Openpolitics: blog

Death Therapy

2013-04-29T20:51:43Z

When I hear that someone has been given multiple life sentences as punishment for a crime, I ask myself what the difference is between one life sentence and five life sentences. I understand there is symbolism in the additional sentences; and in some cases people with a "life sentence" may be released early. Regardless, would there be a way for multiple life sentences to actually be carried out? Perhaps the sentence could mandate killing the criminal and then resuscitating them again, only to kill them again and then resuscitate them. The process could be repeated enough times that a criminal could serve 5 life sentences in the course of a month. (No, I'm not a lawyer, I just think like one sometimes.)

A new book by a doctor who specializes in resuscitation suggests that there is a common experience of dying that is consistent across cultures. To be considered "dead", one's heart has to stop beating. This stops brain activity, but it does not mean the the brain cells have died. In fact, it is possible for a body to be chilled, and the person to be resuscitated several hours later.

Upon regaining consciousness, many patients have no memory; but others report seeing a bright light and feeling a very loving presence. They recall having their life reviewed with them and feeling pain as they recall times when they caused others pain. Some patients even report being inspired to try to do better with their new lives.

So perhaps instead of giving our prisoners a lethal injection, we could give them "death thearapy".

I also can imagine many wealthy people would pay for such an experience, assuming that the resuscitation is perfected, so that the risk of staying dead is minimal.

The Temptation of Jesus, Mercedes edition

2013-04-29T20:54:48Z

Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the Desert to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell the stones to become bread.”

Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.”

Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. ”If you are the Son of God, he said. “throw yourself down. For it is written:

“He will comand his angles concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”

Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

Then the devil showed him the new Mercedes CLA, and all the fame and glamour that it would bring, saying, “Sign your soul over to me and all this is yours.”

As Jesus was carefully considering the devil’s offer, he saw the CLA’s price of only $29,900 and said, “Thanks, I think I got this.”

2013 Resolution: Increase my Reading Quality

2013-01-01T10:55:27Z

This is the time of the year when sites around the web compile "best of" lists, as a way of reflecting on the past year. It's one of the few times we reflect on which of the many messages we've been drowning in will have lasting significance -- what messages are more than just noise.

In 2010, Robin Sloan wrote an article that provides a useful vocabulary for thinking about creating and consuming content in a world with 24/7 news, endless facebook updates, and twitter.

Robin introduces the terms "stock" and "flow":

There are two kinds of quantities in the world. Stock is a static value: money in the bank, or trees in the forest. Flow is a rate of change: fifteen dollars an hour, or three thousand toothpicks a day..

I actually think stock and flow is the master metaphor for media today. Here’s what I mean:

Flow is the feed. It’s the posts and the tweets. It’s the stream of daily and sub-daily updates that remind people that you exist.

Stock is the durable stuff. It’s the content you produce that’s as interesting in two months (or two years) as it is today. It’s what people discover via search. It’s what spreads slowly but surely, building fans over time.

I feel like flow is ascendant these days, for obvious reasons—but we neglect stock at our own peril. I mean that both in terms of the health of an audience and, like, the health of a soul. Flow is a treadmill, and you can’t spend all of your time running on the treadmill. Well, you can. But then one day you’ll get off and look around and go: Oh man. I’ve got nothing here.

So what are the ways that I can increase my ratio of stock to flow?

Zucherburg's Law

Mark Zuckerberg, of Facebook believes that every year people will share twice as much information as they did the previous year, so they've developed tools to help their users cope.

You can choose to subscribe only to what is most important and you can filter out messages from people you know less well. It would be nice if there were a service I could subscribe to which could dial back the level of flow and receive a greater quantity of stock on the web. Monthly magazines are supposed to serve this function. Or I can just go to the library and find some classic books.

So for 2013, my resolution is to increase the quality of what I read -- more stock and less flow.

Financial Reform Videos

2013-01-01T10:22:51Z

I've been reading a lot about financial reform. Here are a few videos on the subject:

1) Inside Job

Katie Couric interviews Charles Fergueson, creator of "Inside Job"

INET: The Corruption in Academic Economics

Charlie Rose Interviews Charles Ferguson

2) The Warning: PBS Frontline Documentary

Long before the meltdown, one woman tried to warn about a threat to the financial system

Watch The Warning on PBS. See more from FRONTLINE.

How would Frank Luntz frame Warren Buffett's Tax Debate?

2011-08-20T16:15:25Z

The Secretary-Billionaire Tax Equality Principle

title="Warren Buffett Op-ed in the NYTimes: Stop Coddling the Super Rich">Warren Buffett wrote an op-ed recently that suggested that the top 0.3% of yearly earners were paying too little in taxes.
One of his favorite illustrations of this point is that his secretary pays a much higher tax rate that he does.

title="Link to Video: Charlie Rose Interview: 'Stop Coddling the Super-Rich' (sorry they don't support embedding)">

His prescription is:

undefined cuts to entitlement programs

higher taxes on the top 0.3%

The Power of Framing

The idea that a secretary should not pay a higher tax rate than their billionaire boss
is hard to argue with and shows the power of "framing".

Here's an other tax framing idea:

It is often said that we don't want to push the burden of current spending onto future generations.

href="http://www.nationalreview.com/agenda/274253/garett-jones-critique-republican-short-termism-reihan-salam" title="National Review: ">
Reihan Salam: During the Bush years, it was often said that the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts
represented redistribution from future taxpayers to current taxpayers.

You might reframe this as:

Those older Americans, who can afford it, should not get a better deal their grandchildren's generation

But how would Frank Luntz say it?

The Colbert Report
Get More:
Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,
Video Archive

John Stewart on Warren Buffett's Class Warfare:
- Part 1: This is Class Warfare
- title="The government could raise $700 billion by either taking half of everything the bottom 50% owns or by raising the marginal tax rate on the top two percent"
  >Part 2: The Poor's Free Ride Is Over

Bill Bradley:
The big money is in popular tax deductions, built into the tax code

David Merkel: Warren Buffett is hypocritical on taxes

Felix Salmon: The dual-taxation meme and
Designing a national consumption tax

Bill Gross: Big cuts almost guarantee a recession (end of video)

Multi-resolution blog template

2010-03-03T17:27:46Z

In late 2006, A List Apart had an article about "Adaptive Layout",
which they described as an improvement over liquid CSS layouts because it is optimized for multiple
screen resolutions and adjusts automatically.

I was intrigued, so I decided to experiment with an adaptive blog template that automatically
adjusts itself to different screen resolutions, from an iPhone to a 1920x1200 monitor.

The result isn't very "polished", but I finally got around to posting my own
"adaptive blog layout", which uses javascript to tell the browser to use a different body css class, depending upon the reader's screen resolution.

Future Improvements

The template could be improved by paying better attention to the most common
browser resolutions and developing grid-based versions tailored to specific
resolutions. I did the opposite -- I started with the content and defined CSS
rules to fit my text and images.

iPhone tester

Full Resolution Screenshots: Graduation from 1920px -> iphone (1900x6000 3MB)

License: Creative Commons

Download template source: github | zip

Better metric: Gallons per 10K Miles

2009-06-03T05:24:27Z

Last year the New York times had a short article proposing that instead of thinking
about fuel economy in "miles per gallon", we should think about
"gallons
per mile".

The reasoning behind this poposals is that stating fuel economy in MPG
"leads consumers to significantly underestimate the gains in fuel efficiency
that can be achieved by trading in very low m.p.g. vehicles — even for
one that gets only a few more miles per gallon."

Larrick emphasizes that his long-term goal is to get everyone into the most fuel-efficient vehicles that exist. But right now, he says, “as a national-policy question, the urgency is getting people out of the 14-m.p.g. vehicles.” And m.p.g. ratings aren’t the most useful prod, largely because the real significance of differences in m.p.g. is often counterintuitive. The jump from 10 to 20 m.p.g., for example, saves more gas than the one from 20 to 40 m.p.g. The move from 10 to 11 m.p.g. can save nearly as much as the leap from 33 to 50 m.p.g.

title="2009 Cadillac Escalade">

People often scoff at the idea of hybrid trucks or SUVs like the Cadillac Escalade that only
improve MGP from 14 to 20. But if you do the math, over 10,000 miles, this decreases
the number of gallons used from 714 gallons to 500 gallons. This is a savings of
214 gallons,
By comparison improving a Toyota Prius's mileage from 46MPG to 70MG only saves
75 gallons over 10,000 miles.

Here is the comparison of "miles per gallon" (MPG) and "gallons per 10,000 miles" (GP10K):

Vehicle	MPG	GP10K
Cadillac Escallade AWD	14	714
Cadillac Escallade Hybrid	20	500
Toyota Prius	46	217
Hypothetical Hybrid	70	143

To illustrate the point further, I put together a spreadsheet
using actual fuel economy figures for some current models, along with some extreme cases.

Optimistic Assets: The Banking Crisis is Over

2009-04-25T18:25:16Z

Time: The Banking Crisis is Over

On the same day that I read an title="Fed Minutes Show Worry as Credit Seized Up">
article reporting that the Federal Reserve minutes from the March 17-18 meeting
showed that members expressed such great concern that the Fed decided to pump 1 trillion
more dollars into the system,
I also heard news reporting that things are looking a lot better, with some even preparing to
title="Time: More Quickly Than It Began, The Banking Crisis Is Over">declare victory.

I would think the memory of Iraq should be recent enough that we wouldn't
immediately accept statements saying that we have turned the corner on the financial system,
especially without strong evidence that the fundamentals of the crisis have
changed.

type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always"
allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344">

Profits from Easy Money (excluding losses)

One statistic that people use to support the optimistic view is
title="Wells Fargo shocks market with record profit">
Wells Fargo's projected $3 billion quarterly earnings, but these figures may
include temporary profits caused by title="Robert Reich: Solving the Crisis with More Cheap Money">refinancing, and exclude some losses.
To convince me further, I would title="Wall Street Journal: Why a $3 Billion Profit Doesn’t Solve Much">
want to know why Wells Fargo's charge-offs on bad loans and loss provisions were below expectations.
I would also want to know that the Option ARM portfolio it acquired from Wachovia isn't
about to hemorrhage losses. Housingwire says the decision to take
title="A Game of Credit Cost Smoke and Mirrors at Wells Fargo?">fewer charge-offs accounts
for a significant portion of these "profits".

Simon Johnson says that we shouldn't just be looking at the stock market. While
the stock market may be rising, the debt market is indicating a

higher probability of defaults.

Defending the Private-Public "Partnership"

I have yet to hear a persuasive response to criticism that
title="Geithner Plan: Not True Price Discovery: Example">
the "Public/Private Partnership" can easily be manipulated
in a way that allows banks to inflate the prices of assets
and offload a significant portion of losses on taxpayers. When banks and related parties
can participate in the purchase of these assets, the process is ripe for abuse.
There are several
title="Stiglitz: Obama's Ersatz Capitalism">examples
of title="Geithner's Plan: Loopholes Galore">how this could be accomplished circulating presently.
Also note that the flaws in the bailout process would likely to be a
positive for bank stocks. Newsweek says that title="Newsweek: [Citigroup is] cleverly gaming the government's new Public-Private Investment
Program to their own advantage">Citigroup is buying up
more toxic assets in anticipation that they will be able to game the system.

Optimistic Assets

These critiques suggest that the loses the banks have are not likely to be recognized, meaning the
banks will likely refuse to sell unless they receive an offer
that comes close to the value they hold on their books.
Indeed, though Bank of New York Mellon may be in a different class than some of its peers
(I don't know), Robert Siegal's interview
with bank CEO Robert Kelly produced a good soundbite for what will likely be some of
his fellow banker's positions:

Robert Siegal: What are we going to call toxic assets which
banks decide are so good that they want to hang onto?

Bob Kelly: Perhaps optimistic assets (7:20 min)

And to throw in another possibility: subsidized and gamed assets.

2 Views on the Crisis

Ultimately there are two views of the crisis:

A Liquidity Problem: Individuals and institutions may be short on cash,
but they're "Good for it". Their assets are worth more than their liabilities, and we
just need to "unthaw" the credit system.

A Solvency Problem: Individuals and institutions have too much debt and will be
unable to pay their debts without implicit guarantees from the government and other forms of assistance
(or to use a less generous term, more "bailouts").
Future economic growth we be reduced because these
"zombie" banks will have to be recapitalized; and
consumption won't be able to quickly recover to past levels, reducing future corporate earnings.

If this is a crisis of the first type, positive cash flow should indicate that the crisis is
abating. If it is the latter type of crisis, we won't know where we stand until we
can get a better sense of what those "optimistic assets" are worth.

Unfortunately, I don't see how we will know the value of the assets, even after they have been
"priced" by the "market" because of the presence of subsidies, gaming, and the unknown future
performance of those assets. Merely having a "price" does not solve the problem unless the
price is credible or unless the goal is simply to move the "assets" from the private
balance sheets to the the taxpayers.

Not Considered Insolvent

One final note: on re-reading the original Time Magazine
"The Banking Crisis is Over"
piece I was struck by this sentence:

"There is enough evidence
in comments from the CEOs of Citi and B of A and in the Wells Fargo earnings
to show that the idea that banks are insolvent and probably in need of
nationalization is no longer part of the consideration of how the problems with
the system will be settled."

Really? Is that sufficient evidence? Wells Fargo may have a real quarterly profit, and various
CEOs may be saying positive things, but how does that show that the entire banking industry is solvent?
Solvency is independent of quarterly profits,
especially given the circumstances under which these "profits" are projected.

It sounded to me as though the author is saying that the banks are obviously solvent,
but if you read more closely,
you will see that he is actually saying something more subtle: that the possibility the
banks are not solvent is not being considered as an option.

The Financial Iceberg

Credit: Rita Willaert Creative Commons Noncommercial License

I'm more inclined to believe that the full extent of the financial crisis
is like a iceberg, still lurking under water. The size of the iceberg is finite
and we may even be able to say that it won't grow larger (I don't know),
but how will we know when we understand the full size of the problem?

I've traded emails with the author of the Time piece, and he seems to think that I
am missing the point of his piece: the crisis is
behind us and, although the remaining piece is large, the rest is a
multi-year $1 trillion plus "reclamation" job. I hope so, but I would be surprised.

Updates

Old News Remembered: CEO of Major Icelandic Bank Disputes Dire Forecasts

Simon Johnson: The Next Bank Run

Bloomberg: Insider Selling Jumps to Highest Level Since 2007

Embedded Video goes Viral

2010-02-27T16:28:25Z

There are a lot more services that allow you to embed themselves on your own website.

Youtube

Dilbert

Comedy Central

Gravatar

My old dream of referenceable TV is becoming a reality.
Check out the latest Simpson video on Hulu:

type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowFullScreen="true"
width="512" height="296">

Here's the syntax to perform the embedding:

<object width="512" height="296">
   <param name="movie" value="http://www.hulu.com/embed/UXAfciFSseznQ7G5ec_pJQ/253/399"></param>
   <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param>
   <embed src="http://www.hulu.com/embed/UXAfciFSseznQ7G5ec_pJQ/253/399" 
   type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowFullScreen="true"  
   width="512" height="296">
   </embed>
</object>

The last two numbers in the movie value url represent the start and end time (253/399) in seconds.

The important part of this syntax is that it allows anyone to go back to the previous part of the clip to see
it in full context. It also allows the viewer to continue on to view the rest of the video. It becomes clearer
where the truth lies when someone argues about misquoting.

Now the next step in referenceable "television" is a way to combine a series of embedded clips together and retain the links back to the original.
That would allow anyone to create mashups similar to the ones produced by the Daily Show.

Top of the Dropdown

2010-02-27T17:23:28Z

Today I had an interesting online experience while checking out a slideshow service for work. On the signup
form was a dropdown box with an unusual "quick pick".

I'm used to seeing a US-centric world with the US as the top entry, even though, alphabetically,
it should be near the bottom. But "India" as #2? I had never seen that before!

I haven't researched the reason for this. Maybe the founders or employees are Indian. Maybe Indians have more need
for this type of service because outsourcing jobs require a slideshow presentation service. In any case, it was
one of those little signs to watch, like the end of cash advances.

Of course in a perfect world, the server would determine the visitor's likely country of origin and put that at the
top of the list. In the meantime, I'll continue watch the "top of the dropdown".

Credit Crisis: An End to Cash Advances?

2009-02-28T22:06:36Z

Since the fall, I've said that the credit crisis hasn't really hit average Americans. One indicator is the amount of credit extended through credit cards:

I still continue to get cash advance checks in the mail from my bank. These checks would be charged against my credit card, and the only reason why I would use them is that I have a bill that I can't pay, and that doesn't accept credit card. (In other words, I'm in financial trouble)

Now maybe the reason why my bank continues to give me 3 "blank checks" at the end of the month is because I have good credit. Maybe its one of those things you can have if you don't need it, but you can't have if you do.

In a related development, I read an interesting story about how American Express is calling some of their cardholders and
pushing them to submit an early payment.
AmEx is also paying some of their customers $300 to close their accounts.

I'm waiting for more stories of this kind. If the credit card companies have identified groups of customers who are overextended, it would really make sense to limit their losses and encourage these customers to transfer their balances elsewhere.

The 1% Doctrine: Evaluating Risk

2009-12-09T08:14:47Z

I've been struck by several recent and current
policy decisions that involve high risk and (perhaps) low probability.

Cheney and the Threat of Nuclear Terrorism

The first such policy to catch my attention was the statement attributed to
George Tenet and an un-named briefer in a briefing to then
Vice President Cheney in Ron Suskind's book:

If there's a 1% chance that Pakistani scientists are helping al-Qaeda build or develop a nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response. It's not about our analysis ... It's about our response. (Wikipedia)

This type of threat is described by Cheney as a "low probability, high impact event"

Pascal's Wager: the Chance of Heaven

At the time I saw it as a parallel to
Pascal's Wager, roughly stated:

Even if there is only a small chance of God's existence, one ought to act
as a believer, because the cost is finite and the reward is potentially infinite (heaven).

To paraphrase Cheney, this is an "uncertain but high impact wager."

Investing: Value at Risk

The next high stakes decision to strike me was the risk anlaysis of potential losses
caused by borrowing money (30-1) and betting that home values would not decline
nation-wide.

The technique to estimate the risk involved in these complex transactions is called
Value at risk. Value at
Risk (VaR) estimates the highest loss that is likely to occur in a given time frame.
Think of this as a:

100 year hurricane, or

500 year flood

The odds of these events happening in a given year are 1 in 100 and 1 in 500 respectively.

Value at risk is a way of calculating a similar loss to a financial asset. Two
common VaR metrics are 1% Var and 5% Var, the maximum likelihood that an asset will
loose value 1% and 5% of the time.

Thus, if I were selling you an asset with a one day 5% Var of $1 million, there is a 95 percent
chance that any asset loss will be less than $1 million dollars on any given day.
Restated, 1 day out of 20 will likely result in a loss of $1 million.

Value at risk was pioneered at JPMorgan, and then picked up by others. Eventually the
federal government required that firms calculate a VaR and submit it to regulators.
This resulted in the practice becoming widespread, and it started to be used for the opposite
purpose that it was designed. Rather than serving as an
aid to
human intuition, as Goldman Sachs did, VaR
became a crutch that obviated the need for human risk analysis and it produced
a number that led firms to a false feeling of confidence.

Nassim Taleb, one of the biggest critics of Value at risk argues that "unlikely events" happen
more often than our perception of probabilities, and when they do,
their magnitude is greater than the dollar value stated by
Value at risk.

Put another way, for a 1% VaR of $1 million dollars, one percent of the
time the least you stand to loose is $1 million dollars, with the potential
that it could be much worse--it could bankrupt your company and overflow into
the wider economy. Value at Risk does not really help you prepare for the 1%.

Climate Change

In the case of climate change, I have heard of no such VaR. I have heard about
some of the risks:

drought (including an end to commercial agriculture in California)

melting of the ice caps

disruption of biological systems

changing ocean currents

My assumption is that the risk is greater than 1%, 5%, or even 20%.

One "conservative" argument is that the cost of action is high and the likelihood
of success is unknown.
Until the likelihood is better known or there is a promising solution that is likely
to yield the cooperation of all other interested parties, no American action
should be taken.

What Guides Action?

In these four cases, we've seen widely divergent approaches to action, and it
may have something to do with the amount of sacrifice required and
the perception of the likely success.

Cheney: Dire Warning: the risk is higher than the cost.

Pascal: the reward is so high that is is worth it.

Wall Street: a 1% risk is unlikely and success is measured quarterly

Climate Change: "conservative" Americans don't act when the costs are high and success uncertain.

Tom Friedman: Going Cheney on Climate: the "precautionary principle"

Supply-Sided Environmentalism

2012-03-31T15:29:39Z

Tax Cuts: a Virtuous Cycle

One of the most appealing things about
supply-sided economics
is that its proponents describe a feedback loop that transforms
taxcuts, which are commonly thought of as "costing money",
into a source of new revenue (when measured through a larger economic base).

Energy Efficiency: a Virtuous Cycle

Though their isn't anything "supply"-based about some
environmentalist's proposals for increased energy efficiency, I see an interesting parallel.

Increased Energy efficiency is normally thought of as an increasing
cost to get a reduced benefit. Think of home insulation and improved
windows.

Improved windows and more insulation cost more money; and as the desired
energy savings increases, the cost increases, so as to be of diminishing
value.

Credit: Natural Capitalism

Like the supply siders, Amory Lovins looks for circumstances in
which evaluations of individual actions within the traditional model
don't hold true for their effect on the system as a whole.

If Lovins were building a home, he would measure the future savings
from the improved insulation and windows, but he would not stop there.
Instead, he would analyze the effect of those savings on other parts of the
system.

Would the improved insulation and windows allow him to buy a smaller furnace and
air conditioning unit? If so, he could take the savings from the air
conditioning unit and furnace and plow it back into even better windows and insulation.
Perhaps he would spend the money on more design, so that the south side of
the house would take better advantage of passive heating principles.
Lovins would continue to iterate through this process, continually looking
to pass on savings to other parts of the system.

Tunneling Through the Costs

Lovins describes his technique as "tunneling through the costs", where he takes
a graph for which cost-effectiveness has seemly been maximized, and demonstrates that
higher energy saving can be advanced by eliminating one of the system's
assumptions, such as reducing or eliminating the heating or cooling system.

The New York Times ran a story recently about
Passive Solar Houses in Germany in which the the need for a
furnace had been reduced or eliminated, freeing up money to be put
to alternate uses.

Time magazine recently ran a cover story titled
"
America's Untapped Energy Resource: Boosting Efficiency".

It seems that the concept of reducing costs by optimizing an entire system
would be attractive to many people; and unlike supply-sided economics, its effectiveness
should be testable on the small scale.

Note:

For those who have an unfavorable view of "supply-sided" economics, I'm not trying to disparage Amory Lovin's approach. The actual benefit of taxcuts can be debated. Rather, I think it would be interesting for those who like the idea of supply sided economics to consider the practicality of "Tunneling through" barriers to efficiency.

Is Oil A National Security Issue?

2008-07-16T23:00:25Z

In an interview with two former Secretaries of State, Charlie Rose asked the question "Is oil a national security issue?".

It is interesting that both said yes, and specifically the way that James Baker described how it has been recognized as official policy for at least 3 of the 4 presidents he served under.

Charlie Rose: "..Most people now consider it, with oil now at $140 a barrel, a national security issue. Do you?..

Warren Christoper: Oh, there is no doubt that our energy is a national security issue and will be for a long time ahead..

James Baker: "Energy has been a national security priority for a long time Charlie. I served in 4 administrations and I know for a fact that in 3 of those we had national security decision directives that said we would go to war in effect to protect our access to the energy reserves of the Middle East and and we in effect did that at one point.."

Charlie Raises the Question: 27:10

James Baker's Response: 27:57-28:47

Carter Doctrine

Bike Light Review: Dinotte 600L headlight and taillight

2008-07-19T14:00:26Z

One of the things I really like about the web is doing research and finding
products and companies that are doing a good job. Negative reviews "exposing"
bad stuff can help you avoid making a mistake, but the positive reviews
are the most helpful because they give you confidence that you've found a decent
option. It's with this spirit in mind that I share with you my experience with
the Dinottee 600L headlight and taillight.

I first was drawn to the Dinotte
line of lights by reviews of their taillight --
which was described as the brightest available.

EXTREMELY bright. There is no way a car won't see you.

This tail light is far and away the brightest, most
attention-getting example I have seen. The instructions even caution you
to mount it to prevent aiming it directly at the drivers behind you! After
years of wondering if the cars coming up behind me actually notice my tail
light, I now have confidence they do. What a great feeling!

This tail light is unbelieveably bright!

People have told me that at several hundred yards it still
looks "like a star or constellation"

You won't be disappointed with the brightness and there is no reason I can think
of why you would need a brighter taillight, although Dinotte does make
a ~600 lumen taillight.

The biggest downside to this light is cost, but I'm of the belief that if cyclists
want to be treated as vehicles, they should make an effort to be visible
at night. For a commuter, think of it as insurance. These lights will probably
come down in price over the next few years as LED technology improves. The
Dinnote package is one of the first lights that performs like a bike light
should.

The second potential downside is mounting options. I have a rack on the back of
my bike and my bag blocks the normal seapost mount that Dinotte includes in their
package.

I did a little bit of research and built myself a saddle mount for my light.
It's based on a Minoura
SBH-300 water bottle cage holder that mas been sawed off below
the first screw hole. A 1 inch thick PVC pipe (less than $.50) is screwed
into the top water bottle mounts, creating a very solid mounting platform.
This design will not work if your seat isn't very high above your bag.
(For a rack option, see further below)

The 600L headlight is also very bright. The first night I got it, I charged it up,
used it for 10-15 minutes as recommended, charged it again, used it for 1 hour,
and then charged it fully.

I was experimenting with the blink mode as I was riding and watching the speed
limit signs 200 meters ahead flash in the distance. My father happend to
be walking through town and thought he saw police flashers coming from
around the bend in the road. I now only use flash mode when it is dusk;
otherwise I think I'm beyond the point of visibility and becoming more of a
distraction.

The big advantance of the 600L over HID and halogen systems is the battery life --
3.5 hours on high and 7 hours on medium with the lithium ion batteries.
Bulb life is also a big advantage-- LED bulbs typically last thousands of hours
and are less vulnerable to breakage. Medium brightness is plenty bright for
typical road riding, but the battery time
is long enough that I'm able to use the high beam for my commute to work
(19 miles each way). One time after an extra long day, I forgot to charge
my batteries and I still made it through the second day (I used flash mode a lot
because it was slightly after dawn and just before dusk).

One of the questions I had when ordering the headlight was whether the beam
pattern would be wide enough to take a steap downhill S-turn
that is part of my route.
I considered the wide lens option, but their excellent support guy, Rob,
counseled against it for the road. I took that S-turn at 25 mph one night
during a new moon and I was impressed. I have no need for the wide lens,
although it is option for mountain bike riders.

Batteries: I chose the 4 cell lithium ion batteries. They are quite small, and
I'd go with the 4 cell option unless you're mounting the light and battery
both to your helmet, rather than the bike. (Helmet mounting is an option
I haven't tried). I debated
going with rechargable AA batteries, but I'm glad I chose
the lithium ion. The run time is much longer and you can run both lights
off of a single battery or use two
batteries. If you carry your connector cord and one of your batteries runs
out, you could run both lights off the second battery. One thing you might
also consider is buying a second charger -- that way you can run both lights on their
own battery and charge both overnight with their own charger. It only takes
4 hours to charge, but it's nice not to have to remember to switch batteries
later in the evening. You'll notice that the batteries mount to the
tob tube or seat tube with velcro straps. It's very convenient to
recharge them -- just detach
the cord from the light, unvelcro the battery from the tube and connect to the
charger. You'll notice the cord doesn't unplug from the light very easily,
but that's a good thing. My mom's earlier light tended to loose its connection
periodically as she rode.

I was so impressed with my lights that I got together with my brother and dad
to get my mom a new set. We had to devise an alternate rack mount for her
because she has a rack-mounted bag and her seat isn't as high as mine.
Fortunately we were able to mount another
trusty PCV pipe on the back of her Trek 520 rack. It's just a 4 or 5 inch long
piece of PVC pipe with a slit cut in it. My brother packed it full of rubber
strips from an old bike tire. We drilled holes in it and secured it to the
rack with an old shoe lace. It's not going to win any design awards, but with
the help of the animated knots website,
we were able to tie some sort of knot to keep it in place.

I'm the type of person who likes to open the box and start using my new purchase
right away. I had scanned the directions (available online before you buy),
but I hadn't fully read them. It took me about 3 minutes to realize that
my superficial reading was inadequate to correctly cycle between the
light modes and to turn the light on and off. I went back inside and read the
directions again. Ahah! To turn it on, click the left button twice!

When you first receive your light, you may find yourself seeking out the darkest
country roads and alleys in your town. The night after I recieved my mom's
light, I was running it through it's initial charging process,
when I thought I saw a black cat cross the road in front of me in the distance.
I'm not superstitious, so even though the "cat" was on the right hand shoulder,
I was about to continue on. But as I got closer, I realized that the "cat"
was actually a skunk!

With a lesser light, I might not have detected the
difference until it was too late. I slowed down dramatically, rode on
the other side of the road, and continued on my way. There's more than
cars and branches to look out for at night!

Alternatives: I don't know of anything comporable to the tail light. I have
a Cateye LT1000 that I'm thinking of mounting as a backup, but it doesn't
compare in brightness. For the headlight, the NightRider TriNewt is a
bright LED (500 lumens) that lasts a long time. If the Dinotte were
unavailable, I would consider it, but the Dinotte is brighter
(at least by spec: 600 lumens), the same price, and the lithium ion
batteries can be swapped or shared with the tail light. For a cheaper headlight,
I'd consider the 200 L. I haven't tried it, but its probably pretty bright as
well.

Photo Albumn: Dinotte light mounts

Dinotte Company Website

Dinotte 400L

This Headline Suggested by Google

2009-02-28T16:48:16Z

Earlier this month, after returning from a backpacking
vacation out
west, I
searched for the right words to describe my feelings. One week I was wading in
a glacial lake at 9,000 feet with snow capped peaks towering above me.
The next week I was back in my cubicle with phones ringing from 3 directions.

Photo: Daniel Miller

Previous generations of writers turned the dictionary and thesaris, but
my generation has "google
suggests".

Google suggests is the dropdown box that appears in my browser as I type search
terms. If I type "american", google suggests:

american idol

american airlines

american express

american eagle ..

If I type "post vacation", google suggests:

post vacation depression

post vacation blues

post vacation rentals

Well, "depression" may be a little strong, but "blues", yes.

Seriously, google suggests is not a replacement for the thesarus becaused it's
designed for search, not general use. But it could be. And it's interesting to
think about how technology that was originally designed for a specific purpose
could turn into something larger.

Take google adwords. Google adwords was originally designed to display taylored
ads in the right hand margin of search results. Mouse click-through rates are
logged and totaled, allowing better-performing ads to be displayed more often
and unclicked ads to be dropped from the rotation.

This sort of performance tracking is a revolution in the advertising business
and is probably making inroads in the newspaper business as well.

Online Newspaper editors can track what stories are most read. They can also
experiment with alternate headlines, if their software supports an adwords-type
click analysis.

Of the first 100 people to view a New York Times article, the first 50
could be given one headline. The other 50 people would see an alternate
headline. The system could track click-through rates and the winning
headline would then be show to a majority of subsequent visitors.

I wonder whether an online publication is already doing this sort of thing.
If they aren't, I suspect some newspaper will start in the near future.

It's been over a month and I'm over my "post vacation blues", but I'm still
intrigued by the idea of performance-tested writing. Does performance
testing (or rather popularity-testing) really improve the quality of newspaper headlines? The
collaborative news site Reddit would be a
good place to test the concept.

Reddit currently gives article submissions a single title field, yielding
submissions that range from self-help, to outrage, to overly verbose:

"7 Secrets of the Super Organized"

"Pit bull owner shoots man for trying to stop pit bull attack"
'"IMPEACH CHENEY IF YOU WANT, but do bear in mind that he'll
preside over his own impeachment trial"'

Actually its not so much just headlines, but the content too. Performance-tested
headlines drive traffic, which drives story selection. But direct democracy isn't
always a good thing. Think of it as an "invasive species" that destroys an
ecosystem if not properly balanced.

Newspaper editors and sites like Reddit will have to maintain standards or
develop moderating systems to prevent the sensational, but popular, from taking
over. Think of it as a "national park system" for writing

Quoting Google Video

2009-04-11T20:42:01Z

Charlie Rose is now available through Google Video!

You can always watch the latest show for free but archived shows cost $.99.

A while back, I showed how to quote Realvideo. I'd be interested in seeing a similar process for quoting Google Video

A quotable moment from last night's show with Alberto Gonzalez occured at 24:02.

Charlie Rose: Senators like Lahey and others including Republicans have said we did not, in voting for that force resolution, vote for any wireting; and it was specific that we did not; and by having a wiretapping provision in congressional legislation it was even more apparent.

Alberto Gonzalez: Well of course we are a nation of written laws not a nation of intentions of specific individuals in congress. Those of us who operate under the laws, members of the judiciary, we have to look at the written text what did congress say in the words that they used not what they think that they passed or what they think in their hearts they were passing.

Update

It looks like google uses javascript to call up specific portions. It would be nice to see a URL api.

Google China: A very different image

2006-02-06T16:59:21Z

As someone outside the Chinese firewall, I can compare the Chinese version of google, with the regular version. For some searches, the results can be quite dramatic:

Take for instance tiananmen vs tiananmen.

via the Floating Sun Weblog

Learning Standard: May Stall. May Roll Back.

2006-01-01T16:52:01Z

This Christmas my brother drove home in his new (used) car. Its has a standard transmission and he had never driven a standard on the road before he bought the car a week prior.

I think it was pretty brave of him to attempt the 9 hour drive from Ontario to Pennsylvania, or maybe just a sign of his youthful optimism. He did make a sign to alert following drivers. It said "Learning Standard: May Stall. May Roll Back."

We were so pleased to see him when he arrived.
He told us he had only stalled twice.

No Third-Party Explicit Links

2005-03-03T23:17:36Z

I'm normally the type of person who would favor add-on tools like
Google's Autolink. But then I remembered a site I read
several months ago that used Intellitxt. Google has a good reputation,
but I fear their software will be imitated by others and pretty soon we'll
have
a companies like Juno and Netzero adding Intellitxt-type
advertising to everything through a default browser plug-in.

Here's a sample of Intellitxt in use. Note
that the green advertising links appear
on my Windows PC [screenshot], but not my Mac. .

This got me thinking about where to draw the line.

I start by making a distinction between:

Explicit links - are visible links which encourage the reader to follow them

Implicit links - are potential, invisible links which are activated
by an action of the reader. (ie right clicking)

If Google Autolink is only providing a useful service,
it shouldn't mind being part of the right click menu instead
of part of the page. But if Google Autolink is really about advertising and
affiliate dollars, they will be tempted to go explicit.

I imagined a "link fight" back in November of 2000, but I
didn't anticipate that it would be initiated by a major vendor
like google.

In the future, I'd like to see new features like highlighting added (more later) to
the browser, but I think it's important to draw a line somewhere.

For me the line is: no third party explicit links.

NYTimes: Ads Embedded in Online News Raise Questions

A future post about adding "Highlighting" to the Browser

Openpolitics: blog

Death Therapy

The Temptation of Jesus, Mercedes edition

2013 Resolution: Increase my Reading Quality

Zucherburg's Law

Financial Reform Videos

1) Inside Job

2) The Warning: PBS Frontline Documentary

How would Frank Luntz frame Warren Buffett's Tax Debate?

The Secretary-Billionaire Tax Equality Principle

The Power of Framing

Related

Multi-resolution blog template

Future Improvements

Related

License: Creative Commons

Better metric: Gallons per 10K Miles

Sources

Related

Optimistic Assets: The Banking Crisis is Over

Time: The Banking Crisis is Over

Profits from Easy Money (excluding losses)

Defending the Private-Public "Partnership"

Optimistic Assets

2 Views on the Crisis

Not Considered Insolvent

The Financial Iceberg

Updates

Embedded Video goes Viral

Top of the Dropdown

Credit Crisis: An End to Cash Advances?

The 1% Doctrine: Evaluating Risk

Cheney and the Threat of Nuclear Terrorism

Pascal's Wager: the Chance of Heaven

Investing: Value at Risk

Climate Change

What Guides Action?

Related

Supply-Sided Environmentalism

Tax Cuts: a Virtuous Cycle

Energy Efficiency: a Virtuous Cycle

Tunneling Through the Costs

Note:

Is Oil A National Security Issue?

Bike Light Review: Dinotte 600L headlight and taillight

Related

This Headline Suggested by Google

Quoting Google Video

Update

Related

Google China: A very different image

Learning Standard: May Stall. May Roll Back.

No Third-Party Explicit Links

Related