Friday, August 25, 2006

Wandering Minds

"People speak at 100 to 175 words per minute (WPM), but they can listen intelligently at 600 to 800 words per minute. " -- from Mindtools.com http://www.mindtools.com/CommSkll/ActiveListening.htm
 
The key phrase here is "listen intelligently."
 
I can talk very fast, and I will speed up even more when I get enthused about the topic (which always happens since what I am talking about I am already enthused about).
 
This makes it VERY hard for anyone who is listening to a person who is talking very slowly not interrupt them and finish their thought - you are in a wait state 7 seconds out of 8 seconds while they are talking and you can "race ahead" and finish their thought for them one they have spoken enough words. Sentences (in any language) have a pattern and once you get enough words you can predict with 98% accuracy what the the rest of the words have to be. It is like cracking any code - get enough of it and you can reverse engineer it and figure out the base encryption key. (read "Between Silk and Cyanide" ISBN 0-684-86422-3 by Leo Marks to understand how this is done.) . When people are speaking the "key" is their base idea.
 
I think this is why public speaking is so hard for many people at later ages. When they were young they thought and talked slowly therefore people got impatient with them and stopped talking with them thus made them NOT want to speak based on this social feedback given to them from 6 years of age onwards.
 
Listening to talk radio is a very good way to tell the good speakers from the bad - the good ones are (generally) the hosts and you can figure out how good the callers are by how fast they talk and how precisely they verbalize their thoughts compared to the vast majority of others.
 
Locally in Portland talk radio Lars Larson (www.KXL.com), Victoria Taft (www.KPAM.com), Jayne Carroll (www.kuik.com), & Tom Hartman (www.KPOJ.com) all are very good speakers - I bet most people do not how how fast the hosts are really talking and how fast they are listening.
 
It would be interesting to document the stats of the talking speed of the above set of people.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Fishing for Salmon

I like fishing - but I really do not want to spend 3 to 5 hundred of dollars just to be able to have SOME of the gear that would allow me to fish twice a year. This is where the true value of contracting out comes into being. Hiring a fishing guide is definitely a way to go unless you really go fishing 20 to 30 times a year.
I cam across one, Cameron Guide Services, where for 8 hours at a $150 per person they take you salmon fishing. This is really a good deal. See www.catchasalmon.com

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Top 10 List OF Stupid Things IT Pros Still Do

E-Week.com put this up on their site, by Peter Coffee.

This list can be translated to really apply to most any field - just substitute your own job field name in lieu of IT.

Good drawing and humor.

http://www.eweek.com/slideshow/0,1206,pg=0&s=700&a=186516,00.asp

Friday, August 11, 2006

Using a Computer vs. Maintaining a Computer

To teach a person how to use a modern desktop computer (Apple or PC) really takes only about 1 hour to introduce a person to the fundamental basics of operation so they can use it - it is no harder than a person driving a car and talking on the phone (Wait! Connecticut, New York, New Jersey and the District of Columbia are "special": they take may take years to train them since those cities knows that people living there are incapable of driving and talking at the same time - give them a Commodore Vic 20 - that is the highest level of competence their city government thinks they can operate at!).
However, to MAINTAIN a computer, teach them how to organize the information that they store on it so that later on they can find it, and navigate the system (and the web) effectively is a whole different problem that many people just cannot - will not - ever be able to do. Harsh, yes, but it is true.
The PC is a tool, but it is a very complicated tool because it IS a general purpose tool which MAKES it more complicated than a dedicated narrow "vertical" computer tool.
What amazes me is the number of people who use a computer that do without problems - course these same people are the ones who are oblivious to the risks of their system becoming a zombie, spam generating, attack systems - because they look at it as a TOOL (and it has been promoted as such for 20+ years) and thus  - by design - sold it to operate like a car - turn it on and it works and you almost never have to do any maintenance on it - and what you do only needs to be done once in a great while by someone who specializes in that.
And PCs are NOT at that level yet - give it another 30 years - before it gets that. Look at cars - it was not until the 1970s that EVERY car in the US got rid of chokes and automatics overcame standard shifting. 70+ years after cars appeared.
The computer is still in the 1920s of the car era.
I really feel sorry for the people who use computers since it IS NOT easy at all to REALLY use a general purpose day in and day out effectively.

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Business Maxims (Rules) That Need to Be Scrapped

This site promotes positive thinking and sharing.
 Can't tell who it is, no name visible even when viewing the source code, it is good reading.
He is using positional CSS techniques, and the last bit of code run wipes out the Blog entry info on the right when using IE 6 on XP so it is all hidden, viewing source code you can see past blog entries.
 

Wednesday, August 02, 2006

How to Put a Plastic Lid on a Paper Cup

Never put the drinking hole of a plastic lid over the seam of a paper coffee cup.
If you place the lid's drinking hole over the seam, it will always leak.
The seam has just enough of a gap to let a drop of coffee out as you drink.
Acts like a friction pressure gap problem.
There never is an engineering graduate student specializing in fluid dynamics and consumer engineering when you need one.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Oregon is now Idaho's Portugal

Colbert Report July 31, 2006
See the video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmHm0rGns4I  on YouTube of the broadcast to understand why he has said in the past that Oregon is "California's Canada," or is Oregon "Washington's Mexico." He looked it up and the update from the show of July 31, 2006  he has now revised it and Oregon is now really should be referenced in Wikipedia as "Idaho's Portugal."