tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38964378027603001962024-03-05T16:26:10.678-08:00Nick NotesNicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.comBlogger23125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-74355176809210356322010-05-18T09:33:00.000-07:002010-05-18T09:33:57.638-07:00Official Google Blog: Not merely tilting at windmills — investing in them too<a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/not-merely-tilting-at-windmills.html?dbk">Official Google Blog: Not merely tilting at windmills — investing in them too</a>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-52149413399526921992010-04-28T17:09:00.000-07:002010-04-28T17:09:51.744-07:00Current Event BlogsI have been trying to find good blogs to follow and have decided to share what I find with everyone here. Just to give you some ideas on how to find blogs, here are some methods I have tried.<br />
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<b><u>Blog Searching Techniques</u></b><br />
<ul><li>Twitter - I tried looking for things that were of interest to me, such as Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc, and found many people that were posting blogs about current events. I found this was extremely hit or miss...basically random</li>
<li>Google - As always, Google provided fairly good results</li>
<li>Bit.ly - I found an <a href="http://bit.ly/app/search">interesting tool</a> on Bit.ly, which allows you to search twitter feeds which have bit.ly urls in them. The interesting thing about this search, was it showed you how many clicks each of the blogs got on Twitter, so I was able to look for the ones that got the most clicks to find more relevant urls and that seemed to work much better than the twitter search.</li>
</ul><br />
<b><u>Blogs Found</u></b><br />
<ul><li><a href="http://respectedopinions.ning.com">RespectedOpinions.ning.com</a> - A blog about current events as well as alternative energy and sustainable living.</li>
<li><a href="http://bit.ly/9t5jtl">Afghanistan Crossroads</a> - A blog focusing on things going on in Afghanistan. This is a CNN blog so it has a lot of good video and many stories you don't see running on their main site.</li>
<li><a href="http://cleantechnica.com">CleanTechnica.com</a> - Great blog about alternative energy, sustainable living, and green technology. Not a lot of original content, but a great layout and good articles being presented.</li>
</ul>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-32268609371802930932010-04-23T20:56:00.000-07:002010-04-23T21:48:25.743-07:00Affiliate Networks - Easy as 1-2-3In the world of internet marketing there are 2 basic parties to advertising deals.<br />
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<ol><li><b>Publishers</b> - The people who have a website and need advertisements<br />
<li><b>Advertisers</b> - The people who want to display ads for their products on other people's websites<br />
</ol>The way a typical "Affiliate Network" works, is they will work out deals with Advertisers, so that they can publish "Promotional Offers" which will pay the Publishers on their network a percentage of the amount they are getting from the Advertisers. This works out for everyone because <ol><li>The Advertisers don't have to find thousands of little websites to work deals with in order to get their ads out</li>
<li>The Publishers don't have to continuously work at finding new advertisers for their sites</li>
<li>The Affiliate Networks make some money by doing the leg work for both parties</li>
</ol><b>3 Things Publishers should look for in an Affiliate Network</b> <ol><li>The best CPA because the more they get paid per lead, the more they can make on their traffic</li>
<li>Trust - Trust that the Affiliate Network will pay them the money they say they will, and that the Affiliate Network is tracking all of their leads correctly (not accurately tracking leads for the purpose of saving money is called "shaving").</li>
<li>Conversions - Although CPA is important, if the offers on the network don't entice the Publisher's traffic, it's better for them to run ads at a lower CPA depending on the conversion difference.</li>
</ol><b>A few Affiliate Networks I have worked with</b> <ol><li><a target="_blank" href="MarketLeverage.com">MarketLeverage</a> - I trust them, I did a lot of business with them. They always paid on time and they were in contact with me regularly.</li>
<li><a target="_blank" href="Azoogle.com">Azoogle</a> - Only had limited experience with them and never got paid. The amount wasn't a lot, but above my minimum and I never got any response from their client services.</li>
<li><a target="_blank" href="CommissionJunction.com">CommissionJunction</a> - Didn't do much business with them, but they had a lot of offers. Their offers didn't convert well though, and many people have raised trust issues about them.</li>
<li>Google AdWords/AdSense - It's Google!<br />
<ul><li> <a href="http://adwords.google.com">AdWords</a> - This is the Advertiser's Side</li>
<li> <a href="https://www.google.com/adsense">AdSense</a> - This is the Publisher's Side</li>
</ul></li>
</ol>Please feel free to leave comments on this blog and come visit RespectedOpinions.com and RespectedOpinions.Ning.com to learn about social networking.Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-18734262797455883282010-04-13T11:37:00.000-07:002010-04-20T12:28:29.959-07:00Become a News Aggregator in your Social NetworkIn today's world of social networks, portal sites, and personal home pages, there is a WEALTH of news and information. In fact there's almost too much to process coherently. I'm writing this blog to express an idea you may or may not have thought of, and to show you how I've built some tools that can help you realize the importance of being a News Aggregator in your Social Network.<br />
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I have recently made an effort to use and understand social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. I have found many wonderful things about both, and one that I'm particularly interested in, is the way news and information travels through these networks. An unexpected thing happened while I have been conducting this research...I ran out of time to look at news. But what I noticed was that, I was actually more current on things a lot of news I never would have read about when I had time to browse news on my own. This is because there are certain people in all my social networks that post interesting news articles, videos, and pictures. I didn't pay too much attention to them until I launched my new website <a href="http://www.respectedopinions.com/index.php?cid=nnblog">RespectedOpinions</a>.<br />
<br />
So here is my observation. Not only do I get to hear about things I wouldn't have otherwise due to my friends' combined interests being well outside of my own, the quality of articles to surf is usually much better. I find I waste less time reading crappy articles, and get just the best from each category because someone else has done the sifting for me.<br />
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Ok, so what does that mean for you and me. What it means to me, is that we should all try to contribute to this news stream with links pertaining to things we have the most interest, while using the "experts" in other fields to sift through articles in other fields to present to us the best of their field. To me, this is a way for my friends and I to collaborate on gathering news without formally saying that's what we're doing.<br />
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So now that you understand the reason I think these tools are interesting, please visit <a href="http://www.respectedopinions.com/index.php?cid=nnblog">RespectedOpinions.com</a><br />
<br />
There you can track which of your networks value your opinions on each type of subject. For instance, I noticed that my Facebook friends like to hear about Coupons and Politics. People on Twitter seem much more interested in what I have to say about Games and Marketing.<br />
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Try using different types of Promotional URLs like I did to find out about your social network. And BE A NEWS SOURCE FOR YOUR SOCIAL NETWORK. We all benefit from well reviewed links and content.<br />
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<embed wmode="opaque" src="http://static.ning.com/socialnetworkmain/widgets/index/swf/badge.swf?v=201004131104" FlashVars="backgroundColor=0x000000&textColor=0xFFFFFF&config=http%3A%2F%2Frespectedopinions.ning.com%2Fmain%2Fbadge%2FshowPlayerConfig%3Fxg_source%3Dbadge%26size%3Dmedium%26username%3D0q4vby11bubfj" width="206" height="174" bgColor="#000000" scale="noscale" allowScriptAccess="always" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer"> </embed><br /><small><a href="http://respectedopinions.ning.com">Visit <em>RespectedOpinions</em></a></small><br />Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-62729854280016064642010-04-08T15:57:00.000-07:002010-04-08T15:57:20.068-07:00First Blog RecommendationHello everyone,<br />
<br />
It's been a while since I've blogged here, but I'm hoping to pick it back up again. I just dropped by today to tell you about another blogger I found through the UrgentEvoke project. She is working to help use emerging technologies in education and is doing some really great things. I recently found her personal blog and find her views to be well thought out and valuable, so wanted to share the blog with you. You can visit her blog here<br />
<br />
http://ninmah.be/<br />
<br />
You can also check out the blogs she's done on the Evoke network by going here<br />
<br />
http://www.urgentevoke.com/profiles/blog/list?user=1xq3fd3se0bvi<br />
<br />
I hope everyone is having a great Spring, and the weather where you are is better than here in Toronto :)Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-57536872816162985832010-03-27T15:35:00.001-07:002010-03-27T15:36:42.150-07:00Playing by the rules....but which set?First let me say, I grew up in a science household. My father is a Physicist, and my mother a Microbiologist. Growing up around parents that spent their whole lives using the scientific method, I learned to discover the world in a very unique way, which was to experiment and question everything. You will often hear me say "question everything", because that is the single most important thing that I do that is different than %99.9 of the population. People find it annoying at times because I'll even admit, it will take away from a conversation or whatever we're doing because I'll just blurt it out. For instance, when the elevators in my apartment building were acting flaky, while everyone was sitting around asking why they couldn't get the elevators to work, I asked the group of angry residents....what do you suppose would be the most efficient way for the elevators to respond to calls? I was thinking perhaps the poor elevators were just confused, and they just needed someone to straighten out their thinking ;) Well, considering this was after waiting 10 minutes for the broken elevators, most of the crowd was pretty unresponsive, but the longer I thought about it, the more I realized that this was actually a really difficult problem. In fact, I did some research, and there are many ways to design an elevator in an effort to solve this exact problem! In fact, depending on what type of application you're using the elevator for, there are different ways the system can be setup for efficiency<br />
<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elevator#Destination_Control_System">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elevator#Destination_Control_System</a><br />
<br />
Anyways, I've again gone off course, but you get my point, while everyone else was complaining about how easy it must be to fix, and why couldn't they fix it, I asked the REAL question which is WHY IS IT SO HARD TO FIX?<br />
<br />
Similarly, I long ago recognized that rules were more like "suggestions". Here's what I've found:<br />
<br />
1. Some rules have actual consequences, which I would consider REAL rules<br />
2. Some rules have consequences which may not be fair, ethical, or right, and thus might be worked around in some way. These are sometimes the rules I like to break in order to bring this to light (especially if I can have fun proving it :)) To be fair, I have broken rules, then been told why they were there, and felt bad about it....so do try to think about why the rules are there before deciding if they are "good". Some rules are in place to protect others who are not as smart, fast, young, old, etc as you, so try to make sure you're helping to look out for those who may not have all the same advantages as you too.<br />
3. Some rules which are arbitrary, and really can't possibly have any consequences because either the consequence would hurt the enforcer more than the punished, or there is really no way to enforce it.<br />
<br />
So to summarize, I'm suggesting we "break" the rules in order to find the REAL rules because I think this helps innovative people find the envelope (aviation term referring to the maximum stresses an aircraft can withstand, which is why fighter pilots PUSH THE ENVELOPE). If you don't know where the envelope is, you'll either exclude solutions because there are solutions in a space you think doesn't exist, or you'll go flying right past it because you didn't take the time to do the experimentation before (good test pilots also have experience and know about where the envelope should be so start small until you have that experience).Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-43624029282536426422009-10-12T07:15:00.000-07:002009-10-12T07:15:40.873-07:00Blackberry Curve OS UpdateWell, I finally updated my Blackberry OS on my Blackberry 8100 Curve. The upgrade was very easy to do...all I did was open the Blackberry Desktop Manager and plugged in my phone to my computer. The software automatically recommended the update, and I just pressed go. My phone did stop responding after all the software was reinstalled, and I had to do a reset on it, but once it came back on, the update continued by loading all of my data.<br />
<br />
So far I'm loving the updates. What I've noticed so far:<br />
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* Text is easier to read on all the screens due to the font change (seems bold almost all the time)<br />
* OS responds faster in general<br />
* Email features all started working<br />
* Address book seems faster and cleaner interface<br />
* Browser is MUCH improved, with a google search bar, and a more browser like experience<br />
<br />
I'll update this post as I find more things I like/dislike about the new OSNicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-60246716378431940032009-03-03T10:52:00.000-08:002009-03-03T10:52:00.293-08:00Investment Series Part 2<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'>So I have been playing with the virtual portfolio I created myself at the <a href='http://vse.marketwatch.com/Game/Portfolio.aspx?a=hxia2NS72ql/TqFkqYbhsfYcQguFwqKXdc7LyH8yQ44ZhfhOQihPRhxvNaHOvynu&g=WiredOps'>Virtual Stock Exchange</a>, and I have discovered what many people have told me in the past. I have often been told, "It's not just seeing the trends, it's executing a strategy that will make you the most money." So what this means is, you could see a trend developing, but unless you pull the trigger and buy when the stock is at it's lowest, and sell when it's at it's highest, you are leaving money on the table. Here is at least 1 strategy I have come across and am testing which allows for some tolerance in terms of trying to pinpoint a top and bottom of a stock. Rather than trying to wait for the absolute bottom price of a stock, you should try to identify a good price for the stock based on research, and then wait for that price to hit. This price should not be your predicted bottom to the stock price, but rather just a price which you feel is good value for the stock. Once the stock hits that price, buy SLOWLY, as the stock continues to fall. That way you are continuing to build your position at more and more ideal prices. And then do the same type of thing when you're selling on the way up. Once you have done the research, set a price you want to start selling at, and sell in increments until you've either sold your entire position, or the stock has started back down, in which case you again look to see if it hits a price that you can build your position up again (this is presuming you've done your homework and this is a stock worth owning, if not just look for an exit price even if you have to lose money). Stay tuned to this blog to find out why you should never "ride it out" with a declining stock.<br/><br/><div class='zemanta-pixie'><img src='http://img.zemanta.com/pixy.gif?x-id=dfd50cc2-7e97-4eb2-b70a-bfaf93783185' class='zemanta-pixie-img'/></div></div>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-61242690082295810062009-02-25T09:27:00.000-08:002009-02-25T09:27:00.522-08:00Learning Stocks Part 1<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'>I have begun my "official" quest to become a better investor, and to create tool that will help me with this endevour. I have also adopted the philosophy of sharing information, and using information shared by others will benefit everyone in the long run. With that in mind I have put together a few resources that everyone is free to use and contribute to. The first one is a wiki for anything stock related. I started it out listing all of the stock symbols I've been hearing about or am invested in. If you take a look, there are some facts about the company, and any notes I thought were important. If we all share notes, we're much more likely to be educated about a stock when an opportunity arises. So far, what I have learned is that there is simply too much information, data, and opinions out there about stocks to absorb alone. So this wiki is something I think will help everyone that uses it digest more information and cut through to the important tidbits we can all pick up from everywhere. So here's the link to the wiki.<br/><br/><a href='http://1337code.com/stocks'>Stocks Wiki</a><br/><br/>The second thing I did was to see if there were sites that I could use to test my theories on picking stocks. I found a site that allows you to setup a virtual portfolio, and even have contests to see how much money everyone makes in a set time period. I set up such a contest and invite everyone to join. The link to see the virtual stock echange I setup is here, and it only asks for email and a password to get started I believe, so try it out.<br/><br/><a href='http://vse.marketwatch.com/Game/StartViewGame.aspx?id=WiredOps'>Virtual Stock Exchange</a><br/><br/>That's it for now, I am looking into a few other sites and will write about my first stock screening idea which I am currently testing at the virtual stock exchange in my next post. Please feel free to comment about the resources and/or give me suggestions on other tools that might be helpful in making money and learning about the stock market.<br/><br/><div class='zemanta-pixie'><img src='http://img.zemanta.com/pixy.gif?x-id=3d40d62e-fb4a-4248-8739-42b443a67db1' class='zemanta-pixie-img'/></div></div>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-26421199197952913172009-02-19T11:24:00.000-08:002009-02-19T11:24:00.804-08:00Investment Education Series<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'>To all my loyal readers, I will be documenting my research into the stock market on my blog so that other new investors can learn along with me. I have been investing in the stock market for about 3 years now, mostly with my IRA, and have a few things figured out, but am interested in documenting all of my ideas and research, which I am currently doing on http://www.1337code.com/stocks. However, I thought it would be nice to document the way I got to all of the conclusions I put up on that site, so follow along, and we can learn to make some money on stocks together.<br/><br/>P.S. Sunny Nair is also contributing to http://1337code.com/stocks, and everyone is encouraged to add more to the wiki. The more information we gather, the more useful the site will be for everyone!<br/><br/><div class='zemanta-pixie'><img src='http://img.zemanta.com/pixy.gif?x-id=d73cdfef-7bab-4c9d-bc89-86d92d96f865' class='zemanta-pixie-img'/></div></div>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-32295514417246752102009-02-19T11:12:00.000-08:002009-02-19T11:19:28.572-08:00Firefox woesSo I was reading this article today, which told of Firefox's monumental task of trying to gain marketshare from Microsoft's Internet Explorer, which comes pre-installed on Windows computers (<a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10167433-16.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5">Aritcle Here</a>). An interesting problem was brought up by the founder of Firefox, in which she says Firefox must convince users to make a choice to go with Firefox over and over, every time a user gets a new computer. It was an interesting problem, but when I thought, ok, what if Microsoft stopped packaging IE with Windows....and a funny problem arises. While IE is forcing people to use IE when they get a new computer, it's acutally this very piece of software which allows users to "choose" Firefox. If IE didn't come with Windows, how would Firefox get users to install their software? I agree there is an advantage being given to IE due to the packaging with Windows, but you have to give Microsoft some credit. If this weren't the case, I wonder how much longer it would have taken for the internet to have gotten to the mass usage we see today. If a consumer had to buy or FTP a browser, just think of how much that would have slowed down internet usage adoption. Anyways, I just thought it was a funny problem, in that without IE, it would have been difficult for Firefox to be downloaded to being with, yet they are complaining about the monopoly Microsoft has created. Perhaps I'm missing something else too....how is Firefox making money? Are they a non-profit? If so, why do they care about the "Monopoly" on browsers. For that matter, how are ANY companies making money on browsers?Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-72278303610500461002009-01-29T08:38:00.001-08:002009-01-29T08:38:46.577-08:00ScribeFire<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'>I'm making this blog post from a new FireFox add-on called ScribeFire. It took me less than 5 minutes to install and setup. Let's test a few things like...<br/><br/>Including an image/picture on the page from my computer...<br/><br/><img src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivlTmxHHCm_INoKuqFVo4RZXtnKNz2IEqGqkUfrk2WJEPPJYwrQjnjdbcv9dJB7xdYtI8d-iKcmnu33et_13oR6oC6BsNix0WE4fMalhp2y7s0FFO6oEnH_o03ufQSdhyaSIJPoqHPEOg/?imgmax=800' style='max-width: 800px;'/><br/><br/>How about from the web (which many blogging servers do not let you do...so this may actual upload this to the server, let's see).<br/><br/><img src='http://www.lostartofblogging.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/hackers.JPG' style='max-width: 800px;'/><br/><br/>Wow, let's see how it comes out because this was SUPER easy to use.<br/><br/><br/><br/></div>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-53194814086919157592009-01-28T11:58:00.000-08:002009-01-28T12:04:46.890-08:00Online Political News SourcesI'm always looking for more reputable news sources, and understanding the slant of each resource is also very important to me. So, when I came across this link today, I figured I would share it with all of you that are also interested in getting a complete view of the political issues that we face today.<br /><br /><a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10151227-2.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5">List of political news sites here</a> - They are broken down into liberal, conservative, and non-partisan.<br /><br /><br />Please post your thoughts or comments about any of these sources here...Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-34650387109588766752009-01-22T10:02:00.000-08:002009-01-22T10:04:34.455-08:00Amazing Hip Hop ViolinistI found this video about a year ago, and am still blown away every time I see it. This kid has such an amazing and original sound (even though the whole thing is him sampling different hip hop songs hehe). Check it out, it really inspires me every time I see it:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36Xt-XeWnHM">Watch The Video Here</a><br /><br />It's Amazing!Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-33128732461464250352008-12-11T14:08:00.000-08:002008-12-11T14:09:41.074-08:00Alternative EnergyRecently I've been reading about a lot of alternative energy sources. I read about the new tidal generators, which use buoys in the ocean, which have pistons in them that are driven by waves. I also just read this article:<br /><br />http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/11/piezoelectrics-installed-in-tokyo-railway-station-floors-generat/<br /><br />It talks about generators in the floor which generate electricity due to vibrations in the floor I believe. These examples got me to thinking...what other places do we see an up and down motion which we could harness for electricity? My first thought was that of elevators. Obviously you need energy to get the elevator to go up, but what about when it's coming down? It seems to me like you would be able to harness the force of gravity to create some electricity. I could see multiple ways to do this...The most straight forward being to attach a rope to the elevator car, and have the motion of the car either turn a wheel, or move a piston up and down. Along with this type of generator, I was thinking about another alternative energy story I saw about cars that run on compressed air. You could use the motion of the elevator to compress air for use in generating more energy later (in other words, use the elevator as a huge pump). I don't think any of these are breakthrough ideas, but with the issue of alternative energy popping up everywhere, it's got me thinking about ways I could make a difference. Take this as the first installment of a series of Alternative Energy posts I intend to make.<br /><br />Here's a picture of the generator installed in the UK dance floor, as well as the link to the article:<br /><br />http://www.geek.com/articles/news/uk-club-gets-dance-floor-that-creates-electricity-20080718/<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgityOY1ikeKV0pK0O6njt1nLmH0WOZxs3ONBYkEqSTkVfHj_QtviZflujRuQ_BSUNCAfDk4tGDnfX2J94pvSUahs2-Cj_hML_P_fqAU9ZR9Nbo4cFrofTOrS-l0CNLpVTKrbiJZTZwnMo/s1600-h/dancefloor-power-generator-440-x-354.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 322px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgityOY1ikeKV0pK0O6njt1nLmH0WOZxs3ONBYkEqSTkVfHj_QtviZflujRuQ_BSUNCAfDk4tGDnfX2J94pvSUahs2-Cj_hML_P_fqAU9ZR9Nbo4cFrofTOrS-l0CNLpVTKrbiJZTZwnMo/s400/dancefloor-power-generator-440-x-354.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5278658091349854274" border="0" /></a>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-90088109931098615772008-11-20T08:47:00.000-08:002008-11-20T08:53:27.961-08:00UAW finally bringing down American AutomakersIt amazes me that the American auto industry can have the nerve to ask taxpayers to bail them out of the crisis that they have created for themselves. For years people have been saying that the UAW would bring Detroit to it's demise, and here it is...but rather then push back on the union, the auto makers think that the taxpayers should enable this insanity to continue. Not only has the UAW made it impossible to compete with the Japanese or Koreans, but leadership has been so short-sited (even with all the campaigning people like Gore have done to educate), that they didn't see this gas crisis coming, continuing to spend billions of R&D money developing the next bigger badder SUV. Now competitors that have spent their R&D money figuring out how to make more fuel efficient motors, and hybrid and alternative fuel vehicles are going to continue pummeling the American automakers. If this were a bank the automakers were presenting their case to, they bank would laugh at them, there's no way a bank would risk their money in companies run so poorly, with such an obvious competitive disadvantage. If we do give these companies any money, there had better be some terms regarding management reform and a new UAW agreement.Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-64590451633938899862008-09-29T14:58:00.000-07:002008-09-29T15:01:11.429-07:00Coming out of retirement....I recently joined a flag football team to try to get some exercise and to quite all the fans asking for my return to the gridiron. Our first game is Saturday, and I expect there will be many NFL scouts waiting to see me make my fateful return back to Football. Coming off an injury after our first practice (a little turf toe from breaking in new cleats), I expect to be fully recovered and ready to put up some points! So come out and cheer us on this weekend!Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-15864751886127616482008-09-16T11:49:00.000-07:002008-09-16T11:52:51.012-07:00Houston/Galveston Picures of Ike AftermathI found these pictures of Galveston/Houston after Hurricane Ike and wanted to share with everyone that hasn't seen it. It's humbling to say the least.<br /><br />http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/09/the_short_but_eventful_life_of.html<br /><br />Here's one that gave me a perpective on what's going on out there<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://cache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/ike_09_15/ike8.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px;" src="http://cache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/ike_09_15/ike8.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-44579673160868261502008-09-16T10:17:00.000-07:002008-09-16T10:21:34.778-07:00NASA Patents Auctioned Back To PublicToday I read an interesting article on Techdirt describing the way Ocean Tomo is auctioning off patents created by NASA. In the article, the author poses the question, didn't tax payers pay for these patents to be created? And now the public will not only not get free access to it now, but will also eventually help some other company make money because they will own the patent that we helped pay for. Personally, I don't understand how this is being allowed...I understand the need for patents within our high tech arms of the government, but I think once the patent is eligible for use by the public, it should be exactly that, eligible for use by the public, not just the commercial players willing to pay for the patent. What do you all think?<br /><br />Here is the link to the original story:<br /><br />http://techdirt.com/articles/20080915/1859022278.shtmlNicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-79194212981639478482008-08-14T12:04:00.001-07:002008-08-14T12:17:44.443-07:00Chinese Gymanst...Child's PlayHow old is she?????<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxpnD9lyYc5NBTL-a6fT0wKhkf8sT1j8nEV3wxA_n-Ypz0DWX4BnvopxlMTVdj7rD9thV1QAG-9uyH49zRxeen79gJYDZFUOv8ZXxtFx8th5WoSVYoz5aDn4WWPjFYq8Y-gSxx0aq7Vf0/s1600-h/linlin.rosato.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxpnD9lyYc5NBTL-a6fT0wKhkf8sT1j8nEV3wxA_n-Ypz0DWX4BnvopxlMTVdj7rD9thV1QAG-9uyH49zRxeen79gJYDZFUOv8ZXxtFx8th5WoSVYoz5aDn4WWPjFYq8Y-gSxx0aq7Vf0/s400/linlin.rosato.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5234454653515141346" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br />So I have been reading a lot about how the Chinese Women's Gymnastics Team that took home the gold the other day might have underage members on it. <a href="http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/olympics/2008/writers/em_swift/08/14/underage.olympians/index.html?eref=si_topstories">Here's an example</a> of one of these stories. I think it's hilarious that we are now complaining that the competitors are TOO YOUNG! Seriously, if a little girl or a little boy can beat you in an Olympic sport, don't you deserve to lose? It's not like this is a limbo contest, or some type of game where the entire competition is just about how low you can go, or how small you can get, there are all types of acrobatics and complicated skills involved. For a little girl to master these skills and beat other world class (adult) athletes is amazing.<br /><br />Ok, so aside from my personal views that an adult should not complain about getting beat by a child, I would be interested to know why the 16 year old age limit was put into place to begin with. I would venture to say it has more to do with things like safety then fairness. It seems hard to believe that they would enforce such a rule because they are afraid all of the kids are going to beat the other athletes...Therefore if their parents and their country were ok with them competing, it seems like it should be their prerogative. And finally, if there are any 14 year olds in America or any other country that could do what these girls can do, maybe those countries should have sent those athletes as well.....BUT the other countries DON'T HAVE SUPER TALENTED 14 YEARL OLD GYMNASTICS PHENOMS, which is why they are so bitter.<br /><br />In conclusion, stop crying about little girls kicking your butt in front of the whole world, and just move on with your lives. They were better then us, I don't care how old they were!Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-41297915283274124762008-08-07T09:35:00.000-07:002008-08-07T09:40:09.769-07:00PDA Turned Wifi TouchpadYesterday I found a really cool app called Stylish for the Windows Mobile platform, which is what my HP iPaq HX 4700 runs. It's a great little application that turns your whole PDA into a touchpad that connects to your computer via Wifi, so you can connect to any computer on your network, and you get the range of your Wifi network. It works great! And now I use it as a remote contorl for my computer that I have hooked up to my TV for watching on Demand TV like Lost, Heroes, My name is Earl, and lots of other TV shows from ABC.com, Fox.com, and NBC.com.<br /><br />Here's the link to the Stylish app: http://www.handango.com/PlatformProductDetail.jsp?siteId=1&platformId=2&N=96806&productId=128136<br /><br /><br />Oh, I almost forgot, you can use it as a digital whiteboard too!Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-53062785128705892122008-08-06T09:52:00.001-07:002008-08-06T10:04:06.366-07:00Jocelyn's Wedding<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHa5GVvb7D36jd9_Lcg-lTG9JikxCZ_0kYzvFY09cE92TJTtB507K_lQkViVtvUZkO8L_iEferCVKuu6helT78cUS0nmo8gvhtHfxZmcBC3v0puSAneYutbj4ZNRkugDBg0Q-18gQ-4Y4/s1600-h/sunset_beach.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHa5GVvb7D36jd9_Lcg-lTG9JikxCZ_0kYzvFY09cE92TJTtB507K_lQkViVtvUZkO8L_iEferCVKuu6helT78cUS0nmo8gvhtHfxZmcBC3v0puSAneYutbj4ZNRkugDBg0Q-18gQ-4Y4/s400/sunset_beach.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5231450548313397138" border="0" /></a>Sunset Beach - Where the wedding was. The picture was taken from the back yard of the beach house the wedding party was staying at.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-gUu1-lH7oE4ZuRj_Njh14-3RWoYgSJzVJvPrbEqb42vG8oGOx0Te2XKU9XGo3l1a01fEbr-YgUycUh-yvqvopZN6Sq4bb2nCpOZv5EEYM0_g_ZZZLkMDzcVDDYD3lABKxLJbnjukxzY/s1600-h/jocelyn_coming_down_stairs.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-gUu1-lH7oE4ZuRj_Njh14-3RWoYgSJzVJvPrbEqb42vG8oGOx0Te2XKU9XGo3l1a01fEbr-YgUycUh-yvqvopZN6Sq4bb2nCpOZv5EEYM0_g_ZZZLkMDzcVDDYD3lABKxLJbnjukxzY/s400/jocelyn_coming_down_stairs.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5231451188472803122" border="0" /></a>Jocelyn making her way from the back yard down to the beach during the ceremony.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3FTEJvbj_ucKPOmrEeq4h1b5c1WSUHtwIlTEh0zpWVne59wTE6NZ3gfwMujUbyKaWer31pQ6YrGsSwX1VcaSKcWy8IoMytkB6Ge5AdF1H9fceKV6BJF_4N549ovwnHjp_fV7OGifiqGQ/s1600-h/ceremony.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3FTEJvbj_ucKPOmrEeq4h1b5c1WSUHtwIlTEh0zpWVne59wTE6NZ3gfwMujUbyKaWer31pQ6YrGsSwX1VcaSKcWy8IoMytkB6Ge5AdF1H9fceKV6BJF_4N549ovwnHjp_fV7OGifiqGQ/s400/ceremony.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5231451512958531378" border="0" /></a>A picture of the ceremony.Nicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3896437802760300196.post-77847379199934384932008-08-06T09:49:00.000-07:002008-08-06T09:51:57.743-07:00My new blogHey everyone,<br /><br />Just starting to explore this blog craze that everyone has been talking about. I've been thinking about starting one on a few subjects, but this will be my personal musings just about anything. Perhaps later I will create a blog about specific subjects. For now I'm just looking to have fun with this and keep people up to date on what I'm up to. I'll try my best to keep this up to date, and comments are welcome.<br /><br />Thanks for coming by,<br />NickNicholas Nagaohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14258376324042297915noreply@blogger.com0