This is one of the many beautifully manicured parks in the Azores. These small areas appear to be what families visit when taking breaks (evidenced by the BBQs), but also parks that are lovingly taken care of all year long. These parks can be found all over the coastal highway.
Wow, It’s been a while since I’ve posted a photograph. Too long. So let me fix that. Here’s one from my short trip in January to the beautiful islands of Azores. While here, I rented a car; and damn wasn’t that the best possible move. The island has lots of hills and mountainous areas that give you just insane views of the rocky coastline below.
The unusual story of Jim Kubicek, an IT consultant and business owner in Cumming, Georgia captured my attention recently. Due to a disagreement with the Cumming-Forsyth County Chamber of Commerce having unpaid bills, Jim’s company KIT cut off its services. What followed was the local Sheriff charging Jim with “theft by extortion”, “computer theft”, and “computer trespass”. All of these felonies could conceivably see Jim spending 45 years in jail. Incredibly, this is a small town with a population of 5,613, so I’d expect people like Jim are known to a large number of people in his local area. This is becoming a far-too-common cautionary tale we can learn from.
While reading The Formula, by Luke Dormhel, a treatise on the many ways computer (and other scientists) have attempted to quantify and algorithmically understand the world, I was struck by this idea of our past present and future. What kind of future are we looking at when humans are replaced by robots and even laws are being handled by artificial intelligence? The answer is, I don’t know, but it got me thinking.
Last year I had an idea: Create a really, really high quality newsletter. Reading technology related news is a daily and rigorous ritual for me, so why not take that effort and synthesize it into a curated list of “What to Read“? Many others are doing this, of course, but I felt the value for readers was to get it from your trusted technical advisor (I manage technology for a number of small and medium sized businesses). For many years this voracious appetite for news and information was only for myself, but I knew it was time to change that. Time to share this with the world.
The story is all too common: I go onto Kijiji (a Canadian Craigslist clone) and find what I had been looking for: an iPad. I see the post’s price and presume it’s an “anchor” price, so I start off asking if the device is available and if they’d take a lower number. What follows is finding out the iPad posting was misrepresented as a “personal” sale, when in fact it was a business selling the product at a firm price, quoted without tax. Another asshole muddying what’s known as the “grey” market for the rest of us. Too many of these types of experiences, and you start to wonder if this can ever be improved past this level of failed experiment.
You might think the two of these have nothing in common, but I find it surprising how these two share similar tactics. In fact, taking a similar approach to writing information in each place might improve your odds of getting that message accross clearly and concisely. You may be the type of person that writes one-word message in email and Tinder profiles; and this wouldn’t be an article for you. For everyone else, however, read on to see these two in action.
Flying to the archipelago of the Azores landed me square in the sights of Azores Airlines (a new brand flying under SATA). Their logo includes a whale fin and planes are adorned with a full-sized whale sticker. For good reason as Azores is the largest whale sanctuary in the world. Booking this flight deal on Expedia, I had never really heard of SATA before this trip. I’ll break down my experiences, flight costs, and let you know what I thought of this particular airline.
This is the El Capitolio (National Capitol Building) in Havana, Cuba. The building, seen currently under construction, is notable for how strikingly similar it is to the United States Capitol building. In fact, construction was overseen by U.S. firm of Purdy and Henderson – which may have had something to do with the similarity. Finished in 1929, it was designed by Eugenio Rayneri Piedra. Currently it is home to Cuba’s National Assembly.
You might remember my mention of a way to help book authors combat piracy. It was an idea borne of a simple conversation with a friend; and neither of us had read the book. In fact, at the time of writing that article, I had not read a physical paper book in years. This seemed like a great way to exchange ideas and help the author in our own small way (though, frankly as a bestseller, this book doesn’t need the help). Now that I’ve read it, I wanted to let you know what I think.
Kevin Costain