Happy New Year!

The Salton Sea

Happy Holidays, Happy New Year, etc.
I wrote 6 posts last year. Let's see if I beat that this year.
Here are some photos I just took at the Salton Sea. Beautiful.

Why Mainstream News Sucks

Is this news?

I'll keep this brief. News companies are companies just like any other and are driven by profit. This means advertising for the most part. Therefore, the news will show the stories that will either directly make them money (by being paid by a company to show a story highlighting that company), or by showing the story that will get them the most advertising dollars (by showing the most sensationalized news stories.)

People love sensationalized stories that make them feel like the are actually impacted instead of most of the boring news. Let's get real here for a moment. If you didn't watch/read/listen to the news for a year, would your life change? Exactly.

Second, people love the polarized country that is so popular now especially with elections coming up. This way people can take sides and the issues directly impact them.

Last, there isn't really enough news for the amount of news networks and agencies that exist. Therefore they try to make news out of stories that don't really matter, which ends up being most of the news.

Thanks for letting me rant some more :)

My Thoughts On Advertising

The unseen advertising

Great advertising will always be successful. The classic Apple commercials that make us associate cool, hip music with iPods are the top. So are the Budweiser commercials featuring the clydesdales we love. These are the Super Bowl ads, the ones we talk about with our friends and coworkers. This form of advertising, however, is not limited to TV. Billboards, internet ads, radio, etc. can also be Super Bowl ads.

The second major factor in ads is matching ads with consumer. Some might say Google pioneered this with their AdSense technology, but ad-consumer matching has occurred since the beginning of advertising. Open any magazine and look at how focused the ads are to the topic of the magazine. Watch any TV show and you will see that the advertisers hand picked which shows to put their ads on. However, Facebook is advancing this idea further because they have a profile of each consumer. Because Facebook knows so much about the consumers, they can match ads perfectly.

Let's pause here for a second. You may say that this is awful because these advertisers are taking advantage of the consumers and shoving their faces with products they don't need. While this is true, these products might also be useful in their lives. If you don't like advertising, watch public TV.

The future: Ads will continue to become specialized and personalized. With most purchases occurring electronically, we'll get ads like "So you bought XY Product. Now you need XZ." The bottom line is that ads must be important in some way to the viewer in order to be effective.

However, there is another slant to this. As pointed out to me by Dr. Diana Blaine everything we consume is an advertisement. The news is an ad for the products that the stories are about. TV shows are ads for the products shown. Maybe life is just a huge advertisement that makes us keep getting out our wallets.

As for the ads on my site, hey, it pays.

LA Metro Blue Line - Great Termini and a Little Slow

Blue Line Train along Washington Blvd. Photo by bossco

A few weeks back I took a Metro Blue Line train from Los Angeles to Long Beach. This is what I think of the line:

• Ticketing is easy (and cheap). Tickets are bought from machines at the station.
• The ride is very smooth.
• Trains are clean and not too crowded.
• The stops are well spaced out allowing the train to move quickly (much faster than a bus). The dedicated right of way also helps the train move fast. There are still enough stops for them to be close to where you want to get on and off.
• On that note, there is no reason to get off in the middle of the line. The only places to do things are at the two termini in Los Angeles and Long Beach. The stops along the line would only be of interest if you lived in that area. However, it seems like a lot of people get on and off quickly.
• The train has to wait for some stop lights when the tracks run in the middle of the street. This is ridiculous. Come on, it's a train.
• Long Beach Rocks!

During my recent experimentations with different forms of transportation I have come to the following conclusions about the speed of different forms of transportation. Of course all these modes of transportation also have a time associated with transfer between modes, and we all start walking. Speed of transfer also depends on where we have to park, how often the bus or train runs or other factors like airport security or delays.
from Slow to Fast.

1. Walking
2. Biking and buses
3. Cars on city streets
4. Rail (both local and long distance)
5. Cars on highways
6. Airplanes

The Future of the World

Ahh, Europe

The NY Times has a great essay entitled "Waving Goodbye to Hegemony" discussing the future of the world written by Parag Khanna. Khanna argues that there will be three superpowers (U.S., E.U. and China) in the near future who will dominate the economics of the world. He also says that second-wold countries like Russia, Argentina and Iran will be the so-called swing states. They will determine who wins economically and will be doing deals behind the backs of the Big 3.

I definitely agree that Europe will consolidate into one power. The region already relies on one currency, except for England, and it seems like every day there is news of barriers falling between the countries of the E.U. The U.S. will maintain economic control of North America.

However, in Asia, while China is clearly the largest power in terms of population, geographic area, and economics, it is my opinion that they are lacking behind the rest of the region in terms of technology and innovation. The essay also ignores the problem the much of the growth occurring in China will catch up with the country. It is not possible for the country to sustain the growth it is presently undergoing forever. The country still faces numerous ethical and legal challenges in becoming a world leader. For years China has escaped from scrutiny in software piracy, human rights and environmental issues because the country remained a closed state of lesser impact. The current growth is and will continue to bring these issues into the global spotlight.

The essay also makes one huge, although unavoidable, mistake. All the predictions of future growth are presented from current information. Just like it's impossible to predict the future of stock markets, it is impossible to precisely predict the future of countries. Numerous events including natural disasters, wars, and other unforeseen events could drastically change the track the world is on. However, given all present information Khanna paints a incredibly probable future.

Great Food in LA

Westwood

in no particular order
Chano's (almost 24 hour)
Johnny's Pastrami on Adams (24 hour)
La Taquiza
El Cholo
Mao's Chinese
Tomodachi Sushi
Village Pizzeria
Langer's Delicatessen and Restaurant
Canter's Delicatessen (24 hour)
In-n-Out Burger (open late)
Fatburger
Dino's Burgers No 2
Jean P's Soul Food Express (untested)
Roscoe's House of Chicken' n Waffles (open late)
Gladstone's of Malibu
Papadakis Taverna
Kabuki Japanese Restaurant
Mel's Drive-In (open late)
Santa Maria Barbecue Co.
Phillip's BBQ
Philippe the Original
Diddy Riese Cookies (open late)
Daikokuya (open late)
The Original Tommy's (24 hour)
King Taco Restaurant
Armando's Lunch Truck
Original Pantry Cafe
El Tarasco (added 1/28/08, thanks paul!)

Average food:
Pastaroma
Vistango Cafe
The Original Texas Barbecue King
Caveman Kitchen
Papa Cristos

Bad food that I eat anyways:
Teriyaki 1
Wendy's (open late)
Spudnuts Doughnuts (24 hour)
Panda Express (open late)
Subway (24 hour)
Chipotle
Jack in the Box (24 hour)

LA Public Transit Works OK

if only every city had the Paris Metro

Today I decided to take public transportation from the airport to USC. Although I've been on a bus before in LA, this was my first time alone. Here's how it went.

1. Before my trip, I checked out metro.net's trip planner and put in my starting and ending point. At first the route it told me to take looked a little awkward, but it was in fact the best way to go.

2. After getting my bags at the airport, I walked out to wait for the bus to the green line. It came within five minutes. After about 10 minutes of driving, the bus dropped us off at the LAX Transit Center. This is just a place a couple of miles from the airport where all the buses pick people up. But I wanted something else: The Green Line.

3. I bought my ticket from the machine at the ground level and took the elevator up to the train. This time, I was not so timely as the train was rolling away as I was exiting the elevator. It took about 15 minutes for the next train. The Metro Green Line functions much like any other subway system in America or abroad. Interestingly, you don't have to scan a ticket anywhere; it runs on the honor system. However, this could change soon. The train runs about as fast as cars on the freeway, but it has to make stops.

4. As directed by the website, I got off at the Vermont Ave. stop. Here is where I make a mistake. There are exits on both sides of the street with elevators and stairs. I got off the wrong side and had to go back around because you can't cross the street on the overpass.

5. Boarding the bus was easy; I just showed the driver my day pass that I bought for the train and up Vermont we go. The bus runs about as fast as cars in the right lane of traffic. Metro Rapid services works like a subway on the road with stops spaced far away. Metro Local makes many more stops. About 20 minutes later I got off the bus and walked the last 5 minutes home.

In all it was a nice experience. MTA runs a clean and efficient service. The only complaint is how long the whole thing took (over an hour vs. a 20 minute car ride), but this is to be expected with all the stopping. I think I might take the bus more often.