Tag: tech

tech

To All My Fellow Bloggers: Keep Your Day Job

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Fake Steve Jobs, aka Daniel Lyons, has an article in Newsweek this week titled Time to Hang Up the Pajamas in which he states that growing rich by blogging is a high-tech fairy tale.

I learned the hard way: while blogs can do many wonderful things, making huge amounts of money isn’t one of them.

So, if you had dreams of turning your Ninja or Pirate themed blog into a money making machine, keep your day job (if you have one). A few years ago I had a dream of blogging for a living but then I thought about it and realized that posting around 10 times a day, every day time didn’t seem like it would be that much fun. Lyons for instance, after posting 20 times a day for about three years, is walking away “feeling burned out and weighing 20 pounds more than when I started.” Yikes.

ramblings

My Facebook Status Update

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I have been very torn about idea of social networking Facebook (FB) style since it truly caught the world by storm – an event which I think took place within the past year. I have been torn because FB is the first social networking site (sorry Friendster and MySpace) to truly break out, and by that I mean it is the first place that my family, friends, friends of friends, fraternity brothers, former classmates, co-workers and ex co-workers, along with old friends who’ve I’ve lost touch with over the past 5 – 20 years, all mingle together.
The site is structured so that this disparate group can see (and comment on) the details of my life that I put out there, however inconsequential they may be, and tonight I pruned my ever growing list, removing people I’m not friends with but for whatever reason added to my friends list and moving people I’m friends with but not that close to onto a limited profile list so that certain details of my life which I deem “intimate” will remain hidden from them. My email address and web site address? Fine. My birthday? Fine. My work history? Public knowledge due to the fact that I’ve posted my resume to my web site. A video of my daughter laughing and playing with my dog? Sorry – that’s for me and only a select “few” but wait, the video in question was posted to my wife’s profile and she does not care nearly as much as I do about FB privacy, plus she has about four times the amount of friends that I have so I guess the video in question is in fact out there. Man, this whole networking thing get complicated.
This scenario has made me remember how I know of someone who was outed as a gay man through FB. His profile gave no clues as to his sexual preference, one way or the other, and he never linked to his partner’s profile but he did link to the profile of a friend of his partner’s and sure enough, that friend was linked to his partner and sure enough, the partner in question had written extensively about their relationship and even had posted pictures of the two of them in various romantic poses. So, in the span of three mouse clicks, about thirty years of life in the closet was undone, all thanks to FB.
My primary critique of the entire idea of FB can be expressed by delving into one particular sentence that I wrote above in the second paragraph: “The site is structured so that this disparate group can see (and comment on) the details of my life that I put out there.” What fascinates me is not the amount of friends that anyone has but the information that they choose to share. Unless you have heavily filtered your profile, your entire network will see and receive announcements about most if not all of what you post. I just learned that my 18 year old cousin, who is a freshman in college and who chose his college in large part to be close to his high school girlfriend is now single and feel incredibly weirded out to know this fact via FB. If you dear reader is on FB, let me ask you, do you post pictures of your kids? Do you post super mundane status updates, like “waiting in line at Duane Reade and frustrated, again?” Does anyone care? Unbelievably, a lot of people do care and that caring is the true reason why FB is so successful: it takes advantage of the inherent narcissism in the human character. We all have become media companies of one who have a permanent 15 minutes of fame. Posting on FB screams “I am important! Pay attention to me!” The fact that I just got a bagel and a cup of coffee matters! No longer is our collective obsession about these type of details limited to the rich and famous – we all are now our own paparazzi: we doggedly post photos, videos and stories, all in the manner of an US Weekly “Just like us!” column. I can just picture someone reading my current FB status and thinking, “Jeff is frakkin addicted to Battlestar Galactica – just like me!”
My secondary critique of the entire idea of FB is about how it is just one outrageously enormous time suck. One can lose themselves for hours or days or weeks just looking at photos or comment threads or status updates of friends, friends of friends or people they have not seen or thought of in decades. For those that have given into this form of voyeurism, I ask how many great novels could have been read or great movies could have been watched in that time span? That being said, there are so many different forms of time sucks available that it is unfair to single out just one. Blogging as a form of journalism could be considered a time suck right? I’m not reading Anathem even though I’ve had it for over three months. Rather, I’m writing 1500 words on what I think about FB. Hmmm.
This secondary critique is not all together fair because if FB was truly a waste of time it would not be nearly as popular as it is – this voyeurism is not truly evil because it directly feeds into the site’s shining virtue which to sort of quote the FB homepage is to “help you connect and share with the people in your life.” As life continues to speed up, staying “connected” to those you care about has become more and more challenging. These quotes around “connected” are used because I still have not come to terms with what I feel connected truly means in this instance. Does connected mean “I know what so-and-so is up to”? Does the fact that I know that my cousin is single matter when I do not know who ended the relationship or why it ended in the first place, or that I don’t really know anything about their relationship except frankly what I wrote above?
Regardless, not only does FB allow you to stay “connected,” it allows you to reconnect with long lost friends and family, like for instance the people you went to camp with when you were 12. These are the people who you thought you would be friends with for the rest of your life but then separate schools and schedules pulled you apart. Now FB is helping to repair these severed connections. I blogged about this type of reconnection experience a few years back and while it was brought about without FB, it happened because of email. Considering that the Internet played a primary role in this reconnection process, I would make a serious case that FB is just the killer app for reconnecting and that it made this process as easy as pie. Who doesn’t love pie?
Now of course, one cannot mention the FB phenomenon without griping at some point about the “why are you contacting me?” person. We all have encountered this person more times than we ever would like. He or she is the one who, way back in 7th grade, we were never even friends with to begin with so why this person needs to send us a friend invitation now is beyond all comprehension. To me, these requests are more than a little odd – they are a delusional attempt at revisionist history. So, to those that keep sending me friend invites who were never really my friends, please know that I do check my queue and that I do not want to connect to you as we have less than zero to offer each other. In fact, my act of adding you as a friend only would feed your psychosis and of that I want no part. I am a nice person and cannot bring myself to block you, even though I have hit the “ignore” button more than ten times. Going back to the FB mission statement, you may think that you are simply reconnecting with the people in your life but you should re-read the statement for it actually reads “connecting and sharing” and considering we never shared anything back then, I have no interest in sharing anything now, period.
The last part of the entire FB experience that is challenging is managing that ever growing friends list. Mine after tonight’s pruning exercise is about 180 strong and of those, only about two thirds can only see my full profile. The NYT has a great article this week called Friends, Until I Delete You. It goes into detail about the etiquette of friending and defriending (or unfriending – I prefer the de but it seems the un is more popular) and is what made me in the end post these thoughts.
You may have heard me voice some or all of these ideas in private conversations over the past few months but the Gray Lady finally inspired me to finally put them down, all 1,500 words of them, in zeros and ones. So, there you have it – my view on FB. I think that my status updates will be solely reserved for only Battlestar Galactica related comments for the foreseeable future. The fact that I am in love with this show is something that I don’t care if everyone knows…

tech

Ray Gun Reality

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The United States Army has turned over 100 years of science fiction into science fact as it has deployed a ray gun named Zeus in Iraq to blow up road side bombs. It works by shooting lasers at them and can do so from up to 300 meters away. It is named Zeus because this supreme ruler of Mount Olympus loved to throw lightening bolts around like they were candy.
I just love it when fantasy becomes reality. Now where is my flying car?

science

A Luminous Alien Landscape Fiber Optic Style

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I have no idea why I do not read io9 more often but that is about to change.
For instance, I know how that outside of Cornwall, England lighting designer Bruce Munro has placed his outdoor installation, “Field of Light.” Thousands of fiber optic cables topped with acrylic orbs illuminate the countryside, giving the impression that the field is populated with bioluminescent vegetation from another world. To sum it up in three words, I would call it just plain sick.

io9 is Gawker Media’s blog about all things Sci Fi and their manifesto says in part that,

“The problem is that science fiction doesn’t always seek out the strange new worlds it purports to be cruising for. That’s why we’re plagued by franchises like Star Trek and Superman that return, again and again, to the historical times in which they were born. Superman is still basically an old-fashioned, small-town white boy in an age more suited to postcolonial urban hero-mutants; and Star Trek is a prisoner of the Cold War, rehashing old conflicts and stereotypes.

io9 is from an uncharted region in futurist culture. Our idea of science fiction includes things like Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica TV series, the architecture of Frank Gehry, and the writing of Michael Chabon. These creators don’t cater to fanboys with trivia obsessions, and neither does io9.

Heady words but after checking out their last few posts, I have to say that I am seriously not spending nearly enough time on this site.

tech

Happy Birthday Emoticon

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Twenty six years ago today, Scott Fahlman posted the following electronic message to a computer-science department bulletin board at Carnegie Mellon University:

19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman 🙂
From: Scott E Fahlman
I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:
🙂
Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use:
🙁

As any teacher who has received a paper from a student in the past 5 – 10 years will tell you, the world has never been the same since.
To honor the occasion, Wired has an article about the founder of the emoticon movement and a slide show as well.
Smile – it’s Friday!

tech

An Advertisement About Nothing

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To my amusement and delight, one of my favorite comedians Mr. Jerry Seinfeld has filmed a number of Microsoft ads with Mr. Microsoft himself Bill Gates which are perfectly Seinfeldian. The first takes place at the mall where Jerry spots Bill buying shoes. The second takes place at a residential home where Bill and Jerry have moved in with a random “normal” family.
As PC World writes, the ads are “all just stuff to make you react. Whether you chuckle, guffaw, scoff or spew, you’re doing something — and that’s ultimately the point of the ads about nothing.”
They are funny to watch and almost like a traffic accident – though I may not want to look, I simply cannot not look. Plus, seeing Bill do “the robot” is quite enjoyable, though English striker Peter Crouch does the robot much, much better.
Over time, the ads are supposed to get more and more “specific” about Microsoft products and service. When that happens, who knows if I will feel the same way about Jerry shilling for MSFT. For now, I will just simply enjoy Jerry swapping George Costanza’s companionship with yet another major icon’s as he goes through the banal moments of life.
First he hung with Superman. Now he’s hanging with the richest man in the world. Sounds pretty fun to me.

Shoe Circus:


New Family:

movies

To Be Batman

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In preparation for the hotly anticipated “The Dark Knight,” it seems that everyone is talking about, as the Joker puts it, “The Batman.” While he may be “at home, washing his tights” (okay, that would never happen, Alfred would handle that chore) it is precisely that that idea which so endears Bruce Wayne’s alter ego to the public. Unlike other superheros, Batman is normal. What I mean is that he (in many ways) is a just an incredibly above average man – he does not have any special powers, period. He is like you and me, in our dreams.
Scientific America has an interview with E. Paul Zehr, associate professor of kinesiology and neuroscience at the University of Victoria in British Columbia and a 26-year practitioner of Chito-Ryu karate-do who happens to have a book titled “Becoming Batman: The Possibility of a Superhero” coming out.
After further analysis, it’s true: it would be very, very hard but it could be done. If all the stars in the sky are in alignment, I could be Batman.
Via Steve.

Uncategorized

From the "I Thought Of This 2 Years Ago!" Department

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It finally has happened and truly, it was only a matter of time: someone has made a “Knight Rider” themed GPS device. As the Gray Lady puts it, Generation X nostalgia and modern technology have come together like peanut butter and jelly. I for one cannot believe that two years have passed since I thought of the idea and it is only now coming to market.
I spent the first week of July, 2006 on the West Coast and borrowed a TomTom GPS device to get myself, my friends and my rental car around. On July 1, I flew to San Diego, watched England lose in penalty kicks to Portugal in the quarterfinals of the World Cup at the San Diego airport while waiting for my friend Steve’s flight to arrive from Las Vegas, and then spent 4 days in S.D. before driving up the coast to spend 3 days in La-La Land before heading home on the July 8.
While down South, I drove to the border but not across (we parked in a motel’s parking lot and walked into Mexico for tacos in Tijuana), tooled around many different parts of Diego and while in LA I drove from one theme park to the next, mixing in a Dodger game and the Getty museum in between, while making my base at a family residence in Brentwood (near the Ralph’s off of Wilshire for those that care). I hit up In-and-Out Burger. I hit up The Cat and the Fiddle. It was tons of fun and I got around flawlessly.
While the device had a number of different voices that could bark out lefts and rights, none of them satisfied me. I was in a car, a computer was giving me directions and that could mean only one thing: I was Michael Knight and the GPS was KITT. The closest that TomTom came was an Englishman’s voice which while being sort of close was sincerely no cigar.
I used to spend lazy Saturday afternoons (like today) watching “Knight Rider” at 3 and “The A-Team” at 4 on On WWOR Channel 9. For a time they replace “Knight Rider” with “Airwolf” which sucked – a super charged talking car was one thing but a dudeflying around in his own attack helicoptor? Someone can only suspend disbelief so far!
Anyway, during the CA vacation, I talked endlessly about how they should have a “Knight Rider” voice option and sure enough, now Mio has made my dream come true. In case you were wondering, MythBusters proved that you really could drive up the ramp of a Knight Foundation big rig.
Two last closing points just for shits and giggles. One is that I spent many a Friday night at the Harvest Diner while in Junior and Senior High School performing the “Knight Rider” theme acapella in 4 parts with my friends. The way to perform it is you have one person go “DUH duh, DUH duh, DUH duh Duh duh, Duh duh.” Another goes “Shwoo shwoo, shwoo shwoo.” The third person goes “munnah munnah munnah munnah, munnah munnah munnah munnah, munnah munnah munnah munnah, munnah munnah munnah munnah” and the last then goes “Dum dah dah dum….dum dah dah dum….dum dah dah dum dum Dum!” Try it sometime. Its hard to do.
Second, below is a clip I found on YouTube of Regis introducing a Knight Rider themed act on America’s Got Talent. Watch and enjoy!