In my recent article on the power of visual images I discussed the image of a UC Davis campus police officer using pepper spray on student demonstrators. One of the points in my article is that visual images lack context and that we are moved by the image because we don't always know what occurred before […]
By now you've probably heard that yesterday's test of the national Emergency Alert System did not go as well as planned. This, of course, is not a bad thing. The system has never been tested and identifying problems can only help to improve it. The larger question, though, is do we still need it? The […]
"Social media is for parties. We ain't giving no parties." This quote is attributed to a Washington DC Fire Department spokesman in a response over the DC fire twitter feed. It seems that one spokesman (who was later transferred to another job) was tweeting real-time information that the public could actually use. His boss preferred the […]
Several times a month I'll receive an email from some well-meaning friend that provides a warning about some new crime technique, virus or government/corporate conspiracy. I'm fairly good at spotting that they're spam and usually can find a link on one of the debunker sites that I can send back to my friend. Some of these […]
By now you've probably heard that the CDC has been trying to generate interest in preparedness through a rather light-hearted campaign encouraging people to prepare for a zombie apocalypse. The idea of using zombie infestation as a metaphor for pandemic infection has been around for a while – I blogged about it back in August and October […]
Today is the 20th anniversary of the Oakland Hills Fire that destroyed over 3000 private dwellings and claimed the lives of 25 people. This particular disaster has always had a special meaning for me as I was part of the FEMA team sent to provide relief to the survivors. The smoke was so thick in […]
The recent decision by the State of Israel to release over a thousand prisoners in exchange for a kidnapped soldier raises some interesting issues that may well have implications for future policy. The decision raises questions about the generally-accepted policy about negotiating with terrorists. The official line from most governments has always been that there would be no […]
Online gaming is a phenomena that is a bit hard to understand at times. People will spend hours doing repetitive tasks to garner an "achievement" that offers nothing more than bragging rights with other gamers. But there's no denying the attraction. With the advent of social media and smart phones, smartphone gaming has exploded into a […]