TECHNOLOGY: Just use GMT!

Sunday, March 14, 2010

http://www.lewrockwell.com/pr/end-daylight-saving-time2.html

End Daylight Saving Time
by Sheila Danzig

*** begin quote ***

It has not escaped our notice that in the United States, Eastern standard time is the same as Central daylight time and Mountain standard time is the same as Pacific Daylight Time. Thus, we propose that The Pacific and Central time zones remain on permanent daylight saving time, and that the Mountain and Eastern time zones remain on permanent standard time.

*** and ***

This proposal will simplify scheduling, travel, and commerce. And by ending semi-annual clock tampering, it will also allow people to get more sleep, be better adjusted to their daily routine, avoid missed appointments resulting from failure to reset clocks, and, most importantly, save lives.

*** end quote ***

http://www.standardtime.com/

I don’t agree completely.

Let’s just go to GMT time. COmputers already do.

And, leave everyone free to sort out the details themselves.

With one standard time, people will sort it out.

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TECHNOLOGY: Can’t Yahoo at least id spam that claims to be from Yahoo?

Friday, March 12, 2010

*** begin quote ***

From: “Yahoo!” <jenny@networkci.net>
Date: March 12, 2010 1:53:42 AM EST
To: <jenny@networkci.net>
Subject: Verify Your Account Services!!!
Reply-To: mail.dataservicea2@yahoo.com



Yahoo! Customer Care Satisfaction Survey

                             Account Alert Yahoo!

Dear Valued Member,
Due to the congestion in all Yahoo users and removal of all unused Yahoo! Accounts, Yahoo would be shutting down all unused accounts, You will have to confirm your E-mail by filling out your Login Info below after clicking the reply botton, or your account will be suspended within 24 hours for security reasons.
UserName: ……………………………… Yahoo!
Password:………………………………….
Date Of Birth: …………………………………..
Country Or Territory:..……………………….
After Following the instructions in the sheet, your account will not be interrupted and will continue as normal. Thanks for your attention to this request. We apologize for any inconvinience.



Yahoo! Customer Care Yahoo!


*** end quote ***

This type of SPAM is exceptionally frustrating.

Yahoo should at least be able to catch it.

They even have a offering of “hidden addresses”. So you’d thing they could use that to ensure that their sers KNOW what’s really from them.

Come on, guys, this ain’t rocket science! Is it?

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JOBSEARCH: Hold on by your fingertips

Sunday, March 7, 2010

On Mar 3, 2010, at 11:35 PM, LUDDITE wrote:

*** begin quote ***

Interesting….a ‘slew’ of people got RIFed this past Monday. And do you think they picked me, no! They think I won’t hold out but I will fool them…work till I am 75! :-)

*** end quote ***

Ahh, it makes a “teacher” proud when the student exceeds the master. “Go For The Gold” ain’t just for the Olympics!

A vestige of the “gold watch” era, the companies make workers “disposable”.

Part of “jobsearch” is: (1) making sure you do NOT have to search for one in this terrible job climate for fat old white guys — like expense avoidance is much better than saving after-tax money; AND (2) if you are going to get nuked, you need as much money as possible to cushion the blow. No way anyone should ever “voluntarily” leave a job without very careful consideration.

Argh!

Remember: Success for everyone’s generation is:

(1) ruthless financial discipline — no bad debt;

(2) a life long interest in learning — education — a degree — they can’t take it away from you;

(3) a NON-OFFSHORABLE white collar job in order to save big bux;

(4) a blue collar skill for hard times — never saw a poor plumber;

(5) one or more internet based businesses — your store is always open;

(6) a free time hobby that generates income; and

(7) a large will-maintained network of people who can “help” you.

Can’t preach it enough!

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TECHNOLOGY: “referal failure” medical error

Saturday, March 6, 2010

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100226101330.htm

The Most Frequent Error in Medicine

*** begin quote ***

ScienceDaily (Feb. 26, 2010) — The most frequent error in medicine seems to occur nearly one out of three times a patient is referred to a specialist. A new study found that nearly a third of patients age 65 and older referred to a specialist are not scheduled for appointments and therefore do not receive the treatment their primary care doctor intended.

*** end quote ***

It would seem that technology could eliminate that “disconnect” problem. It’s the “committed database transaction” problem.

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SERVICE: “twitter sparks…” a customer service revolution!

Sunday, February 28, 2010

http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/28/cherchez-la-fame

NSFW: Cherchez la fame – or why the media’s obsession with Twitter campaigns will make customer service smell French

   * 5 Comments

   *

   *

   Share3

   * Buzz it

by Paul Carr on Feb 28, 2010

*** begin quote ***

Time was, companies knew how to keep track of their important customers.

*** and ***

Two years ago, none of this would have been news. A cult film maker was kicked off a flight? So? What was he going to do? Make a film called ‘Jay and Silent Bob hate Southwest airlines’? (Admittedly that would still have been better than Jersey Girl). An entrepreneur’s got quietly kicked out of a members’ club to make way for more profitable clients? Tough shit: that one’s not even newsworthy enough for the most desperate trade magazine. A little known designer gets ripped off by a gigantic retail chain? Boo hoo. Tell it to someone who cares. Without a major celebrity angle, there was little to no chance of the media picking up a run-of-the-mill intellectual property complaint and forcing the company into action.

*** and ***

Really there’s only one answer – and it’s one that strikes at the very heart of the established hierarchy of customer importance. Companies are going to have to start treating every single customer like a VIP. Actually, no, it’s worse than that – consider the Hidden Eloise example; she wasn’t a customer, but just a humble designer. Companies are going to have to start treating every single person in the world like a VIP.

*** end quote ***

Twitter will burn more and more organizations that are inconsiderate, fraudulent, or deceptive.

I love the strategy: form up your ‘David vs Goliath’ story and get people tweeting and retweeting about it.

Then, watch the “blood”!

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JOBSEARCH: We Don’t Need As Many College Grads

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

http://www.allthingsworkplace.com/

Are We Educating for the Right Jobs?
We Don’t Need As Many College Grads As People Think
Steve Roesler

*** begin quote ***

How Many College Graduates Does the U.S. Really Need?

*** end quote ***

I have lately questioned the ROI of an “expensive” college education.

I’m sure I’m not the first. Nor, the last.

By “expensive”, I think efficient and effective. Efficient, in that, it’s affordable. Effective, in that, it leads to a lifetime of satisfying and rewarding employment in the service of others.

REMEMBER my personal formulation of “Success For Your Generation”

Success for your generation is:

(1) ruthless financial discipline — no bad debt;

(2) a life long interest in learning — education — a degree — they can’t take it away from you;

(3) a NON-OFFSHORABLE white collar job in order to save big bux;

(4) a blue collar skill for hard times — never saw a poor plumber;

(5) one or more internet based businesses — your store is always open;

(6) a free time hobby that generates income; and

(7) a large will-maintained network of people who can “help” you.

I disagree SLIGHTLY with Steve on “We can and should question whether the current system is designed to effectively produce what, and who, is needed.” That’s a good MACRO question. But as participants in the job market, we can’t care about grand scale problems; we have to worry about the MICRO question. What’s good for me?

The country is beset with so many political problems caused by “fuzzy thinking”. A good college education might help create an “educated electorate”. Unfortunately the current education paradigm — schools completely under the control of secular progressives who think esteem is more important than wisdom — is unlikely to produce the hard-nosed pragmatic thinkers we need to work our way out of these problems. (My personal suggestion is to KICK the gooferment out of education completely. It’s only job is to prevent the residents from force. So private schools should be the rule; with the gooferment ensuring that there is no fraud.)

I think that my alma mater, Manhattan College, strikes a great balance. Remember it’s just the “well”; it’s the students who bring the energy and the “bucket”. When I was taking my engineering courses, I questioned the need for philosophy, theology, and literature courses. Upon reflection, maybe those were MORE important.

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RANT: Tiger’s apology; not looking too good

Saturday, February 20, 2010

He’s a private citizen, who is a media star. The billions of bucks he makes off the rubes was at risk by his bad behavior. His image needed to be re-shined. I suspect that what this is all about.

BUT! But, I could care less.

Rosie O’Donnell has made me skeptical of media icon, who have a persona, that hides their true spirit.

So, this may be sincere; time will tell.

Already I’m suspicious. “No domestic violence.” Well, who broke the windshield with the golf club?

As some wag said, “Apparently, the only person who can beat Tiger Woods with a golf club is his wife.”

So after promising to lead a better life, he, or rather his writers, told a whopper!

Argh!

We’ll see.

There’s a Chinese Proverb: “Talk doesn’t cook rice.”

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SOFTWARE: TEXTEXPANDER good but dangerous

Friday, February 19, 2010

After my visit to the Apple store for them to replace my Mac Book Air display, I found that TEXTEXPANDER had “lost its mind”. All my registration and abbreviations were gone.

Great Brother Jasper’s Ghost!!! No real backup. Argh!

I started the rebuild from an old old print and griped at the maker. Software; not THE Maker! Please, no lightening bolt for me. Surely not for something so trivial as lost data. Lost date maybe; lost partial data not so much.

Here’s their response.

# – # – #

Sorry about that, on rare occasions TextExpander can reset. If you have v 2.8 then there is a backup in TextExpander. Go to:

[Home]/Library/Application Support/TextExpander/Settings.textexpander

That Settings.textexpander file is what you need to replace with a backup to restore your snippets and registration information. Also, you will see a SettingsBackup.textexpander. Rename that to Settings.textexpander when you need to restore your settings.

Thanks for using TextExpander from SmileOnMyMac!

Regards,

TextExpander Support

http://www.smileonmymac.com/textexpander

# – # – #

Another less that satisfying reply. At least next time it happens, I will know where to go and restore a file from my Time Machine. (It just keeps chugging away. I’m kinda looking forward to a bare metal restore. How’s that for over confidence?)

And, I’ll keep a weekly print of my abbreviations file.

My response to “support”:

# – # – #

Too late. I already started rebuilding it.

Really need a explicit back up and recovery option. Over on window, my copy of ROBOFORM has a really nice UI. Explicit menu choice to BACKUP and RESTORE from a user chosen location. Suggest same.

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And not a WTx, Argh, or other expletive in it. (One small checkmark for the Final Judgement?)

So my opinion hasn’t changed much on TEXTEXPANDER. Great utility; dangerous as a falling knife.

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GAMBLING: Expanding casinos will lead to Chapter 11 all around

Friday, February 12, 2010

— On Tue, 2/2/10, Casino City Times News Desk <newsletter@mail.casinocity.com> wrote:

From: Casino City Times News Desk <newsletter@mail.casinocity.com>
Subject: Casino City Times: Delaware approves table games for racetrack casinos

On Feb 2, 2010, at 8:42 AM, Luddite wrote:

Nice slot strategy, and table games at Delaware Park and Dover? Cool. LV continues to suffer over years from not being the only place to gamble…still has the magic though.

# – # – #

I think imho that they (the politicians) are going to kill their own “golden goose”. “Gambling” doesn’t help build the mindset of a vigorous energetic people building “wealth”. I have read some stuff that it impoverishes the bottom strata and extracts net 15% from the local economy. In addition, all the venues makes it less “special” and divides the pie in to infinitesimally small slices that can’t support economic activity. Thus, their “slice” wanes over time. imho!

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LINKEDIN: Offhandedly, just ask folks for help

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

http://www.marketingexperiments.com/blog/general/connecting-on-linkedin-quality-or-quantity.html/comment-page-1#comment-2110

Connecting on LinkedIn: Quality or quantity?
Anna Jacobson February 4th, 2009

*** begin quote ***

However, in the middle of a detailed post about creating community on LinkedIn, F. John Reinke, offhandedly comments, “Create a LinkedIn group (It takes weeks to get this done)…”

Remember that most of the people writing about the benefits of LinkedIn have, in truth, been poking around LinkedIn answering questions and making connections for months, possibly years, before they posted their article making you feel inadequate, behind the curve, and left out.

*** end quote ***

I have been blundering about with LinkedIn since they hit prime time. I’ve grouched about their failure to be responsive to suggestions and down right hostile to their early adopters and champions. I’ve wish for a competitor to arise — I’ve dubbed it NiDeknil as a placeholder for all the things LinkedIn could have been. At no time have I ever tried to make anyone feel “feel inadequate, behind the curve, and left out”; if anything, that’s how I feel about my relationship with LinkedIn. I can’t point out many more early advocates who have been bludgeoned by LinkedIn. Figuratively speaking. The biggest misconception that I try to communicate is that “LinkedIn is NOT networking”. AND, anyone, who needs help, just has to ask! No charge for “premium membership” unlike LinkedIn.

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