when you put your mind to it, anything is possible
Thoughts
PSA: Please Change Your Mobile Phone Signatures
0There is no question that Smartphones and Tablets have permeated through to practically every layer of our society. Looking back in history it’s amazing to see how long things like the radio, television, and internet took to be in a position where it would be an every household item. Compared to smartphones and tablets that seem to have sprung up overnight and now everyone has one.
Because these devices are getting to be as powerful as the computer I’m typing this blog out on, more and more people are opting for consolidation when it comes to their devices. For example, not long ago it was very common for a business to provide you with a Blackberry so you could get your emails on the go. Most people would then carry a Blackberry and a purpose built phone that was their personal telephone. This seemed very reasonable as the two devices had two separate functions. Nowadays we want everything and the kitchen sink with us at all times. Our smartphones replace the camera, computer, regular mobile phone, gps device, and watch. Most of us are now in situations where we want one device to rule them all, meaning we don’t want to carry around more than what we absolutely need. Because of how fast the market has adapted to smartphones, it is truly easy to get Exchange to sync on my Android or iPad as well as my Google Apps for my personal email.
But wait. As more and more people do this in business, I am finding a growing trend of…. lazy people. Yes that’s right. People who think that setting up their work email on their smartphone is a super cool and smart thing to do (it is, I’m not criticizing that per say) but then choose not to change their signatures. I can’t tell you how many emails I get now that say “Sent from my iPhone” or “Sent from my HTC <Device Name>”, honestly this is something that should be done right after adding your work mailbox.
So please do everyone a favor and change your email signatures. I did it as the first thing I did on both my HTC Sensation and my iPad, so there’s no excuse!
Falling out of grace
0When you’re a kid, you find yourself looking up to everyone as you seek out a better understanding of the world. As you get older the field narrows as you seek out a mentor, someone to show you the ropes, but moreover someone you can look up to and admire.
In todays day and age, its more and more difficult to find people that you can look up to. The days of honorable people like Jack Welch and Warren Buffet are few and far between. Corporate America is far more concerned about aggressive behavior that fuels young naive individuals to climb over each other in the pursuit of climbing the corporate ladder. Corporate America is more concerned with the bottom line–especially in this economy with the health and wellbeing of the workers coming secondary. Learning and growing as a professional is now up to the individual through self determination and self awareness to their own progress or lack there of. All of this leads to a situation where finding people in the work place that act and behave as mentors is dwindling faster than the housing market.
In reality this is quite sad. It use to be the mentors in business that saw the young raw potential and blew that spark into life that in turn helped the business but also drove that person to be more successful. Taking a page from “paying it forward” that person would in turn do the same later in life when they get the opportunity to do something similar for another.
Looking back in my professional career I can think of someone who was a mentor to me. Someone who when I first met him made me think, “thats who I want to be like”. The way he treated people, treated customers, his business acumen, and the way he carried himself. All of these qualities I saw and wanted to be more like. In fact I can say with certainty that the majority of my early career was working towards emulating those talents and trying to build myself more like that. The saying goes, “imitation is the highest form of flattery” and part of being a mentor is having others look up to you and to in many cases, trying to be like you.
But on the other hand, what happens when your mentor falls from grace? Someone that you look up to having a serious of decisions that results in them hitting rock bottom? Whats it like to see that person again after several years expecting to see one thing and then you finding something else.
Its disheartening to say the least. Its like getting told that there is no Santa Clause or Easter Bunny. Not only is this a tell that says the economy is still not in an upswing when someone as talented as he is can’t get back on his feet, but with the already lack of mentors in the workplace its one less person to care and look out for the next generation.
I’ll be sad to see them leave, to find a better opportunity and to spend more time with their family. But in the end we all need to do what’s best for each of our own situations. The saying goes that whenever we have reached the bottom there is only one way to go but up. I’m a firm believer in this and believe that one’s own character will in the end out shine any adversities that they may have faced.
Obama Appoints Richard Cordray to CFPB
0After months and months of delays and politicking, Obama uses the executive orders to recess appoint Richard Cordray as the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It’s about time. According to news outlets, Republicans have been using a “pro forma” sessions to continue the delay of several appointments.
For me, it was curious why a delay was necessary, but more over what the impact it has on the CFPB to delay his appointment. The reality of the situation is that without Cordray at the helm of the CFPB they are in effect and agency that cannot carry out their mission. When it came to bailing out wall street there was little hesitation by Washington to move quickly to help address a problem. Why is it then when regular consumers need help to provide some fences and safe guards to prevent companies from taking advantage of Americans, do politicians do everything in their power to make this appointment a faint priority?
With the appointment Richard can start the process of taking control of the CFPB and move forward initiatives that were held up as most of the actions that the CFPB can take require a director to be named and functioning in the role of the job.
But moreover I would like to see further action taken by Washington to stabilize the housing market–the very thing that was at the heart of the worse financial crisis since the great depression (as was voiced by Obama in his speak earlier today). We see a runaway train here that is eating at the very foundation of the American dream. More and more Americans are either forced to or making the conscious decision to short sale or foreclose on their property. But in doing so, dramatically reduce the prices of all the homes around them. In fact in our housing market your home is only worth what similar types of homes have sold in your area. Pretty soon we will be in a situation where good law abiding Americans who’s dream to own a home and who did the right thing by standing by their financial commitments will be in situations where their homes are worth half or less than the value of purchase. How is this right? We need stricter laws and enforcement to make it so the rules apply to all or more people. Or make it so those who did the right thing can have some benefit and be able to get out from under their homes if they need to move or relocate.
I plan on starting a discussion with my representatives to urge them to consider legislation that would provide regular Americans a way to relocate and be able to help drive the housing market by stimulating more sales. For instance, if your home was purchased within the last 10 years and the purchase price was $300,000 and now is worth $175,000 because of foreclosures and short sales and a complete lack of regular home sales, you should be able to apply and qualify for a program where you can take advantage of short sale prices and the difference between the sale price and the remainder of the mortgage would be subsidized by the government. Then over time if the price of the home goes up, the government would be entitled to the difference up to the value of the original loan. This means if that same home over the next 10 years returns to a value greater than the original loan value, say it was $250,000, and sells for $320,000 then the government would get the difference between the original short sale and the loan value, and the person who sold it would get the difference of $250,000 and $320,000. Its not a perfect system, but at least it takes the current behavior that is already happening and put some fences around it so more people can take advantage of it. Think of it as rebooting the housing market. Additional stipulations could be put into place that in order to quality you have to then in turn purchase another home, and/or be financially responsible in other areas to minimize fraud. Nonetheless we need more options to allow hard working Americans to have options that are quickly being taken away at the hands of less than honest or responsible people.
Why Does Washington Squabble About Spending Issues That Affect Americans and Not Its Own Spending?
0American’s have seen some of the worst gridlocking and in-fighting in Washington since the days of Truman and the “Do-Nothing” Congress. Let’s face it, when it comes to money issues, whether it’s the Debit Ceiling Increase that resulted in the downgrading of the United States credit rating to the most recent incident where Congress held up a critical piece of legislation that would increase the payroll tax cut for another 2 months, American’s have the lowest confidence rating of Congress and to be fair most of Washington that we’ve seen in decades. It seems that whenever an issue comes up that involves American’s and has some type of spending associated with it, everyone throws up their hands and we let the mayhem ensue.
But what’s entirely more comical is to hear that just recently the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and it’s various divisions: FEMA, TSA and US Customs and Border Patrol, that these agencies all received a substantial increase to their 2012 budget. Now how is it that we hear the media go on and on about the politicking that occurs on other spending issues, and yet we don’t hear a peep when it comes to a silent passing of this increase? How is it that in a day and age where we need to look at ways to shrink the size of our government, to cut the fat as it where, we are spending more money on things that honestly we don’t need.
I’ve posted about this topic before, but there needs to be some honest discussions in Washington as to whether or not we need the TSA. Clearly there are news outlets and political officials who also must have asked this question. But can we say that we are or can be safer by spending money’s that by all rights we don’t necessarily have, to provide the TSA with:
- 250 additional advanced imaging technology (AIT) devices,
- 140 new behavior detection officers,
- 12 additional multi-modal Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) teams,
- 20 additional explosives detection canine teams,
- 53 air cargo security staffers
All for an additional $153 million dollars more to tax paying Americans. Wait, am I the only one that see’s a problem here? First off, as pointed out in the HSToday article, many airports already have AIT devices but are not used because they don’t have the staff to man them. Clearly the TSA needs to have an organization shakedown as time and time again I go through the lines and see TSA agents just standing about. Perhaps the issue isn’t sheer manpower but a lack of specialized skill sets to take on the really important tasks.
For example, I can see a reduction in headcount, that is followed by an increase in training and hiring of specialized people and focus more energies on stuff that is going to prevent terrorist attacks, than to have TSA agents wheeling around bins from one end of the security line to the other. Or someone standing there to direct people when to walk through. Clearly these are not people that we need to be spending $40k/yearly on. Look at how in Chicago you can go through the security check points to get onto the L-train. You put your ticket in, a turnstyle let’s one person through. This isn’t rocket science here. If the issue is to turn us people into cattle and herd us through the lines, there are ways that this can be done without the intervention of people and will allow the TSA to focus their efforts on the manpower that is required to carry out their duties.
In this case, I would have liked to see the House and Senate both call on Janet Napolitano, head of the DHS, to find ways to cut $153 million before spending more. Isn’t this what the Speaker of the House John Boehner keeps calling for? He’s not opposed to tax increases, but he wants to see similar cuts in spending. I want to see this same philosophy be used for all money considerations in Washington. If the DHS wants more money, they have to find ways to fund it, reduce other programs, more their processes more efficient, etc etc. In other words, be more creative than just throwing money at a problem.
TL:DR, spending it out of control in Washington. There’s no question about it. This Administration, Congress, and Senate are all responsible. As much as one political party will say and do just about anything to say it’s the other party’s fault, clearly there is ample blame to say it’s everyone’s fault and now everyone’s got to find a way to come together, compromise and make some serious reforms. All federal departments should undergo cross-departmental scrutiny to understand how they are using their money and justify it. For example, in the Peace Corp, they aren’t allowed to spend any of their budget on food items for themselves. This sounds like a great idea. They wanted to have bottled water delivered to their office, what did they do, they put a water pool together and people contributed $X dollars of their own money and they get bottled water delivered. These types of common sense practices should be universal across all agencies and departments of the government. How much would we save if people had to ask themselves, do I really need this, or is it just a convenience?
We need to urge our political representatives to stop the business as usual practices when it comes to agency and department spending. Treat those spendings as you have treated all the American facing ones. The tag line that’s commonly used is that politicians are looking to “Cut and Grow”, cut spending, and grow the economy. How is it that this Act cuts spending or grows the economy? If we use that as a litmus test as we have for other things, i.e. the deficit ceiling or the payroll tax extension, this act fails on both fronts. It doesn’t cut the agency’s spending, it actually grows it, and it doesn’t necessarily create more jobs it creates more Government jobs. I’ve always been a firm believer and this is where I will side more on the Republican views than Democrat–jobs should never be created by Government and should instead always be grown through the private sector. Governments responsibility is to guide the ship. Steer this country with sound policy and legislation that allows businesses to get back on track. Will businesses be hiring in 2012 if there is an outstanding question on whether or not they will have a payroll tax increase from the previous year? Probably not? And I don’t buy into the rhetoric that it should have been 12 months instead of 2. The question on the table is should these cuts be permanent or not? Period. Give people the certainty of knowing that ou rGovernment is passing legislation and policy that makes sense and allows them to forecast months down the road to know what they can or should or will be doing. But Government should not be creating jobs–specially when an outside look in says that this department, the TSA in particular, needs to trim the fat. Find new ways of making it better, or paraphrasing the late Steve Jobs, make it so that people will love it.
Take for instance the Federal Air Marshal Service. Part of this service is to provide trained personnel on aircraft in a way that people don’t know if they are there or not. This service is at the cost of $966 million dollars. WTF. The idea behind this service is clear, had a trained Marshal been on one of the planes on 9/11, maybe, the outcome would have been different. But more so aren’t we just saying that we want a pair of eyes and ears on the planes? Wouldn’t it be far more cost effective to outfit planes with video surveillance and have a centralized surveillance monitoring center that had eyes on each and every plane in the sky? Planes are soon going to be wifi enabled, doesn’t that make for this type of surveillance a more cost effective solution?
Cut and Grow Washington, you need to start listening to your own words and playing by the rules that you have set forth. You have time and time again this year shown us that you will put the country in jeopardy, to effect changes that cut and grow. But when it comes to your own backyard, I don’t see you playing the same game here. Is it the unwritten rule that we only scrutinize the public policy’s and internal policy’s go unchallenged? Is there a hands-off approach when it comes to certain agency’s? Is there a sense of entitlement that prevents these types of changes from occurring because of political clout and/or backing? Who runs Washington and are they working by the people for the people? These questions we all need to ask, but more so we need answers from Washington on how they plan on Cutting and Growing when it comes to their own houses.
Momo Needs a Job
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Obviously bird watching doesn’t count:
Because at the end of the day, he’s just a lazy bum!
Merry Christmas 2011
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Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
2010 has been an interesting and exciting year. For PaDeu that has meant starting a new career and all the challenges that comes with.
Momo has been busy working hard with his trainer John at BarkBusters to learn how to be more social and how to be a good Shiba. How’s he doing–the jury is still out on that! (I kid!) He’s doing quite well, and we are hoping for more social play dates in 2012.
George started Hapkido and couldn’t be happier! He recently completed his Yellow Belt Green Strip rank and is looking forward to continuing his journey in 2012.
2010 also marked the first time that PaDeu has gone skiing! Park City, Utah was amazing and we got a chance to see the Galicia’s, long time friends of the family. Turns out I fell more than PaDeu did so we are looking forward to go back!
We love all of you and hope your 2010 was one for the books! Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year!
Kindle Fire – An iPad Killer?
0Whenever the blogosphere talks about Apple-killers, it’s a move to knock Apple off it’s high horse with it’s superb platform. That’s going to be the extent that I talk up Apple, and I will also temper that comment with the following–Comparing Apple and Android on equal playing fields is fundamentally an invalid argument. And here’s why:
- Apple controls the OS, hardware, and to some extent Carriers
- Android controls the core OS, separate hardware vendors who skin/theme their devices, Carrier influences on skin/theme along with configuration of core OS features, i.e wifi hotspots, etc.
Clearly there is a separate here given Apple’s control of the entire device. Now that’s not saying one is better than the other, but merely pointing out the obvious–because of inherent differences to their business models, while they are similar products, they are different nonetheless.
But that hasn’t gone over very well with the Android community with talks over forks, fragmentation, and legacy continuing to propagate through the user ecosystem. Clearly user’s want to see their platform to be managed better and for their devices to have better support when it comes to updates and upgrades.
What can be done about all of this? When you talk about the Android problem, it’s a coordination issue between Google, OEM hardware vendors, and Carriers. The problems seem so monumental that I don’t think anyone has a good idea as to how to cut through all the nonsense and bring some type of order that results in an improved user experience.
What user’s want is to have a device that is supported end to end by 1 party. Where the OS version is inconsequential to the functionality of the device. Where the process of getting stuff, i.e. downloading music, movies, books, apps, is all managed in one place and seamless (in the words of the late Steve Jobs, it just works). An app store that is human reviewed and apps verified to function properly on the device.
Bring the Kindle Fire. First off looking at the benefits: no contract, no monthly fee, a flat up front cost, cheap, again cheap (yes it deserves 2 mentions!), portable form factor, backed by Amazon.
The last bit is fairly important. Amazon maintains their own app store, that is directly tied into your Amazon account. The device comes to you pre-configured to your Amazon account! Yes this could be seen as a security issue, i.e. what if you don’t get your device, but nonetheless, for the end user who wants a good tablet it’s a bonus. I go back to the process I had to go through to get the iPad2 setup for my Dad and all Apple provided was a picture to plug the device into the computer with zero instructions included in the packaging. Ergo a device that is fully setup is a win. Apps are reviewed by humans. This is a good thing or bad thing depending on how you look at it, and unfortunately there isn’t a right answer or wrong answer to this, but one good point is that it ensures that the apps that you search for and have available to install have at least been tested by Amazon to work on the Fire. This is a lot of the issues that we see on the Android Market as devices that weren’t made to handle certain apps have users download them, install them, and then rant what a piece of crap the app is when the real issue is that they loaded it on a crappy device. The hardware is directly from Amazon and support is direct with Amazon. Amazon doesn’t sugar coat the price. Actually reports show that on every Fire, they LOSE MONEY!
From end to end, you have an Amazon experience. When you purchase something, it just works. No secondary screens. No payment issues. Everything is with Amazon and they stand behind the product and purchases. If you buy a book it’s no different than buying it on your Kindle and history has already proven that this model works and works well. Amazon has taken the Kindle and skinned it with a really slick theme that pretty much covers the fact that you are using Android at all. Yes it may be only Android 2.2, but guess what, it doesn’t really need anything higher. Will the Fire get Ice Cream Sandwich? Maybe, or maybe not. But that doesn’t really make a difference does it. Since you as the user don’t notice or see the need because all you see is the interface that Amazon provides and it just works, why would you care? The only downside I can think of are games that are designed for Honeycomb or ICS that would not be supported on Android 2.2, yes this is a loss, but generally the percentage of games or apps that fall into the category I would think would be fairly low.
All in all, I think Amazon will revolutionize the tablet market–at least from an Android perspective. They are doing what no-one else would (or possibly could). They took something that arguably was very fragmented and divided, and made it follow the Apple model when it comes to devices. And what it proves is that what Apple doesn’t isn’t unique to Apple and that it can be replicated across other companies.
Now some people may say that Amazon is just a copy cat and unoriginal. Sure this may be the case, but how many things in this world have been invented first by someone and then later copied? Do we argue when the pharmaceutical companies come up with a magic drug and then as soon as the patent drops, others are able to make generic versions and therefore delivering a cheaper alternative to allow more people coverage? The bottom line is that the joy of tablets should be accessible to everyone. Amazon does this by bringing what I would say a very decent tablet at a price that most people can see as affordable.
Does this device come with it’s limitations? Absolutely! The list is fairly easy to point out:
- No GPS
- Wifi Only
- No variations to screen size or form factors
- Limited apps (yes this is a limitation but with growth of the community and increased adoption, this will quickly be a thing of the past)
- No camera
A front facing camera would be a major plus on this as it opens the device up to Skype and other face to face chat software. A GPS would be even better! Imagine an 7 inch GPS on the dash =), grins is all I can say to that. A cellular option would be nice, but honestly with the number of people with smartphone and portable wifi hotspots having another radio sucking down your device juice is probably better.
With everything that Amazon has brought to this device and the Android platform, it’s my hope that more companies start to do similar things. Take back some control and deliver a superb user experience. Is the Kindle Fire on the same par as the iPad? In many ways it is and in many ways it is not. But out of all the tablets for a wide array of users (not specialized to uber-geeks) this one is one of the first Android devices that is strictly aimed at the mainstream consumer.
Blackberry’s Vision of the Future – Isn’t this the Present?
0Recently, Microsoft published their view of what the future would look like. And it looked great! (surprise surprise).
Blackberry published their view, and to be honest, what a bummer. Aside from a jazzed up version of a phone that was screen from side to side, and the use of NFC to replace access cards or proximity detectors, and Blackberry OS running on a PC (standard hardware), I saw this more as a view on how Blackberry should be today, instead of what it thinks tomorrow will look like. Have a look for yourself, but personally this was a big let down.
If this is how RIM Is approaching their product roadmap, you don’t have to wonder why it is that they are quickly and steadily losing to Android and Apple.
Have American’s Become Xenophobic?
0I was reading an article on what usually is a comical site Not Always Right, that deals with the notion that a lot of times, the customer isn’t always right and that adage is old and inaccurate in most cases. Many companies still take this approach, and while I won’t brow beat them down, I can’t stress how much this annoys me that customer’s believe that they are always right–even though customer’s by and large generally don’t even know what they want. A.k.a. Bring on the little baby syndrome that are American’s. We like to be treated like kids. We like to be told we are doing a good job and that we’re good and even when we puke on your shoe we want someone to hug us and tell us it’s not our fault (even after we just ate a bag of candy and got in trouble for it) and everything’s going to be ok. That’s what we want as consumers. We never have any responsibility to the issue. We don’t like being told what to do. And we expect, when things go sideways, the company is solely responsible for making it all better.
But what makes things even worse, now we are threatened whenever we receive services from abroad. Now I’m not saying I’ve not had the same problem where I call a customer service number and get to someone who is clearly from a foreign country (India or wherever). And I’m not saying that sometimes working through any accents and missed understandings isn’t frustrating. But have we really become such babies when it comes to customer service that we refuse service because of our preconceptions of where that service is coming from? When were the days that we were just glad to get someone who helped, and it didn’t matter who that was or where they were from?
It’s views like the one described in the link that makes me absolutely disgusted that people can treat each other this way. But it’s a two way street. If companies still treat customer’s like spoiled little children, they will not learn to behave better and treat the company, and it’s representatives, with respect and courtesy. God forbid people take a step back and ask themselves there really is a problem and allow the person the benefit of the doubt to fix it. Or to have the patience to work through a problem? Perhaps this is why our economy is in the toilet–we lack the patience to dig down, roll up our sleeves and start working through the problem. Instead we’d rather blame other people for the problem, like the selfish customer who can’t take responsibility for their own problems (it’s always someone else).
But add on top of that the American condition, the condition that came as a result of the events on 9/11 and we are unfortunately hampered by this scared stupid belief that anyone that comes from a Middle Eastern decent is somehow out to get us. Just sad. Yes, we experienced terrible things, but can we continue to live our lives in fear, judging those who were not, have not, and will not ever be participants to such acts in the future? Why is talking to people in other lands such a problem? When did we lose our tolerance for other cultures and acceptance of differences?
To fix this America needs to go back to it’s roots and remind itself that we are a land of the free and the home of the brave. That means regardless of what has happened in the past, we put our best foot forward and embrace a global society where goods and services can come from anywhere. The old Bush era montra of “Made in America” just doesn’t hold weight anymore as America has lost it’s industrial footing, natural resources, and refining processes as those have been shipped to other shores. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, we just need to adjust our thinking and our approach.
Accept. Embrace. Be Brave.
The Future–As Seen by Microsoft
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This video is circulating on the net that describes how the world might interact in a future where we are all interconnected through devices that allow for truly seamless integration between multiple functions. For example, we all have devices like smartphones, DSLR cameras, appliances with smart functions, paper thin displays (almost), portable laptops and tablets, but to have all of these seamlessly interact with each other is still a thing of the future.
What’s seen her has an almost Apple-like view of stuff that “just works” as was the popular phrase that the late Steve Jobs use to use. But moreover, the idea that we use technology to keep track of the things in our lives that use to make our stomach acid burn and lead to many people going out for one too many smoke breaks (I’ve been there!).
While I agree with the original post on Gizmodo that if we are moving to a future where we touch everything, people like me will freak out and we’d better have a ton of sanitizer with us at all times, we’re definitely going to have to go through a paradigm shift to realign our realities to this concept. But how much of this is future in fact, and how much is just a future that’s better off left to Minority Report?
We all remember that movie, wall size screens, retinal displays that changed the environment around us as we interact with them, cars that drove themselves. All really really cool tech.
And then we look at the Star Trek model, where we interact with computers through similar interfaces as we’ve become use to with mainstream tablets, but also adding in full voice commands that we are now seeing take popular stage in both Android and iPhone devices.
Regardless of what view you take, I think what’s true here is that the future is going to be a place where our idea’s become free flowing and that technology provides a very fluid medium to be able to translate those abstract thoughts into meaningful stuff. (yes stuff). Personally I like the idea of a pop-up holographic display that you interact with, so take the best parts of Minority Report, but remove the physical element of a display so it’s entirely portable. Then tie that into Star Trek, so that the same device can be interacted with verbally. Add in endless power so you can be fully mobile all the time, and have it so that all the things we interact with, doors, windows, houses, buildings, walls etc, all are interactable, then we have a future where no matter where we are or what we are doing, we can take our thoughts and do something with them.
How many times I have been shopping and thought to myself, “geez wiz, I wish I knew if we had this in the pantry”. In the future, I should be able to take a realtime view of my kitchen inventory and see whether or not I have something. Take that one step further, the kitchen inventory should check trends on what’s being used and what’s not, provide suggestions on meals based on tastes and criteria (gluten free, vegetarian, etc), and based on what you have suggest meals. Or can forward think and detect when stuff goes bad or when stuff has to be replaced and to automatically create a list that goes with you to the grocery store. I’d like to see advancements too where my experience at a store is optimized, for example, if I have a grocery list, that I am guided through in the most optimal way to get me in and out as quickly as possible.
Even looking at things like cars, my one pet peeve has always been the idea that humans don’t deserve to drive their own cars. Period. No exceptions. I don’t care if you are the best driver or the worst, most drivers suck. Why? Because we are human. No matter what our driver record officially is, we all get distracted. We’re all faced with situations where fatigue and carelessness can cause accidents. We can become victims to circumstance and we freeze up where we’re not able to react quickly enough. We don’t pay attention. Basically accidents in general can and should be avoided. The excuse of “well we are all just human” is no longer an excuse as far as I’m concerned. Cars and roads should all be automated like what we see in movies like Minority Report so that your role in all of the driving experience is to buckle up, turn on your device and just enjoy the ride. I always get confused by why people are so fiercely determined to hold on to their right to drive when in reality most people would agree that during that ride you probably have better things to do. Catch up on a good book, go through work, watch something off your DVR, talk to your friends, kids, or people in the vehicle, eat something, sleep. The list goes on and on. Only people who enjoy recreational driving should be allowed to drive on special streets where human drivers are allowed–and this wouldn’t be most streets. How would traffic be in major cities that have the worst traffic :
The top 10 cities for traffic delays in 2009: 1st - (tie) Chicago, Washington, D.C. – 70 hours 3rd - Southern California – 63 hours 4th - Houston – 58 hours 5th - San Francisco-Oakland – 49 hours 6th - (tie) Dallas-Fort Worth, Boston – 48 hours 8th - Atlanta, Seattle – 44 hours 10th - New York- Newark – 42 hours
Most traffic delays that I’ve seen are due to:
- Impatient drivers. Drivers who are quick to press the gas, build up speed, and then realize that the car in front of them isn’t driving ahead as quickly and have to press on the brakes. People think that these actions are singular, but the fact remains that pressing on brakes has a ripple effect through the cars behind you.
- Gapers Delay. We drive pass something interesting, you look over and in those few seconds, you forget to maintain your speed, or press your brakes, etc.
- Accidents. Usually caused by the aforementioned list regarding stuff we’d rather be doing than actually driving. In most cases, people ought to be doing that other stuff and not worry about driving.
- People who don’t know how to drive. It’s physics people. If you don’t know about momentum, velocity, inertia or can’t determine the average speed required to maintain a particular pattern without having to aggressively apply gas or brakes, you are a bad driver. And most of the drivers out there fall into this bucket. This is another issue, but primarily stems from the fact that when we are tested to drive it is a very subjective process, and we have treated driving as a right and not a privilege so the number of people who fail is much lower than what it should be. Can anyone fly a spaceship? Probably, but that doesn’t mean everyone should. Cars are the same, just because you think you can drive, doesn’t mean you ought to drive–and let’s be honest, you know who you all are, you probably shouldn’t!
- Road raggers. People who treat the cars boundaries as extensions of them or their property and drive anyway that they feel fit. Yes we all need to drive with the idea of the whole instead of the individual. If you are late, that’s your own fault, don’t rage on people because your late and you want to go fast to make up the time.
- Poor traffic patterns. Who thought up these crazy traffic patterns!
- Road construction. Honestly people, as soon as you see orange you freak out. Seriously. Drive normally and don’t panic.
- “I was here first” mentality. Many times we cause delays because we don’t want to yield to other cars. We take the mentality that “others won’t yield to me” that results in you not yielding to others.
But now take the perspective that roads are all driven by vehicles that drive themselves. They all are interconnected so they take average speed into consideration. They all have positioning systems so they know where you want to go and can negotiate with other cars for lane changes and off/on ramps. This overcomes any “I was here first” issues and traffic can move in a very fluid pattern.
Let’s look at the cloud and devices and portability. In the present even with our super awesome devices, we are tied to the limitations of that device. Year over year, we have to upgrade the device because new technology comes out that requires more horsepower. I take a look back at the G1 when it first came out and thought, wow, I won’t ever need more power! 6 months later, I was lamenting over how slow the G1 was and how it was time to upgrade. In fact every 6-8 months, I have that desire to upgrade even though at the time the device seemed to be the best in class for performance. I think the first device I’ve seen so far that takes this a step further than the norm has been the Kindle Fire using Silk. The idea that a lot of the computing and retrieval is done in the cloud and then just pushed down to the device–this idea is revolutionary! Imagine the possibilities. What if in the future you only needed the display, and all the processing existed in the cloud? That as you needed more power, the cloud gave you more? Think about laptops. Imagine what we could do in a work environment if we were never tied to the number of processors on the local machine or the amount of RAM we had or storage? What if these systems were all nebulous and in the cloud, so our focus is just the work, and the hardware to process all of that is scaled infinitely on the cloud? That’s the type of device I’d like, where we just carry our the display and interface parts of the hardware.
TL:DR, the future is an awesome thing, and I have to commend Microsoft for putting this together as it really does go to show that Microsoft is starting to round those rough edges that everyone has always attributed to windows. You know where this comes from (see right!). But that also the future can be productive. When we come to think about it, all of our lives are about getting things done (GTD:David Allen). Whether it’s work, shopping, travel & vacation, business, etc, all of it is a matter of prioritizing and getting stuff done. Why can’t that be elegant and use technology to maximize what gets done and how we do it.
Sarah
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Laura
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User
Awsome post
2 months ago