Apr 012015
 
I‘ve mentioned before that I’m working to open up life possibilities.  Career and home location are the two big ones: family obligations limited options for the past two decades but they’re steadily dwindling as a factor.  My house needs a great deal of rehabilitation before I could get rid of it, but let’s assume I get to that point.

Where would I go? Continue reading »

Mar 172015
 
I‘m going to shift gears a bit, get out of my own head and back to broader topics.  I’m motivated today by some activities I’m doing to ramble a bit about volunteerism, and maybe help overturn some preconceived notions I’ve run into on the subject. Continue reading »

Jan 232015
 
The last time I assembled a home-built PC was over ten years ago.  I’d won an Opteron CPU at an AMD event at a time when those babies were very expensive and among the most powerful workstation options, so I decided to begin there.

Impatient and lacking in funds, I got real resourceful at finding deals.  Many items were of their previous generation; new enough to work for me but often heavily discounted.  Ebay was, unsurprisingly, a great place to shop.  So was Pricewatch. Continue reading »

Jan 072015
 
This morning my twitter feed was greeted by yet another tired, loaded question asking if Windows Phone is dead, this time from Venture Beat’s Chris O’Brien .  I like Chris, and odds are his headline is borne more of frustration than click-baitiness, so I’ll spare him my usual snarky reply and take a cold, sober look at the situation. Continue reading »

Oct 162014
 
I lamented in a previous post about how the Dallas-Fort Worth area lost out on an advanced manufacturing research center, and noted that there would be more such opportunities.  Many more.

Sure enough, the White House just announced the next step in the series:

As part of the effort to build on the progress made and highlight the need for continued investment in American manufacturing, the President is announcing today a new competition to award more than $200 million in public and private investment to create an Integrated Photonics Manufacturing Institute, led by the Department of Defense, and the second of four new institute competitions to be launched this year.

Continue reading »

Oct 082014
 
I mentioned a couple of articles ago that our local maker foundation was dissolved and that I would share more later.  It’s later, so here’s the more.

If you’re looking for a steamy exposé on what can go wrong when a bunch of creative strangers start an organization, I’ll have to disappoint you here.  But you might pry it out of me over a drink offline.

Instead I want to share the Big Gotchas that derailed us, in hopes that the knowledge can help someone else.  I’m sure much of it will sound familiar to other organizers and leaders. Continue reading »

Sep 112014
 
Lately I’m working on a collaborative book project; three authors, one editor, and a small collection of raw content contributors.  It’s an exciting prospect but have to say, when it comes to co-managing a project like this sometimes little things become surprisingly big.  Like platform preferences.  Everyone has their pet tool and trying to get consensus on one easily reduces to finding the Least Worst Overall Not-Quite-Hated solution.  We’re working through that, but…

In our first conversation, Charlene the editor she asked me something about iPhones and the conversation went

Me: I wouldn’t know; I use a Windows Phone
Charlene: Oh, I’m sorry

So many ways to go with that… but suffice to say that from my perspective it proves how much more convincing a distortion field can be than reality.  I’m in no way impugning Charlene– she’s definitely sharp or I wouldn’t have started following her in the first place.  But Apple and others have done a spectacular job at misinforming even the discerning public.

Microsoft is included in that others category. Continue reading »

Aug 282014
 
Ok, I’m getting slaughtered in the Helsinki photo contest, so it’s time to up the game. You’re going to want to read the whole post.

I’m going to pull YOU in as a potential prizewinner. That means a FREE TRIP TO HELSINKI, FINLAND for you if I win the contest (Facebook contest winner gets two tickets) and you get drawn from the list. Continue reading »

Aug 272014
 
Okay, I admit it: I screwed up.

Yesterday in my zeal to win a trip back to Helsinki, Finland I lost all common sense and spammed the crap out of  Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and a few texting streams.

I know better.  I should have done better.  Impatience is no excuse, but it got the better of me. Continue reading »

Aug 262014
 
Today I’m spamming the Internet with yet another appeal, this time involving a possible opportunity for this unofficial ambassador to revisit one of my favorite cities: Helsinki, Finland.

There’s no funds or funny stuff required.  Visit Helsinki has arranged a contest where contestants’ photos are displayed in a Facebook media album and all you need to do is Like those of your favorite participant.  In this instance, me.

And in case you need further motivation, as I noted in the previous post here I’m working on a book about maker communities.  One of the coauthors, Jarkko Moilanen, works in Helsinki and I’d like a chance to get with him face-to-face for a bit.  I also hope to interview former Maemo/MeeGo community members (now with Jolla) to get their perspective on collaborative communities.

I have many friends in Finland and several of them have jumped in to help.  But so far it’s not nearly enough– I’m being beaten pretty soundly by another contestant and could use all the assistance I can muster. Continue reading »

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