Non-/Tech. Terminology
As technology becomes more prevalent in our society, I look forward to seeing more technical jargon. That is, technical jargon used correctly but in non-technical situations. Admittedly, we do already have quite a bit and I don’t mean Hollywood’s usuage.
Here are some words and my suggested usage!
While thrashing between watching a mystery movie and baking cookies I missed the main reveal and burnt my cookies.
Sorry I forgot your name, I suffered a stack overflow during Freshman orientation.
I page faulted the directions to the house and had to Google Map it on my mobile phone.
I pwned the jar today by opening it using the hot water trick.
Although chocolate chip cookies have a high latency; they also have a high throughput!
When hosting a party, I tend to wash my table cloth first since it has the highest lead time.
You Have Two Cows: OS Edition
Everyone has heard the “You have two cows” economic breakdown. I feel that this can also be applied to Operating systems.
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Atari DOS: You have two cows, if you knew anything about chickens you could get some milk out of the cows. |
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Windows 2000: You have two cows, you have to hunt down for the associated gear for the cows so much that you don’t like doing anything but the basics. Every once and awhile the cows fall asleep and play dead (some stay that way). |
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Windows XP: You have two cows, they are pretty reliable and produce decent milk. Most gear, even the fun stuff, fits on them well. There are hopes that the rancher you bought them from will improve their training for the next cows. |
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OS 9: You have two cows. Your cows are special in so many ways. They are bright colored and don’t warn you when they suddenly decide to take a nap. Their milk isn’t acceptable to so of your clientele. You become embittered against the rancher that sold them to you. |
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Vista: You have two cows, you must sacrifice one to the “gods” to make the other one look pretty. You get milk that no one likes. |
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OS 10.5/Leopard: You have two cows . . . but do you? You’ve refused the cows outright due to being embittered from OS 9 but some respectable ranchers recommend them. You are still skeptical. (Or maybe it is just me.) Oh, and the cows are pretty. |
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Ubuntu: You have two cows. They are exceptionally trained to help pump as much as they can by farmers just like you, but if you aren’t familiar with them, they can be intimidating. Some gear doesn’t fit on them. |
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Embedded Linux: You have one cow. People shouldn’t expect two cows’ worth of milk from one cow. |
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Windows CE: See Windows 2000. |
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Palm OS: You have two cows. They work great and can stay awake. They are so cutting edge that the other farmers don’t understand you. If you feed them, they’ll give you good milk. |
That’s all I have. All trademarks are owned by their respective owners. All the pictures are linked to where I found them!
My Generation
I look forward to the days of my generations’ “Golden years,” where:
- Rap is “Old peoples’” music
- Nursing homes are set up for LAN parties
- One is considered “hard core” for NOT having a tatoo
- Hearing aides have IP addresses and serve a webpage
- One of my generation can look at a young un’ and say “When I was your age, Pluto was a planet!”
- IPv6 is finally implemented
- My generation is judged by a standard that would seem unrealistic today (eg. “You touched a cigarette! How barbaric!”)
- Cursive handwriting is a lost art
- Children don’t know what pennies are
We’ll see what happens! Let me know if I missed any glaring ones!
Man-vs-Machine
Ever since the Eagle Eye post I’ve been trying to think of story lines with man and machine (in particular artificial intelligence/robots).
Frankenstein Complex (man makes machine, machine threatens man’s existence)
Battlestar Galactica (tagline: Never create what you can’t control)
Bladerunner (could go in the other category . . .)
Asimov (man makes machine, machine helps us discover what it means to be human)
Other (there are some that aren’t man-made)
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Please let me know if I’m missing any robot movies/TV shows that should be here!
Here are some other lists I’ve found:
Forwarding
No one is a stranger to “the forward.” “The forward” has the following characteristics; they usually contain some compelling statement “pads have asbestos” or “Obama is a terrorist.” They proceed to provide “facts” to prove their point sometimes citing “sources”. They are usually not signed and are defamatory in nature.
I want to address the forwarder. Consider “research” as common netiquette. I want to also address the people who receive forwards. You are not free from obligation.
All this being said, I find the people who heavily forward me tend to be people who honestly do want the best for me. They care about me. Forwarding sans research is an easy trap to fall into and made easier by the following dangers.
Danger 1: Dubious Origin
Forwards are often not signed by the author but instead they are sent by a trustworthy friend. The friend would surely not knowingly lie to you. One assumes that the person who sent it to you, or sent it to begin with, did some research. Why do it and repeat the work? I feel like this is akin to waiting at a crosswalk controlled with a button with a crowd of people, when you get there you assume that someone pressed the button. After waiting awhile, you realize no one hit it. Everyone embarrassingly looks at each other sharing the blame for not doing a public service due to the fear of being redundant. This is what sociologists would call “The Free-rider Problem.”
Origins are further obfuscated by the main mode of e-mailing itself; good old SMTP. It indeed lives up to the “Simple” in “SMTP”, but I think it would be more accurate to call it “Naïve” MTP. It has no verification inherent to sign a e-mail or, for that matter, even to verify that the original sender used a legitimate e-mail address. The e-mail, thanks to SMTP, cannot verify itself.
Danger 2: Mixed Motivation
Let’s face it, e-mail is one of the easiest things to use on the web. Gorgeous/expensive UIs and high motivation from family and friends make even an occasional web visitor an e-mail pro. You get a few e-mails a day, you check them it is a low pressure, low energy, and low cost investment. You can send e-mails, to a ton of people, through a few clicks. It is easy. This same ease can lend to forwarding without concern of the veracity of the contents.
Another motivations for sending forwards is the want to connect with people without the need of providing any content. It is easier to send it on without spending time researching.
The Big Misconception
This all comes down to a big misconception. “It is hard/unreliable to research things on the Internet.” This is simply not true. Addressing the ease, it has never been easier to do cursory research on the Internet. Sites like www.snopes.com, www.about.com, www.truthorfiction.com, and Google all provide good sources of information. If you really wanted to do your due diligence, don’t stop at these sites. A good site provides good links to evidence that they did their research. Follow them. You may end up learning more about the subject than the original writer (if not malicious) ever attempted to find.
Addressing the reliability, there are bad and good sources on the internet. Forwards and, dare I say it, blogs are notorious for having inaccurate information. Getting information from the source company/individual is better as are news agencies.
My Plea
Please be a responsible forwarder. Do your research. Also, be a responsible forward reader. Do your research. I have no qualms about doing reply to all rebuttals, lies about people/companies/products/groups should stop here. I would appreciate if someone defended me if there was a viral e-mail talking about illegitamate indiscressions, do the same for people who can’t defend themselves on a private/mass e-mail thread. In the end, swallow your pride. Admit to forwarding carlessly (I’ve done it myself) by privately/mass rebutting yourself. Admit to reading forwards carelessly and pledge to verify claims. If you want truth in your e-mail box, start contributing now and don’t add to problem by being a “free-rider”.
Review: Spore
After years of hype, a year of propaganda, and friends ceaseless praise, I finally broke down and bought Spore. I’ve heard nothing but good things about the game play and was curious to try it out myself. This review is not about the game play of Spore. This is a review of the installation process. In the past, the installation process was what only took a few minutes and you never had to think about it again, this was not the case for this installation.
My History with EA Games
First, I feel like I should give a bit of my own history with EA Games. I just want to prove that before Spore I bore them no malice. I grew up playing the original The Sims games. I thoroughly enjoyed them. I also appreciate their support in the A.L.I.C.E. project which I think is a good way to help people learn how to program.
Procurement
I ended up getting it at Walmart of all places. Note that I didn’t pirate it.
Installation
I got home and did the normal preparation for a game. Make sure I have enough food for the week and getting things organized to optimize gaming comfort. I then started installing the game. I installed it and I entered my information to register for Spore. After hitting submit, I got an error saying that my license key was in use. This came as a shock since I had just 30 minutes ago opened up the nearly excessive packaging. I called up EA Games and after navigating their phone maze I got a hold of a live person. When I explained my circumstance, he recommended that I go back and return it to Walmart. He told me that Wal-mart does their own packaging so someone must have copied down the key as they were packaging it. So, returning it to Walmart was his solution. I told him, “Wait a minute can’t you guys just generate me a new key?” He put me on hold and when he came back he said I should take a picture of my receipt, the case, the manual, and the disc and send it to EA Games and they would generate a new key. It was interesting logging into EA Games to upload the pictures since it was during the registration process/EA account generation for the game that I was stopped because of a bad license. When I finally uploaded the pictures, I re-called EA Games. After re-navigating through the phone maze, I finally got another live person. He got my case number and he said that more than likely they had a misprint where they just printed the license keys twice. He generated a new license key and sent it to me. It dawned on me that I wasn’t done. I asked him, “So, does this mean I have to reinstall it?” “Yes,” was the answer. So, I uninstalled it and reinstalled it. Honestly, after all that I was too tired to play the “fabulous” Spore and a bit bitter.
Lessons Learned
Other than the obvious lesson of keeping pictures that have the pictures proving that I purchased it for when the DRM bites me during one of my annual rebuilds of my computer, I feel like I learned more. Truth be told, DRM has never hit me like this. I don’t pirate things. That being said, I am against DRM. To me, DRM is the industry’s (I mean this in the very general sense music/game/…) reaction to not being ready for a digital age. Imagine what money could have been made by a music subscription service online in the early/mid-90s, if the industry wasn’t ignoring the opportunity. Again, I am no expert, but I don’t think DRM is the answer. Creativity is. I really like Larry Lessig’s talk about copyright. He raises some good points and I hope they are considered as people look for a better solution to copyright than DRM. I also appreciate the XKCD’s analysis of this problem:
XKCD's Analysis of Piracy
I know EA Games has already had a huge blacklash for the DRM of this game, but I’m sorry, if you are having problems with legitimate people playing ones game due to very restrictive DRM your system is broken. I couldn’t even install it for the first time without DRM stopping me from playing it. If a keyed door had the same problem, where not allowing a person to get through who is allowed is worse than allowing people to go through who aren’t, one would throw away the key.
Okay, I’m done with my rant, now to go vote on Amazon . . .
Review: Eagle Eye
I was able to see a pre-screening of Shia LaBeouf’s “Eagle Eye” some time ago and I wanted to record some thoughts about it. One thing to note is that I’m not planning on holding anything back so SPOILER ALERT!
Initial Reaction
I though it was an interesting movie with and interesting premise. I very much liked the GLaDOS evil computer (it even looked a bit like GLaDOS with all of her orbs) pulling the strings and utilizing its resources to keep the United States safe. It was an entertaining flick with so much going on you can’t help but pay attention. It was an intriguing combination of “Enemy of the State” and “I, Robot”. After thinking through the movie though . . .
What Disappointed me About the Movie
I was disappointed on many levels with this movie. I was disappointed in the character development in this movie. Everyone would agree that Michelle Monaghan’s character “Rachel Holloman,” didn’t really grow in the movie either. She is a two-dimensional mother to her son, which is a fitting foil for our hero “Jerry Shaw” who doesn’t seem to care about anything including family. But I would submit that our hero “Jerry Shaw” didn’t seem to grow in this movie either. As much as I love happy endings I feel that having a happy ending for this movie killed any chance for overall character development. If Jerry Shaw would have died saving his country, he would have grown. Jerry would have gone from not caring enough about anything to stick to anything, to caring enough about his country and for his brother to not let either go without a fight. But in the end he didn’t almost die to save his country, he died to save his new girl friend. The beginning of the movie you already know that he will expend some effort to impress a girl. He falls in love with her and in the end we are shown that he is a part of her and her son’s life.
This aside, I have other concerns about this movie. Issues this movie brings up are very relevant. You have privacy and artificial intelligence (even more current considering the recent Turing Test), which are two big issues of today. This movie doesn’t attempt to make statements about either. There was ample opportunity but this movie fell short from being a relevant movie contributing to the discussion to simply an action flick. Not that I should be surprised since . . .
What Disappoints me About this Genre
I must say that this entire genre disappoints me. I couldn’t help but think half way through the movie, “This computer is obviously not Three Laws Safe.” When will we get over our, as Asimov would put it, “Frankenstein Complex”? Man makes machine, machine kills/controls man is getting old. I admit it some of it hasn’t been too bad like “Bladerunner” (this actually goes both ways), “Matrix,” or the “Terminator” trilogy+. But really, I would like to see some movies that do better.
… robots, are a subject to which the modern science-fiction writer has turned again and again. There is no uninvented invention … that is so clearly pictured in the minds of so many: a sinister form, … vaguely human, … and speaking with no emotion. The key word in the description is “sinister” and therein lies a tragedy, for no science-fiction theme wore out its welcome as quickly as did the robot. Only one robot-plot seemed available to the average author: the mechanical man that proved a menace, the creature that turned against its creator, the robot that became a threat to humanity. And almost all stories of this sort were heavily surcharged, either explicitly or implicity, with the weary moral that “there are some things mankind must never seek to learn.” — Isaac Asimov “Robots I have Known”
This is as true in our time as it was when Asimov wrote it in the 1950s. Asimov’s solution to this was the “Three Laws of Robotics” which in the end didn’t stifle his ability to write on the subject. I’m tired of these “I, Robot” (which I submit is completely miss named) and “Eagle Eye.” I would like some more intelligent movies that don’t have the “Frankenstein Complex” but show that Robots could really have some of the ideals that humanity is missing/or deficient in. Loyalty, concern for life, and humble service are some of the possibilities.
Well, that is what I thought about “Eagle Eye.”
Ubiquity
Everyone and their mother has probably heard about Ubiquity by now. All I have to say is, it is about time. I’m so glad people are thinking this through; the Web is by definition connected. The Web isn’t simply a rag tag collection of sites anymore it is an active community sharing information and I love it when designers start to get that.
I just ran across “The Ultimate List of Ubiquity Verbs.” I can’t wait to see what is next.
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