blueZhift Blog

I’m still rather depressed about the stunning first round loss of Chicago’s 2016 Olympic bid today. I’ve heard a lot of analysis this afternoon, but one thing I think is quite clear… There won’t be any more Olympic bids from Chicago. We wasted a lot of time and money when we probably never had a chance. I  like Rio, and if the IOC wants to give the games to Rio, then that’s okay. But don’t make the rest of us spend so much effort if we don’t have a chance at the prize.

Another shocker is the emerging picture that the IOC did not want the voting to play out as it did with Chicago going out so soon. Of course not, a crushing blow like that guarantees that Chicago won’t try again, it also scares off any other sane US cities as well. They needed this to go to the last round so that we could entertain the notion that our tremendous effort almost got us there.

As it stands, I think my fair Chicago feels like a jilted bride, just not good enough. It seems Havana will get the Olympics before Chicago ever will. Maybe we’ll try again next century.

Today is the day that the host city will be decided for the 2016 Olympic Games. No one likes to be disappointed, but today I’m going to let myself dream just a little bit about the Games coming to my backyard! I hope this dream comes true! I think even the detractors here in the city will be excited if the Olympics come to Chicago.

Chicago already hosts millions of international visitors every year, but still doesn’t quite feel like a truly international city. The Olympic Games in Chicago would be the final push we need to become a truly international city, one the world’s great destinations. Let’s go Chicago!

This isn’t a continuing series, just some random thoughts from an observer. An observer I say because I’ve never been a social butterfly. I’ve always thought of myself as more of an observer, but over the years I learned to play my part and function reasonable well in social situations. I like to joke that I’m just a collection of heuristic algorithms!

Anyway, even in the best of times, breakups and other drama reek havoc over one’s social network of friends and acquaintances. But now, social networking sites like Facebook have the effect of magnifying this in  a way not seen since people started accidentally clicking reply to all on sensitive email messages. At least with Reply to All, things are going out over email to a relatively static and known list of recipients. But with sites like Facebook, not only is the list dynamic, there’s really no way to know who is now privy to your status. And triple damage bonus points come if/when it leaks to the general web and is indexed by search engines like Google. From that point the whole world, including past, present, and future employers may have access to info about your social life.

None of this is really new. But it really hurts when you see someone you care about driven off of the network in part because of this. Well that’s all I have for now, just had to let that out. I don’t know of any real solution. I think that social interactions will just have to renormalize, which like resetting the world economy, is going to take a long time.