Hiatus

For personal and professional reasons I'll be taking leave of blogging for a while.

The Public's Calling

Um, Take a Message

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It's 1984

Has Been For Years

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 ~ Lost in all the breathless coverage of the NSA eavesdropping brouhaha is that it isn't news.

While a small number of us worry about that our civil liberties are being steadily eroded, most of the American public actually trusts their government to snoop secretly into every communication they fancy. We traded liberty for security long ago, so what's the current fuss really all about?

Farmboat

Floating the Idea of Local Food

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 ~ Every Thursday from 11:00 - 3:00 through the week before Halloween, tour a vintage wooden boat and buy local farm produce:

The FarmBoat Floating Market is held aboard the historic steamship Virginia V docked at Lake Union Park Wharf. Vendors display locally grown produce, specialty foods and artisan crafts on board the 125' wooden vessel--just as it was done a century ago. Market visitors can tour the ship for free and learn about Puget Sound agricultural and maritime heritage while they shop. (There is plenty of space on deck to enjoy lunch with fantastic shoreline views of downtown Seattle and Lake Union).

Coffee is Your Friend

Live Longer

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 ~ OK, I lied. Here's more information that coffee is good for you:

Researchers primarily at the National Cancer Institute parsed health information from more than 400,000 volunteers, ages 50 to 71, who were free of major diseases at the study’s start in 1995. By 2008, more than 50,000 of the participants had died. But men who reported drinking two or three cups of coffee a day were 10 percent less likely to have died than those who didn’t drink coffee, while women drinking the same amount had 13 percent less risk of dying during the study.

Other studies have shown salutary effects on cancers and various kinds of dementia. Time to brew another pot!

Blended Standards

Is E15 Gasoline Safe?

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 ~ The American Petroleum Institute (API) is fighting the EPA over how much ethanol should be blended into gasoline. Is 15% ethanol content, E-15, safe for modern cars?

The [EPA] and the biofuels industry say the blend — which contains 15 percent ethanol, rather than the standard 10 percent — is safe for those vehicles.

But the oil and gas industry has produced studies finding that the mix would damage vehicle engines, and some automakers have said they would not honor warranties in cases where E15 was used.

“E15 could leave millions of consumers with broken down cars and high repair bills,” said Bob Greco, API group downstream director. “It could also put motorists in harm’s way when vehicles break down in the middle of a busy highway. We are asking the Supreme Court to step in and protect consumers by striking down EPA’s dangerous E15 mandate before it’s too late.”

Well, of course it "could". But will it? The API's studies have been called "scientifically weak" and there are, naturally, many other studies that show no harm. Could it be that the science is not settled?

Reminds me of another contentious argument of interest to the API...

Where's It Wednesday—CXXVI

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

Tomato, Tomato

A Drink From the Bubbler?

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 ~ How you say? "Pecan"?

21 more.

Startup Leadership

Coda—The Song Remains the Same

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 ~ Building a car company isn't easy. Building one from scratch is harder still. And building one using new, bleeding edge drive train technology is perhaps hardest of all.

It can be done, as Tesla shows.

Yet it is more likely to fail, perhaps spectacularly—DeLorean, Fisker, and the latest, Coda Automotive. Never heard of Coda? Launched in 2009, it aimed to produce a plug-in electric sedan for under $40,000. Last month it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Why did Coda fail when Tesla, with a pricier offering, has succeeded wildly?

GMO

Who's Afraid?

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 ~ And what do they fear?

Passion

All Entrepreneurs Have It

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 ~ I've been accused at times, to my astonishment, of lacking evident passion for my startup venture. Somehow, apparently, during investor presentations, I focus too much on the factual details and fail to offer (say some) a higher level of dynamism at the podium.

Does this really matter? Do investors truly demand a theatrical exhibition of passionate enthusiasm? Or a concise and complete enumeration of the relevant criteria for evaluating a prospective investment?

A sober presentation is better:

From now let’s all agree that we’ll only use the word passion when it’s followed by the word fruit. Ideally then followed by the word daiquiri.

Passion is implied. Passion is why you are reading this article. Passion is why you don’t work for Deutsche Post or a big bank. It’s why you believe that in the face of all the advice that tells you not to do it, to stick to your nice, safe, salaried day job, you’re doing it anyway. Passion is no longer a differentiator, it’s a prerequisite. It’s why you’re at the race, but it’s not the reason you’ll win.

No passion, no chance. I wouldn't be doing what I do (rather than a safer, easier and likely more immediately remunerative alternative) unless I was deeply passionate, not just about the startup, but about the difference I intend it to make in the world. Nor would any entrepreneur.

Only the passionless could possibly be confused on this point.

Greenhouse Gas Flows

A Problem with Many Strands

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 ~ Reductions will require sustained effort and focus across a wide swath of global economic sectors.

The problem will soon become even harder.

Choosing Profits Over Planets

From the Mouths of Boobs

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 ~ "What good is it to save the planet if humanity suffers?"

So said CEO Rex Tillerson at Exxon's annual meeting yesterday. What really concerns him, of course, is less the suffering of humanity than the suffering of diminished profits. The right choice between the planet and profits? Yes! More money! Never mind that there is no business to be done on a dead planet. Or that you can't take it with you. Or that dispensing with the Earth, our only home, is somehow a reasonable option in service of unbounded cupidity. But then T. Rexx has some puzzling beliefs.

Where's It Wednesday—CXXV

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

Love Trains

Dating In Prague

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 ~ Officials in charge of the Prague subway are creating a novel kind of singles scene:

Starting later this year, select carriages on each of the city's three underground train lines will be designated as singles-friendly. The idea was hatched as a way to increase ridership on public transportation, according to Filip Drapal, a spokesman for Ropid, the city's public transport authority. "This idea is just part of a new long-term campaign whose aim is to show what activities can you do in public transport that you cannot do inside your car (like reading, studying, listening to music, playing e-games and checking emails)."
Of course, there are many things one can "do in public transport which you cannot do inside your car." Why stop at dating?

Why indeed? Perhaps because the typical ride is only 5 minutes? Speed daters will need to perfect their "elevator" pitches... and here's the soundtrack.

Mounting Disasters

More Billion-Plus Dollar Losses

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 ~ The number and severity of economic losses from extreme weather events has been on the rise for years:

Several interesting things pop out from this graphic:

• Droughts and heat waves (yellow) have increased in number, although the typical size of each event was higher in the previous decade.
• Wildfires (red) are increasing in number
• Tornadoes (purple) have dramatically increased in number and severity.
• Hurricanes (dark blue) have also increased in both number and severity; it is not yet clear whether the last few years suggest a return to "normalcy" or just a brief respite in a worrisome trend.

Total damages are on the rise, and losses over the past decade exceeded half a trillion dollars. Given concerns about budget deficits, reducing that expense would be a worthwhile object of public policy discussion.

While direct linkage to climate change is notoriously difficult to prove in individual cases, the overall picture over the past 20 years cannot otherwise be easily explained. Engaging in puerile finger-pointing and self-interested politics is not befitting those we expect to provide leadership for the country as a whole.

Serial Killer

The Sequel

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 ~ Weren't lead, tobacco and asbestos all once in the dock peddling the same you-can't-prove-it line?

Whatever became of them anyway?

Tesla

Entrepreneur Funding Follies

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 ~ Should the government try to play venture capitalist?

Some think not, and they sure made hay over Solyndra. But—surprise!—we're not hearing from these same second-guessers now that Tesla has paid off its loan early.

The criticism of government playing VC is inapt anyway, and besides, do they really behave like VCs?



(h/t Mark Suster, Both Sides of the Table)

So, Do You Feel Lucky?

Or Are You Too Tired to Tell?

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 ~ We entrepreneurs are a notoriously optimistic (if paranoid) bunch.

Ask most why they are optimistic and you'll usually hear about the unique and compelling virtues of their latest startup, the enormous market opportunity, the great team, the many sustainable competitive advantages, how much traction it already has, etc. Heck, I've said these things myself. Recently.

There's another oft-stated reason: hard work. As Thomas Edison memorably observed, many miss opportunity because it comes dressed in overalls and looks like work. Not entrepreneurs. We expect to work hard. We may even be proud of it.

Some count on hard work so much they come to believe that they succeed (and others don't) solely because of hard work.

It's not true.

Another Kind of Oil Rig

I'm Shocked. Shocked!

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 ~ Ho hum. Another case of a rapacious global corporate cartel caught doing what comes naturally.

European officials are investigating BP, Shell and Statoil for fixing the price of oil. The US may do so as well.

[UK Energy officials] said manipulation of the oil price could have driven inflation and pointed out that the market is an important benchmark for many financial transactions.

High oil prices also feeds through to bigger bills for food, clothes and other essentials because it pushes up the cost of transport and manufacturing.

A high oil price will also fuel inflation, which erodes the value of people’s savings, and can stifle economic growth, by pushing up businesses’ costs.

The economic impact of artificially inflated oil prices is huge; $20T worth of oil is priced from the Brent crude index, a focus of investigators. As with the LIBOR rate fixing scandal, it turns out the largest players "report" prices which are then aggregated and used as the benchmark for everyone else. What stops them from playing games with those reports? Nothing, except apparently the danger of being caught due to an excess of greed.

Where's It Wednesday—CXXIV

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

Faster Than Rabbits

Propagating Rootstocks

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 ~ Here at Phytelligence, we're busy growing for our customers.

See these pieces of budwood?

In the next few months we're going to turn them into more than 10,000 trees.

Need trees? Contact us, or come to our open house on June 11 and find out how we do it.

Two Countries

Hotspots of Hate

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 ~ We're two countries alright, just not divided the way you might think:

The map shows the use of hateful epithets used in tweets, aggregated by county.

Um, so just exactly where is "middle America"?

A lot of related maps to look at and more detail here. Especially interesting (or sobering) to zoom in on where you live, or other places of interest, both to see the localized hotspots, and which hate words predominate. (Here in Washington State, the hate in Aberdeen is visible from space. What's up with that?)

Buildings With Integrated Wind Generation

Beyond Turbines

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 ~ Here comes another unusual-looking building, the Strawscraper, which employs a hair-like covering which the wind ruffles to produce electricity:

The system utilizes Piezoelectric technology, which turns movement into electricity that can be stored for later use. The hair’s tiny movement is safe for birds and humans and isn’t noisy like traditional turbines can be. But Strawscraper isn’t all about the brains, it also has the beauty. The hair covering the building creates the illusion of movement, giving the normally static city skyline the illusion of motion.

While London's Strata Tower is still "expected" to generate perhaps 8% of the building's energy needs, after three years there is as yet no indication of the actual power produced. Perhaps sensibly, a power estimate is not being offered for the Strawscraper.

My prediction? It looks a lot like a scratching post, so beware giant predatory Siamese cats.

It's Hard Raising Money

Serial Startups

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 ~ Or so it seems.

Translation...

...Into a Foreign Language

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 ~ "A loud noise at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other."

Leave alone those that bandy 'bout a megaphone...

Another Market Failure

Heads I Win, Tails You Lose...

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 ~ When oil is cheap there is little incentive to develop and commercialize biofuels or other liquid alternatives. Especially since they largely remain generally more costly than conventional hydrocarbons.

But when the price of a barrel of oil rises, alternative energy fuels will surge, right?

Actually, no:

Where's It Wednesday—CXXIII

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

Thirsty? You're Going to Pay

Greed Ascendant

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 ~ If water is not a human right, then what is?



(h/t Keithpp's blog)

Metro Transit's Funding Gap

Slow Starvation

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 ~ Once again, Metro Transit has a revenue shortfall.

And once again, the proposed solution is to cut service, and further diminish pubic transit.

It's a vicious circle, or perhaps more accurately, a death spiral. As routes are cut or curtailed, the overall utility of the system suffers as well. As the system becomes less useful and timely, people use it less, and revenues from the fare box decrease.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Conversely, increasing service and making transit more available, more accessible, and especially, more affordable, increases ridership. Public transit use has been increasing locally; we should be building on that, not thwarting it.

Metro Transit needs additional funding. Cost cutting is but a slogan, not a real, considered solution that would make a (positive) difference. Fully funding public transit increases use of the system, promoting urban vitality, reducing congestion and air pollution, and improving our quality of life. In fact, public transit should be free; the costs and benefits are very favorable compared to alternative public expenditures, particularly car infrastructure.

There is a public hearing tomorrow afternoon.

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Also posted to Fare-Free Northwest blog.

What Big Oil Can Learn from the Gun Manufacturers

Astroturfing Savvy

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 ~ Big Oil could learn a lot about faking broad public support from the gun lobby.

National Train Day

Go Take a Train

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 ~ I've posted many times about trains. It's a pleasing form of travel, usually rapid because of its own right-of-way, and very energy efficient.

They can be very fast.

Or maybe too fast.

Living and Dying in 3D

Printed Guns

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 ~ It had to happen.

The incredible advances in 3D printing, and the rapidly shrinking costs, have made weapons like the Liberator pistol inevitable. We may not need to worry—yet—but it is only a matter of time before it revolutionizes many things, including crime.

3D printing is poised to be another new technology where the capabilities are increasing and becoming more widespread faster than policy can keep up. Not just guns, but many other things, at least in theory, can and will be built from this technology, whether in the privacy of your home, or, without the capital expense, at your local store. Many kinds of things have already been made. In the future, perhaps the very near future, one will be able to print not just prosaic hardware, but other weapons, chemicals, even animal or human tissue, meat, drugs (legal or not)—maybe whatever one can imagine. Forget postal regulations, export controls, anti-proliferation, regulation, or licensing which all may become quaint notions of a simpler time.

Carbon Intoxication

Scientists are Not Immune

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 ~ I've been formally trained as a computer scientist, and at one time made a very good living from it at a top institution. However, just because I am a "scientist" it does not mean that I am qualified to discourse on scientific subjects at large.

This does not, however, much deter some scientists from fulminating well outside their areas of expertise or qualification. Or spouting their personal beliefs from ideologically aligned platforms. Today we have been treated to another tired retread of an article in the Wall Street Journal by climate change simpleton William Happer. Along with astronaut Harrison Schmidt, he claims, again, that more atmospheric carbon is good for us because we need plants, and plants need carbon dioxide.

Much of the article can be dismissed on factual grounds with reference to what actual climate science and climate scientists can tell us. (I'm no expert—being a computer scientist does not make me a general scientific expert—and I happily defer to those who are.) Happer and Schmidt focus on the tired and discredited trope that carbon concentrations have been higher in geological time (true) but ignore the recent, and utterly unprecedented rate of change in those concentrations. Sure, life flourished, but not human life, and species that cannot adapt to a changing environment not infrequently suffer or become extinct. Evolution does not work well in short time periods of rapid environmental shift.

Where's It Wednesday—CXXII

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

House Effects

Using Intramural Rivalry

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 ~ My high school had (and still has) a house system, modeled on the traditional arrangement in English schools. All students are assigned to one of four houses, each with its own symbols, traditions, and social events. They provide a way of promoting esprit de corps across different grade levels, but their most obvious purpose is to provide various forms of intramural competition in sports, debating or other contests.

J.K. Rowling imagined a house system at the fictional Hogwarts.

Similar loyalty-building divisions and intense competition can also be found between the various branches of the US military, especially among the elite units of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).

Companies sometimes form competing "skunk works" teams to each independently tackle tough problems.

These institutions all seek through a kind of tribal loyalty to promote rivalry and vigorous competition that, in theory increases the excellence of all.

So why isn't it working at Microsoft?

Oceans of Trash

How Long Until It's Gone?

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 ~ I have found every one of these things (and more) washed up on beaches.

At least the ocean turns broken bottles into polished sea glass, but diapers.... there's no polishing that turd.

From Nucleus to Universe

Orders of Magnitude

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 ~ This blog is too cool.

Startup Salaries

Which Risks to Take?

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 ~ How much should startups pay in salaries?

One line of thinking, advanced largely by rookie angel investors and those who have never worked in a startup, is... nothing. The justification? A need to "conserve cash" so the startup can maximize the length of its runway, the period of time it can continue operations (and take self-sustaining flight) before the bills can no longer be paid.

This idea is, simply, wrong. It is behaviorally naive, financially simple-minded, and legally dangerous. Here's why:

400 ppm

Too Much Carbon

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 ~ Atmospheric carbon is now higher than it has been in 3 million years.

The last time CO2 reached the symbolic milestone of 400 parts per million in the atmosphere - in the Pliocene era - temperatures rose by between 3 and 4 degrees and sea levels were between five and 40 metres higher than today.

Climate change is a slow-motion calamity, but also an economic opportunity for those who seek profit. Might be a good time to start businesses building seawalls, boats, or snorkels.

An Entrepreneur's Challenge

Tempering Urgency with Patience

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 ~ Sure, you want to get the cheese, but take some time to think and plan first instead of just rushing in.

Or maybe first see how the impulsive mouse fares.

First mover advantage? Bah. It's often the second mouse that gets the cheese.

Where's It Wednesday—CXXI

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

A Walk in the Greenbelt

Leo Strolls Bellevue

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 ~ It's awesome having the Bellevue Greenbelt nearby, with trails reaching out into neighborhoods all around. The peripatetic pup and I can log 5 miles walking down to the Robinswood dog park and back. And he adds a few more miles with the pack at the park.

Is it Investing or Speculating?

Don't Ask YourBroker

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 ~ The word "invest" has become debased.

We hear so much about the supposed importance of investor confidence and about the need for low taxes on investors, and all because, the pundits aver, we need investors to invest so that the economy can grow and solve all of our problems.

Bunk.

Believe It...

Soothing Sights

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 ~ These places looks so astonishing it's hard to believe they exist? Guess I'll have to go see for myself. If I ever get done assembling this investor due diligence package.

I want to take this train...

Tax and Spend

Or is it "Borrow and Spend"?

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 ~ Tell me again who's spending is out of control? Recall that in 2000 we were running a budget surplus, with the prospect of those continuing for years...

What Shall We Teach Our Children?

Science? Or Belief?

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 ~ Hardly a week goes by without someone decrying the atrophy of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) instruction in the US, yet we do nothing about the teaching of ignorance in schools throughout the country. We desperately need to have more scientifically capable graduates for our global competitiveness as a nation, but we condone indoctrination in dogma instead.

A Break in the Clouds

Willows Run

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 ~ Such a beautiful day, requiring a non-work interlude, so I spoiled a good walk, despite a hole one two.

Where's It Wednesday—CXX

Where in Seattle is this?

Answer next week.

Details on the weekly Where's It Wednesday puzzle here.
Other weeks' puzzles here.
Answer to last week's puzzle, after the jump.

Is Entrepreneurship Cyclic?

Should It Be?

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 ~ The number of people starting businesses or styling themselves as entrepreneurs rises in difficult economic times. When the economy improves, as it is perhaps now doing here in the US, such "entrepreneurs" bail out, rejoining the mass of (temporarily) comfortable wage slaves according to the Kauffman Foundation. Some fret that a decline in new entrepreneurial business is worrisome, even though the economy overall is improving, but this misses the more fundamental point; our future economic health is not tied to the growth of entrepreneurial startups, but to the growth of entrepreneurs.

What about the legions of "fairweather" entrepreneurs eager to return to the vanishing and fundamentally ephemeral security of the big company sinecure?

You were part of a trend like jean jackets and spandex, and so long as it was cool you were on board...

Startup Thrift

Just Like Old Times

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 ~ Back in my Microsoft days (1982-1993) I would sometimes sleep under my desk. With intense deadline pressures, it just took too long to go home and come back,so many of us just crashed at the office. We did it to save time.

Now I do it to save money. At Phytelligence, my current startup, I've stopped springing for a hotel room every time I drive out from Bellevue to Pullman. The Pullman Aquatic Center provides a workout room and hot showers for $5 a day—deal!

However, age has imparted a few grains of wisdom, and, as you can see in the picture, I have improved the level of comfort over the carpeted floor.