RELIABLE 3G INTERNET IS BETTER THAN 4G

 

                                              4G                                            

In the last two decades, Mobile telephone service providers have invested loads of money and man-hours to woo and steal new customers and maintain old ones. More often than not, it’s a bloodbath. In fact we the consumers have been treated to cut-throat competitions through advertisements by these ferocious sharks on all media platforms. Some of which have been dirty and bordering on extreme to say the least. To their credit though, the results have been a substantial drop in call rate, message and data billings and improved Customer Care services.  Remember the days of slavery that had SAASA TARIFF of Safaricom as the cheapest tariff, being Ksh 20 per minute for PEAK hours and OFF PEAK at Ksh 8 per minute? Folks had to wait until 2 PM when OFF PEAK time would start to make calls

However I have my reservations with the over-hyped roll out of Fourth Generation (4G) network by telephony companies. The majority of millions of subscribers that providers boast of having cannot even access nor enjoy basic 2G  networks on their devices, forget the 3G. Actually what we call fast internet and strong networks for calls and text messages are ONLY a luxury of urban centers and their coverage is radii is at most 400 meters from network masts.

Yes, internet usage in towns is higher   compared to rural areas. But this service has now become a Basic Need for millions of people regardless of their geographical location.

Ideally speaking, mobile phones penetration should be commensurate with network coverage in the country by all service providers. However the former has outweighed the latter several folds.

With the advent of Mobile Money, telephony service providers, especially market leaders, have spent the biggest portion of their resources on promotion of its uptake and a merge one on other services like excellent network. It’s definitely owing to Super Profits raked from M-Money service and the yet to be explored potential it holds in the future. But who needs an Unreliable and fluctuating 4G network when 3G is a hell of frustration to access and enjoy currently by most.

The petty squabbles among industry players about who owns what share of the market. What financial obligations a company of such status ought to bear or who is gaming unfairly with subscribers cost-wise or otherwise, are NOT of any substantial benefit to subscribers. A unity of purpose by ALL players for provision of utmost best Network and Internet services that available technology can allow to EVERY subscriber, is the prudent and patriotic deed needed to charter this Digital mega road of infinite possibilities. And the guardians of Consumer Interests especially the government of Kenya which has be so lux in my opinion, must do more. Concrete and verified data of the standard of services available to citizens from every corner of the nation, must be provided first before allowing a roll out by a provider simply because they can bank roll it.

Obscession With Universities Just About Anywhere in Kenya

Some time before the 2017 general elections,there were popular calls Wananchi of Central Imenti constituency for the establishment of a public university in the sub-county. The proponents of that project argued the larger Imenti region,consisting of three constituencies, lacked such an institution to serve them. that their support for Jubilee administration was rock-solid and immeasurable and as such the area ought to be 'Rewarded'
  This 'Reward for votes' is a popular culture practiced countrywide since Kenya gained independence. In my opinion this practice is not only unfair but backward too for it is one of the major causes of marginalization in a many parts of the the republic. Every citizen deserves services by reigning government, regardless of Who or What party they supported the previous or future administrations. Unfair distribution of resources with voting patterns being the Primary factor has created a UNEQUAL Society. After all Kenya Revenue Authority does not discriminate in its mandate of tax collection. There isn't 'let's tax those who voted for Us'  No, every Kenyan  is directly or indirectly taxed across the county.
   But that besides my point. My contention is the logic behind having a public university in Imenti, to serve those residents,whereas the large Meru region (Thuuci to Ntonyiri) already has TWO chartered public universities. Chuka University and Meru University of Science and Technology in Meru and Thakara-Nithi counties respectively. The two institutions of higher learning, especially the latter are very under-utilized. Mind you there are tertiary institutions including Meru National Polytechnic, Kenya Methodist University (KeMU) and campuses of other universities situated in various towns in the region with a collective population of over 10,000 students.
  We cannot and should not erect buildings in underutilized public parcels of land in the name of a university or any other utility for the sole reason of spurring 'development' in that place. As a matter of principle and procedure lets evaluate the Necessity, Usability, Priority, Proximity to a similar institution, Capacity of growth and full maximum utilization, cost of establishment and running expenses and other factors.
  It's the craze and obsession of having degrees during Mwai Kibaki;s tenure that led to mushrooming of substandard institutions of higher learning all over the republic. Churning out half baked graduates who sew scalpels inside a patient's body!
 It would be prudent to equip and fund better the existing institutions rather than start new ones just to be even with other citizens.

How KTDA can Invest in Tea Pickers

Tea is among the top income earning agricultural products in Kenya, if not the highest. In Abothûgûchi West ward, Meru County, tea is only rivalled by dairy farming. The two run the engine of this agriculture dependent area.
  The buying price Kilogram of Green tea is between Sh 14 -16 . And since this crop requires a fairly large track of land to be economic viable, the Farmers employ Pickers locally known as Ntûngi. These labourers are paid daily wages of Sh 10 per Kg of green tea picked. Tea picking is skill horned through practice and the more you pick, the higher your earnings. During rainy seasons some can pick up even 80 Kg per day.

However this very crucial service is largely unappreciated and down upon in spite of it being the central anchor on which billions of money are earned monthly and annually. Thousands of poor residents do this tedious work from Monday to Saturday, years on end to put food on the table and other basic needs. But on a bigger perspective they have nothing to show for it. The beneficiaries of this cash crop are the Estate owner/Farmer, processing factories and KTDA honchos in air conditions comfy offices in Nairobi. Oh, and the unscrupulous tea cartels in the name of brokers at the auction in Mombasa.

These holloi pollois have negligible say in affairs of tea. Their business is picking and delivering of tea to collection centres, have it weighed, return a receipt indicating the number of Kgs picked and get paid. The factory doesn't care who picked tea,theirs is collecting and processing. Wages and other favours due to the Picker are dependent on mercy of the Farmers. After all there isn't a labour union for tea estates workers.
  It's my opinion that Ntûngi ought be recognized by the tea industry players and gain more benefits for their services. First, factories should take up the Payment of wages role. And make deductions from the farmer's monthly earnings. The wages per Kg be standardized. This will solve the petty contention by factories that they cannot raise prices per Kg because Pickers will demand more and Farmers cannot afford.
Second,for the above suggestion to function better all tea Pickers should be registered and have a Unique identifier call it a 'Picker Number'. Subsequently a digital card bearing important data be insured to the pickers. Every time tea is delivered, the clerk feeds in the
(i) Number of Kgs
(ii) Farmer's registration number
(iii) Collection center number
The factory will have an automated system that makes due wages payment to the Card Holder's Mobile Money Account instantly. Also printed Receipts for they Picker and Farmer be issued at the completion of sale for record keeping. At the end of the month and bonus time a complete statement of account be served to the two parties.
Thirdly, a majority of Pickers do not have a Health Insurance. Three to five Kgs can be deducted from the Pickers daily sum of tea delivered, to cater for NHIF. At Ksh 10 per Kg for 26 picking days in a month, that's 260. Since minimum NHIF cover cost is 500 per month ,the remainder be a Compulsory contribution by both Farmer and KTDA via the Factory. The remaining Kgs should be banked as savings of the Picker which can be accessed after a given period of time. It's from these savings that the Picker can acquire Financial Credit if he/she so wishes.
  Fourthly, during tea bonuses period Pickers depend on generosity of Farmers to give them 'something small' as a token of appreciation. To truly cater for for Picker's welfare, the amount of deducted Kgs as savings throughout the year can be added and multiplied by Books Rate and issued to them as their Bonuses.
   This is a worth endeavor that will greatly improve the welfare of Tea Pickers, boost their morale and give them their long overdue Appreciation and Recognition. It's also another new net for NHIF and banks.

Sound Phenomena: Doppler's Effect on Motorcycles and further queries

                                                 

                                                Sound waves inter looping
                                

Motorcycles or boda boda as they are fondly referred to as in Kenya are the most convenient means of transport over short distances both in towns and to and from market centers in upcountry.  Most of them have customized music systems to attract passengers especially youth. They are thereby blaring loud music as they ride along.

While walking or being near a busy road, I have observed a Peculiar behavior of sound of music from boda bodas. I can distinctly hear and know which song is playing and as well follow the lyrics word for word, from a motorcycle that is approaching from say 100 m or 50 m ahead depending on how load it is. However when the boda boda rides past me, the rhythm and words of that song Become Distorted for a few seconds before resuming normalcy. This phenomenon also occurs if the boda boda is approaching from behind and reaches a similar distance ahead of me.

Doppler’s Effect explains this occurrence by stating that it’s the Wavelength of the sound which Increases because “in a given time the sound at the end of a vibration has to travel an extra distance due to relative movement of the boda boda”. However this theory fails to state specifically at what point the sound distorts or thins out. 

I haven’t done any experiment on the phenomena but I opine that the point at which wavelength Increases and Decreases in split seconds is key to this occurrence. But I opine that at this Point, P, the sound waves either flattens or inter loops each other and hence distorts the sound of the music.

Furthermore I have thought of other questions regarding this phenomenon:

      i) If there is number of people walking one ahead of the other in a straight line at measured intervals at which distortion happens and a boda boda (source of sound) is approaching in front or behind them, would they all hear the song in its distorted form?

    ii) Also how would the song sound if one was running towards a stationary source of sound?

    iii)   And what if two boda bodas are approaching from Opposite direction playing the Same song at the Same time and reach the distances of distortion (say 5 m on either direction) Dd1 and Dd2 at Once. Would there be distortion or would the wavelengths Cancel Out and therefore the song sound Normal as if from a single source without distortion?

Freedom; Lessons from Domestication of Chicken

                                      

                                              (Image courtesy)

My people, the Ameru, tell a story of the Chicken and the Partridge. The two were great friends and lived together in the forest fending for themselves and their young.  One day it was very cold, they were in desperate need for warmth but had no skills of making fire. Fortunately they knew of man who lived in the village, the chicken was sent to borrow the fire. When the Chicken reached the village, she met a woman who was preparing fermented porridge using grinding stones.  Before asking for the fire, the chicken started feeding on the droppings, known as makie, around the grinding stone.

After some eating, the chicken walked out, stood at raised ground and shouted to her friend, “Nkware gutirii mwankiῙ ῙῙ”, (Partridge there isn’t any fire here”), and went back in to eat some more. The Chicken never returned to the forest.

Ms Chicken realized the readiness of food is more important than fire for warmth that day.  In the forest there was Freedom to whenever and at whatever time but there was No guarantee of food, it was a hustle. Also one’s security was bear, predictors were many. Food was more important to the chicken than all the freedom; she therefore made a sacrifice Food over Freedom. She probably did not know man was also a predictor but what if he was? He was just one, better than the mongoose and tens of others carnivores in the forest.

But man turned out to be more vicious predictors of the chicken than all other monsters in the forest combined, he consumed most of the eggs and gave just a few for hatching. Therefore Ms Chicken had to produce more eggs to ensure survival of its species compared to forest life. What more the food wasn’t Free after all. Ms Chicken was being fattened up for slaughter. It can be argued that man saved chicken from Extinction if she had picked the fire and went back living in the forest like other animals. Yes, the population of this species is bigger than that of man himself.  However I opine that the chicken could probably have developed a Survival tactic in her natural habitat and increased its number substantially without the aid of man. Would the chicken be Content if they weren’t as many but FREE?

What is Freedom?  It’s exemption from restraints. The fundamental tenet of a democracy is Freedom. Freedom from what and to do what? In a colony, man cannot move, associate or pretty much do anything without consent of his master. Same case as being a child, or living under a dictator. But then one day all these rights are granted and you celebrate, Freedom at last! It’s all an ILLUSION, man is Never free; he has never been and Never will be.

Independent states may not serve a Master per say but new masters emerge that are more ruthless. The new masters, kill, maim, loot money and land, divide us, detain, say unsavory words, live large as we wallow in destitution. Man puts up with all this crap in the name of building a nation and securing a future for his offspring. We realize the new master is like the old one, now on steroids. There is No Freedom. You cannot move about at certain times of day or night, you risk arrest. You cannot associate at certain places or with people. There is a law prohibiting every goddamn thing a Free man wishes. A teenager who yearns for Freedom from overbearing parents soon realizes how Responsibilities chokes much of the air out of Freedom.  

Hell! Even believe in a super natural being did not offer Freedom  from the vagaries of life, fear of unknown , pain and agony as man had envisaged  and Death won’t either.

Brain's Multitasking in Different Locations

                                                       

                                                                 Courtesy www.fwbusiness.com

It is often assumed that man’s (humanity) biggest shortfall is the failure to create life using science.  However this is a far-short, it will be achieved someday in the future when requisite technology is available. In my opinion the possibility of our brain performing multiple tasks at the same time, i mean multitasking in the sense of time.

An average human being wishes to perform at least five or so tasks and complete them ALL at once at a given time. For instance I would want to be studying for a degree, master or PhD program and working too. That is instead of breaking for studies or doing part-time studies; you are simultaneously studying and working full time.

Also imagine a situation where one could be able to say:

        -Go out with friends

      - Be at home alone, with a loved one

       - At a date

     - Do some reading

     - Watch a favourite program or movie

    - Striking a business deal

Or attending a weekly job’s meeting on a Monday morning while taking your kids to school.

ALL at the same time. Simultaneously.

I am talking about activities that demand our mental presence and NOT physical presence. As such this function will involving ‘sending’ one’s brain or part of it to PERFORM  a number of Tasks at DIFFERENT locations simultaneously.  The brain will thereof recollect as one. Meaning the brain functions as the central command and database of data acquired from different locations and tasks.

But then, if we were to acquire such ability would we still maintain our unique identity as an individual as we are now? Or would our brains’ acquisition of different data/information simultaneously transform us into different individuals?

FIVE QUESTIONS ON THE DONALD E. CARR ETERNAL RETURN

In Chapter 5 of the book THE ETERNAL RETURN, titled Déjà vu and the Mysterious Flashes, the late American author Donald E Carr in trying to explain the concept of Individual Memory in the eternal return, he poses the following scenario to his imagined recalcitrant and stubborn antagonist Marvin

    DEC: Your real objection, I take it, is the common one, not to say vulgar one, of the whole-hog    

    materialistic. You insist that memory must pounding or making holes in a piece of funny putty. Let’s take a look in space-time at a hypothetical experiment by some neurologists the future. This a very important experiment and takes a very long time and exacts an enormous amount of skill. We shall call it the “Experiment of the Cut-Down Brain”

 Now, what the experimenters do is to carefully and gradually cut a human being into pieces. However, the subject does not know he is being cut into pieces because the surgical neurologists, as they remove arms, legs, finally the whole torso, leaving only the head, cleverly substitute an artificial sensory and sympathetic nervous system (which may be a big black box full of wires) so that the brain still imagines it is still receiving sensations from the trunk, the stomach, the arms and legs and even thinks that it is moving its hands, that it is digesting and evacuating, etc. on the next step, gradually, oh very gradually, perhaps over a period of centuries, the eyes are cut out, along with the nose, the mouth, the ears, but immensely ingenious artificial substitutes are implanted, so that the subject imagines, he sees, tastes, smells, hears, talks, experiences, closes his eyes to sleep, dreams, scratches his head, etc. the cutting process continues now into the brain. Yet because of substitution by artificial neurons, synapses, glia cells etc., which need not be in the subject’s brain at all but can be in the black box, the subject still maintains some degree of consciousness. As we cut down perhaps the last cubic inch of original brain, there is still consciousness. Finally, still making the immensely complicated substitutes, which now perhaps require several millions of years to assemble properly, the last cubic inch is removed and thrown away, and its artificial simulacrum is connected in to the black box…. Now what would you say we have done?

      Marvin: You’ve killed the poor bastard.

However Donald explains that the poor bastard has not been killed rather he has been reproduced as a different event sequence in the space-time continuum.

     DEC: As consciousness has faded from the original brain it crept into the artificial devices. The black box is now a conscious entity. It possess not only memories of the original brain, but as the great experiment has proceeded over the millennia, the black box has acquired its own private memories. There has been no total loss of consciousness. The amount of consciousness lost by the original brain has been recovered by the artificial system. Like energy, consciousness has shown itself to be indestructible…

I follow and understand the train of thought that Donald Carr and even imagine the whole experiment of Cut-Down Brain sequence. It is a fascinating and the book itself is very enlightening. I would have loved to meet Carr in person, but unfortunately he passed on in 1986 some years before I was born. Since I read this 1968 publication by him, I have been bothered by the thoughts of a REVERSE EXPERIMENT. What would happen if the whole body cut down to the last cubic inch of brain were to be reconstructed? The process is assumed to take the time, cautiousness and perhaps more advanced technology. Then,

     1. Would the brain still have consciousness?

    2. Is it possible for the brain to remember the Cut-Down experiment carried on it and the body?

    3. Can the brain detect there was a time break or gap between then and now?

    4. Is it possible to maintain the thoughts or say consciousness of the original brain and Black Box   

          as separate entities?

     5.  And if the two entities were let to live alongside each other subjected to the same life events all

          the time, would we be able to tell who is who, I mean would they be different individuals or an 

          individual in two forms? Would their thoughts be the same always?

I will be glad to get answers to these disturbing questions. I invite anyone out there with thoughts on them to contact me via email kithinjikinotikk@gmail.com or use any other platform to settle them.