Lumpy's Corner

Further Along the RIAA's "Road Less Logical"

2013-02-25T15:04:30Z

Those of you who have followed this blog over the year's are aware of just how passionate I am about the RIAA. I simply love the way they are creating a new type of mathematics which rivals even federal fiscal budgeting logic, a new Gestapo economic model in which they sue consumers who do not wish to participate in a business model last considered modern in the Precambrian era and crusade to collect artists' royalties which never seem to actually get to the artist.

Ready for their latest move? It seems that they have been unhappy with how Google serves search results. They don't like the way sites they like don't rank as high as sites they feel are "pirate" sites. Mike Masnick, over at TechDirt, brings up the best point which I will paraphrase as "ever hear of SEO?" I wonder if Apple likes the fact that HP shows up in search results for "personal computer brands"?

If Apple were to respond as the RIAA has, they would do some research and conclude that Google is not trying hard enough to keep other brands out of the search results. Go figure... Nonetheless, I must part. I am off to hire a research company to find out why "Lumpy" is not the only result you get when you search for "blogger". I mean why waste time and energy on relevant key words, content and providing the searcher what they are actually seeking?

"You're Self Employed, So You Should have the Time... I mean you set your own hours."

2013-02-21T21:41:12Z

LumpCharcoal (Photo credit: John "Lumpy" Lemke)

The title is exactly what some body replied after they took the liberty of volunteering me to be somewhere at a specific time to do something that nobody else volunteered for. They were truly shocked and amazed when I informed them that I was not available. They totally and honestly believed that I was just being difficult.

I thought I would take just a few paragraphs to elaborate on the myth. (Maybe next time, I can simply point the shocked to this post.) First off, this individual might have better said that "other people" set schedule my time for it is much closer to the truth.

Obviously, they did not have any problem with it nor did they see anything wrong with doing so. They felt every right to do so... Trust me on this one readers, if some one is actually paying you, they feel even more entitled to control your time and your life. If you can't accept that, DO NOT consider becoming a freelancer.

]]> However, it is very much true that you have very little control over your schedule when you are self employed. The simple fact that every client you ever have as a writer expects you to live up to your dead line kills that before a seed even turns into a sprout. It has also been my experience that deadlines are always "sooner" rather than later... at least for the better paying gigs.

The reality is that, if you don't meet their deadline, you won't be working for that client again. If you don't have clients, you are "unemployed" and not "self-employed". If you meet the deadline early, you might get a bonus or be viewed more favorably for future bids.

The most truthful, hurtful and real part of this is that if you are not willing to jump through the hoops by meeting or exceeding the client's time constraints, there are at least 100 other writers, web designers or programmers who are willing to. Do you think somebody is going to pay you good money so that they can wait for you to complete the job at their leisure? Seriously, do you think you are Isaac Asimov or Stephen King?

Furthermore, consider the following:

Do you think that my utility companies, insurance companies and grocery bills are due "whenever I want"? If you can make such arrangements, enlighten me please.
It is not like a job with benefits. You do not get "X" dollars per hour. Your X is dependent not only on how long you work but much more so on the quality of your finished product. If you don't estimate well, you still have to finish the project or risk the loss of future work. In other words, you can, too often, get into situations best described as a "reduction of X".
While it is hard to ascertain exactly what value X is when you are working, the value of X is certain when it you are measuring sick time, time off and lack of work days. That value equals zero.
Often enough, especially as a writer, you are not guaranteed any X amount and your X amount may, even if not sick or on vacation, still equal zero dollars. (We call these rejection letters and most writers actually collect them... I ran out of fire wood a few years ago and mine got me through a cold winter.)
Regardless of what state you live in, there is no law which allows you to earn 1.5 X, 2.0 X or any other increase in it for hours over 40 or work on Saturdays and Sundays.

To close, no I did not end up fulfilling the obligation I was volunteered for. The fact was that some one else had already scheduled the same slot of time by "buying" me. If you wish to embark on a career where you can schedule your own time, I suggest becoming a lotto winner.. good luck.

Life is Difficult...

2013-02-18T12:02:00Z

The title of this post is also the title of the first chapter of the best selling book The Road Less Traveled. M. Scott Peck had much to say on this matter. Even after a decade past my most recent read of this excellent book, that first chapter still rings clear in my mind. A quote is in order:

This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult--once we truly understand and accept it--then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters.

When I first read the book, now almost 30 years in the past, I honestly believed and felt that my life was very difficult. However, my life today is far more difficult than in the past and, in the present, I do not feel the same amount of stress. In fact, I am more thankful now than I ever have been in my 49 years of existence.

So why would I bring this up at my personal blog? Frankly, I think it is high time that every American buy a copy and embrace what it says.... you are going to need it.

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Consider the following:

The fact that the United States middle class controlled the majority of our nation's wealth was a parody in history. It never happened in any other nation or in any other period in history. Why did America come to believe that this is to be the norm?
Our efforts to occupy Wall Street, in fact, accomplished nothing for the 99%. It was nothing more than a way for the masses to vent and served as a diversion for the 1%.
We are looking to the government to help us out of this. Folks, the government did not bring us health benefits and better wages... unions did. In fact, the original response of the government was to mobilize the army against striking worker.
The Gross Domestic Product, adjusted, for 2012 was estimated to be 3,588.8 billion dollars. We have had a trade deficit since 1980. Our national debt currently exceeds 16 trillion dollars. That amount of debt has NOT decreased under President Obama. (Our solution was to increase the debt limit.) The interest on the national debt is currently about 220 billion annually. We currently owe China and Japan about 1.1 trillion each. While we can debate the accuracy of these numbers, it is more than evident that we are spending more than we can afford to. Instead of paying it down, we increase the limit or extend the deadline. How much are you willing to wager that the current May 2013 deadline will be extended?
We are at war. We are always at war, supposedly for human rights, and wars do not reduce debt but increase it.
There is some kid in India, Taiwan and/or China who thinks that your hourly wage is a really good amount to earn in a day, a week or maybe even a month. You didn't want to pay all those bucks for an American union made cell phone so you went with the iPhone. Remember to support the war for human rights mentioned above.

Fellow Americans, I know that I am not going to win any popularity contest or have any chance at being elected by stating the real status of our country. But honestly and seriously, we all need to wake up from "The American Dream" and accept the fact that our fiscal irresponsibility has made our lives difficult and they are only going to get more difficult.

Your government is not going to get you better pay, a job or health care. They will change their stance on that the next time the oil companies, banks or Wall Street needs a bail out. The current economic recovery has benefited the upper 1% and not the 99%.

If you want your health care, great wages and the bag of chips, you had better accept that you are competing with that robot that built your iPhone. You need to accept that your difficult life will now be a choice between paying more for a union made product or accepting the fact that your earnings are going to decrease.

Super Fast Password Cracking Machine

2012-12-06T21:19:56Z

DES Cracker circuit board fitted with Deep Crack chips Source: http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Crypto/Crypto_misc/DESCracker/ link Copyright: the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Information on licenses found from: http://www.eff.org/ ; private communication by User:Matt Crypto (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

While there are various reasons why this particular password attack, dubbed "brute force", is not a large threat provided you use some common sense protections, the speed of this machine which uses 5 servers and 25 graphic processing cards (GPUs) to rapidly try and break encryption. However, it is not the hardware I am interested in here. Hack a Day covered that very well.

I was more interested in expanding on, quoting the source, "How can one understand 348 billion hashes per second?" While they gave a few examples regarding breaking encryptions, I don't get encryption well enough to understand in those terms. So how fast is 348 billion guesses per second, in terms I can understand?

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Light travels, in a vacuum, at 299,792,458 meters per second
Sound, in air, at about 343 meters per second

Above we have two of the fastest thing moving items we can imagine and they pale in comparison. A photon only darts millions of meters in a second. It takes about 3 and 1/3 seconds for a photon to travel a billion meters. It would take a photon over 19 seconds tor travel 348 billion meters. It would take a sonic boom over 32 years to travel the same distance.

I still can't fully get it but I do get just how much faster this is than anything I tried tor grasp in the past. Faster than what most of us ever even to dare to think about.

New 25-GPU Monster Devours Strong Passwords In Minutes (it.slashdot.org)
Hacking Super-Weapon Can Crack Encrypted Passwords In Seconds (huffingtonpost.co.uk)

File Under "Things not to Do"

2012-12-06T15:08:54Z

There are, as Arsino Hall used to say, "make one go hmmm" and then there are things that simply should not be done. While I have been alive too long for this later list to be short, calling the police because a dough boy sold you a dummie is one that immediately comes to mind for example, I confess, I did not see this one coming.

Yahoo! Odd News reports that a man called the police to report that the woman, perhaps better termed prostitute, that he hired had, ready, shorted him by 10 minutes!

Cleveland's The Plain Dealer to Reduce Guild by Ont Third in 2013

2012-12-05T16:49:59Z

Photo by Brice Burtch, June 24, 2007 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I don't know exactly how to feel on this one. Growing up in greater Cleveland, I was exposed to several local daily newspapers. However, that all change forever about the era of CompuServe. The Cleveland Insider and Cleveland.com are now more read by me than Cleveland's only surviving daily paper.

The Cleveland Insider reports that cuts are coming, with more in years to come, at this long published paper. Worse yet, the cuts are in the core area of the business, the guild. You know those that produce the content. Personally, while I feel for those employed, I think we are witnessing the end of an era. I don't think the story started this year. Remember The Cleveland Press?

Sorry to say it this way but I think that is the way it is. Papers, perhaps as long as 2-3 decades have been "surviving". While I still love to listen to radio drama, even dabble in it from time to time, I have to accept that I am not going to a catch Mystery Theater on the air anymore.

For those of you who are interested in it and for what it is worth, there is a Facebook drive to save this newspaper. I say "for what it is worth" not to be cruel or mean but, honestly, it would make about as much sense as me launching a save radio drama campaign. Newspapers are saved by circulation and advertisers not petitions and causes.

Sorry the writing about this one is not "on the wall" nor in columns of newsprint but in 1s and 0s streaming world wide. I will miss newspapers but I don't think they are going to be able to survive much longer.

Aloha Kona

2012-12-05T14:31:19Z

Pale Ale (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

f more choices are a good thing, there is good news regarding beer for Clevelanders. I can understand why we like micro-brew beers. Despite the fact that they are bit pricey, they are worth it for the experience on occasion. I think it is safe to say that the average person from my town would be pleased to have Longboard Island lager, Big Wave Golden Ale and Fire Rock Pale Ale added to craft beer options.

The Cleveland Insider is reporting the, Hawiian based, Kona Brewing Company will be expanding its distribution to Ohio in January, 2013. The expansion will result in the beer being available in 35 states... I wonder if we should still call that micro-brewed?

While I think this is going to be nice for the suburban grocery stores and Cleveland's entertainment districts, I a doubt it is going to replace the 40 ounce bottles in most of the neighborhood stores. Nonetheless, I admit my tongue is already looking forward to trying their seasonal Koko Brown Ale in spring of 2013.

The Correct Way To Arrest a Terrorist

2012-12-04T15:00:41Z

I bet this terrorist won't be taking any hostages in the near future. Actually, I don't think he will be walking any time soon.

The report states that Spain was having a bit of a terrorist out break and described the police as impatient. One thing for sure, they had a very expedient solution.

Recording Audio with HTML Five

2012-12-02T02:29:33Z

While the write up at Hack a Day says it is not easy, using HTML 5 to record audio does sound neat. Why would you want to do this? First, it is just geek but, more importantly, it was mandated by Chrome ditching Flash for their own version of it. This created a problem for the folks working on Dubjoy a site designed to make translation of videos easy.

DOE Awards CWRU "Rustbelt" Battery Research

2012-12-01T02:10:05Z

I am pleased to hear that CWRU was 1 of 66 to receive an award for, what an article at physorg.com called "high-risk, high-payoff research". More specifically,

Vanadium Redox Flow Batteries (Photo credit: PNNL - Pacific Northwest National Laboratory)

The Department of Energy awarded 567,805 dollars for research to develop a flow battery. My first thought was "a half a million dollars" and next "what is a flow battery?"

Five minutes on Google hits and I think it would be better to mention what this battery is and can do in simple terms:

It is green energy technology
This battery is not for your laptop but for today's power grid
It is older tech, now revisited, due to the reality of solar and wind power creating a demand for it.
I will go into more below, but a good descriptive analogy is that it would be like being able to increase the size of a vehicle's fuel tank for longer trips, ie, greater energy storage in the battery as per demand
While flow batteries do exist, they most often use, rare and expensive, Vanadium, the battery being researched uses cheap and plentiful Iron

Wow, that does sound kewl. I am aware that this is considered risky but how we produce energy in this country has changed. Older energy production provided energy at a pretty constant rate. If the energy demand increased, you burned more coal, polluted the air more, and pumped out power. If the demand was less, we breathed slightly easier. We really didn't have a high demand to store electrical power for the grid. Power production for the grid was varied based on demand.

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This wind turbine charges a 12 V battery to run 12 V appliances. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This would likely be the reason that the energy industry was not interested in Robert Savinell's "rustbelt battery" 30 years ago. However, today's energy industry is heading to greener production. Solar and wind power do not produce energy at a constant rate and, at times, none at all. In today's world, we have a demand to store energy. While high risk, this could play out to be technology of great benefit.

Robert Savinell is a professor of chemical engineering at CWRU. According to the CWRU Blog, he and fellow chemical engineering professor, Jesse Wainright "have begun a three-year project to fine tune the chemistry, develop the cleanest, most efficient system, and build a working model proving the technology." There is a need for a flow battery but, as Savinell argues, it may well be the best type of battery for a power grid.

A quick and dirty explanation of a how a flow battery works is that they are fluid based. Two fluids stored in separate tanks act as the power storage. If the fluids are pumped one way past the electrodes, the battery is charged. If they flow the other way, the battery gives off power.

In a conventional battery, the electrodes store the charge and are in constant contact with each other. If you want more storage with a traditional battery, you need more electrode surface area. In a flow battery, electrodes do not store energy but transfer it to and from the fluids. If you need more storage with a flow battery, you only need bigger tanks.

From what I read, it sounds like the right tool for the job. The three year research program is also intended to design a system that will not only show it can be done but one that is safe. As stated at the CWRU Blog, the fluids should be safe enough to swim in. While I am always skeptical of large chunks of government money on risky research, I confess this one seems like a good idea.

An Entire Nations Worth of Identity Theft

2012-11-23T23:30:36Z

Sad news for you if you are Greek. The numbers are not all in at this time and there could be "duplicates" in the 9 million identities stolen. I first heard of this over at Boing! Boing!. The good news is that the man was arrested. The bad news is that if you are a citizen of Greece, there is 91% chance your identity might have been stolen... some sources say 82%.

The actual percentage seems rather mute. 9 million is a big number any way you look at it.

I read that he was "trying" to sell the files... I hope he failed at that before he was arrested.

Lumpy's Multi-Grain Basic Bread

2012-11-22T13:18:01Z

Bread (Photo credit: ulterior epicure)

I am not a bad cook or baker. In fact, I am pretty darn good in the kitchen and there are a few of my recipes that are in high demand. One of them I thought I would share today. Originally, it came out of an old edition of The Joy of Cooking but I modified it over the years.

Many like this particular loaf of bread. It is not met to be a fancy special difficult to make project. It is your basic multi-grain loaf.

The ingredients are:

1 beaten egg
1/4 cup melted butter
2 1/2 cups lukewarm water (75 to 85 F)
1/4 cup Maple Syrup
1/4 honey, sugar or brown sugar (you can mix and match here according to your taste, just make sure that the maple syrup, honey and/or sugars are between 1/4 and 1/2 cup)
1/8 teaspoon molasses (this is the ingredient that makes it real yummy with the rye)
4 cups bread flour (you can use all purpose flour but your bread may not rise as well)
3 2/3 cups of whole wheat flour
1/3 cup of rye flower
1 package active dry yeast or equivalent

Alternately, you can eliminate the molasses and substitute wheat for the rye and just have a whole wheat loaf.

This recipe will make three loaves.

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First off, get your yeast ready. Personally, I use Red Star Quick Rise Yeast. I use 2 1/4 to 2 1/2 teaspoons of yeast (the yeast I can get in my neighborhood is often pretty old, in that case, I add the extra 1/4 teaspoon) in 1/4 cup of water 105-115 F and add 1/2 teaspoon of sugar. I wisk it and let it set for 5-10 minutes. You will know when it is ready for it will get rather frothy.

While you could hand mix the ingredients however this recipe is intended for a mixer. Add the ingredients to the mixing bowl but save your self one cup of the bread flour. Let the dough knead and add the cup of flour you saved slowly to help keep the dough ball rolling.

Bread dough which has risen and is ready to go in the oven (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Let the mix sit in the mixing bowl for 10-15 minutes. Then using a sifter, dust a counter top with some flour and knead the dough by hand for about 10 minutes. Try and work the dough with only moderate pressure, push it flat with open palms, fold it away from you, rotate it about 90 degrees and repeat.

Once you have finished kneading, place the dough ball in a large greased bowl, grease the top of the dough ball as well, cover and let rise. You want the dough to rise until it has doubled in volume. This will take 1-2 hours. I would also suggest that you paint the top with vegetable oil and then cover it with plastic wrap. This seems, in my opinion, better than just greasing it for, as the dough rises, the grease seems to spread too thin.

Once the dough has doubled, divide into three equal dough balls and form into loaves. You can do this either using a rolling pin or simply by hand. Try not to work the dough any more than you have to. Place the loaves into greased pans, pay attention to the short sides of the pan and make sure that your dough makes 100 % contact on those edges. After the dough is in the pans, again oil the top as above, and let rise till dough doubles. (about 1-2 hours)

Once risen, place in a pre-heated oven at 350 for about 45 minutes. To be sure the bread is done, drop a loaf out of it's pan and thump the bottom with your finger. It should sound hollow. Let the baked bread cool for at least 10 minutes and enjoy.

McAfee's Life Stranger than Fiction

2012-11-22T00:30:53Z

I have this visual image of some guy hiding, an accused murderer, in a remote location in an even more remote and obscure country. He is on the lamb from the law, mixed in with drug dealers, experimental drug labs and, the entire time, with a woman young enough to be his grand daughter.

Not the image I ever expected to have regarding John McAfee. Then again, I never claimed to know much about this security guru who apparently is also a yoga master. Adding to never before, where the heck is Belize anyhow?

]]> McAfee's side of the story and there is even a Kindle book out on the strange side of this security guru. (Affiliate link below.)

According to a write up at Boing! Boing!, the author of the 99 cent Kindle book was one of the last people to have contact with him before he went on the lam. Regardless, it is not the image I had when I thought of McAfee.

To be fair, McAfee is arguing that he is not what he is being spun to be at the moment and, in fact, innocent. Quoting his most recent blog post:

The media has portrayed me as paranoid. I am a poor judge, since if I am paranoid, it is a paranoid mind judging itself. However, I am a technologist and use that as best I can for my own purposes. Shortly after the raid on my property by 42 soldiers in riot gear looking for a non-existent meth lab, I began a program of observation and recording of everything that happened to me. I planted tiny POV video cameras and sound recorders on myself, some of my dogs, all around my property, in my cars, on my boats, at the Studio 54 bar in Orange Walk, on trees, in bushes, - everywhere I could. The first two months were audio only. I knew that The Government was recruiting friends, neighbors and acquaintances for information about me and for help with "dealing with me" in some fashion. Most declined. No-one would ever believe my story, so recording it was my only option.

He also has links to audio files in the post. He claims that, if you listen well enough, you can figure out the Creole and hear that they are trying to kill him... Personally, I am not sure if the paragraph I selected is going to do well in defeating the paranoid image. The detail I want is exactly how many cameras did he hide?

I am not going to form an opinion on this one yet but am certainly going to follow it.

Phil Dawson for The Pro Bowl!

2012-11-19T02:12:02Z

English: Script logo used by the Cleveland Browns from 1999-2002 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am not a huge football fan. I listen/watch to the games on Sundays but they are more my cleaning/cooking jam background noise than something I actively watch. However, despite the fact that I don't think they are the greatest team, I do like it when my home team, The Cleveland Browns, win.

Heck, even if you are not into the Browns, it is worth it to see them do well just to see what happens to all the fans in this town. I mean they are crazy when the team is doing poorly. I think it very fair to say that Cleveland fans are among the greatest in the world. I would love to see the city's reaction if they ever did do really well.

Fellow Cleveland blogger, ClevelandChick has a great idea and a good how to post on how to achieve it. Give us Clevelanders something to cheer about. Why the heck should we all not storm the ballots and get Phil Dawson in the pro bowl? Seriously, he is one heck of a kicker.

And remember, in this election, you CAN "vote often".

Green Google

2012-11-16T23:37:43Z

Image via CrunchBase

I have said it before and believe I shall say it many times more in the future. "I like Google"

To be completely honest, not only do I like them I am pretty fond of them as a whole. I like AdSense, nalytics, Google+, Doodles and I am darn near emotionally dependent on Reader.

I think closing in on 1 billion invested in green energy may be another reason to like this giant.