I'd read all the news stories about NHTSA-induced fires, laughed at all the jokes, and watched Newt Gingrich claim that "You can't put a gun rack in a Chevy Volt." (Wrong.) But I also read "Car Guys vs. Bean Counters" by Bob Lutz, who knows more about the automobile business than anyone alive... and who proudly declares himself to be the father … [Read more...]
Traffic: What the Heck Do I Want?
February 27, 2012 by
Derek Edwards found my ancient post Packets beat Circuits and wrote this response. I replied in his comment stream, but decided to duplicate my comment here on my own blog. … [Read more...]
The “Invest Georgia” Program
January 17, 2012 by
Last week, State Rep. Allen Peake and his co-sponsors dropped HB 718 into the legislative hopper. It's an effort to put state resources into venture capital, and I think it's worth supporting. But, like all bills, the legislation is a little hard to read, so I'm translating it into English here. … [Read more...]
The Green Thing
January 7, 2012 by
Received in email, and too good not to post here in its entirety... Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the older woman, that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment. The woman apologized and explained, "We didn't have this green thing back in my earlier days." … [Read more...]
Supporting Technology Entrepreneurs in Georgia
November 28, 2011 by
I prepared the following document as my testimony to the State Science and Technology Strategic Plan Joint Study Commission, meeting in Columbus on 30 November 2011. It's going to be available on their website, but I decided to replicate it here. … [Read more...]
Public Pension Investment
November 17, 2011 by
It's been almost four years since I've written here about investing a portion of Georgia's pension funds into "alternative assets" (which includes venture capital). In those four years, nothing has changed, but everything may be about to change. We have a new governor who has signaled his willingness to consider making a small allocation from one … [Read more...]
Immigration and Competitiveness
September 28, 2011 by
Back in June, I blogged about immigration as it affects student entrepreneurs at Georgia Tech. Apparently that qualified me as an expert on immigration policy! Someone at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce noticed what I'd written and invited me to a forum in Washington yesterday on "Immigration and American Competitiveness." … [Read more...]
Georgia Forward
September 1, 2011 by
For my column this month, I wanted to talk about the Georgia Forward conference that was held at Callaway Gardens in mid-August. From their website, "Georgia Forward is an independent, non-partisan organization working to improve the state of Georgia by engaging business, political, academic and civil leaders to collaboratively shape a statewide … [Read more...]
My Talks at Dragon*Con 2011
August 28, 2011 by
Once again, I'm honored to have been asked to speak in the Space and Science tracks at Dragon*Con. Dragon takes over downtown Atlanta during Labor Day weekend. It's enormous. All the public reports of attendance are wrong... they admit to "40,000+" but that's low-balled to avoid fire code problems. But for those of you who don't know, there … [Read more...]
Fixing K-12 Education
August 21, 2011 by
This post was triggered by John Warner (@SwampFox) tweeting a link to an editorial in a South Carolina newspaper. South Carolina needs a personalized education for every student Go read it. I actually agree with a lot of it … [Read more...]
