Simulation Remake - UPDATE

Just a quick update on my progress so far:

• Schema for database backend has been created using MySQL
• Currently using three tables
• Installed MySQL ODBC driver so connection to database can be established in executable (connection yet to be established)
  
• All conference and team information has been entered into the database
• 32 conferences
• 341 teams
  
• Started a PHP script to scrape player statistics from popular sports website
• Statistics scraping currently done by team, one team at a time
  
• Team selected using drop-down list -- all 341 teams are available
• Statistics scraping code completed successfully, but still need to add code to insert stats into database

That's pretty much it. All-in-all, it's been a pretty productive few days of work. I plan on adding the database insertion code to the PHP script tomorrow. Should be fairly straightforward -- just need to take care not to duplicate player stats when inserting. After that, I'll begin to tackle the database connection inside the executable.

EDIT - Here's a quick little video of the PHP stats script. My script is in the left pane, and the website the stats are being extracted from is in the right pane. If the video quality weren't so poor, you'd see it successfully retrieve the stats. Since the making of this video, I've enhanced the on-screen output of the retrieved stats by putting them in tabular format -- looks much cleaner. ;)

Note: If you're using FireFox, the video may not play completely. Not sure why. Seems to work OK with IE though. Make that semi-OK. Or maybe it's just my computer...hmmm...

Simulation Remake...yay!

About 13 +/- years ago, a group of four enthusiastic geeks set out to create a computer simulation of an NCAA basketball game as a project for their business math analysis class (lovingly abbreviated as "anal bus math"). The goal was to simulate that year's Iowa vs. Iowa State basketball game prior to the event, and compare the simulation results to the actual outcome. This would serve as a measurement of their ultimate success (i.e., their grade).

The Geeks
Jerry, Norm, Corey, Me

The Project
Programming Language: Applesoft BASIC
Computer Hardware: Apple IIe and Apple IIGS
Workhorse Programmers: Jerry and Norm. Corey and I were familiar with programming basics, but Jerry and Norm were the real experts. We helped where we could, but ultimately the workhorses pulled the majority of the weight. Not that it probably would have made much of a difference in the ultimate workload sharing because Jerry and Norm were obviously more equipped to do the work, but the development environment with BASIC was not very conducive to multiple programmers. It wasn't like the object-oriented languages of today, where you can easily break off chunks of the code to be put in separate modules and coded by separate people. I suppose we could have done that, but it would certainly have been a lot more cumbersome.

The Results
Unfortunately, the program was not finished prior to the Iowa/Iowa State game, but it did end up getting finished. I don't recall exactly how close we actually got to the final score, but I seem to remember it wasn't too far off. Of course, we already knew the final score, so I'm sure we tweaked our code a smidge here and there to get reasonable results. Doing so was not necessarily a bad thing, even though we were being graded on the results, as calibration with the real world is definitely needed for something like this. Plus, it's not like we stole the answers - everyone (including the teacher) recognized that working backwards to the solution was an available option.

In the end, we presented the program to our class, and a math class in a neighboring town (Cascade - "The Mecca of all learning and knowledge" according to Mr. Strang). I think we ended up with an "A". If we didn't, we should have. ;)

The Remake
It's not known what eventually became of the masterpiece we created. It's probably sitting in a box somewhere collecting dust in one of our parent's homes; the disk surely succumb to failure. So sad.

In late 2001, I set out to recreate the masterpiece; this time using Visual BASIC 6. I plugged away at it here and there in my spare time, and finished the basic logic of the program sometime in late 2002 or early 2003. It has sat dormant ever since. I've decided now is the time to finally finish it -- hopefully, before March Madness 2008.

In it's current state, it is hard-coded with the stats from the 2002 National Championship Game between Maryland and Indiana, which I used as a start for the underlying calibration of the code. Certainly more calibration is in order. This makes it quite tedious to simulate other games, as it requires delving into the code itself to input new statistics; a fatal flaw suffered in the original code as well. The last major task at hand is to implement a database backend for storing all the statistics, making it possible to easily input and edit statistics and simulate a game between any two teams, with the ultimate goal being a simulation of the entire NCAA tournament in one fell swoop. Now that would be sweet...

I hope to post updates of my progress now and then, but we'll see how that goes. In the meantime, here's a quick video of the current program:



As of right now, it can simulate 100 games in about 5 seconds (10 seconds if the line-by-line results are chosen to be displayed). Definitely a LOT faster than the original, which I think took about 20-30 minutes for just one game, if I remember correctly. The increased simulation speed is certainly more a result of faster computers moreso than better or more optimized code.

Folding@Home Sets Guinness World Record

Stanford University's Folding@Home project has officially become the world's largest distributed computing network in existence according to the Guinness Book of World Records (Press Release). The Folding@Home project has successfully broken the petaFLOP (one quadrillion FLoating-point Operations Per Second) barrier, largely due to the addition of the F@H client to the PlayStation3 platform in March of this year.

For more information on the Folding@Home initiative, you can read my previous blog post, or visit the Folding@Home website.

tobyMac

So I finally got to see Tim perform live this past weekend with tobyMac. They came through Des Moines a year or two ago, but I couldn't make the show for some reason or another. Luckily, I was able to make it this time around.

Even though I play in the praise band every Sunday at church, I'm still more of a hard rock/heavy metal guy. I must say though, they rocked the house pretty good. It was kind of weird seeing a friend from high school on stage, and then signing autographs and taking pictures. Tim did a great job, and the band as a whole put on an entertaining show.

Anyway, here are some video clips. I recorded these with my Canon still camera, so the video quality is not the best and the audio quality is horrible. It's a long video, so it may take a bit to load.



Here is a better quality live recording of their song Boomin'. There are also several other videos on YouTube.





Good show.

ps - For an even better, in depth review of the Portable Sounds Tour, check out Carl's blog, One Pilgram's Progress. It's great to see others enjoyed the show as well.

Your "Ideal" Presidential Candidate -- Update

So it turns out that the website I used in my previous post to determine my "ideal" presidential candidate wasn't the same one that Glenn Beck used on his radio show. Not that it really matters. Anyway, after reading Glenn's email newsletter and seeing the address of the website he actually used on air, I figured I give that site a try as well for comparison purposes. It doesn't ask exactly the same questions as the first site, so I figured there would be some discrepancies with my previous results. And there were.

So...survey says:

1. Mike Huckabee (R) - 98.98%
2. Mitt Romney (R) - 93.88%
3. Fred Thompson (R) - 90.82%
4. Duncan Hunter (R) - 83.67%
5. John Cox (R) - 81.63%
6. Tom Tancredo (R) - 81.63%
7. Rudy Giuliani (R) - 76.53%
8. Sam Brownback (R) - 74.49%
9. John McCain (R) - 71.43%
10. Bill Richardson (D) - 53.06%
11. John Edwards (D) - 51.02%
12. Ron Paul (R) - 50.00%
13. Joseph Biden (D) - 46.94%
14. Hillary Clinton (D) - 46.94%
15. Barack Obama (D) - 42.86%
16. Christopher Dodd (D) - 38.78%
17. Mike Gravel (D) - 25.51%
18. Dennis Kucinich (D) - 18.37%

Another surprise top place finisher, with even more surprising percentages. Wow...Mike Huckabee and I are like long lost brothers, I guess.

Now, let's put all this into perspective, shall we?

How well do these things really work, anyway? Well, Glenn Beck put this particular site to a pretty good test the other day by having one of the Republican candidates take the survey, and it just so happens that the candidate in question was the one on top of my list -- Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee.

So who is Huckabee's ideal presidential candidate according to the "Candidate Calculator"? Take a guess.

No, actually...it's not himself. It's Mitt Romney.

What?

Another interesting piece of information is that, according to the results of his survey, he only agrees with himself 71% of the time.

Huh?

So...that either means Mr. Huckabee can't make up his mind about the issues, or this website has some of its facts wrong. Hmmm...

Oh well. No one is saying that you should go straight to the polls and vote based on the results of these online surveys. I view them more as a quick and dirty gauge of the candidates that makes you think about more than just the front runners. I know it's done that for me.

What the...?

Apparently, this bear was scared by on-coming traffic into jumping over the bridge railing, and managed to hang on for dear life and climb up to safety on the concrete arch. It is being reported that the bear slept there overnight until rescuers were able to get the equipment necessary to safely get it down off the bridge the next day. Wow.

Your "Ideal" Presidential Candidate?

So I was listening to Glenn Beck on the radio today, and he mentioned an interesting website where you answer a series of questions about major political issues, and it spits out a list of the presidential candidates and how well they align with your political views. Supposidly, the candidate's stance on topics (and subsequently the results of the questionaire) are based on a plethora of voting history, public remarks, press releases, candidate questionaires, etc. in an effort to best represent their views. I thought it would be interesting to see who I most aligned with according to this site, so I went ahead and took the questionaire. My results are below.

1. Alan Keyes (89%)
2. Tom Tancredo (85%)
3. Mitt Romney (81%)
4. Duncan Hunter (78%)
5. Sam Brownback (73%)
6. Chuck Hagel (not running) (71%)
7. Jim Gilmore (withdrawn) (70%)
8. John McCain (66%)
9. Newt Gingrich (says he will not run) (66%)
10. Fred Thompson (60%)
11. Mike Huckabee (58%)
12. Kent McManigal (campaign suspended) (57%)
13. Tommy Thompson (withdrawn) (54%)
14. Ron Paul (52%)
15. Rudolph Giuliani (52%)
16. Bill Richardson (32%)
17. Joseph Biden (29%)
18. Hillary Clinton (29%)
19. Michael Bloomberg (says he will not run) (28%)
20. John Edwards (27%)
21. Al Gore (not announced) (26%)
22. Mike Gravel (24%)
23. Christopher Dodd (24%)
24. Wesley Clark (not running, endorsed Clinton) (19%)
25. Dennis Kucinich (18%)
26. Barack Obama (17%)
27. Alan Augustson (campaign suspended) (10%)
28. Elaine Brown (3%)

Obviously, I'm a conservative republican (hey, I'm an engineer, we're conservative by trade). That wasn't anything I didn't know about myself already. But I was a little surprised by the rankings. Probably because I don't really know a lot about most of the "second tier" candidates. The chances of most of these candidates getting their party's nomination are slim-to-none, but it makes me want to learn more about their views regardless. Would I ever really vote for Alan Keyes? Hmmmm...

Anyway, give it a try for yourself. I think it could have some benefit for you whether you've already got a candidate in mind or have absolutely no clue. Perhaps it will encourage you to look beyond the top tier candidates (D or R), see who else is out there, and educate yourself about their viewpoints.

Cross your fingers...

Well, we finally did it. Tonight is the first night Ashlyn is sleeping in a regular bed. Her crib is one of those convertible jobbies, so we converted it after work tonight and re-arranged her room quite a bit. So far, so good. Cross your fingers...

PreSonus Inspire GT

So, I purchased a PreSonus Inspire GT firewire recording box to mess around with a few days ago, and I must say that I'm thoroughly enjoying it so far. I'm still learning how to use the multi-track recroding software that it comes with, Cubase, but it seems to be a pretty good software package. The Inspire ships with Cubase LE, so it's got some restrictions as compared to the full-blown version, but it seems to do what I want for the most part. It also comes with a multitude of guitar effect plugins and a few drum machine apps that are fun. I'm really looking forward to finally recording some of the guitar riffs that I've been messing around with for years!

Here's one of the first riffs I recorded: (Audio clip removed. If you really want to hear it, just ask.)

Not sure if it will ever become a full-fledged song, or just stay a quick little doodle -- I'm just glad it finally got recorded before it disappeared into the ether. :-)

Quite a dancer

Here's a sample of our little dancer:



I foresee dance classes in the not-to-distant future...

The Accident -- Part 2

Actually, it's been so long since I posted the first part to this story I kind of forgot where I was planning on going with the second part. :-P
But, since the title of the first post implies there being at least a second, I thought I'd go ahead and post a few pictures.

Scott's "head zipper"
















What I look like on the inside:



















You can even see the screw in my left shoulder from the rotator cuff surgery I had in high school. Neato.

And no, I don't have an abnormally curved spine. It only appears that way because I have severely limited mobility in my left shoulder due to the previously mentioned surgery, and I had to raise my arms above my head for the X-Ray and CT scan. In order to do so without causing extreme discomfort, I had to slightly twist my torso.

I should really make up a t-shirt with the X-Ray image on it, and some text saying: "I was in a car accident, and all I got was this lowsy t-shirt." Yeah, that would be cool...

Folding@Home

No, I'm not talking about your laundry. ;)

Folding@Home is a distributed computing project run by Stanford University to research the process of protein folding. More specifically, they are studying the phenomenon of proteins that do not fold correctly, and the role they play in such diseases as Alzheimer's, ALS, Huntington's and Parkinson's disease, and many forms of cancer. The project began over seven years ago, with the beta version of the software released in 2000.

The Folding@Home project utilizes a concept known as distributed computing, where the complex calculations required to simulate the folding process are broken down into chunks of smaller, more manageable calculations (called Work Units) that are then sent to the client software running on a home user's computer (or PS3). The client software runs in the background, using "spare" CPU cycles. Once the client software finishes the folding simulation of the individual Work Unit it was assigned, the results are uploaded to Stanford's servers where Work Unit results from users all over the world are re-assembled for further analysis. The hundreds of thousands of home computers running the client software provide enough computing power to "simulate problems thousands to millions of times more challenging than previously achieved", according to the Folding@Home website.

The online gaming group I belong to has joined the folding effort, and all are welcome to join our team. Yes, even YOU! You don't need to be a gamer, but if you are, we even welcome rival clans. ;)

So what do you need to do to join the folding effort?
- Go to http://folding.stanford.edu and download the client software. Client software is available for PC, Mac, and even PlayStation 3!
- Install the software, select a username, and join Team [760] by adding team number 70586 in the config window.
- Let it run in the background. That's it - you're folding!

Once you've finished your first Work Unit, your folding stats will appear on the Stanford website, and the Team [760] Stats Page.

As a fun added bonus for Team [760] members, I've personally put together a much more comprehensive stat tracking system: Team [760] Folding@Home Advanced Stats. We realize it's not a competition amongst ourselves or other teams -- these stats are just for fun, and serve to document our progress and help visualize our contribution to the project as a whole.

Even if you don't join Team [760], I hope you'll consider joining the Folding@Home project. It's a worthwhile cause.

Decline of a Neighborhood

When we moved into our house on the southeast side of Des Moines five years ago, we were fairly pleased with the neighborhood we had chosen. It's located at the edge of a development that was constructed in the mid-90's (ours built in '94), so the homes are all relatively modern and in decent condition. The immediately adjacent neighborhood to the west is slightly older (probably mid-80's), with the homes continuing to get older as you move farther west. Extending to the east are generally newer homes, with the most recently constructed houses popping up all around Easter Lake, which is about 5 minutes from our house. We knew that the SE side, in general, was not the nicest part of the metro area, but it provided a lot more buying power, getting us a much nicer home than we could get for a similarly priced house in the western suburbs. Basically, you have to drive through some "not so nice" neighborhoods to get to ours, and when we purchased that was OK. Unfortunately, things have changed over the years.

The most significant change has been the fact that we are now parents. Having the well-being of a young child at the forefront of your daily concerns makes you sensitive to things in your surroundings that you probably could care less about when you qualify as just a couple of D.I.N.K.'s (Double Income, No Kids). Anyone with children will know exactly what I'm talking about. Things that might seem trivial to someone without any children can often times be very important to a parent. Unfortunately, there have been more than just trivial events (even by D.I.N.K. standards) leading to the decline of our neighborhood.

In general, the SE side of the Des Moines metro could be considered a bit of a rough neighborhood -- really the entire east side. Yes, there are nicer spots interspersed among the bad areas, like our neighborhood for example, but it's generally not a highly revered part of the metro. We knew that going in, realizing that we would most likely move on after 5-7 years, so no big deal, right? Well, it wasn't at the time we purchased, and continued to not be a problem up until about two years ago when the crime associated with the bad areas around us started creeping closer and closer to our neighborhood.

It seems like there is a shooting/stabbing/robbery/hit-and-run/recently discovered dead body on the east side about every other week. Seriously. If it's not one of those things, it's another. Here are just a few examples that stick out in my mind:

- A few nights ago a 15 year-old was killed in a hit-and-run near South Ridge Mall (about 5-10 minutes south of our house).
- There have been at least three robberies of various businesses on SE 14th over the last several months -- at least one of which ended up in a high speed chase. SE 14th is the nearest major north-south thorough-fair to our house, about 5 blocks away.
- Last year, a man was arrested for sexually assaulting a young child (under the age of 10) in a van parked at the Fareway 2 blocks from our house.
- A few months ago a house on our street was broken into. I'm not sure what, if anything, was stolen. No one was home at the time.
- And most recently, there have been a rash of mailbox bashings on our street. Saturday evening/Sunday morning marked the third time it has happened this summer. This last go-around was the first time our mailbox was hit. Luckily, the damage was only superficial. There were somewhere between 5 and 10 other mailboxes on our street that weren't so lucky.

Normally, I wouldn't get too concerned about my mailbox getting bashed. And compared to the other items in my above list, some damaged mailboxes seems pretty trivial. Yes, it's annoying, aggravating, and an inconvenience -- especially when it happens repeatedly, but under normal circumstances I'd just chock it up to some bored, rowdy teenagers. That's what it appeared to be all the times leading up to the most recent. However, this last round was accompanied by, what I can only assume to be, gang symbols spray painted on the side of my neighbors boat which he had parked in his driveway. I have no idea what it meant or what gang it may or may not have been representing, but it concerns me greatly. That's just too damn close.

I feel as if it's only a matter of time before something more significant than a smashed mailbox will happen to my family, and I don't really feel like waiting around to find out what it might be. It's time to get the hell outta dodge...

Backyard Fun

My 15 minutes of fame

Well, not really...but it'll have to do.

Here's a link to a local television news spot about the last project I designed for my former employer.

http://www.kdsm.com/players/news/top_story/video.shtml
(Click on the video for "Asian Gardens..." in the video list)

The video will probably only be available for a day or two before getting cycled out of rotation.

Here's what it will look like when all the landscaping is finished (click for larger image):

The upper "pagoda" portion of the structure was hand made in China, and assembled here in the US by the Chinese craftsmen who made it. The solid marble railings and statue figures were also hand made in China.

A few other photos:


Here's what it looked like before the pagoda was installed:

I wish they would just finish the damn thing already. I designed it in 2005!

Happy 4th of July

Budding Percussionist

RAWK!!!

How I spent my Sunday

7:30 AM: Awakened by my wife screaming from downstairs -- "Chad, wake up! Wake up!"
A few seconds later: I wake up and run downstairs to where my wife's voice is coming from.
Another few seconds later: I get to the basement and immediately notice a wet, spongey sensation on my bare feet.
Another few seconds later: Many profanities are spoken in a loud, angry tone as I shut off the water to our house, and the burst water pipe slowly stops spouting water all over my (formally) nice, finished basement. A few electronic items are move up off the floor - including my computer.
9:00 AM: The plumber arrives at our house and locates a faulty plastic T connector going to our water filtration system.
10:00 AM: Many calls and phone messages to our insurance agent go unanswered. We later find out he was on the golf course all day.
10:30 AM: I begin moving stuff out of the basement and in to our living room, garage, etc.
2:30 PM: The contractor arrives at our house to begin cleanup.
5:00 PM: The contractor finishes ripping out all of the carpet pad, and leaves behind 4 industrial size carpet fans and a de-humidifier which will be running non-stop for the next 3 days.
5:30 PM: I take a shower and curse repeatedly.
7:30 PM: I setup my computer in the living room. It doesn't appear to have suffered any water damage.
12:30 AM (technically, Monday): We still haven't heard from our insurance agent.

What a great, relaxing way to spend my Sunday -- especially after a long two-week business trip to Denver where I worked 60 hours each week.

Update:
We finally got in touch with our insurance agent. The kicker of the whole deal is that we go to church with him, and I even play in the church contemporary band with his wife. We called his office and left a message, and even called his house only to find out he was on the lynx. We spoke with his wife for a while, but she isn't in the biz, so couldn't help much. When my wife called his office this morning (yes, we had to call him even after all the messages we left), he basically passed the buck to his wife, and said she should have given us his cell phone number. Whatever. We're not impressed.

The upside is that our insurance company has said they will cover the losses, minus our deductible of course. Unfortunately, since the piping was to our water filtration system, they are saying that they won't cover the cost to fix it since it's not "essential." That cost is peanuts compared to the cleanup cost, but still it's a little disappointing.

Another possible upside is that we may even end up getting our deductible back. The day before all this happened, we had our local cable co. send an internet technician to our house to fix some problems we were having with our service. The primary junction where the cable enters the house is in the same closet where the water filtration equipment that broke is located. I was standing there when the tech was in the closet fixing the cable, and saw him set his very large flashlight on top of the filtration equipment. Was it a coincidence that later that night/early the next morning there was a broken connection almost exactly where he set his flashlight? I think not. We have been told that our insurance company may go after the cable co. for damages, and in turn, we may get our deductible back, which would be fantastic. We'll see...

When will they learn?

Only one month after the AACS LA announced updates to PowerDVD and WinDVD to thwart the highly publicized cracking of the 128-bit processing key used in decryption of HD DVD and Blu ray movie discs, they are back to square one. The new key has been cracked already. The most comical thing about this whole situation is that the key was cracked before the May 22nd debut of the first movie titles using the new key.

Just another episode of the never-ending cycle. When will they learn that DRM is a losing battle?

All I have to say is that they better not have used MY 128-bit precious, or there will be hell to pay! Hell, I tells ya!!!

The Accident -- Part I

Today is the six month anniversary of an event I will never forget. An event that has become known simply as The Accident. I've lost count as to how many times I've told this story, and who I have and have not told it to, so I thought I'd just let everyone read about it here. I apologize if you've heard this story already. ;)

Synopsis
November 14, 2006
I-80 mile marker 98, just east of Stuart, Iowa

Shortly after sunset, a co-worker and I were returning to Des Moines from a business meeting in Council Bluffs. We were traveling in the left lane of I-80 near Stuart when a large deer ran up out of the median and struck the front left of the Jeep Liberty my friend was driving. There was essentially no time to react. We hit the deer at 70+ mph. The impact sent us through the right lane and into the right-side ditch where we rolled the Jeep at least once, and eventually came to rest on the driver's side. We both managed to climb out of the Jeep through the broken sunroof. After a brief check that we were both "OK", I called 911. Approximately 20 minutes later, two ambulances arrived at the scene and transported us both back to Des Moines.

Vague Details
Essentially, my recollection of the accident is somewhat vague. I remember the impact, but do not remember seeing the deer. I vaguely remember the vehicle swerving, but do not remember it rolling in the ditch. After the impact and initial veering of the Jeep to the right, the next thing I remember is hanging up in the air, belted into the passengers seat. I can recall the blood starting to partially rush to my head as I waited for Scott to climb out of the sunroof. If I had tried to go first, I would have immediately fell on top of him after unlocking my seatbelt.

After we made it out of the Jeep, I remember us both exchanging more than a few "holy shit, what the hell just happened!?!?" comments. Scott was bleeding profusely from a large gash in his head. The image of his blood-soaked face and hands is permanently etched in my memory. I think the sheer surprise of the accident in combination with the gory scene of Scott's bloody face, hands, and clothes sent me into shock, as I do not remember the nearly 20 minutes that it took for the ambulances to arrive. Apparently, I was speaking coherently with Scott during that time, but I do not remember any of it. None. Zilch. Zero. I remember feeling pretty good after getting out of the vehicle -- only some minor cuts here and there. Funny that I should be the one who goes into shock, when Scott was the one with the huge gash on his head that was bleeding everywhere.

The next thing I remember after calling 911 is sitting in the ambulance being evaluated by the EMT. The specifics of the evaluation and the ride back to Des Moines are sketchy at best. The next several hours of poking and prodding in the emergency room, and the night spent in the hospital wearing a neck-brace are also very sketchy. I'm sure Cindy could recount everything that happened that night in the hospital, as she was there shortly after I arrived and was there for the duration.

The Aftermath
Despite the 12 staples required to close the gash in Scott's head, and the burns on his wrist from the airbag, he managed to be discharged from the hospital the night of the accident. As far as I know, he's back to normal (he transferred to our Seattle office in January to be closer to his family).

As for me, all I suffered was a few cuts and some bruised ribs which are now long since healed. Initially, they weren't sure if I had fractured my left wrist or if I had some sort of neck injury, but luckily that turned out not to be the case. Unfortunately, I still had to frequent the doctor's office for several weeks after the accident.

Looking back at the photos of the wrecked Jeep (see below), it almost feels like it didn't happen to me...like it happened to someone else. I think that is primarily due to the fact that I don't remember so much of the actual accident. Remembering the night in the hospital , the numerous aches and pains afterwards, and the frequent doctor visits that followed quickly remind me that it did, in fact, happen to me.

I think we are extremely lucky to be alive.

My 128-bit Precious

The Advanced Access Content System Licensing Administrator (AACS LA) group, founded by such companies as Microsoft, IBM, Intel, Sony, Toshiba, Panasonic, Walt Disney, and Warner Bros., has been in a legal uproar in the past several months over the publishing of a "processing key" used to decrypt HD-DVD and Blu-ray movie discs. They have issued takedown notices to numerous websites that have published the 128-bit hex number, claiming that hosting the number is a violation of the DMCA's ban on trafficking of circumvention devices. How can a number be considered a circumvention device on its own? The AACS LA is relying on language in the DMCA that defines a circumvention device as:

"primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title",

and

"has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title"

or

"is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title"

Basically, they claim that there is no significant commercial purpose for that particular 128-bit number other than for use in the decryption of HD-DVD and Blu-ray discs, thereby classifying it as an illegal circumvention device under the DMCA, and hosting or publishing the number would be considered trafficking.

Following the lead of AACS LA, I hereby lay claim to the following 128-bit, 16-hex-pair, number for purposes of encrypting/decrypting all my intellectual property:

FF 25 77 64 00 81 4A 4C E3 59 4F BF 06 98 C7 32

This is my number. There are many like it but this one is mine. My number is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. Without me, my number is useless. Without my number, I am useless. I must encrypt with my number true. I must encrypt better than my enemy, who is trying to circumvent me. I must encrypt before he circumvents me. I will. Before God I swear this creed: my number and myself are defenders of my intellectual property, we are the masters of my enemy, we are the saviors of my life. So be it, until there is no enemy, but peace. Amen

My Precious. Get your own you dirty, circumventing leaches!

UPDATE: The day internet radio DIES

Internet radio receives a stay of execution -- sort of...

"The day internet radio DIES" has been pushed back a month to July 15, 2007 following the publication of the Copyright Royalty Board's (CRB) "Final Determination of Rates and Terms" in the May 1, 2007 Federal Register. The CRB ruling states that webcaster's first payments are due 45 days after the end of the month in which the "final" determination is published (Sec. 380.4(c)), which results in the July 15, 2007 date.

House Resolution 2060, The Internet Radio Equality Act (H.R. 2060), which is currently under review by the Energy and Commerce Committee, has gained significant steam since it's April 26 introduction by Jay Inslee (D-WA) and Don Manzullo (R-IL) in the House of Representatives. Strong support for the proposed legislation has has emerged over the last few weeks, with 41 current co-sponsors to the bill (31 D, 10 R). The bill would nullify the March 2, 2007 CRB ruling for increased royalty rates, and apply a more mutually beneficial and economically feasible rate structure. In addition, the bill would unify the royalty standards between internet radio, satellite radio, cable radio, and jukeboxes. It appears that unification with terrestrial radio royalty requirements is not addressed specifically.

The sponsor of the bill, Jay Inslee (D-WA) is a member of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet, which oversees "Interstate and foreign telecommunications including, but not limited to all telecommunication and information transmission by broadcast, radio, wire, microwave, satellite, or other mode; and, Homeland security-related aspects of the foregoing, including cybersecurity."

Contact your representative and urge them to co-sponsor H.R. 2060, The Internet Radio Equality Act, and help save internet radio!

30th Birthday Surprise Party

Thanks to everyone that showed up at the surprise party for my 30th birthday last month. It was really good to see you all.

Special thanks go out to:
- Cindy for orchestrating the whole thing without me finding out about it. Having it a month after my actual birthday was pretty sneaky!
- My brother Brian for letting us use the bowling alley and providing the food
- My mom for the birthday cake

Here are a few pictures for your enjoyment.

Thanks again everyone. It was really fun!

The day internet radio DIES - Part II

The following is a continuation of my blog entry entitled: May 15, 2007 -- The day internet radio DIES.

Another aspect of the Copyright Royalty Board proposed fee schedule that deserves mentioning is that it continues the unbelievable disconnect in royalty payments between terrestrial stations and internet/satellite radio (at least as far as I can tell). Ever wonder why your favorite FM station, with all the backing of a mega-conglomerate like ClearChannel, doesn't offer an online stream? I know I've thought about it before (the local ClearChannel rock station here does not offer such a service). The (likely) answer: It's because as soon as they cross over to streaming their station online, they are required to pay additional royalties that they are not obligated to pay as terrestrial stations. That's right -- internet radio stations are actually required to pay royalties beyond those that terrestrial stations are required to pay. Now tell me that makes sense.

I'm sure that the additional royalties are not the only factor driving the decision not to stream online for these FM stations, but it's got to be a major player at the very least. And don't tell me they lack the capital to purchase the necessary equipment to get a stream off the ground. If Joe Blow the internet radio hobbiest can stream his favorite Led Zeppelin tunes at 192 kbps mp3 using his P.O.S. home computer and COMPLETELY FREE SOFTWARE, then certainly a ClearChannel owned FM station can find a way to afford to simulcast their terrestrial signal. In the end, I've got to think that the additional royalties make venturing into online streaming significantly less attractive to terrestrial radio.

As noted above, the gap in royalty payment requirements between terrestrial and internet radio is unfortunately a continuation of the status-quo. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998, which was built upon the Digital Performance Rights in Sound Recordings Act of 1995, says that internet radio stations have to pay performance royalties on songs played, in addition to composer royalties on those songs. Terrestrial radio stations pay composer royalties, but are not obligated to pay performance royalties. Why, you ask? Because of the long-established rationale that recognizes record labels benefit from the promotional value of songs played on terrestrial stations. In essence, the logic is that the promotional value to record labels offsets any performance royalties that would be due. So why is it that internet radio is not afforded the same rationale??? If anything, internet radio provides more promotional value for a wider artist-base than terrestrial radio. It just doesn't make sense. Unfortunately, the CRB ruling set to go into affect May 15, 2007 not only increases the royalty fee schedule, it also appears that it fails to address this disconnect.

I'll admit that I do not know exactly how the fee schedule is setup for the composer royalties terrestrial stations must pay. Perhaps they are somewhat inflated to try and balance with the total royalties paid by internet stations, I don't know. But from the reading I've done, it doesn't appear to be this way.

Web browsing frustrations

After many frustrations with Internet Explorer 7, I decided to give Firefox 2 a try. Yes, I know -- slightly behind the times again. My main complaint is that IE 7 would tend to hang on page load quite often, and once it did so, any subsequent browsing (even in a new tab) would also hang indefinitely. Only a completely new instance of IE would remedy the problem. I'm thinking it may have something to do with the corporate network and/or proxy server, as the problem seems to only occur at work. The irony of the situation is that IE is required to use the corporate intranet site -- Firefox is not "approved." So it looks like IE will still get some use, albeit begrudgingly.

One week into my trial, I must say that Firefox is performing quite well for me. Page loads seem to be generally faster, and I haven't experienced any of the annoying hangs that I was getting with IE 7. I switched to IE some years ago after wanting to try something other than Netscape Navigator, but it's looking more and more like Firefox will be my browser of choice from now on.

May 15, 2007 -- The day internet radio DIES

For more information on the CRB ruling, please visit the following sites:

SaveNetRadio Coalition
Small Webcaster Community Iniatitive
International Webcasting Coalition
Save Webcasting dot org

Perfectionists

A recent article posted on the Yahoo front page caught my attention. After reading only a few lines of Breaking the perfection habit by Penelope Trunk, I quickly realized this article was probably going to hit home to some degree.

While I don't agree with every assertion that she makes, and didn't care for her general disdain of those that "suffer" from perfectionism, there are a couple of points that I not only acquiesce to, but I find eerily relevant to my own life. Here are a few of her opinions on perfectionists, along with my perspective:

"Perfectionists procrastinate because they're scared of not being perfect."

I definitely suffer from the procrastination bug, but I disagree with the hypothesis that it is driven by the fear of being less than perfect. I would attribute it more to just plain-old being lazy. Yes, perfectionists can be lazy.

"Perfectionists are hypercritical to the point that they can't support people around them."

Perfectionism and being hypercritical are basically synonymous, but I don't necessarily think that they preclude the ability to work in a team setting.

"Perfectionists can't finish a project because they can always think of a way to improve it."

While I most certainly fall victim to this frequently (I can't tell you how many projects I've started and not finished), I think "can't" is probably a bit too strong of a word here. Maybe I'm not a true perfectionist.

"Perfectionists are phony, because no one's perfect and they can't handle showing that in themselves."

What!?!? I'm a phony because I often like things to be the best they can be? I guess I'd rather be a "phony" than celebrate mediocrity.

"You get more done if you don't sweat the details."

True to a certain extent, but the other side of the coin reveals that even the grandest project depends on the success of the smallest components. Or as the old saying goes, "The devil is in the details."

"You do better work if you aren't worried about perfection."

A bit of an over-simplified deduction, but the point is still somewhat relevant. I guess that statement doesn't preclude worrying about being accurate, which is how I initially perceived its meaning. So maybe it's not as much of an oversimplification as I thought.

"Working the longest hours doesn't mean you're doing the best work."

Very true.

If you consider yourself a perfectionist, I'd definitely recommend giving Penelope's article a read.

Can you teach an old dog new tricks?

An alternate title for this post could be "Can an old dog overcome certain bad habits and learn how to do things the right way?"

The unfortunate truth of the matter is this post could refer to any one of my many bad habits, but the one in particular I'm referring to is not as far reaching or have as numerous (if any) life altering implications as my other wayward practices. It's still something I've been thinking about trying to rectify. So what exactly am I eluding to? I'd really love to take guitar lessons. Yes, guitar lessons. You were probably expecting something more profound, but that's it. Really.

Being a self-taught player going on 12 years now, I think I would really enjoy getting some "formal" training. Overall, I think my technique is mediocre at best, and could definitely stand to be tweaked for the better. Solo improvisation and general music theory are definitely where I need the most help, as I have basically zero skills in those areas. I feel fairly comfortable with my ability in the rhythm guitar role -- although I'm sure I've taught myself some bad habits, and surely have much to learn even in that regard.

Specifically, my interests currently lie within the acoustic realm of guitar playing, and have been pointed in that direction for many years now. I started off playing rock/metal tunes on electric guitar, but got bored quickly (c. 1998) and decided to purchase an accoustic-electric. I've been hooked ever since. For me, it just seemed like a natural progression as my (uh-hum) skills improved. In particular, the technique and complexity of classical guitar intrigues and amazes me, and is the "stretch goal" (read, pipe-dream) of my long, drawn-out guitar education.

Why do I even care to improve my playing abilities? Well, there are several factors involved here, but it's primarily just due to my enjoyment of playing guitar and music in general, in combination with a bit of perfectionism (or perhaps more aptly put, non-mediocre-ism). Add in the fact that every Sunday I play in the praise band at my church, and it only increases my longing to improve. In fact, our practice this evening is what spurred on this post.

Plus guitar players get all the chicks. Wait a minute, I'm already married. Damn, I missed the boat on that one! :-p

And so it begins...

I've entered the world of blog. The world of rants and opinions. The world of spilling your guts. The world of introspective reflections that most people could care less about. A little behind the times? Definitely. Better late than never, I guess.

I've been a reader of various blogs for quite some time now -- mostly those by friends, but occasionally I'll peer into the mind of a complete stranger. Up to this point, I've been a blog "lurker", hiding in the shadows. Sometimes I feel like I've stumbled upon someone's super-secret personal diary that I shouldn't be reading, and I'm getting a glimpse into their deepest, darkest secrets. While I know this isn't likely the case, I've got to think that sometimes, just sometimes, people might let down their guard a bit and reveal things they might not normally be willing to reveal in a face-to-face conversation - even with close friends. Or at the very least, people might let you know how they really feel. More-so than any other reason, these compel me to keep going back to read what my friends have to say. I hope this works both ways.

As a side-effect of my pseudo invasion of privacy described above, I haven't engaged others by commenting on their blogs. Not even my friends. But I imagine I'll be more actively involved now that I've thrown myself under the train and started one of my own.

On the rare occasion that I stray from blogs of people I know, there is one over-reaching thing I have noticed. In general, I find it hard to stay interested in blogs by someone I have no personal connection with, unless I can relate to the topic of a particular entry in some way. Otherwise, I could care less what some schlub has to say. If this holds true for others (which I assume it most likely does), I would expect very few people outside of my network of friends to actually spend the time to read what I've got to say. Do I really care if no one reads my ramblings? To some extent, yes I do care. But I'm fully ready to accept the fact that I might just be talking to myself here. These blog things are therapeutic though, right? Right???

Oh well, c'est la vie.