Apologies

20Nov08

Work’s been up, so posts have been down. Hopefully I’ll be able to post in more depth soon, but for now you can check out my short comments at FriendFeed (look at the sidebar).

Filed under: Blog   |  Leave a Comment

Net Neutrality

12Nov08

Time Lee has just posted an article at Freedom To Tinker that is pretty well thought through.

With Barack Obama’s election, we’re likely to see a revival of the network neutrality debate. Thus far the popular debate over the issue has produced more heat than light. On one side have been people who scoff at the very idea of network neutrality, arguing either that network neutrality is a myth or that we’d be better off without it. On the other are people who believe the open Internet is hanging on by its fingernails. These advocates believe that unless Congress passes new regulations quickly, major network providers will transform the Internet into a closed network where only their preferred content and applications are available.

…

So it seems to me that new regulations are unnecessary to protect network neutrality. They are likely to be counterproductive as well. As Ed has argued, defining network neutrality precisely is surprisingly difficult, and enacting a ban without a clear definition is a recipe for problems. In addition, there’s a real danger of what economists call regulatory capture—that industry incumbents will find ways to turn regulatory authority to their advantage. As I document in my study, this is what happened with 20th-century regulation of the railroad, airline, and telephone industries. Congress should proceed carefully, lest regulations designed to protect consumers from telecom industry incumbents wind up protecting incumbents from competition instead.

I think the majority of Lee’s points are sound and worth considering. I do think that he overestimates the power of competitive forces among ISP’s, given that the majority of consumers only have one or two broadband choices, but that doesn’t soften his position too much.

If anyone has a good, reasoned article for the pro-Net Neutrality position, I’d be glad to read it.

Filed under: Politics, Technology   |  Leave a Comment

The Wrong Question

12Nov08

Jim Wooten put up a post this morning, beginning with a simple question on the AJC website:

Does anybody actually believe Republicans are trying to keep legitimate voters from exercising their right to vote?

I think this is the wrong question to ask. The right one is “Does anybody actually believe partisans are trying to keep legitimate voters from exercising their right to vote?” To which I would answer, unfortunately, yes.

From redistricting tricks to return required mailings to unverified voter purge rolls, I believe it’s all too easy for elected officials to look the other way for a few people’s rights when their job is at stake.

Filed under: Politics   |  Leave a Comment

Isn’t It Interesting

06Nov08

My girlfriend brought up an excellent point yesterday when we were talking about the election results.
 
All of a sudden, it seems to be ok to talk about Obama as the first black president.

I don’t believe people were naive to it earlier, but at the same time there was clearly a stigma surrounding its discussion in the media and by those supporting Obama. As one example, Colin Powell caught significant flack for his mention of Obama’s skin color during his endorsement, and it seemed to be that if anyone else brought it up they would be charged (as Powell as) with voting based on race.

I believed, and still do, that Obama’s skin is something that can’t be tossed out, but that shouldn’t define him either. However, nearly every news source I’ve read in the past few days has been talking about how proud people are of the country, and how far we’ve come as a nation, and what Obama’s presidency means symbolically to this nation and to the world.

All of those things are true… but I feel like I’m getting a little whiplash… going from not being able to discuss it three days ago to dominating the news these past few days.

Filed under: Media, Politics, race   |  Leave a Comment

Wesabe: Wrap Up

30Oct08

In conclusion, I’ve mentioned three things (Proxy Tagging, Data Export, and Community) that keep me coming back to Wesabe, and what ties them together is Wesabe’s winning attitude as a company.

That attitude prompts Wesabe to write a Bill of Rights on behalf of their customers that is both publicly accessible and awesome. The attitude behind that Bill is one that seals the win for Wesabe, even if it has a few more bugs on average than the other sites.

If you haven’t tried web-based personal finance yet, I’d highly recommend Wesabe despite the slight learning curve that comes with completely free form tagging. I recommend it because I believe Wesabe to be the safest, most powerful site, with a group of people behind it who truly want to help you keep track of your money so you can get more out of life.

If you have any comments or opinions otherwise, please feel free to post them below.

Filed under: Personal Finance, Technology, Web 2.0   |  1 Comment

Wesabe Praise: The Community

29Oct08

Problem:
I don’t really know how to go about X (finance related), how do I start?
OR
I keep trying to do something I know Wesabe can do but it’s not working!

Wesabe Answer: Groups

As for the first question, there are pages and pages of discussion, all searchable in Wesabe’s Groups, talking about almost any financial topic that you could imagine. My favorite part about Wesabe Groups is that they cover several topics that are more obscure, in addition to major financial issues. The user community does their best to help each other out, even if by the end of the debate the answer isn’t always clear.

Now to the second question, Wesabe’s help is extremely transparent. If you have any problem with the site, search for it in the groups. In all likelihood there will be an answer. If not, the Wesabe support is excellent.

I’d actually like to restate that. The people behind Wesabe are excellent. They care about user feedback more than the vast majority of people at other services I’ve used. For example, they made a change to their Goals page one night, which I often use, and I tweeted my dismay before I went to bed. Come morning, there was a direct message asking what specifically was wrong and wanting more detail about my tweet. That is what that separates Wesabe from Mint and Quicken. They prove that they care about what they’re doing day after day in a very tangible way.

I’m not one to leave that kind of passion easily.

Filed under: Personal Finance, Technology, Web 2.0   |  1 Comment

Wesabe Praise: Data Export

29Oct08

Problem: You’ve spent a lot of effort setting up your system on Wesabe, and you’d like to be able to see that data many ways and on many devices.

Wesabe Answer(s): Firefox, iPhone, Twitter, CSV, OFX, OFX2, QIF, Widget, or plug straight into the source with the API

For those that don’t recognize everything in the list above, let me paraphrase. Wesabe is uncommonly eager to let you use your data any way you want. They have a Firefox extension if you want a financial summary in your sidebar. They have a mobile (as well as iPhone specific) website so you don’t have to stumble through large page downloads to see your information on the go. They export into numerous financial formats, so if you want to import your data into Quicken Desktop or MS Money later, you can do so. They have several widgets, excellent for those that want to keep up on their finances handy at a glance. Most impressively, they’ve released an API, which allows programmers to write programs that Wesabeans can use to further analyze their data.

Personally, I’m most excited about the iPhone website (which let’s me see my spending targets on the go) and the API, because I think there could be some really cool stuff done with it once someone puts their mind to it. Nothing particularly groundbreaking seems to have come of it yet, but I have my fingers crossed… as well as my eye on a coding book to give it a go myself.

Mint and Quicken both allow for text messages and email digests to be sent at particular times, but sincerely lag behind Wesabe in all the other areas. Rumor has it they’re developing a native iPhone app, and I hope Wesabe will be right there with them when they do.

Because I check my accounts often, Mint and Quicken’s reminder features just aren’t that useful to me. As such, Wesabe’s data portability gives it a huge edge over the other two services.

Filed under: Personal Finance, Technology, Web 2.0   |  1 Comment

Wesabe Praise: Proxy Tagging

29Oct08

Problem: 2+ people share a living space, but bills can only go to one person.

Common Answer: Have one person pay the bill each month, and have the other pay them back.

Wesabe Feature: Proxy Tagging

Wesabe’s free form tagging let’s you create a taxonomy for your finances that makes sense to you, without having to adapt my thinking to any quirky, already supplied categories. One of the techniques I came up with to solve the problem above is something I call Proxy Tagging.

Proxy Tagging is shorthand for the way I split bills in Wesabe, and it’s not hard to implement. Whenever I see a bill transaction, I split it, tagging one half “bills” the other half “proxy.” This way, when I’m looking at my monthly goals, I can be sure there’s no distortion from overpaying any bills.

There’s also a bonus splitting transactions this way, in that I can track my proxy tag and make sure that I’m getting paid back. Tagging all my payback “reimbursement” allows me to compare the two tags and make sure everything checks out.

It keeps visibility high and roommate arguments low.

Mint could technically do this, but I find it easier to split and tag items in Wesabe than to split and recategorize in Mint. Quicken, on the other hand, explicitly omits splitting transactions. If you want to go the Intuit route, you’ll have to pay up for their desktop software.

As for me? I like my software free when it already does what I want.

Filed under: Personal Finance, Technology, Web 2.0   |  1 Comment

Why Wesabe Works For Me

29Oct08

Taking a brief hiatus from politics, over the next few posts I would like to talk about why, out of the big three web finance apps (Mint, Quicken, and Wesabe), Wesabe has been the app that I can’t give up, no matter how tempting the other two become.

First, if you’re considering using a web app to track your finances, which I would recommend over a simple spreadsheet, picking any of these three will get you the same basic features. You can import your accounts straight from the bank, categorize the transactions, and get graphs of your spending. They all provide some sort of budgeting tool, and all of them get around your bank fees if your bank is cash strapped to the point where they charge you a monthly fee to use the desktop version of Quicken or Microsoft Money (I’m looking at you, Wachovia).

That said, there are certainly differences between the services. Each site has a different focus with a few different bells and whistles that may or may not appeal to you. My goal here isn’t to list all the differences, each site has their own intro set up for that. Instead, I’m going to explain why Wesabe is the right choice for me.

Wesabe Praise: Proxy Tagging
Wesabe Praise: Data Export
Wesabe Praise: The Community
Wesabe: Wrap Up

Filed under: Personal Finance, Technology, Web 2.0   |  4 Comments

Absolutely Not

28Oct08

Fox news is running an article where Joe the Plumber agrees that an Obama administration would be death to Israel.

And I would like to say no. Absolutely not. We are not going there in our discourse.

We are not going to credibly take foreign policy commentary from people who have marginal experience in the realm they’re supposed to represent, let alone zero experience in foreign policy. I am officially drawing the line here. I will not tolerate this.

And if you were curious, there is no link to the article because I refuse to give even my blog’s meager support to its popularity. I hope the American people agree that those who speak without knowledge or experience say nothing.

Filed under: Politics   |  Leave a Comment