on the top of your game

Just learned that my program of study ranked in the top 20 nationally for supply chain management. The full details are here.

This isn't a big shocker, given the quality of my SCM professors. They literally wrote (or co-wrote) two of the leading books in the field. Anyway, congrats to my fairly young program on gaining some recognition. Hopefully it will spill over in the form of employment momentum.

on the future of energy

Recently I spoke with someone who works over the renewable energy division of a large utility provider. Based on blogs and industry-related articles, it's sometimes a concern that renewable energy is just a sort of fad that will pass. My gut says otherwise, but it's as though folks in the industry don't want to get too optimistic about the chances that cleantech will stick around this time.

With that said, here are some things that make me think cleantech (and, nastily, I include fusion/fission, and biomass) will have some sticking power this time around.

Exhibit A:
My bank, in Texas, is buying carbon offsets from a wind provider. It's a bank geared toward military service members, who are fairly skeptical--at best--about environmental issues.

Exhibit B:
Intel is placing itself at the fore of cleantech VC investments, along with seasoned energy VC firms like Khosla and Braemar. A company built on the high-tech industry sees not only merit in cleantech, but also profit potential.

Exhibit C:
This Bloom Box is only one of so many really cool technologies I've spied in the pipeline. Other really great prospects include edge-collecting solar which is 2x as efficient and 1/4 as expensive as traditional PV, non-traditional wind capture systems, advancements in nuclear, and Thorium-powered nuclear reactors, but that's only scratching the surface. I still think, though, that the future of energy belongs to the one who can create an efficient, clean, cost-effective way to store energy that has been collected from cleantech. Also, the one who figures out a way to reduce the overall footprint of a global supply chain.

I'm workin' on it, folks. ;)

Win-Win is a sort of dangerous term

I had a professor who argued that there's no such thing as win-win in conflict negotiations. In her opinion, if neither party is compromising even slightly, then there wasn't an actual conflict to begin with. As a political scientist by education, I tend to agree. It's the basic Prisoner's Dilemma: the only way to win 100% is if the other party loses 100%. The 'win-win' most folks refer to is, in reality, Nash equilibrium, which is a situation where you optimize both parties' outcomes by compromising slightly in order to avoid getting totally screwed over. Else they're referring to synergy, which is a misapplication of the term. (Synergy is creating something greater than the sum of its parts, whereas Nash equilibrium is effectively creating something less than the sum of its parts.)

With that said, though, I'm going to clunkily segue into this story about Don't Ask Don't Tell.

The amazing Ian sends this article, and adds:

Everybody wins!

* The military generals seem not to have a problem with it.

* Evidence of similar equality in other Western armies (like the UK) suggests that the ranks will be against it in general, but that tends to melt away when it actually happens.

* Lieberman gets to run with it, giving him a chance to reestablish his liberal credentials (he took a huge hit in Connecticut over the HCR mess), whilst also making it somewhat more palatable to pick off a Republican or two.

* The public is now in favour of repealing DADT. Even Dick Cheney thinks it's time!

* It's the White House's idea to give it to Lieberman, so if it gets through, they get a big slice of the credit.

* And homosexual soldiers get to serve openly. Obviously, the most important winners :)

Here's crossing our fingers it gets passed quickly and smoothly. If it does, I think it does basically end up being an excellent example of 'win-win' synergy, as the military gets back an incredible number of mission critical members, and gays get to serve openly without fear of retribution for their private lifestyles. I'd like to add that in this case a 14-year-old conflict actually does exist as well.

On the other hand, the opposition then send articles like this one, which is ominously titled "Troops oppose repeal of 'don't ask'." Meanwhile, if you actually read the article, nearly 80% are fine with repealing the policy. How should we expect this policy to change when those who oppose the repeal of DADT think that 19% opposition from a traditionally wildly conservative organization is considered broad enough to blanketly apply to the majority of service members?

The Life of the Mind

This is a sort of extension of the discussion in my previous post about education. In this instance, a grad school professor of English talks about the lies surrounding the benefits of graduate school in the humanities. In a nutshell: the career prospects suck unless you're already well connected. There's no such thing as a meritocracy (or, not nearly to the degree it's suggested). Professors are self-justifying about this and care not whether their students end up with minimum-wage jobs.

This, to me, sounds a lot closer to reality than the doe-eyed essay about how majoring in something you just super-love will automatically bring happiness and rainbows to your life, job reality be damned!

Again, this is not to say that I'm against the arts and humanities. I was almost an English major myself, and I have friends who work in publishing, or are accomplished artists. I just think that given the volume of English majors in the world, there aren't enough jobs in the field to carry them. Aspiring English majors should be told this, and told of possible related majors and fields that would satisfy their lust for language while giving them more concrete job prospects. Diffuse the students to improve prospects for everyone.

one last amalgam of links

1.

(future poli sci majors, many illustrious housing options await you!)
Stop Asking Me My Major
Stanford Poli Sci grad complains that people asking what practical use a degree has only causes stress, isn't productive. As a poli sci undergrad myself, I can't help but say that yes, there's value to all degrees, but it would be nice if there were more guidance on career trajectory in high school and college. I *loved* my poli sci courses, but I didn't realize poli sci majors were expected to a) go to law school, b) get PhD'd in poli sci and teach, c) work as an unpaid lackey for some sleazy politician's campaign, or d) bag groceries. English majors may get into med school, but not without med school in mind, or there's no way they'd have all the prerequisite courses and grades. Also, someone from the comments (a liberal arts career counselor) posted this juicy nugget as evidence that liberal arts degrees are useful. My takeaway: further evidence that liberal arts degrees without PhDs land you a job serving tables. Another eyebrow-raiser: the author's friend ditched 'high-paying' medicine for a more populist engineering degree. Wait, what?

2.

Free is Not a Marketing Tool
A thought-provoking article that I think is ultimately a bit foolishly idealistic. While it's true that giving things away for free doesn't always--or even generally--create loyal customers, it can be an invaluable marketing tool in some instances. And it definitely shouldn't be discounted as a tool for startups and creative-class workers to generate interest in what they're selling. Suggesting that "free" as a marketing tool is somehow wrong is also pretty offensive to small businesses and self-employed workers relying on buzz and word of mouth. There's an aphorism in economics: you can't make money off something that's public knowledge. Which is to say, you can't create long-term competitive advantage when everyone's doing the same thing. To argue with this is to argue with the foundation of a capitalist system of exchange, which I won't do in this forum.

3.

The mole was a fake?*
30 Awesome Rare Celeb Photos
I'm particularly struck by #9.
*(I may be the last person on earth to know it, but it was news to me.)

4.

1930s Atlas Lust!
*drool* ...except, page 95 disturbs me. A lot.

The sin of omission...

This is just pathetically sad.

I thought we were a decade into the 21st century. What's the deal, folks? The LGBTQ community is a legitimate population, with measurable purchasing habits and demographic information, and even has representatives holding public office. Even if I don't understand or agree with people's feelings against same-sex marriage, I sort of get it, you know? But thinking that it ought to be okay to openly discriminate against people because you disapprove of them personally? Just wrong.

Oh, wait. I shouldn't be surprised, coming from this guy. What surprises me more is that there are enough people like him to have elected him.

Yes, despite everything, maybe I'm more of an optimist than I get credit for.

I'm tired of these motherf'in fat people on this motherf'in plane

I know I'm a bit behind the curve to weigh in on this story (zing!), but the whole Kevin Smith being kicked off a SWA flight for being too fat thing has the blogosphere in a tizzy, bickering back and forth about whether he's a whiny fat bastard or justifiably enraged. Being a "passenger of size" myself, I tend toward the latter opinion.

In that spirit, I'll share my two favorite articles to come out of this mess. This Kate Harding article on Salon has been, in my opinion, one of the most coherent expressions of what it's like to both fly while fat and hear some of the hateful things said about Smith in the wake of this. Following that, I really appreciated this insight on Fatshionista.

I think others have covered the issue more eloquently than I could, so I'll forgo my own story. I'll say, though, that as a fat person, I wish I were enraged like Mr. Smith rather than profoundly humiliated whenever my size gets called into question.

an excellent opportunity

for MBAs with an interest in consulting, or for nonprofits in need of some business help.

The Micro Consulting for NC program offers (volunteer) North Carolina MBAs and needy nonprofits the opportunity to connect for some business consulting interchange.

Do not adjust your TV set

We control the horizontal.

We control the vertical.

We control your heart.

[ UPDATE: (in best attempt at He-Man voice) By the power of Google, I HAVE THE POWER! ]

Can't you see I'm white and nerdy?

Thought I'd share a few design-centric things that made me happy over the past couple of days in my cruisings of the internet (not necessarily in any particular order). It's nice to see such quant-based representation. Yay, numbers nerds!

1.


The State of the Internet - lovely visuals to demonstrate what's up with the internet, who's using it, how often, and how. Things learned from this:
(a) It's important to think about where data come from, since this visual repeatedly switches from a US to global data set
(b) The arrow for Netherlands should point to Netherlands, not Denmark. It really erodes your credibility
(c) Pick your visual carefully. People see pie charts and assume all things should go on one pie chart, forgetting that not all things are mutually exclusive

2.


We feel fine. - nice set of visuals from a several years' worth of phrase-mining on blogs. The project has sought any mention in blogs of "I feel" or "I'm feeling" phrases, aggregated them (at a rate of 15-20k per diem), and apparently--as a whole--the blogosphere feels fine.

3.


Annual Reports are Awesome. - a collection of stunning print items combining two of my favorite things to nerd out about--design and finance. I'm so glad OKgreat understands the lustful appreciation some of us have for both design and numbers.

4.


Design--nature trumps humanity. - Brainless slime molds manage to replicate the work of hundreds of engineers, nearly replicating the layout of the Tokyo rail system in a matter of hours.

5.

(apologies to Avatar Pocahontas for using an image from the movie)
Colors of the Wind? - An LED array attached to mini wind turbines helps visualize wind patterns. Seems like it could be tremendously useful for plotting out wind farms or alternative wind capture devices.

6.


Physical Color Picker - the coolest concepts will never see the light of day. *sigh*

I wish they hadn't asked

and I wish these results weren't so telling.

Add yet another reason I think both parties are out of touch. What on earth could cause so-called "progressives" to display such a wide discrepancy between results? Wider, even, than conservatives. Just unbelievable.

(link via @maddow)

Building trust by shutting down communications

Iran says it's shutting down gmail in favor of an in-house developed email. The government says it's to foster trust and to develop its own tech infrastructure.

...suuure. Let me know how that goes, fellas.

(link via DET)

Yes we can.

really satisfying message of the day, from my Mom's old friend, who's a school crossing guard. apparently, she went to work and this had been anonymously posted.


look closer...

thanks for the reminder.

thoughts for when I ought to be studying for my finance exam

Sea change beginning? I hope so. (link courtesy of Awesome Ian)

Hideously disturbing. Sometimes wish there were some way to control who reproduced and/or raised kids that was more effective than DSS/CPS.

Really rather hilarious (and, I suppose, also practical) patent issuance. Please check out the images. You'll be so happy you did.

Via Make, a really awesome mini-documentary about how vinyl records are made.

Now, I go to sleep. Two hours too late. Stupid mid-evening nap.

Little boxes on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky tacky.

I thought this concept was pretty cool, and sort of sexy in a bizarre, house-is-only-slightly-bigger-than-you sort of way. I heard it suggested as useful for disaster relief efforts. I gotta say, I'm sure people with no homes would kill for one of these right now.

Trust in me, in all you do. Have the faith I have in you.

I must admit I half-chuckled to myself as I imagined my housemate reading this post.

On the list of banks ranked by level of consumer trust, my bank takes the top spot in insurance, and is close at its own heels in banking.

There's a lot to be said for a bank that aims to please. I suppose it's able to cut its costs a bit by stabilizing its membership based on certain demographics, but my bank consistently offers top-notch customer service, competitive pricing, standard plan features that other banks and insurers consider premium (or don't even offer), and an overall fantastic customer experience.

Bank of America? Not surprisingly, not even on the list. That's a bank suffering a serious crisis in customer confidence--haven't heard a single member lately who's really happy to be a member of that bank.

Worm food.

So tonight my housemate and I assembled a pretty quick & dirty vermicompost bin. I'm pretty excited about this, especially since they took away the compost bin from the apartments next door as they began the renovations. I'm looking forward to a healthy, bountiful garden this year (dangit!), and I'm hoping the little red wigglers can help me out in that respect. All that remains is to buy the actual worms (though our garden may turn some up over the next day or so).

The nice thing about vermicompost bins is that, in addition to requiring less maintenance and processing time, worm bins are less smelly, despite the fact that you're basically turning the contents into worm poop. In fact, the only time it smells is if you're doing something wrong, so it makes a great built-in alarm bell. In the end, the worm "castings" are one of the richest, safest forms of fertilizer, and they're pH neutral (like water!).

Anyway, there are any number of ways to build a vermicompost bin, but the simplest worm composter involves taking an opaque 18-gallon rubber tub with lid, drilling holes along the top and bottom of the bin, and throwing in some damp newspaper, a couple handfuls of soil, some leaf litter, and cardboard, then placing it over a drain tray and covering it. This is what we did, and it took all of 5 minutes from start to finish. I know it's rather nerdy, but I'm eagerly awaiting a vibrant worm bin.

On that note, I leave you with what is by now a classic youtube viral: the disgusting sewer worms under Cameron Village in Raleigh, NC.

R-E-C-Y-C-L-E, find out what it means to me

Sometimes I worry myself. I often find it difficult to motivate myself to crack a textbook (even in classes I enjoy), but I spent hours on end reading articles about how paper is recycled and issues faced in the recovered paper pulp industry for a case competition. Literal hours. Can we call it Applied Supply Chain and get academic credit for it? No? Damn.

(p.s., I'm still reading them, even though our application was turned in yesterday.)

Sociopolitical Networking, or Congress 2.0

This is a ridiculously nerdy and fascinating look at the evolution of the two major parties in Congress over time. It's interesting to visualize the phenomena, and how rare the real moderates can be. It also makes it that much more clear how impressive President Obama's meeting with the Republican members of Congress really was, and why something like that will probably get him demonized by both sides in the end.

It's a shame, the polarized state of politics, with its blind-deaf-dumb sloganeering party-lines-only existence. Alas, in a democracy, this is vox populi in its purest, most unfortunate form.

Yesterday's News (literally)

Defense Secretarry Gates and Joint Chiefs' chaiman Mullen came out (pun not intended, but I like it) in support of repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell. In an "it's about dadgum time" moment, the pair announced that repealing it was "the right thing to do" and that the Pentagon is working on a plan to transition to the new gay military.

In his twitter feed later, Mullen added:

Stand by what I said: Allowing homosexuals to serve openly is the right thing to do. Comes down to integrity.

I couldn't agree more.

The depressing news on antidepressants

is that, apparently, they're no more effective than placebos.

As one who has both experienced depression and known many people who sought treatment for (or otherwise fought) depression, I'm hesitant to believe the figures. The idea is that, in this study, people believed they were getting either antidepressant or placebo, right? So the results led the scientists to believe that antidepressants are only effective because people believe them to be.

On the other hand, there are only two major studies to have concluded this, and their research may not even have a statistically significant sample size.

One thing I agree on is that medication shouldn't be the first or only course of treatment. All treatment should be accompanied by ongoing therapy of some sort. The problem then becomes: how do we get mental health treatment for all who need it? Insurance plans, for those lucky enough to even be insured, often have incomplete to basically-no coverage of mental health care. Moreover, some employers stigmatize mental health care such that it's better to struggle with it internally than get treated and be ineligible for employment.

What's wrong with this picture?

all the young dudes

Recent news stories on two makers in the news.

Texting Underground can save lives and caves
I love the idea that digital messaging is something that can advance us; it's been getting a lot of flak lately, along with social networking and web 2.0. [side rant: Resistance is futile, my friends; take advantage of the benefits of social media before they become completely commoditized.]

The boy who paints like an old master
While I have my own views on old masters, this kid is an interesting study. It's sort of amusing/nauseating, though, how often his parents refute that he's being pushed into painting. Like, a) either he really is being pushed into it, and/or b) our news media try too hard to imply it such that it needs to be something repeated endlessly.

Now, on old masters, Kieron is quoted as not wanting to end up like Picasso, but rather more like Monet or Seago. Which is fine, really. The problem is how so many people mock modern art, mock abstract expressionism, mock cubism or surrealism or dadaism. I used to be among these, but I've come to hold these things dear to me.

For one thing, most of the folks who mock these forms of art haven't the slightest clue what Picasso was even trying to do (trying to revolutionize the concept of perspective in a completely different artistic language than what had been established). Second, many of these same folks couldn't distinguish a Monet from a Manet from a van Gogh... in fact, I'd lay wager that if you step into a room and asked people to identify a Monet from a lineup of paintings, fewer people could than if you asked people to identify a Picasso (unless you were a bastard and threw in one of 16-year-old Picasso's hyperrealistic paintings). Even fewer, a Seago.

The truth is, representing reality isn't all that unique. Sure, you can be a standout like Velazquez or Titian or El Greco, or you can be one of the lump of semi-indistinguishable impressionists, but creating your own interpretation of reality is so different from artist to artist. You can almost always tell a Miro from a Picasso from a Kandinsky from, well, you get the picture. This isn't to imply that there's no merit to strict representations of reality, but rather that one should take care before suggesting that a 3rd-grader could create better art than some of these abstract artists. It's all personal preference--folks who like classic paintings want beauty they can see; folks who prefer modern or abstract art want beauty they can feel.

Then there are the tightrope walkers. The Munchs, or the de Goyas (one of my personal favorites), or the Kahlos, or the Riveras. Then there's even the Warhols, who take ubiquitous imagery and feed it back to you to the nth degree, in hyperbolically popularized form.

Anyway, I won't talk about paying 1000GBP for a chalk drawing by a kid, and you don't talk about how Kandinsky is just a bunch of color and shapes on canvas. And we definitely won't start on classical ballet vs. contemporary.

Anyway, next time you try to write off someone's art because it doesn't look like anything, stop looking with your eyes. I leave you with a favorite quote from Picasso on language. Turns out, Picasso did a lot of really incredible things playing around with language (I'll be eternally grateful to the Nasher and their exhibit "Picasso and the Allure of Language" for opening my eyes to this):

If I begin correcting the mistakes you speak of according to rules with no relation to me, I will lose my identity to grammar I have not incorporated. I prefer to create myself as I see fit than to bend my words to rules that don't belong to me.
--Pablo Picasso, 1946