Before you read this: No, I am not arguing that we should be flying if there is danger. No, I do not believe that the authorities acted badly by cancelling flights last Thursday. Yes, I agree that environmentally London and Europe without air traffic is a marvellous thing!

Remember, I have no inside knowledge of the Met Office, NATS, any civil aviation authority, volcanology, meteorology or the aviation business at all. What I am is a questioning member of the public, stranded in London, but with wonderful friends supporting me such that it doesn’t matter that I never made my flights. So here’s what I question…From the public view it looks like this is what happened:

1. Met Office shows an Ash Cloud

This leads to:

2. NATS looking up the guidelines and saying “No Tolerance on Volcanic Ash”

Which leads to:

3. All airspace being closed

What it looks like to me is that there was almost a religious blind allegiance to science reports, previous guidelines and almost a “faith” in science by governments, official bodies and the media. At no time in the media or in the public or apparently behind closed doors until 5 days after it was all shut down were questions and communications happening. Where/when were the following questions being asked?

a. At what concentrations of volcanic ash will an engine fail? This is important, because if it means that one piece of dust is enough to destroy a plane then planes have been designed very poorly. More importantly it leads to answering “how much dispersion is required?” Now I know that if a plane flew into a flock of birds all engines might die, but do we stop flying because there are birds in the air?

b. Where are the concentrations of this ash? Reading the Met office web page their say their instruments can “detect” the ash but not tell the concentrations. So who was going up there to test it? Were they able to test it everywhere?

c. All reports indicate that the Met office was/is using computer modelling to predict the dispersion. What is the accuracy rate of these models? On what science is it based? I’m not saying they’re wrong, I’m asking the question.

d. Airplane companies needed to ask the question of “What can we do to alleviate the situation?” This is an extraordinary situation and while the airlines did finally try flying in it, maybe the airlines could have thought of new solutions. Perhaps ferrying passengers to various locations. They are now doing that but, really… does it take 6 days for someone to come up with the solution?

All this seems to me as if a whole pile of bureaucracy never bothered to do proper science, proper questioning and certainly proper project and disaster management. Realistically, second day of such an event, all of these questions and thoughts should have been going in people’s heads.Look I don’t want to be flying if there is a danger, but flying *is* dangerous. There are many hazards out there, there are volcanoes in other parts of the world, there are other things that bring planes down. Just communicate that these questions are being asked and answered, that none of the answers are just guesses and guesstimates! The more that they are guesses the more likely none of us will fly to the UK or Europe again if the danger persists.

The biggest problem for me is not that this all happened, that no one was willing to question any official line, science, paradigm, statement or guideline. It’s almost like they are treating science as a religion: “Thou must not fly in Volcanic Ash”. I want the human species to question and complain, because through that comes innovation and advance, it’s how we got to having giant metal birds in the sky in the first place.Now, admittedly, the air in London is clean, it is a bright sunny day and no sound of thundering jets. I question the necessity of planes and I question whether we need such air travel, perhaps this will allow us the opportunity to have a look at other alternatives.

To those that say, “thank goodness there are no flights” that’s because you haven’t been disrupted. Yet. Our world is interconnected and we are able to do the things we do because of how we have run the world to this point. In that same vein, do not complain when economies crumble, when you get laid off, when things don’t arrive and when you cannot get the goods you want.

Nothing is isolated and the volcano and last year’s recession have shown that. If you are perfectly willing to go or have gone to a shopping mall and buy a rose for a loved one, then do not complain over air traffic. Roses in England almost all come from Kenya by air freight at this time of year. And because of that, people in poor countries are laid off and worse is yet to come for them. This is the world that we have built

Driving in Asia is an experience everyone should attempt at some point. Don’t worry about driving on the other side of the road, at least the pedals are in the same place. If everything goes wrong, close your eyes and pray. In Sri Lanka, with the world’s greatest density of religious public holidays and every Bodhi tree a holy shrine, the very trees may be listening to your prayers. Just don’t hit a Bodhi tree as the populace will likely be angrier at that than any bodily injury you may have incurred in the process.

Of course driving in Sri Lanka is also quite dangerous. At last count at least five people are fatally injured each day in a traffic-related accident. That’s quite high, but let’s not dwell on such morbidly fascinating issues. Driving in western countries is quite simple, and frankly comparatively boring; you get in your car, adjust your seatbelt, straighten your mirrors, get into your lanes, watch out for traffic lights and off you go.

Driving in Sri Lanka (and I suspect most of Asia) is truly about participating in a symphonic conversation conducted in concert with a giant stage production. A stage where cars weave in and out skirting pedestrians and leaping around suddenly acrobatically twirling drunks while avoiding certain deaith and dismemberment by the other vehicles on the road.

Let me describe the opening allegro movement of this car horn symphony on the streets of Sri Lanka.

“Hi I’m here!” beeps the Nissan Sentra
“Oi, I know you’re here, just beeping twice!” honks the Nissan Prado.
“Your owner is old, my car is newer!” barps the Toyota Corolla with the new license plate and the stylish driver in a suit.
“Watch out I’m thinking of moving out into the next lane!” sounds the Suzuki Maruti
“What lane are you talking about? I’m already here!”
“This is Sri Lanka! What the hell are you all talking about lanes?!”
“Hey watch out for that pedestrian!”
“I’m honking to the pedestrian as well!”
“Okay now I’m honking so the pedestrian knows I’ve gone!”
“Honking twice. That three-wheeler is barely moving!”
“Get out of my way I have vegetables to deliver!” A truck with headlights blinking incessantly.
“Ha yoooou may think you’re big but I’m bigger!” A towering and teetering public bus bears down on the truck. The conductor is frantically waving out the opposite side as if warning everyone in front that the driver and bus has gone mad. The bus passengers are all praying silently.
“Oi, I’m here too!” A three wheeler with the engine of a lawnmower on steroids tries to pass the bus who’s passing the truck who’s passing a pedestrian who’s now wondering why he didn’t just get in a car to cross the road.

Now for the slow movement:

“Ah, just honking even though there’s no other cars!” A small Maruti passes by.
“Hey you on the motorbike, I’m behind you!” A bike laden with an entire family passes by with a car gently nosing its way out to pass them.
A bus coming from the opposite gently blinds the car with its powerful lights
The car pulls back.
“Thanks!” The motorbike honks.
“No problem now, I’m passing you!” The car moves out and passes.

And then the Minuet:

A drunk twirls seductively waving his arms in the air and falls gracefully across onto the road.
A motorbike swerves.
“What the hell are you doing you stupid bugger?!” The car driving opposite honks.
A pedestrian dances across to the drunk.
The drunk waves conducting the minuet of the cars on the road.

And finally enters the Rondo:

“Get out of my way, get out of my way!” The sirens of a motorcycle are blaring.
“Can’t you see I’m important, I have ‘police’ written on the side!” A black car with shades honks deeply.
“Look I SAID get out of our way, your little lives are worthless!” Another motorcycle with lights and siren blaring.
“You should know by my deep honks and flashy car that I am one of your ministers you pathetically struggling people! Out of my way!” That’s the big four-wheel drive with the wife of a government minister or one of his children.
“No, don’t listen to him in front, remember to vote for him in the next election!” A smaller car beeps plaintively as it now passes in the motorcade.
“Okay you can go back to business. I said go back to business!” The last motorcycle zooms by with its sirens blaring.
“Hi I’m here!” beeps the Hyundai Accent.

Remember to master the techniques of conversing with the horn when driving in Sri Lanka or you too shall be an uninteresting statistic on a news item. If you come to Sri Lanka, take the moment to sit by the side of the road (I suggest behind a concrete barricade), close your eyes and listen to the undulating conversation of horns and sirens. The giant conductor in the sky is telling a lively story about life, politics and death. You just have to listen.

This is not a reliable test of any piece of software. Let me reiterate, this is not a condemnation of a piece of software as a whole, only as a piece of software used by me and by my computer. In this case my macbook.

Today Google announced the Beta availability of Chrome for the Mac (and Linux).Now, I’d already been using builds of Chromium for the Mac released by Google. I liked Chromium in Alpha, but let’s face it, it was Alpha. I’m not saying Chrome Beta is better, I haven’t given it a good run through.

However, this post isn’t really about Chrome (well, not really though it leads to it). It’s about Firefox on my macintosh. I have truly had it, given up, thrown in the towel, decided to call it quits. After watching Firefox chew threw my battery as it runs up cpu cycles and disk runs with 10+ tabs open for the last many months, I decided the Beta release of Chrome was good enough for me to switch default browsers.

Now, your mileage may vary, but so far, no Firefox crashing, no Firefox eating through my memory. For the record I have VMWare Linux VM running, 6 applications, 10 Chrome tabs, 3 Safari Tabs and memory hungry Komodo IDE that I code in and I still have 1.2 GB of memory freed and a good solid 3 hours of battery on my 3 year old macbook.

Yes, I championed the cause of Firefox, but I’m done for now, the peace of Chrome has settled around here for this Christmas at least.

This is an exciting day for me. Today, we’re far enough along on the project for which I left Sun Microsystems and MySQL that we can at least announce that we exist. So today I’m proud to announce the existence of Empire Avenue Inc. You can head on over to our little introductory web page and see who all is involved. You can also add Empire Avenue to your Twitter and Facebook so that we can inform you when stuff is actually out there.

Okay, so that’s probably not that exciting for anyone else I suppose, after all, the key question on the mind of anyone reading this is quite likely, “sure you exist, but what the hell are you actually doing?”

Sorry, can’t tell you that just yet.

Not unless you are interested in us sending you a NDA and listening to us pitch to you for either money or a partnership

Here’s what I am going to reveal: We’ve managed to put together a really neat and incredibly talented team of individuals to take on the challenge of revolutionizing online advertising. We’re not just a bunch of technology geeks, but people with passion and a fair amount of experience over numerous technology, game and marketing fields.

Of course every entrepreneur thinks that they can change the world. I’m no different. But what I can definitely tell you after a month or more of working together with this team is that we are going to have a lot of fun challenging and disrupting the marketplace. Isn’t that what it’s all about?

So when are we going to reveal all?

The answer is something I learned from working at BioWare: When we are done; when we are happy with the quality of the product. Our goal is to launch something that is exciting, but polished, it would do no good to go into a beta when we’re not ready. Now for those that we approach in the near future about investment and/or partnerships, well they will hear all about it! We can’t wait to get this out into a beta for you. As you can probably tell I’m truly excited, not just for me, but for the entire team at Empire Avenue!

Follow us on Twitter and Facebook and we’ll reveal all to you as soon as we are able!

So I moved my desktop running Windows 7 to a part of the house where running cables would be just plain old ugly. To fix the situation I went out and bought a Wireless USB from Linksys. This was not an easy decision, I’m not exactly the biggest fan of Linksys, but there was an open box item for $60 a Wireless N USB adapter (WUSB600N ver 2.0). I figured the worst was I would return it as well.

Well, as it turned out I think I might have a couple ideas why someone returned it in the first place.

First, Windows 7: The drivers that ship with the adapter are for Vista and do not work with Windows 7. I tried everything from manually opening the device manager and trying to manually install the drivers, no dice. I tried using generic USB adapters, no luck. A pretty frustrating experience, especially when Cisco/Linksys haven’t posted any Windows 7 drivers as of this past weekend. Poor showing on their part I thought. Finally, exasperated and near to returning it I read somewhere to check Windows Update.

Now this is an interesting problem, it’s a chicken and egg situation. For Windows Update, you need a net connection, but the thing I’m trying to install is what gives me the net connection. Sigh. Luckily for me I can stretch a cord out to the computer and get the net, I wonder about those that can’t. Could this be the reason someone returned this? Regardless, if you are in this predicament, yes Windows Update has the latest drivers and the entire thing was up and running in seconds.

As for the device itself, I can only guess that another reason someone might have returned it is the poor reception quality if you use the included USB extender cable. I can’t quite understand this, but the extender cable actually drops the reception quite dramatically even though I can then take the USB adapter closer to the wireless router. Very odd. Connecting it directly to the computer was fine (and I tried multiple USB slots).

So moral of the story (1) Windows 7, trust Windows Update first especially in these early days as manufacturers are probably releasing to Microsoft before the consumer on their websites and (2) I’m still not convinced on the quality of Linksys products and reviewers around the web seem to agree…

This morning while walking up Duluth past Coloniale in Montreal I witnessed the aftermath of an accident. An SUV had collided with a bicyclist in the intersection (an all way stop). The bicyclist was on the ground bloody and waiting for the ambulance, the bike was mangled and under the automobile. Very unfortunate, very messy.

I do not know who was at fault. I did not witness the accident itself.

I am, however, about to make myself highly unpopular amongst Montrealers. This city has a traffic problem. I do not mean the messy and screwed up road system, I’m talking about people following the rules of the road. I do not just mean the automobiles, I mean everyone: bikers, pedestrians and the car drivers. In almost every case everyone seems to think they know better than the laws which are put into place to protect us and protect others.

There is a reason for a red light. It means stop. Running the light whether you are in a car, legs or on a bike puts you at risk of getting hit, or worse hitting someone else. This is a bad thing. This is why you get fines if you are in a car and run a red light. The same goes for a stop sign. The sign says “Stop” for a reason.

Now, do not assume I am perfect. I jaywalk, I am like everyone else in Montreal. It is easy to jaywalk, it’s part of the culture, it’s expected and there is no feedback mechanism to prevent people from jaywalking. Laws are not acted upon.

The same goes for biking in Montreal.

Again I do not know what happened at that intersection this morning. But just today here is what I witnessed bicyclists do at that or around that intersection within a 5 minute period:

1. Run the intersection without stopping, glancing or even checking (3 bicyclists)
2. Run the intersection without stopping, glancing or even checking while wearing headphones (2 bicyclists)
3. Switch lanes crazily on St. Laurent while talking on a cell phone and handling the bike with one hand (1 bicyclist).

I personally believe that if you are in any vehicle, and a bicycle is a vehicle, you should be subject to the same laws. Running a stop sign or a red light in a bicycle is extremely dangerous. If I am driving a car I assume you will stop at a stop sign or red light if coming from the opposite direction. We all agree running red lights for cars is one of the worst driving mistakes. Why can we not fine someone who does it on a bicycle?

What would happen to an individual who is driving a car and wearing in-ear headphones? Answering a cellphone and driving with your knees while switching lanes of traffic?

I call on Montreal to actually set an example. Ticket bicyclists, jaywalkers and drivers alike, especially when it comes to running stop signs and red lights. I do not ever want to hit a bicyclist in a car driven by me, even if it is not my fault at the end of the day. A car does way more damage than a bicycle. It is to protect bicyclists that I even write this.

I challenge the police to go to that intersection and give out tickets to bicyclists.

I suspect I’m about to be labeled for my idiosyncratic ideas. But hear me out. If you are in the northern hemisphere you might have noticed that the weather has definitely cooled off just a tad. In Montreal we’re reaching the single digits for highs and I have even witnessed a flurry. Thankfully I was ensconced in a bar with a beer and crying into a beer is saved for other occasions of much more dire circumstances.

Now, I remember my high school models of the Earth. As the Earth rotates and wobbles on its axis we are treated to a change of seasons.

However, I would like to present an alternative view and a solution to this slow descent into the marauding madness of winter. Have you noticed that as the weather gets colder you tend to wear more clothes? You bundle up in parkas, toques (and for those non-Canadians who don’t know what toque is, you’re missing out), gloves, hats, sealskin and rabbit fur and more besides.

What if the reason for the general depression into Winter is due to us wearing more clothes? What if the mere need to wear more clothes accelerates the onset of winter?

I present to you exhibit “A”. When I was a child my eyesight started to deteriorate. To halt this sudden blindness (so acutely shown when a tennis ball hit me in the face when I was playing tennis at the age of seven), my parents hastily convened a meeting with the optometrist/ophthalmologist who nonchalantly insisted I correct my eyes with glasses. Wonderful.

The eyes of children are unfortunately quite unstable. My eyes decided to adjust to these new peripherals and then some. They adjusted to just below the threshold of perfect vision. Every six months thereafter, my favourite optometrist would continue to play a game of cat and mouse with my eyesight. He would exasperatedly correct my vision to near perfect and my eyes would drop in vision to non perfect, whereupon he would sigh and the process would start all over.

So taking this example, here’s what I propose happens: The weather drops in temperatures and we wear more clothes than necessary because we are unsure about our ability to handle this sudden coolness. To adjust, the temperature drops a bit more to prevent us from getting all sweaty underneath our jackets. We react badly. We swear at the sky, pull on an extra jacket and grumble our way out the door. And so the cycle begins again.

It is time to stop this insanity.

I demand all in the city of Montreal and beyond wear less clothes and warm the temperatures up.

Imagine a world where we all walk around in swimwear in the middle of December with balmy temperatures in the middle of the city of Montreal! I know we can make this dream come true without global warming. Wear less clothes and set yourself free from the tyranny of the temperatures!

It’s something that has mystified me for all the years I’ve lived here in Montreal. During the summer months or what is ostensibly called “Construction Season” in Quebec, mysterious pylons appear all over the city. Roads are blocked off, sidewalks closed, indecipherable detour signs (often leading in circles) appear and strange directions are hysterically broadcast to avoid unavoidable city sections.

However, this “Construction” part of the “Construction Season” goes incredibly slow. The pylons stick around for months and there are very few street construction crews to be seen. It’s almost as if the workers are invisible. The work somehow plods along haltingly. It’s like the thought that if you look at a watched kettle it never boils, the urgency of fixing any issue in the city crawls to a halt the more you look at it or want it done. Obviously Montreal street construction obey laws of relativity that I am unaware of and which would probably astound Einstein himself. But then again, as the nights get longer and the city inches towards our first snowfall, construction hits a pace of urgency that seems to be lacking throughout the rest of the year.

Montrealers, Tourists, wonder no more, as I have deduced what is happening.

You see, the Montreal Street Construction Crews are actually legions of the undead. Yes, you heard it right here. The Construction Crews are filled with daylight avoiding vampires, ghouls and other undead. It’s an ingenious attempt by our city council to tap a previously untapped potential.

Now granted, I don’t have definitive proof. I am slightly nervous at approaching a construction crew member lest they decide that I am actually good juicy food.

So here’s my reasoning:

1. Construction is slowest during the longest days of the year. Previously we all thought that it was because the nice hot weather was keeping construction crews from operating and enjoying vacation. Not at all. The undead cannot go out in the day, naturally the working hours for our frustrated dead brethren is rather short. No wonder the pylons pile up and no work gets done.

2. Pylons appear out of nowhere in the night time and there’s hardly anyone working during the day. Here I thought people were taking copious breaks or potentially the city could not get enough workers. No my friends, it’s actually that the undead crew must work during the night. It is why things go slow. But naturally they have to wait till after 1am to start work. Oh poor souls.

3. Again traffic jams on the streets at 2 or 3 in the morning, how else could it be explained.

4. The slow progress at getting anything done around the city! We all know that the undead are rather stupid and lusting after blood and live humans. Naturally this is why it takes forever. Have you ever tried to get a zombie to do anything useful other than eat your brains?

5. The crumbling nature of our concrete. Obviously the undead need to eat and occaisionally they kill humans and put them into the mix. I had thought this previously to do with the mafia and its penchant for dropping dead bodies into the concrete mixer, but really when you think about it. vampires must be to blame. Never trust a vampire.

I do have to hand it to our city council and mayor. I had no idea that you could keep something like this a secret, but then, what an amazingly brilliant idea. I applaud you. I applaud you.

I’ve tinkered with being self-employed before. When I was working at Memorial University just after finishing my degrees a friend of mine and I formed a company to do side work (called DigitalRnD). Later in life I took side projects and side contracts here and there. However, I was always aware of where my next pay check was coming from. Not so much anymore. I am truly out in the cold wilderness of the unknown.

Nowadays, people keep asking me, “what the heck are you up to?”

My parents are wondering whether I have gone insane.

The parents of my friends are wondering if I have gone insane.

Can Dups feed himself? Is he okay? Oh heck, screw Dups, how’s his long suffering cat doing?

Let me put the rumours to an end. I am not selling my body on the streets of Montreal. But yes, I recently decided it was time to see what the hell all this “entrepreneurial” spirit is all about.

Now admittedly, I might actually be insane but really is that a surprise to anyone?

So let me answer the question as to what the heck I’m actually doing.

First and foremost, I’m taking on the challenge of leading a startup through its paces into the limelight. I wish I could get into exactly what it’s all about, but I can’t just yet. Suffice it to say it should be a bit of fun no matter which direction it goes in. If you have a pile of money or know some interesting tech-related investors get in touch with me and we’ll talk about Non-Disclosures and stuff like that.

Secondly, I want to take on numerous projects (programming, writing, photography and personal), that I have always wanted to do. Some of these involve trying to pay my way through some freelancing, some consulting and perhaps even some photography. Hopefully I’ve learned one or two things in life that might be of interest to someone out there and they might actually be willing to pay me for that knowledge and some hard work. The name of that little venture, I’ll divulge in the next few weeks, I’m just getting some logos finished for now.

Thirdly, I want to work on a couple of software projects that I’ve wanted to open source for years. This will also be done as part of the second thing for which I’m working on logos, so more details to come.

All this comes at a cost. It’s not a small one either. It means less of having what I want and doing a lot more with less. It means staring down that precipice of the unknown and having no choice but to downclimb with no idea of how or what’s actually below and to top it all off, there’s no sense of security in any part of the climb.

It’s scary and exciting all at the same time. It’s the same feeling I have when travelling and coming to a place and not knowing where I’m going to sleep, just magnified a few more times

And this is where my most awesome friends come in. I often say how incredible my friends are. As I set down this path, the most amazing thing to me is how supportive all my friends are being and how helpful. I know that there will be days to come which will make me weep with frustration and I know that I’ll have friends who will stand by me on those days. No matter, success or fail, it’s the human spirit and kindness that truly make a difference in the world.

I hope this answers those questions about “what the heck am I up to?”

As today’s Tweetisode gets published it will bring to an end the 12 weeks of the Tweet Rhapsody. The Tweet Rhapsody takes six Twitter accounts and creates a 2000+ Tweet conversation which creates the Tweet Rhapsody story. The details of “what” it is, I have blogged about, but the how and why… well that’s another story.

The How

Technically the Rhapsody is very very simple. So simple in fact that the entire technology was finished in a matter of three days. The site, its design, the wonderful portraits purchased from an artist on iStockPhoto and the bots which post to Twitter. In short from conception to realization the Tweet Rhapsody came together mostly over a single weekend.

The process for posting each Tweetisode went thusly: Write the 25-40 Tweets place them in a spreadsheet which automatically checked for lengths. For each Tweet I entered the GMT time which I had to mentally calculate for its relevance to the story and to what it meant to Montreal, Canada and Colombo, Sri Lanka. I did discover that conducting a romance between those two countries is entirely possible with the time zones (just in case someone wants to try in real life).

Once the Tweets were done, all I had to do was import the CSV directly into the MySQL database and the programming would take care of the rest. This included showing it appropriately on the web site as well as a bot which would post to the Twitter stream of each individual character. Simple, sufficient and in the end worked very well.

The Why

It’s not every day someone wakes up and says “I’m going to write an Internet-based romance between Sri Lanka and Canada and I’m going to use Twitter as a medium”. I can guarantee that that is likely not a thought most people wake up with. I did.

The Tweet Rhapsody was written to accomplish several tasks. One was a technical test of a generic platform I had written in PHP and Zend Framework with MySQL as the database, this platform I hope to now finish and use for various other projects (and yes, eventually open source).

The second objective was to finish a literary experiment I had started several years before during the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) initially at the behest of my good friend Craig Welsh. This was a story written through blog posts similar to the “Briefroman” or Letter novels of the 18th-19th century. I never finished it and it is these characters which became the central pieces of the Tweet Rhapsody. In addition, the great thing about the Briefromane was that they did not ignore the fact that the letters were important to the story, quite the opposite in fact. I wanted to make Twitter not just the medium, but indeed, part of the story. In other words the story might happen in Twitter-space but could not have happened without the characters being aware of Twitter itself.

The third reason was that I wanted to have a running commentary on issues in both Sri Lanka and Canada and show the similarities of the two countries rather than the large obvious differences. I am of the Sinhalese majority by birth but I long for the day that all the peoples of that island nation are brought together in peace, no more than I wish for the eventuality where there is no discrimination between the English, French and Aboriginal Peoples of Canada. In Sri Lanka yet, the divisions are very deep and my hope is in the possibility of friendships of the type displayed by Raj and David in the Tweet Rhapsody.

The last reason is that I am a closet romantic and I kind of liked the idea or seeing whether this format could actually make people believe in six characters enough to follow them through to the bitter end.