I have been trying very hard to stay away from controversial issues on this blog. I often find, looking back a few months later, that my opinion on the matter has softened. It's actually a bit embarassing to see what I once considered important ended up meaning so little.

So it is with caution that I write something about the current hot topic of the month: the Terri Schiavo case.

The case is doubly-sad. First, there is the deep sympathy I feel for the woman at the center of it all: Terri Schiavo. 15 years ago, she was a normal, healthy woman. Then she suffered a heart attack that caused severe brain damage. She has been somewhere between comatose and barely conscious ever since. Court-appointed doctors have said she is in a “persistent vegetative state“.

The other sad aspect of this case is how this case has become a lightening-rod dividing people all across the United States. In fact, this case has attracted such a odd assortment of characters and issues, that you need a scorecard to figure out who's who.

What this whole case smacks of is hypocracy. Don't worry, there's plenty to go around for all sides.

Maybe I'm cynical, but when all those Senators flew into Washington two weekends ago to pass a special bill to give her parents standing in federal court, and then the President was woken at 1am to sign it into law, it seemed to be a publicity stunt. It's been almost two weeks, and we have not heard one peep out of the vacationing President on the issue. I bet he wishes it would just go away - one way or another.

At the time he signed the bill, the President made a statement like, “All life is precious“, or something like that. But while Bush was governor of Texas, there were 131 executions in 5 years. Many of those cases had serious legal questions about guilt - including 40 cases where the defence lawyer presented no evidence. There seems to be something odd about passing laws in the middle of the night to save the life of someone who is almost comatose, and letting 131 people, some of which COULD be innocent, die without blinking.

You can't even blame traditional Democrat versus Republican bickering. Politicians of all parties are using this to push their agendas, whatever they may be. But when it got too hot, like it is now, they are nowhere to be found.

The parents seem to be stuck in some type of legal infinite loop. I feel sad for them, because what they are doing is fighting for their daughter's life, but they have appealed this case at least 10 times (6 times to the Supreme Court), and been rejected each time. They should probably just drop the legal appeals of this case, and focus on getting the public on their side. It's probably their only hope.

Jesse Jackson annoys me to no end. “Jesse, come on down to Florida and help us with this case.” “Will the media be there?” If I thought he was the least bit sincere, I wouldn't mind so much. But with Rev. Jackson, it's all about the publicity value. I do appreciate a comment he made a couple of weeks ago, before got involved with the case, about how he opposed the way congress sped through a law in 24 hours to save one life, while they blindly ignore the millions of other people starving in America. Of course, now he's fighting for the camera time, oops I mean fighting for Terri, alongside those same politicians.

Jeb Bush, the governor of Florida, is in a tough spot. He's sort of thrust himself out there, to lead the political fight in Florida. But now, everyone has sort of abandoned him - including his brother - so now he fights alone. Activists are calling on him to do something, and will no doubt blame him when Terri dies. So there's a kick in the pants for you - the one guy who I think really genuinely tried, and still tries, to help becomes the biggest goat in all this. Poor Jeb.

Lastly, there is an interesting contradiction here. Apparently, most states currently would allow what Florida allows - for a hospital to remove a feeding tube at the request of a legal guardian. But that causes the person to be starved to death - what a horrible way to die. Since most states clearly allow people to be starved to death in this way, shouldn't there be an option for a more compassionate way to die? This is the contradiction - every day people watch their loved ones travel a long and painful road to death (ie: the last weeks of cancer), with nothing but morphine to ease the pain. There should be some other compassionate options, if doctors, patient and family members all agree.

Also, it should be noted that Terri Schiavo, thankfully, feels no pain. According to an article on CNN.com, people in a persistant vegetative state are not conscious, and thus neither suffer nor feel pain. I really, really hope this is true.

I'm watching a program called Everest, on Outdoor Life Network, and one of the oddest things they show is that there is a team of climbers near the top of the mountain, waiting to do the “final push” towards the summit. They wake up, to discover their oxygen tanks have been stolen...

Excuse me? You are camping at the top of Mount Everest, and in the middle of the night there's a theft? I wonder how frequently that happens. Maybe a full oxygen tank is worth more than gold up there?

A guy who just found out he won the $27 million jackpot in a German lottery responded to the news by saying, “I don't have time to chat right now. I'm late for work.”

Although it comes off sounding odd, I can understand what he means. If I won a lottery, no matter how big, I would still go into work that day (and for the next little while) because I like the people I work with, and I would feel bad for them if my sudden departure causes them undue stress. 

No doubt, I would give my “two weeks notice“ that I intended to leave and would leave sooner than that if I could, but I wouldn't just “not show up” again. There's no excuse for doing that to people you consider friends.

When I first got into blogs and blogging 2 years ago, I used to read Robert Scoble religiously. He was interesting, sometimes funny, fairly informative, and casual. It definitely seemed like he was just a normal guy - who happened to work for Microsoft.

I especially liked some of the stories he used to tell. Like how he was on a plane the other day, and wouldn't you know it he was sitting next to the CEO of WhateverTech and they're really doing some cool stuff over there. Or how he stopped some guy in the airport because he was wearing a jacket with a Cisco logo on it. Perhaps I even admired his ability to just go anywhere and meet people, and come away with a name, an email address, and an interesting story...

Over the last year or so, something changed. I found myself spending less time reading what he was writing. I would immediately skip over topics that didn't interest me. The tone of his writing changed. I don't want to jump to conclusions over what exactly happened, but once he developed a “link blog“, I guess he had more space in his main radio blog to express his opinions on things.

Many of the things he expressed passionate opinions about, I just didn't care one way or another. He would simply lambaste a company repeatedly (like Google) for something completely inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. He became like my uncle, who writes letters to the government, outraged over the 30 minutes he had to wait to get his drivers license renewed every 5 years. Save your anger and indignation for something important, I say.

Several months ago, I just stopped reading. I still sometimes stumble upon his blog - once per month maybe - in my RSS reader. I can't bring myself to delete the subscription just yet. But almost.

Maybe the worst thing I am noticing is that many of his entries are about him. Like this example from today, with all of the self-congratulations. “Google did something good today. Hey I work for Microsoft? Why do I talk about the competition? Because we all win. Yay!” Ugh. Scoble, please, stop congratulating yourself for being different. It makes you look like the only reason you link to non-Microsoft blogs is so that someone will notice how you link to non-Microsoft blogs.

When he's not telling everyone what a great example he makes of corporate blogging, he's talking about how he fits in to important stories. He'll start talking about web standards, but then the real story he's telling becomes about how the commitee asked him for his help, and he was able to introduce them to someone on the IE team, and more people should come to him because he knows people. He actually questions the motives of standard commitees that don't come to him for help, because that proves they're not genuine...

“Call me. Here's my cell number. I am the only person who publishes their cell number on the Internet. This person linked to me. This person hates me, but I am linking to him anyways. I was intereviewed for the New York Times. I'm taking a 5-minute blogging holiday. I read 2,000 blogs a day.”

Don't get me wrong. I don't dislike him. I don't even know him. Maybe once I admired him, but now the annoyance factor has gotten really high. Scoble and I have grown apart. If he ever gets back to talking about interesting stuff that he reads, hears about, or even things happening in his personal life, AND can figure out how to tell these stories without it sounding “all about him“, I may come back.

I'm prepared to wait a long time though.

Here is a really helpful post on customizing process templates. The author links to a download on the Microsoft site called “Team System Extensibility Kit”. This kit contains XML schema, documentation and utilities to help in the customization of process methodology templates.

According to this article on CRN, Beta 2 of Team System will be released at the end of March or first week of April. This beta will come with two predefined process methodologies: MSF Agile and CMMI.

MSF for Agile Software Development (or MSF Agile for short) is a “scenario-driven, context-based, agile software development process”. It is, basically, the extreme programming (XP) model for software development, adapted to fit the Microsoft Solutions Framework. It is sometimes called a lightweight model, in that it is both flexible and adaptable. These types of programming models are great for small projects, or projects that have to be completed quickly.

MSF for CMMI Process Improvement (or MSF CMMI for short) is aimed at “mature application development“. It is a more formal model for development, requiring a more rigid processes be put into place. There are many CMMI models to choose from, and so a development team (typically a large project, with a longer development timeframe) can choose what is best for them.

Of course, you can still choose to implement NO software development model, or customize your own model. VSTS gives you many options in this regard.

Here's a fresh article indicating that the next team system beta (officially, Beta 2) is coming soon, and the product itself should be available “after the summer”.

Microsoft developer division corporate VP S Somasegar, said, "We shipped the beta last summer, we are going to ship another beta in the next month or so and we hope to be able to ship the product after summer sometime this year."

I guess the good news is that it sounds like progress is still being made in getting the product to a releasable state. The bad news, I guess, is that the final ship date is deliberately vague: “after summer”. Hmm, is that Fall? Or Winter?