Congolese Conflict

I was reading a blog post from a classmate of mine about the Congolese Conflict. You can read all about it on his blog, the post is titled Breaking the Silence from Oct 18-24.


I had heard of the Rwandan conflict, but I didn’t know that the violence had spilled over into the Democratic Republic (DC) of Congo as well. Which is odd because one of my history classes focused quite a bit on genocide and it seems like this conflict had many similarities to Rwanda…


So I did some reading to find out more about it and I came across this more recent article from the BBC. It mentioned that as early as January of this year Rwanda had sent some troops into DC Congo (with permission from DC Congo) to help take care of mutual enemies. But who are the mutual enemies? Are they actually enemies or are they civilians caught in the middle?


When I was reading Wikipedia to get a general idea of the conflict, it said it ended in 2003 with over 5 million civilians dead and countless more displaced. Obviously the conflict is still going on in some form if Rwanda has sent troops into the DC Congo.


The UN is involved in the area, deploying around 15,000 troops to protect the region. There is only so much those 15,000 troops can do though. They can’t protect everyone, as much as I wish they could.


If you want to learn more about this check out these articles/sites:
Q&A: DR Congo conflict

http://afrovt.blogspot.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Congo_War

Google Syntax Highlighter

I have been looking into applying a nice Syntax Highlighter on my site for when I post code for people to read. I was glancing through my classmates blogs and noticed a nice post from Ryan Coughlin on the subject.

He was going to mover over to Google's Syntax Highlighter from WP Syntax. I have always been a fan of Google and the fact that so much work and experience goes into the creation of all of their products. So for me this is a major selling point in choosing a syntax highlighter for my web site.

The Growing Popularity of Macs

I was reading a posting over on the EMH Design Blog on the rise in popularity of Macs.  My current choice of computers are a laptop running Windows XP and a test PC running Windows Web Server, Windows 7, and OpenSuse Linux.  

The rise in Mac users brings Apple to a 9.4% market share [1].  Which doesn't seem like a lot glancing at it, but it accounts for around 1.64 million people.  How does the PC market compare?  Dell and HP both hold around 25% of the market.  Which is understandable considering the difference in pricing between these two companies and Apple.

Apple markets and prices their computer as a high end computer.  HP and Dell market their computers as an economy computer with a low price. 

For me the rise shows me that perhaps people are starting to look for performance over price these days?

Preliminary U.S. PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 3Q09 (Thousands of Units) | Source: IDC

Car Pooling

How often do you drive alone?  How much do you spend on gas per week?  I often think car pooling isn't done enough.  If you are going somewhere and have the room why not see if someone needs a ride?  This past weekend I car pooled home with my buddy.  It saved me from having to take a bus home, and him from driving alone.  So it worked out for both of us.  


If everyone makes a conscious decision to drive only when there is at least one other person in the car it can help lower the cost of driving.  If you spend $20 a week on gas and you find someone who would be willing to switch off days driving you can save $10 a week.  That is enough to buy you one buffalo chicken sub from Big Daddies and a drink.  Or you could save the $10 and put it towards something more worthwhile like your favorite charity or perhaps even invest it.


Aside from the benefit of saving money, the consumption of gasoline would also go down.  We as a country if this took off would lower our demand for the precious fuel.  It is a long shot, but over time we would depend less and less on external sources of oil and even though car pooling isn't the end all solution for our dependence on foreign oil it would be an immediate source of change.  


I was just doing a Google search for carpooling and I came across this site.  Ride Buzz, a site where you can find other people who are 'going your way'.

Pacific Garbage Patch

Where is the world’s biggest landfill located? Right smack dab in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. By now most people have heard of the Pacific Garbage Patch. Not very many people realize the size of it. In my head I pictured a floating mass of plastic about the size of Vermont. What I found out was that it is two times the size of Texas! Check out this animation on the Greenpeace web site. Something of this size cannot be ignored, but how can something so large be fixed?

We can all help. About 10% of the plastic produced worldwide ends up in the ocean [1].  It would be unrealistic to assume that by recycling we can make the garbage patch go away, but we can slow its growth. I won’t preach about recycling as if not doing it makes you a bad person.

The solution. There is no solution, only ideas, thoughts, and suggestions. Maybe if recycling was mandatory? Or perhaps if there were not only garbage cans on the sidewalks but also recycling cans? Or what about those microbes  I keep hearing about?

Ok, so be on your way and next time you think about throwing a plastic bag out, just think of where it ends up. It may not be where you think it will.