Evidently, a group from The International Volkssport Association was recently in Madison. This group has organized walking tours of US Capitol Areas. Interesting stuff. I remember running across these sort of opportunities in Europe.
Monthly Archives: June 2005
Doctorow/Cuban on Ineffective DRM
Cory Doctorow and Mark Cuban question inane Digital Restriction Management (DRM) tools that Hollywood is using to restrict our fair use rights. Support the EFF.
Arrests in Tribune Newspaper Circulation Fraud
David Folkenflik on NPR (audio).
Trusting Big Tech Companies with Democracy?
David Horsey sticks it to Google, Microsoft and Yahoo for rolling over to Chinese censors.
Jarvis on Investigative Journalism
But I’ll be heretical enough to ask whether investigative journalism is what the public most wants from the press, whether chronic suspicion — as opposed to skepticism — can breed chronic cynicism, whether ever-sparer journalistic resources are best put to bringing down the bad guy or to helping us in our daily lives. What is the proper calling of journalism?
Northwest Airlines’ Fortress Midwest Strategy
Susan Carey writes about Northwests’ “catering to travelers between small and midsize cities in the Upper Midwest. This “heartland” gambit aims to keep fares higher and discourage discounters from flying there. …. Going one big step further, Northwest also has been expanding aggressively with nonstop flights between nonhub cities, so that more passengers don’t have to make connections through one of its hubs when flying to some domestic cities.”
This strategy has manifested itself with 50 seat jet non-stop flights between Madison and Washington’s Reagan National Airport (though at inconvenient middle of the day times) and a variety of non-stops from cities like Milwaukee and Indianapolis to New York, Washington and other east coast destinations. This is also an attempt – futile, I think to kill Midwest Airlines.
Northwest is largely betting that flyers will put up with the small, uncomfortable jets in an effort to grow frequent flyer miles (the hidden secret here is that frequent flyer miles are growing more difficult to use by the day, unless you use a lot of them…..)
On a related note, the Boyd Group has written about the declining utility and economics of 50 seat jets for some time. They recently mentioned growing demand for 100 seat planes. I think, unfortunately, it will be difficult for Madison to grow service with 100 seat aircraft – I hope I’m wrong on this. Microjets will likely be one popular alternative in places like Madison.
We’re so back in the 70’s…
I’m old enough to see the color & design schemes go round and round. Boeing’s latest, the 777-200LR is undergoing flight testing. The Worldliner’s blog includes several interior photos that feature the aircraft’s brown/tan hues.
Fifty States, A Thousand New Tax Laws = Decoupling
For most of the 92 years since the federal income tax was established, the states followed Washington’s lead concerning how to tax people and businesses. That ended in 1981, when 21 states adopted their own rules on depreciation in response to a Reagan tax cut. Many of these renegades — California being a notable exception — later went back to a more uniform tax code. But the precedent was set. When Congress began slashing federal rates in 2001, many cash-strapped state legislatures opted to go their own way once again.
Tax experts call this “decoupling.” That’s a jargony name for a practice that can — and most likely will — cause you to run screaming to your accountant. “It is a zoo,” says Jere Doyle, an estate-planning and tax expert in Mellon Financial’s Boston office. “Everybody thinks ‘federal, federal, federal,’ and assumes that the same rules will apply at the state levels. But they do not
Steve Jobs Odyssey
A transcript of Steve Jobs’ Stanford Commencement Speech, given this past weekend.
Errol Morris Interview
Errol Morris discusses advertising and his recent documentary, the Fog of War in this interview.
HuffPost: But there’s certainly been criticism, especially with McNamara, that you may not have pushed hard enough.
Morris: In truth, I wish I had done something like that when he went on and on about the Gulf of Tonkin incidents. Didn’t we try to provoke them? A number of people have criticized me and the movie for giving a false impression or what they consider to be a false impression of those events.
HuffPost: You and Eric Alterman had a conflict about this issue in the film, about footage that may or may have existed showing McNamara discussing secret intercepts regarding the Gulf of Tonkin.
Morris: Right. Alterman just engaged in hand-waving. It’s sort of, “You’re not a historian so why should I listen to you?” I’m not a big enthusiast of that kind of argument. It’s like in Mr. Death, Fred Leuchter, the Holocaust denier, has a degree from BU in history. Does that mean that his historical views are more valid? No.
I’m always puzzled when people ask if a film is true or false. Fog of War, true or false? Fahrenheit 911, true or false? Sorrow and Pity, true or false? Isn’t what interests us about documentary film, that there is a claim that relates to the world and hence does have truth value? You can think about things that are said by people and think, is this true, is this false, what is this?