I haven’t noticed much educational programming in the way of MacGyver, Knight Rider, or the A-Team… but their absence is more than fulfilled in the form of live action choreography that makes the WWE look realistic.
Yes, while most of the populace hides from the sun light (being tan is stigmatized here, more on that at a later time), we at least all receive the daily recommended allowance of Airwolf – the pinnacle in day-time televisions quest for consolidating crappy plotlines and recycling fight sequences (seriously).
Not to be a Debbie Downer, but the capabilities of the helicopter are beyond even today’s latest and greatest vehicles (military or otherwise).
For instance, the fastest helicopter ever made (ZB500) only achieves 250 mph, which is just a smidge slower than the supersonic velocities that Airwolf was capable of reaching in a fire fight.
Oh, and you know how every episode involves tackling some tin-pot dictator in a Third-World shanty town? Well, being the douche bag that I am, I’d like to point out that this bird-of-prey supposedly hides in Monument Valley, Utah.
Big deal, right? Well, again, the longest range any helicopter ever had was a prototype OH-6, which could cover 1,900 nautical miles.
So uhh, it is kind of hard to take the fight to Charlie and other boogey men at the ends of the earth. Unless of course, they all reside in the Northern regions of Mexico.
Then again, as John Candy discovered in Canadian Bacon, there are copious amounts of dastardly bastards holed up within 100 miles of the US border. Like Pamela Anderson and Geordie Rose…
Note to purists: it is true that the creators recognized the range limitation in the “design spec” but seriously now. In the enlightening episode I watched last night, Hawke & Co. ended up battling a local group of herdsmen in Afghanistan. I don’t think you need a protractor or abacus to calculate the disparate differences between Point A and B. And in-flight refueling would be an odd thing for a wanted fugitive to continually receive from their adversaries in the Air Force.
See the intro that includes the “innovative” motorcycle helmet.
Four years ago I wrote about a metasearch project called Grub. At the time, it was basically being hailed as an open-source way to index the interweb, in real-time.
And it pretty much went nowhere for a number of reasons, one of which was that the parent company was free-riding off of its install base.
Another reason is that end-users trying to search the results had a subpar experience when compared to the dominant search engines of the time, especially the bigger players like Yahoo, MSN, and Google.
And now it seems as if a bit of fresh air has been blown back into Grubs little, presumably, unsalted heart.
Last week, Jimmy Wales (co-creator of Wikipedia) purchased the spider/crawler from its beleaguered parent company and intends on “truly” open-sourcing it this time.
In Om Malik’s write-up of this event, he mentions that building a scalable infrastructure was perhaps the prime culprit in Grub’s original demise; I still think that is merely one piece of the overall service.
No matter how big your index is, providing relevant results and presenting them in a useful manner still seems like the most important attribute desired by consumers.
And while a number of factors have gone into success, arguably one of the reasons Google dominates the current industry is because the developers have figured out not just how to index the web in a timely manner, but also how to present it in a productive, meaningful way — this despite the fact that both Yahoo and MSN have indices of comparable sizes and scope.
Here’s to hoping that Wales & Co. will not fulfill Santayana’s maxim. Heck, if they really are on top of things this time, I might even utilize the fat pipe I have here to help with the project.
Note: be sure to check out the Daft Punk song, “Technologic“
While still get a kick out of the various markets that are entirely foreign to Westerners like myself (e.g., Replacement drivers), I am equally amused that individuals can make a living by writing about what they believe the future holds.
Inventor and award-winning author Ray Kurzweil is among many commentators of futurism and I accidentally bumped into another prediction of his that seems to be accurate.
While he would hardly claim to own a crystal ball, it seems as if a prediction he made 7.5 years ago is unfolding on time.
In “The Age of Spiritual Machines” he suggested that at some point in the early 2000s (and before 2010), “[s]peech-to-text machines translate speech into a visual display for the deaf.”
And according to a recent patent application, it looks like the gadget wizards of Cupterino California (Apple Computers) have been working on commercializing a product that does just that.
So while it is hardly an earth-shattering Apocalypse-causing innovation, it does give ol’ Ray a little more room to flex at cocktail parties. See more on his track record here.
Back in the late ’90s and even up through parts of the ’00s there were people that got tattoos of Asian hieroglyphic characters, just because they looked cool.
The user had no idea what they meant and in the few weeks that I have been here, I have noticed a similar trend in xenophilia.
While I haven’t seen a whole lot of Romanic characters stenciled on the locals, many young people wear shirts even if they don’t know what it may say.
Exhibit A:
I snapped this photo during a scavenger hunt through one of the many jam-packed markets on Korea’s Constitution Day.
There are a million more where this one comes from, most of which are not family friendly…
I recently bumped into a couple of stories that are about a year old now, detailing one of those grandiose 5-Year Plans that are reminiscent to Soviet-era master planning.
This time the guilty party is the Ministry of Education in South Korea.
They plan on spending $51 billion of taxpayers ducats to invest in English education programs — a kind of ‘chicken in every pot‘ scheme or ‘robot in every home‘ kind of deal.
So, instead of allowing the residents to keep their money and finance education as they see fit, the technocrats (“Great Deciders”) have decided to throw money at an artificially created quagmire.
Also, in continuing the story from the other day, according to my co-workers it is illegal for someone like myself to teach pro bono, even at an orphanage. Because it is not part of the E-2 visa.
Draconian labor laws? Free-market in labor? Maybe this is why foreign businesses have been shunning the peninsula…
The contemporary debate over occupational licensing typically involves the fields of medicine and law.
In fact, you would be hard pressed to find anyone being arrested for or accused of practicing history without a license.
While many individuals would consider that sort of licensing scheme borderline retarded under the reductio ad absurdum fallacy (after all, why not license all commercial activity?), in South Korea, and just about every other country, this ridiculous policy actually exists.
For instance, a Canadian was just arrested and sentenced to six months in prison for fabricating his academic record to receive an E-2 Visa, the kind you need if you want to teach English here.
Now, while I certainly do not condone falsifying documents and committing fraud in any kind of business transaction, another overlooked criminal act is the artificial barrier to entry that South Korea has placed on the market for tutoring services.
Aside from needing a bachelors degree from an accredited institution, applicants must originate from an approved list of countries. And foreigners are only allowed to work at licensed/registered hagwons or public schools due to the fact that private one-on-one tutoring sessions are illegal.
Thus, the larger issue is that the Korean government is in effect insulating teachers here from outside competition: it is modern-day protectionism.
In addition, a lively debate is taking place on a popular ESL/EFL forum surrounding this issue and whether or not you should snitch/tattle-tale on someone teaching illegally.
Scratch and sniff
Two pillars of a free-market involve the freedom of association and freedom of contract, and in this instance the government is meddling in the affairs of businesses at the detriment of both the business and client.
In short, because schools are not at liberty to hire whomever they feel qualified for the job, an artificial shortage is created by government regulation. In addition, the negative distortions are no different than in any other market that the government regulates (such as the housing marketin NYC).
And as a result, a black market for education exists and thrives because effective instructors will still be approached to fill the market demand.
And this protectionist attitude is no better illustrated by one of the forum posters who suggests that the market price for an English teacher would drastically decline if the current requirements were dropped — they are scared of competition and are willing to use force to prevent a change in the business model.
The end result of this market regulation and government intervention is that customers cannot get the cheapest education, nor can they be offered the best, because some of the most creative and innovative teachers will never attend college.
Note: residents of India and many other former British colonies are not in the pool of acceptable E-2 applicants… because they aren’t honkies.
Every lunch I try to eat some local native food here.
While the noodley (sic) look and feel will not be entirely foreign to anyone that eats a lot soup and pasta, the spice factor is out of this world.
Visitors really have no need to buy any kind of decongestant as your nasal cavity is probably unaccustomed to the intense levels of heat that enters your mouth.
Kimchi is pretty much the primary staple in a diet here — it automatically comes with most meals whether you want it or not.
It basically looks and tastes like white lettuce that is inebriated with tabasco sauce. It’s actually fermented cabbage that has been aged and is dosed in a healthy helping of chili peppers.
The other staple is actually a beverage that tastes like a blend between Russian vodka and Japanese Saki called Soju.
It is watered down sugarized Ethanol that really needs to be drunken with a mixer (Sprite, OJ, Coke, etc.) and is consumed at many meals (especially dinner).
And on that note, apparently you’ll never be arrested for vagrancy or PI here.
So I was buying some salted peanuts at one of the million convenience stores around here and this guy dressed as a buddhist monk — robe and all — strolled in.
He must have smelled Westerner or something because he started banging his little pot and chanting alien incantations — and then asked me for some money.
And he’s not the only guy with an unconventional approach to raising funds around here.
Like a rock
There is that one lady, a middle-aged mom who rides the subway line through the Bundang area.
I see her everyday at the same time and like the vibrant colors of a peacocks feathers, every muscle in her face tells the peanut gallery that she means business.
So while other patrons of the subway are content to sit in their chairs, watching TV on their itty bitty phones, she wastes no time in hawking a slew of wares.
Toting two plastic crates strapped to a stroller she makes her way up and down the aisles. Like an auctioner at a flea market or an orator in an ampitheter, she tries to command the attention of everyone.
And as far as I have seen, she has failed every time.
If the Bud Light announcer guy lived here, he would certainly salute her tenacity and energy towards selling corn on the cob, yellow panchos, and a sundry of other unwanted goods.
So crack open a cold one amigo, because rain or shine she’ll be at it again tomorrow, and you’ll still act like you’re deaf and dumb.
I haven’t noticed much educational programming in the way of MacGyver, Knight Rider, or the A-Team… but their absence is more than fulfilled in the form of live action choreography that makes the WWE look realistic.
Four years ago I 
While still get a kick out of the various markets that are entirely foreign to Westerners like myself (e.g., 
I recently bumped into a 
The contemporary debate over occupational licensing typically involves the fields of 
Scratch and sniff
In short, it is nothing like 
So I was buying some salted peanuts at one of the million convenience stores around here and this guy dressed as a buddhist monk — robe and all — strolled in.