04.28.09
Posted in Geek Culture, miscellany at 9:51 am by Nate Smith
Some people think geeks complain a lot. I believe some geeks complain because they can always see a better way of doing something or can imagine doing it optimally. Sometimes that means complaining because it wasn’t done their way. Even a solution that everyone agrees is good-enough is still probably sub-optimal. In the case of software this may because of sub-optimal tools on hand used to create it. And sometimes, even a really clever hack is still a hack.
Many geeks see the world as it could be, instead of how it is - which may explain why so many geeks like science fiction. Maybe a little too much. Doing what geeks do and approaching things as they do is our way of changing the little bit of a sub-optimal world we can have an effect on. The geeks who are working hard and are not complaining are busy taking over the world.
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11.10.08
Posted in miscellany at 7:54 pm by Nate Smith
A new release from the Smiths and a recent release from The Cure. Two great bands, one very defunct and the other very old.
http://www.amazon.com/Sound-Smiths-Very-Best/dp/B001ED7C5S
http://www.amazon.com/4-13-Dream-Cure/dp/B001FBSMOO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1226368316&sr=1-1
Couple these with the onset of Winter and let the seasonal depression begin.
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01.05.08
Posted in Uncategorized, miscellany, ramblings at 10:10 pm by Nate Smith
Some interesting things have gone on with regard to the organization of information during the evolution of the World Wide Web. Initially, the ability to link relevant items was key to the Web. While this is still important and the basis of the Web, search engines have almost replaced linking as a means to locate information. The search engines themselves require the links so links will always remain the key organizational feature of the Web.
The development of the Wiki realized the promise of sir Tim Berners-lee’s original vision of the web — at least until the wiki-spammers arrived to crush it. A wiki has micro links on an organized site. Relevant information tightly linked and easily updated. One might argue Wikipedia is almost the antithesis of what a wiki should be. This is because the scope of Wikipedia is really too broad for a classic wiki. Wikipedia requires special disambiguation entries in order to distinguish between terms that overlap subjects.
Then came the blog. Blogs are mostly comprised of chronologically organized, granular, topic-focused entries. Of course blog entries usually have their fair share of links to other pages. Initially few blogs had original material and were in fact a chronological pointer to interesting things happening on other web sites.
The social network is another interesting facet of information organization. Sites like facebook and linked-in organized on the basis of social connections.
Now we have immediate information organized by the likes of twitter. It will be interesting to see if anything useful comes of that.
My own idea is to combine the highly linked and organized nature of a wiki with the chronology of blogs and twitter. Wikis have a problem where old information goes stagnant and does not get removed or updated, but there is no way to easily tell what is new information and what is old unless authors go to lengths to make it apparent. I would like to see a wiki - I call it a horizon wiki - where each entry has a date or timestamp associated with it. Old entries would be visually different from new entries and corrections. For instance new entries could be dark while older entries are progressively lighter, or vice versa. It would be visually apparent what information was recent and what was old so the reader would have a cue to make sure it is still relevant.
There are a lot of neat experiments with information organization going on right now too. One of my favorites is the news application on the Nintendo Wii. You can place it in a mode where it shows a globe. Places that have news stories show as a small thumbnail picture. The globe is simulated 3D so you can rotate it and see that some locations have stacks of stories with a number to indicate how many while some only have one or two items in the stack stories. This is a neat combination of geographical, and chronological organization - older stories are on the bottom of the stack. Innovative.
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06.20.07
Posted in miscellany, ramblings, rant at 1:25 am by Nate Smith
Here is the graph I wanted to show you. It is a little rough, but it demonstrates the concept. Across the bottom you can see the age in years. I stopped at 79 just for demonstration purposes. You can see the line on the graph make a noticeable curve about age 5, again in the late teen years, and it seems to again in the mid to late 30’s (It may appear to curve differently on a different scale).
I think people actually perceive these changes and that is why these ages are probably under discussion more than others. There are a lot of milestones in the late teens years 16-21 or even 25 all seem to have some built in milestones. This curve may somehow enhance our perceptions or the importance we place on these milestones?
Finally, I think this all goes back to the “sundae theory”
Perhaps it could also have something to do with why the early memories become hard to recall and few people have real memories from before the age of two.
At any rate, the graph should make it clear, that as we get older, a full day is a smaller and smaller fraction of our total life, of course I can’t actually prove our perception is affected by this. I will need to consider that further. Does this make time actually pass faster? No. There can only the perception that it passes faster. It could also be argued that since each month and each year are progressively smaller parts of our life that they would be perceived as passing faster too.
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06.15.07
Posted in miscellany, ramblings at 12:35 pm by Nate Smith
This is my theory, but I think others may share it. Perhaps somebody proposed it long ago.
When I was young it seemed like a Sunday afternoon would last ”F O R E V E R”. Now they seem to disapear in a blink of an eye. Waiting an hour seemed like an eternity, now the hours slip by unnoticed.
I believe that as we get older, each unit we use to measure time becomes and increasingly smaller fraction of our lives. When you are five years old an hour is still a measurable fraction - about 0.0005 of our life. At age 25 it’s 0.0001 of your life. At age 35 the fraction is much smaller (7.8226093 × 10-5). It works the same if you calculate it in weeks or years but the numbers are more impressive when you use hours.
So that’s my theory on why time seems to pass faster as we get older.
Look at it this way - when you are two - a year ago is one half of your life. Each day is also a greater fraction of your life. Say .001 if you are two years old. When you are 30 (Thirty) you have lived 10950 days, so each day is like 9.1324200913242009132420091324201 e-5 fraction of your life. A much smaller fraction of your total life as you grow older. More to come, including some diagrams, if I can find the time.
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03.07.07
Posted in Uncategorized, miscellany, ramblings at 1:05 pm by Nate Smith
As people get older I think they begin to question what reality they are a part of and wonder if it is the same one they share with others. I believe this on an uncouscious level. You can see it in everyday conversation, people comment on wether it is cold, or hot, or the particular sharde of green the grass is. It’s like they are trying to nail down a common experience that they are sharing.
Example:
“That was very loud, did you think that was loud? I thought that was very loud.” Translated: I just had an experience, something very loud - did you have the same experience I did?
There are probably several reasons this dissonance appears as people age. Their senses begin to change, their ethics change, they might experience chemical induced experiences - all these cause people’s sense of existance to vary.
More to come.
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10.18.06
Posted in miscellany, rant at 10:12 pm by Nate Smith
It seems that about nine times out of ten, when we experience a “close-call” or a crazy driver during our daily commute, it is a person talking on a cell phone. It is also amazing how many people will be talking on their cell phone before they are even out of the parking ramp.
I drive a car with a manual transmission. I used to drive a manual because I enjoyed it, I still do to a degree, but now I realize that it is important to keeping my concentration on driving. It makes it very challenging to use a cell phone unless I am on the interstate.
If I ever have an accident in my car that is not my fault, I am virtually certain it will be a driver who was talking on their cell phone.
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05.17.06
Posted in Internet, miscellany at 2:20 pm by Nate Smith
Web 2.0 is like art. You know it when you see it. Web 2.0 is also the empreror’s new clothes - much ado about nothing. When a technology or a concept starts having conferences while it is still defining itself it starts to sound more like a conference in search of a reason.
Some people are saying that web 2.0 will be the “social web”, characterized by things like myplace. Bah. People are just trying to categorize innovations that are happening and group them with some kind of handle. in another year and a half we will laugh at the concept of web 2.0.
If Tim Berners-Lee had not tried to go through channels and persue open standards for the symantic web concept and had just pointed to something and said “that’s it!” the symantic web might have received as much traction and hype as web 2.0.
Please let web 2.0 go silently away like push technology did.
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04.12.06
Posted in miscellany, ramblings at 10:30 am by Nate Smith
Every decade or so a year takes on particular importance. I think 1984 was one of those years. It was filled with expecations due to George Orwell’s book of the same title, but things took place in 1984 across the breadth of politics, nature, music, etc. At this point I think that 1984 took on more importance than any year since, but it will take some hindsight to be certain. 2001 is probably a candidate, though not for flying cars and vacations on the moon like we hoped back in the 60’s. I’m not sure if there is any particular event that makes 1984 a standout year, but when you see it all together it becomes a bigger year than many since.
Music
* Synchonicity by the Police
* The Police split up
* Thriller by Micheal Jackson (love him or hate him, it was a big album)
* New Wave music gained traction
* Band Aid
* Count Basie dies.
* Madonna comes on strong
In general, there may have been more variety in music than any year prior. Everything from Prince, Madonna and INXS to Wham, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, and the Police.
Movies/Entertainment:
* Ghostbusters
* Footloose
* Gremlins
* The Karate Kid
* Cosby Show premieres
* Amadeus
* Miami Vice
*”Where’s the beef” commercial
Other Events:
* Indhira Gandhi, India’s Prime Minister was assasinated
* Bernhard Goetz - the subway vigilante
* David, the boy in the bubble died.
* Soviets boycott U.S. Summer Olympics
* Apple Macintosh Commercial
* Apple Macintosh becomes available.
* GNU project started by Richard Stallman
* AIDS falls into the public view/concern
* Toxic gas leak in India from Union Carbide plant kills 2000 and injures 150,000
* Bell System decision handed down, “Great Bell Breakup”
* Regan re-elected for second term
* Joe W. Kittinger solo baloon flight across the Atlantic
* Ethiopian famine began sometime in 1984ish.
* Iran/Iraq war escalated with “tanker war” - attacking commercial shipping.
* Gary Hart scandal in 1984
* Iran-contra affair bridged across 1984.
* Miss America Contest Vanessa Williams Scandal.
If you were alive in 1984, you can probably remember some things that were pertinent to your interests too. I think you would miss a lot of jokes if you didn’t know some of the events that went on in 1984. I wonder how much of Billy Joel’s song “We didn’t start the fire” is from ‘84?
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03.20.06
Posted in miscellany at 6:59 pm by Nate Smith
Ok, stay with me on this one.
In a nutshell: Your next chocolate sundae (or substitute anything you like to experience, eat, or do) will never be as good as the last one you had.
The reason: The last sundae you had is a complete memory, a sum total of the experience. You don’t have the full memory of eating the sundae. or the experience until it is in the past. When you eat a Sundae (or enjoy any experience) you do it one moment at a time, or one bite at a time. Each portion building the memory. Anytime you consider the last sundae you ate, you are remembering the whole experience complete.
So your next experience is always colored by the expectations of the last experience and it will never live up to the first experience because you perceive an experience something one moment at a time, but your memory is of the whole experience.
A good reason to enjoy the moments as they happen.
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