Bye Bye Birdie :o)

NBC Universal is shooing away the peacock from its new corporate logo as Comcast takes over a majority stake of the company. 



 "NBC Universal," which previously had the 55-year-old peacock logo separating the two words, will now read "NBCUniversal" to reflect a "we-are-this-close" family vibe, a voiceover presentation told 25,000 NBC Universal employees in L.A. 



The actual TV network NBC is keeping the iconic plumage in its branding.

I am glad that the TV network will keep this icon.  Sometimes I think the branding concept is taken to far.  I say if it works, it is know, then don't mess with it.

Sunday Silliness - Adversity

Tired Just Watching (360ball)

I know I used to love to play racquetball, but that looks slow compared to this new game from Germany.

Shanghai Conservation

In another effort to encourage people to use reusable chopsticks the China Environmental Protection Foundation has sculpted a chopstick tree and handed out reusable chopsticks.

About 100 acres of tree are cut down a day to create single use wooden chopsticks.

"Think here of a forest larger than Tiananmen Square - or 100 American football fields - being sacrificed every day. That works out to roughly 16 million to 25 million felled trees a year. 

To do this, the CEPF gathered 30,000 pairs of used disposable chopsticks from restaurants in Shanghai, washed them and built a tree sculpture, five meters tall high. The tree was chopped down and it was then displayed on a busy downtown street in Shanghai. Volunteers handed out reusable chopsticks to people passing by. 

According to the CEPF only 20 years worth of trees are left to continue to make the disposable wooden chopsticks.

Source

The Meeting Zone

Nothing challenges my sanity faster than a long, unproductive meeting. 

A productive meeting can be tremendously valuable, a big time-saver, and even exhilarating.  Here are some strategies to try to make a productive meeting happen:

Start on time, and end on time.

Spend a little time in chit-chat. People need to build friendships, they need a chance to show their personalities, they need to establish rapport. 

Everyone needs to contribute, find a way to draw people out. 

Have an agenda and stick to it. 

Never go to a meeting if you don’t know why you’re supposed to be there! 

Regular meetings should be kept as short as possible and very structured. 

For longer meetings, schedule breaks when people can check their email and phones.  Establish ground rules for actual meeting time - pagers on stun, no checking email, phones silent.

Take action items for meeting follow-up.  These need to be summarized with owners and due dates prior to adjournment.

Using these tips can prevent you from having a Haunted Meeting :o) 

[One of my favorite Bob and Tom skits, and a recurring entry in my little world]

Archer or Magnet?

How do you go from being an “archer” in which you aim and shoot for relevant contacts to being a “magnet” in which relevant contacts come to you?  These tips can be used from a company perspective, in a volunteer or professional society, or in surrounding yourself with the right friends.

First, it is important to understand that the even though the goal is to attract quality contributors, it might take quantity efforts to reach this goal. You need to aim for more people than you initially thought you had to.  Since you can only expect a 5-10% acceptance rate, you need to factor that into your initial outreach.

Be willing to listen and take a new approach.  We are often stuck in our own mindset and thus we already think we know whom we need to get in touch with. This is potentially dangerous as it can limit the reach of open invitations and hinder engagement with potential team members that we never thought would be able to contribute to the endeavor.

Diversity is a key reason for engaging in open outreach.

From experience, it is easier if you already have a framework and some solid areas that are "shovel ready".  It is so much easier to create a positive buzz on initiatives if they are solid and ready. 


Source

Are You Cultural?

Principles for a Strong Culture

1.         Everyone is personally responsible.
2.         Leaders demonstrate commitment.
3.         Trust permeates the organization.
4.         Decision-making reflects goals.
5.         Individuals demonstrate a questioning attitude.
6.         Organizational learning is embraced.
7.         Culture undergoes constant examination.

Media Noise - A lot of Huff, Enough!

the following, a quote from Joe Kline, in a recent issue of Time, says pretty much what I feel about the sorry state of the media in our country.  In some ways, I long for the days of only the major networks.


"The effect of all this [media] noise is to make it seem as if something drastic is happening, even when nothing really is. It becomes near impossible for us to accurately gauge the state of the nation — and it becomes utterly impossible to deal with abstract long-term threats like climate change, a flaccid educational system and the economic cancer caused by financial speculation. This is the precise opposite of what the media should be doing. It is a far greater threat to the Republic than the Sarah Palin circus or the anarchy of Julian Assange. It gets worse with each passing year, and I see absolutely no cure for it."


Read more: http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,2039920,00.html#ixzz1BAG6HCAc

Da Bears!

Sunday Silliness - Acquisition :o)

Science Scene - A slippery proposition?

Just when you thought that banana peels were destined merely to be the tormentor of cartoon characters and video-game go-kart racers, science has finally found a use to nature's most slippery litter. 


It turns out that peels can clean dirty water, too.


A chemist named Milena Boniolo from the Federal University of São Carlos, near São Paulo, has made a discovery that could potentially save thousands of banana peels from the garbage heap. When dried and ground into a powder, says Boniolo, peels have the ability to clean up polluted water.

For Boniolo, inspiration for finding a practical use for banana peels came after seeing so much of them going to waste. She estimates that her city's restaurants alone discard around four tons of the stuff each week. If her technique is implemented, it could be a low-cost alternative to the expensive methods used by industries currently -- which often use things like magnetic nanoparticles to clean water.


Source

Science Scene - Biojet Fuel

Australian airline Qantas will announce this month that they will be building the world's second commercial-scale plant to produce biojet fuel completely made from waste for its aircraft.

The airline is partnering with Solena, an American biofuel maker to build the plant, which will convert food scraps, household materials like grass and tree cuttings, and agricultural and industrial waste into biojet fuel.  

Solena has already partnered with British Airways to build a similar plant in London that will convert 500,000 tons of waste into 16 million gallons of biojet fuel a year.  That plant will be up and running in 2014.

Almost every airline has been testing biofuels in their aircraft, with successful results so far. Right now, only a 50/50 blend of biofuel and jet fuel is certified for use in the U.S. and the U.K., though British Airways is looking to use 100 percent biojet fuel once it's approved.

Source

So, why is can't this American company do this here?  It amazes me how far ahead of us Europe is when it comes to environmental friendliness.  We must find a way to fight the special interest and NIMBY activists.  If not for our sakes, how about our children's?

Cool Beans :o)

The conventional advice for mastering your temper is to “Count to 10” before reacting. I know I try and use this technique, but sometimes my ire is up before I can think to count.  So here are a few questions to to ask when you find your irritation quotient exceeded before you have the chance to count:

1. Am I at fault?

2. Will this solve anything?

3. Am I improving the situation?

4. Can I make a joke of this?


Source

Farewell Fermilab :o(

My father worked here from 1968 through his early death in 1990.  I worked there during summer and holiday vacations from 1976-1984.  When I was in high school, I made the state level in Science Project with a scale model and explanation of this facility.  It is with a heavy heart that I see them planning to close the facility.

Tough budgetary times spare no one, not even the last best hope of American researchers discovering the “god particle” on their home soil. Rumblings and rumors surfaced early yesterday that Fermilab’s Tevatron would not receive an extension to continue operations until 2014.  They will close operations by the end of 2011.

Tevatron and the LHC ICern) are redundant, and the DOE and HEP program are respectfully bowing out of the Higgs race to focus on other aspects of particle physics that aren’t already being probed by more powerful experiments elsewhere in the world. It’s a letdown for those who wanted to see Tevatron find the Higgs first, but it’s a practical move that will keep science moving forward while keeping Fermilab and it’s HEP program at the forefront of particle physics.

Vitriol?

vit·ri·ol: something highly caustic or severe in effect, as criticism.

Does the following sound familiar?

I am going to ignore you, and have zero dialogue.  I will focus on the things about you that I do not agree with, and extrapolate that to paint a picture that is ugly and menacing.  I will speak half-truths and twist things to my perspective, regardless whether it is true or accurate.  I will make unrealistic demands out of the blue, and if you do not immediately respond, I will seek legal recourse.  When you protect yourself legally, and a solution is put in place, I will lament on how unfair the system is and how you manipulated things to conspire against me.  I will repeat this behavior over and over again, and hope for a different outcome.

Of course, the last sentence is the definition of insanity.

This attitude is in place today in our country; in politics, in corporations, in school boards, in relationships, entitlement, in __________ (you fill in the blank)...

I hope that as a country and a society, we can start to live up to the "We The People" philosophy.

I Have A Dream...

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.” I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice. I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.  


August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr.

Sunday Silliness - Achievement :o)

Science Scene - New Hook & Ladder

Orville Douglas Denison spent much of his youth sketching out futuristic aircraft, but in retirement he has turned pragmatic. His “aerial fire truck,” a cross between a conveyer belt and a ladder, could help firefighters quickly shuttle victims out of burning buildings.

Denison began studying fire-rescue technology after watching TV coverage of the World Trade Center evacuations on September 11, 2001. Eventually he turned his focus to the ladders often used for smaller buildings. Firemen began deploying telescoping ladders in the 1880s, and they haven’t changed significantly since. “It’s ridiculous to climb up, put someone on your shoulders, and climb down,” Denison says. There had to be a faster way, he thought. So he designed a moving ladder that could be retrofit-ted to trucks to reduce a firefighter’s climbing time by more than half.

In a rescue, firemen could extend Denison’s hydraulic ladder to windows as high as 113 feet. But rather than clamber up the ladder, the firefighter would hop on, and the rungs would roll up at 200 feet per minute—more than twice the average climbing speed of a firefighter weighed down by 130 pounds of gear. The firefighter would ride to a window, load unconscious victims into a rescue bag, hook the bag to the ladder, and shift it into reverse to bring the person to safety. Denison says it can now take up to 15 minutes, and sometimes several men, to carry one victim down a ladder from 10 stories. He estimates that his ladder could lower four people to the ground in less than four minutes.

I love seeing practical solutions to real world problems, must be the geek in me :o)

Source

Why Goals Are Not Achieved

It is that time of year again when we reflect on what we had hoped to accomplish in the past year and what we plan to accomplish in the next. Most times we look back and realize that we did not quite measure up to our hopes and dreams. People tend to make the same mistakes when setting goals for both their business and personal lives:

1. Goals do not support your life or business main purpose.

2. Lack of continual action. Goals usually die from inactivity. Make sure you take one positive step towards your goals every day.

3. Lack of commitment. Many times we set a goal because it just seems like it should be completed or someone else thinks we should do it.

4. Goals that do not inspire. Goals should excite you. Plain vanilla goals usually never get off the ground. Set your goals high - goals that have a WOW factor.

5. Loss of focus. Goals tend to get lost in the mundane issues we face every day. Keep your goals visible. Write them down and post them where you can see them every day.

6. Goals are not positively focused. All goals should be written with a positive focus. We are drawn to things positive and repulsed from things negative.

7. Goals are not SMART. SMART goals are those that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timely. SMART goals tend to give you a laser focus and keep you on track.

Source

TARP - Quiet Success

In October 2008, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (Division A of Public Law 110-343) established the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to enable the Department of the Treasury to promote stability in financial markets through the purchase and guarantee of "troubled assets." Section 202 of that legislation requires the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to submit semiannual reports on the costs of the Treasury's purchases and guarantees of troubled assets. The law also requires the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to prepare an assessment of each OMB report within 45 days of its issuance. That assessment must discuss three elements:

• The costs of purchases and guarantees of troubled assets,
• The information and valuation methods used to calculate those costs, and
• The impact on the federal budget deficit and debt.

To fulfill its statutory requirement, CBO has prepared this report on transactions completed, outstanding, and anticipated under the TARP as of November 18, 2010. CBO estimates that the cost to the federal government of the TARP's transactions (also referred to as the subsidy cost), including grants that have not been made yet for mortgage programs, will amount to $25 billion. That cost stems largely from assistance to American International Group (AIG), aid to the automotive industry, and grant programs aimed at avoiding foreclosures. Other transactions with financial institutions will, taken together, yield a net gain to the federal government, CBO estimates.


CBO's current estimate of the cost of the TARP's transactions is substantially less than the $66 billion estimate incorporated in the agency's latest baseline budget projections (issued in August 2010) and the $109 billion estimate shown in the agency's previous report on the TARP (issued in March 2010). The reduction in estimated cost over the course of this year stems from several developments: additional repurchases of preferred stock by recipients of TARP funds; a lower estimated cost for assistance to AIG and to the automotive industry; lower expected participation in mortgage programs; and the elimination of the opportunity to use TARP funds for new purposes (because of the passage of time and the provisions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, P.L. 111-203). CBO's current estimate is also well below OMB's latest estimate, $113 billion, because the market value of assets held by the government has increased and several recipients of TARP funds — most notably General Motors and AIG — have significantly restructured the Treasury’s investment since May 31, 2010, the date used as the basis for OMB's analysis.


Clearly, it was not apparent when the TARP was created two years ago that the cost would turn out to be this low. At that time, the U.S. financial system was in a precarious condition, and the transactions envisioned and ultimately undertaken through the TARP engendered substantial financial risk for the federal government. However, the cost has come out toward the low end of the range of possible outcomes anticipated when the program was launched. Because the financial system stabilized and then improved, the amount of funds used by the TARP was well below the $700 billion initially authorized, and the outcomes of most transactions made through the TARP were favorable for the federal government.

Science Scene - Electric Garbage Trucks

Paris waste management is about to get cleaner.  The city will be getting 12 all-electric garbage trucks by the end of 2011.

The trucks are being built by PVI Electric Powertrain and will feature five strings of seven lithium-ion battery packs providing 250 kWh of energy.  The batteries will have a liquid cooling system to keep temperatures in line.  Each new truck will reduce CO2 emissions by 130 tons compared to a diesel-fueled truck.

Like city buses, or the hybrid street sweeper that just hit New York City streets, garbage trucks are well-suited for electrification.  They have fixed routes, travel at mostly slower speeds and have a lot of stops and starts -- conditions that allow battery power to really excel over diesel or gasoline.  The shifts that municipal trucks operate on are also perfect for fitting in recharging or battery swaps.

The electric garbage truck can pick up 16 tons of waste in two rounds of service before needing a recharge or swap.  The first truck will be introduced into the Paris suburb of Courbevoie and the next eleven will be in service within the next year.



Source

Science Scene - Future Space Travel, a Powerful Proposition

Interstellar travel won’t be possible for at least 200 years, according to a former NASA propulsion scientist who has some new calculations. And by then, the spaceships we would design for the trip will be obsolete.

Forget cost, political will and all the other variables — simply obtaining enough energy will take until 2196, according to Marc Millis, former head of NASA's Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Project and founder of the Tau Zero Foundation, which supports interstellar travel research.

Millis did plenty of extrapolating to reach this conclusion, which he presented at an astronomy meeting in Prague last fall and posted to the physics archive this week. He crunched 27 years of data on energy trends, mission energy requirements, individual energy use and even societal priorities, and chose two possible trips: An aimless interstellar colony ship, and a 75-year-long mission to Alpha Centauri.

For a 500-person ship on a one-way journey, Millis figures you would need at least an exajoule — that’s 10¹⁸ joules — which is just a little bit less than all the energy consumed by the entire world in one year. For an unmanned ship destined for Alpha Centauri, you would actually need more energy, because you’d want to slow it down upon arrival at our nearest neighboring star. This would require 10¹⁹ joules. Even without accounting for fuel, the 500-passenger ship wouldn’t be able to launch until around 2200 at the earliest, and the A. Centauri probe won’t be ready until around 2500.

Millis’ math is actually more optimistic than other studies, which have suggested you would need 100 times the world’s total energy output to cover that distance.

Choice

Every one of us alone has the power to direct the course of our lives by choosing what actions we will or won't take.  While sometimes it's easier to believe you don't have a choice, the reality is that you always have a choice to behave differently.

 - Francine Ward, business leader.

Don't censor Mark Twain's N word - Leonard Pitts Jr. - MiamiHerald.com

Don't censor Mark Twain's N word - Leonard Pitts Jr. - MiamiHerald.com

Well said Mr. Pitts!

Sunday Silliness - Accomplishments o)

Gen Y Communciation

Some 30 million young people in their late teens to early 30s are expected to join the U.S. workforce in 2010.  Effectively communicating with them will be crucial to our continued economic progress.  Empowerment is what this generation craves, looking for more than a paycheck, desiring to be serving a cause.

The old command-and-control style of managing just does not work with this generation.  Here are five ways to engage them:

Don't manage, mentor: Growth, Skills, Contribution, Learning.

Don't assign, explain: Experience, Understanding, Life Skills.

Don't dictate, solicit: Daily Employee Input.

Don't ignore, respond: Empowerment, Listen, Communication.

Don't conceal, communicate: Feedback, Social Interaction with peers, Dialogue.

Science Scene - Starbucks going LED

On a light-by-light basis, changing from incandescent to LED only makes a tiny difference in energy consumption and cost, but when you're talking about retrofitting a thousands of Starbucks stores, the energy savings can be huge.

That's just what Starbucks has found now that the replacing of incandescent and halogen lights in 7,000 stores in the U.S. and Canada has been completed.  The company's Director of Environmental Impact said that the program is on target to cut lighting energy consumption by 80 percent.

The good folks at Greenbiz did the math and figured that each 1,000 square foot store was saving $600 a year and reducing CO2 emissions equivalent to 10 barrels of oil.  The lights also cut total store energy consumption by 7 percent.



Source

AAADD: KNOW THE SYMPTOMS.....PLEASE READ!

          
                                                                           
                Recently, I was diagnosed with A.A.A.D.D. -                
                 Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder.                 
                                                                           
                         This is how it manifests:                         
                                                                           
                        I decide to water my garden.                       
                   As I turn on the hose in the driveway,                  
             I look over at my car and decide it needs washing.            
                                                                           
                       As I start toward the garage,                       
                   I notice mail on the porch table that                   
                  I brought up from the mail box earlier.                  
                                                                           
           I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.          
                                                                           
                      I lay my car keys on the table,                      
           put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table,           
                      and notice that the can is full.                     
                                                                           
                       So, I decide to put the bills                       
                                    back                                   
                on the table and take out the garbage first.               
                                                                           
                             But then I think,                             
                   since I'm going to be near the mailbox                  
                    when I take out the garbage anyway,                    
                     I may as well pay the bills first.                    
                                                                           
                    I take my check book off the table,                    
                 and see that there is only one check left.                
                My extra checks are in my desk in the study,               
                 so I go inside the house to my desk where                 
                                 I find the                                
                      can of Pepsi I'd been drinking.                      
                                                                           
                      I'm going to look for my checks,                     
                  but first I need to push the Pepsi aside                 
                so that I don't accidentally knock it over.                
                                                                           
                         The Pepsi is getting warm,                        
        and I decide to put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.        
                                                                           
                As I head toward the kitchen with the Pepsi,               
                      a vase of flowers on the counter                     
                      catches my eye--they need water.                     
                                                                           
                     I put the Pepsi on the counter and                    
                      discover my reading glasses that                     
                    I've been searching for all morning.                   
                I decide I better put them back on my desk,                
                 but first I'm going to water the flowers.                 
                                                                           
                I set the glasses back down on the counter,                
        fill a container with water and suddenly spot the TV remote.       
                   Someone left it on the kitchen table.                   
                                                                           
               I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV,              
                            I'll be looking for                            
                                the remote,                                
            but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table,           
          so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs,          
                     but first I'll water the flowers.                     
                                                                           
                     I pour some water in the flowers,                     
                 but quite a bit of it spills on the floor.                
                                                                           
                  So, I set the remote back on the table,                  
                   get some towels and wipe up the spill.                  
                                                                           
                    Then, I head down the hall trying to                   
                    remember what I was planning to do.                    
                                                                           
                           At the end of the day:                          
                            the car isn't washed                           
                           the bills aren't paid                           
                           there is a warm can of                          
                        Pepsi sitting on the counter                       
                    the flowers don't have enough water,                   
               there is still only 1 check in my check book,               
                          I can't find the remote,                         
                          I can't find my glasses,                         
             and I don't remember what I did with the car keys.            
         Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today,        
           I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all day,           
                           and I'm really tired.                           
                                                                           
                    I realize this is a serious problem,                   
                   and I'll try to get some help for it,                   
                     but first I'll check my e-mail....

Rare Earth Debacle

Japan has already taken measures to innovate around China’s monopoly on the global supply of refined rare earth elements, and the U.S. is now doing the same [China supplies 95% of these elements, and they are slowing or stopping shipments for political gain]. Rare earths producer Molycorp has secured the proper permits and clearances needed to reopen the Mountain Pass, Calif., mine that should be able to cover the current domestic demand for rare earths once it reaches full production.

Mountain Pass would be the first domestic producer of rare earths in the U.S. in more than a decade, when cheap Chinese imports rendered the U.S. market unprofitable. The 50-acre pit near Las Vegas is about 500 feet deep currently, but expansion will push it down another 1,000 feet in coming years.

By 2012, Mountain Pass is projected to be capable of delivering around 20,000 tons of rare earth materials per year. Molycorp says it has already lined up contracts for a quarter of the materials it will mine during that first year of full production, and already has letters of intent to sell the rest in U.S., Japanese, and European markets.


The materials that come out of Mountain Pass will be used to make high-strength magnets necessary for electric vehicle engines, wind turbines, and a variety of other high-tech products. However, the U.S. possesses neither the technology nor the licensing to manufacture the neodymium-iron-boron alloy necessary for their production. As such, Molycorp has partnered with Japanese firm Hitachi Metals to manufacture the magnets in the United States.

The development of a domestic U.S. source of rare earths really doesn’t come as a surprise, though it does add another wrinkle to the ongoing rare earths narrative that is increasingly seeing the U.S., Europe, and Japan aligning themselves opposite China in a sometimes quiet, sometimes overt struggle for these prized raw materials that are necessary to manufacture everything from portable electronics to emerging green technologies to high-tech weaponry. Both the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense have voiced concerns about a disruption in supply, concerns that were exacerbated this year when China quietly imposed a brief and unofficial embargo on exports to Japan.

In addition to re-establishing our own mining capability, I hope this will give us additional motivation to recycle technical components and start thinking about recycling from a product life cycle perspective.

Source