Hashemian Blog Web Tools, Financial Markets, Technology Friday, November 13, 2009 Madoff's Programmers  Bad reputation. Lawyers have it, used-car salesmen have it, priests and clerics have it. And now computer programmers? That's what I thought when I read about the two programmers working for Bernard Madoff's Ponzi investment firm being arrested and charged with fraud. It seems that their skills were put to good use by fabricating reports and statements for clients and the SEC, making them look legitimate. According to the story, they both knew that they were engaged in shady work, and they both had complained about it. But in return for a mediocre bonus from the company they'd stopped complaining and had silently continued manipulating the numbers and generating phantom reports. As a programmer myself this story gave me a pause. What would I have done? I'm not the blackmailing type, but would I have just drawn a salary and turned a blind eye? Would I have raised my concerns, not to extort, but out of moral obligation or at least out of concern for my own complicity and the possible punishment? Or would I have left the company without leaking a word, just to save my own skin? Businesses ask many things of their employees. Some are blatant violations of ethics, but some others fall into gray areas. I wonder if these two programmers could have avoided the hot water if they had kept their mouths shut and just did what they were asked. The fact that they raised concerns only to bury them after payoffs has certainly been a factor in what they're facing now. At any rate, I have a good feeling that if Madoff's scheme hadn't turned into a high profile case that it is today, these programmers would have never been implicated. There's just too much public fury and too few targets to go after. I mean how many programmers at Enron have suffered the same fate? As far as I know, none. madoff,enron, securities fraud,wall street,programmers Labels: financial, programming <Madoff's Programmers> // posted by rh 0 comments Wednesday, November 11, 2009 Online Radio and Traditional Media  I don't remember exactly when or why, but up until a few years ago traditional radio stations were barred from broadcasting online. I believe it had something to do with advertising rules. But then the rules were apparently relaxed and one by one the stations started broadcasting online in addition to the airwaves. Still, internet-only broadcasters such as Pandora, Slacker or Last.fm have had a competitive edge. They have large cache of music, they play few or no commercials, and they can adapt to their listeners' tastes. But as the music industry has begun to demand royalty payments, the internet-only stations have had to adapt by playing more commercials and/or charging fees. Previously I wrote about my defection from Pandora to Slacker for that exact reason. Now I've left Slacker for traditional radio and so far have been happy. What convinced me to make the switch? When I found a radio station that played the kind of music I like. A few weeks ago while driving to Hartford, CT to run a half-marathon, I was flipping through radio stations when I stumbled on an alternative music station (104.1 FM WMRQ, Hartford, CT) that kept me listening song after song. I thought what a shame that I couldn't get the station where I live or work. Fortunately it wasn't long before I found that the station also broadcasts online and I've been listening ever since. Sure there are commercials and DJ interruptions and the selections are not perfectly tuned to my taste (pretty close though), but listening is as simple as clicking on a link, no logins and no fees. In fact internet-only radio isn't perfect either and they play more commercials these days anyways. My experience speaks to a bigger issue here. To borrow a quote form Mark Twain, the reports of the traditional media's demise are greatly exaggerated. The arrival and propagation of the Internet has not necessarily just given rise to the upstarts to the detriment of the traditional companies. On the contrary, it has given the old media new means of serving their audience and also reaching new ones. The Hartford radio station is one such example whose listeners aren't necessarily within the sphere of its antenna's influence anymore. radio,online radio,radio stations,media Labels: internet, music <Online Radio and Traditional Media> // posted by rh 0 comments Sunday, November 01, 2009 NYC Marathon  What a nice day to be a part of the biggest marathon event in the world. Only thing is that I wasn't there. I did register for the New York City Marathon a few months ago but I was in the pool of some 60 thousand people who were turned down. No hard feelings though. I know there's a limit on how many people are allowed in and managing 40 thousand runners is a no small feat. So in sympathy, I decided to run a mini-marathon of my own in my own hometown today and I logged 16+ enjoyable miles. Ok, I admit that running solo on back roads isn't exactly like being a part of a big event, but for me the fun is just the same, maybe even more. With the solo runs there are no rules and no crowds. It's just me and the road. I get to choose the time, the distance, and the routes, and I can change them as I go along. There's definitely something liberating about setting your own rules and it costs nothing. The challenge, the therapeutic effect, and the satisfaction of finishing the course are still there. No, there are no official times, no like-minded people to hang with, no medals and no parties at the end. But for me running means a lot more than that. How many activities can give one that kind of return with a pair of sneakers and a road? And as for the NYC marathon, maybe next year. Meanwhile, congrats to all of today's participants. marathon,nyc marathon,running Labels: running <NYC Marathon> // posted by rh 0 comments Thursday, October 29, 2009 Chrome Wishes  For a creature of habit like me it was a difficult move, but I have finally migrated from Internet Explorer v6 (IE6), and not just to v7 or v8. As long as I was making a leap, I went out on a limb and started using Google's browser, Chrome. While occasionally I find myself back on IE6 for a few sites, Chrome has become my default surfing window into the world wide web. Chrome comes in 3 flavors, known as channels, Stable, Beta, and Dev. I took the middle ground and settled on the Beta channel, what I would call the Goldilocks version, not too safe but not too risky. For the most part I like this browser and as new versions go online and are automatically downloaded, it just keeps growing on me. Chrome is fast and clean. It launches much quicker than IE or Firefox and it has an impressive response time, specially for the Web 2.0'ish pages that seem to be everywhere these days. And the so-called omnibox (combined search and URL bar) is an ingenious feature. But for all of its goodness, there are still a few areas that it falls short. Here are my top 3 pet peeves with Chrome: • View source - Like other browsers, Chrome does allow one to view the HTML source of a page but not correctly after a form is submitted. This still stymies me at times, until I realize that when viewing page source, Chrome appears to make a fresh request to the URL rather than just display the current content. This results in displaying source code that is inconsistent with the page that's resulted from a POST operation, such as a form submission. This bug needs to be fixed. • Image properties – Just about all browsers allow users to get the properties of an image (URL, size, dimensions, etc.), generally via a right-click and selecting "Properties". There's no such capability in Chrome. The "Inspect Element" menu item just loads the page source and positions the cursor at the declaration of the image tag. Hardly helpful for obtaining image properties. • Referrer settings – This one can be generalized into allowing users to tweak low-level browser features. Chrome has a number of nice commands like about:memory and about:dns, but where is about:config, as in Firefox? One of the browser features I like to disable is the Referrer. I know this could lead to some usability issues on some sites, but I despise giving sites any information about myself including where I'm arriving from. Chrome doesn't allow any such tweaks, but it should. Ok, I know Chrome's source code is out there and I could edit and recompile, but really I'm not that desperate :) chrome,browsers,google,ie,firefox Labels: browsers, google, internet <Chrome Wishes> // posted by rh 0 comments Tuesday, October 20, 2009 Arizona Not-Quite Hiking  Last week I was at the Astricon show in Glendale, Arizona (near Phoenix), running the registration system. Not being one to pass up a chance for hiking, I had arranged to stay an extra day to hike the White Tank mountains. There was one problem though, I didn't have transportation to the park. After some thought I hatched what I thought was a good plan, getting there on a mountain bike. The plan was to pedal about 15 miles from the hotel to the trailhead, hike one of the trails (about 8 miles) and then return on the bike and finally donate the bike to a charity before flying back home. Getting the bike was the easy part. I bought a relatively cheap one from a nearby Wal-Mart and after making sure that it was road-worthy I had the hotel store it for me until later. By the way, being on a bike brought back some good memories of my childhood and that feeling of freedom one gets on a bike. On the day of the hike I stocked my backpack with water and food and I was on the road by 7 AM. It was predicted to be a hot day but at that time the desert air was still relatively cool and pleasant. As I biked my way closer to the park, I started to hear the thunderous sounds of fighter jets, apparently from training flights at the nearby Luke Air Force Base. By then I had biked nearly 8 miles and decided to pull over the side of the road for a quick drink of water and some food. That's about the time when my plan unraveled. As I got ready to jump back on the bike and pedal away, I noticed that the front tire had gone flat. On closer inspection, I saw that the inner tube had slipped out and wrapped tightly around the front brakes. It was a hopeless situation. Even if could untangle the mess, and even if the tube was undamaged, I had no air pump to bring the tire back to life, and I was in the middle of nowhere. Standing by the side of the road and considering my options, it quickly became apparent that I really had no options. I had to scrub the plan and started the journey back to the hotel on foot, leaving the bike behind. Sometimes you have to see the good side of an adverse event. While disappointed that I couldn't make the planned trek, I was treated to a decent air show with the fighter jets buzzing overhead, and sometimes flying low in tight formation. And instead of hiking the park, I ended up hiking by the roadside in the desert heat all the way back to the hotel. At least I had enough water. Plans sometimes fail. I might have mitigated the problem had I brought an air pump along, but no point dwelling on that. The way I see it, I got a good aerial show and still had a decent hike. And if I make it back to this place, I'll be sure to be more prepared, at least for a flat tire. The hapless bike with the inner tube tangled looking back at the forlorn bike and the unhiked mountains just beyond arizona,hiking,biking,fighter jets Labels: hiking <Arizona Not-Quite Hiking> // posted by rh 0 comments

Links Technorati Profile TMCnet.com ARCHIVES 09/01/2003 - 10/01/2003 03/01/2004 - 04/01/2004 04/01/2004 - 05/01/2004 05/01/2004 - 06/01/2004 06/01/2004 - 07/01/2004 07/01/2004 - 08/01/2004 08/01/2004 - 09/01/2004 09/01/2004 - 10/01/2004 10/01/2004 - 11/01/2004 11/01/2004 - 12/01/2004 12/01/2004 - 01/01/2005 01/01/2005 - 02/01/2005 02/01/2005 - 03/01/2005 03/01/2005 - 04/01/2005 04/01/2005 - 05/01/2005 05/01/2005 - 06/01/2005 06/01/2005 - 07/01/2005 07/01/2005 - 08/01/2005 08/01/2005 - 09/01/2005 09/01/2005 - 10/01/2005 10/01/2005 - 11/01/2005 11/01/2005 - 12/01/2005 12/01/2005 - 01/01/2006 01/01/2006 - 02/01/2006 02/01/2006 - 03/01/2006 03/01/2006 - 04/01/2006 04/01/2006 - 05/01/2006 05/01/2006 - 06/01/2006 06/01/2006 - 07/01/2006 07/01/2006 - 08/01/2006 08/01/2006 - 09/01/2006 09/01/2006 - 10/01/2006 10/01/2006 - 11/01/2006 11/01/2006 - 12/01/2006 12/01/2006 - 01/01/2007 01/01/2007 - 02/01/2007 02/01/2007 - 03/01/2007 03/01/2007 - 04/01/2007 04/01/2007 - 05/01/2007 05/01/2007 - 06/01/2007 06/01/2007 - 07/01/2007 07/01/2007 - 08/01/2007 08/01/2007 - 09/01/2007 09/01/2007 - 10/01/2007 10/01/2007 - 11/01/2007 11/01/2007 - 12/01/2007 12/01/2007 - 01/01/2008 01/01/2008 - 02/01/2008 02/01/2008 - 03/01/2008 03/01/2008 - 04/01/2008 04/01/2008 - 05/01/2008 05/01/2008 - 06/01/2008 06/01/2008 - 07/01/2008 07/01/2008 - 08/01/2008 08/01/2008 - 09/01/2008 09/01/2008 - 10/01/2008 10/01/2008 - 11/01/2008 11/01/2008 - 12/01/2008 12/01/2008 - 01/01/2009 01/01/2009 - 02/01/2009 02/01/2009 - 03/01/2009 03/01/2009 - 04/01/2009 04/01/2009 - 05/01/2009 05/01/2009 - 06/01/2009 06/01/2009 - 07/01/2009 07/01/2009 - 08/01/2009 08/01/2009 - 09/01/2009 09/01/2009 - 10/01/2009 10/01/2009 - 11/01/2009 11/01/2009 - 12/01/2009

هاشمیان.com

 Home

 Blog

 Web Tools
Usage

 News

 Articles

 FAQ

 About

 Contact

 Financial Markets Book
Read Complete Book

Search Amazon: