Implicit Bias

Brian Nosek, Professor of Psychology from University of Virginia was one among the many distinguished and prominent speakers who walked the ramp of 543 Howard Street as an invited guest from our sister organization, LPFI. He gave us a scintillating presentation on unconscious bias - thoughts and feelings that exist outside of conscious awareness or conscious control that to a large extent shapes how we think and do things.
Recent results from his lab compared implicit - and explicit -
bias between self-identified conservatives/liberals, with these results,
as reported in the Washington Post:

"Another study presented at the conference, which was in Palm Springs, Calif., explored relationships between racial bias and political affiliation by analyzing self-reported beliefs, voting patterns and the results of psychological tests that measure implicit attitudes -- subtle stereotypes people hold about various groups.

That study found that supporters of President Bush and other conservatives had stronger self-admitted and implicit biases against blacks than liberals did."

Here's the complete article from Washington Post.

But better commentary yet was from Stephen Colbert on Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show".

Twitter

If you are in for hours of mindless voyeuristic fun, here's something for you:

http://twittermap.com/twittervision

"Small" is BIG

I have been a proud owner of an Apple PowerBook for the last 3 years. While I possessed and used only Windows based machine for about a decade before that, I have to admit my loyalties switched as soon as I got used to a Mac. The resolution of the graphics, the slick user-interface and virus-free system that never crashed on me - all had me going for it. The package was all the more attractive since mine was a really slick 12-inch Powerbook that was handy to carry along and fast enough for running all my cpu and memory intensive applications (earlier version of Chandler included). Recently I was told by my IT guy that it's time to switch to a newer machine and I had to pick one out soon. Well, given practically everyone around me now owns the new Intel-based MacBook Pro and they rave about how swift it is, I couldn't wait to get mine soon. So I was checking out the Apple Store in San Francisco, I have to say I was thoroughly disappointed to learn that they have stopped carrying the 12-inch laptops anymore. All the MacBook Pros now come only in 15 and 17 inches. While I am looking forward to my new MacBook Pro I have to say I am going to miss my "small" book that had become the central domain of my work life the last 3 years. Who ever said, "small" is big has my +1 on that.

What is a brown-paper-bag bug?

There's not much software jargon that I am unfamiliar with. Well, today in one of our discussions, I heard someone say "Can we test this quickly so we can forestall any brown-paper-bag bugs?" It had me wondering what that meant and as usual Google came to my rescue. And here it is for you:

"A bug in a public software release that is so embarrassing that the author notionally wears a brown paper bag over his head for a while so he won't be recognized on the net. Entered popular usage after the early-1999 release of the first Linux 2.2, which had one. The phrase was used in Linus Torvalds's apology posting."

The Grasshopper

A very interesting article that was forwarded to me by a friend. So accurately reflecting the state of affairs in India I had to blog it.

Subject: The Grasshopper

OLD VERSION...

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long building
his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper
thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away.
Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food
or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

MODERN VERSION

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building
his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper
thinks the ant's a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away.
Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and
demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed
while others are cold and starving.
NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering
grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a
table filled with food. The World is stunned by the sharp contrast.
How can this be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?
Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house.
Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other grasshoppers demanding
that grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter.
Amnesty International and Koffi Annan criticize the Indian Government
for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper. The
Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the
grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt
support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance) . Opposition
MP's stage a walkout.Left parties call for "Bharat Bandh" in West
Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry.CPM in Kerala
immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat
so as to bring about equality of poverty among ants and grasshoppers.
Lalu Prasad allocates one free coach to Grasshoppers on all Indian
Railway Trains, aptly named as the 'Grasshopper Rath'.
Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism
Against Grasshoppers Act [POTAGA]", with effect from the beginning of
the winter.
Arjun Singh makes Special Reservation for Grass Hopper in
educational
Insititutions & in Govt Services.
The ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and, having
nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by
the Government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony
covered by NDTV.
Arundhati Roy calls it "a triumph of justice". Lalu calls it
'Socialistic Justice'. CPM calls it the 'revolutionary resurgence of
the downtrodden' Koffi Annan invites the grasshopper to address the UN
General Assembly.
Many years later...The ant has since migrated to the US and set up
a multi billion dollar company in silicon valley. 100s of
grasshoppers still die of starvation despite reservation somewhere in
India ...
As a result loosing lot of hard working ants and feeding the
grasshoppers, India is still a developing country..... .

Bollywood on Colbert

Amitabh and Shah Rukh Khan made it to the Colbert Report on Comedy Central. It's hilarious.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgVrygLx-hY

Multiples in the womb

Yesterday Mr.PureAnarchy and I watched this absolutely amazing, intriguing, visually awe striking documentary on "In the Womb : Multiples" on National Geographic Channel. While our 'sitting-together-and-watching-TV' days are far and few these days, we had put this one on our agenda to specially it watch together. Using revolutionary 4-D scans they showed unique footage of how fetues mark their journey from inception to birth - their fight for space and nourishment during gestation and their final journey into the outside world. Some key take-aways:
1. It was fascinating to see how humans first interact with their siblings even before entering the world outside - reaching, touching, pushing and even engaging in some game playing that continues after they are born
2. The personalities they develop in adult life are to large extent groomed in the womb.
3. 95% of all multiple births in United States are twins and it has increased by 400% from 1980-1998.
4. The record number of human fetuses in one womb at any one time is 15

This gave us a good prelude to life ahead with Arin and Riya...

Chandler in the WSJ

As part of Scott Rosenberg's book review by WSJ, Chandler made it to the WSJ. With the upcoming 'Preview' (beta) release of Chandler in Spring, we are hoping this will give us the right publicity we need before the launch. Go Chandler!

Dreaming in Code

Scott Rosenberg's new book based on software development titled 'Dreaming in Code' will be out this month. He has used the software development of 'Chandler' - our PIM software as a basis for his book. Scott has been a friend of OSAF - sitting in our meetings, hanging out at lunches and gathering the data for his subject. I am waiting to buy a copy of the book to read about the early years of OSAF when Andy Hertzfield, Lou Montulli and others were active contributors. A lot has changed since then - the people, the product vision and the business strategy. The latest copy of Business Week(Jan 15th 2007) has also reviewed the book calling it a "fascinating look inside a software development project". Katie Capps has since then updated our osaf blog with where we are since Scott's narrative leaves off - around the end of year 2005. For all of you wanting to know where OSAF is going with Chandler and Cosmo, there's your read for the day.

the ultimate travel companion

10 years back when we first came to this country and did some extensive traveling, I remember taking paper maps of the places we went to and as a co-driver/navigator my biggest role on a road trip was to make sure we were taking the right freeways, the right exits, the right turns. It felt quite equipped with paper maps even though we needed ton of them as we spanned different states and then narrowed down to the areas within each state. Then came the age of Map Quest and Yahoo! maps. Some 5 years back I remember making this statement that I couldn't imagine life without Yahoo! maps. It was as simple as mapping your routes and keeping those print outs handy while driving. Really that simple compared to carrying those dozen maps.
Just recently we bought a new GPS gadget the Garmin nuvi 360- the ultimate travel companion. Since the iPod I have never gone so gaga over any gadget. Not only does it map routes and speak out the directions, it has bluetooth, speaker phone and an MP3 player. That means my blue tooth phone connects to Garmin as soon as I enter the car and then I can use the speakerphone on it to chat while I am driving. Makes your driving experience truly enjoyable. I have always desired this in an automotive and now the wish has come true.
Wouldn't you agree technology has truely enhanced the quality of our lives? Just the last 10 years are an outstanding evidence. Wonder what we'll have to say in a few more years.

teething pain...times 2

In some ways I and my 7 month daughter are going through similar experiences. While she is going thru teething pain for her first 2 pearly whites, here I am going thru the pain of losing 2 of my wisdom teeth. While I got orajel for her, I got the adult orajel for myself. While she is taking infants' tylenol for her pain, I am taking the extra strength tylenol for mine. She enjoys cold yoplait and so do I. The only difference I guess is she wants to bite into everything within reach and I am staying away from biting just about anything.

end of the year ritual..

It's end of the year ritual for us friends to share our favorite 5s of the year.

5 memorable things this year:
1. gave birth to 2 lovely babies
2. spent quality time with my mom, something I hadn't done in last 10 years
3. been a good listener and support to a friend
4. learnt many many nursery rhymes
5. reconnected with 2 friends with whom I had lost touch

5 things I did this year that I have never done before:
1. well #1 above applies here
2. did not have any alcoholic drinks this year
3. made more online purchases than I have ever before
4. stayed indoors for 3 days without stepping out
5. had dental work done on 5 of my teeth(!!)

5 favorite books:
1. What's going on in there
2. Rishis, Mystics and Heroes of India
unfortunately the pregnancy books do not count so that's all I have.

privileged audience that we are!

Being part of a fairly visible non-profit software foundation like OSAF makes us privileged audience to quite some prominent speakers. Last year we had Vice President Al Gore who gave us a truly enlightening talk on Global Warming which is now made into a movie called 'An Inconvenient Truth' - a must see if environmental facts interest you. We had no media, no cameras just some 50 of us between OSAF, LPFI and Creative Commons and him. Even though most of us have heard of the alarming effect of global warning, pure statistics presented in his slides were staggering. We all came out pretty shocked at how little we are doing to fix this. Eventually something was done about it - OSAF office became the only green office in all of San Fransico city. We use only recycled products, we recycle all unused food items into compost and use vendors and restaurants who adhere to environment friendly standards. It feels quite rewarding being part of such an environment aware organization.

Next was Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia. An eloquent speaker who walked us through how he founded Wikipedia and how it became the biggest free encyclopedia on the internet. He also gave us some insight on how it is a self-governing organization managed by a handful of paid employees and hundreds of dedicated volunteers.

Later part of the year we had Mayor of San Francisco city, Gavin Newsom who had come for a student fund raiser hosted by our sister organization, LPFI.

Well, with the new year only a few days away we eagerly await the new list of prominent speakers who might walk the ramp of 543 Howard Street.

sometimes it's important to remind ourselves..

A recent news item making it’s rounds in the blogs, describes the experience of a well known Kenyan author, Ngugi wa Thiong'o, being kicked out of Hotel Vitale, in the SF bay area. It just highlights how very different peoples’ realities are based solely on skin color – yes, even today. Ngugi was here to promote his most recent book. Here’s a post that made it around in the blogs, describing Ngugi’s experience:

“…What happened next could have been a scene from a pre-Civil Rights Era of a Black man caught in a “White Only” section of a hotel. A hotel employee approached the Professor and said:
“This place is for guests of the hotel. You have to leave.”
Handling the matter calmly and intrigued by the assertion of the man, the Professor asked
“How do you know that I am not a guest of the hotel?” ..”

Here's an interesting article on that.

Here’s another post that also prints the CEO of Joie de Vivre Hospitality response, which begins “Prejudice still exists in America. It is real and palpable…”



And finally, here’s one of the comments from a staff member at the hotel, which reveals the distance we need to travel to clarify the insidiousness of bias to people that consider themselves rational, logical, and only ‘doing their job’.

our little adventure to kauai

We had little hope of making this trip anything close to a relaxing vacation but to much of our surprise it was quite so. Taking the twins on a 6 hour flight from SF to Honolulu to Lihue seemed quite daunting at first but turned out to be manageable after all, not pleasant but manageable. I have to agree with Viral that most important thing about traveling with kids is Planning, Planning and Planning. We had a good checklist of things we had to take - their everyday items, emergency items, medical items, play time items etc. Of course we also took our nanny along which is what made this easy. Viral and I actually got to spend some time together. Also the ensemble of 8 other friends were a great support around. While the reason for the trip was to cheer one of our dear friends Rakesh who ran the Honolulu Marathon, we didn't quite make it to the event. We cheered him with our enthusiasm and support remotely from Kauai. The weather switched between being scorching hot and humid in the day time to being cold in the evenings and night. The sunset on the Poipu beach was breathtaking. Here's one for a starter..

Open Source, Open Standards

Time and again this has come up in various discussions with people - how are open source and open standards related. Most people think they are entirely complementary. Finally here's a blog post from a fellow colleague who has done a great job addressing it.

after a long hiatus...

This has been the longest hiatus in my 9 years of work life and if I may add, one that has sped most quickly too. I was away from work for the last 6.5 months resuming work only last week. Even though initially I had some withdrawal symptoms, I have to admit I soon got so entrenched into mundane activites of the day to day life taking care of the twins that I did not miss much being without my laptop and or the daily staple of online news, blogs and rss feeds. My twins are exactly 6 months old and with the luxury of having a full-time nanny, I am happy to rejoin the work force with renewed vigor.
Development of Chandler has come a long way in the past few months with a working dashboard and an almost usable Calendar. We are closing in on the alpha 4 release. For us intrepid dogfooders, it has some big advances including background synchronization and performance enhancements.

Why we do what we do?

What's this working for a non-profit foundation all about?
I have been asked this same question a hundred times in different gatherings and parties and I have tried to answer it to the best I could. But here's a more pertinent response to that as posted by Mitchell Baker from Mozilla. Here's her blog post.

Sunshine is finally here..

..and so is the update to my blog. Sorry friends for not having reported anything the last few months. Being pregnant with twins has taken it's share of toll on me. Being 5 weeks away, I am so big and bulky, I can barely drive, walk or even stand for more than 10 mins straight. And I have been told that life is going to change in even more ways once the babies are here.
As for the bay area weather, it has been depressingly cold and rainy the last 2 months. Finally we are getting some sunshine and everyone's keeping their fingers crossed. It's nice to see little flowers blooming in the backyard, people running in their shorts, mothers taking babies out for a stroll, kids riding their bicycles etc
It feels like the spirit of summer is finally here and I better get out and get some sunshine rather than being confined in a room with a computer.

New developments ...

in our backyard