Small steps to make the world a better place
12 May 2009 - Filed under Life Outside Work
Lately I’ve been thinking about people who smoke while walking along crowded streets or standing at pedestrian crossings. Will the world be a better place without people who choose to smoke while walking along crowded streets or standing at pedestrian crossings? Possibly. But I have more important propositions that will definitely make the world a better place. These are a random selection of the little things that annoy me the most, some of which have already been mentioned on this blog.
Liberate the over-regulated Web addresses. When it comes to technology, people often complain about monopolies, duopolies, lack of competition, corporate greed, high prices of services, and so on. But I would put something else on top of the list: digital bureaucracy. It’s most evident in the unnecessarily long addresses of Web sites in countries like Australia, New Zealand, the U.K., Singapore, and Fiji. Let me skip the details and just reiterate what the crux of the problem is: It’s over-governance that doesn’t often do justice to the size of the local economy, is costly to consumers, looks ugly, and hurts the value of, and the loyalty to, corporate and national branding. While many countries have taken measures to get it right, many others just don’t seem to realise that it’s ultimately about national competency in a heavily networked world. Things particularly don’t look good downunder: People in Australia, whose governments take pride in maintaining layers and layers of governance, have to put up with Web addresses like www.agencyname.statename.gov.au. Across the ditch, the New Zealand government believes that the country’s domain names should be regulated under eleven different second-level domains in an economy of four million people. In New Zealand, “NZ” is much more than just a domain suffix. De-regulate it and the value of the NZ brand will skyrocket. Isn’t that what the business-friendly National government stands for?
Put some ergonomics into laptop keyboards. Some of the world’s top laptop manufacturers don’t listen to customers. Lenovo and Apple, in particular, have yet to learn Ergonomics 101. Screw the tradition and just swap the bloody keys around so I can type, for crying out loud. I’m stuck with Lenovo laptops at work. I am seriously considering installing a registry hack so I can get the seldom-used Caps Lock key to act as the left Control key instead. No, I’m not the only one complaining; there is a looooooooong rant from frustrated Lenovo users all around the world. Arrrrrgh!
Equip police officers with firearms that can overpower criminals. Need I elaborate?
Eliminate region-locking in DVD and Blu-ray. Annoying, unnecessarily limiting, and largely meaningless. It would have suited the VHS era better.
Stop playing with time zones. I am not at all opposed to the idea of saving daylight. As I wrote before, what I don’t understand is why the local time needs to be switched back and forth every six months, which is hugely wasteful in every aspect. Pick the best time zone for the locals and stick to it.
Make all wheat-based foods gluten-free. With so many people with special dietary requirements these days, I think this makes a lot of sense.
2009-05-12 » JK