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04/11/2008
I don't like to talk about my cars, primarily because I have no real luck with them. My good car is usually broken and sitting in a shop somewhere (as it is now), and my backup car (a Ford Taurus I bought new 10 years ago) just died for good on Friday with about 240,000 km on it. That may have been a blessing though. I ran into an Australian couple who decided to leave Canada for home because they wanted to reconnect with family (poor buggers). They had a 1999 Chevy Malibu with a 3.1 litre V6 that they needed to get rid of. It had 90,000km on it (54,000 miles, or about 6000 miles per year). I bought it. It drives perfectly. There are no significant stains or discolourations in the interior and it's comfortable and quiet and fuel efficient. For this, I spent $3500. The rain-covered picture below was taken about 10 minutes ago.
It's a bit of a reality check for me, this. Why exactly do we buy $50,000 vehicles and then spend $5000/year not including gas to keep them running? Ok, I admit it's not an exciting car, but in my experience with several, exciting cars tend not to work very reliably. I begin to reasses my automotive values.
29/10/2008
 I went to Starbucks with Gunda the other day and a painting on the wall caught my eye. It was huge, red and dramatic. We spent a bit of time guessing what it was, drank our bad Starbucks chais and that was pretty much that.
It was signed and it had a business card holder and a small white price tag underneath it. I looked at the price and thought, "It's probably worth that much but I can't justify that kind of expense." I snagged one of the business cards intending to just visit the painter's site and flushed it from my mind.
It didn't stay flushed. I visited his site and emailed him to tell him I had seen it, loved it, but couldn't pay his full price. He emailed back telling me he was more interested in finding it a good home than getting rich. A few hours ago, I met up with him and the deal was done.
It's hanging in my new support office, now, and it just feels right there. Gunda likes it. The night support tech on shift tonight hated it. I love it. To me, it looks like it has come home. I've disabled anonymous comments due to the extremist spam, and since I tend not to add people as users, that pretty much means I've disabled comments totally. I regret this but the alternative was to spend hours cleaning them up and I'm just not that dedicated.
To anyone who saw the comments before I deleted them, please note that the extremist comments on the blog were not mine, even if they had my name at the bottom. Until today, anyone could leave a comment (and obviously, they could end it with my name). 26/10/2008 I've always wondered if Jesus existed. I'm not talking about the separate question of whether he was the son of God. I'm talking about whether he existed at all. I can't find any evidence that he did. There are no Roman records of him, and the Romans were meticulous record keepers. Actually, there are no records of him at all that I can find other than the Bible which, when taken alone, is no more convincing than any other book to me. I don't believe Alice in Wonderland existed because she's mentioned in a single book. The other day, I stumbled across the story of Horus, the Egyptian falcon god, from 3000 years before Christ was allegedly born. Here are some interesting facts about Horus (credit to various sources around the net).
- Horus was born of a virgin on December 25 in a cave/manger with his birth being announced by a star in the East and attended by three wise men.
- His earthly father was named Seb (Joseph).
- At at 12, he was a child teacher in the Temple, and at 30, he was baptized having disappeared for 18 years.
- Horus was baptized in the river Eridanus or Iarutana (Jordan) by Anup the Baptizer (John the Baptist), who was decapitated.
- He had 12 desciples, two of who were his witnesses.
- He performed miracles, exorcised demons and raised El-Azarus from the dead.
- Horus walked on water.
- His personal epithet was Iusa, the ever-becoming son of Ptah, the Father. He was thus called Holy Child.
- He delivered a Sermon on the Mount and his followers recounted the Sayings of Iusa.
- Horus was transfigured on the Mount.
- He was crucified between two thieves, buried for three days in a tomb, and resurrected.
- He was called the Way, the Truth, the Light, Messiah, God’s Anointed Son, the Son of Man, the Good Shepherd, the Lamb of God, the Word made flesh, the Word of Truth, etc.
- He was called the Fisher and was associated with the Fish, Lamb and Lion.
- He came to fulfill the Law.
- Horus was called the KRST, or Anointed One.
- Horus was supposed to reign one thousand years.
I could've sworn I've heard some of that stuff before.
18/10/2008 That's the view out of my apartment near the data center. I used to have an unobstructed view of the data center itself but the Infiniti complex went up between us and hid it. That complex is a $350,000,000 project with 5 skyscrapers and 1400 luxury condos. Only one of the skyscrapers is finished, but two more are halfway up. Except for one problem. The second mortgages were backed by Lehman Brothers and didn't materialize. All the other major lenders had no liquidity and were spooked by subprime anyway. The entire $350 million dollar project sought and received bankruptcy protection a few days ago. It now sits empty and silent after years of busy activity, one of the first victims of the liquidity crisis. It won't be the last. To those involved as condo buyers, it means a loss of many thousands and often hundreds of thousands of dollars. To those not directly involved but living nearby, we've gone from having this huge project we were proud of to hoping some buyer comes along and picks up the pieces at fire sale prices just so we don't have to look at the eyesore every day (and you can't miss it no matter where you are nearby). Anyone who thinks the problems in the US won't affect Canada should come visit the data center. What an ugly mess. And things are likely to get uglier. 07/06/2008
I've had so many Blackberries over the years, I can't remember them all. I've disliked most of them. They were generally great PDAs but terrible phones. Last year, I made the switch to the Blackberry-compatible Nokia e62, and for the first time ever, I had a truly useful all-in-one device. It seemed to me that Nokia had out-Blackberried RIM. Well, a year of wear and tear later, my little e62 was clearly ready to be retired, and I bought myself a lovely unlocked Blackberry 8800 on eBay. Here are my first impressions.
Fit & Finish
What an elegant little thing this Blackberry is. It's mostly plastic, of course, as almost all phones are these days, but it's a high-quality plastic and there are enough chromed metal bits to make the thing look good. The glowing trackball in the middle is a nice touch that somehow manages to not be gaudy, and the bright and clear screen all add to the mix in making the 8800 a very nice looking device, at least to my eyes.
Phone
This is the first Blackberry in my experience that works decently as a phone. Most of this has to do with the speed of operation, which is usually close to instant unlike previous Blackberries, and the revised user interface that makes it far easier to type numbers in during a call. Do note that I've only had a day or two of use, and annoyances often take longer than that to arise. So far so good, though.
GPS
There's not much to say about the GPS other than it seems to work flawlessly. I navigated to the Blackberry Maps application, selected "Turn on GPS" and found myself looking at my position after a few minutes of "searching for satellites". It nicely kept my speed displayed in real-time while driving, and showed the names of upcoming cross streets in a band below the map. Highly useful.
Interestingly, Google's Map application which I also downloaded works much better on this Blackberry than it did on my Nokia e62. The "My Location" feature of Google Maps (which doesn't use GPS but instead uses some cellular-based locating capability) didn't work at all on the Nokia, but works fine on the Blackberry. It's not as useful as Blackberry Maps' full fledged GPS, but it's an excellent alternative and the actual maps themselves are of higher quality overall on Google Maps.
Since both applications get their maps in real time over the Internet, they're much more up-to-date than those on stand alone GPS units, although the stand alone units are often much more feature laden. I don't much care about features, myself. The convenience of carrying a single device and the availability of up-to-date online maps of the entire world far outweigh the lack of a handful of features I wouldn't likely use, anyway.
Email
I didn't think it would be possible to improve on the Nokia's ability to check my 10 or so email accounts quickly, but the 8800 has. One glance shows me all of those accounts in real-time, including which accounts have new mail, and a single click lets me view all the mail from all my accounts in one shot.
One huge feature the Blackberry has over my old Nokia is the ability to set different ringtones for each email account. This lets me keep most silent, while alerting me if an email comes in on one of the accounts I consider important.
Changing from the Nokia was totally trivial, too. I took the SIM out of the Nokia, plugged it in to the Blackberry, and went to the Blackberry website on my computer expecting to spend the next half hour configuring my email on the new phone. Instead, it had detected that the SIM was in a new device and asked me something like, "Do you want to change devices from your Nokia e62 to the Blackberry 8800 you've been playing with?" I said, "Yes, please." and that was all there was to it. All my accounts were available on the Blackberry within a few minutes.
Calendar
I hadn't used the calendar functions on my Nokia because I like the Google Calendar and I didn't want to keep appointments in two places. Well, it seems Google has a sync application available for Blackberry that wasn't available for Nokia. With it, your Google Calendar and Blackberry Calendar are kept 100% in sync, and appointments added/edited/deleted in one are equally affected in the other. It's not perfect. Syncs need to be done manually, generally, as the automatic ones sometimes fail. Still, I've got my schedule synchronized and available from any PC through Google and from my phone through Blackberry Calendar, which is as good as my appointment-keeping has ever been.
Google Talk
A few weeks ago, I uninstalled MSN Messenger. I had a million reasons that I won't bother covering, but the bottom line is that Google Talk is my replacement. It runs in a browser, as a desktop app, and now, on my phone. I can log in from multiple locations without having it log me out at the others, and it seems to work flawlessly. Instant messaging isn't my primary use for the phone, but it's handy to have.
Overall
It's too early to be really definitive, but so far, this is the best phone I've ever owned by far.
26/05/2008You probably don't know this, but there's a huge battle being waged on the Internet, and it's like nothing we've seen before. The net itself is the primary weapon. The combatants are the Church of Scientology and a group calling itself Anonymous which openly seeks to destroy them.
Scientologists, this post does contain OT material, so be aware of that before you read on.
 What is Scientology? First, the basics. The organization itself says "Scientology is the study and handling of the spirit in relationship to itself, others and all of life." From my reading, Scientology is a religion based mainly on the work of L. Ron Hubbard in which adherents proceed through many levels by taking courses and receiving counseling/therapy (called auditing). Each level is alleged to bring benefits to the adherent. This progression through the levels is called the "Bridge to Total Freedom". The organization is heavily structured and has its own paramilitary (the Sea Org), its own CIA-like wing (the Office of Special Affairs or OSA) and even its own prisons (Rehabilitation Project Force or RFP camps). Scientology Doctrine Scientologists strive to rid themselves of the influence of engrams (whatever they're supposed to be) in order to achieve a state called Clear. Once having achieved this state, they are then permitted to embark on what are called the OT (operating thetan) levels, which include most of the more controversial teachings. These include the story that, 75 million years ago, an evil Galactic warlord named Xenu brought billions of people to Earth in DC-8-like spacecraft, stacked them around volcanoes and killed them using hydrogen bombs. Scientology holds that their essences remained, and that they form around people in modern times, causing them harm. The Xenu story is only taught to Scientologists who have attained the OT III level, and is hidden from all those below that level. L. Ron Hubbard even claimed that reading the OT III material before one was ready would result in pneumonia, which may explain my respiratory problems. It's too late for you now, though. You've already heard the story. Criticisms of Scientology I'm going to list some of the main criticisms of the Church of Scientology here without claiming that they're true. I simply note that this is what critics of the CoS allege.
- The CoS is not a religion at all, but is a money-making business with the goal of selling lots of courses and course materials.
- They hide their true doctrine from new recruits who, if told the truth, would probably not join. They also deny their true doctrine when queried, although hundreds of ex-scientologists have confirmed such things as the Xenu story as true.
- Their claims have not been scientifically verified, and any effort to do so is rebuffed by the CoS.
- Almost anyone who leaves the church is labeled a "Suppressive Person" and church members are forbidden from communicating with them. This has resulted in the breakup of many families.
- Their current leader, David Miscavige, is accused of being a temperamental dictator who physically abuses his staff.
- They use litigation as a weapon, aggressively filing suit against their critics.
- The "Fair Game" policy instituted by Hubbard encourages them to attempt to "totally destroy" those critical of the church. This policy was amended to apply only to those declared suppressive persons, but as almost everyone who leaves the church is declared to be one, this amendment doesn't impede them much. Ex-members and critics are often harrassed with extremely sleazy methods, even having leaflets about their sex lives distributed to their neighbours.
- The church brainwashes its members and restricts access to any dissenting opinion.
I've probably missed a few criticisms, but these give you a general picture of what those critical of Scientology have to say. The Tom Cruise Incident Tom Cruise made a video for Scientology that was leaked to the Internet. In this video, he appeared to some as, well, insane. This alone is hardly news, especially as he has done some nutty things in recent years and many people have thought him a bit crazy. What happened, however, is that the CoS aggressively moved to suppress distribution of the video and even forced YouTube to take it down and suspend the accounts of those who put it up. Some very popular anti-Scientology critics like Mark Bunker and Tory Christman had their accounts suspended. These actions on the part of the CoS caused a huge swell of resentment among many people, including many outside the anti-Scientology movement. Anonymous A group calling itself Anonymous was so offended by the actions of the CoS over the Cruise video that they declared war on the CoS. This started as a series of hacker attacks, including attempts to hijack the CoS website, but the group quickly abandoned such methods and is now focused on using only non-criminal methods. Their primary attacks on the church are:
- Peaceful but relentless protests in front of Scientology churches and orgs.
- Flooding the Internet with copyrighted Scientology material with the intention of showing people what they see as the true story behind Scientology.
The CoS considers Anonymous to be cyberterrorists and accuses them of death threats and other such things. The FBI, however, has said they are unaware of any illegal activity on the part of Anonymous and do not consider the group to be a threat. Anonymous is identified by their masks, their dancing at protests, and their unfortunate fondness for awful music, particularly Rick Astley's "Never gonna give you up". Where We Are Today In just a few short months, the methods of Anonymous, whether moral or not, appear to have been extremely effective. Previously unavailable Scientology material is now readily available all over the Internet, and the CoS appears to be unable to keep up with the lawsuits. The real-world protests have been relentless, worldwide, well organized and show no signs at all of subsiding. Every Scientology org worldwide gets "rickrolled" at least once a month, and the resulting news coverage has drawn a huge amount of attention to those critical of the church, allowing them to get their message out. This may be the most interesting battle in the history of the Internet, with the primary weapon being the net itself. Anonymous is clearly violating copyright law by releasing Scientology material, but they're doing it in a way that is nearly impossible to prosecute. Many CoS insiders report a huge decline in recruiting and a huge increase in defections from the church. The CoS, on the other hand, is actually garnering some sympathy for having been targeted by a group that openly seeks to destroy it. As of this moment, my money is on Anonymous, but I don't count the Church of Scientology out at all. It won't be a short fight.
19/05/2008
Happy Victoria Day. Queen Victoria was a hag, but having noted this, I'll happily take the day off and use it to catch up a bit. I remember when I started traveling to the US a lot in 2000. I only stopped in 2007, but for almost 7 years, I was in the US a couple of times a week while living in Canada. Some observations:
- When I first started going, it felt very different down there. After a few months, I got used to all the little things that felt so different and the two places seemed much more similar.
- The roads are wider and more developed in the US, and on the interstate highways, a huge swath of trees is cut beside each highway as a buffer zone. In Canada, the trans-Canada highway is often just 2 or 4 lanes, and we let the trees grow almost up to the edge of the road. I have no doubt the US way is safer and much better for trucks, but our way appeals to my eyes.
- On the other hand, litter is better controlled on US Interstate highways. This might be because of the Adopt-A-Highway program. I don't know. Whatever it is, I wish we'd do the same thing up here.
- Food in the US tastes heavily processed and is served in quantites that boggle the mind and fatten the belly. Americans visiting Vancouver often have to order two meals to get the quantites they're used to, particularly at sushi places.
- Americans like single-family-houses. People there tend to live in townhouses or apartments only if they can't afford a house. In Canada, townhouses and apartments are just as often a lifestyle choice, and often cost more than houses.
- The drivers in northern Washington are more polite than BC drivers, generally. The drivers in Seattle are just as obnoxious as we are, but no worse.
- There's an edge of violence to some US cities, and since you never know if the guy you're arguing with has a gun, you tend to be hyperaware of how badly things can escalate.
- Vancouver has more beggars than Seattle. They tend not to be obnoxious but they're there. Seattle has a normal number of beggars for a city its size, but Vancouver has more than a normal amount and the politicians here tend to be tree hugging communists so they won't do anything about it.
- Vancouver has far more Asians. The US has far more black people.
- Americans are friendlier, I'd say. Strangers often smile at you and chat with you. Women, especially, seem more willing to strike up a conversation in the US in my experience. This is a net positive, of course, but it does mean that you end up exchanging mindless platitudes with total strangers quite a bit.
15/05/2008
Every now and then, I encounter someone in a panic about the fact that a website they've surfed to knows their IP. This panic often results in the discovery of various anonymous web surfing services (sometimes called proxy servers) that purportedly allow you to browse the web without anyone knowing who you are. Now, everyone is welcome to be as paranoid on this topic as they choose. I will note, however, that in my opinion, most of the paranoia on this topic is rooted in a total lack of knowledge on the part of the paranoid.
Every web server has always been able to see the IP address of every visitor. This has been true from the beginnings of the web and is fundamental to TCP/IP. It has never changed. When you browse to a website, what is actually happening is that your DNS subsystem resolves a canonical/host name (like www.regnatarajan.com) to an IP address, and then your networking subsystem initiates a connection to that IP address -- in the case of an HTTP connection, it usually connects to port 80. The web server on the other end usually allows that port to be opened and sends back responses to the requests made by your system.
This is always true. There is no other way to browse to a website hosted on a web server, and all web sites are hosted on web servers of some kind or other. There are minor variances to the mechanisms described above, such as entering the IP address directly in the address line, but these result in the exact same thing minus the DNS resolution and they don't change the basic principles involved. Now, here's the important part: as soon as this connection is open, the web server knows your IP address. Every time. It has to, or it wouldn't know where to send back the responses.
Every web server you connect to knows your IP. Deal with it.
Now, anonymous web surfing services simply introduce a layer between you and the web server. You connect to the anonymizer service, it connects to wherever you want to go, and it passes the information back and forth like a relay agent. The web server only sees the anonymizer's IP and you never connect to the web server directly so you're anonymous, right? Wrong. You are simply now trusting the anonymizer service with your security instead of the web server, which is usually highly dubious. The CIA is strongly suspected of operating many of the popular anonymizer services, and some others are operated by kids and hobbyists who I, personally, wouldn't trust at all with my personal data. I know this to be true as many of them rent servers from my company to do it. Beyond this, any anonymizer service in the US, even if it honestly intends to be credible, is subject to the Patriot Act which allows government to inspect the service's logs and data and forbids that service from informing its clients that this has happened.
Now, if there's a site you particularly distrust but need to access, using an anonymizer service may be a credible thing to do in that case, but don't delude yourself into thinking you're anonymous. You've just shifted your vulnerability from one party to another. 12/05/2008
My mother sent me this. She's 74 and has time on her hands, it seems.
1 x 8 + 1 = 9
12 x 8 + 2 = 98
123 x 8 + 3 = 987
1234 x 8 + 4 = 9876
12345 x 8 + 5 = 98765
123456 x 8 + 6 = 987654
1234567 x 8 + 7 = 9876543
12345678 x 8 + 8 = 98765432
123456789 x 8 + 9 = 987654321
1 x 9 + 2 = 11
12 x 9 + 3 = 111
123 x 9 + 4 = 1111
1234 x 9 + 5 = 11111
12345 x 9 + 6 = 111111
123456 x 9 + 7 = 1111111
1234567 x 9 + 8 = 11111111
12345678 x 9 + 9 = 111111111
123456789 x 9 +10= 1111111111
9 x 9 + 7 = 88
98 x 9 + 6 = 888
987 x 9 + 5 = 8888
9876 x 9 + 4 = 88888
98765 x 9 + 3 = 888888
987654 x 9 + 2 = 8888888
9876543 x 9 + 1 = 88888888
98765432 x 9 + 0 = 888888888
1 x 1 = 1
11 x 11 = 121
111 x 111 = 12321
1111 x 1111 = 1234321
11111 x 11111 = 123454321
111111 x 111111 = 12345654321
1111111 x 1111111 = 1234567654321
11111111 x 11111111 = 123456787654321
111111111 x 111111111= 12345678987654321 |
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Copyright 2008 Reg Natarajan. All rights
reserved.
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