How Bill Gates Would Repair Our Schools

The inspiration from this came from a thread posted by Mona Nomura – one of the people I follow on friend feed.  It links to this article:

How Bill Gates Would Repair Our Schools

I wanted to keep my post in that thread, so here it is:

The thing that bothers me most about education today, more people go to college than ever. Nearly all graduate high school. Keep that in mind when you consider letters sent by soldiers in the war of the American Insurrection, The War of 1812, and the America Civil war. Just as in all wars, they’re being actually fought by the kids of the poor/working class. Lucky if they had 6th grade education. Raised with the ONLY thing to read was the bible (not cause they’re religious, but cause it’s the only booktheir parents could afford.)  Basically what we’d consider uneducated peasants. You read their letters home to their families and girlfriends and town papers. I have a B.S. and 2 graduate degrees, and scientific publications, and I could NEVER dream of writing that eloquently and beautifully. On paper, without backspace, in ink. They were able to convey such knowledge of what was happening to them and what they felt in such amazing ways. Uneducated peasants……. Compared to todays College kids.

I really don’t think my hearing is that good.

Created by Train Horn

This is no where near as high as I expected.

My favorite place to hear music: The Ark

I has absolutely the best acoustics and site lines of any live music venue anywhere. You're right in there with the talent. It's so intimate and immersive. The engineers are top notch and everything always sounds amazing there. Oh, and beer.

My road-trip mix tape

Tank! by Cowboy Bebop Soundtrack

If I had a million dollars (Live) by Barnaked Ladies

Johnny Jump Up by Gaelic Storm

Gretchen 1994-2008

Goodbye Puppy

What was the best “home” that a TV character has lived in?

I’m just talking about where the character called home and why you think that.  I’m not talking the fortress of solitude cause of the computers, or the castle on Voltron cause it had guns, or the Bat Cave with all it’s gadgets. Just the place where the show’s characters called home. My vote I think would have to go to Stringfellow Hawk’s Cabin on Airwolf. Secluded, serene, warm, well stocked pond, cool kitchen, amazing architecture. You can see it here
Airwolf ep1 via Hulu

I’d like to know what others think though.

TechCrunch’s Yertle the Turtle Tantrum Over News Embargoes

TechCrunch’s Yertle the Turtle Tantrum Over News Embargoes

Posted using ShareThis

(found via Dave Winer’s Friendfeed)

And excellent summary and interpretation (read, real journalism) by Kara Swisher of Mike Arrington’s embargo spaz yesterday on Tech Crunch.  While I do agree to a certain extent that embargoes are a silly system that just creates copies of news, I think Ms. Swisher does a good job of summing up the true motivations of the original article with:

And all of it is increasingly less important as the economy withers and a lot of the less sustainable start-ups fade away. There are big important stories happening in tech right now about major public companies, the state of innovation and the future of the industry, which require more serious journalism.

So I think we can all imagine a day very soon when the Web 2.0 echo chamber dissipates–as it inevitably did in Web 1.0–and no one goes nuts if Start-up X adds new embeddable widget, Start-up Y changes home page design or Start-up Z contemplates a new social networking site for dogs to gain a new revenue stream.

I am so proud of you MOTHER*$@*$ING $(*!SUCKERS

Being the beer snob that I am, I despise all Budweiser products (see the picture on my flicker over there —–>).  Being bought by the Belgians making it no longer American is a favorite new tool that I like to use on my Bud-drinking friends. All that aside, that company can sure make a good commercial sometimes.

One of my favorite webcomics.