A few months ago, an acquaintance passed away. We attended school together, but her and I may have spoke once over those 3 years. My only true interaction, one I don’t fully remember, was at a small Halloween party that a few of my friends threw in college. For some reason, her death has haunted me, it’s something I think about several times a week; I wish I knew why because without an real connection, only a closeness in age, it feels weird.

Obviously, she has had an impact, even on those like me. The ripples from her loss are greater than I would expect. While the full impact on my life might not have came from the events related to her; I can point to several things that have changed at least in part because of them.

One of the most notable things for me has been that I’ve felt broody. Some of it I know comes from my cousin’s pregnancy, but some of this I feel comes from facing mortality. Sitting there during the memorial service, watching snapshots of her childhood pass before me it touched me, and made me wish I was there. There not just as a form of nostalgia, but also as something I felt the need to be part of now. The happiness of childhood and innocence provides such intense joy to those around.

Another thing that’s changed, is that I have become more open to religion. Something about watching the community in and from the church during the service, changed something for me. While I am still not religious, my view has changed, and continues to change. I’ve always leaned more on an agnostic front personally, with a belief in some form of karmic justice. I know that from experience what I do always is almost always returned greater in the future. I cannot say that it is by fate, or by the hands of a deity, any more than I feel I can say it is by luck. More and more, I seek to find a shared faith, even though I don’t truly believe, and part of that is due to the warmth of the community I saw that day from our shared grief.

We will all have an impact and it cannot be measured or seen. Only once we have passed and settled will the scales truly show the difference we made. Change what you can, for you and those near, and even if the impact isn’t large or doesn’t occur swiftly; your impact will be felt. Do good.

Let us look at some of those numbers. I’ll start with a simple example for a 1Mb/s connection and assume that this contains both up/down streams.

1Mb/s connection = 1/8th of a MB/s ;

MB/30 day month = 60s*60m*(24h/8)*30d = 324000 MB/month = ~325GB/month.

That’s the invisible bound on a 1Mb/s connection for 30 days, you can’t achieve greater than ~325GB/month. Then you have to factor in decay caused by latency and dropped packets on the line and assume maybe 90% capacity is possible, which brings you further down to ~290GB, realistically.

Taking that information, I think I would start people off with a percentage based amount of their bandwidth. I’d start off with a provision of a 40% utilization(~130GB/month), and allow it to be increased/decreased. It’s entirely possible that this is too high of a utilization offering to start with; for example,  when you get to 5Mb/s lines that same 40% is ~650GB/month. On the other hand, some companies want to cap it at 250GB/month which is less than 20% utilization of a 5Mb/s connection. It is my belief that they need to scale their utilization cap with their speed offering; to me, it doesn’t make any sense, otherwise.

If I can do this math, I’m sure they can and have done it as well. They already know what they are theoretically being asked to provide at peak times, and also what they’re capable of handling. How hard would it be for them to optimize this, and increase their efficiency?

Maybe offer a 10% utilization at 1Mb/s(~32GB) as a baseline, for those like RMS who don’t use the web with the exception of email? Then they can automatically roll you into the next 10% for the month, if you go over that limit. You automatically get rolled up 5 or 10%, at some percentage of cost. Once you have the roll over and initial utilization provisions determined, you can go about extrapolating and targeting different areas of what you provide.

Lets assume that you start with a base fee of maybe $10 + taxes and then a rate for bandwidth/speed similar to this:

For a 1Mb/s  plan: 32GB(10%) @ $10, 64GB(20%) @ $12, 96GB(30%) @ $14, and 128GB(40%) @ $16.

For a 2Mb/s plan: 64GB(10%) @ $15, 128GB(20%) @ $18, 192GB(30%) @ $21, and 256GB(40%) @ $24.

For a 4Mb/s plan: 128GB(10%) @ $25, 256GB(20%) @ $30, 372GB(30%) @ $35, and 512GB(40%) @ $40.

You can extrapolate further.

Maybe my scaling is a little off, a little too linear, as I’m not really accounting too much for trying to limit peak loads. Also I’m starting each tier at roughly the cost of the tier below at 35% utilization. There are lots of inefficiency in my model, but that’s because I don’t have the actual data required to see if this is feasible. I think it is still better than their blind caps that they try to hide.

If you have any thoughts or suggestions on how this could be done, or if it’s feasible, leave a comment.

Can we please stop this.

Unfortunately, I noticed it on the new StackExchange homepage and decided to tweet my outrage. While I was there I decided to check Twitter. Sure enough, in their footer box they had the same damn affliction. While they do it mostly right, it still bothers me. Can we please get to grips with this.

Here are a few rules:

1. If it’s content that is meant to be read, and actually consumed, don’t use text-shadow. Period.
2. If it’s a headline/html5 logo, you might be able to use it, but 90% you shouldn’t. Think hard first.
3. If you don’t know why you need it. You probably don’t. Let it go, you won’t regret it in the least.

So let’s all play our part and clean it up. Stop using text-shadow in your stylesheets.

My experience with the site has been pretty crappy as far as responsiveness goes; I can’t put all of this on Google, as I do have a slower connection. I can like, er, +1 an item and it doesn’t take, I do it again, and then it takes and un-take simultaneously for example. Posting has horrendous lag particularly when trying to select circles, all 8 of them, in which to display. Notifications are so slow, they’re sometimes as far off as several hours at this point, which is the worst I’ve seen since launch and continues to degrade. If you’re browsing, occasionally comments don’t show up without a refresh of the page or opening a thread in another window. So as far as responsiveness of the site, I’d put them above Twitter, barely, but still way, WAY, behind Facebook or Friendfeed. They’ve made improvements, but even so it still seems to be degrading faster than they can keep it up, this without mention of the memory issues.

My personal social experience with the site has felt off. It is okay at a lot of things, but isn’t the best at any. Circles are in theory good, but in practice this doesn’t seem to be the case. I’m not going to share anything I want my close friends and family to see, because Facebook already does that and is more closed off; there is no need to try and pull all these people over and shove in a circle. It’s hard to find valuable content, without immense amounts of effort at some point in the loop. If I follow someone who occasionally shares something I find interesting, or shares a topic I want squared away to the side; the only recourse I have is to put them in a circle, otherwise I have to wade through the noise, and even circling them isn’t a perfect solution. Twitter is much better at handling noise, by having compressed context. I can parse a tweet a lot faster than the longer form content shared on Google+.

The service just feels like a waste of time, when there are alternatives that aren’t as much of a waste of time and more productive. The only exception I make is when I have specific need to share with a few specific people that do use Google+, and it would be quicker to contact them this way. I don’t have any good ideas on how to fix the social experience, but they can start with the responsiveness of the site.

As some of you know by now, I’m mostly* cut off without choice. This is something that doesn’t bother me much though as I had grown to be quite dispassionate about the current state of affairs, both legislatively – even if I’m not around SOPA is bullshit – and technologically. The realm has stagnated, changes are more often of the ‘OOH SHINY’ variety, than of anything that is something that can be productively leveraged.

In my mind, technology should be about enhancing productivity or boosting efficiency, as such saving life. However, all the big players have stabilized their market, and now they’re just pushing the tendrils further and further with mediocre improvements that increase lock-in. As they go further, they’re shifting their mass as well, and the shift is towards the cloud**. I get it, you want to restrict consumption sources and maximize its flow to your coffers; that’s fine, but be reasonable.

An anecdote, a few weeks ago my mom purchased a tablet for my younger sister and asked me to load some apps onto it for her. This was an excruciating experience and left me with an extremely bad taste in my mouth. The tablet wasn’t up to Google’s standards, so no Market app, that sucked. I figured I could add Amazon’s Appstore and that would be just as fine, and it worked pretty well, until I made a realization. About $20 in I realized that, all the apps were verified to my account and couldn’t be used if the Appstore app wasn’t installed and my user account logged-in. There is absolutely no way that’s going to happen, because I use 1-click, and I could find no option to disable purchases.

I went through the process of setting up another Amazon account, just for the device, and provided it a stipend via gift-code figuring that would be good enough and she could add what she wants herself; it’s not, you have to have a card linked to the account before any purchase could be made. There is no way to add apps using Amazon’s Appstore, that doesn’t require leaving your account there, no way I could find to gift apps, and no offering of a stipend system. This sucks, and is anything from simple. I don’t know if it’s similar with Google Market, or even iTunes, but it’s a really shitty experience.

Another anecdote is the necessity for me to have a physical phone. When I need a phone, often for texting, I will often use Google Voice, which is no longer linked to a physical device that I know of. Yet, I constant get berated by them to add 2-step verification, which I can’t use anyways. Or in my search of hosting, a phone number is required which I guess I can understand for contact purposes, but it doesn’t help me. I’m essentially locked out of paying for something I want, because I don’t have a phone. Fuck you, I want to give you money, and because of my personal decision not to have a phone, you won’t let me. You are an idiot, and this is a pretty shitty experience.

Technology fucking sucks, not really, but these systems sure do.

At the same time, I love it and spend most of my time programming for fun and to automate tasks in my life. It should be used to save time and make better decisions. Those instances are just two of several that make me loathe and wary of technology. In this, I’m held in a state of contradiction.

On to a topic I’ve touched on several times over the past 4-5 months, but couldn’t get out of fear of backlash. Now is probably the best time to get it out where I won’t be drawn into the thrall of an argument. Feel free to skip this next section, as it is a bit political in nature. Bottom of post.

Another area that I’m held in a state of contradiction is life, death, and healthcare. What I would love to see and what I believe is better for the present and future or the nation and the world are at odds. I side with what I feel is right, but it does make me hurt inside.

On the one side, I would love to see everyone become centenarians, cancer not exist, and no one need worry about how they pay for it. The other, I see death as necessary, and possibly already less prevalent than necessary, cancer and other illnesses as agents of this change. I’ve been called heartless by some on where I stand, maybe they’re right, but I doubt it.

“No man really wants to die.” We don’t want to die and we don’t want those we love to die, but it is an eventuality. It will happen, and there are two paths, die fighting (for quantity) or die living (embracing the moments you have). Most people equate quantity with the goal; age is the barometer on life after all.

I have spent years with dying people, they managed to get the time, but I don’t know that it was worth it. I’ve been around them all my life, between my mom’s patients, when I was younger, family friends, my great-grandmother, and currently one of my grandfathers. In most of these cases, death is strung out over years, and it’s painful to just about all involved. In only one case did I see it used as a way to actually live longer, out of about a dozen.

I watched two of my mom’s friends die of Hepatitis and the gradual organ failures that came with it, when I was younger, I didn’t know at the time, just that they were sick. They managed to make the most of what they could, and for the most part embraced the time they had, like few others; they where the exception.

I have also watched people like my grandfather lose everything, except for their life. At that point, it’s not a life, it’s a personalized hell and they get sucked in to it. My grandfather survived prostate cancer, but he lost his life to the treatments and now broods in his resentment of the doctors. It’s such a pitiful thing to watch, sure it’s nice he’s here, but I have more memories of the pain and anger than of the happiness and fun times.

This is why I chose to request a DNR order, and won’t seek further care in any terminal or potentially terminal case. This is my choice, and I shouldn’t be taxed for not fitting in with the model of what I and others want. In just about any need I would have for medical care, it will be cheaper for me to pay out of pocket on a need basis, throughout my life, because of that decision. I don’t need help covering it. This is why I still say that the Healthcare Act is unconstitutional in its request that I have to pay for something I do not need. Of course, I’m on the receiving side, being below the poverty line which isn’t something I oft admit. I still cannot agree with it.

I think that we’ve gotten the whole concept backwards. As it stands now, our system takes money from the young and sends it to make sure our older population has a secure and comfortable life. We should be securing our youth; they are the future after all. Take money from social security and Medicare, and invest it in programs that drive experience and knowledge into our youth and protect that investment. While I’d love to live forever, I think that if you want that that is your burden to bear, not the publics.

This means some people in my life today, wouldn’t be, and that makes me sad. I don’t know what I would do without them. What I’ve said was hard, but its how I feel. This is what the populace embrace, but I don’t know or think that it’s the right choice. In this, I’m held by the contradiction.

I don’t claim to know the solutions to either of these issues. I don’t have them. I don’t even know where I stand, often it’s somewhat murky. We all have our contradictions, I guess, and these are some of mine.

Notes:

* If or when I really want to end this exile, I can either purchase a new router or run several dozen feet of cable. It’s only been a few hours, but it feels nice. It’s been like an erratic weaning process over the past few weeks of network issues.

** I can point out rather easily that such a thing as ubiquitous computing via the network is a lie. If the device, or capability, isn’t available when you need it, then it is useless. At this point, and for the foreseeable future, availability isn’t a promised thing.

As our lives are shaped by the grind, polishing us, we might forget about our beginning. We might allow our life to define us, but that isn’t life defining us it is our environment. Life already defined us, we live. We cannot let the environment drag us into what it says we need; it doesn’t know because need is personal.

Our world says that we need to eat this, wear that, drive this, buy that, find love (as long as it is an accepted form), etc. To that I ask why? Why do we have to fall in line with what the world says is needed. The real needs were spelled out long before the world came up with their own set; why do we let ourselves forget them? We are driven by metrics and goals that don’t matter.

Life says we need air, we need to eat, we need to drink water, we need shelter, and we need to fuck at some point. These are the only necessities of the pure life we were born into, all of us free and equal in those regards. Life makes no promises, it has no need, it has already given us a blessing and now it is our turn.

Yet, many of us forget the simplicity of life, believing the world to be honest. In forgetting, we forgot ourselves, who we really are. This is not our fault, it is our nature, born of pure innocence we know not of evil or temptation. The world takes advantage, crafting us, driving us through the sieves, trying to make us fit. Wanting us to fit, for a multitude of reasons befitting the different elements we interact with.

Life requires nothing from us, except for us to follow our needs. The world has changes that as it bounds toward ever more complex systems defining what our needs should be and how we are to meet these needs. We believe the world, chasing after what it says, like a dog bounding after a rabbit on a rail, as the world watches on in much amusement at our gullibility. How is it that we give our freedom up so easily?

How? The world presents us with solutions that it says will make us happy. It bombards us with images and stories, constant advertisements for a happy life. It projects forth ideas about what we should do, what we should buy, where and how we should live, yet it does this without the personal understanding necessary. It does not care about you or I, it created the jobs, it created the wants, and it created the money that will drive both. The world continues the grinding, rolling you over.

As we progress, many lose their edges, ground down so smoothly only to find another edge if they are forced to crack. Most of these will not find their way back, never becoming free again, withering away with time until the end. Some will find and hone their edges, fighting against the world to live life; this path is hard, life makes no promise that it will pay off. You can choose your path, follow the world, living marginally happy, or take a chance with the edge and risk never being complete.

Some will fight life, or death as it is better known at that point. Life and death are one and the same, but from different perspectives. In life we slip from the darkness through to the light, then watch as the light dims. In death, looking backward, we slip from the light into the darkness and watch as the world brightens, this is nostalgia. On both paths, there are blips, or maybe extended periods of both light and dark, representing the tumultuous affairs the world presented. In the end we can only hope to go out as bare as when we had entered.

The fact of the matter, in my experience, and my observation is unless you do something on the product side, good or bad, or have some clout you aren’t going to get news. There is a factor of your scale as well, as some sources tend to focus on the larger stable companies and products, which is partly due to the advantage of inertia and size. I’m going to mostly ignore that though and point out product problems I’ve encountered.

I know that there are products that can get by successfully only doing data processing, primarily when offered as a business service. Unfortunately, it’s common to see stagnation or failure in the consumer area because it has pretty low barriers to entry, and often times lower consumer value. I’ve got no problems if this is how you want to start and test a market. As you grow you’ll need to either be so awesome the user wants to keep using it or have another reason for the user to interact with the site.

If you only handle data from one service, that’s great, but why aren’t you handling data from more? Only Twitter or Facebook, why don’t you add the other one to your sources, even better try and get in and add Google +, while it’s still early and/or hot. You are self-limiting and become susceptible to your source’s actions. Free yourself from the dependence, through wider integration plans. Even better, add your own system that can be used without the external dependence, giving yourself more control on the data you want, a protection from external forces, and a possible pivot point.This doesn’t mean you need your system to be the primary, but having it is a good thing.

I’ve had several minor rows with people over this in the past. Often times they aren’t in a position to change it. Once, I was in the only actual position to change it, but it wasn’t what was planned or wanted; I should have done it, anyways. You’ve got to just do it.

Another issue, I’ve had was trying to push a dev issue, that was a roadblock to the companies API. Yes, they offered a public API, but as a consumer data-processing, they neglected some key functionality required for 3rd-parties to offer clients, while also being completely absent from a huge market. I had jumped in to try and help build a client not realizing the issue when I started. Once I found it though, after a few weeks work, I sent several emails and had a discussion with a non-technical person to try and get the issue fixed. I received no replies, aside from the non-technical person, even when I stepped out of the support chain and contacted a developer explicitly. I gave up after a few weeks of trying to get a response. I still support this company’s mission, and wish them all the best.

A big one that killed my big project I was working on at the beginning of the year was that the team had no focus. We were all on different pages, and sometimes there was a delay in one area, or someone pushing hard in areas that wasn’t necessary at the time. Getting off the rails and trying to keep going further is a recipe for disaster. If you fall off of a clear path, collect yourselves, lock-in what needs done, and focus on your goal. Also, don’t let what you’re doing be driven by press reasons, that’s the wrong place to focus and will have you running everywhere.

While I wish I could say that I haven’t and won’t again make any of these mistakes, I can’t. I will absolutely try, and they are things I don’t want to forget because they cost me a lot of time, energy, and passion. When it comes down to it you’ve just got to focus on the product.

• Problem #1: You’re just a data-processing company.
• Problem #2: Developers aren’t involved in technical support.
• Problem #3: Your team doesn’t have the same goals or reasons.

Erosion, by wind and water, is biased in that it takes the most direct path with the least resistance. The wind and water are of coursed biased by their own factors such as temperature, gravity, or  physical displacement. Solution caverns are formed after long periods of graceful wearing by biased paths of water dripping through the stratified layers of earth and wearing limestone or another composite down. Men are similar in that we make our paths through life using biases to survive.

Our biases help us to form groups, of positive and negative responses, based on prior knowledge or instinct(biases shared from previous generations), and particularly opinion. Biases based on opinion — family, friends, religion, race, color, creed, nationality, wealth, just about way to slice society and ideals into disparate groups — create stratification within our modern societies. We take in what we see, what we hear, what we feel and our biases respond with negative or positive reaction. These reactions aren’t always rational, because they have been passed through a filter before being truly inspected.

How can we limit our biases? How do you limit the effects of stratification, being in or out of group, above or below a threshold?

I don’t think we ever can completely destroy bias, a factor being emotion, but can we limit it; I believe so. Social networks are often based around a user’s identity and relationships, and also the sharing of the user’s ideas and emotions. Each is a form of bias, but what if we can remove everything that is unnecessary, the relationships and identities. You end up with a muddled stream of anonymous content, you strip away the biases you have positive and negative that aren’t relevant to the actual content. We hear how bad anonymity is, but just because you hide the identity doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have to exist.

John Gabriel's Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory

Why does anonymity have to devolve? What if you can have your anonymity along with identity, and the responsibility (most) people have when it is our identity attached. Can you impart the freedom of stratified bias, while simultaneously allowing the community to hold itself to a standard without abuse. To be honest I don’t know, but both on their own are simple, the first being the standard identity based model, the other being more akin to 4chan’s open anonymity. Maybe it should be as simple as an interface switch, that can show identity, if it is wanted, but otherwise hides it by default. Relationships shouldn’t have to be destroyed in order to have the anonymity exist.

Anonymity like the biases can’t and won’t be perfect, but there have to be some ways to limit and control them. This post was partly spawned by thinking about group stratification and realizing I had partially solved it with little app I made for myself a while back that removed all external points of identity, incidentally. It my content streams from Friendfeed, and was amazed at some of the reactions I had to things I had liked that I normally would have scoffed at.

“I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ And whenever the answer has been ‘No’ for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.” ~ Steve Jobs

This question impacted me quite seriously, when I was in college. The whole commencement speech helped changed my path; I’ll not say whether negative or positive, as the choices made were by me. Steve changed me, he sent me off on a mission to create the change I wanted to see and to always, “Stay hungry. Stay Foolish.”

He helped change the world from the very early days. He helped introduce the PC to the mainstream. Even after being forced out of Apple, he helped  push change with NeXT and Pixar. He was humble enough to allow a competitor to help him recover the company he founded, and recover he did. He made digital music available in a cheap and legal manner, as well as providing an integrated portable device to store them. The defining legacy is that he continually pushed further on with what worked and promoting changes to forge new paths to take them. Our world as it is now is indebted to the leadership he has shown.

My condolences to his family  and friends.

I say this as someone who has never owned an Apple product, and aside from iPod’s and a very short tech call, I’ve never touched an Apple product. My view of Steve comes from watching him lead for the past few years, when he was able, and looking back on those moments in the past where he had shown the qualities of a true leader. I truly thank him for that commencement speech.

“Death is the destination we all share, no one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be because death is very likely the single best invention of life.” ~ Steve Jobs

Over the past few years, I’ve used social media as almost a full replacement for real social interaction. It started out nicely enough and I’ve definitely interacted with plenty of people that have changed me. Some positively, few negatively, and the rest have been there. Unfortunately, with time what I, and others, want or need has changed, not unexpectedly; operating as if nothing has changed leaves me feeling somewhat empty.

July and August of 2008 was when I started actually using social media for purposes outside of just keeping up with friends on Myspace and Facebook. I ended up on Pownce, Twitter, Friendfeed, Ustream, Seesmic and others in rapid succession. That was also when I began taking blogging a bit more serious, in retrospect a very bad thing.  I decided sometime around then that I had to interact and add value on Twitter every day, no matter how small.  I kept it up for a few months pushing a motivational quote or video in the morning to try and lighten the increasingly gloomy situation.

Come March and April of 2009, Friendfeed rolled out their real-time site and I became instantly enthralled in the interaction on the service. It was so far superior to anything at the time, and still to most today, that I gradually stopped devoting time to the other sites. In between April and August of 2009, I interacted and got to know many people on Friendfeed, one in particular was Holden Page who people used to confuse with me and likewise me with him.

August 10th, 2009: The day that Friendfeed was lost; Facebook purchased Friendfeed and in the next few weeks, a large portion of the English-speaking community leaves. This push left only the most diehard lovers of the site and community there, but with the knowledge that it’s not going to get better and there is a chance the plug will get pulled. Every time something new has come along the question has been, “Will, or can, this replace Friendfeed.” The answer never an absolute yes, and nothing came by that could truly match the service with it’s community for nearly two years.

July 2011, the weary ship set adrift just a few years, yet a lifetime, ago finally scrapes against something that can truly match it, Google+. When Google+ launched it immediately became a haven for the reFFugees, and has thus sucked most of the remaining members of the community away. My community there is now gone; it’s not where I want to be any longer, as shown by my interaction recently. I guess I could try to embrace Google+, but it is not the site or community I want.

So for now, I’m checking out on actively utilizing social sites. Will I come back? I don’t really know. I’ve had fun over the years, but it’s mostly been for naught or worse. With the time I’ve recently had, I’ve had time to think about a lot of things that matter and those that don’t. I want to spend more time creating value that is going to last and less on the frivolous affairs.

P.S. for Friendfeeders: Right now, I don’t think I’ll be going Full-Cristo, but it could be a possibility in the future.

P.P.S. to Louis Gray: I know it’s probably your job, but please don’t encourage people to +James Fuller on Google+.