if anyone can help me locate it. HAH!

Also:

If you haven't already, you MUST follow/read http://www.twitter.com/thefatjew

And for the curious, my (far less funny) account is http://www.twitter.com/kaichang

ikes.

Being a rising actor and celebrity means that every person is going to form a different opinion of you, and whether they think you’re amazing, or not, you just have to realize how special you are, and that you do things that only a few people in the world can ever dream of doing. When I meet girls now, they are so intimidated by who I am, and the power that I hold with my stature and new celebrity, that I think that it pushes “normal” people away, and gives them the wrong idea of who Arthur Kade is. I am becoming a worldwide brand that stands for quality and excellence, and people will follow me as “The Journey” goes to the next level, but with this power comes the fact that “Haters”, and non-believers will be jealous, and become intimidated, and try to sabotage greatness.

The beauty of Arthur Kade, is how dynamic and complex that I am, and the depth to which I can address any topic, including sexuality.

PHEAR!

aturday brings me to my once-every-two-months ritual of donating blood at the local Red Cross, where I am attached to tubes and get about 50 hit points drained into a 500mL bag. Free cookies and snacks abound in the donation place, as well as free WIFI.

It is a strange and somewhat surreal experience, watching your life literally drain out of your body even in such a controlled environment - the steady filling of the blood bladder, the antiseptic smell of iodine on the arm.

The questionnaires - always adjusting to current realities, now focus on Swine Flu and ask a blizzard of questions related to exposure risks that donors' lifestyles might put them in contact. Oddly enough, being gay male automatically excludes you from blood donation - a strangely archaic restriction in this day and age.


Still - all for a good cause, and for those who care, a free blood test (since the Red Cross runs a full-spectrum test on donations each time they come in).
If you're healthy, over 110lbs and not a gay male (hey, I don't make the rules. :( ) go forth and give life!

Eased off on Crossfit last week while I'm down a pint, but I'm feeling ready to rock starting this Monday.

s taxpayers, we are badgered and harried into guilt of how we are morally obligated to bail out the longsuffering public-sector government employees, especially in this blighted economy.

What do your taxes buy? Compare your salary with the following San Francisco employees (keeping in mind that these folks have lifetime pensions EQUAL to their ending salaries after 20 years of work; an annuity that pays 250k/yr would cost in the open market between US$4.5 Million and $5 MM).

Next time you hear city officials bleating about how impoverished the city is (as a pretext for raising more taxes), take a long hard look at the chart and ask what those new taxes are buying.



Is it too late go get a nursing degree to nurse at the teat of government largess?

uring the HK jaunt, we visited the famed Kowloon Walled City, where I found, amidst the historical architecture and well-tended gardens, a set of stone creatures reflecting the animals of the Chinese Zodiac.

he human visual cortex has all sorts odd quirks in processing information - I've spend hours at the Exploratorium mesmerized by various optical and tactile illusions that reveal the quirks of perception psychology.

If you look at the image below, the one on the left looks angry, and the one on the right looks happy, right?



Now step away from the computer, about six, seven meters away and look at the image again. The two faces have switched, right in place.

Perhaps we shouldn't be so quick to judge somebody coming from far away as being in a bad mood?

s some of you already know, I've been volunteered to curate/host an Alternate Reality Game at the upcoming BIL Conference in February.

Thematically, we're choosing Water as our vehicle - riffing on the fact that half the world's population does not have reliable access to clean, potable water.



Participants in the game will be issued an empty water bottle at the beginning of the game; for the entirety of the ARG, they will not allowed to drink anything except what is filled in the bottle by redeeming Potable units they earn through various tasks around the Long Beach area (obviously, we are on the honor system here! :) ).

Everyone will be issued a small supply of cards, (for inspiration, see the stuff made by Akoha) - 'gray water' counts as non-drinkable water allowances that can be traded for [X] minutes of showering (again, obviously we're on the honor system :P ), very rare 'potable' cards which can be turned into Gamemasters for [X] mL of water poured into their bottles. Other cards will be held by NPCs across Long Beach, which they will give you for completion of various tasks and puzzles.

Among the cards will be tasks, pieces of puzzles, and most importantly - components of a BioSand Filter which every team will race to assemble (once a team's BioSand Filter is complete, they are free to redeem all their remaining greywater shower-allowances tokens for 'potable,' effectively ending the game).

Part scavenger hunt, part fundraiser (we will set a portion of the participation fees as donation to Human Translation, an ambitious project to provide clean water to people in Cambodia), the Water ARG will be hopefully be a fun way to get to know your fellow BIL attendees while solving puzzles across the Long Beach area.

A number of things are already set - but I wanted to also get feedback since we won't have much time/manpower to playtest the game before it goes live.

Poll #1317603 WATER Alternate Reality Game
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Are you going to TED2009/BIL2009?

Would you be interested in participating in a 72-hour Water ARG as described above?

To cover costs in producing/hosting the game - we are considering charging $25/person to participate - with an optional 'donate [X]' to the water project in Cambodia. Does that sound fair?

Thoughts, feedback - please feel free to comment!

s someone who didn't start shaving until age 21 and coming from an ethnicity predisposed to sparse facial hair, I always assumed I wouldn't be able to have much of anything aside from a whisper-think fu-manchu 'do.

On a whim, I've let things go a bit and am bemused that a somewhat plausible goatee has emerged. I'll likely shave it off before Xmas, but until then - your thoughts?



Poll #1310071 Goatse
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Immediate reaction:

Because ...

uestion (actually, two questions):

1. Anyone have experience with a well-regarded patent attorney for consumer products (preferably in the San Francisco area)?

I've done a bit of groundwork researching through Tim Ferriss' post on 'renting' ideas/inventions to manufacturers to sidestep the ferociously expensive tack of hiring a patent attorney for a full-boat research+patent-application process that still leaves no markable product at the end ; on his recommendation, spent some time researching the website of Stephen Keys.

I'll admit I am biased - I dislike the design of Key's website (smells too much of late-night infomercials - complete with the cheesy and unverifiable First-name-last-initial testimonials) but it doesn't necessarily mean the information isn't useable.

Anyone who has sold an idea/held a patent - I'd be very interested in speaking with as well.

2. Anyone knows an canny engineer working on bluetooth/RFID who's game for a meet-and-greet to answer some questions over lunch/coffee in the area - please do comment/message me.

ecent events brought the subject of MLMs back to the forefront of my thoughts - two otherwise-intelligent friends have been recruited (and been trying to hustle me) into their "new business," and I am again aghast at how powerful memes can override the critical facilities of thinking adults.

From time to time, someone in my social circle is suckered into a MLM (Multi-Level Marketing) organization. Inevitably, they see dollar signs in my significant rolodex, and approach me to discuss a "business opportunity" (always in those vague terms). The product varies through the years (water-purifiers and detergents ten years ago, to 'natural' vitamins and goji juice in recent years) - the pitch remains the same: it's a Brand New Thing and you have been specially chosen to get in on the "Ground Floor" of a business that can earn you residual income in the tens of thousands a month for just a few hours of work.

Too, there's always a story of a friend-of-a-friend who claims to have made serious income from whatever scheme is in play for the day - the 1% of 'distributors' who managed to sucker enough hopeful millionaires-in-waiting to their downline as proof that this is a legitimate opportunity. (For every person who actually earns a solid income from their MLM downline, there's probably dozens of low-rent pretenders lying about being that guy).

Like all effective cults, MLMs build an 'us-against-them' culture to hijack the social capital of its inductees - friends of the newly-recruited are suddenly potential customers or enemies; you as their friend are either 'supportive' (by signing up in their downline) or a 'dream-stealer' (try to talk them out of it by pointing out its inherently deceptive business model).

Which means that once a friend or family member is a few weeks into a program, deprogramming them from MLM propaganda will be a painful process - you can either just blow off their weekly invitations to "opportunity seminars" and hope they eventually give up, or proactively try to stop them before they spend themselves into bankruptcy. So here's a question: What do you do when your friend or family member is sucked into a destructive organization?

Poll #1301585 MLM
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What's your experience with MLMs?

Have you lost a friend/family member to an MLM?