Michael Kubler

One of the extensions I’ve come to love is Facebook Photo Zoom. It lets you put your mouse over a small image (e.g someone’s display pic) in Facebook and it’ll show a full sized (or as close to it as your screen will support) image.

Download Facebook Photo Zoom for Google Chrome or Firefox.

Update : Another great Firefox extension is Download Flash and Video, which allows you to easily download YouTube videos, plus the Extended Copy Menu which lets you copy as plain text (great for pasting into other documents without the crazy formatting that you sometimes get).

Other recommended Firefox extensions :

• Tab Mix Plus : Adds advanced control over how Tabs are used in Firefox. I love the ability to protect tabs, plus set it up to always opento the right and focus on the right tab on close. Makes it easier to deal with many, many tabs.
• Xmarks Sync : If your like me then you’ve got multiple computers then you’ll know how annoying it can be to syncronise bookmarks between your different installs of Firefox.

Extensions for Web Developers

• Firebug : Firebug is great for inspecting elements and the DOM, checking jQuery expressions, making live CSS, HTML and Javascript changes, viewing the console logs, etc..
• DOM Inspector : A plugin for Firefox which is similar to Firebug.
• Colorzilla : It’s amazing how often I need to find the right colour. Using Colourzilla I can use the dropper to work out what another colour is, use the colour wheel to select my own colour and easily copy the # or RGB colours for my CSS files.
• Screengrab : Ever wanted to make a screenshot of a WHOLE page even though it was say 8 times longer than the screen? Now you can! I often use Screengrab to save screenshots at the end of the Scrum sprint (Friday’s) so that I can see a history of the sites I’ve been working on and their evolution.
• WebDeveloper : This should be on every web dev’s toolbar. Whilst doing a number of features similar to Firebug it’s still incredibly useful, especially when trying to test the page with javascript disabled (or disabling those damn right click restrictions on certain sites). I usually like the inspect element tool when trying to write jQuery selector expressions, although sometimes also use Firebug or Google Chromes built in inspector.

Got some more Firefox or Chrome extensions you think should be on the list? Comment or email me.

The many of people, myself included have fallen into a trap.

We have a set of behaviours when using a computer which are mostly there to optimise the power of the computer, not of humans. We might have to start copying a load of files and leave the computer for a while as things are slower, or when trying to organise our files and folders might multitask, trying to keep track of multiple file copies, whilst downloading the latest episode of a TV series, chatting to friends on social media all whilst we are meant to be working on an assignment. Such multi-tasking of attention is not what the brain is designed for or can really do. We can usually only concentrate on one thing at a time and have to keep switching attention, but each time you switch it takes up to half a second.

We have become so used to computer restrictions like only being able to send 160 character sms’s that we have duplicated the restriction with services like Twitter which don’t need such restrictions.

Basically, we have been optimising computer potential, which was a scarcity, at the cost of human potential. But we are near if not have reached the point where that needs to change. We need to be using computers to optimise human potential or else computers will leave us in the dust before we even reach the singularity.

As computers are getting faster we can predict that they will be as computationally powerful as humans in only a couple of decades. Only 18 months after that they will be twice as fast and barely 6 years later will be 32x as powerful, assuming Moores law is the main limiting factor.

Below is based on a Facebook response I wrote to someone asking for evidence that the GFC caused peak oil.

The often cited cause of the GFC was sub prime mortgages in the USA. People who purchased crappy housing with little to no risk on their part.
But why is it that the deal seemed good but then lots of these people couldn’t pay? Because the price of oil went up and like a rising tide that lifts all boats the costs of nearly everything goes up with it…. But wages don’t increase with it. So lots of people defaulted.

Also, ask yourself why some people not paying off some housing in America would cause a GLOBAL financial crisis where countries like Greece are still reeling from the effects?

Peak Oil production was actually hit in 2006 ( according to the International Energy Agency’s 2010 report http://www.resilience.org/stories/2010-11-11/iea-acknowledges-peak-oil ) and has basically kept at around the same level of production for a while. The price spike didn’t happen until 2008 thanks to existing oil reserves ( many of which were brought out of the ground by the derivatives market especially by people with memory of the 1970′s oil crisis in America ), plus things like the exponentially rising demand for oil as Dr Albert Bartlett explains so well in the presentation ‘Arithmetic, Population and Energy’

As predicted more than 20 years ago and as you can see in the 5 year graph of crude oil prices at http://www.oil-price.net/index.php?lang=en in 2008 there was a spike in oil prices around the time of the GFC, it then fell ( as people used less oil ) and prices have been going through the expected cycle of rising then people using less because of the higher prices which reduces demand and causes the price to fall, the lower prices then mean people use it more so the price increases until people use it less, etc..

The 10 year chart at http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/crude-oil.aspx?timeframe=10y is probably a better view of it all.

If you want an economist which talks about this then Jeremy Rifkin does although what he talks about is so good that you should watch the whole thing ( short version provided if you don’t have much time the long version if you can’t keep up with the dubstep speed ).

The short version (for those without much time)

The longer version (for those that can’t understand the dubstep version)

I don’t think Civilisation will collapse as everyone keeps being worried it will, it is more likely to either break down or undergo multiple major paradigm changes at once.

Henceforth I will try and use the term ‘Civilisation breakdown‘, instead of  ’Civilisation collapse‘. It gives me more leeway in being able to say “I told you so!” later on… Not that such bragging rights will matter without the Internet to brag on.

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One of the TED talks I have watched the most and basically require other people to watch is on The Surprising Science of Motivation. In the presentation Dan Pink talks about Intrinsic Motivation, something which as a programmer, film maker, entrepreneur and activist I am very deeply motivated by.

Dan Pink : To Sell Is Human

In the TED talk Dan Pink basically explains the core premises behind his book Drive. I loved the book so much that I purchased multiple copies and gave them away as presents.

When Dan’s website showed he was going to release a new book I jumped on the pre-order.

Well the book, To Sell Is Human arrived yesterday and straight out of work I started reading it. Waiting for the bus, riding the bus, at home until I basically fell asleep.

I’ve only read 72 pages so far (out of 250), but I’m loving it.

Some points so far :

• There are two types of selling. The normal sales type, of which 1 in 9 Americans are employed to do (a lot more than I expected). But there is also the non-sales selling. Things like a teacher convincing a student to study for the up-coming test, or an entrepreneur pitching their idea to potential co-founders. The thing is, pretty much everyone is doing non-sales selling. They are moving people. Getting them to change their ways or part with time, expend effort and do things which are the the mutual interests of both parties involved.
• When most people thing about salesmen they think of the classic used car salesmen, Avon ladies, or insurance salesmen. Those situations, especially use car sales were fraught with information asymmetry. The seller knew if the car was a ‘lemon’… A dud that would break down and be very expensive to maintain, or if it was a peach. So the buyer had to beware. However these days it is the sellers that have to beware. With the Internet and sites like eBay, Amazon and the like it is easier for buyers to do research and know more about the product than the salesmen do and if they suspect any deception or problems they can buy it online.

• The new ABCs of selling is no longer Always Be Closing. It is attunement, buoyancy and clarity.Attunement : Being in tune or harmony with the people, groups and contexts with which you are trying to move them.Buoyancy : The ability to bounce back from rejection and why believing in what you are selling is essential.

  Clarity : The capacity to make sense of murky situations. What matters more today isn’t problem solving but problem finding. Uncovering challenges that the other person may not know they have. In the world of information overload curation is also important.

My only real issue with the book so far is that Dan Pink spends so much time trying to convince the reader that selling is a big part of the modern world, something I already understood, that it has taken a while to get into the actual techniques .

I’m hoping that some of the techniques in the book will help me be both a better activist and also a better entrepreneur.  Hopefully in the future I will be better at explaining to people the ideas around the Price of Zero, a future where the necessities of life can be free to everyone on the planet. Food, water, electricity, education, entertainment, health and more, for free, to everyone. In case you are interested, I am working on the Education side :)

Have you read the book? If so what did you think?

NB : I am not affiliated with Dan Pink in any way, nor am I getting any money for this post. I just like his stuff.

The aim of this post is to show how your perspective on a problem can alter your approach to solving it.
Lets take water as an example.

You live in South Australia, the driest state in one of the driest continents in the world where there is constant water shortages.

You are having a shower, you find your brain works well in the shower, coming up with some of your best ideas, but your partner or parents complain that you are using up all the water. Let’s take the shower as the most zoomed in level.

Let’s zoom out a level to the bathroom. Out of the washing machine, toilet and hand basin your showers may very well be using up most of the water.
Zoom out again to the whole house. You might find that the garden getting watered through automatic sprinklers during summer might use more than your showering during summer, but that the bathroom in total uses more water than any other part of the house, including washing the dishes or having cooking and drinking water from the kitchen.

Zoom out to see a block of houses and you might find that the house with the biggest lawn might use more than the one with the most people.

Zoom out again and see a group of blocks and you might find that your previous findings vary, some blocks have houses with more people which use more water but on a water per person basis you might find that the richer the people the more water from the tap they use. For example they are more likely to have a pool in their backyard, however lower socio-economic classes might be more likely to drive to a community pool or the beach to enjoy their summer and are less likely to wash their car.

Zoom out further and you start to see some industrial areas, mainly factories, which on a per sq meter basis use a lot more water than residential areas. This would likely be a similar finding if you were to analyse the water usage from the reservoirs for standard tap water.

Zoom right out to the state basis and you find that whilst agricultural farming areas use less water per sq meter than factories or residential but there is simply so much more of it that they use up the vast majority of water. Although decent amounts of this come from the main river running through the state, or from underground aquifers. The problem is that the River Murray is running dry.

You could then zoom out again and look at the whole continent (of Australia in this example) and all the states and territories with which feed the River Murray and see that South Australia’s part of the River Murray is just the end of it and it is actually supplied water from three other states and that their agriculture and industries are taking more than their fair share.
If you wanted to reduce water usage at any of these levels you can see that your policies and tactics would change. It might however need a coordinated effort of water reductions in residential, industrial and agriculture with major reforms in other states (a very hard thing to do politically) in order to address the problem. If the water reservoirs are low then the approach will be different to the problem of there not being enough water in the river and these approaches will be different again if there is a desalination plant which can take up some of the slack or if the reservoirs can be filled with water from the river.

The same process can be applied to electricity. Changing every light bulb to LEDs (which are even better than compact fluros) might make only 2% reduction in overall electricity usage in the country, whilst shutting down a single aluminium smelter might make a 3% difference. But changing to renewable energy or zooming out to a global scale can change things yet again.
Note : These numbers are very inaccurate examples.

If you want to know about the level of production of renewable energy generation needed then check out the great presentation by Saul Griffith.

The sun beats down, heating a particle of dust on the ground. It shakes and vibrates with heat and excitement, raring to get away.
Plod goes the feet and with a puff of air the dust is off and away.
In the air, it is joined by millions of friends as a cloud forms behind the walkers on the dirt road.
Up, up and into someone’s nose it goes.
*Achoo*
Out it goes.

The pressure changes, the wispy clouds bring the wind with them.
Dirt, dust, destruction.

The dust is insidious. It gets into everything. Buttons, camera lenses, your skin, your eyes, into your brain. It clogs everything up, turns sliding surfaces into scratching, grinding, destruction. It lets itself into your tent, into the weaving of your clothes, it refuses to leave from under your fingernails and even when evicted returns before you have had a chance to admire the clean white view.
Your skin turns brown, not from the suns rays giving burning your skin, but from the dust which seems to make its way under your skin.
The dust can eventually be washed away, although a 3min shower isn’t enough. Try an hour long bath.
Blow your nose 3 days after you have been in the outback and you will still find enough dust to turn your hanky brown.

Water, an essential part of life. But mix it with the dirt and dust and you get mud. Soft, squishy pervasive mud that cakes itself onto your clothes, weighs them down and then hardens upon drying.

Civilisation, cities. These are havens from the dust, a place where the insidious, malevolent force of nature is not allowed, is banned, shunned, hated and attacked.

We are ripping open the heart of the land to extract minerals, we are drilling in more and more remote places to find oil. We are cutting down trees far faster than new ones can grow. We are over fishing, poisoning and even blowing up our marine habitats then destroying the rest with increasing ocean acidification.
Our burnt waste and car, truck and plane fumes are turning the very air we breathe into a caustic cocktail…. And it is all nearly worth it. It is nearly worth the destruction of the planet and all humans, plants and animals, for we are putting up a barrier against dust.

But no, it is not worth it because we can do better. We don’t need to destroy the world, we can live within in. We can enjoy it.

The post above was written by Michael Kubler after having spent some time up at Roxby Downs (Lizard’s Revenge) and also from the first few days of the Walk for Solar (328km walk from Port Augusta to Adelaide). I don’t actually loathe dust THAT much, I suspect I’m just not used to it and the effects it has on things like electronics.

Rally for Solar – 30th Sept 2012, Adelaide, South Australia

If you live in South Australia, then I hope to see you at the rally for solar!

The rally is at Rundle Park, which is where the Garden of Unearthly Delights is usually setup.
The rally will be MC’d by Dr Karl, the ABC science guy and it will be some awesome fun!

Myself and nearly 100 other people will have done the Walk for Solar, a 325km, 2 week trek from Port Augusta to Adelaide to be there. I’ve already spent thousands and donated hundreds towards the cause and have helped with a number of trips to Pt Augusta as a part of the Repower Port Augusta campaign.

If we are to have cheaper, cleaner electricity then we need the community support which comes from people like yourself showing that we want Solar Thermal electricity for South Australia.

See you there!

Update :
I’ve put some photos from the walk on a Dropbox Gallery (anyone can access and download high res versions) and my Facebook Gallery.

South Australian Energy minister Tom Koutsantonis talking with the walkers for solar

–
Michael Kubler

– Michael Kubler

My ‘requirements’ for a partner are fairly simple. You enjoy spending time with the person and you can and do spend lots of time with them (but not too much, personal time is good too).

Enjoying your time with a person usually equates to having shared interests and values and getting along, being on approximately the same wavelength. Just because you might be a cat person and they might be a dog person doesn’t mean you won’t enjoy your time together. Although some people are very strict when it comes to the type of people they can hang around and the sort of conversations and attitudes they enjoy. For example I know that I despise smoking and smokers, but could overcome that for a really awesome woman. But if she’s religious she has to be REALLY fucking amazing :P

I’m joining a walk from Port Augusta to Adelaide to promote Solar Thermal. The 300km+ walk will start on the 16th of Sept and take until the 30th. We will arrive in the city on the Sunday hopefully to a large group of supporters with the votes from the community vote which shows that Port Augusta wants to replace their old coal fire power stations (which are being shut down) with Solar Thermal.

Whilst I’ll be putting up $500 myself to support the event and my walk I’m looking for people to donate some money (doesn’t have to be much but most people have been donating $25-$50). My fundraising profile is at http://www.repowerportaugusta.org/michael.kubler

Michael’s fundraising profile