Pat Sullivan Blog

FreeRice.com Might Save The World's Hunger Problem...But Only If You Can Tell Them the Meaning of The Word "Farrier"

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

Have you heard of FreeRice.com?  You should have since it's been around over a month.  (Heavy sarcasm.) 

FreeRice has now donated 1.5 billion grains of rice to the UN World Food Programe...in just 37 days of operations, all thanks to web surfers testing their vocabulary.  Talk about a viral marketing program!  (And yeah, it's pretty addicting.)

According to my (clumsy?) predictions, they'll have donated 1000 tons of rice (or 4 billion grains, 4 million cups) by Christmas. 

My assumptions and calculations:

1. There are about 1000 grains of rice in 1 cup.  (I asked my wife who works from home to count this out.  About 150 grains in, she googled it instead.  She's smarter than me, obviously. ;-)
2. There are 2 cups in 16 ounces, so 2000 grains = 1 pound.
3. So there are 4 million grains in one ton.  (2000 grains x 2000 pounds)
4. The thick green line is what they've done so far.
5. The thin blue line is the trend, brought to you in part by Excel's Chart Trend function, Polynomial type, order 2, for 47 days.  (No, I don't know what that means either.)

If you'd like to take this any further (or fix it), download the spreadsheet.

Other interesting rice stuff:

• 11,340,000 tons of rice is grown in the USA. (Source: USA Rice Federation Fact Sheet)
• My favorite rice as of late is Uncle Ben's Original Ready Rice.  Plain and simple.  Add a little butter when you're eating a piece of steak or fish and it's a great carbohydrate.  (This is some of the only MSG-free ready-to-eat rice products as most contain yeast extract, which is MSG.)
• Looking to do some math problems?

(H/T: PCspy)

"Internet Anonymity is as Destructive as Internet Porn"

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

Dear Anonymous, get a name!

I just read Internet Anonymity is as Destructive as Internet Porn, by conservative writer, radio talk show host, and the voice of Jigsaw Magnesium, Dennis Prager. 

Whenever people lament aspects of the Internet, they are most likely to lament the net's ubiquity of pornography. Only God knows, for example, how many kids, searching for some government information, typed in "whitehouse.com" only to be greeted by pornographic images (happily, the website changed hands in 2004). It is almost impossible to completely avoid such imagery even with filtering programs.

But there is something at least as awful -- and arguably more destructive -- that permeates the Internet: the lies, vitriol, obscenities and ad hominem attacks made by anonymous individuals on almost every website that deals with public issues.

[...]

Being identifiable breeds responsibility; anonymity breeds irresponsibility.

[...]

Some might argue that anonymity enables people to more freely express their thoughts. But this is not true. Anonymity only enables people to more freely express their feelings. Anonymity values feelings over thought, and immediate expression over thoughtful reflection.

[...] I doubt I am alone in reading fewer and fewer comments sections because of the low level of so many of the postings. Just as bad money chases away good money, moronic postings chase away intelligent ones.

[...] But there is an easy fix, and websites owe it to society to use it. Just ban anonymous postings.

I couldn't agree more with Dennis' take. 

A little levity

Laughter is a good thing.  My sister in law sent me a video that is really funny.  For all of us who are aging (lets see, that would be all of us) this is/will be us.  Enjoy.

New Look for the Blog

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

Thanks to my sister Karin, the "Pat & Pat Show" now has a new slimmed down and simplified look.  (And the code is a heck of a lot easier to manage thanks to some much needed improvements to TypePad.)  All the posts and links should be bug-free, but who knows.  "After all, this is software." as Pat likes to say.

Neither Pat nor myself have been very diligent about posting in the past few months, but with this new look and all the news and controversy kicking up again in the autism world, I'm hoping to get back on the wagon.

The Death of Common Sense

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

Something funny in my Inbox...

Today we mourn the passing of a beloved old friend, Common Sense, who has been with us for many years. No one knows for sure how old he was, since his birth records were long ago lost in bureaucratic red tape.

He will be remembered as having cultivated such valuable lessons as: Knowing when to come in out of the rain; why the early bird gets the worm; Life isn't always fair; and maybe it was my fault.

Common Sense lived by simple, sound financial policies (don't spend more than you can earn) and reliable strategies (adults, not children, are in charge).

His health began to deteriorate rapidly when well-intentioned but overbearing regulations were set in place. Reports of a 6-year-old boy charged with sexual harassment for kissing a classmate; teens suspended from school for using mouthwash after lunch; and a teacher fired for reprimanding an unruly student, only worsened his condition.

Common Sense lost ground when parents attacked teachers for doing the job that they themselves had failed to do in disciplining their unruly children.  It declined even further when schools were required to get parental consent to administer Tylenol, sun lotion or a band-aid to a student; but could not inform parents when a student became pregnant and wanted to have an abortion.

Common Sense lost the will to live as the Ten Commandments became contraband; churches became businesses; and criminals received better treatment than their victims.

Common Sense took a beating when you couldn't defend yourself from a burglar in your own home and the burglar could sue you for assault.

Common Sense finally gave up the will to live, after a woman failed to realize that a steaming cup of coffee was hot. She spilled a little in her lap, and was promptly awarded a huge settlement.

Common Sense was preceded in death by his parents, Truth and Trust; his wife, Discretion; his daughter, Responsibility; and his son, Reason.

He is survived by his 3 stepbrothers; I Know My Rights, Someone Else Is To Blame, and I am A Victim.

Not many attended his funeral because so few realized he was gone. If you still remember him, pass this on.

MondayMorningMemo

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

Do you subscribe to Roy H. William's MondayMorningMemo?  I just met Roy at the beginning of December while in Austin attending a 3-day class at the Wizard Academy.  (No, it's not some kind of Harry Potter thing...)

Anyways, the December 25 MondayMorningMemo was an excellent compilation of "ready to begin the new year?" type quotes.  Give it a read. 

And personally, I'm really looking forward to 2007.  Oh-six had it's share of ups and downs.  Day to day, there were more ups than downs, but the downs did make a noticeable appearance.  Still, hope springs eternal and I have very high hopes for oh-seven.  You?

I am Time Magazine's Person of the Year (UPDATED)

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

That's right, Time Magazine named me as it's person of the year.  :)

Somewhat ironically, this article was just forwarded to me from Andrea, the "community manager" of the new BazaarVoice user reviews feature we added to JigsawHealth.com about 30 days ago.  It's sort of scary to make yourself vulnerable to negative reviews.  I know our products are great, but not every single product pleases everyone all the time.  (Bob Marley taught that business lesson to me.)

But I elected to add BazaarVoice to our website because I felt like customers were searching for this kind of information anyways, so let's just put it directly on every product page.  Let the chips fall where they may.  The winning products should invariably sell better.  And the products that no one seems to like, we'll just drop from the catalog.  In the end, both the customer and the business win. 

Since we just recently added this feature, we only have about 150 reviews.  We started sending out emails to our customer base last week.  Even though we're a small company with only 20 months of operations, I expect to have at least a thousand reviews within the next 3 or 4 months.

So if you're a customer of Jigsaw Health and want to write a review, I would greatly appreciate it.  Find out about writing reviews and learn about the contest we're running to promote this.

PS - This may seem like an odd request.  Out of 150 reviews, our average ranking is 4.8 out 5 stars.  Like I said, I know our products are good, but 4.8 out of 5 stars is borderline unbelievable.  So if you have some constructive criticism, I would actually really appreciate that.  Not that this is an invitation to make up crap about products you've never tried.  :)

UPDATE: What Bob Marley actually said/sang was, "You can fool some people some time, but you can't fool all da people all da time..."  I mixed that up, but the same principle applies.

Vitamin P Show

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

My podcasting career begins.  Check out my contribution to the Health Hacks Podcast.

Then go visit VitaminPshow.com.

Loud Cell Phone Talker

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

Hard to not laugh at this clip.  :)

Science & Super-models

(Posted by Patrick Sullivan Jr.)

This is the direction I think RandomJohn needs to go in.  Science and supermodels.  Who knew?  LOL  ;-)