I must admit, while shocked, I was not totally surprised to learn that the protestor killed yesterday in Gaza, was from my alma mater, "The Evergreen State College". Yahoo's story on Protestor Killed in Gaza.

Mobile Geekdom:

While I didn't think much of it at first, but it seems as if I may be in a somewhat unique situation, that of working for small, but up and coming Japanese keitai (mobile phone) web dev company. One of sites, girlswalker.com (viewing the *real* site limited to keitais only) as a mobile portal already has more hits per day then yahoo! Japan's mobile portal site.

While there is some degree of technical understanding involved in making such sites, I find myself marveling most at is the market and business orientation. Business arrangements seem very incestuous, and often ambiguous on who is doing what. Perhaps, this is due still to my somewhat novice understanding of such things.

The market orientation is just amazing, especially compared to typical US or perhaps even European markets, where the orientation is for professional (often older males) users, while in Japan is all oriented towards young (teens and 20-somethings) users who have more of entertainment, novelty and personalization interests.

One site that really spurred me on is:

Institute for Mobile Markets Research

My thinking is really starting to shift about what type of products to focus on...

Oh, and yet reason to get better at my Japanese!

Why does George W. Bush really want to pummel Iraq?

Some reasons that have been tossed around

1. The official reason - Iraq is dangerous with weapons of mass destruction. (uh-huh)
2. The oil
3. Middle east power balance
4. A Dismal domestic state that needs distracting
5. Personal Feud with Saddam Hussien

Some interesting commentaries why

Lip Magazine

The Guardian

More soon!

Geekdom at Large

Rumor has it that people at the Microsoft campus can not access slashdot. Is this because of slashdot or Microsoft? Slashdot and especially it's commenters rarely have anything good to say about MS, so it's interesting to see where the block is happening.

True believer thing...

... While I was at the 'Evil Empire', in the heart of the 'Deathstar', I noticed that there was this sense of fanaticism - That Microsoft could do no wrong, the rest of the world was just jealous, and any government action was totally unfair and manipulated by their competitors who couldn't honestly compete. There was no real discussion on the issue. Either you agreed and you were one of 'us' or you didn't and you were one of them! On the flipside, all you have to do is read through the comments on any article that mentions MS on slashdot, and you see a lot of vehemency towards MS. I can't help but think that this sense of vehemency is just about of equal strength on both sides.

What's even more odd is when I would come accros those individuals whom I had once known as MS haters, working at MS, and then being one of the true believers. The world amazes me.

OK, Here it is the first post to The Buzz:

The World at Large

Why is so hard to find honest discussion and debate? It seems so many times that people are only interested in pushing their viewpoints and not so interested in finding out what is the most reasonable viewpoint. Perhaps it is the need to be heard, understand, or simply, ego, to leave their mark upon their world. It also should be noted that true objective analysis is impossible. Even if we disregard the epistemological underpinnings of how we assimilate and understand the world, all of us, even the most sincere, honest and open-minded of us, still have assumptions, biases, judgments and invested opinions.

Nevertheless, It is my hope that this is one such place that people can find honest explorations of many issues.

Regards, James