More on Neurons and the Printed Word

Caille Millner's Saturday column was "Short list of benign tech firms in the area."  She began by discribing a fight she had with "some guy on a digital barstool."

I'm not quite sure what the "concept of disruption" is, and I've only a slightly better notion of hashtages, as in #changetheworld, #evilluddites, #nerds-rule, #movefastandbreakthingsinc.  She says that some people in the tech industry think that anyone who "offers pushback against thier ideas is not only categorically wrong but stupid."  She goes on to herd thinking and the new mobile app called Yo that let you say Yo to your friends with just two taps on the phone.  It just raised $1 million from investors.  So she says some good things about the tech world and their good-doing:  BeGoodClothing...


C.W. Nevius says that it's "Time for the disabled to pay for parking" since there are 60,750 placards issued in the city and only 28,000 metered parking spaces.    The people who can issue the placards are optometrists, podiatrists, chrropractors, physicians and midwives.  California is one of 15 states that don't charge disabled drivers for parking.  When Philadelphia went to paid parking, the placard parking dropped from 65 percent of available spaces to 2 percent and on-street parking availability went up 11 percent.  (He doesn't point this out, but even paying, it provides the opportunity to park closer to where a person wants to be.)  The reason for NOT charging was that puttin the coin in and turning the handle of the meter was thought to be hard for some with disabilities, but now they can pay with smarphones or credit cards.

Also on the subject of parking is "SFpark program touted as success/Now it will expand throughout the city" by Michael Cabantuan.  Meters will charge according to demand.

With a different meaning for the word park, "Drones will be outlawed in U.S. parks.

Sasturday is also the day that Kamiya's Portals of the Past appears, and today it's "Spanish street names set off western San Franciscans."  Interesting that Mayor Edward Taylor appointed a historian, Zoeth Eldredgge, who favored Spanish names--after the Spanish-American War.  Some San Franciscans weren't so happy about that..  Irving was named after Washington Irving and Judah after the engineer who masterminded the first railroad to cross teh Sierra.  Kirkham and Lawton were generals.

Then there's "medical technology Worth a seal of approval."  A robotic stuffed pinniped soothes seniors and costs only $6000.00.  It was invented by the Japanese company AIST and first sold in Japan in 2005.  Paro (for social interaction, stress reduction, anxiety reduction and to combat self-isolation by giving seniors someting to engage with) made it to the US in 2009.  This about dementia:  "If every time you go someplace it seems unusual to you, it brings on fear...we use paro..."