Tag Archive for 'Berkeley'

There’s Hope Yet

Published
by
Brendon J. Wilson
on June 29, 2004
in Uncategorized
. 1 Comment

Jon Stewart is god. Note the capitalization: not the God, in the typical sense of an omnipotent, omniscient, vengeful creator of all. Lord knows (again, not that Lord - this guy sells ponchos in Berkeley) I don’t want to incur the wrath of any possible-but-not-probable all-seeing creator who lives in the sky, on the off chance that I’m wrong and he actually does exist. Nevertheless, blasphemy aside, Jon Stewart is a god.

“But Brendon,” I hear you, my entirely fictitious readership, asking, “Why is Jon Stewart a god?”

Simple - his is the only news show, ironically, not willing to follow the mainstream press’ script, choosing instead to ask the tough questions. Well, the only one in the US at least - those Irish reporters have been spoiling for a fight. The Irish never submit, never answer to anybody. Apparently their reporters aren’t too fond of submitting questions in advance either.

Nobody gets their news from “news” programs anymore - they never seem break the important stories first, if at all, anymore. No wonder people are turning to comedy shows for their political coverage. How weird is this? The quality of news programs has been deteriorating for years into entertainment disguised as news - but it appears to work both ways? While the press may sneer at the “reporters” on Entertainment Tonight, at least Kojo has the balls to come up with his own questions rather than letting his interviewees’ handlers suggest fashion questions.

To the rest of press, I can only offer this suggestion: start studying your notes - you might learn something.

Bay Area Road Trip

Published
by
Brendon J. Wilson
on December 13, 2003
in Personal and Uncategorized
. 1 Comment

A weeklong gap in my blog usually means I’m either temporarily dead, or I’ve been busy. In this case, I’ve been very busy on a road trip to the sunny Bay area near San Francisco, colloquially known as Silicon Valley. Ashley and I drove down to Palo Alto last weekend, taking two days to enjoy to trip, so I could check out the region, see a few companies, and get a general idea of what the area had to offer a newly-minted MBA.

First, let me just apologize to freeways. You see, I had always felt freeways were a Bad Thing, an opinion mirrored by the City of Vancouver in deciding to design the city without them. Let me just say, after driving around the Bay area, covering much ground with minimal effort, I have to say that freeways are definitely a Good Thing. In the time it took me to drive to Coquitlam the previous week, I drove five times the distance in the Bay Area without so much as taking the Lord’s name in vain. A significant feat for me, especially given my dislike of driving.

So, what did I do while I was down there? Well, let’s see. I had an interview with PGP Corporation, which went pretty well. The company, reformed from the intellectual property divested by Network Associates, is humming along nicely, complete with revenue, customers and experienced management. Looks really good, so hopefully I get an offer.

I also got a chance to visit with team at Project JXTA at Sun. It was nice to finally meet the team, see what was going on. I was also given the opportunity to dub the next release of the JXTA reference implementation - it seems that the team is naming releases after exotic dishes. Not to be outdone, I chose “Klauh Kalesh”, in reference to the episode of ‘The Simpsons’ where Homer visits New York. Ironically, “Klauh Kalesh” is a real food, not just a Simpson’s gag, though it sounds very unappealing.

I also managed to visit the Haas School of Business in Berkeley to access their Career Center, which operated in a league of its own compared to UBC. But I digress. Berkeley seemed pretty cool, if a little bit like a Phish concert that had been going for thirty-five years, before which it had been a Grateful Dead concert. Many, many flower power casualties wandering the streets there.

Best of all, I managed to attend a morning event presented by Carr & Ferrell, a local law firm. They were hosting a seminar/workshop on “Pitching to Win” - complete with Jerry Weissman, the legendary pitchman who has helped numerous CEOs tune their IPO roadshows, giving tips from his new book, “Presenting to Win“. Cool!

All in all, the Bay area seems very active, has lots to do. Not a bad place to live at all, should I get the chance.