MassPerception.com

who doesn’t recognize these two guys…

Minding my own business on the observartion deck of Sears Tower, I was treated to the sudden outburst of these two. Mr. T and Conan O’Brien were tapeing a bit for Conan’s show (BTW, the show will be live from Chicago in early May). I’ve got to say, Mr. T was awesome; between takes he stopped to take pictures with the kids and sign autographs! An awesome role model for the kids, he sat with each one and encouraged them to do well in school . . . all the kids were excited, one girl even got her shoes signed.

No one really recognized Conan . . . I think he was a bit bummed . . . he started walking up to people and offered to take a picture with them

chicago, conan o'brien, sears tower, mr. t

A group of enterprizing volunteers has come up with an ingeious way to save penquins caught up in oils slicks off the coast of Australia. Excerpts from the article:

… women in New South Wales have undertaken an unusual service project, knitting sweaters for cousins to the loveable stars of the Academy Award-winning documentary narrated by Freeman.

The smallest breed of penguins, often known as “fairy” penguins, tend to get caught in oil spills off the coast of Australia, which can destroy their natural oils or even kill them. Doll size, tight-fitting wool sweaters can keep the penguins warm during the rehabilitation process, and “stop them preening and ingesting the poisonous oil,” according to The Sydney Morning Herald,

The sweaters improve penguin survival rate to about 98 percent, the paper reported.

Via tingilinde

rescue, survival, penguins

At last, one of the Certificate Authorities has come to the conclusion that the average Internet user is not going to spend anywhere from $50 to $100 per year to prove their identity online or sign and encrypt their email. Thawte, one of the more forward thinking CA’s, is now offering a free Personal Email Certificate that allows you to prove your identity, and sign emails – allowing you to prove that an email did in fact come from your computer and your email account (no more Joe Jobs here).

The consumer encryption problem is really a chicken and egg issue. On one side you the software developers that would rather not put the time and effort into making online identity and non-repudiation of transactions a standard feature in all Internet applications. On the other, you have the consumers, in desperate need of a standard – USABLE method for proving their identity online (or say, checking the identity of their eBay trading partner).

On the software side, the developers seem to be waiting for a critical mass of consumers to adopt a specific solution (which will never happen). On the consumer side, they continue to look for a solution that doesn’t require an engineering degree to install and a PHD to use.

Making the consumer credential free, drives the software industry in a direction . . . one, arguably, that I did not believe would be successful in the past (I have always thought that PKI for the masses will never fly duue to its complexity). While the consumer experience leaves a lot to be desired, its a great first step in the process of deploying some sort of digital credential to each Internet user.

Ok software developers, let’s start focusing on a usable consumer interface for this foundation that Thawte has deployed.

Also of note, Thawte does not seem to have a eassy way for you to integrate their certificates into the Apple OSX Mail.app. I have written a ‘quick’ rundown of the (35) steps that you will need to complete to make this work on a Mac. This process takes about 15 minutes.
Have fun, and happy signing!

mail.app, certificate, certificate authority, credential, identity, x.509

Take one early morning flight the day of a time change . . . add in connecting flights in 2 additional time zones and you end up with your internal clock in meltdown. Ick…

We seriously need to eliminate daylight savings time. I cannot come up with one good reason to keep it. Any “energy savings” that we might encounter from reduced use of electric illumination is likely offset by the extended use of air conditioning in the summer and productivity loss in the week or so following a time change.

I just can’t wait for Bush’s extension of daylight savings time to go into use, it should make the Y2K issue seem like a fond memory. Extreme chaos in the making.

So, it’s been a while since I’ve written anything, this is partly due to my work schedule, and partly because playing with Aiden is so much more fun! But anywho, here’s an update . . .
This morning I flew into San Antonio for some business meetings. As our jet pulled up to the ramp, I looked out the window and was greeted to the sight of this massive grey aircraft (military grey). For some reason they had parked an Airforce C-17 Globemaster on the ramp at the corporate terminal next to where the ground crew had directed us to park. There were quite a few other jets also taking up space, so parking was tight with this huge grey goose sitting on the tarmac.

I guess I was lucky that they had parked my rental car close enough that it was practically under its wing . . . close enough that I actually got a good look at it.

As ugly as this thing seemed at first, it was damn impressive from the ground looking up at it.

Here’s a picture of one in the event you’ve not seen one:

Even as a pilot, knowing the concepts behind aerodynamic force and the whole lift thing, I am still amazed at the fact that these things actually take to the air and fly!

As a quick comment to those of you who design our military aircraft, you make some damn beautiful machines! Keep up the great work!
This is actually one of my favorite airports to fly into as you get to see some really interesting aircraft parked out on the tarmac. On my last trip out, I got to see a blackhawk land while we were walking out to the jet; what a blast to watch such a machine land about 50-75 feet from where you are standing . . . that and the rotor wash!

Well, enough fun for one night . . .

First they close the Williams Sonoma in the local mall . . .

And then NBC cancels The West Wing!

What next???

retail, the west wing, television