Lots of candidates? Not so much.

Unemployment in the USA has been headline news for a while now and the 'man on the street' conclusion is that it should be easy for companies to find employees.

Unfortunately, it's not that easy.

Of course, that's not to say that we don't get a lot of applicants - we get scads of them. It's just that finding the right employee isn't so easy.

But don't take it from me, read this article from the Wall Street Journal:

Some Firms Struggle to Hire Despite High Unemployment

Ecobee is super nif-tee!

Fellow ClimateTalk Alliance Member Ecobee can be quite proud of their product. The Ecobee thermostat flawlessly connects to the internet to allow its users web access to change thermostat settings and set up programming.

They really had their Nogginthinkingcaps on when they thought to put the weather report right on the thermostat display and when they made it easy for customers to schedule maintenance with convenient on-board reminders.

And boy, the design of the Ecobee is super-sleek - enough to make Steve Jobs blush! Add to all that the fact that there is even an Ecobee iPhone App you can use to control the thermostat leaves me virtually speechless.

You can bet Nogginhaus clients will see Ecobees on their living room walls & we look forward to seeing more of their Nogginhaus musings in the future.

Check out Ecobee here...

ClimateTalk and Nogginhaus

Spent the day in Phoenix, Arizona with the good folks at the ClimateTalk Alliance. Nogginhaus is now a member of the alliance and will be helping the smart people from Emerson, EDC, Microchip and more create a product that will revolutionize the way houses work (house? work? housework!).

So how will they work?

That's our task. It seems to me that we really do live in a Matrix of sorts. Data is everywhere --getting it to the people and machines that can make good use of it is the challenge.

ClimateTalk is up to that challenge.

Smart Machines

Your cellphone rings. A voice tells you that you need a gallon of milk and you have about a week's worth of mustard left for the family-pack of Hebrew Nationals you bought last weekend.

You make a mental note to make a supermarket stop on the way home from work tonight.

No, it wasn't your wife who called, it was your refrigerator.

A recent Wall Street Journal blurb announced a joint venture between Verizon and Qualcomm to provide "machine to machine communication" via cellular equipment.

Machines are already smart, they just need to communicate. Once they do that, who needs you?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124883407168489041.html

Wethinks about chickens, Part Double Yolk

I wrote a few months back about raising chickens in our backyard (read it here).

Evidently, this line of thinking is becoming more mainstream.

Boog is worried about that and thinks maybe we should consider pheasant instead.

Check out this video from the Wall Street Journal about the chicken wars in Salem, Oregon.

Thoughts on Independence Day

This Independence Day, take a moment to learn how our politicians are gleefully taking the role of the aristocracy and how there's no difference between Democrats and Republicans.

Wall Street Journal provides these reports that illustrate that the rhetorical badgering that takes place on the Sunday talk shows is followed by happy backslapping on the planeride to exotic locales on the taxpayer dime.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124650399438184235.html

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124657931514989505.html


There's the Political Class and then there's us stuck paying for it.

Smart Outlets

What if an electrical appliance could communicate with its house? What if a coffee maker that is suddenly drawing too much current and could not only shut itself off, but also shut off its circuit?

John La Grou, longtime electronics inventor talks here about such a product. Another exciting step toward Nogginhaus - the house that thinks for itself.