The Hobbit Hole III - Journey to the Cross-roads!

[HairOfTheDog]

Welcome to The Hobbit Hole!

Journey to the Cross-roads
The Two Towers Edition

Come on! Come in! -if you would like to have some seedcakes and a pint and relax a while. (If it is a special occasion, we still have a few bottles of the old wineyards left!)

Our first thread ( New Zealander builds Hobbit hole ) reached 4,100 posts, and we thought that was big. Our second thread (The New Hobbit Hole ) held us for over 48,000 posts, and we loved it dearly. We talked about moving to a new thread for the last 38,000 posts, but we are really slow to muster! Finally, the time has come. Tomorrow (at 12:01 am, to be precise!) The Two Towers comes out, and we start a new chapter.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

Oh, I suppose it would... would have to make up for it by having breakfast out.

[HairOfTheDog]

Yeah - Gidget thinks it is pretty cool that I am home all the time.... But I am gonna have to find a new job, and that job require me to be there!

I hate to take on another animal when my income is somewhat uncertain. But, I worry for Gidget if she had to be alone all day very much.... she is self-destructive with her anxiety when I am gone. (isn't another dog to feed a drop in the bucket at this point?)

[HairOfTheDog]

National snoops network
Jay Walker's US HomeGuard will have you grabbing your mouse and protecting the homeland, from home

Welcome to the National Snoops Network, where it's "I Spy" 24/7. You've all seen advertisements offering what appear to be nearly irresistible opportunities to "work at home for only a few hours a day" and bring in reams of cash. I've never taken advantage of any of them, although I've been tempted. I've always wondered: Just how many stinking envelopes do you have to stuff and seal to earn enough to take in a movie?

Now, however, a whole new world of stay-at-home work may be at your fingertips, thanks to Jay Walker. You may not reel in thousands of dollars, but if you've got good eyes, time on your hands and the patriotic gusto to apply to the task, you just may catch a terrorist or two. If Walker's company, US HomeGuard, gets rolling, citizens will be able to log onto the Internet and sign up to monitor one of several hundred thousand of America's essential infrastructure facilities that are currently at risk from a terrorist attack.

Here's how it works: Outdoor Webcams will be installed along the fences of chemical plants, reservoirs, airports, and other critical infrastructure facilities across the country. The cameras -- costing about $1,000 a pop -- will be equipped with heat sensors, microphones and loudspeakers. These onsite cameras will transmit pictures to the World Wide Web, and that's where the at-home spotters come in -- they will be monitoring these sites from the safety and comfort of their own homes. Terrorist spotters will register online and get paid for clicking through photos from various facilities.

According to Newsweek's Steven Levy: "If any of the first round of spotters saw something suspicious, the system would 'flood the zone' by sending more pictures from that camera and those around it to 10 new spotters. If this group confirmed the alert, the professionals at the [central] data center would [be alerted and then] take over. They could confront the trespassers via the speakers in the Webcam… and, if necessary, contact local authorities."

"You may not reel in thousands of dollars, but if you've got good eyes, time on your hands and the patriotic gusto to apply to the task, you just may catch a terrorist or two."

Jay Walker's no ordinary Jay with an idea. He is the founder of the Stamford, CT-based Walker Digital LLC, a company that "invents business systems which solve problems." Founded in 1994, Walker Digital's inventors "have been granted over 200 U.S. and International Patents for unique business systems."

Walker is probably best known for founding Priceline.com, the Web site buying service that allows people to bid on airline tickets and hotel rooms. After its initial success, Priceline.com's stock plunged from a high of $162 "to just over $1, and Walker, once a billionaire on paper, fell from business magazine listings of America's richest people," reports the Boston Globe's Hiawatha Bray. (As of this writing, the stock was trading for just under $4.00. For a critique of the company, see The TRUTH about PRICELINE.COM.)

Walker's spin-off project, called WebHouse -- which allowed customers to bid on gas and groceries -- tanked in 2000, one year and $363 million after its startup.

In order to protect the several hundred thousand facilities "about a quarter-million miles of perimeter" must be secured, writes Levy. Walker figures that it would cost about $50,000 a mile for the setup -- about $12 billion -- which would be paid for by the operators of each facility.

Walker anticipates that a surveillance force of about a million people would be needed. He thinks that government agencies and those companies in need of protection would pick up the approximate $10 per hour payment to the home spotters (sans benefits, no doubt). Walker would sell the system to the federal government for $1 and then charge fees to run the system.

Could Walker's system actually work? Some critics argue that it would be subject to all kinds of potential glitches including power outages, bad phone connections, and hackers. Inattentive spotters could be the cause of a huge number of false alarms that police and fire departments would be forced to respond to. What about the stay-at-home spotters: Will they have to undergo a round of security checks and drug testing? How much will that cost? Who will be assigning the shifts?

Charles Boyd, the retired Air Force general who served as executive director of the Hart-Rudman National Security Commission, which warned of a massive attack on the United States eight months before Al Qaeda struck, told the Globe's Bray that he "found the idea interesting and appealing. I don't know if the damn thing will work or not. But I like two things about it: I like innovative thinking… and I like ideas that engage and energize the citizenry."

But the federal government, always on the lookout for breathtaking new ways to combat terrorism, is not yet on board. David Wray, spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security, told the Associated Press's Konrad that federal officials have not done a "serious evaluation" of the project and that the agency isn't thinking about developing a defense strategy that hinges on Internet surveillance.

"Despite such skepticism," writes the Associated Press' Rachel Konrad, "more than 10,000 people have visited US HomeGuard's new Web site." Walker said that he easily could enlist hundreds of thousands of Americans to sign up for home-based, work-when-you-can jobs. At a recent tech conference Walker said that "We like to think of US HomeGuard as a digital victory garden" -- referring to the vegetable gardens that Americans planted to help ease food rationing during World War II. "It lets people be part of the solution."

The US HomeGuard Web site, which bills itself as "The Citizen Corps that's helping keep our country safe," is currently under construction. If you are over 18 and a US citizen, you can join "The Homeguard," and/or sign up to receive more information at www.ushomeguard.org.

Source: WorkingForChange-National snoops network

[Scott from the Left Coast]

You wouldn't much notice a second dog (food-wise). Vet bills, maybe. But with two horses, one dog and that monster of a cat, another dog wouldn't much show up expense-wise. Gidget would require at least a medium sized dog (spaniel or upwards) to be a true companion. Fortunately for us, Emma is a little bit larger than Chance. And we need a dog who can really take a wallop when it comes to doggy-play.

[JenB]

Hullo! Back from work. Tonight is family evening, but I'll be on and off... working on my story, mostly, which grows nicely. I have some interesting family dynamics going. I don't think I've got a nasty enough group of characters though.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

[Scott from the Left Coast]

Career Opportunity. I can see my business card now:

I AM BIG BROTHER and I am watching you!

[HairOfTheDog]

Yes, what I worry about is more than one illness at a time if there are too many animals, the law of averages starts to kick in how many of them could get hurt or sick at the same time.

Bay's lameness is going to be expensive, his special shoeing and medication to try to stop his feet from hurting are expensive. The answer is that I just can't remain uncertain about money.... I just need to find another income source to supplement what I will lose by cutting my current job back, and not really even a big one. I am ready to do something simple.

Bay and the pony have enough hay now to last nearly a year I think. But that is only one of the overhead costs.

[HairOfTheDog]

Evening Jen.... I still have to get up the steam to go to town.

No, don't got to town Tonto, you always get beat up when you go to town!

[HairOfTheDog]

Bear is speaking a foriegn language.... should we report it?

[Sam Cree]

off for 3 days = off computer and out of town for 3 days.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

bye Sam, have a good weekend!

[Sam Cree]

Thanks Bear, bye everyone.

[JenB]

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Hey, I know that one! It was in a Heinlein book so I remember it. Are we trading Latin phrases tonight? Because all I can remember is draco dormiens nunquam titillandus, which is from Harry Potter and so doesn't count.

[HairOfTheDog]

Gidget is really alpha and persnickety about what kind of play she likes.... Most females are, you know. ;~D You remember how your female and mine would have tangled and clashed a bit if we'd let them.

Gidget would not tolerate a rough player until she knew them quite well. She is way too defensive.

I would have to take her and let her pick who she likes. She likes my friend's shepherd mix that is female, but that dog lets Gidget plotz her. Gidget would not like to be plotzed. She also sortof like that obnoxious Jack Russel my other friend has.... He climbed all over her and she liked him. I can't predict what dog she'd like.

My other friend's old male Labrador is here (dog-sitting - he arrived last night) and they ignore each other. But he is on his last legs. Was funny to watch he and Logan grumble at each other the last time, two Grumpy old men refusing to budge in the hallway. It was the principle of the matter.

[HairOfTheDog]

Bye Sam! See you when you return! - Stay off the road!

[HairOfTheDog]

You know what I have noticed with only one dog? Less dog poop.

Gidget has like one place in the yard she poops.... Logan and Zulu went 'wherever'. So I notice that I am not constantly finding dog poo. That part of it is good. ;~D

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

heh, I just thought it had particular application to the job idea Hair posted about.

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

spam, eggs

[Bear_in_RoseBear]

sausage and spam