Doug Cornelius .com

Here is a collection of posts from my professional blog: Compliance Building.

Compliance Bits and Pieces for January 29

Here are some interesting stories from the past week: French Supreme Court Limits the Scope of the Whistleblowing Process by Cecile Martin in the Privacy law Blog For the first time the French Supreme Court addressed the issue of the validity of a Code of conducts that had been implemented by a listed company. Read more »

Governing Social Media: How to Monitor, Manage and Make the Most of Employee Use of Social Media

Join me, Kathleen Edmond, Chief Ethics Officer, Best Buy, and Janice Innis-Thompson, SVP & Chief Compliance Officer, TIAA-CREF, as we discuss compliance and governance issues of web 2.0 and social networking. “Corporate Communication takes on a whole new meaning in a world of social media, where employees can freely post their views and spread documents,… Read more »

The Economist Special Report on Social Networking.

January 28, 2010

“An astonishing amount of time is being wasted on investigating the amount of time being wasted on social networks.” I love reading The Economist because of lines like that. The January 28 issue has a special report on social networking. (The cover image is Steve Jobs dressed like Moses with his new tablet) “Another , by… Read more »

Tax on Carried Interest? Maybe Not.

January 28, 2010

Tucked into the Tax Extenders Act of 2009 (H.R. 4213) was a provision targeted at partnership interests held by partners providing services. H.R. 4213 flew through the legislative process of the House of Representatives. It was introduced on December 7, 2009 and passed by the House on December 9, mostly along party lines. Read more »

More on Data Privacy Day

January 28, 2010

Today is International Data Privacy Day. Massachusetts Recognizes Data Privacy Day 2010 and touts the the new data security regulations. Disney has enlisted Phineas and Ferb to help guide your kids through cyberspace and teach them about the rules of the road on the internet. Google published their guiding privacy principles and published a video discussing them:… Read more »

Data Privacy Day is January 28

January 28, 2010

Data Privacy Day is an annual international celebration to raise awareness and generate discussion about information privacy. Last year, both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives recognized January 28th, 2009 as National Data Privacy Day. Intel, Microsoft, Google, AT&T, LexisNexis and The Privacy Projects are sponsoring Data Privacy Day efforts, with assistance from… Read more »

Hayek vs. Keynes Rap Anthem “Fear the Boom and Bust”

January 27, 2010

For you economics geeks, how about a rap duel between John Maynard Keynes and F. A. Hayek? In Fear the Boom and Bust, John Maynard Keynes and F. A. Hayek, two of the great economists of the 20th century, come back to life to attend an economics conference on the economic crisis. Before the conference… Read more »

Blue Collar or White Collar

January 27, 2010

Undercover agents, wire taps and search warrants. For a criminal case it sounds like your typical organized crime investigation. You would expect the indictment to have charges for drug dealing, racketeering, murder or something similar. But last week we heard that these were the techniques used to catch the 22 people indicted for violations of… Read more »

FINRA Issues Guidance on Social Networking Sites

January 26, 2010

Securities firms and brokers have been looking for guidance on how they can use social networking sites. Actually most industries have been trying to figure out what they can and cannot do with these sites. The difference is that the FINRA limitations on communicating with the public make it very difficult to use the… Read more »

Global Ethics Summit Update

Dow Jones and Ethisphere Institute are teaming up to present the 2010 Global Ethics Summit on February 23-24, 2010 at the Grand Hyatt New York City. I will be attending, thanks to an offer from the event’s organizers. If you are interested in attending I can offer you a 15% discount on regular conference fees,… Read more »

But Everyone Else is Doing it

What is missing from your coffee drinking experience?

Does it have enough geek?

Does it have enough dad?

Probably not.

But how can you fix that?

How about a brand new GeekDad mug!

You can even personalize it.

Being in the real estate industry, I am a big fan of maps. I like how they help visual the world around us. There is the physical sense of the objects around us and how to get from one point to another.

But maps can also help us visual information in many different ways. That is what interested me in Strange Maps by Frank Jacobs. I first heard about the book from an interview on the Freakonomics blog: Maps: Fighting Disease and Skewing Borders.

I encountered the book and the Strange Maps blog at the same time. Although, it took a few months for the book to surface in my reading stack. (The blog was being published before the book.)

As you might expect, the book is very blogish. Each page has a map and a narrative about the map. There are some great ones, some mediocre ones and some so-so ones. You take the hits with misses. In the end there is lots of interesting visuals and interesting information. After reading Strange Maps, you won’t view a map the same way.

Image by Consequencefree

Bubble Wrap was created by two engineers, Alfred Fielding and Marc Chavannes, in 1957. They went on to form the Sealed Air Corporation (US) in 1960. That makes 2010 the 50th birthday of Bubble Wrap®.

Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day has been celebrated annually on the last Monday in January since 2001.

How can you celebrate?

Pop some! Or if you don’t have ready access, you can pop some virtually with Sealed Air’s virtual bubble wrap game. Or check out some of their other Bubble Wrap Fun.

Dave Metz decides he wants to spend four months crossing the Alaskan wilderness with no human company. Just him and his two dogs. He tells us his story in Crossing the Gates of Alaska: One Man, Two Dogs, 600 Miles off the Map.

With two young kids at home, I’m now an armchair adventure, after a few years of Adventure Doug. So I enjoy a good adventure story. The publisher sent me a free copy to review.

In the spring of 2007, Dave Metz sets out from Kotzebue, on the west coast of Alaska, with two dogs to traverse the Brooks Range on foot. It was a tough journey covering 600 air miles (far longer on the ground) through some of the most remote territory on the planet. For four months, Metz and his dogs, battled bitter cold, rugged terrain, wild animals and the threat of starvation before arriving at Anaktuvuk Pass.

Image by Travel Alberta Canada

Metz spent the first six weeks skijoring up frozen rivers toward the interior mountain ranges. What is skijoring? Strap on skis, tie up your dogs, strap on their leashes and the let them pull you. For Metz, he had the dogs in front of him and two heavy plastic sleds behind him towing his supplies. Since Metz wanted to travel up the smooth surface of frozen rivers rather than bushwhack through underbrush, they had to race against the spring thaw.

At one point he encounters a local. When Mr. Metz tells him his plan to ski from Kotzebue to Ambler, he gets “a blank face, like he isn’t sure why anyone would want to do what I’m doing.” The book left me wondering the same question.

I never got a good sense from the book why Metz had taken on this adventure. At times, it seems the reason is to get back to nature in the sense of Thoreau and Walden. He wants to live alone with nature. But then he craves the companionship of his girlfriend, brothers and friends. He looks forward to drinking tequila and smoking cigars with them when they hike together on the second leg of the journey from Anaktuvuk Pass to Coldfoot.

His main companions are his two dogs, Will and Jimmy, big Airedale Terriers. All three of them end up running out food and close to collapsing from starvation by the time they stumble in to Anaktuvuk Pass.

The book lacks an interesting story and gets repetitive. Metz finds a big river that is hard to cross, he encounters nearly impenetrable brush, he falls down, again. I really didn’t care if Metz made it to his destination. Since there is a book, you know he made it.

Crossing the Gates of Alaska goes on sale January 26, 2010.

You can see some of his pictures on Flickr: “Crossing the Gates of Alaska” by Dave Metz

I also put together this map of his route.

View Crossing the Gates of Alaska in a larger map

Back in 1980, your Star Wars cred could be shown by slapping Empire Strikes Back sticker letters on your book covers and trapper keepers.

RestrainingBolt.com has a virtual sticker generator that serves up those old letters. So badge your names and go get a new trapper keeper.

via the Star Wars Blog: Retro Empire Sticker Generator

I grew up learning about the nine planets. My son is growing up learning about eight planets. In 2006 the International Astronomical Union demoted beloved Pluto from its planetary status.

The demotion of Pluto was my impetus to read Planets X and Pluto by William Graves Hoyt. The book was written in 1981 and is since outdated. But I thought it would interesting to read a story about the discovery of Pluto that was written before the demotion. The book was on my shelf because it was a college textbook of Mrs. Doug. It is very dense, as you would expect from a college textbook. (and terrible to read)

Six of the planets can be seen with the human eye: Mercury, Venus, Earth (since you’re standing on it), Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Ancient civilizations were able to see these “wandering stars.” Eventually math, science, technology and faith evolved so that the planets were seen for what they are and that Earth was not the center of the universe.

Uranus

Planets X and Pluto opens with the 18th century discovery of Uranus. It was the first planet discovered with the use of technology, since its not otherwise visible. That discovery opened the door to the idea of there being other planets in our solar system.

Asteroids

After mapping out the distance between the seven planets known at the start of the 19th century, astronomers noticed a big gap between Mars and Jupiter. The theory was that there may be a yet unseen planet in that orbital space. That lead to the discovery of the Ceres and a short time later Pallas. After some time figuring out the size, they realized these two objects were much smaller than the other planets.

The Orbit of Uranus

Using a collection of current observations and a set of much older observations, 19th century astronomers were trying to create a model of the orbit of Uranus. They were having problems getting a model to work. Uranus seemed to be going slower than it should be.

A group of astronomers came up with the theory that there was another planet out there that was pulling on Uranus. At this point the math and technology had evolved to the point that they could calculate where this yet unseen planet should be and where they should look for it. The hunt was on. (At least for the few astronomers who believed the theory.)

Discovery of Neptune

Neptune became the first planet discovered by mathematical prediction. Johan Gottfried Galle used the position data calculated by Urbain LeVerrier. After observing the region of the sky, he saw a “star” moving retrograde. A sure sign that it was not a star, but something else. It turns out to be the eighth planet: Neptune.

Beyond Neptune

Following the discovery of Neptune in 1846, there was speculation that another planet might exist beyond its orbit. The math was not as definitive as that used with Neptune. Percival Lowell was convinced that there was a Planet X beyond Neptune. (Of course he also believed there were Martian-made canals on Mars.) Lowell proposed the Planet X hypothesis to explain apparent discrepancies in the orbits of Uranus and Neptune, speculating that the gravity of a large unseen ninth planet could have disturbed Uranus enough to account for the irregularities. He died before Pluto was identified.

Discovery of Pluto

Clyde Tombaugh was hired by the Lowell Observatory, funded by Percival’s estate. He discovered Pluto in 1930, apparently validating Lowell’s hypothesis. But the discovery was more because of Tomabugh’s persistence and the meticulous nature of his search. After the announcement, astronomers looked back at their old photographs and at least a half-dozen had overlooked Pluto.

From the beginning, there were disputes about Pluto. Some thought it was a comet. Others thought it was merely an asteroid. Pluto’s orbit was more eccentric than the other planets. There were many attempts to link Lowell’s formulas to the discovery of Pluto lasting for decades after the initial discovery. Any of hope of that was crushed in 1978 when Charon, one of Pluto’s moons, was discovered. Some of the reflectivity and measurements came from more than one body, meaning that Pluto was too small to be having much of difference on the orbit of Uranus or Neptune. Lowell predicted Planet X would have a mass that was six times larger than Earth’s mass.

Foreshadowing of Pluto’s Demotion

Even back in 1980 when Planets X and Pluto was written, Pluto was considered odd. It’s orbit was much more elliptical than the other planets. Enough that Pluto passes within the orbit of Neptune. That lead to speculation that Pluto was a lost moon of Neptune. It’s clear that in 1980, little was known about Pluto.

Planets X and Pluto ends with some unexplained disturbances in the orbit of Uranus and Neptune, leaving the reader with the possibility of there being a Planet X at the far reaches of our solar system.

Beyond the Book

As we now know, Pluto is just one of many Kuiper belt objects orbiting the sun beyond Neptune.

It also turns out that there is another big object out there. Eris was first identified in January 2005 as a trans-Neptunian object in a region of space beyond the Kuiper belt known as the scattered disc. Eris is actually bigger than Pluto. This was one of the new discoveries that led to the demotion of Pluto.

Planets X and Pluto is not very good, even with the understanding that it is dated. There is some interesting material and there is the possibility for an interesting story. It’s just not in this book.

I don’t know how Lorne Michaels got James Cameron to do this movie, but it’s hilarious.

Combine Terminator, Aliens and Avatar with Laser Cats. Add funny. Now laugh.

One of the challenges of parenting is finding activities that you enjoy and that your kids enjoy. The same is true with reading. There are books you like and there are books your kids like, but there are very few that you both like. The Lightning Thief is one of those few books.

Percy Jackson is a misfit at school, having been kicked out of school after school. At first it seems that he is just another New York kid diagnosed with ADHD. It turns out he is half-blood offspring of one of the Greek gods and that Mount Olympus has migrated to the 600th floor of the Empire State Building

It’s easy to compare Percy Jackson to Harry Potter. Both take kids and immerse them in a fantasy world with some friend to help them out. With Harry Potter, it was magic and wizards. Percy Jackson substitutes ancient Greek mythology.

Instead of Harry’s Ron and Hermione, Percy’s friends are a disguised satyr and the half-blood daughter of Athena. Percy has to travel from New York to Los Angeles to prevent a war between Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon by finding the lightning thief. Along the way they encounter the Minotaur, the Furies, Medusa, and Ares, the god of war, decked out as a motorcycle thug.

The characters are not as interesting as the Harry Potter characters, but the storytelling is more light-hearted. Percy is more rebellious and snarkier than Harry Potter.

The true test was that when we finished the book, I thought it was good enough that I wanted to read the second book. Even better, my son asked me to read the next book. I’m heading tomorrow out to get The Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book 2).

GoodReads versus LibraryThing versus Shelfari

Back in 2008, I started looking at ways to catalog my household’s book collection: Books and Knowledge Management. LibraryThing was the winner. That decision was largely driven by their ability to manually enter books. Back in 2008 GoodReads and Shelfari libraries were limited to books listed on Amazon.com.

Since then, I have happily been using Library Thing. I have entered over 1,200 books in my LibraryThing catalog. About 300 of those books are more than 50 years old, meaning they are not available on Amazon.com.

It’s been about two years so I decided to take another look at my options. LibraryThing has been good to me, so I am hesitant to move. I suspected that there would be a great deal of time trying to recreate my catalog on another site.

Import and Export

All three have the ability to import and export books. So I exported the lists to Shelfari and GoodReads. I ended up with 1082 in Shelfari after manually adding 100 or so books. Shelfari made me go through a painful process of adding books by matching covers, with only 20 books per page. I gave up a third of the way through. I did not manually enter any books in Goodreads and ended up with 967 books.

Visuals

Back in 2008, Shelfari had the best visuals of the three. Unfortunately, it looks like time stopped for Shelfari. I did not notice any change in its visuals. The site  shows the book covers sitting on a wood grain bookshelf.

LibraryThing is the least attractive of the three. But it seems to have forgone good visuals for a user interface full of information. I found it the easiest to use, but I had the most familiarity with it.

GoodReads has the best looking user interface of the three.

Tags, Shelves and Collections

One of the keys is how the sites allow you to organize the books. For me, I have two basic pieces of data. The first is the reading status: read it or planning to read it. The second is whether I own it or not. Essentially I want to track the books I’ve read and the books I own in one place.

LibraryThing uses “collections” that work well for my basic data. The collections are not exclusive, so books can be in multiple collections. My collections are currently reading, publisher provided, reviewed, read but unowned, and to read. The LibraryThing also allows for extensive use of tags.

Goodreads allows many “shelves.” I set up currently reading, to-read, borrowed, and publisher provided. For some reason, your ownership status for a book is separate from the shelves. There is no separate tagging.

Shelfari limits your “shelves” to reading status, own, favorite and wish list. Instead, they allow lots of tagging.

Mobile Views

All three have a stripped down mobile view of their sites. Of the three, GoodReads has the most functionality squeezed onto the small iPhone screen, yet it still very readable.

Community

All three sites about their active network of users sharing information about books.  I had very few connections on the sites. Lots of connections on one of the sites would be a good reason to selection that site.

Integration with Other Applications

Goodreads has a nice tie into Twitter and Facebook allowing you update you books status to those sites. I really like this feature.

LibraryThing and Shelfari both have Facebook applications but they are far behind GoodReads.

Widgets

All three sites allow you to use widgets to show part of your collection.

LibraryThing had the most widgets and an ability to customize those widgets.

Cost

All three sites are free.

LibraryThing requires you to buy a membership if you want to keep more than 25o books in your catalog. I bought the $25 lifetime membership.

GoodReads and Shelfari both display advertisements.

What’s Next?

Going forward for the next months, I am going to use all three site and try to replicate the information. (although, I’m not going to spend much time going back to clean up my catalogs in GoodReads or Shelfari.) The stack of books next to my nightstand has gotten nearly as tall as my kids. So I have an itch to  cram in a bunch of book reading this year to clear out my backlog.

I will publish a follow-up in a few months and let you know which site won the competition.

In the meantime, if you are using any of the sites let me know your thoughts and connect with me.

• Doug on LibraryThing
• Doug on GoodReads
• Doug on Shelfari