A Geek in China

KaKa

Jacob Redding — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 02:37:14 +0000

An unfortunate title.

Glass fences

Jacob Redding — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 02:37:12 +0000

Throughout China people use recycled glass on the top of their fences and ledges to keep out intruders

Rap Szeged Style

Jacob Redding — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 14:32:32 +0000

Those Hungarians.. they know how to rap.. how to get down! Hey the man had the bawls to get up on stage and sing, that has to be honored.

Open Letter to James C. Mullen, CEO of Biogen

Jacob Redding — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 15:28:58 +0000

Reposting from dembot.com.... time is of the essence.

*URGENT**

cc: Lance Armstrong, President Bill Clinton, Senator John Kerry, Senator Tom Harkin, Senator Ted Kennedy, Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach (Head of FDA)

Mr. Mullen, my name is Andrew Baron and my father Frederick (61 yrs. old), has final stage multiple myeloma has been recommended the drug Tysabri as a last chance effort for life.

Please read this carefully.

Last Thursday, his doctors at the Mayo Clinic determined that he may only have about 24-48 hours to live.

In what can only be defined as a miracle in timing, a few days ago, one of his doctors who has been studying his tumor cells in the lab for years found an antibody with an exact match: Tysabri which is manufactured by your company, Biogen Idec. In the test tube, it attached to the antigens on the surface of the tumor 100%.

Though the drug has never been used before in this way, and because time is running out, the head of the FDA, Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach has granted special approval for use of the drug for this purpose but you have personally decided “no”.

Lance Armstrong, who you spoke with on Friday, has also pleaded with you to say “yes” to my father, but you personally said “no”.

President Bill Clinton, Senator John Kerry, Senator John Harkin, Senator Ted Kennedy, Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach and others who you spoke with on Friday and again yesterday on Monday have all pleaded with you to say “yes”, assuring you that there would be no legal risk and no negative consequences to your company if something went wrong, but you continue to say “no”.

If this drug was rare, scarce, or if people were waiting in line to obtain it, we would not be expecting any privileges. But the drug is readily available, cheap and even sitting in our clinic’s pharmacy just 6 floors below us right now… . All we need is for you to just say “yes” to save his life.

I’m the CEO of my company so I can appreciate the pressure of doing what’s best for your company. Is denying my father access the best thing for your company? How could it be? What’s the risk?

What is the justification? No one knows. We have gotten back reports from everyone that spoke with you and others at your company and they do not see any justification as to why. All I know is “No because no”.

The very best doctors in the entire world from the Mayo clinic which is one of the most experienced treatment centers in the world have recommended this drug to save my father’s life and it’s the only thing known that could work.

After you refused on Friday, the doctors decided that they must do something, and resorted to another antibody called Campath which is working to prolong his life.

Please Mr. Mullen, there is no time left. There is no justification. Just say yes.

To anyone else who reads this: Please help! My father is a saint who has given his life and his resources to better humanity. He has spent his entire life seeking to protect the rights of others from harmful death and has spent an enormous amount of money and time in helping to shape our government to protect the rights of people everywhere. He is a philanthropist at heart.

1. Call Mr. Mullen or anyone at Biogen and ask them to please say yes (or provide a justification for whynot). Speak with anyone in the company in any department that you can find: http://www.biogenidec.com/site/contact.html

2. Contact an elected official and plea with them to call Biogen to seek approval:

http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml

3. We have been searching all over the world for international options and continue to look for a country that we could fly to to obtain and administer the drug. Do you know of anywhere that we could go? So far we have found that by law, Biogen controls use in every country that the drug is distributed in.

4. Do you know of any options in alternative medicine?

5. Do you know how we can obtain this drug?

Please comment here, email me at andrew@rocketboom.com or post and discuss here:http://friendfeed.com/rooms/myeloma

We are trying to figure out what to do.

3 minutes of Silence

Jacob Redding — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 08:42:29 +0000

While in Shanghai China recognized the victims of the Sichuan earthquake with a nationwide 3 minutes of silence. At the time I was on a subway, everyone on the subway stopped, stood silently and waited until the 3 minutes passed.

Shanghai Software Park

Jacob Redding — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 08:33:57 +0000

Most tourists like to travel to resorts, amusement parks, or fancy restaurants. I like software parks!

yup, I'm that geeky

Huangzhou Developer Conference

Jacob Redding — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 08:26:10 +0000

May 24, 2008 I attended the 2nd annual developers conference in Huangzhou. I have to say that I was quite impressed with the line up of speakers and with the quality of the presentations. I was always extremely interested to compare how I, a big white westerner, and the local Chinese students interacted within the sessions. Or maybe I should say that lack of interaction within the sessions. I was extremely excited to ask questions, to probe deeper and to really get at the "meat" of the matter(s). The Chinese students seemed bored and also as if they knew all the answers or maybe they just didn't care.

I was cool to attend and to see how the local developers interact and to watch this ecosystem grow. In 10 years (or less, according to the Chinese government) the world is going to see a lot more highly skilled, very talented developers hit the industry.

Working in China

Jacob Redding — Wed, 28 May 2008 00:31:36 +0000

Working in China, for someone coming from the "West", comes with its own unique set of difficulties. The first difficulty, of course, is the language barrier which may be present even if you speak perfect 普通话（Mandarin, Chinese) as many Chinese people still speak in local dialects. The second is another obvious one, the cultural differences. Cultural differences may not be apparent at first but they creep up on you and can present interesting challenges from time to time.

The biggest challenge/difficult when working in China may not be these obvious ones but rather these things that we take for granted in the "West".

1) 24 hour power. Power at all isn't always guaranteed even in the big cities. I know of several technology shops that have regular power outages. How does a tech-company operate without power? answer, it doesn't.

2) Internet access. Yes you have the challenges of the great firewall and the impositions it places but you also massive inconsistencies with the web itself. You may be paying for a 2MB line but there is no guarantee that you are going to get that or anywhere near that. Now when you combine spotty Internet with the fact that most of the Internet is hosted outside of China you get a really bad combination for doing any sort of web related work unless, that is, your web is 100% focused on China, your hosted in China and all of your resources are within China; a highly unlikely scenario even for China-based sites/companies.

As an example of one of the challenges, I uploaded 100MBs of file to a server in the U.S, the upload was done on a 2MB up/down business class ADSL line. The picture shows my upload times. As you can see one 34 MB file took 2 1/2 hours to upload, at a whopping 3.8KB/s but roughly 2 hours later a 13MB file took only 4 minutes at a, moderately faster, 54.7KB/s. This sort of inconsistency reigns supreme here and its just something that, for the moment, you just have to live with.

Doing any sort of web-based work in China is, in a word, challenging.

I'm cool

Jacob Redding — Mon, 12 May 2008 16:53:50 +0000

Although the earthquake hit the country of China Beijing is far away from the epicenter moreover I was in Hong Kong at the time. It was reported that people in Hong Kong could feel the aftershocks but I didn't feel anything.

In short, I'm cool. I thank you all for your kind letters of support and checking to ensure my safety. I (We) are cool.

Listen to my Horrible Chinese

Jacob Redding — Sat, 03 May 2008 17:52:36 +0000

Yes its true I do speak a little Chinese and a lot of horrible Chinese. At our last Drupal meetup in Beijing I was stuck as the only presenter and I didn't have an interpreter handy so it was just me and a room full of Chinese Drupal folks just waiting for me to speak. Very intimidating but I think I managed to get my point across.

These videos only prove one thing. I need practice!

Coming down off the great wall

Jacob Redding — Sat, 03 May 2008 17:38:00 +0000

After a long, hard day of climbing the Great Wall you really don't want to climb back down. Fortunately Chinese people are incredibly smart. They setup an "Inertia Ropeway" which allows you to get down from the Great Wall with the greatest of ease.

Simatai Great wall

Jacob Redding — Sat, 03 May 2008 17:34:49 +0000

I've been attending a small private Chinese language school here in Beijing in an attempt to improve my Mandarin language skills; which are currently at the baby talk level. The school took a trip out to the Simatai section of the great wall. Previously I had only visited badaling so it was nice to see a different part of the wall, especially one that is less touristy.

Beijing Pollution

Jacob Redding — Sat, 03 May 2008 17:16:54 +0000

I shot this video several weeks ago and after I shot it the air cleared up for a few days and then got worse again. The last two days the SEPA index has been over 100. Fortunately today the rains and wind came to wash and blow away all of the pollution! yay!

Jacob + Raincity Studios = Drupal China love

Jacob Redding — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 06:29:01 +0000

I'm happy to announce that I have joined the great intercontinental team of Raincity Studios. Raincity has a great team in Vancouver and Shanghai as well as awesome folks scattered throughout the world. Since moving to China last year I have been looking for a way to get more involved in the local Chinese Drupal scene and to do my little part to help it grow. Additionally when I became a board member of the Drupal Association I made a pledge to do whatever I could to help encourage the growth of Drupal-related events around the world.

I'm excited that my work with Raincity Studios will allow me to do exactly this!

My job at RaincityStudios will not only focus on China but also on the rest of the world. In China I've been fortunate to meet some great folks at the Beijing user group as well as the Shanghai user groups and I'm excited to meet new Drupal folks down in Guangzhou, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Hong Kong and ???. In North America I've met great folks in Boston, NYC, San Francisco, LA, Colorado and many other places. The great folks in Europe, whom are currently putting on Drupalcon Hungary are awesome as well are the folks in Australia.

In addition to working with the community I will also be providing internal and external Drupal training. I'm very excited to get back to my training roots as it was as a Microsoft, yes that's right Microsoft, trainer that I really became the geek that I am today. I love training and watching others learn it is a wonderfully gratifying experience.

My new position will have me based out of Beijing, China with frequent trips to Shanghai. I'm looking forward to meeting all of my new coworkers as well as the new folks in the Chinese Drupal community!

Shanghai Drupal user meetup

Jacob Redding — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 09:30:04 +0000

I was fortunate enough to be in Shanghai for their Drupal user meetup. It was great to meet all of them and see the projects that they are working on. Shanghai has a good number of Drupal developers and some of them have worked on some really cool projects. For me the highlight of the entire meetup was when one of the guys introduced himself as "ian" and just in case you didn't know how to pronounce it, it is "Ian" of Deb-ian.

Yes! There are super Chinese geeks! I love this place!

Track the group at groups.drupal.org/Shanghai, they are growing quickly.