(empo-tuulwey) Social media protests - how ANOTHER book on Amazon (written by Mr. Sandusky) is getting a lot of negative attention

Amazon sells a lot of products, and provides the capability for people to review the products.

Google+ user ken mark has noted that people are suddenly paying a lot of attention to this ten-year old product, even though it's not currently available.

The book? An autobiography by a man who goes by the name of Jerry Sandusky.

The title? Touched.

It seems that a lot of people have recently chosen to review the book, although it appears that they haven't read the book. Perhaps they've read something else, such as a grand jury transcript.

Most of the reviews are negative - I only found four positive reviews of the book. One was written back in 2005, back when most of the population didn't know the full story. With what we now know, it's sad to read these words.

Whe you finish this book you wish it was longer. Like a good movie you do not want it to end. It describes a man who has done some great things to help others. How many college football coaches would turn down 3 head coaching opportunities at big-time schools to stay in "Happy Valley". A couple who could not have their own children. Then adopted 6. Not all in infancy. A man who took in foster children and at the same time ran the defense for one of college football's elite teams for 23 years. A kid who never grew up. Yet a person who is so selfless it defies human ego. Everyone reading this should do themselves a moral favor and contribute money to the Second Mile. (...).

Again, this was written back in 2005 - something that people reading the review in 2011 should have realized. The sad thing about this is that unless you were among those few who knew that Happy Valley wasn't so happy, you'd be inclined to take the book at face value, and join in the praise of this wonderful man who cares about kids so much. That's the tragedy here - and, in a different way, it's the tragedy of why just-fired coach Joe Paterno is getting negative press from some people - for someone who reportedly stood for ethics and morality, the claim that he fulfilled the letter of the law rings rather hollow.

The other three positive reviews of Sandusky's book were all written recently - and all were sarcastic.

But this whole exercise goes to show that tools are sometimes used in ways other than originally planned. Amazon provided a facility for book reviews, and people are now using it to express their disgust at the person who wrote the book.

Stupid telnet tricks (a really old hope)

If you've been around online communities for a while, you know that there are a variety of different ways to communicate online. One of those methods is a service called telnet.

Telnet is a protocol that allows you to connect to remote computers (called hosts) over a TCP/IP network (such as the Internet). You use software called a telnet client on your computer to make a connection to a telnet server (i.e., the remote host). Once your telnet client establishes a connection to the remote host, your client becomes a virtual terminal, allowing you to communicate with the remote host from your computer.

If you're only used to 21st century operating systems, telnet may seem a little strange at first. But if you've ever seen the MS-DOS operating system, perhaps the best way to describe telnet is like MS-DOS over a network.

I recently learned that there is a built-in telnet client for Windows 7. You just have to turn it on. Fernando Fonseca describes how to do this:

1.Click Start, and then click Control Panel.

2. On the Control Panel Home page, click Programs.

3. In the Programs and Features section, click Turn Windows features on or off.

4. If the User Account Control dialog box appears, confirm that the action it displays is what you want, and then click Continue.

5. In the Windows Features list, select Telnet Client, and then click OK.

6. Go to start and type telnet

So once you get your telnet client up and running, what can you do with it?

One thing that you can do is log in to a BBS. There is a listing of telnet-accessible bulletin board systems.

And there's one more thing you can do. Fernando Fonseca suggests that you could watch an ASCII version of Star Wars.

To do so, type the following in your telnet client:

o towel.blinkenlights.nl

Yes, the entire Star Wars Episode 4 movie, done in ASCII art. ASCII art is so old that it predates telnet - I used to use a typewriter to create a simple version of ASCII art.

It doesn't appear that George Lucas has ever sued over this re-creation. Which is good.

Everyone's a dummy - my review of Jesse Stay's Google+ for Dummies, Portable Edition

I love it when I make detailed plans that go completely awry.

Even before I received my copy of Jesse Stay's Google+ for Dummies: Portable Edition, I was musing upon the nature of printed books about technical topics. (Actually, I started to muse about this when Shel Israel was talking about his progress in writing Twitterville - when it became clear that it would take months to write the book, I wondered if it would be out of date by the time Israel actually published it.) I really began thinking about this AFTER I ordered the book - you see, a few days after I ordered the book, Google announced the long-awaited availability of business pages. Unless Stay had advance notice of this and was not prevented from talking about it, I figured that Stay's book would be out of date before I even got it.

According to the U.S. Postal Service, I'd receive the book on Thursday. So I figured that I could spend Wednesday night musing upon the nature of book publishing in today's age, and get all of that out of the way BEFORE I read, and reviewed, Stay's book.

You can guess what happened. The book arrived today - Wednesday - before I got a chance to write my musings.

So rather than doing that, I'm launching straight into my review of the book. It's been years since I've read a Dummies book - not because of any intellectual superiority of my own, but just because I haven't read one. And, of course, I've been following Stay for years. And, of course, I have a deep interest in Google+ (I read somewhere - page 47 - that you should write about things you're passionate about). I was curious how the Dummies format in general and Stay's writing in particular could benefit me, a somewhat experienced user of Google+ and other tools.

I intentionally did something - as I read the book, I kept a running list of comments in a Google+ thread. This not only allowed me to remember my thoughts as I read the book, but also allowed for possible interaction with others as I read.

After reading good chunks of the book and thinking about it, here are my comments:

• Stay and the Dummies people answered my question about book updates right off the bat. Obviously Stay's book isn't the first book that had the potential to become outdated quickly. The last paragraph of the Introduction included a link to receive updates to the book, The printed link was www.dummies.com/go/googleplusfordummiesportableedition - this link redirected you to another page on the Dummies site, which included a link to https://plus.google.com/u/0/102328323939973097344/posts. Not only is this a page in Google+ itself, but it also happens to be one of the business pages that wasn't available until after the book was already published. So yes, you can get updates.
• Stay identified his target audience as people who were familiar with older social media services such as Facebook, but who weren't familiar with Google+. Stay therefore took the approach of comparing the way that Google+ works to the way that Facebook works - although sometimes even Facebook users might not be familiar with some Facebook features, such as lists. To accommodate these users, there is a Facebook page about the book - https://www.facebook.com/googleplusportable - and Stay spends some time talking about Facebook when warranted.
• A Dummies book - or any book, for that matter - is not going to answer every specific question that every person will ever have about a topic. Heck, this is explicitly described as a "Portable Edition" - and therefore the book isn't going to talk about topics that would be esoteric to most of the audience, such as FriendFeed or netbook limitations. One relevant omission that I did find - in Chapter 1, when Stay described the procedures to create and set up a Google+ account, Stay neglected to mention that Google+, unlike some other Google services, is only intended for people who are 18 years of age or older. (At least this week; this could change by next week.) This has been a big issue for some users, and probably should have been mentioned in the book. Stay does mention the whole "real names vs. pseudonyms" controversy, however.
• If you think that you already know everything that there is to know about Google+, think again. I found it very helpful to go through the steps in the book to see what I had missed. For example, I had never set up the "Bragging rights" section of my profile; my Google Voice number (which I advertise publicly) was only visible to myself; and my work information had not been entered, and therefore wasn't accessible to my "work" circle. And I got all that after reading pages 11-14. Experienced Google+ users will find similar helpful hints throughout the book - it's often good to review things that you already know, because you may not know what you think you know.
• As I read through the book, I discovered a lot of Google+ features that I had never used before. For example, even though the "Share" button is right there on the sandbar (and I didn't know that it was called a "sandbar" until I read Stay's book), I had never actually used that button. I tried it out - it works well. I also didn't realize that Google+ was available via a mobile web browser, so I tried that also. (For the record, it didn't work on my LG env3 phone - I got stuck in an endless loop when trying to accept the mobile terms of service.) The biggest thing that I tried? I had never exported any of my data from Google before, so I followed Stay's steps (on pages 119 and 120) to "liberate" all of my Google+ data, including related data such as Picasa pictures. Now I just have to do this for my Blogger data...
• As he wrote the book, Stay realized that Google+ was going to go through incremental updates, and the text often cautioned readers by noting that things were working one way at the time the book was written, but could be working entirely differently by the time the reader actually received the book. The availability of business pages is but one example. Stay mentioned that some features, such as the ability to list pseudonyms in your profile and the ability to +1 things, would probably be fleshed out in future iterations of Google+.
• The book also includes some advice about how to actually use Google+. Stay has been around the block a few times - remember, he also co-wrote a book about using Facebook - so he is able to provide helpful advice to readers, ranging from the best ways to engage your friends and family on the service, to how to deal with spammers. He shares his view on why Google+ doesn't have a "-1" button (and why Facebook doesn't allow "dislikes"). He provides a wise caution regarding what not to share - "Social networks are a lot like high school - after one rumor gets going, they're pretty hard to stop!"
• Other than the lack of a mention of the age restriction on Google+, I really didn't have any issues with the book. I shared a minor quibble or two in my thread on the book, but you have to remember that I'm a person who obsesses about minor things, such as improper use of ID3 tags on mp3 files and incorrect references to "standard time" during a daylight saving time period. 99.9% of the people who read the book aren't going to care about whether game notifications can be redirected.

In short, the book succeeds in its primary purpose - teaching users of services such as Facebook how to use Google+ - and also succeeds at providing tips for experienced Google+ users to use the service more effectively.

Doing it wrong vs. doing it right - Penn State vs. The Second Mile

Over the last few days, there has been a lot of criticism of Penn State University, an institution that at times seemed to go out of its way to protect its current and former staff at the expense of the victims of sexual abuse by one former member of that staff. Here's what Graham Spanier was saying just a few short days ago:

The allegations about a former coach are troubling, and it is appropriate that they be investigated thoroughly. Protecting children requires the utmost vigilance.

With regard to the other presentments, I wish to say that Tim Curley and Gary Schultz have my unconditional support. I have known and worked daily with Tim and Gary for more than 16 years. I have complete confidence in how they have handled the allegations about a former University employee.

Tim Curley and Gary Schultz operate at the highest levels of honesty, integrity and compassion. I am confident the record will show that these charges are groundless and that they conducted themselves professionally and appropriately.

Graham Spanier

A few days later, Penn State tried to control the reaction to the case. First, the college said that Joe Paterno's press conference would only take questions regarding football and the Nebraska game - as if anyone wanted to ask about the Nebraska game at the time. When the media howled about the restrictions, the press conference was cancelled.

Perhaps both of these actions could be justified. After all, Curley and Schultz are innocent until proven guilty, and lawyers really wouldn't want Paterno to comment on an ongoing investigation. But at the same time, these actions just didn't fell right to anyone. They certainly didn't feel right to the mother of one of the victims.

When the arrests were announced Saturday, and the family learned that two Penn State officials had known about a prior incident and didn’t report it to police, she flipped out.

“I’m infuriated that people would not report something like that,” she said. “I still can’t believe it. I’m appalled. I’m shocked. I’m stunned. There’s so many words. I’m very mad. They could have prevented this from happening.”

Her son has accused Sandusky of four years of abuse, and it started not long after Curley and Schultz were notified of a abuse report in 2002.

The attorney general has said their inaction allowed Sandusky to molest this boy.

His mom said he knows that.

“He’s very angry,” she said. “I just can’t fathom how anybody could do that. When I read the indictment, I was very shocked that there was so many people that didn’t do anything ... and there had to be more people covering it up, I think, for him to get away with it for this long.”

Contrast this to the reaction of The Second Mile, the charity founded by Jerry Sandusky. On its web page, you can currently find these statements.

A Statement from The Second Mile 11.6.2011

The newly released details and the breadth of the allegations from the Attorney General’s office bring shock, sadness and concern from The Second Mile organization. Our prayers, care and compassion go out to all impacted.

The most recent reports we’ve read this past weekend state that Mr. Sandusky met the alleged victims through The Second Mile. To our knowledge, all the alleged incidents occurred outside of our programs and events. However, we are encouraging anyone with information regarding this investigation to contact investigators from the Office of Attorney General at 814-863-1053 or Pennsylvania State Police at 814-470-2238.

As The Second Mile’s CEO Jack Raykovitz testified to the Grand Jury, he was informed in 2002 by Pennsylvania State University Athletic Director Tim Curley that an individual had reported to Mr. Curley that he was uncomfortable about seeing Jerry Sandusky in the locker room shower with a youth. Mr. Curley also shared that the information had been internally reviewed and that there was no finding of wrongdoing. At no time was The Second Mile made aware of the very serious allegations contained in the Grand Jury report.

Subsequently, in November 2008, Mr. Sandusky informed The Second Mile that he had learned he was being investigated as a result of allegations made against him by an adolescent male in Clinton County, PA. Although he maintained there was no truth to the claims, we are an organization committed first and foremost to the safety and well-being of the children we serve. Consistent with that commitment and with The Second Mile policy, we immediately made the decision to separate him from all of our program activities involving children. Thus, from 2008 to present, Mr. Sandusky has had no involvement with Second Mile programs involving children.

The Second Mile was first contacted by the Attorney General’s office in early 2011. Since then, we have done everything in our power to cooperate with law-enforcement officials and will continue to do so.

Our highest priority always has been and will continue to be the safety and well-being of the children participating in our programs. We encourage program participants to report any allegations of abuse and/or inappropriate sexual activity wherever it has occurred, and we take any such reports directly to Child Protective Services. We have many policies and procedures designed to protect our participants, including employee and volunteer background checks, training and supervision of our activities.

The Second Mile has helped thousands of Pennsylvania’s children to lead better lives, and we remain committed to that mission. Our success is a result of the trust placed in us by the families and professionals with whom we partner, and we will take any steps needed to maintain their confidence in us.

And while Penn State is focused on its game with Nebraska on Saturday, the Second Mile has chosen to take a different tack.

Second Mile Reverse Drawing Scheduled for November 11, 2011 Postponed

We thank all of you who have purchased tickets for The Second Mile’s Reverse Drawing. The Second Mile has helped thousands of Pennsylvania’s children to lead better lives, and we thank you for your support of that mission.

That mission was in evidence as Second Mile Friend and Friend Fitness events took place at a number of locations across the Commonwealth this past weekend. We very much appreciate the continued trust placed in us by the families of all of our program participants. We remain committed to providing our programs and services to children as scheduled.

While we are providing our children’s programming as scheduled, The Second Mile has decided, out of respect and compassion for all impacted by the allegations from the Attorney General’s office, to postpone The Second Mile’s Reverse Drawing, which was to be held November 11, 2011. In past years, this has been a fun-filled and exciting evening, and we cannot imagine holding this event in the wake of the recent allegations, which have brought shock, sadness and concern to all associated with The Second Mile organization.

We thank you again for your support, and we look forward to seeing you at the re-scheduled event. We will be in contact with you about your Reverse Drawing support and our continuing to serve children together.

The Second Mile realizes that drastic action needs to be taken in this crisis, and is working as quickly as possible to regain the trust of its donors and beneficiaries.

The same cannot be said of Penn State.

Mister Phone with a solution to your iPhone 4 shut-off problem

I'm going to start calling myself Mister Phone.

Back on November 11, 2006, I provided a tip to Motorola Q smartphone users who suddenly lost the sound on their phones.

Just recently, on October 17, 2011, I provided a tip to LG env3 users who suddenly had their phones power off.

Today's tip is for iPhone 4 users. And I don't even own an iPhone.

And yes, I'm talking about the iPhone 4, not the iPhone 4s. I'm not an early adopter (well, not really), and I don't hang out with a lot of early adopters either. I know someone who bought an iPhone 4 a few months ago. No, the person didn't wait to get the iPhone 4s, and no, the person didn't immediately upgrade to the iPhone 4s when it came out. When I'm around, who needs Siri?

So anyways, the person was busily doing important stuff on the iPhone 4 - solitaire, most likely - when all of a sudden the iPhone 4 screen went black. Despite multiple tries, the iPhone 4 wouldn't come back on again.

Before planning an afternoon at our local Genius Bar, I figured I'd do a little reading to see if others were encountering this issue. And it turns out that others were encountering it, for a lot of different reasons. But the first article that I found provided some helpful tips.

As I was reading the issue (in this case, it had to do with a proximity sensor stuck in face mode, whatever that is), I saw this handy-dandy little diagnosis step.

[T]his morning I was told that a friend called and my iPhone rang 4-5 times before going to voicemail although my iPhone appeared dead. If it was turned off, it immediately went to voicemail.

So I tried calling the iPhone 4 in question - and the line did NOT immediately go to voicemail.

Whether we're talking about proximity sensors or not, that at least indicated to me that the phone was actually on, not off. For whatever reason (and we'll get to this later), it just had a black screen.

Now I don't know 21st century Apple products (the last Apple product that I owned personally was a Mac that I had in the 1990s), but this sounds like the Cupertino version of sleep mode or something. So all that I had to do now was wake the thing up.

So I continued to read, and ran across this.

Update: (08/16/10) I have found a way to power it back on easily. And lots and lots of readers in the comments are confirming that the following worked for them. So, don’t despair and try this.

1. Hold the Power and Home button together for 10-15 seconds. Let go of both.
2. Just hold the Power button for a few seconds to see the Apple logo.

Now I don't know which button is which on the iPhone, but I did find two buttons. So I held them both down for a few seconds...and got an Apple. I never even got to the "Let go of both" stage.

So the problem was solved, but why did it occur? Since I don't know what the proximity sensor face mode thingie is, I didn't think about that at first. But as I continued to read this article, I was directed to another article about memory issues on the iPhone 4. And that's where I read this:

As you might already know, iOS 4 introduced multitasking. The way way Apple has implemented is that every app you ever open are kept in the multitasking bar. As time goes on it starts to have an effect on iPhone memory. It uses it up.

Even though Apple has allowed only certain functions of the iPhone to be backgrounded (to help with battery life), the apps hanging around in the multitasking bar do take up memory.

And it seems when your iPhone memory gets completely used up, your iPhone could act like it is dead with no response to touches, button holds or even connecting to your computer.

After reading this, I went to the iPhone 4 owner and asked when the phone had last been turned off and on. The person couldn't remember.

So, while there are a number of possible causes for a phone turning off and on, a simple reboot may take care of the issue. And that applies to all phones - and all electronic devices. Heck, if duct tape had a "reboot" button, I'd reboot duct tape.

I don't know when the next installment of Mister Phone will occur - it's clearly not on a regular schedule - but now I'm wondering if I was working for the wrong part of Motorola.

(empo-tuulwey) How to recognise different persons from very close to an espresso machine

Some items, such as dentures, are pretty much designed to be used by one person. Other items can be shared by multiple people. However, each person may have a preferred way of doing things.

Take espresso. Your high-end espresso machines can be pretty complex, with a lot of different settings. One person might want to have his or her espresso drink made one way, while another may prefer another group of settings. Each person could laboriously set everything each time, or (remember that these are high-end machines) the espresso machine could store the preferences for each user. Then, all that the user has to do is provide the espresso machine with the proper identity, and then the espresso machine will configure itself for that particular person.

So HOW do you tell the espresso machine who you are?

Remember the private biometrics mailing list to which I subscribe? (I mentioned it here.) Well, someone in the list referenced the Saeco Xelsis Digital ID One Touch Espresso Machine. And when they say "one touch," they mean it.

If the mere ability to store 6 individual users with a full drink menu for each weren't enough for you, the Saeco Xelsis Digital ID turns it up a notch with the home espresso industry's very first fingerprint reader. The Xelsis Digital ID will remember 6 unique fingerprints. Rather than scrolling through icons that represent each user, simply place your fingertip on the reader....The Saeco Xelsis Digital ID will automatically change to your user profile, which can be programmed with most any name of your choosing. The color touch panel allows each user to program their favorite drinks into each of the 6 one touch beverage buttons and then program a name for each user profile. That's a whopping 36 unique drinks in one compact appliance. If you've ever stumbled to your espresso machine, pushed your once-favorite button, and got some foreign drink, you are going to love having your own user profile.

In effect, the "one touch" serves two distinct purposes - it identifies the user, and (depending upon which of the six buttons you press) identifies a specific drink.

And JL Hufford sells this convenience for less than $2,500. Specifically, one dollar less than $2,500.

I'm waiting for the civil liberties folks to get up in arms about this intrusion into privacy. Hey, it could happen - what if a small six-person company installed one of these espresso machines, and then required you to register your print with the device if you wanted company coffee? Would the company's lawyers be asked to provide each employee with a complete statement regarding how employee personal data from the coffee machine would be used? If one person is making ten cups of coffee a day, I'm sure that the company's health plan would like to know about it.

P.S. Some of you make have ascertained that the title of this post is a play on a Monty Python's Flying Circus sketch entitled "How to recognise different types of trees from quite a long way away." This explains why I didn't use a Zed in the title.

P.P.S. The larch.

Today's example of why ads have a long way to go

I was conducting a web-based search for information on a person whose first name is Ed. I won't reveal the name of the search engine that I was using, but it rhymes with smoogle.

Guess which ads were presented to me?

Above my search results, there was a highlighted link to the official site for Cialis.

To the right of my search results, there were a number of similar ads for erectile dysfunction.

The actual search results (which were based upon the full name of the person, as well as an organization name) were much more relevant, but the ads...um...didn't deliver.

To see if other acronyms tripped up the search engine, I entered a search for "fab morvan" (the member of Milli Vanilli who is still alive). No ad was presented by the search engine.

Are socially connected people unable to think for themselves?

I recently saw an interesting take on connectedness on a post on GovLoop. Louise K described a hypothetical incident in which a girl went to purchase some shoes. Here's part of Louise's scenario:

A girl walks into a shoe shop with a friend. In the process of walking back out again with a pair of shoes she will: take pictures of the selection of shoes and ask her friends which one they like. Narrow it down to two pairs and ask her friends via text which one's she should pick after also sending photographs of herself wearing aforementioned shoes. Then, once she has crowdsourced the decision, she will buy the pair of shoes, and then tweet a picture of her leaving with them.

Louise described some other possible online interactions, and then assembled her conclusions. Some of them are not surprising - for example, that she is always reachable. Some of them have been discussed by security specialists - for example, that she has constantly revealed her exact location. But a couple of Louise's conclusions hit me out of the blue:

She has made no decisions on her own
She has not had a single moment 'to herself'

And again:

She has crowd sourced her taste in shoes and not made a decision for herself

I began to wonder - is our connectedness truly turning us into non-independent, unthinking animals?

Personally, I think not.

Here's how this same incident would have progressed thirty-five years ago. And no, I am not a girl, but I have known a lot of girls, so I think I'm right on this.

A girl walks into a shoe shope with a friend. Before she even gets to the cash register (back in those days, people paid with something called "cash"), the girl asks her friend what she thinks about the shoes. She also asks the friend whether Doug would like the shoes. They see Julia walking by in the mall, and they ask her to come over and look at the shoes. In the process of walking back out again with a pair of shoes she will take out her Polaroid camera and take a picture of her shoes. When she gets to school the next day, she'll slip the picture into Gretchen's locker.

In this example, the girl exhibits the same type of crowdsourcing that the modern, connected girl exhibited in Louise's example. Of course, the modern girl can connect to more people, but both girls are performing the same activity. Do we say that the 1976 girl makes no decisions on her own because she asked her physically present friends about the shoe purchase?

At the same time, just because you are connected doesn't mean that you will automatically crowdsource. Back on October 28 I purchased some music. I shared my purchases on Google+ - but only after I had made them. I could have crowdsourced the decision, but I chose not to do so.

And even when decisions are crowdsourced, does that mean that we are not making decisions? I think not. Whether you look at Louise's modern texting girl at the mall, my 1976 non-connected girl at the mall, or whether, at the end of the day the person who was asking others about the decision made the final decision herself. OK, she could have set up a poll and vowed to abide by the poll, but then what if some of her friends deviously cast votes for the combat boots?

While modern communication technologies can influence the amount of feedback that you can receive, and the speed at which the feedback is received, the technologies themselves do not change the way in which decisions are made.

Take the American Revolution, and the crowdsourcing that took place in the years before that event. The Committees of Correspondence spent a lot of time...well, they spent a lot of time corresponding. And while network speeds were pitifully slow by modern standards - transmissions would take days or weeks to reach their intended recipients - you had the same type of crowdsourcing behavior. Don't believe me?

A girl (Abigail Adams) walks into Boston Harbor with a friend. She sees a bunch of people dressed up as Indians throwing tea into the harbor. The girl's husband "texts" all of his friends and reports what the British did in response to this. The husband and all of his friends narrow down their choices of how to respond. They schedule a few meetups to talk about things some more, eventually meeting in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the summer of 1776 to develop version 1.0 of a new standard. (Version 2.0 would be developed 11 years later.)

Alamo Drafthouse "Don't Talk" PSA (clean version)

This has been all over the place, and illustrates the point that you should not necessarily go after EVERY customer. Incidentally, this is the censored version of the video.



Basically, Alamo Drafthouse has a "no texting" policy, and a customer violated the policy, was thrown out, and subsequently left an angry voicemail message. After playing the ex-customer's voice mail message, that includes the words "I will never be coming back to your "Alamo Drafthouse" or whatever; I'd rather go to a regular theater, where people are actually polite," Alamo Drafthouse prints the words

Thanks for not coming back to the Alamo, texter!

Needless to say, movie-lovers who like to watch their movies without interruption are happy that this ex-customer was treated so badly by Alamo.

I wish that I had been in the Alamo Drafthouse when I watched the film "Short Circuit" years and years ago. Perhaps the guy in the theater wouldn't have given away the ending.

P.S. Allow me to pause for a moment and bask in a milestone - this is the 1500th post that I have written in the Empoprise-BI blog. I haven't ever totaled up the entire count of posts that I've written in all of my blogs (starting with the Ontario Empoblog), but there are thousands upon thousands of posts out there written by me under my own name or under the old Ontario Emperor pseudonym. It's enough to make me want to jump up in a theater and shout - but then I'd (deservedly) get in trouble.

What if you don't know that you're living in the cloud?

Over the decades, computing models have constantly alternated between two extremes. In one extreme, the device in front of you is merely a terminal that connects to a computer somewhere else. When the pendulum swings in the other direction, you have a computer that can do everything. Obviously there are some different options between these two extremes, but we still tend to gravitate toward one or the other. When the company then known as Apple Computer first started, for example, they specialized in providing something known as personal computers, or devices that could do everything for you without having to hook up to some big mainframe somewhere.

Times change.

Louis Gray, who recently became an employee of Google, wrote a blog post back in September that talked about living in the browser. A browser is the 21st century version of a dumb terminal - you use the browser to access a computer somewhere else to do stuff. For example, I'm using a browser right now to type these words, which (since I use Blogger) are being stored in some Google server somewhere.

Today's trendy term to refer to dumb terminals and mainframes is "the cloud." Companies like Amazon and Google do things in the cloud. Of course, there's always a danger in using the cloud, which I noted in a comment on Gray's post. This is (part of) what I said.

Call me a Luddite.

And Gray probably does call me a Luddite. But I digress.

My employer provides automated fingerprint identification systems, which have an entry step (scan the inked fingerprint card, capture the live-scanned prints, enter the crime scene latent print) which is followed by a processing step (compare the captured prints to the database of prints). Entry takes place on workstations with thick clients, the captured prints are then submitted to a central site, and all user access after submission (quality control, fingerprint match verification, database maintenance) takes place via a web browser-like model.

If you lose the network, you're mostly hosed. You can't submit prints, you can't perform quality control, you can't verify match comparisons, etc. However, you can still capture prints, and queue them for later submission when the network is restored. So while a police agency is somewhat crippled if the network goes down, they can still perform a limited amount of processing.

My question - if the Google cloud is inaccessible, does work stop?

I see two possible solutions: (1) have a backup mechanism (such as a thick client version of Google Docs) that allows you to continue work in a limited capacity, or (2) make sure that your network is high availability and is able to resist fire, flood, earthquake, hurricane, riot, and the Scoble Effect.

Now I'm sure that Google and other services put enough redundancy into their systems to minimize the occurrence of outages. But there is no "cloud" company - none - that can guarantee 100% availability to its users. It is literally impossible to do so.

This is an obvious drawback of cloud-based computing (or whatever term you use), but for many people, the benefits of cloud computing outweigh the costs. Gray can go anywhere in the world and access his documents, on any computer, at any time. He can collaborate with other Google employees all over the world. Let's face it, most of the services that we talk about - Google, Facebook, Twitter, and the like - use centralized servers to provide massive collaboration benefits.

Of course, most people who use Google, Facebook, and Twitter know that the application depends upon a network connection.

But what if you don't know this? What if you think you're using a stand-alone application, but in reality the application is completely dependent upon network connectivity?

Enter Siri, the new application on the iPhone 4s. Except that it actually isn't on the iPhone 4s, as many people found out when there were network problems. ComputerWorld explained:

Siri may be the most prominent feature on the iPhone 4S, but in truth it's only partly "on" your phone, as a network-related outage this past Thursday demonstrated. iPhone 4S users were cut off from their virtual assistant, their queries answered only by messages that Siri could not make a network connection....

While it's not surprising that a network problem would prevent Siri from making Internet-based searches, many users don't realize that the feature's voice-recognition depends entirely on network connectivity; an outage, therefore, means that Siri can't even perform tasks like making a calendar appointment, setting a timer or creating a reminder.

ComputerWorld explained that Siri takes advantage of huge server farms that provide much more processing power than a mobile phone ever could. This works fine - as long as the network connection is there. But many people didn't realize that a network connection was necessary.

Some time within the next few years, there will be a bit of a backlash against cloud computing. Leading techies will champion the benefits of having all of your computing capability locally, so that you're not adversely affected by poor network connections or sunspots or whatever. Someone will come up with a cute term to differentiate this from the "haphazard" world of cloud-based computing - maybe they'll call it rock computing or something.

And the pendulum will swing agin.

On Nigerian English, and my own English

Colleen Jolly should be thankful that she hasn't started a Nigerian branch of the 24 Hour Company yet.

I recently ran across a news article which included the following quote from a representative of the (Nigerian) National Union of Electricity Employees:

We are in receipt of a provocative memo sent to Chief Executive Officers of PHCN by Mr. H. Labo, citing biometric exercise for staff as a pre-condition for payment of the negotiated 50 per cent salary increase.

We are not surprised at this satanic verse. This confirms our earlier fears that some people within the system were bent on importing crisis into PHCN, where none exist. For the avoidance of doubt and contrary to Point ‘A’ of the memo ‘that all employees are expected to undergo biometric exercise, as agreed by Federal Government and PHCN Labour Unions,’ this assertion by Labo is the biggest lie of the millennium.

The language used in the quote resulted in mental images of Olivia Newton-John shaking her finger and contorting her face (biometric exercise), and of Salman Rushdie (satanic verse). I also mused on corporate organization; even Oracle does not have multiple chief executive officers. And if this dispute (which presumably involves biometric enrollment of employees) is truly the "biggest lie of the millennium," then I think we'll have a relatively peaceful millennium.

While the language provides chuckles to me, it presumably does not provide chuckles to the Nigerians who read it. In fact, those same Nigerians may question the language that I use, or that weird u-infused language that Steven Hodson, Johnny Worthington, and others use.

Because of my curiosity about the topic, I ended up reading a piece entitled Back-Formation and Affixation in Nigerian English. The piece describes eight phrases in Nigerian English which differ from American and British English. Here is one of them:

"Vacate." This is a popular word used in educational institutions in Nigeria to mean "take a long, formal break from school." It is a back-formation from "vacation," the American English word for what British speakers call holiday. (In British English, vacation is only used to indicate the formal, temporary closure of universities and courts of law, not primary or secondary schools).

Many native speakers of the English language will find the Nigerian semantic extension of "vacate" strange, even incomprehensible. In standard British and American English, vacate usually means one of three things: to leave a job, post, position, etc voluntarily, that is, to resign (as in: he vacated the job when he got a better offer elsewhere); to abandon, to leave behind empty, or to move (as in: "You must vacate this house by tomorrow"); to rescind, to reverse, to cancel officially (as in: "the president vacated the death sentence on the political prisoner").

Read the other seven here. (I wonder if I need to barb.)

However, before discussing these unique features of Nigerian English, the article points out how my own dialect of English has evolved. For example:

[B]ack-formation is said to occur when speakers of a language invent new words by removing what is wrongly thought to be a suffix (i.e., an element added to the end of a word) from an existing word....

The word "negate," which ... never existed until relatively recently, was formed from "negation." Other popular back-formations that have been fully integrated into the English lexicon are "reminisce" (from "reminiscence"), "televise" (from "television"), "baby-sit" (from "baby-sitter"), "sculpt" (from "sculptor"), "chain-smoke" (from "chain-smoker"), "edit" (from "editor"), "back-form" (from "back-formation")....

[B]ack-formations are often met with stiff resistance from grammarians and semantic purists of all shades when they first emerge. But because they fill a real semantic and lexical void, they often ultimately prevail. All the examples I've cited above were once considered egregious grammatical taboos.

I have used the words "negate," "televise," "baby-sit," "chain-smoke," and "edit" constantly over the last several decades, never realizing that they were controversial at one time. As a writer, I cannot imagine a language with the word "edit." However, if I were sitting in a room with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson discussing changes to the Declaration of Independence, I would not have asked Adams to edit the document; the term didn't exist until 1785-1795. (By the way, Jefferson didn't compose a rough draft; he composed a Rough draught.)

Why do I share this? Simply to illustrate that just because someone over yonder colours his or her words differently, it does not mean that the person is incorrect. My Californian-Virginia English is not a worldwide standard. (Thankfully.)

On low-cost computing (a discussion with Jason Suss)

Loren Feldman has this insane belief that social media is supposed to be social, so when he goes on Google+, he starts threads that get people to interact. Sometimes those threads can take interesting turns.

Take this thread, which was initially devoted to the readability of http://www.theverge.com/. I entered the discussion:

+Nuno Maia, I took up your challenge while on my netbook. I couldn't answer anything in 10 seconds, because it took much longer for www.TheVerge.com to load on my netbook. When it did, it was obvious that the most recent/important item was the BMW ad that filled my screen for a while. I did not have a seizure because I was too busy scrolling down to the bottom of the page, through a disorganized mass of differently colored articles. Plain text would have been more readable.

This prompted a response from Jason Suss, and some interaction between Jason and myself. Read the thread for all of it, but I'm going to reproduce Suss' second comment.

+John E. Bredehoft Latest and greatest isn't the question here. Netbooks are unnaturally gimped to meet the inordinately low price points in their market. Most netbooks likely have less computing power available and are on less optimized platforms then the 4s (and at least on my SGII theverge.com has a pretty nice mobile site of similar design that pops rather quickly).

My point is that the direction of design / development shouldn't be dictated by a user base who have chosen to provide themselves with a limited computing experience. Netbook hardware (processing power, graphics, etc) is intentionally generations behind in order to hold the line on costs. In my experience, most netbooks are also often limited to running XP and come chock full of bloatware that assumedly also help finance their price points. Combining weak innards with old operating systems and a bunch of garbage bloat apps constantly running in the background is a recipe for disaster.

Perhaps a better solution is to pre-equip netbooks with browser agent strings that identify them as cellphones in order to deliver a more appropriate computing experience.

Dont get me wrong, I just believe that an unfortunate side effect of the netbook fad has been to similarly cheapen the web experience that devs like me are asked to build.

Of course, the netbook is not the only low-priced computer out there. For entirely different reasons, a cheap computer is being produced in India - one that makes my netbook look like a powerhouse. From NPR:

India has unveiled what its government says is the world's cheapest tablet computer, along with a promise to make the device available to the country's college students, and possibly, to those in high school as well. The government says it's a major step toward bridging the country's gigantic digital divide.

The tablet is called "Aakash," the Hindi word for "sky," and boosters say it could give Internet access to billions of people....

The Aakash fits neatly into the span of his two hands as he demonstrates its features: a resistive touch screen, Wi-Fi and video conferencing capabilities. It has an SD card slot, two USB ports, a 600 MHz processor, 256MB RAM and runs Android 2.2.

Tuli says it has a battery life of about three hours, crucial in areas that don't have reliable electricity.

Now presumably an Indian high school student doesn't place a high priority on viewing the information at The Verge. But this does illustrate that in any market, there are a wide variety of computer users. Some have very powerful and capable machines, while others (for various reasons) have machines that have less power.

My netbook works fine for most of the things that I use it for, and its low weight and long battery life make it ideal for some situations. If (in the words of my comment on Feldman's thread) I treated computer purchases as short-term expenses rather than capital expenses, I'd go buy a newer computer in the same form factor that has 2 GB of RAM rather than the 1 GB that last year's netbook has. (Tablets or iPhones/iPods don't meet my needs; I like keyboards.)

P.S. I've previously addressed other obsolescence situations, such as my use of Internet Explorer 6 as late as March 2009. In that case, this was a company-imposed restriction. At the end of the day, I left the company (or, more accurately, the company left me).

P.P.S. Suss is the code monkey at Primal Stare Studios in New Jersey, a provider of "art & technology solutions" to companies such as Chili's, Kohler, and AARP. And no, I guess I shouldn't be using a netbook to buy Kohler products from http://www.josplumbing.com/. Nor should I be on a slow Internet connection - time to move to Finland.

North America is Behind (of Ahead of) the Times

My apologies to most of the world for this post, but it takes people in North America a little longer to get in gear.

You see, most of the Northern Hemisphere already transitioned from Daylight Saving Time to Standard Time back on October 30. Most of North America, however, will not transition until November 6.

A complete list of the Daylight Saving Time dates for 2011 can be found here.

There are a few outliers here and there. Cuba, just to be different, doesn't make the change until November 13. The Gaza Strip ended Daylight Saving Time back on August 1. The West Bank, however, ended Daylight Saving Time on September 30.

And, of course, the Southern Hemisphere ended Daylight Saving Time early in the year, and starts it again late in the year.

Note that a certain popular business website couldn't care less.

Incidentally, I was writing about daylight saving time a lot in early 2007. See two posts from February 14, for example.

The invisible hand packs a wallop

Maybe they teach things differently today, but when I took my first-year economics course back in 1980, the presentation began with the assumption of perfect markets, in which information is immediately available to all, there are no barriers to entry, and prices therefore fluctuate instantaneously. (One of the ramifications of this - the fact that no one makes a profit - is conveniently ignored by politicians who worship Adam Smith.)

As time goes on, you realize that there are imperfections in markets. Cartels, regulations, politics, and general business secrecy all play their role in creating a real market that is often stagnant.

But the classical model can be valuable, because there are times when free markets actually free up a little bit.

Take the labor markets of the U.S. vs. the third world. Because labor is relatively expensive in the U.S. vs. Mexico or China, we find that a lot of jobs formerly performed here are now performed elsewhere.

But sometimes things can change:

Manufacturing wages in China continue to increase at 15-20% per year on average, and have actually increased by a whopping 300% for Taphandles since it opened a Chinese factory in 2006. In contrast, manufacturing wages in the U.S. have remained relatively flat, or have even decreased in some industries that have adopted a two-tier wage structure.

For this and other economic reasons, Taphandles has shifted its manufacturing operations from China to the United States.

This may not become a huge trend, but as wages naturally increase in China as labor becomes more valued there, offshore exercises in China will become less attractive.

Now Bangladesh, on the other hand...

(H/T Jim Ulvog's Outrun Change.)

Ah, the good old misery index again

Differentiate Your Business has listed some misery indices from around the world. If you weren't around during the Carter administration, the misery index is a fake statistic in which you add the inflation rate with the unemployment rate. During the 1980 election, Ronald Reagan used the misery index to his advantage. And now Reagan admirer Barack Obama finds that people are talking about it again.

So while the U.S. has a "misery index" of 13, Switzerland has a much lower misery index (3.5), Japan's is only 4.8, Mexico's is 8.37, countries such as Spain and Greece have misery indices above 19 (Greece 19.23, Spain 23.99), and South Africa's misery index stands at 28.9.

The numbers really aren't comparable - you can't necessary say that South Africa is twice as bad as the U.S., and that Japan is almost three times better. But the numbers can be really potent in those countries, including my own, in which elections will soon occur.

More adverse effects on FriendFeed

This is a follow-up to my post How the Google Reader changes are adversely affecting FriendFeed.

In that post, I referenced a Jesse Stay Google+ item that predicted these adverse effects.

Well, when I shared my post on Google+, Stay offered this comment:

I mentioned earlier (on Friendfeed) that this could be the end of Friendfeed. That was the last thing that was populating the service for me.

So Stay said the same thing on both Google+ and FriendFeed. But I never saw his FriendFeed statement.

That says it all.

P.S. If you want to make sure that you continue to read posts from this blog, even if your Google Reader friends aren't sharing posts with you, go ahead and subscribe at http://feeds.feedburner.com/empoprise-bi.

How the Google Reader changes are adversely affecting FriendFeed

It's finally arrived.

Not too long ago, Google announced some changes its segment-leading feed consumption engine, Google Reader. Google Reader was going to get a brand spiffy new look that aligned with some of Google's other products, and Google Reader users were also going to get the capability to share things with their Google+ buddies.

Oh, and there was (quoting Google's arch-enemy) one more thing:

As a result of these changes, we also think it's important to clean things up a bit. Many of Reader's social features will soon be available via Google+, so in a week's time we'll be retiring things like friending, following and shared link blogs inside of Reader.

And some people are not pleased about this. Here's something that Jesse Stay wrote back on October 20:

Dear Google Reader team, as one of your most active Google Reader users, I will no longer use Google Reader if you remove friends from the service. It completely loses its purpose for me. To me, it was a way to get news from my friends and guarantee I got it. There is no equivalent service on Google right now. Please don't remove my friends from Google Reader!

Now I'm a long-time Google Reader user, and I get a lot of my blog post ideas from things that I see in Google Reader. But let me let you in on a little secret - when I have over 1,000+ unread items in my feed, the shared items from other Google Reader users are one of the first things that I mark as "read." So most of my actual reading in Google Reader is from feeds that I explicitly selected on my own. And I don't know that I share as much stuff as I used to - frankly, when I shared items, I usually received more comment on FriendFeed than I did on Google Reader itself.

So I wasn't quite sure how these Google Reader changes were going to affect me. Early this evening, however, I was able to take the new Google Reader for a spin. Other than the change in appearance, it's almost identical to the old Google Reader - with one exception: instead of having the "Share" or "Share with note" buttons, there is now a "+1" button. I plus-one'd a few things (including some things from my friends' shared feeds from before the change). That's when I noticed something.

But I wasn't the first person to notice it. Over a week before the new Google Reader was implemented, Jesse Stay saw something down the horizon. Here's one of the questions that Stay asked back on October 22nd:

What think ye? With Google Reader native sharing leaving the service, is this the end of Friendfeed as well? I know that's one of the last things populating Friendfeed for me.

This is what I observed today. The things that usually would have shown up in FriendFeed are now showing up in my Google+ feed.

So then I began looking at the other things that I send to my FriendFeed feed. Some of them, such as Google Reader shares and Twitter tweets, no longer work. Nothing comes from YouTube, because YouTube permanently disabled my account and won't let me talk to anyone about it. But posts from all of my blogs still show up on FriendFeed, and my Disqus comments show up on FriendFeed, and the songs that I like on last.fm and Pandora still show up on FriendFeed (well, when I log into Pandora, that is).

Now what are the chances that last.fm or Pandora would change their systems so that you would +1 songs rather than sending your likes to an RSS feed? As far as I can tell, those chances are pretty slim.

But there is YouTube - well, not for me, but for you. Perhaps YouTube will be the next Google property that turns off the RSS feed capability and only allows +1's instead.

While I as a user might not like it, I realize why Google is doing this. Google's customers are its advertisers, and Google therefore has a fiduciary duty to its shareholders to get as many eyeballs in front of ads as possible. And to do that, people need to be directed inward toward the Google silo. Competitors are trying to keep people within the Facebook silo, or the Twitter silo, or whatever.

And this certainly affects Google+, because someday there will be some form of advertising on Google+. Maybe it will be on the side of the feed, or maybe it will be "sponsored" posts within the feed. My feed already contains the occasional alert to the really popular item, so it's really simple to use that same functionality to bring you the latest sponsored post from someone.

So don't be surprised if Google's actions inadvertently kill off FriendFeed. (And it should be noted that Facebook is doing its part to kill off FriendFeed as well.)

Is Grainger Games using the Bob Parsons playbook? (Sponsorship of the Games Media Awards)

When Andy C shared a Michael (heeed) Rimicans share of this Gizmodo UK story, I just ended up shaking my head.

Bulent Yusuf's story described the antics at this year's Games Media Awards in England. Now awards shows sometimes have antics from some of the people competing for awards, and sometimes there are antics from people just seeking free publicity. But in this case, the problems came from a different source.

Yusuf's article begins:

The first warning sign was at the entrance to the venue: Vinopolis, near London Bridge. Parked outside was a giant, orange-coloured Humvee, the words “Grainger Games” splattered all over it. Who’s Grainger Games? Why, they appeared to be the main sponsors of the evening’s festivities.

What does Grainger Games do, exactly? They’re a national games retail chain. Given that we’ve never heard of them before, sponsoring an industry event is a pretty savvy move, right?

Yusuf then describes some of the things that the sponsor did before the show even began. I'm not going to go into all of them here - read the article if you want to know more. I'm going to concentrate on what happened after the awards show itself began.

What really got everyone’s attention though was the table down at the front. Everyone on this table was pissed out of their heads, repeatedly interrupting [host Greg Davies'] routine for their own amusement. Someone shouts out “BUSTOP WANKER!”, in reference to a gag from The Inbetweeners. Who are these tossers? Why, it’s none other than the folks from Grainger Games.

Yusuf links to a JamSponge account:

Shouting loudly over the top of each and every award and speech, the lack of respect escalated from irritating to infuriating. Some kindly described the behaviour as heckling, but I’m pretty sure what you’re saying has be either amusing or decipherable for that distinction to be technically valid.

Expertly alternating between shouting whilst sitting down and shouting whilst standing up, at one of the particularly coked-up chaps even decided to jump up on stage and start thrusting his pelvis towards the audience. I think it might have been the award for Rock Paper Shotgun. I’m a big fan too, but still.

And it only got worse. Yusuf:

The pinnacle, or nadir, of the evening, came as Patrick Garrett stepped up to present a Games Media Legend Award for Colin Campbell. His speech, designed to honour and celebrate his colleague’s achievements, was slow-clapped and booed by the drunken morons from Grainger Games.

Also see Bitter Wallet and Nukezilla.

Stuart Dinsey of Intent Media, who organized (I mean organised) the event, penned a long statement which included the following:

I'd like to take this opportunity to apologise wholeheartedly for this – and to make it very clear that Grainger will not be welcome back in any capacity to the GMAs, or any Intent Media events.

I'd also like to give you a little background, without in any way ducking the fundamental point that, as event organiser, we take ultimate responsibility.

Grainger approached us a few months ago and explained that their intention, through association with the GMAs, was to get closer to the games media. What they have done, in spectacular fashion, is alienate the entire games media in one night. Good work, guys.

I'd especially like to apologise to the nominees and winners whose big night may have been soured; to our host, Greg Davies, who battled through manfully (and spoke for all of us, I think, when he told Grainger Games exactly what he thought of them); and to our sponsors, old and new, who year after year provide the funds and support to make the GMAs such a great event but who, last night, justifiably, were angry and horrified to find their names associated with such shoddy behaviour.

For its part, Grainger Games issued an apology that Nukezilla characterised (see, I can un-Zed) as "weak." Judge for yourself:

The GMAs

We wholeheartedly apologise if we offended anyone at last night's GMAs. It was never our intention to upset anybody. We sponsored the awards to show our support for everyone involved in games media and we continue to value and appreciate all their hard work and commitment.

My suspicion is that they're trying to follow Bob Parsons' GoDaddy route - basically, to get free publicity by doing things that HBO and Showtime lovers characterize (or characterise) as "edgy." But that course of action will only work if your sales are so outstanding that investors will want to be associated with you DESPITE your boorish behavior (behaviour).

(You know, perhaps I need two blogs - one for the USA, and one for the rest of the world. Or perhaps I'll write all of my posts in French, and allow my readers to translate them with all the u's and s's and zed's that they want.)

Thoughts on Zed (courtesy Colleen Jolly) #APMP

I am a member of the Association of Proposal Management Professionals (APMP), and therefore receive the organization's journal. The Fall/Winter 2011 journal included an article by Colleen Jolly entitled "Case Study: An American (a)Broad: The story of one small business expanding internationally." Jolly is one of the partners of the 24 Hour Company, a firm that provides high-quality proposal graphics to bidders who need graphics done quickly.

[DISCLOSURE: I HAVE USED THE SERVICES OF 24 HOUR COMPANY FOR ONE OF MY PROPOSALS.]

Jolly chose to expand the Fairfax County, Virginia-based business to the United Kingdom. Since she often markets to APMP members, she was encouraged by the fact that there was an APMP chapter in the United Kingdom. She also made several other assumptions, including this one:

Americans and Brits more or less speak the same language.

Five years have passed since Jolly launched the UK branch of 24 Hour Company, and she learned a number of lessons during those years. One of the lessons that she learned was that this assumption was incorrect.

Her APMP journal article includes an entire section entitled "Meet Zed, just another letter or something more sinister?" The term "Zed" encapsulates several differences between British and American people. First off, this is how British people refer to the letter Z. Jolly mentions another difference:

The British do no like "Zs." They use the letter "S" in place of most "Zs" (or Zeds as they call them), they add "Us" in funny places, and occasionally mess up the spellings of normal, little words like "centre" and "tyre."

Jolly noted that the British are somewhat tolerant when we Americans spell things incorrectly, but when we combine misspellings with cultural ignorance, we appear amateurish. Tip from Jolly: do not refer to a presentation in Britain as "Design 101" - the British number their educational courses differently, so Jolly's intention to describe the course as an introductory seminar was completely lost on her audience.

Jolly learned from this experience and other experiences, and now 24 Hour Company's marketing in the United Kingdom has been designed to meet that market. In fact, 24 Hour Company has two different websites - http://www.24hrco.com/ and http://www.24hrco.co.uk/. Can you tell which website includes the text listed below?

24 Hour Company UK specialises in providing consulting and training services to support proposal development. Since 1992, we have helped companies win billions through our graphics and conceptualisation, desktop publishing, proposal editing, and instructional seminars and workshops. Increase your win ratio with our team of qualified consultants or let us train your own staff using our effective, bid-winning methods.

That was easy. Even if I had removed "UK" from the text above, you could probably identify the source after seeing "specialises" and "conceptualisation." Note that "billions" is not followed by either "dollars" or "pounds," by the way.

OK, let's try another one:

[DELETED] was founded as a traditional graphic design firm in 1992 by Dennis Fitzgerald. Realizing the opportunity to focus on an underserved niche market in the Washington, DC area, Dennis transitioned the company into one whose primary clients are business development professionals who bid on government and commercial contract work. To provide a growing client base with unique, new services, the company added three new partners: Mike Parkinson and Paul Kay in 1999, and Colleen Jolly in 2004.

Now here's similar text from the other website:

[DELETED] was founded in 1992 with Dennis Fitzgerald as managing partner. To provide a growing client base with unique, new services, the company added three new partners: Mike Parkinson, Paul Kay in 1999 and Colleen Jolly in 2004.

One more question. Jolly has different business cards depending upon whether she is in the US or the UK. She even uses a different title - on one card she is a "Managing Director," and on the other one she is a "Partner." Do you know which is which?

P.S. If you want another example of the differences between the various English speakers, ask Steven Hodson for his zip code.

Kitchen Aid oven "remove probe" problem revisited

Almost two years ago, I wrote a post entitled Remove probe? It's hard to find a kitchen aid at KitchenAid.com. The main point of the post was that when I encountered a problem with our Kitchen Aid oven, I found the answer to the question at a third-party site, rather than at Kitchen Aid's own site.

The specific problem? A message that suddenly pops up on the oven telling you to remove the temperature probe, even when you aren't using a temperature probe.

The solution, as documented at howtomendit.com, is to dry out moisture from the oven. This takes care of the false reading.

Incidentally, I have subsequently found this same advice at two posts at fixya.com.

So why am I talking about a 2009 post? Because that post recently received a comment:

I found this by googling, and am grateful. We have had other issues with this oven--we didn't have an oven for 6 weeks while KitchenAid misdiagnosed a major problem, sent out the wrong part, took forever to send the right part, etc. We are tenants, but we do own a home elsewhere, and you can be sure I won't ever buy KitchenAid.


In my reply, I wondered if other brands were any better.

As it turns out, this very question was addressed in the second of the two fixya links that I found. After providing his advice, Norm Dickerson went on to say:

Also as an aside, I work on all brands of ovens and we find that the Kitchen Aid models have the fewest repairs and the greatest reliability, everybody has design defects and most of the other brands have deliberately built in these defects for faster replacement. The only advice on the Kitchen Aid units that I recommend is that when you do replace it that you buy a separate oven and seperate microwave oven. Most microwave ovens are only lasting 8 to 15 years before major repairs, yet the ovens last 30 to 40 years.

Granted that this is just one opinion, but it's interesting to note that despite the problems encountered by various people, at least Dickerson thinks that KitchenAid is still the most reliable oven around.

But we still have the issue of having to go to a third party, rather than KitchenAid's own website, for advice. Since a couple of years had passed, I returned to KitchenAid's website. There's still no discussion area on the site, so I ended up at the FAQs page. A search for the word "probe" yielded three results, one of which described the tempreature probe but did not address errors.

But I did learn the following:

The health of some birds is extremely sensitive to the fumes given off during the Self-Cleaning cycle. Exposure to the fumes may result in death to certain birds. Always move birds to another closed and well-ventilated room.

Remember this when you cook your Thanksgiving turkey. Cleaning the oven beforehand could kill the bird.