Fri, 19 Aug 2005
More Housing Bubble T-Shirts
Barry at The
Big Picture points out another popular housing bubble t-shirt, a
parody of Mr.
Bubble.
Barry thinks that the fact that because there are declarations of the bubble everywhere, that it is must not be a bubble.
I find that somewhat ironic -- the same people who missed the largest stock bubble in human history have now become expert in spotting bubbles. And they now are spotting bubbles everywhere.
…
I cannot quite put my finger on precisely why the entire world declaring a housing bubble exists makes it less likely to be so at the moment.
I think, because so many people lost their shirts in the nasdaq bubble just a few years ago, it makes sense that many would be able to recognize the housing/credit bubble. I find it remarkable that so many people have been party to the current bubble. It's not like previous bubbles where there have been multiple generations between bubbles, causing the lessons of the past to be forgotten. There must be a propensity among people to assume that if the banker wants to give them a loan for 10 times their income, it must be in their best interest.
Thu, 18 Aug 2005
Plazes
Plazes is pretty cool new service that tracks
your physical location based on the MAC address of your default gateway. The
idea is that when you connect to a network, a litle program on your computer
called a launcher checks your
default route, looks up its MAC address in your arp cache
(doing something likenetstat -rn | grep '^0\.0\.0\.0' | awk '{print $2}' | xargs /usr/sbin/arp | tail -1 | awk '{print
$3}'), and sends it to Plazes.
If it's a MAC address that Plazes doesn't know about yet, it lets you put in a name for the location and an address. Then you can share your location, perhaps by integrating it into an IM client or on your blog.
You can also look up the location of a Plaze user using a url such as http://beta.plazes.com/whereis/xn, and you can look for people within a certain radius of your location.
Note that if you're using the GTK launcher on Debian, it expects to find arp in /sbin.
Hocus Pocus
In response to Kansas becoming the latest state wanting to teach "Intelligent Design" in a science classroom, one of Denisa's professors, Robert Cleve, suggested that doing so is akin to splitting a physics class in two, and teaching magic during the second half. I thought that was a clever and apt analogy.
Mach3 Power Scam
I have been using Schick Tracer FX razor for years. It's a great razor; the best feature is that its two blades flex, giving a close shave for people without two-dimensional faces. It's increasingly difficult to find Tracer FX blades, though. Apparently, Schick has eliminated the product, and replaced it with the Xtreme 3 (3 blades) and the Quatro (4 blades), which reminds me of this:
Hitchhiker: You heard of this thing, the 8-Minute Abs?
Ted Stroehmann: Yeah, sure, 8-Minute Abs. Yeah, the excercise video.
Hitchhiker: Yeah, this is going to blow that right out of the water. Listen to this: 7... Minute... Abs.
Ted Stroehmann: Right. Yes. OK, alright. I see where you're going.
Hitchhiker: Think about it. You walk into a video store, you see 8-Minute Abs sittin' there, there's 7-Minute Abs right beside it. Which one are you gonna pick, man?
Ted Stroehmann: I would go for the 7.
Hitchhiker: Bingo, man, bingo. 7-Minute Abs. And we guarantee just as good a workout as the 8-minute folk.
Ted Stroehmann: You guarantee it? That's -- how do you do that?
Hitchhiker: If you're not happy with the first 7 minutes, we're gonna send you the extra minute free. You see? That's it. That's our motto. That's where we're comin' from. That's from "A" to "B".
Ted Stroehmann: That's right. That's -- that's good. That's good. Unless, of course, somebody comes up with 6-Minute Abs. Then you're in trouble, huh?
[Hitchhiker convulses]
Hitchhiker: No! No, no, not 6! I said 7. Nobody's comin' up with 6. Who works out in 6 minutes? You won't even get your heart goin, not even a mouse on a wheel.
Ted Stroehmann: That -- good point.
Hitchhiker: 7's the key number here. Think about it. 7-Elevens. 7 doors. 7, man, that's the number. 7 chipmunks twirlin' on a branch, eatin' lots of sunflowers on my uncle's ranch. You know that old children's tale from the sea. It's like you're dreamin' about Gorgonzola cheese when it's clearly Brie time, baby. Step into my office.
Ted Stroehmann: Why?
Hitchhiker: 'Cause you're fuckin' fired!
Update (09/15/05): The above is even more apropos with the announcment of Gillette's Super-Mega-Turbo-Mach-Power, 5-blade, facial-hair-obliterating gizmo. (via Seth)
Anyway, fretting the day when my supply of Tracer FX blades runs out, I have been on the lookout for a replacement razor. Enticed by a four-dollar Costco coupon, I bought a Mach3 Power. I knew the razor-cum-vibrator was a marketting gimmick and a way for Gillette to sell more Duracell batteries now that many battery-powered devices come with Lithium-Ion or other rechargable batteries. But, just what if all of those Ph.D.'s slaving away for years in Gillette's labs really did make a huge breakthrough in shaving technology. Did I really want to miss out on the revolution? (It was televised, but my Tivo sheltered me from the 30-second clips.)
In short, the Mach3 Power is nothing special. Because it's vibrating, it sounds similar to barbers' clippers. This doesn't make for a better shave, though. I'm also not very fond of the swiveling cartridge; I feel like I don't have enough control of it.
I'll be on the lookout for old stock of Tracer FX blades before they become a relic of history.
Update: I guess it's "Mach3" rather than "Mach 3". I've made the appropriate copy changes.
business » marketing | Permanent Link
Opt Out of Social Security
Join a church. Separate from state.
While doing my taxes this year, I discovered IRS Form 4029 which allows an individual to opt out of social security and medicare. To do so, you must be conscientiously opposed to accepting benefits of any private or public insurance that makes payments in the event of death, disability, old age, or retirement; or makes payments for the cost of medical care; or provides services for medical care. While I am conscientiously opposed to public insurance, I have no objections to private insurance. Of course, there are a couple other stipulations. You must also join a collectivist organization with a belief in the supernatural which has been in existance since at least 1950.
Individuals who wish to be self-sufficient or participate in private insurance programs rather than be part of the state's welfare system are unable to do so. I find this to be egregious. I have contact my elected representatives in Congress to let them know how I feel, but I'm not expecting much considering that both Senators Boxer and Feinstein have petitions on their home pages to preserve social security as is.
Here's the short note I sent to Congressman Sherman and the Senators, and the non-responsive form letter response from Ms. Boxer.
Congressman Sherman, As President Bush and Congress are currently working on the reform of Social Security, I would like to propose that one of the reforms include the ability of citizens to opt out of participation in the Social Security and Medicare insurance programs. Being a responsible individual, I plan to save enough money during my productive years to fund my retirement until death. I am conscientiously opposed to accepting welfare from the state and would be happy to waive all rights to Social Security benefits in return for not being required to contribute to the program. Such an option is available to members of certain religious organizations, and I would appreciate your support in ending such unconstitutional discrimination. Thank you for you time and I would be delighted to hear your thoughts on the issue. Sincerely, Christian Warden
Date: Fri, 4 Mar 2005 09:21:31 -0500 From: senator@boxer.senate.gov To: cwarden@xerus.org Subject: Responding to your message March 4, 2005 Mr. Christian Warden 18531 Prairie Street, Apartment 214 Northridge, California 91324-3156 Dear Mr. Warden: Thank you for writing to express your concerns about President Bush's plan to partially privatize Social Security. I appreciate hearing from you. Social Security is a crucial insurance program and an indispensable safety net for our people. It has been enormously successful. Before Social Security, over half of all seniors were poor. Today, 10 percent live in poverty. That is still too many, and we want to take care of that. What we do not want to do is go back to the days when 50 percent of our seniors were living in poverty. Under the President's plan, Social Security benefits would be cut by 45 percent. The average yearly payment would be only $5,700, which is 35 percent below the poverty line. That would be a tragic reversal of fortune for our people. Certainly we know that Social Security needs periodic adjustments. However, President Bush is misleading the American people by calling this a "crisis." According to the Social Security Trustees, there is enough money to pay full benefits until 2042. And according to the Congressional Budget Office, there is enough money to pay full benefits until 2052. Now more than ever -- as we are faced with an aging population, the imminent retirement of the baby boom generation, the costs of the war on terrorism, 40 million Americans without healthcare, and a ballooning budget deficit of well over $400 billion -- we cannot afford to divert needed funds away from an already stressed Social Security system. ^L This is too much of a risk to take with funds that so many workers are counting on for their retirement. Privatization would also impact people with disabilities, survivors of deceased workers, and 3 million children who depend on Social Security benefits. I feel strongly that we should not weaken Social Security or compromise its financial condition. Rest assured, I am committed to preserving the integrity of Social Security for generations to come. And it is not difficult to solve this challenge, just as we did in 1983. Again, thank you for taking the time to voice your concerns. Please continue to keep me informed about the issues that matter to you. Sincerely, Barbara Boxer United States Senator
Disclaimer: As a child, my mother received welfare. And while it allowed her to spend time raising me, given the choice, I would not want to be a burden on my neighbors.
business » taxes | Permanent Link
Fri, 29 Jul 2005
mnoGoSearch PHP Extension on Debian Sarge
The mnoGoSearch extension is one of the few PHP extensions that isn't packaged by Debian. Additionally, the version of the mnoGoSearch extension in PHP 4.3.10 seems to be incompatible with the version of mnoGoSearch in Debian Sarge. Here's how to upgrade the extension and build a php4-mnogosearch package:
/usr/src# apt-get build-dep php4 /usr/src# apt-get install mnogosearch-dev mnogosearch-mysql /usr/src# apt-get source php4 /usr/src# cd php4-4.3.10/ /usr/src/php4-4.3.10# ./debian/rules patch /usr/src/php4-4.3.10# curl http://xn.pinkhamster.net/download/php4-mnogosearch.patch | patch -p1 /usr/src/php4-4.3.10# cd ext/mnogosearch /usr/src/php4-4.3.10/ext/mnogosearch# curl http://mnogosearch.org/Download/php/mnogosearch-php-extension-1.96.tar.gz | tar xvz /usr/src/php4-4.3.10/ext/mnogosearch# mv 1.96/* . /usr/src/php4-4.3.10/ext/mnogosearch# rmdir 1.96/ /usr/src/php4-4.3.10/ext/mnogosearch# cd ../.. /usr/src/php4-4.3.10# ./debian/rules binary
You can now install the php4-mnogosearch package located in /usr/src. If you're using SQLite or PostgreSQL, you should be able to install the correct mnogosearch-* package instead of mnogosearch-mysql, but I haven't tested doing so.
For the lazy, you can just add this to your /etc/apt/sources.list:deb http://packages.pinkhamster.net/
sarge main
Then run apt-get install php4-mnogosearch.
Update 11/02/05: I've updated the Sarge package to 4.3.10-16.
Update 11/06/06: I've updated the Sarge package to 4.3.10-18.
Update 05/05/07: I've updated the Sarge package to 4.3.10-20.
Update 08/10/07: I've updated the Sarge package to 4.3.10-22. I also
put a copy of the mnogosearch extension tarball in my download directory because mnogosearch.org is currently
down.
Semis for Soccer Moms
Back in 1999, after the Lincoln Navigator was introduced, I joked, "Next year, people will be driving semis around town." Looks like I was only off by a few years.
MSNBC has a picture and
details on the 14,500-pound behemoth.
But does anybody really need a vehicle that is nine feet tall, eight feet wide, 21 1/2 feet long and gets about seven miles on a gallon of diesel?
No.
"Anybody can lease a Hummer now for $500 a month. Soccer moms are driving them," he said. "This is not a soccer mom's vehicle."
We'll see about that.
Thu, 21 Jul 2005
Congress to Slow Earth's Rotation
According to the Chicago Sun-Times (via Max Clark), Congress is planning to add two months to Daylight Saving Time.
"The more daylight we have, the less electricity we use,'' said U.S. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), who co-sponsored the measure with U.S. Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.).
Shifting daylight from the morning to the evening doesn't create more of it. See Wikipedia for more details on DST.
Napster Marketing
At least somebody noticed that Americans weren't really going for that whole "ownership society"
thing.
business » marketing » advertising | Permanent Link
Watered-Down California Wine
Intelligent Life, a new magazine from the publishers of The Economist, has a story about how much of the wine produced in California is "watered back", i.e. diluted with water. Apparently, this is done to keep alcohol content down or to make sure that fermentation occurs if there is too much sugar in the grapes. I'm no wine connoisseur, but I'd be surprised if very many wine drinkers were aware of this.
…French towns and villages are a great deal more picturesque than anything that northern California can offer. Calistoga and Yountville are not exactly Beaune and Châteauneuf-du-Pape. But for the winemaker the obvious difference is the weather: California has longer and warmer sunshine—which means that the fully ripened grapes may well produce a wine with a bit too much alcohol for comfort (too much, also, for the bottom line, since wine and liquor are taxed according to their alcohol level).
One obvious solution would be to pick the grapes earlier, except that that would be at the cost of the "full-bodied" flavour and "big" character of the typical Californian wine. Hence a preference for the other obvious solution: adding water during the fermentation process. At which point, everyone gets a little coy, even a trifle alarmed. Witness the concern of a spokeswoman for California's Wine Institute. "How did you hear about this?" she demanded. "This is a long, long story—it's kind of a stylistic thing."
