Disqus - Latest Comments for BluesBro

Re: Search for documents in the Arolsen Archives

BluesBro — Sat, 26 Apr 2025 00:14:25 -0000

Thanks for your reply. Following my post I spent more time to understand how your archives work, with better results.

Re: Search for documents in the Arolsen Archives

BluesBro — Sat, 19 Apr 2025 20:26:35 -0000

MyHeritage said there were documents here relating to my great grandfather, however nothing showed up

Re: Daring Daylight Robbery in Vallejo Thwarted by GPS Tracking Mishap,

BluesBro — Sun, 04 Aug 2024 21:24:29 -0000

I love seeing these stories, foiled by the GPS. More people should use them. There are very cheap devices available these days.

Re: How This Google Maps Rival Tries to Copy Waze's Number One Feature

BluesBro — Fri, 19 Apr 2024 20:58:42 -0000

As someone who was trying to make it happen when I worked as the National Travel Information Manager at NZTA, there are 2 vitally important keys to deal with planned and unplanned events impacting motorists. That is combining information from the authority, with what people are experiencing. They are:
1. What was the official cause of the event? What is the expected delay time. For example, if the event was a fatal accident, there is likely to be a minimum road closure time, so that the serious crash unit can investigate. It's all very well to see the congestion level, but the authority knows the road WILL be closed for 1.5 to 3 hours on average. That's more useful than coloured lines on a map.
2. Receiving the official detour routes from the transport authority. A routing algorithm doesn't contain that data, only the road controlling authority does, and it can vary according to the circumstances. Often the detour calculated by the navigation system has the impact of making things worse (with the best of intentions) and gridlock can occur, which can be a major if the event has life threatening implications. Think floods as a good topical example. Councils and authorities know what is going on and have plans. An algorithm that calculates a route from your destination back to your location, can make things much worse.

Re: Here's a Feature Google Maps and Waze Should Copy From a Top Alternative

BluesBro — Mon, 08 Apr 2024 17:22:35 -0000

This is great when conditions are great. Having been involved in research into this technology in New Zealand, we found it a slow and difficult process. In New Zealand we have low ambient light. It takes a long time for the sun to reach zenith, which makes the signs much harder to machine read. Add to this a lot of wind, rain, and other weather conditions, signs can be hard to read. Combine those factors with the angle of the street sign in relation to the camera, and it can be difficult to even identify the geometric shape of the sign, which is one of the factors in identifying what sort of sign it is. People rely on their technology, which is why I coined the hashtag #thegpsmademedoit because people start trusting technology, following the instructions and then blaming the technology when it gives wrong information or hallucinations. The navigation solution provider is not going to pay the fine if it gets something wrong and you trustingly follow the incorrect instructions. A far better solution to me would be for signs to have telematics that can tell your navigation system what it needs you to know. A well designed system might be no more expensive than street signs, and I'm sure insurance companies would be interested in contributing to the costs.

Re: Apple envisage de nouvelles fonctionnalités Apple Maps pour rendre Google Maps obsolète

BluesBro — Sat, 30 Mar 2024 17:15:32 -0000

And yet it doesn't include actual eco-routing. I used to work for a mapping company in New Zealand and we charted every road including inclinometer and the angle of camber. This was to support eco-routing, where for every route you could calculate the most economic route, which would allow a hybrid supporting app to include regenerative braking into the recommendation of a route, to use the least power. TomTom bought the company to have access to the dataset, which excluded all other mapping companies from accessing it. As a hybrid driver, that is a navigation feature I would be keen to use.

Re: Routes to sustainability: cargo bikes are delivering big results

BluesBro — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 17:35:11 -0000

I can see the sustainability, but what about the human cost versus productivity. You don't get much on a cargo bike compared to a van or a truck. For a modern city, wouldn't you need many hundreds of people and unless you had wide cargo lanes, wouldn't we end up with more gridlock?

Re: Suche in Dokumenten der Arolsen Archives

BluesBro — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 15:25:14 -0000

I'm not sure what this document is. Oom Herman was the younger brother of my Pake, Maurits Cappel

Re: How environmentally-friendly are EVs really?

BluesBro — Fri, 01 Oct 2021 16:56:44 -0000

Some excellent information here and great that over the lifetime of the car itself, the carbon footprint is much less than for petrol and diesel, but what about how the power is generated? Here in New Zealand, most of our electricity comes from geothermal, hydro, and a little wind. But what about countries where electricity comes from coal, and nuclear. Electricity generated from coal, must negate the benefits of using batteries and with nuclear, unless some of the new rocket companies find a way to jettison waste materials into space, I don't much like that idea either. Personally, I'd like to see subsidies on EV's going to pay for domestic and commercial solar power with battery systems that allow power to be shared between a house or office and the car in both directions. Even better a grid network that bypasses the power companies who do not want to pay fair feed-in tariffs.

Re: Enterprise adoption of IoT stuck in “trough of disillusionment”

BluesBro — Thu, 10 Sep 2020 17:40:14 -0000

We had the same situation in the early days of wireless and it took a combination of the telco's and hardware distributors supporting the innovators to get us out of the trough. With COVID19 there are so many opportunities for IoT, but enterprise may be focusing on lockdowns, offices, HR etc instead of innovative technology solutions. Also smart money might be reconsidering where the value is in the 'new normal'. I'm questioning the Smart City right now as more and more people move to remote working, as an example. Gartner is seldom wrong and the trough is almost always part of the journey. It may be that for IoT to take off, we need to reconsider what problems it can solve. Social distancing, reduced staffing levels due to reduced income, changes in transport demand, changes in entertainment and shopping are a wonderful place to start thinking about problems we can solve with IoT, but they may be very different to what we were thinking about in 2019.

Re: University innovation team helping to develop high-tech dementia aid

BluesBro — Mon, 27 Jul 2020 21:33:10 -0000

Great initiative. I did quite a lot of research in this space as a topic I was passionate about. I also had a vested interest (long after I started my research) in that my mother-in-law suffered from dementia. She was in her 80's at that time and in the early phases was prone to wandering. One of the issues was that she would not wear any item that she did not recognise. We tried necklace, bracelet and a device to pop in her handbag. Problem with that was that she would not pick anything up before going for a walk, so the handbag would stay in her room. She would not ever have worn a watch like this. I suspect that elderly men would only be keen if it had an analogue face. One of the potential fatal flaws for people in rest home care is charging of devices. As baby boomers come into this category, it might get easier.

Re: Over 35 years, Advantage perfects the art of the pivot

BluesBro — Wed, 17 Jun 2020 19:58:23 -0000

A great story. BAU is never a strong model for business growth or even survival and COVID19 has brought that even more to the fore. Companies that are able to keep pivoting, while maximising their skill sets and industry presence are IMHO more likely to stay in business and thrive in both difficult and more positive times.

Re: Apple CarPlay Now Acting Crazy Causing Google Maps to Lose GPS Tracking

BluesBro — Sat, 22 Feb 2020 22:57:05 -0000

It could be the location, i.e. there are places where GPS jamming is being tested. Clearly it is to do with the GPS and not the app.

Re: LinQ smart People Compass released to general public

BluesBro — Tue, 07 Jan 2020 20:37:32 -0000

Would be great for trampers, school group hikes and the like for repeat use.

Re: Backseat driver: NZTA gives unwilling speeders a voice | StopPress

BluesBro — Mon, 27 May 2019 22:23:25 -0000

Nice work. We've all been there right? My favorite subtle words when there are kids in a car are 'precious cargo'. Doesn't offend anyone, just makes them think about what the rush is.

Re: ‘Exploitative Play in LIVE Poker’ by Alexander Fitzgerald | Podcast #231

BluesBro — Wed, 24 Apr 2019 00:45:36 -0000

Great podcast and made me want to buy the book. I've got too much to read at the moment so used your link and got Amazon to send me a sample.

Re: What Clues Are You Leaving Online? Be Aware this Easter Weekend -- Security Today

BluesBro — Sat, 20 Apr 2019 23:08:54 -0000

I did something similar live at a social media conference. I made up a random name, looked up the name, found a woman who is in the navy, discovered she was in Fiji on vacation and a lot more information before deciding I was treading on dangerous ground, having seen the pictures of jet skis and other items that she shared from her home. On a tangent, at 5AM this morning a drone was flying over our home and those of our neighbors who called the police. We're pretty sure we know where the people live who were scoping the neighborhood, but we can't prove it.

Re: Q&A: VPIP & PFR, Thoughtful Decisions and Abundant Poker Content | Episode 170

BluesBro — Sat, 06 Apr 2019 20:54:36 -0000

This is a great podcast. I really like the way Sky explains the ratio between VPiP and PFR. Say you were looking at a VPiP/PFR of 20:15. I would look at them as TAG's and be cautious if they were going after a hand because they only play 1 in 5 and PFR 15% of hands. But what Sky was pointing out is that of the 20% of hands they play (excluding the blinds of course) they raise 75% of those. That's a pretty significant statistics don't you think?

Re: Using PriceSpy to check for Boxing Day rip-offs

BluesBro — Mon, 04 Mar 2019 21:38:11 -0000

But they said the next sale will be even bigger than Boxing Day lol

Re: Tile wants to put Bluetooth tracking in all of your favorite devices

BluesBro — Thu, 10 Jan 2019 19:28:22 -0000

I have some concerns about privacy, which are relevant to any IoT expansion. With a product like Tile, it needs to scale and this is a great way to do it. If I was them I'd also be partnering with all of the major luggage manufacturers. I suspect that there is only room for 1 or 2 products that work this way in the western market. Tile have the potential to eat other competitors like Magpie if they do it quickly. They also need to bring the price down dramatically and they can do that if these partnerships allow them to mass produce in huge volumes without sacrificing quality.

Re: Tyler Cowen: Be Dynamic – Love Your Work, Episode 155

BluesBro — Sat, 29 Dec 2018 17:19:05 -0000

Thanks David, yes it did make me resilient and opened some great doors for me. Key things I think I gained from it were a passion and ability for learning and the ability to find patterns from disparate information...

Re: Tyler Cowen: Be Dynamic – Love Your Work, Episode 155

BluesBro — Thu, 27 Dec 2018 21:42:18 -0000

So maybe moving as a child was good for me, actually I know it was. I was born in Holland, moved to New Zealand at 2 1/2. By 3 I spoke Dutch, English, Hungarian (so I could speak to my neighbours) and by 4 could understand French and German. By the age of 6 I'd been to 3 primary schools in 2 different cities. At 11 I went back to Holland and 13 back to New Zealand, going to school in both countries. I learned cultures, languages, history, geography, studied guitar, recorder and by 15 played many instruments and was writing songs and at 16 teaching guitar. By 20, I had added French and Latin to my languages subsequently to be followed by Russian, Japanese and Spanish. These studies prepared me and gave me the opportunity to travel and do business in the US, Australia, Japan, France and the Netherlands and collaborate with people in many other countries. I also studied creative musicianship in NZ and songwriting with Berklee (online). Moving definitely gave me a very different perspective on life than people who were born and raised their families in the same suburb of the same town!

Re: Your Blog Post Title Here...

BluesBro — Sun, 09 Dec 2018 20:36:49 -0000

Nice article. Yes a map is a key and can be related to art in the way it delivers a message. Certainly an aesthetically pleasing map is one that is easy to use, whether it is finding your way around Paris, or Lord of the Rings:)

Re: Your Blog Post Title Here...

BluesBro — Wed, 26 Sep 2018 16:16:29 -0000

Very cool. I've had VIP tickets a few times for sports events at Eden Park in Auckland and not even the security guards controlling access knew where my reserved parking space was. I got "Try over there" and of course it wasn't there, then I'd loop back and get "Try over there" and after about 15 minutes with hundreds of members or other guests driving around causing major traffic congestion, I would find my park. It's a bit like the research that says a third of urban traffic is people looking for a carpark. Having your nav tell you the right gate and direct to your park would be awesome. As to leaving a little later, they generally advise guests to do that. Great work.

Re: Q&A: Poker Math and Hand Reading | Podcast #202

BluesBro — Fri, 07 Sep 2018 15:36:08 -0000

Great that you have an Alexa skill contribution. Half of the Alexa feeds I subscribed to have nothing current in them, which is really frustrating. It put me off looking for feeds, so keep telling people you're there so you don't get judged by people who haven't heard you yet on the basis that others haven't withdrawn their feedback when they can't be bothered uploading new posts:)

Disqus - Latest Comments for BluesBro

Re: Search for documents in the Arolsen Archives

Re: Search for documents in the Arolsen Archives

Re: Daring Daylight Robbery in Vallejo Thwarted by GPS Tracking Mishap,

Re: How This Google Maps Rival Tries to Copy Waze's Number One Feature

Re: Here's a Feature Google Maps and Waze Should Copy From a Top Alternative

Re: Apple envisage de nouvelles fonctionnalités Apple Maps pour rendre Google Maps obsolète

Re: Routes to sustainability: cargo bikes are delivering big results

Re: Suche in Dokumenten der Arolsen Archives

Re: How environmentally-friendly are EVs really?

Re: Enterprise adoption of IoT stuck in “trough of disillusionment”

Re: University innovation team helping to develop high-tech dementia aid

Re: ​Over 35 years, Advantage perfects the art of the pivot

Re: Apple CarPlay Now Acting Crazy Causing Google Maps to Lose GPS Tracking

Re: LinQ smart People Compass released to general public

Re: Backseat driver: NZTA gives unwilling speeders a voice | StopPress

Re: ‘Exploitative Play in LIVE Poker’ by Alexander Fitzgerald | Podcast #231

Re: What Clues Are You Leaving Online? Be Aware this Easter Weekend -- Security Today

Re: Q&A: VPIP & PFR, Thoughtful Decisions and Abundant Poker Content | Episode 170

Re: Using PriceSpy to check for Boxing Day rip-offs

Re: Tile wants to put Bluetooth tracking in all of your favorite devices

Re: Tyler Cowen: Be Dynamic – Love Your Work, Episode 155

Re: Tyler Cowen: Be Dynamic – Love Your Work, Episode 155

Re: Your Blog Post Title Here...

Re: Your Blog Post Title Here...

Re: Q&A: Poker Math and Hand Reading | Podcast #202

Re: Over 35 years, Advantage perfects the art of the pivot