Technology & MSG

The following refers to transparency in the global currency market, but could be true of privacy as well. Just ask anyone famous…

Once you have committed yourself to that level of scrutiny by the heard, there is no going back, except at a huge price.

– Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree

Tags: fame, scrutiny, transparency

On August 9th, WTOP announced a casting call for extras to take part in the shooting of Transformers 3. There was special interest in those with cars and precision driving experience. Nifty.

On August 10th, it was announced that quite a bit of the planned D.C. shoots were denied by the National Park Service. Not horribly surprising, there.

As of this evening, the Office of Motion Picture and Television Development reports that “there are no open casting calls at this time.” Bummer.

I wonder if the casting call was closed due to the reduction in shooting time or whether they got the extras they needed or a combination of both. Whether driving, walking or just standing about, it would have been a neat experience.

Tags: extras, movies

I find the election signs that are emerging from street corners and lawns up and down the coast to be incredibly tacky, especially when they disrupt an otherwise pristine landscape. They seem to scream “vote for me, because I don’t give a shit how this neighborhood looks!”

I’d make it a personal mission not to vote for any candidate that stoops to such methods, but I’d end up voting for myself and I don’t particularly want to be the county commissioner of some rinky-dink town in the middle-of-nowhere New Jersey.

I don’t think I’d win, anyways.

Tags: advertising, campaigns, elections, landscapes

Inspired by two Flickr groups, I decided to document my everyday carry. That is, the items that I carry with me on a daily basis.

Nothing really fancy here.

I’ve got the usual ring of keys to various houses, offices, and vehicles, most of which are infrequently used. There’s a ten-year-old wallet, filled with a modest amount of membership cards, but with more scraps of paper bearing incomprehensible notes than I’d care to admit. For communicating with the world, a basic Motorola W755 flip phone, the bottom-of-the-barrel freebie model from Verizon, plus a numeric pager if I happen to be on call.

The only thing that is fairly unique is the folding knife. It’s a fairly inexpensive serrated model from China that only cost a few dollars at a show, given to me by a friend. The rubber finish has been worn down to the steel in places. It’s been with me all over the country and it’s one of the items that I feel most awkward without. There’s countless reasons to carry a knife, but most of them you won’t think about until you don’t have one.

I used to carry an original Leatherman PST on my belt and a AA Maglite, but now that I’m at a desk most days it seemed like extra weight for the most part. I usually have my day planner around, my Canon PowerShot, as well as a pair of sunglasses, but those come and go.

Granted it might be a tad more interesting if I lived in Virginia, but I don’t. My everyday carry is pretty basic, especially compared to some of the survivalist types.

Tags: carry, everyday, keys, knives, maglite, pager, phones

Not just companies and countries, but our individual lifestyles as well.

The world has become an increasingly interwoven place, and today, whether you are a company or a country, your threats and opportunities increasingly derive from who you are connected to.

– Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree

Tags: connections, opportunities, threats, world

I find child prodigies to be enigmatic. Adora Svitak is no exception. Though perhaps smarter than most of the child (and perhaps adult) population, I found her talk from TED entitled What Adults Can Learn from Kids to be insightful and fun.

Sometimes all it takes is a really sharp individual to make people think about things in a different way. Maybe they’re a lot younger. Maybe they work in a different division. Maybe they have no formal training. Sometimes you have to throw your assumptions out the window and get down to the root of an issue; while kids have that innate ability due to lack of worldly experience, anyone can prompt you to attack a problem with a clean slate.

I firmly believe that we shouldn’t mock or disparage ideas just because of their source.

Tags: adults, ideas, kids, prodigy, tedtalks, youtube

I’m not usually a fan of bottled water. It’s pricey. You end up with lots of bottles. But sometimes, it’s the only thing going.

Over the weekend, I stopped into Trader Joe’s for lunch. I grabbed a pre-made wrap and was looking for something to drink, when I discovered the following: a half-liter bottle of spring water at Trader Joe’s costs 17¢.

I thought I had misread the sign. Probably $1.17, but whatever. I was thirsty and probably a bit dehydrated from the slow crawl up West Street in full riding attire. But when the cashier rang it up, it really was indeed 17¢.

Not that it’s imported from Switzerland or Fiji or wherever. But neither are most bottled waters. It tasted just fine to me, and it’s the cheapest I’ve ever seen. Hooray for Trader Joe’s!

Tags: annapolis, cheap, trader joe's, water

When you accept an offer of employment, be cautious when it comes to your employment contract. Assuming that you’ve read it, understood it, were fine with its terms, and signed it, make sure you get a copy of it.

Once you sign the official copies, they’ll likely disappear into the vacuum that is HR. I envision a bottomless file cabinet, without any organization whatsoever. Any attempts — no matter how genuine — to locate your contract within the cabinet will fail, even if you ask nicely. That is, until you decide that you want to sell some code you wrote on your own time. In such a circumstance, corporate legal will have no troubles; they’ll be knocking on your door with your faded and slightly crinkled contract in hand, explaining to you in large and obscure legal terms how you owe your employer money.

This isn’t just a matter of protecting your interests, but it’s about convenience too. Maybe you’ll want to moonlight. Maybe you won’t. But it’s a lot easier to know what your responsibilities are for sure if you can consult your contract whenever you like. This is especially important when reviewing invention clauses, non-disclosure, and non-compete section. If you need legal assistance, it’ll save you a bit of money if you can provide the documents up front rather than having your attorney bill you by the hour to track them down.

And if you aren’t allowed a copy of a contract or agreement, you might think twice about signing it.

Tags: agreements, contracts, employment, non disclosure, non-compete

After it was announced that consular fees would be rising effective July 13th, I decided that it was time to renew my passport. It was due to expire later in the month anyway, so I figured I’d take care of it and save $35 in the process.

I went to Penn Camera in Laurel to have my photographs taken. It cost $12.71 for two photos after tax. I know that you can get cheaper photos elsewhere. There are hundreds of forum posts out there where people extol the virtues of Walmart, CVS, Walgreens and all sorts of other places where you can get it done for a few bucks. I choose to go to a photography store for two reasons, time and quality. I was in and out of the store in about seven minutes, the bulk of which was spent waiting for the photographs to print; I’d dare anyone to try that at your local Walmart on a Saturday morning. For quality, I wanted to avoid the click-and-print operation. At Penn, several photographs were taken and examined. I have no doubt we could have taken a dozen more had I not been satisfied.

I went to the post office to mail everything off, certified delivery. The Columbia branch was an absolute madhouse. There were a few dozen people waiting to get their passports, struggling with forms, kids in tow. Compared to that, the line to mail things off was pretty darned short.

Certified delivery has changed a bit since the last time I used it. I remember filling out a small card with my return address that the Post Office would mail back to me after an item was delivered. Now they just give you a detachable slip with a tracking number on it so that you can track and confirm the delivery online. Here’s what it gets you. In my case it looks like the postal work had to make a few attempts, probably due to the lunch hour at the State Department.

Label/Receipt Number: XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX
Class: First-Class Mail®
Service(s): Certified Mail™
Status: Delivered

Your item was delivered at 11:51 AM on July 12, 2010 in PHILADELPHIA, PA 19190. 

Detailed Results:
Delivered, July 12, 2010, 11:51 am, PHILADELPHIA, PA 19190
Notice Left, July 12, 2010, 11:40 am, PHILADELPHIA, PA 19190
Notice Left, July 12, 2010, 11:36 am, PHILADELPHIA, PA 19190
Arrival at Unit, July 12, 2010, 10:05 am, PHILADELPHIA, PA 19190
Acceptance, July 10, 2010, 11:42 am, COLUMBIA, MD 21045

In all, it took me all of two hours out of my Saturday afternoon and $91.12 to renew my passport. It’s good for another ten years. Less than 3¢ a day to be able to leave at a moment’s notice. That’s a heck of a deal. Had I waited one more day, it would have cost $35 more. Say what you like, but $35 is $35.

The State Department estimated that I’d get everything back in 4-6 weeks. As it turns out, their turnaround time for me was 3 weeks. Both the new passport and the canceled one were delivered on the same day via USPS, in separate envelopes. The new one was in a USPS Flat Rate Envelope w/ delivery confirmation. The old one was in a plain envelope, standard delivery.

Everything, summarized…

Costs:
$75 - Passport renewal
$0.61 - Postage
$2.80 - Certified delivery
$12.71 - Photographs

Timeline:
Sat, 10 July - Mailed
Mon, 12 July - Received
Thur, 15 July - Processing, according to Application Status
Friday, 06 August - New passport arrived
Friday, 06 August - Cancelled passport arrived

Why do this at all, when I don’t have any trips planned? To keep my options open. Who wants to be running around — or waiting in line, as the case may be, even with an appointment — at the last minute trying to get paperwork sorted out to get a passport issued at the last minute? Not me. Now it’s taken care of.

I was fairly impressed with how easy it was and the quick turnaround time.

Tags: passport, state department, usps

Credit to Rolling Stone, their renewal notices are more amusing than most.

This is the last letter you’ll receive from us, despite our best efforts over the past few months to keep our relationship alive.

What went wrong?

Some time ago, you gave us a few dollars you would have otherwise squandered on who-knows-what, and believe us we were grateful to get it.

[...]

Who else could take our place?

Wired magazine, that’s who.

Tags: magazines, rolling stone, wired

After a year with Amazon Prime, I’m renewing my membership. The convenience and savings — both time and money — make it more than worthwhile.

In the past year, I placed 23 distinct orders with Amazon that weren’t covered as part of my free trial to Prime. Each of the orders contained at least one item, but some a half-dozen or more. At $79 for the year, that’s $3.43 per order for 2-day shipping. In most cases, that’s less expensive than I would pay for standard delivery.

To be fair, the free Super Saver Shipping is still an option. But after living with two-day UPS delivery for a year, going back to 5-10 day USPS delivery isn’t good enough. The service isn’t timely or reliable. Especially during the holiday gift-giving season, it’s worth paying a little extra for both.

Even if all of the items I bought were available in a single store and I liked going shopping, the cost of getting to the stores would add up too. My car is relatively efficient, but even so it costs 7¢ per mile to drive. One 20 mile round trip to the mall costs about $1.40, compared to the box being dropped at my doorstep for $2 more.

Time is important to me. Time is finite. I can’t buy more. This is a simple concept, yet a lot of people don’t have any idea what their time is worth.

How many times have you seen this? A person drives all over the town to save a few pennies per gallon, which may save them a dollar or two on a tank of gas. But what about all the time they spent driving around? They didn’t take the value of their time into consideration when making their decision. Or maybe they’re on the clock…

I can’t accurately predict how long it will take to drive back and forth from the mall, walk to and from distant parking lots, trudge through people at the mall, and wait in line for the cashier to call the supervisor over to put the override key in the register. I don’t need to, really. Assuming one trip out takes 30 minutes (which is optimistic at best), that time — which I could be using to do something else — is worth a lot more to me than $3.43.

Amazon Prime takes the complication out of the bulk of my shopping. And for someone who doesn’t like the typical aspects of shopping, that’s a bargain.

Tags: amazon, prime, shopping

Mosquitoes don’t seem to like gunfire.

A few weeks ago a buddy and I trekked into the woods, ready to try out a new set of reactive targets. We were inundated by mosquitoes as we set up, all wanting their lunch. But after a few rounds, the mosquitoes just disappeared. I didn’t see or hear one the rest of the afternoon and didn’t receive any new bites.

Relocated or dead, I’m unsure. Maybe it’s the gunpowder, masking the scent that mosquitoes seek. Or maybe it’s the shock waves, knocking their small bodies unconscious. I can’t seem to find any literature on the subject.

Tags: guns, mosquitoes

From the moment the 8-bit Universal logo hits the silver screen and the 8-bit version of the melody fills your ears in digital surround, you know that Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is going to be excellent.

To be honest, I didn’t know what to expect. With a tag-line of “an epic of epic epicness,” can you blame me? Until yesterday afternoon, I hadn’t even heard of this movie. Then — thanks to NLE and the folks at Big Planet Comics — I obtained some passes to tonight’s advanced screening at AMC Columbia. In the meantime I had watched a short trailer and read the paragraph or two that was on the back of the pass. That was it. Not at all familiar with the source material, I was thinking that it’d either be amusing and watchable or absurdly stupid and forgettable.

The opening bits didn’t lie. I really liked it.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is a laugh-out-loud funny sort of movie, heavily steeped in popular culture. Even if you aren’t intimately familiar with some of the references, I suspect most 20/30-somethings will recognize far more than they thought. There are things that pop out and make you chuckle and laugh throughout the movie. “Holy shit, I remember that!” was a common outburst.

Ever felt like you have to live up to a significant other’s significant others? While not spelled out directly, this is the plot of the entire movie. I know that I can relate. I suspect that many others will too. So ends the seriousness.

Without any major spoilers, there’s a lot of themes rocketing around in this one. Video games. Girl on girl. Knives. Canada. Power ups. Bacon. Worst (and funniest) sleeping arrangement, ever. Bad indie rock. Picking up dudes. The sex. Martial arts fights. Hair dye. Exes. Word action. Snow. And hideously baaaad disco-era title credits, whoa buddy lemme warn you ’bout that.

Edgar Wright did Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz. If you think back to the editing and direction there (and liked it), you’re in for a treat. There’s all sorts of style and sound effects throughout that adds to the humor. Some technological imaging marvels as well. And a lot of badassness. Apparently Tarantino and Smith responded positively to a rough copy, and that’s never a bad thing either.

The cast felt fresh, even though some of them aren’t completely new to the big screen. Michael Cera is dynamite in the lead role, funny and droll as ever; he’s the kind of awkward that everyone feels like from time to time and we love him for it. Mary Elizabeth Winstead plays Pilgrim’s love interest but felt a bit lacking; I hope we see more from her in the future. Kieran Culkin steals the scenes as the gay roommate. Anna Kendrick pulls a 180 from her role beside Clooney in Up in the Air. It’s not a huge ensemble sort of movie, but it was nice to see people playing different roles even if they were bit parts.

My only nitpicking would be about pacing; some of the dialogue gets laughed over after some of the funny bits, but I suppose when the audience is laughing a lot that becomes difficult to fix. Not a big deal, you soon forget that you missed a line or two. My cheeks hurt from smiling and laughing so much. Who do I complain to about that?

The movie opens in theaters on August 13th. It takes one to know one, so I can say without question that the geek in you won’t be disappointed.

Tags: columbia, geekery, previews, screenings

The U.S. Postal Service hasn’t turned a profit since 2006. Since when does a government-run organization have to turn a profit? Do any of our government programs turn a profit?

The management blames the steady decline in pieces of mail that people are sticking in the mailbox. I don’t know about you, but I haven’t seen that. I get about the same amount of personal correspondence in the mail that I always have. Overall, I’ve seen a steady increase in the amount of junk mail.

I wonder if the Post Office increases the rates for bulk mail every time they jack the rates for First Class stamps. If they don’t, they should. Why should bulk mailers get such a good deal? They’re already getting a bulk rate, so just give them a slightly less good deal. Add a few cents to their rates and I’m sure the budget would swing back into the black in no time at all. Makes sense too, since the majority of what’s being delivered is the bulk mail to begin with.

Tags: junk mail, postage, rates, usps

For the last couple days, the cron job for updating my SpamAssassin rule set has been throwing an error:

Argument "1.39_01" isn't numeric in subroutine entry at /usr/bin/sa-update line 81.

It turns out this is a bug with the Archive::Tar module that was released a few days ago, not SpamAssassin or CentOS per se. The fix — as described on an AtomiCorp thread post July 14th — is obscenely easy.

*** Tar.pm.old	2010-07-18 13:20:51.000000000 +0000
--- Tar.pm	2010-07-18 13:20:31.000000000 +0000
***************
*** 19,20 ****
--- 19,21 ----
  $VERSION                = "1.39_01";
+ $VERSION				= eval $VERSION;
  $CHOWN                  = 1;

Oddly enough, this behavior was observed back in 2006 on the SpamAssassin tracker but dismissed as “works for me.” It since has been filed with the CentOS tracker and on the upstream Red Hat tracker.

Before the advent of search engines, I have no idea how troubleshooting was done in a timely manner. Sure, we would have dug up a solution somewhere eventually but why wait when someone else has already put in the legwork?

Sometimes it’s about pride. The knowledge that you saw it through and figured it out. But for a lot of dinky little issues, you just want it fixed.

Tags: atomicorp, bugs, centos, forums, linux, perl, spamassassin