The coming oil crisis

After thinking over yesterday’s announcement that Southwest is changing it’s Rapid Rewards frequent-flyer program, I was reminded of Southwest’s savvy negotiating of its oil contracts. Its keen ability to manage its fuel costs helped Southwest remain profitable through our last recession while its rivals collapsed into bankruptcy.

I also thought of last week’s analysis saying the surging worldwide demand for oil, driven by China’s voracious energy appetite, would likely result in nearly doubled gasoline prices by 2012. This is after gasoline prices doubled over the past two years. This week the average price of a gallon of gasoline on the East Coast is $3.07, whereas the price two years ago was $1.65 (and yes, I am fully aware that these prices will one day seem hilariously low).
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Ah, the price of fame

After making my list of highlights of my community service from the past year I have to mention a strange new phenomenon of late: lots of people now know me and I don’t always know them.

I’ve went down to the municipal building for something earlier this year and gave my name to one of the staffers I had just met. “Oh, so you’re Mark Turner! We’ve heard all about you,” came the cheerful reply. Some treat me like some kind of celebrity. Even cops. City staffers have told me they read my blog on a regular basis, too. It’s a little unnerving knowing that people are talking about me, even if it’s good stuff. (At least, I hope it is!)
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Highlights of 2010: helping out the community

It was a productive year for helping out in the community.

The biggest and most rewarding thing I did as the CAC chair was help organize the first East Raleigh Community Day event along with Ronneil Robinson, Raleigh Police, Raleigh Parks, WakeMed, and others. It was so much fun seeing everyone out and having a good time. I had a silly grin on my face all day long.

Part of the Community Day celebrations included the grand opening of the Police Department Field Office in the Raleigh Boulevard Food Lion shopping center. This was the result of an initiative I took two years ago to work with the city and the property owner to get it done. Now the shopping center is thriving, new businesses moving in, and the neighborhood has a nice local place to shop.
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Southwest Airlines screws the pooch

In a single, boneheaded move, Southwest Airlines just lost me as a loyal customer. The airline’s simple rewards program just got a lot more complicated.

Fans are hopping mad and are burying Southwest’s Facebook page with their comments. It’s sad, considering how much cheerleading I’ve done for them over the years.

The Baltimore Sun’s Consuming Interests blog has a good breakdown on what the changes mean.

Southwest Airlines Co. overhauled its frequent-flier program to add rewards with no black-out dates and redemptions for international flights on other carriers.

The first major revamp of the Rapid Rewards loyalty plan since it began in 1987 should add “several hundred million” dollars a year in revenue, Chief Executive Officer Gary Kelly said yesterday at a briefing at Southwest’s Dallas headquarters.

Southwest, the largest low-fare airline, spent almost $100 million on the project and aims to win new customers and deepen ties to existing business travelers, who generally pay higher prices. The carrier unveiled a related website for passengers today to explain the changes, which take effect March 1.

“If we get our fair share of frequent fliers, the opportunity is huge,” Kelly said. “We’re very confident this is a good investment.”

via Southwest Loyalty Program Gets First Revamp in 23 Years to Boost Traffic – Bloomberg.

25 years of compact discs

Photo by Arun Kulshreshtha

This past Christmas marks the 25th anniversary since I got my first compact disc player. I don’t remember exactly what brand it was. Maybe a Teac. [Update: It was a JVC.] It was the single-disc variety and didn’t do much error-correcting, if I recall. It lasted for years, though. I remember it still spinning discs into 1995 or so.

Word when they came out was that CDs would become as affordable as albums were (~ $10) once their manufacturing reached a certain scale. Like a lot of things the music industry says, it turned out to be lies. The suits in the industry chose to maintain the high prices of CDs even as their manufacturing costs dropped through the floor.
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Capt. Honors and his videos

Capt. Owen Honors

When I first heard about the controversy over Capt. Owen Honors and the videos he made when he was Executive Officer of the carrier USS Enterprise (CVN-65), I immediately thought of the irreverent videos made by my captain and senior leaders right before our ship would pull into a foreign port. They usually had some costumes in it or a skit of some sort. Looking at the same horizon, the same haze-gray paint, or the same windowless compartments for months on end can make you crazy, so adding a little humor is a good thing. Especially if it conveys important information in a compelling way.
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Amazon Video on Demand

Now that I’ve played around with the Roku for a few weeks I decided to check out the Amazon Video on Demand (or VOD) store. Amazon offers fairly new movies for “rental” or “purchase,” and through the magic of Roku these rentals get automatically billed to your Amazon account. They have content for standard-definition as well as high-definition. I checked out a few of their free offerings (an HD promo for The Office) and was impressed by the quality.
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Slain Pakistani governor retweeted my brother in law

I was reading the Twitter feed of the fearless, assassinated governor of the Punjab province, Salman Taseer. He seemed like quite the technically-savvy politician.

Just three days ago, Taseer retweeted a status update from my brother in law, David Swanson, sent on New Years Day:

@SalmaanTaseer Salmaan Taseer
And not iin 2011 either RT @marvisirmed: Sweet na! RT @davidcnswanson: The United States has not launched any new wars all year

Pakistan’s increasing instability worries me greatly, and the U.S. military has lost whatever clout it used to have there. I fear Pakistan’s troubles will boil over in the next few years. Time to try a different approach, and fast.

Smoking in Parks interviews


As I mentioned yesterday, I did two interviews for the Smoking in Parks (in addition to the News and Observer’s).

The News 14 interview with Jessica Cervantez was posted yesterday afternoon and came out nice with the exception that my name was not mentioned during the interview.

The WPTF interview came out well, too. The interviewer took perhaps 3 minutes of my time to discuss the issue and didn’t ask any biased questions. I spoke calmly and with authority, which I think conveyed that this issue is no big deal. I was even impressed that our Voice over IP phone connection sounded fantastic. The clip aired during their next top-of-the-hour news update, where their newscaster repeated nearly everything I had said verbatim before playing the clip of the rest of what I said.

I laughed when the newscaster twice referred to me as “Councilman Turner” on the air. I admit I liked how it sounded, though!

Highlights of 2010: Parks board

Lions Park Playground Dedication

This year marked the start of my second term on Raleigh’s Parks, Recreation, and Greenways Advisory Board (a.k.a. PRGAB). Service on this board has led to an amazing set of friendships and a greater understanding for all our Parks department does.

It has been challenging but rewarding work. The board meets every month, and each member is also expected to serve on one or more committees. My committee of choice is to act as liason to Mordecai Historic Park, which is a mile away from our home.
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