Posted in economy, technology, tagged Alan Blinder, American Dream, applicant, applicant tracking, apply, apply for a job, automated resume screeners, automation, biased technical change, bifurcation, body shops, buisiness, career ladder, cheaper, cloud computing, consumer demand, contingent labor, contractors, corporate, destruction, digital, double dip recession, economist, economy, education, efficiency, electronic, eliminate, fallacies, fewer, free trade, gross job loss, hiring, human resources, Internet, IT, job retraining, job seeker, jobs, just in time staffing, labor, machines, offshoring, on demand, outsourcing, overseas, plan, polarization, policy, prosperity, rebound, rebuild, recruiters, restore, resume, return to work, self-serve, skills, social networking, structural unemployment, temp work, the great restructuring, Third World, threatens, underemployed, unemployed, voters, workers, workforce on August 29, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
It’s a presidential election year and by all counts the race is close. There is no question the post-recession recovery has been anemic at best. To call it a recovery is a stretch and the threat of a double-dip recession lingers. Whether anyone can really turn this lackluster economy around is anyone’s guess. Talk of the unsustainable $16T deficits looms large but specifics on job creation remain few.
It’s not just abstract conversation for the nation’s unemployed and underemployed.
Posted in technology, tagged ABC, AccuWeather, Acu-Rite, Ambient Weather, Android, apps, barometric trend, blank, blank screen, broadcast, burned, cable, call, Cheney Instruments, company, compare, complaints, consumer, consumer confidence, consumer fatigue, contact, customer, customer service, customers, data, demand, desktop, device, disapointment, discontinued, display, disposable gadget, e-waste, executives, failure, Flash Forward, forecast icon, gadget, Garmin, gizmo, GPS, GPS weather, home weather station, Internet, iPhone, La Crosse Technology, landfills, lineup, MagicJack, media, method, MSN Direct, new season, news, no longer works, not as reliable, Oregon Scientific, outage, POTS, press release, products, publicity, radio signal, radio-controlled, reason, recommendation, sensor, service, smartphone, solution, stock, V, VoIP, Weather Direct, weather forecast, weather service, weather stations, write on January 3, 2012 | 8 Comments »
I remember it well: standing in the Sharper Image store debating between a three-day Bushnell wireless weather forecaster featuring AccuWeather forecasts and an Oregon Scientific model alongside it that offered more detailed information from a competing service provider, MSN Direct. Both weather stations did something unique: They didn’t require owners to hook up outdoor sensors that generate fickle forecast icons based purely on barometric pressure as opposed to a bona fide regional weather forecast. These weather forecast alternatives, unlike the vast majority of weather gadgets on the market, receive a radio signal that automatically displays forecast data from a genuine weather service.
For a weather junkie or just about anyone who doesn’t want to watch several minutes of TV, boot up a computer or drain a battery on a smartphone merely to check the weather, having weather alerts, pollen counts, humidity and UV Index information at a single glance at no cost beyond that of the device itself seems almost too good to be true. And, in hindsight, it was too good to be true. For those of us who chose wrong, the convenience was not to last. MSN Direct, the service provider for Oregon Scientific-branded weather units, powered down its US and Canadian network of FM radio transmitters on January 1, 2012. And yet, weather watchers were not the only ones to lose. MSN Direct broadcast a variety of data including traffic information, gasoline prices, Doppler weather maps, news, stocks, local events, movie listings to a variety of devices, all of which began with the debut of Microsoft’s novel “Spot” wristwatch in 2004.
Posted in economy, first person, health, tagged 2010, 2015, additive, adverse, agency, agriculture, anthropogenic, Apidae, approval, asthma, autism, autoimmune, babies, bathroom cleaners, Bayer, bee, beekeepers, biomagnification, biomarkers, biomonitoring, blame, Bloomberg, butterfly effect, buyer, cancer, carcinogen, care, chemical, chemistry, children, choice, choices, cleaners, coating, colonies, colony collapse disorder, commercial, companies, consequences, consumption, control act, cooking, cookware, cord blood, corporate interests, court, crops, cumulative, damage, dangerous, dangers of, date, death, decimate, decline, demand, die-off, disease, DNA, DuPont, dying, effects, empower, empowerment, enlightened consumer, environmental, EPA, epidemic, epigenetics, evolved, famine, farming, fate, fertilize, food, food chain, fungus, future, genes, genetic code, GMO, grandchildren, groups, harm, harvest, have our backs, health, hives, homologue, honeybees, hunger, illness, immune system, impact, industrial, ingredient, inherited, injunction, insect, institute, Internet, judge, lawmakers, learning disabilities, legislature, look in the mirror, lost headline, magnifier, market, marketplace, media, mice, mirror, mite, modern, modified, Movento, mutate, national, new year, New York, newborns, nonstick, numbers, nutrition, packaging, pans, parasite, pest, pesticides, PFOA, phase out, pocketbook, policy, pollen, pollinators, population, precautionary principle, profile, profitable, protection, public health, public interest, rationalize, reaction, reduction, reflection, regulators, represent, reproduction, research, retailers, risk, risk factor, ruling, safety, science, Scotchguard, self interest, serve, shopper, shrinking, sick, smart consumer, Spirotetramat, stain repellents, Stainmaster, stay, stewardship program, stock, stores, study, substances, take charge, Teflon, tipping point, toxic, traits, trigger, trouble, tumor, voluntary, voting with our wallets, weeds, welfare, withdraw, working group, zero on January 6, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Remember that story a few years back about the mysterious honeybee affliction known as Colony Collapse Disorder? It didn’t remain in the headlines for long but it should have: Honeybees pollinate up to 1/3 of the world’s crops. Lose them and we lose a great deal of human civilization to malnutrition.
I was reminded of this sad phenomena over the holidays when, from city to city, county to county, I kept stepping over dead and dying honeybees. Not just one, but several. Not merely one week, but several weeks in a row. Three years earlier — and what first brought CCD to my attention when I came online in search of an explanation — I took a walk in a local park and saw hundreds of bees dying on the ground. It was all I could do to keep my dog from stepping on them, a number of them still trying, fruitlessly so, to fly. A few weeks later at another park, I saw the same phenomena. The carnage became so commonplace that year that I eventually lost count.
Now here comes a late-breaking 2009 headline nearly lost amidst end-of-year festivities:
Bayer ‘Disappointed’ in Ruling on Chemical That May Harm Bees | Bloomberg.com
Bayer’s newest chemical wonder, Spirotetramat, was not on the market when CCD surfaced, but what is alarming about this story is that the EPA apparently approved it, critics allege, knowing that it could heighten or accelerate the harm to a critical link in the food chain.
Our food chain.
