Monthly Archives: May 2006

Amazon’s Online Book Beta – Ugh!

Posted on by Kathy E. Gill

Firefox 1.5.0.3 – PC. Cannot annotate a bookmark. Tried highlighting “notes” and typing – does not work. Tried putting cursor to the right of Note: and still cannot type anything. VERY disappointed – since I was going to use this to set up chapter links … since the TOC page is not hyperlinked to chapters (this is lame, guys!).

Ditto annotating a highlight — the text box has no visible spot to indicate the start of the text field and clicking around in the window has proven useless.

There is no “go back to the page that I was just on” option either. The incredibily one-page-at-a-time linearity is frustrating.

On the plus side, the “go to page number” feature actually goes to the printed page number. Good for you!

My kludge at the moment is to highlight a chapter title — that is giving me links to each “start” page. But I shouldn’t have to do this! These links should be pre-populated!

520 Bridge – Proposed Pacific Interchange

Posted on by Kathy E. Gill

Notes: Presentation to UW Senate.
The Washington State Department of Transportation (WashDOT) will release the SR
520 project Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) mid-summer. Because
there is only a 60-day comment period, this meeting is the last
opportunity for the Senate to hear about the
proposed expansion of SR 520.

WashDOT is evaluating a six lane alternative, which would add two dedicated HOV lanes. The Pacific Street Interchange — which was part of a proposal by BetterBridge.org — has gained traction with WashDOT as an addition/change to the original six lane proposal. Arial View.

This Pacific Street Interchange would result in the closure of the current Montlake exit/onramp at Shelby-Hamlin.  WashDOT would build a new offramp that terminates in the Husky Stadium Parking Lot. [Note: WashDot has rejected the suspension bridge portion of the Better Bridge proposal.]

These links show WashDOT’s latest interpretation of the Pacific Street
Interchange. (very large,
cropped) Note the "lid" over the interchange, which appears to be
larger than Husky Stadium football field.
The offramp is eight lanes; Montlake would be six lanes north to 45th.

This proposal:

  1. Has a negative impact on the Washington Park Arboretum.
  2. Increases traffic volumes on neighborhood streets around the
    University.
  3. Has a significant and negative impact on the long term development capacity of
    the University.

Continue reading →

Ramblings on COPE and Net Neutrality

Posted on by Kathy E. Gill

This afternoon, I’ll be interviewed on KUOW on the Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006 (COPE) in general and network neutrality (I prefer to call it network discrimination) in particular.

To be honest, I had not fully investigated the bill before now — I had focused only on net neutrality. That attitude has now changed, big time. From the CBO analysis of fiscal impacts:

  • It would set up a national franchise for cable companies,
    replacing the current
    system of locally negotiated contracts.
  • The bill would preempt state and local consumer
    protection laws; preempt local government authority over municipal
    rights of way; and preempt state laws prohibiting local governments
    from offering certain services to provide Internet access.

Whoa! That’s a bigger challenge, in my opinion, than waffling on net neutrality (the bill "waffles" because it doesn’t protect neutrality: something the telecos/cable companies don’t want).

Continue reading →

Small World

Posted on by Kathy E. Gill

On Saturday, I was a participant in the PRSA Career Jumpstart — one of the "Day In The Life" professionals. Since I no longer practice PR, I talked to students and junior PR folk about new media and its impact on the profession. Amazingly, the first student to come to my round table was a fellow graduate of the University of Georgia Grady School (now the Grady College of Communication).