December 2008 Archives

My MacBook has one of the best designed power adapters out there: the MagSafe. Until we get wireless power, this is the next best thing to prevent your laptop from hitting the ground as you inevitably trip over the power cord on your rush to the bathroom between hands in a PokerStars tournament. Oh wait, that's me.

At any rate, MagSafe is a great innovation. As are some other features, such as the narrow design for fitting neatly into a power strip, and the folding prongs for travel. But the extension cord attachment, not so much. It's almost like there's some "conservation of design quality" law keeping the universe in balance.

You see, the brick by itself is not grounded. The plug has only 2 pins, and both of them are the same width, so it can be plugged into any outlet in either orientation.

But the extension cord is grounded. It has 3 prongs, meaning that -- aside from any hacksaw modifications -- it must be plugged into a grounded outlet.

And the question is simply, why? Why does extending the  length of a wire place an additional constraint on an otherwise hippie-in-the-Haight-in-1967-like constraint-free power adapter? All the electronics for handling ungrounded power are clearly in the brick itself. Otherwise, the non-extended version would be unsafe, right? So why not simply have a 2 prong plug on the extension that is the same as the one on the unextended adapter?

Look, I know that any modern building is going to have 3 prong outlets, and for most use cases this is a moot point. But my house is not modern. Nor are many of the cheap office spaces in SF I've tended to visit as of late. And traveling with a 3-to-2 prong adapter is both a hassle and not in line with Apple design standards.

Screw it. I'm getting the hack saw.

I recently got a new Apple "Alimunum" MacBook for work -- the very latest, top of the line MacBook model. It has all of the great specs -- 2.4GHz Dual core processor, 4GB RAM, backlit keys, blah blah. In most respects it is a really great computer, and I'm thankful that I have an employer willing to buy such a capable tool for my job.

For less money, however, Apple still sells their previous generation MacBook. Dave has already mentioned what a great deal it currently is. It has a 2.1 GHz dual-core processor and inferior graphics and worse battery life. It's a bit heavier, probably less sturdy, and of course not as cool as the latest thing. It also has at least one important feature not present in current model: a trackpad that doesn't drive me freaking insane!

The trackpad on the new MacBook is a classic case of Apple over-reaching in the form vs. function tradeoff -- trying to be just a bit too clever with a slick design, and accepting a non-trivial drop in functionality. The trackpad lacks a real button -- really the whole thing is a button. You can glide your finger around it and when you want to click, just press. Or, if your prefer, it can be configured to recognize a light tap as a button press. Actually, there's a whole host of various configuration options for two, three and even four-fingered tapping, pinching, dragging and perhaps tickling. Mostly all of those options are a waste of time and there "just because we can -- see isn't it cool!"

I wouldn't mind all of these extra bells and whistles if the basic feature worked well. Clicking the main button is in the top three most important tasks in using a computer. (Looking at the screen and typing on the keyboard are the other two -- and thankfully both old and new MacBooks excel here). On the old MacBook, I had a nice big trackpad, with an equally nice big single button at the bottom. Take your hand, and rest it neutrally over a square directly in front of you. Your thumb will be exactly where the button is, and your index finger will be a centimeter or two above it -- perfect for the trackpad. When it is time for a click, you have two choices -- either push with your thumb, or -- if you have "tap to click" on, just tap your index finger. Nice and easy. The "right-click" or secondary button click is either a two finger tap, or ctrl + button press. Also reasonably easy.

In theory, nothing has changed with the new MacBook. However because there's no separate physical mouse button, and because people still rest their thumb at the bottom of the trackpad (as is natural, and as we have been trained by years of Mac usage), they already have one finger on the trackpad. If you move your index finger around, the trackpad on the new MacBook will "see" two fingers. Ah, but Apple are so clever -- they have accounted for this by declaring that a certain portion of the bottom of the trackpad -- you know -- the part where the button used to be, is an exception. If you rest you thumb in this magic lower region, you can still move your index finger around on the upper part of the trackpad, and still click your thumb or tap your finger to click the mouse. Despite having two fingers on the trackpad, only a primary click is triggered. Magic!

Except magic absolutely sucks when it comes to computers if the trick doesn't work absolutely, unfailingly all of the time. You can see what's coming next: in the case of the new MacBook, it doesn't. It almost does, but every now and again I find that instead of moving the cursor, I'm moving nothing. Or sometimes my thumb comes up off the trackpad for a second, and I accidentally click when it comes back down. Sometimes despite moving my index finder around, the cursor barely moves. The problems don't happen all of the time, or even some of the time -- just occasionally, but it's frequent enough to make me unhappy. There was a recent software update for the trackpad which I understand fixed some problems -- just not mine. The problems get even worse if I turn on the "one finger drag" option in the Trackpad system preference panel. That option is misnamed -- it should be called "randomly initiate mouse drags until your brain leaks out of your ears."

Where is this "magic thumb line?" Somewhere -- who knows. If you're in the market for a new MacBook, get the older, cheaper model -- add in a ton of RAM, and be happy. It's a great computer.

I can't say that I've heard most of the albums released this year, but I have sampled at least a song or two off of many. But Narrow Stairs by Death Cab for Cutie stands in a class by itself. It is so good, I even included it on my list of best albums of  all-time.

The funny thing is, the song they picked for their radio single, I Will Posses Your Heart, is the weakest song on the album. The second single, Cath..., is one of the better ones. For me, the best song on the album is Your New Twin-Sized Bed, followed by Grapevine Fires.

But seriously, talking about music in much depth is pretty pointless when you could be listening. Listen to it for free over on Lala. If you like it, then buy it. It's only $5 at Amazon right now. Great album, great price. Buy it now.

The economy sucks. I'm unemployed. We've lost over a third of our net worth in the past 6 months. It's time for a good, hard look at the monthly budget.

The thing I'm looking at the hardest are the monthly recurring bills. Any savings here is recurrent savings, and the savings compounds.

First on the chopping block was the TV service. I've had DirecTV + a DVR for nearly 10 years, but $64/month is far too much in this day and age of Hulu and Amazon's Video on Demand service, paying that much (or really anything) for TV is simply unnecessary. I bought a digital/HD antenna, and we'll use that for local news, breaking news, and the occasional TV show. For everything else, it's the internet.

Speaking of internet, my DSL needs a trim too. I'm still on the $50/month plan with 4 static IP addresses. I don't need those anymore. (In fact, I really never did.) I can get to $40/month for a single dynamic address. I might even consider going to $25/month which drops my bandwidth from 3/.75 Mbps to 1.5/.4 Mbps. Although now that I think about it, that might impact the whole "watch TV over the internet" plan. Hmmm....

We already don't have Netflix; we use the library for DVDs. And some things just can't be easily cut: water, sewer, garbage... Although for that last one, I suppose I could distribute my garbage across my neighbors' partially empty bins the night before. But I don't think I'm quite that desperate yet.

And as for my mobile phone service, it's too soon to switch. I'm an iPhone guy now, and I need my smart phone capabilities. But I am hopeful that other phone manufacturers will get their act together in 2009 and truly compete with the iPhone. Ditto for other mobile carriers vs. AT&T. And then I'll happily shop for a new phone and plan, for less money.

Unless the user experience sucks. Then I'll stick with the iPhone. After all, some things are worth paying a little bit extra for.

Funny place, California. On the one hand, we pass Proposition 8 -- removing the right of same sex couples to marry. It alters the state constitution -- the highest, most sacred law of the state, with a simple majority vote. Meanwhile, the state legislature can't raise taxes one cent without a two-thirds super majority because of the (in-)famous "Prop 13."

I hear people on both sides of both issues complaining about the "rule of the majority" or the "rights of the minority." What I don't hear so much of, is how completely screwed up the entire state political system is because of one entrenched problem: the initiative system is fundamentally broken.

Don't get me wrong: I'm a democrat through and through. Churchill said that "...democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried.." and that sounds about right to me. But let's not forget that there are many forms of democracy, from systems where everyone participates in every decision, to those that essentially elect an autocrat every few years.

I'm not a historian or political scientist, but it seems to me that we in California are essentially expressing our dislike for a current political problem like immature kids. We lash out, throw a tantrum, and make a "They're never going to do that ever again!" kind of rule.

A representative legislature separate from the executive is expressly designed to give reasonable consideration to laws (and constitutional changes). In California, since the Brown Act and the rise of Open Government we have good transparency into the formerly "smoke-filled rooms." I'll go so far as to say there is nothing we have accomplished via a California initiative that we could not have done through the legislative process in a similar amount of time. (And yes, I know there's no way to prove or disprove that).

As an added bonus, if we didn't have to vote for 15 different initiatives, judges, dog-catcher, and so on, our ballots might be simpler, easier to count, and maybe more people might vote.

Fry's Electronics is a classic example of the "love it / hate it" dilemma. The exasperatingly low quality of their staff is well documented elsewhere, so there's little need to go into that again. If you happen to be in a Fry's in Silicon Valley, it's not an exaggeration to say that you are more likely to get help from the consumer standing next you in the aisle than the service rep. I have witnessed, and participated in several interchanges where an engineer responsible for some aspect of the product in question happens to be shopping there, answers questions from customers.

But like I keep trying to say, that's not the point of this post. This post is about your civil rights. In 1788 Patrick Henry said "You ought to be extremely cautious, watchful, jealous of your liberty; for instead of securing your rights you may lose them forever." Here's a tiny little thing you can do at Fry's to be a patriotic defender of liberty: stop fricking showing you receipt at the door!

Fry's is not Costco -- it is not a "club," you did not pay any money or sign a contract to "join" Fry's. Shopping at Fry's does not constitute an agreement to give up any of your rights -- it's a public establishment. When asked for your receipt at the door, just (politely) say "no thanks!" and keep walking. Not having a pink mark on your receipt doesn't mean you can't return an item -- I've easily done this many times. (OK that's a lie, returning things to Fry's is never easy, but you get the idea).

I have been doing this for years, and I have never had a single issue -- in fact the employees at the door have always been polite. They understand that they can't stop you -- you should too.

My wife read Kitchen Confidential by Tony Bourdain a few years back, and I vaguely remembered that she mentioned he had some snarky comment about vegetarians in it. When a friend was talking about the TV show with the same title, I decided to search the book on Amazon to see exactly what the quote was. It was much worse than I expected.

On the dust jacket, Tony straightforwardly mentions his "naked contempt for vegetarians, sauce-on-siders, the 'lactose-intolerant'...", and he isn't kidding. (By the way, I love how he puts lactose-intolerant' in quotes, as if it were some alleged condition with no scientific evidence to back it up.) Here's the paragraph from the book that is the real stand-out (bold is mine):

Vegetarians — and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans — are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food. The body — these waterheads imagine — is a temple that should not be polluted by animal protein. It's healthier, they insist, though every vegetarian waiter I've worked with is brought down by any rumor of a cold. Oh, I'll accommodate them, I'll rummage around for something to feed them — for a "vegetarians plate" — if called on to do so. Fourteen dollars for a few slices of grilled eggplant and zucchini suits my food cost fine.

Wow, really? "The enemy of everything good and decent"? That's pretty damn extreme. And as for his "accommodation"... I've had chefs at wedding banquets from Colorado to Michigan do a better job creating a vegetarian entree than him. It speaks volumes of his attitude towards his profession if the best vegetarian entree he can summon is to grill a few vegetable slices.

Tony, if you're truly interested in growing yourself as a chef — or even if you're simply interested in seeing how good vegan cooking can be — then you owe it to yourself to try a meal made by a top chef who considers the lack of animal products not a constraint, but a freedom. Have a meal at Candle 79 in New York. Try the black bean torte at Millennium in San Francisco. Have one of the fine chefs from VegAdvantage cater a meal for you. Or maybe try one of your own recipes that the have been veganized by the people you so despise

But you shouldn't pass judgement on vegetarians without at least trying the experience yourself. And if you're worried about the cost, then worry not. Dinner's on me.

I like Pandora Radio a lot, and listen to my various custom channels on it quite frequently. At work I experience non-stop Pandora-izing by my colleagues. Their musical tastes are eclectic and entertaining and edifying -- it's fun to hear new music. But after months of listening to Pandora-programmed radio I have switched my habits at home.

At my previous job we designed and built SIRIUS Satellite radios, among other things. Over the past couple of months I have rediscovered the glory of real-live human DJ-programmed radio music. I don't give a rat's behind about Howard or Oprah or the extensive live sports coverage on SIRIUS. But First Wave (channel 22) is absolutely fantastic, as is Symphony Hall (80), the Coffee House (30), and Classic Vinyl (14). These are all live DJ-programmed stations (or at least appear to be), and have a decent variety of music and of course no commercials. If those stations don't appeal to you, there's about 75 others that might. Not all of them appear to be human-programmed -- Spa (73) is great, but a giant squid could do an effective job there...

I think there's a place in my life for both algorithmically and human-programmed music selections. Pandora has done a fantastic job of making their client available everywhere I could possibly want it, and SIRIUS' pay-extra-for-high-bitrate streaming policy is complete crap (IMHO). Still, with a good external antenna, when I need some music to program to, it's invariably SIRIUS.

We've written about the Chumby quite a bit before here on KPAO (start here, continue here). One year later and I still love it and use it every day. The folks at Chumby, Inc. continue to improve the software (the updates come nearly automatically), and through that process it has become the best alarm clock ever.

Since the Chumby is really a Linux computer, it runs some pretty sophisticated software. The Alarm Clock application lets me specify multiple different kinds of alarms for different days of the week, weekends, weekdays, and so on. On some days, I have the Chumby alarm play a favorite Pandora channel for a while and show a nice weather forecast. On other days I ask it to play the KQED NPR news for 10 minutes while scrolling stock values. It's all easy to setup and understand -- about the only thing I can't get it to do is feed my cat.

The Chumby also has two USB ports on the back -- these are intended for connecting mass-storage devices like USB-sticks or iPods for playing back music through the Chumby. I don't use the ports for that purpose, but it turns out that these ports provide enough power to charge my iPhone and other USB devices. That's one less transformer that needs to be plugged into the wall, silently wasting energy.

About the only complaint I have is that it doesn't remember its last powered state. We recently upgraded our electrical panel, and the power was on and off quite a bit during that time. When the power is restored to the Chumby, it does not automatically turn itself on. Most modern computers will turn themselves back on if they lost power while on. I do have one more complaint -- it has become such a capable music player, that it really needs a remote control but now I'm starting to pick nits...

The title of this post aside, I actually like Country Sun Natural Foods in Palo Alto. They have a pretty good selection of vegan and vegetarian products, lots of locally grown organic produce, and a knowledgeable staff. Of course, one-quarter of the floor space is dedicated to supplements and homeopathy, but if they want to sell worthless-crap snake oil to clueless morons that's their business. Hey -- it's capitalism -- give the customers what they want, right?

Well almost right I suppose. I won't complain too much that Country Sun doesn't accept American Express, even though the Amex Blue Cash is my new favorite credit card and every other grocery store in the county accepts it. And I certainly can't complain they there is now better produce available cheaper right outside their own door every Sunday morning at the local farmer's market. After all that's not their fault. What I will complain about is their refusal to accept more than one coupon of any kind. That's their rule: one coupon per household per day. The only reason I that I can think of for this policy is that it must be too much of a hassle to redeem tons of manufacturer's coupons. (Cue the tiny violins).

Maybe there's some other reason? No clue -- they wouldn't say. The helpful clerks just kept repeating the rule: "one coupon per household per day." There's no shortage of organic groceries available in Palo Alto these days (we invented "earthy crunchy" in the Bay Area). Even mega-corp Safeway has good organic food these days, and since they're based in the Bay Area they even qualify as local I suppose. Plus they take all of my coupons, and my American Express card.

We recently canceled all of our credit cards and switched (mostly) to the American Express Blue Cash card. The old cards were linked to various airline frequent-flyer programs. Airlines miles used to be OK if you could work the system, but the availability, restrictions and hassles have outweighed the benefits for sometime for us. On top of that, the annual fee means that you are starting out in a hole as far as value is concerned. Yes, we could probably negotiate to get the fee waved, but then we would have to remember to do that every year (and maybe run a balance every now and again for that privilege).

Instead, we have opted for the no-fee, cash-back cards. The Amex Blue card seems to be the best deal -- typically averaging about 2.5% cash back based on our buying habits. Most of the grocery stores, gas stations, restaurants, drug stores, etc. that we frequent accept Amex. For those that don't I got a Citibank CashReturns Master Card. It's not as good a deal as the Amex, but they are both free, so it is a good backup. The money we save in terms of fees and typical cash-back can more than compensate for the occasional free airline ticket, and of course was have the option of using the cash for anything we like.

OK, I'm a bit late on this one since the election was 6 weeks ago. But I recently watched this video where Sol Sender describes the process of creating Barack Obama's brand and the now legendary "O" logo. And designer that I am, I couldn't help but think, "Why not combine the logo and the Gotham font into an Obama branded version of the font?" So I did.

It was pretty straightforward. I grabbed the 1-color logo from the Obama downloads page. I then used VectorMagic to convert it into a vector. Then I opened Gotham Bold (which was the weight closest to that of the logo) in TypeTool and replaced both the majuscule and miniscule O's with a proportionately-scaled logo.

A bit cheesy, perhaps, but then there have been far worse abuses of the Obama brand.

Update: And just for fun, I created the Obama sez "LOOK..." site.

I have two Apple Airport Express base stations in my home. They generally seem to work well as Wi-Fi bridges, with only the occasional hiccup. Then I decided to simplify my setup a tiny bit, and turn off my dedicated HP JetDirect print server (which hooks our HP LaserJet printer to the network), and just plug the printer into the Airport Express USB port.

Yesterday, I dropped my iPhone. From 4 feet up. Onto concrete. Face down. Crap.

It bounced twice, putting a matching set of cracks in both the top left and bottom left corners of the screen. Luckily, the cracks mostly they cover the black strips above and and below the screen; they only edge into the viewable area subtlely at the corners. And even luckier, the phone still works. The entire screen is still accurately tappable.

Still, I wanted to see if there was anything I could do. I happened to be near the Apple Store in SF last night, so I stopped by.

The first floor was packed, so I went upstairs. Genuis Bar, also packed. No more appts  for the day. So I wandered over to the software section. An employee (I didn't catch his name, but young 20s urban kid with some facial fuzz) makes eye contact and opens with a friendly greeting. I tell him my story and show him my cracked iPhone.

First off, the guy is sympathetic. Not at all what I expected. He's reassures me that he's seen a lot worse, and tells me the fact that it is still working is great news. He immediately puts me at ease, and we move on to talking over my various options:

1. Do nothing (always an option)
2. Get the screen repaired for about $300
3. Upgrade to a 3G and be forced into a new monthly plan
4. Get a used original iPhone and swap in my SIM card
5. Get a protective case and protective screen film for it to prevent the damage from getting worse

I opt for the last one. While I feel the need to do something, everything else is just too damn expensive for a guy without a job.

Of course this is the original iPhone, and every accessory in the store is for the 3G model. He has to dig around in the back storeroom to find accessories for the original. But find them he does. The anti-glare screen protection film and a selection of hard cases.

Now the cool thing (and something that every retailer should go implement right now): He rings me up right there in the middle of the iPhone accessories aisle with his mobile credit card reader. I don't even need to sign. And my receipt is emailed to me. Awesome.

And it gets better. He now asks if I want help outfit my phone with these new accessories. Are you serious? Of course I do! No doubt I'd end up putting a big fingerprint on the screen film while applying it. So I open the packages and he puts on the film, then snaps the case into place. 15 minutes and $47 later, I walk out of the store happy with a workable solution to my problem.

All in all, a fantastic customer experience. Sure, you can get Apple products and accessories online for cheaper. But you can't match that level of personalized service. When you're not sure and you have questions, it's more than worth it to go into the Apple store.

He's a fun trick: go to the Google main page, and start typing something in the search box like "stupid things" and the box will fill with some "helpful" suggestions (#2 most popular: "stupid things sarah palin said").

(Warning: shameless marketing follows.)

It's a week before Christmas, and only a few days before the start of Hanukkah. If you're looking for something that is unique, useful, affordable, then give the gift of a personalized domain and web site. And the best part is it is extremely likely that the person won't already have one.

Sure, personal web sites have been around for a while, and there are free solutions out there. But these free services come and go. What was your personal page last year became a 404 error the next.

Even now, what people consider their home page is changing all the time. Friendster pages led the way to MySpace, and then Facebook. Some people have hosted blogs, the hardcore run their own blog software or even custom web sites. And for some, it's simply a very lightweight service like Twitter or FriendFeed. The point is, what you consider your primary presence on the web this year may not hold true next year.

The obvious solution is to buy your own domain name. But have you tried to do that lately? It's a mess. The user experience is complex and cluttered overwhelming you with technical jargon like A RECORD, CNAME, and Dynamic DNS. Even worse, you still need to hook that domain name up with a web site (aka "web hosting"), which is a major hassle and likely ends up costing you more than you expect. And then the registrars keep spamming you, trying to upsell you on various services: domain protection, domain parking,email hosting, additional storage, buy more domains (special on .info this week only!)...

Nombray is a domain name + web site solution for the rest of us. It is simple, easy-to-use, inexpensive, and  useful. It's literally 3 steps to get your name on the web:

1. enter your name
2. choose your domain
3. pay $20 
   

And the domain name is yours. If you're using Twitter this year, show that on your Nombray page. When you upgrade to a WordPress blog next year, no problem. Add a tab for that to your Nombray page. You can easily update the content on your page anytime you want. And the beauty is, the domain name is yours. So once you give it out to people, you're done. No more sending out emails telling them about the new site you are now using. They will see for themselves the next time they visit your page.

OK, I'm rambling. Back to the original point: giving the gift of a personalized web page. It's simple. Go to Nombray.com, type in the name of the giftee, choose the domain you want to give them, and then check the box for "gift" on the payment page. After that, you chance to customize a gift greeting for them, like this one.

Yesterday I posted my picks for the top 10 songs of all time. It got me thinking about the list of top albums I always wanted to make. The only rule is that it can't be a greatest hits or compilation; only new material is allowed (or at least 80%+).

1. The Wall - Pink Floyd
2. Coil - Toad the Wet Sprocket
3. Whatever and Ever Amen - Ben Folds Five
   
4. August and Everything After - Counting Crows
5. Gordon - Barenaked Ladies
6. 100% Fun - Matthew Sweet
7. Motion in the Ocean - McFly
8. Throwing Copper - Live
9. Presents Author Unknown - Jason Falkner
10. Lost and Gone Forever - Guster

Honorable Mentions
Purple Rain - Prince
The Dream of the Blue Turtles - Sting
Out of Time - REM
Pyromania - Def Leppard
Narrow Stairs - Death Cab for Cutie (so recent, but damn it's solid!)
Near Tonight - Lapdog
In Light Syrup - Toad the Wet Sprocket
Fear - Toad the Wet Sprocket
Third Eye Blind - Third Eye Blind
Go - Vertical Horizon
Everything You Want - Vertical Horizon
Boston - Boston
Nevermind - NIrvana
Dark Side of the Moon - Pink Floyd
A Capella - Todd Rundgren
Dookie - Green Day
There Is Nothing Left to Lose - Foo Fighers
The Way It Is - Bruce Hornsby
Mad Season - Matchbox 20

I randomly reached out to Todd Beaupré a few years back when I was at Yahoo. I was being a good corporate citizen and trying my hand at blogging by dogfooding Yahoo 360°. I did a search for people with similar musical tastes to mine, and ended up finding Todd. Serendipitously, he not only worked at Yahoo, but he was also Director of PM for Yahoo Music.

Fast forward to now. Todd pinged me about my Messenger status, and as we were chatting, the conversation drifted over to music. And now we just can't shut up about it. He's given me a ton of recommendations to check out. (I've only just scratched the surface, but Faber Drive and Mêlée sound really promising so far.) And I've done the same with him.

But it got me thinking more consciously about the music I like and why. I decided to try to put together a list of my favorite songs of all time. It's tough to do, but these are the songs that just stick with me, never passing out of favor for the next musical fad. I'm sure I've missed some, but it's a good start.

1. Family Snapshot - Peter Gabriel
2. Why Should I Cry for You? - Sting
3. I Go Astray - Jason Falkner
4. Rings - Toad the Wet Sprocket
5. Don't Change Your Plans - Ben Folds Five
   
6. Transylvania - McFly
7. Comfortably Numb - Pink Floyd
   
8. Anna Begins - Counting Crows
9. What You Wish For - Guster
10. Take It Outside - Barenaked Ladies

Here is a SeeqPod playlist that has most of the songs in it.

There are bunch that didn't make the list, sadly. But with only 10 spots, competition is high. And there are a lot of great songs out there. But these are simply phenomenal.

Honorable Mention

• O Holy Night - Various Artists
  
• Bohemian Rhapsody - Queen
• All in All - Toad the Wet Sprocket
• Missing the War - Ben Folds
• Hotline - Fountains of Wayne
• Everybody's Changing - Keane
• Camera One - Josh Joplin Group
• Tired of Being Sorry - Ringside
• Winter - Josh Radin
• The Flag - Barenaked Ladies
• A Murder of One - Counting Crows
• The Background - Third Eye Blind
• Smog Moon - Matthew Sweet
• Uncertain Weather - Genesis
• Taking It All Too Hard - Genesis
• Amity Gardens - Fountains of Wayne
• Leave the Biker - Fountains of Wayne
• Boys of Summer - Don Henley
• September - Earth Wind & Fire
• Take It Easy - The Eagles
• Save a Prayer - Duran Duran
• The Promise - When in Rome
• Losing My Religion - REM
• Stagefright - Def Leppard
• Last Beautiful Girl - Matchbox 20
  
• Not the Same - Ben Folds
• Black Balloon - Goo Goo Dolls
• The District Sleeps Tonight - Postal Service
• Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses? - U2
• Your New Twin Sized Bed - Death Cab for Cutie
• Winner Takes It All - Abba
• Telephone Line - ELO
• More Than a Feeling - Boston
• Walking in Memphis - Marc Cohn
  
• Getting to the Point - ELO
• Hide and Seek - Imogen Heap
• Don't Dream It's Over - Crowded House
• Mary's Prayer - Danny Wilson
  
• Barely Breathing - Duncan Sheik
• Ants Marching - Dave Matthews
• The Way - Fastball
  
• The Good Headmaster - Chuck Coleman
  

I just bought a TV antenna from Amazon. (The Winegard MS-2002: amplified, omni-directional HD. I highly recommend it for over-the-air HD/digital TV.) It showed up last week, and I promptly installed it on my roof. Yesterday I happened to see  see that the very same antenna — for which I paid $80.28 — was now selling for $58.99 + tax on Amazon. That's a difference of $16.42; a 20% discount.

So I thought I'd just invoke the Amazon Price Guarantee and get a refund for the difference. However, I couldn't find a link to it on their site. The reason why? They stopped doing this on Sept 1, 2008.

So I did what any consumer who has a strong sense of justice and is slightly crazy would do. I ordered a new one and returned the original.

Shipping the original back is free, and the shipping on the new one is free, too. It'll be a bit of hassle on my part. But I hope that by doing this — and by blogging about it — Amazon realizes how short-sighted it was for them to drop the price guarantee. Granted, most people who would have used the price match guarantee aren't going to be as extreme as me and do the return + re-buy gambit. But for the few of us that do, Amazon is losing money on the transaction by paying for an additional 2 shippings of the product. And that's my lever with them. Make it less economical for them to allow return and re-buy than to simply refund the difference.

So here's my call to action. If you run into a case where Amazon drops the price within the return window, do what I did. Buy a new one and return the old one. And then tell Amazon about it. I'm putting a link to this blog post on Amazon's Get Satisfaction page.

This is my motorcycle (which Dave says is not safe, as if one can put an absolute meaning on that term, but that's another story...).

While I'm on the subject of bad experiences during a job hunt...

For the second time in just over a year, I'm actively looking for a job. Both times I applied to Google. And both times, the Google recruiting process utterly failed.

I should point out that I am provably of Google caliber. Google gave me a job offer back in 2004 that I ended up turning down to go to Yahoo. (FWIW, I don't regret it. I gained great experience and grew significantly as a designer at Yahoo.) So it is a bit puzzling that twice within the span of a year, my conversations with Google recruiters have come to a screeching halt.

Here is the last missive from my conversation with them in 2007:

Only Mountain View, I'm afraid. I've got family in the Bay Area.

------ Original Message ------

Hi David.  Are you only interested in Mountain View?  Would you be open to Santa Monica or Kirkland?

 

And here is the most recent one from nearly 2 months ago:

http://tinyurl.com/dave-cortright-resume
http://tinyurl.com/dave-cortright-portfolio
(Both are also viewable online here)

I also recommend that anyone on the interview loop take a look at my Designing with Vision presentation. It's my design philosophy in 5 minutes or less.

------ Original Message ------

Hi David!

Thank you very much for your interest! I currently recruit designers for the User Experience Team at Google. I am working on filling a interaction designer role that will get allocated towards the Android team. I have attached a job description for your review.

If you are interested, I request that you send me a updated resume as well as a portfolio for us to review.

I'll keep you posted on next steps

Cheers!!

The conclusion is fairly obvious: they aren't interested in me. But common courtesy would be to come out and tell me that. (Communicate concisely, candidly, consistently, and conveniently.) While I generally am very positive on Google and its products, this whole experience leaves me with a bad impression: a bit for Google as a whole, but mostly of the personal brands of these two recruiters.

So I have to ask: does anyone have a recruiter they absolutely love? One who they feel like is only looking out for their best interests? One who makes you -- the potential employee -- feel like you are the most important person in their world? If so, I would love to meet them. Because I have to say, my experience with recruiters of late has left quite a bad impression with me for the profession as a whole.

Now that my health care coverage is officially expired from my previous job, my wife and I are looking at getting our own coverage on the open market. And let me tell you what a total debacle this is turning out to be. It's not even a matter of price. Reading some of the stories out there on the web, it looks like people in great health with minor, manageable conditions are being denied coverage.

I firmly believe that health (both physical and mental) is the single most important thing in anyone's life, and we shouldn't be screwing around in this country with something so basic and essential. The collective health of our nation is the foundation upon which our happiness, productivity, and basic decency are built. Watch Sicko if you haven't already. The health care systems in countries like France and Cuba are simply unbelievable compared to the mess we have here.

So, my proposal: cut all medical benefits for all elected politicians immediately. Force them to procure their own medical insurance (or they can self-insure if they choose). The problem isn't getting fixed because it isn't a real problem to elected officials. They have great medical coverage. They can't really empathize. So let's force their hand. Make them part of the problem.

Of course we can't rely on the politicians to voluntarily give up their medical benefits Let's start with a ballot proposition here in CA that will do this. I'd be happy to help work on this. But we need a lot more people to make it happen. And money. Post a comment if you're interested in helping out, or have ideas or suggestions. Let's help fix health care in CA first, and USA next.

Support my idea on Change.org!

I'm interviewing for a job at Jobvite. Well, I guess technically I was.

Their web site claims "Companies use Jobvite to hire faster." and "Jobvite streamlines your hiring process for speed." The great irony is that my initial contact with Jobvite was on Oct 21, exactly 7 weeks ago today. I have been in for 3 rounds of interviews, the last one on Nov 10. That was a month ago. And I've heard nothing since. This just plain sucks.

With a communications gap that long, I can only conclude they aren't interested. But for a company that is building the "next generation eRecruitment tool," this certainly doesn't make them look like experts in the space. No matter how great your tool is, you still need dedicated people using it to make your hiring process a success. As a company focused on improving the recruiting experience, I expected better.

I'm also interviewing at Mozilla  — which happens to be one of Jobvite's customers — and it is night and day comparing the process. I give a lot of credit to Dayna Wu, Mozilla's rock star admin who is totally on top of everything and communicates with aplomb. If Mozilla were offering a recruiting/hiring tool, I'd recommend it unreservedly.

The sad thing is, Jobvite's behavior is becoming the norm.

I recently had outpatient surgery (a tonsillectomy), so I have had several prep and follow-up appointments in addition to the surgery in the past few weeks. I go to the Palo Alto Medical Foundation (PAMF), and overall I love them. But when they build their new facility, someone really screwed up the parking. I mean really.

The parking lot is so bad, they have hired several permanent workers to direct traffic through the garage. Off the top of my head I can think of 3 places where guys in orange and yellow vests with glowing orange flashlight wands play traffic cop all day, every day.

It's so bad, my wife and I have create the PAMF parking (Pp) scale, which can be used to rate the ease of parking anywhere. Pp = 1 just like c, the speed of light. All other parking facilities in the world are some fraction of a Pp. Like c, Pp is a theoretical maximum for exactly how screwed up you could possibly make a parking facility without resorting to concious malice.

In stark contrast to PAMF, there is the Eureka Tower Carpark in Melbourne, Australia. While I haven't experienced it first-hand, the pictures I've seen make this a near zero on the Pp scale. I really love the big, obvious labels painted in perspective smack in the middle of the driver's line of sight. It'd be pretty hard to screw up navigation there. 

I grew up in Michigan, in the metro-Detroit 'burbs. My house was just over a mile away from the GM Tech Center. Many of my friends had family that worked for the auto companies, or for their suppliers. And we even owned our share of GM cars, like the Chevy Impala station wagon that saved my life when a red light runner T-boned me on the driver side at 45. His car was totaled; I drove home.

But we also had a Chevy Manza, which was such a piece of shit I remember my dad driving it with in the summer with the heater on full blast to prevent it from overheating. After that, my mom got a Honda Accord and never looked back. She's on her 4th Accord right now. And that right there summarizes the problem with the big 3 auto-makers: they just don't understand what customers want in a car. Reliable. Inexpensive to operate. Easy to use. A pleasure to drive. Attention to detail. They don't want aggressive styling, or blowout sales events, cheap financing, or the fucking paint sealant and undercoat rustproofing thrown in for free. People want a car that just works.

And over the past 30 years, they've had ample opportunity to do so. They saw so well in the 70s and 80s how the small, reliable, economic cars were gradually increasing in popularity, and they did nothing to stop it. They rode the wave of SUVs, with their high profit margins, and chose not to invest in a truly diverse line of transportation. They made no serious effort for alternate fuel technology. They made this mess themselves. And now they want a bailout.

And what are they going to do with that money? They'll spend it on liquor and drugs. Metaphorically speaking, they are no different than the homeless guy on the street. Giving them money is just a band-aid over a gushing arterial wound. They will  waste it away and merely defer the inevitable demise of their companies, simply becuase management knows not now, nor never have they known, how to truly focus on creating a sustainable business that places customers at the center of everything they do.

Please, do not bail these incompetent companies out. Let them die, as the invisible hand of the free market is surely doing right now. To intervene is simply bad socialism. If you want to spend tens of billions of dollars propping up the economy, give it to the workers who lose their jobs. Retrain them. Create new public works programs to hire them into. Give them incentives to go into business for themselves. Give it to the people actually affected by this morass. But don't give it to the companies that failed year after year, decade after decade. They've already had their chance to turn things around time and time again. Now their time is over.

P.S. My standing offer to be CEO of Yahoo! also applies to GM, Ford, or Chrysler. Admittedly, I don't have an executive background, but I have the intelligence, drive, and most importantly, the focus. At this point, I think an unemotional, unencumbered outsider is just what these failing auto-makers need. Call me.

I've blogged before on how I have found recruiters to be "value subtract" to the recruiting process. Yet I continue to get pinged by recruiters, and I continue to run across interesting positions posted by recruiters. And worst of all, recruiters brazenly ask me if I know of anyone looking for the jobs they are trying to fill, hoping for the charity of my network in getting them their next commission.

Every large company I worked for offered bounties for employee referrals. Microsoft was a paltry $50 when I was there (now $1000; thanks, Andy!). Most places were at least $1000, and it went up to $5000 for key technical roles. I think this is a pretty good model, so it is one I am instituting for myself.

So recruiters, if you want my help in filling a position — whether the person hired is a referral I make, or even if the person hired is me — I require 30% of the commission you earn. I feel it is only fair, as I am referring top-quality candidates who are quite likely to get hired. So I am basically handing you free money with hardly any effort on your side.

If you're interested in such a business partnership, contact me.

He's got a camera and a big goofy grin. He looks harmless enough. Maybe if I give him my spare change he'll go away...

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The biggest thing that annoys me about Microsoft software are the crusty layers of legacy that survive from version to version simply because the team didn't have time to fix it after paying the enormous internal tax working on the strategy du jour. Whether it's Hailstorm, or OLE, or the Digital Dashboard, or Sharepoint whatever thing is currently taking up 40%+ of the teams' resources.

So because of that, things like "the J bug" in Outlook never get fixed. Don't get me wrong. Turning :) into a Webdings smiley character was pretty cool stuff back in the day of the early interwebs. But now, not so much. Pretty much every email client is Unicode capable. And if you haven't noticed, the Webdings font tag too often gets stripped during transfer. So I end up reading lines like this in my email:

Is that what the kids are calling it these days? J

What a pathetic user experience. It makes the sender look like a moron. That's right, Outlook: You are making your customers look like idiots when they use your product. And the sad thing is that the fix is trivial. Just swap out that WebDings J with a Unicode smiley: ☺.

I really wish there was a marketplace where I could bid to get certain bugs fixed. I'd pay for this one. And I don't even use Outlook.