My Life On the Transition, or, The Wonderful Thing About TIGR

The hardcore action starts around 1'50". :-)

Tokyo, 10:23pm

Tokyo, 9:46pm

Life Vest

Milo in Paris

Milo in Paris, Sacking Out

Milo's hand

Milo in Oxford

Prague, 10:38pm

Accra, Shoe Docter Shop, 9:37am

Gisenyi, Rwanda, 1:40pm

Nyamata, Rwanda, 11:34am

Santa Rosa, 6:28pm

Milo: 1 week

"It looks like you went to the hospital, and came home with a garden gnome...."

Milo!

Milo Alexander McLaughlin, born June 20, 2006, 5:44pm, San Francisco. (Woo-hoo!)

More photos here.

Beijing: Cindy, 9:43pm

Jian Wai Soho.

Beijing: 798

Kyoto - Ninenzaka, approaching Kiyomizudera

 

Tokyo: Shibuya, 10:11pm

GASPANIC!

Tokyo: Meiji Shrine, 8:23am

Shinto Monks.

Tokyo: Tsujiki Fish Market, 6:39am

Tokyo: Tsukiji Fish Market, 6:36am

Tokyo (& Girl) from the 26th Floor

The Party: New York City

The Bride - New York City

The Roast - New York City

The Ceremony: New York City

The Afterglow: SF City Hall

The Next Moment: SF City Hall

The Moment: SF City Hall

The Waiting: February 2006

Paris: Place des Vosges

Revile: A Message from Cindy

 

Hanneke5

Amsterdam, November 2005.

The Threat: Nart, Me, Paul, and DJ Spooky (That Subliminal Kid)

Sidi Bou Said, Tunisia, November 2005.

I'm sure this thing has a timer

EnFrente Arte, Ronda, Andalucia, Spain. October 2005.

My Life as a Mouse

... not a mole.

Mrs. Beasley Takes The Plunge

Sebago Lake, Maine, August 2005.

With Dave, Jonathan, Zach, and Mrs. Beasley

Sebago Lake, Maine, August 2005.

Dave & me.
Dave, Jonathan, and Mrs. Beasley.
Zach, exhibiting uncannily good canoeing.
Dave, meditating amid the serene calm of the riverside cabin.

Daisy's Adventures in Corsica

Ajaccio and the Réserve Naturelle de Scandola, Corsica, July 2005.

On Menorca: After the Ceremony

Menorca, Spain, July 2005.

On Menorca: At the Ceremony

Menorca, Spain, July 2005.

On Menorca: Before the Ceremony

Menorca, Spain, July 2005.

Girl and me.
David.
Joshua and girl.
Yat and Joichi.
Daniel.
Joanna and John.

On Inch Strand

Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, Ireland, July 2005.

Girl Meets Sundial

Kilmalkedar Church, Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, Ireland, July 2005.

Girl Meets Beehive Hut

Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry, Ireland, July 2005.

After The Ceremony

Block Island, July 2005.

Dusk

Block Island, July 2005.

Miss Your Forms From the Trace of Fairyism

Beijing Capital International Airport, July 2005. Anyone have a clue what this means?

Girl Meets Fridge, Tugs Heartstrings

New York City, May 2005.

Meeting Nick of Kate and Scott

Berkeley, California, April 2005. Proof that I can overcome my fear of small, cute things & handle them without injuring either of us. Thanks to Kate & Scott -- next time, I definitely won't drop him!

Beagle a-leaping.

Pfeiffer Beach, Big Sur, February 2005.

Girl a-leaping.

Pfeiffer Beach, Big Sur, February 2005.

Girl and beagle.

Pfeiffer Beach, Big Sur, February 2005.

OneVoice Blog - strengthening Palestinian and Israeli moderates

OneVoice has launched a weblog. OneVoice is an amazing organization -- a movement, really, in the best sense of that term -- that seeks to mobilize the moderate majority of Israelis and Palestinians to find a workable path to peaceful coexistence through honorable compromise. OneVoice is a pragmatic effort to reclaim the public debate from the radical extremists, built around broad participation on both the Israeli and Palestinian sides. The great virtue of OneVoice is its pragmatism, expressed through on-the-ground actions. At the moment, for example, OneVoice is conducting a first-ever get-out-the-vote campaign in the Palestinian Authority. They are about to start running a 1-minute ad on Palestinian television that features the amazing trio of (1) Sheikh Taysir al Tamimi, the Chief Palestinian Islamic Justice, (2) Father Attallah Hanna, the Patriarchite of the Greek Orthodox Church in Jerusalem, and (3) Richard Gere. Sheikh Tamimi proclaims in the ad that it is a "religious and a national commandment" for Palestinians to participate in the upcoming elections.

My commandment: put the OneVoice weblog on your daily reading list, and think about what you can do to help.

Kenya (Finally) Embraces Tech-Neutral Regulation (Sort of)

The last few weeks have seen some amazing moves in the direction of opening the Kenyan telecom market to Internet-based voice services (known as "voice over Internet protocol" or "VoIP"). Credit goes to the relatively-enlightened and by-all-reports relatively-uncorrupt Communications Commission of Kenya, as well as to the ISPs and others who have been pushing tirelessly for reform. The CCK's new licensing policy is designed as a first liberalizing step toward the following remarkable objective: "...the Commission intends to adopt a unified and absolute technology neutral licensing framework that permits any form of communications infrastructure to be used to provide any type of communications service that is technically capable of providing." That, in a nutshell, is exactly what we've been fighting for in Africa since the late 90s. It's a thrill to read it in a government policy statement. It's a real testament to Kenya's democratic transformation, and to the hard work and dedication of the CCK staff over the past few years to pursue a rational, transparent, open, and people-centric, regulatory regime for communications.

The most dramatic element of the CCK's immediate changes in policy is the decision to stop granting licenses by auction, a practice which raised the amount of money paid by the winning bidder to government coffers, but correspondingly reduced the funds available to it to invest in actual infrastructure. Operators were forced to borrow more at higher rates of interest, leading to delays in construction and higher passed-through prices for consumers. The CCK has now made most licence categories open on a first-come-first-served basis. One stubbornly lingering exception is fixed-line domestic and international voice, which will as a practical matter be confined to Telkom Kenya for the foreseeable future.

Another immediate and happy consequence of the new licensing policy is that mobile operators will be permitted to operate their own international gateways and to deploy VoIP technologies. One mobile operator estimates that these changes will result in a 90% drop in the cost of international calls via mobile phone. There are still plenty of obstacles in this path, however. Kenya's corrupt political elite is clearly terrified at the potential loss of bribe income from Telkom Kenya's monopoly cash cow. Less-pristine government agencies like the Ministry of Information and Communication will doubtless erect whatever regulatory brakes they have at their disposal. Indeed, that Ministry was recently behind the cancellation of a prospective second National Telecom Operator licence as well as an awarded third mobile license, a decision that has been enjoined, for now, by the Kenyan courts. The Ministry has also backed off of a common-sense plan to deregulate VSAT (small satellite dish) Internet links. Not surprisingly, there appears to be a real struggle for administrative power between the quasi-independent CCK and the still-politicized Ministry.

Nevertheless, the CCK continues to assemble the regulatory elements of a freer market in communications services. Mobile number portability is scheduled to begin in July 2005. Wisely, the plan is to use KENIC (the non-profit that has done an outstanding job running Kenya's .ke top-level domain) as the neutral operator of the number portability database.

New Mongolian Invasion

I have a thing for Mongolia (OK, an esoteric thing). Mongolians have a thing for power chords. For example, the Mongolian band Hurd makes really cool music that transforms traditional themes and melodies into everything from sugar-sweet pop ballads to screaming metal bonanzas, often incorporating traditional instruments. And now even the New York Times is focusing on the geopolitical implications.

Meet Penelope

Hallandale Beach, FL - October 31, 2004

Delhi, Chandi Chowk - October 2004.

Hello, ladies!

Behold: My 9th grade class photo, sporting Mr. Roarke jacket and thuggish sneer -- the very picture of the neatly-pressed streetsmart badass-ism they fostered at the American Community School, Cobham, Surrey, UK.