Issue 89 Another approach: Patents May 31, 2013

I first heard of this idea in an Economist article. The idea was simple, sell the right to use a patent like you would stock on the stock market. Here is how it works.

Simple really: Basically you take your patent and offer it as an investment on the stock market. This literally opens up your patent to every one for there use. All a person would have to do is buy stock in it and they would be allowed to use that patent in an item they produced equal to the number of stocks purchased. The article gave a really nice example. If you design a superior type of tire and a car company wants to use it on their cars they would buy the stock. So one car needs four tires, thus they must purchase four shares in the stock. If they want to make a full production run of 100 cars with the tires they would have to buy 400 shares of stock equivalent to the number of the tires they want to make and use. As such, the person who created the item in the first place makes a profit.

Supply and demand: What makes this system even better is that if the stock goes up, so does the share price enabling the patent holder to make plenty of money. Of course the opposite is true as well, for if the stock goes down so does the amount of money the person makes. This prevents a patent from being too overpriced or even under priced. So basically supply and demand ensure that the no body is over charged or under paid.

Risk: The only risk in this idea is that you are basically putting your patent out there for all to use. But people who would just want to use the idea without paying up will still attempt to do so. Thus, legal hurtles will still be there with respect to protecting your patent from those who don't want to pay to use your idea or invention. However, such a problem already exists in the first place and people would have the right to sell their patents in the traditional way as well so as to maintain the patents integrity.

Conclusion: This concept eliminates the traditional licensing agreements that lawyers have to make allowing smaller companies access to these ideas which may in turn boost small businesses with better quality products. It insures that greedy patent holders never over charge and greedy corporations never under pay through supply and demand. Also, it gives an inventers idea much greater exposure in the market place and allows for nearly anyone who can afford to pay the stock price to use the patent. Sure the risk that your idea will be stolen is still ever present. However, if you think of how many people would have access to your idea, one that may even change the world, then is it not worth the risk. So shall we shake up the patent system and let everyone join in?

Issue 88 How fuel prices impact costs May 30, 2013

Fuels, we all need it to power our cars, our homes and all of life’s convinces. We would not have electricity to fuel the power in our cell phones without some other source of device to generate that power. When such fuel rises in price though, so does the cost of owning and operating life’s little conveniences.

Gas: Some probably think that if we stopped using oil then all prices would drop. Well that is false; we would in reality be exchanging one form of fuel for another. Ethanol, hydrogen, and even air has a cost. This is all due to supply and demand. More supply with low demand equals cheap fuel and thus cheap goods. High demand and little supply mean everything costing a lot of money. Interestingly enough, buildings require much more fuel than cars and thus produce a lot more pollution thanks to the amount of fuel needed by the power plant to produce electricity. Mind you that this does not always include heating costs. If you need oil or some other form of fuel to heat your home, then you not only pay for what you need, but the cost to deliver that fuel which includes the price to fuel up the truck that brings it to your home. Such costs can be mitigated by new forms of energy harvesting, but those technologies are developing slowly and the only thing that has pushed such designs to the forefront is the public demand for a cheap and renewable alternative to oil.

What if cars stopped using oil: It would be great if we could do that. By eliminating oil and switching to a much lower cost fuel it would potentially save people millions at both the pump to fuel their vehicles and also on store shelves as the cost of the fuel to deliver such items is added onto the price. Not only that, but some of those every day items are made from oil byproducts. This in turn reduces overall costs in manufacturing. But what about that new fuel the car or truck is using? Will it not go up in price as well? Of course it will. Anything bought and sold is affected by supply and demand. As such, vehicles that cannot adapt to new fuels quickly and easily will still remain costly to own and operate in the long run. Cars are probably the costliest and also the sole object that may be holding us back from switching fuels. Cars need specific types of fuel to run, and by putting in the wrong fuel you actually harm the engine leading to greater maintenance issues down the line. If a vehicle however, was able to switch fuels at will based on which ever one was the cheapest that day, it could save lots of money for both producers and consumers as costs will be driven down to the bare minimum to compete.

It is easier for homes: When it comes to powering homes, especially those primarily powered by electricity, it is far easier to switch fuels at the power plant. All the power plant has to do (depending on the plant itself) is to change to the cheapest fuel possible to generate electricity. However, I am only just discussing burnable fuels and not renewable fuels. There are other ways to make burnable fuels cheaper but this is the easiest in terms of reducing overall cost. At this point the problem stems from government regulations that may prohibit the use of different fuels.

Conclusion: Fuels are part of the supply and demand equation as they help to both expand and limit supply. Even if we go rid of fossil fuels and other burnable fuels at power plants, the costs to fuel cars would only have a short term impact. What I feel needs to be done is create a car that uses little to no fuel. They have systems that can make water from burned gasoline and the burned gases still have combustible gases inside them like butane. If they could also use that water to make hydrogen, and also recycle the unburned chemicals it would go along way to reducing fuel prices and chemical emissions from the atmosphere. If you really want to reduce the cost of goods at the supermarket, and other stores you have to have a cheaper fuel to reduce the cost of shipment that inherently increases costs. We need a car that can produce its own fuel, and such vehicles like the air powered come close to that. If we want all things cheap, we need to make the method of delivering our goods to the store cheap and that means fuel.

Issue 87 Did you know: Baby development May 29,2013

I learned about baby development in my AP Psychology class back in high school. I found it interesting and I thought I would share this knowledge in the hopes of aiding parents in raising there children. So here I go.

Developing the nervous system: When babies are born they are of course still developing. This is especially true for their nervous systems as they are for the first time being exposed to all sorts of new stimulus. As such, the simple act of holding the baby, touching their little fingers and toes aids in the overall development of the baby. Basically, touch your child so that the nerves in their body are stimulated and as such develop. The more stimuli you give the baby the faster they develop. They have even done experiments with monkeys where one was given a wire mesh mother and the other a mother clothed in warm cloth. What scientists found was that the monkey baby with the cloth mom developed not only faster, but was healthier as well. So in short, giving a baby your love and attention is a very good thing if you want your child to grow up healthy.

Speak to a baby, not gibberish: Have you ever said "goo goo ga ga" to a baby. Well don't do that! Babies are like a sponge with knowledge being the liquid. By speaking gibberish and even imitating the sounds of your child you are holding back their language and even their brain development. Just like touch, sound helps the baby’s nervous system develop, in this case for the purpose of being able to speak. Also, when speaking to the infant, try to make it so the can see your lips moving because the baby will in fact try to imitate you. This enables the mouths nerves and muscles to grow too even if the baby has yet to understand what they are imitating. Basically, talk to your child like you would any other individual and it will help your child develop faster and maybe even healthier.

Conclusion: I love children. I literally have a bunch of young cousins who when I see them, I can't help but hug them out of love. Of course they then proceed to maul me in a group to which there parents must yank them off. Needless to say it is kind of funny. As I love the kids in my family so much, I wanted to help parents with respect to their young children and showing their love and affection toward them. I am sure we can all agree that we want all children to grow up happy and healthy and thus why I write this tiny article here for you today. I hope you find it useful.

Issue 86 Public Libraries and the Internet May 28, 2013

Libraries, the place that many thought would be outmoded with the internet are still trying to hang on. To do so they are looking to lend books electronically. But even this is causing some interesting problems.

Publishers don't like electronic libraries: The reason is simple; it cuts into printed book sales. Publishers still like printing books in paper back and hard cover, but libraries cut into those sales. They do so by offering cheap and often time’s free access to the books once published via the internet. While yes, some publishers charge libraries to use and lend there books, there is still a sense of "cannibalism" within the realm of publishing.

Issues with electronic lending: Generally libraries guard the data of there borrowers end their reading habits, but with electronic lending digital traces are left which publishers will attempt to exploit. Thus, privacy is an issue. Libraries themselves could even exploit the data by selling it to make more cash. Only one advantage can be drawn that I can see, and that is a book version of "Pandora" that puts up similar music to what you normally listen to. In the case of books it will use genre and authors to help make useful suggestions for avid readers. But there is also an issue of the providers and their servers. Libraries don't use there own servers to lend books as they use an outside vender. If they try to switch, they may loose all those book titles that they can lend and may have to go through legal hassles to aid the new service to lend out the same books. It comes down to licensing law.

Overall advantage: Electronic lending does have its perks. It allows people to borrow books even after the library itself is closed. This means no more waiting in line for a book let alone for someone to return the book. Also, this allows for people access to information that would otherwise be hard to obtain as not all books are available on the internet itself save through an electronic lending system. In addition, while many may see this as a negative, hackers may break into the digital parts of the library and pirate all of the data. The hackers of course will win in the long run as libraries and publishers both will be forced to adapt to the new realities or literally die trying. Of course most libraries offer books free of charge so that issue will be minimized.

Conclusion: Libraries are here to stay. Some may not even be buildings, but rather online sights that lend out books and may even give a chance for people to buy the book itself (the electronic version). It opens up the market so that armature authors may publish a book through a library which may even turn into there big break. Advertisements are inevitable as some form of revenue will be required if the author is self publishing, as far be it for me to deny them the right to profit from their work. Even Amazon is getting into the act of lending out books along with movies and other media through their Amazon Prime service. Publishers have naturally pushed back by refusing to sell certain books to libraries, but that just means more room for the unlicensed and armatures to have greater exposure rather than be brushed aside for the more popular titles. How the library evolves is something we all cannot predict, but for me, I kind of hope that all the libraries in the world form a kind of network to provide titles from all over the world to the masses. An international library seems like a nice idea from my stand point.

Special for Memorial Day

Today in the U.S. we celebrate Memorial day.  Originally started after Americas civil war to honor the fallen, it has since become a day to honor all soldiers who gave their lives for their country.

God Bless all those who have fought and died and all those they left behind.

Issue 85 Interfaith Marrige May 27, 2013

Interfaith marriage is a good thing. Love should overcome everything including faith. But this is not always the case. According to an article in the Economist people are not prepared for an interfaith marriage possible problem. So let’s discuss those issues.

Problem: Some men and women of different faiths don't count on their religious differences getting in the way of their marriage. Apparently, A Roman Catholic man fearing that his daughter would not go to heaven if left un-baptized was given a court order saying if he ever did it again that he would go to prison. The reason was because his wife was Jewish and he had already promised to raise the child as a Jew. As a result a divorce occurred leading to joint religious rights. Interfaith marriages are more likely to end in divorce. Usually child birth brings people back to their faith and then the questions arise over which faith the child should be raised. Usually it is the mother’s faith that supersedes the fathers, but many do not discuss such issues out of fear. Fear of looking intolerant and even un-romantic. So the obvious solution is to discuss it before it is too late.

Interfaith marriage is common: About 45% of marriages are of two people with different faiths and the numbers are rising. These include people who are of different faiths or parts of a faith where their faiths "clash seriously". Even if you exclude the different denominations from the statistic the marriage rate is still at 36%. We Americans are apparently more likely to marry a person of a different faith than a person of a different political party. Why is this trend occurring? Well according to Ms. Schaefer Riley (she is Jewish and is married to an agnostic Jehovah's Witness) people are marring later in life. After a period of being single and on their own, peoples family traditions generally fall away. As such some people who marry into a different faith convert, but that is not always the case. America in this respect is a melting pot of faith.

Conclusion: I want interfaith marriages to survive. So I ask for all couples who are different faiths to discuss their differences early to avoid such problems. I personally, if I am to meet and marry someone of a different faith, would ask that the child be raised in both faiths and decide for themselves which faith to follow when they are old enough. If they want both and they feel they can reconcile the differences then I would support that to. However, we must also be careful as from my perspective a lot of my friends from interfaith marriages have become atheist out of the confusion reconciling the differences between the faiths and the promotion by secularists that faith causes war and death. It is not a faiths fault that a war occurs; it is the people who try to justify the act of murder who are at fault there. In any case, interfaith marriage I believe is a good thing. With this, just like the market place of ideas we will be able to root out the silly parts of faiths that we find untruthful or false. Let us face facts, we all agree on a lot of things when it comes to faith like helping the poor, and such. So in this I find that we are all correct and incorrect at the same time and that the differences are the issues that must be resolved. Maybe, just maybe, interfaith marriages will be the cure to such ills.

Issue 84 Interfaith centers May 24, 2013

An interfaith center is a place where people of multiple faiths may go and pray. Though, these people may not necessarily pray at the same time as a person with a different faith. It seems that such spaces are becoming more and more common with 1,500 in Britain alone. This I find to be a wonderful trend.

Why I like it: For one it brings together people of different faiths. By doing so it exposes people to other ideas and concepts within the faith based communities. While some of different faiths generally do not pray together, there are instances where a Muslim, a Christian and even a Jew pray together. These spaces are in no way limited to the monotheistic religions, as people of all faiths are welcome. These include Sikhs, Hindus, Buddhists and in some cases atheists. It is a wonderful display of cooperation between the different groups with people either bringing in their own religious items in with some becoming permanent fixtures like Muslim prayer rugs. Some even have the room designed with curtains which cover up other religious items while people of a different faith pray. In Frankfurt's Goethe University they have an interfaith room called "house of silence" (Haus der stille). Here the Protestant and Muslim ministers have taken advantage of the space to hold a monthly peace prayer. It is a wonderful level of cooperation between the faiths and I would like to see more.

Possible future potential: Due to this level of cooperation we may see further expansion of this concept. It is possible that the different faith based groups will share more such spaces as it will decrease there overall costs in maintaining a traditional single faith house of worship. This may also lead to combined food kitchens and food drives that support the poor (something that all faiths can agree on). Basically we may have an elevated level of cooperation in helping those who are down and out as people of different faiths join hands to feed the hungry. Is it far fetched at the moment, maybe as more tolerance and acceptance of each other will have to continue. However, these spaces open up a dialogue with people of different faiths and as such ideas are shared. It will help us reach a better understanding between each other and realize that we all have a lot in common.

Problems: Some people fear that these spaces are Muslim prayer rooms disguised as multi faith spaces. This fear of course stems from the Jihadist terrorists within the Muslim community. People forget that it is only a small percentage of Muslims that are actually out to get them and their more moderate brethren. But most people are thankfully ignoring such fears as according to the Economist article public attitudes show that people are unconcerned about religious differences (Johannes Stuckelberger, Theologian and expert in church aesthetics at the University of Bern in Switzerland).

The one other problem is the overall design of the space. Some things may be deemed offensive like an alter that shifts from one direction to another to comply with Christians and Muslims need to worship in a particular direction. They also may be looked upon as tacky like the German Gebetomat which is a vending booth for prayers in 65 languages. As such most of such rooms are made to be as neutral as possible until the parishioners of the different faiths add there own touch to make it their own.

Conclusion: I have always liked this idea as I have always felt that these sorts of facilities would help bring people together on a more spiritual level. I do hope that these spaces will ultimately result in a dialogue that can bring all faiths together and shunt the violent radicals in all faiths out.