plucky tree

the day the google died

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:14:00 -0800

In 1998, I relied on two search engines, Alta Vista and Yahoo, each of which was radically different in how they worked. Alta Vista required understanding boolean logic and was very geeky, but if you knew what you were doing, it could produce amazing results. Yahoo categorized content very effectively, so in cases where Alta Vista failed because of search terms having multiple meanings, Yahoo would come through.

Then Google came onto the scene and when it opened up at google.stanford.edu, I was an instant convert and never looked back. I remember when I would see my co-workers at Apple struggle to search for something on the Internet and I’d evangelize Google to them. Many people were very resistant! I got into the habit of just politely taking over people’s keyboards at their desk and re-doing the search they were trying to do in Google. I probably converted at least one person a day that way as they were amazed at the results as I was.

Google has slowly forgotten what made it great in the first place. In the past few years, I noticed a gradual decline in search result quality that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. As the number of times Google search failed me increased, I’ve started trying other search engines like Yahoo and Bing. I’ve found that Bing especially seems to provide results that are at least as good, if not better than what Google does, while having some unique qualities that make it worth giving a try:

With the advent of Google+ you can no longer do searches on Google that MUST contain a specific search term. Previously, you could prefix a word with a “+” and it would find only pages that contain that term. Bing still supports this, and in addition, you can do advanced searches that include all search terms.
Bing’s interface is more polished and less cluttered than Google. One of the things that originally made Google great was its spartan, clean interface. Now, it’s all junked up and it takes away from the search results.
One really nice feature that I appreciate on Bing is when you do a search, it dynamically changes the available tabs (Images, Shopping, Videos, News, Maps, etc) based on the results. This lets you know if it’s worth clicking on any of the tabs, which is a great time-saver.
Bing has a great Advanced search feature that is quite powerful. Most people will never use it, but if you understand it, it’s far better than what Google has.

About two weeks ago, I changed my default search in Safari and on my iPad and iPhone to Bing and have so far not looked back. Bing seems to have successfully ripped off many of the cool things that Google originated while not forgetting that the most important thing is the quality of the results.

I’m no fan of Microsoft, but sometimes being an underdog makes you remember that user experience trumps everything else.

shop small

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 13:42:00 -0800

You know a store is too big when you need Google Maps to navigate it:

Some of the big-box stores such as IKEA, Macy’s, Bloomingdales and Home Depot have already been mapped, but not Target. Not Wal-Mart. And not nearly as many malls as you’d like to see, especially in this holiday season.

Support your normal-sized, local, family-owned retailer!

I’m in my living room and our house was in Mountain View,...

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 10:50:42 -0800

I’m in my living room and our house was in Mountain View, CA when we bought it, but apparently my Mac feels that we’re really in Gahanna, OH.

According to Wikipedia, Gahanna was listed as #96 of the Top 100 Best Places to Live in 2007 by Money magazine. We’ll see how it goes once we settle in.

"Young Blood" by the Naked and Famous

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 12:55:00 -0800

"Young Blood" by the Naked and Famous:

2011 Single of the Year at the New Zealand Music Awards. Pretty addictive. I might listen to the radio if they played stuff like that.

I’m in the market for a fixer-upper.

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 11:38:00 -0800

I’m in the market for a fixer-upper.

ATM, please don’t start beeping at me until the money/receipt/card is ready. It’s like...

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 13:57:32 -0800

ATM, please don’t start beeping at me until the money/receipt/card is ready. It’s like shouting STOP to a driver a block before a stoplight.

what is libertarianism?

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 12:35:00 -0700

Excellent and badly needed new website that defines and explores the history and current state of libertarianism.

It includes some pretty nicely done videos that explore the nuances and complexity of a political, moral, and social philosophy that many people consider antiquated, simplistic, utopian, or impractical.

how homeopathy "works"

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 20:07:00 -0700

For a long time, I put homeopathy in the same category as organized religion. I felt both were based primarily on faith with little science to back them up. I believed that both were the refuge of the weak or less intelligent among us.

The problem is that even among smart people, homeopathy is very popular and many people swear by it. Heck, in much of Europe and Asia, homeopathy is practically mainstream. Is this a pervasive mass delusion?

Before too many people think I’m crazy, I should mention that I strongly believe that homepathic remedies simply cannot work based on their physical content. They are basically salt or sugar pills or plain water and the notion that they contain some “essence” or “memory” that has a physical effect on the body makes little sense.

So, how is it that so many people feel that homeopathy works?

Complicated question, but the body is a complicated think! Western medicine has long operated on the notion that you see a doctor, get a diagnosis, and get some sort of treatment (usually pills). Then you are cured or at least back to being productive.

Homeopathy comes from a completely different angle, in that it believes your body has a great deal of power to heal itself and that making yourself healthy will both help you recover from illness as well as prevent future illness. I don’t see how many people could find that much wrong with this specific aspect of homepathy.

Homepathic doctors also greatly differ from Western doctors in the following ways:

They spend a significantly greater amount of time with their patients.
They tend to be very empathetic.
They spend a lot of time on psychological issues, making them almost hybrids between doctors and therapists. Because of the mind-body connection in health, this can be very important.
They can often convince people (and rightly so!) that the body has an amazing power to heal itself. When people go to the doctor and expect the doctor to fix the problem, that implies that the body is somewhat weak and helpless and that it’s mostly out of your control. It’s not.

Just having a doctor listen to you and help you understand how strong your mind and body are and how it really can assist in recovering from or preventing illness is, in my mind, a huge reason why homeopathy works for many people.

Now we get onto the subject of homeopathic remedies, which is what people tend to focus on. Here we have doctors prescribing people pills or liquids with absolutely nothing in them and yet people claim they actually work! Smart people, even!

How does that happen?

Well, I think there is a strong case that the placebo effect has a lot to do with it, but I think there’s more to it than that. When a homeopathic doctor prescribes a remedy, s/he will tend to associate it with something very specific, like a specific symptom or illness or a specific psychological issue.

Even if you are a die-hard skeptic such as myself, when you take this remedy, I believe your subconscious mind is remembering what your doctor associated this remedy with, even if you don’t consciously recall that while taking it. Perhaps when the remedy was given to you, you discussed the importance of relaxing and letting go of something painful in your past. It’s not inconceivable that taking a salt pill that your brain associates with letting go actually makes you let go a little.

Combined with placebo effect and the empathy of the doctor, I can see how over time, people can feel that a remedy “works” even though it essentially contains nothing. I think the subconscious mind is so ridiculously powerful that even crazy stuff like this is possible.

Having said all this, I have a lot of disdain for homepathic doctors that claim all sorts of magical powers in these remedies. It’s like acupuncturists that claim things about mystical pathways in your body. The truth is that sticking needles in your body does seem to have some sort of therapeutic effect. We don’t know completely why, but it works for a lot of really smart people. Not because of crazy pathways, but because the body and mind are amazing things.

I also have disdain for these manufacturers making homepathic remedies that contain no active ingredients and charging more for them than over-the-counter medicines. $35 for a small eye dropper bottle full of water is absurd, even if it does “work”.

For a long time, I believed that homeopathy was a gigantic crock. I think someday we’ll understand how homepathy actually works for so many people.

One interesting counterpoint here is that if you read the information booklet that comes with prescription drugs, you’ll find that few of them actually contain info on how the drug works, because they really just don’t know! Is that any less crazy than taking a salt pill that your subconscious brain can potentially use to reduce your stress or anxiety, leading to better overall heath?

Organized religion is still bunk, though.

go green on your next renovation

Sat, 08 Oct 2011 22:07:00 -0700

Up-front disclamer: I have a minority stake in Greenspace, the company I’m about to plug here.

If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area and are planning to do anything from repainting a bedroom to a full-on renovation, I wanted to plug an amazing store in Santa Cruz that I used when I renovated my townhouse in 2005. Here’s my original posting. I also put up some stunning before and after photos.

Times are really tough in Santa Cruz, with unemployment at 12% or more, so I wanted to let people know that Greenspace works with clients all over the San Francisco Area (and beyond), so send them some love and some business. I live in Mountain View and everwhere I look, people are remodeling and renovating their houses and there are so few good stores around here that have eco-friendly products to choose from, so the 30-45 minute drive to Santa Cruz is worth the effort.

And once you’re in Santa Cruz, you can make a day of it, visiting the beach, doing some hiking, or shopping or eating downtown.

Everything you need to do a renovation is there at Greenspace, including the expertise. Anything from flooring to countertops to paint to everything you need for inside your house after the renovation is done. Feel free to contact me with any questions!

the last time I saw Steve Jobs

Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:56:00 -0700

I worked at Apple from April of 1999 through July of 2011. I’ve never written publicly about that experience, but I wanted to share a little moment that will always be with me, even though it’s not of any great significance.

After leaving my job at Apple, I dropped in for lunch one day. I was exiting the main building, Infinite Loop One, and just ahead of me was Steve Jobs, walking with the usual spring in his step that never seemed to go away even as he started looking more frail. Bumping into Steve was a surprisingly common occurrence for such a large company as Apple.

Steve was heading towards a car parked next to the curb with its door open, waiting for him. The car was idling. A family was standing near the Apple sign outside the building, a common site for people to take photos on their pilgrimages to Apple.

The father turned to Steve as he passed close by and asked, “Excuse me, sir, would you mind taking our photo?”

Steve paused for a moment as an iPhone was extended to him, realizing that they didn’t seem to know who he was. With a hint of enthusiasm, he said “Sure!” as he took the iPhone into his hands.

Steve took a great deal of care composing the photo, backing up a few steps several times, tapping the iPhone screen to lock focus, then said “Smile!” as he snapped the photo, grinning a little bit himself to encourage the family to follow suit.

He handed back the iPhone and they said “Thank you, sir” as Steve stepped into his car, closed the door, and was driven away. The family looked at the photo that Steve had taken and all agreed that it looked great. Then the iPhone was pocketed and they were on their way.

And that was the last time I saw Steve Jobs.

didn't we already have food freedom?

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 12:31:00 -0700

While this is a step in the right direction, it’s sad that anything like this needs to be proposed. It should already be 100% within our rights:

Resolution Recognizing the Rights of Individuals to Grow and Consume Their Own Food and to Enter Into Private Contracts With Other Individuals to Board Animals for Food

Just the title of the resolution itself points out the absurdity of the current laws on the books. Wow, we can now grow our own food and enter into private contracts with other people?

Again, it’s good to see something like this, but it’s likely that the State and the Federal government will likely continue to enforce existing laws (e.g. arresting Amish people for selling fresh milk).

And what’s up with this part of the preamble:

“While it is legitimate for government to see that producers are following the law in order to ensure the highest level of food safety for the public, there must be a distinction made between those farmers engaging in direct commerce with the public, as in the case of a farmer’s market or grocery store, and those individuals choosing to take part in a private herd share or community garden share.”

Why is it legitimate for government to do that? Let people decide what’s safe to put in their bodies. If the government wants to publish information on food safety inspections, that couldn’t hurt, but let the ultimate power reside with the people.

21st century philanthropy

Fri, 02 Sep 2011 20:45:00 -0700

I babbled about philanthropy in an earlier posting called “wealth now, philanthropy later”, so I was thrilled to see this blog posting on the Harvard Business Review website:

Steve Jobs, World’s Greatest Philanthropist

Try to ignore the hyperbolic title of the article and just absorb the content.

Making the world a better place means making decisions your whole life that either incrementally or substantially make people’s lives better. People dislike hearing that investing in a promising new company could potentially have more of an impact on the world that the more common charitable action of, say, donating food to starving children.

However, if your conscious investments create jobs for people who are treated kindly and with respect, and something is also created that benefits the customers of your company, it can have a huge multiplier effect.

This all fits nicely in with the concept of Slow Money. There are certainly wealthy people that have made their money in ways that cause suffering to people and give nothing back to the world other than charity-by-guilt or by giving to causes that exacerbate problems rather than solving them.

However, I believe there are many more that quietly have a profound impact on the world by taking risks that amplify the potential positive results.

the perils of watching time-shifted tennis

Wed, 31 Aug 2011 16:42:00 -0700

I record a lot of tennis on TiVo partly because it’s usually inconvenient to watch it live (time zone differences) and if I time-shift it, I can zap the commercials or skip through matches I don’t care about.

However (and this is where I begin to whine), it’s gotten increasingly difficult to not have the outcomes of matches I’ve queued up be spoiled before I’ve gotten a chance to see them. I almost need to cut myself off from the outside world during a tournament I’m watching. Here are the various ways matches can be easily spoiled:

I’m on a bunch of tennis email lists and even if the list has nothing to do with a tournament, everyone seems to love to be the first to announce something, especially if it’s an upset or the result of a big tournament.
I play tennis often and players are often fans and love to chatter about who just won a given match, even if I tell them not to spoil it, they’ll do it in some subtle way (e.g. you say a match was “shocking”, then it’s probably the underdog that won).
Some places I go, like a tennis retailer or the club where I play, have a big TV blaring, showing a live broadcast of something I’m recording, so I have to avert my gaze and plug my ears.
I have a bunch of friends that are tennis buffs, and if I’m on my computer, there’s always a risk of getting a spoiler instant message.
Even though I’ve removed sports from my Google News feed, sometimes a tennis-related story will show up in the headlines either because it was super-dramatic or is the final match of one of the big 4 tournaments.
Going on Facebook or Twitter during a tournament is always a bad idea, not only because of tennis friends but because I’m fans of various pro tennis players and they will likely spoil something.
If I want to check the schedule of matches for a day, the schedules on-line are always updated to show live scores as well. Bah, don’t do that!
Visiting a website that shows live tennis streaming is also a minefield. Typically, live scores will be somewhere on every page and when you open a live stream, it’ll start playing something live (obviously) even if you really want to watch the match from the beginning.
Watching archived matches can be easily spoiled by the mere fact that it always shows how much time is remaining. If it’s a best of 5 set match and one players is up 2 sets to none and there’s 45 minutes left, you already know the outcome of the match.
For the big 4 tournaments, coverage typically spans multiple channels and sometimes simultaneously. Watching one channel will typically spoil what you’re taping on the other channel, even if it’s just the score ticker at the bottom of the screen.
Some of the tournaments have iPhone apps that send push alerts that you need to remember to turn off. Otherwise, they love to send messages with match results, especially for upsets.
TiVo has this retarded “feature” (to avoid screen burn-in) where it will start playing live TV if you leave it alone for 30 minutes or so. When you turn the TV back on, suddenly it’s showing the live feed of something you haven’t yet watched from the beginning!
If I’m days behind on a tournament, just seeing the schedule of matches or a draw can spoil a match I haven’t yet seen (i.e. if I see someone is still in the tournament, I know they won the match I’ve yet to watch).
The silliest one that’s burned me is that, while watching a time-shifted match, I’ll look up one of the players on Google or in Wikipedia. If you search for a player in Google, it’ll show the scores of recent matches at the top! And if you poke around in Wikipedia, they’ll get updated right after a match finishes, so you can be reading a bio and get the result of the match spoiled.

And that’s just what came to mind just now, without thinking about it. Along with all these possible ways to spoil something, I think people have changed in general. I think people care more about the result rather than the drama of a match, so I think it’s kind of hard to get people to understand that you don’t want it to be spoiled. Also, I think everyone likes to be a publisher nowadays–Facebook, Twitter, blogs–so it can be irrestible to “break the news” to the world.

Ok, I’m done whining now.

arguments against ron paul

Sat, 20 Aug 2011 22:06:00 -0700

I’ve been a Ron Paul supporter on and off for 23 years now, casting my first ever Presidential vote for him in the 1988 election. Two things have remained 100% consistent since then:

Ron Paul’s convictions and beliefs
The arguments against Ron Paul as a potential President

For me, the arguments against him, however legitimate they may be, are an order of magnitude less significant than all the wars we are involved in and how many people die and suffer every day as a result of them. Here are the usual arguments against him:

He’s supposedly anti-abortion
He’s a Christian and/or creationist and somehow that’s the worst thing ever
He’s a Libertarian, so that’s automically terrible or something
He’s supposedly racist

Even though each of these are only partially true at best, it’s interesting to just step back a minute and assume for a moment that they all are true and compare these thoughtfully to all of the things he supports or opposes:

He wants to end all wars and bring all the troops home
He wants to end all meddling in the affairs of other countries, including sanctions that cause starvation and suffering in order to push some political position
He wants to end the insane drug war
He wants to let people have complete control what they eat, drink, and otherwise put into their bodies
He wants to end corporate welfare

Personally, I’d vote for anyone from any party or anywhere on the political spectrum if they supported these five things. Sadly, he’s the only one that does.

how the government worsens income inequality

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 12:28:00 -0700

Let’s say you have some friends that are starting a small business. They set themselves up as a Corporation or LLC and are looking for investors. You decide, sure, why not, I’ve got a few thousand dollars saved, I’ll invest.

Well, turns out you probably can’t!

Unless you have a liquid net worth over $1 million or earned more than $200,000 in the last couple years. To buy any shares in a private company, you need to be an “accredited investor”:

SEC: Accredited Investors

If you find some already rich people, they can invest, that’s fine. So, this is one of the many ways that government actually worsens income inequality. When people are clamoring for the government to “do something” to fix this inequality, perhaps they should step back and look at all the ways they have caused it in the first place.

how can I provide you with excellent service?

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 19:41:00 -0700

It seems like almost every time I make a phone call to the customer service department of a big company, I get an email, a return phone call (gah!), or a tree is cut down to email me a survey asking how my customer experience was.

In other cases, I’m asked before I even talk to someone whether I’d like to take a survey later, which delays my forthcoming excellent customer service.

It’s hard to argue conceptually with the idea that you should ask your customers how they are doing. But how about this:

Talk to your employees manning the phones. They probably have a good idea about whether customers are generally happy or not.
Listen in on some phone calls and take notes.
If you’re going to survey, try to do a very small random selection so it’s an uncommon occurrence.

When I think of companies that have outstanding customer service (Zappos, Apple, Air New Zealand, Charles Schwab, Sonic.net, American Express), I can’t recall ever getting surveyed.

Spending effort to make customer service great is far better than wasting money to find out if it’s great or not. If you don’t know already, then it’s not! :)

if only plastic canoes were our biggest problem

Wed, 06 Apr 2011 17:24:00 -0700

Giant waka seen as ‘cheap’

If only our biggest problem here in the US were the government potentially wasting money on a plastic canoe.

Only $2 million? I guess it wasn’t a no-bid contract!

Instead, we have to wonder what country we’re going to bomb next.

new tennis faces for 2011

Sat, 29 Jan 2011 21:41:00 -0800

The highlight of the Australian Open this year for me was seeing three very promising players that I’ve never seen before, two of which I’ve never even heard of:

Bernard Tomic, who has a very unconventional style that really messes with people’s minds. You never know quite what he’s going to do. Does need to ditch his father as a coach.
Alexandr Dolgopolov, who also has somewhat of an unusual style, but can surprise you with easy power.
Milos Raonic was the most impressive of all, although he didn’t make it as far as Dolgopolov. He’s much more of a classic player, with an incredible serve.

All three clearly need more experience and to work on some things, but I was very impressed with their calm and collected attitudes and I will be very excited to see them play in 2011.

the seductiveness of net neutrality

Fri, 17 Dec 2010 18:25:00 -0800

It’s hard to be against something with such a benign and positive name like “net neutrality”. It’s like being against the Clean Skies Act, which, as it turns out, is one of many pieces of legislation whose name doesn’t accurately describe what it contains

Despite the seductiveness of net neutrality, I believe any government intrusion into the Internet would spoil the one place where true freedom still exists.

Here’s a great article by presidential hopeful Gary Johnson on the subject:

Opinion: Government Should Keep Its Hands Off the Internet

return trip to new zealand

Sat, 04 Dec 2010 22:15:00 -0800

Eric and I made a second trip to New Zealand this year! Even though we got back in mid-October, I just now finished sorting through all the pictures and uploaded them to Flickr:

New Zealand - 2010

We hope to back again two years from now for another visit.