Stormy's Corner

Working Poor

Working Poor by David K. Shipler is a terrific book. One of those books that helps you see the world through somebody else's eyes. I remember standing behind a woman in Walmart once who didn't have enough money to pay, and instead of taking out the DVD or the tennis shoes, she took out the food. The good food, not the junk food. Shipler's book helped me to understand how someone could make that choice in that situation. He explains that the poor are in a cycle of poverty because they don't have the skills or resources to teach their children better. I won't try to explain it all to you - read the book! But I thought a couple of his concluding points were worth calling out.

- David Shipler advocates not for raising the minimum wage, but for creating a path to better jobs. People that start out at minimum wage should have a clear training or experience path to a job with better wages. There will always be people around to fill the entry jobs, however, to end the cycle of poverty, we have to allow those that are working hard and well to progress.

- Job education is key. Many children from poor families don't learn the basics of job interviewing, showing up on time, customer service, etc. As hard as it is for some of us to accept that, we could do the best good by teaching them the basics. Shipler had quite a few positive examples in this space.

Through real people Shipler shows us what the life of the working poor is like in America. Check out a copy from your local library or click on the link to the right and buy it. Read it.

Does Money Buy Happiness?

This article,How not to buy happiness, suggests that it can if you use the extra money to shorten a commute or otehrwise alleviate stress in your life. "... if we use an increase in our incomes, as many of us do, simply to buy bigger houses and more expensive cars, then we do not end up any happier than before. But if we use an increase in our incomes to buy more of certain inconspicuous goods–such as freedom from a long commute or a stressful job–then the evidence paints a very different picture."

Torturing Terrorists

For my friends that believe torturing terrorists is ok. You're in the minority. "Two-thirds of Americans believe the United States should never use physical torture of people it detains."

Yahoo! News - Poll: Americans Against Using Torture

Netflix, Open up or die… - Features - Engadget - features.engadget.com

A great article about how Netflix could be more successful as an online business.

Netflix, Open up or die… - Features - Engadget - features.engadget.com

BookMachine

This BookMachine can print a book in five minutes. Select the book you want, insert your credit card, and in 5 minutes, your book comes out the slot. Imagine what this will mean to bookstores! To all the industries involved in getting books from publishing houses to bookstores!

Will your local chain bookstore still stock thousands of titles to browse through? Or just the bestsellers? Will there be "bookstore kiosks" at the local mall? The airport?

If these machines catch on and publishers buy into it, I would expect book prices to drop significantly as shipping costs decrease and overprinting and overstocking problems are eliminated completely.

The New York Times & Google

Search for news on Google, and the New York Times articles rarely show up. This article in Wired discusses why. "The New York Times requires that its users register, which makes it difficult for search engines to spider its content. Perhaps an even more impenetrable barrier is the Times' paid archive. Because it stows material more than a week old behind an archive wall, you have to cough up $3 per article. Since few are willing to pay for content they can get free elsewhere, search engines, which often base results on relevancy (read: popularity), will continue to dis the Times."

I had to post this because just a day or two ago, my mom suggested that I not link to NYT articles in my blog since after a couple of weeks they are no longer available for free. The article had the perfect solution. This New York Times Link Generator offers a solution. They keep an archive of all of the NYT articles. Enter a NYT url and they will give you a "weblog-safe" link, one that will continue to be freely accessible even after two weeks.

Get email when your dog leaves the yard

Attach the collar to your dog.  Define the area you think your dog should stay in (i.e., the backyard, Chase!) When your dog leaves that area, you'll get an email that says he's left AND the location where your dog is at the moment.  If this is going to work for Chase, it better send an update every thirty seconds.

The device is supposed to be out by the end of the year and will cost $300 plus a $13 monthly fee.  As to what this means if applied to children is a topic I will leave for another time.

The New York Times > Technology > Circuits > What's Next: For the Fretting Pet Owner, a Wireless Distress Signal

10 Partisan Myths

I haven't read this book, but I just added it to my wish list after reading this Newsweek summary.

"Running on Empty: In his new book, Peter G. Peterson, chairman of the Blackstone Group and a former secretary of Commerce, explains how the theological war between Republicans and Democrats is bankrupting our future" It seems to add factual material to my theory that we exaggerate the differences between the parties and follow our party's belief a little too blindly.

Robot Vacuum Cleaners

Here's a humorous but informational review of Roomba, the automated vacuum cleaner.

The New York Times > Technology > Circuits > Just Browsing: Self-Propelled, With a Mission: Clean House

Goal Setting Causes Cheating

Setting goals and then missing them may make people more likely to cheat than if they hadn't had any goals, especially if they missed them by just a little. This Wharton article, Goal setting and Cheating: Why They Often Go Together in the Workplace - Knowledge@Wharton, talks about several studies that relate goal setting to cheating and gives very tangeable, believable examples. It does end on a positive note with some suggestions for how to minimize cheating. For example, they suggest that the rewards should be graduated, so if selling one more car will win you a trip to Hawaii, there had better be a pretty good second prize or you're likely to cheat on that last car.

What would you pay to find out how much pain your pet was in?

Having personally spent a good deal of time worrying about my dog and wondering what yelps of pain really mean - is she in pain all the time?  just when she yelps?  how much pain?  does it just startle her or is is excruciating? - I know I would pay a significant amount of money to answer the question "how much pain is my dog in?"  Well, now, thanks to an Ohio nurse, I can find out.   She's developed a $600, palm sized device that measures stress, a good indicator of pain level.  She's selling them to vets, but I bet wealthy individuals would be willing to buy them, and I bet a whole bunch of us would be willing to rent them when trying to diagnose chronic health problems in our pets.

Ohio researcher designs, builds device to measure pets' pain

How much would you pay to find out how much pain your pet was in?
	<$10
	$10-50
	$50-200
	>$200
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Japan: Schoolkids to be tagged with RFID chips - News & Technology - CNETAsia

Yikes! Japan and Disney World are starting to tag kids. Anybody who has lost a kid in a crowd, will understand the sentiment behind this. Anyone who imagines wearing one of these things and making their location information permanently available to anyone (parents, spouse, employer, retail stores, government, etc), can imagine how scary this could be.

Are there any rules or laws about tagging kids with electronic tracking devices? Can they get rid of them when they are 18? How would your life as a 16 year old have been different if you knew your parents could tell exactly where you were at all times?

On the other hand, are you more technology saavy than your 16 year old? How would parents get them to buy into this? Lock it to their ankle? Or only provide a cell phone that comes with tracking?

(Note, I know RFID isn't up to universal tracking but the technology to do so is out there.)

Japan: Schoolkids to be tagged with RFID chips - News & Technology - CNETAsia

Bloggers attract attorneys

Some more blogging statistics:
- 36% of bloggers irritate friends or family,
- 55% identify themselves by their real, full name,
- 83% write personal entries,
- 20% post primarily interesting links,

The article that pointed me to these studies is here: 8,000 bloggers born every day | The Register. (Note that the 12% attracted an attorney's attention is not acurate. The original MIT study says that 12% of bloggers know a blogger that has attracted attorney's attention. They might all know the same person!)

Creative Dog Tricks: Dog Goes to Post Office To Get Mail

This dog picks up the mail every morning and races home with it.  What cool things have you trained your dog to do?
Dog Goes to Post Office to Get Mail

See more dog posts on my Humans for Dogs blog.

Scientists horrified by Bush's Bad Science | The Register

Sociology is not the only area where the Bush administration stretches the facts. The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) has issued a new report expressing its concern about the way the Bush administration uses scientific data. The UCS report is signed by 4,000 scientists, including "48 Nobel laureates, 62 National Medal of Science recipients and 127 members of the National Academy of Sciences."

Scientists horrified by Bush's Bad Science | The Register

Teaching Bush Cause & Effect

A while back, Bush announced plans to encourage and help poor people to marry. His reason? Married people are less likely to be poor. I think Bush should have taken Sociology 101 in college, which is where I learned the difference between cause, effect, correlating statistics and other interesting tidbits that might help set public policy. Barbara Ehrenreich wrote a column in the New York Times about this.

Let Them Eat Wedding Cake

7/13/04

During a conversation (with a smart friend) last night, I realized I need to expound some more. Married people might be less likely to be on welfare than single people. However, getting married will not automatically make single people less likely to need welfare. Maybe, people who are not on welfare have more peace of mind and more time to look for a spouse. Or maybe not being on welfare makes them a more attractive mate and makes it more likely that they will marry. Being on welfare might be the cause of being single not the other way around! There's no way to tell from the fact that "married people are less likely to be on welfare" which one is the cause and which one is the result. Without knowing that, spending government money to encourage marriage in welfare recipients is a waste of money. For all we know, it might actually make the problem worse! If welfare causes singledom, then those people you encouraged to get married, might end of divorcing because they are on welfare and divorce is expensive! I don't know. That's my point. We don't know. Bush doesn't know. Spend my tax money on policies based on good science.

Wired News: Bloggers Suffer Burnout

The authors of extremely popular blogs are under constant pressure to produce witty entries. In this article several of them talk about feeling pressure or stress to constantly come up with new posts. If they don't post, they get asked if they are ok. If they do post, lots of comments are posted immediately.

Chiropractic Care for Dogs

As I posted a while back, my dog Teddy has a slipped disk. I was told by the vet that it is a permanent condition and the best we could do was to give her pain medication.  In addition, I should not take her running and I should go easy on all activities like long walks and backpacking.

It's been tough and I can definitely tell she's worse after a long walk, so when I heard about a chiropractor who routinely treats horses and dogs, I decided to give it a try.  I have to admit that I've always been a little bit skeptical about chiropractors in general, but after seeing how it was done, I decided it probably wouldn't hurt Teddy.  So we went yesterday.

I can't say Teddy enjoyed the treatment, but the minute it was done she was jumping around and twirling in circles.  (And before you say, that's because it was done, I can tell you when the vet is done with anything she runs to the door or hides under my chair.  She most definitely does not even wag her tail.)  She also jumped on the bed last night without any coaxing!   So, it's too soon to tell for sure, but it definitely looks like it might help!

Do you think chiropractic care for dogs is a valid medical treatment Yes No Not enough information   Free polls from Pollhost.com

September 23, 2004 Update.  I took Teddy to the chiropracter three times.  I did not treat her back or her pain in any other way.  She is no longer yelps with pain!  I haven't heard a yelp in over a month!  To be conclusive that it worked, I think I would need to get another xray in a few months but if she's happy and not hurting, I'm happy! See other blog posts at my dog blog, Humans for dogs.

Blogging Statistics

This is an interesting study on the characteristics of blogs and bloggers: Perseus - The Blogging Iceberg. One fact, 52.8% are 19 years old or younger. 82.5% are under the age of 30.