Greg In The Desert

The Arizona Republic has an story about Brad Niesluchowski who worked for the Higley Unified School District and was fired for installing SETI@home, among other things. He appears to be some sort of administrator. There appear to be other charges including stolen equipment and failure to train other staff.

Higley officials so far estimate the damages, energy usage and equipment losses linked to Niesluchowski at $1.2 million to $1.6 million.

…

Higley officials said the SETI program requires wattage to run, and therefore was an extra burden on computer processors and power usage. They allege several computer processors would burn out sooner than expected, and the SETI program’s operation raised utility costs.

They don’t go into specific on how much extra it cost the school district to run SETI@Home but I have to question if it was really significant amount of power. Perhaps the school district and news site are over emphasizing the use of SETI@Home as part of the excuse to fire fire him.

When SETI@Home first came out, there was a lot of competition and I installed it on every computer I could find. Today I don’t care but I could see how it was its easy to install everywhere.

Update 12/05/09: Berkley’s Eric Korpela releases “FAQ and comments about the Higley School District controversy“. He indicates a lot of bad reporting and I agree.

Monday was the big day when Apple had the their annual World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) and made some hardware and software announcements. Though there were a number of new and expected things I was most interested in the new iPhone.

The new iPhone 3GS doesn’t look different from the old iPhone 3G except there’s an “S” added to it’s name to denote speed. This is not really all new phone but an improvement to the current phone model:

• Faster processor
• More memory
• 3 Megapixel camera with autofocus
• Video Recording
• Includes a compass

The two features that prompted me to buy the iPhone 3Gs is the 32GB of memory (over the 16GB in my iPhone 2G) and the addition of the compass.

There has been some controversy for existing owners of the iPhone 3G and their inability to get the subsidized price of $300 off the list price ($499 for 8GB, $599 for 16GB, or $699 for 32GB. I actually blame Apple for this, they should have announced the normal price for the iPhone 3GS then noted that carries may offer subsides prices. AT&T is doing nothing different with the iPhone in terms of free upgrades to phones that they would do with any other phone. I do agree that the new iPhone models are expensive without the subsidies.

I can’t complain about AT&T too much. I get the subsided price for the iPhone 3GS but I did pay $599 for my iPhone 2G so AT&T never subsided me in the first place. AT&T recently placed a new tower near my house so I am no longer in a cell signal black hole. I get a full 5 bars at my house all the time. Clearly they are working on improving their coverage.

The other complaints about AT&T is their inability to provide multi-media messaging service (MMS) and using the iPhone as a modem (tethering) when the new iPhone launches. It’s pretty amazing that AT&T can’t get their act together in time and clearly aren’t ready to handle dealing with the type of users that use the iPhone.

I pre-ordered my phone through Apple’s well done iPhone ordering site. I’m thrilled that Apple promises delivery of the new iPhone on Friday June 19th, the day of launch. I don’t have to stand at in any lines and I’m guaranteed a device.

Hardware aside, the big improvements will be with the software. iPhone OS 3.0 is to be released on the same day the new hardware launches and has more improvements that any new hardware. It works on older iPhones and will be free. The Golden Masters have already leaked onto the internet and the reviews have been good so far.

I’m trying to think back to my own graduation 15 years ago. It was held at the high school football field and I think there was a limit of how many people I could attend, something like 5 people (the class was 2000 people (update: 2000 is the total number of students in the school that year)). The Rio Rancho High School graduation is in some controversy due to the 8 person limit imposed when the school moved the ceremony to the Santa Anna Star Center. It was previously held at the “Pit” in Albuquerque.

The Santa Ana Star Center, which opened in November, will hold 5,500 of the graduates’ family and friends, while the The Pit held 11,000 for the ceremony last year, said Bill Duncan, Rio Rancho High activities director.

One thing that is annoying me is the woman I’ve seen on the news several times who complains that she cannot take all 50 of her relatives (she has a blog rioranchogradsunite.blogspot.com) to see her kid graduate. The Albuquerque Tribune says another person is upset because she ordered 40 invitations. Even if it was held at the Pit, there isn’t enough room for every kid to take that many people.

I know this is important to a lot of people and I don’t have a kid who is graduating nor 50 relatives that would come out for it even if I did. It appears that the school is willing to accommodate a reasonable amount of people (this problem isn’t unique to Rio Rancho High School). I feel it’s better to have the graduation in Rio Rancho, where the school is. I also feel that parents should be reasonable.