JALA Thoughts

The Durban climate change meetings are over. The results are in. They are: not much has been resolved. The 2012 expiration date of the Kyoto protocols is unchanged. No new protocol was adopted. Still, there is movement toward a global agreement on climate change sometime around 2020 or so. This agreement would/might include China, India, and other large carbon–emitting nations. But 2020 may be way too late to have the world avoid serious temperature change.

The general impression that this meeting leaves is that, if you feel that action is required now to reduce further global warming, you had better not depend on any government  (except maybe the state of California) to make it happen. As I stated in my previous blog on this topic, Mother Nature is indifferent to the actions of mankind. The laws of physics remain in effect regardless of who believes himself in charge. This year, 2011, was again one of the warmest on record with a number of serious weather events. The non-climate disaster in Japan simply added to the toll of misery inflicted on humanity. So, what to do?

Here’s a list of rescue resolutions you might want to make for the coming year: Continue reading Death by Durban, Part 2

In 2005 the so-called Kyoto protocol went into force, requiring most of the developed nations to begin serious reductions in their production of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (GHGs). The protocol was designed to last until the end of 2012. It specifically left out reduction requirements for developing countries such as China, Brazil, and India. The European Union countries began specific and varied steps to implement the protocols; the United States did not.

Today what is supposed to be a determined attempt to expand the Kyoto protocols beyond 2012 begins in Durban South Africa. The outlook for success is not bright. For example, Japan, one of the major leaders in development of the Kyoto protocol, has said that it would not support a second commitment beyond 2012. So what began as an important effort by world governments to slow the rate of global warming is in real danger of suffocating. Rather than taking an energetic step forward, the participants are in danger of death by ennui.
Continue reading Death by Durban

The first and only time I met Steve Jobs was late in the summer of 1976 at a Southern California Computer Society meeting. Among the exhibits there was a table with two hirsute young man behind it. On the table was a circuit board, a power supply, a 9 inch black-and-white monitor, a keyboard, and ribbon cables connecting them together. The two young men, both of them called Steve, demonstrated the power of their scattered–component computer on the 9 inch monitor. They said they were about to begin production of the system. I ask them what they called it. They said it was the Apple I. I told him that they would have to package the parts in a more attractive case if they wanted to sell very many of them.

The rest, as they say, is history. From that humble beginning, in a garage in Northern California, arose one of the world’s most dominant technology firms. Also, that Computer Society meeting inspired me to take a close look at the future of personal computers. A year later I had secured a grant from the National Science Foundation to perform a technology assessment of the personal computer. That assessment, completed in 1978, forecast a rapid expansion of acceptance of personal computers and a concomitant, pervasive impact on almost every aspect of modern society (although with some hitches, as in education).

This was also the beginning of the contest between open and closed personal computer systems. Steve Jobs was among the foremost proponents of closed systems—where the hardware and software were intimately interconnected and designed as a single entity. “It just works.” Continue reading The future after Jobs

In the 2 September 2011 Los Angeles Times there’s an article titled: Panetta’s commute raises eyebrows. The gist of the story is that many Washingtonians are shocked, shocked that the Secretary of Defense could even consider boarding a U.S. Air Force jet to fly home to California for a three-day weekend. Almost every weekend. Never mind that Panetta’s ranch in the Carmel Valley is fully equipped with the telecommunications technology to allow him to keep in constant touch with the Pentagon 24-7.

What memories this situation arouses in me. Flash back to the mid-1960s when I was still a “rocket scientist” engaged in some highly classified research for the Air Force. In Los Angeles. One afternoon I got a call to brief the Undersecretary of the Air Force at 9:30 the next morning. In the Pentagon. One does not refuse such a request so I dutifully boarded the “redeye” to Washington, arriving the next morning at about 6:30 AM. Upon arriving at the Pentagon I was told that the briefing had been postponed to 2:00 PM. At 1:00 P:M I was told the briefing was cancelled. So I climbed on the evening plane back to LA, never having briefed the Undersecretary. I thought: there must be an easier way.

A short time later I was told that there was a secure color TV link to the Pentagon in an office about 50 meters from my office in LA. Had I been a General I could have used that link instead of making that fruitless and expensive round trip to the Pentagon. To borrow a phrase from Leonard Bernstein’s Wonderful Town: “What a waste of money and time!”

Continue reading SecDef Telecommutes? Shocking!

At fairly regular intervals I get questions from the media like: “Whatever happened to the great surge in telecommuting that was predicted back in 19xx (or 20xx)?” The reporter usually hadn’t seen any recent stories about telecommuting and therefore (while imagining the headline) leapt to the conclusion that “telecommuting is dead!”

Telecommuting isn’t dead. It’s alive and well, if stealthy.

As a very recent indicator I was listening to NPR this morning as the reporter in Manhattan was describing the return to work of exurban-dwelling workers after the onslaught of Hurricane Irene. The reporter’s words were to the effect that workers seemed to be arriving by bus or car as usual or “maybe they’re telecommuting” (as an explanation of the lower than usual numbers of arrivals). An indication that disaster planning efforts that included telecommuting might actually be in effect in many companies (see some of my earlier blogs to that effect). But who’s counting?

I have also had conversations over the past few years with employees of large corporations on  the topic of telecommuting, both formal and informal (stealth). The general telecommuting implementation scenario goes: Continue reading Stealth Telecommuting

As I mentioned in my last post, the general media panic about total gridlock in LA during Carmageddon could possibly be a replay of LA during the 1984 Olympic games.

As it turned out, my forecast was right on. Here’s a shot of the I-405 freeway at Sunset Boulevard, near the southern end of the Sepulveda pass, at 2:00 PM the afternoon after the freeway closure.

Carmageddon, Day 1

The only car shown on the freeway is a parked official vehicle. Not only that, all the streets in the immediate area were traveled by only the occasional car. Not only that, the rest of Los Angeles reportedly was also congestion-free. I’d love to say that this wonderful highway emptiness was a result of a sudden interest in telecommuting but this photo was taken on a Saturday, not the usual workday. No, the sudden hiatus mainly was the result of a mass decision to stay home.

The bridge reconstruction that triggered all of this was completed hours ahead of time, on the following Sunday morning. Here’s the freeway, from the same vantage point, on Sunday afternoon, same time.

Carmageddon, Day 2

Still pretty nice, but the freeway had only been open for less than 3 hours when this was taken. The massteria still ruled. But would it last?

Continue reading Carmagedddon v. telecommuting: Part 2

As is generally known, the Los Angeles region depends for its economic survival on its cars and freeways. Tomorrow a key section of one of the world’s most traveled freeways, the 405, will shut down for at least 53 hours. This action is to allow demolition of a bridge in Sepulveda Pass as part of the project (costing an estimated $1 billion) to widen the 405. The pass is the principal connection through the Santa Monica mountains between the San Fernando Valley and West Los Angeles.  The shut-down allegedly is scheduled for the weekend in order to minimize the effect on business-related traffic, i.e., the daily commutes to and from work. Normally, if such a term can be applied to Los Angeles, the to-be-closed section of the 405 handles 500,000 cars per day during the weekends. So something in the order of 1 million cars are about to be blocked from their wonted activities.

Naturally, the local news media have been having a field week over the prospects, calling the impending automotive doom Carmageddon. Also naturally, in accordance with the law of perversity of the human psyche, people who live on one side of the city tend to work on the other side. This is the primary reason for the so-called rush hour; well, it once was called the rush hour, now it tends to be four hours, twice daily. On weekends people, freed from the need to commute to work, still get on the freeways to go shopping or whatever. The word lemmings comes to mind. Why, the imminent disaster might be comparable to that of the 1984 Olympics when similar scenarios were bruited about.

But wait! As I recall, the actual traffic in LA during the 1984 Olympics was much lighter than normal; almost free-flow. What happened was that:

• Workers shifted work hours or telecommuted during the Olympics;
• Families moved their shopping and entertainment travel to work around the Olympics;
• Truck travel was confined to non-Olympic hours.

In short, millions of people quickly adapted to the need not to travel. Could this happen again?

Continue reading Carmageddon v. telecommuting

A recent article by Daniel Gilbert in Nature, titled Buried by bad decisions, made me rethink approaches to encouraging telework. Gilbert’s point is that humans often make bad decisions; decisions that seem sensible but aren’t because “they tend to focus on what we are getting and forget about what we are foregoing”. Gilbert continues:

For example, people are more likely to buy an item when they are asked to choose between buying or not buying it than when they are asked to choose between buying the item and keeping their money “for other purchases”. Although “not buying” and “keeping one’s money” are the same thing. . . .We will change our lives to save a child but not our light bulbs to save them all.

This description would be amusing if it were not for the fact that humanity is rushing headlong toward serious trouble because of such decision processes. Continue reading The moral imperative

One of the interesting features of telework is the way it keeps popping up even when “management” tries to suppress it. Often this is because all the tried-and-true options have been exhausted. For example, in the 27 May 2011 edition of the Financial Times Amy Kazmin writes about the Tata conglomerate’s program (called Second Career) to retain the talents of young mothers. The problem in India, as in many countries, is a growing shortage of skilled workers (as contrasted to a surplus of unskilled workers). In one sense, India’s efforts in global off-shoring have been too successful. Many companies have used up the supply of local skilled talent and are scratching their collective heads in search of new talent supplies.

Where the needed skills are information/knowledge-related, telework may be part of the answer. As the FT states:

The Tata Group’s “breakthrough”, says Mr. Pradhan, was to realize that taking time out to raise children did not have to exile women from the job market permanently. “It is part of a normal social process for women — because of their unique space in humanity and bio-uniqueness — to take time to raise a family,” he says. “We said, ‘let’s focus on what is preventing women from coming back into the workforce’.”

Continue reading India flexes time for women

Years ago I usually commented, in response to questions on the future of telework, something like this:

Think of telework and telecommuting as the tide rolling in rather than a sudden tsunami. Telework will gradually increase in acceptance and variety as the enabling technology improves and as our business norms progress past those of the nineteenth century.

That’s pretty much how it was from the 1970s through to the early-2000s, punctuated by occasional natural disasters that acted to ratchet up the acceptance rate while the aftereffects lasted. But since then matters have picked up a tad.

One of the persistent holdouts against telework were Japanese firms. Japanese business culture demanded that all managerial and professional employees and support staff collocate daily in company facilities. There were also social pressures enforcing the leave home and work elsewhere model. Often, when telework was allowed it was for the salarymen on “vacation”. That is, the salarymen would take their families to a resort where there were office facilities so that they could keep working while the other family members took advantage of the resort facilities.

The major earthquake and tsunami of 11 March 2011 changed all that. Continue reading The Infotsunami