From NYTimes:

Unwilling to take new jobs that pay far less, neither employed nor looking for work, they are not counted in the jobless rate, and a surprising and growing number of them instead depend on a government check to get by.

Once these statistical nonpersons are counted, the labor market of today looks all too similar to those of supposedly bleaker past decades, according to a number of recent studies by economists. Even when the unemployment rate was near a 30-year low in 1999 and 2000, men from the ages of 18 to 54, as a group, spent 11 percent of the year not working, roughly the same as in the late 1970's and late 80's, according to one study.

Things are considerably worse today. In the last two years, the official jobless rate has risen and an additional two million people appear to have dropped out of the labor force. Today, the real level of unemployment for men probably approaches the level of the recession-mired early 80's.

  10:50:21 AM  Google It!  comment

Lightness Perception and Lightness Illusions

The paper and interactive movies based on a paper by Edward H. Adelson.

1 Cover the right half of the image. Looks normal.

2 Cover the left half of the image. Looks normal.

3 Look at the whole image. How could that be?

Thank you M.I.T.
  9:21:18 AM  Google It!  comment

Chargers 21 Patriots 14

The Patriots were outplayed today by a team that wanted to win this game more than the Patriots. It was another exciting game and a close battle but after the first quarter when the Patriots got a drive going the Chargers D managed to stop them time after time. This week the Patriots D were unable to effectivly stop the Chargers run from making big plays and consistantly getting into the secondary.

I hope the Patriots recover their desire to win before next weeks meeting with the Dolphins in Miami. Both teams are 3-1 in the AFC East. This is a big game for both teams.

Excuse the brevity of my post I was napping before the start You can read all about the game at the links below.

Game Story

Box Scores

USA Today

Boston.com, Discharged
  8:46:10 AM  Google It!  comment

iSay - What? "deal with customers" Obviously written by someone who dislikes customers. If you don't establish the customer as the central reason you're in business your business will fail. Doing for your customers drives the business. Smart salespeople understand this. That's why they are powerful in business. Now combine that with a digital technology understanding coupled with curiosity and watch what happens. Example: look at John Robb and Dave Winer at Userland software. I am a customer because their products empower me to easily publish to web sites and the products also open new areas of creative endeavor to me. Userland is a small company with great products (not perfect, but working on it) who are building a loyal customer base the right way. If you like my concept then consider hiring me. See my resumé here or here

  8:29:07 AM  Google It!  comment

The Patriots are averaging 35 points per game over first three weeks of season, but could meet their match this week against the Chargers' league-best defense. San Diego is allowing opponents just 206 yards per game in total offense, and leads the NFL with 16 sacks.

Looks to be another exciting game. Stay tuned.
  10:43:52 AM  Google It!  comment

Google, the rapidly growing online search engine, introduced a service yesterday that uses its search algorithms [~] but no human editors [~] to create a news page that looks not much different from those of many news Web sites.

"We are trying to leverage the experience of all the editors out there," said Larry Page, Google's co-founder and president for products. The site brings together headlines, and makes its automated news judgments, from information appearing on 4,000 sites.

  7:13:23 PM  Google It!  comment

	Patriots 41 Chiefs 38

This game did not show a smooth running well oiled championship team. It showed a Patriots team that was in a fight to a win. And was this ever an exciting game!

First the Patriots dug themselves into a big hole of penalties and 10 to 0 deficit by the end of the first quarter. Linda said the team must have been out partying the previous evening. They could do no right. In the second quarter after adjustments a glimmer of the Patriot smarts, versatility, and toughness showed through with a 23-yard pass from Brady to Kevin Faulk followed by a 37 yard field goal to end the half. Why did Weis try for a two point conversion sneak play? Our New England pessimism was running high all during half time. The third quarter opened with a domineering Chief TD in the first two minutes. Then the Patriots came back and scored a TD with a two point conversion to tie the score. When the fourth quarter opened the Patriots jumped convincingly to a 31 to 17 lead. I breathed a bit easer with the 14 point cushion. Joe on the other hand said he wouldn't be comfortable until there was a 100 point lead and Chief blood on the field. The Chiefs simply showed Priest Holmes the ball and he took it in to score. The last time to tie the game with 3 seconds left from the one yard line. The guy is one hell of player. Perhaps it was home field ju-ju but the Patriots won the overtime toss, elected to receive and never looked back. They took nine plays to move the ball into Vinitari's striking distance and as he has done many times his kick neatly split the goal posts.

My hope is the team remains healthy. Brady was taking some tough shots. Andruzzi was missed, and so was Bruschi.

Go Pats! 3-W, 0-L

Box Scores

Boston.com report

Patriots Schedule
  6:00:17 PM  Google It!  comment

Existential blogging from Ray Ozzie:

Clay Shirky on online community.  Clay's contrasting of "audiences" versus "communities" is also relevant in the enterprise environment.  "Employees", like "audiences", are intentionally gathered sets of individuals, linked by organizational affiliation and by the business processes within which they need to participate.  The bonds that hold communities together, however, are edge-based forces - the same forces that bring people together to solve problems, to innovate.

Center vs. edge.  Orchestrated organization vs. self-organization.  Business process vs. business practice.  Fragility vs. resiliency.  Complexity vs. chaos.  Control vs. empowerment.

Clay and Ray are right.

Complexity science bleeds all over the social sciences. It is slow going and the math and empirical work are just getting started. But the thought, the approach is there. We're not decomposing organizations. We're going to their atomic components, people, and studying their interactions.

Take a look:

• Chaos Theory in the Social Sciences: Foundations and Applications 
• Complexity Theory and the Social Sciences
• >Weaving Complexity and Business: Engaging the Soul at Work by Lewin and Regine  
• The Edge of Organization: Chaos and Complexity Theories of Formal Social Systems by Russ Marion
• Facilitating Organization Change: Lessons From Complexity Science by Edwin E. Olson, et al
• Cities and Regions as Self-organizing Systems: Models of Complexity (Environmental Problems and Social Dynamics) by Allen

And then there's the attempt to inform the management classes:

• Complexity and Management: Fad or Radical Challenge?
• The Paradox of Control in Organizations
• Complex Responsive Processes in Organizations: Learning and Knowledge Creation  by Ralph D. Stacey
• Changing Conversations in Organizations: A Complexity Approach to Change by Patricia Shaw
• The Emergence of Leadership: Linking Self-organization and Ethics by Douglas Griffin

I can't wait for emergent project management: it's coming.

A lot of it is balderdash, slogging through the bog in the dark.

But then you come across advice to the atom. If you are a cell in a cellular automata, what are your rules? What works best for you?

Bill Jensen's Simplicity and Work 2.0, and Cultivating Communities of Practice by Wenger, McDermott and Snyder are like this. Hell, I'll go so far as to say that the Cluetrain Manifesto and Small Pieces Loosely Joined belong in this cluster.

This is part of why I like cyberspace. Our scribbling, pinging, messy stuff of human interaction, leaves spoor for academe. 

I blog therefore I am.

We link therefore we are.

Our klognet melds with your klognet.  

  8:10:01 PM  Google It!  comment

Monday is a hot day, air temperature in the 90's and humid with bright sun. The game is broadcast on Monday Night Football. A two hour pre-game warm up; Dennis Hopper being his bad self; the new big stadium in Foxboro; the old shrub; Patriots matched against the 3 point favorite big mouth Pittsburg Steelers. (note to the Steelers, if bad attitude and trash talk win games you guy's are champs). The game starts badly for the Steelers, two Patriot interceptions lead to TD. After a few punts the Steelers get a TD and it's 7, 7. The Steelers and Patriots keep upping the intensity until a Steeler drive reaches the Patriot 1 yard line. The Patriots D holds the Steelers, two consecutive penalties push them back to the 25 and then the Steelers miss the field goal! From that point on the Patriots dominated. The Patriots rack the score up 30 to 7 and show that action on the field means way more than sound bites from a knucklehead. To the Steelers credit they don't give up and with one second left on the game clock they score their second TD. That's it, game over. The best line from John Madden all night referring to the Steelers coach "He's got to be happy that his team is in such a weak division. He can loose here tonight and still be on top of his division tomorrow." An auspicious opening for the Patriots. I'll just say, Go Pats 2002!

This just in:

From Linda via the Globe.....

As for Kordell Stewart and Jerome Bettis, an APB was being sent out by their coach, Bill Cowher, because he couldn't find either of them except when they were on the ground or chasing some Patriot who had just intercepted another errant Stewart pass.

What Cowher did find was the same nightmare he'd watched last January in Pittsburgh, except this time it was worse. Last January, his team got its collective purse snatched. Last night, it got mugged.

In that AFC title game, at least Cowher's defense showed up, holding New England in check only to lose on two special teams breakdowns. Last night at Gillette Stadium, the only people who showed up were the Patriots.

Read box scores and game play action.

  10:05:15 AM  Google It!  comment

Update: After writing about this and thinking for a bit about why Amazon would risk their brand doing something this stupid I began to think that someone altered the header info to use the email reply as a live address harvester. Either way they're still scumbags.
  12:34:41 PM  Google It!  comment

Update: The four drives and scsi card checked out ok. With the DAT alone on an external scsi chain I was able to have a succesful back up. Looks like the problem was a cable or the zip drive with internal termination.
  3:58:49 AM  Google It!  comment