This is a great directory to browse through! Index of /NaturalHazards/Archive/Oct2003  ¶ Permalink 10/29/2003 06:57:00 PM 0 comments

I need to listen a bit more. Pay attention to feedback.

There's just been so much going on!, and you know how I get- Excited, anxious, ready.... But too soon. No patience. Come, now. Slow down. You're just getting started.

My body can hardly muster that sentence above this three-day running, mostly stuffy nose. Today my symptoms developed into that-kind-of-a-cough, and I haven't had an appetite in days. Today I rested in over six hours of television, and I am entirely responsible for grossly neglecting my body's needs over the past six days.

My computer can barely mimic the 256 colors that this screen now flickers forth. It has recently decided to axe its own BIOS on every 29 out of 30 start-up attempts. When it does boot, Windows is constantly asking me if Microsoft may include my Thinkpad in a focus group that can only be titled "x86 Driver Conflicts, Ruined IDE Sectors, and Faulty DRAM Leaks within the First 10 Seconds of System Initialization." Today I pressed the power button on my laptop seventy six times in a one hour period, and I am entirely responsible for neglecting my personal computer's needs over the past six months.

Is that the simple difference between monkey and machine? Neglect one for a period of days, yet the other can last much longer. After enough deprivation, it seems both still crash. Happening at the same time has hopefully taught me my lesson.   ¶ Permalink 10/26/2003 02:28:00 AM 0 comments

Tomorrow Morning's To-Do:

1. See if ZSR has Harvard International Review
2. Clean out my In-Box (Advising, Goals)
3. Begin reading for Quant (test Thursday)

  ¶ Permalink 10/19/2003 11:41:00 PM 0 comments

Pay By TouchTM is a service that allows you to pay for purchases in one easy step. It uses a simple method of finger imaging to link you to your financial data without the need to carry cash, credit or debit cards, loyalty cards or checks. Welcome to Pay By Touch  ¶ Permalink 10/15/2003 07:40:00 PM 0 comments

Note to self after homework- A View from the Developing World, Knowledge at Wharton.  ¶ Permalink 10/15/2003 05:07:00 PM 0 comments

Harvard Business Review's October issue has a great 30+ page spotilght called China Tomorrow. The first pages are filled with the hard numbers I was looking for, as three weeks ago I found myself unable to explain exactly why and how China was becoming the next world superpower. Everything I'd read and everyone I'd talked to who's been to Shanghai knows- but how do you prove it to someone that watches Sex in the City reruns twice daily? I'm sure she blew my fact-less rantings off as potspeak, but now I'm armed.

China's overall record since reforms began in 1979 is dazzling, and its performance is in many ways improving. Annual real GDP has grown about 9% a year, on average, since 1978- an aggregate increase of some 700%. Foreign trade growth has averaged nearly 15% over the same period, or more than 2,700% in aggregate. Foreign direct investment has flooded into the country, especially through the past decade. In 2002, China became the first country since the 1980s to attract more FDI in a year than the United States (brining in $53.2 billion while $52.7 billion flowed into the States). (emphasis mine) In the first quarter of 2003, a billion dollars a month in foreign capital poured into the Pearl River Delta near Hong Kong, where integrated clusters of suppliers and assemblers are becoming an awesomely efficient manufacturing base for exports of everything from circuit boards to machinery to shoes to tools. Led by businesses there, China has rapidly moved to take its place among the world's largest trading nations.

from The Great Transition, by Kenneth Lieberthal and Geoffrey Lieberthal

  ¶ Permalink 10/15/2003 09:49:00 AM 0 comments

It looks like HBO picked up Born Rich, to debut Monday, October 27th at 10pm ET. Mark your calendars.

First-time filmmaker Jamie Johnson, a 23-year-old heir to the Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical fortune, captures the rituals, worries and social customs of the young Trumps, Vanderbilts, Newhouses and Bloombergs in the documentary special, BORN RICH, a 2003 Sundance Film Festival selection. Offering candid insights into the privileges and burdens of inheriting more money than most people will earn in a lifetime.

Narrated by Johnson, a history student at New York University, and filmed over a three-year period, BORN RICH spotlights ten young adults who came into the world knowing they would never have to work a day in their lives. These society-column names speak frankly about the one subject they all know is taboo: money.

Good reviews abound. I think I read about this movie on Gawker.  ¶ Permalink 10/14/2003 10:55:00 AM 0 comments

thoughts on Kill Bill per Gawker  ¶ Permalink 10/14/2003 10:40:00 AM 0 comments

Zach took a good Where's Waldo picture of me at the football game yesterday. Click below and take a look. Also, observations from the other two: (1) I need a haircut. (2) LUCENTE!

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This article from Knowledge@Wharton introduced me to a term that I hadn't heard acronym'd before: BPO, which stands for business process outsourcing.

”Gartner estimates that the worldwide BPO market was worth $110 billion in 2002 and will grow to $173 billion in 2007, at a 9.5% compounded annual growth rate. Offshore BPO services -- where work is sent to another country -- will grow from $1.3 billion in 2002 to $24.3 billion in 2007 at an 80% CAGR. Offshore BPO will grow to represent 14% of the total BPO market in 2007.”

link and selected quote per tjacobi.com  ¶ Permalink 10/10/2003 04:57:00 PM 0 comments

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I Love You  ¶ Permalink 10/08/2003 10:48:00 PM 0 comments

This is today's must-read article: A Slave to Health Insurance (washingtonpost.com) per mefi  ¶ Permalink 10/06/2003 11:54:00 PM 0 comments

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Judged on web style, the IHT Online has always been one of my favorite reads. This article, The end user: Swallow this phone (candid thoughts from MIT Media Lab director Nicholas Negroponte), reminded me why. No scrolling, huge area one-click for next page, clean and concise. There's a great paper in California whose name escapes right now with similar features....   ¶ Permalink 10/06/2003 05:41:00 PM 0 comments

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News - Official: hackers have broken into GPRS billing per boingboing per IP  ¶ Permalink 10/05/2003 05:11:00 AM 0 comments

AFI Enhanced TV Workshop has an introductory video that makes me want to explore the future of television.  ¶ Permalink 10/05/2003 04:26:00 AM 0 comments

The Future Is Now - Who needs AOL? Time Warner is already the media company of tomorrow. By David S. Bennahum

"Time Warner is increasingly a company built on the economics of selling access to digital media: Whether it's cable television, high-speed Internet, or premium television, the company's most lucrative businesses involve selling subscriptions, not commercials."

per anil's daily links  ¶ Permalink 10/02/2003 12:34:00 PM 0 comments

Iraq: What Went Wrong, by General Wesley K. Clark per metafilter  ¶ Permalink 10/02/2003 12:27:00 AM 0 comments