Before I get to my post, I wanted to explain a little about Oklahoma 2.0. When people think about Oklahoma, rarely, and by rarely I mean never, does internet or technology enter into their thoughts. What we have done with ONEsite is built an incredible technology company in what seems to most people to be the middle of nowhere. Oklahoma 2.0 is just a reflection on the trials, tribulations, and good times we have being a high tech company, certainly one of the only web companies, in the Great State of Oklahoma.

Yesterday I was discussing a contract with a potential client. It was a great, very productive call – they will be great to work with. Just like most companies, we always try and keep any legal issues close to home, so we naturally had a clause about the contract being governed by the laws of Oklahoma.

The potential client laughed a little and pointed out that it would probably be better to put it under California or New York law, where we might even find better protection because there was a body of law built up around the web business. Oklahoma law might provide an incredible depth of protection and understanding of which rancher owned which cows, but probably not a lot about the web.

And yes of course he is right. We have a lot of common sense laws (and some that seem to completely defy common sense) and certainly can deal with any cattle or land dispute with the best of them, but technology, maybe a little more gray. Still, there’s a straightforward way of thinking to the laws here, just like there is to life, and if they don’t have a law to cover it they can certainly figure out what a good honest person would think, and settle the dispute the old fashioned way (and I don’t mean a shootout) but without a lot of complicated legal twists and turns. So while we don’t have book after book of laws governing the web, there are certainly worse places to worry about legal issues than an Oklahoma court house.

 -Thad

Most cultures have tales describing the end times - war, oppression, famine, plague, the return of one god or another, the war between some god and another.  We all see signs - global warming, wars, etc etc etc of the coming apocalypse, but none so telling, as a cat getting along with a mouse.

A knowledge of history is critical to the understanding of the world, there can be no question about that.  It is impossible to understand where we are and where we are going without understanding where we have been.  In the UK they are no longer teaching about the Holocaust or the Crusades out of fear of causing anger, insult, and offense.  

No nation on this earth is free from past transgressions.  Every country has engaged in its share of deplorable acts.  The lessons we learn from history are an understanding of how the acts occurred, what brought them about, how people were influenced to commit such things, all so that we might LEARN FROM THEM SO THAT THEY MIGHT NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN.  Merely ignoring events removes the worth from an education, and worse destroys and undermines the understanding of the world around us.  Without that understanding, individuals can only act in ignorance.  Without that understanding we are condemned to the inevitable repeat of past offenses and atrocities.  How can we hope to find a better future if we are unwilling to look to our past objectively and learn from it.

I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes, and it still holds true 

"The risk of insult is the price of clarity" 

 We must be willing to open our eyes, to become educated, even if it is uncomfortable and troubling, because this is how we grow as people and nations, but looking at the past with reasons so that we can gain KNOWLEDGE and act accordingly.  

I really do love Alanis, and this is the most awesome remake ever.

BRAVO 

Yesterday was the Ides of March, the day that Julius Caesar was murdered in the halls of the Roman Senate by a group of senators aimed at stopping his tyranny.  I will admit Caesar was one of my heroes.  History has gone back and regarded him as a tyrant, along with Alexander and many of the other great leaders who's conquests were military as much as political. 

Caesar, I truly believe, had a love of the Roman Republic.  A healthy ego as well, but he wanted what was best for Rome, he just also knew that at that momment, that he was what was best.  Or at least sincerely believed himself to be.  He saw the plight of many common romans and a senate that was unwilling, because of its wealthy status, to respond.  Caesar stood with the common people as the intro to Rome says, and for that they loved him.  

 Greece laid the foundation for democracy.  The Roman Republic extended the ideals.  But it was the Roman Empire, not the Republic that spread those ideals throughout the Western World from the British Isles across all of Europe.  Even when the empire fell, it was to Barbarians who only wanted to live as romans (see a lengthy, previous post on immigration and assimiliation) and maintained the same ideals as the Empire had.