MUDGE’s Musings
In this short attention span world, it’s an extraordinary story that commands one’s S.A.S. for eight full pages. This is that extraordinary story. It’s an investment, faithful reader, for which yr (justifiably) humble svt hopes you’ll take the plunge.
We last tackled the relationship between technology and the developing world some time ago in a post worth re-savoring (well, I did!).
3 Comments | 
Technology | Tagged: cell phones, cellphones, developing world, microfinance, Nokia, One Laptop Per Child, poverty, Technology | 
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Posted by mudge
MUDGE’s Musings
This is not the Navy related story I expected to write. But, as always, real life changed my plans.
More than many, the MUDGE household has been observing this past week’s American Airlines MD-80 debacle with more than passing interest.
There have been myriad news stories, in print and on line, much television (I’m told – I never watch TV news). It’s a topic that anyone who flies can relate to.
As it happens, we’re headed off on a much needed vacation next week to see the grandMUDGElets in L.A., and, as American most frequently protects that route with this disappointingly tiny (in the context of: traversing 2/3 of the continent), not to speak of disappointingly elderly (in the context of: acquired cheaply when American absorbed what was left of the once proud TWA many years ago), sardine can (in the context of: so small, there’s never been audio entertainment available, much less an in-flight movie. Not that this is much of a hardship, but, it is a 4-hour flight). It’s an awful flight, in the best of circumstances, especially for a somewhat larger than life person such as yr (justifiably) humble svt. You guessed it: we’ve got tickets on an MD-80 flight.
Q: What’s worse than flying an American Airlines MD-80 to Los Angeles?
A: NOT flying an American Airlines MD-80 to Los Angeles because the flight’s among 1,000 that they’ve been forced to cancel due to inadequate maintenance procedures finally catching up to them.
2 Comments | "War on Terrorism", Air Force, Army, Business, Economic depression, Economy, Marines, Navy | Tagged: Air Force, American Airlines, Army, cancelled flights, Economic depression, Marines, MD-80, Navy, Recession, recruiting | Permalink
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Web Conferencing Week
All right, it’s been a lot more than a week since the last of this series appeared. Actually, about 26 weeks. Ouch!
It’s been a time.
Began this post with the aim of sharing what’s been a roller-coaster of a week. So, we’ll try that, but read on beyond the quotidian carryings on to see what’s really underlying the lengthy delay between what I had hoped would become a more predictably episodic series.
Wearing all of my hats this week.
Teaching. I teach web conferencing to my fellow employees; ran some numbers the other day. 650 classes of one to two hours duration; more than 3,900 participants collectively in 5-1/2 years. This is harder than it sounds (you scoff: one to two hours!). All of these classes are conducted on line via the web conferencing product that I’m endeavoring to teach, together with a telephone conference call to provide the audio.
Rather like the radio, in that you are performing for people whom you cannot see, and whose only impression of you is what they hear, and the static slides they see on their computer screen. Takes a great deal of emotive energy.
I’m pretty good. My feedback surveys say so. This week, I’ve taught two regular classes, and two more special one-hour rather more free-form sessions directed at participants in our pilot of the new, much improved version of our product that we’re endeavoring to roll out to full production in less than three months. This is a heavier load than usual, due to the pilot, and there still is one more pilot session scheduled for tomorrow morning as I write this, together with three more early next week, along with the two regularly scheduled ones.
2 Comments | Business, business collaboration, Career, Corporations, Technology, Web Conferencing, Web Conferencing Week | Tagged: corporate life, Lotus Sametime, on-line instruction, retirement, Web Conferencing, Web Conferencing Week | Permalink
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MUDGE’s Musings
This story hit NYTimes most emailed list the other day, so you may have encountered it.
But, it’s just too cool for an old railroad enthusiast, much less maritime enthusiast, to go unremarked upon.
1 Comment | Environment, Government, Transportation | Tagged: Delaware, New York City subway, Redbird Reef | Permalink
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There’s most read, and then there’s favorite. This is a post which yr (justifiably) humble svt is, regrettably, but not regretfully, not at all humble about.
![lhc250x46_thumb2_thumb[1]](https://mudge.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/lhc250x46-thumb2-thumb1.jpg){kind=small}
BlastS from the Past!
2 posts we really, really loved to write, and read, and re-read…
From our very earliest days, originally posted July 10 and 11, 2007. They’re short, so here’s a two-fer.
Didn’t want all of the political and social and career observations to totally obliterate some deeply personal ones (this is my sandbox, after all!).
This weekend we celebrated, in order of importance and reverse chronology, the beautiful (most ever!) wedding of my dear son and his amazing new wife; the 80th birthday of my indomitable mother (attended by her four children and their life partners save one; eight of her nine grandchildren and her two great-grandchildren); and we must mention MUDGE’s and his heroic spouse’s own 37th anniversary.
2 Comments | Blogging, Career, Life | Tagged: 80th birthday, career development, corporate life, valor, Web Conferencing Tsar, wedding anniversary, wedding day | Permalink
Posted by mudge
MUDGE’s Musings
Stanley Bing of Fortune is one of my favorite guys. His The Bing Blog has been part of the Left-Handed Complement blogroll from the early days.
Today’s post discusses the latest news of the tug-of-war now entering what is probably its final phase: Microsoft’s intention to take over Yahoo.
Yahoo thoughts and Microsoft dreams
The Bing Blog | Monday, April 7, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I thought I would begin the week here by taking a moment of silence for all the good folks at Yahoo (YHOO), now under assault by the great and powerful conquistador from Redmond (MSFT). Today Yahoo management found it necessary to combat comments made by Microsoft top pate Steve Ballmer to the effect that the company was in serious trouble and would probably tank in the very near future without the timely rescue now under consideration. This could be seen by some cynics as a blatant attempt to lower the value of the property Mr. Ballmer and team are looking to acquire, but you won’t find any cynics here. Just sympathetic skeptics who have been there and done that.
Few topics among we who toil in the vineyards we call “IT” are more likely to elicit a curling lip than the subject of the Ogre of Redmond, “Micro$oft.”
3 Comments | Business, Internet, Internet Culture, Technology | Tagged: Microsoft, Netvibes.com, Pageflakes.com, Stanley Bing, The Bing Blog, Yahoo | Permalink
Posted by mudge
MUDGE’s Musings
Cleveland. Philadelphia. New York City. Chicago. Most egregiously, Detroit.
For more than 30 years, the overwhelming impression has taken hold that the old, big cities, the engines of the industrial might of this country for more than 150 years, are hollowed out shells.
Their manufacturing jobs fled first, to the suburbs and exurbs, then the non-union South and West (before fleeing totally offshore). Their office jobs disappeared as the bureaucracy supporting those factories inevitably shifted: first to the suburbs, then the exurbs, then South and West (soon, Mumbai and Bengaluru?).
So, accepted wisdom: big Eastern and Midwestern cities: in steep decline.
Now, Michael Gecan is here to alert us that, as far as he can see, the suburbs and exurbs that became the refuge of those who could flee their declining city homes, are built on sand and are about to experience their own fall.
6 Comments | Civilization, Economy, History, Religion | Tagged: Boston Review, Chicago, DuPage County, exurbs, fiscal crisis, Michael Gecan, New York City, police, public transit, suburbs, urban schools | Permalink
Posted by mudge
MUDGE’s Musings
We’ve occasionally been moved to comment about process.
This hobby/pastime/obsession we know as “blogging” is made possible through a host of technological artifacts: the Internet itself; the Internet Service Providers (ISPs) who, for better or worse, are the ‘Net’s gatekeepers; and, most of all, the indomitable urge for self-expression that has found such fertile ground to manifest itself in these times.
And then there are the tools that we bloggers use daily to self-express.
Shortly after we began for real this grand adventure called Left-Handed Complement, we were moved to comment about the fantastic, free of charge nature of this medium.
The platform, the means to access it richly (although said platform is highly capable in that area), and some on-line resources whose existence makes life easier — essentially, the only cost to self-expression is one’s time.
3 Comments | Blogging, Blogging Process Hall of Fame, Technology, WordPress.com | Tagged: BlogExplosion.com, FuelMyBlog.com, Mudge's Blogging Process Hall of Fame, nanocorner of the sphere, Picnik.com, WindowsLiveWriter, WordPress dashboard, WordPress.com | Permalink
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MUDGE’s Musings
It shouldn’t be that much of a surprise in the Age of Google and Amazon that several companies are conspiring with your ISPs to harvest every last URL you land on, the better to feed you contextual advertising.
Can an Eavesdropper Protect Your Privacy?
By Saul Hansell | April 3, 2008, 5:39 pm
I wrote last month about a new crop of companies that is likely to spawn what I called “the mother of all privacy battles.” These companies put devices inside the data centers of Internet service providers to gather information about every Web site the I.S.P.’s users visit. Their goal is to use this data to display advertising related to what people might want to buy.
Leave a Comment » | History, Technology | Tagged: Amazon.com, Anonymizer.com, Bits, Google, internet surfing, NebuAd, Phorm, Privacy, Saul Hansell | Permalink
Posted by mudge
MUDGE’s Musings
I can’t help it — our turbulent economic news continues to cause concern.
And, as we’ve pointed out, it’s increasingly top of mind most everywhere.
As a topic, it has appeared here with depressing regularity (depressing topic but lively and insightful commentary, of course!):
Pointed here by American.com here’s a useful analysis that lays out the causes of the financial system’s deep crisis, and you might be surprised at the source: St. Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve that, directed by Greenspan’s successor, Ben Bernanke, now is portraying itself as our white knight.
2 Comments | History, Politics | Tagged: Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, Economic depression, Economy, Federal Reserve, foreclosures, housing market, Jeffrey D. Sachs, mortgage crisis, Politics, Recession | Permalink
Posted by mudge
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