Aug/08©Chris Farley
The Case Against Sarah Palin
In my several years following politics, Sarah Palin is probably the worst candidate I’ve seen ascend to the vice presidential level. I’m going to present a very clear case against Sarah Palin in this post, but even if you don’t agree with any of those reasons, here’s one more: When voters choose a vice president, they realize that his or her Constitutional duties are to be ready to assume the presidency. When nominees choose a vice president, they realize that the most important factor is the vice president’s preparedness to assume the presidency. Sarah Palin is not ready to assume the presidency and she is therefore unfit to assume the vice presidency.
Her experience is limited to salmon fishing and moose hunting. Her foreign policy experience is non-existent. John McCain is 72 years old and he’s had several recurrences of cancer. The actuarial tables aren’t looking so good. McCain’s death is not imminent, but it is more likely with this particular president that he will expire before his term is done. Voters understand that, so they immediately look to the bottom half of the ticket. And who do we see there? Sarah Louise Palin.
So who is she? Palin is in the middle of her first term as governor of Alaska. Before that, she was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska. Population: 5,469 in the 2000 census. How can people who say Obama is inexperienced say that Palin is even comparable? While Palin was mayor of a 5,500 person town, Barack Obama was a state legislator serving 12.5 million people. While Palin was governor of a state with a population of 650,00, Obama was in the United States Senate serving 300 million people.
Going further back, Palin attended the University of Idaho with no further education. Obama started at Occidental College, then transferred to Columbia University. He attended Harvard Law School and became president of the Harvard Law Review (I mention that because it is no minor accomplishment). I’m not against public or even community colleges, but do you think that Palin’s degree in journalism is going to be much help in anything but being nice to the press?
And now to the issues. Palin is pro-life, but also pro-capital punishment. In other words, everyone should have their babies because if they do something wrong, she’ll just advocate killing them later. This is not the woman I want to run the country. She supports drilling in ANWR, even though that will clearly not help anything. As for other issues, she’s such an unknown that nobody really knows where she stands on most important issues.
Given that her state is so important as it is her only experience, it’s worth it to think what some of her colleagues think about Palin’s appointment. Fellow Republican State Senate President Lyda Green from Palin’s own town said,”She’s not prepared to be governor. How can she be prepared to be vice president or president? Look at what she’s done to this state. What will she do to the nation?” In the article linked above, Green cites an oil tax increase Palin pushed through and a $500 million state subsidy Palin awarded to a Canadian firm to build a natural gas pipeline with an uncertain future.
To top it all off, Palin even said to a question about VP speculation, “I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the V.P. does every day.”
Normally VP picks don’t matter so much, but in this particular case, McCain’s choice really matters. She is not ready to be vice president by her own statement. She’s not ready to be president. Her views are shrouded in mystery because she’s never had to address many national issues in Alaska. She has zero experience on the national scene, zero experience of the international scene. Sarah Palin is not a good choice. She’s a small time governor being brought out on to a big stage.
Please, please, somebody who has read this explain to me why they would still vote for Palin. In my opinion, even if someone were voting for McCain, the Palin choice would be enough to persuade someone to vote for someone else. If the VP has to assume office, Palin isn’t ready.
Aug/08©Chris Farley
The Amazon Kindle in Education
It’s back to school for me on 3 September, but at the moment I’m fully engaged in buying books and such. Textbooks are, after all, important. Where else would one find either annoying but colorful blurbs on vaguely related topics surrounded by some content (at the less advanced levels) or remarkably dense, black-and-white books? These pieces of bound paper are worth something, though, because my books for this year cost over $600! The college students among you will probably ask if I left out a zero or two, but this is for 9th grade. $600 for 9th grade textbooks!
On top of that, the books weight about 25 to 30 pounds in total. They take up a bunch of space and are inconvenient to move and carry around. So what is the solution?
E-books! I can completely reduce the clutter, the tonnage, and the inconvenience. I can put all of my books onto one device. As far as e-book readers go, the Amazon Kindle is the clear winner for a number of reasons, including its ability to download books over the air and its independence from a computer. The obstacles to that oh-so-elegant solution, however, are not few.
First, my school does not support e-books at this point. With good reason as well! E-book technology has not developed to the point where it’s suitable for classroom use. You can’t take notes on the ink, for example. It lacks a built-in dictionary. The ability to configure many Kindles at once would be helpful for school as well.
Second, the availability of textbooks is a problem. McGraw-Hill publishes nearly all of their textbooks electronically as well as on paper, as do many publishers, but I’d have much more trouble finding my obscure French textbook on the Kindle.
Third, the design of the Kindle (the only viable option) would be problematic. It has some design quirks (the placement of the “next page” buttons, for example) and the screen is a bit small.
Like most things, all of this will be solved in time. My school (as well as many others) will start support e-books when the technology progresses to where it needs to be. The availability of textbooks is a work in progress. As time passes, more books will be published electronically and as schools and consumers switch to e-books, that will surely fuel more electronic releases. My design prayers will be reportedly answered as early as October with my small screen fears allayed next year.
With those changes made, Amazon will have created an electronic device that mimics most of the features of a regular book and enhances many others (please give us a dictionary that would allow us to tap a word and see the definition or something similar). The only “big” missing feature is the ability to write on the “paper.” That will help the Kindle infiltrate the education market because taking notes in the book is crucial for students. But in the case of a touch screen, write-able Kindle, it is not Amazon that is slowing the process. The underlying electronic paper technology cannot produce those results yet.
So it seems that my dreams of walking out the door to school with nothing but my Kindle and my laptop in hand are a bit far off. I’d probably still have to pay about $600 anyway because the high price of textbooks is due to the content on the pages, not the cost of the pages themselves. I can hope, though, as I’m lugging my books out my front door.
Aug/08©Chris Farley
Changes and Updates at View from a Farley
Times are changing for the world and so too they must change for View from a Farley.
I initially conceived View from a Farley as a weblog and podcast. I come from a background of video podcasting, so I felt that I should do what I know. Without the financial backing to do a video podcast properly (I wanted good equipment or no equipment), I went to audio podcasting. I even invested in an excellent theme by Geoff Smith, but the audio part of View from a Farley never took root. For one reason or another, writing has come more easily to me than podcasting. So today, the View from a Farley podcast is officially dead. (However, since I am all-powerful on my own website, I can ressurect it if I ever feel motivated to do so.)
View from a Farley will now exclusively be a weblog. The purpose is not changing, but some other things will.
The number one rule of successful blogging, according to several accounts, is to write every day. Especially at the beginning, it seems, not showing up is the worst thing you can do. Most bloggers manage it well, but I’m not content to throw up a YouTube embed with a couple words. The nature of View from a Farley is that it requires much more time than a typical personal blog. If only this could be my full time job! Unfortunately, my other commitments are pressing and showing up everyday is just not going to happen. You will instead be hearing from me most days and you can always be bothered by me on Twitter!
Several people noticed and commented on the new theme. By no fault of the designer, Matthew Heidenreich, and coder, Adam Kiss, the theme is not what I wanted. Of couse I approved the design every step of the way, but I don’t like it in action. It’s a shame not to use this theme, though, so it will be around for a while. If there are any changes that could be pulled off with relative ease, I would be happy to hear about them.
Regarding plans for the future, I’ve been asked if I plan on monetizing through advertising at any point. To answer, I’ve considered it, but AdSense hates me and it’s difficult to get a traditional sponsorship. If any opportunity ever arises, I would consider advertising, but I’m not planning on living off View from a Farley. I’d hope to cover my operating costs and other things to help the site (new theme, etc.)
I also wanted to communicate how much I appreciate your comments. View from a Farley was intended to be my thoughts and initially I didn’t care if people listened to what I was saying or not. Today, I care very much. I want people to listen, I want more people to read, but what I like best are the comments. I love it when a conversation develops in the comments (so feel free to hit reply in the comments instead of just writing a new comment). Intense Debate provides excellent tools for actually having an intense debate, so I hope people use them.
Thank you to everyone for reading! Expect me to be back with a real post in the next few days.
Aug/08©Chris Farley
Teens in Tech – Good Team, Bad Product
Teens in Tech's Launch Marred by Technical Issues
Teens in Tech, the new startup purportedly creating a community for teens interested in creating new media, not-launch launched into private alpha yesterday. After a TechCrunch review yesterday, the group has been widely panned.
Critics point to the lack of innovation on the part of the company. It uses a standard Wordpress MU installation and has already shown a surprising lack of foresight. A review on TechCrunch generates huge site traffic and server load, but Teens in Tech (I’ll spell out the name to avoid the acronym – not the best marketing choice) was using DreamHost, a service clearly not designed for reliability. The people at Teens in Tech bit the bullet and switched to a more reliable host, but only after leaving the front page down for most of the all-important launch day.
But still, I don’t think the technicalities are critical. Being crashed by TechCrunch is almost a rite of passage for startups, but Teens in Tech should have at least attempted to plan. My concern lies with the theory behind the company. Even if the launch has been smooth and Teens in Tech used the best custom backend in the world, the service would still fail because it is pursuing a flawed (if existent) business plan. While the teen market is huge on the Internet, the number of teens who are willing to create new media is very small. From a business perspective, targeting such an infinitessimal market segment isn’t at all profitable. Opening up to everyone would defeat the purpose of beging a teen company and place the group the group in direct competition with more established foes, like Mevio.
In fact, one of only a few things Teens in Tech has going for them is the design. Sean Blake did an excellent job at creating a professional design to complement the content. But as professional as the site looks, I’m not sure how professional it actually is.
The company is not incorporated and much of the company’s future plans remain “in discussion.” Oddly, Teens in Tech is generating an inordinate amount of hype for a service launching into private alpha. I question the wisdom of launching so early, given the technical issues, lack of innovation, and lack of clear direction. While Teens in Tech has the profit potential of a lemonade stand on a deserted road, a few conversations with the Teens in Tech team lead me to believe that the company isn’t going after profit. They seem undecided at the moment, but some sort of charity-type, donation-based organization might be in the works.
For the most part, the criticism of Teens in Tech is well-deserved. They launched too early, with no real innovation, haunted by technical difficulties. It was just not thought through. It is, as of now, all hype and no product. But I won’t tolerate the people who say Teens in Tech is only popular in the media because of who Daniel, the founder, knows and because of his location (Daniel is based in Silicon Valley). Perhaps this has some merit in that Daniel has more access to those who matter, but the people who matter wouldn’t care about Daniel if he was just an ordinary person. Daniel obviously has something going for him that’s impressing the likes of Robert Scoble and others.
My primary concern is that Teens in Tech will harm the teen community as a whole on the Internet. As teens, we have a certain disadvantage because we are not viewed as equals. But we can’t expect to be treated specially because we’re young, either. If teens want to be as successful as adults, then they need to be as good as adults. Age is no excuse for a less-than-fantastic product.
I have nothing against Daniel or the Teens in Tech team, but I want them to use their efforts for something else. I want them to do something really great, but I’m not quite sure what. Daniel would do it well, I’m sure, but more importantly, if he and his team pulled it off, it would be a major advancement for teens. So my advice to Daniel is to close up shop on Teens in Tech and move on to something more worthy of his efforts. Teens in Tech is just not going to gain the audience it needs to be a successful business.
Aug/08©Chris Farley
It Counts Now
About a month from now, I’ll be sitting in a classroom. I’ll be sitting at my laptop, cracking open a book, cracking a joke (perhaps at my teacher’s expense). Ninth grade is the beginning of the end. On 2 September, everything counts. I trigger a countdown clock to leaving home and going to college.
In a lot of ways, this is exciting. In others, it’s depressing. If I keep looking forward to what’s next, I will be a step ahead, but I won’t be focused on what’s happening now.
In preparation for the years ahead, I am moving myself forward. I will no longer continuosly look over my shoulder for the Internet would-be-predator who has haunted me for the past few months. I’m past the point of caring about him. I have neither the time nor the motivation to pursue act against him on behalf of me and others. It’s just no worth it. I’m cleaning my room, too. You never know, I might even become a Buddhist or something.
The next few years will be interesting. If I look at just the past year, I realize how much has changed. I’m looking forward to the next 70 or so years.