blog.spathis.com

WooHoo! The crazy kids at Spinback just launched (well a few days ago). They are a great bunch of fun folks co-located with us for the moment.

Given the official launch I just had to become a Spinner, so for my first spin I present a wonderful black iPod:

iPod, 30GB, Black

So sleek, so roomy, so ready to accept your music. Go forth and spin I say…

To the Spinback team, awesome site and congrats on the launch. I look forward to independent wealth thanks to my ability to spin…

Technorati Tags:
business

A confluence of events the past few months created a perfect storm that took my server down. First my server died, then a family medical emergency kept me quite busy, and my new company is demanding substantial time. Finally, after ten years of hosting my own server, I have finally relented and re-located to a shared hosting provider.

Barack Obama announces his "Presidential Exploratory Comittee" , the latest euphemism for he is running for President. I wish him well, I suspect we are in for a very bruising presidential election. 

Barack is an incredible guy, he is quite likeable and may give all comers a real run for their money. His life has been a classic immigrant's tale of overcoming. Born to a white mother and a black immigrant father from Kenya, he epitomizes what is best in America. His embrace of the African-American experience will garner him support from the African American community (although there appears to be murmurs that the traditional African American leaders like Al Sharpton & Jesse Jackson may not approve) and his championing of traditional American values will win him many white supporters (not to mention more than a few Republican defectors sick of the cesspool the party has become). Hopefully he will be able to live up to the ideals he frequently talks about, he has a real chance at changing the face of Washington.

Obama's oft mentioned weaknesses, his inexperience and youth, may also turn into his greatest strengths and allow him to differentiate himself from the typical calcified Washington political hack. If he is elected (or even if he wins the primary) it could signal the handover of power to a new generation, similar to Clinton's win in 1992. How different? Anyone's guess at this point, although honesty will hopefully play a big part (in a brilliant move Obama has publicly admitted to using cocaine in his teenage years to "push questions of who I was out of my mind", how is that for honesty). Another similarity with Clinton is that they both have the ability to mesmerize an audience, Obama's keynote at the 2004 Democratic Convention was a superb example of that. It is absolutely critical that Obama use the momentum he now has to educate the people as to his plans for America, in particular Iraq & the war on terror, and resist knee-jerk responses.

John Edwards has announced and now Obama has made the presidential race just a little more crowded. Lets hope they stick to the high road.

Fascinating piece in the Atlantic Monthly on the birth of a new political party, Unity '08 . What do they stand for? In their own words :

Unity08 divides issues facing the country into two categories: Crucial Issues – on which America’s future safety and welfare depend; and Important Issues – which, while vital to some, will not, in our judgment, determine the fate or future of the United States.

In our opinion, Crucial Issues include: Global terrorism, our national debt, our dependence on foreign oil, the emergence of India and China as strategic competitors and/or allies, nuclear proliferation, global climate change, the corruption of Washington’s lobbying system, the education of our young, the health care of all, and the disappearance of the American Dream for so many of our people.

By contrast, we consider gun control, abortion and gay marriage important issues, worthy of debate and discussion in a free society, but not issues that should dominate or even crowd our national agenda.

In our opinion – since the disintegration of the Soviet Union – our political system seems to have focused more attention on the “important issues” than the “crucial issues.” One result: The political parties have been built to address the interests of their “base” but have failed to address the realities that impact most Americans.

Wow, sounds like they might have their priorities right. I will be watching this quite closely, it will be a refreshing day if they stick close to their founding principles and the American people support them. They may even get my vote.

It has been an absolutely crazy last few weeks with the holidays, fund-raising for a new venture, and preparing for and attending CES. Hopefully we can get back to our regularly scheduled program soon.

Check out Merriam-Webster's selection for 2006 Word of the Year!

Stephen Colbert should be quite proud

The Will Wright, creator of the Sims, SimCity, & the soon (not) to be released Spore, was on The Colbert Report. Pretty interesting to hear what he has to say, particularly his "spreadsheet of your life." Colbert is out of his mind, completely utterly brilliantly insane. Will gets into Spore a little bit and gives a release date of second half 2007. Spore is going to be an interesting game, I really hope it actually lives up to the hype.  

I profess a real fondness for a good single malt and given that I found this article amusing, the world's oldest bottle of whisky. I am willing to try a glass (although it sounds like it was not a very good one given the price it went for). 

A bruising election anyway you look at it. Viriginia and Montana went down to the very end. Hopefully we aren't going to have 2 years of deadlock at this point.

The upper east side is a complete zoo, seems as though a small plane hit an apartment building on 72nd St and York Ave, Police & Fire responding like champs as usual. Yankee's pitcher Cory Lidle was on the plane and thought to have been the pilot.