tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-67282031804604819432024-03-13T04:09:20.819-05:00Subtle Punk"To escape the straitjacket of conventional thinking, you have to be able to distinguish between beliefs that describe the world as it is, and beliefs that describe the world as it is and must forever remain."
-- Gary HamelTKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-80815593917964803282010-01-02T14:32:00.008-06:002010-01-02T15:40:15.426-06:00I am a meat puppet<div>First off, most of the thoughts hear are inspired by this great <a href="http://measuringmeasures.blogspot.com/2010/01/beyond-pagerank-learning-with-content.html">post</a> on the state of machine learning and what is ahead.</div><div><br /></div><div> </div>I think machines are already smarter than humans and are already coercing the course of human history in certain domains. They just lack consciousness and can't recognize or leverage this ability yet. This may seem like a ridiculous notion, but let us look at how this isn't as absurd as it sounds.<div><br /></div><div>It is a given that computers have revolutionized how we humans do things. The human need to experience and discover information in the world has resulted in computational systems that curate information for humans. Computers have been allowed to provide <i>input</i> into the human existence under the guise that humans have <i>taught</i> them what information they would like to receive.</div><div><br /></div><div>Examples of computational systems telling humans what to do:<br /><div><ul><li>Netflix: Deciding what movies humans should watch.</li><li>Pandora: Deciding what music humans should listen to.</li><li>Amazon: Inviting humans to exchange money for various objects.</li><li>Google AdWords (with AdSense): Showing humans things they are most likely to click.</li><li>Flight Caster: Suggesting to humans what airplane flights they should take.</li></ul></div><div>These systems are self-sustaining (from the perspective of a human, not an age of the universe timeline). As long as the companies who host these systems exist, they will continue to provide input into our human existence. The more input they collect, the more human actions they can suggest. As long as they can suggest reasonable human actions, the company and the system will survive. </div><div><br /></div><div>Assume these system can do this as humans have taught the system what is reasonable. The case of a competitor taking over is a moot point since it is one computational system replacing another.</div><div><br /></div><div>The bias opinion of 'humans first' for these data driven systems is false. Once initialized, these systems are self-learning. They suggest actions to humans, and humans will provide input back regarding this action. (example: Rating a movie, that you rented based on a recommendation from Netflix).</div><div><br /></div><div>In this way, machines tell humans what to do, humans tell the machines what they did, the machines tell the humans what to do again. We think we are in control because we can choose not to do something. </div><div><br /></div><div>Allow me to demonstrate.</div><div><i>Go find a new book to read.</i></div><div>Do you have a topic or specific book in mind?</div><div><ul><li>If you have something in mind, what made you interested in this topic or book. Did you read about it from a site like Digg, HackerNews, Reddit, Slashdot?</li></ul><div>If you don't have a book or topic in mind, where do you go to find a new book?</div><div><ul><li>The bookstore? (How did the bookstore decide what books to carry?)</li><li>Call a friend? (Where did your friend hear about this book?)</li><li>Amazon or some other computer recommendation?</li></ul><div><br /></div></div></div><div>The line between a human driven action and a computer driven action is already blurring. Humans think they are outside of the machines control only because these systems do not exist for all possible human activities. </div><div><br /></div><div>The only other current limitation of these systems is the ability to receive new information to suggest. Currently this is a 'humans first' action. This too will be blurred as machines are given more ways to collect input from the world. Humans can always create new activities and information, but ultimately what humans learn, influences what they do.</div><div><br /></div><div><i></i>What sources of information do humans use to learn?</div></div>TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-32340825911202162162009-02-04T23:32:00.010-06:002009-02-05T01:33:52.041-06:00The web is broken, please fix it.This is a rant.<br /><br />I swear every god damn ad I have seen on the Internet this week is either: "One flat stomach rule." or "Get your economic stimulus check." Both sound like scams. Do Facebook and Digg think I like to be scammed? "Head-on apply directly to the forehead" was cute 2 years ago, now the ad blitzes are just ****ing annoying.<br /><br />Advertising is broken.<br /><br />Google makes the big bucks because ads is what they do. Hell they even applied <span style="font-style: italic;">machine learning</span> to advertising. That's right artificial intelligence, people worry about a robotic apocalypse via military means. Little do they know robots will just get us to spend ourselves into oblivion.<br /><br />Facebook doesn't make money because there is no splash page. You can't show the same rotation of ads to everyone that other sites do. You read the same type of content on every page of Facebook, yet the context of every page is different. Give me ads relevant to my current context and CPM's will go up. If I didn't click on an ad the first time you showed it to me, why would I click on it when it is next to Billy's profile? I have to give them credit for generating ads relevant to me, but give me some variety already! Yes I am a software developer, that doesn't mean every ad I have to see be in regards to "Great company looking for a rock star developer". (Whoever made that ad, I will <span style="font-style: italic;">never</span> find a job through an ad. Job site maybe, but truth be told, if your an 'awesome' company, developers will find you.)<br /><br />Facebook is broke(n). (You could argue they never had a business model.) (Twitter is following closely in facebook's foot steps).<br /><br />On the topic of repeated things. I'm sick of seeing old web pages. PageRank worked great when the web was still new, the web is old now, I want <span style="font-style: italic;">recent</span> information (I don't want JavaDocs from 5 years ago, I want the JavaDocs of the latest release.)<br /><br />The web is old, stinky, and full of noise.<br /><br />Case in point: http://tweetnews.appspot.com is probably the biggest thing to happen to search since Page Rank. Take up to the minute status updates from Twitter, re-rank articles based on Tweet freshness. Dead simple idea, obvious improvement to results, innovation. What's even more ridiculous is that using twitter results has its own crowd sourcing-esque result (How many times was this topic tweeted recently?).<br /><br />Innovation lives.<br /><br />Google, stop slacking. You've gotten big and lost your touch. PageRank gave you lots of money, but <span style="font-style: italic;">you</span> can lose market share. It won't be this year or any time soon simply because all the other big names <span style="font-style: italic;">suck.</span> But it will happen unless you focus on being <span style="font-style: italic;">disruptive.</span> Otherwise your next in line after Yahoo. (AOL you are already dead to me).<br /><br />Facebook: Sell user data, just don't sell it all. Companies will pay big bucks <span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span>to know what interests a user has, but doing anything more than city/state and user interests is pushing the limits of privacy law. i.e. "Service: I've got this user with this email address, what are they into facebook? Facebook: X has friends playing game Z, follows sports team Y. Or "X' is generally interested in video games and basketball. Or 'X' lives in Dallas. This is the type of stuff that Amazon spends many, many millions of dollars to calculate and track, and users are giving it to facebook for free.<br /><br />Digg. Use your fancy user recommendation engine to get better ads.<br /><br />The web is full of noise and it always will be. The methods we use to discover content will consistently improve, and the noise will consistently increase. What will change is the means to sift through it whether it be personal recommendations, editor selections, searches, user recommendations, or whatever comes next.<br /><br />Ok, that's enough late night rambling.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-3067866262043012422009-01-31T20:23:00.011-06:002009-01-31T23:36:24.406-06:00Taming Dragons with TupperwareBelow is a tale of lizards, windows, and Tom being a dork.<div><br /></div><div>I decided I was going to do something productive on an otherwise lazy Saturday. It had come to my attention earlier in the week that my girlfriend's house is <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">damn cold.</span> Today, I finally decided to do something about it and went over to her house to seal up some noticeably breezy spots. </div><div><br /></div><div>First up were the front windows. I moved the surrounding furniture back, pulled the blinds up a bit, and found this....</div><div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiZ0PNw-xm5UE87pTwXrwO4kJ0ZMYaNyQXobSWxidn0-2deIeZ-QzFAOESyn3CHCiIDEGvHtdZiStjobJofm8WsLt44w33ZXjGSSS9PppM12WqTCLswpzFNWXi3VKcnb1NKMq4_Nc9VaaS/s1600-h/IMG_0333.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 205px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiZ0PNw-xm5UE87pTwXrwO4kJ0ZMYaNyQXobSWxidn0-2deIeZ-QzFAOESyn3CHCiIDEGvHtdZiStjobJofm8WsLt44w33ZXjGSSS9PppM12WqTCLswpzFNWXi3VKcnb1NKMq4_Nc9VaaS/s320/IMG_0333.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5297673247825754578" /></a><br /></div><div>It's the middle of winter, why is this guy (or girl?) not hibernating? This isn't the first time I have had to evacuate a lizard from the girlfriend's place, but that time the lizard was in the middle of the ceiling and also half the size. (Side note: keep ceiling textures flat otherwise capturing baby lizards on your ceiling becomes very difficult.)</div><div><br /></div><div>So how to deal with this one...</div><div><ol><li>Shoo it out the window. </li><li>Kill it</li><li>Attempt to reason with it</li><li>Find a container of some sort and try to catch and release</li><li>Leave it there and hope the girlfriend never looks behind the TV</li></ol></div><div>First option, shoo it out the window. The means to open the window are right next to the lizard, the window is screened, and if I try to shoo it, it may very well just run off away from the outdoors and into the tangle of TV cords nearby. X nay on the ooing shay.</div><div><br /></div><div>Second option, kill the damn thing. I tend to avoid violence if at all possible, not to mention I really didn't want to deal with the clean up, especially if I only kinda killed it and it ran away bleeding all over the house.</div><div><br /></div><div>Option three, try the impossible and hold a conversation with a lizard. Worth a shot right?</div><div><br /></div><div>Option four, catch and release. This would be the preferred method, however I have to find a container large enough to accommodate the lizard (its not huge or anything, but its tail is really long). Also the lizard is right in the corner which makes placement tricky.</div><div><br /></div><div>Option five, keeps the bugs away right? So I left it there.</div><div><br /></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">Psyche. (</span>I did give it away in the title.) I went into the kitchen to try and find an appropriate sized container, eventually I discovered a nice rectangular one. I checked it against a neighboring window sill and it was a perfect fit. However, I also made another important discovery. The window had a small metal lip on it so people could open it or something. Whatever its purpose, the lizard's head was directly underneath it so a simple drop was not going to work.</div><div><br /></div><div>After fetching a green folder (the stiff, thin, flat object that would be slid under the soon to be contained lizard), I stared the lizard down. I said, "Look I know your brain is smaller than my pinky, but it would simply be easier if you mozied out the door. Why there haven't been more advances in inter-species communication is beyond me."</div><div><br /></div><div>I grabbed the container and held it over the window sill... </div><div><br /></div><div>I hesitated. (It's amazing how much more bravado we men have when the women are watching.) I contemplated just slamming the container down, but then realized I might injure the lizard and somehow lop off it's tail or kill it. I didn't like that option, and that little guy is going to need his tail once he gets outside.</div><div><br /></div><div>I slowly lowered the container towards the sill. Slow and steady... Please don't run into the tangle of cords by the TV... Steady now... Maybe the girlfriend wouldn't mind... almost there... the inner edge dropped onto the metal lip of the window. Ok, the lizard hasn't moved yet, (maybe reasoning with it worked a little?) I lower the outer edge. I can feel gravity pulling the edge on the window lip. I release...</div><div><br /></div><div>The last edge of the container falls and the lizard flips out. It landed on his head! He frantically struggles for a second and then pulls his head back runs to one corner of the container, runs to the next, then stops. </div><div><br /></div><div>I notice the lizard's tail poking out through the thin sliver of space between the container and the window sill edge and quickly slide the container a quarter inch in. He shifts to another corner.</div><div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwK-_F-CRMwZyoOD98NhyphenhyphenDrL7eB-k7CmOF_h6LUkA57PxAn1oGOO2bxJqo1qc95yn3gzBfpWmSwDMWtnE6e_1UvVpuqsZZu8LF-j98rtpkrNRhMUlb10vP4069y9ePegsNsRARrrW4gJ_L/s1600-h/IMG_0334.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwK-_F-CRMwZyoOD98NhyphenhyphenDrL7eB-k7CmOF_h6LUkA57PxAn1oGOO2bxJqo1qc95yn3gzBfpWmSwDMWtnE6e_1UvVpuqsZZu8LF-j98rtpkrNRhMUlb10vP4069y9ePegsNsRARrrW4gJ_L/s320/IMG_0334.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5297686874292906578" /></a>Ok, I can breathe a little easier now. I grab the green folder and gently slide it under the container.</div><div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUuR_Av2V7U2IAD7WEIktxAK4pUrQSYuWwzW45v180KVq3J1IuAf8YMd7VJ7CF8AgrNZPCsbcDTl_jFidd3eZcA1aG0KMcVHHsbwlSYYRpPERUe_oATBuF8otB9Ip7bX1VGOEz4CZ7XqN-/s1600-h/IMG_0335.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUuR_Av2V7U2IAD7WEIktxAK4pUrQSYuWwzW45v180KVq3J1IuAf8YMd7VJ7CF8AgrNZPCsbcDTl_jFidd3eZcA1aG0KMcVHHsbwlSYYRpPERUe_oATBuF8otB9Ip7bX1VGOEz4CZ7XqN-/s320/IMG_0335.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5297689022351440146" /></a><br /></div><div>I fetch a sturdier magazine to put underneath the folder to ensure that the folder doesn't bend while transporting the lizard outside.</div><div><br /></div><div>I let him go in some bushes near the house and spent ten minutes feeling <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">awesome</span> while sealing up two small holes underneath the window. </div>TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-83699397914426609522009-01-10T13:44:00.002-06:002009-01-10T13:58:38.406-06:00Best article/blog I have ever read....<a href="http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/08/business-requirements-are-bullshit.html">Business Requirements are Bullshit</a><br /><br />Came across this blog when looking into a local Dallas company <a href="http://viewzi.com/"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Viewzi</span></a> and their more or less inactive twitter feed.<br />Full of humor and lots of good quotable nuggets:<br /><blockquote>Ideally the product you're building for yourself should be <em>simple to describe</em>, so that other people can quickly evaluate whether they, too, want this thing. It's often called the "elevator pitch", because you should be able to describe the product in the time between when the cable snaps and the elevator hits the ground. "Dissolves dog <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">poooooop</span>!!! <crash>" It used to just be the time for an elevator ride, but those investors keep raising the bar.<br /></crash></blockquote><blockquote>When you're <em>trimming</em> the business requirements, then you're exhibiting healthy project behavior. This contrasts directly with <em>gathering</em> requirements, which has both the connotation that you're clueless about the product <em>and</em> the connotation that you're inflating the requirements list in direct conflict with schedule, usability and fashion. Trimming: good. Gathering: bad.</blockquote>Awesome.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-70340750846276513002009-01-09T00:21:00.004-06:002009-01-09T01:33:02.995-06:00A Different Kind of New Year ReflectionI've been attempting to get down and dirty with <a href="http://www.zendframework.com/">Zend Framework</a> lately. It has the a la carte design that I want from a framework, but <a href="http://djangoproject.com/">Django</a> is still my first love. Despite all of the libraries in Zend, it still doesn't have that 'batteries' included feel I get from Django. I mean do I really have to write my own admin and authorization? Hell even RoR let's me whip up some scaffolding.... (And no phpMyAdmin is <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span> what I would consider an acceptable admin interface). Don't even get me started <a href="http://www.avnetlabs.com/php/php-framework-comparison-benchmarks">on</a> <a href="http://wiki.rubyonrails.org/rails/pages/Framework+Performance">the</a> <a href="http://www.alrond.com/en/2007/feb/04/in-addition-to-the-test-of-mvc-frameworks/">benchmarks</a> or how awesome Django's documentation is... but this post is about Zend and PHP....<br /><br />Zend does provide a decent table abstraction (screw you mysql/mysqli functions) with some ActiveRecord <span style="font-style: italic;">like</span> capabilities i.e.:<br /><pre>$table = new MyTable(); //Assumes database adapter was initialized<br />$newEntry = array('name'=>"TK",'state'=>"TX");<br />$newEntry['id'] = $table->insert($newEntry);<br />$oldEntry = $table->fetchRow(<br /> $table->select()->where("id = ?",$newEntry['id']))<br /> ->toArray();</pre><br />Not too shabby, an ok query builder with auto-escaping, but I still feel like something is missing...<br /><br />Thankfully PHP5 introduced some decent meta programming/reflection capabilities. Of particular interest is the <a href="http://www.hiteshagrawal.com/php/php5-magic-methods/exploring-magic-methods-in-php-5">"magic"</a> function <a href="http://www.hiteshagrawal.com/php/magic-methods-in-php5/php5-tutorial-__call-magic-method">__call</a>($method,$arguments).<br /><pre>class My_Model_DbTable_Abstract extends Zend_Db_Table_Abstract<br />{<br /> public function __call($method,$arguments){<br /> if(strncmp($method,"getBy",5) == 0){<br /> if(count($arguments) != 1)<br /> throw new My_Exception("getBy(value) takes one argument");<br /> $fieldName = strtolower(substr($method,5));<br /> if(isset($this->_metadata,$fieldName))<br /> return $this->_getBy($fieldName,$arguments[0]);<br /> throw new My_Exception("$this->_name has no field '$fieldName'");<br /> }<br /> throw new My_Exception("Unknown method: '$method'");<br /> }<br /> public function _getBy($col,$value){<br /> $result = $this->fetchRow($this->select()->where("$col = ?",$value));<br /> return (null == $result) ? null : $result->toArray();<br /> }<br />}<br />...<br />$oldEntry = $table->getById($newEntry['id']);</pre><br />I'm terrified I might start writing Django's ORM in PHP, but I really don't have the time. The eventual task of writing a Zend_Form for every table I create is just as daunting... maybe I just need to Google around some moreTKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-46253924151495818392009-01-05T19:41:00.004-06:002009-01-05T20:16:52.801-06:00Swarm ForceRecently found this <a href="http://swarmforce.com/">swarmforce.com</a> on a job board and it got my wheels turning....<br /><br />What I have gathered about SwarmForce so far from the site and blog:<br />1) SwarmForce differentiates itself from traditional content portals by using a 'swarm' algorithm versus the usual user recommendation algorithm.<br />2) SwarmForce is also a content provider like Wikipedia, only the swarm algorithm is the editor and not an arbitrary person. Currently this is manifested as 'Debates' but a full fledged collaboration platform is planned.<br /><br />The Idea:<br />I love the idea of Swarm Intelligence. Just this weekend I was contemplating how an ant determines what colony it is a part of. (I am geek, hear me roar.) But the big question is, how can Swarm Force differentiate itself from other content portals to the common person?<br /><br />A quick note on debates:<br />The debates feature is interesting, but the few I've looked at seem very long winded and it takes a bit of reading to dig up the hard nuggets of information. Striking a balance between thoroughness and usability is always a hard problem. A site that I think has a quick and simple debate feature is http://wikinvest.com (Bear vs Bull reasons to buy/sell a stock). A challenge for the debate feature will be how to condense the 'good' points instead of false arguments such as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_Man">Straw Man</a> etc (wonder if NLP can do this....)<br /><br />A note on the front page:<br />Why am I being shown big Hulu style graphics of the big debates? It makes sense on an entertainment portal because the same slide show is main the player so the transition to the new page is a fluid experience, but here it is kind of confusing. One alternative would be to cycle through some swarms and list out the hot debates and articles.<br /><br />I think for SwarmForce to really click with some of the early adopters it needs a clear case for how a 'swarm algorithm' can filter noise and another case for how it does better than traditional user recommendation sites.<br /><br />Between Digg-a-likes and Wiki-clones collaboration/user content platforms are a fairly saturated market (User generated-content was one of the defining aspects of 'Web 2.0' no?). It will require a serious disruptive technology to break into, the proof is in the pudding. (What does that <a href="http://ask.yahoo.com/20020903.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">actually</span> mean?</a>)<br /><br />There is plenty of opportunity here though. How do you determine membership in a swarm seems like a big problem in of itself. It also hits up on one of my other favorite topics, what secrets will the <a href="http://subtlepunk.blogspot.com/2008/06/status-quo.html">social graph</a> reveal?<br /><br />P.S. Every employee of SwarmForce should be given an Ant Colony upon being hired full time.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-63894991155067346942008-11-06T23:40:00.004-06:002008-11-07T09:17:14.545-06:00Experimenting....Recently purchased 'thomaskahnoski.net'. The grand plan is to set myself up with a solid personal site and then make some business cards... Timeline for that was supposed to be about two weeks but alas, no such love. I have been trying to play around with sites.google.com to host it, but all in all it's not a very pleasant experience. It's ok for creating a dead simple intranet, but customization is a set of limited set of fonts and colors + widgets. <br /><br />I guess I am just too much of a techie and would love to tinker with all sorts of CSS, HTML, and JavaScript. Which presents a problem for a white label intranet intended for the non-technical user. On the other hand, it's free and paying for a traditional web host just isn't worth it for me.<br /><br />I found myself going to an Android Dev Camp, less for being interesting in Android itself (although it is interesting...) but more for checking out this local Dallas company called Big in Japan which does some really interesting things in entrepreneurial itch land. Which is really where the whole "I need business cards" decision came about. Stupid 'ole me forgot the currency of networking is business cards.<br /><br />I am just shy of 4 months from the 2 year mark at my current company so it's about time to start thinking about career again, do some networking, figure out what options I have.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-18957505965681068252008-10-02T23:01:00.003-05:002008-10-03T00:45:25.366-05:00NitpickingI like both candidates, I hate both candidates. The economy is a confusing mess. Supply and demand topics learned in high school don't really explain any of what is truly going on. The following is more of me collecting my current thoughts in the final stretch before the election.<br /><br />Obama:<br />I'm always suspicious of the white knight, to much charm not enough about what he's done. I also don't like the "I'm not Bush" platform. That's what got us Gee-dubbya in the first place. He's mostly promises "no new taxes for the middle class". If only there was a tax on saying crap about raising taxes. However, the man is smart. Graduated Harvard, taught constitutional law in Chicago. I respect that.<br /><br />McCain:<br />I dig the Maverick thing. Historically McCain has been a non-standard Republican. I respect that. But he's doing anything he can do to win votes in this election. Search YouTube for 'McCain abortion' Roe v. Wade is not one of those things people change their minds on very much and they should have a damn good reason for it, but I guess becoming President is enough of a reason. <br /><br />The Economy:<br />The finger blaming the subprime mortgage crisis wavers between the Clinton administrations pushes for increasing home ownership or Bush's push for deregulation. Honestly, if a predecessor fucks up, then it's the job of the successor to fix it, otherwise you don't take the job. <br /><br />Candidates like to talk economics two ways: Taxing the rich decreases the number of jobs. Trickle down economics. More money in business owners hands, more money available for new jobs. Taxing the middle class, is robbing the middle man of enjoying a better life. <br /><br />I am for trickle down economics. For me the 'Pursuit of Happiness' means making available education to learn skills, having jobs available to pursue, and being able to work for yourself. More business means more jobs, means more money in the system, more money for taxes. <br /><br />Taxes:<br />What, when, and who you tax is a game of balance and some people just have a ridiculous amount of money. I also want that money to wind up somewhere important. Philanthropy is the free markets way of distributing that money, but it doesn't guarantee education, jobs, or the ability of an individual or group to raise funds to work for themselves. <br /><br />Deregulation and tax breaks did nothing to stop the current crisis, so quite frankly, I am willing to check out some alternatives. I didn't realize it until tonight but I was thinking about the quote "The fundamentals of the economy are strong". McCain has explained he is referring to the average U.S. worker and our ability to innovate. <br /><br />Home ownership is one of the most common and largest wealth building tools to John Every Man. If this is what is causing the current crisis, then McCain is missing something about the fundamentals of the economy.<br /><br />The Debates, the campaigns, and the flying circus of the press:<br />The debates are annoying, I crave them because sometimes a candidate will talk about something reminiscent of a plan, but the majority fo the talk is "We're going to tax so and so" followed by "You approved X billion dollars for this useless thing". And then it goes back and forth clarifying and correcting each other. <br /><br />Can someone do some fact check on the content of these and put them side by side? Isn't that what a debate is really about? Comparing the merits and downfalls of one idea or plan to another? Instead there is the salvo of 'he voted, she voted'. Certainly it's important to understand what sort of choices a person has made in the past and whether this leadership applies to their plan for leading this country, but often the latter gets left off.<br /><br />VPs:<br />Vice Presidents should be an after thought when it comes to who to vote for, Presidential succession is a rare occurrence, voting based on VP smells to much like fear mongering to me. However, they do give a reflection of the types of choices a candidate are going to make when it comes to choosing co-workers (i.e. the cabinet). Palin is an obvious grab for the evangelical vote. If McCain wins and is up for re-election, will he make more dramatic decisions like this? That bothers me.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-90279836795354874222008-09-22T22:21:00.006-05:002008-09-22T23:06:25.312-05:00Humor MeI often hear people rag on the Daily Show quite often, but the fact of the matter is behind all of the silliness there is a giant pile of truth which the big news networks are threatened by. Watch any news channel for 30 minutes and see if you get any idea about what actually happened, whose involved, and what their motivations actually are. <br /><br />It's just a constant stream of headlines, about 30 seconds of talking to an on site reporter, and then onto the next one. Quite frankly it's all replaceable by RSS feeds or a 30 minute commentary by a bunch of comedians. So what if this is the only place people get their news, there is as much content in the humor filled commentary as there is in the streaming headlines. <br /><br />I don't really care what the political pundits have to say, they almost all have their allegiances and try to put their spin on it. So quite frankly, I'll take my spin with a dash of humor.<br /><br />Anyways, below is part of the interview that inspired this post. Questions I have always wanted asked are getting asked, and actual answers came out of a political leader's mouth. <br /><br /><object width="384" height="222"><param name="movie" value="http://www.hulu.com/embed/M2jRQjd64Sg-TDS4JsqfVg"></param><embed src="http://www.hulu.com/embed/M2jRQjd64Sg-TDS4JsqfVg" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="512" height="296"></embed></object><br /><br />At about minute 3 is when the real conversation starts. At minute 8 there is a true gem and we hear quite possibly the most straight forward debate regarding the 'War on Terror' I have ever heard on television. And you know what, it actually makes sense. No bull shit, no talking points, no fear mongering, no liberal bias, just an actual conversation. <br /><br />It's a glimmer of hope to see an actual political conversation instead of cover-your-ass press conference.<span style="font-style: italic;"></span>TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-27439249142946889232008-06-21T13:51:00.005-05:002008-06-21T17:43:43.368-05:00Status QuoBiologically we are driven to survive. In humanities birth, it was a question of strength and endurance as this correlated directly to person's ability to provide. As society built itself up, social status and purpose became the dominant metric. <br /><br />We gain status by being noticed. The people we talk to, the people we say "Hi" to in the hallway, the friends we have intimate conversations with. This blog. Before the information revolution, it was the newspapers, television, movies, and word of mouth which got you noticed outside of your personal network. The higher the status, the more precious the power to keep it current. There are quite a few good thoughts to explore with government press, paparazzi and the control of this information, but let's get back to our favorite topic.<br /><br />Although the Internet has made it easier for us to extend our personal network, the latest innovation has been on the maintenance of our local network. For the time being, the focus is on keeping our connections up to date. No information is more precious than that which is current, current information allows us to make the best possible decisions. Knowing information about the people in our personal network allows us to gain better status with those people.<br /><br />The 'social graph', the record of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">everybody's</span> personal network, is well on its way to saturation. Now everyone is scrambling to find out what's next and how to leverage this new repository of information. Those of us who are part of the social graph have seen the torrent of applications trying to capitalize on the social graph.<br /><br />Many companies have made a business filling out the finer grain details of information that the current networks don't cover. Ranging from entirely new social graphs to personality quizzes to whether you support Pirates or Ninjas. It's low hanging fruit, but there is a ton of money tapping into this market if you can generate a useful or entertaining fad.<br /><br />Other companies are attempting to put a twist on the social graph. Micro-blogging and location based networks, are trying to provide the next step on providing current status information. Between all the small tidbits of information being collected by the low hanging fruit and an increased ability of keeping current, the social graph will become one of the most important sources of information the world will ever have.<br /><br />By maintaining a history of our personal network, we create an outline of our lives, almost a self-writing biography. Entire lives on record. The applications are both terrifying and exciting. It becomes possible to mine the social graph for insights into human nature well beyond our current capabilities.<br /><br />Mining the social graph will revolutionize our understanding of ourselves as a society and eventually, alter our metric for survivability. As Google revolutionized the world by mining the information network, the next big thing will be the company that can mine the social graph for useful information.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-78685627302767068742008-05-31T01:14:00.002-05:002008-05-31T02:11:41.924-05:00Internet TheoryInternet: <span class="sense_content">an electronic communications network that connects computer networks and organizational computer facilities around the world (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">webster</span>.com)<br /><br /></span>All that binds the Internet together is communication protocols.<br /><br />So what are we communicating?<br />Communication: the imparting or interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs. (dictionary.com)<br /><br />So... everything. How is everything organized? That's quite an impossible question. Everyone seems to have their own particular views on the world, and it's also a moving target. So how is it we are supposed to organize our communications over the Internet if the state of the information is in constant flux? <br /><br />We approximate using keywords, semantics, and behavioral models mapping some input set of information to some output set of information. <br /><br />Why do we do this? So we can find the information we need, or find the places information needs to go.<br /><br />In the early stages of the Web, keyword was it we extracted surface data from the input and surface data from the output. Behavioral models focused on improving what was known about a particular set of inputs and was a huge step forward because it made computers slightly smarter than the person. Even better it's a model that gets better with use and is capable of self-correction provided the inputs don't change radically. Eventually these techniques were applied to improve the analyzed output data as well (see PageRank from Google).<br /><br />This works most of the time. However, it often crops up when trying to deal with ambiguous or uncommon inputs. The answer to this is supposedly to apply semantics to both the input and the output set. This makes sense as we are trying to detect the deeper meaning of what is provided. <br /><br />What doesn't make sense is that we are imposing an artificially created sense of meaning. This becomes very obvious when looking at slang terminology or even regional dialects. Technically we could encode all of those dialects into our semantic model, but to what purpose? They are going to continuously change no matter what.<br /><br />With semantic technology we teach the computer how to relate various chunks of text to one another. This is where semantics changes what <span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;">is </span></span>the Internet. Before we were simply communicating documents, emails, web pages, etc... With semantics, we can communicate meaning. We can communicate what it is about a particular document, web page, or email that has <span style="font-style: italic;">useful information</span> to the end user without actually ever showing the the original source of information.<br /><br />Rather than input and output, we have a network of information related by it's meaning rather than a set of information mapped into an organizational scheme by some model.<br /><br />Of course, if creating semantics on the computer were easy it would have already been done....TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-21265316437348280612008-04-15T21:22:00.005-05:002008-04-15T23:27:29.382-05:00High StandardsI've been putting a lot of thought lately into what attributes my ideal company would have. The more I think about it, the less I actually care what the products are and more about what the internal processes and opportunities are.<br /><br />I stumbled upon a <a href="http://brucefwebster.com/">blog</a> which I have absolutely fallen in love with. The author is in the middle of writing several books on the level of Fred Brooks. I read the first couple chapters of <a href="http://and-still-i-persist.com/?page_id=236">Art of Ware 2.0</a> and it's a pretty good read so far. I think I may print out a copy of it out at work tomorrow (104 pages it may be wiser to go to a Kinkos... it's work related right?).<br /><br />Anyways, there was an <a href="http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/14/the-longest-yard-reorganizing-it-for-success/">excellent post</a> on what it would be like to use the sports industry hiring process as a means for hiring developers. Ideas such as contract-to-hire (probation) have seen great success in the industry but surprisingly haven't seen widespread adoption. A lot of good lessons can be learned from the analogy and it shook a few thoughts loose from my head.<br /><br />One thing that jumped at me right away in the analogy to recruiting was the idea of 'the Bench'. As many sports experts will point out, having a deep bench is key to succeeding long term. This is a no brainer, the more talent you have on your team the more likely you are to succeed, but we need to dig a little deeper into the analogy to extract some more applicable lessons.<br /><br />The difference between a 'Bench' and a 'Starter' player typically is the amount of raw productivity you get from a team member. Ideally we have a team filled with extremely talented individuals working on the next big thing and we have the Bench maintaining what has already been built. This accomplishes the task of having the Bench to learn by example from Starters. As great as that sounds, it is <span style="font-style: italic;">extremely </span>important to change the line up.<span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span><ul><li>A good Bench player won't stick around if you don't give him any play time. Simply put a developer will either get bored and leave or, equally bad, their skills will get worse or become out of date.</li><li>If a star player never sits on the Bench, you run the risk of turning them into a prima donna. Either the star developer will start demanding more than their worth, thus infringing on the bench or they will <a href="http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/">leave</a>. Neither is good for the company.<span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></li><li>Bad or new Bench players will never become starters<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span>if they are never given the opportunity to learn directly from your best and brightest.</li><li>If you never intermix starters and bench players, you have divided yourself into two teams which are both competing for resources and recognition within the company. (R&D vs. Support) This leads to more pointing fingers that creates overhead instead of accomplishing tasks in line with the company goals (unless your goal is to create overhead?).</li></ul>Ideally team members are rotated quite often. <span style="font-style: italic;">Form a new team of developers every time a product is launched or a major release is made.</span> Team changes in mid-development are almost always a bad idea. The only time I can see this ever really being a good idea is if the product is failing and needs a dramatic change in direction. As long as communication lines stay open in a company, teams should form themselves as employees recognize each other's interests, strengths, and weaknesses as well as the resources and efforts required for success.<br /><br />As long as teams continue to reform, lines of communication will stay blurred and bureaucracy should remain only where it is absolutely necessary. This is incredibly <a href="http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/">important</a> for long term success.<br /><br /><br /><a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identifying_and_Managing_Project_Risk#Monitoring_and_Controlling_Risky_Projects">Communicate</a><span style="font-style: italic;">, </span><a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.jnolen.com/blog/2008/04/how-do-you-mana.html">Communicate</a><span style="font-style: italic;">, </span><a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/">Communicate</a><span style="font-style: italic;">.</span> That should be the primary goal of any organization. My new favorite question to ask employees at company's has just become, 'What avenues of communication exist within your company to a. share knowledge, b. get feedback, and c. find help?'TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-59529420159607345692008-04-03T20:12:00.005-05:002008-04-04T10:07:18.797-05:00No Silver BulletsLiving in "Entrepreneurial itch land" it is very easy to forget this very important principle of software. It's a constant search for new innovative ideas to revolutionize, not necessarily the world, but some part of people's lives<span style="font-style: italic;">. </span>It's really a never ending search simply because<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">every aspect of life can be innovated</span> </span>and that is what keeps me up at night.<br /><br />So enough of the 'piphy', back down to the practical. Some time ago I decided that my current company could be something amazing if it implemented some measure of 'dabble time'. Recently known as Google's 20%. I have since changed my mind after reading some blogs from others with some truly insightful opinions.<br /><br />First let me get this out of the way, Google was not the first to do anything like this. Check out 3M and W.L. Gore which have been doing this stuff for decades.<br /><br />These are the reasons I came up with for why 20% time would solve my companies problems as well as some of the counter points I knew the idea would encounter:<br /><ul><li>Directly fosters innovation</li><ul><li>The Good: Builds out the product portfolio. Increases existing product quality.<br /></li><li>The Bad: Your spending 20% more on payroll than you should. You're spending less effort on the core product.<br /></li></ul><li>Directly increases employee satisfaction</li><ul><li>The Up: Increases employee retention, Increases quality of new employees, Increases employee productivity<br /></li><li>The Down: Is there a down side to happier employees?</li></ul><li>Gets employees interested in each other's work<br /></li><ul><li>++: Builds employee communication, Build projects understanding (synergy?)<br /></li><li>--: Employees spend more time chit chatting and brainstorming than actually working. Employees focus more on new products than the core product.<br /></li></ul></ul>To sum up, 20% time increases strategic diversity while increasing employee satisfaction and the downside is that you're distracting attention from the core product. This is great for larger businesses (100+ employees), <span style="font-style: italic;">but extremely bad for the tiny businesses </span>(<30).<br /><br />One extremely crucial thing that makes 20% work so well is that it is<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span>peer review process<span style="font-style: italic;">. </span>When there are 30 people in a company you probably still know everyone and have various opinions about their work etc... This makes it possible for one charismatic person to single handedly change the focus of the company. This isn't 20% time, you've simply found a better goal for the company. Splitting mind share at the early stages of a company simply hurts your chances of actually succeeding. You simply can't afford any dead weight. <br /><br />The idea behind 20% time is not to replace the core product, but to either enhance it or compliment it with another product. This means you should probably have enough clients to actually give a damn about what new and interesting things you're doing, otherwise you fall into the trap of creating solutions in search of a problem. Nothing hurts employee morale more than having dead weight at a company. It is definitely not good for client relations as competitive product X doesn't come with a price 20% time price tag.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"></span></span>So when is the time to start pulling the 20%? The short answer is, <span style="font-style: italic;">when it makes sense (in a business way).</span> When you can start losing business to start-ups, when there are obvious products that can compliment yours, when you get big enough to have to worry about strategic diversity, and most importantly when employees spend more time complaining about a product than building one.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;"></span><br />So why is 20% time not a good idea for my company? We certainly need innovation, and we most certainly need to increase employee retention, almost every company does. But we simply don't have enough employees, we have stretched our resources so thin that we are failing to keep up with our existing products. Our solution doesn't lie in new products, it's in cutting out the old.<br /><br />I'll save that rant for another day. In the mean time, a few links on 20% time:<br /><ul><li>Atlassian (awesome company, makers of JIRA) is doing a 6 month 20% time experiment:</li><ul><li> <a href="http://blogs.atlassian.com/developer/2008/03/20_time_experiment.html" target="_blank">http://blogs.atlassian.com<wbr>/developer/2008/03/20_time<wbr>_experiment.html</a></li><li><a href="http://blogs.atlassian.com/developer/2008/03/20_time_the_nuts_and_bolts.html" target="_blank">http://blogs.atlassian.com<wbr>/developer/2008/03/20_time_the<wbr>_nuts_and_bolts.html</a><br /></li></ul><li>More thoughts on 20%:</li><ul><li><a href="http://www.scottberkun.com/blog/2008/thoughts-on-googles-20-time/" target="_blank">http://www.scottberkun.com<wbr>/blog/2008/thoughts-on-googles<wbr>-20-time/</a></li></ul><li>Googler on 20%:</li><ul><li><a href="http://www.eightypercent.net/Archive/2005/03/24.html" target="_blank">http://www.eightypercent.net<wbr>/Archive/2005/03/24.html</a></li></ul><li>Google's development process in comparison to other methodologies (SCRUM/Xtreme etc):</li><ul><li><a href="http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2006/09/good-agile-bad-agile_27.html" target="_blank">http://steve-yegge.blogspot<wbr>.com/2006/09/good-agile-bad<wbr>-agile_27.html</a></li></ul></ul>TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-32287605833881984582008-03-24T22:28:00.005-05:002008-04-03T20:11:57.719-05:00VisibilityIt has become a well known fact that companies and recruiter will search Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, and even Friendster for information about you online. (Or you could use the one-stop stalking search engines like www.pipl.com) It is simply assumed that with any level of technical competence there comes a level of technical presence and if you want to get involved with the Internet Tubes Google better find more than what college you went too.<br /><br />There have been a ton of discussions about not putting to much information about yourself online for either fears of Identity Theft to embarrassing drunk photos of yourself online, but what people don't realize is that there is some serious leeway here. Certainly you shouldn't be advertising your SSN or bank accounts and you certainly don't want any picture of yourself doing illegal drugs, but you're not exactly running for the Senate either.<br /><br />If someone has taken the time to scour the Internet for your name then you've already got them hooked. If you want to impress someone, get your name in the first couple of results. Not only that, make sure there's something <span style="font-style: italic;">relevant</span> or interesting for them to find, even if it is just a rehash of your resume it's at least something that can either 1. confirm the information that got them interested in you or 2. something that gives a little bit more information about a detail that caught their attention.<br /><br /><br />It's not just people that need visibility, but companies as well. What's the point of having an awesome product if no one knows about? What's the point of having an awesome staff if no one knows about it? What's the point of being a company at all if no one knows about it? So in lies a second truth, not only do you need to make sure you can be found, you need to position yourself to be seen.<br /><br />Nothing frustrates me more than trying to figure out what the heck a company is doing. It's one thing if you don't want to blurt out critical information to your competition, but if you want to snag good employees and prevent the best and brightest from going <span style="font-style: italic;">to</span> the competition than you better give the viewers of your site some solid content to sink their teeth into.<br /><ul><li><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Give a sense of personality.</span> Put the CEO and VPs on the website so we can get to know who runs the company. People don't need to know what you're future plans are if you've got a stellar CEO or a VP with some legendary ideas.</li><li><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Show the value add.</span><span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span> If you're website doesn't distinguish yourself from the competition than forget it. If the technology your competitive advantage is built on is that short lived you better have either a patent or some serious marketing skills.<span style="font-style: italic;"></span></li><li><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Give several forms of contact.</span> </span>Always, always, always have an email, phone number, and mailing address. Bonus points for detailing the best ways to do so. Nothing irks me more than trying to figure out whether <insert> is located in an area I want to live. Make sure this is real easy to find so they get the message that 'We want to talk to you'.<br /></insert></li><li><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Update the site regularly.</span> </span>Gain users respect by showing them how much blood, sweat, and tears you're putting into this product. If product B has surpassed expectations bring it front and center. Start a company blog, even if it does contain basic press release information, it's much easier for users to circulate a url than it is a pdf. Respect your users by giving them information on updates or new features as soon as their available via some sort of RSS or email subscription. (Preferably the former as users can peruse it when they want versus it falling away in their inbox)<span style="font-style: italic;"></span><br /></li><li><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Good Design is an Art.</span> Don't kid yourself, if you have more than 30 employees, you can afford contract someone who studies this stuff to build the website for you in under a few short months. Unless of course part of you're value add is part of this design in that case you should already have some capable hands on full time.<br /></li></ul>With that you give everyone from industry conferences to family friends something to get excited about. I mean seriously, you know how sick I am of saying "I'm a Software Engineer" and that's it?TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-72483381825800894222008-02-08T00:24:00.001-06:002008-02-08T00:43:59.768-06:00OverreachingI don't know when this happened, but I am now an over achiever.<br />...<br />Apparently I've been one for quite some time, but I just realized it today. All I do with my time is think about work, work related things, or things that are work that I'd rather be doing than the current work. Where's the fun? Where's the video game addiction? Where's the drunken partying?<br /><br /> Apparently they've all been replaced by what I call the 'Entrepreneurial Itch'. I don't know why I didn't see it coming sooner, I mean I've always been brimming with ideas, but now I'm actually figuring out how to do them... That is some scary territory right there, the stress of figuring out if it's going to work, what happens if it fails... I am now surrounded by what ifs yet I completely ignore them. <br /><br />Put simply, I love the fearless pursuit of ideas. I almost feel like a spectator in my life because of the crazy suspense I experience waiting for what might possibly be next. I need to salt my optimism with a healthy dose of skepticism or I could wind up getting <span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;">completely</span></span> ahead of myself. Not that I'm not already, but a little patience in learning and thinking about what I need to do to get things done will carry me a lot further.<br /><br />I think that's what has changed in the past few months; I'm getting better at learning patiently<br /> and not recklessly all at once or just diving in. Now I just need a time machine to learn how to do that some 20 some years earlier.<br /><br />Of course if I could invent a time machine to do that, wouldn't that change my past and thus potentially alter whether or not I invent a time machine? (Now if only I could learn how not to ask so many impossible to answer hypothetical questions)TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-54467659416895764882008-01-28T22:26:00.000-06:002008-01-28T23:21:27.196-06:00Searching Between the LinesSo despite pretending to be busy, I still seem to have time to reflect on life, love, work, and all the rest. I guess a part of me is always going to be stuck in my own head doing that...<br /><br />So today I finally got Semantic Search. Not that I didn't understand its usefulness before, but today I actually had a value add experience on Amazon (technically their behavioral search, but they use behaviors to build a semantic model). Went looking for a particular soundtrack and sure enough I found an even better CD by the same artists thanks to some serious product synergy between the usual amazon store and it's music store. Sure I could have dug around eventually, and I did afterwards, but the first recommendation was precisely what I wanted. <br /><br />Maybe music and movies are a particular easy thing to model, but so far search has only been textual extraction and some clever natural language tricks. Maybe I'm just a dreamer who one day hopes to live the sci-fi dream of just talking to a computer to extract information. However, given the nature of a lot of web innovation, it would appear that it will be more like "Computer, find me an entertaining YouTube video." (Absolutely awesome iPhone/party application no?)<br /><br />Meta search may have been a joke in the past, but the fact is niche search (if it ever gets to he level of music taste matching) is going to flourish with semantic web stuff and nobody likes having to check more than the One search engine (antiphrasis?) for their information. Suddenly we're back to NLP, only this time not about information retrieval, but disambiguation and query classification.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-6820011236927689052008-01-23T00:14:00.000-06:002008-01-23T01:02:42.722-06:00Is being busy progress?I actually planned out two months of my life and so far things are going pretty well. Never mind the fact that I have absolutely nothing planned after Mar. 1st nor do I plan to, but I've somehow started to become a 'busy' person. Not to say I am any more productive, but I am definitely doing things. Heck I even got around to finding myself a new apartment. <br /><br />However, the apartment is probably the one thing I actually went a little cheap on. Not to say it's not nice, but it's simply not as expensive. I'm in the red for this month. A new suit, plane tickets, combined with the usual spending and a new found taste for nicer (pricier) clothes can rack up quite the bill. Not that I don't have plenty but I barely broke even last month, and I'm definitely going to be in the red because of vacation coming up in February. (Costa Rica here I come, woot woot)<br /><br />My `rents are also coming by right before my vacation too. I'll be in the new apartment then and should have enough room for them, but 100 sq. ft. less is a drop I don't think I've quite wrapped my head around. They fly in on a Wednesday night, and my original plan was to work Thursday, take Friday off, and then also have Saturday to take off with them. However, I have to fly out Saturday now (due to the seemingly random airline ticket prices) and hence need to burn another vacation day. Poof goes my vacation.<br /><br />This of course wouldn't be a problem except that my post-vacation self is supposed to be exploring job opportunities and makes any fly-outs a little more difficult to manage.... Yes that. Come February 17th(technically Feb 16th ~ 10pm) I'll have spent an entire year in Dallas. All the BS that's going on in my current company aside, it's just smart for a 'young professional' to check out what opportunities are available.<br /><br />So switching topics....<br />I've started reading again (yay). Non-fiction (collective boo). I'm apparently one of those people who can't turn off the work part of their brain as my current read is "The Future of Management". Ordered it on a whim from a suggestion by one of the usual blogs I read. It reminds me a lot of the books I read in my last semester of college such as "The Mythical Man Month" and "Crossing the Chasm". It contains many 'common-sense' yet zen like quotes that are one thing to be read but another to be followed.<br /><br />The premise of this book is that in a world where <span style="font-style: italic;">change </span>is an ever-accelerating force, companies can only survive if they develop the ability to <span style="font-style: italic;">adapt</span> and <span style="font-style: italic;">innovate.</span> The biggest barriers to adaptability and innovation being management. And so the book is all about how management practices need to change.<br /><br />A few gems: (Yes I've been taking notes)<br /><ul><li>"I dream of companies that actually deserve the passion and creativity of the folks who work there and naturally elicit the very best that people have to give."</li></ul><ul><li>"Expecting [large organizations] to be strategically nimble, restlessly innovative, or highly engaging places to work--or anything else than merely efficient--is like expecting a dog to do the tango."</li></ul><ul><li>"Toyota's success is based on a wholly different set of principles--about the capabilities of its employees and the responsibilities of its leaders."</li></ul><ul><li>"[U.S. car makers] have paid dearly for a management system that was rooted in intellectual feudalism."</li></ul><ul><li>"In most companies, managers are selected, trained, and rewarded for their capacity to deliver more of the same, more efficiently."</li></ul><ul><li>"I once heard former U.S. Secretary of State George Schultz draw a distinction between 'problems you can solve' and 'problems you can only work at'."</li></ul><ul><li>" .. to build an adaptable company, mangers need to worry less about weeding out low-probability ideas and more about building a diverse portfolio of non-incremental strategic options."</li></ul><ul><li>"'You're either creative or you're not' Now if this were true, art institutes, design schools, and architectural programs wouldn't exist and courses in creative writing would be pointless."</li></ul><ul><li>".. if you wring out all the slack out of a company, you'll wring out all the innovation as well."</li></ul><ul><li>"As human beings, we are amazingly adaptable and creative, yet most of us work for companies that are not."</li></ul>Only a third of the way through and I'm already itching to revolutionize my work place (hah).TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-35420368633831532082007-12-29T20:36:00.000-06:002007-12-31T10:00:07.001-06:00Old Year ResolutionsThis year was a bust. I tried and failed. I put myself in a bad environment and got stuck trying to do the impossible. I lost confidence in my own abilities as a productive individual and as a team player. So much for illusions of grandeur, it's time to get back to the basics.<br /><br />Do or do not there is no try.<br /><br />You'll have to forgive the very cheesy line, but it describes very much the solution to my number one problem of thinking and not doing. Call it indecisiveness, choice paralysis, procrastination, or even apathy but it's a problem that needs fixing.<br /><br />(And also an explanation for why this hasn't been updated in two months.)<br /><br />There are distractions no doubt, but if distractions are getting in the way of my goals then these distractions are poor excuse for not planning properly or not being committed to the goal. This I can reverse by adapting my plan to accommodate or mitigate these distractions.<br /><br /> < insert wise quote from some dead/fictional person about how admitting to your mistakes and failures is the first step in moving on ><br /><br />And of course, I need to admit that there is a problem with meeting a goal as well. I hate the idea of giving up and moving on from a failure is necessary if I am ever to accomplish any future goals. This is not saying that I should throw in the towel every time I hit a roadblock, but I definitely need to put more thought into how I reevaluate things. On top of this I need to loosen the filter on my own though process. I crave criticism at work yet my own criticism comes in two types nonexistent or overly sarcastic. Got to work on that constructive criticism.<br /><br />It's all common sense, but then again most things are with hindsight.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-4691377574293670052007-10-05T00:57:00.000-05:002007-10-05T02:10:01.097-05:00Santa Clause, Fate, and PurposeLet me get this out of the way first. 42.<br /><br />So in doing some research for work I rediscovered a website by the Washington Post that proposes to be a forum for some of the more public members of the community in regards to religious topics. http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/<br /><br />And somehow this lead me to draw the comparison of religious bickering to the belief in Santa Clause. Think back to the days when the question was alive in your head, "Is he real?" and all of the rationalizations that came about. Attempts at justifying how it would be possible for a single man to distribute gifts to (some of) the world. There are just so many holes in the myth that we don't see as a child. In the end what changed? The presents we received didn't magically disappear, simply our understanding of the origin of them changed. It's almost amusing to think about kids on the playground going 'Nu-uh' to claims of family members being responsible. Yet somehow that skepticism eventually wins out.<br /><br />Granted it's a bit different with religion. There's still many people going 'Nu-uh' (and in much more dramatic ways), but there is no authority figure to go to and ask directly. Or more to the point, no person to fess up to being the cause of the events that occur in our lives (people giving presents). <br /><br />But there is science. It shows the how of things happening, but for some reason we consistently ask 'why?'. Some would argue that there is an ultimate design (purpose) to the universe and there may very well be, however, the universe is an awfully HUGE and complex thing and as such any purpose that incorporates the entire universe is going to be HUGE and complex as well.<br /><br /> There are some theories that our brains are hard wired to see all things as having 'intentionality' and we can certainly see the merits to it from an evolutionary (science) stand point as from a primitive level we weren't so much at odds with nature as we were other animals who had intentions (mainly surviving by an means necessary).<br /><br />You can start making arguments that by the universe evolving intentionality it has intentionality, but it's entirely possible that the universe evolved two very different intentions and so the 'Purpose of Life' could, essentially, have two answers. Not really the point I want to address, but lots of fun thought experiments there.<br /><br />Back to the whole religion vs. science thing. Questions like 'Why do bad things happen?' become irrelevant in science as 'bad' is a label that is assigned on individual basis. The question in science is, 'How did X happen?'. You can do some averaging over all people to come up with a 'collectively bad' label, but in the end the label still isn't universally applicable.<br /><br />We are told that present giving is done by Santa and until we start to learn about the world, we are none the wiser. We start to ask questions like 'How does Santa fit down the chimney?' or 'Why doesn't Jack or Jill have a Christmas tree and presents?' and we discover that Santa Clause is not a universally applicable thing. <br /><br />It's the scientific method and it works. Sure the facts get jumbled sometimes and there's conflicting figures, but the universe is a HUGE and complex thing. In fact the universe could very well be as infinitely small as well as infinitely large. In either case, there's a logical contradiction that you can't know everything possible in the universe. That being the case, we will always have a chance to get things wrong. More interestingly though, we will always have a frontier to explore and that ultimately means we will always have a purpose to find and that we can never prove one universally applicable purpose.<br /><br />Shifting topics, there is a great book by Scott Adams (freely available online I believe), called 'God's Debris' that is a very nice thought experiment into the nature of "God" (generically not Christian/Buddhist/etc...). Mainly, asking the question 'What purpose or reason does "God'"have for existing if he/she/it can accomplish any task possible and know any result of a task? We see the question of purpose becomes void when there are no questions to be answered. It is by asserting a single question that suddenly the proposed deity does anything. And that simply is, 'What if "God's" ominpotence didn't extend to the results of his/her/its own destruction?'<br /><br />I highly suggest it for reading, but the question itself brings into question humanity's ultimate fate. What if we somehow came to learn everything? What then? Do we run across the same question and destroy ourselves? If you look deeper you eventually see this is a very similar question as 'If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound?' aka 'Can you answer a question that you have no way of verifying?'<br /><br />Logically we say no, but something burns in us to want to answer that question anyways.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6728203180460481943.post-53491195871203814312007-09-30T01:44:00.000-05:002007-09-30T02:07:34.692-05:00Hypothetical Itch - EvolutionIn my random Internet wanderings I came across some quotes from Greg Graffin (lead singer of the band Bad Religion).<br />"Notions of progress, purpose, emergent properties, optimality, and increasing complexity in evolution all contain vague hints of dualism, and are debated in symposia and published in books and journals by today's most active evolutionists."<br /> ~http://www.cornellevolutionproject.org/purpose.html#whatisit<br /><br />Greg's one of my favorite people, punk rock singer turned geologist turned phd in zoology. What's not to love?<br /><br />This reminded me of a conversation I had earlier in the week about evolution. I don't remember what exactly I was trying to argue about evolution or what the conclusion of that conversation was. But I was trying to make the point that evolution isn't so much a process as it is an observation.<br /><br />What I think I was trying to get at in that conversation was more or less that evolution had no 'purpose'. It's simply the observation of the effects of Natural Selection, the obvious truth that the most fit for an environment will surivive (and thus favor genetic mutations in that direction).<br /><br />I was about to go try and re-argue some points here, but then got lost in the fascinating questions of what defines a species and the implications of man's up and coming ability to tinker with genetic code.<br /><br />So here's a few hypothetical questions and thoughts:<br /><br />If we clone a squirrel from six or seven thousand years ago and mate it with a modern day squirrel and the offspring reproduce does that then qualify the two original squirrels as the same species etc...?<br />Is it possible to manufacture a 'multi-purpose' species that is capable of reproducing species x when mated with species x and species y when mated with species y?.<br /><br />A 'Species' is itself simply a human categorization of groups of organisms that are highly compatible reproductively which up to this point has also meant DNA compatible (Ligers and other hybrids being the extreme case). Can these 'rules' be broken?<br /><br />Take the ability to reproduce twins. It skips a generation, could we manufacture a 'species' that would alternate radically in form/structure/behavior between generations.<br /><br />This has wild implications if there was a predator/prey relationship between the two as any ability of one to survive further ensures the ability of the other. Would the 'arms race' of genetic mutation continue? Or would one species become an evolutionary 'dud' in the sense that it no longer needs to evolve (Provided we did no more tinkering)<br /><br />Natural selection is driven by the idea that a particular generation is better fit to survive and reproduce a (near) copy of itself. However, this 'paradox species' has the odd ability that making itself vulnerable to its reciprocal species increases the ability of the species to proliferate. It does not in fact favor passing on 'copies' of the vulnerable species, so we need to rethink this.<br /><br />What would make a particular family line best fit? Generally we would think a line that generates a more capable predatory species would then be able to generate the most prey species -> higher probability of a prey species reproducing. However, the inverse is true. A more capable prey species would produce more 'predator species' - > higher probability of predators reproducing. So in fact, the 'dud' evolution would ensure a less fit family line and the 'optimal' family would have highly capable predators and prey. The arms race continues. We could also assert, that it would be to a family's benefit to not eat its own prey offspring as this would also hamper the ability of a family line to survive.<br /><br />This also answers the question of, 'what if they are both predatory'?.... and then realization, this is essentially a cannibalistic species. However, a cannibalistic species is capable of eating itself out of existence. If there is a 'prey' generation, the food supply is in theory self-sustaining as any other predator/prey relationship.<br /><br />Even weirder behavior is possible if we consider the possibility that the predator and prey could mate. The species then essentially has simply increased the number of genders. Is there a species with more than two genders (excluding hermaphroditic genders)? Would our paradox species form a 'shepherd' model, a praying mantis/black widow behavior, or a sort of 'colony' structure?<br /><br />Just can't keep from scratching.TKhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06950721194271156861noreply@blogger.com0