Monthly Archives: February 2011

Living Last Mile

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I apologize for any cursing I do, this is an issue I fight with daily, and it’s a ridiculous one.

I live in semi-rural WV, but I also live without adequate access to information, at a nominal rate. In order to get an internet connection, where I live it costs roughly $50 on top of a phone bill for 768kbps ADSL. There is also no means of getting television, besides paying for satellite service, which also doesn’t come with local channels f or some absurd reason. Ever since the Analog-to-Digital transition in June ’09, the reception which is known to be bad in mountainous areas, dropped completely off the map, because it became an all or nothing signal.

What you end up with is exorbitant costs for minimal service, even though people within a mile, have no such issues; cable is provided along the main road on the backside of the property, but it’s about 3/10th’s of a mile. Currently, the two bills are $80 for TV, for mid-range satellite service, that isn’t 2/3 Christian broadcast, receiver rental, and 2 broadcast station feeds, that should be locally provided, and $65 for Phone & Internet. It pisses me off to know that just because we live just outside, the service area of the cable companies, we are charged out the ass.

If our house was moved less than half a mile, we would have a more stable internet connection that is 10x as fast, basic enough tv with local stations, we really only need broadcast stations. For about half the price. This needs to be addressed, as well as anti-competitiveness in areas, companies trade off in areas and create virtual monopolies on local markets. I’m just frustrated at how close, and yet how far the access to information is, and I also know that I’m not the only one in the area that feels this way.

Our nation, has turned its back on those that live last mile, and the infrastructure required to provide its citizens decent access to information. We are solidly driving forward, in improvements, but those improvements are generally within the large metro areas, where they see maybe a 2x increase ever 3-4 years, while those living last mile slip further behind. I understand it’s not feasible for the companies to create the infrastructure, that they won’t see a return on any time soon, but there has to be a way to improve our nations information infrastructure(IPv6 should be included).

Super WiFi is probably the only decent technology for this area, considering everyone is stretched rather thin, the infrastructure costs would be lower, but that’s not a likely roll-out option for at least 4-5 years, if not a decade. That’s how slow progress is, when you’re living last mile. It’s infuriating to see improvements so close, and simultaneously know that it will be held right in front of your face, but out of your grasp.

25 Ideas To Live 25 Hours A Day

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1. Sleep is unproductive and a waste of time.

Every hour you spend sleeping is one fewer hour you get to truly spend living. One hour a day is more than 2 weeks of extra time, every year. Obviously, taking it too far isn’t healthy, but a 4-6 hour night adds 1-2 months to your conscious living every year.

“Sleep is unproductive and a waste of time.” ~ Louis Gray

2. Be Childish.

Never take yourself too seriously, life is too short. Enjoy every moment, and don’t block your own path. Spend your time with making memories and friends.

“If it seems a childish thing to do, do it in remembrance that you are a child.” ~ Frederick Buechner

3. Acknowledge the inevitability of death.

Sooner or later we will all die, fighting for survival is ultimately a losing battle. Stop fretting, and focus on every moment you have in the present.

“This is your life, and it’s ending one second at a time.” ~ Fight Club

4. Money is less valuable than time.

There is no way to gain more time in life, and the clock never ceases. Stop trading your time for more money than you need, if your time is more valuable.

“Time is money says the proverb, but turn it around and you get a precious truth. Money is time.” ~ George Gissing

5. Ignore the little things.

Do only the 20% most import things or those that you feel will have the biggest return. The time and energy you save, can be spent on the things you really want to do.

“20 percent of focused effort results in 80 percent out come of results!” ~ Vilfredo Pareto

6. Never be afraid to challenge the ideas.

There is no reason to let anything stop you, particularly yourself. Rules are roadblocks with 3 options: follow the rules, break the rules, find a way another way around the rule. Choose your own path in life, and never stop learning something new.

“The Way of Mastery is to break all the rules—but you have to know them perfectly before you can do this; otherwise you are not in a position to transcend them.” ~ Aleister Crowley

I’ve Lost My Value, Now I’m Taking It Back

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“Extreme hopes are born from extreme misery.” ~ Bertrand Russell

Somewhere along the way, I succumb to the narcissistic nature of man. My life has shifted into being about me, even though that is most definitely not what I wanted. When I first started focusing on Social Media as an outward motion, in August 2008, I set a goal, post at least one tweet a day. I later changed that goal, in October 2008, to pushing out a positive motivation, because it was what was necessary at the time, with the collapse of the financial sector. I also always tried  stepped out of my way to throw out a tip, or assistance when I had an answer.

I still try to help people with their questions or problems, but I’ve also  begun injecting my stories on top of their stories rather than listening. I’ve reversed my value proposition, I’m not listening anymore. I answer rhetorical questions. I project myself into stories. I fail at doing what I was good at. Listening.

I look at what I’m providing now, and it’s weak. I’ve become apathetic to just about everything. My passion towards life has been drained, to the point where I have to get that quick hit of social media bliss, a simple rise, a reaction at any cost. I need to change, something, anything, everything. I need to figure out what I want, from life. Life is short, too short, to live emptily.

“The fear of death is nothing compared to the fear of having not lived authentically or fully.” – Frances Moore Lappe

Starting tomorrow, I change back into Jimminy the Cricket, as much as I hate being called Jimminy Cricket. I will become the listener, again.  I will focus on my value added, and my value taken. I will skip the cheap laugh, reserving respect. I will be happy; it’s a hell of a lot easier getting through life when you’re happy, even when times are rough.

At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want.” ~ Lao Tzu

What Made Facebook Special

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Why did people join Facebook; what made it special?* This is a though I have so often, it’s become funny, but my answer has never been precise enough, “critical mass.”

Critical mass doesn’t tell you anything, except that they manage to get enough people to use it, and as more did, it became almost invaluable to the rest. The problem with such a simple, and ignorant response is that doesn’t really help to understand how they generated that critical response anyways. That’s the real question that needs to be answered.

We all know about FaceMash, and the exclusivity presented by the college email restrictions in the beginnings. I think through every phase of the company it has held momentum by voluntarily limiting growth, and strategically raising the level of suspense, and necessity via critical mass in various markets.

One quote paraphrased as I remember, “When we went to add Baylor, they wouldn’t allow us on campus, so we went to all of the surrounding schools, and added them to the network. In effect, we built the demand within Baylor by adding most of their friends from other schools to the network, and then expanded to Baylor.” [Editorial Remark: It was from The Facebook Effect. The paragraph was about the “surround strategy.” Also, I originally thought it was BYU, and not Baylor.

I find that brilliant, they built demand in the market, before releasing in the market. The same can be said of Mark’s original FaceMash, which provided him with enough notoriety and acknowledgment within Harvard to release Facebook, as well as providing access to a tool that helped to keep up with your friends.

The whole reason I brought this up is I started thinking about how my friend made me create a new account** when I got to WVU, ‘because everyone uses it.’ I find it interesting that it had created such a critical mass at that point in schools, and it seems to have managed to maintain critical mass among it’s markets this whole time, I find it simply amazing.

Notes:

* = More general “Why did/do people use/join/verb X Company?” I ask these type of questions all the time.

** = I had one for a week or two in HS, because I got tired of fighting the school admins with proxies to get to myspace, and couldn’t remember how to access it.

(Original written January 29th, 2011)(Last Edited March, 17th 2011)

A Tech Lover’s Luddian Emotions

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I have been conflicted for a long time with technology, and hype. Technology is wonderful in that it gives us productivity or efficiency, but what are do we trade for them? It isn’t always free, we still have to put in something, and maybe we don’t even see all the resources that are devoted to the process.

I have a tendency to feel Luddian about things, but it comes from knowledge not ignorance. Most things have merits, that, I can’t deny, but it also has somewhat hidden ramifications for it’s use. Cellphones. RSS. Search Engines. Social Networks. All have their positives, but simultaneously negatives.

We have reached a point of decentralization, so that we can do almost anything, anywhere; we’ve also managed to place a shackle upon ourselves, that is virtually always there, (or always virtually there.) We have created a world that we can’t walk away from, because it is so easy to connect and get drawn in. We can check the news, our portfolios, our relationships with family and friends, using the technology at our fingertips via text, photos, video, audio all on a device that can be kept in our pocket. At this point we have more knowledge that is more ubiquitous than at any other time, but with it we’ve become forgetful.

I’m stupid. I can’t give you a single friends phone number off the top of my head. My grammar and spelling is often atrocious, without spellcheck. I often have to check definitions because I only have half a clue of what a word might mean. I can find information, but it’s often not of the quality that is necessary, for what I want.

We gave up our freedom, of being unavailable for evenings, weekends, weeks, in order to always have access to the outside world, with cellphones. Then we gave up our freedom to not be bombarded by news, and information. How much of the news you see every day, has an immediate or profound effect on you? Noise is growing faster than the valuable pieces, and search is succumbing to it.

Last night, I spent 2 hours searching for an article I had read about the creation of Zork. Unfortunately, the article was mainly on the MDL language, with Zork  only as an example. Searching for it, Google gave me nothing but junk. Stumbleupon and Delicious  gave me nothing. I only lucked out in that I had shared the article with Friendfeed, and Friendfeed’s search was actually functional. It shouldn’t take that long to find what you’re looking for. That was 2 hours I could have spent actually doing something, by the end I was exhausted, and didn’t even really want to do what I had started the search for.

Everything comes with the sacrifice, but it seems that I’m having to sacrifice more and more to gather the value from all the systems that I use. I broke away from my cell phone last year, it was great for setting up the occasional meeting with friends, and in cases of emergency, but over all it was just a nuisance. I like to escape from constant distraction and information, because it’s what I deal with on a day to day basis. Somewhere I feel that we lost our way, but at the same time I’m damn amazed at what is possible now. I stand torn, in what I know, and my opinions on what I know.

This was written on January 21st, 2011.