Adam Fields (weblog) » WithComments http://www.aquick.org/blog entertaining hundreds of millions of eyeball atoms every day Fri, 09 May 2008 13:38:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 en How to cut a pepper http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/05/07/how-to-cut-a-pepper/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/05/07/how-to-cut-a-pepper/#comments Wed, 07 May 2008 15:26:19 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/05/07/how-to-cut-a-pepper/ Some people were asking, so I finally got around to making a short video of how I cut a bell pepper. I haven’t been able to find anything on the web illustrating this, but I haven’t actually looked very hard.

[Update: Okay, yes, it's a stupid minor thing, but I made this in response to the proliferation of instructions like this.]

Tags: , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/05/07/how-to-cut-a-pepper/feed/ Warner Bros. goes Blu-ray exclusive http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/01/05/warner-bros-goes-blu-ray-exclusive/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/01/05/warner-bros-goes-blu-ray-exclusive/#comments Sat, 05 Jan 2008 17:15:04 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/01/05/warner-bros-goes-blu-ray-exclusive/ Warner Bros., one of the big dual-format holdouts in HD video, announced yesterday that they’re switching to Blu-ray only as of May 2008, abandoning HD DVD. The format war isn’t quite “over” yet, but this is a significant victory for Blu-ray.

This leaves Paramount as the only major studio still backing HD DVD [update: oops, Universal too.].

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=803

http://www.timewarner.com/corp/newsroom/pr/0,20812,1700383,00.html

Tags: , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2008/01/05/warner-bros-goes-blu-ray-exclusive/feed/ New Star Trek movie apparently reboots with an open time loop http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/new-star-trek-movie-apparently-reboots-with-an-open-time-loop/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/new-star-trek-movie-apparently-reboots-with-an-open-time-loop/#comments Sun, 02 Sep 2007 15:15:58 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/new-star-trek-movie-apparently-reboots-with-an-open-time-loop/ “Picture an incident that throws a group of Romulans back in time. Picture that group of Romulans figuring out where they are in the timeline, then deciding to take advantage of the accident to kill someone’s father, to erase them from the timeline before they exist, thereby changing all of the TREK universe as a result. Who would you erase? Whose erasure would leave the biggest hole in the TREK universe is the question you should be asking.

Who else, of course, but James T. Kirk?”

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/33832

Although I don’t think it would work as a standalone movie, I’m still waiting for the followup series they hinted at the end of TNG - the continual use of warp drive is found to be definitively unraveling the fabric of space-time. How do you deal with that? What does that do to interplanetary politics? How do you develop alternate forms of travel that don’t use warp technology? How do you stop everyone from using warp drive, and how do you police that? How do you impose that restriction on hostile entities? Nothing like a good galactic environmental crisis to bring Star Trek back into relevance.

(Of course, in TNG, the answer obviously lies in Wesley Crusher’s newly acquired godlike Traveler capabilities, but I think there are a lot of people who would find that objectionable.)

Tags: , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/new-star-trek-movie-apparently-reboots-with-an-open-time-loop/feed/ Newer PS3s apparently use software emulation for PS2 games http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/newer-ps3s-apparently-use-software-emulation-for-ps2-games/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/newer-ps3s-apparently-use-software-emulation-for-ps2-games/#comments Sun, 02 Sep 2007 13:35:25 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/newer-ps3s-apparently-use-software-emulation-for-ps2-games/ Apparently, Sony dropped including the PS2 hardware in the 80GB model, and the last version that includes it is the now discontinued, recently price-cut $499 60GB model. If you care about playing older PS2 games and are thinking about getting a PS3, you probably want to get that one, before it disappears. It should also be noted that the HD is user-replaceable, so there’s actually very little tradeoff there.

http://astore.amazon.com/buyadam-20/detail/B0009VXAM0/105-0381338-1255632

The new model includes a software emulator, but a fairly large number of the older games have at least some problems.

I’ve really been pretty blown away by how much fun the PS3 is, both for the newer games (which are huge and gorgeous) and for how much better it makes the PS2 experience - all games that support it can play in widescreen, everything’s faster, using the hard drive instead of memory cards is both more convenient and MUCH faster, and the analog sticks are more precise. I think dropping the hardware emulator is an unfortunate cost-saving move that will probably diminish the experience, if you care about that.

Also interesting - I found this list of current and upcoming PS3 exclusives, including PSN (downloadable) games:

http://www.psu.com/PlayStation-3-Exclusives-List-Feature–a1079-p0.php

I think the PS3 has only shown a mere fraction of its power, and Sony didn’t do even a passable job of promoting it properly at launch, but the slate of games on the list for the next six months and beyond has me very excited.

Tags: , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/09/02/newer-ps3s-apparently-use-software-emulation-for-ps2-games/feed/ Brilliant DMCA side effect http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/05/10/brilliant-dmca-side-effect/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/05/10/brilliant-dmca-side-effect/#comments Fri, 11 May 2007 03:23:00 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/05/10/brilliant-dmca-side-effect/ Crappy DRM company says the DMCA forces you to buy their technology instead of building your own because not buying their technology is a circumvention of an effective copyright tool.

The thing is, I think they’re right. I mean, it’s stupid, but then so is the DMCA.

There are some other provisions (which seem to not apply), but the crux of it is:

“No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that–

`(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of
circumventing a technological measure that effectively
controls access to a work protected under this title;”

It explicitly does NOT say “copy the work”, it says “circumvent the technology”. “Circumvent” is not the word they were looking for.

In fact, now that I think about it, convincing someone that DRM is bad is also a violation, as that may be interpreted as offering a service that is primarily design for the purpose of circumventing technological protection. Crap.

http://www.forbes.com/business/feeds/afx/2007/05/10/afx3708595.html

(via boingboing.)

Tags: , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/05/10/brilliant-dmca-side-effect/feed/ Remember when DoubleClick was pretty universally reviled and sued for privacy violations a few years back? http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/14/remember-when-doubleclick-was-pretty-universally-reviled-and-sued-for-privacy-violations-a-few-years-back/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/14/remember-when-doubleclick-was-pretty-universally-reviled-and-sued-for-privacy-violations-a-few-years-back/#comments Sat, 14 Apr 2007 14:49:46 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/14/remember-when-doubleclick-was-pretty-universally-reviled-and-sued-for-privacy-violations-a-few-years-back/ Oh yeah.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/14/technology/14deal.html?ex=1334203200&en=d94eb7f788b32db5&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/14/remember-when-doubleclick-was-pretty-universally-reviled-and-sued-for-privacy-violations-a-few-years-back/feed/ Cadbury got busted for reducing the size of the Creme Egg and then lying about it http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/13/cadbury-got-busted-for-reducing-the-size-of-the-creme-egg-and-then-lying-about-it/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/13/cadbury-got-busted-for-reducing-the-size-of-the-creme-egg-and-then-lying-about-it/#comments Fri, 13 Apr 2007 20:31:28 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/13/cadbury-got-busted-for-reducing-the-size-of-the-creme-egg-and-then-lying-about-it/ I used to get a Cadbury Creme Egg a year about the same time I had my annual McRib. Since I’ve realized over the course of the past few years that you’re only supposed to eat food, I didn’t know that Cadbury reduced the size of the Creme Egg this year. And then they lied about it! And they blamed it on the increasing size of their consumers (possibly from eating too many Creme Eggs)! And then they got busted on National TV! At least they could have had the dignity to release the “New Creme Egg”, and then release the “Creme Egg Classic” in the smaller form factor when people complained about the new formula.

http://consumerist.com/consumer/cadbury/cadbury-our-eggs-arent-smaller-you-are-bigger-250559.php

Tags: , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/13/cadbury-got-busted-for-reducing-the-size-of-the-creme-egg-and-then-lying-about-it/feed/ New in Photoshop CS3 - “Quick Selection Tool” http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/09/new-in-photoshop-cs3-quick-selection-tool/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/09/new-in-photoshop-cs3-quick-selection-tool/#comments Mon, 09 Apr 2007 16:07:56 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/09/new-in-photoshop-cs3-quick-selection-tool/ They took the best of the magic wand, color range selection, magnetic lasso, and channel selection, and rolled it all up into a new kind of brush - the quick selection tool.

You paint with the brush for broad strokes to define your selection, then you have a dialog box to refine the edge with radius, contrast, smoothing, feathering, and contrast selectors, with 5 kinds of masked preview. (Also, it appears that the Refine Edges dialog is also available on all of the other selection tools.)

This alone is worth the price of the upgrade.

Documentation is non-existent in the beta, but I found this tutorial:

http://www.photoshopcafe.com/cs3/qs.htm

Tags: , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/09/new-in-photoshop-cs3-quick-selection-tool/feed/ The end of DRM is nigh http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/02/the-end-of-drm-is-nigh/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/02/the-end-of-drm-is-nigh/#comments Mon, 02 Apr 2007 16:27:57 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/02/the-end-of-drm-is-nigh/ The iTunes store is about to start selling the entire EMI catalog DRM-free. It’s slightly more expensive, but also higher quality.

This completely destroys the rationale behind having any DRM at all. It can’t be because they’re afraid of the higher quality recordings getting out, because those are the ones they’re releasing without DRM. All that remains is shafting the customer, which is of course all that DRM is actually good for.

http://www.boingboing.net/2007/04/02/itunes_store_will_se.html

Tags: , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/04/02/the-end-of-drm-is-nigh/feed/ ISPs apparently sell your clickstream data http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/16/isps-apparently-sell-your-clickstream-data/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/16/isps-apparently-sell-your-clickstream-data/#comments Fri, 16 Mar 2007 18:10:37 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/16/isps-apparently-sell-your-clickstream-data/ Apparently, “anonymized” clickstream data (the urls of which websites you visited and in what order) is available for sale directly from many ISPs. There is no way that this is sufficiently anonymized. It is readily obvious from reading my clickstream who I am - urls for MANY online services contain usernames, and anyone who uses any sort of online service is almost certainly visiting their own presence far more than anything else. All it takes is one of those usernames to be tied to a real name, and your entire clickstream becomes un-anonymized, irreversibly and forever.

I’ve talked about the dangers of breaking anonymization with leaking keys before:

Short answer: It is not enough to say that a piece of data is not “personally identifiable” if it is unique and exists with a piece of personally identifiable data somewhere else. More importantly, it doesn’t even have to be unique or completely personally identifiable - whether or not you can guess who a person is from a piece of data is not a black and white distinction, and simply being able to guess who a person might be can leak some information that might confirm their identity when combined with something else.

This is also completely setting aside the fact that you have very little direct control over much of your clickstream, since there are all sorts of ways for a site you visit to get your browser to load things - popups, javascript includes, and images being the most prevalent.

Preserving anonymity is hard. This is an egregious breach of privacy. Expect lawsuits if this is true.

http://internet.seekingalpha.com/article/29449

Tags: , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/16/isps-apparently-sell-your-clickstream-data/feed/ The Penny Gap is the difference between free and mostly free http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/14/the-penny-gap-is-the-difference-between-free-and-mostly-free/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/14/the-penny-gap-is-the-difference-between-free-and-mostly-free/#comments Wed, 14 Mar 2007 16:16:51 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/14/the-penny-gap-is-the-difference-between-free-and-mostly-free/ Interesting post about the Penny Gap. I think this is directly related to a similar concept which might be called the Unlimited Chasm.

http://redeye.firstround.com/2007/03/the_first_penny.html

The Penny Gap says that if your service is actually free, it will have a much greater uptake than one that is merely very very cheap. Rather than being a smooth curve up the value chain, there’s a quantum shift between “free” and “costs anything”. I think this is largely due to the implicit value factoring of the “cost” (in effort) of the transaction. If you could just wave your hand and pay a penny for something without getting out your credit card number or typing in your password, it seems like this gap would largely disappear.

There’s a similar effect at play when dealing with “unlimited” services. If you have to pay for usage, it takes a lot of mental effort to add up everything you’re paying and make sure you’re not over a certain amount. If you don’t, and have an unlimited plan, that mental effort goes away. Even if the unlimited service is more expensive than you’d pay with metered service, there’s less hesitation to use it because you never have to worry about keeping track of it. I feel like this effect is less prominent on services that give you constant feedback about how much you’ve used. Presumably the extra security of insurance of not ever going above a certain limit has some value to it as well.

Free and unlimited are obviously closely related, mentally and emotionally. I’ll have to think about this some more.

Tags: , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/03/14/the-penny-gap-is-the-difference-between-free-and-mostly-free/feed/ My Windows Vista “review” http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/02/28/my-windows-vista-review/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/02/28/my-windows-vista-review/#comments Thu, 01 Mar 2007 03:23:21 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/02/28/my-windows-vista-review/ I haven’t run Vista. I have no intention of doing so. Here’s my “review” anyway:

SCANNER COMPATIBILITY PROBLEMS?!? What year is it?!?

What a total embarassment.

Tags: , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/02/28/my-windows-vista-review/feed/ Gorillapod - yes! http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/18/gorillapod-yes/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/18/gorillapod-yes/#comments Thu, 18 Jan 2007 14:11:27 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/18/gorillapod-yes/ I’ve been continually unhappy with all of the ultraportable tripods I’ve bought. They’re too heavy, not flexible enough, take too long to set up, and the smaller ones won’t support my big camera. The gorillapod fixes all of that. It’s incredibly light, totally portable, and even sufficiently adjustable to wrap around small objects (benches, railings, bike frame, etc…). It is, in short, the best portable tripod I’ve ever seen.

It comes in three sizes:

http://www.gorillapod.com/

I got the DSLR-Zoom for my big camera (which holds up to 6 lbs.) and the regular size for my little pocket cam (which is more portable). I’m a big fan of Canon’s wireless flash system, so this also seems like a great way to mount a remote flash in an inconspicious location.

Regular (digicams and flashes):
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000EVSLRO/002-0315298-6861671?ie=UTF8&tag=buyadam-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=B000EVSLRO

DSLR (no zoom):
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000HAVVFG/002-0315298-6861671?ie=UTF8&tag=buyadam-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=B000HAVVFG

DSLR-Zoom:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000KFRSG4/002-0315298-6861671?ie=UTF8&tag=buyadam-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=B000KFRSG4

Tags: , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/18/gorillapod-yes/feed/ Don’t look at the Fnords http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/12/dont-look-at-the-fnords/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/12/dont-look-at-the-fnords/#comments Fri, 12 Jan 2007 14:50:44 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/12/dont-look-at-the-fnords/ Robert Anton Wilson is dead.

http://robertantonwilson.blogspot.com/2007/01/raw-essence.html

I can’t say enough about the importance of his writing to our national culture of weirdness. He will be missed.

Tags: , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/12/dont-look-at-the-fnords/feed/ iPhony http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/10/iphony/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/10/iphony/#comments Wed, 10 Jan 2007 23:29:21 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/10/iphony/ Cisco owns the trademark on “iPhone”. Apple was apparently in negotiations to license the term, but had not actually completed doing so prior to the product announcement. Negotations would not seem to be going well, as Cisco has filed a suit against Apple for trademark infringment:

http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2007/corp_011007.html

Tags: , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2007/01/10/iphony/feed/ Google has your logs (and all it took was a fart lighting video) http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/10/google-has-your-logs-and-all-it-took-was-a-fart-lighting-video/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/10/google-has-your-logs-and-all-it-took-was-a-fart-lighting-video/#comments Tue, 10 Oct 2006 19:06:26 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/10/google-has-your-logs-and-all-it-took-was-a-fart-lighting-video/ The non-obvious side of Google’s purchase of YouTube: Google now has access to the hit logs of every page that a YouTube video appears on, including LOTS of pages that were probably previously inaccessible to them. MySpace pages were probably going to get Google ads anyway, because of the big deal that happened there, but many others weren’t.

Add this to AdSense, the Google Web Accelerator, Google Web Analytics, and Google Maps, and that’s a lot of data being collected about browsing habits, and the number of sites you can browse without sending some data to Google has just dropped significantly.

Previously:

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/03/detailed-survey-of-verbatim-answers-from-aol-ms-yahoo-and-google-about-what-details-they-store/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/30/flickr-pictures-web-beacons-and-a-modest-proposal/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/29/whats-the-big-fuss-about-ip-addresses/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/27/google-does-keep-cookie-and-ip-correlated-logs/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/26/does-google-keep-logs-of-personal-data/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2005/11/21/google-really-wants-your-logs/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/2005/05/05/google-wants-your-logs/

http://www.aquick.org/blog/index.php?s=google&submit=Search

Tags: , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/10/google-has-your-logs-and-all-it-took-was-a-fart-lighting-video/feed/ 400D support is out with ACR Camera RAW 3.6 http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/07/400d-support-is-out-with-acr-camera-raw-36/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/07/400d-support-is-out-with-acr-camera-raw-36/#comments Sat, 07 Oct 2006 16:17:57 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/07/400d-support-is-out-with-acr-camera-raw-36/ It’s a beautiful thing. I downloaded the ACR 3.6 update (still beta, but seems stable), and the output on the 400D shots is very very good.

As predicted, with a decent RAW converter, the evident noise is strongly diminished, and the noise that remains is very very fine and can be easily removed with Noise Ninja.

Here’s a shot I took at ISO 800 with no flash:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fields/262621826/

Get the update here:

http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/cameraraw.html

Tags: , , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/10/07/400d-support-is-out-with-acr-camera-raw-36/feed/ The state of Adobe RAW processing for the Canon 400D http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/27/the-state-of-adobe-raw-processing-for-the-canon-400d/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/27/the-state-of-adobe-raw-processing-for-the-canon-400d/#comments Wed, 27 Sep 2006 22:01:51 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/27/the-state-of-adobe-raw-processing-for-the-canon-400d/ Camera RAW 3.5 doesnt support it. Camera RAW 3.6 will be out “soon”. My results with the Canon DPP processor have been pretty dismal. Lightroom Beta 4 is out, which does support it, but I haven’t really played with it yet, as it got a bit choked up (but hasn’t crashed yet) when I threw my 30,000+ photos into its library.

Some comments from Thomas Knoll (the man):

http://www.adobeforums.com/cgi-bin/webx?13@@.3bb6a869.3bc1b01e/0

Tags: , , , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/27/the-state-of-adobe-raw-processing-for-the-canon-400d/feed/ GOOD Magazine http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/20/good-magazine/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/20/good-magazine/#comments Wed, 20 Sep 2006 14:59:07 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/20/good-magazine/ One of the projects I’m working on is GOOD Magazine. We have some incredible things planned for their site in the next few months, and there will be future updates about that. In the meantime, the magazine itself is pretty good. The first issue has come out, and it’s an interesting read. These guys are genuinely interested in the phenomenon of doing good, and they’ve uncovered some great stories.

For a $20 subscription, you get a year’s subscription (six issues), and 100% of your subscription fee goes to your choice of 12 partner organizations.

http://www.goodmagazine.com/subscribe/why/

Tags: , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/20/good-magazine/feed/ Amazon Unbox is a travesty http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/17/amazon-unbox-is-a-travesty/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/17/amazon-unbox-is-a-travesty/#comments Sun, 17 Sep 2006 15:13:45 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/17/amazon-unbox-is-a-travesty/ I was going to write something about this, but Cory beat me to it.

http://www.boingboing.net/2006/09/15/amazon_unbox_to_cust.html

Amazon Unbox has the worst terms of service I’ve seen in a long time. Like Cory, I’m a longtime Amazon supporter, and I think their customer service is outstanding, and this is a travesty. Way to fuck over the people who won’t actually read the terms because they just want to download a movie.

I only really have one thing to add with respect to the “if it has value then we have a right to charge money for it” proposition. Does the MPAA reserve the right to charge more retroactively if you enjoy a movie more than you expected to? That’s hidden value, right? This madness has to stop.

Mr. Bezos, you should be ashamed of yourself, and also whoever you put in charge of this.

Tags: , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/17/amazon-unbox-is-a-travesty/feed/ Why Johnny Can’t Code http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/14/why-johnny-cant-code/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/14/why-johnny-cant-code/#comments Thu, 14 Sep 2006 14:19:47 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/14/why-johnny-cant-code/ any]]> Interesting article by David Brin from Salon today on the lack of an educational consensus on what constitutes “the learning language”, or indeed >any< learning language at all.

http://salon.com/tech/feature/2006/09/14/basic/index.html

It used to be BASIC - textbooks of other subjects had BASIC programs in them to try out, and it was installed everywhere. Even my Intellivision, one of the early game consoles, had a BASIC module.

Sure, it’s not good for teaching you about any modern programming concepts, but that’s less important in the beginning than understanding how computers fundamentally work.

There’s been a lot of ranting recently about how kids these days can’t program because all they learn is Java and they never get near the guts of the computer itself (because why should they learn something they’re never going to use?), but I think I agree with Brin’s point - it’s deeper than that. The prevailing opinion is that languages that force you to understand what they’re doing are not only useless but obsolete. The analogy to eating your seed corn is apt - we’re cutting off an entire generation from the hacker tools they need in order to learn how to do interesting stuff with technology instead of just put other people’s pieces together (and people who have never learned the basics are far more likely to be stumped when something doesn’t behave as they expect).

I’m not sure what the answer to this is, really, but it’s definitely worth discussing.

Tags: , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/09/14/why-johnny-cant-code/feed/ Doing what the terrorists want http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/25/doing-what-the-terrorists-want/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/25/doing-what-the-terrorists-want/#comments Fri, 25 Aug 2006 21:24:07 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/25/doing-what-the-terrorists-want/ I’ve often said that terrorism is an auto-immune disease afflicting civilization. Bruce Schneier has a great article up about how responding to terrorism by locking things down is, in fact, exactly what the terrorists want.

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/08/what_the_terror.html

Tags: , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/25/doing-what-the-terrorists-want/feed/ An important lesson about key races http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/18/an-important-lesson-about-key-races/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/18/an-important-lesson-about-key-races/#comments Fri, 18 Aug 2006 15:13:36 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/18/an-important-lesson-about-key-races/ WAS]]> Britt pointed me at this piece about how Lieberman still has very strong support:

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/009461.php

There’s an important lesson in here. When you hang principles on a single race, and then lose, the principle goes with the race and suffers a horrible blow. This >WAS< the Dean mistake - it represented the internet way, and everybody fled when he lost, and how long has it taken that approach to recover its reputation?

When Lieberman wins, the ENTIRE “unseat the incumbents” approach dies a horrible death, in one single event.

How to dissociate the principles from the individual race?

Tags: , , , , ,

]]> http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/08/18/an-important-lesson-about-key-races/feed/ Addressing the lamentations of the local http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/30/addressing-the-lamentations-of-the-local/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/30/addressing-the-lamentations-of-the-local/#comments Fri, 30 Jun 2006 14:27:16 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/30/addressing-the-lamentations-of-the-local/ Meg says it’s too expensive to shop locally:

http://www.megnut.com/2006/06/the-expense-of-eating-local

I have some responses to this.

1) The Union Square greenmarket is, in my experience, significantly more expensive than the other satellite markets throughout the city. There are a few possible reasons for this - it might draw the more expensive farms which sell different but slightly more expensive varietals of the same produce, the thriving restaurant business in the area could be a factor, or it could just be fame. What I do know is that everyone I know who shops at the USGM says “hey, this stuff is really expensive” far more than the people who don’t. I’d suggest doing some comparison shopping at other markets.

2) There are regional variations in the growing season and only the most prime produce will be at better prices. The berry season has barely started here in NY, so they’re more expensive. But lettuce, greens, beans, and cucumbers are all MUCH cheaper at my green market than the supermarket, and much higher quality. You’ve got to pick your battles. One exception I’ve found to this has been tomatoes. Local tomatoes are outrageously expensive compared to shipped tomatoes. But on the other hand, they’re incomparable, because tomatoes were not meant to be shipped. They are completely different beasts. $3/lb for local tomatoes is an indulgence I’ll gladly pay to consume what I consider to be among the most pleasurable culinary experiences we have available to us. The depth of flavor and delicate texture in a local tomato is simply something you can’t get for any price nonlocally, because what it must go through to survive shipping destroys its unique characteristics. I feel the same way about Ronnybrook Farms milk. It’s pretty expensive compared to other milks, but that’s only if you assume that because they have the same name that they’re somehow the same product. They’re not.

3) There’s a lot to be said about the freshness and fridge life of fruits and vegetables purchased locally. If you’re actually going to eat it in a day or two, the quality will likely be unmatched by anything you can find even at Whole Foods. On top of that, a head of lettuce purchased at Whole Foods will last maybe 3-5 days in the fridge before it starts to wilt, but I’ve eaten lettuce purchased two weeks prior from the farmer’s market, and it’s always still crisp and green.

    Tags: , , , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/30/addressing-the-lamentations-of-the-local/feed/     New Thunderbird function - Group By Sort http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/29/new-thunderbird-function-group-by-sort/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/29/new-thunderbird-function-group-by-sort/#comments Thu, 29 Jun 2006 13:22:23 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/29/new-thunderbird-function-group-by-sort/ I noticed that sometime recently, Thunderbird added a new item to the View menu - Group By Sort. (If you don’t see it, it’s time to upgrade. If it’s greyed out, you need to choose a different sort key.)

    This is really cool!

    If you’re sorted by date, the mailbox displays as groups characteristic of the message date - Today, Yesterday, Last Week, Two Weeks Ago, Old Mail.

    If you’re sorted by sender, you get a group for each sender.

    Now, we only need the ability to sort the groups separately…

    Tags: , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/29/new-thunderbird-function-group-by-sort/feed/     I’m about to waste your whole day (and your wallet won’t like me either) http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/23/im-about-to-waste-your-whole-day-and-your-wallet-wont-like-me-either/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/23/im-about-to-waste-your-whole-day-and-your-wallet-wont-like-me-either/#comments Fri, 23 Jun 2006 14:48:55 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/23/im-about-to-waste-your-whole-day-and-your-wallet-wont-like-me-either/ Pandora is a music recommendation network.

    It’s extremely easy to use.

    You tell it a song or artist you like, and it builds you a customized “station” based on songs that are like that. At each song, you tell it whether you like it or not, and it learns. Alternately, you can branch off a new station based on any song playing.

    I have not yet signed up or reviewed the privacy policy, but this seems intensely cool.

    http://www.pandora.com

    Also, it’s integrated with the Squeezebox, which I’ve recently obtained, and about which I’ll be writing a full review.

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/23/im-about-to-waste-your-whole-day-and-your-wallet-wont-like-me-either/feed/     Opera 9 is out http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/21/opera-9-is-out/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/21/opera-9-is-out/#comments Wed, 21 Jun 2006 18:00:35 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/21/opera-9-is-out/ I’m a huge fan of Opera; I’ve been using it on an off since around version 2. It got really good at version 5, and became my primary browser of choice until I switched to Firefox because version 7 was crap. But version 8 was great again, and now 9 is a big improvement over that. It’s fast, it’s smooth, standards support is better, they made some usability fixes, and it’s pleasant. I haven’t really delved into widgets yet, but those seem well-suited to being in the browser instead of in some standalone app.

    http://www.opera.com

    Also, the development team is blogging. They’ve been releasing weekly snapshots, most of which have been great, leading up to this release. They’ll continue doing so going forward.

    Congratulations, guys!

    http://my.opera.com/desktopteam/blog/

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/21/opera-9-is-out/feed/     All video is suspect http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/20/all-video-is-suspect/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/20/all-video-is-suspect/#comments Tue, 20 Jun 2006 15:18:20 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/20/all-video-is-suspect/ Fascinating movie about the process of making Marlon Brando speak new lines for Superman Returns.

    Remember when you first realized that everything you saw in a photo could be faked and you couldn’t tell the difference? It’s here for video too.

    http://raincloud.warnerbros.com/wbmovies/supermanreturns/jor_el/jor_el_large.mov

    Tags: , , , , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/20/all-video-is-suspect/feed/     Google Government search http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/16/google-government-search/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/16/google-government-search/#comments Fri, 16 Jun 2006 14:42:19 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/16/google-government-search/ I think it’s simultaneously good that Google is turning a watchful eye on the government, but also somewhat creepy that they’re putting themselves in the position of proxying people’s access to potentially sensitive information. I do NOT think that the Google privacy policy is sufficient to cover this situation.

    As many have predicted, this is also likely to expose some interesting accidentally unprotected things at some point in the future.

    http://www.google.com/ig/usgov

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/16/google-government-search/feed/     Support local farms by joining a CSA program. http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/14/support-local-farms-by-joining-a-csa-program/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/14/support-local-farms-by-joining-a-csa-program/#comments Thu, 15 Jun 2006 02:52:27 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/14/support-local-farms-by-joining-a-csa-program/ We finally got around to signing up for a CSA share this year.

    I strongly support the concept in principle - you buy a “share” of a small local sustainable farm, and in return you get a portion of the harvest every week (or two weeks, depending), for the duration of the growing season, which is usually June through October for NYC. For the one near us, this seems to be an assortment of about 7-10 vegetables plus 2-3 fruits (which are two separate shares). You have to go to the drop location to pick up.

    We picked up our first drop tonight. It was a bit sparse, but it’s still very early in the season and I expect that the volume will pick up over the summer.

    What we got this week:

    5 garlic scapes
    a small bunch of red radishes
    about a gallon ziploc bag of mesclun greens
    about a gallon ziploc bag of escarole
    about a gallon ziploc bag of spinach
    1 pint of sugar snap peas
    5 rhubarb stalks
    2 pints of strawberries

    We also got the fresh flower share, which was just a bunch of assorted flowers. For $6 a week, this is definitely cheaper than any florist around here.

    We ate the radishes and some strawberries tonight. The radishes were intensely peppery raw, but cooked up nicely braised with butter, balsamic vinegar and chicken stock. The strawberries are among the best I’ve ever had. Not yet prime of the season, and small, but again, very intensely flavored.

    Depending on whether the portion sizes increase, I suspect that the prices are going to be about equal to going to the farmer’s market, but I like the idea of supporting a farm directly. This is somewhat of an experiment; we’ll see how it goes.

    If you’re interested in this, it may not be too late to sign up, but do it ASAP. This is the NYC one; if you’re not in NYC, you might be able to find a local program by searching for CSA.

    http://www.justfood.org/csa/locations/

    Tags: , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/14/support-local-farms-by-joining-a-csa-program/feed/     Software radio is here, and it’s open source http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/05/software-radio-is-here-and-its-open-source/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/05/software-radio-is-here-and-its-open-source/#comments Mon, 05 Jun 2006 19:15:04 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/05/software-radio-is-here-and-its-open-source/ I’ve been talking about software radio for a while, and wondering when it would become cheap. Basically, all wireless devices are just radios of different kinds, and there’s no theoretical reason why one device couldn’t talk to them all. Except that it was prohibitively expensive, but apparently it’s not anymore.

    http://www.wired.com/news/technology/1,70933-0.html

    This is very very cool.

    The software’s open source, and the hardware is cheap:

    http://www.ettus.com/

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/05/software-radio-is-here-and-its-open-source/feed/     The motivations of wiretapping http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/04/the-motivations-of-wiretapping/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/04/the-motivations-of-wiretapping/#comments Sun, 04 Jun 2006 18:33:43 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/04/the-motivations-of-wiretapping/ Boingboing points out this Wired article about a reporter who crashed a conference of wiretapping providers, mentioning this quotation in particular:

    ‘He sneered again. “Do you think for a minute that Bush would let legal issues stop him from doing surveillance? He’s got to prevent a terrorist attack that everyone knows is coming. He’ll do absolutely anything he thinks is going to work. And so would you. So why are you bothering these guys?”‘

    It’s an interesting read, but I fundamentally disagree with the above statement, and this is the problem.

    It’s not the surveillance that bothers me, it’s the resistance to oversight, even after the fact.

    If there was any confidence that what they were doing was a reasonable tradeoff, they wouldn’t have to a) lie or b) break the law to do it. Yet they’ve done both of these things.

    If the law enforcement community said “well shit, we’re out of ideas about how to stop these people, and so we really need to have our computers read everyone’s email and tap everyone’s phones and we guarantee that this information won’t be used for anything else, and anyone we find doing something nefarious will be dealt with according to due process”, then we could, you know, engage in a meaningful discussion about this. And then we could move on to the fact that “terrorist” is not a useful designation for a criminal, and then maybe we could fire the people who thought up this brilliant idea and find someone who would practice actual security because wholesale surveillance and profiling have been widely debunked as largely useless for anything besides persecution, political attacks, and invasions of privacy.

    But we won’t, because that’s not what this is about.

    This opinion of a member of the Dutch National Police is particularly telling:

    ‘He said that in the Netherlands, communications intercept capabilities are advanced and well established, and yet, in practice, less problematic than in many other countries. “Our legal system is more transparent,” he said, “so we can do what we need to do without controversy. Transparency makes law enforcement easier, not more difficult.”

    The technology exists, it’s not going away, and it’s really not the problem. The secrecy is the problem.

    http://www.wired.com/news/technology/1,71022-1.html

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/06/04/the-motivations-of-wiretapping/feed/     Better presentation of search results http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/31/better-presentation-of-search-results/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/31/better-presentation-of-search-results/#comments Wed, 31 May 2006 17:40:06 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/31/better-presentation-of-search-results/ I just happened to notice that Clusty, which I’ve been using for searching for the past few months (their privacy policy is better than the others, although not perfect, and the results are mostly indistinguishable from Google’s or Yahoo’s), has some neat little buttons next to each result that are totally unobtrusive, to the point that I only even realized they were there today, but also extremely useful.

    Two of them are kind of standard (open in a new window, and view the cluster for the search result), but the other one is so mindbogglingly obvious that I’m ashamed that they don’t all do this.

    It’s preview. Click it and the link opens up in a small frame underneath the result without leaving the page. Even PDFs.

    Duh.

    http://www.clusty.com

    Tags: , , , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/31/better-presentation-of-search-results/feed/     10,000 sheep drawn by the Amazon Mechanical Turk service http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/25/10000-sheep-drawn-by-the-amazon-mechanical-turk-service/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/25/10000-sheep-drawn-by-the-amazon-mechanical-turk-service/#comments Thu, 25 May 2006 15:04:50 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/25/10000-sheep-drawn-by-the-amazon-mechanical-turk-service/ Definitely click the “More…” link.

    http://www.thesheepmarket.com/

    This is indicative of something, but I’m not sure what.

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/25/10000-sheep-drawn-by-the-amazon-mechanical-turk-service/feed/     Good articles on using RAID1 with linux http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/23/good-articles-on-using-raid1-with-linux/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/23/good-articles-on-using-raid1-with-linux/#comments Tue, 23 May 2006 12:29:45 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/23/good-articles-on-using-raid1-with-linux/ I have my big data drives on a RAID5 array, but they can’t boot individually if the array fails. RAID1 addresses that problem.

    These links are helpful for migrating an existing system to using a RAID1 boot/root disk setup.

    That first is particularly good, as it details how to set up the array with a failed member initially so you can get it set up, copy your data to it on the new drive, then add your existing drive to it, without overwriting your existing contents. I haven’t tried it yet, but the instructions look right. The others are about using grub with RAID1 drives.

    http://www.debian-administration.org/articles/238
    http://www.doorbot.com/guides/linux/x86/grubraid/
    http://www.linuxsa.org.au/mailing-list/2003-07/1270.html

    Tags: , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/23/good-articles-on-using-raid1-with-linux/feed/     Privacy without hiding http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/19/privacy-without-hiding/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/19/privacy-without-hiding/#comments Fri, 19 May 2006 13:57:49 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/19/privacy-without-hiding/ Excellent article from Bruce Schneier on why privacy is important, even if “you have nothing to hide”.

    ‘We do nothing wrong when we make love or go to the bathroom. We are not deliberately hiding anything when we seek out private places for reflection or conversation. We keep private journals, sing in the privacy of the shower, and write letters to secret lovers and then burn them. Privacy is a basic human need.’

    http://www.wired.com/news/columns/1,70886-0.html

    Privacy is freedom. It is freedom from judgement, the freedom to stew in our own individual cognitive juices, the freedom to express and learn and argue.

    Tags: , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/19/privacy-without-hiding/feed/     Musings on Consumer Content Experience (or sometimes, maybe you need a brand) http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/18/musings-on-consumer-content-experience-or-sometimes-maybe-you-need-a-brand/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/18/musings-on-consumer-content-experience-or-sometimes-maybe-you-need-a-brand/#comments Thu, 18 May 2006 20:00:04 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/?p=1102 Doc Searls gave an interesting closing keynote talk on the Live Web at the Syndicate conference yesterday. He started with search engines and how they index the static web, but they’re also branching off into indexing the live web via blog search and rss (not sure I agree, but more on that later). From there, he drew further dichotomies between marketing and participation/demand, and publishing as a finished product and blogging as a provisional conversation. All of this centers around his assertion that the Live Web is (or will be) a dynamic expression of the demand side of the equation fulfilling its own needs. Instead of a value chain, you get a value constellation, where each star participates in the network, and in between is freedom. I like that metaphor, and it flowed right into his main point that the Live Web economy consists of two halves - the attention economy and the intention economy. In the Live Web, consumers not only command where they look (attention), but are also in control when they’re ready to buy (intention).

    The intention economy hasn’t really arrived. As a customer (no longer “consumer”), when you’ve decided what you’re going to buy, you still have to go find someplace to buy it. In the intention economy, you should be able to announce your intention to buy, and companies who are selling will come looking for you. We’re getting closer to that - shopping comparison sites help, but they’re still static snapshots. What’s needed is a dynamic marketplace around these ideas. Incidentally, that’s why I don’t necessarily think that blog search is a marker of the Live Web - RSS feeds aren’t interactive. They’re push, to be sure, so you get more updated static information, but like the shopping comparison sites, they’re still just static snapshots. On the other hand, getting people used to having some automated process working in the background is a step in the right direction.

    The existence of branding is tied very closely into this. In a certain sense, a brand exists primarily to help make products seem better than they are, by associating them with other things that are known to be good. If you already know what you want to buy, maybe you’re past this point, and it’s more honest to do without. As a counter example, consider these two products, which are made by the same company and basically identical. One’s a piece of foam sex furniture for adults, and one’s a piece of foam gaming furniture for kids. Esse vs. Zerk. Same product, two very different uses. Brands serve to make the distinction. Does the fact that the same product has two different names for two different audiences make a difference? I’ll have to think about that one some more. Incidentally, if you switch the marketing copy on those two pages, it’s really funny.

    (Who wants to help me come up with a brand for my spool-fed bacon-wrapped CPU cooling scheme? You have to refresh the bacon every once in a while, but on the plus side, it’s tasty.)

    Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/18/musings-on-consumer-content-experience-or-sometimes-maybe-you-need-a-brand/feed/     New “security glitch” found in Diebold voting systems http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/11/new-security-glitch-found-in-diebold-voting-systems/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/11/new-security-glitch-found-in-diebold-voting-systems/#comments Thu, 11 May 2006 14:08:34 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/11/new-security-glitch-found-in-diebold-voting-systems/ “Elections officials in several states are scrambling to understand and limit the risk from a “dangerous” security hole found in Diebold Election Systems Inc.’s ATM-like touch-screen voting machines.

    The hole is considered more worrisome than most security problems discovered on modern voting machines, such as weak encryption, easily pickable locks and use of the same, weak password nationwide.”

    Perhaps it’s time to acknowledge that the Diebold systems themselves ARE the security glitch.

    http://www.insidebayarea.com/ci_3805089

    Tags: , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/11/new-security-glitch-found-in-diebold-voting-systems/feed/     Bosses generally suck http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/08/bosses-generally-suck/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/08/bosses-generally-suck/#comments Mon, 08 May 2006 21:19:59 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/08/bosses-generally-suck/ Hah, fooled you. This is a gaming post, not a business post. Wired article on the greatness of boss battles:

    http://www.wired.com/news/columns/1,70832-0.html

    I disagree. I often find the boss battles to be the most tedious parts of the game. Instead of another interesting level, you’re treated to a 10-30 minute repetetive motion fest until you can find the one pattern that works against the increasingly overpowered enemy.

    Sometimes, this is well done, but often not. I’d feel better about them if the boss battles required a little strategy or intelligence beyond “Find the four switches/weak spots/colors, hit them in order, then the boss will reveal the little extra boss inside the other boss and you can kill that too. And once you figure out the trick, the next three are all exactly the same as the first one, and between doing these tasks, you have to run in circles to avoid the predictable fireballs/rocks/energy blasts.”

    The Vizier in Prince of Persia 3? Nope, I don’t think so. That battle almost killed me with its tedium alone. I could almost hear Hank Azaria’s character narrating along between hits … “dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge!” And to add insult to injury, after a fantastic game about sand powers and time travel, you get to use almost none of those interesting powers, because there’s no refill sand during the battle. Bleh.

    God of War was refreshing in this instance, by accident. They had to leave some of the bosses out due to time pressure, and I’ve never been so relieved as I was when progressing from one really interesting level to another really interesting level without another button masher in the middle.

    The boss battles should be woven into the pace of the game, not grind it to a halt. Integrate the boss battles into everything else. Have other stuff going on at the same time. Punctuate it. Don’t make me start all over unless I do every single keypress right. If the way to kill the boss is to find the pattern and do something specific more than once, you’ve done something wrong. When done well, boss battles can be interesting. But they rarely are anything more than a placeholder for a lack of gameplay imagination.

    Tags: , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/08/bosses-generally-suck/feed/     Original Star Wars coming to DVD in September http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/04/original-star-wars-coming-to-dvd-in-september/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/04/original-star-wars-coming-to-dvd-in-september/#comments Thu, 04 May 2006 14:40:25 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/04/original-star-wars-coming-to-dvd-in-september/ I have two things to say about this.

    1:

    The original films’ video quality will not match up to that of the restored versions. “It is state of the art, as of 1993, and that’s not as good as state of the art 2006,” Ward said.

    You have no idea why we like Star Wars, do you?

    Wait… what was that? 1993?

    2:
    Two-disc special editions? Come ON. Everyone who’s going to buy this either already has the revised DVD edition, or doesn’t want it.

    http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?id=35855

    Tags: , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/05/04/original-star-wars-coming-to-dvd-in-september/feed/     US Mandatory Data Retention laws are coming http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/30/us-mandatory-data-retention-laws-are-coming/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/30/us-mandatory-data-retention-laws-are-coming/#comments Sun, 30 Apr 2006 14:35:48 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/30/us-mandatory-data-retention-laws-are-coming/ Remember the privacy implications of the government asking Google for search data? (http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/19/doj-demands-large-chunk-of-google-data/)

    It’s going to get worse before it gets better. No online service considers your IP address to be private information, and now they will be required to maintain logs mapping your IP address to real contact information, for a period of at least one year after your account is closed.

    The only way to prevent this information from being misused is to not keep it, and now there won’t be any choice.

    http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/200604/msg00176.html

    I’ve discussed this before:

    http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/29/whats-the-big-fuss-about-ip-addresses/

    Tags: , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/30/us-mandatory-data-retention-laws-are-coming/feed/     Thoughts on questions every high school student should be able to answer http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/25/thoughts-on-questions-every-high-school-student-should-be-able-to-answer/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/25/thoughts-on-questions-every-high-school-student-should-be-able-to-answer/#comments Tue, 25 Apr 2006 21:29:37 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/25/thoughts-on-questions-every-high-school-student-should-be-able-to-answer/ The Star Tribune wrote a fluff piece asking scientists to come up with their (seemingly) most disappointing question that every high schooler should be able to answer. (via Kottke)

    http://www.startribune.com/389/story/369290.html

    MJD (hey, man - what happened to Advocacy?) rightly savages the list:

    http://www.plover.com/blog/physics/questions.html

    The analysis is mostly very strong. My only complaint is that he failed to note that evolution doesn’t actually “choose” anything, and saying that it does is just typical “owning the terminology” ID doublespeak.

    And what is up with that last paragraph in the article about family life interfering with remembering things you learned in high school?

    My choice for this question would probably have been “What is the scientific method?”.

    Tags: , , , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/25/thoughts-on-questions-every-high-school-student-should-be-able-to-answer/feed/     An important first step towards unmanufacturing http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/07/an-important-first-step-towards-unmanufacturing/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/07/an-important-first-step-towards-unmanufacturing/#comments Fri, 07 Apr 2006 16:08:39 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/07/an-important-first-step-towards-unmanufacturing/ Nokia phones are going to use a heat disassembly process that allows them to be broken down into their constituent materials, which can then be separately recycled. It’s not quite unmanufacturing, but it’s the first thing I’ve heard about a step in the right direction.

    http://www.nokia.com/nokia/0,6771,27610,00.html

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/07/an-important-first-step-towards-unmanufacturing/feed/     MIT student told to drop out of school by the RIAA to pay settlement fines http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/06/mit-student-told-to-drop-out-of-school-by-the-riaa-to-pay-settlement-fines/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/06/mit-student-told-to-drop-out-of-school-by-the-riaa-to-pay-settlement-fines/#comments Thu, 06 Apr 2006 15:22:31 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/06/mit-student-told-to-drop-out-of-school-by-the-riaa-to-pay-settlement-fines/ http://www-tech.mit.edu/V126/N15/RIAA1506.html

    Of course, this is nothing compared to the fact that the RIAA says you shouldn’t be allowed to break DRM even if it’s going to kill you if you don’t:

    http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=984

    I’ve discussed this before:

    http://www.aquick.org/blog/2005/08/01/why-i-oppose-drm/

    Tags: , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/06/mit-student-told-to-drop-out-of-school-by-the-riaa-to-pay-settlement-fines/feed/     Impacts of Eolas patent on web pages http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/05/impacts-of-eolas-patent-on-web-pages/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/05/impacts-of-eolas-patent-on-web-pages/#comments Wed, 05 Apr 2006 14:43:41 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/05/impacts-of-eolas-patent-on-web-pages/ Due to a lost patent claim, on April 11th, Active X controls (all embedded objects in IE) will have changed behavior and will require an “activation click” before they can be interacted with.

    http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1943847,00.asp
    http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/?url=/workshop/author/dhtml/overview/activating_activex.asp

    1) This does not affect pure DHTML/javascript, only DHTML/javascript that interacts with embedded applets.

    2) As described in the MS article and some of the links below, it is possible to bypass the restriction by loading the objects from an external page, and this can be automated in some circumstances. Apparently, Adobe/Macromedia is also working on better fixes.

    http://www.macromedia.com/devnet/activecontent/
    http://www.devx.com/webdev/Article/18063
    http://news.com.com/Microsoft+tweaks+browser+to+avoid+liability/2100-1012_3-5980658.html
    http://www.betanews.com/article/Microsoft_Offers_60Day_ActiveX_Reprieve/1143650536

    Tags: , , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/05/impacts-of-eolas-patent-on-web-pages/feed/     Turning off the Blizzard background downloader http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/04/turning-off-the-blizzard-background-downloader/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/04/turning-off-the-blizzard-background-downloader/#comments Tue, 04 Apr 2006 13:10:34 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/04/turning-off-the-blizzard-background-downloader/ Apparently, with a recent update, the Blizzard background downloader defaults to on all the time. Since it uses Bittorrent, this means that even if you’re not actively downloading updates, you’re still using your bandwidth for uploading pieces of it to other players.

    Maybe that’s okay with you, but it really ought to be a personal decision and not something that’s foisted off on you. Here’s how to turn it off if not:

    http://www.blizzard.com/support/wow/?id=aww01954p

    Tags: , , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/04/04/turning-off-the-blizzard-background-downloader/feed/     Greek wiretaps were enabled by embedded spy code http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/03/02/greek-wiretaps-were-enabled-by-embedded-spy-code/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/03/02/greek-wiretaps-were-enabled-by-embedded-spy-code/#comments Thu, 02 Mar 2006 14:47:34 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/03/02/greek-wiretaps-were-enabled-by-embedded-spy-code/ Power, once given, will be abused. And not necessarily by those it’s given to.

    Bruce Schenier has a blog entry about the Greek cell phone tapping scandal - about 100 cell phones of politicians and officials, including the American embassy, have been tapped by an unknown party since the 2004 Olympics.

    Bruce points out that the “malicious code” used to enable this was actually designed into the system as an eavesdropping mechanism for the police.

    “There is an important security lesson here. I have long argued that when you build surveillance mechanisms into communication systems, you invite the bad guys to use those mechanisms for their own purposes. That’s exactly what happened here.”

    http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2006/03/more_on_greek_w.html

    Tags: , , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/03/02/greek-wiretaps-were-enabled-by-embedded-spy-code/feed/     Handy trick for mobile users http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/22/handy-trick-for-mobile-users/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/22/handy-trick-for-mobile-users/#comments Wed, 22 Feb 2006 17:04:44 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/22/handy-trick-for-mobile-users/ I have net access on my phone, but it’s reasonably slow. A click to follow a link is expensive, especially when I just want to look up a word or something.

    I’ve noticed that answers.com and m-w.com are now both supporting putting a query in the url path:

    http://www.answers.com/privacy
    http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/privacy

    Also, there’s gada.be search, which lets you do things like:

    http://privacy.gada.be

    Any others?

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/22/handy-trick-for-mobile-users/feed/     Oil-based lenses on the way http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/07/oil-based-lenses-on-the-way/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/07/oil-based-lenses-on-the-way/#comments Tue, 07 Feb 2006 17:38:38 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/07/oil-based-lenses-on-the-way/ Oil based lenses have the potential to put zoom cameras basically everywhere. Because they require no moving parts, they’re very compact, power efficient, and fast. The digital imaging world is changing fast. Sensors are already tiny , and glass lenses have been an obstacle to miniaturization. Oil based lenses, where the zoom can be adjusted by running a charge through the lens, will fix that problem.

    http://www.phonescoop.com/news/item.php?n=1577

    Tags: , , ,

    ]]>     http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/02/07/oil-based-lenses-on-the-way/feed/     iRAM SATA ramdisk is now available http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/31/iram-sata-ramdisk-is-now-available/ http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/31/iram-sata-ramdisk-is-now-available/#comments Tue, 31 Jan 2006 18:22:38 +0000 adam http://www.aquick.org/blog/2006/01/31/iram-sata-ramdisk-is-now-available/