digital signing

I have started experimenting with winpt and find it very easy to use to sign (and encrypth) email. Encryption has become common place on the web though few people realize it. SSL (secure socket layer) encrypts messages between the browser and the server and is needed for effective ecommerce. Without this type of encryption few people would transmit their credit card information on-line because of the evil people on-line (i.e. crackers). SSL (or something like it) is required for e-commerce. THe same is not true for digital signatures of email (ensures true identity of sender) or for encryption of email (equivelent to a sealed envelope). It would be nice if a government related agency such as the us post office would provide a digital key service (the could use the gnupg softare which is free software (open source) and is easy to get, distribute and install. All the software components are available, it is just a matter of making it available in an easy to use package such as winpt (also open source). The bigger issue is the lack of perceived need.

digital under class

I have read in the newspapers, over the past few weeks, many articles on computers. These articles dealt with music, movies, financial services, government resoruces, and so forth that are available on the Internet. I have also seen statistics such as 168 million us citizens use the internet, 65% of us households have a computer, and over 25% of use households have broadband.

I believe that there is a large number of persons in the us who either do not have the capacity and or the interest in learning how to use the internet or computers. These persons are at a distinct disadvantage in functioning in our society because they do not have access to what is becomming a basic service. I suspect that this will become a social issue within the next few years as it becomes clear that these persons are developing into an under privilaged class. I do not have a solution, but I think that this is worth watching.

Colorado computer problems

I have read in the news that several governmental agencies have been having problems with computer systems. The motor vehicle department's system has been virtually desxtroyed by viruses, and the wealfare departments new system is almost unusable. It seems to me that there are some very poor computer business practices beeing used since both of these 'problems' should have been managed and dealt with without complete disruption of the involved departments. I wonder why these departments could not fall back on backups. I also wonder why the viruses were not stopped by firewalls and anti-virus programs; and why the new wealfare system was not properly tested before being forlled out (at least use a piolt test). I am missing something in my understanding of what happened or the IT people involved did not do a very good job.

employee layoffs

Much has been in the news on employee layoffs to control costs. When a management team does this, the news stories often paint the management team as taking strong action to improve the company's fortunes. What is usually not stated is that this, in my view, is strong evidence that management has failed in plannning and /or execution. At some point management had hired these now being layed off employees. Also, this same management team increased the salaries (and thus the cost of) these employees. To me it is obvious, that in laying off employees, management is showing that they have made serious errors in judgement yet often the stock price will go up and management will be given praise instead of being critized.

Also, while companies often state that employees are their most important asset, the financial system records employees only as an expense. Even when an employee is so important that the firm takes on key person insurance, the target employee is shown only as an expense on the firm's books. If training (often very expensive) is given to an employee, it is treated as a period expense, even though the benefits will span many periods. When natural resources such as forests increase in value this increase in value is recorded in the books of record (accretion) but when an employee's value is increase through experrience, training and education there is no reflection of this increase in value. Also when a valuable employee is lost (retirement, layoff, or voluntairy leaving) there is no reflection of this lose within the books.

chinese language

I jsut read that while there are 5 major spoken languages in china they all use the samne ideographic written language. A person speaking one of those languages can not understand a person speaking in one of the other languages; but anyone using any of the 5 languages can understand the written version. In other words there are 5 different spoken languages but only one written language.

using retired persons in the work force

There has been a lot of news about social security costs in the future as more people retire. I think a bigger question is how to take advantage of the knowledge and skills retired people have. Right now, once a person reaches retirement age, society tends to put them aside; as if they nolonger can make significant contributions.

It is true that older persons tire more easily and can't or won't work full 40 hour weeks. Projections are that over 35% of the adult population will be of retirement age soon. It seems to me that society and business needs to find ways to permit such persons to be productive and to do this in a non coersive way (i.e. not through tax or social security penalties).

For knowldge workers an approach might be to use them, in information technology, to such tasks as documentation, testing, user training, peer reviews, quality control, etc. In general business (inculding IT) activities such as mentoring, stratigic planning, education, and so forth would be a good fit. The key is to leverage on an experienced person's judgement, perspective, and work habits.

heath care costs

The news papers have been reporting a lot about the rising cost of health care and health care insurance. The public has developed the attitude that health care is a right and that it is 'not fair' that some people do not have heath care insurance. This attitude, combined with the rising costs, is about to create a crisis that is going to force governmental action to either control costs and /or provide a low cost (i.e. tax subsidised) heath care insurance.

We may see some sort of change to the general way we handle heath care insurance. One attractive alternative is to follow the example of automobile insurance where routine care like oil changes is not covered by insurance, but out of the ordinary repairs are. In health care this would mean that routine exams would not be covered, but surgery would be. For this to work there needs to be a change in the public's understanding of what insurance coverage for health care means, as well as the availability of low cost routine health care - I am not sure this will happen.

This is an area with a high degree of emotion and self interest and even 'class warfare' issues. The public debate will cause a shift in how we deal with health care; probably within the next 4 years.

bicycle ride

Yesterday I took a bicycle ride on the Highline canal and it was so very nice. The biccycle is a lot simpler and smaller than a car and I guess that is one reason I enjoy it. The ride on the Highline is flat so there was no real work; it was sunny and warm so the ride was a pleasure.

new blog

I have been keeping a blog on open source software (http://fos-softwares.blogspot.com/) and decided that I also want to write about other stuff so I have set up this new blog.

I will try to make postings each day.