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If you are like me and check forums and websites related to your favorite MMO then you've probably stumbled across more then your fair share of machinima videos. A few years ago these videos mostly consisted of people putting together clips of their greatest in-game kills while playing Linkin Park in the background. This has been slowly changing as series like Red vs. Blue showed that game engines could also be used to tell a decent story.
With the release of World of Warcraft many machinima enthusiasts made use of the extensive emote system to produce better quality videos. Instead of threatening lawsuits Blizzard embraced the use of their game engine and created several contests for machinima videos. This practice caught on quickly and now several different gaming companies sponsor machinima contents each year. All of this attention has been great for the budding art form and numerous new studios and individuals have gained Internet fame.
Studios tend to have many people to work on a machinima video and they split the work between puppeteering, voice acting, and special effects. Individuals tend to work on a funny and zany script while leaving most of the production work to a simple fraps capture. Both styles of making machinima have merit though studios tend to make videos nicer on the eyes and ears. Still, individual work often seems to capture a classic Space Ghost/Adult Swim feel to it that can make it beloved by many fans.
Now I'm going to stray from general comments and go into a specific example here of where the two styles can clash. Specifically I'm talking about a machinima video called Time Gnomes 2 where the director made fun of the studio Myndflame for spending an absurd amount of time on production for their Escape from Ogrimmar video. Perhaps one of the most popular WoW machinima series out there Illegal Danish: Escape from Ogrimmar has been in limbo for over a year. The studio founders have often been criticized for releasing very short but highly polished videos while fans wait for the release of a video originally promised more then a year ago.
Recently at Blizzcon sever members of Oblivious films, who release under Myndflame, criticized that the fast release of machinima like Time Gnomes without polish was in poor taste. Some people agree with this sentiment while others continue to stress that special effects and polish take a back seat to a original script and a fast release. One has to wonder though since over the last year the rough style of WoW machinima does seem to be getting rarer as more people join studios/groups.
So I'm ending this post with a question of what sort of WoW machinima do you favor?
Videos without much polish like Big Blue Dress and Jimmy a World of Warcraft Story
Semi-professional Studio work like The Grind and Snacky's Journal.
P.S. All films can be found on Google Video or Youtube.com
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
What matters more in WoW machinima? Production or Script
If you are like me and check forums and websites related to your favorite MMO then you've probably stumbled across more then your fair share of machinima videos. A few years ago these videos mostly consisted of people putting together clips of their greatest in-game kills while playing Linkin Park in the background. This has been slowly changing as series like Red vs. Blue showed that game engines could also be used to tell a decent story.
Posted by Relmstein at 2:34 PM 4 comments
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Will Wrath of the Lich King hit the gear reset button again?
I've been hearing a lot of speculation about the future WoW expansion especially with the tidbits released by the developers over the last couple of gaming conventions. Most of the player discussion has revolved around the new hero class, the death knight, though some discussions on dungeon design have been making appearances as well. Still the one issue I haven't really heard brought up is how much more powerful the gear in Northend will be compared to that found in the Outlands.
In the Burning Crusade we saw a huge increased in the power of items. Randomly dropped greens from the first first zone were often on par with old world raiding gear. Quest rewards earned at 61 would replace epics that had required countless hours of raiding or grinding battlegrounds to attain. Blizzard developers had announced this jump in power in advance but it still came as a shock to many. Truthfully though the disparity between raiding and non-raiding gear had become so pronounced that it was impossible for non raiders to participate competitively in player vs. player combat. With the introduction of the arenas and more world PvP objectives it became imperative for Blizzard to balance the playing field. However, many players saw this as a blow to the amount of time they had invested in their characters.
Fast forward six months and most players now feel safe that the great gear reset of 2006 will never be repeated. After all casual players can now keep up with raiders by earning decent epics through arenas, heroic dungeons, and battlegrounds. So chances are high that the expansion will only have progressively better gear instead of the huge jump we saw with the release of the Burning Crusade. Yet this is based on the assumption that raiding and arena gear stays balanced as higher end zones are introduced.
What troubles this assumption is that some Blizzard developers are pushing for changes to the arena system to extend the time it takes to earn rewards. The original design for arenas called for a low time investment but a high degree of skill to earn rewards. However, with the introduction of daily quests developers forgot that the cost of forming a new arena team isn't really that high. Now what we have are a lot of players who simply reset their rating by forming a new team whenever it drops too low.
This is incredibly ironic because the majority of players who do this are mid range raiders who simply desire the arena weapons. Hopefully, the developers don't overdo the nerf to the arena system or we could see the same disparity in gear quality we saw back before the Burning Crusade. If a situation like this arose in the months before the WoW expansion then we could see another gear reset especially with Warhammer putting pressure on Blizzard to maintain the PvP side of the game. After all any real or perceived favoritism of raiding is going to make it hard for Blizzard to hold onto players against a shiny new MMO with the same style of artwork.
Posted by Relmstein at 5:10 PM 6 comments
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Top Ten Dangers of a 48 hour Server Maintenance
10) Your significant other mistakenly believes you have finally quit and un-installs WoW from your computer.
9) You log into the forums and pass out from exposure to high doses of stupidity.
8) You call your friends on the phone only to discover that their servers are still up and running. You spend the entire next day answering questions for the police.
7) You emerge from your room only to find out that you have been declared legally dead and your younger siblings now own all of your stuff. You are really pissed about it for about 2 days.
6) You attempt to organize a raid in real life but are thwarted by the federal government. Oh well its not like Canada would have had any good loot.
5) In the off time you make the tragic discovery that you now suck at arm wrestling because of muscle atrophy. You spend the next two days hiding from your sister who just won't let it die.
4) You get drunk and make a naked, level-1 gnome named "Shortnsexe" on one of the few realms that is up and running. You wake up the next morning with 400 gp, a severe hangover, and a dirty feeling that even the shower won't clean away.
3) You go outside and are mistakenly attacked by a Vampire Hunter since you now have no pigment in your skin. Fortunately, for you the Van Helsing wannabe notices your "Rogues do it from Behind" t-shirt and figures you for a WoW player.
2) World of Warcraft terms start to sneak into your normal everyday conversations at work during the 48 hours. Luckily the boss laughs his ass off when you accidentally suggest "It melts faces" as a new product slogan.
1) Bored to tears, you log into your blog and post a top ten list.
Posted by Relmstein at 2:07 PM 5 comments
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Would SOE misuse Micro-Transactions?
While Blizzard was holding its ritual display of product teases and developer roasts called Blizzcon another major MMO publisher was doing the same. I speak of course of SOE's Fan Faire which has been an annual tradition since the early Everquest days. But while Blizzard focused on actual products, SOE introduced yet another method to show how devoted they are to getting your money. Their new plan involves a virtual card game where players can buy booster packs online and compete in a game which sounds a lot like Magic the Gathering.
For those of you who never experienced the money sink that was Magic the Gathering, I'll go ahead and explain the basic premise. Basically players could buy a 15 card package that was guaranteed to have a ratio around 1 rare, 3 uncommon, and 11 uncommon cards. Rare cards were needed if a player wished to have a competitive deck since they tended to be overly convoluted and powerful with effects that often modified the basic rules of the game. If you've every flipped to FOX in the afternoon think of the last card that spikey haired brat, Yugioh, always pulls out at the last second.
Unfortunately for most players half the rare cards in these types of games tend to be useless or only useful in a very specific and unlikely scenario. Thus players are forced to buy more packs or try to trade with other players until they can get the collection of rares they need. Companies have perfected this formula into a science over the years as Magic, Pokemon, Yugioh, and others have robbed players of their cash in 3$ intervals. What makes SOE's online card game one step worse is that players won't even be able to trade cards with each other only buy them in virtual packs from SOE.
The truth of the matter is that if you look closely enough at collectible card games you see the father of the micro-transaction. Anyone can start playing a collectible card game at almost no cost but to actually compete you need to spend a lot of money in small transactions to raise your chances at winning. This is the exact type of payment plan that some MMO publishers would love to push on us if they could get away with it. I see this virtual collectible card game being hosted inside a MMO as SOE testing the waters for a micro-transaction market.
Now I can see some areas where micro-transactions might be a useful payment method. Twitch based MMO's like Auto Assault and probably Tabula Rasa would definitely benefit more from a hourly subscription rate then a standard monthly fee. Other games like Second Life seem to make a decent living by selling virtual land (piece of the golden gate bridge anyone?) and cosmetic changes to their avatars (genitalia anyone?) by using micro-transactions. It works well for games that are based on players only spending a small amount of time in the game each week.
However, the incorporation of micro-transactions into a long term MMO where most players put at least 12 hours a week into the game is only going to result in people having to pay more money to get the same amount of entertainment they get now. They are a million ways a smart and greedy publisher could incorporate micro-transactions into a game without seeming to give an advantage to the rich. Imagine having to pay a quarter every time you killed a boss who dropped loot. You're of course guaranteed one rare item but who knows if its a pair of leather pants of the Bandit or Spirit. One's useless but the other would start a fight to the death between the rogue and feral druid. Sounds a lot like opening a booster pack doesn't it?
Posted by Relmstein at 1:47 PM 0 comments
Monday, August 06, 2007
Changes Down the Road for WoW PvP
I've been reading several articles and posts coming from people who attended the different Blizzcon panels. Most of the the discussions seem like they were insightful and provided a multitude of facts on how Blizzard approached class design, dungeons, lore, and future content. My eyes caught several nice tidbits about upcoming changes for the different PvP systems in the game. With such a wealth of information out there I thought I would draw attention to these tidbits since some of them will probably be introduced much sooner then the expansion.
Just like any other list of changes in a MMO there are some negative and some positive.
The Good
1) First Tier of Arena gear will be available through the honor system in Arena Season 3
2) An Alterac Valley Anti-AFK buff. Will use a method similar to the spam report option. Once enough players have reported a person as AFK, a short debuff appears on that person. If that person doesn't move during that time (perhaps a minute) then they gain a very long debuff which prevents honor gain.
3) Looking at making battlegrounds playable at 15v15 or 20v20 brackets.
4) Honor Distribution changes: Battleground objectives will start rewarding more honor towards the end of a battleground. Developers hope this will encourage players to finish battlegrounds.
5) The option to join Alterac Valley as a group will be put back into the game.
6) Developers are looking at putting in a guild versus guild battleground option and perhaps some system to track each guild's wins/losses.
7) Siege Engines are coming to the new Outdoor PvP zone in the next expansion. Developers are also looking at reworking old battlegrounds so siege engines can play a role.
8) Some Arena Class Balancing. Rogue's viability and mobility in Arenas are being examined by the developers. Expect something to help them deal with range dps. Prot Warriors and Ret Paladins told that Arenas are still not for them. Mana regeneration (Spirit) will eventually be improved which should help the offensive casters who aren't Warlocks.
The Bad
1) Developers think Arena loot is easier to get then Raiding loot and that is bad. Instead of increasing the amount of drops per raid boss they are going to be looking at the rate at which arena points are gained. In the future look for an increase in the cost of Arena gear or a reduction in the amount of points earned per week.
2) The developers feel that too many raiders are simply saving up points just for the Arena weapons and this is also bad. I guess they feel that they are not actively participating in Arenas if they are just getting their 10 games a week for one item. Whatever the reason expect a minimum rating requirement for purchasing Arena Weapons in the near future.
Thanks again to WoWInsider whose Live Blogging provide a majority of the information here.
Posted by Relmstein at 2:31 PM 4 comments
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Guesses About the next WoW Expansion
The excitement players experience when a MMO expansion is announced can sometimes start a chain reaction of speculation which can easily get out of control. With World of Warcraft the announcement for the next expansion hasn't even been made yet and already every MMO site is guessing on what title, races, and classes will be in the game. Rumours are flying around the Internet at light speed and some have already traveled so far they've become facts. The amazing thing is that this feeding frenzy of gossip and bad investigation was sparked by just the vague assumption that an expansion will be revealed at Blizzcon this year.
True this assumption makes so much sense that its 99% likely that Blizzard will unveil the next chapter in Warcraft this weekend. But some of the other rumours making their rounds through the Internet are considerably less certain. Still its fun to gossip and add your own opinions to the melting pot of the rumour mill. Since I'm not one to control my impulse to have fun I guess I'll join in. I've divided the most common guesses about the expansion into the three categories and given reasons why I think they are likely to be implemented or not.
1) Likely to be Included in the Expansion
- At least one new class
Probably the most desired feature by players. The sales numbers for the expansion would suffer horribly if no new classes were included.
- Level cap raised to 80
I'm afraid raising the level cap by 10 each expansion is now part of the formula. Blizzard has stated before that they have a formula for increasing the power of gear for several hundred levels.
- Takes place in Northend
Hints about the Northend continent have been appearing for the last 8 months.
- Death Knight as a new class
This class has a relation to Arthas and the Scourge plus it might provide an outlet to the scorned retribution paladins out there.
- 3 month extension on the announced release date
Its Blizzard.
2) Might be Included in the Expansion
- New races
A new race would require a new starting zone. This was done in the last expansion but home cities take up a decent amount of development time so Blizzard might not want to repeat the same process.
- Multiple new classes
Blizzard might try to achieve class balance by introducing multiple classes to counter balance one another. God knows they have enough class ideas to pull upon.
- Necromancer as a new class
Fits with the Northend and Arthas theme but might play too much like a warlock. Then again most players would simply appreciate the newness factor.
- New content for the mid-levels
Very desired by players and necessary for once again leveling up new characters without going crazy in Stranglethorn Vale.
3) Playable Murlocs more likely to be Included then
- Blizzard stops making raid zones only 2 guilds per server can do
Jeff Kaplan still works there, right? Unfair to Jeff but the upper raid zones are a waste of development hours when only 2 out of 100 of your players can ever see it.
- The Expansion releasing this year
The time tables would probably make the expansion available February 2008 at the earliest. Plus Blizzard might want to time the expansion to compete with the Warhammer release.
- Hero classes making an appearance
The balance necessary for allowing a class to transform into another would probably be overpowering and give an advantage to long term players. Eventually I suspects Hero classes from Warcraft 3 might come into the game as entirely new classes.
- 40 man raids making a come back
Blizzard can be stubborn and the breaking of almost every major guild on the shores of Karazhan is still recent. Since development of this expansion probably started before the release of TBC, I'm guess that Blizzard hasn't made a decision to bring back the larger raid size yet.
Posted by Relmstein at 10:15 AM 4 comments


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Yesterday, before a crowd of 120 people at the River Oaks Country Club yesterday, the Prison Entrepreneurship Program hosted our first "free-world" Business Plan Competition.
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Securities Fraud Cases: Ponzi Scam Operator Sentenced to Prison, Fund Manager Pleads Guilty, Ex-Options Trading Instructor Allegedly Misappropriated Investor Funds, & $1.7M Financial Scam Leads to 10-Years Behind Bars
SEC Charges Man Accused of Running $10M Ponzi Scam
Mark Anderson Jones, whom the US Securities and Exchange Commission has charged with fraud, has been sentenced to 70 months in prison in a parallel criminal case. Jones pleaded guilty to running a $10M Ponzi scam.
According to the SEC, Jones solicited investors in a number of US states, as well as in Washington DC. He did this by issuing promissory notes, as well as providing personal guarantees to clients that were willing to invest in The Bridge Fund, which supposedly lent money to Jamaican businesses that were waiting to get commercial bank loans.
However, rather than investing their money the way he said he would, Jones used a portion of investors' cash to pay his own expenses as well as make Ponzi payments.
Investment Fund Manager Admits to Fraud Conspiracy
Nicholas Mitsakos has pleaded guilty to conspiring to bilk investors. Mitsakos, who ran Matrix Capital Markets, touted a fake investing track record to customers.
According to prosecutors, Mitsakos told prospective investors that he supervised over $60M of asset when, in reality, he didn't oversee any client assets at all until a Cayman Islands fund gave him about $2M to invest. He claimed yearly returns were at 20-66% percent between '12 and '15.
Prosecutors said that Mitsakos spent about $800K of investors' money on his own expenses. He lost a substantial chunk of the $1.2M of their money that he did invest.
Ex-Trading Teacher Accused of Bilking Private Fund Investors
The SEC has filed securities fraud charges against Gustavo A. Guzman, an ex-options trading instructor. The Commission is accusing him of misappropriating investor monies and making material misrepresentations.
According the regulator's complaint, between at least 4/2010 and at least 8/2015, the ex-trading instructor raised over $2.1M from investors for a supposed equity options fund and a real estate fund. He then misappropriated about a third of thee money in these funds to pay himself as well as cover his own spending. He also used the money to make Ponzi payments.
Meantime, investors received fake tax documents and account statements. The paperwork inflated returns to hide that Guzman had lost the rest of investors' money through options trading that did not fare well.
Man Accused of Affinity Fraud Gets 10 Years
Michael Dale Bennis, who pleaded guilty in a $1.7M affinity fraud, is sentenced to 10 years behind bars. Bennis bilked friends and their relatives. Several of them gave him their life savings to invest.
He started day trading after another business of his failed during the financial crisis. Bennis began committing financial fraud in 2012 when he set up PRISM Alliance, an investment group.
Bennis sent false emails to investors talking about the trades that he was making, as well as spreadsheets that made it appear as if they were making high returns on the millions of dollars. He even set up a fraudulent investment fraud agreement and generated false tax documents.
Aside from serving time in prison, Bennis must pay his victims restitution, as well as $200K to the IRS for unpaid taxes.
At Shepherd Smith Edwards and Kantas, LTD LLP, our securities fraud lawyers are committed to helping our clients try to recover their losses. Contact our securities firm today.
Ponzi Scheme Operator Sentenced to Prison in Parallel Criminal Case, SEC, May 25, 2017
The SEC Complaint in the Jones Case (PDF)
Purported Hedge Fund Manager Pleads Guilty To Fraud Conspiracy Charges, FIN Alternatives, May 6, 2017
The SEC Complaint in the Guzman Case (PDF)
York man gets 10 years in $1.7 million financial fraud case, Daily Press,May 24, 2017


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Turning water into wine / To water grapevines or not -- the roots of the wine industry's next great controversy
For years, I took the New World's thirst for vineyard irrigation for granted. I believed what I was told: Napa Valley was a desert and needed its 100 to 200 gallons of water per vine per season.
I never realized how complex an issue water was until I visited northern Oregon's Willamette Valley, where I noticed black irrigation pipes snaking through the vineyards. The region gets 40 inches of rain annually, double the oft-quoted number necessary to grow wine grapes without delivering any extra water to the vineyard. I accepted the need for water in California and even more so in desert-like eastern Washington. But the Willamette Valley?
In the best vineyards of Europe, the practice of dry farming -- relying solely on natural precipitation to water grapevines -- is almost universally accepted. Yet in the New World, irrigation is now viewed as essential to the wine industry's survival. And what began as a novel innovation -- drip irrigation -- has become standard practice, such that throwing dry farming into a viticulture conversation is like pitching a lit match into a brittle summer forest. Who knew that something as simple as watering plants could be so, well, hot?
Here's one reason why: California is anticipating drought conditions this year. Most vintners who dry-farm aren't worried; they've seen it before and have gotten through just fine. But some, like Kunde's Steve Thomas, acknowledge that the future of viticulture will have to be sensitive to water shortages. With global warming, drought-tolerant practices are likely to become a way of life.
"We're going to have to start to think of it. It's got to be coming down the road," Thomas says.
Whether adding water or withholding it, water management is a crucial aspect of wine-grape growing, and drip irrigation can be found in about 70 percent of the state's 471,000 acres of wine grapes.
Originally, the preferred watering method was flood irrigation, in which parcels of vineyard were deluged with water. According to Peter H. Gleick, president of the Pacific Institute in Oakland, which studies global water issues, flooding was quite wasteful, using 20 percent more water than the current technology. It was replaced by drip irrigation, a method that applies water in drops to each individual vine, which was devised more than a century ago but refined by Israeli researchers after World War II. Drip irrigation arrived in California in the 1970s.
And it was firmly in place when the devastating vine louse phylloxera hit the state in the late 1980s. Large swaths of California vineyards were replanted. One key decision during replanting was to ditch the drought-resistant rootstock most of the state was planted on -- phylloxera-resistant St. George as well as the popular hybrid AxR1, which had been thought to fend off phylloxera but turned out to be vulnerable.
They were replaced with riparian rootstock -- water-loving stuff. Roots that previously had to dig deep now hung out close to the ground -- and that's where University of California Davis viticulture and enology professor Larry E. Williams likes them.
"If you're a grape grower, you want to have that vine dependent on what you do so you can manipulate them," says Williams, whose academic work focuses on irrigation management. Williams further explained: "Since the vine is getting most of its water from the drip system, then a grape grower has greater control on how much the vine gets water."
The other objective for replanting was to mirror the density in Bordeaux and Burgundy, up to 2,500 vines per acre instead of the previous status quo of 450. Vines competed for the soil's water and prompted the need for 100 to 200 gallons of water per vine per season -- each vine typically produces two to four bottles of quality wine per year. Though water consumption in California rose as a result, replanting helped revive the state's fine wine industry, and the practices became standard.
But not all vintners are convinced. In Oregon, the Deep Roots Coalition views irrigation as an unnecessary, terroir-occluding manipulation.
"When Oregon's wine pioneers ... planted the first vinifera wine grapes in the north Willamette Valley, they understood that with the abundant rainfall and careful attention to timely cultivation of the soil, irrigation was just not necessary for the vines to thrive," says Doug Tunnell of Brick House Vineyards. "Today, 40 years on, those same first vineyards have yet to see a single drop of water from a drip hose."
Less water, more terroir
Pinning their belief on old-world wisdom about grape growing, the Deep Roots Coalition's seven Willamette-based wineries believe dry farming is the way to deliver a specific sense of place to a wine and one that reflects the vintage -- not the viticultural decisions of the winemakers.They believe that vines get addicted to water, that watering makes vines physiologically lose track of when it is time to shut down and prepare for harvest, all leading to less complex fruit.
One of the primary reasons they believe so fervently in dry farming lies in the nature of grapevines and their miraculous roots, which can Roto-Rooter through just about anything -- including granite and dense clay.
Loire Valley vintner Nicolas Joly, a guru of the biodynamic movement, claims vines can wriggle down 60 feet into the ground. British wine writer (and Chronicle contributor) Jancis Robinson writes in the "Oxford Companion to Wine" that it's more likely 20 feet, and usually that's in more arid areas like Portugal's Douro Valley, where vines must seek precious water to nourish their grapes and stay alive.
Besides water, vines also suck up a diversity of minerals in the soil that leave a minerally stamp on the fruit. In the right deep soils, and if there are 18 to 20 inches of rain in the winter, conventional wisdom dictates that irrigation is not necessary.
Europeans seeking fine wine associate irrigation with overcropping -- when vineyards have large yields of under-ripe grapes -- and generic table wine, which prompted regional laws that outlawed the practice in places like Burgundy and Bordeaux. Though the beastly hot summer of 2003 resulted in some bending of the irrigation rules and further changes were announced recently by French officials, the practice is still frowned upon as a violation of terroir among the Old World's greatest wineries. But things are never that simple.
UC Davis professor Williams acknowledged a few examples of California vineyards that can dry-farm, many even in relatively arid Paso Robles and others in Sonoma's Dry Creek Valley. But he talks about those remaining old vines -- beautiful head-pruned gnarly vines, such as those found in Kunde Estate's Century vineyard -- as oddities.
Growers' insurance
Steve Thomas is the vineyard manager of the 600-acre Kunde Estate in Kenwood, out of which 100 acres are dry-farmed. Thomas said that even if he was able to convert to dry farming he would keep the pipes -- installed to the tune of $1,600 an acre -- as insurance to deal with the variability of weather and for applying vineyard treatments such as nutrients, fertilizers and pesticides.
Like many others, he underscored that if California returned to dry farming, vintners would have to rip out rootstock, replace with drought-resistant types and replant vines farther apart.
Which is exactly what Tablas Creek Vineyard in Paso Robles did when it put in new plantings. Most of the property gets two deep waterings a season with drip pipes. General manager Jason Haas says his family planted that new plot in 2006 and 2007 -- totally dry farmed -- because they had no water access on the vineyard.
They planted on 1103-P, a rootstock known for its excellent drought resistance. Haas planted less densely, based on 600 vines per acre, more similar to traditional dry farming in Paso than in Chateauneuf du Pape, where the Perrin family -- a partner in Tablas Creek -- also farms vineyards.
Irrigation is part of the ongoing debate between traditional and modern winemaking, Haas mused. "But it really depends on whether you are trying to make a product that is consistent or a product that represents that place and year in as compelling a way as possible," Haas says. "It's like Fresno State (viticulture and enology) profs rolling their eyes at the use of native yeasts (and saying), 'Well yes, if they want to take that risk.' "
In Napa, soft-spoken winemaker Boris Champy takes such risks -- with both native yeasts and dry farming -- at Dominus, owned by Christian Moueix of Bordeaux's legendary Chateau Petrus.
"When I was in school in Bordeaux my professor told us about the dry farming on the Greek island of Santorini, which illustrated how adaptable the vine could be," Champy says. "Sometimes they only get 4 inches of rain a whole year. But because the soil is made up of crushed pumice and is greatly absorbent, it transfers the tremendous nighttime humidity as moisture to the vine."
Irrigation not only keeps vines well hydrated, it is a significant player in manipulating fruit flavors and quality. Since the early 1990s, the fashion in grape picking has typically been to leave fruit on the vine until late in the season in order to elevate the level of Brix, a measure used for grape sugar.
"Remember eucalyptus and green bean flavors?" asks Philip Coturri, who runs a vineyard management company Enterprise Vineyards that specializes in organic farming. "Those were due to unripe grapes. To get today's super-ripe flavors the vines need hydration. Irrigations produce a very different type of wine. Irrigation is a tool for extended ripening."
But isn't there a taste in between green beans and jam? What happens if wine drinkers start wanting a less opulent style? Fashion changes, after all.
Some wine writers and consumers have complained about high alcohol levels and smack-you-over-the-head fruit coming from a long hang time and the often-needed dealcoholizations and acidulations to correct them. Coturri, who besides his family's eponymous farm in Glen Ellen works vineyards for Hanzell Vineyards in Sonoma (which farms with little or no irrigation) and Oakville Ranch Vineyards in Napa, doesn't see that happening. People like the ultra-fruity flavors, he insists.
And then there's the money.
Unlike Europe, California's vineyards tend to be large, making it more difficult to work the land manually and much more difficult to control without irrigation. "As an organic farmer," said Coturri, "I'm in demand. I pay my workers between $10 to $12 an hour. To do that I must produce a consistent 2.5 to 3 tons an acre. On so many of these properties if I dry-farmed them, I'd get 1.5 to 2 tons. It's a matter of sustainability."
But in addition to Dominus, such long-standing Napa properties as Grgich Hills and Frog's Leap dry-farm. John Williams, founder of Frog's Leap Winery in Rutherford, recalls buying his vineyards in 1987. "The vineyards were dry-farmed but then I started to irrigate, because I came from UC Davis. By God, we know how to take care of a vineyard!" he says.
"Under irrigation, I soon realized the vineyards were not thriving. Phylloxera attacked. Fortunately Frank Leeds, our neighbor then -- now vineyard manager -- was driving by the vineyard and said to me, 'I don't want to interject here, but you're killing that vineyard.' And that's when he taught me dry farming. What are the great wines that built the reputation of this valley -- the old Inglenooks and BVs? Not a single one of those wines were irrigated."
Despite using AxR1, Williams' vines fought off the louse in the '80s. He suspects that when he irrigated, the roots shrank up to the danger zone that phylloxera inhabited in the soil. By reverting to dry farming, the roots ran down to water and safety.
One essential requirement of dry farming in arid regions like California is the need to plow the land. This keeps the soil sponge-like, ready to absorb every bit of water that comes its way. If the land is hard or has cover crops during the growing season, dry-farming can't be effective.
Ivo Jeramaz, Grgich Hills' vice president of vineyards and production, agrees: "There's an old saying that one cultivation is worth two irrigations." Jeramaz comes from Croatia, where soils are rocky and the water is scarce. He also says that his vineyards resisted the louse at Grgich's Carneros vineyard site, despite use of the vulnerable AxR1 rootstock. He believes his roots went deep enough to a sandy spot beneath dense clay where they stayed safe. That said, there are no clear scientific conclusions about any link between irrigation and phylloxera.
Art of dry farming
"Where irrigation is a science, dry farming is more an art. It's not always possible, but when it is, it's the best option," conceded Coturri, who oversees both farming options in his vineyard management business. "You see, it's not what you do, it's how you do it. As far as usage? Am I aware of the water I use? You bet I am. And the pavement we put up depletes the aquifer more than vineyard irrigation. Growing high-quality plants is a balancing act. I will use every tool at my disposal to produce something that I love."
Those who endorse dry farming see things in a starker light. "The mind-set of irrigation needs to be challenged. It is just like the great gas-guzzling cars that we have decided are our God-given right to drive," says John Paul Cameron, an Oregon winemaker who's a founding member of the Deep Roots Coalition. "Since water, like oil, is becoming an increasingly scarce commodity, I believe that our position is the wave of the future."
When pressed, others will often agree. The Pacific Institute's Gleick first said dry farming was impossible. Later he reflected: "As water gets more scarce, we might see a revival of dry farming. Water is still pretty cheap, but when the cost goes up people will look to alternatives and look at lessons from the past."


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Morning Glory Farm in Edgartown is a bit of an institution on the island of Martha's Vineyard, an island off the coast of Cape Cod in Massachusetts. Although billed as a humble farm stand, Morning Glory has the reputation and faithful clientele that would make any high-end gourmet food store proud.
The farm was started in 1975 on land owned by the Athearn family who have lived on the Vineyard since the 19th century. Starting off with a farm stand, by 2010 business was thriving enough that a newly-built barn replaced the original structure. They farm over 120 acres over several sites on the island. The farm produces a wide variety of crops, herbs and cut flowers.
We are lucky we live near Morning Glory Farm and stop by the farm stand often. I am in the habit of getting their ice tea and a muffin for breakfast after I drop my children off at horse-riding camp nearby. My favourite are the corn muffins followed closely by the peach muffins (in case you are wondering).
Martha's Vineyard is such a small island that the farm where my children take their riding lessons is located near some of the Athearn family land in West Tisbury. The horse farm sends off its manure to fertilise the Morning Glory farm crops.
The farm stand's zucchini bread is deservedly famous for being delicious. You can find the zucchini bread recipe here at Cape Cod Magazine if you feel inclined to try it out. I heard grumbling in line in front of me the other day when one woman was complaining to another that the zucchini bread was not as good as it used to be. Definitely, first world problems.
I thought the best way to introduce Morning Glory Farm to you was with a vlog. It'll give you a short tour of the farm stand and all the delicious products inside.[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMIfIPPbdy8]
Morning Glory Farm is located on the corner of Meshacket Road and the Edgartown-West Tisbury Road. It is open 7 days a week.


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Burger King Announces Angry Birds Promotion
Beginning on 19th January and continuing through March 1, 2015, guests who visit participating BURGER KING restaurants in the UK and Ireland will be treated with a fun welcome by various characters from the Angry Birds Go! and Angry Birds Stella games. The Angry Birds promotion marks the brand's first global marketing campaign designed to connect with fans of all ages, around the world.
The campaign will encompass a specially designed kid's bag, one of six different Angry Birds themed toys in every kid's meal including a double puzzle and stencil kit, digital activations, as well as in-store posters and window stickers to advertise the promotion.
"We are always looking for ways to innovative the guest experience," said Matthew Bresnahan, Marketing Director, Northern Europe, Russia, & Africa. "The Angry Birds franchise is well-known for crossing all generations and offers the perfect opportunity for us to connect with all members of the family."


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Welcome to the Natural Berries website
Over the coming months Natural Berries will be introducing a range of products sourced with nature in mind.
Watch out for special offers and seasonal promotions.
Medox® is a pure natural product extracted from Scandinavian bilberries and blackcurrants that is a highly effective antioxidant.
Medox® is a highly effective antioxidant for use as a dietary supplement.
Medox® is a natural product developed and produced in Norway consisting of anthocyanins from bilberries and blackcurrants in a vegetable capsule.
Each capsule contains 80mg of anthocyanins that are the naturally occurring pigments that give certain plants their blue colour.
The anthocyanin complex MP865 contained in the capsules is unique. No other product contains this clinically documented complex.Medox® is recommended by the Norwegian Heart & Lung Association.


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Cocina 214
151 E. Welbourne Ave. (Park Ave.) Send to Phone
407-790-7997 | Make Restaurant Reservations | Menu
OpenLunch & Dinner daily, Brunch Sat.-Sun.
- Dress code: Casual
- Full bar
- Kid-friendly
- Outdoor dining
- Private room(s)
* Click here for rating key
: Tucked on a side street off of busy Park Avenue, Cocina 214 is easy to overlook. The 214 in the restaurant's name represents the Dallas area code. Start with a margarita such as The Park Ave Lux with Patron Silver, Patron Citronge and fresh lime. Nibble on appetizers like the 214 ceviche, a plate of fresh seasonal fish drizzled in a citrus lime marinade with chunks of spicy jalapeño, red onion, tomato and avocado; and the complimentary chips and salsa (or pair the former with the hand-mashed, chilled guacamole). Entrées are hit and miss, but the duck confit tacos are a good, decadent choice. Or share some of the "street" tacos, perhaps the beef brisket or blackened fish versions made with airy house-made flour tortillas. For dessert, we recommend the tres leches cake. Warm colors, wood-and-brick textures and pops of bright hues give the place a decidedly Southwestern feel. Tall ceilings and painted concrete and tile floors are modern and attractive, but the noise level is pretty high during happy hour and on busy weekend nights.
Enjoy a meal al fresco at these restaurants with patios.
Wine of the Week Review by GAYOT


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In only one month's time my baby son will be one year old! It seems amazing that soon he won't be a baby, but a toddler running around and having adventures. This month, Oscar has had a
number of exciting experiences, including visiting Sizergh – post here – and discovering his first chicken, his first tooth emerging and learning how to shake his head, as if to say 'no'.
This little chicken had escaped from her pen in to the lunching area at Sizergh and Oscar was captivated as she scouted the tables, looking for scraps. If we dropped a piece of bread she would come running, only to be scared away by Oscar's flailing hands. After lunch, Oscar walked all around the picnic benches, while holding my hands, and we watched the daffodils dancing.
Oscar has a big interest in animals and, acquiring Hugo, a little rescue cat, has been an exciting event for all of us! Hugo is so friendly and patient with Oscar, he is not bothered by his screams and tantrums, and is happy to offer himself to be stroked aka tail pulled. He is goofy and very forgiving and usually Oscar likes to use one finger to trace the white sections of fur in his dark coat, before gently grasping his ears
and thowing his face in to his fur.
Oscar can now push himself up on his hands and knees and crawl a few steps, although his favourite thing to do is just stay there, rocking backwards and forwards and practice swaying. He has suddenly learnt to shake his head, much to others' amusement and loves to do it for attention, while he is shouting. His words so far are "dadadada" and "nananana" and occasionally imitates a word when he hears it from us, which is an amazing experience!
We've been waiting what feels like a long while for a tooth to emerge and his bottom gums have finally produced what looks like a blob of rice pudding. We were completely fooled until we noticed the spoon catching on it and realised it was solid and firmly rooted in his gums!
It's come up a lot more since I took these photos and he was able to show it off at a dinner party we had, down in the West Midlands. He enjoyed his beans and mash so much and it's now up there on his list of favourite foods, alongside morning weetabix. His favourite toys are his new glowing, musical Makka Pakka, Christmas snowman (still) and colourful bead frames.
Right now, Oscar's favourite activity is zooming around like a mini Davros in his walker, where he targets peoples' ankles and clothes horses alike. Thank you so much for your comments and feedback, it means a lot!! Pictures of Hugo to come soon 😉 I'm debating how often to do Oscar's updates after he turns one year – how often would you like to see them? ♡


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About the Author
Ann Gimpel is a clinical psychologist, with a Jungian bent. Avocations include mountaineering, skiing, wilderness photography and, of course, writing. A lifelong aficionado of the unusual, she began writing speculative fiction a few years ago. Since then her short fiction has appeared in a number of webzines and anthologies. Three novels, Psyche's Prophecy, Psyche's Search, and Psyche's Promise are small press publications available in e-format and paperback. A husband, grown children, grandchildren and three wolf hybrids round out her family.
@AnnGimpel (for Twitter)


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The Cherryholmes, a family bluegrass band who rose to the top of the bluegrass heap as IBMA Entertainers of the Year after their first Skaggs release, have followed up with another successful project.
For followers of traditional bluegrass, the collection has a little of everything - breakdowns and fiddle tunes, twin fiddles and percussive mandolin, soulful singing and tight family harmonies.
Cia Cherryholmes, one of the most emotive young female voices in bluegrass, is at her best on her original "You Don't Know What Love Is" or the murder/prison modal dark "Black and White." The entire multi-talented family can sing, play and also write - young Molly's "Tell Me Why" was especially good.
Most of their work is straight bluegrass, and they can blister the up-tempo numbers with the best of 'em. In particular, "The Nine Yards" is played with a drive and intensity reminiscent of Mountain Heart. However, they are not limited to that genre, and also dabble in other textures at times, ranging from Scottish influenced fiddling to bouncing swing in "Darkness on the Delta."
There is a reason Skaggs signed this family to his label, and his judgment regarding emerging talent again proves sound.


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This dish is perfect for summer barbeques and get-togethers! Enjoy.
What You'll Need:
2 pounds small Yukon Gold potatoes
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 cup pickled vegetables, finely chopped
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/3 cup fresh dill, finely chopped
½ - ¾ cup of pickled vegetable brine or dill pickle brine
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
¼ teaspoon coarse black pepper
What to Do:
First, boil potatoes until tender. Drain and let cool. Once potatoes have cooled, cut in half and peel with your hand. The peel will literally come right off. Placed peeled potatoes in a large mixing bowl and mash with 2 tablespoons of oil.
Add chopped pickled vegetables (can buy these in jars from Trader Joe's), chopped fresh dill, garlic powder, sea salt, pepper, and the brine from the pickled vegetables.
Mix well and taste. Depending on your preferences, you may need to add a little more brine, dill pickle or garlic. It's entirely up to you.


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The Last Tab Conundrum
by Matt Copperwaite 6 months ago
The closing of the last tab has inconsistent results between multiple applications and OS's. It amused me lately when looking at the wide variety of options and realised that my preference is not the one that may be best for users.
So what happens when you close the last tab?
Firefox on Desktop
Firefox by Mozilla is a browser that prides it'self on usability, however has been falling out of favour lately against the faster, sexier Chrome.
So the first thing to note is that there is no close button on the last tab. As soon as the number of tabs hits 1 the close button suddenly vanishes. I can understand this design decision, it prevents accidentally closing Firefox by miss-clicking on the last tab but it also means the tab close button (and associated keyboard short-cut) is no-longer consistent, meaning you cannot depend on it being there and may unnerve some in-experienced users.
Firefox on Android
Mozilla, looking to expand their horizons, also has a Android version of their very popular browser and if you haven't tried it yet, give it a go, it isn't half bad.
By closing the last tab in the browser with the tiny X at the side (once you have opened the tab list) you instantly get another tab with a screen full of the latest or most popular sites you have visited. This functionality is pretty friendly, especially for mobile when closing an app is done in a universally consistent way but I'm not sure anyone would accidentally go to all the effort of finding the X button in the tab list and find their browser closed when they least expected it. The inconsistency with the desktop browser is a weird decision.
Chrome and it's open source parent Chromium have been a unmitigated success over the last few years and is still my preferred browser, but it's tab closing may seem a little strange to some.
In Chrome closing the last tab closes the program. I actually really like this feature -- and it is how I configure Firefox once I install the plethora of add-ons I require for me to enjoy my Firefox experience. However for the novice user this may be a scary and unexpected result. I'm pretty sure any long standing Chrome fan will have at least once accidentally closed the last tab and ultimately browser. At least re-opening Chrome is so fast you tend not to fret over it for long.
Gedit in-case you didn't know is a fairly rudimentary text file editor and allows you to have each file in a tab in the main program but for comparison how does closing the last tab stack up?
As you can see closing the last tab does not close the application or do anything fancy other than close the tab. You are left with a plain empty window and power users might have expected the program to close, but they will quickly learn where as in-experienced users won't feel like their stuff probably hasn't gone too far, and in-fact the thing they closed (assuming it was saved) is now under the recent items menu. There isn't (and there could be) a "recently opened" list like with Firefox for Android but you have to wonder how useful those lists really are anyway. Strangely this model is closest to how Chrome on Android works where it leaves you with a blank screen and a few menus.
There is a hell of a lot of variation between applications, even between ones from the same company on different platforms and you cannot predict what is going to happen when you (accidentally or not) decide to close that last nagging tab.
It would be useful for those tabs to act consistently and for that we need to determine the best result. I'm going to say here, despite my preference for the Chrome model, it is the Gedit model. It is most easy to recover from errors and while experts will have to learn the new model they will learn quickly. The browsers could also then have a list of recently closed tabs, most commonly visited sites etc so that users didn't feel like they could not recover.
An update! Hurrah!
by Matt Copperwaite 9 months ago
Hello visitor. You must be lost. The site is telling me that I haven't posted for 4 months and I had to look at the source code to remember how to log in. Well, I'm here, I'm back. At least for now and I want to share with you some of the things I have been up to. Writing it an publishing it in 15 minutes too because otherwise I'll write another 5 blog posts without actually posting them.
In no particular order (or an order that is probably some decreasing ratio between most recent and most interesting) I attended Hacked.IO where I build hobrogrammer.com a website built entirely out of Flask, jQuery, Backbone and other cool tools that you seriously need to check out. It was amazing to build something so awesome in 24 hours and look so good and look so nice. I'm extremely happy with it and a huge shout out to everyone who was there and especially Moggers87 who helped me with a huge chuck of code.
I've also lately been working on the Freeserver project, or more specifically a Google Reader replacement that I have called ReadeRSS. The over-arching project is to create a Free version of Google specifically focusing on the tools they have dropped and areas where there are no good, scalable and Free replacements. We aim to add an XMPP server soon. I plan for the business model to be open while it is in alpha/beta but some small cost (something like £50 per year) once we get going and having a usable system. As with all my current projects time is a huge issue.
I have also been helping out with the Brixton Tinkerspace guys. These guys are a bit like the London Hack Space (of which I am also a member) but based in South London as LHS is pretty inaccessible to a lot of people in south and west of London. In my adventures I have also discovered many maker communities around south London and I have also found a distinct lack of hacking space (as in places to code in a hacker like way) except at coffee shops. I shall have to investigate this dressed in vetement ethnique. Anyway the Tinkerspace community has very interesting parallels to the Free software movement. They seem to have a guy that started the whole idea called Daniel and has very specific plans (a bit like RMS) I kind of bow to the communities greater knowledge in this area but it will be good to find out how well thought out the whole process is. I'm kind of trusting everyone that it's all been put together in an intelligent way. The Brixton Tinker space guys have found a space in South London called The Artwork which looks amazing and I'm hoping we can move in there soon once we get the funds and structure in order.
Final piece of news is that I'm still doing food reviews that I love doing. I've had some really great times and my latest review has been very well received.
Also lets not forget The Dick Turpin Road Show which is going swimmingly and because of some unfortunate circumstances surrounding other related podcasts means that I think we have a good chance of becoming even more successful. To back this up we are also planning a guest for the next episode as part of a suggestion from a listener.
Finally I am going on holiday to Valencia, Spain next week with my girlfriend for her 27th birthday and our 8th anniversary. I'm hoping for lots of good food, sun and relaxation. At least one of those would do.
Well I've reached my 15 minutes of typing now. So just going to have to sprinkle in some links and hit post. Oh, last last thing though, FIGHT CENSORSHIP.
Release Early, Release Often
by Matt Copperwaite 1 year ago
So this blog is now alive after many years of work (in terms of time rather than man hours). I built it from scratch using Python and Flask both of which I do love.
It was one of those projects where you think "yeah, that can surely only be an hours work at most" and then it all goes nuts and you start building things you never intended to build and adding features you never imagined at the beginning. It's all reasonably trivial stuff but it was getting to the point that I had more posts I wanted to write than time to spend building the blog so I thought screw this. Lets get the minimum amount of work I need to do done to be a usable blog and release it. I can always fix it in situ. Which is what I am now doing.
Release early, release often.
It makes sense. Just get something out of the door and start using it. That's when you notice the real problems. Fix them, upgrade. I guess it works for something like this blog. It must be harder for companies, especially start-ups to do the same thing. Release too early, and be too successful and you're web server goes down and you've lost all that custom. Maybe people in that situation are more tolerant. Maybe as long as you release quickly and often enough you'll code out those problems assuming you can code out of those problems.
For now I'm happy the site is up. It has a long way to go yet from my ultimate plans for this tool but it's a start and in the mean time I can procrastinate and put my thoughts in here that are just one character too big to fit in a tweet.


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Provincial Government Recognizes OBHF
- Written by Super User
- Published in South Simcoe
- Read 2501 times
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It is with great pleasure to announce that on March 8, 2017, the Ontario Ball Hockey Federation (OBHF) achieved "full recognition" as the Provincial Sport Organization for ball hockey in Ontario.
Through this recognition the OBHF is now recognized by the Government of Ontario and is able to apply for funding through the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture & Sport's new Ontario Amateur Sport Fund (OASF). The program has been designed to support three priorities for amateur sport in the province as outlined in Game ON including:
- Participation – so that athletes (para and able bodied) are better able to participate in safe, organized sport.
- Development – to ensure that athletes receive the right support, including access to trained coaches and officials to develop their skills and progress through the development pathway overseen by Provincial Sport Organizations (PSOs) and Multi-Sport Organizations (MSOs).
- Excellence – so that athletes can do their best in high performance sport by having competitive training and development opportunities and access to the latest high performance programs, services, facilities and technologies led by sport experts.
"The opportunities to grow the sport of ball hockey in Ontario are incredible", says Shelley Callaghan, President, Ontario Ball Hockey Federation, "being recognized as the Provincial Sport Organization for ball hockey in Ontario is a major milestone for the OBHF and we are looking very forward to working closely with the Ministry to further develop this great sport throughout the province."


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zero bound
A term used to describe an ultra-low interest rate environment. When the Federal Reserve takes short term rates to zero or just above zero, other methods of economic stimulus such as buying back maturing Treasury securities, must be examined and undertaken. Zero bound can also mean when the value of a stock has diminished to the point of having no bid.
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Team GB Athlete Visits St. Nicholas
St. Nicholas is very lucky to be hosting a Team GB athlete on Wednesday, January 25th. We have Kola Adedoyin, who is an accomplished Triple Jumper. He will be working with classes, completing for time specific fitness circuit activities which promote healthy living and positive competition within our school. He will also answer questions and speak with students about what it takes to be a Team GB competitor. It will be a fantastic afternoon and a great opportunity for the students to interact with a world class athlete. Kola is working with Sports For Schools and his autographed bracelets will be available for purchase. All children can bring in £4.00 as year 5 and 6 students will be selling these on the day.
Published on: 20th January 2017


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Our website and Camden shop are temporarily closed due to coronavirus pandemic. We look forward to welcoming you back when it is safe to do so.
Specially made for hazelnuts lovers! It is a hazelnut heaven creamy chocolate cake with hazelnuts bites. Handcraft three hazelnut and Rocher cream flavours covering this beautifully made cake. Three layers of chocolate sponge cake with hazelnut cream in between and decorated with our Vegan Rocher balls and Pralines.
Size: 23cm diameter (10-12 slices)
Ingredients: Sugar, Vegetable Oils (Palm and Rapeseed), Hazelnuts , Low Fat Cocoa Powder, Emulsifier: Sunflower Lecithin, NaturalFlavours, Vinegar, wheat flour, baking powder, Modified Potato Starch, Alkalized Cocoa Powder, Acidity Regulators(Tetrasodium Pyrophosphate, Calcium Acetate, Calcium Lactate, Disodium Phosphate), Burnt Sugar, Flavorings, Rice crisps,Almonds, Hazelnut praline, Water, Palm Kernel Oil (Fully Hydrogenated) 15%, Maltodextrin, Glucose Syrup, Stabilizer: Starch,E435, E331, E464, E460, E466, E339 Emulsifiers: E481, E471, E475, Salt.
Allergen: Wheat flour, Hazelnuts
***This product is available for self-collection from our Camden market store (Unit 596 Camden Lock NW1 8AF)


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Below, a guest-post by Dr. George Lundberg, Editor-at-Large of MedPageToday; Editor in Chief of Collabrx; President and Board Chair of the Lundberg Institute. (Full disclosure: I am a member of the Lundberg Institute's Board)
What Lundberg says is not meant to be news. Today, physicians tend to agree that many of the tests that patients undergo are unnecessary. Three years ago, one hospitalist shared a story on HealthBeat, describing how he warned his residents about over-testing. His hospital may not have been happy about his disclosure: tests boost revenues.
But in some cases, we have solid medical evidence showing that for certain patients, these tests do more harm than good– though vested interests may try to bury that evidence. (See Dr. Hoffman's post below.)
Yet doctors continue to order the tests– why?
George Lundberg brings a unique perspective to this problem. Drawing on his wealth of experience, both as a practitioner and as a teacher, he puts it in a historical context. For 40 years, he has asked physicians why they perform so many tests. The frankness of their responses is matched only by Lundberg's own candor as he diagnoses the excesses in our medical system .
How to Avoid Avoidable Care
George Lundberg
Why do physicians order laboratory tests? The traditional reasons are: diagnosis 37%, monitoring 33%, screening 32%, previous abnormal result 12%, prognosis 7%, education 2%, and medicolegal 1%.
In order to confirm these data, I began to ask the same question of many groups of clinical and laboratory workers over three continents in the 1970s, '80s and '90s during Socratic teaching sessions on how to use the clinical laboratory correctly. And I began to get very different answers.
I was told that physicians order laboratory tests to: confirm a clinical opinion; establish a baseline; complete a database; curiosity; insecurity; public relations; documentation; peer pressure; patient pressure; pressure from recent literature; question of accuracy of prior result; unavailability of prior result; personal education; research; personal reassurance; a need to show to an attending physician; hospital policy; state legal requirement; concern for liability; CYA' personal or hospital profits, fraud and kickbacks; hunting or fishing expeditions; frustration at nothing better to do (don't know what's wrong with this patient, better get some lab tests); to buy time (maybe by the time the lab tests come back I will have some better ideas what is wrong with this patient); simple availability; and ease of doing.
When I was editor-in chief of JAMA I introduced a new series called "Toward Optimal Laboratory Use" by observing that: "The huge variety and volume of available laboratory tests confronts the physician with a major dilemma: What tests should be ordered on what patients? When, how, how often, at what cost, grouped or individually, and in what sequence? What is the interpretation of the results and what steps should be taken? . . . Standards have not been established, but are urgently needed.
I wrote those words in 1975.
Today, these questions remain largely unanswered. Outcomes credited to performing or not performing screening or diagnostic tests still are largely unknown although millions of such tests are performed on Americans each year.
In 1989, shortly after he became the Secretary of Health and Human Services, I asked Dr Louis Sullivan how much medical care was unnecessary. He said that he thought that between 30 and 40% of medical care was inappropriate or unnecessary. Many people cite similar numbers in 2012.
Looking at the reasons lab tests (and imaging is likely similar) are ordered, it is easy to see how a person who is "not sick" transitions through the "worried well" into a lifelong "patient." Better not to do un-indicated fishing expeditions to begin with.
It is not that nobody cares about this. There has been a recent deluge of at least 15 American books on the topic of overtreatment or unnecessary care:
2000; Severed Trust: Why American Medicine Hasn't Been Fixed. Basic Books. Lundberg, GD;
2002; Overkill: How Our Nation's Abuse of Antibiotics and Other Germ Killers is Hurting Your Health and What You Can Do About it. Rodale. Thompson KM;
2003; Epidemic of Care: A Call for Safer, Better, and More Accountable Health Care. Jossey-Bass. Halvorson GC and Isham GJ;
2005; Hope or Hype: The Obsession with Medical Advances and the High Cost of False Promises. AMACOM. Deyo RA and Patrick DL;
2005: The Health Care Mess: How We Got into It and what it will take to Get Out. Harvard University Press. Richmond JB and Fein R;
2006: The Trust Crisis in Healthcare: Causes, Consequences, and Cures". Oxford. Shore DA;
2006: Money Driven Medicine: the Real Reason Health Care Costs so Much". Harper Collins. Mahar M;
2006: Money Driven Medicine: Tests and Treatments that don't Work Cundiff DK;
2007: Overtreated: Why too Much Medicine is making us Sicker and Poorer. Bloomsbury USA. Brownlee S;
2008: Too Much Medicine: A Doctor's Prescription for Better and More Affordable Health Care Paragon House. Gottfried D;
2008: Hippocrates Shadow: What Doctors Don't Know, Don't Tell You, and How Truth Can Repair the Patient-Doctor Breach Scribner. Newman DH;
2008: Do Not Resuscitate: Why the Health Insurance Industry is Dying and How We Must Replace it. Common Courage Press. Geyman J;
2011: Rethinking Aging: Growing Old and Living Well in an Overtreated Society. UNC Press. Hadler NM
2011: Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health Beacon. Welch HG, Schwartz LM, Woloshin S.
2011: How We Do Harm: A Doctor Breaks Ranks About Being Sick in America St Martin's Press. Brawley OW.
Alas, Shakespeare foretold the effects of all this concern while writing MacBeth in approximately 1605: "it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury. Signifying nothing."
Nobel Peace Prize recipient Bernard Lown MD, when recently asked if he was an optimist or a pessimist replied that he was both: a pessimist about the past because it cannot be changed; and an optimist about the future because it can be changed.
Physicians Hold the Key
In 2012, one almost must take an optimistic view on avoiding avoidable care, because as a country and as a profession, we simply must do a better job of acting out our professionalism. Physicians hold the key. "Doctors orders" dictate as much as 75% of all medical costs. Physicians can fix the problem if they begin to exert their will power.
Virtually every time I address this topic in lectures, some physician comes up to me afterwards and tells me that he wants to do the right thing but that authorities, such as hospitals, tell him not to because they need the revenue.
Around the world, medical care is generally about health. In modern America, medical care is mostly about money and it is about jobs.
Still this may change, because it must. We are heading for a wall.
Could it be that there is now a movement sizable enough to make real change in this hemorrhage of money on unnecessary care? To "bend the cost curve"? To ascend to a "tipping point"? I don't know, but there are at least glimmers of hope. The "Choosing Wisely" movement that sprang up inside organized medicine got off the ground in 2012.And around 150 medical leaders assembled in Cambridge MA on April 24-26, 2012 to try.
The conference called "Avoiding Avoidable Care" was organized by Vikas Saini MD and Shannon Brownlee under the auspices of the Bernard Lown Foundation, with support from many other organizations, such as the Institute of Medicine and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. If you are interested in this topic, and you certainly ought to be, it is worth your time to click here to study what has been done and to follow the movement as it evolves.
It is easy to feel discouraged. But I believe that we must not be disheartened. We simply must fix this problem.


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Summertime, Summertime! It's so difficult to keep up with my writing when I want to bask in the hot July sun. But I always have to take any opportunity to get on the computer. Mommy is outside and although she isn't basking in the sun, she is enjoying the warmth while pruning her tomatoes. Nanny would be so proud!
I joke about Dakota (DK) and how he leads a simple life and sometimes can appear to be simpler than we think. This photo reflects his inability to learn as Dakota will salivate and try to bite a brick when he sees a shadow. No matter how many times Mommy tells him to stop, he just can't help himself.
As you know, DK absolutely loves balls. He will chase balls for hours and as I blogged before, he is relentless trying to get people to throw balls for him. A couple years ago Daddy bought a GoDogGo Remote Fetch system so DK could have balls tossed his way over and over and over again. It was a great idea, but no matter how hard he tried, DK could not learn to put the ball back into the bucket.
Remember how DK always places the ball behind someone sitting outside? Read my last blog for that one. Well, Daddy in his infinite wisdom decided to place his chair next to the fetch system so that instead of placing the ball behind Daddy, he would place them in the bucket. Guess what? He did it! At least for a few times. Then instead of putting the ball in the bucket, he put it in the front where the ball shoots out. Hey, whatever works right! What a happy dog he is now and I'll give him credit for being smart!