Rise to the Top

We live in a world of degrading ethics and morals. Where high standards were once expected, today they are an anomaly. There is, however, a silver lining to this sad truth: an ethical person now stands out amidst the crowd. So while society as a whole is on a downward slide, opportunities are opening for individuals to stand up and exercise moral courage in doing what's right. It is more imperative now than ever before for people to stand for what is right, since so few are willing to do that today. Especially in the professional world, where Enrons are commonplace, ethical dealings are essential. It seems that people care less for their reputations and standards than they do for money. The business professional who upholds his reputation and conducts himself with dignity will be a rare treasure in days to come. So decide now to be that rare treasure. Perhaps your example will help society rise to higher standards as well.

Video Blog

I made the satellite animation on blender 3d, the music on Renoise, and the video was edited with iMovie.

Computers and the Kingdom

As a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints I spent every waking hour thinking about and attempting to bring the life-changing message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to as many people as were interested. In the back country of Kentucky and Indiana, our mission was the home of almost 200 missionaries. A central office in Louisville organized and directed the work of those missionaries and provided referral information about people who were likely interested in hearing the message. I had the rare privilege of spending 6 months of my mission serving in that office. It was there that I learned just how much well-designed computer systems improve efficiency in the work of the church. The church created a database system called MOS to handle the missionary office work. Unfortunately, MOS was extremely lacking in features and the result was that a lot of work that should have been computerized was being done by hand. It was better than having no computer system at all, without a doubt, but things could have been much more efficient. During the course of my time in the office, I wrote some programs that connected with the MOS database and extracted information in a more meaningful way. I was able to automate many tasks, some of which took hours, and allow them to be completed by simply pressing a button. Perhaps the most useful of these was a program that automatically sent the referrals out by text message. In short, this experience showed me just how much of a blessing computers can be in the church and how much improvement there can still be in the processes. I believe that the church is improving the way it uses technology, but the best is yet to come.

The Open Source Takeover

Microsoft Windows is universally despised yet also universally used. Why? The issue is compatibility and not performance. The average computer user cares little about the operating system he uses, so long as it can run the programs that he wants to run. For several decades, Microsoft has dominated the operating system world, which means that almost all programs that people use are written for Windows. However, a revolution is under way that is already beginning to challenge the Microsoft giant. Open source software is slowly but surely taking over the computing world. Linux, an open source operating system, is far more powerful and secure than Windows. Almost all open source software is written for Linux, and increasingly, commercial software is being written to be compatible with Linux as well. Currently, the main programs that people use (or equivalents) are available on Linux. It is the less common programs that are keeping most people from migrating to Linux. As those programs also become available, Microsoft will lose its position. It's about time.

Pancake is a Bad Shape

The World is Flat, by Thomas Friedman, was not, as you may have guessed, written in the medieval ages. Nor does it refute the physical spherical shape of our planet. Instead, it refers to the global equality which comes through technological advances. It is fantastic to think how technology has increased the quality of life for people all over the world. Yet it is not all fun and games. The social flattening of the world has many negative implications.

The American economy and freedom give opportunity for upward mobility. The joy of living in such a country is that very prospect. The idea that anybody from any background, including the depths of poverty, can start a company, be successful, and change the world with good ideas and hard work, is heart-warming. Yet just as a flat tire slows a car down, a flat world inhibits such small companies from being successful.

Gigantic companies such as WalMart and UPS followed the American success pattern. They started small, but grew to success and world influence. Along the way, they have burned the bridges they crossed to get there. Can you imagine trying to create a retail store chain to compete with WalMart? Starting from nothing in such an area would be nearly impossible now. The competition is too large to compete with.

Similarly, a flat world hurts individual workers in fields like computer science. With cheap communication around the world and cheap technical labor in places like India, it's difficult for American workers to stay competitive. Why would a company pay five times more for an American computer scientist to do the same job as an Indian computer scientist?

The flattening of the world is really all about competition. When a company can outsource to India or offshore to China to do the same job but for much less, they will do it, at the cost of many domestic jobs. In the end, it gives the American consumer the latest technology for a much lower price, but it also gives the same American consumer a much lower paying job. Do the two balance each other out? You decide.

Insert Creative Title Here (But Make Sure You Copyright it First)

Perhaps you have heard arguments that illegal file sharing benefits musicians by giving them free publicity. I can definitely see that there might be some truth to that. However, file sharing goes far beyond just music. Illegally copied software does very little to benefit its creators. If file sharing is legalized based on the benefits it has to musicians, then there will be nothing to stop sharing of other content, including software. I suppose I'm rather biased on this subject. Perhaps I write this with purely selfish motives. You see, I will soon be graduating with a degree in computer science and I hope to make my studies worth something. If software engineering is no longer lucrative because all software is shared illegally, then companies will stop producing new software. This means that the job market for computer scientists will diminish and I won't be able to get a job. So yes, I speak with selfish motives, but I also speak for the betterment of society. Allowing illegal activity to continue to the point that it destroys an entire field of study is far from progress. I think the main issue here is that people like to be able to get something for nothing and want the laws to change to allow that.

More Information, Less Knowledge

Technology has revolutionized the way we communicate. Because of the increasing popularity of the Internet, it is easier than it has ever been to share information and news. However, these wonderful technologies bring with them grave consequences. We are at risk of sacrificing quality of information in favor of quantity. Anybody can put anything they want on the Internet and share it with the whole world. We have all heard the warning that you can't trust everything you read, especially on the Internet. I submit that soon there will be such rapid flow of pointless babble that nothing will be worth reading. Currently, there are sources I trust for information online, such as major news networks. With the increasing popularity of online news sites, these news networks are facing major financial hardships and are being forced to fire many of their employees. Many are considering charging for online viewing of their news. Because there is so much free information out there, people will just stop using major news networks altogether. The market for news will shrink and the news networks will shrink with it, firing many educated, talented reporters and writers. Yet these are the very people whose work we would rather be reading. I fear that soon we will find ourselves getting news from postings by middle school students and not from reputable sources.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8542430.stm