links for 2009-08-15

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links for 2009-08-13

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Coldwell Banker Triad Launches Mobile Site

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Coldwell Banker Triad Realtors has launched a mobile version of their listings so that house hunters can use their Blackberries, iPhones, etc. to look up listings.  Not sure how many local realtors have done this, but I think if they haven't then they'll need to get on the stick pretty quickly.  I think the days of carrying around listing printouts are numbered.

Anyone know if ListingBook has a mobile version?

A Little Good News for Forsyth County

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According to this report Forsyth County saw the largest increase (5.9%) in visitor spending in 2008 of the large tourist destinations in North Carolina. And here are some interesting stats:

Visitor expenditures directly generated 190,500 jobs and nearly $4.2 billion in payroll income within North Carolina in 2008. Payroll increased 3.9 percent from 2007. Visitor spending in the state also directly generated close to $2.7 billion in tax revenue for federal, state and local governments in 2008, up 3.6 percent from 2007…

Mecklenburg County received more than $3.6 billion in domestic travelers' expenditures to lead all 100 of North Carolina's counties. Wake County ranked second with more than $1.5 billion, followed by Guilford County with close to $1.1 billion.

links for 2009-08-11

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Thomas Jefferson on Ideas

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I'm constantly amazed at some of the thinking that is revealed in quotes from the Founding Fathers.  This one from Thomas Jefferson is astounding to me in its timelessness (from a 15 year old essay in Wired.  h/t to Helene for the lead.)

"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property." – Thomas Jefferson

On Facebook

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I'm finding the Facebook thing more and more interesting.  Not Facebook itself, but the Facebook thing. There are several reasons for this, not the least of which is that it's the first tech related thing that my kids use regularly and have kept using even after "old people" started using it in droves.  Of course the fact that old people use it in droves also makes it interesting.

Personally I love Facebook because it's allowed me to reconnect with all kinds of people that I actually want to reconnect with and haven't seen in real life in decades.  Literally.  Of course there have been a few who have contacted me who I wish would have stayed un-reconnected but that's a very small minority.  My wife, who is much more cautious than I am, has resisted the Facebook light because she fears it will be a giant time suck.  She's right of course, but in my mind that's no reason to stay away.  Productivity is way over rated.

And of course the reason people leave Facebook is equally fascinating to me as the reasons that people use it.  Being stalked by a wacko from the gym?  By all means kill your Facebook account.  Actually, I think Fec has come up with the single best reason I've seen for killing a Facebook account:

I killed my Facebook account when I found all my old girlfriends had become lesbians, not that there’s anything wrong with that

links for 2009-08-10

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  • Recession pummels South's miracle' economy | csmonitor.com
    From the article: "Growing income inequality 'is a national story, but the South may show it most dramatically because they pushed the low-wage strategy most successfully,' says Joseph Persky, an economist at the University of Illinois in Chicago, who has studied the economy of the South. He believes the region’s low-wage, anti-union model won’t survive as the economy moves away from traditional manufacturing industries. '[The South] can’t compete with Mexico, let alone China.'

    and

    "'Conservatives maintain their faith in the Southern model. The South’s economy may be struggling now, but in the long-term, it is more likely to be successful,' says Patrick Fleenor, chief economist at the conservative Tax Foundation in Washington.

    'The way to fix this economy is to invest in human capital and encourage people to invest in themselves. The state can’t fix the wage gap through income transfers,' he says.'"

    (tags: economics south)

  • The Seventh Sense: Making the Rounds

    A rebuttal of the "government can't do anything right" argument.

    (tags: healthcare government)

  • NY Times: Is Obama Punking Us?

    Man, this is a good piece. Best explanation I've seen for the current American cynicism and how Obama might be blowing it. From the column: "It’s in this context that Obama can’t afford a defeat on health care. A bill will pass in a Democrat-controlled Congress. What matters is what’s in it. The final result will be a CAT scan of those powerful Washington interests he campaigned against, revealing which have been removed from the body politic (or at least reduced) and which continue to metastasize. The Wall Street regulatory reform package Obama pushes through, or doesn’t, may render even more of a verdict on his success in changing the system he sought the White House to reform." h/t to Ed Cone for the link.

    (tags: healthcare politics cynicism)

  • Questionable Use of Nazi in Healthcare Debate

    Great post by a rabbi in Greensboro about the need for civility in the healthcare debate, and the nasty effect of using the terms "nazi" and "national socialism" in comparison to the healthcare plans being proposed by the Democrats.

    (tags: healthcare politics)

  • Reb Fred says…: The Health Care Debate and the Usage of Nazi Imagery and Propaganda
    (tags: ping.fm)

  • Otterblog: NBTF Coverage

    Winston-Salem Journal's editor writes about criticism the paper has received as a result of its coverage of the National Black Theater Festival. Basically readers are complaining that the paper is too "black." Ken does a nice job of addressing the issue.

    (tags: winston-salem newspaper media)

  • Seventh Sense: Sarah "Quit Making Things Up And Leave My Son Alone" Palin Makes Things Up, Using Her Son As An Example

    Sarah Palin takes the same passage from the House healthcare bill that Rep. Foxx got in trouble for misrepresenting as a way for the government to kill the elderly and adds her own level of misinterpretation.

    (tags: politics healthcare)

  • BOOKMARKS Book Festival

    Winston-Salem's Bookmark book festival is being held downtown in the arts district this year after being held at Bethabara Park for the last few years. Date is September 12, 2009 and time is 9:30 to 5:00.

    (tags: books winston-salem)

Why Not a National White Theatre Festival?

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This past week Winston-Salem hosted what has become a very prominent arts festival, the National Black Theatre Festival.  It's a big deal and it's a heck of a boost to the city, and as you'd expect the Winston-Salem Journal has given it significant coverage.  Also not surprising is the feedback that the Journal's editor has gotten.  In a couple of words it's that the paper is "too black."  In his blog post about the issue Ken does the best job of explaining why there's not a "National White Theatre Festival":

One of the issues is of course terminology, its the National BLACK Theatre Festival. And so one caller asked when we were going to cover the National WHITE Theatre Festival and wouldn’t people be up in arms if such an event existed. But of course, such events exist. They’re just not labeled as such. And we do cover them. The labeling along racial and ethnic lines is part of minority groups—racial, ethnic, religious—banding together to tell the majority that they exist. Majority groups don’t have to label. They’re implied.

I think he's right, but I'll add my own two cents.  I don't think there's a need for a national "white" anything, but the day is approaching when whites will no longer be the majority in America.  When that happens and when someone decides that there's a need for a National White Theatre Festival I hope that the same acceptance applies.