Jordy Blog

With over 250 RSVPs in 24 hours, the Peter Schiff event tonight is on! If you want to really understand what’s going on with our economy, how we got here, and what we can do about, come hear from one of the few people who PREDICTED it would happen. RSVP and details for this FREE event are at http://tinyurl.com/schiff-rsvp

BACKGROUND
Peter Schiff is a well-known Austrian-school economist, best-selling author, radio-show host, investment broker, and financial commentator. Peter is a recent senatorial candidate, and he also served as an economic adviser to Ron Paul’s 2008 presidential campaign. Peter Schiff is perhaps most famous for his detailed, accurate predictions of the housing bubble, the resulting subprime mortgage crisis, the automotive industry crisis, and the crisis in the banking and financial markets. These predictions are documented in his famous YouTube video called “Peter Schiff was right”, as well in his books and many other publications and recordings. Please join Campaign for Liberty and other liberty-minded groups at this FREE event, as Peter explains how we got here, where we’re going, and perhaps how you can protect yourself and your assets from other financial crises that still loom ahead! RSVP below!

IMPORTANT NOTE
Obviously this is pretty short notice. To respect Peter’s time, we will only be holding this event if we can get at least 50-100 solid RSVPs. (And ideally we would get much more than that!) What that means is that, in order for this event to happen, you’ll need to call, email, and text your friends. And don’t forget to share this link (http://tinyurl.com/schiff-rsvp) on Facebook and Twitter! We’ll email a final confirmation to everyone who signs up, regardless of the outcome.

Also note that Peter will also be speaking (along with lots of other great speakers) at the 2011 Grassroots Economic Summit hosted by iCaucus on the same day. There is a $25 charge to attend that event, but it may be worth it for those who have the time and money to attend an all-day event. There are more details on that event on the iCaucus site.

RSVP HERE!

Hoping to see some of my nerdy friends at the Python Birthday Bash we’re throwing!

What: Python’s 20th Birthday (well, public release birthday) Extravaganza Lunch Party!

When: Monday at 12:15

Where: Izeni. We’re located at the Novell TCN, also known as the building formerly known as OSTC, also known as (but not really numbered as) building A. (Campus Map: http://bit.ly/Pythons_BDay_Party)

Who: Python Users worldwide*, plus a special invitation to Guido van Rossum: We’ll pick up the plane tickets and hotel if you want to join us :)

Queridos Pythonistas,

As any faithful subject of Guido (the Benevolent Dictator for Life) must already know, this Sunday marks the 20th anniversary of Python’s first *public* release[1]. (I know, such a tender age…) Since we all know that attending a birthday party for the awesomest computer programming language of all time is on the top on everybody’s bucket list, Izeni would like facilitate the fulfillment of your wildest geek dreams by throwing perhaps the best programming-language-themed birthday celebration ever known to mankind.

We’ll be gathering Monday to have pizza, giant subs, spam with eggs**, and a specially commissioned Python-themed cake by Joseph Hall of 3D TuxCake fame[2]. We’re working on getting a snake charmer too! (Know anybody?)
Come join us, mingle with other Python users, and enjoy some great food! And spread the word!

Please try to RSVP by either by tweeting me @izeni or emailing me offlist so we can get a (rough) food estimate.

Thanks, Gabe

* While everyone is welcome to join us for cake, there are certain restrictions for free pizza/subs/spam-and-eggs. Specifically, you must meet at *least* one of the following qualifications:

0) You have commit privileges for Python.
1) You have read and given *serious* thought and consideration to ‘The Zen of Python’.
2) Your license plate says PEP-0008.
3) You use Python professionally or as a hobby.
4) You have an untrimmed beard that’s longer than 1 inch (or are at least trying).
5) You have a Monty Python tatoo.
6) And lastly, you enjoy playing the game “snake” or just like the name Guido.

Due to what we expect to be an overwhelming response, we *will* be checking for non-pythonista freeloaders by verifying *basic* knowledge of the Python language. We also reserve the right to inspect your keyboard for disproportional wear on your “{” and “}” keys and may additionally do random spot-checks on your webservers for the ‘X-Powered-By’ headers for any traces of PHP.

** We really will be serving spam and eggs.

[1] http://python-history.blogspot.com/2009/01/brief-timeline-of-python.html

[2] http://blog.josephhall.com/tutorials/tuxcake/

BTW, if you’re looking for a gig writing clean code in Python, we’re always looking for sharp Utah Python hackers. Let us know!

My brother and business partner Gabe will be helping to lead a discussion on FreeSWITCH and Asterisk at the the Utah Open Source Conference tomorrow.

Gabe is the CTO of our small startup company (Izeni), and our team has built, and continues to build, some pretty cool projects based on these (and other) open source telephony technologies.

Some of the recent FreeSWITCH customization projects we’ve built for our clients include a custom call center that can handle up to 100 concurrent agents on commodity hardware, and a distributed SIP load tester that’s capable of pushing thousands of concurrent SIP calls (suitable for stress testing extremely large telephony infrastructures).

But those are just 2 examples of the many ways a company can customize a free software phone switch to enhance their current products or services with open source telephony. Whether you need a hosted IVR (Interactive Voice Response) solution, or just some method to bridge phone calls, record calls, make outbound calls, etc; FreeSWITCH and Asterisk are up to the task.

Anyway, if you’re in Utah and are interested in learning more about Open Source telephony, you should come by tomorrow to check out the discussion. You can also can review the (expansive) FreeSWITCH and Asterisk feature sets. And if you need some phone-related development done for your company, that kind of work is highly specialized, easy to outsource, and right up our alley. We’d love to help!

Along those same lines is something that’s been on my mind lately: I’d be interested in starting a Utah FreeSWITCH Users Group, originally meeting in only in Utah Valley, but hopefully spreading as the FreeSWITCH project comes into more common usage. If you’re local and would be interesting in participating (or leading), please let me know.

And if you think of some way you’d like to have your product interact with phones, text messages, even IM –that’s just what we do. We’d love to help you work through it –even if it’s just to help you see what’s possible.

China calls for new reserve currency. This could get scary.

I’m looking to replace GoDaddy as my primary registrar. I originally used them because they were cheap and well known; but I’ve always hated their interface, and I really dislike the offensive turn their marketing has taken. Let’s face it, GoDaddy sucks, and they don’t deserve my money.

Anyway, what recommendations do you have for a domain registrar that is affordable, no-nonsense, and easy to work with?

Thanks,
Jordy

Izeni will be at BYU’s Web Startup Group tonight to give a short demo of our first product, CallClock.

CallClock is a mobile (hosted) timekeeping system to help employers and contract workers record work time for payroll, invoicing, job costing, and project management. CallClock is still in private beta, but Izeni joins other local companies in using it in-house while we’re finding bugs and adding features.

If you’d be interested in being a part of our private beta, let me know. If you’re in the Provo area tonight and want to see it work, swing on by.

Gabe and I want to be sure that our start up company, Izeni, has a cash runway that’s long enough to ensure that we can have a proper lift off. To that end we’ve been doing some consulting and contract work (mostly low-hanging fruit) to slow our burn rate, and it’s worked fairly well because we’re in bootstrapping mode and our expenses are relativity low. So, although we’ve never really sought contract work, we do like it; and I thought I’d do a quick post officially soliciting it.

So without further ado, Izeni will be accepting all kinds of technical consulting and contract work. Our specialities are Python coding; website development (particularly using the Django framework); Linux systems administration (Apache, *SQL, Postfix, Mailman, IPtables, Samba, Bash, etc.); and VoIP-based telephony (Asterisk and Freeswitch).

We can also do general computer and network support, online marketing, and a myriad of other technical and business odds and ends.  :)

Izeni is based out of Utah, but we can also telecommute.

Please let me know if you have any contracting and consulting opportunities or know of any companies looking for web guys, programmers, or other technical contractors. Otherwise, feel free to repost this (pass the word along), or just keep us in mind.

Now we’re talking:

EXCLUSIVE: RNC draft rips Bush’s bailouts
Ralph Z. Hallow (Contact)

Republican Party officials say they will try next month to pass a resolution accusing President Bush and congressional Republican leaders of embracing “socialism,” underscoring deep dissension within the party at the end of Mr. Bush’s administration.

Those pushing the resolution, which will come before the Republican National Committee at its January meeting, say elected leaders need to be reminded of core principles. They said the RNC must take the dramatic step of wading into policy debates, which traditionally have been left to lawmakers.

“We can’t be a party of small government, free markets and low taxes while supporting bailouts and nationalizing industries, which lead to big government, socialism and high taxes at the expense of individual liberty and freedoms,” said Solomon Yue, an Oregon member and co-sponsor of a resolution that criticizes the U.S. government bailouts of the financial and auto industries. Republican National Committee Vice Chairman James Bopp Jr. wrote the resolution and asked the rest of the 168 voting members to sign it.

I hope this resolution passes. It would be a clear sign (to me) that the Republican party is worth saving.

It’s End-the-Fed day today. I thought I’d commemorate it by posting a video featuring Peter Schiff (Ron Paul’s campaign finance advisor), who accurately predicted the sub-prime meltdown and the ensuing recession.

Some great quotes (emphasis added):

Our markets are going lower. This is not just a financial crisis; this is an economic collapse. Our entire phony economy is collapsing around us. There’s nothing the government can do to stop it; they should get out of the way and let it happen.

—-

Look, you have to understand: for the past several years everybody thought we had a real economy. We didn’t. We had a bubble. All we did was borrow trillions of dollars from the rest of the world, and we blew all the money on consumption. We can’t pay the bills. The asset bubbles that were inflated by reckless monetary policy are deflating around us, and we’re going to have to rebuild a viable economy; and it’s not going to be easy. A lot of companies are going to go bankrupt during the process. A lot of people are going to lose their jobs, but this has to happen: we have to go back to a sane economy where we save our money and actually make stuff.

—-

I’d be … getting out of the dollar because it’s a bottomless pit. When this dollar stops rallying, it’s going to fall like a stone. That is the next major economic crisis we are a setting up, a major major run on the dollar, and that’s going to have tremendous repercussions for our economy and our markets.

—-

We manufactured our way into becoming the wealthiest economy country in the world, and now we’ve consumed our way into bankruptcy.

—-

It’s time Americans take a long, hard look at the flawed monetary policy that’s behind all of this funny business; and that means understanding the history, operations, and goals of the Federal Reserve. If we don’t figure this out and get back to system of sound money, we may well “wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered“.

It’s frustrating that the only major party presidential candidate that was talking about these issues in any substantial way was written off from the very beginning. But you wanted empty platitudes? Well, you got ‘em.