Friday, January 09, 2026

Giving as Much as I Spend on Myself to Charity for the Next 3 Years

Given how horribly my society is behaving I have decided to give at least as much money as I spend on myself to charity each of the next 3 years.  My guess is that I will continue this past 3 years, but I will see how it goes and then re-access my long term plans.

I don't spend much, compared to my middle class USA peers (for housing, health insurance, food, car, technology, travel …). I have been spending more over the last couple of years and I expect spending will continue to go higher.


I think it is important for us to take action to protect the USA and the world from the horrible behavior by those in charge of the USA government now. Like most of those in the USA, that have prospered, most of my wealth is due to living in the USA. I feel I must use some of that wealth to fight the incredible damage being done to the people of the USA and world by the Republican party.



The USA Capital (photo by John Hunter)


We need many others to take meaningful steps to protect the world from the USA's actions. Direct action (volunteering in a food bank, for get out the vote efforts, to provide legal help for those being harmed by the USA government's violating the constitution and the rule of law…) is great; money need not be the way you participate. For me, giving money to charity is way I can make a difference. For others, different actions may be sensible.


My charity donation posts on Mastodon - https://fosstodon.org/@curiouscat/tagged/charity


Some of my 2025 donations


Trickle Up  

https://trickleup.org/


Southern Poverty Law Center   

https://www.splcenter.org/


Navajo Hopi Health Foundation  

https://navajohopihealthfoundation.org


Develop Africa  

https://www.developafrica.org/


Marketplace  

https://www.marketplace.org/about-us/


Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School 

https://www.brennancenter.org/


Electronic Frontier Foundation 

https://www.eff.org/


Texas Civil Rights Project    

https://www.txcivilrights.org


Partners for Health  

https://www.pih.org/



I hope you will take time to consider how much you have benefited from the rule of law, common decency, civil rights, the previous commitment to science and engineering in the USA, relatively minor corruption (certainly compared to the current kleptocracy level of Republican corruption we now are in the midst of), health care policy that wasn’t ignoring science…


And then consider making serious sacrifices to make sure the USA reverses course and makes meaningful changes to the disastrous policies and behavior they have engaged in and encouraged recently.


I fear for our future if those of us who can do much more chose not do so and just pretend their actions don’t matter. We must take action to stand up to the incredible abuses of our government today, if not, the harm to all of us, and even more so to future generations, will be heartbreaking.


Certainly the USA has long had many problems. I thought for most of my life that even if our progress toward fairness, decency, improved economic opportunity (for those that are not trust-fund babies)… was too slow, in significant ways we were getting better decade after decade. The last decade has seen us destroy decades of progress. I also now think, my estimation of how much progress we were making was far too optimistic.


I hope a decade from now the USA has fundamentally changed and realizes how close we came to critically damaging the future of hundreds of millions of USA citizens and billions of people around the world.  I am old enough and wealthy enough that the harm my society is inflicting on ourselves, future generations and the world are likely to be very minor compared to most of the billions of people that will be harmed. 


What I am concerned about is the damage my society is doing. I need to do something substantial to try and help halt the damage that is increasing every week and hopefully start to recover from this catastrophe.  So this is my attempt to help do what I can to protect the world from the catastrophic damage my government and the Republican Party are doing to the USA and the world. 


Related: I Fear for the Future of the USA if We Do Not Vote in Favor of the Rule of Law this Year (2024) - Society is being shaped for us while we are busy making other plans (2011) - Disregard for the Rule of Law by Government (post from 2013, things are so much worse now that it is shameful how badly we have chosen to behave recently) - Freedom Increasingly at Risk (2008)









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Monday, July 07, 2025

I was a Lucky Kid

 Comments on: Work travel: it’s required for my role and business, but brutal for my heart.

My 5-year-old is really struggling with me traveling this week.. She’s missing me more than usual and is worried that something might happen to me. That I won’t come back.

...

Any words of wisdom to share on how you strike the working parent balance? 

My father traveled a fair amount for work. It worked out well for us. I didn't realize until I was an adult having parents who loved you and made it obvious they did day to day is so valuable. That matters. Being gone sometimes didn't matter to me, I am sure some days it was annoying and is annoying for other kids. But it is really a minor blip, in my opinion.

My father and me

We also got to live overseas twice, for a year each time, and that closeness really can't be duplicated easily living in the USA (or your home country I don't think).


A parent that loves their work also provides huge benefits, in my experience

I wrote about my experience

https://management.curiouscatblog.net/2015/05/13/the-aim-should-be-the-best-life-not-work-v-life-balance/

The theme of that post makes sense for this case too I think. You want to optimize your life and your children's lives. That isn't the same thing as avoiding any things that might have some negative aspects.

Related: Positivity and Joy in Work - Making a difference in people’s lives - Touring Factories on Vacation When I Was Young - Curious, Joyful, Happy Kids Grow Up: Unfortunately

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Saturday, July 20, 2024

I Fear for the Future of the USA if We Do Not Vote in Favor of the Rule of Law this Year

The USA has enjoyed a long run of economic success. That is due to many factors, but a very large factor is that the rule of law in the USA was more trustworthy in the USA than elsewhere. That is at risk given how systemically the Republican Party has packed the courts with those from carefully crafted lists of judges supporting extreme judicial activism.

That process has been underway for several decades and those actions have reached a point where the rule of law as we have know it is in great danger. If we allow the even more extreme Republicans that have taken control of the party in the last 6 years to gain the presidency and retain their positions in the USA house and senate I fear the USA will not resemble what we have known in the last 100 years in the next 10 years.

I cannot fathom how anyone seeking political office in the USA that doesn't strongly speak out against someone with the horrendous track record Donald Trump has amassed during his life and the last 8 years can get even 5% of the USA population to consider voting for them. However, the USA public has shown that my beliefs are very different than many, at least it seems about 40% or maybe even more, voters.  I fear we could not only elect him but also those that have not strongly spoken out against his hundreds of violations of criminal, ethical and other abuses against our society.

Details on some of the many abuses (frankly even 5% of which should disqualify anyone from supporting such an individual for any political office and most certainly from the most powerful political office in the USA):

These links added to the original post as new evidence on the depth of the corruption, undermining of democracy, and unfitness for duty are learned:
There are an unprecedented number of officials President Trump appointed that have withheld their endorsement of him based on the his abuses.  This is yet another sign of how unfit he is for office and yet some people continue to ignore the incredibly dangerous warning signs. If we don't wake up and take action to support those that will protect the USA from those supporting such an unfit person from taking office we will suffer greatly for our failure.
We need everyone that cares about the future of the USA to vote this year for the Democrats that have shown they care about protecting the USA from the dangers we face from political extremists.  We need to make clear with an overwhelming showing at the ballot box that such extremists are not going to be tolerated in the USA.  Only if we do that can we return to the debate about what policies our country should pursue. 

This year the only thing that matters is saving the future of our country.  Then we can have the Republican Party decide to promote those that will first concern themselves with our country, rule of law, democracy and the constitution and then after those things we all agree on they can provide alternative policy options that we can chose from.  Or we can have a new party take over the position the Republican Party used to hold.

If we as a society fail to provide a clear victory to those promoting democracy the rule of law and our constitution the dangers to the USA are enormous.  Those that think just because the USA has survived challenges before we can just not worry that much about the terrifying behavior of those leading the Republican Party the last 10 years are taking a much larger risk than I think they understand.


Many people just want to hope they can avoid thinking about the dangers we face since in the past we have survived dangerous situations. I think we did survive because enough people cared to confront the difficult challenges they faced and take a stand for what they knew was right, even if that meant going against what was easiest for them in that moment.

This isn't about Republicans vs. Democrats. This is about corruption, religious extremism (nationalism), the reputation of the United States on the global stage, and the legitimacy of the Presidential Office and democracy. It's about upholding the Constitution, Woman's Rights, my Daughter's rights, and future Granddaughter's rights. It's about our national security and maintaining our position as the country "you do not fck with." For me, this is about not letting a sick minded narcissist unravel the wisdom of our founding fathers so he can squander the American Empire and our economy... just like he squandered his own father's real estate empire he inherited and drove himself into bankruptcy repeatedly... then defrauded banks along the way with lies about the portfolios value, hiding his tax returns from us all and committing fraud while he slept with a porn star while his pregnant wife sat at home alone, preparing to give birth thinking she was "the only one for him."  ...


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Monday, April 01, 2024

The USA Needs to Stop Coddling Those Behaving Abhorrently and Undermining Our Democracy

I am continually shocked and amazed at how far below (what I thought were low expectations) the Republican Party has managed to sink in the last 8 years. And it continually gets worse and more shocking. The country faces an enormous risk if we don't vote out those that have not strongly opposed the actions of the current Republican leadership this year. We need to rebuke their horrible behavior and vote those in power out of office, and keep those out of power today out of power forever.

I cannot imagine voting for a Republican for a long time that doesn't document exactly how their behavior in the last 8 years stood in forceful opposition to the horrible actions by the leaders in the Republican Party all this time.  How did they respond when their party put the country in great danger?  Very few have taken any actions that show any concern for the future of our democracy.

Photo of the White House by John Hunter

The editor of the cleveland.com/The Plain Dealer expressed the reality of the important choice our nation faces this year.

Our Trump reporting upsets some readers, but there aren’t two sides to facts

The truth is that Donald Trump undermined faith in our elections in his false bid to retain the presidency. He sparked an insurrection intended to overthrow our government and keep himself in power. No president in our history has done worse.

This is not subjective. We all saw it. Plenty of leaders today try to convince the masses we did not see what we saw, but our eyes don’t deceive. (If leaders began a yearslong campaign today to convince us that the Baltimore bridge did not collapse Tuesday morning, would you ever believe them?) Trust your eyes. Trump on Jan. 6 launched the most serious threat to our system of government since the Civil War. You know that. You saw it.

The facts involving Trump are crystal clear, and as news people, we cannot pretend otherwise, as unpopular as that might be with a segment of our readers. There aren’t two sides to facts. People who say the earth is flat don’t get space on our platforms. If that offends them, so be it.

As for those who equate Trump and Joe Biden, that’s false equivalency. Biden has done nothing remotely close to the egregious, anti-American acts of Trump. We can debate the success and mindset of our current president, as we have about most presidents in our lifetimes, but Biden was never a threat to our democracy. Trump is. He is unique among all American presidents for his efforts to keep power at any cost. 

We badly need to return to the days when the USA had 2 very flawed political parties; but still parties that at least had standards that would not tolerate the majority of those leading the current Republican Party to have any significant power.  And by that I don't mean 10 or 20 leaders I mean hundreds of the leaders (the USA senators, presidential candidates, members of the USA House of Representatives, state party leaders, state legislators...). Our country is in grave danger. We can't pretend this is just more of the same bad faith behavior by politicians. The previous bad faith actions pale in comparison to what we have seen the last 8 years.

We need those who normally sit out elections to strongly rebuke the current Republicans and force the Republican party to stop allowing those with abhorrent beliefs and that have been destroying the safeguards our society has built and promoted to lead their party. It is shocking that so many USA voters support those politicians.  If we continue to allow them to become more and more extremist in their rhetoric and actions we are placing the future of the USA at great risk.

Please make your voice heard and vote this year. There has not been a more important election since I have been voting. It is extremely important that we stop the decent into chaos and destruction of the rule of law that is being promoted by the Republican Party now.

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Friday, November 10, 2023

The Current Republican Party is a Huge Risk to the Future of the USA

 I am very concerned about the long term extremism that dominates the USA Republican Party.  Far too many people are complacent believing that the USA has done pretty well over the last 100 years so that will continue.  It need not continue. There are societal level critical risks today due to the behavior of voters over the last 20 years.

We have allowed our health care system to tax the economic well being of the country enormously. We pay twice as much as other rich countries for worse overall health outcomes. We also have huge waste stress and health care avoidance due to how poorly matched the system is to modern life. That tax can be paid and the economy can survive (as we have seen) but it is a large drag on the country and reduces the leeway to survive other mistakes.

The USA Capital (photo by John Hunter)

The Republic Party has been on a long term effort to destroy the rule of law in the USA. The continued tolerance of those that openly tried to overturn the results of the election they lost is a critical issue that anyone that cares about the rule of law should not tolerate. 

The behavior of the Trump administration at the Department of Justice and IRS were unacceptable. Trumps personal behavior while President should have resulted in his removal from office for anyone that cared about the rule of law or national security of the USA.  The Republic Party failed to put the rule of the law and the country above their personal fears about what Donald Trump would do to their careers. We need to elect people that care about the country first. We have not done so.  Unless we change we are taking a huge risk.

We need to stop tolerating those risking the constitutional republic we have been for over 200 years.  That is by far the most urgent and critical issue.  I cannot see voting for any Republicans that haven't loudly spoken out against the dominant practices (undermining the rule of law, putting a party and person above the interests of the country, ignoring national security concerns...) of the current party leaders.  And beyond that having demonstrated their actions to halt such behavior and withhold all support for Republican Party leaders that have gone along and pursued policies that undermine the rule of law and national security of the USA.


Inside Mike Johnson’s Ties to a Far-Right Movement to Gut the Constitution


For the last 10 years, the “Convention of States” movement has sought to remake the Constitution and force a tea party vision of the framers’ intent upon America. This group wants to wholesale rewrite wide swaths of the U.S. Constitution in one fell swoop. In the process, they hope to do away with regulatory agencies like the FDA and the CDC, virtually eliminate the federal government’s ability to borrow money, and empower state legislatures to override federal law.

As far-fetched as this idea might sound, the movement is gaining traction — and now, it believes, it has a friend in the speaker of the House.


The long term efforts of the Republican Party to disenfranchise voters is another completely unacceptable behavior.  I am extremely worried about the risk of voters electing even more officials that will overthrow the rule of law in the USA. But it is unacceptable to d disenfranchise such voters. If the voters in the USA decide to vote for those that will take future steps to toss out the constitutional protections we have had in our political discourse the last 200 years then we must deal with the consequences of such a catastrophic result. The Democratic Party in some states does engage in extremely damaging gerrymandering but the level of the the Republican Party's actions in this area have been enormously more damaging to the country.  And the Republican Party's continued efforts to suppress voting by those they feel won't vote for them is completely unacceptable and unique to them (in any significant form).

It is easier to ignore the huge risks to our society and hope everything works out ok. That is a huge risk. Once it is obvious that you should have acted strongly 5 or 10 years ago it may well be too late to make a difference.  

Don't be complacent. Speak out against those that are placing the USA's future at risk. Take actions to make a difference in avoiding the USA further degrading the protections of the rule of law and a government that is most interested in the interests of the country rather than institutionalized corruption favoring those with political power.

There is always going to be some corruption (Lobbyists Keep Tax Off Billion Dollar Private Equities Deals and On For Our Grandchildren, 2007) but the trends we are seeing and risks under another Trump administration are potentially catastrophic.  Waiting until the risks are even more obvious that they are today may well mean you waited past the chance you had to save the future of the USA.

Related: Critical Thinking is Needed to Counter Propaganda (2018) - Preaching False Ideas to Men Known to be Idiots (2010) - The USA Should be Ashamed of Who We have Elected (2017) - Selling Out the Country - We are Electing the Wrong People to Control Our Government (2015) - The Continued Fall of the USA's Political Leaders that We Give Power To (2017) - Living Through Your Society Becoming a Police State (2013) - Society is being shaped for us while we are busy making other plans (2011) - Bikinis For Liberty (2010)

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Sunday, February 28, 2021

When to Bench Basketball Players Due to Foul Trouble?

comments on: 2 foul auto-bench

I think the best reason to do it during the regular season is to teach players not to foul.

Otherwise I think a decision process should be used. Is this player foul prone, is there a difficult matchup making fouling more likely, are these officials calling questionable fouls, how badly do we need them out their now (are we falling behind by a large margin...). Also I would vary it (especially late in the season) depending on how likely we are to need to push every advantage. If we are likely in trouble take more risks, leave the player with fouls more exposed. If we should win even with them missing extra time, ok be more willing to pull them.

In general, I think coaches pull players much too often due to foul trouble. Unless the player is foul prone it seems they often pull the player with 2 fouls in the first half and they never even pick up a 3rd foul in the second half. That just makes it seem like a bad in game tactic. The one exception is for a season long strategy of teaching the players not to foul.

One way pulling a player earlier for 2 fouls in the first half or 3 or 4 in the second is to spread out the time of the reserve. If there are 12 minutes left in the first half and there is really 1 reserve that needs to take the time this player is out, pull them now, let the reserve get 4 minutes in and bring the player with 2 fouls back (maybe for 2 or 3 minutes). Especially if the reserve almost always plays in short 3 or 4 minute spurts don't create a situation where they need to play 12 straight minutes or something (protect, not just them getting tired but the other team figuring out how to exploit them).

Related: Frank Kaminsky, College Basketball Player of the Year - Lessons for Managers from Wisconsin and Duke Basketball - Why Do People Fail to Adopt Better Methods? (underhanded free throws) - Universities Again Abandon Fans/Mission to Increase Pay to Administrative Staff/Coaches

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Tuesday, January 08, 2019

The Most Popular Social Media Sites

These are the most popular social media sites ranked by monthly active users (for the most recent date I could find data for). The data is from various sources and is the most recent reliable sources I could find (Alexa ranks as of January 2019). What constitutes a "social media" site isn't so easy to define so I use a bit of judgement on what sites of involved enough of a social element to be included.


  1. Facebook (monthly active users 2.2 billion - Alexa Rank #3)
  2. YouTube (1.6 billion - Alexa #2)
  3. WeChat/Weixin (1.1 billion - #2,537)
  4. Instagram (900 million - #17)
  5. Tencent QQ (803 million - #6)
  6. QZone (548 million) - #209
  7. TikTok (500 million - #3,204)
  8. Sina Weibo (446 million - #18)
  9. Tumbler (350 million - #65)
  10. Reddit (340 million - #13)
  11. Twitter (335 million - #11)
  12. Baidu Tieba (300 million)
  13. Snapchat (291 million - #4,480)
  14. LinkedIn (270 million - #30)
  15. Pinterest (230 million - #77)
  16. VK (120 million - #14)
  17. Huya (100 million - #565)
  18. YY (95 million - #270)
  19. Taringa (75 million - #811)
  20. Renren (? - #1,824)
  21. Nextdoor (? - #1,310)

Alexa rank doesn't track smart phone app use (Alexa tracks website use, and far from perfectly but it does provide some insight into how much use popular sites get). Most of the social media sites have most use via apps but many also have useful web sites. Some have much more of a bias to smartphone apps (WeChat for example).


Related: What I Would Include in a Redesigned Twitter Profile - Don't Lock Your Content Inside a Proprietary System
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Thursday, January 03, 2019

Most Popular posts on the Curious Cat Comments blog in 2018

The most popular posts on our blog (by page views in 2018):

  1. Security Theatre Thinking is Damaging the USA (2013)
  2. Blog Readers, for Reading RSS Feeds (2013)
  3. Critical Thinking is Needed to Counter Propaganda (2018)*
  4. The Worst Aspect of TPP That Gets Nearly No Attention (2016)*
  5. When You See the Problem as Capitalism Instead of Corruption You Seek to Solve the Wrong Problem (2015)*
  6. Utopia (Dreamland in the USA) is an Amazing TV Program (2015), available on Netflix
  7. Preaching False Ideas to Men Known to be Idiots (2010)*
  8. Liberty and Support or Control and Hate (2013)
  9. Challenging Conventional Thinking (2015)*
  10. Curious, Joyful, Happy Kids Grow Up: Unfortunately (2010)
    11. photo of 2 children
  11. Society is being shaped for us while we are busy making other plans (2011)
  12. Netflix is Well Managed - People are Overreacting (2011)
  13. They Will Know We are Christians By Our Love (2010)*
  14. Banks Continue to Push for Insane Special Favors (and Sadly Get Them) (2014)*
  15. Why Copyright Extension is a Very Bad Idea (2009)
  16. Bikinis For Liberty (2010)
  17. USA Encouraging Governments Worldwide to Spy and Hack Globally is Very Dangerous (2014)*
  18. Appeasing Rude Selfish People Just Makes them Behave Even More Selfishly (2015)*
  19. Filter Out Links to Lame Websites on Reddit (2017)*
  20. Businesses Misusing Required Private Information (2017)*
* new on the most popular list this year (for the 2016 list we only listed the top 10)

The publication year of our most read posts this year:

2018: 1 post
2017: 2
2016: 1
2015: 4
2014: 2
2013: 3

2011: 2
2010: 4
2009: 1


Related: Most Popular Post on the Curious Cat Comments Blog (2016) - Most Popular Post on the Curious Cat Comments Blog (2011) - Most Popular Posts on the Curious Cat Comments Blog (2015) - Most Popular Posts on the Curious Cat Comments Blog (2014)
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Tuesday, January 01, 2019

Egregious Billing Practices by USA Health Care Organizations

Taking Surprise Medical Bills To Court Under the Theory of “Mutual Assent”

Consumers are increasingly vulnerable to... so-called balance bills, which represent the difference between what insurers pay and hospitals’ list prices. List prices can be several times higher than what they accept from Medicare or in-network insurers.

Congress is considering bipartisan legislation to limit balance billing. But some legal scholars say that patients should already be protected against some of the highest, surprise charges under long-standing conventions of contract law.

That’s because contract law rests on the centuries-old concept of “mutual assent,” in which both sides agree to a price before services are rendered, said Barak Richman, a law professor at Duke University.

Thus, many states require, and consumers expect, written estimates for a range of services before the work is done — whether by mechanics and plumbers or lawyers and financial planners.

But patients rarely know upfront how much their medical care will cost, and hospitals generally provide little or no information.

While consumers are obligated to pay something, the question is how much? Hospitals generally bill out-of-network care at list prices, their highest charges.

Without an explicit price upfront, contract law would require medical providers to charge only “average or market prices,” Richman said.

In several recent cases, for example in New York and Colorado, courts have stepped in to mediate cases where a patient received a big balance bill from an out-of-network provider. They ordered hospitals to accept amounts far closer to what they agree to from in-network private insurers or Medicare.

I strongly believe congress should pass a law outlawing the existing practices. And it is good to know the most egregious, and increasingly common, practices of the USA hospitals are already illegal. If you state hasn't already taken hospitals using such practices to court and required refunding all ill gotten gains, contact your attorney general to make sure they do so. And contact you state legislators to make sure they act also. Several states have been much more concerned with protecting their citizens from being abused by large health care providers but most states have not.

The existing practices are unethical and it is unconscionable that our elected representatives have allowed such egregious practices to continue and even become more common.

Related: Democrats and Republicans Have Failed the USA on Health Care for Decades (2015) - USA Health Care System Remains Broken, Neglected (2011) - The USA Should be Ashamed of Who We have Elected - Decades of Failure by Those Responsible for USA Health Care System Needs to be Addressed (2012)
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Friday, December 28, 2018

Privacy Invasion as a Business Plan

The rise of the internet has resulted in many companies building business plans on invading the privacy of their users and selling the data to those wishing to track those users. For many companies this model of behavior has always been obvious. I never created an account on Facebook because of how strongly focused they have always been on invading privacy and selling that data. The distain for Facebook finally became more than a side note in 2018 (though there has long been some push back against them). Though still most people continue to use Facebook even as the extent of their bad behavior has come to light.

Certainly other companies (Google etc.) also practice gathering and aggregating information about individuals in order to profit. I have used Google from the beginning though I have reduced such use in the last few years (still using them quite a bit). Duck Duck Go has long been my primary search engine though I do also use Google. I added Fastmail years ago, but still use some gmail accounts.

The integration of online tracking and offline tracking (via credit agencies, credit card companies etc.) has greatly increased over the last 5 years with Google planning a central role (along with, of course Facebook and many others).

One of the worst behaviors by internet companies is to collect phone numbers in order to facilitate selling and integration of private information while pretending it is somehow a security issue. Though security experts all say using phone numbers for security adds security risks instead of using much more secure methods such as a security key. Companies that use deceptive security methods to collect phone numbers in order to sell the private information of their users make it very hard to trust what else they are doing.

Twitter has long claimed a security reason to collect phone numbers [update in 2020 - Twitter faces $250 million fine from the US FCC for these practices abusing the private information of users]. Now they have locked one of my Twitter accounts (because I sent a string of 5 reply comments) and refused to allow me to regain access without adding a tracking phone number (I had no phone number before). For this reason I won't be using Twitter any longer.

This experience once again shows the risks of promoting connections via a system that can lock you out when they chose. It is much safer to use systems like (blog, where you own the domain, email... that are within your control). Of course nothing is 100%, email can blocked (people that try to run private email servers find they are challenged by systems setup to distrust such email). But investing time in building communities (say on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter...) is risky. At any time they can change the rules and harm what you have built.

I suggest avoiding investing in Facebook, Twitter, etc.. To some extent it may make sense to invest some time in such communities but I suggest focusing most effort on things that are not built on the model of invading users privacy and selling that data to others.

One of the many things Apple is doing well is positioning themselves to protect user's privacy. With so many other businesses built on invading that privacy it provides Apple both a real opportunity to help and also a marketing advantage. Other organizations and tools are also filling a need to protect people from spying and malware (some of which is getting hard to distinguish from business practices of large privacy invading companies) such as EFF's Privacy Badger, ublock origin and Ghostery.

It is extremely difficult for individuals to protect their private information. It is essentially impossible. When companies built to sell that private information and create business processes to ease their business practices they often create a situation where their actions have resulted in false information created that somehow becomes the individual user's responsibility to fix (so when those privacy selling companies allow a person's data to be mis-used it is then called "identity theft" though it is not, it is companies misusing information and then putting on the individual the burden of fixing the errors). Europe has much better privacy rights than the USA does. But much more and better efforts are needed from governments to protect citizens from having their lives thrown into turmoil by the abuse and misuse of their private information.


Related: Governments Shouldn't Prevent Citizens from Having Secure Software Solutions - Businesses Misusing Required Private Information - Living Through Your Society Becoming a Police State - I Can Spy on You, But You Can't Spy on Me - Freedom Increasingly at Risk
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Wednesday, October 03, 2018

Stamping Out Curiosity


Thoughts on LinkedIn conversation about curiosity it lean (LinkedIn's extremely poor Ux practices means I can't link to a web page of the discussion).

The strong sense of curiosity is in America but crushed out by bad management.
Allen Scott

And crushed by poor education systems and even just peer pressure. I have written about encouraging curiosity in kids (and adults).

I do agree bad management reinforces the anti-curiosity culture but it goes far beyond bad management - even the anti-fact or anti-critical-thinking aspect so prevalent in media and politics is a system designed to quell thoughtful questioning of existing systems, policies, results, affects... I think the decreasing of curiosity is likely strongly influenced by psychology, aging and coping as an adult (coping becoming the focus instead of curiosity and joy). And then we have several powerful aspects of our culture that discourage cultivating curiosity.

I wrote earlier this year that Critical Thinking is Needed to Counter Propaganda. It seems very obvious to me there has been a decades long concerted effort to decrease critical thinking, discourage curiosity and create a large group of people that will follow what they are told (Fox "News" etcetera). That makes things easy if you control what those people are told, but it also makes those uncritical and incurious followers susceptible to anyone that can create propaganda that appeals to them.

Related: Curious, Joyful, Happy Kids Grow Up: Unfortunately - Sarah, aged 3, Learns About Soap - Experience Teaches Nothing Without Theory
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Wednesday, June 27, 2018

Surviving Modern Conveniences

Today my car wouldn't start. I guessed the battery died.

I try to use Lyft. Their app says it is a bad connection and so it won't work (using iPhone on Sprint in Charlotte, NC - the 17th largest city in the USA). Sad but ok, whatever, deal with it. Ok try my iPad mini with ATT. Lyft connects and doesn't let me use it requires putting in a phone number before it will do anything so that I can get pin and give it to them. Ok, give them the number. Nothing ever comes from them.

Ok try Uber on iPhone. Uber asked for permission to spy all the time (not just when you are using Uber. Decline that intrusion. Now it can't find my current location. So I type it in. It finds it. Uber says it isn't available where I am and only offers their "luxury" options.

Now I could go directly to work but I have a mover scheduled to unload my large moving items at my new house this afternoon. And my dead car is blocking the garage (and there is a fairly steep hill up to the house) so backing the truck to the garage seems like a much better option so I want to move my car out of the way before they arrive (it is parked front in so jump starting it would be very hard I figure).

I select the closest Walmart (that I went to the night before 3 miles away or so). Driver shows up in the most beat up car I have ever been picked up with by Uber or Lyft (including traveling around SE Asia (where actually they were always very new and clean). This is Uber's luxury option remember. They then drive me to some other Walmart at least twice as far away.

I get a trickle charger (to charge my car battery) at Walmart and am back on my way. I use my iPhone to request Lyft and they show up. The signal strength is actually good. Now I am late to my 3rd day onsite at a new long term client. So I ask the driver to wait and let me take 5 minutes to setup the trickle charger and then he can take me to work. He asks me to add the new leg to the Lyft app. I tell him it might not work since my Sprint signal is so bad usually and I try and it fails. He says he will wait but you can tell he isn't thrilled with it. I guess that Lyft has a bad process to deal with situations like mine (or maybe he just wasn't certain how it would work).

I try calling someone at work using my iPad mini (while the ATT signal is bad, Sprint is much worse) and it connects but constantly breaks up.

But he says he will wait. I hurry up and set things up and am going out the door in maybe 3 minutes and I see him driving away. I try Lyft again and it fails again (on both phones just like earlier).

Then I try Uber and decide to give them my address again and they come pick me up. I type in the wrong address (a leading 4 instead of a leading 1, sigh). It doesn't seem we are going the right way, I figure that out and ask what address we are going to... I am amazing able to update the address in the Uber app (the connection barely works). The driver and car were nice for this trip.

Now I am late to work but am able to put in a partial days work then have to leave to meet the mover. My workplace is one of these huge building with big delays for visitors checking in... I have no idea how you can get Uber or a taxi or anything or any idea who you can ask (those I did ask have no idea either). So I decide to walk out (the equivalent of a few blocks to a sensible public street. I actually have 4 bars on 3G on Sprint (the iPhone) which is the best I have seen yet in Charlotte. I try to use the iPhone Lyft app. Won't connect due to bad connectivity. Seems much more likely it is some caching bug but whatever it doesn't work. And of course the other Lyft app (on the other device) won't let me use it (due to it not sending my pin number). So I open up Uber on my iPhone (which as with other other times today Lyft said it couldn't work due to bad connectivity the Uber app on the same phone worked fine. But now the wonderful Uber app (that I didn't allow to continuously spy) has decided that the only place I can be picked up is my house that I entered the first time. They won't let me change it.

So I have now use 3 of the 4 ride hailing options I have at hand. So I try my 4th and final option, the Uber app with full spying privileges and thankfully it works. And the can is new and clean and the driver is professional.

I get home go look at my car. The charger is off. I think wow that is pretty good I didn't think it would be finished. Put everything away and try to start the car and nothing. I put everything back the way it is and it all lights up like it is fine and charging and in about 15 seconds turns off. It must not like something, I try it a couple more times and finally reach a state where it won't turn off.

Of course when the mover arrives I the car won't start. Actually we tried to back it up the driveway some but it was too steep and couldn't make it anyway.

The modern convinces really did help in many ways (I am still hoping the trickle charger will help, though as I write this it is still questionable). The battery is about 10 months old. But while it is great to have cell phones and apps to help us when we are stuck it is very annoying to have such bad connectivity in the 19th largest city in the USA and such lame usability failure in the Uber and Lyft apps. And it is frustrating to have to deal with your own lameness that likely caused the battery to die (I left the lights on in the car - the garage had lights on so I didn't register the car lights were no going off...) and putting in the wrong address...

And this is one of what seem like several such episodes each day for the last few weeks. I agreed to move states within about 10 days to a full time job on site with a client. I didn't really have a desire to do so but I have worked for the company as an offsite consultant for years and understood the situation they were in where I really was the best option and it was fairly important. So far it has been a struggle. I hope soon I will have passed through this spate of frustrations. If I had this one episode happen some week it wouldn't bug me much. But day after day of multiple such things is wearing me down.

And since I have no decent internet connection I can't even Netflix and chill :-(
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