Beth (Take a Sad Song and Make it Sadder - Or Funny)

My shaggy dog cover of the most famous song KISS ever recorded... to Gene Simmons' chagrin.  C'mon Gene, it's a pretty song. :)

Happy Easter

A Conversation on IP, Piracy and the Culture

This is a very important conversation.

Halelujah

The journey to freedom from bondage travels a trail of innocents lost to forces both terrible and hateful, forces that cover holy robes in blood and wanton destruction, that transform the young into warriors and old women into grieving mothers. Let us not become the monsters we behold. Let us pray for peace for ourselves and our neighbors. Shalom.

This is a cover of a Leonard Cohen song and I'm sure he had a meaning but the brilliance of his work is I can find another. Shalom.

I Will Vote for Obama

Programmers Leading the Way To Hell

Here is one of those nifty articles from a web developer.

Some nifty ideas lead to hell. That is one of them. Most of the "we can make it easy on ourselves" ideas do that in a system that rock-bottom relies on some standards, regardless of how weak, to work.

Note that in a following article, they talk about making a standard nifty idea out of the path to hell. Let's be sure on the way to hell we are all taking it as easy and marching in lock step. The Devil likes nothing better than people who take an approved route to hell and web programmers are the Devil's Disciples when it comes to making it easier for themselves while increasing the misery for everyone else.

That's why a technical writer's standard response having spent the time to master SGML and XML to a programmer bitching about HTML and "how hard it is" is: "You're right. Now, go to hell."

:)

All of Me/Today - Len Bullard With Johnny Tona and Steve Weber

From the vaults.  About 1985.  Johnny was a master fiddler and pool player.

What If Mitt Wins?

From today’s Washington Post

Dismal support for Republicans among minorities is a long-term problem for the GOP in a rapidly diversifying nation. Fully 91 percent of Romney’s support comes from white voters.

It is what I feared four years ago. By overhyping then overrequiring, the left created a perfect fail scenario for Obama. All the Repugs had to do was make sure no one cooperated with him the same way the same types shut out the smart guy in an office where a social clique has taken over.

On top of that, the race card used in the last election created a force that rebounded reversing social gains made and creating a perception that it is ok to say he failed, then vote against him while hiding racist motivations. See rants about Colin Powell from Sununu. Now they feel vindicated and empowered to vote their worst habits and reinforce their worst natures. See Fascism.

That isn’t the worst of it. If Obama loses on race, the aggregate minorities and progressive backlash in the next term will be terrifying both in the US and across the world. The White Uptight will lie and deny but no one will be buying it and our adversaries will exploit it to maximum advantage. The hard right will reply with bluster and militarism. The diplomatic gains made in the last four years will evaporate as it becomes clear for the first time that not only can our government not be trusted, but the American people as well. For the first time in our history, the world will truly turn on America.

Epic fail, folks. I pray Ohio sees the future and decides to reverse Romney’s gains.

The Dark Net

This isn't a suprise. to any of us who have been on the Internet for most of our careers prior to the Web. Email relationships, technical list relationships etc. are older and consistent. Since social networks favor the oldest connections, it is not surprising that the dark net still dominates communications and link power. How the structuring of relationships work out past my generation should be a follow-on study.

How this affects so-called "disruptive innovation" is a question worth asking as that idea is increasingly viewed as corrosive to society.

How To Succeed in The Software Business

In response to Headspring:

Not project management technique, nor tools nor talent are proven to guarantee success. As a wise friend taught me, promise control is everything.

Simple rules that work:

1. Every RFP is reviewed by a person on the technical staff who by practice and background can recognize features required and match them to development features required.
2. Every item is recorded in a database with citations and a succinct technical response including a time estimate based on the feature type. It is a lie that all development is custom or new if there is a base product set. What is a new feature has to be evaluated not for it's value to the customer but for it's value to the base product.
3. If marketing or contracts changes a bid based on that response, they are held to account in the review for bid/nobid. Do not bid a project that can compromise the rate of maintenance over the cost of new development (feature creep).
4. Never bid what you cannot demo. IOW, if it isn't already under development, it is probably outside your base product strategy. A demo is not a fully-developed feature of necessity.
5. Never commit to a feature that doesn't have value to at least 80% of your customers. NO one offs.

If you do not have a base product, you do not have a core market. You are creating custom one off software. This is a bad business to be in for the majority of technical businesses. That's your fault. The idea here is you should be in a market where you understand the customer's technical requirements to a depth that you can anticipate what they will need.

Use the RFP db to keep track of requests for a feature. When one customer asks, do your research. When two ask, put it on the list of items for possible development. When three ask, schedule it EVEN if you did not win the bid. You will.

Greed is the reason most projects fail in ANY business. Risk is the reason most businesses succeed if they manage it.