Monthly Archives: September 2004

Bill Clinton’s Bypass & Good Drugs

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Dave Winer recalls his own bypass surgery as former President Bill Clinton faces the same procedure.

Thank heaven for good drugs.
Bill Clinton called into the special Larry King roundup on his bypass surgery. He sounded great. Of course I projected my own experience onto his. I sounded great too, at that point in the process. They’re pumping relaxing drugs into your system. I don’t think you could feel anxious, no matter what. Good drugs.

Richard Knox:

About half a million Americans undergo coronary bypass surgery each year. Vice President Dick Cheney has had the surgery. It’s a low risk procedure, with as little as 1 to 2 percent mortality and chances for full recovery. It is done urgently sometimes, as in the case of former President Clinton, when blockages are found.

Invention, Refinement and Making Money

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The popular Honda Odyssey is often seen at Madison area soccer, swimming, football, basketball and academic events, among others. Honda has introduced a new version for 2005. There’s an interesting fuel saving feature in the new Honda: cylinder “deactiviation”.

The fuel-saving feature automatically switches between 6-cylinder and 3-cylinder combustion, depending on driving conditions.

Interestingly, and typically, this is not a new idea.
General Motors actually pioneered the volume production (there were earlier concepts) of turning off cylinders to save fuel with their variable displacement V8-6-4 engine, available in 1981. Evidently, reliability problems doomed this effort.
Now comes Honda, and others with the same useful concept. They will likely make it work and make money (I imagine that today’s much more advanced computers and software play a big role in the success of these efforts).
Wilde Honda, Rock County Honda and Zimbrick Honda sell them.

Health Care & Windows Risks

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I recently observed a health care diagnostic system (made by Milwaukee based GE/Marquette electronics) that used Microsoft’s Windows software. While the system collected data, somehow, another network user took over the screen (!), likely via a terminal sharing tool (PC Anywhere or similar). I wonder what the virus/work risks are?
It sure seems like firms have put a very large tool – windows – into places that it may not make sense, such as atm’s, cash registers and medical devices among many others.
Network world has been looking into this.

Piracy and Kool Aid

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Ed Treleven unfortunately passes along some Hollywood Kool Aid regarding file sharing in this article.
I don’t see any mention of our “fair use” rights in Treleven’s article. It’s clearly not right to copy thousands of copyright protected music files (read Janis Ian’s take and Courtney Love Does the Math for a counter argument), however, file sharing has many legitimate uses, significantly reducing the distribution costs of public domain and permissively shared art and speech, as well as reducing the centralized control of that distribution,” Judge Sidney R. Thomas in the recent Grokster case.
What’s next, no photos at the National Constitution Center due to “copyright”?
Actually, it’s worse than that. Democratic Senator Pat Leahy and Republic Orrin Hatch are carrying water for Hollywood by pushing the Induce Act.

Copyright Act (S.2560, Induce Act) would make it a crime to aid, abet, or induce copyright infringement. He want us all to think that the Induce Act is no big deal and that it only targets “the bad guys” while leaving “the good guys” alone. He says that it doesn’t change the law; it just clarifies it.
He’s wrong.
Right now, under the Supreme Court’s ruling in Sony v. Universal (the Betamax VCR case), devices like the iPod and CD burners are 100% legal — not because they aren’t sometimes used for infringement, but because they also have legitimate uses. The Court in Sony called these “substantial non-infringing uses.” This has been the rule in the technology sector for the last 20 years. Billions of dollars and thousands of jobs have depended on it. Industries have blossomed under it. But the Induce Act would end that era of innovation. Don’t let this happen on your watch – tell your Senators to fight the Induce Act!

Senator Herb Kohl sits on the Judiciary Committee, which held hearings on the Induce Act July 22, 2002.
I’ve not seen Kohl take a position on this, so I emailed his office on August 3 and received a reply on 8/30/2004. Contact Senator Kohl and tell him to vote against this Hollywood give away.

Wireless Internet for all? Philadelphia

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David Caruso:

For about $10 million, city officials believe they can turn all 135 square miles of Philadelphia into the world’s largest wireless Internet hot spot.
The ambitious plan, now in the works, would involve placing hundreds, or maybe thousands of small transmitters around the city – probably atop lampposts. Each would be capable of communicating with the wireless networking cards that now come standard with many computers.
Once complete, the network would deliver broadband Internet almost anywhere radio waves can travel – including poor neighborhoods where high-speed Internet access is now rare.

Judy Newman says that Mayor Dave is in favor of it (count me as a skeptic on this one. The Madison airport, as of August, 2004 still does not have wireless internet, otherwise known as wi-fi. Most other airports have had it for years). True two way high speed internet access should be a public good, just like our roads and utilities. This is the economic issue for the state.