doxagnosis

Touchdown!

2008-09-14T12:04:00.000-04:00

Why are the youth beginning to vote?

2008-01-22T21:33:00.000-05:00

I used to be annoyed by Rock the Vote. I really thought that they were a liberal crap-spouting organization designed to try and get rid of GW. Well, I don't know if that was the case or not, but trying to get movie stars to organize the youth around voting never left me with the warm and fuzzies.

Thinking about it, I really disliked celebrities talking about politics more than anything. This continues to bug me. I don't trust celebrities, and I believe that they generally know less about politics and the future of this country than the youth they trying to rally (and some of the candidates!). However, I am officially renouncing and apologizing for my previous RTV rants and misgivings.

Rock the Vote represents two great things for todays younger voters, such as myself. Firstly, and most importantly, they allow you to register online. You can register for the first time, change your address, political affiliation, etc. Today's youth care a lot more about thing when they become accessible. Frankly, getting to the BMV to change a registration (and having to fill out a paper form!) is a much larger hassle in a young persons mind than in the generation that preceded. (Now if we could only do our taxes online without going through a third-party...)

Secondly they have embraced the online social community. This seems like a no-brainer, but I'd like to point out that the last election they did a lot of crap to try and get people to vote. They didn't do much else. It translated like this...

"GO AND VOTE! YOU SHOULD CARE ABOUT THE VOTE BECAUSE YOU SHOULD!"

The truth was, no one liked the candidates back then... They both sucked...
For young people, they were nearly as exciting and trustworthy as a Wall Street Broker and a Car Salesman (I'll let you guess who is who) but now the candidates are actually exciting...

Well, at least, they are enabling youth to care and discuss in a medium they are comfortable with.

Sure, there are still rappers and celebrities...but at least they aren't as obnoxious.

Limewire on 30% of Computers

2007-12-27T21:52:00.000-05:00

This study seems to have generated some buzz. I'm not sure it's something you really need to know about to be an educated person, but I think it can be viewed as an enlightening business idea.

Think about it, iTunes works at $1 per song...people like being legal.
Over 35% download "illegally"...of computers...which means most people that have songs on their computer...so people are heavily interested in piracy?

Aside from the fact that don't believe in the legitimacy of this survey because the information appears to be gleaned from a particular site without the knowledge of the user, I think you can see that there's money left on the table.

DRM finally appears to be disappearing a little bit, but the music/movie industry needs to get on their toes. They have been dumping money into fighting the ol' fight against dem pirates for a while now...and it doesn't really appear to be working....

When will they realize that the best way to make money is to give people what they want at a price they think is fair? Umm...it's supply and demand...the supply has been going up in songs and in distribution...should the price be the same?

I haven't built up a lifetime of expertise in the business...but if you're not following these simple rules...isn't there money out there that someone is leaving on the table?

Not Much Time Left...

2007-12-26T21:54:00.000-05:00

What you should know today

2007-12-19T19:36:00.000-05:00

http://nonprofitshoppingmall.com/
This seems pretty cool. I've never used it, but I like the idea.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/geekthevote08
This is a really easy place to see what the upcoming presidential hopefuls think about a few issues related to geekdom. How does this affect you that might not be geeks? Well, luckily geeks today are on the leading edge of the environment discussion...and they might be the only ones that can safeguard your freedoms in the future. Okay, that might be a proud overstatement, but seriously, some real privacy and property issues that affect everyone will be dealt with in the upcoming election. Vote for someone that understands the issues.

FCC Relaxes Media Ownership Rules
I'm pretty upset about this one. For years there have been laws about who can own what in the media. For example, if you are a major network owner in a town, and you want to buy the newspaper too - you probably can't...until now.

There are many negatives that can happen with media consolidation. For instance, a single ownership is going to limit the coverage of the news. It's also going to limit the venues for advertising. This means you are going to see less diversity in advertising (but I highly doubt less advertising).

Anyway, the biggest rub is that the FCC did this against the advice of the public and Congress. If you feel so inclined to look into the issue and maybe take a little time to be active in the political stage, go here.

[rant warning]

[rant]
Congress slashes science budget. also here.
This one really pisses me off. I don't use that language often, but I mean it when I do.
My idea is this, about IRAQ and about PATENT REFORM:

1. We shouldn't have gone to war. We should have gone after Osama, and if the country wanted to (which we obviously must have) gone after Saddam, but not total war/cleanup everything. We should have defined the mission, and if the rest of the world hated us for going in and leaving after we were done killing our enemies: fine. They hate us now anyways.
2. The better option to war with any Middle Eastern country would be to revolutionize the economy in a way that does not involve oil. We spend about 275 billion a day on the war! Can you honestly tell me that, if we had spent $275 million per day on energy research that we wouldn't have it figured out by now?

We realized with Sputnik that we needed more emphasis on education so that we can do better research. You know what? It worked! We did awesome in the second half of the 20th century. When are we going to learn we need to KEEP LEARNING! WE ARE NOT AT A TIME WHERE WE CAN SLOUCH ON RESEARCH AND KNOWLEDGE! The rest of the world is shifting to value all of this more, and we are shutting down because we don't see the immediate benefit...and of course it doesn't get many elected.

THIS NEEDS TO CHANGE. Without this you will see more emphasis on war, more emphasis on spending, and less economic development. Not only that, we make our aged economic behemoths that are relying on old, and non-green, technology even more comfortable - and thus scared of change - which further delays progress.

[/rant]

manikos

2007-12-19T02:18:00.000-05:00

:scatterbrained

This is officially a first post. As I have been scattered over the web for as long as I know, tonight starts a new turn in my internet life.

Many have heard me rant and moan about the things that I feel the world should know; things that I feel everyone should care about. I follow pretty much all things tech, and I have a secret passion for politics. My real interests lie in Intellectual Property and Idealism.

I hold a firm belief that there are perfect solutions out there, but that all too often people simply do not work hard enough to achieve them together. I'm going to (hopefully) discuss some of that here.

Why tonight to start this new venture? Why, it's simple really. Hopefully someone else's manifestation of a dream will reach me tomorrow. Tomorrow I hope to receive the OLPC XO which, by the way, is something I whole-heartedly support.

www.laptopgiving.org
www.laptop.org