the klog

Here's more than you ever wanted to know about Ronald McDonald. Did you know that NBC Today Show weather reporter Willard Scott used to be Bozo the Clown and then became the very first Ronald? But then:

When McDonald's decided to make Ronald a national figure in 1966, the company dumped Mr. Scott, fearing it would be hard to find people in each market with Mr. Scott's big build, recalls Mr. Klein. "That was a heartbreaker," says NBC's Mr. Scott. "I was too fat."

McDonald's is really crazy protective about Ronald McDonald. One time, Ronald was willing to risk arrest to avoid revealing his real name. They won't admit that there is more than one, even after Ronald was spotted in several countries on the same day. McDonald's released a statement attributed to Ronald: "Let's just say that between you, me and Santa, it's magic."

Ted Turner has spoken out against media consolidation in an article for the Washington Post. It's reminiscent of that Warren Buffett bit. Turner says that he would never have been able to break into the market as a young entrepeneur if anti-monopoly laws were as relaxed as they are now. He talks about how small businesses are more willing to take risks and come up with new ideas, while big businesses just stay with safe bets and buy up companies with successful new ideas. He makes this interesting analogy:

That's an understandable approach for a corporation -- but for a society, it's like overfishing the oceans. When the smaller businesses are gone, where will the new ideas come from?

The article sometimes reads like a typical anti-big corporation rant in many ways except... it's Ted Turner writing it! :)

He also talks very directly about the danger of media consolidation leading to more biased news, and even specifically about news organizations marginalizing those who opposed the Iraq war. I suppose a cynic would say that this is hypocritical coming from the guy who founded CNN, but I still praise him for this article. Hell, an optimist might even hope that this means better coverage from CNN itself in the future. *chuckle* Okay, I tried my best to say that last part with a straight face. :)

On the left is the lighthouse at Point Reyes that was used until 1975. Built in 1870, it was equipped with a state-of-the-art Fresnel Lens. But it's still in this cute little house and stuff, you know? On the right is its replacement, a pair of 1000-watt lightbulbs on an automatically rotating platform.

I mean, sure, life sucked for the lighthouse keeper who had to watch over the old light through fog and storm without human contact, but did they have to make the new lens so.... Utilitarian and ugly? :P

It reminds me of when I was in Florence, and I visited the "History of Science Museum". They had actual Galileo contraptions, Kepler's old telescope, things like that. And they were so beautiful, with intricate wood carvings and all that.

A man on an Australian flight just attacked the crew with two small wooden stakes that he snuck through security by carrying on his person. He stabbed (but didn't kill) two flight attendants before being subdued. Also, the cockpit door remained locked throughout the attack.

The Australian Transport Minister said the oversight was a "lesson about unforeseen tools being used." He also said, "We'll leave no stone unturned, plainly we don't want to see a repeat of this." But like... dude.. how are you supposed to prevent a repeat of this sort of strip-searching every passenger?

So in my jury selection post, I discuss a guy who's mostly just trying to get out of jury duty, probably, but who talks about how he believes in "natural law". At one point I write, "If you're going to just follow whatever laws you feel like following, then we need to either toss you in prison or kick you our of our society. That's how societies work!"

While talking with a friend today about related issues, he pointed out that people shouldn't be kicked out of a society just for having a different view about how it works. And I agree. I don't think natural law guy should be kicked out of society just for his views, and I apologize for suggesting that. I actually think he has every right to disagree with how society functions; that's what free speech is all about. I only think he should be punished if he actually acts to break the rules of society.

In a sense, though, that was exactly what he was threatening to do. He was flip-flopping on whether he would make his decision as a juror based on the laws of the land. That act, were he to follow through, would be a violation of the social contract. (Only problem is: There's no way to enforce the method by which he comes to his judgement.)

Also, about social contracts and stuff, my friend pointed out that people do not actually get to sign it if they're born into it, and people also don't have freedom to immigrate to other countries... so in that sense, we are very much coerced to follow a particular social contract, and that's not very fair. I think I agree with that. At the same time, I don't see any better alternative, at least as long as we have scarcity of land and resources. There's probalby a much bigger discussion here that I'm not going to get into now. :P

Tania sent me a forward containing this photo of a modern Chinese tan. I can't vouch that it's real and not Photoshopped, but it could be real, at least. :P

The Chinese reads, "This summer has passed." And no, it's not any better of a joke in Chinese.

Mars Global Surveyor just took a picture of the Earth as seen from Mars. There are also photos of the Earth accompanied by the Moon and one where you can see both the Earth and Jupiter in the same shot. [Space.com article] [JPL article] It's the first photo of Earth from another planet where we can resolve oceans and continents at all. It's also kind of reminiscent of the shot of Earth that Voyager took from really far off, way back when. Carl Sagan wrote a beautiful essay regarding that one.

Oh, and I made a wallpaper-ready version of it for your enjoyment.

Warrent Buffett, one of the richest people in the world, speaks out against Bush's tax cut plan.

I reported for jury duty recently. You can read a couple of observations about Day One (including a rant about something unrelated :P). So I basically wait around a lot, and they eventually weed out anyone to whom a two week trial would present "extreme hardship". At the end of the day, we fill out a survey with questions asking us about previous experiences with asbestos, our views toward corporations, and our views toward personal injury lawsuits. That's all I know about the case, since they have to tell us as little as possible about the case until it actually starts to minimize bias. I do know that I like the Honorable Donald Mitchell, though. He's kinda relaxed and funny. And it's kinda neat that he actually has jury duty too. He's just arranged to split his day between that and his normal job. :)

Day Two

On Thursday, a computer randomly selects 18 people to be potential jurors, and I'm one of the first 12. We find out a little more about the case. It's a civil case, an individual suing a corporation. The plaintiff is a man sick with cancer, and he claims that he was exposed to asbestos while working at the company. The company denies any such exposure. In addition, the guy's wife is suing for loss of consortium. The jury isn't allowed to find out the identity of either party until the beginning of the trial, though; we only see their lawyers.

To test our suitability as jurors, the lawyers start asking us questions, and the plaintiff's lawyer goes first. She looks through our survey responses and talks to anyone she has concerns with. Three or four people are fine with awards for medical bills and lost wages, but they have issues with placing a value on abstract harm like "pain and suffering" or "loss of consortium". There's a lot of confusion over whether or not the court will actually give us guidance about how to decided the amount to award if we decide for the plaintiff.

Then there's this one older guy who recently filed suit against a company and lost. He's still visibly distraught about it. "Will that affect your ability to decide the case fairly? Do you think you'll biased against a corporation?" "Yes." Later, he'll be the only juror dismissed "for cause".

The most (unintentionally?) amusing guy looks like a stereotypical businessman. His reading material is an American Spectator magazine. He says that he believes in "natural law", that the "law" as we call it is actually a set of rules that the state coerces us to follow. He adds that he believed in free markets.

Lawyer: So, when you get to the deliberation room, do you think you'll be able to make a decision based on the law as given to you by the court?

Natural Law Guy: Well, I don't think that's "law"...

Judge: I think we're arguing semantics here... Could you base your decision on the rules or laws or whatever that the court gives you? Or would you feel compelled to follow your own moral code instead?

The lawyer and the judge keep asking that basic question, and he keeps giving different answers. At one point, the judge starts making an analogy about a red light on a desert road with no cars in any direction. Will he ignore the light? Yes, he says. But then the judge realizes it's not a perfect analogy. :P

This just goes on and on until he eventually agrees to "try his best". As for me, I think this guy needs to get out of my country, or at least out of my city and state. If you live in a given society, you've signed the social contract to abide by its laws. If you're going to just follow whatever laws you feel like following, then we need to either toss you in prison or kick you our of our society. That's how societies work!

Ahem. To continue, one lady has lost her grandfather to asbestos-related cancer. The lawyer asks her if she can put that behind her and decide the case fairly. She says she thinks she can, and she'll try her best. The lawyer launches into a little speech about how that's all that they can ask us to do, that we all come into to courtroom with experiences, but that we just need to try to be as fair as possible, etc.

And that brings me to the style of question the plaintiff's lawyer employs. Thing is, I totally feel like she was covertly trying to build a rapport with the jurors. She's playing up the "representing an everyday person" angle. The defendant's lawyer is this man in a suit with stylish hair. He just looks all slick and, well, corporate lawyer-ish. I can totally imagine him as a TV lawyer. :) The plaintiff's lawyer, on the other hand, is wearing something decent but kinda plain, like maybe a sweater and pants or something; I don't remember exactly.

She also jokes around a lot with the jurors. On a couple of occasions, when she mentions her client's illness, the defendant's lawyer objects that she's "arguing", that is, bringing up stuff that should be left for the trial. So later, she's about to say something that leans in that direction, and she disclaims, "Now I don't want to be accused of arguing, but..." She even makes a couple of jokes that only she laughs at. :P

Personally, I'm finding it kinda irritating. I feel like she's obviously playing to our emotions. And she goes on asking questions for so long that it takes a couple of hours, and we have to break till the next day.

Day Three

On Friday, the plaintiff's lawyer continues with her questions for a while until she's finally done, and it's the corporate lawyer's turn. He doesn't have too many questions. The one amusing bit is when one juror says he probably has a little bit of bias against corporations, but it's nothing major, just that corporations have money to hire better lawyers and such. "So," the defendant's lawyer says, pointing to the plaintiff's lawyer, "Are you saying that she's not a good lawyer?" We all have a good laugh. :)

So then we have a break while the lawyers talk to the judge about juror dismissals. As I mentioned before, only one juror gets dismissed for a valid reason. The lawyers also get a limited number of dismissals "without cause", and the plaintiff's lawyer picks out one or two without cause. The defendant's lawyer passes, which is kind of surprising to me.

The judge asks us one last time if we have any concerns about being jurors. After a pause, the natural law guy says that the plaintiff's lawyer said something at some point that offended him, and that he'll probably hold it against her. I think he's obviously just trying to get out of jury service at this point. The judge won't have any of it, and neither will the lawyer. The judge tells him it wouldn't be fair to let his impression of a lawyer to taint his view of their client's case, and he asks natural law guy if he thinks he can try to put that aside and just the case fairly. A pause, and then another reluctant "yes".

And that's that. The jury is set, and we are to report back for about two weeks of actual trial on Monday, serving 9:30am to 4:30pm every day. It'll be kind of lonely, I think, because we're not allowed to talk about the case with anyone, jurors or not, for the duration of the trial. This is to keep us unbiased.

Day Four

So I get to the court Monday morning, and only the plaintiff's lawyer is there. The judge comes out and tells us he has some good news and some bad news. The good news is that the case has been settled! The bad news is that he won't get to spend two weeks getting to know us fine people. :P He tells us that, when presented with an actual jury, people often think harder about all the trouble of going to trial. It's apparently not unusual for them to settle at the last minute.

So the judge dismisses us, and the plaintiff's lawyer comes over to ask us jurors about our thoughts and so forth. I notice at that point that she's wearing a business suit. She never wore a business suit the previous days. Intentional or not? I don't really know. But it does get me thinking... After chatting with a couple of other jurors, I decide that much of her act wasn't directed at the jury at all! At one point, she even mentioned to a juror that most cases don't go to trial; that was likely intended for the ears of her opponent. All her rapport-building may have been to sway us to her side emotionally, but it was also to convince the defendant's lawyer that he doesn't have a good chance. Same probably goes for her delay tactics in asking so many questions. It was probably all to convince the defendants to settle. And the defendant's lawyer's complacent attitude toward the end of jury selection makes more sense now, too. The corporation had probably already decided at that point to settle out of court.

And thus ends my second jury service. I'm going to get $15/day (excluding day 1) in the mail for it, and I'm exempt for a year. (In Massachusetts, you're exempt for 3 years after serving!) I don't know if I get to say I served on a jury this time, though, since technically the case ended before going to trial. And yet, since my last trial only lasted only two days, and jury selection only took a day, this actually took just as long! :) I kinda looked forward to learning more about asbestos, but two weeks all day would have probably been a bit too much, so I guess I'm glad it's over. And as the judge assured us at the end, our very presence was a major influence in making the parties settle, so I didn't really waste my time, and I fulfilled my civic duty once again. Hurrah!

So I have here before me a Chicago DVD from China. Below is the description blurb from the back. All spelling and capitalization is as presented.

Chicago, leading lady hate that story occurrence in last century two 10-year on behalfs is a song and dance actor for always thinking the establish a reputation. On Chicago's satge, she continuously look for opportunity, through after suffering the beguilement, he killed to her unfaithful to ruler lover, in the jail, hate met the woman of actor song and dance the kaly. Similar to hate, kaly too Equally hope earnestlies the establish a reputation's woman, she hope the quilt medium the concern. His lawyer's billy too the on the payroll take upped the legal case of the hate. In the jail after, the kaly discovers oneself that year of Those is old to smell to have already let to by oneself become the star. Same, the hate also therefore become the star, they at the thing - freedom that jail empress finally goted the oneselfed the dreamed in order to with the reputation.

Gotta love it. :) (If you want it to make slightly more sense, be sure to note that Roxy somehow became "hate" and Velma "kaly". Don't ask me why. Update: It occured to me that Roxy's last name is "Hart" and Velma's is "Kelly", so there you go... but still. :P )

Some of you may have already seen this story about how a Thai politician and his driver were trapped in their BMW 520 limo after the car's onboard computer crashed. The computer controlled the doors, the windows, and the A/C, so the car was heating up rapidly until they got the attention of a guard, who smashed a window with a sledgehammer. All around amusing story. [Update Jan-28-2007: In response to the comment below, I can see how this would be totally unfunny when you're actually in the situation, however easy it is to express schadenfreude as an outsider. In my defense, I think this was mainly funny because it happened to a politician; it's funny when unfortunate things happen to those in power. I probably would not have found it nearly as amusing if it was a story about an ordinary person. I apologize to the commenter for being insensitive, and I hope she's able to get some resolution.] Hardware backups, people! Not having a way to manually unlock the doors just seems negligent. But then the article says:

BMW's more up-market 7-series range uses a computer system called i-drive which has Microsoft's WindowsCE at its core.

Did Mr Jaovisidha narrowly miss being killed by the blue windscreen of death?

And that, I had a problem with. It gives the impression that WindowsCE was responsible, when in fact it was not (as far as I know). I've seen another article on the subject that doesn't even have the word "up-market"; it just said that it was a BMW 520, and then later mentions that the BMW 7-series uses WindowsCE. I mean, look, Windows has already disabled the USS Yorktown. Do we really need to invent blame when it was not responsible?

As a followup to this post of mine, here's a New York Times article on blogging and privacy.

We've all seen tons of movies with "hacking scenes" featuring giant 3-D graphics and a big red ACCESS DENIED. Well, guess what? The hacking scene in Matrix: Reloaded features actual hacking techniques! (Trinity uses Nmap and exploits an SSH security hole.) Here are some snapshots of the scene in question. Update: And here's a SecurityFocus article on it.

Reviews have been very mixed, but big geek points for this one. :) Speaking of geek points, read what's on the floor of the entrance to Magneto's prison. God, I love details. :)

I went to jury selection today. It continues tomorrow, so I don't know if I'll be serving yet. Anyway, three tidbits from my little adventure today:

On my way to downtown, I was sitting just past the senior citizen section of the bus. (The MUNI Metro, technically, but we San Franciscans have a tendency to call our light rail/subway "MUNI" or simply "the bus" for some reason.) Anyway, a little old lady came on board, complete with grocery bag in hand. There were three non-senior citizens in the designated section, and none of them moved a muscle!

I felt awkward at first, since I didn't want to seem all holier-than-thou; I wasn't even in a senior citizen seat. But eventually I stood up and gave her my seat. The bus had already started moving, though, and she couldn't really make her way over to mine. Still, no one else moved. I considered helping her over, but I definitely felt too awkward to do that. She waited until the next stop before making her way to the seat I vacated.

What is wrong with people? This was in the morning, too. At least in the afternoon commute, they could make the excuse of being tired or something. And what pisses me off the most is that I had to feel awkward for wanting to help. I was afraid of being looked down on for giving an old lady my seat, when no one in the designated seats would move. I repeat: What is wrong with people?

Okay, on to something more amusing: the video they show prospective jurors. "California: The greatest state!" it said at one point. But the best part was when they told us we couldn't discuss the details of the case while it was ongoing. However, it told us, we could investigate the case, by going to the scene or by doing our own research! :) Imagine that: Kenneth Lu - Private... uh.. Juror!

And finally, in the courtroom, some people gave their excuses for why serving would present them with "extreme hardship". One guy said he just found out he's going on vacation next week, and the plane tickets were all purchased and everything already. The judge asked him how he found out.

"My wife told me."

Everyone in the room was much amused. :)

I saw some Little League players warming up for a game, and it reminded me of this photo I took in Panama. Look! They have uniforms and everything! It may sound cheesy, but it reminded me of how lucky we are.

(Well, maybe not me, personally... When I was in elementary school, my friends and I played baseball all the time. (We used a tennis ball, but we had aluminum bats and baseball gloves.) We dreamed of playing in the Little League, but our school didn't have that. Oh well.)

Another interesting thing about this photo was how awkward I felt taking it. Even though they were playing in a public park, I didn't want to seem like some freak or something. :P Now that I've started taking some photos of random stuff, I've become conscious of how uncomfortable some people feel about having their pictures taken by strangers.

This sign was by San Francisco's Ocean Beach. I found it really interesting. Click to expand and read.

I missed Ocean Beach and its overcastness. :)

Finally, we have this rather inexplicable billboard:

Caltrans is the California Department of Transportation, for those who don't know. But a public service ad about construction zones? And with such a funky catch phrase?

David Weinberger has written an excellent column on a fundamental flaw of digital rights management. The gist is that, despite our laws, it's important for us to bend the rules a bit sometimes.

The letter of the law is too rigid for real life. Fortunately, in real life, we have leeway, and that's a fundamental part of being human. Unfortunately, computers don't give leeway, and enforcing laws by computer is thus a flawed concept. Anyway, go read the essay.

It's only going to get worse. On June 2, the FCC will vote on media consolidation rules. The proposed changes will take further steps toward deregulation. Even fewer companies will be in charge of our media. Maybe this is in our best interest, right? After all, the FCC is part of the gov't, and they work for us, right? Well, let's get back to American media coverage of the war. Coincidence? :P

And I don't think it's just a conspiracy theory, either. As Paul Krugman points out in his latest column, NewsCorp (Fox's parent company) cut deals with the Chinese gov't, dropping the oft-critical BBC World Service from satellite feeds and such. And he mentions some evidence that lobbying groups do the same sort of thing here. Krugman also mentions how many Americans looked to the BBC for news during the war. He postulates that the added scrutiny of being government-owned actually makes BBC News less biased. And let's not forget that Britain has a large number of competiting organizations.

Certainly, pandering to public opinion about the war was one reason for the coverage, and it wasn't just to please the gov't, but media consolidation is a scary thing regardless of why it's happening.

I find it hard to be more riled up, though. Eva's been bugging me to blog about this issue, and Lessig and Copyfight have been talking about making blogs do what the regular media won't... But I just feel too helpless to care. Money rules, and only widespread public awareness can fight that tide. I'm more pessimistic about this than about other causes because the very media that could raise that public awareness doesn't want you to be aware; there has been very little coverage of media consolidation issues in the mainstream media. Of course, that's also precisely why it's so dangerous, and maybe it's precisely why I should care more.

The new colorful twenty I mentioned earlier was delayed because of the war, but it's finally been unveiled.

Behold: color in the new twenty! It's subtle, but still! So so wrong! :)

Okay.. so I actually kinda like it. :P

Looters had been continuously looting an industrial stockyard in Eastern Baghdad. Since US soldiers don't have a shoot-on-sight policy or anything, they just kept on coming. So now the military is paying former looters to guard the property, thus building a working relationship with the locals, and it's been working very well.

What I find interesting is how this may seem a bit lenient, but it probably works better than harsh punishment like shunning anyone who's looted.

Just how close are we to Rapture? Keep track regularly with The Rapture Index. (Link from Paul.)

On a flight the other day, I sat beside a man who just came from an NRA convention. He was there to participate in a calling (making various animal sounds) competition. He placed second, but he should have been first; the first place winner had made a couple of mistakes that the judges didn't deduct points for. Even the first place winner agreed that the judging was bad. The problem, apparently, was that several regular judges were in military operations in Iraq, and the substitute judges weren't as good.

He was from Southern California, and so I asked him whether he hunted much back home. He said that he did sometimes, but that he often goes out of state, mostly to the Midwest, to hunt. He volunteered that he only hunts what he can eat, animals like duck and deer. He said that he refuses to hunt purely for sport.

I wonder if he sensed my liberalness and was being preemptively defensive or something. Anyway, I felt like this was a liberal version of a conservative person having a chat with a gay person for the first time. :)

He even mentioned at one point that he was particularly furious with the bad judging because his dad is aging and might not be around in another year. The guy wanted to bring the title home to dad.

Back when I made my old MIT homepage in 1996, I put my whole personal history on there, my contact info, all sorts of things. That just seemed like the thing to do. When I graduated and started this new site, I realized I was a bit uncomfortable with letting everyone read all about my life. Also, no one who knew me would ever go to the web to look up my contact info, so I stopped publishing that, too.

I don't think it's so much that I've changed, but more that the web has changed. Back in 1996, it was something only computer geeks and college kids used. Now almost everyone has an email address, and there have been articles written about people using Google to check up on their dates. Privacy is worth more than a passing thought now.

Personal thoughts

Ironically, as I decided to stop revealing my life history on the web, I also started to write this blog. It's been interesting figuring out what I do and do not feel comfortable talking about here. I've found that I've mostly talked about abstract topics and thoughts, and I've mentioned little about events in my personal life. I think that's a good compromise.

There are still privacy issues relating to revealing my thoughts about things. Theoretically, a potential employer might not like certain political views or something. But I'm a big fan of open communication. I stand behind my opinions. I hope I'm giving people a new perspective on life. There's certainly more than a little hubris involved, too. I'm assuming that people are interested enough in what I think to read it, and if they do, well, that's a good feeling! Maybe I'll even influence you them! That's worth giving up a little privacy about my thoughts.

Other people's lives

In my old static homepage, I didn't mention other people much. Here in my blog, though, I may sometimes refer to what other people are doing, and I have respect their privacy as well. That can be a bit tougher. There have even been a few cases where I've asked someone whether they'd mind my talking about something, and we came to the conclusion that I wouldn't mention it, or that I'd talk about it in a more indirect way.

This brings me to my pictures. For a while now, my main nod to privacy was in mentioning names: I only mentioned first names (to foil Google searches), and I avoided mentioning who people were (who was my friend, who was my coworker, who was dating whome, etc).

Public access to my photos

Since I got my digital camera, I've started to put a lot more pictures on the web. It's gotten to the point now where people can see quite a bit about the concrete aspects of my life from my photos, and I'm no longer comfortable with that. So I've closed them off to the public. If you know me, just ask me for the password. I'll be pretty liberal about giving it out to people I know. I just don't want them to be open to anyone with an Internet connection.

This decision was made easier by the creation of my photoblog. It started as a list of photos I wanted to show to the public at large. I noticed that it had mostly impersonal photos, and so I realized I wouldn't lose much by closing my normal photos to the public. Over the next few months, I'll probably occasionally post some of the more interesting photos from my archives on my photoblog as well.

What do you all think?

I know a lot of people who think blogging is weird, who think it's weird to reveal so much of your life to the world. As you can see, I certainly don't just write totally freely here. Please place your thoughts below. If you blog, what are your criteria for what you do or do not mention on your blog? And if you don't blog, is it for privacy reasons?

The Blue Angels were pretty darn cool:

On the road outside Patrick Air Force Base:

Now take a look at this:

It's camouflage.... covered in DayGlo!

Camouflage... DayGlo!

Camouflage .............. DayGlo!

I found that very amusing.

From Orlando International Airport:

Note how these people are smiling when they're citizens and no longer smiling when they're soldiers. :P

From the tour bus at Kennedy Space Center:

Oh, how I love warning signs. :)

The following are from Panama.

Why oh why did this sign have to be in three different languages? Is anyone on this planet really going to understand one of those three big words but not the other two?! (Especially since they could just as easily have used "Inflammable" for the English version as well!)

No comment on this one:

From just outside Jenny's house:

A neighborhood kid playing baseball with a stick:

And finally, look what's invaded Panama! This is from a country fair I went to. I might also note that there were no Chinese people at the stand this sign pointed to:

My last photo from London, just around the corner from my flat.

I love these car carrier things. This one was trying to back into a side street when a couple of cops hollered at the driver to stop because he was about to hit a traffic light.