Array A plurality, 44 percent, believes that an incapacitated patient should be presumed to want to live in the absence of a written directive to the contrary and 57 percent believe that hearsay shouldn’t be admitted to prove the patient’s wishes. That 57 percent majority would effectively prevent a patient’s wishes to be proven.Other answers show that the American people were disturbed at the result in the Schiavo case as 56 percent agreed that Michael Schiavo should have turned over his guardianship to Terri’s parents. A plurality (45 to 39 percent) also believe that there should be exceptions to permitting spouses from acting as guardians.In good news for Republican legislators who intervened in the case, and who are pressing forward with legislation in the area, only 14 percent thought that elected officials should not intervene to order a feeding tube to remain in place;
link
Something New in IT Market Research
– Real Data
During my 15 years in the marketing research business, I
developed a healthy respect for the power of data turned into information
turned into insights. I worked in Information Technology (IT) with ACNielsen
from the dawn of the business PC to the flowering of online Web applications.
You may know the Nielsen name from the Nielsen TV ratings folks, but I worked
for the part of the company that counts how many Cheerios people buy in Minneapolis or New
York or probably where you live (ACNielsen is in more
than 100 countries worldwide).
ACNielsen’s information is derived primarily from the
laser-scanning checkouts you’re familiar with in grocery stores, drug stores,
and mass merchandisers. What is great about this type of information is that it
is fact-based – a box of Tide or a six-pack of Coke is scanned at the point of
purchase and forms the basis for information in huge databases that the major
consumer packaged goods companies like Kraft, Gillette, and Procter & Gamble pay millions of dollars a year to access.
These companies are serious about these numbers because they
represent the realities of the marketplace and are based in hard scanning data.
They use this information to inform their decisions about everything from pricing
and promotion to compensation for sales staffs and brand managers.
The consumer packaged goods industry is thus very
sophisticated in its use of information to inform decisions and has been a
pioneer in what is now called data mining. But while I worked at ACNielsen, I
became very frustrated in the way that decisions were made in IT. Since the IT
market research lacks a hard-data-based information source, most decisions were
made by serendipitous processes. I used to joke that the way new technology
came into the company was because somebody went to an IT trade show and got
excited about something a vendor showed them. It was no joke, though; it was
that random.
Sure, there are plenty of IT market research companies: the
first rank Gartners, Forresters and the second rank Aberdeens, Yankee Groups,
and Delphi Groups, and many more. But what these folks consider research I
consider rumor and innuendo. The major way a typical IT market analyst gets his
or her information is to call folks he or she knows in the industry and ask
them what they think. (Actually, long ago there was a data-based research firm
called DataQuest. The company estimated shipments of computers by stationing a
spy outside the warehouses of computer manufacturers and counting the outgoing
trucks! Gartner bought them in 1995.) These informants usually include the
vendors of the technology, whom we can be sure are not in the least biased.
Right?
Add to this less-than-rigorous data collection methodology
the fact that most analysts have never used the technology they are expert in
and you can see how the resulting insights can be less than accurate. In fact,
go back and track the annual predictions the big research houses make at the
beginning of each year and see how accurate they were, especially during the
Internet bubble years. You’ll find these high-priced, so-called experts could
have done better with a dart board and a magic 8-ball.
So it was a breath of fresh air when I started working with
a client that is changing the rules of the IT research game.
Started by former Meta Group, Forrester Research and
ACNielsen executives, Evalubase
Research, Inc. is a market intelligence firm that continually gathers and
analyzes the real-world experiences of IT users. Rather than presenting opinion
and anecdotal evidence, Evalubase research enables IT users and decision-makers
to track how IT solutions perform in the trenches among their peers.
What a great idea! Actually ask the users of a technology
how it performs and what value it delivers! Evalubase’s Website (which I am
responsible for developing) enables any consumer of IT technology (including
you, gentle reader, who at the very least has experience with personal
computers) to establish an account and within 5 to 10 minutes create a
comprehensive evaluation of that technology. Hate a computer you bought?
Evaluate it. Love the new Customer Relationship Management system you
installed? Evaluate it. Since Evalubase’s customers include technology vendors,
your voice can be heard.
The beauty part of the deal is that for just a single
evaluation, you get a month’s free access to the Evalubase database in the
category you evaluated. Non-subscribers only get summary level information, but
if you’re planning a purchase, even that is way better than analyst innuendo.
Evalubase presents its information in two ways, via an
integrated charting
package and via an innovative IT Scorecard that compares an enterprise’s ratings with ratings from peers in the same
industry, in the same geography, or with similar revenue or number of
employees.
Evalubase is just getting started building its database of
evaluations but already there are significant insights to be gleaned by its
subscribers. And because I have inside information here, I can tell you there
are plenty of innovations coming for its Website and methodology.
With the recent purchase of META Group by Gartner, the
diversity of opinion in the IT market research industry has been reduced. There
will probably be other consolidations of firms, and plenty of firms withered or
died during the long post-Internet-Bust IT depression. I predict more and more
IT consumers will de-emphasize the fuzzy math of analyst firms and turn to Evalubase’s
empirical research for real-world advice from IT practitioners in the trenches.
Evalubase Research
Briefly Noted
Shameless Self-Promotion
Dept.: It’s here: A wireless networking company called The WiMAX Guys.
Our main business is new installs for people who want to set up wireless
hotspots such as hotels, warehouses, apartment buildings, and office
buildings or hotzones that cover cities. We also sell a knowledge-based Web
portal called the MAX K-Base.
Check out our main Website at www.TheWiMAXGuys.com.
My wife created a bit of a stir when her oped piece was published in the
Minneapolis StarTribune newspaper after the election. Her article, “Two
Nations, Handcuffed Together,” has been commented on or linked to by more
than 85 Websites. She’s now created a Website to capitalize on her
newfound pundit status. Check it out at www.debellsworth.com.
Coming At Some Point: A new eBook, Be On the Wave Or Under It™ will
collect the best of SNS’ insights over the last couple of years, along
with additional material from CTOMentor white papers and new material. It
will make a great gift for associates and friends in need of a guide to
the latest and greatest technology. Watch for more information in upcoming
SNS issues.
Several issues ago I debuted SNS Begware, an opportunity for you, gentle
reader, to express your appreciation by tipping your server via PayPal. See
the sidebar for more info. Total in the kitty so far: 6.48.
The Raw
File: SNS
is dedicated to delivering the scoop on the latest and greatest. However,
I collect lots of information that never makes it into the newsletter
before it gets old. I’ve collected all this aging info into a page called
The Raw File. This page is the raw information I gather for SNS articles.
It’s not pretty, and some may be a little incoherent, but chances are
there are still things in TRF that might be news to you. So therefore, use
The Raw File at your own risk – it’s 45 pages of the best stuff that
didn’t make it into SNS.
The Raw File
Anti-Laser Contact Lenses: OK, the world is obviously getting
weirder when we need to start to worry about errant lasers rendering us
blind. But at least Air Force thinks there’s a need here. They solicited
bids for a contact lens that “sits on the eye, the entire cornea and pupil
are covered, so there is no chance of a reflection, or high angle incident
beam, sneaking behind the LEP [Laser Eye Protection].” Thanks to Alert SNS
Reader Andy Stevko for passing this along.
DefenseTech.org
Really Mobile Wi-Fi
Hotspot:
You can’t get much more mobile than the Magic Bike, “a mobile WiFi
(wireless Internet) hotspot that gives free Internet connectivity wherever
its ridden or parked.”
I don’t care how much I pay (Too much, Magic Bike)
I wanna drive my bike to my PC each day (Too much, Magic Bike)
I want it, I want it, I want it, I want it … (You can’t have it!)
Magic Bike
Nannycams
Gone Wild: You
may be familiar with the concept of the nannycam.
Parents place a surveillance camera in their homes that is accessible via
the Web to keep track of how their day care providers are treating their
little charges. The parents get piece of mind and the nannies get, well,
their privacy invaded, I guess. Like many technologies, however, nannycams
have unintended consequences: Many of the cameras are unsecured and anyone
on the Internet with access to Google can find them and eavesdrop. What’s
worse, once the parents return to the bosom of their families, they may be
unaware that all their activities are also viewable by anyone, which could
lead to some X-rated possibilities if the cameras cover private areas of
the home.
Don’t believe this is a problem? Try Googling inurl:view/index.shtml
or ViewerFrame?Mode=
or MultiCameraFrame?Mode=, or
link
Mr Rosanova is the mentionee of an earlier post who refused to leave the confines of the capital on an earlier visit to this island, and I suspect it’s only the knowledge that our friendship would cease if he did not that causes his present visit. As it is, Miss Pillsbury and I are stuck cleaning the flat to his exacting standards for what will be a 28-hour visit.Despite some nervousness that Mr Rosanova (who, let’s not forget, lived in Des Moines for several years) will find our fair city to be the small, backward one-horse town he seems to imagine it is, I’m looking forward to what I hope will be a hedonistic visit including a gluttonous meal and some very bad behaviour on a tour of Nottingham’s gaybourhood.
link
Though viruses and worms still cause more damage in compromised or lost data, a newer menace, popularly known as spyware, steals users’ productivity and peace of mind.\The spyware label can apply to legitimate but annoying programs that users consent (perhaps unwittingly) to have installed on their PCs, or it can describe programs that install themselves without permission. We were pleased to find that a couple of the programs did a very effective job of cleaning an infected system and preventing new infestations with effective real-time protection.PC World tested seven products in the 0 to 0 range from big and small vendors: Allume Systems’ (formerly Aladdin Systems’) Internet Cleanup, Aluria Software’s Spyware Eliminator, Computer Associates’ ETrust PestPatrol Anti-Spyware, InterMute’s SpySubtract Pro, McAfee’s AntiSpyware, Sunbelt Software’s CounterSpy, and Webroot Software’s Spy Sweeper.In addition, we tested two popular free programs–Lavasoft’s Ad-Aware SE Personal and Safer Networking’s Spybot Search & Destroy–and a third free program that operates very differently but no less effectively, Merijn.org’s HijackThis. These two installed without our consent and proved the most difficult to remove, using multiple processes that reinitiated one another when anything tried to delete them.In contrast, the common adware applications WhenUSearch (a search toolbar) and Bonzi Buddy (a desktop companion that offers search assistance) presented easily understandable EULAs prior to installing and provided an effective uninstaller through Windows’ Add or Remove Programs utility.CounterSpy and Spy Sweeper Lead the FieldSunbelt Software’s CounterSpy and Webroot’s Spy Sweeper caught and cleaned more than 80 percent of adware and spyware infections and finished well ahead of the competition.Anti-Spyware ScannerScanning efficiency Detects suspicious processes in memory Prevents changes to Registry run keys Protects against home- and search-page changesProtects against Hosts file changesOther Supports scheduled/startup scansSupports automatic or scheduled updatesComments Best Buy Sunbelt Software CounterSpy 1.0 0 Posted the highest detection rate in our tests. Free scanner provides average detection rate, plus real-time prevention components to guard against infection.Computer Associates ETrust PestPatrol Anti-Spyware 5.0 0 With a detection rate of slightly less than 50 percent and limited capabilities, this product failed to distinguish itself.Aluria Software Spyware Eliminator 3.5 0 A below-average scanner, Spyware Eliminator provides a unique blacklist of offending sites and ActiveX controls to protect users.McAfee AntiSpyware 1.0 0 This product had one of the lowest overall detection rates, and the real-time protection failed to block or detect anything in our tests.Allume Systems Internet Cleanup 4.0 0 Almost completely ineffective at removing or preventing spyware in our tests. we then looked at each app’s real-time protection, for preventing the installations in the first place.Sunbelt Software’s CounterSpy proved the most capable of the bunch, finding and stopping 93 percent of all the running processes created by our 45 test programs.CounterSpy was the only product in our tests that was able to shut down and remove the tenacious WinTools from our system.Webroot Software’s Spy Sweeper came in a close second, clearing 89 percent of the active processes (but leaving behind elements associated with both WinTools and Slotchbar).The least effective were McAfee’s AntiSpyware and Allume Systems’ Internet Cleanup, at a removal rate of 33 percent and 11 percent, respectively.Spyware often hijacks the user’s browser home page and search pages so that attempts to access or search the Internet are redirected to pornography and other unwanted Web sites. Malicious software creators frequently exploit the file to prevent users from visiting security-oriented pages such as those on antivirus companies’ sites.CounterSpy and Spy Sweeper also blocked attempts to modify the Hosts file, stopped edits to the system Registry, prevented our browser home page and search pages from being changed, and detected suspicious processes in memory.Ad-Aware SE Personal does not include real-time protection, although you can set it to block edits to the Hosts file. The Scan Now button appears prominently on the welcome screen, menus are easy to traverse, and shutting down the program does not result in a loss of real-time protection.Ad-Aware’s interface is equally attractive, but the program’s menus are hidden behind unlabeled icons and require a bit of guesswork to find.Spybot requires the user to first switch to Advanced mode and then sort through various categories to find the most useful settings and tools options.Both Ad-Aware and CounterSpy provided reports that were easy to understand, but Ad-Aware listed a few cookies as critical objects–giving the impression that some benign cookies are a high-risk threat.HijackThis’s simple text-based interface presents options well, and the program is exceptionally easy to use–though the results it reports may require an advanced user to decipher.Spyware Eliminator provides a clean interface with clear menus, but the tool was slow to load.We found Internet Cleanup’s interface cluttered and difficult to use. nonetheless, AntiSpyware looks like it will be a top-notch product when it’s ready for shipping.It was able to detect 91 percent of the adware/spyware in our test suite, including 96 percent of processes running in memory, 67 percent of home- or search-page modifications, 100 percent of BHOs and toolbars, 95 percent of Registry additions, and 100 percent of other items such as menus and buttons added to programs.The utility scanned our 2.7GB of data in less than 3 minutes. Modifications to the Registry can allow unwanted programs to load, prevent wanted programs from loading properly, or change the user’s browser preferences.Spyware –Software that is surreptitiously installed on the user’s system to monitor the user’s Internet activities and that often displays advertising based on that monitoring.Related Topics: Adware, Maintenance/Management, Tips, Spyware
link
Harrier jet shakes off past to prove itself in Iraq
Chicago Tribune March 19, 2005
Harrier jet shakes off past to prove itself in Iraq
By James Janega, Tribune staff reporter.
Lt. Col. Robert Kuckuk helped redesign the Harrier fighter jet after a series of deadly accidents killed 45 of his fellow Marine pilots. Now he is helping rebuild the plane’s reputation.
With every hour in the air, he believes, his VMA-311 Tomcat squadron is slowly vindicating the single-seat Harrier, which can take off vertically but has been plagued by a checkered history.
A decade ago, the Harrier was known as the most accident-prone aircraft in the American arsenal, a mark that sidelined it from many major missions in Operation Desert Storm and Afghanistan. But since the invasion of Iraq nearly two years ago, and especially after November’s fighting in Fallujah, Marines say the Harrier has played a key role in the fighting in Iraq’s Anbar province, and in ways few envisioned.
Just after midnight last Sunday, Kuckuk tipped his Harrier over the provincial capital of Ramadi, high above Marines under mortar attack.
The Marines thought the incoming rounds were coming from insurgents in a car, moving from spot to spot to fire mortars–a common tactic to evade counterfire. But the Marines on the ground couldn’t see for themselves, and in a heavily populated area they were worried about shooting back.
Hovering above, Kuckuk looked down and sure enough, theres a car going by,” glowing gray-green on the cockpit monitor by Kuckuks right knee. It was flouting a curfew and bouncing off-road through the desert, fleeing an area where the Marines thought their assailants had been.
Kuckuk called in an artillery strike. Moments later, the shells began landing. No more car, he said.
Such are the successes that make Harrier fighter pilots say they are at last living up to the promises made a generation ago.
Of British design
The Marines first bought the British-designed Harriers in 1971, replaced them with a newer model in 1985, upgraded them in 1993 and fixed them in 2000.
But safety issues have plagued the aircraft, notably problems with the engine that allows the plane to take off vertically.
As engine program manager for the Marines Harrier program office, Kuckuk helped redesign both the Harriers engine and its maintenance program.
Congressional overseers have said that while they are satisfied with the new engine, rigid attention to its maintenance is key to the Marine Corps seven squadrons of Harriers. No more are being made, and the aircraft is expected to be replaced with another vertical-takeoff fighter in a decade.
After the Harriers most recent engine redesign overhaul, serious accidents dropped from 39 every 100,000 flight hours to 3.17 per 100,000 flight hours in 2001.
The Navy reported two serious accidents in 2004, comparable to previous years. During the current fiscal year, there have been two more: an engine fire in Arizona and a crash at sea. Both pilots ejected safely.
But in Iraq, Harriers have now flown nearly 11,000 hours without a mishap since May 2004.
Jets strong points
Though the Harriers nemesis has been its engine, its best systems include a 2-year-old camera pod attached like a torpedo under its stubby right wing.
The tool was designed to guide bombs but can spot enemy fighters and vehicles in almost any weather, at distances unlikely for subjects to know they are being watched. In a war that has often involved guerrillas fighting in urban areas, the camera has proved more useful than even its designers believed it would be.
Certainly the utility of the improved sensors to manage close air support has attracted attention in certain parts of the Pentagon, said John Pike, a military expert at watchdog group GlobalSecurity.org. They are being noticed in some places.
The Marines on the ground are noticing too. Within hours of landing at Al Asad last November, the Harriers were flying missions over Fallujah. They brought total confidence, said Maj. Andrew Hesterman, air officer for Regimental Combat Team 7, part of the Marine force that attacked Fallujah last fall.
Of the 170 air strikes RCT-7 called in, half were delivered by Harriers. It was a remarkable step forward, Hesterman said. I was calling ordinance drops within 150 meters of friendlies, he said.
Still, for every one hour the Harrier flies, a crew of maintenance technicians spends an average of 25 man-hours working on the planes frame and engine.
A status board in the maintenance office of Kuckuks squadron tells the tale. Of 16 Harriers, four were ready for flight Thursday night. Among the others, one had a radio altimeter problem, another needed a routine inspection. There was a troublesome hover mechanism, a fuel meter problem, one with lingering gripes after an engine replacement, one OKd as a backup.
In a repair hangar a short walk away, two Harriers were being dismantled and reassembled. This aircraft requires a lot of attention to details, said Sgt. Francisco Martinez, part of the repair crew. Anything you might miss would really take a toll. . . . It’s a great job if you like to turn a wrench.
So far, so good
When the Tomcats shipped to Al Asad from Yuma, Ariz., they took over the former home of an Iraqi MiG-21 squadron. Arab lettering and unit insignias still cover the walls.
Shortly after arriving, Kuckuk added a document called the Commanders Intent to the bulletin board just inside the units front door. His Tomcats were beginning what would be their current 4,700 flight hours without a serious accident.
KEEP DOING WHAT YOU’RE DOING, Kuckuk wrote in capital letters.
A few paragraphs later: I see our critical vulnerability as complacency, he wrote. We are one mishap away from being heroes to being goats.
link
Seventeen years ago today I became a father for the second time.The most awsome responsibility and the greatest joy a man can have.I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.Happy Birthday Beans.
link
(more…)