Scott A. Wilburn

Back to Seattle… sort of

scott — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 22:20:47 +0000

After a year of being in Spokane full-time, I’ve decided to re-establish a residence in Seattle so that I can be closer to my business partners and work with them in person more often. That’s not to say that I will be leaving Spokane behind. In fact, I will keep my primary residence in Spokane. I found a nice little furnished cottage to rent in the Greenlake neighborhood of Seattle. Yay! No more apartments. At some point, I plan to buy a house in Seattle or a live-aboard boat.

Sarah Palin: DRILL, DRILL, DRILL

scott — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:30:55 +0000

If you care about the environment and oil independence, you might want to think twice about supporting John McCain’s pick for VP, Sarah Palin. She supports drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge:

Stick with Obama, you’ll be glad you did

Bear warning in British Columbia

scott — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 22:10:03 +0000

Dad forwarded this photo of a bear warning sign at a campground in British Columbia, Canada:

Our newest cash trivia site: Pay Day Trivia

scott — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 06:24:56 +0000

We have just launched a new trivia game site, paydaytrivia.com. This new site is a trivia gaming site which allows a user to answer trivia questions to earn points, which can then be used to spin the wheel to win cash. These are some of the trivia games we have on the site:

Time for a new car

scott — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 19:40:25 +0000

My previous car, a 1999 Nissan Altima, had given me 9 years of reliable service, but it was time to upgrade to a newer car with all-wheel drive. Last winter’s storms had made it difficult to get around with a conventional front-wheel drive vehicle. Enter the 2008 Subaru Outback. Now I’m sure I’m going to hear ridiculous comments such as, “Isn’t that a lesbian car?” or “Why would a single guy own a station wagon?”, but the truth is this car is more suited to my lifestyle and living in the Pacific Northwest. It has the all-wheel drive, Vehicle Dynamics Control (VDC), lots of cargo room for camping gear, and roof racks for kayaks and bikes. Plus, it has leather seats and a moonroof.

Spokane Salaries: Why so low?

scott — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 17:36:40 +0000

I recently came across a problem. I was really in need of consulting with a qualified PHP/MySQL developer close to home to discuss a problem that I needed to solve. I only know of one in the area and it got me thinking about where these mid-career professionals might be. Did these qualified developers leave the area?

So I started thinking about salaries. The bulk of my work comes from Seattle, so for me personally this is not a concern, but what about the people here who work for a Spokane-based employer? I went to payscale.com to get some salary comparisons, not just between Seattle and Spokane, but also from cities closer in population to Spokane.

When I did a search on software developer salaries between Spokane, Boise and Seattle, I found that salaries are significantly lower for software developers in Spokane. This could be why there’s few qualified software developers in the area.

The big question is, WHY?

Median Salary by Job - City: Spokane (United States)

CAREER TOOLS: Salary Calculator, Career Path Tool, Cost of Living Calculator, Meeting Miser

Median Salary by Job - City: Boise (United States)

CAREER TOOLS: Salary Calculator, Career Path Tool, Cost of Living Calculator, Meeting Miser

Median Salary by Job - City: Seattle (United States)

CAREER TOOLS: Salary Calculator, Career Path Tool, Cost of Living Calculator, Meeting Miser

Pacific Northwest Gay Pride 2008 Roundup

scott — Fri, 09 May 2008 09:55:01 +0000

Last year, I published a list of all the Gay Pride events in the Pacific Northwest and I decided to make it a tradition for 2008. So here’s the list of this year’s celebrations around the Northwest:

Idaho

Boise: Boise Pride (June 14)
Moscow: Palouse Pride (August 2)
Pocatello: Pridaho (August)

Montana

Billings: Montana Pride Celebration (June 20-22)

Oregon

Bend: Bend Pride (June 21)
Eugene: Eugene/Springfield Pride Festival (August 9)
Medford: Southern Oregon Pride (July 26)
Portland: Pride Northwest (June 14-15)
Salem: Capitol Pride (August 2)

Washington

Bellingham: Bellingham Pride (July 13)
Bremerton: Kitsap Pride (July 19)
Olympia: Capital City Pride (June 21-22)
Seattle: Seattle Out and Proud (June 29) Seattle Black Pride (July 18-20)
Spokane: OutSpokane Pride Parade & Rainbow Festival (June 14) - Visit the WilburnWeb booth at Pride!
Tacoma: Out in Tacoma (July 12)
Vancouver: Saturday in the Park (July)
Yakima: Yakima Pride Festival (June 14?)

British Columbia, Canada

Kelowna: Okanagan Pride (June 22 - July 1)
Vancouver: Vancouver Pride (August 3)
Victoria: Victoria Pride (July 6)

Florida lawmakers try to ban testicles

scott — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 01:06:36 +0000

They’re tacky and probably offensive to some people, but fake bull testicles on automobiles have become the latest target of Florida lawmakers. If this bill becomes law, drivers displaying Truck Nutz or similar fake bull balls could be fined $60.

It sounds like the Florida senate should concentrate their efforts on more important issues, such as global warming. Hey Florida! Wake Up! Your state is going to be under water soon, and you’re worried about whether a truck has a pair of gonads hanging from the trailer hitch.

My new bedside computer

scott — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 20:24:26 +0000

I have been looking for something to replace my old clock radio with something that would allow me to wake up to any radio station or music that I wanted. Last week, I discovered Chumby. Chumby is a small, soft-sided device device with a 3.5 inch touchscreen. It connects to my home network via wi-fi and I can listen to any streaming radio stations or listen to any songs (non-DRM tracks only) by connecting my iPod to one of the USB ports on the back. It works fairly well and can be modified because the code is open source and linux-based. Chumby has only been available to the public for a few months, so there’s a few bugs that have to be worked out, but all in all, I’m pretty pleased with this clock radio replacement.

Skiing in Dubai?

scott — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 09:02:01 +0000

Just when I thought every big idea had already been thought of, I come across this one: an indoor ski area with a chairlift and real snow… in Dubai. It’s called Ski Dubai and is located inside of the Mall of the Emirates in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. They actually advertise 85 meters of vertical drop (255 ft.). I’m guessing there’s no double black diamond runs at this ski “resort”. I’m also guessing they won’t be having gay ski week here, either.