Anthony's Store - News

Twitter DoS!!

2009-08-06 09:55:44 -0700

twitterstatus

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Ongoing denial-of-service attack

We are defending against a denial-of-service attack, and will update status again shortly.

How am I going to Twitter about this??

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My Gadsden Flag On Display

2009-07-05 12:33:26 -0700

I pulled out my yellow "DONT TREAD ON ME" flag at the park yesterday when they started up with the patriotic stuff. I'm sure it just confused people who saw it. It's more of a New England symbol and has little connection to California.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Wilson Park Yesterday

2009-07-05 12:09:00 -0700

Here's a composite photo of the Independence Day event at Wilson Park.

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Wilson Park

2009-07-04 14:57:38 -0700

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Sent from my friking iPhone!

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My Thoughts on Cap & Trade

2009-06-30 07:00:22 -0700

First, let me clarify that big oil companies are fans of Cap & Trade and lower profits as long as it effects the whole industry equally. If oil company A has to lose 30%, A would want to make sure oil company B loses 30% as well.

The problem is that oil company C can't afford to lose 30% of its profits, so it'll go out of business or be bailed out (of course, bailouts would be very likely if A and B took out default swap insurance policies on C going under, who itself netted out swaps on A and B going under, obviously).

Another problem is it raises the bar for oil company D to enter the market. So, yes, big oil likes Cap & Trade because it makes competition scarce. All big energy providers want Cap & Trade so they can "stabilize" their market. But really, "stabilization" is code for what I call "a fettered market."

So are you willing to act in defiance of Cap & Trade? Clearly, since the system doesn't work, we should work outside the system. If the market is regulated, we need an unregulated alternative. The advantage we have is that we don't have to worry if it's "green" or not.

As an example, one way to do this would be to buy a whole-house electrical generator that can run on multiple types of fuels (not very green sounding, which is good). My grandfather installed one of these in his previous residence, and it was pretty cool. I believe it could be configured to run on gasoline, propane, and natural gas. The natural gas option meant he could theoretically run it indefinitely.

Obviously, this would require a change in life style. Merely installing a generator isn't a silver bullet. But if the economics work out, it could be a smart move.

My grandfather got this generator because the place he lived would have frequent power failures in the winter. He wasn't thinking of political defiance. Nonetheless, having a way to go off grid or partially off grid would create competition for the electric company who is itself (voluntarily) hindered by Cap & Trade. In addition, the ability to run on propane also opens the possibility for "alternative" methods of trade.

For most, it could come down to a mere matter of economics. Is it really more cost effective to produce your kilowatt hour for yourself or allow the regular fettered market to do under heavy tax. If the cold hard numbers are the only thing anyone looks at, it may or may not be enough to justify the act. But it might be good to also go one step beyond the math and looking at this alternatives as a form of defiance.

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Kindly Ignore This

2009-06-05 13:36:28 -0700

I’m posting this as an experiment in counter-search engine optimization. It has nothing to do with you. Yes, I am totally ripping off this guy.

In fact, I don’t particularly want anyone to read it. Go away. Or try some posts from other blogs that I’ve recently enjoyed. If you came here to read something, these should do nicely:

1.	path train
2.	french open tv schedule
3.	karna small bodman
4.	eddie freas
5.	racing for recovery
6.	federer del potro live streaming
7.	david carradine asphyxiation
8.	anna hansen photo
9.	nj path
10.	tennis channel

Again, none of these links has anything to do with the point of this post.

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My Thoughts on the Tased Granny

2009-06-03 17:31:59 -0700

First, let me start off with an analogy. Here's the setup:

Once there was an old man who lived alone on his private property in a remote part of the town. Usually, he would just sit on his back porch, polishing his favorite shotgun.

Then one day, a little girl of about 5 years old happened upon the property. She was picking flowers had wondered in, oblivious to the property line.

The old man decided he wanted to enforce his property, so he took the appropriate actions to get the little girl to leave.

First, he put his shotgun away. Then he walked over to the little girl and politely but firmly asked her to leave.

The little girl ignored him.

What level of force is appropriate for the old man to force the little girl to get off his property?

Is there any point where it is appropriate for the old man to lay hands on the little girl?

I would say the old man is basically stuck. If the little girl continues to ignore him, there is nothing he can do. There is no level of force he himself can personally use on the little girl. He might be justified in yelling at her, but that's probably about it. Maybe he could get his big dog to bark at her, as long as he is able to keep the dog on a leash. But at no point is the old man justified in inflicting pain or bodily harm on the little girl.

Perhaps if the little girl was really a ninja disguised in a dress, maybe the old man would be justified, but that's not the analogy. The intent of the analogy is to illustrate that there is no path imaginable that could lead to a justification for inflicting pain or bodily harm on the little girl.

So here is a video that shows that we are living in a police state:

I bet that "dash-cam" will never surface. It doesn't have to. There is no path imaginable that could lead to a justification for inflicting pain or bodily harm on the granny. There is no mention of weapons, only profanity. Profanity alone qualifies as "being combative" "violence" to the police, which is asinine. But even if she threw her dentures at the officer, there is still no reason for the officer to use the taser.

So remember, these thugs will lash out at you with their pain sticks if you don't comply. If anyone is ever successful in non-compliance, this will undermine the entire system, so there are no exceptions. You are lucky they are only pain sticks, you worm!

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Don't Give Up On Mozy

2009-05-17 19:03:24 -0700

I've been using Mozy to perform backups on my home system. Basically, Mozy is an online backup solution. It's rather inexpensive compared to certain solutions and more expensive than others.

One of the problems I've had is that Mozy never seems to ever complete the backup. According to the log the longest attempt was a try for 3 hours, and in that attempt, the software only got half way through my total backup. It seems to give up after 11 tries or so. Each subsequent attempt would get only so far then report failure.

I was thinking of giving up on it since after a month, it never completed a backup. But I also noticed that the log claimed to have files on the server, with the message "Already on server." In other words, my client would report a file to upload, but the server would claim it already had the file, which is good. So it appears that previous failed attempts did actually result in files being backed up.

But how many files have been backed up? That's the thing, I don't know from the client. But the server says there are massive files on its side. I'd estimate about 65% or 70% of the files I've been trying to upload have actually reached the server. And that's a sliding average because I have a lot of large video files that I back up locally and remove. So it might actually have all of my files.

Bottom line is that over a month's worth of use, a large number of files have reached the Mozy server, so I'm going to stick with Mozy for now. I'm not happy with the client, but it appears to move in the direction I want. I think the client could certainly improve, but I'm willing to work with it.

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Titus Joseph Martin Is Here

2009-05-10 02:25:48 -0700

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Price Gouging Is Good #swineflu

2009-05-01 17:28:25 -0700

The Colombian government has imposed a price fix for face-masks of 180 pesos (about 8¢ US). Violators will be fined, shut down, and/or imprisoned. This is a basic economic mistake governments always make during emergencies (real or hype). Even in emergency situations, the free market should dictate the price of things, not a centralized bureaucracy.

This is because forcing the price to stay low will only result in a shortage and distribution complications. Likewise, allowing the price to rise mitigate these problems. Will certain people be denied access to face-masks? Yes, either way, they will. But if denial of face-masks is brought on by government intervention, less people will actually receive them due to red tape than if they were merely unable to afford them.

This is why price gouging is good. If a face-masks are fixed at 8¢ each even during an emergency, I am more likely to buy more than I need, which would bring about a shortage. But if each face-mask is going for $10 each, I might be a little more careful and leave some for other people.

The free market solution is to allow the masks to rise to a point where no one can buy them, even in a panic. Maybe they rise to $1,000 each. Crazy, right? Maybe one sucker would buy one mask and that's it. After that, the seller won't sell any more until the price falls. Eventually, it will fall to a level where more and more people can afford them.

People critical of the above free market solution would say this slows everything down. They think it takes too long for the price to fall to the "proper" level. They would say the government should step in because they know a) the proper price and b) the proper quantity.

Yet, if they remain at 8¢ each, the one person who would have used $1,000 for one mask is suddenly able to afford ten thousand masks. This is where governments decide to impose limits which slow the whole process because they know the proper quantity, after all.

Trusting the free market is smart because it naturally addresses the problems associated with hording better than red tape ever could. Private property and multiple wills react better and more quickly than government "experts" and red-tape.

Trusting the government that sucks at everything it does is just dumb. What makes us believe they know the proper price and quantity for face-masks, especially in a hyped emergency?

Gouging protects against the effects of panic. This applies to face-masks as well as medicine and generators. Whenever the government monkeys with prices and quantities, unintended consequences abound.

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