Reports From My Nanocosm

My wife has a new web site. In her own words:

Gluten-free? Dairy-free? Egg-free? Some-kinda-other-allergen-free? Presenting my new blog dedicated to cooking and eating authentically and well while allergen-free: www.gianthippo.org . I cook for my son, who has multiple food allergies and an adventurous palate. Most of the recipes are my own. The photos are hardly professional and yes, there are going to be more kids’ melamine dinnerware and even Legos in the pictures with every weekly update, but hey, that’s just how this mama rolls.

What are you waiting for? Visit: GiantHippo.org.

This is important stuff. Share with anyone you may know who has food allergies, has celiac disease, incurable eczema (generally due to a food allergy), or who just happens to need a recipe without those ingredients.

Tags: allergies, food, gianthippo

Tags: saipan

Tags: dog, family, saipan, sprout

Tags: saipan

The Moon

Bananas

Clouds

Pomelo

Geckos

Laundry

Spiders

Hang Loose

Tags: saipan

“[I]f one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.”

Henry David Thoreau, Walden.

Tags: inspiration, quotes

We moved to the island of Saipan a few weeks ago. I now work as a law clerk clerk for the territorial Supreme Court of the Northern Mariana Islands. More specifically, I am the law clerk to the Honorable Alexandro C. Castro, Associate Justice.

Politically, the Northern Mariana Islands, or CNMI, is a U.S. territory similar to Puerto Rico. It was part of the Trust Territory of the Pacific that was set up after World War II by the United Nations and administered by the U.S. In the 1970?s, CNMI chose to become part of the United States while other parts of the Trust Territory of the Pacific decided on independence. Saipan is the capital island of CNMI.

Geographically, Saipan and the rest of the islands that make up CNMI are part of the same archipelago as Guam (about 125 miles from Saipan) and classified as part of Micronesia. The archipelago is located 2/3?s of the way between Hawai’i and Manila, Philippines. Less than 100 miles east of Saipan is the Mariana Trench, which is the deepest known portion of the Pacific Ocean.

This summer, the California High Speed Rail Authority proposed putting its high speed trains through Alhambra, the suburb close to downtown L.A. where my family and I temporarily landed. The I-10 freeway runs through the city with 12 lanes (6 lanes each way) and a commuter train line down the center of the freeway. Despite such a wide transportation corridor, the Rail Authority had the gall to propose a route along but outside the footprint of the freeway. Such a route would require homes to be seized and people evicted. Unlike other areas near freeways, Alhambra and its neighboring cities are not blighted nor ghettos. Moreover, a route down the center of the freeway on the commuter tracks would force the Rail Authority to build on an elevated platform from 35-50 feet high. Worse yet, the Rail Authority is rushing its environmental study process through despite having plenty of time on its side. It currently intends to finish its environmental reviews in 2014 but not begin construction until 2020, the earliest. By rushing, it is predetermining the I-10 freeway as the route selected.

I am showing my opposition the only way I know how. I created a web site where I am tracking the project and providing analysis about the route, focusing on the things the Rail Authority is leaving out of its presentations. http://www.alhambra123.org/ I am also organizing my community so that it is informed, can learn more about the project, and voice concerns now before it is too late.

Knowledge sharing is a foundation to a strong society and economy. For that reason, I think it is very impressive and wonderful that libraries and companies have teamed up to share books digitally.* For example, while researching the philosophical underpinnings of public trust in our democracy, I stumbled across Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, Volume 2, hosted by Google Books. His Democracy in America series is a classic work and important for its early study of American democracy and society.

The book is also available in ebook format and other digital formats at a number of different web sites.

• Project Gutenberg (e-book)
• University of Virginia Library (plain text)

All digital formats have their pluses and minuses. Including book scans is wonderful because it is generally more readable than plain text formatting and does not require a specialized machine that costs $100 or more. Of course, I prefer paper to digital books but the downside to paper is the inability to quickly and easily search.

* Note, I am talking specifically about books in the public domain, and to some extent orphaned works. Despite the obvious flaws to our copyright system, copyrights are valuable to society to encourage and reward creativity.

After a long hiatus, I’m back to updating this blog and doing the social network thing (although still a tad less frequent than before).

Me: Good night, sweet dreams. What will you dream of tonight?
Casimir: Lay see

Lay see are the red envelopes given as gifts by Chinese folks. Other words are hong bao (literally red envelope). Cas prefers the envelope to its contents (for now;-).

You can now download the paper I wrote for a Mass Communications class I took during the fall semester (also with a more practical title): Water Law Principles Applied to Spectrum Opportunities for Wireless Rural Broadband (PDF — 37 pages – with links) (Google Docs – without links).

In the paper, I recommend that the FCC utilize principles from water law to open up radio spectrum to encourage mobile/wireless broadband in rural areas.

From the introduction:

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued an order, [the White Spaces Order], in November 2008 to free up  unused radio spectrum in the television frequency band for unlicensed use by low power devices. A  goal of the order is to help lower the costs of entry to potential wireless broadband providers by making more spectrum available for free to businesses and consumers.

One shortcoming in relation to rural users is the order’s failure to address backhaul between a rural  community and backbone networks. Frequencies in the television spectrum that are the focus of the  White Spaces Order do not lend themselves well to point to point communication necessary for longer  distance backhaul from a community to a backbone connection point. Without access to spectrum for  backhaul, rural communities will be forced to rely on other alternatives such as more expensive fiber cables. As such, the Commission will need to provide spectrum that is better suited for backhaul required for viable and economic high speed Internet services in rural communities. To that end, I suggest that the Commission apply three modified principles of water law that: 1) require spectrum use  be beneficial and reasonable; 2) require the licensee to actually use the spectrum and not hold a license  for speculative purposes; and 3) provide for equivalent replacement of a communications signal.

Applying these principles will free up unused and underutilized spectrum for more productive purposes including point to point backhaul connections.

Continue reading: Water Law Principles Applied to Spectrum Opportunities for Wireless Rural Broadband (PDF — 37 pages – with links) (Google Docs – without links).

Tags: fcc, law school, policy, spectrum, water

I’ve been a bit too pre-occupied over the past few months to post anything. I am likely to post a few belated posts over the next few days and weeks to fill in the blanks and because they are still timely.

I finished up my last semester in December and now have a Juris Doctor degree. Or, at least that’s what my unofficial transcript says and the State Bar believes (it let me sit for the bar exam).

As much as I intended to enjoy myself for a few weeks after the bar exam, colds/flus/other have kept us all sick and miserably inside. This after promising the following to be our theme for the few weeks after the exam.

Regardless of what happens next, I intend to be the change I wish to see in the world.