How Much "G" Do I Need?

Today’s ROI Topic is “How much G do I need?”

One of my favorite movies is Lethal Weapon (1987) with Danny Glover and Mel Gibson. I happened across this film on TBS not long ago and joined the movie at the scene where Danny Glover is on an overpass using what we used to call a “Bag Phone”. I recalled my first Bag Phone, Motorola I think, with its sleek and stylish nylon black bag and shoulder strap (which was required to carry the 4.6lb mobile device).
I suspect that that phone, being as old as it is was probably a 1G phone.

I mean it’s old so it G count had to be low right?

Now we all have the power of tripple G, except my Dad, who because of where he lives may still have 2G service, but uses 3G network card for his computer.

So what happened to 1G and 2G? How did we get to 3G? I hear Sprint is about to release 4G! If I am in the right place can I use 4Gs? And is that place the famous G Spot I am supposed to find?

I am often surprised at how many people don’t really understand what the heck the G is, but value it’s importance so much during the purchase of their phone and the all-important data plan that now must inevitably now accompany all cellular purchases.

Let’s face it; I was befuddled when they started adding lemon-freshened borax to Fab detergent. Did I need Borax? Why was Lemon chosen? Why couldn’t I get pigmy-orange freshened bleach added to my detergent? So it’s no wonder that the mystery of the G is still an ever perplexing topic of concern for many.

Well my friends my ROI today is to demystify this great G and it’s culmination of marketing perplexity and sales propaganda so that the common cell phone user (Mom) can denote for themselves the importance of their G.

The G in this case does in fact refer to the generation level of the cell phone provider’s network services. Moreover this has come down the common factor of the network data speed for the phone provides. I don’t want to dispel the authority of such governmental agencies and organizations that would pretend to regulate these standards, but in reality it’s mostly marketing hype. But in my meager attempt I shall offer some form of explanation for the common folk among us.

1G – First Generation – This was the old analog (non-digital) wireless phone system. It was slow, had static, and it worked just better than a beeper at getting information transferred.

2G – Was the term used for phone networks that enable the use of digital signals. This was supposed to end the static and signal issues where phones faded in and out of range. (Someone explain that concept to my IPhone please)

3G – This was the term given when multimedia support was added to cell phones. Photos and video could be sent over the wireless networks to the devices allowing the true advent of the “smart phone”. The Windows Mobile Phones, Treo, and the Blackberry devices spearheaded this and the Apple IPhone helped secure this marketing extravaganza.

4G – The next “Generation” of service is poised to emulate the internet in the real-time wireless world providing true Internet Protocol (IP) like addressing and routing to the cell phones and smart devices much like the internet. Think of it as a wider range extension of your home PC wireless network. This should have more bandwidth (that’s another topic all together) to allow for more data, game playing, file sharing and streaming media to your device. Now maybe we can all just get an application for our phones that let us call home and talk to someone, that would make me a real happy camper!

So there you have it friends and loved ones. The G is demystified for you. It’s a lot of hype, it’s a lot of marketing, but it’s really just a way to say “Oh Yeah, well our service is newer and better than yours, but we can’t really prove it”.

Until next time, Take Care and Call Your Mom.

Revisit Your Roots

Today’s ROI Topic is “Revisit Your Roots”

Let me preface this with a clear apology to Mr. Alex Haley for a slight plagiaristic approach with the term “Roots” and admit boldly that I shall make no references to Chicken George in this excerpt. Nor shall I be admitting anything about the need for supplemental hair coloring or Rogaine. This session is about the need to stop and revisit for a moment the things that shape us and who we have become in our lives, and then, perhaps pay homage to some of them.

To frame this more let me admit to my recent acceptance of social networking and the discovery I didn’t expect to make through it. A while back I joined Facebook and was very pleased to discover through a few selected friends that many and I mean MANY of my old and dear friends from my young formative years were already using the system.

This prompted some research whereby I discovered that the fastest grown demographic right now in social networking sites is the 45-55 year old population. Maybe we are all looking to reconnect or seek some sort of past connections and validity to what we are or perhaps where we are now.
For me, as I see it, it was a fluke that I ended up connected on the system to so many good friends whom I allowed time and work to disjoin me from. I cannot speak for others, but suspect that similar contemplation would reveal a combination not too different from my own.

So I planted my seed with the first post on Facebook and waited by my computer… waited… went for coffee but took my Iphone with Facebook app loaded… and I waited some more. Oh how I waited and watched that screen. Hand on the mouse, refreshing the webpage over and over again. Time appeared to be mocking me in my suspense filled moments. After all, I put up a photo, I posted a message, and I gave the darn thing my email address. Look at the work I put in to this effort people! And still I waited… Can you imagine that it took almost twenty minutes after I setup my account for my first friend request to come in!

So, as it goes, one friend became two friend, and so on and so on and so on… Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful (Sorry if you didn’t get that little pun)

What I discovered was that as the friends in this social networking extravaganza exploded it became apparent that these are not new friends at all. These are the people who I grew up with. These are the people who shared critical life shaping times and experiences with me. We lived our formative years in partnership and fun with each other. We had loves and heartache; we had drama and joy together. We watched the drinking age go from 18 to 21 for goodness sake! We saw the original Smokey the Bear on TV and watched that Indian cry over litter next to the highway (if you don’t remember that you are too young to read this)

So I say to all of you, slow down and reflect on those times and the lessons you learned. Remember the people and find them. Seek them out and make it a point to reconnect to them, to as many as you can. Nothing I have ever done has helped me find this level of clarity, peace, and a sense that no matter what the world and the economic times today can put in my path, I will be able to deal with.

I am not discounting my current friends, my career, or family in any way. I am telling all of you from my heart that there is more. There is a refilling of good nature and a firmness you can rely on when you reach back to those roots and recall the foundation you are built upon.

Our lives are like a very old and long book that we read a bit of every now and then. Sometimes it helps to go back to the preface or early chapters and reacquaint one’s self with the primary character again.

Take Care and Reach Out!

Balance is Always Restored...

The Technology Industry always has a way of reassuring me that no matter what happens in life, no matter how bad things get, there will always be restoration of order and that balance will be restored. This proclamation is of course notwithstanding the old axiom that no good deed goes unpunished. Ever...

Life exhibits itself in a cyclic manner quite often. These cycles often produce a fluctuation and imbalance in the natural order of things. However, this righting of the off balance is the topic of today’s blog entry. At this point I wish to be clear to those whose significant other is of the female persuasion; I am not referring to that monthly cycle where things get way off-balance. However, in retrospect that too comes full circle and eventually balance is somewhat restored (if even for a temporary period, praise the gods!).

We all have our own pet peeves and issues that we deal with that provide us that oh so adequate agitation and discomfort level in our daily jaunt through life. Whilst my most probable issues revolve around dealing with the common idiot or suffering the inexhaustible turmoil of having to witness flagrant incompetence in action all too often, I am sure you too have your “buttons” that get pushed from time to time. No matter what the cause, the effect of the issue is the unbalance in our daily routine, happiness, and life in general. I take solace in the fact that while this unbalanced situation is upon me that at least I know it will be short lived.

As mentioned above, the Technology Industry has always provided me with a number of real world examples that show me that no matter what, balance is eventually restored.

The champions of this effort have always been that elusive and nocturnal creature whose only foray in to the real world is to acquire additional Mountain Dew. Yes, I am speaking of the Software Developer.

Software vs. Hardware has always been a source of constant out-of-balance and recovery for the world. Have you noticed that every time Intel makes a processor that runs faster that those software developers out there match it by creating more complex software that again restores balance? No matter how hard Intel tries to make it faster, the software developers make it more complex in order to invalidate the money spent in your last upgrade. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Mr. Gates for inspiring this balance for our betterment.

Have you noticed how the software developers have always managed to keep up with bandwidth as well? The programs of yesteryear worked well on my Hayes 2400 baud modem. There was balance! However the evil empire of US Robotics (Could this be the forerunner to Cyberdine Systems) developed the Courier HST that would use asymmetrical technologies to achieve an unheard of 14,400 baud rate. But the elusive developers would not rest and soon created larger applications and file formats that would tax even these new baud rate boundaries. Again balance restored.

These are but a few of the ever reassuring examples of how unbalance is restored to a balanced situation once again.

(/sarcastic overtones on) Knowing that my life is following the example of this is certainly making me a happier person. (/end sarcastic overtones)

Thoughts on Planning

Today’s ROI consideration is planning. Consider the word planning itself, a word that infers the act of forethought and analysis prior to attempting to achieve a given task or endeavor. Can any of us truly make the claim that we always consider the time and tasks ahead of ourselves in the appropriate light and with the required consideration to plan for them?

There is an old adage that says, “This never time to plan, but always time to correct”.

While I certainly support and believe in planning, I have not always been the astute disciple of planning that I am today.

My first memories of planning always revolve around the familiar weekend projects of my early years when my father would begin the day at the kitchen table with his trusty yellow legal tablet scribbling out information, requirements, materials lists, an drawing a roughed in prototype of whatever it was to be constructed. Oddly enough nowhere on any scraps of paper I ever recovered from the trash or other waste receptacle could I find where it indicated my role as “clean up” or “holder of the other end of the board”. Nevertheless these tasks always appeared to befall to me with ease under the firm conviction of my father.

In my formative teenage years I experienced additional opportunities to use planning, albeit I didn’t see the value in this at the time. Normally these opportunities would present themselves at later moments in the form of questions from many of my hometown’s public officials and servants.

“Where were you going in such a hurry Mr. Adams?”

“Mr. Adams, how is it you missed English class 4 days in row, yet you were at all the other classes before and after English, can you explain that?”

“Son didn’t you know that fence was electrified?”

These but are many of the opportunities life presented to me in those early years in an attempt to help me understand early on the value and the need for planning.

So why is it that we take so little time in life to stop, consider, plan and then take action? Can we blame it on the “now” generation? Has the Microwave Oven spoiled us? Did Nescafe Instant Coffee offer such a trend that we needn’t consider where to stop for coffee anymore, nullifying all need for planning our morning ritual commute to the office (Thank-You Starbucks for correcting that little anomaly)?

Well friends I think not. I think that the lack of stopping to plan things is a rich American tradition that is has been embedded on us through the rich tradition of storytelling that has morphed into that thing we now call television.

After all, look at all of the classic examples we were taught growing up and consider how they may have had an impact on us:

· What would have become the seven stranded castaways if the Skipper would have left a detailed course chart with someone and had followed the US Coast Guard guidelines and had an emergency water proof radio beacon?

· If Uncle Jed was smart enough to move to “Beverly” then maybe some financial planning other than Mr. Driesdale and Miss Jane would have been in order.

· If every time Tonto goes to town by himself he gets in trouble, then perhaps some careful planning by the Lone Ranger could have helped. Maybe he could remove the mask, go to town and get the groceries, then put the mask back on later.

· If the Starship Enterprise runs on Dilythium Crystals, then why can’t they carry some spare ones? It seems to me that since they tended to burn out and strand the ship years from home that having a cigar box full of them somewhere in the Captain’s quarters may have made sense.

· Another great Star Trek lesson under the heading of “a total lack of planning” has to go to the Romulan idiot who invented the cloaking device that has to be turned off before you can shoot your weapons at the enemy, making you completely vulnerable in the process.

There are wonderful examples everywhere of a lack of planning and the intense rush to success blindly with hopes of accomplishment. The truth is that when we can wait, slow down, and plan before hand we normally improve the chances of that success greatly. I encourage you to break free from your bonds of instinctual impulse to gain immediate success and gratification (unless it’s a quickie or just a one-night stand) and plan!

Take time to evaluate the final outcome you want to achieve and then engage in the actions to accomplish it!

Sameul Jackson's Example

Samuel “Mother F’er” Jackson as I know him.

Samuel often is seen as a powerful character actor who possesses the keen edge to cut through the murk and despair of his current scenario and appear on the other side a victor and hero. Hallmarks of Samuel’s action packed adventures include rapid firing machine guns, excessive amounts of bloodshed, the busty female to save, and the occasional exploding head (Sorry Marvin).

For many of us this is not to unlike our own day to day adventures in the work place. As of late I have noted that Samuel is most gaining notoriety for his standardized use of the term “Mother F’er” in many of his action packed adventures. Most recently I will recall that he was tired of a number of Mother F’ing snakes on a certain Mother F’ing airplane.

Who among us cannot really say that they haven’t had the same thoughts and emotions while sitting across from a co-worker in the conference room? “I am tired of this Mother F’er talking about this Mother F’ing issue!” I can hear the tension building along my L3 and L4 vertebrate just thinking of those intense moments of repetitive mantras of corporate direction and revisited goal plans. Again I am pushed in to the realm of near unconsciousness and emulated attention to the point that all I can hear is the familiar “whaaa-waaaaaa whaaaaa waaaa wahhhh” of Charlie Brown’s teacher as he sits in class each day.

And once again I must ponder the question… Why am I here?

All good team members and employees know the answer to this is of course a multifaceted reprisal of the old war cry for victory over one’s competitor while attempting to secure income and glory for one’s personal satisfaction (or to pay the bills and child support).

What would Samuel Jackson do in this instance? Would Samuel sit by and muse at the person delivering the corporate standard power point presentation?

I doubt it!

Samuel Jackson would slam his fist on the table then rise up and announce…

“I am tired of your Mother F’ing presentation and this Mother F’ing meeting. You Mother F’ing people need a Mother F’ing life and to get some Mother F’ing direction here. Now Everyone… Go to your cubes and get your Mother F’ing ass to Mother F’ing work Mother F’ers.”

Maybe I can try that.


Next week.