A 17 years old kid hacked the iPhone, making phone call using networks other than AT&T is already old news. There is also an alternative hack fooling the iPhone using a turbo SIM that pretends to be a AT&T SIM card. I have quite some friends at work who bought the iPhone readily tried the hacks and eagerly showing off their fully functional iPhone.  As an engineer, I am genuiely interested in the technical details of hacks, but I am more interest in responding to an comment from a friend who condemns the hacks.

She is complaining all the hacking deprive the profit of AT&T and hacking in general cause the lack of investment in R&D because company cannot turn a profit. I have to disagree with her argument. AT&T is making a wrong and stupid business decision for locking up the iPhone.  It is our consumer right to tinker with whatever product we purchase by making it a better product that suits us better. If the company put in anti-user features that alienate the customers by making the product hard to use, we have every right to remove those unwanted features ourselves.  The invisible hand will punish those who act against the force of the free market.  The only way to make a profit is by giving the consumers what they want, not stupidly going against the consumers’ will.

In terms of business ethics, the consumers should only be responsible to pay for whatever they wish to buy. It is unjust to exploit the consumers by bundling sub-standard product with a high demand product.  The consumer should be given the option of not buying things they don’t need or wanted.  Everyone knows AT&T has the worse cellular network in US. If AT&T wants to gain more market share, it should provide a better service, instead of holding iPhone users as hostages.

Today was the old boys annual summer picnic. The president is owner of an organic farm and he let us use his place farm for BBQ. After the BBQ, we had a tour inside the farm. Modern farming is a capital intensive business with lots of agricultural technology. The organic farm is a 10 acres of green house, growing two hundred thousand plants with about 30 vegetable on each plant. That worths more than $1 million of vegetable in retail value. The temperature and water is computer controlled. The farm grows only organic pepper, cucumber and tomato, since organic food can sell at a premium.

I always thought growing organic food must be very dirty, but I was totally wrong. The farm use organic fertilizers that looks just like normal fertilizer, except it is made by organic materials. Since the vegetables are growing indoor, there is less pest hazard. The farm use organic means for pest control, having some good insects that hunt pests and growing plants that drive away pests. The farm buy bees in carton boxes for pollinating the plants. Harvest is labor intensive, although there are rail system inside the green house to help transporting the vegetable. During the tour, the owner pick some fresh pepper off from the plant to give us a try. Since the vegetable is pure organic with no harmful chemical, we can eat the pepper picked right off the plant. It tastes very good. This tour totally change my perception on farmers and found new respects to them. I always think farming is so boring and so out of fashion. In reality, farming is an engineering challenge to grow enough food to feed everyone.

10 acres of green house

  Rows of vegetables under the glass roof

Newly planted

Rail trolley for harvest

Big red pepper

There are some cost you cannot avoid, going to optometrist is one of those.  I wanted to get a pair of new glasses.  Not because I can’t see clearly with my old glasses, but rather want to get a new look.  I thought my original sight prescription is still OK, so I didn’t bother to visit an optometrist before buying glasses.  When I pick my glasses, I let the shop did sight test for my new glasses. When I pick up the new glasses, I find my vision of my left eye is kinda funny, like looking through magnify glasses.  I have the shop change the lens but the sight is equally bad.  The sales said I have a lazy eye, but that doesn’t sound right to me, I am fine with my old glasses.  So I figure it is time to seek professional help from an optometrist and do a full eye exam.  It turn out the result of the sight test is away off.  My eyes are quite health, but the left lens is +1.0 more than it should be.  That’s why I am seeing funny vision and thought something is wrong with my left eye.  The moral of this story: 1. Never trust any sales person. 2.  You can’t cheap out all the time.  If the money is ought to spend, then you have to spend the money.