The valuation of electrons

Unless you’ve had your head buried in the sand about financial news, Facebook will be offered to investors as an issuance of stock. Since this is the first issue of stock to the general public, know as an IPO, there has been some speculation as how much the stock will be offered and at what price each share will be. Estimates would value Facebook at $95 Billion. !!!

What exactly is Facebook ? Oh, it’s a social network  (internet) site that just about anyone on the internet knows about.  But what IS Facebook, is their headquarters worth billions? You can’t touch Facebook unless you want fingerprints all over your display, monitor screen or smart phone.

What you getting for your share of stock is a bunch of electrons. These electrons of course are arranged by the knowledge workers at Facebook. It’s the softwear or instructions that allow users to interact or more importantly format information into a readable and interact able design (website). It’s customizable  within formats to allow the user(s) to have their contacts, friends, relatives, likes and dislikes organized for easy viewing and feedback. Facebook doesn’t build hardware like computers and smartphones. Facebook just arranges electrons in a way that’s popular to the general public.

This isn’t a new concept,  software isn’t a new concept. If a product can be digitized , it can be bought or sold with out it physically existing.  Did your ever open a video game cartridge to actually see what was in it. Basically circuits to order the electrons of your game console. A floppy disk, just a collection of magnetic pulses, optical disks? the same, just a collection of miniature reflections from a rotating surface to order the electrons by instructions and information read by a light (laser) beam.

Enter the internet, we even don’t need the media anymore, the electrons are passed back and forth by computers now globally connected. Over a period of time, by digitizing,  media formats were laid to rest, photography went digital, now publishing actual print is dying. Music, download is the key word. Even financial,  a swipe or pass of the RFID plastic is all it takes, the obsolete media is paper money and checks. 

  What the winning element is is that the software is a generally accepted user interface.  If a software company can get it right and accepted by the masses, grow and improve the interface, it wins. Popularity makes up a good portion of the value. So does it’s ability to be a place for  advertisements and ripe for data mining of it’s customers.

How much are we willing to pay for the orderly arrangement of electrons? Time will tell, maybe the next consideration won’t be what OS (Operating System)  you’ll have on your digital device but what AI system you’ll have.

apple- America-and-a-squeezed-middle-class

This is mostly a food blog , but sometimes a tech article I read on-line sparks my attention.

and now the news from the current political elections is un-escapable for the most part

 How U.S. Lost Out on IPhone Work

NY Times, Business Day ,The Economy

By CHARLES DUHIGG and KEITH BRADSHER

Published: January 21, 2012

my comments:

Asia is the leader of large scale manufacturing. This

article focuses on the electronics industry.

notes:

“Companies once felt an obligation to support American

workers, even when it wasn’t the best financial choice,”

said Betsey Stevenson, the chief economist at the Labor

Department until last September. “That’s disappeared.

Profits and efficiency have trumped generosity.”

(a)this was creating jobs for the sake of creating jobs.

 

    "…a current Apple executive said. “We don’t have an

obligation to solve America’s problems. Our only

obligation is making the best product possible.”
(b)this is  focusing on making a product, not influenced by political distractions

…

    "For technology companies, the cost of labor is

minimal compared with the expense of buying parts and

managing supply chains that bring together components

and services from hundreds of companies. For Mr. Cook,

the focus on Asia “came down to two things,” said one

former high-ranking Apple executive. Factories in Asia

“can scale up and down faster” and “Asian supply chains

have surpassed what’s in the U.S.” The result is that

“we can’t compete at this point,” the executive said. "

    "Another critical advantage for Apple was that China

provided engineers at a scale the United States could

not match. Apple’s executives had estimated that about

8,700 industrial engineers were needed to oversee and

guide the 200,000 assembly-line workers eventually

involved in manufacturing iPhones. The company’s

analysts had forecast it would take as long as nine

months to find that many qualified engineers in the

United States. In China, it took 15 days. "
(c)Other countries are set up demographically and geographically to make efficient use of manufacturing

supply chains and labor for mass production in shorter time spans. They have the resources and control

mastered.

 

Other governments support and motivate a national pride towards production and manufacturing versus individual

financial gain (very debatable) and have the qualified work force ready.   Some governments are better at a

growing a service economy.

It seems that Asia is the only place to build fast moving (changing technology) products in great numbers at a price that makes

them affordable.

What does that leave us, the U.S. ? In the technical field; programming? software development?

So here is a follow up question , if you will: Multiple choice, no correct answer(s) at this time

What is the United States better suited at producing?
What ones will grow or shrink or remain the same?
(a) legal professionals
(b) Doctors
(c) political parties/ politicians
(d) health care systems
(e) financial/credit systems
(f) welfare systems
(g) an up to date infrastructure
(h) discourse
(i) non-profit organizations and exemptions(too many to list)
(j) Research and development
(k) Political Action Committees
(l) an affordable education system
(m) a chaotic tax code (AKA red tape)
(n) regulations
(o) benefit packages
(n) small businesses/manufacturing
(p) artistic expression
(q) agriculture
(r) defense/law enforcement

(s) computer programming/servicing/software development

add your own

I’m  poking fun at the USA, this is who we are. A diverse culture. Asia has it’s problems too, and no telling where they will be after 15-20 years.

No doubt though that hobbies should be encouraged as they were in past. They are the first step in education of the trades.

Have they been displaced by dismissing them as nonsense as they have no social redeeming value? Personally speaking, a home with out a work bench is not a home.

Walkman E464

Note: I haven’t anything to compare this to other than the Creative ZEN as a portable storage mobile device  and don’t use ITunes or a smart phone.

                 One of the gifts that I had a choice to receive, through an awards program with my employer for 10 years service, was a Sony Walkman. The Creative 5 gig mp3 player I previously used did not want to hold a charge despite having replaced the battery.  I liked all the features and capabilities of the Creative Zen player but I couldn’t pass up a chance for this free replacement.

                 The Walkman NWZ-E464 is not what considered state of the art, no touch screen or even WI-FI capabilities but It does have video playback  and color screen (320×240) something the Zen (gray scale LCD) did not. The accompanying software is loaded on the player so no disk/CD is included. It’s not necessary to use the Media GO software as the Walkman shows up on Win XP once It’s connected by the supplied USB  data/charging cable.

 

                The Media Go is another playlist manager import/export styled software suited for the Walkman.  The Sony Media go software has an analytical feature called SensME Channels which I didn’t use at first. In addition to the usual ability  to bookmark and index songs\video by playlist the SensMe analyses songs according to a “12 Tone Analysis” and places them in one (or more than one) SensMe channels. 

 

List of channels

Channel    Description

[Morning]  Plays music for various times of the day.

[Daytime]

[Evening]

[Night]

[Midnight]

(These automatically change with the time)

[Shuffle All]  Plays all songs in random order.

[Energetic]  Plays up-tempo and high-energy music.

[Relax]  Plays calm and relaxing music.

[Upbeat] Plays cheerful and uplifting music.

[Mellow] Plays soft and slow-tempo music.

[Lounge] Plays jazz and easy listening music.

[Emotional]Plays ballads.

[Dance] Plays rhythm, rap and R & B music.

[Extreme] Plays loud and powerful music.

With a 8 gig capacity this type of analysis can be useful to divide up your music if you don’t want to manually place every song in a playlist or edit the properties of each selection. Media Go analytics gives you a Tempo and Mood rating for each song.

The software does have the ability to sync with Gracenote media database if you are  connected to the internet to download track information if you want and album graphics covers if you don’t want to manually enter the info. There are many fields in the database properties where you can enter much information. It’s also possible to import and manually add lyrics for a Karaoke style playback option.

The Walkman also has an FM Radio tuner, a voice recorder function, sleep and alarm timer,and many settings for each function. One function I miss from the Zen is the ability to directly record from the FM radio tuner which allowed you to create your own mix file from recorded audio from the FM Tuner. (back in the day we used cassette recorders and the like to record audio from the radio\records\TV  and made mix tapes “for our own personal use”)  Now with software such as Sound Engine, Audacity, etc. it’s all done digitally. A recorded sound/video file can be edited on your computer, leaving out the commercials, then exported  from your computer and stored on the Walkman, if you prefer the small screen and need portable video. 

The supplied Ear buds, come with small medium and large adapters to use according to the size of your ears.

The sound quality, is only as good as the source, and the Walkman E464 supports many file types and bit rate and sampling  settings. The Media Go software can rip CDs. With the maximum bit rate and sampling settings the sound is as good as it gets. Of course if you have the proper cable and stereo amplification equipment you can use the Walkman as a source and hear your tunes through traditional speakers. Even though the ear buds give you decent sound, in my opinion, nothing can replicate the sensation  and sound of speakers moving air and the feel of the low end of frequencies, and the  heterodyning caused by room acoustics . Over the years I have used earphones when private listening or music monitoring was required, but with the shrinking size of portable media devices it would be impractical to carry around earphones (Koss pro4a) with the Walkman. Earphones and ear buds give a totally different sound by my standards, the acoustics are totally different. Since no one carries boom boxes any more it’s a trade of having all your music with you in such a small package. Ear buds are OK, I’ll have to get used to them, and if you wear hearing  protection at your job having ear buds for listening is something else you have to jam in your ears.

Having been looking frequently for a replacement to the Zen player and it being on the back burner, the Walkman fits the bill and the price was right! I can slip it in my pocket with the ear buds easily and the battery life is excellent so far.

Real time blogging?

12/24/2011

Tiny Chat is a real time audio/video streaming 2 way conference type website. Having a broadband connection and camera enabled computer (I don’t know if this is available for mobile devices, yet) it’s possible to have a live audio/video interactive feed in a chat room setting with your friends. The technology is not really new but the fact that broadband connections are becoming more common nowadays allows more households to participate and collaborate on projects.

computer, broadband and network access, Renee Metro

Is this the future of cooking programs?

windows live writer

As with everything else, downloading apps is the standard practice these days, which is about the same as installing software instead it’s function may be associated with a particular program. Puttering around wordpress.com and checking out recommended apps, windows live writer was on the list. At first look it appeared to be a fancy HTML editor/composer but what the heck I could always uninstall it if I found it to be unnecessary. One of the points of the live windows live writer (why does the word “live” seems to be a favorite buzzword now for titles ) is that you can write up and post directly to your blog, simple if it’s on the list, otherwise If you post to an off beat blog you have to supply a URL address so it seems. Down loading BTW prompts you to download other windows (live) items which I unchecked.

I’ve always at one time or another used a HTML composer editor  that being, I could whip up a quick page using the email composer of Netscape 7.1 or it’s html composer and cut and paste into a blog or website.windows live writer  has most of the bells and whistles you need without being too heavy. Some of it’s strong points are the ability to save drafts locally, off line composing, and the direct line connection with your blog that imports certain elements of your blog editing capabilities and feel. When I switch from wordpress to live journal in windows live writer, it even uses some elements of the theme, background colors etc. Another point is that you have a dedicated window for all the composing/editing chores that I find sometimes is difficult to do in your blogs cloud because of the limited size of the editing window, all the ancillary menus and dashboard controls take up screen space. Also editing and/or correcting or reposting within your blog, say a large post with graphics, is cumbersome  because of the large amount of info you have to navigate through within a limited size editing window.  If you have a slow connection, at times the text/graphics may stutter or drag while your typing away, the effect of going back and forth between the cloud of your blog. If you want to update or edit a previous blog posting in windows live writer, pull up the published blog, edit,  and simply re publish and the blog is updated, something that is not readily noted. (if the draft is used it may publish a duplicate posting though).

 

Getting back to installation, it was flawless and gives you  the standard desktop icon to launch windows live writer as needed. One thing is that you are prompted to supply your blogs user name and log in info so it can integrate with the blog. Once  live writer downloads the editing elements of your blog is done, you only need to log in to your blog through live writer when you hit the publishing button.

I haven’t used  windows live writer long enough to test all of it’s features, if indeed i need them, but overall it’s a plus for  me by being able to compose off line in a large scalable window , have all the necessary editing elements (including easy graphics editing property features) and the ability to save and/or auto save drafts offline (local) and save\auto save drafts to your blog site, for  “when i get around to it” finishing of your postings.

Surprised, no buttons for facebook/twitter posting though I have that feature through my blogs.

LiveJournal Tags: windows,test

removing HEAT

Refrigerators don’t make things cold ! They remove heat. Heat transfer, energy transfer.
We take for granted the fridge until maybe the light bulb inside burns out or the ice cream doesn’t get as hard as it used to or the milk (or beer) doesn’t get cold enough.
This is a basic two door (side by side) fridge with out the bells and whistles , Ice maker, water dispensers etc.
Refrigeration depends on removing the heat from inside and venting it to the exterior of the fridge.
Most rely on proper air circulation both inside and outside to work effectively and efficiently .
Keeping the condenser coils, those located some where outside the box, clean promotes proper energy transfer.
Older fridges had the condenser coils on the back and simply gave off heat. Now they are usually at the bottom and air circulated over them by a fan.
It is recommended that these coils be cleaned often.

in this case remove the grill as the manufacturer recommends.

with a vacuum and a crevice tool, clean the coils

while your under there, remove and clean the drip pan.

When the fridge goes through the defrost cycle the melting ice has to go somewhere !

If you never clean it, it may cause odors, the water that collects in it normally evaporates, you don’t have to empty it periodically.

You can remove the back cover and clean the compressor, fan and coils of dust buildup that traps in heat if you desire. CAUTION ! some of these components may be hot and of course unplug the fridge before cleaning. Note any copper tubing that is touching another surface or rubs against another tube, over time this could wear due to vibration, cause noise, and or refrigerant loss. Isolate.

A look at the evaporator coils in the freezer, cover removed. It’s not necessary to clean these. This fridge relys on a fan to circulate air over the coils removing heat and ducting it from the freezer to the fridge side for cooling.

With simple periodic cleaning, you fridge will always keep your cool !

XP

wow, catching up with the times, installed Windows XP on one of the Win 98 desktop computers. It didn’t copy all of the files , maybe skipped 2 or 3 but running good so far, don’t have any peripherals on that system yet. Had to reload Mobo audio drivers and it didn’t recognize the monitor, had to reload the monitor driver. It is also set to classic theme so there is not much difference from the Win 98 look.

mugged

comp-u-mug coffe mug, status: retired, cracked handle

I think that the line from the decision block “is boss looking” ,no, should go to the block “take coffee break”.

computer laws mug, status: retired, handle broke off

doctorate mug, status:everyday use, one of the few mugs with printing on the inside

bahrain mug, Status: collectable

retro movies

“this” tv network , Boston, mostly retro movies now OTA HDTV   channel 7.2

A High Definition Over the Air Television Desk Top Component Solution

A High Definition Over the Air Television Desk Top Component Solution

(1) KWorld TV BOX 1680ex, W/Multi-Video Inputs, PC/TV Switch, Built-In Speakers, Remote Control
(1) Samsung DTB_H260F Digital set top box
(1) CRT (or LCD) computer monitor with sub D input

I ran The Kworld TV Box right out of the box to a 17″ Dell CRT monitor with a rooftop broadcast antenna input and it gave good results for standard broadcast. I had an older Techmedia 14″ crt monitor that I connected to it later. I had to set the resolution of the Kworld at 800×600, the most that this older monitor can handle, but it worked with this monitor also giving me TV reception to replace an old 19″ TV. Next, connecting a Samsung DTB-H260F Digital over the air tuner utilizing the YPbPr component outputs to the inputs to the Kworld and feeding a 17″ Sony Trinitron CRT monitor really showed off the capabilities of the Kworld TV Box. The picture is astounding and between the Kworld, Samsung, and Sony monitor, there is a wealth of adjustments. An excellent combination for OTA HDTV system that utilizes a monitor capable of true component system High Definition. Having both, a Sony Monitor set up for Tv reception and a Dell monitor for the computer on my desk, it’s possible to watch Tv and use the computer at the same time. (the Kworld will support Picture in Picture function if you have only one monitor, though the manual states that it won’t work at 1680×1050 resolution). The Kworld 1680ex was purchased from Tiger Direct. There may be other converter boxes available that do the same thing but this combination has alot of fexibility and the ability to add other components such as a DVD player or video game etc. The Samsung was available from circuit City , it’s relatively expensive compared to other Converter boxes and IS NOT available for the $40.00 off Program, but the outputs are true high definition. The government issue converter boxes, those available for use with the $40.00 off coupons, won’t output over 480i and by the Coupon program Rules are limited to analog output only , some have separate video/audio output. It’s unfortunate that the $40.00 off government coupons limit your choice of converter boxes and not available for use if you decide to replace your old analog TV with a digital one.

desk wiring schematic

Note the antenna should be listed as  a PR-4400 ((not PR-8800, which is a double bow tie grid,) www.starkelectronic.com))