copy it and post it here -- and found the little addition at the very end, which adds some juice.

- - - - - - - - -

Journal reporter Stephanie Chen on changes coming to US Air’s domestic flights today.

Charging for checked luggage and legroom isn’t enough for some carriers — starting today, coach passengers flying aboard US Airways Inc. must pay for a drink of water.

This morning, US Airways began charging fliers $2 for bottled water and sodas and $1 for teas and coffees. First class members, trans-Atlantic passengers and a select group of others are exempt from the extra fees.

“This is another clever way to masquerade airfare increases without increasing airfares,” says Randy Petersen, editor of Inside Flyer Magazine. “Everything has been passed along to the consumer.”

The Tempe, Ariz.-based airline is among many other carriers scrambling to cut costs and boost revenues amid skyrocketing fuel prices. For now, other major airlines including AMR Corp.’s American Airlines, Delta Air Lines Inc., and Northwest Airlines Corp. say they won’t resort to the a la carte beverage system yet but will continue researching all possible ways to save money. Discount carriers AirTran Holdings Inc., JetBlue Airways Corp. and Southwest Airlines Co say they will also continue serving complimentary beverages.

Continental Airlines Inc. — one of the few airlines left that serves free meals on certain domestic flights — says it is unlikely to abandon its free beverage service. Continental says charging for a soda would detract from passenger comfort. “That’s always been our philosophy, and it’s one that works well with us,” says spokeswoman Julie King.

Several other low-cost carriers like Spirit Airlines Inc and Allegiant Air, LLC began charging for beverages a few years ago. These low-budget airlines say their business model offers “unbundled” deals, which strip away extra costs and charge only for the flight. Spirit and Allegiant officials say customers like this plan, which allows flyers to add on extra drinks and snacks only if they desire.

US Airways says it will provide water and drinks for passengers in cases of medical emergency and during extensive delays. If a desperately thirsty passenger does forget a few extra dollars, US Airways spokesman Morgan Durrant says flight attendants will likely “err on the side of the customer” and give him or her water. After all, the airline wouldn’t want its customers drinking tap water from the aircraft bathroom. That water is safe to drink, just not very palatable, according to Durrant.

“Frankly, that’s just not classy,” he says.

Update: Farecompare’s Rick Seaney is flying US Air this afternoon and reports on the scene:

I am now on a US Airways jet heading from Las Vegas to Dallas — but just before boarding, the gate agent made a sarcastic little speech.

He wasn’t upset with us — he was upset with his airline — and he spoke in bitter tones: “It is my very special duty to inform you that today is inauguration day’ at US Airways and what we are inaugurating is our new onboard beverage policy. You now have to pay $2 for that coke, $2 for water.”

Now, nobody booed or anything but I did see surprised and startled looks on the faces of some passengers — apparently they hadn’t heard about this new fee, and looked like they couldn’t quite believe it.

23 Jun, 2008

Yes, yes, I know -- it sounds like a joke. It ain't. See the 3-page PDF. From the thing:


No, I've never seen one in real life.
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22 Jun, 2008

I read this in the May/June issue of VISION, the magazine of the Consumer Electronics Association.


Let's leave aside, for the moment, the consumer electronics implications of those numbers (which are obvious -- sell more stuff to people for them to use in their cars!). No, let's dwell on other meanings of those numbers.


I found this mathematical exercise to be enlightening. How do you get some of this time back? Well, 17 hours in a car is pretty harsh, I think; find work closer to home, or find an employer who favors telecommuting (even 2 days a week). On the other front, turn the damn thing off (pick up a book!).

07 Jun, 2008

This story dates back 3 months, but I'm glad I caught up with it:

No one said "green" was gonna be a rose garden!

16 May, 2008

I stumbled on a 4/23 item from "United News of Bangledesh" -- "electronic and electrical applications are being damaged in large numbers due to frequent power outage and rapid voltage fluctuation . . . the rate of complaints about the damage of goods has increased abnormally with the rise in load shedding across the country."

What's being damaged? Elevators, AC, refrigerators, washing machines, microwave ovens, lights, and fans.

Loads are being shed -- and it's "frequent, abrupt," according to the story -- for 6 to 7 hours per day. It happens "for several hours at different spells on a day."

29 Apr, 2008

I've spent enough time on negative crapola lately, so here's something positive: Wireless "Smartwalls." I'm not in the habit of quoting items in their entirety here (that's not really fair, is it?) -- so go here and read the item (Commercial Property News).

Here's an appetizer:

18 Apr, 2008

I could not make up anything this creative.  I'm not sure whether or not this 4/8 item is real. Here's a link. It starts like this:



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03 Apr, 2008

A feature on the RenewableEnergyWorld website is headlined "Nanowire-Embedded Fabrics Generate Electricity From Motion." The piece includes this photo:



Caption, from the site: "Illustration shows the concept behind a microfiber nanogenerator. Microfibers coated with gold (yellow fibers) scrub the nanofibers that are not coated with gold (green) to produce electricity through a coupled piezoelectric-semiconductor process."

Here's what they say they are talking about here: A "wearable power source that . . . would allow people to generate their own electrical current while walking."

No, the story was NOT posted on April Fool's Day.

21 Mar, 2008

As part of trying to serve the electrical distributors who read TED magazine, I try to keep an eye on developments in RFID technology. RFID = radio frequency identification. The idea (as applied to electrical products) is to stick these tiny tags on things, find them in warehouses quickly, etc.

There are numerous applications outside of electrical distribution, of course. Put a tag on a piece of construction equipment (anything from something large, like an augur, to a Fluke meter) . . . and, in theory, you'll be able to find it if and when it wanders away from a construction site. Tags applied to packages of prescription drugs could eliminate counterfeiting. Tags stuck on goods at your supermarket could not only eliminate shoplifting, but reduce the need for long lines at checkout counters.

And so on.

Well, here's another use. In London, scientists at QMUL (Queen Mary, University of London) are attaching tiny RFID tags to . . . bumblebees.

- - - - -

One interesting factolito in the story: Bumblebees average about 950,000 brain cells, humans have 100 billion. We're attaching tags to them, not the other way around. Yet I'm not sure that we humans are, on average, 100 billion times smarter than bumblebees.

17 Mar, 2008

This story caught my eye: Where there is no electricity (i.e., huge swaths of Africa), this new product -- a "telephone bicycle charge" -- will dothe trick. The story is sourced from Uganda, and the price looks forbidding (65,000 Ugandan shillings). I checked the currency converter -- that comes out to less than $40.

Of course, $40 in Uganda might be a forbidding price. But -- in theory -- folks in a small town could go into this together. According to the article, the system can charge 8 phones per hour of bicycle riding. One could even envision an enterprising Ugandan getting a "micro loan" to buy this thing (assuming he/she already had a bicycle) and going into the business of riding the bike and recharging a lot of phones for people -- for a small fee.

06 Mar, 2008

Along the lines of humorless blog entries, I found the other day a blog called "Connected" from Autodesk. I resolved to go over and read it when time presented itself. I found some interesting stuff, and then this:

Do you embrace change?

The Luddites, who smashed machines in the early 1800s and claimed that technology would destroy standards of living, had it exactly backwards.

Technological development over the past two centuries has raised standards of livings around the world so much that we now worry about the gap between the leaders and the laggards. Many must "diet," and farmers get paid to idle their fields, because we have too much food.

As design and collaboration technology lower the cost of building and manufacturing, these trends will only accelerate (different forms of technology tend to advance at different rates, and tend to reinforce each other's growth rates.)

So don't be a luddite. Don't fear the changes that technology brings. Embrace the new, the untried, the possible, and recommit every day to being open to new ideas. We don't want you to end up like these guys did...

"Don't fear the changes. Embrace the new, the untried . . . " blahblahblah.

EleBlog take:

a. If people could control their fear, it would not be an emotion.

b. The kind of people who are able to "embrace the new" are those who don't share 98% of their DNA with chimpanzees. I've met damn few of these; you?

c. I sometimes write blog entries that don't appear here. I often have ideas to post something here that, with time, look like the crap that they are in the clear light of the next day . . . hint, hint.

02 Mar, 2008

Two takes:

Headline: "Cellphone recycling is on the rise"

Rest of it: " . . . but still uncommon."

According to a survey, 9.4% of used cellphones are recycled. The link takes you to the story (words). But the table (not included online) in the print edition of TWICE magazine shows:

36.75% "stored" used cellphones.

15.54% "gave it to a family member or friend"

10.19% claimed the cellphone was "lost or stolen" or the user threw it away.

8.53% gave the phone to charity

7.99% "kept it" (and are still using it -- which seems to indicate the survey was sloppily written or administered)

5.73% "returned it to the store"

- - - - -

EleBlog Take:

a. This isn't a "green" blog, but I thought this was interesting.

b. by my reckoning, you take out the 8% of respondents who said they are still using the old phone, and the 2.73% who said they "don't know." So you have a divisor of 90, not 100.

. . . then you take the people who recycled it, gave it to charity, or returned it to the store -- that adds up to better than 23%.

. . . add in the people who gave it to someone they know (15.54%)

AND: You have roughly 39% who did NOT allow their used cellphone to go to waste.

Now add to that the 36.75% who said the used cellphone is "stored" -- and you have 75-76 out of 90 respondents who are doing something productive with the freaking thing.

. . . as opposed to only 10.19% who said the thing was gone.

THEREFORE -- the headline is stupid. The news here is actually GOOD.

02 Mar, 2008

It's a joke. See the column here.
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25 Feb, 2008

Have you ever wondered why there is so much junk e-mail? My assumption has been, for years, that the explanation is simple -- It Works. That is to say, some idiot is out there clicking on the e-mailed ad that promises to add 18 inches the size of his private member; or (Worse) someone is sending his personal information out there to someone from Nigeria who wants to help make him rich.

Well, now someone has done a study and found:


I believe this means it will NEVER end.

20 Feb, 2008

"Knee Brace Generates Electricity From Walking" is just the latest (2/13) in a series of stories about harvesting energy from sources other than power plants (small or large). I like the idea that you can take a walk and recharge your cell phone or GPS.

I also like the quote: "There is power to be harvested from various places in the body." Here's what it took me:

- - - - -

I expect the future to bring "GREEN Sex" advertisements . . . it's the ultimate Convergence:

I'm not kidding!

15 Feb, 2008

You might have seen this story in mid-January. A CIA speaker said -- out loud, at a public conference -- that "criminals have been able to hack into computer systems . . . and cut power to several cities."

11 Feb, 2008

From the 2/5 Wall Street Journal:


Whew!

Anything that grows at 20% a year doubles in 3.6 years.

Does that mean electricity demand in Red China will have about quadrupled between the beginning of 2000 and the end of 2008?

Wow!

31 Jan, 2008

For a sample of the kind of lunacy that passes for thinking among Libertarians, see this post (and the 10 comments) -- "Occupational Licensing = Protectionism."

The idea that electircal contractors should NOT be licensed is so crazy, I can barely breathe.

What this proves: True believers of any stripe can be dangerous -- to the rest of us, and even to themselves.

24 Jan, 2008

I'm happy that SOMEONE is reporting on this. The incredible pollution in China has gotten more ink in the U.S., I think, than the government policies to suppress the Chinese people.

What's more, this article comes from Reporters san frontieres . . . yes, The French! The link takes you to an English page. Here's one slice:
EleBlog take: The powers-that-be in the West are in collusion with the powers-that-be in the East. Our rich and powerful are turning 2 blind eyes and 2 deaf ears to all of this, so that they can pursue their goals in China (which apparently don't include the spread of democracy, human rights, or anything else laudable). The powers-that-be in China make deals and -- promptly -- forget what they promised.

It sucks. It's another reason to look at the labels and boxes of the stuff you buy -- and avoid stuff made in China. YES, I know that will cost you more. So what? You know the old saying . . . ."Evil thrives when good men do nothing."

22 Jan, 2008

Southern Electrical Contracting (www.s-e-c.co.uk) took first place in a survey of 50 construction contractor websites in the U.K., according to Building.co.uk.

15 Jan, 2008

"Spy planes to recharge by clinging to power lines" reads a headline from New Scientist, a British weekly magazine. I get NS in the mail, it's one of my favorite things to read. Generally speaking, I save the magazine. I wait until there is "quiet time" available (as in another wonderful trip on an airplane) and read a bunch of issues all at once. It's like a wonderful, long-lasting serving of desert (for the brain!).

Back to spy planes hanging from power lines. Turns out a unit of the U.S. Air Force


NS tends to put its content behind a firewall after a while; this article might not be available forever.

12 Jan, 2008

I read a lot of environmental, vegetarian, and alternative magazines. I've been a vegetarian since 1978. I was the editor of Waste Age, the #1 magazine in the waste biz, from 1984-89. I don't necessarily live "an alternative lifestyle," but I'll bet I've eaten more granola than you have.

In browsing one of these magazines this past week, I came across a quarter-page ad for GreenSingles.com. I went to the site (no, I'm not single, and I don't want to be -- but curiosity got the better of me). Here's what it is, I think:

12 Jan, 2008

Two distressing items -- unrelated -- were called to my attention yesterday:

1. The item you probably already have seen -- Moody's, the rating service, is starting to wonder aloud about the viability of the AAA rating it slaps on U.S. government debt. The fact that someone would eventually question this is NOT a surprise to me, as I've been following financial news for years -- and it's not hard to put 2 + 2 together.

However, the eventual news item itself IS distressing. It felt better when I thought this would come "someday" . . . but not yesterday.

2. An item you perhaps did not notice carried the headline "U.S. Loses Capability to Equip Itself for Future Conflicts." I'm not big on War, but I think that a country not able to make war on its own will, eventually, find itself in a weakened position. Yes, sure, I knew this, too, would happen "someday" . . . but I wasn't looking forward to reading the news.

Summary: The future viability of our debt as "sterling" in quality is being called into question. Our future ability to make war might already have been comprised (read the 2nd item, it's short -- and scary).

Is the U.S. becoming -- rather quickly -- a banana republic?

10 Jan, 2008

There is a category "Off The Pathen Beat" of posts here on EleBlog -- stuff that isn't about electrical, electrical-related, or elephant stuff. Here's something that caught my eye (and made me laugh recently, on an airplane):

It's from a 12/1/07 Economist article headlined "Just Add Cash," a short feature on "construction on campus."

05 Dec, 2007

Looking around at other blogs this morning, I stumbled across a game for kids (and maybe older people -- My Sustainable House.

First, it's a neat idea. Check it out!

Second, it brought me back (once again) to my days on Waste Age magazine, 1984-89. While there, I hired a guy named Tom Naber. Tom is now the President of the National Association of Electrical Distributors, but in our days together at Waste Age, he got to start a quarterly magazine (Waste Alternatives) -- and invented, with the help of a creative artist, a character for kids called Walt Waste Not.

I'm not going to say "those were the days." However, I had a very high opinion of Walt!

28 Nov, 2007

A neat online animation of a living room in what looks to be a shipping container. You'll enjoy this!

08 Nov, 2007

TEDMAG.com's latest "special report" column (by yours truly) deals with "How To REALLY Be Green." Here's probably the best piece of it:

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25 Sep, 2007

My wife and I soured on water out of the tap in 1985. At the time, we lived in Maryland, and I worked for Waste Age magazine. As the magazine's editor, I was doing a lot of traveling -- visiting one heck of a lot of waste facilities (including landfills) -- and I didn't like what I saw. Jill was noticing color in the water coming out of the tap (as in, it wasn't always clear).

As a result, we've not had water from the tap since mid-1985. Yes, it's damn expensive to buy water in bottles (even if you buy gallon bottles in cases of six, as I do). But we drink a lot of water. When I tell someone this, they usually ask "how do you know the bottled water is any good?" Answer: I test it.

I probably would, most of the time, get good results in testing what comes out of the tap. But maybe not.

In the process of writing an article recently on water and wastewater markets for engineering firms, I stumbled across something that didn't end up in the article: A study on contamination in tap water, done nearly two years ago. It's scary as hell.

This isn't here to say "I was right." It's here to warn EleBlog visitors about what they put in their bodies.

11 Sep, 2007

Back when I was Publisher of Electrical Contractor -- which makes this memory from 1997 or 1998 -- I was invited to Leviton's HQ to make a presentation to the company's Distributor Advisory Committee. I considered it an honor then, and I do now. The DAC consisted (if memory serves) of 15 electrical distributors. I honestly can't remember what my presentation was about (other than, of course, that it contained a lot of data about electrical contractors based on E.C. magazine's research).

Early during my presentation, Harold Leviton wandered into the room. He sat down at a small table in the back (a table at which I had left my computer bag -- this was a PowerPoint presentation, and I lugged the thing). He smoked a cigar, which interested me; I was a regular (1-2 per day) cigar smoker at the time.

I finished the presentation and answered questions. When done, I went to the bag to pack up and leave. Mr. Leviton was still sitting there. In a friendly way -- and with what sounded like a Brooklyn accent to me (and I should know!) -- he peppered me with a few questions. I remember thinking:


I also remember talking briefly about cigars. Needless to say, he smoked a somewhat nicer brand than I did.

In short, I came away with the impression that Harold Leviton was not only the oldest guy in the place, he also was the sharpest tool in the shed. I came away humbled. I've long since quit the daily practice of smoking cigars (my dad died of cancer as the result of cigarette smoking) . . . but when you consider that Mr. L lived to be 90, perhaps that was a hasty decision.

04 Sep, 2007

John Grau, the top staff person at NECA national in Bethesda, Md., has devoted his blog this week to Brooke Stauffer.

I have to admit -- I think NECA and the electrical construction industry as a whole have lot someone important. But that matters least to me. I know when I go to NECA's offices in the future, I am going to walk by Brooke's space and feel like someone lopped off one of my ventricles.

30 Aug, 2007

NECA's executive director of everything technical, Brooke Stauffer (and his girlfriend) went missing one week ago (TH 8/24) in what appears to be a plane crash. I was a friend of Brooke's. Indirectly, I helped him get the job at NECA in the early 1990s.

I have been severely bummed out by this news. I have tried not to think about it, but it's very hard -- NECA is a big presence in the electrical industry, and I've been involved with the organization in one way or another since 1979 (even including the six years I worked in the waste industry).

It's hard for me to avoid NECA. It's impossible right now to think "NECA" and not then think "Brooke" -- and wonder why Fate couldn't take someone else -- and to not think about the fact that I will miss him.

NECA posted an update yesterday on the search for Brooke + Karen.

13 Aug, 2007

I know the Japanese are different from the Americans -- and that on our side of the ocean, we prize diversity. But this new thing makes me want to find the place to sign up for the Luddite movement!

10 Aug, 2007

I ran across this in a 5/31 article in TIME magazine:

"Last year, Exxon Mobil spent $19.9 billion looking for oil and improving its refinery, pipeline, and pumping capacity . . . adjusted for inflation, it's only about 60% of what Exxon and Mobil together spent in 1981."

EleBlog take: If you watch the energy biz (which I do), you will find the energy companies UNDERinvesting in exploration, equipment, new transportation (ships), and more. There are a number of explanations for why they would all do this at the same time. One of them is: THEY believe in Peak Oil.

Think about it.

30 Jul, 2007

I found this paragraph embedded in a story on CRMDaily.com about IBM:

- - - - -

For IBM, the world's largest supplier of technology services, moving up to more sophisticated work is not the only step in its strategy to address the rising global competition. Labor represents 70 percent to 80 percent of the cost in traditional technology service contracts, and the traditional work of maintaining and updating software and data centers for corporate customers is still a large part of IBM's services business.

So IBM has moved aggressively to tap the global labor pool, and is increasingly using software to automate as much traditional services work as possible.

Today, IBM employs 53,000 people in India, up from 3,000 in 2002; in India, the salaries for computer programmers are still about a third of those in the United States. Over the same span, the company's work force in the United States declined slightly, to 127,000 at the end of last year.

27 Jul, 2007

"In Casablanca, life is cheap." That is the phrase (the part I remember) that the German badguy says to Ilsa Lund during Casablanca.

Life is still cheap -- at least in Myanmar (which people my age might think of as "Burma"). According to a new item, there are 20-hour-long daily blackouts there. During these blackouts, thieves set to work stealing copper power cables.

Here's the problem with that: The power can come back on at any time -- without warning. As a result, it can cut in at exactly the moment when one of these capitalistic types has hit hands in the cookie jar. At that moment, our Burmese thief gets very unlucky.

News items I've seen on this reference "dice with death" and "electrical Russian roulette." It pains me to think how little money these people are probably getting via their crimes . . . the price at which they are willing to sell their lives.

Further, all of the dead are not guilty. "In one case, the broken cable end left by the thief dangled into a puddle and a woman jogger was killed when she stepped into it," a police officer told a reporter.

27 Jul, 2007

With 1.3 billion people in one country (a damn big one), the odds of any particular one-in-one-billion event happening are, apparently, pretty good. According to a report, a Chinese welder was killed when the mobile phone that he had in a pocket near his chest exploded and drove pieces of his ribs through his heart. I am not making this up; click the link.

21 Jul, 2007

Here's a headline from the 7/13 issue of The Virginian-Pilot, a pretty good newspaper (from what I can tell from here) in Norfolk, Va.


That's the sitch in the Hampton Roads, Va., area, according to the newspaper -- there are 24 agents of the U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency working in an area believed to be home to 250K illegals. Wow.

21 Jun, 2007

This is Off The Pathen Beat, as I categorized this post -- but these 2 items are worth your while:

JOURNEY OF MANKIND -- The Peopling of the World. A really neat use of Web technology to convey information.

Ancient Rome - Digital Simulation -- Rome Reborn. A simulation of how the ancient capital of Western civ might have looked. According to an article, some private companies are working to put something like this in a theater (to open 4/08) -- in Rome.

27 May, 2007

From Science Daily: "Ceiling Height Can Affect How A Person Thinks, Feels and Acts." If I read this right, a person in a space with a 10-foot ceiling "will tend to think more freely, more abstractly." In comparison, a guy in a room with 8-foot ceilings "will be more likely to focus on specifics." CLICK HERE for more.

23 May, 2007

It's a bit off-topic, but a column by John Caldwell of Electronic House magazine caught my eye. He talks about how "big-box A/V retailers are cutting staff and closing stores."

My favorite part is his "memo to Circuit City" -- kinda of in the middle of the piece: "Why are you bent on taking away the one advantage (your people) you arguably still have left in the marketplace? . . . why are you so busy seemingly benton racing to the bottom?"

If memory serves, the talented people that Circuit City hsa dupmed (3,400 of them) were making about $19/hour. They are going to be replaced @ $7.50/hour. CLICK HERE to see Caldwell's thots fully expressed.

16 May, 2007

OK -- this IS the EleBlog -- about electrical construction, datacom, automated/intelligent buidings, ELEPHANTS, and much more.

But . . . I have an abiding interest in archaeology. So we interrupt the regularly scheduled programming for this:

Herod's Tomb Discovered (!!!!!)

News report from Israeli newspaper
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/856808.html

News @ Hebrew U.
http://www.hunews.huji.ac.il/articles.asp?cat=6&artID=773

Institute of Arch., Hebrew U. of Jerusalem
http://archaeology.huji.ac.il/news/newfound.asp

11 pictures on site of German newspaper der Spiegel
(find the navigate thing above the first picture -- which is a knockout!)
http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/0,5538,21444,00.html

Biblical Archaeology Society -- I read the BAS magazine,
Biblical Archaeology Review (BAR), and have for many, many years.
http://www.bib-arch.org/herodium/bswbHerodiumMainPage.asp

Previous article on looking for the tomb (by the guy who found it)
-- from a back issue of BAR
http://www.bib-arch.org/herodium/bswbHerodiumSubPage.asp?PubID=BSBA&Volume=9&Issue=3&ArticleID=1

10 May, 2007

This is a project from Pittsburgh Homes Daily -- an update of a list compiled 10/06 of 500 real estate blogs. Some are incative, I think. CLICK HERE to see it.

08 May, 2007

The biggest mystery in construction is -- how on earth did the Egyptians build the pyramids, roughly 5,000 years ago? Now a French architect claims to have the solution -- and he's placed some info about it online, including a 3D demo. You'll probably have to download software to see the demo; if you don't want software from France (!), you can download a PDF and read all about it. CLICK HERE.

04 May, 2007

There are four generations in the workforce today, according to many sources. I've personally sat through such a presentation.

If you haven't, you might find the thought interesting. It's summed up in a chart that I found in a newsletter from a local chapter of IFMA.

CLICK HERE to download a 10-page PDF; see page 5.

24 Apr, 2007

I try to expand my information-intake horizons. It's not easy; there's much too much information out there. But recently, I've tried to add to my regular intake a publication called Grist. The fact that I've not hungrily taken to spending more time on this is reflected in the fact that the article I'm referencing here posted on 1-31-07, and I just read it last week.

It's a Q-and-A with Frank Luntz, who has been one of the brains of the Republican Party. Grist asked Luntz about the environmental issue. It's a pretty entertaining read. Why have the enviros gotten nowhere, the pub asks? Because you can't communicate, Luntz answers.

CLICK HERE to see it.

12 Apr, 2007

Perhaps because I was born in New York City, visit there occasionally, and live near Washington, D.C., I'm more aware of the possibility of a terrorist attack than folks in, say, Wyoming. I've saved a page from the National Academy on Engineering where you can access four Fact Sheeets on Terrorist Attacks -- CLICK HERE to see it.

13 Mar, 2007

In doing a news scan recently, I printed out an article from the January issue of Army Logistics -- not standard reading for me. It's a 3,886-word piece on "Energy On Demand" on how "the availability of instant, usable energy may revolutionize the way combat operatiosn are supported in the future battlespace."

Interesting reading? Yes. But here's a paragraph that somewhat surprised me:

"It is important to point out that a recent stud indicated that 70% of the convoys in Iraq transport fuel -- ideal targets fr our enemies. Transporting enormous quantities of fuel over vulnerable supply lines equates to an Achilles heel for an otherwise unmatched Army."

70%? Wow.

06 Mar, 2007

There have been 7 underground electrical explosions in Connecticut towns in the past 18 months, all of them in the service area of Connecticut Light & Power. Much of the state is in an uproar over this, including the Attorney General, who accuses CL&P of . . . well, being ignorant, if you want to get to the bottom line. One person died recently (a 35-year-old electrician), altho it's not apparent how this happened.

My attention was diverted from this (while reading about it) by the following headline on a 2/26 Associated Press wire item: ""Downtown blasts bad for business, Waterbury merchants say."

No kidding.

Reading into the piece, there was a quote from a local guy: "People who come downtown may soon start saying, 'Look, there's a manhole. Am I going to get clobbered?'"

Here's the name of the guy quoted (and I really am NOT making this up): Ken Killer.

02 Mar, 2007

Every month, ASHRAE makes an old article from the ASHRAE Journal available, free, for a brief time. As I'm not a member, I don't get the publication, so I get the association's e-mail newslettter and glance at what's on offer. Recently, I downloaded a PDF of "Assessing Risk of Legionella."

OK -- so this isn't directly relevant to electrical contractors. But it sure as heck IS relevant to HVAC contractors, people who breathe (100% of us, I would think) . . . and especially to me. In 2000, I came very close to death, thanks to the goddamn Legionella bacteria. I went on a vacation in Spain and came back to the U.S. with Legionnaire's Disease.

According to the article, "European Union estimates of incidence vary from 1 to 20 cases per million people . . . the true number of cases may be 20 times greater than this figure, since only a small fraction of cases are reported to public health authorities."

20 x 20 is 400 out of 1 million on the high end. A given human's chances of inhaling the bacteria and become deathly ill (i.e., what happened to me) are 4/100ths of 1%, then. And that a shaky number. They could be half that, or less.

That's as far as the article goes on numbers; from there, it progresses to discuss why people who operate ventilation systems might pay attention to this disease.

For me, the net result was both horrible and very positive. I spent 25 days in the hospital. On 13 of those days, the doctors and nurses used every trick they knew to bring my body temperature down but -- according to my wife -- it varied between 102 and 104 degrees (F). When they finally brought my temp down, they thought there might have been some brain damage (actually there was, but it was very minor).

Many people who get this disease die. Others lose major portions of their lung capacity. My pulmonogist told me of a patient who retained only 30% of his lung capacity; he was too weak to come to the doctor's office, the doctor said, so the doctor actually made house calls to see him (think about that!). I retained 100% of my lung capacity. So after coming in like a 125-to-1 long shot with the damn disease, I came through with flying colors.

If you're reading this and you own a building, think about having your air-handling system looked at -- regularly -- by professionals. You don't want to be guilty of killing people with the air you provide.

20 Feb, 2007

While on vacation over the past week, I managed to read a few books. One was “Stealing God’s Thunder: Benjamin Franklin’s Lightning Rod and the Invention of America.” An excellent read. I’ve read books previously on Franklin, but this was unique: Devoted almost totally to his work as an inventor – especially the lightning rod. In the telling of this particular story in this particular way, the American Revolution is but a sideshow!

Did you know that Franklin created the word “electrician” . . . as well as battery, and positive and negative?

Of significant interest to me, given the work I do, was the epilogue. Franklin invented the lightning rod in 1752. By the 1840s “there were at least 15 lightning rod factories in America, and the devices were being marketed directly to individual households.”

And: “By 1870, there were 30 major lightning rod manufacturers in the United States and perhaps as many as 10,000 traveling lightning rod salesmen.”

That, apparently, was the beginning of the electrical industry! I had always (previous to this read) dated the industry to Thomas Alva Edison’s wiring of lower Manhattan (1881).

The book is by Philip Dray. He did an amazing job!

04 Feb, 2007

I'm falling behind. Doing some reading recently, I found out about TWO services of Google:

1. a "200-year" news archive. I use Google News all of the time, and I had missed this entirely. This is idiotic. Look at: http://news.google.com/archivesearch

2. An article in The New Yorker talked about "Google's Moon Shot." It's all about the effort to scan a bunch of books into a database. http://books.google.com/

I knew about the Books deal, but I hadn't kept it in my sights; it's still in Beta. The 200-year archive is apparently OUT of Beta, which makes it a disgrace to have missed it completely.

To see the New Yorker article, CLICK HERE.

27 Jan, 2007

One item missing from the 2006 national election, the State of the Union, the SotU response, and most of the news and political commentary in the country, is the fate of New Orleans. We all know who is to blame for what happened to NOLA in 2005 -- the weather gods. We all know who to blame for what came (or didn't come) after -- government at all levels . . . which is what made the re-election of the mayor down there astounding.

I'm not sure who to blame for the city's extremely slow recovery from the destruction. There were all kind of promises made, including those floated by President GW Bush. Money was budgeted. Construction people were excited -- literally -- by the prospect of a great deal of work. I listened to a lot of talk about this at various meetings.

But the 1/21/07 NY Times carried a story with this headline: "New Orleans of Future May Stay Half Its Old Size." Here are some dreadful facts:

• NOLA's populiation in the 1960 Census was 627,525
• Before Katrina, the city's population was 444,000.
• Now, there are 191,000 folks (as reported 11/06 by the LA Recovery Authority).

Here's a quote (in that story) from a LA-based "consultant and demographer," Elliott Stonecipher: "It will be a trickle based on what we know now. Low tens of thousands, over three or four or five years, something in that range. I would say we could start losing people, especially if the crime problem doesn't get high visbility."

Also quoted in the Times: "The Brookings Institution says the number of citizens paying for electric service and/or natural gas didn't increase appreciably between 4/06 and 11/06." That's depressing, isn't it?

Let's quantify what Stonecipher is saying: Maybe NOLA will get near 225,000 to 240,000 citizens by 2010-2012. Maybe not! If a decline happens, NOLA could someday in the next 10 years approach 150K to 180K residents -- 30% of what it was in 1960.

Buried in the Times story -- in the third paragraph before the end -- was this: "There has been little to no construction of cheap housing that would enable the return of the largest category of those still displaced, Mr. Stonecipher noted."

Essentially, we the people of the U.S. are allowing -- through collective inaction and inattention -- one of our major cities to evaporate.

Frankly, when everybody jumped on the Bash-Bush Bandwagon after the screw-up in the aftermath of Katrina, I never envisioned this. I didn't think the country coulid allow this to happen; I figured the Bush people would move heaven and earth to prevent a morass.

And I am normally a pessimist on such matters.

15 Jan, 2007

I don't know if global warming is happening. I don't know if it's caused mostly by "man" or whether the globe is warming naturally. In other words, I'm NOT SURE on a lot of this.

However, I am sure that's it's damn warm for January here in Northern Virginia. Where in the past I've shoveled snow in January, last night it was 67 degrees at 10pm on the middle floor of our three-story townhouse. It was warmer upstairs.

Read the 2006 "annual climate review" for the U.S. from the NOAA -- click here.

20 Dec, 2006

One of my non-electrical/elephant interests is Biblical Archaelogy. Yes, it's a weird one. The folks at the Biblical Archaeological Society send me a news-filled e-mail (yes, news about what went on 2,000-2,500-3,000 years ago!). The latest includes a link to a really neat Web app.

Assuming you access the Web with a reasonable amount of bandwidth, you can "scroll through" the Isaiah Scroll online. Don't miss the Zoom feature, which is on the lower right. http://www.bib-arch.org/bswbFisaiahscroll.html

17 Oct, 2006

This is WAY off the beaten path for electrical folks, but I found interesting the recent Color Trends report from The Rohm and Haas Paint Quality Institute. Judging from the Web site, they issue such a report annually. See it here.

10 Oct, 2006

I was unable to find this online – a letter in the 9/06 print Scientific American on the CURRENT utility of the slide rule.

This is of interest to me, because as a youth at Brooklyn Technical High School, standard student equipment included a slide rule. My proudest possession at the time was a gift from my cousin Anna – a tie clip that looked like a slide rule (and actually worked!).

Writer: 1^st Lt. Christopher Lusto, USMC – a fire direction officer for a battery serving in Iraq. He reacted to an article SA ran headlined, “When Slide Rules Ruled.” Here’s the relevant piece:

“I – a 24-year-old artillery lieutenant – would like to inform you that the slide rule is alive and well in the artillery community in the form of the graphical firing table. Despite having $40,000 fire-direction computers to calculate data, we still use our trusty ‘sticks’ to double-check the solutions.

“And should our high technology fail, we retain the ability to deliver accurate and timely fire support, all thanks to a few dollars’ worth of wood and plastic . . . I’m happy we can do our part to keep a little piece of scientific history out of the museum and in the field.

28 Sep, 2006

Voyager 1 left our planet in 1977. It’s still moving – out past Jupiter and Saturn, its initial targets. According to info from NASA (click here), it is finding “magnetic potholes” out there in the deep stretches of the solar system, as well as “magnetic speed bumps.”

Field strength of the “heliosheath” (from helios, as in The Sun) varies from a typical value of 0.1 nanoTesla down to as low as 0.01 nT or less, and on up to 0.2 nT.

Our scientists don’t have a “why” for this, and explanations for some other stuff (detailed if you follow that link). Wow!

18 Sep, 2006

Ever get one of those spam e-mails touting a stock? I get a bunch of them. A Web site I’m starting to really like, CXO Advisory Group, posted to its blog 9/12 an investigation of these things.

On days when there is touting, a touted stock is the most actively traded stock 81% of the time, it says. Investors who “respond positively” (which I think means buy the damn thing) “lose, on average, 5.25% in the two-day period following touting.” That doesn’t include commissions.

See the CXO note here.

Why is this bad news? Because some large group of people are ACTING after receiving these e-mails – opening them, reading them, and then investing their money based on what the anonymous spam TOLD THEM TO DO.

. . . instead of deleting them, unopened.

17 Sep, 2006

I found the 737-word “Shedding Light on Iraq’s Electrical Challenges” an interesting story. The source is listed as “Multi-National Force Iraq,” which I think is us.

Some highlights:

• “Most of Iraq’s electrical structure dates back to the 1950s and 1960s . . . ‘Most of the transformers serving local communities and homes . . . date back to the ‘50s’.”

• “The failures of [Saddam’s] regime to provide for network maintenance have been compounded by the new Iraq’s relative affluence. With a rise in incomes and availability of goods, the demand for power has frequently spiked.”

• “Most of Iraq’s transmission lines cannot handle today’s rated power outputs of 400,000 volts coming from electrical generation sites.”

Read it (if it’s still online) here.

06 Sep, 2006

An engineer at Lockheed Martin thought there were critical security flaws on Coast Guard patrol boats. No one listened. So: He made a YouTube video.

I'm not sure how much notice this has attracted -- so you might have missed it. I'm also not sure if this is the beginning of something important (and good!) . . . or just a blip on the radar screen.

See a report on the item here.
http://news.cnet.co.uk/software/0,39029694,49283172,00.htm

See the YouTube video here; it's 10 minutes long.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qd3VV8Za04g

The Washington Post coverage of this item (I didn't link to it, because they'll put the story behind a firewall soon), quoted a woman who may or may not know something: "This is an excellent example of the democratization of the media, where everyone has access to the printing press of the 21st century." That's from Dina Kaplan of Blip.tv.

Note that the Post reporter did his job. The next sentence of his story: "Kaplan, like others, was hard-pressed to think of another video" like the one linked above.

24 Aug, 2006

From 1984 to 1989, I was Editor of Waste Age magazine. By happenstance, those were probably the most interesting years to do that job -- and the most lucrative for the pub's owner, the National Solid Wastes Management Association.

In the period, waste incineration ("waste-to-energy") got really hot. Recycling took off. The NYC "garbage barge" took float, and made headlines for weeks. The U.S. EPA tried to put forth its new "Subtitle D" regulations for municipal solid waste landfills. And on and on.

Also during that time, Waste Age published a "show" issue that ran over 400 pages; it remained the #1 magazine in the industry (that's what it was both when I got there and when I left), and extended its lead in % of ad pages; and the editorial staff went from one person when I started in January 1984 to nine when I left at the end of 1989.

I met -- and hired -- some good people there. Tom Naber, who is president of the National Association of Electrical Distributors, came in for a job interview in 1985, and I hired him. He filled the first "new" staff position at Waste Age, and eventually went on to create "Walt Waste Not" (the waste-reducing cartoon squirrel), serve as founding editor of Infectious Wastes News (a newsletter); and also found a quarterly publication, Waste Alternatives, again about waste reduction and recycling.

Why this trip down memory lane?

By happenstance, I recently discovered that a North Carolina agency has scanned in several articles that I wrote back then and posted them online as PDFs. I don't know that I should get all "puffed up" about it -- but I sure appreciate seeing my byline on these things on the Net, as there was no other way they would get there.

Here, for the record, are the articles and where to find them:

Why San Jose Goes The Extra Yard
http://www.p2pays.org/ref/05/04818.pdf
6/87 -- 3 page PDF

Recycling's Future Is Now (Palo Alto, Calif)
http://www.p2pays.org/ref/05/04813.pdf
10/87 -- 4 page PDF

Divert As Much As Possible
["the edict of delvecchio"]
http://www.owr.ehnr.state.nc.us/ref/05/04858.pdf
9/88 -- 5-page PDF

Recycling By Objective (Sunnyvale Calif.)
http://www.p2pays.org/ref/09/08495.pdf
9/88 -- 3-page PDF

Meeting The Spec In Newark
(glass recycling)
http://www.p2pays.org/ref/10/09709.pdf
date not apparent, 4-page PDF

That's Gold In Them Thar Tree Limbs
(San Mateo Calif)
http://www.owr.ehnr.state.nc.us/ref/08/07900.pdf
8/88 -- 3p PDF

Nation's First Merchant MRF (New Jersey)
(MRF = materials recovery facility)
http://www.owr.ehnr.state.nc.us/ref/10/09712.pdf
2/89 -- 4p PDF

Editorial: No, We're Not Recycling . . . Yet
http://www.owr.ehnr.state.nc.us/ref/10/09712.pdf
5/88 - 1p PDF

An Education In Recycling (central Illinois)
http://www.p2pays.org/ref/08/07905.pdf
11/87 -- 3p PDF

# # #

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23 Aug, 2006

Here's an interesting [and probably unanticipated] tale of how a technological change [at the supermarket] is forcing a major change in basic marketing tactics.

IHL Consulting Group has done a study on consumer use of self-checkout lanes in supermarkets. I didn't read the study, but did peruse a three-paragraph summary of it included in the weekly e-mail newsletter from Chain Store Age magazine.

[Stray fact: I worked for a now-defunct sister publication of CSA -- Chain Store Age - Supermarkets - for almost five months in 1979. I was there long enough to write, with another staffer, what was perhaps the first cover story about supermarket scanners!]

"Consumers in the study said that they purchase impulse items such as gum, candies, and magazines 45.4% less often when they use self-checkout than when they use a staffed checkout lane. The impact is greater for women, down 50.0%, vs. a drop of 27.9% for men in the study."

CSA's item includes a quote from Greg Buzek of IHL, also of note: "Retailers are being forced to re-think their merchandising as the front end as they deploy self-checkout systems. The impulse displays have not caught up to this new technology. By definition, these are impulse items. Thus, they must engage the senses."

What's the answer? Here's what Buzek said: "Retailers such as Meijer and Kroger have adjusted by offering items such as rotisserie chickens and fresh-baked breads [at the check-out] to rely more on the sense of smell to drive sales rather than simply visuals when trapped in a staffed lane."

15 Aug, 2006

According to NASA, a "backward sunspot" popped up recently on the big light in the sky that rises every morning in the East. It's probably not the end of time, but it couldn't hurt to sacrifice a goat.

11 Aug, 2006

Yes, jeans. Like those you wear. With a computer cable. Thess are iPod-ready jeans. They go for $250. No, I didn't make this up -- go here.

08 Aug, 2006

When's the best time to buy airline tickets? Here's the answer.

31 Jul, 2006

At a business meeting this morning, I made an appointment for a near-future follow-up. My contact (my boss on the project) chose Monday, 9 /11, for the follow-up.

I hemmed and hawed, but I couldn’t find a legit reason to say no to that date. 9/11 isn’t a national holiday; it’s the week after Labor Day; business-wise it’s a good day for a meeting. We booked it.

But I got "the creeps," just a bit – a weird feeling. Not a premonition, not a worry. Just . . . a bit of sadness. I am, after all, New York City born and bred. Much of what happened on 9/11/01 boils down to an attack on my home town, as well as my country.

And much of the rest of what happened on 9/11/01 happened, or was scheduled to happen, in my adopted home town, Washington, D.C.

One more odd-ball 9/11 story, while I’m at it: A few years ago, Jack Pullizzi took two of us (me and Paul Rosenberg) on a tour of 140 West Street.

Jack is an electrical and facilities management genius (Paul is also a genius, the author of more than 30 books on electrical, construction, and related topics).

Employed as a consultant by Verizon, Jack was instrumental in restoring 140 West Street after the disaster. It’s a long, not-odd story. I won’t tell it here and now.

Jack’s tour took us to one of the five basement floors, on which there was electrical switchgear. This was ancient stuff, copper-and-slate. I asked Jack how old it was; he pulled out a Maglite and honed in on the nameplate.

As it turned out, the installation date was 9/11/28. I can’t speak for Paul or Jack, but I got a chill; they looked a bit surprised. Of course, it meant absolutely nothing.

But still . . . at that moment, just months after 9/11/01, standing in a building right next door to the WTC . . .  my body produced “goose bumps" -- and an involuntary shudder. Somehow, it felt as if it meant something.

This is the building left standing to the west of the gaping hole in lower Manhattan.

19 Apr, 2006

I know (and like) Joe Freeman. He's a brilliant man, THE expert on the place where home networking and the security industry intersect. Joe has a doctorate, yet he can speak to common folk (like me). He is the JP at J.P. Freeman Inc., which you'll find by clicking here.

In the April issue of Fast Company magazine, I found a 2-page article (words = 1 page) that says "the state of statistics is dreadful." They contacted Joe for information on the security market. His response resonated so much that they included it in large type (as a pull quote) on page 30.

" . . . there's a robust trade in supplying current, relevant statistics and forecasts for, well, money. 'Do you have projected data for the number of surveillance cameras in the United States?' we asked Joe Freeman of J.P. Freeman, a security industry researcher. 'Do you have $5,000?' he snapped."

EleBlog's take:

a. I don't believe that Joe Freeman snapped at the Fast Company intern who called without being provoked.

b. One thing you learn (long before you get to Joe's level of experience) -- if you develop "market expertise" of some kind on almost anything -- is that folks will call and seek information for free. I learned all about this in the 1980s when I served as Editor of Waste Age magazine. The garbage/toxic waste industry was HOT in the 1980s. I would get at least one call per week from someone seeking to pick my brain.

STUPIDLY, I allowed this -- probably an ego thing; I guess I was excited by the fact someone wanted my opinion. It was idiotic to give information for free to strangers. It was dumb to spend 15 or 30 minutes on the phone with someone, giving them information they would re-sell . . . with the only concrete result of that I spent 15 or 30 minutes less at the end of the day with my wife.

c. Read the Fast Company article (link here) . . . just read the thing for content and tone. It's a sucky piece. It's a waste of space. It adds nothing to your knowledge. It's written to be "cute," but it's dumb. I'm not talking about the part about Joe, read the whole piece. It blows dead bears!

If you trouble to read it, you might well come to respect Joe's "snap" instinct. It appears that NO ONE at that magazine, including the writers of that crap (three of 'em) and the editor or editors who allowed it to get into print, is worth speaking with on any matter.

10 Apr, 2006

In times of great stress and lackluster leadership, the Romans told each other (and their children) stories of mythical and legendary (real) heroes – exemplars. You’ve perhaps heard the story about Horatius at the bridge? A myth. But not so the tale of Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus, a general.

He left the army to resume civilian life as a farmer. When Rome needed him to lead it out of a crisis, he became dictator, leaving his farm. As soon the emergency ended, Cincinnatus resigned as dictator . . . and returned to his plow (he was no Julius Caesar!). No fewer than 2,200 years later, Henry Knox and George Washington collaborated to form The Society of the Cincinnati – an association of officers from the Continental Army. Motto: “He gave up everything to serve the republic.”

We Americans, in this time, look right and left (and up and down) to find leadership. We are unable to find any; we find ourselves in a sorry state of affairs. BUT: Instead of bemoaning our current fate, we need to remind ourselves of our history. Sure, it’s not perfect; but some of it is glorious!

There Was Caption Washington . . .

Consider something I stumbled over recently – the tale of Yankee Doodle Dandy. It’s a song. The British created it (during the French and Indian War) to make fun of the colonists. There were a lot of versions and verses; they updated it regularly! They loved to sing it:

Yankee Doodle went to town
A-riding on a pony
Stuck a feather in his hat
And called it macaroni.

Yankee Doodle, keep it up
Yankee Doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy.

Father and I went down to camp
Along with Captain Gooding
And there we saw the men and boys
As thick as hasty pudding.

Yankee Doodle, keep it up
Yankee Doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy

There was Captain Washington
Upon a slapping stallion
A-giving orders to his men
I guess there was a million.

Yankee Doodle, keep it up
Yankee Doodle dandy
Mind the music and the step
And with the girls be handy.

First, I had no idea that George Washington was IN that song (did you?). Second, you can find more about the song – and meaning of “called it macaroni,” which has always been mysterious to me (and, it turns out, is also derisive) – by clicking here.

Singing It Back At ‘Em!

There’s more. In a book called The Greatest War Stories Never Told, I learned that the British troops headed from Boston to Lexington and Concord (on April 19, 1775) sang the song “merrily” as they marched up the road.

Of course, the Brits weren’t all that merry as they returned – a retreat made in bloody disarray.  Colonists were coming out of the woods (irregularly) and shooting the British to pieces. The original detachment had to be rescued, literally, by more troops sent from Boston.

Here’s the delicious part: As the colonists shot at the British, they were singing “Yankee Doodle Dandy” back at them. The book quotes a British officer: “Damn them, they made us dance it till we were tired.”

The colonists originally renamed the song, “Lexington March.” And (according to the book), the American army later played the song during the British surrenders at Saratoga and Yorktown.

09 Mar, 2006

Yesterday's horrifying news item from New Jersey (there's gotta be at least one item a day, right?) detailed the exploits of Angelo Prisco. This guy is a real-life Tony Soprano of sorts, you'll gather if you read what's on the Web page (click here).

A few points to note:

a. Reading about this guy is much different from watching the Soprano show on HBO. The stuff these people do -- routinely -- is horrifying. A TV series can lead one to identify with the lead character (in the case of the Soprano's, a big, fat, lazy homicidal thug). It's not quite the same when you read it in black-and-white.

b. The Asbury Park Press (Springsteen's home town newspaper) did a wonderful job on this. On the right-hand side of the Web page, next to the "gimme $4K and I'll beat the daylights out of your enemy" news, is Prisco's rap sheet. UGLY!

c. I don't routinely read Mobster news. This item popped up in a search on the words "electrical contractor." The most recent Prisco arrest is alleged to have started with one contractor's inability to come in lower on bid jobs than another contractor. Contractor A, it is alleged, wanted someone to beat the living crap out of Contractor B.

d. Here's the part of the whole thing that drives me up a wall -- a bullet from Prisco's rap sheet:

• Parole Board grants Prisco a more lenient reporting schedule, four times a year instead of monthly, a status granted to 5 percent of parolees. May 2004.

. . . how does such stuff happen?

07 Mar, 2006

Something to think about:

According to a wire service release (click here), LG Electronics -- one of the biggest electronics makers in the world -- is now selling an air conditioner "equipped with a filter made out of kimchi that destroys the killer bird flu virus."

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06 Mar, 2006

If you need to learn how to invest -- or re-learn it -- you can't do better for FREE than to download the Berkshire Hathaway annual reports. Each year, Warren Buffet shares a piece of his amazing brain with the public in what this year is referenced as "Chariman's Letter."

You could do a lot worse than reading this year's letter, which is roughly 20 pages of the 2005 annual report (download the PDF by going to this page).

Want the rest of that FREE education? You can download past BH annual reports, going back to 1995 -- go here.

I've read many of them in the past. Before the Internet, I wrote to BH to get copies (I am not a BH shareholder, which has proven an enormous mistake).

04 Mar, 2006

This fellow ended up eating a one-inch nail in 1970. He coughed it up in 2006, at age 84. I'm not planning to turn this blog into a "news of the weird in review," but this seemed strange enough to merit 3 sentences and a link.

26 Feb, 2006

Repeat after me: THOU SHALT NOT DISRESPECT THE CUSTOMER.

Wanna see a whole bunch of dissing of the sources of all funds? Go to the Network World site, where (on this verrrrry lonnnnnng Web page), the community of network geniuses has posted stories about stupid end-users.

You'll probably laugh. I did. The thing prints out at 16 pages, and it's NOT the result of reporting by the NW folks (who are wonderful editors and writers, by the way). This stuff was posted by the readers.

While you're laughing, though, you might think seriously about what this says about how the geeks see the rest of us. It's not just the stories themselves, some of which are weird. It is also the fact that so many felt free to post these things. And, of course, while some of the content is funny, read ALL of the content from the other side of the coin. These are (supposedly) real stories about real people having real difficulties.

For me, the message of the 16-page print out, having read through it once, is quite clear: Neither computer equipment nor the documentation nor the people involved are geared up to help this stuff work with real people.

It's kind of a simple conclusion. If the products these people supply, support, and  the stuff they print (technical documentation) was Any Good At All, there would be a lot fewer stories posted, and they wouldn't be all that funny.

 (More)

14 Jan, 2006

Reality and science fiction are starting to converge. I’ve found one project you might not know about, which sounds like something out of the year 2175! In my prowling around the Web, I ran into “VisiBuilding” – a project of the Special Projects Office of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. You might remember that DARPA is the Defense Department agency that created the Internet.

You can download a 23-page PDF here. Why should you?

It’s interesting as hell – and might, eventually, produce products that the “intelligent building” industry can use. Here are a couple of pieces of the “problem statement and vision for solution” section:

“Urban operations have become an essential part of military and peace-keeping operations. Currently, buildings provide a safe refuge from our reconnaissance and surveillance capabilities. We cannot currently locate potential adversaries within buildings, nor can be remotely identify which buildings to search . . .

“The VisiBuilding program will develop knowledge-deriving architects for sensing people and objects in buildings. The program will address propagation and backscatter off urban structures, develop operational concepts for sensor position and utilization, and derive model-driven algorithms that best match hypothesized structural models with the actual sensed data . . . “

“Once specific buildings have been identified as deserving closer scrutiny, our forces can concentrate more specific resources on these buildings . . .

“In addition to vehicle-mounted or airborne sensors, handheld or emplaced sensors can also be employed to examine a single structure . . . “

“Sensors must continue to provide real-time updates on personnel within the building to blue-force raid teams so they are aware of threatening personnel and/or locations of innocent occupants of the building as they proceed inside.”

I’m not a big fan of the war in Iraq. But if the U.S. – which has fewer than 5% of the world’s people – is going to commit armed forces to police the world, I’m strongly in favor of giving those men and women every single advantage.

Could you imagine the Internet in 1972? Probably not; DARPA, however, did. Can you imagine technologies that enable our soldiers to walk down a street in Baghdad and “see” which buildings are occupied, how many people are in ‘em, and where they are?

What's the application in NON-violent life?

1. There's a fire in a building. It's raging when the firemen get there. How many people are in the building -- and where? For that matter, from the fireman's perspective: Where in the building has the floor caved in? This technology might be the answer.

2. The police respond to a home security alarm. They get to the house; there's no answer at the front door. Is there anyone in the house? Should they break the door down to save someone from an armed criminal -- or just leave, because it's a false alarm? Right now, it's guess-as-guess-can.

3. A woman is working late, along in an office building. She "gets the creeps" thanks to building noises as she works alone. With technology that detects the presence of others, she can be just a bit more assured that she really is alone -- and work on with a clear head.

There are, no doubt, more. Those three are off the top of my head.

 

07 Jan, 2006

According to the LA Times (12/25 issue), we're now building the final power plant under an "ill-fated $4-billion attempt to restore Iraq's power supply to its prewar level." Further: "The massive U.S. effort will leave behind this legacy: Iraqis will actually have, on average, fewer hours per day of electricity in their homes before the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003."

The article quotes Iraq's minister of electricity: "The money was not effective. The contracting was wrong. The whole planning was wrong . . . it's a big problem."

Unfortunately, newspapers put their article archives behind pay-to-read walls these days. The article is worth a read, and it's got allegations and speculations that make troubling-but-worthwhile reading.

* * * * *

However, I want to take this in another direction. Consider the life of an Iraqi under Saddam Hussein, circa 1999:

a. A mind-numbingly godawful sadistic + stupid dictator rules your country. If you're not rich, or a freedom-lover, you don't care. If you have a mind, you do.

b. The dictator is a secular SOB. Therefore, your women are free to dress as they like, live as they like, and so forth. They just can't express an opinion that the SOB in charge doesn't like.

c. Electricity supply, while not great, is steady.

d. Saddam's minions can't go and bother the Kurds, because there is a "no-fly" zone policed by the British and Americans.

e. Your country is under embargo because Saddam remains in power. What comes into the country (in exchange for oil) is managed carefully by Saddam and his band of horrible friends.

f. While you had an 8-year-long war in the 1980s with neighboring Iran, your country is now at peace with this country. If you're an Iraqi of the Shiite persuasion, you look longingly over the border. If you're a Sunni, you still hate Iran – but since the war was so horrible, you're probably pleased that you're at peace.

g. There is NO terrorism in Iraq. Notice, I didn't say "no terrorists" – that's controversial. But it seems certain that there was no armed, violent resistance to Saddam worth discussing.

h. Voting is not going to happen. Then again, religion is not compulsory.

Bottom line: In February, 2003, there was peace for most Iraqis – inside their country, and externally. The country was undergoing slow economic strangulation, which was not affecting Saddam and his Ba'ath party. Women were as free as one can get in an Islamic country (with more rights and freedoms than, say, TODAY in Saudi Arabia).

* * * * *

Now contrast this with what is likely to be the case after we leave:

a. No dictator. An elected Islamic theocracy of the Shiite persuasion. One current joke in some circles: "The war in Iraq is over. Iran won." This increasingly seems to be the case.

b. In the U.S., "bureaucrat" is an insult. But in Iraq, the Islamic Theocrats will word very hard to turn the lives of "independent" women into a living Hell.

c. Electricity supply, as we've seen, is likely to remain WORSE than it was under Saddam.

d. The Kurds might or might now be fine. They've been arming themselves and planning to keep oil revenues from Kirkuk. After the U.S. Army leaves town (be it 2006 or 2011) -- we'll see how that sits with the Iranians and Turks. Could be another war.

e. Oil production is still at relatively low levels, compared to Iraq's potential (which is said to be 5 million b/d). Right now, it's around 2.5 million b/d. Considering the price of oil is at $50-65/barrel -- that really HURTS!

f. Iran may not rule Iraq directly. But much of the country will be ruled by a government strongly influenced by Shiite religious orthodoxy . . . and that orthodoxy is (for some of these folks, anyway) determined by mullahs who live (and rule) in Iran.

g. There might or might not be reduced terrorism in Iraq after we leave; no one can now. A civil war is a possibility The Sunnis will be crushed under the thumb of the Shiites . . . no one can now whether or not the Sunnis (a minority) will get used to it, or fight to the last nutcase.

h. Yes – don’t forget, NOW the Iraqis can vote.

* * * * *

Bottom line: If you sit down and analyze things, Saddam Hussein – a man I acknowledge to be a horror – is starting to Look Good! Putting him back in power might well be the best deal that can be obtained – both for the United States (in terms of our national interest, which do NOT coincide with those of Iran and the Kurds) . . . and for the average person in Iraq.

Certainly, Saddam’s rule would be better for the women of Iraq. And perhaps for the man-on-the-street as well.

28 Sep, 2005

You might already know this. But I was surprised by these numbers:

1. How many wireless subscribers (cell phones) are there on the Planet Earth? Answer: 2.06 billion, according to Computer Industry Almanac.

2. 19.27% of those are in China -- 398 million!

3. For comparison purposes, there are 202M subscribers in the U.S. (ranked #2), and 115M in Russia (#3).

The raw number is astounding, isn't it? But when you think about it, you get a "read" on China's massive weight. Almost 20% of the world's wireless subscribers are in China -- and yet there are 900M Chinese who do not have cell phones!

15 Sep, 2005

The price of gold hit a 17-year high in trading today (9/15). For those looking around for a reason, I present the following -- courtesy of NASA:

- - - - -

September 15, 2005: Just one week ago, on Sept. 7th, a huge sunspot rounded the sun's eastern limb. As soon as it appeared, it exploded, producing one of the brightest x-ray solar flares of the Space Age. In the days that followed, the growing spot exploded eight more times. Each powerful "X-flare" caused a shortwave radio blackout on Earth and pumped new energy into a radiation storm around our planet. The blasts hurled magnetic clouds toward Earth, and when they hit, on Sept 10th and 11th, ruby-red auroras were seen as far south as Arizona.

So this is solar minimum?

Right: An X-flare photographed on Sept. 9th by Birgit Kremer of Marbella, Spain. [movie]

Actually, solar minimum, the lowest point of the sun's 11-year activity cycle, isn't due until 2006, but forecasters expected 2005, the eve of solar minimum, to be a quiet year on the sun.

MORE HERE: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/15sep_solarminexplodes.htm?list768823