Immortal computing

Microsoft just applied for a patent for "immortal computing," a scheme to make information understandable in perpetuity. An interesting idea, but is this really a good business strategy? I mean, patents expire after 20 years. Can you really build planned obsolescence into something that is "immortal"?

On another note, is the idea of immortal computing really a good thing? Weren't we saved from the Cylon attack by the fact that their modern computer brains couldn't interface with Galactica's outmoded technology?

Border patrol numbers

I don't really know what if anything to make of this.

From the Office of Detention and Removal: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement "removed* 187,513 illegal aliens from the country in FY06, a record for the agency and a ten percent increase over the number of removals during the prior fiscal year."

*--"Removal" means what "Deportation" used to mean.

From public radio's Marketplace's report on : "Mexico detained and deported more than a quarter-million people last year."

But the US is beating Canada. From the Canadian Border Services Agency, only 11,845 persons were removed from Canada in the 12-month period ending March 31, 2005. That's approximately 3.6 deportations per 10,000 residents of Canada, compared to 6.3 per 10,000 residents of the US, and 24 per 10,000 residents of Mexico.

However, in terms of people denied entry at the border, Canada is beating the US on a per capita basis. CBSA denies entry to 7.8 people per 100,000 residents of Canada per day, whereas the US denies entry to only 1.9 per 100,000 residents of the US per day.

Passer rating flaws

The NFL has this stat for quarterbacks called the passer rating. It's formulation is nonintuitive, and while the lowest possible rating is 0.0, the highest possible rating is 158.3. The league average rating is usually in the high 70s, with the leader being around 100.

The passer rating has four components, with a quarterback being rewarded for 1) completing a high percentage of passes, 2) throwing for a large number of yards per attempt, and 3) throw a large number of touchdowns per attempt, and being penalized for 4) throwing lots of interceptions.

There are several quirks in the formula. One for example is how one might think that throwing 10 passes and completing none of them should result in the lowest possible score, but no, the passer rating rewards this performance for not throwing it to the other team, and gives it a 39.6. (One interception in ten attempts is however 0.0.) And then there are questions about its relevance because quarterbacks can do very important things to help their teams win by running the ball, which is completely ignored by the stat and contributes in a small way to lowering the rating.

However, the quirk I choose to focus on in this post is how the rating for a season is not the average or sum of the ratings of individual games. This is not completely related to the cutoffs where a quarterback does not get any more points for increasing his completion percentage from 78% to 81%, but this can really be taken advantage of to create some interesting scenarios. For example, please examine the following four games, which are not totally out of the realm of plausibility in the NFL:

Game 1:
7 comp/25 att, 188 yards, 2 touchdowns, 0 interceptions->Rating: 85.1

Game 2:
18/25, 295 yds, 1 TDs, 3 INTs->Rating: 85.0

Game 3:
17/25, 235 yds, 2 TDs, 4 INTs->Rating: 85.0

Game 4:
13/25, 100 yds, 3 TDs, 1 INTs->Rating: 85.0

The total of these four games:
55/100, 818 yds, 8 TDs, 8 INTs->Rating: 75.3

Does this make the passer rating a bad stat? I tend to think not when used for a season. The problem I feel is how the passer rating for a single game is being used more frequently. This should stop. Only Rams QB Marc Bulger had more single games (8) this season with rating over 100 than Chicago QB Rex Grossman's 7, despite the fact that Grossman gets all sorts of flak from how he's terrible because he had games with ratings of 36.8, 23.6, 10.2, 1.3, and a season ending 0.0. But the Bears did win 2 of these 5 games.

Thr3e (The Postcard)

In the mail today, I received a postcard advertisement for "Thr3e," which is apparently a film that is "In Theaters January 2007." This is a first for me, a postcard mailed directly to me about an upcoming film.

There are a few things about it that I found interesting:

On the front, it's got the poster seen here, plus the tagline "Some sins were never meant to be discovered," "From X-Men producer Ralph Winter," and "Based on the best-selling novel by Ted Dekker," as though I am supposed to know who he is.

On the back it says Quote:
When a young seminary student is targeted by a psychopathic killer, he joins forces with a criminal psychologist whose brother was murdered by the same madman. Together they must unravel the killer's riddles and catch him before he strikes again, but the closer they get, the more twisted the path becomes. This heart-pounding thriller will keep you guessing up until the final shocking scene!


At first, I was quite confused about why I had gotten this postcard, but then I figured it out--I noticed the www.foxfaithmovies.com thing in the small print at the bottom. I've known for a few years that my address has somehow found its way onto the mailing lists of a handfull of Christian things. (I think it's probably from the church that grew up at, but I'm not sure.) There are a couple of charities and orphanages, some of which I've heard of, some of which I haven't. There was the Christian college with 500 students located in Regina, Saskatchewan, a city that I have never been within a 1000 mile radius of. It's pretty clear that this must be it. The closest other thing I can think of would be that the film stars Marc Blucas, and I have purchased Buffy DVDs from Amazon that include him.

This just doesn't seem like an effective ad campaign to me. I guess the idea is that they think I'm looking for a low budget psychological thriller that is also a Christian allegory. (An alle-Gory? It is rated PG-13.) But the only way that I knew it was a "Christian" film, was that the Fox Faith Movies website was on it. Well, that and the fact that it was junk mail targeted at me.

How many of these postcards do they send out? In terms of households per dollar, a postcard (24 cents postage) gets you 4 per dollar whereas a Super Bowl commercial would be a much better "bargain" getting you 22 per dollar.

Now, about the film. From SPOILERS!! on the IMDb page, it's my impression that the twist ending of this film is the same as Donald Kaufman's The Three. If so, is Thr3e, as a Christian allegory, drawing a parallel between the Holy Trinity and the victim-cop-psychopathic killer three-in-one mulitple personality? Oh, wait, its screenplay was crafted by the same hands that wrote Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever? Sign me up.

Selection Order

With the NFL regular season now over, 20 of league's teams know where they will select in the league's upcoming draft. (The playoffs effect the order of the remaining 12 teams.) The first tie-breaker is strength of schedule, and so if the Detroit Lions had not somehow won at Dallas when Dallas needed to win in order to clinch their division championship, the Lions would have gotten the first pick. However, now they'll draft second after the Oakland Raiders.

However, to decide the third and fourth picks, the Cleveland Browns and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers will need a coin flip. No word yet on when the fateful coin will be flipped.