Primitive? Evil? Perverted?

What can you say about people who would call for a teacher's execution (and would probably carry it out themselves) for naming a teddy bear "Mohammed"?

So they'd kill someone for naming a teddy bear the same name as half the kids in the class, but they'd be fine with someone executing their own sister for adultery or blowing themselves up in a bus?

Perhaps there is no "they", perhaps it's just a crazy few people who do each horrible act but we shouldn't try to collectively brand a class of people...

But then is there any point at which you connect the dots and draw some conclusions — about religious zealotry, about educational systems that allow people to grow up with such beliefs, about governments that tolerate this behavior or these teachings? This isn't about being politically correct. Screw that. It's about doing the right thing and calling this kind of phenomenon, and the much larger abyss behind it, by their name: primitive, evil, and perverted, and the list goes on.

It's the people who teach their kids such beliefs, who tolerate or encourage or act out such beliefs, who think there's some excuse for this behavior or thinking, that are the problem. Or maybe the problem is that sane people aren't likely to grab sticks and swords and go into the streets to protest, the same way the nuts do. But I would hope that we can at least sharpen our mental swords, see this evil for what it is, and make sure we both shape our foreign policies accordingly as well as ensure we don't cultivate this disease in our midst. Let's not be silent, polite, politically-correct lambs (again).

Voices

Like many people, I've found the last seven or so years particularly depressing and infuriating politically, like no other period I can remember. And it wasn't just the suddenness of the transition from the suspension-of-disbelief, world-of-unlimited-possibilities dot-com boom to the collapse and mini-depression of 2001-2002. It was the beginning of an era in politics in this country and around the world in which things seemed to go from bad to worse to truly WTF.

But, refreshingly, there are some voices in the usually-tone-deaf wilderness that are starting to be heard. Richard Dawkins is one. Bill Maher is another. And one fragment of one episode recently bears quoting. Yeah, it's not the same reading it as it is hearing it, so surf here if you'd like the full experience. Or read on. And by the way, it's not really about the French at all:

And finally, New Rule: Conservatives have to stop rolling their eyes every time they hear the word, “France.” Like just calling something “French” is the ultimate argument winner. As if to say, “What can you say about a country that was too stupid to get on board with our wonderfully-conceived and brilliantly-executed war in Iraq?”

And, yet, an American politician could not survive if he uttered the simple, true statement, “France has a better health care system than we do, and we should steal it.” Because – because here, simply dismissing an idea as French passes for an argument. “John Kerry? Couldn’t vote for him; he looked French.” Yeah, as opposed to the other guy who just looked stupid.

Now, last week, France had an election, and people over there approach an election differently. They vote. Eighty-five percent of them turned out. You couldn’t get 85% of Americans to get off the couch if there was an election between “Tits” and “Bigger Tits,” and they were handing out free samples!

Now, maybe the high turnout has something to do with the fact that the French candidates are never asked where they stand on evolution, prayer in school, abortion, stem cell research or gay marriage. And if the candidate knows about a character in a book other than Jesus, it’s not a drawback.

The electorate doesn’t vote for the guy they want to have a croissant with; nor do they care about private lives. In the current race, Ségolène Royal has four kids, but she never got married. And she’s a Socialist. In America, if a Democrat even thinks you’re calling him “liberal,” he grabs an orange vest and a rifle and heads into the woods to kill something!

Madame Royal’s opponent is married, but they live apart and lead separate lives. And the people are okay with that for the same reason they’re okay with nude beaches; because they’re not a nation of six-year-olds who scream and giggle if they see pee-pee parts!

They have weird ideas about privacy. They think it should be private. In France, even the mistresses have mistresses. To not have a lady on the side says to the voters, “I’m no good at multi-tasking.”

Now, like any country, France has its faults, like all that ridiculous accordion music. But, their health care is the best in the industrialized world. As is their poverty rate. And they’re completely independent of Mid East oil. And they’re the greenest country. And they’re not fat. And they have public intellectuals in France. We have Dr. Phil!

They invented sex during the day, lingerie and the tongue. Can’t we admit we could learn something from them?

(Excerpted from http://www.billmaher.com/?page_id=37).

Experience-Oriented Enterprises

For many years we've heard pundits describe how businesses have evolved from offering raw materials, to finished products, to services, and finally to entire experiences -- with every transition up the "value ladder" allowing for more differentiation, better profit margins, etc.

I think I finally get it -- not because it wasn't understandable before, but because now it's really happening and I can feel it in my bones.

Apple sells the Apple experience: slick, expertly-crafted devices that make you feel amazing at just opening the box, much less using them, admiring them, delighting in how they've nailed how machines should interact with humans. I'm still a PC user for the most part (though I've upgraded from Windows Vista to Windows XP and I'll soon upgrade to Mac OS X, completing the circle I started on NeXT OS many years ago). But I grit my teeth every day struggling with Windows, with Lenovo, with drivers and bizarre behavior and constantly-crashing Outlook and (until recently) with Windows Mobile that after 6 releases is still several generations behind iPhone 1.0. I don't want to grit any more: it's 2007, and I want a computer that doesn't suck, and maybe even one that goes a bit beyond my expectations. I want a computer store that knows something about computers (hear that, Fry's?) and when the line at the register gets too long equips their sales people with mobile registers (a.k.s. PDAs) they can carry out to the customers. Apple gets it.

Whole Foods is an experience company. It isn't even necessarily more expensive than Safeway or Anderson's, but boy what a difference: you feel good just walking in, the staff are for the most part incredibly friendly and knowledgeable, they don't stock the garbage that too many people ingest daily, and if you don't like the cake you bought yesterday the woman at the bakery counter may just hand you another pie of your choosing even if you have neither the receipt for the cake nor the cake itself. I could not have imagined my family looking forward to going to a grocery store just for the hell of it -- until Whole Foods.

Google largely gets it, in that most Google things you interact with -- the search page, Google maps, the toolbar, gmail, the calendar, Google reader, Google code -- are delightful, do what they're supposed to well or even incredibly well (maps), and make you feel glad you chose to use them. Yes, we have a choice, and more often than not we choose Google not only because it works but because it feels good -- it's a good experience.

And then there are the anti-experience companies. This is almost too easy: most airlines (they do provide true experiences, but not ones you want to remember); most things Microsoft (but they do have excellent developer tools); Home Depot (a great idea that went terribly wrong); most cell phone carriers. If people love to hate a company, there's probably a good reason for it. And when they love a company -- a brand, really -- they'll reward it almost beyond reason. (What possible rationale is there behind the pricing of iPods, esp. the red nano?)

I strive every day for my current company, Aptana, to be a great experience company, a name synonymous with a great web development experience, with a real understanding of and appreciation for the Ajax craft.

When you think about it, each one of us is a brand of sorts, and people around us associate us over time with an experience. Some people always make you feel good, some you associate with creativity and insight and always being at the right place at the right time, and some trigger almost Pavlovian nausea and disgust (consider a certain current president). What's your brand?

iHack Therefore iAm

Wow. Last night my friend Todd showed me something that almost knocked my socks off.

The iPhone is an incredible device, raising the bar incredibly high and making many people wonder why all the other phone/pda/whatever companies even bother. But it has some glaring omissions, not the least of which are 1) a carrier network (AT&T/Cingular) that really sucks, 2) a shortage of built-in apps, for example no voice dial or voice recorder, and 3) no way (currently) to install 3rd-party apps.

So I've been thinking about hacking it, but the effort and the uncertainty were a bit daunting.

Enter jailbreakme.com. Just surf to it with your iPhone's Safari browser, click the button, and in a matter of seconds the site breaks into your iPhone (via a TIFF buffer overrrun), installs an application installer, and patches the TIFF vulnerability it used to break into your phone to begin with! Slick, quick, and brain-dead easy, and you can now take your pick of numerous (though mostly quite simple) 3rd-party apps.

Now, I won't get into whether this is safe or smart or legal or even if it'll survive the next update from Apple. But it is unbearably tempting, and it's really, really well done. Hats off.