I guess this shouldn't surprise me here, where people seem to think that a great idea is all you need to be successful. (It isn't.)

Having the superior product doesn't count for anything if people don't know about it. I'm quite confident that my products are better than my competitors', but one competitor in particular was first to market and gained so much name recognition that many people don't even realize there IS an alternative. I don't *like* having to pay for ads, but it works, if you're smart about it anyway.

I *stopped* advertising on one popular site because Google's targeting was way off - my ads were getting lost in a sea of garbage ads that had no place on that site, and were causing the users to ignore everything as irrelevant. My sales went up immediately when I moved that budget elsewhere.

So yes, I would happily pay more to have my ads presented only to very specific categories of users, especially if it meant an overall thinning out of the quantity of ads thrown at them. I don't want to waste money spraying ads everywhere - I want them in front of people already looking for something I offer, or who have a need that they didn't know there was a specific product to fill.

As a consumer, if I have to see ads I'd much rather they be for embedded C compilers, test equipment, and scuba gear than cosmetics, luxury cars, and heartburn medication. Every once in a while I *do* come across something I could really use that I didn't know existed. This happens almost exclusively with ads in magazines like Circuit Cellar, though - where the ads are, of course, targeted.

As for American consumers not wanting targeted ads, maybe they should ask in a different way. Put someone in front of the TV for 30 minutes with the usual mix of ads for feminine products, pet food, dandruff shampoo, and so on. Then try another 30 minutes with ads targeted to their specific interests. Then ask them which they'd rather see every day.

I tend to do this too (except I get really screwed up in the southern hemisphere), but I can fully understand the part about conflicting mental maps.

There's a campground out in the Mojave desert that I've been going to since I was little. Just over the ridge from the campground is a canyon that ends in a (usually dry) waterfall.

For years I'd tried to find a way down. Even after I learned how to rappel I decided it was too risky. And then, while out hiking one day, I somehow wound up off by 90 degrees in my mental map and thought I was somewhere else entirely when I came across a waterfall.

I looked it over for a few seconds, climbed down, and went on my way. Didn't realize for several minutes that it was the same waterfall I'd failed to find a way down for years.

The influence of that map in my head is apparently so strong that when I thought I was somewhere else, I saw the waterfall in a completely different way. If you'd just dropped me there I'd have immediately realized where I was, but having been off-course for a mile or two I'd generated a new branch on my map of the canyon and was absolutely convinced I was somewhere else.

That 'other' branch of the canyon is still there in my mental map. I know it's wrong, but it's still in there.

My last launch covered 100 miles / 160 kilometers, so yeah, you might want to bring your passport with you if you launch from Great Britain!

Hi Bruce! You going to DCC this month?

The altitude limit isn't universal, and seems to be dependent on how the manufacturer reads the regs. Off the top of my head, I know the Garmin GPS 18 and 18x (with current firmware) and the Trimble Copernicus work at over 100,000'. As far as I know, nothing from SiRF does unless you have special firmware, and good luck getting those guys to even talk to you. Here's a table with some test results:

http://showcase.netins.net/web/wallio/GPSrcvrsvs60kft.htm

I use the GPS 18x myself, but that's mostly because I stock them and in Garmin binary mode I get high resolution Z velocity data which I can use to monitor ascent rate. You can get by with something lighter and cheaper.

Scott
N1VG

It's great that they were able to use a cheap phone for this, but it's worth noting that many (probably most, in my experience) GPS receivers will NOT work properly above 60,000 feet. Some stop reporting their position until they come back down, some just report the wrong altitude, and some lock up completely. As long as you don't get one in that last category it's usually good enough for recovery, but you really need to do some research first if you want accurate tracking through the whole flight.

And ham gear doesn't need to be expensive. You can use a $20 surplus radio from eBay (I used a Radio Shack HTX-202) and a tracker kit (the radio modem part) is under $40.

I think the hardware investment for my balloon project was about $300:

http://n1vg.net/balloon

I've got a new payload sitting here ready to go that's a lot cleaner and simpler, and has a 2-hour video capacity. Everything in the payload is off the shelf (granted, the radio/tracker is off my own shelf, it's one of my company's products) except for a DB9 connector and a few wires that took a few minutes to solder together. The housing is the top half of a magnum wine shipper, and all of the components (battery, radio, GPS) just wedge in between the foam pieces intended to hold the neck of the bottle. The camcorder is held in with rubber bands:

http://n1vg.net/images/payload1.jpg
http://n1vg.net/images/payload2.jpg
http://n1vg.net/images/payload3.jpg

The acrylic window that goes over the end took me about 3 minutes to fabricate on a CNC milling machine and could be easily and cheaply replicated.

It'd be cheaper to build a transmit-only version of this system, but having a receiver lets you do useful stuff like control a cutdown device. This particular payload doesn't have one yet, but it can be as simple as a 1-watt resistor that you drive at 3 watts for several seconds to melt through a Nylon or Spectra cord. Maybe an extra buck worth of hardware.

I might launch this thing as soon as next month if I can find the time. Possibly from the Mojave desert again, or maybe from the Cuyama Valley, a little closer to home. Ground crew and chase team volunteers are always welcome.

At some point I'd like to have a ready-to-fly kit to sell at a reasonable price to schools, along with enough instructional materials to get them started. I just don't have the time for it right now.

I didn't even realize that I navigated this way myself - until I went to New Zealand. I wound up on the wrong coast before it occurred to me that the sun was in the other half of the sky.

Most of the films are rated for temperatures close to room temperature, though you can get other ranges. I've used through-hole resistors as heating elements before and they do indeed work quite well. A 1-watt metal film resistor will generate enough heat at 3 watts to melt its own solder joints. Long before that happens, it gets hot enough to melt through nylon or spectra, which is what I was using it for - a thermal knife for a load release.

It's certainly not going to be done in time this year, but maybe next. What actually inspired me was upgrading my desktop CNC milling machine's spindle motor so that it can handle cutting brass easily. I cut a few test shapes and I love it - it machines easily and looks beautiful.

I'm not really into steampunk, but I love some of the design elements. I'm working on a costume for next year that's sort of golden age of science fiction inspired, somewhere between Battlestar Galactica and a WWII German officer's uniform. I love the idea of a slightly bulky, machined brass wristwatch on a big leather band that's obviously electronic but clearly not a display technology in common real-world use, and I think it'll go well with the outfit.

I was thinking about making a thermochromic display for a custom watch, actually. Didn't know if anyone else had tried it before, but I guess I'm on the right track. It's going to take a lot of batteries to power, but I only really want it to run for Burning Man and Maker Faire.

I'm going to see if I can screen print resistive ink onto a PCB to make the heating elements. Failing that, I'll just go with thin film SMT resistors. Anyone know if that has been done before?

Those numbers seem to ignore the cost of producing corn vs. oil. What the farmer's interested in is profit, not gross revenue. Still, assuming it costs $50/barrel to produce and sells for, say, $53/barrel, you're still at $1428 profit per acre.

Or if OPEC opens the floodgates and drops the price to $35/barrel, you're out $7140/acre. But I suppose that's what the futures market is for.

I have to share my most recent California DMV story. Apparently you're EXPECTED to be irate, and they're not sure what to do if you're not.

I was there to transfer ownership of a used vehicle. No appointment, just walked in and took a number. Only the number-taking thing was broken, so I got a post-it. No problem. They got the number machine working again (more or less) and I got called up to get a new number, and got sent to a window. Then sent back to get a different number, and then to another window.

I wound up with three different number slips before getting to the proper window, but the whole thing took under 15 minutes so I wasn't unhappy at all. I was smiling and I think making a 'bingo' joke (the clerk I got was kind of cute) when a dour looking supervisor showed up.

"Sir! SIR! We had some technical problems, but it's all sorted out now and you're being helped. Just settle down and we'll take care of you as fast as we can. Getting upset isn't going to help anything."

The poor girl who'd been helping me just sort of stared at her keyboard during this outburst, then shook her head and muttered apologies as the supervisor wandered off to give someone else the same routine.

I really think the woman was actually unable to recognize a LACK of hostility in anyone. I hate to think what sort of a career has left her like that. The prominent signs plastered all over each window about it being a crime to threaten a DMV employee might offer a clue, though.

Damn, the industry's really improved since I got out, then. I worked as a PC tech (mid '90s) at $5/hour (I used to make $5.50 as a dishwasher) when our billing rate was $65/hour. After a year at this 'starting' wage, my boss said I wasn't worth more than $5/hour to him because I wasn't a good enough salesman. No matter that we probably made more on service and I was a damn good technician.

Doug King, you're an asshole. A good businessman, but a first-rate asshole.

(Incidentally, this is the same man responsible for the fact that when you pull up to a McDonald's drive through in some places, you get a person in a call center via VoIP rather than someone actually in the restaurant.)

My girlfriend's mother is a school librarian, has been for decades. One day she was sorting through a stack of old books and came across a Bradbury book in which someone had scribbled across the title page in pen. I think it was actually as she was in the process of slamming her DISCARD stamp down on the book that she belatedly recognized the scribble as the author's signature.

She's normally got a good sense of humor, but she does NOT like it when you remind her about that dang Bradbury kid scribbling in her books.

I paid $20 for an old Motorola V400 on eBay. Quad band GSM and unlocked, so it works in most countries - I've had local SIM cards for Croatia, Hong Kong, and Thailand. Sound quality, battery life, and reliability are way better than my expensive Samsung SCH-i760 smart phone.

I was ready to smash the Samsung after the one time I called 911 on it. The 911 call worked, but it got stuck in emergency mode and it took at least two complete reboots before I could get the thing to make regular calls again. As soon as the contract's up I'm ditching it and going to the simplest phone they've got - I'd use the V400 as my primary phone but GSM coverage sucks where I live.

Try PSK31 (31.25 bps binary phase shift keying mode used for ham radio) with a couple of sound cards. It'll work over open air with a speaker and microphone. If you used two different carrier tones, you could probably do full duplex.

For my own implementation of PSK31, I once ran it at a carrier of 62.5 hz. Sounded more like war drums than a digital mode over my subwoofer, but it still decoded OK.