Barnaby Jack’s presentation at Amsterdam Blackhat has a lot of humor embedded. My favorite the image on his slide related to “defeating the watchdog”:
Funny how information security guys always prefer cats, but physical security guys like dogs.
The Set of the Sails
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850 – 1919)
One ship drives east, and another west
With the self-same winds that blow;
‘Tis the set of the sails
And not the gales
That decides the way to go.Like the winds of the sea are the ways of fate,
As they voyage along through life;
‘Tis the will of the soul
That decides its goal,
And not the calm or the strife.
I won a recent regatta on the A-Cat. It was an odd feeling because I felt that I was just trying to improve upon my previous mistakes, a typical theme for me in competition against others. It was also odd because the other sailors are so amazing I feel really lucky to get to sail against them and hardly expected to come out ahead.
Over time I have found that I become less interested in finding ways to beat others at a game and instead focus on verifying positive changes relative to my own last performance. Not sure if that makes sense without more context, but it seems to me there are those who want to win at any cost in a most relativistic sense (the win/lose mindset), and then there are those who strive to become a better sailor through generous cooperation of others on the course (in front or behind).
One day in Long Beach after a long day of racing I remember arriving at the beach with a big smile I couldn’t shake. I said to Jay Glaser, who happened to be standing nearby me after we landed our boats, “I made so many mistakes today and learned so much, it was great!” He laughed. Then he and Pease told me about a famously successful sailor in Europe who created a detailed log of every mistake made on the water in order to ensure constant improvement. Too much trouble to be fun, I would guess, but it did emphasize a philosophy about quiet and patient success I found heartening. I have little desire to go back to crewing on big boats where raunchy conversation ofter turns into rah-rah “there is no second place — you either win or lose” shouting matches. And so after five races, where I made numerous mistakes but still somehow managed to finish second in every race, I ended as the overall winner by a fair margin.
Here I am on the final leg of the last race, pleased to be in second, again…
Notable mistakes made:
- did not adjust mental record of marks after big windspeed change — was having so much fun going super fast down-wind i over-sailed lay-line by miles. the angles were exciting until i realized i had to sail upwind to leeward mark
- tried to show-off by blasting through a fleet of 505s going down-wind. a (smarter) a-cat and two 505s with kites to windward really does cut-off the juice
- started a tacking duel but forgot to clear the lines. reverse-rotated mast is really slow, and ugly
- impatient at the start line, i wasted a beautifully clear lane and was over-early by seconds
- pinched instead of powered-up in light air with lumpy seas. power first, then pinch, or maybe just power if it’s too lumpy
- put two drink bottles in the same diamond wire and left the tension off for light air. don’t know where the top one went but i was really looking forward to the blueberry flavor. hopefully someone finds it and enjoys it.
Notable successes:
- since i was over-early, i had a laugh, hurried myself to an immediate restart and sailed on to finish second
- kept the foot loose and paid attention to markings to avoid overtrimming
- giant organic apple pie slice with whipped cream for breakfast. Mmmm, Pergolesi!
- slept on hardwood floor. i don’t know why, but i always sail better after sleeping on a hard surface
- avoided kelp monsters. i think this might just be luck, but maybe past kelp experiences helped
- tried some risky but calculated moves that paid-off amazingly well. lost all the tacks in a duel but still kept my wits and ended up closer to the line
- relaxed and recovered from bone-head mistakes by just trying to enjoy myself
Disney goes biodiesel
Diesel is amazing stuff. I was just reading about how the latest generation of cars can run on straight vegetable oil (SVO), biodiesel or diesel without any muss or fuss by drivers — single tank systems are cool. It’s about $2000 to convert a regular diesel to be able to run on any of the three fuels. That’s different than in the past when people had to choose between a diesel or SVO setup.
Even more shocking is the fact that the Disney empire has gone biodiesel:
For Disneyland, the switch to biodiesel saves as much as 150,000 gallons of diesel fuel each year, while potentially reducing carbon dioxide emissions by up to 80 percent, Disneyland Resort spokesman Bob Tucker said Monday.
“The decision, once we knew the trains would perform well, was an easy one,” said Frank Dela Vara, technical director for Disneyland’s Environmental Affairs.
[…]
“We want other companies and the people that come and visit to be inspired by what we’re doing, and practice their own ways of improving the environment,” Tucker said.
Great. Now if they could just stop trying to trademark stuff in the public domain and stop criminalization of storytelling and information sharing.
EU may tax US goods for carbon-carelessness
Interesting to read that the EU has started to describe products from the US as cheap and dangerous due to the lack of environmental concern in American leadership. The global impact of the US pollution is something that deserves attention, but will higher tariffs or even an outright ban on American goods drive the changes necessary?
…products imported from the US being taxed to compensate for resulting differences in production costs. Thus EU firms would be protected against unfair, carbon-careless competition from outside.
This seems connected with another report that the EU is successfully alerting consumers to the risks of harmful products:
The European Commission has released figures showing a rapid rise in the number of dangerous goods withdrawn from sale across the European Union.
The increase is seen in Brussels as proof that an EU-wide alert system is working better to protect consumers.
[…]
Ms Heemskerk said that the high proportion of Chinese goods among those withdrawn said more about the volume of imports from China, than Chinese safety standards.
A European Commission source also said that China was co-operating with the EU by revoking export licences for some hazardous goods.
Will the US co-operate with the EU by revoking export licenses for carbon-careless goods? Or is the demand sufficient that the prices will just have to be increased in order to compel the European’s to seek more sensible alternatives.
Henry David Thoreau once wrote:
Live in each season
as it passes;
breathe the air,
drink the drink
taste the fruit,
and resign yourself
to the influences
of each.
Little did he realize how much risk would be introduced to those simple concepts by unscrupulous folks trying to make more money at the cost of everyone else. The influences are therefore not so much the air, drink and fruit, but the chemical treatment plant, the industrial rancher, the land developer….