rebron.org: Everyday Life, Work, Ironman Training

I was considering getting an iPhone to replace a Treo and a Sprint account at $65/month.  But then it’s AT&T with a $30 data plan, a $39.99 voice plan 450 minutes, and $5.00 200 text plan which totals $75 a month without taxes.

Realistically, the $59.99 voice plan w/ 900 minutes looks better which takes us out to $95 a month without taxes probably $110 a month with taxes.

Then there’s the iPhone itself at $199 or $299 with a $69 2 year protection plan and a $36 activation fee.

Am I off on this calculation?  Are people paying more or less for their iPhone service?

1000 minutes, unlimited nights/weekends, data plan, unlimited text messaging for $75 a month would still be ridiculous but somewhat reasonable.  $50 a month would be more reasonable.  $110 a month is ludicrous.

For comparison, our one Sprint account is $65 (1100 minutes) a month, one T-Mobile account is $65 a month (1000 minutes), and AT&T landline/dsl is $52 a month, so $185 a month in wireless, landline, Internet.

I’m thinking that $185 a month is low to average for being in the web industry, but higher than what most folks are paying.  $100 to $125 would be about right but I don’t think I can get it down to that without losing minutes, speed, or functionality.

I think it’s a maybe a next year or 2012 type of thing to go to an iPhone.

General Happenings

• Year in Pictures NY Times, Big Picture Blog
• Beijing Olympics
• Obama elected President of the United States of America
• Bailouts for financial and auto industries.
• Recession, Dow at 8500.

Tech

• Mozilla Messaging forms.  Firefox 3 ships.  Chrome launches.
• LCD tvs get cheap, SSD to mass production, Netbooks.
• G1 Phone launched.  New aluminum MacBooks.  Facebook Connect launches.
• Move towards green tech and energy.

Sports

• Phelps and 8 Gold Medals
• NY Giants win Super Bowl
• Celtics beat Lakers, NBA Finals
• ? win World Series

Obits

• TD, George Carlin, Bernie Mac, Eartha Kitt, Randy Pausch, Paul Newman, Tim Russert

Personal

• Kitchen remodel: BlueStar range, PaperStone, cork floors.
• SF marathon
• Travel: Kirkwood/NorthStar (good snow)/Whistler/Kailua
• Instant Soccer Dad for GF III
• Back at Mozilla.  Work for Mozilla Messaging
• Three car accidents - X3, IS, Odyssey
• Ad Hoc, Michael Mina, Rivoli, Rikyu, Brick Pig’s House
• Too many purchases.

An overall strange year.

I’m offering up “Organic Computing” as the theme for 2009.  We’ve had Web 2.0, Mashups, Social Networking, and The Cloud as themes from previous years.

“Organic Computing” as a theme would have the same characteristic of previous year’s themes of allowing people to come up with their own “right” definition but with everyone more or less on the same page with a common definition.

Organic computing could be a couple things: organic as responsible computing and the development of useful applications and networks from the ground up.

• It would be the Facebook app that a couple users put together that got super popular because it was useful.
• It could be a blog/wiki that is setup by a citizen of a community that gets used by other citizens to get things done.
• It would be the Web Developer Toolbar extension that one person started and built a community around, again because of need.
• It’s also hardware manufacturer’s commitment to recycling programs and responsible manufacturing, less packaging, little to no bad stuff in the products.
• Or literally, the organic farmer’s blog talking about what’s new on the farm.

Anyway, just throwing it out there for whomever gives out the yearly theme (Tim O’Reilly I guess?).  If we must have an industry buzzword for 2009, this is something I could support and feel good about, and would certainly attend a conference or two about it.  I know Mozilla and pkim’s team has been pushing the concept of organic the past year or so and it’s a good one.

These are the groups we like to give money to and we’d love be able to give more.  Next few years will be tough for a lot of charitable organizations.

• Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights
• Charles Hamilton Houston Bar Association
• National Organization for Women
• Stanford Fund
• Stanford Black Community Services Center
• Leukemia & Lymphoma Society
• Harvard Public Interest Auction
• NPR - KQED
• San Francisco Aids Marathon
• Project Open Hand
• Alameda County Food Bank
• National Center for Youth Law
• Anwar Foundation
• BSA - Alameda Council
• Planned Parenthood
• Habitat for Humanity
• East Bay Habitat for Humanity
• NAACP
• ACLU
• I Have a Dream Foundation
• A Safe Place

Hope everyone has a safe and happy holidays!

—–

p.s. It’s shaping up to be a nice snow season this year; lots more snow this year than last year by Christmas day.  Anyone interested in hanging out let us know, we like Kirkwood, North Star, and I want to try Alpine Meadows this year.  We may try the Bay Area ski bus too.

Additional Thunderbird 3 Beta 1 news via Google News

Some highlights

• Thunderbird 3 Beta 1 taking over where Shredder leaves off
  TechVibes - Canada
  … a lot of upgrades have been made since Thunderbird 2, incorporating feedback and suggestions from previous releases. Highlights include faster message, …
• Thunderbird 3.0 Reaches Beta 1
  PC World - USA
  Mozilla Messaging Inc. Tuesday released the first beta for its open-source Thunderbird 3.0 e-mail client, with the company’s chief executive calling the …
  
• Thunderbird 3.0 reaches Beta 1, but still not feature-complete
  Computerworld - Framingham,MA,USA
  By Gregg Keizer December 10, 2008 (Computerworld) Mozilla Messaging Inc. yesterday released the first beta for its open-source Thunderbird 3.0 e-mail client …
• Mozilla releases Thunderbird 3 Beta 1
  Internet News (subscription) - Fallbrook,CA,USA
  By Sean Michael Kerner on December 10, 2008 9:50 AM At long last, Mozilla Messaging has put out the first Beta release for the Thunderbird 3 open source …
• First Thunderbird 3 beta arrives with UI improvements
  Ars Technica - Boston,MA,USA
  By Ryan Paul | Published: December 10, 2008 - 08:18AM CT Mozilla has announced the availability of the first Thunderbird 3 beta release. …
• Thunderbird 3 Beta 1 Now Available
  Lifehacker Australia - Sydney,NSW,Australia
  All platforms: Mozilla releases the first beta of Thunderbird 3, the next generation of their desktop email client. Meant only for testers, …

Related

• after a few days back on mozilla thunderbird…
  By Rich
  Mozilla Thunderbird came about and I used that for a wicked long time. Then I used Gmail and Google Apps. Gmail pissed me off (royally), switched to Windows Live Domains (Hotmail). Windows Live Domains was okay and had no problems but …

Airship Ventures $495 per person for a one hour tour of the Bay Area with departure from Oakland or Moffett Field in Mtn View.

This is really cool.  They launched recently and a bunch of people have been noticing that there have been a lot of blimp traffic in the air recently.  Well this is the reason why.

Maybe would be cool some time next year to go up on the blimp.

Sunset at Ko’olina

Trip stuff

I never liked Oahu until a couple years ago when instead of hanging out in Honolulu, we hung out at Kailua — a more laid back residential area on the East side of Oahu home to Waimanalo, Kailua beach, and the quiet yet famous and well photographed Lanikai beach.

Waikiki was just too much of a tourist trap, trafficky, too busy.  I don’t believe there are any hotels in Kailua.  Anyway, we haven’t gotten to explore the North Shore, nor much of the west side and central parts of Oahu and still haven’t gone surfing so maybe another trip.  But actually, would love to buy rental property in Kailua.  Someday.  I think a trip to the Big Island is next though. (more…)

Books I read while on the beach…tough life.

• Finished reading Crucial Conversations, a good book on talking through tough topics.
• The Audacity of Hope, I bought a long time ago but just got around to reading it.
• Re-read the Paradox of Choice and still learning to become a satisficer which is the maximizer strategy anyway.

I could use some more book recommendations if you have them.

303: Surfnyl, Navy Blue, 34″

Birdwell Beach Britches fascinates me.  The company has a great story, they make great products, have a cool logo, they have a super old school web site (which worked fine for me), and I won’t buy any beach shorts from anywhere else.

I’ve got three pairs, and when I lose weight I’ll probably get another two more pairs hopefully at size 32″.  What makes them great shorts: they’re fitted and comfortable, the Surfnyl material dries fast (like 5 minutes tops), they’re lined, and they feel and look well made (in terms of the stitching and materials used).

What I’ve been finding is that there are many small companies like Birdwell Beach Britches that makes great products, at a high quality, at a great price, and with personality.  Getting emails back from the owners is normal and a web site only matters in that it’s up and running and more/less functional.  Berkshire Hathaway’s web site is a perfect example.

The other piece that interests me is the notion of maximizer and satisficer.  I’m a maximizer (unfortunately): I want the best of things, the best value, the best price, and products that last.  It’s borderline obsessive/compulsive but really I’m just super cheap.  A satisficer (who’s generally happier, less stressed, less compulsive) could go to Target or Walmart or anywhere and get a pair of swim trunks.

I had to go online, mostly because swim trunks at stores always have dumb prints on them and I wanted something basic.  I could have only found these shorts being a maximizer and being one is probably a good thing when buying a house, car, or other big ticket items.