Memorial Day weekend dawned cool and windy in our part of the world. Needed a coat to walk the dogs, and I decided to forego planting for a couple hours. But by the end of Saturday, the rockwall out front was finally completed, and it looks almost like it had been there for years.
Sunday was Indianapolis race day, something that my dad never missed (except for once when we went golfing and Jenny turned off the recorder that he had so carefully adjusted to capture it). Castroneves won, despite my rooting for Danica Patrick. Jenny knew Castroneves from the Dancing with the Stars program -- fame has a great way of traveling.
And Monday, more of the same. Chilly. And then the dogs, barking and growling at a woodpile from our ongoing construction. Wow, noisy beyond belief. And then, directly, the cause -- a very large, very angry raccoon that they'd treed in our smallish Persimmon tree. He/she was quite upset with the din, and Zoe especially seemed oblivious to the idea that this thing was able to defend itself.
Fortunately, he was able to get from the tree branches onto the roof, and then onto the spruce tree out front, which he climbed with ease. Four hours later, he was still ensconsed some thirty feet up in that tree. Jenny came home, and saw this great pile of fur and she was mighty impressed. We were both glad that Zoe missed her goal.
The next morning, today, no sign of the big creature.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
IMMERSCOM 2009
The thought was a good one, or so it seemed at the time. Gather the designers and key users of these new Video Immersive environments -- known as HP Halo, or Cisco Telepresence, or LifeSize, or pick your favorite other system (e.g. Polycom, Tandberg, Vidyo...) -- and have a deep and penetrating conference about what works, and what needs improvement, for these new tools.
Put it in Silicon Valley, the mecca for innovation, and you "can't miss". Well, we reckoned without the dire economy, even though these tools are one of the best ways to mitigate costs by eliminating most travel needs and enhancing the teamwork and hence productivity of designers. So, the conference has about half as many attendees as we'd have liked, which means that we'll be lucky to break even.
But today, at MediaX, we hosted Casey King, the CTO for LifeSize, who described a company that has doubled every year for the last five, with now some 10,000 companies using their products, with High Definition Video for relatively low cost, and his enthusiasm was palpable, as it was for the host company, Sun Microsystems, which reported on the productivity increases due to such tools.
And Thursday, we'll tour HP and Cisco facilities to experience first-hand these wonder tools. If you haven't been in one of these uber-centers, run rather than walk to experience this stuff.
Why so few attendees? Could be the esoteric titles on the papers, or it could be the time of year or the travel budget issue, or maybe there is no capital equipment money even if things looked great. Or maybe people are so "heads-down" that they have no capacity to consider change?
Seems odd to me. It feels strangely like the old joke about the machine gun salesman showing up at the castle, and the wife explaining that her knight doesn't have time to listen, because he is putting on his suit of armor and mounting his horse to go fight in the Crusades.
Ah well. We'll have a great time
Put it in Silicon Valley, the mecca for innovation, and you "can't miss". Well, we reckoned without the dire economy, even though these tools are one of the best ways to mitigate costs by eliminating most travel needs and enhancing the teamwork and hence productivity of designers. So, the conference has about half as many attendees as we'd have liked, which means that we'll be lucky to break even.
But today, at MediaX, we hosted Casey King, the CTO for LifeSize, who described a company that has doubled every year for the last five, with now some 10,000 companies using their products, with High Definition Video for relatively low cost, and his enthusiasm was palpable, as it was for the host company, Sun Microsystems, which reported on the productivity increases due to such tools.
And Thursday, we'll tour HP and Cisco facilities to experience first-hand these wonder tools. If you haven't been in one of these uber-centers, run rather than walk to experience this stuff.
Why so few attendees? Could be the esoteric titles on the papers, or it could be the time of year or the travel budget issue, or maybe there is no capital equipment money even if things looked great. Or maybe people are so "heads-down" that they have no capacity to consider change?
Seems odd to me. It feels strangely like the old joke about the machine gun salesman showing up at the castle, and the wife explaining that her knight doesn't have time to listen, because he is putting on his suit of armor and mounting his horse to go fight in the Crusades.
Ah well. We'll have a great time
Where has the time gone?
The last post I made was the day before we moved into our new home. Now, a mere five months later, I surface again! Howze that for tunneling...
A lot has happened in five months. For one, the economy has not gotten much better, despite some semi-heroic government actions. For two, the fact that many kings and noblemen lack clothes is becoming increasingly apparent. Most obviously, the greed and corruption that is being reported daily seems like the ultimate insult to the American Way. The AIG bonuses, the Sacramento water scam, the egregious bankers, and the arrogant Detroit moguls seem of a piece, and not so very far from Bernie Madoff actually. It wouldn't be that hard to find targets at most of the large corporations where seemingly the "family atmosphere" is gone, and the drones of the movie 1984 seem curiously apt.
The issues have become more basic for many who are out of work. What next? Where to? And how can we survive this calamity?
In these kinds of times, there is opportunity to be sure, but it has some of the feeling of the "we were sent in to drain the swamp, but these damn alligators have us under siege".
In our small part of the world, it is not particularly sanguine either. Jenny's work is booming, thanks to the stimulus package for education, and she is so busy she cannot hardly keep up. Profits are elusive, but the work is there, so we are thankful for that. MediaX has had several great opportunities as well, including a fantastic DATA VISUALIZATION exhibit that we have from now through December on display in Wallenberg Hall, open to the public.
And our Summer Institute has its widest variety of offerings to date. See http://mediax.stanford.edu/WSI/ for an eclectic set of seminars and workshops.
But corporate philanthropy, on which our program depends, is at an all-time low, and the cries of distress from the largest companies -- IBM, HP, and Boeing to name a few -- would have you think that they are facing imminent bankruptcy. Maybe they are, and they've carefully shielded us from that fact, kinda like Bernie, but more likely, they are hoarding their billions and making sure that they wring every productive ounce of profit from the system. It seems to me to be a clear case of penny-wise and pound-foolish, but then old Ben Franklin has been dead so long....
Maybe I will develop more energy for the next post...
A lot has happened in five months. For one, the economy has not gotten much better, despite some semi-heroic government actions. For two, the fact that many kings and noblemen lack clothes is becoming increasingly apparent. Most obviously, the greed and corruption that is being reported daily seems like the ultimate insult to the American Way. The AIG bonuses, the Sacramento water scam, the egregious bankers, and the arrogant Detroit moguls seem of a piece, and not so very far from Bernie Madoff actually. It wouldn't be that hard to find targets at most of the large corporations where seemingly the "family atmosphere" is gone, and the drones of the movie 1984 seem curiously apt.
The issues have become more basic for many who are out of work. What next? Where to? And how can we survive this calamity?
In these kinds of times, there is opportunity to be sure, but it has some of the feeling of the "we were sent in to drain the swamp, but these damn alligators have us under siege".
In our small part of the world, it is not particularly sanguine either. Jenny's work is booming, thanks to the stimulus package for education, and she is so busy she cannot hardly keep up. Profits are elusive, but the work is there, so we are thankful for that. MediaX has had several great opportunities as well, including a fantastic DATA VISUALIZATION exhibit that we have from now through December on display in Wallenberg Hall, open to the public.
And our Summer Institute has its widest variety of offerings to date. See http://mediax.stanford.edu/WSI/ for an eclectic set of seminars and workshops.
But corporate philanthropy, on which our program depends, is at an all-time low, and the cries of distress from the largest companies -- IBM, HP, and Boeing to name a few -- would have you think that they are facing imminent bankruptcy. Maybe they are, and they've carefully shielded us from that fact, kinda like Bernie, but more likely, they are hoarding their billions and making sure that they wring every productive ounce of profit from the system. It seems to me to be a clear case of penny-wise and pound-foolish, but then old Ben Franklin has been dead so long....
Maybe I will develop more energy for the next post...
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Musing about memories
She smiled, wanly, and we talked. Between "gigs" as they say. Your mind plays tricks on you when a long-term relationship ends. Actually, I've come to think my mind plays tricks on me most of the time, but that might be an age-related thing.
I got to thinking as we chatted, and even more as our chatting got more animated, turning into Chattering. I had a pet parrokeet once, which had a habit of Chattering. One of Jenny's cousins thinks that's where I got it from (the chattering, not the thinking part).
The thinking went something like this -- Thoreau said it beautifully: “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.” Shakespeare had a slightly different twist, having Brutus say: "There is a tide in the affairs of men. which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries."
Well, easy to say -- HARD to do. The trick for each of us is how to know when to do what. There is a great little book making the rounds, called "Not Quite What I was Planning" which features six-word succinct (!) autobiographies. Such as "I stopped needing approval. Didn’t I?" Or "Found true love, married someone else". How about "Jumped out of perfectly good airplane."
We ended our Chattering with a hug. Hugs are hugely important. Grab someone near you and HUG THEM!
I got to thinking as we chatted, and even more as our chatting got more animated, turning into Chattering. I had a pet parrokeet once, which had a habit of Chattering. One of Jenny's cousins thinks that's where I got it from (the chattering, not the thinking part).
The thinking went something like this -- Thoreau said it beautifully: “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.” Shakespeare had a slightly different twist, having Brutus say: "There is a tide in the affairs of men. which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries."
Well, easy to say -- HARD to do. The trick for each of us is how to know when to do what. There is a great little book making the rounds, called "Not Quite What I was Planning" which features six-word succinct (!) autobiographies. Such as "I stopped needing approval. Didn’t I?" Or "Found true love, married someone else". How about "Jumped out of perfectly good airplane."
We ended our Chattering with a hug. Hugs are hugely important. Grab someone near you and HUG THEM!
new home
Well, new to us anyway. We're moving in TOMORROW! Ten months since purchase, nine months since the Easter soiree, six months from the first Menlo Park permits, and a long time since we've seen our "stuff" that we first put in storage when we sold our Park City home in early 2005.
And no, it isn't finished, but we are "going in anyway". One bedroom with a small bath, the guest bath, the living room, Jenny's office, and the KITCHEN are done. That's enough!
The dogs are looking forward to having a small yard. We're looking forward to having a drawer for the silverware and another for napkins.
If we could figure out how to post pix, we'd show you the place. Since we haven't mastered that little trick, call and we'll invite you over!
Love, Charlie
And no, it isn't finished, but we are "going in anyway". One bedroom with a small bath, the guest bath, the living room, Jenny's office, and the KITCHEN are done. That's enough!
The dogs are looking forward to having a small yard. We're looking forward to having a drawer for the silverware and another for napkins.
If we could figure out how to post pix, we'd show you the place. Since we haven't mastered that little trick, call and we'll invite you over!
Love, Charlie
Xmas signals
I was in Nordstrom's last week, on a Saturday afternoon about 3pm. I found a parking spot five cars from the main door (and had a choice of the sixth, seventh, and ... spots as well). You could have shot a cannon off in the third floor and not hurt anyone.
I was at Best Buy on Friday this week, me and fifteen staff. I found the TV I wanted -- $250 cheaper than the cheapest we found the week before, which itself was $800 off the "list price" (altho Sony had dropped its price $400 midweek). When I asked about a DVD player, they "threw in" the DVD and the 5-1 surround speaker set for another $50, ostensibly a $500 value. I took the deal. Then, they wanted $399 for the articulated arm to allow the set to move for better viewing, and $139 x 3 for the special cables that allow HD connections. None of these are discounted.
I objected, and said "why don't you give away the TVs and just become an accessory seller". The clerk laughed and said, 'don't you buy HP printers?' I recalled the time Kevin Kelly and I consulted for some unnamed Japanese manufacturer and said they should give away three big-screen TVs to every household in return for a $100/mo content delivery fee (ala the I-phones). They thought us daft, but even then (3 years ago) they knew that they could build a 52" set for $500 cost.
Margins are not what they used to be. Nor is the world.
I was at Best Buy on Friday this week, me and fifteen staff. I found the TV I wanted -- $250 cheaper than the cheapest we found the week before, which itself was $800 off the "list price" (altho Sony had dropped its price $400 midweek). When I asked about a DVD player, they "threw in" the DVD and the 5-1 surround speaker set for another $50, ostensibly a $500 value. I took the deal. Then, they wanted $399 for the articulated arm to allow the set to move for better viewing, and $139 x 3 for the special cables that allow HD connections. None of these are discounted.
I objected, and said "why don't you give away the TVs and just become an accessory seller". The clerk laughed and said, 'don't you buy HP printers?' I recalled the time Kevin Kelly and I consulted for some unnamed Japanese manufacturer and said they should give away three big-screen TVs to every household in return for a $100/mo content delivery fee (ala the I-phones). They thought us daft, but even then (3 years ago) they knew that they could build a 52" set for $500 cost.
Margins are not what they used to be. Nor is the world.
Xmas luncheon
Jenny regaled everyone. It was her 36th year of hosting her paternal family for a gala, this one with 81 attendees, 37 of them under 18 years (and most of those under 10). Irish Catholic families have a certain prolific nature about them...
She was peripatetic, coaxing the wee ones in song (with her best kindergarten teacher skills amply displayed), exhorting the oldsters to put their shoulder to the wheel in these economically challenged times, praising the staff who loyally support this noisy horde, and always on the move, with a light touch on the shoulder or a ready smile for the weary.
This was the twelfth year at the Fairmont Pavilion Room in San Francisco, and four of the helpers had worked all twelve years with us. Santa showed about 2:15 for the sixteenth year -- every child knows him by name, and he them. And the gifts he brought were smash hits -- one little girl proudly telling her mother that her mother was wrong when she'd said she was too young to get a cellphone -- that SANTA said it was fine, and in fact gave her one! The look on that mother's face was priceless, as Visa would say.
Consistency, loyalty, family, tradition... values that we think are worth nurturing. We are so blessed that this extended family takes time every year to bring their children and share them with us.
She was peripatetic, coaxing the wee ones in song (with her best kindergarten teacher skills amply displayed), exhorting the oldsters to put their shoulder to the wheel in these economically challenged times, praising the staff who loyally support this noisy horde, and always on the move, with a light touch on the shoulder or a ready smile for the weary.
This was the twelfth year at the Fairmont Pavilion Room in San Francisco, and four of the helpers had worked all twelve years with us. Santa showed about 2:15 for the sixteenth year -- every child knows him by name, and he them. And the gifts he brought were smash hits -- one little girl proudly telling her mother that her mother was wrong when she'd said she was too young to get a cellphone -- that SANTA said it was fine, and in fact gave her one! The look on that mother's face was priceless, as Visa would say.
Consistency, loyalty, family, tradition... values that we think are worth nurturing. We are so blessed that this extended family takes time every year to bring their children and share them with us.
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