...And I start to complain that there's no rain

Google recently announced they are shutting down some of their service offerings. This move is at least partially driven by reducing costs and focusing engineering efforts on more popular services.

I found this all interesting for a few reasons. First, while at least one of those services, Google Notebook, was flagged as unpopular, I personally knew someone who used it quite a bit. Second, it brought to light something which was always dangling out there with these new "Cloud Computing" services.

It's all the rage right now to utilize these services, and move as much as possible to the "cloud" model. Applications as services, delivered through the web, is one of the current flavors of the month. In many ways it's very appealing, and I admit, I drink from the faucet freely. I have signed up for countless numbers of these sites and services, and many from Google in particular are now indispensable in my daily routine. They are easily accessible from any computer and possibly more important - consistent. They can be updated immediately and everyone simultaneously receives the new upgrade.

However, that last point is exactly the looming underbelly of all of this. When a vendor no longer finds it worthwhile or profitable to maintain a service, it disappears. It doesn't just go end of life, it doesn't just stop receiving technical support, it ceases to exist entirely. {Note - in this case it appears that the service won't disappear entirely immediately. There are plans to leave it simply unmaintained for a while. I'd guess eventually it will cease completely though.}

This is a substantial change from nearly any paradigm of the past. If you bought (or received for free) a service or product, you continued to have it. Unless it was a consumable, even if the company no longer made the product or stopped supporting it, you could continue using it as it was. Not so any longer.

Cloud computing on the web isn't the first to have this issue, other "connected" services had this type of potential gotcha as well. Certain Satellite dish receivers and other boxes that receive television guide data have bumped into this issue in the past also. It is just becoming much more prevalent and open to a larger potential user base now via the web.

With most of these services of course, this basically falls under the "get what you pay for" category. However, I would use this as a reason to be very wary of cloud computing services that want to start charging for service. It should also serve as a reminder to keep all data backed up in an offline format as well - unless of course you want to be the next JournalSpace.

As for Google Notebook, it appears some services are stepping up to try to switch existing users. Hopefully more will follow suit. Lifehacker has offered several suggestions for those feeling abandoned by this service being discontinued.

Get the Lead Out

Why does it seem whenever the US Government tries to "look out for our well-being", it nearly always ends up doing the opposite? I'd like to think I'm making too generalized of a statement, but it really does seem to be the case.

The current incarnation of this is a law that will go into effect on February 10th of this year regulating the amount of lead in products for children. "How can limiting lead be a bad thing," one might ask. It seems recently that every toy shipped here from China has later been recalled due to lead, so this seems like a good plan. It's "for the good of the children" after all.

Except there were already lead restrictions on kids toys in place BEFORE these crappy items started rolling in from China. Based on that, I argue it will do nothing to change what type of products are cheaply made with potentially dangerous chemicals overseas, by large companies looking to "protect shareholder value."

Now - here's why I'm angry about this. The new law says that all children's products (toys, jewelry, etc.) must contain 600 ppm or less of lead. In August, that will drop to 300 ppm. If this fact can't be certified, these products are not allowed to be sold.

That certification part is the rub. Certification costs about $150, and must be done for each unique item. That's cost-prohibitive for many small, local businesses making handmade products in the U.S. [Note - the article linked mentions that second-hand stores will be hurt, there is now in-fact an exemption for them].

This of course is where it hits home for me. My wife has a line of jewelry that she designs, makes, and sells. One of her lines is children's jewelry. After Feb. 10th, she would have to get certification for each and every one of those items at $150 apiece. Not going to happen. Instead, that line will cease to be sellable on her website. Poof. Gone.

So - what will be the net effect. Fewer small businesses in the U.S. making handmade jewelry (and other products), and likely then even more of it being made in large factories in China instead. Does anyone think that is a good trade off? Were we worried the mom's working at home on a side income were killing off the kids of this country with lead poisoning? Were we wanting to run to China to keep our products safe?

I sure as hell am not. A few good places to go do more about this are http://cpsia-central.ning.com/, and http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/RepealCPSIA/. The usual letter writing, phone calls, and emails to elected officials are worthwhile as well.

Quick and to the point

This is sports-related, and it's going to be extremely short.

Now that Florida has won the BCS "championship game", many people are going to be calling them the national champions for college football. I beg to differ. The BCS can go suck it.

Here is a fantastic article that I found on ESPN that sums up my feelings for this bowl season better than I possibly could.

Screw it - I just want to watch the Hawks pummel the Cocks again.

Albums of 2008

Ryan nudged me to say that it was time to post my favorite albums of the last year. I actually had this done in time for the New Year, but never posted. So here it is now. As with him, I bought almost no physical CD's in the past year. In fact, the ACDC (no other choice) and Waylon CD's on this list are the only ones I bought all year. Amazon is now my drink of choice over iTunes, but they are both where I get 99% of my purchased music.

Also of interest - this year my free vs. purchased ratio was far in favor of free. I think that is the first year for that.

These are in no particular order, they were simply the 5 albums that I own and found to be the most interesting of 2008.

1. AC/DC - Black Ice
Surprisingly, as AC/DC is one of my absolute favorite bands of all time (XM channel 53 is really the only XM channel I need), I didn't buy this CD right away. Partially because I could only get it at WalMart or ACDC.com (yeah - I got it from the latter). Partially because I wasn't sure how good it would be given their last effort. I'm now mad at myself for waiting. This is the best stuff since Razor's Edge, if not Back in Black. As good of hard rock and blues as there has ever been.

2. Waylon Jennings & The 357's - Waylon Forever (The Final Recordings)
Waylon sends us some tunes from the great beyond, courtesy of Shooter. This was an effort of Shooter's nearly 10 years in the making. In the end, we get an eerie reminder of Waylon's greatness as he re-imagines stripped-down versions of some of his great songs. A fantastic original collaboration with Shooter is included as well.

3. Girl Talk - Feed the Animals
I don't think this needs any more accolades, although it deserves them all. There's a reason this is overlapped with Ryan's list. I know I said these weren't in a particular order, but this album takes #1 for this year hands down. The most original and incredible work I have come across in years - possibly ever.

4. Jamey Johnson - That Lonesome Song
I originally got a sampler song from this for free, and then my wife told me about another on the radio. I bought the whole album, and was amazed at how good it was in its entirety, especially for a freshman effort. A great new country voice I hope to hear continue.

5. Various Artists - Music from the Motion Picture 21
This CD got a ton of play this year. It has an assortment of great songs and acts. The LCD Soundsystem track was good, as always. More importantly, this album introduced me to MGMT, who I had somehow managed to not stumble upon. Correcting that mistake makes this album worthwhile by itself.