Reputation needing a Defender?

The Internet, or as some of us like to call it, the Intertron, is an interesting environment chock full of nuts. Not just macadamia and almond, but all varieties. You know what I mean.

I was browsing a lot of very highly regarded SEO sites the other day. They were sites that are respected and well-known in the search engine community. Most of these sites are featuring leaders in the field. That sort of thing. You have to know that they are good.

You see, search engine optimization and realistic performance are something that have always been of interest to me. But now, I have had recent experiences that have made me interested in the wider subject of identity protection.

I recently lost my wallet while i was down enjoying Galaga t the mall in the arcade. I guess I got a little too animated in either that game of Pac-man, and I was gyrating around wildly. It happens to me sometimes, I get out there. I was imagining I was riding a horse in the woods, by a beach. Man, it was sweet.

Anyway, I found out my wallet was gone when the police called me. They were down at Pac-Sun with it; apparently a kid had been confronted with passing it off as his own and had run out when they didn't print a receipt out right away.

Well, after I got my license back I went and looked at identity theft firms on the ol' Intertron. The first one I found was this company, ReputationDefender (I think they're the same firm as "Reputation Defender" -- there appears to be a European arm?), and they seem pretty legit. I notice a lot of good press about them, and the usual group of detractors, as well. From what I can gather, ReputationDefender (or Reputation Defender, if you prefer) is a pretty good service. For a pretty nominal fee they go on the 'net and root out all your information from the dark little corners. Seems worthwhile to me.

Of course, I could do a lot of this myself, or at least the non-technical portions, but I could also slaughter my own cows for beef steak. But that's not gonna happen!

BIkes With One Gear? No Gears?

So I was in the city this weekend and as I was crossing the street I was almost run over by this messenger guy who was traveling WAY to fast against traffic. Anyway, after cursing him under my breath and making sure I wasn't missing any appendages, I noticed something about the bike he was on: it had no gears!

What's up with this? Has the recession gotten so bad that we no longer can afford gears for our bicycles? I went home and did some research on the matter, and as it turns out these types of bikes are very popular (especially in my area). Who knew?

To break it down for you:

1. Bike
2. Cog (this is the "gear")
2. Chain

That's about it.

Thoughts on poverty

The above image is of the Irish potato famine. While I am NOT that poor, it is worth noting that I am pretty impoverished.

Which is weird, because I have a decent job. I mean, I have insurance, I get paid a reasonable sum (I suppose), and I live frugally, yet I am constantly scraping and surviving. What gives?

I noticed that I got a HUGE chunk of my check eaten up by taxes recently. Damn you, Iraq war. Damn you all to hell! Actually, damn you income taxes. Well, I'm not completely against income taxes. I like roads and infrastructure. I like public safety measures. I just wish I could eat something other than ramen for once! (My stomach hurts as I write that)

How does the internet deal wiht poverty? Not very well, I would venture to guess. For one, poor people don't generally have access to the Internet to begin with. They most likely don't have computers, so the idea of the Internet is kind of moot to them, I imagine. And as bad as it might sound, I DO have a laptop at home, and an internet connection (thank you upstairs neighbors with the unlocked WiFi signal!), so I'm not doing all that bad. It's these little comparisons that make me feel better about my situation.

You know what I wish? I wish we still had a prairie, a frontier. I wish we had free land open to any individuals that were willing and able to work their asses off to cultivate it. In that way, the Internet is kind of frontier-y. Except that you can't make a house on the Internet (yet).

Of Legos and genius

Did you play with Legos as a kid? I know I did. While much of my youth may have been unique (to the point of weirdness) I don't think I was alone in this endeavor. Furthermore, I am buoyed by the fact that there are SO many videos on the 'net in which LEGOs take a starring role. Enjoy:

Michael McDonald for President!

Michael McDonald is terminally cool. I mean, look at that beard ... look at that penetrating gaze, My gawd, jsut looking at this pciture now I am entranced. Can't ... keep ... typing ... must ... fight ... on ...

OK, the spell was broken. Yikes. Got a little intense there for a moment.

Anyway, I would like to see Michael McDonald run for president. Seriously. Why not? If the White House gets a phone call at 3am in the morning, I want the person who picks up the line to have a sultry voice that's smoother than butter on a greased door knob. I also want them to have facial hair that's the envy of men the world over, Sikhs, Amish and Orthodox Jews excluded.

I think that his extensive touring schedule has more than adequately prepared him for the busy Presidential travel schedule, and that performing in front of thousands of fans has made him great under pressure. A real clutch performer and cool head (literally, I'm sure).

Join me in supporting Michael McDonald for President in 2008!

Disappearing

I was listening to NPS today and they had a piece on a girl whose parents were "disappeared" (read: dropped out of helicopter into the Atlantic Ocean) by a South American military regime when she was just a little baby. As fate would have it, she was then adopted by a family that had close ties to the ruling military class. They held onto her and raised her as their own, never telling her who she really was.

Flash forward 22 years, and here come the girl's real life grandparents. They find her, they tell her who they are, and thus, who she is. Chaos ensues. Now the girl is suing and it's opening a whole can of worms, because the problem is now being recognized an unintended consequence of mass scale political whitewashing. Who could have foreseen?

Baseball Season

Baseball season is upon us. I can't wait. As much as I am a true geek and love the internet, I love baseball almost just as much. You see, I love math at the heart of things. Baseball, not many people know this, truly runs on math. Chaos theory and statistics, specifically.

What is chaos theory? In a nutshell, chaos theory is the art of taking disordered information (chaos) and finding the underlying order in that data. As anyone who has ever watched a baseball game with a die-hard fan will tell you, baseball is the perfect game for this discipline. Some teams, in fact, have utilized chaos theory to refine their approaches to play beyond the traditional athletic sectors. Oh, by the way, the Goldblum pic is from Jurassic Park, where he talk at length about Chaos Theory while trying not become raptor food. I hate having to explain that, but I realize that I'm a little esoteric sometimes.

For a more cogent look at this topic of statistics, I point you back to another fave program of mine, NPR. Stats are probably the most visible side of baseball. You hear them every time someone brings up the game. ERAs, IPs, Avgs., OB percents. All these things and many more are the metrics that people use to determine if a team/player is good in comparison to others in the league. It's a little cold and calculating, but it works.