no, really

By now we’ve all read the wise opinions of Henry, Jason and Fred on how the current global financial woes affect the industry.  Overall sense: “negatively” with hope.  None of them seem to see this as another end-of-days, and after having experienced the bubble, we can all say that this doesn’t really resemble that.

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I’ve had this discussion recently with someone, I can’t remember whom, about what services are appropriate as Social (government backed) and Private (hands off).  When it comes right down to it, I think there are two basic classifications for things that I feel are suitable for government support, whether it be financial or legislative:  public necessities (water, electricity, transportation, etc), and betterment of humanity (NASA, DHS, etc).  Bear with me, this is just a sketch of an opinion.

Now wikipedia is something that’s kind of controversial because of its very public and democratic nature.  Read that again… blah blah blah CONTROVERSIAL blah blah DEMOCRATIC.  This is a repository for information that uses the public for submission of information, and is continuously being checked by editors and experts for things like accuracy, balance and relevance.  It only accepts donation money, because many still feel that advertising would make it non-objective and commercial, which is not appropriate for a mass-encyclopedia.

Wikipedia also suffers from a very high barrier to entry.  In order to participate, you have to be able to speak the wiki language, which is not very easy.  It favors programmers in that way, so it is likely to have information highly skewed to the interests of those people.   In order to remove this barrier, it is believed that 30-50 full-time developers could comb through submissions and enter the information themselves.  This is unaffordable because of the lack of sufficient funding.

It just struck me that this could be a valuable public service, for the betterment of humanity.  And who better to help collect the 21st century’s information, as provided by the residents therein, then the Library of Congress?  It’s quite possible that funding, protection and staff from the LOC could give wikipedia what it needs to maintain its objectivity, to continue to foster democratic croudsourcing of information, and make it a reliable source of information for school children.

Besides, the $2M+ / yr that it would take to keep it up and running is a drop in the bucket compared to, say… how much it costs per year to clean the Capitol Building’s drapes.  And how often do you use those?

I’ve been working on this one for a while, and I knew it was going to be a biggie, but… If I went a little overboard, let me know. Also, feel free to splash some cold water on my face if you think I’m being stupid, that’s what talking’s all about!

A couple weeks ago, I took the time to watch the State of the State address given by the newly inaugurated Eliott Spitzer. I haven’t been a big follower of his in the past, but from what I do know, he was the “ethics is black-and-white” watchdog of Wall St. while he was Attorney General.

Two of the big themes that I was interested to hear in his speech were “Spending Requires Accountability” and “the Innovation Economy.”

Spending Requires Accountability

This is a pretty important theme these days. With all the news of accounting scandals, and embezzlement from schools, everyone is going to have a bit of spendthrift on their brains. Grab any old schmuck off the street and ask them how they feel about school taxes, and you’ll get an earful. What Spitzer repeated throughout his speech was “I want to give more to education, but I want to make schools accountable for that money.” He doesn’t propose signing lots of big checks to underprivileged schools and walking away, he wants to give them what they need to do well, and then require that they prove it was a worthwhile expense.

Yes, I am aware there is a lot of contention to this concept because schools and likely teachers will have lots more work to do to show that the funds are being put to good use. But when it comes to compensation, what’s a better measure than performance? Surely he doesn’t put forth A Modest Proposal to deal with the schools that don’t meet their goals. But in the meantime, how better to squeeze out the embezzlers than to make them work for every penny? Government money isn’t free money, people - it was earned on the backs of hard working citizens.

Innovation Economy
Key to Spitzer’s plans for education is the idea that students need to be trained and prepared to compete in the new economy - the information economy. Just speaking English isn’t enough these days, it helps if you speak Java and SQL too. For years people have been complaining about how outsourcing will make it impossible for skilled workers to get jobs in the US, and now, Spitzer is proposing a solution. Instead of complaining, or making it harder for companies to do business with overseas firms, why don’t you make your own workforce better? And how do we do that? Education!

By getting the right programs in schools, and bringing technology into the classroom, these kids will have the opportunity to really learn something that they can use in their life. By being skilled with all facets of high-tech, a graduate can be competitive in almost any field - science, English, mathematics, arts… And when these kids grow up and graduate from the similarly well-equipped state college, they will have excellent skills, get good jobs, and be able to afford to live here and contribute back to the local economy!

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I’m working on a couple posts that are pretty in-depth.

Having heard well the suggestions of some bloggers I avidly read, I’m doing my best to just talk and not “present” or “preach” in my posts, and it feels good. But sometimes you just have something to say.

While busily painting my trim one evening last week, I had plenty of time to meditate on some relevant world/political topics, and I’ve been composing my thoughts, so be prepared!