Ramblings of a Technology Addict

Wednesday, February 5, 2003

Interesting.

I've seen this a few places, but Ben was kind enough to point this out.
In a nutshell...
Senator Chuck Hagel owns a stake in the McCarthy Group. It's worth $1-5mil. They're based in Omaha. One of the companies they own is Election Systems and Software. Which make, you guessed it, voting machines. Used in Nebraska, where Hagel was elected.
Okay, so this is where the conspiracy theorists go nuts. The guy who is the majority shareholder in ES&S is interesting. He's a Theocrat. That's right, wants the US in the hands of Conservative Christians.
Part of me says "ooo, this can't be good" but I think we have to give the benefit to the doubt to the company. If the counties where their machines were bought and emplaced weren't satisfied as to the veracity of the results the machines were being given, I doubt they would have bought them in the first place. Granted, my ideal voting machine is a scantron sheet that's read by a computer, but kept on file for counting in case of later appeal. Also granted, I don't like the idea of a voting machine using proprietary closed source code to count votes, either.
I think we have to encourage ES&S to open their code. That much is sure. What happens next, I'm not sure.
9:20:01 PM  comment []

Okay, now you're just doing this to spite me.

In my referrer logs today was the following google search:
"tom bridge apple suck bite me and bite technology"
Whoever you are, consider yourself off my christmas card list.
if I had one of those.
5:49:54 PM  comment []

Old Radio Days...

My sophomore year of college, I did something new. I joined the radio station, WDUB. I served for a semester as an intern for Laura, the music director. I fell in love with her job. She got to do nothing but listen to music all day. Good, bad, it was all the same. It was new stuff. Some of it was really really good. Some of it was really really bad.
But the best part about radio was the crafting. I'd show up for shows 30 minutes early with an idea in my head. I'd grab CDs out of the massive library racks in our CD library, records sometimes from the crates on the floor and make a show out of it. From A3 (gospel funk techno) to a little The The later in the show, to some new stuff, mostly alt.rock or punk or top 40 stuff. But it was always a good time. Some of that meditative nature of radio, finding meaning amongst all that crazy music.
I loved radio. I loved the fact that people listened to my shows. I loved the goofy crap we could get away with during station identification. I loved the Doobie, it was stress relief in the most bitter and angry of times. I could go do a show, lose myself in all that music, be it old System of a Down, Eminem, Techno, Rock, Rap, Bluegrass. Any of that.
I guess I have to find my favorite show. I did one with a professor once. Dr. Andy Carlson. An accomplished violinist, both in classical and fiddle styles. We did a whole show on the musical development of bluegrass, both cultural and stylistic. It was utterly amazing to deconstruct this on the air. So very cool. I miss WDUB.
5:46:37 PM  comment []

Where is my mind?

"Where is My Mind"
Ooooooh - stop

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
But there's nothing in it
And you'll ask yourself

Where is my mind [3x]
Way out in the water
See it swimmin'

I was swimmin' in the Carribean
Animals were hiding behind the rock
Except the little fish
But they told me, he swears
Tryin' to talk to me to me to me

Where is my mind [3x]
Way out in the water
See it swimmin' ?

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
If there's nothing in it
And you'll ask yourself

Where is my mind [3x]
Ooooh
With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Ooooh
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Ooooh
Ooooh
Thanks to the Pixies.
2:10:51 PM  comment []

Rebuttal, please Bob

A good rebuttal of the Easterbrook piece in Time. An interesting parallel:
Attack the problem this way: Think of the shuttle as to space flight what biplanes were to mail delivery. That's what I did when I started googling for some info on how the shuttle fleet's safety record compares to other systems that are still in developmental infancy. I mean, the STS has been operational for twentysomething years, but it's still an envelope-pushing early version vehicle.
So, its record ought really be compared with relatively comparable systems [in terms of level of develpment at time of operation] performing relatively comparable missions [in terms of risk ? what I do know of aviation history informs me that those early airmail pilots put their lives at great risk flying in conditions so far outside the envelope of what other pilots considered safe for man & machine]
I stopped looking for data when I came across this quote:
"The explosion of the Challenger, after twenty-four consecutive successful shuttle flights, grounded all manned space missions by the U.S. for more than two years. The delay barely evoked comment ... But contrast the early history of aviation, when 31 of the first 40 pilots hired by the Post Office died in crashes within six years, with no suspension of service."

1:57:48 PM  comment []

Good, Bad, Ugly

The Good: The guys from Lockergnome sent me hats and coffee mugs for the MacSlash guys. Awesome. Thank you.
The Bad: Discovered I had a flat this morning
The Ugly: $350 for a new rim, and putting it in.
Glad I'm going to the doc on a day when I'm very very stressed.
12:07:17 PM  comment []