Caretaker Bob

Seems like the history of software is crowded with an almost infinite number of attempts to promote the idea of modular software development.   This is undoubtedly due to humans, from business managers to coders, having to deal with twisted balls of legacy spaghetti code.

No one ever sets out to build a twisted ball of spaghetti code.   These horrendous outcomes are always a result of the best of intentions.   Someone just wants this one little additional feature and the customer needs it asap.  So a coder does their friend a favour and just adds another bit of code to an already complex system.

A series of these well-meaning initiatives over a number of years results in a large complicated system that no one actually understands.   The history of software has been an ongoing battle to avoid this.  From object oriented programming, to classes, to libraries and APIs - it is all I, a non-programmer technology sales dweeb, have heard about and it strikes me as the equivalent of searching for the Holy Grail simply because giant balls of spaghetti code are still being created.

In trying to empower the latest team of brilliant coders I’m working with to avoid building balls of spaghetti code (even if I made the request), I was trying to find the right words when the term “Pristine Sources” came to mind.  No one had heard the term, which surprised me.   So I googled it, and the only references to it are in old Red Hat pages.

And I suddenly realized I had an important mission to play in the history of coding.  Namely to publicize the brilliant Marc Ewing’s concept to the world.

Instead of talking about the techniques of modular coding, Marc spoke about the benefits of modular coding.   Namely that when you code modularly (is that a word?) you don’t have to take responsibility for the code of those who came before you.

The “Pristine Sources” concept is that you need to commit to working with the code you are given without changing it in any way.  Hence “pristine”.

Here’s how Marc explained it in a mid-1990′s Red Hat manual:

http://www.rpm.org/max-rpm/ch-rpm-philosophy.html

There is a draft of a wikipedia entry that needs a little editing here:

Here's my contribution to the comments you can send to the FCC division of the US Government regarding the Net Neutrality issue.   I'd love to read yours.  Submit one here:

www.fcc.gov/comments.

While I've followed this issue and feel strongly about it, it was John Oliver's impassioned and very funny pitch that caused me to take the time to submit a comment:

https://www.battleforthenet.com/#team-cable

While everyone's attention is focused on the Olympics in Sochi Russia, our friends who would rather have American football in Canada than have Canadian football in Canada are at it again.

Here is a promotion to fill out a survey that was sent to a Toronto-based friend of mine.  You'll note the focus of the survey is trying to find support for the idea of the NFL in Toronto, as if Toronto was not part of Canada.   This survey does not want to know if sports fans in Quebec or Saskatchewan want to see the NFL in Canada.  They know the answer from those parts of the country would not be supportive of the goal of replacing three down football with four down football in Canada.

If anyone knows more about this survey, such as who commissioned it, please let me know.   All I know is what this cover letter says.  Not surprisingly the organizers of this survey did not send me an invitation to participate.  ;-)

Cheers,    Bob.

I grew up in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.    But I've now spent the majority of my life in countries other than Canada.    Instead of becoming less Canadian this has made me more appreciative of things Canadian than any of the resident Canadians I know.  The best single example of what I know about Canada that many Canadians don't seem to understand is Canadian Football.

·      The 101 year old Grey Cup Championship is the most watched sporting event in Canada year in, year out.

·      The oldest continuously operating North American "Football" (of any sort) club is the Canadian Hamilton Tiger-Cats, founded in 1869.   According to Wikipedia it is the 55th oldest football club anywhere, including Europe.

·      The typical CFL football game is watched by three to four times as many Canadians as watch any US football game.

·      Canadian high schools, colleges and junior football leagues are all played under Canadian Football's three down rules.

So why is there even a debate on this topic?  Because of probably the second most Canadian cultural identifier - namely  Canada's odd habit of undervaluing  our own culture.   So Canadian Football cannot be any good simply because it has been developed, is played, and is enjoyed by Canadians.   This sad instinct has major Canadian corporate leaders somehow thinking that because Canada's Championship was played in Regina Saskatchewan it could not be world class.

But it is precisely that fully a quarter of the population of the capital of one of Canada's 10 provinces came out for a Canadian Football game in sub-zero weather, and a third of the country tuned in on TV, that makes it world class.  

So why does this effort to bring the American sport of four down NFL football to Canada persist?  It is a direct result of this lack of appreciation of Canadian culture by Canadians that is to blame.  How else do you explain great Canadian leaders like Mr Paul Godfrey bragging about his failed thirty year crusade to bring the NFL to Toronto?

Or why would a great Canadian corporation like Rogers Communications Inc. spend millions promoting a US competitor over a more popular Canadian institution?  Particularly given that Rogers' prospers thanks to  Canadian Government rules (CRTC regulations) that give it, as a Canadian supplier, great competitive advantages over foreign competitors.   The oddest bit is that Rogers's own marketing folks know, but don't tell their bosses that, outside of downtown Toronto no one likes Rogers' using its clout to damage a Canadian institution we all love.

These folks are not less patriotic than you and me.   They care every bit  as much about the success of Canada and Canadians.     They are simply making the same mistake that millions of Canadians have made before them.   They simply see things as being more valuable, more worthwhile, or maybe just "cooler" if societies other than Canada's also value these things.   

No Canadian musician is considered successful in Canada if they have not been successful in the United States.  It is the rare Canadian cultural icon who  becomes successful in Canada without foreign endorsement.

So how does the Canadian Football League prevent the NFL from wanting to put a NFL team in Canada?   The CFL has to do two things, first it must convince Canadian leaders such as  Mr Paul Godfrey and Canadian corporations such as Rogers, of the value of our hundred and fifty year old Canadian cultural institution.

And secondly we must partner with the National Football League in an organized and mutually profitable way.  It is already true that CFL coaches and general managers, whether Canadian or American have many friends among their counterparts in the NFL teams.   The CFL league office has more in common with the NFL league office (and vice versa) than they do with any other institution on the planet.   After all, the CFL and NFL are the only two "gridiron" football leagues.

The National Football league is a lot like the Canadian Football League, being a collection of teams who banded together to form an institution dedicated to their collective success.  Our leagues are among the most successful cooperatives in the history of business anywhere.   We have more incentive to cooperate with each other than any two businesses you could name.

The Canadian Football League is stronger than ever.  We are now able to do more to support athletic achievement in Canada, we are doing more to support the charities we all care about, and more to celebrate this great country.  I'm personally very proud to be a small cog, along with my free market capitalist colleagues, in the recent progress of our league in our contributions to Canada and Canadian culture.

When you get involved in trying to help your hometown football team, in my case the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the CFL, you get many questions.  

From gratitude for helping keep the team in business, to questions about when will the team win its next championship.   But the ones I never anticipated were questions about world trade and modern business economics, and: why aren't the hats the team sells made in the town the team plays in, ie made in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada?

My initial reaction was you gotta be kidding me - doesn't everyone know why people in China or Bangladesh need those low wage jobs more than we do?   But then the penny dropped - in a complex modern society we all specialize.  Some of us learn more about world trade than others, and some learn more about html5 Internet programming.  That doesn't make one of us better or smarter than the other, just more knowledgeable about some things while others have greater expertise in other things.

Which is similar to a trade economics concept called "comparative advantage" but please look to the experts for a better explanation than I am able to provide here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage

My ancestors used to make cotton textiles in Hamilton back in the first half of the last century.  Today the addresses of their cotton textile mills are condos and shopping malls and the cotton textiles are made in Mexico and India.  Wondering whatever happened to my great grandparents' factory I have been forced to learn a thing or two about global trade, and here's why most of the Tiger-Cats merchandise is made in lower cost locations:

The obvious answer is that a factory worker earns less in China.   But that misses the point.   The point is Canadians earn more.   The better question is why is the work of Canadians worth more to the world than the same amount of effort by a hard working factory worker in Bangladesh or China?

The answer is not that the Canadians do the work better - the answer is, on average, Canadians do more valuable work.  For example the Ticats' sister company MRX, www.mrx.ca, employs a couple of dozen software engineers, architects, and customer service reps.   They have very high skilled jobs creating websites that educate and entertain millions of Canadians and Internet users around the world.   The websites built and maintained by MRX are accessible via the latest smartphones.  While none of those smartphones are made in North America the bulk of the value in those phones was created and stays in North America.

Blackberry or Apple will sell you a smart phone for a few hundred dollars.   Yet the cost of manufacturing that smart phone is only a few dozen dollars.   The reason for the difference is most of the cost of that smart phone is in the very high value (and well paid jobs) researching and designing those technologies.  When you buy an Apple Iphone the bulk of the money you pay goes to Silicon Valley California, not Taiwan or China.   Which is one of the reasons why California has an enviably high-standard of living and can afford world class universities of the standard of Stanford University. Where, on an unrelated note, Ticat #95, Brian Bulcke played his college football.  ;-)

Coming back to Tiger-Cat haberdashery - the worker who sews a Ticat hat, just sews one hat for one Canadian consumer.  Most of the cost (ie the value) in creating that hat is in the design and marketing of the hat, ie most of the value of creating the hat is produced and stays in Hamilton.  Only the part of the hat that the Chinese factory can do better than we can do (the sewing) is done in China.

So next time you put on your Ticat jersey or hat, or toss your CFL football in your backyard, take pride in the fact that most of the money you invested in your hat, jersey or football stays right here in Hamilton *and* take pride in the fact that you've also done your bit to help a developing world worker feed her family, or educate his kids.

Becoming increasingly optimistic about the future of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats Football Club as the New Stadium rises on the site of the 1930's Civic Stadium, and the 1950's Ivor Wynne Stadium:

http://newstadiumnewexperience.com/main/

http://www.ticats.ca/page/construction-cam

For those new to the story:   I got involved with my home town Canadian Football League team when it fell into bankruptcy in 2003.  After working hard at improving all aspects of the team, from fan experience to football personnel, resulting in significant improvements in revenue in all categories - we were still having challenges making the team work as a financially viable business.

So I took the time to sit down with a wide range of Hamilton Football historians from former league commissioners to former owners, including my 90 year old Uncle Bill, a member of the team's board of directors in the 50's and 60's.  Only to learn the last time the team had earned a profit was some forty years earlier. 

Sometimes it's no-one's fault, things just didn't work out.

Sadly, I have to announce today that I'm divorcing Twitter @bobyoung from @caretakerbob.   I tried to stay united for the sake of my sanity, but have finally come to terms with reality.

The interesting lesson here is while for many people a single twitter account can work despite their varied interests, for others those interests are so unrelated they become distractions for their followers.

Most of those who share my enthusiasm for the Hamilton Tiger-Cats (www.ticats.ca) do not have as much interest in my passion for technology and the future of content (www.lulu.com).   While my friends who share my interest in the future of technology don't generally care much for Canadian football,

So as of this afternoon, @caretakerbob will be exclusively focused on all things Canadian Football related, and @bobyoung will focus on technology, the future of content publishing on the Internet.

Of course this does not mean that I don't have friends who share both interests and if you are one of them just follow both @bobyoung and @caretakerbob.

Cheers,   Bob.

Recorded last week at uPublishU, the day-long self-publishing pre-conference program of BookExpo. Featuring Jenny Pedroza, co-founder of the Writers Coffee Shop; Mark Coker, Founder, Smashwords; Sandra (Sandy) Poirier-Diaz, President, Smith Publicity, Incorporated; and Bob Young, CEO & Founder, Lulu.com.

Ok, so it is a little early in the season to start celebrating, given the season does not start for another month and three weeks (but who is counting), but for the first time in a decade the bookies are taking the Tiger-Cats seriously:

http://www.oddsshark.com/cfl/sportsbooks-release-grey-cup-odds

We (those of us against NC Amendment One change to the state Constitution) were beaten badly last night.   We can only assume most of our fellow North Carolinians saw it as a poll on the idea that marriage is a good thing, as opposed to what it was, namely an attempt to withhold the right to marry from others. Whatever you think of the definition of marriage, Constitutions are for protecting the rights of minorities, not for withholding rights from minorities.   While I normally respect the result of democratic elections, not in this case.

If you agree please join the effort to have this mistake repealed:

It is sometimes hard to tell which are the chickens and which are the eggs when considering Tolerance, Freedom, Education, and Economic Prosperity.  Although looking at the history of the most successful economies it is obvious that the most creative societies are the most successful over the long term.  And the most creative ones (whether by accident or design) are the best educated, most free, and most tolerant of new ideas and of change.

Fred Wilson, a brilliant VC in NYC, weighs in:

I love North Carolina.  I am a North Carolinian by choice, not by birth.  I chose North Carolina because of its Quaker values of faith, tolerance, and freedom.  North Carolina and the people of North Carolina have been very, very good to me and my family.

We have achieved amazing business success and made lifelong friendships and raised a wonderful family.  All while enjoying the great weather, spectacular beaches, majestic mountains, world class universities, the South's best pulled pork, and the nation's best college basketball teams. 

We chose North Carolina because of its welcoming culture and people.  20 years ago we packed up and did, what our friends in Connecticut referred to as, "a reverse Beverly Hillbillies".   But the joke was on them.   We have not only enjoyed 20 years of much better weather, but unimaginable business success with first Red Hat Inc, and now Lulu.com. 

Now my adopted state has chosen to turn its back on its tradition of welcoming immigrants, and of tolerance and freedom to all its citizens, with a proposed amendment to the NC State Constitution no less, that hangs a great banner across the entrances to the state saying to a whole bunch of American citizens: You are not welcome here. 

This Amendment One, and for more information just google "NC Amendment One", is against the spirit of what makes North Carolina great.  It is against everything North Carolina stands for.   North Carolina stands for freedom for all its citizens, young and old, black and white, handicapped and able bodied, gay and straight, married and unmarried.   

Let me confess my ulterior motive to blogging on this topic:  I build technology companies.  That's my profession.   Building a successful technology company requires recruiting the best and the brightest young people our great nation graduates from its best schools.  Amendment One is the single worst thing the North Carolina legislature could have done to alienate this generation of bright talented young Americans from wanting to invest their careers and raise their families in North Carolina, and here's why: 

This generation of Americans is just plain better than my generation.   They are more tolerant, more freedom loving, more intelligent and more creative than us old geezers.  Trust me, I know this.  I get to work with them every day.  They have more energy and enthusiasm than any prior generation of Americans.  They care more about making the world a better place than any previous generation of Americans ever have.  All we (all of us born before 1970) have to do to make the world and America a better place is to avoid stopping them. 

This proposed amendment to our state constitution is specifically telling them we don't want their friends and fellow Americans to come here.   We need these talented, intelligent young Americans to come to North Carolina to help our technology industries succeed, but they have choices.   They can go to states with mottos like "Live Free or Die" instead of states that attempt to tell them how to live their lives, such as this Amendment One does.  And trust me, these bright young Americans can and will chose to join my competitors in Seattle, or San Jose, or New York.  

If you love North Carolina too, on May 8th please join me and run, don't walk to your polling place to vote for the North Carolina you want.  Let your friends, family and neighbors know this is not some unimportant primary election. Let's tell the world North Carolina is still the welcoming and tolerant and freedom loving place that drew me and my family here 20 years ago.  Vote NO to Amendment One. 

Your fellow Tar Heel,  Bob Young.  

Bob Young, born 1954, Hamilton Ontario Canada.  Founder of several tech companies, the most famous of which is North Carolina's Red Hat Inc.  Currently founder/CEO of Raleigh NC-based Lulu.com. North Carolinian by residency and choice.

Quentin Fottrell of Smart Money takes a look at the Justice Department's investigation into how ebooks are priced.